I drank.
She put her glass down on the bed-table without touching it. Her eyes were wide and dark.
I looked at her, feeling a chill run down my spine. The liquor grabbed at my stomach.
“I should have thought of that,” I said.
The room revolved slowly, then tilted.
“Killeano’s gift,” I heard myself mumbling. “But not for the bride.”
I was staring up at the ceiling. The lights were going out the way a movie-house dims its lights. I tried to move, but my muscles wouldn’t work. I felt rather than saw Miss Wonderly get out of bed. I wanted to tell her to be careful not to catch cold, but my tongue was like a strip of limp leather.
I heard voices—men’s voices. Shadows moved across the wall. Then I rode down a dark shute into darkness.
6
I began to crawl up the dark well towards the tiny pinpoint of light at the top. It looked a tough job, but I kept at it because somewhere close a woman was screaming.
Then quite suddenly I was at the top of the well, and sunlight blinded me. I heard myself groan, and as I tried to sit up, the top of my head seemed to fly off. I grabbed hold of it and rode
the pain, cursing. The woman kept on screaming. The sound chilled my blood.
I made the effort. The floor tilted under my feet as I stood up, but I crossed the room. I walked like I was breasting a hundred mile gale.
I reached the bedroom door, clung on to the doorpost and looked into the sitting-room.
Miss Wonderly was standing pressed against the opposite wall. Her arms were widespread, her hands flat on the egg-blue paint. She was as bare as the back of my hand, and her mouth hung open. As I looked at her, she screamed again.
My head felt as if it was stuffed full of cotton wool, but the scream wormed its way through and jarred all the nerves in my teeth.
I shitted my eyes from her to the floor. John Herrick lay on his back, his arms bent stiffly to the ceiling, his hands clenched. The front of his forehead was shoved in, and black blood stained his white hair and formed a gruesome halo around his head.
Heavy fists beat on the door. Someone shouted.
Miss Wonderly drew in a shuddering breath and screamed again.
I crossed the room and slapped her face. Her eyes rolled back until only the whites showed and she slid down the wall to the floor. She left two damp marks from her shoulders and hips on the egg-blue paint.
The door flew open and half the world burst in.
I faced them. They came so far and then stopped. They looked at me, they looked at Miss Wonderly and they looked at John Herrick. I looked at them.
There was the reception clerk, the house dick, a bell-hop, two ritzy-looking women, three men in white flannels and a fat man in a lounge suit. Right in front of them all was the evil-faced guy in the green gaberdine suit I’d noticed watching me at the Casino.
The two ritzy dames started screaming as soon as they saw Herrick. I didn’t blame them. I felt like screaming myself. But it made the man in the gaberdine suit mad.
“Get those bitches outa here!” he snarled. “Go on, get out, all of you.”
The reception clerk and the house dick stayed, but the rest of them were shoved out.
When the door closed, the man in the gaberdine suit turned to me.
“What’s going on?” he demanded, clenching his fists and shoving out his jaw.
I guessed from that dumb crack he was a copper. He was.
“Search me,” I tried to say, but the words wouldn’t come. My mouth felt like it was full of rusty three-inch nails.
Moving like he was in church, the big house dick tip-toed across the room, into the bedroom. He came back with a blanket which he self-consciously draped over Miss Wonderly. She lay on her back, her arms and legs grotesquely spread out, her eyes closed.
“Who’s this guy?” the man in the gaberdine suit asked, turning to the reception clerk, and pointing at me.
The reception clerk looked like he was going to throw up. His face was pale green.
“Mr. Chester Cain,” he said, in a far-away voice.
That seemed to give the ugly guy a buzz.
“Sure?”
The reception clerk nodded.
The guy faced me. His flat puss was loaded with viciousness.
“We know all about you,” he said. “I’m Flaggerty of the Homicide Bureau. You’re in a hell of a jam, Cain.”
I knew I had to talk if it killed me.
“You’re crazy,” I said. “I didn’t do it.”
