by Horace McCoy
In Culp’s Square, on a bench, sat Amanda Waycross. But that, of course, was just a coincidence.
“More coffee, Mr. Conroy?” the waiter asked.
“No,” John said. “Just the check.” He signed the check and got up.
“Good night, Mr. Conroy,” the waiter said.
“Good night.”
John walked down the steps and around the dance floor toward the door.
He was a little frightened—but that was the way it had to be. As he passed the check room, Decherd and Zumbro both saw him and Zumbro impetuously made a move to leave. Decherd stopped him. He didn’t want John to see them. Nothing must disturb the boy’s sense of balance now.
Red Pringle saw John Conroy before Theban did. He tightened up just a little and eased the .45 out of his pocket. That movement made Theban know that the moment had finally arrived.
“That’s him,” Theban said.
“I make him,” Red said.
“At least three shots, Red. You’ll have time for that.”
“Maybe more,” Red said. He opened the door and got out.
Theban opened the door and got out the other side.
There was an almost idle movement of pedestrians in the direction of the Golden Cock, from both directions—a kind of lazy flux.
John Conroy was approaching the door.
Pringle waited beside the car. He had his .45 inside the top of his coat.
The restaurant door opened slowly, and John came out.
Pringle moved toward him. Only five feet separated them. Pringle’s performance was magnificent. He was completely at ease.
A pedestrian—a real one—passed in front of John and when he had gone, it was only a flash of a second, John saw Red Pringle.
Red pulled his gun when he was three feet away, and at that instant everybody, closed in—Fogel, Decherd, Zumbro.
But Cicero Smith got there first. From the platform of the power and light truck he leaped into the small space that separated Red Pringle and John Conroy. He was not trying to leap into the space, he was trying to leap on Pringle.
But he missed, and it was his stomach that Red’s bullets tore into.
Cicero fell to the sidewalk, and on top of him fell Pringle and a squad of police.
A crowd quickly gathered; many of the diners and staff of the Golden Cock ran outside.
Ansel and Eimick pushed through the crowd with Kip Theban.
John started yanking men off the pile on top of Cicero. Decherd and Zumbro came up with Pringle. From a stooping position Pringle saw his .45 half under Cicero and made a dive for it, but Decherd kicked him in the face and Zumbro yanked him to his feet.
John stooped over Cicero, yelling, “Call an ambulance! Call an ambulance!”
But Cicero Smith was dead.
“One more,” John said slowly.
“It’s a war,” Zumbro said.
A prowl car raced down Lavorno and slowed up in the 600 block. The red light on top began blinking off and on, and out of the darkness of the deserted street and the old buildings several men converged on the prowl car.
“We just got the word,” the driver said. “Go get ’em.”
One of the men beside the car stuck his service revolver into the air and fired twice in rapid succession—and from every side of the building at 608 Lavorno Street, which bore the sign Crespi and Company, squads of police converged. They had been waiting for the two rapid shots. That was the signal.
Upstairs, in Nemo Crespi’s apartment, everyone stopped talking.
“That was shots,” Ackerman said.
“Couldn’t be,” Igo said.
The back window suddenly exploded into uncountable particles of glass, and the machine-gun bullets made little puffs of dust at the top of the wall near the ceiling.
For a second everybody was paralyzed.
Then there were a couple of plunks and two smoking cylinders hit the wall and fell down, filling the room with gas.
“Cripes!” Igo said.
A voice from outside yelled, “Lock your hands behind your heads and come down one at a time.”
Ackerman snarled and took out his pistol and started for the window where the glass had been shot out.
Nemo grabbed him and clubbed him across the mouth.
“That’s as good as they want,” Nemo said. “They may be bluffing.”
“That junkie’s sung a song for ’em!” Trickett said.
“What junkie?” Nemo asked.
“Red Pringle.”
“I don’t remember no Pringle,” Nemo said. “Even if he does sing, I don’t know him.”
Igo coughed from the gas.
“All right!” the voice outside yelled. “If we come in, we’re coming in shooting!”
