Lady, Be Bad

by Brett Halliday

  Several of the senators found this hard to believe. When the legitimate profits are so enormous—

  “But don’t forget we’re talking about crooks,” Shayne said.

  That proved to be the most telling line in his testimony.

  It made the evening news summaries and was quoted several times during the Senate debate the next day.

  Shayne’s report to the Control Board had been accepted and placed on file. But payoffs to Nevada officials are simple—somebody merely puts a pail over the side and dips up some of the cash. One of the men who had brought Shayne in moved to Los Angeles, where he bought property in a high-priced residential district. The other was hospitalized after an automobile accident, which he assured everybody had been his own fault. In the carpet joints, the roulette wheels continued to spin.

  Judge Kendrick asked about Nevada’s methods of licensing and control, and contrasted them with provisions in the proposed Florida legislation. Senator Maslow then took over.

  Sheldon Maslow had started life as an actor, and was only now beginning to live it down. His burly good looks, his direct gaze and firmly clenched jaw seemed to appeal to women voters, especially over sixty, and there are many of these in Florida. Groups of elderly women waited in hotel lobbies for a chance to touch him. Television was his most effective medium. Reduced to the small screen, he looked like the modest, successful son every mother would like to have. In real life, unfortunately, he always seemed to be selling something.

  He had wangled a place on a nearly defunct investigating subcommittee, and began a series of hearings on the links between the Mafia and certain union locals in the big cities. Two or three publicity breaks made him a statewide personality. A few minor hoodlums went to jail. Several cops resigned to take positions in private industry.

  When the senate leadership, not liking his independence of the political machinery, cut his appropriations, he set up his own crime-fighting organization, raising funds from businessmen to hire a small cadre of investigators. He continued to make news, but somehow the important criminals continued to elude him.

  He could be rough with hostile witnesses, but Shayne, of course, was under his protection.

  “Mr. Shayne,” he said deferentially, “you’ve displayed considerable expertise on the subject of gambling and politics, and after hearing the sordid story you have to tell, I fail to see how anyone who is sober and in his right mind could vote to surrender our great state of Florida to the kind of scum and riffraff you have described so well. Now I want to solicit your opinion on a matter that is closer to home. I know you are considered something of an expert on the criminal power structure of Miami and Miami Beach. You must know a man who calls himself Sam Rapp.”

  “Sure. I think his name actually is Sam Rapp.”

  “Will you tell us a little about him?”

  Shayne shrugged. “He’s been around. He hasn’t been arrested in twenty years, and maybe that means he hasn’t broken any laws in that time. He owns a big Collins Avenue hotel, the Regency. He’s considered by many people to be the top gambler and political fixer in the county.”

  The senator’s manner became a touch less friendly. “You don’t agree with that estimation?”

  “No. I don’t believe there is a top man, in that sense.”

  “Isn’t Rapp generally referred to as the Prime Minister?”

  “That’s what the papers call him.”

  “However you rank him in the hierarchy, you would agree, would you not, with the designation of Mr. Sam Rapp as an important professional bookmaker, who consorts openly with known criminals?”

  “I consort with criminals myself sometimes, Senator. It doesn’t mean anything. As far as I know, Sam stopped booking bets years ago.” He added, “I know he used to be a bookmaker because I placed my own bets with him. The statute has run on that. He always paid off promptly, which is about all you can ask of a bookie.”

  The crowd laughed.

  “I’m told you just returned from Las Vegas this morning. You may not have heard that Sam Rapp has raised a six-hundred-thousand-dollar war chest from his underworld colleagues to throw behind this bill.”

  “They were worrying about it in Vegas. They’re three thousand miles away, but they’d lose some of their New York business. I told them not to underestimate the Florida Legislature.” He paused a beat. “Six hundred thousand isn’t enough.”

  There was more laughter, and Maslow snapped, “Do you think Sam Rapp had anything to do with trying to keep you from appearing before this committee?”

  “I’ll ask him the next time I see him,” Shayne said curtly.

