Tim Rourke’s blood squirted out around him. He twitched, stuffing the condom inside his shirt, and lay still.
“Jee-sus!” Lou said fervently.
“You’re tougher than you look,” Truck said. “I’m impressed.”
Lou turned Shayne on his back and knelt beside him. Shayne was breathing raspily, his eyes all but closed. Looking up through a bloody haze, he saw a sallow, anxious face swimming above him.
“I didn’t think I hit him that hard,” Lou said. “Who the hell is he, some newspaper jerk?”
“That’s Mike Shayne.”
“The detective?” He stood up, and reached for a paper napkin to wipe the blood off his fingers. “Talk about mopping up the kitchen. This cat they’ll believe without the picture. He saw the dough on the table.”
“Why get so excited? I always keep cash around to pay the paperboy. You stopped in for my autograph, and we talked football. Nothing wrong with that.”
“Except that my name’s Mangione, and Little Jimmy Mangione of Bergen County, New Jersey, is my father’s brother. We’ll be convicted before we can say a word.”
“On what evidence?”
“I’m not talking about evidence, dummy! In the papers! On TV! The name is all they need. You think Jimmy Mangione has any rights? As for you, boy, you’re off that payroll, as of tomorrow.”
“I don’t see it. I was feeling you out. You didn’t really think I’d bribe Maxwell for you, did you?”
“Nobody’s going to buy it! It’s idiotic! Come on, help me think. Did the club hire him, or who?”
“What difference does it make?”
“If he’s a free agent, we could put some pressure on and see if he’d go with it.”
“He’s supposed to be a hard man to move.”
“It’s your house,” Lou said, his voice climbing. “I didn’t want to meet here. What are we going to do with him?”
Truck thought for a moment. “If he’s working for Sid, it should be OK. He won’t call a press conference. We can talk it over and work something out.”
“Maybe. Maybe. Think about it, will you? How can you sit there digesting your food with something like this going on? He has to be hit, don’t you realize? For both our sakes, and we do it together.”
“You’re nuts.”
Lou pulled at his necktie. “We can’t just drop him in a hallway. This type of person don’t forget it when somebody slaps him with a .38. Look at that blood, will you? Listen to the way he’s breathing. I can’t move him myself. We’ll drive out in the Glades somewhere and put him in. I say we ought to use a couple of slugs to make sure, but we can talk about it on the way. Put on your goddamn shoes.”
“I don’t see—”
There was a note of panic in Lou’s voice. “What’s my uncle going to do if he sees his name in the papers again? God, does he hate that kind of story! Every shape and variety of fuzz starts following him around, embarrassing the family, and he can’t do business. And you know who he’s going to blame.”
“You?”
“Right, he’s going to blame me, and he’s got a hair-trigger temper. It’s not as bad as it was once, but man—”
He picked up the bills on the table and thrust them into his pocket. Truck leaned forward.
“Where are you taking that?”
“I need it, under the circumstances.”
Joe’s tongue made a clucking sound. “What about the game tomorrow? Those bets are down.”
Lou rubbed his forehead. “You’re right.” He slapped the envelope on the table. “Another five for you, another five for Maxie, if we beat the points. Now will you move? What if your wife walks out in the middle of the movie?”
“She never did that in her life.”
Truck bent over to put on a pair of sneakers. Lou retrieved his revolver. As he came back, jerking his hands with impatience to get underway, he slipped in the blood slick. He landed beside Shayne, coming down hard on the little bones at the base of his spine. The flat of his hand slapped in the blood.
“What’s the matter, can’t you stay on your feet?” Truck said.
Lou maneuvered, trying to keep his other hand from going into the blood, and was about to pull himself up when there was a sudden wild howl.
Shayne turned his head, but neither of the others saw the movement. Lou’s unbuttoned jacket had brushed against a kitchen chair. The howl wavered and broke off as he stood up.
“What was that?” he said excitedly. “Did you hear that, Joe? What was it, a siren?”
Truck rose slowly. He had been impressive sitting down. On his feet, surrounded by kitchen appliances and furniture on an ordinary human scale, he was a monster.
