Meanwhile Back at the Morgue

by Michael Avallone

  I stalked across the street and went in. Kelly’s Bar was a second home to me. Benny, the former owner, was dead and I still missed him. Missed him bad. But Kelly had taken up some of the slack with his tough, smart and humane personality. He would have had a lot in common with Benny. They both liked to chew the rag and have me hang around, and would help me out whenever I needed them. I needed some of the Kelly atmosphere right now.

  It was always the same but, as I said, it was home. The juke jumped with a Sinatra record, the lights were low, and two or three people jammed the short stretch of bar. Kelly was at the cash register, reading a scratch sheet, alternately biting a long-dead cigar and scratching what was left of his hair. He had five kids of school age and a fat wife he worshipped—all those things and a flourishing bar that he ran with scrupulous honesty. Kelly was an Irishman whose parents had been immigrants. But Kelly had no accent and was proud of that, too.

  I slid onto a stool directly in front of him.

  “They’re off!” I shouted in a stage whisper.

  Kelly’s head jerked up with a pained contortion of his rugged kisser. The pain was replaced by laughter when he saw who his critic was.

  “They sure are,” he rasped. “And running in the opposite direction. What’s with you, crimebuster?”

  “Martini. Anybody come looking for a nice young man with a .45 and lots of time for sale?”

  Kelly folded his scratch sheet and turned to his stock. I caught his face in the mirror behind the bottles. He started mixing my drink.

  “Only him,” he said without turning, but his eyes did a left turn. I looked in the corner of the big mirror. The glass gave back something out of a leftover Erich Von Stroheim spy flicker. I saw a big bald head, a smooth, hairless face and a monocle hunched over a bottle of beer in a booth behind me. That and nothing else. I went back to the martini that Kelly set down in front of me without spilling a drop.

  I raised the glass and sipped the pale poison. It felt great.

  “How long has he been here?”

  Kelly put his hands on his hips.

  “Half hour maybe. Can’t be more than that. He was up to your place. Saw the sign about me on your door. Come down here. I told him you might come any time at all, but he wouldn’t tell me anything. Said he’d wait.”

  I swallowed some more martini. “Look like he’s carrying trouble of any kind?”

  Kelly’s big head wagged slowly. “No guns on him. Fancy dresser. Looks like he’s loaded only with dough. Clothes fit him too good to hide a gun. But he is carrying a cane. Watch that. He looks like he knows how to handle swords and knives.”

  I finished my drink and lifted myself off the stool.

  “I’ll join him. Bring me another martini in a few minutes. And thanks, Kelly.”

  “Any time, Ed.”

  I turned slowly and walked toward the bald head with the monocle. He was obviously nearsighted because nothing happened on his face until I was almost breathing down on him. Then the smooth, unwrinkled face folded into half a million lines and the monocle fell from his right eye and swung freely on a black string attached to the lapel of a beautifully cut morning-gray cutaway. He stood up stiffly in a half bow and smiled. I noticed then that he favored his weight on a shining black Malacca walking stick. His hands were encased in white gloves with striped backs, unbuttoned and turned back toward the fingers in the approved manner of another generation of gigolos.

  “I’m Noon,” I said. “You wanted to see me?” I left it hanging.

  I could have sworn he clicked his heels. One arm smartly indicated a chair, inviting me to sit down and join the party.

  “Quite so,” he said evenly, with clipped spaces between the words. “Be so kind as to join my table. I would speak to you on matters concerning you greatly. To your benefit and mine.”

  “Benefits for me and you, huh?” I sat down and kept one eye glued on the walking stick. He laid it across his end of the table in a straight line close to his right hand. Now he was the one that was still standing. “I don’t think we ever went to school together,” I said. “I know the name of everyone I ever went to school with.”

  He liked that for some reason. Now he did bow. Low. He straightened with Prussian zest.

  “Forgive me. Von Arnheim is the name. Leopold Kurtz Von Arnheim.” He sat down. “Does the name mean anything to you now, Mr. Noon?” He beckoned to Kelly for service. He revolved in my direction and smiled his marble smile again.

