The Flower-Covered Corpse

by Michael Avallone

  I put my cup down and stood up, resettling my hat. Olan Wing stared up at me and lowered her eyes. She was as subtle and as pretty as a lovely dame can be sitting on a lounge. Even on a lousy faded one at that. Animal sensuality steamed out of every pore.

  "Stay put, Memo. Keep the door locked. And maybe go buy a gun if you haven't got one. I'll tell Monks you've been squeezed a little by the Mob. Maybe he can provide a little protection."

  "Hey. Don't do that. I get on palsy-walsy terms with the cops and Augie French won't have to do any guessing anymore. Nix. No dice. I'll sit this one out all by my lonesome."

  "Suit yourself. Anyhow, watch it. And keep in touch today, tomorrow and the day after that. This merry-go-round isn't over yet."

  "Goodbye, Ed," Olan Wing said.

  "Goodbye, Olan. See you, Memo. Thanks for the use of the hall."

  I closed the door softly on them. Leaving them starting a fast embrace that had no kid stuff about it. I thought about it all the way down the stairs to the front door.

  Why would a lovely young Chinese dame get her kicks with a walking eccentric like Memo Morgan? Sure, he was sweet and he was lovable and maybe there was something else about him I didn't know. I just couldn't buy Olan Wing's interest in him no matter how he rang her Chinese bells. There had to be another answer.

  I made a mental note to check on Miss Wing. Meanwhile, I kept my eyes and ears opened as I reached the sidewalk outside the front door.

  The weather hadn't changed. It was still clear, gusty and raw. The five teenage penny-pitchers had gone off to greener fields. Either that or The Ice Man and Raf Bunker had scared them off.

  The garbage pails and fire hydrants and dismal street with its raunchy sidewalks had lost the centre of the sun. A gleaming, long black Cadillac was parked directly in front of the brownstone that housed Memo Morgan. It looked like it was waiting for me.

  I didn't run.

  Joe Violets, looking straight ahead, was at the wheel of the vehicle. He wore a chauffeur's cap and a fancy monkey suit of buttons and dark black material. His gloved hands were clenching the wheel.

  In the back seat, Tod Crown leaned forward, motioning to me from the window. His Louis Armstrong smile was working overtime and the robes had given way once more to another elegant, very-much-in-fashion executive business suit with striped red tie to match. A white carnation poked from one lapel and a jaunty bowler was rammed down on his nubbin of a skull.

  I walked to the door of the Caddie.

  Brother Tod Crown nodded graciously. Through the rolled-down window, he addressed me as courteously as ever.

  "In the interest of bygones being bygones, we should like to talk to you, Brother Noon. Sister Truth Ruth would like very much that you accompany us to her place of rest. Before you protest, Brother, let me tell you that Sister Truth Ruth is very anxious to hire you to find the filthy murderer or murderers of our dear departed leader, Louis La Rosa."

  "Give me that again," I said, keeping one eye on Joe Violets' uniformed back.

  "Get in, Brother. Get in." The door clicked outward. "We can discuss the situation en route. This is your chance, Brother Noon, to make a large sum of money. In essence, the biggest bundle of your dreams."

  "My dreams don't always come true, Brother Crown."

  His chuckle rolled around the fancy interior of the Caddie.

  "Dream along with me, Brother. Just for a little while." He cocked his head, eyes glinting, smile dazzling. He looked marvellous. Something out of a technicolour musical on a wide screen.

  I got into the car.

  Joe Violets gunned the motor and we slid down the block. I felt like a slumming movie star.

  Chapter Ten

  TWIGGY RIDES AGAIN

  □ It was a ten minute ride.