“When I find a rat with your reputation locked in with a murdered man I don’t have to look all that far to find his killer,” Flaggerty sneered. “You’re under arrest, and you’d better start talking.”
I tried to think, but my mind wasn’t working. I felt like hell, and my head throbbed and pounded.
The reception clerk plucked at Flaggerty’s sleeve and pulled him away. He started whispering. At first Flaggerty wouldn’t listen. Then I caught Killeano’s name, and that seemed to hold Flaggerty. He looked at me doubtfully, then he shrugged.
“All right,” he said to the reception clerk, “but it’s a waste of time.”
The reception clerk left the room. He had to force his way through the crowd outside in the corridor, and three or four of them tried to squeeze into the room. Flaggerty slammed the door in their faces. Then he went over to the window and stared out.
The house dick touched my arm. He offered me a glass of whisky.
I took it and drank it. It was just what I needed.
I said I would have some more.
The house dick gave me another shot. He stood smiling stupidly at me, a blend of servility and horror in his eyes.
Then quite suddenly the cotton wool in my head dissolved, the pain went away and I felt as fine as could be expected under the circumstances. I asked the house dick for a cigarette, and he gave me one and lit it for me. His fat hairy hand was trembling.
“Make the punk at home,” Flaggerty said from the window. He was watching me now, and he held a snub-nosed automatic in his hand. “Stay where you are, Cain,” he went on. “I’m not taking any chances with you.”
“Skip it,” I said. “I know it looks bad, but she’ll tell you what happened as soon as she comes to the surface. I don’t know a thing about it.”
“They never do,” Flaggerty sneered.
“I wouldn’t say anything, Mr. Cain,” the house dick whispered. “Not until Mr. Killeano comes.”
“Is he coming?” I asked.
“Sure. You’re a guest here, Mr, Cain. We want to get you out of this mess if we can.”
I stared at him. “I guess there’s no other hotel in the world with such service,” was all I could think to say.
He simpered at me, but avoided my eye.
I looked over at Miss Wonderly. She was still out, and I made a move to go to her.
“Hold it, Cain!” Flaggerty barked. “Stay where you are.”
I had a feeling that he’d shoot if I gave him half a chance, so I shrugged and sat down.
“You’d better get that dame out of her faint,” I said. “She’s got plenty of talking to do.”
“See what you can do with her,” Flaggerty said to the house dick.
The big man knelt beside her. She seemed to embarrass him, because he just stared and did nothing.
I looked around the room. Cigarette butts filled the ashtrays. Two bottles of Scotch stood empty on the mantelpiece. Another lay on the carpet and a big damp patch showed that it had leaked. There was a stink of spirits in the room. The rugs had been kicked up, a chair overturned. The stage had been set to look like a drunken orgy. It looked like a drunken orgy.
On the floor by the dead man was a heavy Luger pistol. The butt of the pistol had white hair and blood on it. I recognized the pistol. It was mine.
I sat staring at it, and I felt spooked. Unless Miss Wonderly started talking I was in a sweet jam. I hoped she’d start talking soon.
We sa
t around for half an hour without saying anything. Miss Wonderly moved once or twice and moaned, but she didn’t come out of her faint. It was the longest faint on record. Maybe she wanted to earn herself a title.
As I was beginning to lose patience, the door was thrown open and a short, square man, wearing a big black hat, bustled in. He reminded me of Mussolini when Mussolini used to shake his fist from his balcony. He took in the room at a glance, and then came straight to me.
“Cain?” he said, offering his hand. “I’m Killeano. There’s nothing to worry about. I’ll see you get a straight deal. You’re my guest, and I know how to look after my guests.”
I didn’t shake his hand. I didn’t get up.
“Your political rival’s dead, Killeano,” I said, eyeing him up and down. “So you’ve got nothing to worry about either.”
He lowered his hand hurriedly and looked at Herrick.
“Poor fellow,” he said. I swear there were tears in his eyes. “He was a grand, clean fighter; this is a great loss to the Administration.”