  I racked my brain. “Von Arnheim…. Wait a minute. Are you the Von Arnheim who wrote that book about the dead maybe five years ago? Startling new theory of some kind?”

  Leopold Kurtz Von Arnheim was gratified. He replaced the monocle in his eye as Kelly lumbered toward us.

  “It is flattering, Mr. Noon, that a man of your physical and intellectual attainments has found time to acknowledge the efforts of a man such as myself. I am very pleased.”

  I eyed him with new interest. “You didn’t come here to talk about the dead, did you?”

  Von Arnheim’s smile vanished.

  “Does your own death interest you or does it not, Mr. Noon?”

  I grinned. “Do I hear you right?”

  The monocle gleamed.

  “If you do not hear me out, Mr. Noon, you will be dead by midnight. Unless I help you, you have hardly any time left at all.”

  Kelly took our orders and went away. Von Arnheim held his silence, his eyes squinting at me, his face set in a masklike mold. I looked at my watch. It was twenty minutes shy of seven.

  “Doesn’t give me much time,” I said. “Just about five hours.”

  Von Arnheim chuckled. I didn’t like his chuckle. He sounded like an undertaker at the scene of a messy accident. I tried to remember more about him and the book he had written, but I couldn’t.

  I tried tact instead. “Mind telling me just how I’m going to check out, Mr. Arnheim?”

  He didn’t mind at all. He didn’t use tact. He used a sledge hammer.

  “It is a privilege, Mr. Noon.” He paused to sniff the fresh bottle of beer he had ordered. “That is why I have come. Before midnight tonight, someone will try to murder you. I believe he will use a gun.”

  “Who will, Mr. Von Arnheim?”

  “Mr. Manton, Mr. Noon. Mr. Marcus Manton.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  I would have laughed in his face. Only I didn’t feel like laughing. Mr. Von Arnheim had a most impressive way of saying things, even if I knew that Marcus Manton was laid up in a hospital with an ear bandaged, à la Van Gogh. I toyed with the olive in my glass.

  “Drink your beer, Mr. Von Arnheim, and tell me some more about it. I’m interested.” I was still trying to recall something about the man and his book.

  Von Arnheim shrugged and ignored his beer. The low lights of the bar twinkled off his monocle like a red signal. Red for danger.

  “Mr. Noon, there is no doubt that what I say is true. I have checked all my charts and figures. The analysis still holds. Mr. Manton will most certainly attempt to kill you today.”

  “Charts? Figures?”

  “Yes. Surely you recall the major portions of my book?” He paused and studied me seriously. “This Day of the Dead explored the matter completely and scientifically.” He prodded my tired memory. “I proved by statistics and percentages that we are indeed all killing each other. That this civilization, apart from war and disease, is destroying itself.”

  It was coming back to me now by bits and then chunks. He could see me thinking. A faint smile played with his lipless mouth. He had one line for a mouth. A line as tight and relentless as a zipper.

  “Wait a minute,” I said. “I saw a French picture last year that hit the same tack. We Are All Murderers.” Now I smiled. “It seems the French agree with you. About one killing leading to another. But how does that tie Marcus Manton to my tail? How do you know that I even know Marcus Manton?”

  Von Arnheim’s smooth, bloodless face mocked me.

  “Are we ch
ildren who play games with one another, Mr. Noon? Do not be ambiguous with me. I speak only because I know.”

  I finished my drink. “And you did check the charts and figures, I know. Look, my monocled friend, I remember a lot of things now. Your book was interesting, true. Made quite a splash, true. But it was a curiosity piece, a freak. Like astrology or tea-leaf readings. Or beer suds. It wasn’t fact, just science fiction that read like a doctor’s professional mumbo jumbo. You traced a pattern of death and murder, showing how one killing leads to another. But it’s not as reliable as a medical checkup or a study of the stars. So if you want to hold my ear any further, keep on talking. I am entertained. But unless you’re going to tell me facts, I’d rather have Kelly turn his TV on. It’s right over the bar, and we can see it from here without changing our seats. What’s it going to be?”

  I was funny. Very funny. Maybe it’s just my face or my talk or the way I hit people who were born in another country. Von Arnheim tried to contain himself but he couldn’t. His German dignity collapsed in a fit of chuckles counterpointed by the sound of his gloved right hand slapping his neatly trousered thighs.