  Down Tenth Avenue, right at Fifty Second and then a slow easy crawl to the front of a mile-high penthouse apartment building on West Fifty Fifth. The number was 39. I knew the place. Professional apartments, art studios and assorted tenants who made their living in some of the seven lively arts. I was surprised if Truth Ruth called it home. But she obviously did. Joe Violets who had said nothing during the short ride but managed a fierce glare at me in the rear-view mirror dropped Brother Crown and myself off on the wide sidewalk before the canopied entrance and tooled the big car away like an expert.

  I had had enough time during the drive to impressively point out to my ebony colleague that my whereabouts were known to my secretary, I was still carrying a loaded .45 and would use it if I had to. He didn't buy all of it but showed me his piano-key teeth and chuckled to himself. He was fond of me. God knows why.

  "That kid," I said as we walked into the tiled lobby and positioned ourselves at the elevator. "He got rough last night. Two other kids with him. I had to lay them out a little."

  "My, yes." Crown nodded, poking the UP button. It was shiny enamel and sparkled like a diamond. "He'll kill you someday if you give him the chance."

  "Truth Ruth?"

  "Yes. He thinks she is his woman. She lets him think what he wants. If the men and boys that the dear Sister has had were laid end to end—" He shrugged expressively. "Have no fear. He'll stay in line until the Sister throws you to him. He received quite a lecture on his behaviour yesterday."

  The doors slicked open, we got in and he fingered the Penthouse button. I figured that somehow. I settled back for the ride, keeping my eyes on Tod Crown. He was as big as I was and I was sure easy muscular co-ordination and great strength lay under the fancy business suit. In spite of his laughing face and amiable manner.

  "About last night, Crown."

  "At your service, Brother Noon."

  "Joe Violets stopped the party because he was jealous. Turned the lights back on, sent us all on that chute-the-chute ride and then laid for me in the alley. That right?"

  "As you would say, on the nose, Brother."

  "Where did you and Ruth wind up?"

  He chuckled. "The mysteries of Temple Kreshna-Rukka. The slide has many controlled detours. We wound up in a feathered bed. Quite comfortable. I never enjoyed a state of unconsciousness so much. You really laid that gun barrel on my brow, Brother."

  "Sorry about that, Chief."

  The cage car rose silently, swiftly. I eyed the panel indicator. We had passed the fifteenth floor.

  "No matter. Worse things have happened."

  "Did you have to make love to Truth Ruth to get out of the feathered bed alive, Crown?"

  His expression sobered. "Please. About that, no jokes please. I'd as soon wrap my arms around a sleeping tiger. The woman turns me off. Completely."

  We had reached our destination. The car doors slid back. I saw a short foyer, a table with an artificial plant and a glazed oval mirror. There was time for only one more question.

  "You're not interested in old movies anymore, are you, Crown?"

  His face remained sober.

  "A ruse, yes. I was in dead earnest. Our dear leader was missing. Finding you with the Morgan man was a blessing. I had thought he could help—he was supposed to know everything and anything about the City and Broadway. He turned tail and ran. But you—you are more than compensation now."

  "Why? Louis La Rosa is dead. He wasn't yesterday."

  "Yes, but his murderer is still alive. And you are the one to help us find him. It is in your line of work. One in which I have learned you are a giant among pygmies. The Di Maggio of your trade. This way please."

  There was no more time. To talk or think. We were standing before a high amber door with a Judas window. Tod Crown pushed the buzzer. The chimes sang out in a fluted, oddly melodic rendering of something recognizable. I repressed a grin. It was the Beatles' very own I Want To Hold Your Hand. Rendered with all the pomp and hoo-hah of the Boston Pops Orchestra.

  I hadn't bothered mentioning ten pounds of missing horse. That could come later. I imagined Ruth just might tell me the Truth about that. She and Crown had been in the Temple at midnight but—

  The Judas wi
ndow clicked, somebody looked out at us, I couldn't see who and then a bolt shot noisily out of its metal groove and the door swung back.

  "About time you showed," Truth Ruth snarled in all her feminine glory. "What the hell did you do? Stop off for a grilled cheese and a coke?"