“Don’t say nothing,” Nemo ordered.
He went to the door and opened it. Three spotlights hit him in the face.
He laced his fingers behind his head and started down.
The police did not take Nemo Crespi, nor his henchmen—Trickett, Ackerman, and Igo Grodzka—to jail. The police took them to the headquarters of the Crime Commission in the Hotel Manchester where Nemo’s lawyers couldn’t find him and have him freed on a writ of habeas corpus.
Nemo and his men sat in the anteroom of the Crime Commission, each of them handcuffed to and guarded by a uniformed patrolman. The door to the anteroom, leading outside, was locked and that, too, was guarded by a uniformed patrolman.
Inside, in John Conroy’s office, sat John, Amanda, District Attorney Fogel and a police stenographer. They were questioning Paul Sublette. John’s desk was littered with the charred fragments of Nemo Crespi’s records, dug from the explosion and resulting fire at Acme.
It was four o’clock in the morning. Paul had been talking and explaining the setup of Nemo’s syndicate and how it had operated for most of the night. His face looked drawn and tired. There were empty or half-full cardboard coffee containers on the desk, too.
“You understand, of course,” John was saying, “that even though you are the state’s star witness, Paul, you will have to go on trial with the others? I’ll do everything possible for you, but you will be convicted and your sentence will depend entirely on the judge.”
Paul nodded. “I understand, Mr. Conroy. But I’ll do anything to get that son-of-a-bitch. He murdered Pia. I know he did.”
“I think he did, too, Paul,” John said quietly. “But we don’t have proof of that. Proof that will stand up in court. All we can do is place Roy Ackerman at the scene of the explosion a few minutes before it occurred.”
District Attorney Fogel had been sitting in a corner of the room, reading a transcript of Paul Sublette’s statement. It had been typed in the outer office almost simultaneously with the police reporter’s recording of it in shorthand.
“Well,” Fogel said, “I think that about does it. I think that will put Nemo Crespi exactly where we want him—behind bars for a long time.”
John looked at him swiftly. “No, that’s not good enough. That’s not what I want.”
“Well, what do you want, then?”
“Nemo Crespi has ordered the murder of too many people,” John said. “And that’s what I want to prosecute him for—murder.”
Amanda looked at him proudly.
“Now,” John said to Paul, “tell us about Eubanks. He supplied the ethyl ether for the warehouse fire. How was he tied in with Crespi?”
In a quiet, tired voice Paul began telling of Eubanks’s connections with the Crespi syndicate. Nemo had used Eubanks in the past, more than once.
“Now,” John said, “how about Red Pringle?”
“He’s from the coast,” Paul went on. “I didn’t actually hear Nemo tell him to murder you, Mr. Conroy. But I can swear to the fact that Ackerman and Trickett met him at the airport. I can swear they kept him locked up in the cellar until it was time. And I can swear that he told me he had been ordered to kill you, that you were the man he was going to kill.”
“Huh
,” Fogel said. “We won’t have any trouble with him. He’s a junkie.”
Paul sipped some of the cold coffee from a container, then lit a cigarette. His hands were trembling with fatigue. “Mr. Conroy, one thing I want more than anything in the world. I mean, this is the only reason I’m doing any of this. I’ll go to jail, I’ll do anything. But I want to see that son-of-a-bitch burn. He murdered his own sister.”
“Paul,” John said patiently, “we can’t prove that. Unless there’s something you haven’t told us. Is there? Think, now. Anything at all, no matter how trivial.”
“Well, I talked so much,” Sublette said. “I talked so much tonight. I don’t know. I just want to see that son-of-a-bitch burn.”
“I do, too, Paul,” John said quietly. He spread his hands flat on top of his desk. “But we don’t have that kind of evidence yet. If Red Pringle talks—”
“Oh, he’ll talk,” Fogel interrupted. “A junkie.”
“—then we can prove attempted murder,” John continued. “But that might not be good enough to get him the chair. Is there anything else, Paul? Something you’ve forgotten?”