“That was feedback,” he said.
Lou took a step backward. His heel shot out to one side, but he sawed at the air and kept his balance.
“What are you talking about—’feedback’? Joe, we’ve got to get out of here. Work out the details later.”
Truck had been conditioned to move fast for short distances. Lou darted back, but the huge lineman caught him with a quick lunge.
“What have you got inside the coat?”
Gathering Lou’s shirtfront in one hand, he lifted the smaller man and felt inside the black silk jacket. His hand came out holding a tape recorder.
“Insurance, Joe,” Lou said, his voice wavering. “Like a receipt for the money, to make sure everybody performs. You’re dealing with football players, six-six, two hundred and fifty pounds. They take your money and laugh at you, and what can you do?”
“You taped the whole thing…”
“Joe, as I say—for insurance. Everybody does it. With you I shouldn’t have bothered.”
“And next time you wanted me to do something, you wouldn’t have to pay me. I’d have to do it, or Zacharias would get a tape in the mail.”
Lou protested, “We always pay people! I’m under instructions. We’ve got a regular way, Joe, cards on the table. This operation is clean, I mean it. Money’s no problem. If you don’t dig the price I’ll bump it a thousand. Don’t blow this out of proportion. We’ve still got Shayne to worry about.”
Truck examined the tape recorder, pressed one button and then another, and erased the damaging conversation.
“That does it, then, Joe,” Lou said. “Now we can get on with—”
He jerked like a puppet as the phone rang. Truck made sure the erasure was complete before putting down the recorder to pick up the phone.
“Yeah.”
Shayne heard a metallic rasp. Truck answered in monosyllables.
“‘Too bad’ is right. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.”
He slammed the phone down. Lou was edging past, doing his best to keep out of the blood. Shayne decided to remind them that he was still alive. He groaned heavily and moved an arm. Lou’s eyes jumped to Shayne, and back to Truck.
“Pick the son of a bitch up and let’s clear out of here. It’s our one out,” Lou said.
Shayne had been surprised by the big man’s calm; Shayne’s sudden appearance and Lou’s hysterical reaction had seemed to leave him unmoved. But now, without warning, Truck flung out an arm and knocked Lou against the wall. Lou’s hand dived for his gun. The big man grabbed him and snapped him backward. Lou’s head banged against the wall and his hand came out empty.
“You got me into this,” Truck said. “Now you want to kill somebody… dump him in a swamp. You couldn’t even dump an ashtray.”
Shayne, behind them, sat up and looked for something to use as a weapon.
Truck continued, “Why should I worry about anybody’s uncle? He’ll be mad at you, not me. I’ve got to get straight with Sid Zacharias.”
“Joe, consider—”
He banged Lou’s head against the wall. “If you kill anybody they’ll get us both for it. So what I’m going to do with you is break your back. You need time to think.”
“Joe,” Lou said too eagerly, “You wiped off the tape and we’ll smash the guy’s camera… we’ve got a d
amn good deal going tomorrow… there are ways…”
Truck cuffed him lightly, and then drew back a massive fist and drove it against his jaw. Lou slumped slowly to the floor. Truck kicked him once before he was all the way down, and twice more before Shayne, coming to his feet, hit him with the Speed Graphic camera.
The big man looked around, and Shayne tagged him with a right. As pain shot up his forearm he was afraid he had broken a bone. Truck went back, jarring the stove out of position and breaking a coupling. Gas rushed into the room. Shayne followed with two powerful lefts to the stomach. It was like hitting a plasterboard wall; the flesh gave but not enough. Truck pushed at Shayne’s chest, keeping him away.
Lou crawled toward the doorway.
Truck skidded in the blood, and Shayne hit him a swinging blow across the head with a chair. Partially stunned but continuing to shuffle forward, Truck caught him in a savage hug. Shayne used his shoulders and knees, trying to free a hand for a chop at Truck’s exposed throat, but he might as well have been wrestling a tree.
The phone was ringing again. Truck lifted an arm. Shayne saw it coming, but there was nothing he could do to avoid it. Lights blazed around him.