“Save it for the newspapers.” I advised.
We were all posed there like a bunch of dummies when Miss Wonderly sat up and started to scream again.
7
Killeano turned out to be quite a guy for getting things organized. “We’re going to be fair to Cabin,” he said, thumping his fist on the back of a chair. “I know it looks bad for him, but he’s my guest, and I’m going to see he gets a break.”
Flaggerty muttered under his breath, but Killeano was the boss.
“So what?” Flaggerty asked, shrugging. “Why waste time? I want this guy down at headquarters for questioning.”
“We don’t know he’s guilty,” Killeano barked, “and I won’t have him arrested until I am satisfied you’ve got a case against him. We’ll question him here.”
“My pal.” I said.
He didn’t even look in my direction. “Keep that weman quiet,” he went on, pointing at Miss Wonderly, who sat alone, weeping into the house dick’s handkerchief. “I don’t want her shooting of her mouth until we’ve heard the other witnesses.”
I smoked and looked out of the window while Killeano yelled down the telephone and got things organized. Finally he had everything the way he wanted and we started. The reception clerk, the house dick, the elevator boy, Speratza and the barman from the Casino had been collected and lined up in the corridor outside. They were told to wait.
Miss Wonderly was taken into the bedroom in charge of a stout woman in black who’d been rushed up from the local jail to keep an eye on her. They told her to get dressed.
There were two tough-looking cops who stood behind my chair and pretended they weren’t going to slug me if I showed any signs of walking out on the assembly. There was Flaggerty, two plain-clothes dicks, a photographer and a doctor. There was a stenographer, a pop-eyed little man, who sat in a corner and scribbled away as if his life, and not mine, depended on him getting it all down straight. Then there was me, and, of course, my pal, Killeano.
“All right,” Kilieano said. “Now we start.”
Flaggerty nearly fell over himself to get his claws into me. He stood in front of me with his jaw thrust out and an ugly look in his beady little eyes. “You’re Chester Cain?” he demanded, as if he didn’t know.
“Yeah,” I said, “and you’re Lieutenant Flaggerty, the boy who hadn’t any friends to tell him.”
Killeano jumped up. “Look, Cain, this is a serious matter for you. Maybe you’d care to cut out the gags?”
“I’m the fall guy,” I said, smiling at him. “Why should you worry how I handle this louse?”
“Well, it won’t do you any good,” Killeano muttered, but he sat down.
Flaggerty was moving about restlessly, and as soon as Killeano had settled, he started in again.
“All right,” he said. “You’re Chester Cain, and you’re a gambler by profession.”
“I don’t call gambling a profession,” I said.
His face went a dusty red. “But you admit you earn your living by gambling?”
“No. I haven’t started to earn a living,” I told him. “I’m just out of the Army.”
“You’ve been out four months, and during that time you’ve been gambling?”
I nodded.
“You’ve made a heap of dough?”
“Fair,” I said.
“You call twenty grand just fair?”
“It’s not bad.”
He hesitated, then decided to let it go. He’d established that I gambled.
“Is it true you murdered five men in four months?” he suddenly shot out.
Killeano jumped to his feet. “Keep that out of the record,” he exclaimed, his little eyes wide with indignation. “Cain killed those men in self-defence!”
“He killed them!” Flaggerty shouted back. “Think of it! Five men in four months! What a record! Self-defence or not, it’s appalling, and every decent citizen in this country is appalled!”
Killeano sat down, muttering. I guess he wanted to be thought a decent citizen too.
“Come on,” Flaggerty snarled, standing over me. “You killed those five men, didn’t you?”
“Five punks with the trigger itch tried to shoot me and I defended myself,” I said quietly. “If that’s what you mean, then I did kill them.”
Flaggerty swung around to the stenographer and threw out his arms.
“A self-confessed killer of five innocent men!” he bawled.
That got Killeano on his feet again, but I was getting sick of this.
“Skip it,” I said to Killeano. “The facts are on record and the New York D.A.’s given me a clean bill. Who do you think cares what a lousy small-town copper says? Save your breath.”