Paul licked his lips. “Well, there’s one thing. I didn’t exactly forget it, but I don’t see how it fits. I don’t see how it fits with Pia at all.”
“What is it?”
“Well, it’s probably a kind of unpleasant subject for you, Mr. Conroy. About your father.”
Instantly John was alert.
“You see, he was such a friend of Eamon Harrigan’s. A long-time friend, you know. And he was working for you. Well, Nemo and them didn’t trust him, your father. So they set him up. They told him there was some evidence, some old records, and they wanted him to get and destroy it before you got it. It was a fake, a put-up job, but he didn’t know that.”
“And they killed him,” John said soberly. He looked at Amanda. It had been as he had thought. He had not simply been feeling guilty without reason.
“I’m sorry, dear,” she said quietly with an understanding look and crossed the room to him and put her hand on his shoulder.
“But I couldn’t swear they killed him, Mr. Conroy,” Paul said. “I know they talked about getting him out of the way, and they did set him up for a mark. But I couldn’t swear to it. It’s like Pia, I guess. No real evidence.”
John flipped the switch on the intercom on his desk. “Ansel, come in here.”
Ansel opened the door, came inside, and closed it.
“The death of Mike Conroy,” John said slowly, tapping a pencil on the top of his desk. “Go over everything again. Look into every angle.” He paused. “It would appear, after all, that he was deliberately murdered.”
“I’ll get on it, chief,” Ansel said, and left the room.
When Red Pringle was brought into John’s office, dawn was breaking. Red’s hands were handcuffed in front of him and the officer in charge of him thrust him roughly into a chair. Red’s face was pale and he was sweating.
“You don’t look good, Red,” John said. “You feel sick?”
Pringle did not look up from the floor.
John leaned back in his chair and put his hands behind his head. “You killed Cicero Smith, Red. We’ve got fifty witnesses to it.”
Pringle said nothing.
“You attempted to kill me,” John went on. “Read him Sublette’s statement. You know the part I mean.”
They read the statement to Pringle and when they finished he looked up with wide eyes and said sure, he would talk, he would confess, if only they would get him something because he needed it, he really needed it.
“Sure,” John said soothingly.
Red Pringle talked, he told them everything. Then he looked up pleadingly and said, “Can I have it now? Will you get it for me now? I need it, I need it bad.”
John chuckled. “Why, Red, that’s against the law.” He looked at the patrolman. “Take him back to his cell. Let him sweat it out.”
“Cold turkey?” the patrolman asked.
“Cold turkey,” John said.
Pringle was dragged through the anteroom, kicking and sobbing and screaming.
Nemo stared at Pringle with cold eyes and cursed under his breath. Damn junkie bastard.
They sent down for food. Amanda napped for a while on the sofa. It was ten o’clock before Max Ansel returned, excitement on his face that was contagious. Instantly everyone in John’s office knew that Ansel had come up with something—something big.
John stood up. “Well, Max?”
Ansel took a .38 service revolver from his pocket and placed it carefully in the center of the large green blotter on John Conroy’s desk.
“That is the gun that was used to shoot that hoodlum, Kenneth Gladiola,” he said. “It was found in Mike Conroy’s hand at the scene, and the bullet in Gladiola’s skull matched bullets fired from that gun. There is no doubt it killed Gladiola. But it was not Mike Conroy’s gun. Mike Conroy’s gun has disappeared.”
“Well, whose gun is it, then?” Amanda demanded.
“Well, I went over some old records,” Ansel said. “It belongs to Trickett. Verne Trickett. It’s been registered in his name for years.”
John stood behind his desk thoughtfully for a moment. “Send in Trickett,” he said at last.
Outside in the anteroom a patrolman pushed Trickett to his feet. For a moment Trickett and Nemo Crespi stared at each other, both emotionless, then Trickett was led into John’s office.
John came right to the point. “Trickett, tell us how Mike Conroy was murdered.”
“I don’t know anything about it,” Trickett said. He had begun to sweat.
They read him Paul Sublette’s statement.