The first thing he heard after that was an urgent hiss of escaping gas. Truck was talking. Shayne lay face down on the bloody floor, close to the broken coupling. He tried to move, but nothing seemed to be working.
Truck said, “Shayne. Yeah, he’s here. He’s pretty messed up.”
After a moment he went on, “Mercy Hospital, OK. Chan, the thing with Mangione, it didn’t work out. I hate to tell you—a real shambles.”
CHAPTER 6
Shayne was aware of being moved. A bell clanged, and kept clanging. Lights raced across his closed eyelids. He was jolted unpleasantly as the ambulance dipped and swung. Eventually it stopped, and hands slid him out onto a rolling gurney.
Presently he heard a woman’s voice and the sound of running water. A nurse, seeming to float above him, was washing him gently. Shayne’s body was weightless. After a time, gravity began to return and he settled slowly onto a hard hospital bed.
Tim Rourke, an unlighted cigarette between his lips, leaned against the foot of the bed. A starchy red-faced nurse came into view.
“No smoking in here,” she said sharply.
“I’m not smoking,” Rourke said. “I’m just using it for oral gratification. Mike, are you with us?”
Shayne made a sound, and the nurse turned.
“I believe he is! The man has the constitution of an ox. After the amount of blood he lost—”
Rourke grinned. “Not all of it was his.”
The nurse touched Shayne’s forehead with a cool hand. “How are we feeling, dear?”
“Better. Get me a drink.”
She pulled back her hand. “You have a choice of two beverages, Mr. Shayne. Water and orange juice.”
“Orange juice. Crank me up.”
Rourke worked the crank at the foot of the bed, and Shayne’s head rose. He was wearing the usual hospital garment, the kind that ties in the rear.
“Is Ronnie James in this hospital?”
Rourke brought out his lighter and lit his cigarette. “Miss Cannon’s been telling me about that. He’s getting the celebrity treatment, with round-the-clock nurses.”
“But it’s a funny thing,” the nurse said, “as I was saying to Mr. Rourke—Are you sure you’re up to visitors, Mr. Shayne? The doctor said it was all right, but if you don’t want to be bothered, I’ll hustle him out of here so fast—”
She glanced at Rourke, sprang at him and picked the burning cigarette out of his mouth. “That does it. March.”
“I want to talk to him,” Shayne countered. “What’s your first name?”
She hesitated before admitting, “Thelma.”
“I swallowed some cooking gas, Thelma, and I can still taste it. A puff on a cigarette might help. And if you’d get me that orange juice—”
“If you really think—” She put the cigarette between his lips. “I’m a dyed-in-the-wool fan of yours, Mr. Shayne, and for you I’m willing to bend the regulations a little. There, you’ve had your puff.”
She removed the cigarette and left the room with it, holding it at arm’s length.
Shayne sat up and accepted the pint of cognac Rourke was holding out to him.
“I had a feeling you might need some medicine,” Rourke said. “I drove your Buick in. It’s in the south lot, keys under the floormat.”
Shayne swallowed with difficulty. “What happened to you while I was inside losing blood?”
“I was observing,” Rourke said cheerfully. “Keeping my eyes open. I don’t know what kept me from going in when I heard that shot… cowardice, I guess. Then the first casualty came staggering out. Black silk suit and a broken jaw. I got a couple of pretty good pictures. Who was he?”
Shayne drank again, and this time the cognac slid down more easily. “Does the name Jimmy Mangione mean anything? From someplace in New Jersey?”
“Mangione—hell, yes! He’s one of the biggest layoff men in the east. A power. But that wasn’t Jimmy I saw—Jimmy’s been around for years.”
“That was Lou. A nephew. Did he have a car?”
“He only made it as far as the sidewalk. He sat down on the curb and tried to stay alive. I was wondering if I should be a good Samaritan or let him get better by himself. Then a nurse drove up in a Volks and helped him in.”
“A nurse?”