  “You don’t need to wait till you get back to Miami. You can look him up while you’re here. I have reliable information that he is registered under his own name at the Skyline Motel, Room 12-B, in the company of a young woman, one Miss Lib—” he consulted a paper—“Miss Lib Patrick. I am also informed that several senators, whose identity I am not prepared to disclose at this time, have visited Mr. Rapp and Miss Patrick in Room 12-B at the Skyline Motel. That concludes my questions, Mr. Chairman.”

  The other committee members, in turn, under the pretext of questioning Shayne, addressed the television audience. Shayne continued to refuse, politely and patiently, to commit himself on the merits of the bill.

  Afterward, when the hearing adjourned, he was caught in a swirl of reporters and television people, who wanted to know more about what had happened in Las Vegas. It was another several minutes before he was able to make his way out of the building to join Tim Rourke and Jackie in Rourke’s rented Ford.

  “Mike, you were marvelous!” Jackie said, hugging his arm. “So damned calm and convincing.”

  Shayne made a face. “I hope somebody reminds me never to do this again.”

  “You were pretty sharp there with Maslow,” Rourke put in.

  Shayne waved in disgust. “That guy gives me a pain. A kid with an Italian name gets picked up for car theft and people like Maslow think they’ve caught a Mafioso. ‘Consorting with known criminals! The criminal power structure!’”

  A teen-age girl thrust a notebook through the window and asked Shayne for his autograph. He made a threatening gesture. She squealed with joy and darted away.

  Rourke laughed. “Keep that up and you’re going to lose the teen-age vote.”

  “Yeah. What happened to the teen-ager I shot in the chest?”

  Rourke sobered. “They think he may make it, Mike. It went in and out. But he won’t be talking for a few days. The cops want to see you.”

  “Did they find out anything about him?”

  “The name on his draft card is Jerry Salsz. Nineteen years old, and his address is a tramp airfield outside St. Petersburg. There’s a call out for the Volkswagen. I still don’t understand why you let them drive away. We had them cold. We could take a plea and find out who they were working for. This way it’s wasted.”

  “I’ve told you a hundred times,” Shayne said roughly. “In the movies, the detective points a gun at a man and says to hold still, and he holds still. That’s not how it goes in the real world. If he’s jumpy and scared and had a bad night’s sleep, the chances are he’ll pull his own gun and start shooting. And a lady putting groceries in her car a hundred yards away will take a bullet in the head. It wasn’t that important.”

  “What do you call important? They were trying to kidnap us. You mainly, but Jackie and me too—three people.”

  “Kidnapping’s not as serious as it sounds, Tim. You’re not the Lindbergh baby. All they were doing was lobbying for legalized gambling in Dade County. If that bill passes tomorrow we’ll still put on our pants in the usual way.”

  Jackie gave him a worried look. “Mike, you aren’t really in favor—”

  Shayne stopped her. “I’m like you, I provide a service. I don’t refuse to work for people I don’t like. I like Sam Rapp and I’m not impressed with Sheldon Maslow. But if he wants to hire me to find out what Sam and Lib are up to in the Sk
yline Motel, I’ll take a crack at it while I’m here.”

  “Mike, I thought he’d jump at the idea,” Jackie said in a troubled voice, “but he was actually very negative about it. Do we want to fight fire with fire, and so on.”

  Rourke was maneuvering into a parking space in front of a coffee shop. “Let’s grab a sandwich and talk about it. What’s Maslow scared of, that somebody else will get the headlines?”

  The restaurant was crowded and noisy, but the hostess found them a table. After they had ordered, Jackie said, “Well, it’s funny, Mike. Last night he was all in favor of bringing you up to testify if you got back in time, but you really must have got under his skin. Unless—”

  “Unless what?” Shayne said when she didn’t go on.

  “Oh, it doesn’t make sense. But he and Judge Kendrick were having some kind of argument, and I think the judge hit him with his stick, believe it or not. He was fuming! And then Shell had such a queer reaction about hiring you. There’s going to be a party tonight at the judge’s fishing lodge on Lake Talquin, and it seems to me there’s a real opportunity for an exposé. But Shell doesn’t want anybody to try to crash it. He’s afraid it could boomerang.”