Flaggerty looked like he was going to have a hemorrhage.
“Get on with it,” Killcano snapped, sitting down and giving me a hard look.
“We’ll see who cares or not,” Flaggerty said, clenching his fists. “Now I’ll tell you something.
You came to Paradise Palms because you knew it was a gold mine, and you planned to clean up at the gambling tables.”
“Aw nuts!” I said. “I came here for a vacation.”
“And yet you ain’t been in town a few hours when you rush around to the Casino,” Flaggerty sneered.
“I was invited by Speratza,” I said, “and not having anything better to do, I went.”
“How long have you known Speratza?”
“I don’t know him.”
Flaggerty raised his eyebrows. “So you don’t know him? Ain’t it odd Speratza should invite you over to the Casino when he didn’t know you?”
“Most odd,” I said, grinning at him.
“Yeah,” Flaggerty said. He took a step forward. “Maybe he didn’t invite you. Maybe you invited yourself because you wanted to horn in and clean up fast.” He was wagging his finger in my face and yelling at the top of his voice.
“Don’t do that,” I said gently, “unless you want a poke in your pan.”
He turned round, crossed the room, opened the door and hauled in Speratza.
Speratza was wearing light blue trousers, very neat, with pleats at the waist; and his coat was a kind of mustard colour and flared out so wide at the shoulders that he looked bigger than a house. The lapels of his coat came out in a peak about eight inches long on each side and in the left one there was a white rosebud. I bet there were some women who’d swoon at the sight of him.
He smiled around, took a look at Herrick’s body under the blanket, and switched off the smile. He looked at me, then looked away fast.
I lit another cigarette. In a moment or so, I’d know where I was heading.
I found out quick enough. Speratza said that he hadn’t called me. He claimed he didn’t even know I was in town until he saw me in the Casino. He went on to say that he’d heard of my reputation, and he was sorry to see me in this place.
Then I knew for sure that I was being taken for a ride. I call
ed Speratza a liar, and he looked hurt. But he had nothing to worry about. It was his word against mine, and mine was a drug on the market.
Flaggerty got rid ot Speratza and came back looking like the cat that’d swallowed the canary.
“Lying won’t get you anywhere, Cain,” he said. “You’d better watch your step.”
“Go take a nap under a falling axe,” I said, and blew smoke in his face.
“You wait ’til I get you to the station,” he snarled
“You haven’t got me there yet,” I reminded him.
Killeano told Flaggerty to get on with it.
“You met Herrick at the Casino?” Flaggerty demanded, after he’d choked down his rage.
“That’s right.”
“He told you to get out of town?”
“He advised me to get out of town,” I corrected him.
“Then what did you say?”
“I said I’d stick around.”
“You told him to go to hell, and you said if he didn’t keep his snout out of your business you’d fix him.”
“Moonshine,” I said.
Flaggerty called in the Casino barman who said I had threatened Herrick. “He said ‘You keep your snout out of my business or I’ll push it through the back of your head’,” the barman told Flaggerty. He looked shocked and sad.
“How much did they pay you to recite that little piece?” I asked.
“Never mind, Cain,” Flaggerty snapped. He turned to the barman. “Okay, that’s all. You’ll be wanted at the trial.”
The barman walked out, still shaking his head.
“Then you returned to the hotel with this woman,” Flaggerty went on, pointing to Miss Wonderly, who’d been brought in. She looked out of place in her blue crepe in the sunshine. She looked unhappy too. I winked at her, but she wouldn’t catch my eye. “You two got drunk. She passed out, and you got brooding about Herrick. You figured he might be dangerous, and might upset your plans, and that made you mad. So you called him and asked him to come over, because you thought you could scare him to lay off you.”
“Don’t be a dope,” I said. “I was the sucker who passed out. Ask baby-face over there. She’ll tell you. Better still, get that bottle of brandy in the next room; it’s full of shut-eye medicine.”
I'll Get You for This Page 3