  “Really, my American friend—forgive me, but you are delightful. I see so many American films. Ach, how you run to form! A prototype. No, an archetype of the wisecracking Yankee protagonist. Himmel, you are nearly as amusing as Chaplin used to be!”

  I got a little angry. Being angry didn’t help my mood.

  “Chaplin isn’t funny any more. When you’re through killing yourself, I’d like to ask you some questions.”

  He sobered up immediately and, perversely, got back to his beer. He poured himself a glass, still shaking his head silently.

  “I am here to be of service,” he reminded me.

  “Okay. Just how do your charts and figures prove to you that Marcus Manton wants to kill me? I’d honestly like to know.”

  My interest was electrifying. His eyes became cold, fanatical marbles and the monocle swan-dived off his face on the dangling string. He forgot his beer again.

  “I was in the Manton Building today,” he said. “I saw the comedy of the elevators, those four young mädchen. Ach. I was interested. Mr. Manton’s secretary—a Miss Carmody, I believe—was highly upset and therefore most informative. I learned of your employment and some of the reasons for it. I also am aware of the damage done to Mr. Manton’s ear. I go home and study my charts and figures. I am fascinated, and draw the conclusions I have given you.”

  I grimaced. “Would you please explain these charts and figures before you drive me cuckoo?”

  Von Arnheim nodded. “By all means. By chart and analysis and a close study of a particular subject—in this case, Marcus Manton—I learn of a rate of mental depression. I check the subject’s physical conditions and activities and balance it against a mean average. Thus I have come to the conclusion that Marcus Manton will try to kill you tonight.”

  That did it. Any doubts I might have had about his quackery and eccentricity went up in a cloud of beer suds. I sighed and got up, tossing a crumpled dollar bill on the table. Von Arnheim eyed me disapprovingly. And until you’ve been eyed disapprovingly through a monocle by a bullet-headed version of Erich Von Stroheim, you haven’t lived.

  “I’ve decided to say so long, buster, and bye-bye. It’s been.” I pulled my hat brim down. “I better go upstairs and lock the front door and barricade myself in, at that. Marcus will be showing up any old hour now to kill me. Got to be prepared, you know.”

  Von Arnheim did not take offense. His left hand settled on the shaft of his sword cane. I was convinced it was a sword cane. A lunatic should have protection of some kind.

  “As you wish, Mr. Noon.” He smiled his bloodless smile. “It may interest you to know that Marcus Manton was released from his hospital bed an hour ago. It may also amuse you to know that while we were sitting here discussing him I saw him enter your building. Over your shoulder, of course. Shall I come up with you, Mr. Noon? Or shall I wait here? If no murder is done, I can always join you for a nightcap later. I have lots of time.”

  He was cool. Damnably cool.

  “Wait here,” I grunted, and walked out of Kelly’s Bar. I looked up at my office window on the third floor. I was conscious of Von Arnheim leering behind my back. He had a right to leer.

  Something cold worked in my chest. My lights were on. Somebody was moving up there. It couldn’t be, but it was.

  And I was the only one who had a key.

  Until tonight, that is.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  It took only three minutes to get into the building and hustle up to the third floor by elevator. That and half a minute more to reach my front door, which was throwing a crack of light into the darkened hallway. But it is amazing how many thoughts and ideas can chase each other around in your head in three and a half minutes. I was ready for anything from the cops to an invasion from Mars. Take me to your leader.

  I eased up to the door from one side, careful not to let my shadow fall across the glazed glass that said “ED NOON, Private Investigations” in modest three-inch-high lettering. My .45 was front and center where it belonged, in my right hand. A low current of voices seeped through the cracks in the door. And as if that wasn’t proof enough that I had company, a voice suddenly bellowed, “Go to hell, you bastards! You won’t get a thing out of me!” For a guy just out of sick bay, Marcus sounded fine.

  There was a meaty crack of sound, the kind you hear when somebody belts somebody in the face with a fist. Then silence and a string of bad curses and feet moving around the office. Two, maybe three, other people besides Marcus.