“Well, Trickett?” John said.
“I tell you. I know nothing. Nothing.”
They read him Red Pringle’s statement
“You and Roy Ackerman met Red at the airport,” John said calmly. “You kept him in Nemo’s cellar. You knew what he was here for. Murder. It didn’t come off, but you still got a piece of it.”
Trickett said nothing.
“Why did you murder Kenneth Gladiola?”
Trickett glanced up; he was afraid; his face was white. “Who you trying to kid, bright boy?”
“A bullet from your revolver”—John tossed it in Trickett’s lap—“was found in the brain of Kenneth Gladiola. At this time I formally place you under arrest and charge you with the murder of—”
“Wait, wait, wait!” Trickett howled. “I was acting under Nemo’s orders, Nemo told me ...”
And he went on and on and on, a police stenographer taking down every word. When Trickett was led, sweating and trembling, from John’s office, he would not look at Nemo Crespi, either.
Bastard, Nemo was thinking. Mother-loving bastard.
“Bring in Roy Ackerman,” John called.
“On your feet,” the patrolman said.
“Take your hands off me!” Ackerman snarled.
The patrolman shoved him the width of the anteroom. Ackerman stumbled and fell, striking his forehead on the edge of the door. He got to his feet with an oath.
“Damn you—” he said to John as he lunged into the office.
John pointed his finger. “Sit down in that chair, you son-of-a-bitch, and listen to me, or you’ll be shot and killed while trying to escape.”
Ackerman sat down.
“Read him Trickett’s statement.”
The stenographer read the confession.
“You planned the murder of Mike Conroy,” John said. “You’re going to burn for it.”
Roy Ackerman glanced at the faces in the room—Fogel, Amanda, Ansel. Then he jerked his head toward the door.
“Close it,” John said to the patrolman.
The door was closed.
Ackerman leaned forward confidentially. “Listen, you got it all wrong. It wasn’t my idea. Nemo gave the orders. Can’t we make some kind of deal? I mean, I’ll deal with you, Mr. Conroy.”
“No deals,” John sai
d promptly. “Of course, if you turn state’s evidence it will certainly be taken into consideration by the court.”
Roy Ackerman was thinking that life imprisonment was better than execution. He told them everything he knew, and the stenographer took it all down.
“But you got it wrong about the Acme explosion,” he said. “Sure, Eamon Harrigan and I were both there. But we didn’t plant the stuff that killed Pia Sublette. That was Nemo’s idea. Imagine, a guy killing his own sister.”
“Take him away, book him,” John said tiredly, resting his face in his hands. It was almost noon. “Let him see his lawyer.”
Ackerman was led from the office. In the anteroom Nemo Crespi was staring at him with hard eyes that asked a question.
Ackerman paused. “Ship’s sinking, Nemo,” he said. “And you know what happens when a ship sinks.”
In his office John was looking kindly at the tired, drawn face of Paul Sublette. “You’ve been through a lot,” he said.
Paul smiled thinly. “I want to be in on the kill, Mr. Conroy.”
“Then send in Nemo Crespi.”
Nemo walked through the door of John Conroy’s office. His hands were still manacled. His face was an absolute blank.
“Take those things off him.” John said. “Do you want a cigarette?”
“I got my own.”
“How about some coffee?”
“No cream. About a teaspoon sugar.”
Everyone in the room sat silently while the police stenographer read the statements of Paul Sublette, Red Pringle, Verne Trickett, and Roy Ackerman.
John Conroy stood up. “Nemo Crespi, I arrest you and charge you with being directly responsible for the murder of Pia Crespi Sublette, the murder of Lieutenant Michael Conroy, of the murder of Kenneth Gladiola, of the murder of Sergeant Tom Timberlake, the accidental killing of Cicero Smith, and the attempted killing of myself. I must warn you that anything you say now can be used against you later in court. Do you have anything to say?”
Nemo stared at him. “I stand on my constitutional rights as a citizen. I ain’t giving no evidence against myself. You crazy?”