  “What kind of party?” Shayne said.

  “Apparently a real old-fashioned blast,” Rourke told him. “You’d think Warren G. Harding was still alive, the way these people are carrying on. Kendrick loaned his place to Sam Rapp for the night, which is peculiar in itself, and Sam’s going to turn back the clock—broads, booze, pot, poker. The works.”

  Shayne laughed. “All right, you’ve convinced me. I’ll be there.”

  Jackie said helplessly, “I should have gone ahead without consulting Shell, but he has to approve any major expenditures, and he’s said definitely no. I couldn’t budge him. He’s convinced we have the votes. What he’s afraid of—Judge Kendrick has a really unassailable reputation, and unless we can come up with some documentary proof that he’s been bribed, we’ll do ourselves more harm than good. That’s the way Shell sees it.”

  “The guy’s nuts,” Rourke said. “If this bill actually has six hundred thousand bucks behind it we’ve got to move, and move fast.”

  “I agree with you,” Jackie said ruefully, “but he’s the chairman.”

  “Would your paper hire me, Tim?” Shayne said.

  “For how much?”

  “Fifty bucks a day.”

  “For one day? You’re on the payroll as of now.”

  Their food arrived.

  As soon as everything had been handed around Shayne said seriously, “For legal reasons I need a client, but I’ve been on this case since that kid pointed a .45 at me this morning. I have a license to protect. I have to find out who set that up, and make him see that it was a bad idea. Did you get anything from Tampa, Tim?”

  “Yeah, I phoned the crime guy on the paper there, and you were right—a Cuban named Ramon Elvirez is part of the Boots Gregory circle. Collection work, mainly. Strong back, weak mind kind of thing.”

  “Has anyone else mentioned Gregory in connection with this bill?”

  “No, Sam Rapp is the only name I’ve heard. And if Sam called for help from Boots Gregory, that’s something else that’s funny as hell, because Boots is a third-class fink, not in Sam’s league at all.”

  “How did you hear about the party tonight?”

  “Everybody’s talking about it.”

  “I don’t like to sound innocent,” Jackie said, “but I didn’t know this kind of thing went on anymore. It’s so flagrant, isn’t it? My vote’s for sale, how much will you give me?”

  “That’s not how it’s done,” Rourke said. “Take a man like Matt McGranahan. You know him, don’t you, Mike?”

  “That lightweight, sure.”

  “Matt’s unemployable. He can’t live on a senator’s salary. Gamblers are in town, loaded with money, but he can’t just drop in at the motel to ask Sam for the going rate. That would be corrupt, and Matt’s conscience would bother him. So he accepts an invitation to a party where he knows they’re going to have liquor and girls. He knows what happens after a certain amount of drinks—he wants a girl. So they go upstairs, and somebody comes in and takes their picture. Matt’s married. His wife would be horrified if she saw that picture. So they blackmail him with it. He also wins a few thousand bucks in the poker game, but that’s not why he votes their way, he does it because they have him over a barrel. All he has to reproach himself for is getting drunk. That can happen to anybody.”

  “I think I follow that,” she said doubtfully.

  “Just the same, Sam Rapp and Judge Kendrick are both elder statesmen, and this isn’t how elder statesmen are supposed to act. Kendrick wouldn’t be sponsoring Sam like this unless he’s being forced to, and I suddenly begin to wonder about his son. Grover Kendrick, Jr. His father’s administrative assistant, and a kind of a slob. In his forties, unmarried, no stranger to the Miami fleshpots. Yeah,” he said with mounting excitement. “Mike, I think I’ll work on that angle while you’re tied up with the local cops. I’ll make some phone calls and see if I can find out how Junior amuses himself between sessions. There could be a connection—”

  Breaking off abruptly, he looked up. A man had stopped at their table.

  “Why,” Rourke said. “Boots Gregory. We were just talking about you.”

  CHAPTER 3

  Shayne looked the new arrival over, without hurrying.