  I didn’t wait to choose up sides. I had nothing but surprise in my favor. I used it up in a hurry.

  I curved my left hand around the doorknob, got set and flung the door inward, hanging on and following it in with one concerted rush of speed and movement. I’d never had to enter my own office like that before, but there are first times for everything.

  This was a wow of a first.

  The two men towering above the chair that held a slumping Marcus Manton nearly shot up out of their shoes in fright and confusion. Marcus Manton didn’t react at all. He couldn’t. He was sitting in the client’s chair, drooping forward, his face almost down to the floor. I got a flash of his shiny black curls, a swath of bandage over his right ear. The only thing keeping him from toppling forward on his face was the heavy belt that lashed him to the chair.

  His attackers were stunned with surprise. Then they tried to move. They saw me, saw the .45 jutting from my fingers. I thought that would hold them, but it didn’t. The tall guy on Marcus’ left whipped his hand up and fired fast, a dark, ugly .32 erupting in his hand like a firecracker. His equally tall crony ducked behind Marcus and threw me a curve—a pitcher’s motion that sailed a switch-blade knife at me instead of a baseball.

  I went to my knees and fired just once when I realized what the opposition was. Two trained hoods would have respected my .45. The two juvenile delinquents by Marcus’ chair didn’t. They were wild-eyed, punk teen-agers. Without the leather jackets.

  The .32 slug buzzed over my head, lousing up the plaster wall behind me some more. The knife thudded into the door frame above me, digging in viciously. I did a helluva lot better. My one .45 slug boomeranged off the barrel of the .32 in the kid’s hand and dragged it from his hand with lightning speed. He howled in agony and forgot about everything else. His crony, the knife specialist, ran at me with a ducking, weaving crouch and tried to get past me to the freedom of the hallway. He almost made it, but my outstretched leg cut the props out from under him. He came up hard against the wall, his head thumping like a dropped coconut.

  “Hold it,” I said. “If either of you two jacks jump once more, I’ll drop you for keeps.”

  The kid by Marcus’ chair was holding his shocked hand and cursing. I moved into the office and kicked the door shut. The kid on the floor picked himself up and glared at me defiantly. He tried to signal his pal, but I motione
d them with a gesture of the .45 to move together.

  “Come on. Over there by the window where I can look at you. Move.”

  They moved, but sullenly, pouting every foot of the way like a pair of brats who didn’t want to wash their hands before dinner. They were tall enough and strong enough to be men even though they looked no more than seventeen or eighteen. But the spoiled-brat demeanor gave the lie to their man size. That and their long, uncombed hair and undisciplined movements.

  I stared them both down as they posed, police-lineup style, by the window. The knife thrower had regained his composure and was trying to make a gag of their trouble. Either for my benefit or for his partner’s. The partner was obviously the boss of this caper because he’d been man enough to carry the gun. But the gun wielder was no bluffer and had a helluva lot more sense. He forgot about his numbed hand and let it hang at his side. He glared at me, too. If he hadn’t been glaring and wild-eyed, he might have been a good-looking kid.

  “What now, pal?” he said thickly. “You gonna blow the whistle on us? Well, you won’t get anything out of us. We don’t talk to cops.”

  “Yeah.” The knife thrower rallied behind him. “Drop dead.”

  Behind me, Marcus Manton groaned. He stirred behind his belt prison. He couldn’t be too badly hurt so I forgot him for the present. I was concentrating on the punks.

  I did something that baffled them, baffled the life out of them. I put my .45 away, holstering it elaborately so they could see my shoulder holster and strap. I must have looked real Big Time to them. Their unimpressed eyes became impressed.

  “Listen,” I said. “And listen carefully. I don’t need a gun to handle you two. I could take you apart with my hands. And I will if I have to. The cops don’t mean a thing to me. But information does. The guy you were working over is my client. Understand? My client. That means he’s my meal ticket. And if you loused up my meal ticket, you’ll be sorry you ever walked in here. So forget about cops and worry about me. I’m the guy you have to square yourselves with. Now start talking. And that means no flip talk or wise-guy English or words that my mother didn’t like to hear. Think it over. What’s it going to be?”