Rourke lit two new cigarettes and gave one to Shayne. “One of the most therapeutic nurses I’ve seen in a long time. Long blond hair over her shoulders. She had to lean down to pick him up, and Mike, what a sweet ass! I’m not impartial about nurses—that damn uniform—but I think you’d agree this one was special. I took a couple of shots. I didn’t get her face, but that rear elevation I’d recognize anywhere. She was mad at the boy, but I wasn’t close enough to catch the dialogue.”
“How do you know she was mad?”
“From the pantomime. The way she was shaking her hair. She gave him hell, and he was feeling bad enough as it was. They drove off. Truck’s wife started kicking around and making gobbling noises. Pretty soon the ambulance showed up. I was a little surprised to see that you were the one they carried out. The lady was getting on my nerves by this time so I let her go. When I was taking out the gag, she bit my finger—to the goddamn bone!”
He showed his bandaged finger. Shayne’s nurse bustled in with a glass of orange juice over cracked ice.
“Cigarettes!” she exclaimed. Then: “Well, I suppose I’ll have to be flexible for once. Go ahead, if you want to destroy your lungs.”
Shayne sipped some of the orange juice through a bent straw, but after the gas and the cigarette it tasted like creosote. He went back to cognac.
“What were you telling Tim about Ronnie James?”
“Oh, it’s probably nothing, but I did remark on it. I don’t keep up with the latest in football, but from the way the girls were behaving, some of them, this Ronnie James could be the Crown Prince of Denmark. The way they fluttered around! What I thought was unusual, not that there’s probably any real significance to it, when somebody’s as important as that and there’s money in back of him, he usually goes into intensive care”—she waved upward—“where they take you after a heart attack or an operation, so somebody has an eye on you every minute. But not Mr. Ronnie James. They brought in special outside nurses.”
“Maybe it wasn’t really a coma,” Shayne suggested.
“Oh, no question about that!” She looked at him sharply. “Is there? I know they took a whole series of EEG’s, and that’s one machine you can’t fool. Why, good heavens—” She stopped. “What I could do is take a stroll down there right this minute and find out.”
“That’s my job,” Shayne said. “Can you put on a head bandage?”
“That scalp cut is just superficial, Mr. Shayne. The doctor doesn’t think it needs to be dressed.”
“I just want it
for camouflage.”
“You don’t really think you’re in any condition to get out of bed, do you?”
“Let’s find out.”
He swung his legs over the side and pushed off. The walls of the room turned to crepe paper and the lights dimmed. Then he walked to the door and came back.
“I’ve felt worse. It’ll wear off if I keep moving. Get the gauze.”
“I honestly don’t know,” she said uncertainly. “To put a bandage on somebody who doesn’t need it—it seems to me that might be considered a little unethical.”
Ten minutes later, in a bulky head bandage, wearing a red hospital bathrobe and heelless slippers, Michael Shayne went along a corridor in the new pavilion, recently added to the hospital for patients who wanted a private room and a view of the lower bay.
A nurse came out of the nursing station and approached Shayne at a rapid walk. She was startlingly beautiful, with long blond hair, dark eyes, a blinding complexion. There was an interesting flow of movement inside her uniform. She knocked lightly on a door and entered.
It was room 29, Ronnie James’s room.
An instant later a second nurse erupted from the room. Without glancing at Shayne, she hurried to the nursing station to sign out.
Shayne waited until she disappeared into an elevator. He listened at the door of the room she had left and turned the knob quietly. It was locked.
After considering briefly, he went back to his own room. Rourke was still there, using the phone.
“Ronnie’s nurse locked herself in,” Shayne said. “People aren’t supposed to do that in hospitals.”
“Ronnie gets VIP treatment everywhere. Do you think this means—”
“I’ll find out in a minute,” Shayne said.
After assembling his lock-picking equipment, he returned to the Bayside Pavilion and opened the simple spring lock with a narrow strip of celluloid. He knocked loudly, counted to five without hurrying, and entered.
The only light came from a small Sony television receiver mounted on a movable arm above the bed. The sound was turned all the way down. The blond nurse was standing at the bureau, smoothing her uniform.
Fourth Down to Death Page 5