  Gregory wore long, carefully shaped sideburns and an excellent tan. In his thirties, he was beginning to show signs pointing to not enough hard exercise and too much good food. His teeth were too remarkable to be entirely natural. His clothes were as good as any Shayne had seen all day. The back of one wrist was tattooed with a simple motto: LOOKING FOR TROUBLE.

  Shayne had his back to the street. Without looking directly at Rourke, he saw the reporter check the door and the front window, picking up Gregory’s companions. There were three at a minimum.

  “Sit down and have a cup of coffee,” Shayne said easily. “Maybe you can clear up a few things that have been bothering us, such as why somebody from St. Pete should be interested in what happens in Miami.”

  Gregory shook his head. “I want to talk, but to just you, Shayne. You others, wait outside.” He added, “Please.”

  His voice was hoarse, a kind of harsh whisper. He kept his attention fixed on Shayne. His hands hung loosely, twitching. There was a hard glint in his eyes.

  “He said ‘please,’” Shayne said in the same relaxed tone. “That shows he wants to be friendly. We could get along very well, depending on how much money he’s planning to offer me.”

  Gregory waited, the slight movements of his hands his only sign of tension. Rourke made another quick count, and then, when Shayne nodded, stood up.

  “Pretty crowded in here, Mike. They couldn’t do much.”

  “You’re getting so warlike, Tim. We need to know where everybody stands.” He nodded to Jackie. “Go on with Tim. I’ll be in touch.”

  “All right, Mike. I’d like to kick him, but if you say not to—”

  Shayne didn’t watch them go. Gregory pulled back a chair and sat down, pushing the dirty dishes to one side.

  “You try to keep people off-balance, don’t you, Shayne? I thought after this morning you might make us give you a hard time.”

  “You mean the kid on the helicopter? He forgot to say ‘please.’” He indicated Gregory’s tattoo. “People who look for trouble usually find it.”

  “Kid stuff,” Gregory said in his hoarse voice. “I had that done in the Marine Corps. Very dumb. You did us some damage with all that crap about Las Vegas.”

  “Did you think so? I doubt if it changed any votes. Let’s adjourn to a bar. I could use a drink.”

  He picked up his attaché case. Gregory’s eyes tightened.

  “Roll with it, Shayne. Put it on the table.”

  “‘Please?’”

  “Please,” Gregory said after a hesitation.

  Shay
ne laughed. “I don’t believe in shooting first and then asking questions. That way you don’t get any answers.”

  Gregory put his finger on the bullet hole in the lid of the attaché case. “But you make an exception sometimes, don’t you? No hard feelings.” He took a single cigarette out of a pocket and put it in his mouth. “The kid was a homo. He sneaked by on me. Good riddance. One of the things I heard about you, Shayne, is you don’t like to be taken. You like to know who you’re working for.”

  “That’s a fair statement. Who am I working for?”

  “You don’t know, do you? That leaves you wide open. You could come out of this with a lifted license, and I wanted to warn you. Ask yourself. The babe has a dinky little one-desk agency. Why did they pick her to set up that do-gooders’ committee, out of all the publicity outfits in the state?”

  “You tell me. I’ve been out of town.”

  “I figured it out right away. Because she’s known to be shacking up with you.”

  “Is she known to be shacking up with me?” Shayne said evenly.

  “Now don’t start running a temperature. You know what I mean. You’ve got separate apartments but you don’t get home every night, and that could be put on the record. Don’t think I’m threatening you. I’m just pointing out one of the facts.”

  Shayne heard a familiar hammering beginning behind his eyes. He forced himself to lift his cup slowly and take a sip of the bitter, lukewarm coffee. Putting it down, he turned to glance toward the door. He saw Ramon Elvirez, who had been part of the morning’s effort, lounging near the cashier’s counter, a toothpick between his lips. Jackie and Rourke were no longer in sight.

  Gregory was watching him. “I decided to put on the full-court press this time, four men including myself. If that many people can’t handle you we might as well quit. You’ve got nothing at stake here. As far as the bill goes you’re neutral. I’m doing it this way, I mean with kid gloves, because if we’re going to end up neighbors do we want to be snapping and snarling every time we pass on the street?”