  Frowning, Crown swept in past her and I followed. He trooped ahead and so did I. I didn't expect any rough stuff. Not just yet. This was what the lady obviously called her home and most folks will behave in their own frontyard. It was a good neighbourhood. Not the sort of place you move in for one month and then vamoose. The leases are as iron-clad as John D. Rockefeller's last will and testament.

  She clattered down the hall behind us, baubles, bangles and beads of some kind clicking like castanets as she walked. She was bansheeing shrilly. Sounding like a shrew of a housewife who had trapped a late homecoming hubby well past his curfew.

  "Dammit, Crown. I asked you for a rush job, I've been waiting two hours! This fuzz give you any trouble?"

  "Sister, please." Crown had turned around in the centre of one of the classiest living rooms in all real estate creation. "Brother Noon is an intelligent man. If you treat him like one, he reacts in kind. Patience is always the best policy. As you see, he has come. Do lower your voice."

  "Don't hand me that bill of goods," she snarled again but in a softer voice, if that was possible. "Louis's dead and I'm jumpy and I'm going out of my mind while you mastermind. Well, it's my deal from now on. We play my game."

  "Dealer's choice?" I asked but my eyes had already cased the lavish furnishings, the oil paintings, the french windows leading out to an L-shaped terrace that ran around the corner of the building showing well-cared for box gardens. There was even a rubber plant tree of some kind looking oily and spiny in the sunlight. The interior decoration was very much IN. It was a pad to delight a Playboy reader. A furry tigerskin growled at the brick fireplace. The andirons were wrought-iron umbrellas. The rug was piled about a foot deep and patterned after the psychedelic nature of the lady herself. All loops, swirls and whorls of colour. There was a mahogany console in one corner. Silent now but you just knew it had a hidden store of all the music in the world. A chrome and ebony bar gleamed from another corner. You could live in a place like this without suffering very much or feeling very sorry for the starving children of China.

  It was a far, far cry from the barren, flickering Strobes fantasy of the Temple Kreshna-Rukka. And told me more about Sister Truth Ruth than a whole library of IBM cards could. The lady liked her creature comforts.

  One last item of interest caught my eye.

  Among the scattered oils and watercolours on the three walls was a fairly large framed canvas that stood out among all the seascapes, still life and modern mockeries. A painting of a large red owl, paused on a sprig of limb, staring right out at you, quizzical eyes and all. He was a very life-like bird.

  Two splashed drops of blood drip-dripped towards the right hand corner of the canvas. An exact replica or vice-versa of the tattoo adorning a dead body down at the police morgue.

  Crown and Truth Ruth were still making like army brass balking at plans to take some military objective. I cut in.

  "Yakkity-yakkity. Time. I'm here. So let's start off from there. What's the score, Ruth?"

  Green eyes zeroed in on me. She stopped berating Crown and folded her arms. Since she was wearing a miniskirt of some kind of magenta-tinted sequins and the sleeves were mandarin billows, it merely accented her gauntness. One of many bracelets, ringlets and jinglets tinkled a merry tune. The side pocket of the miniskirt was a holster for the same old festooned and silver-plated duelling pistol she had waved in my face last night.

  "Fuzz. We have a deal for you."

  "I gathered some such from Brother Crown."

  "We want the rat or rats that got Louis."

  "So does John Law."

  "We'll pay you. They won't."

  "They're legal. I don't know if you are. After all, we didn't start off our association exactly as a mutual admiration society."

  She laughed at that. She did have a really good face. For all the masses of curls and fuzzy blonde textured tresses, her facial structure was exquisite. She had the hollow cheekbones that make fine models. Her mouth was a shade too thin but what the hell. It was only that she had been short-changed in the meat department.

  "Crown made a mistake by figuring he should bring you to the Temple. Then I got a yen for you. The two things didn't pan out. Maybe they can now. You read me, fuzz?"

  "I do. But please—I'm promised to another and it is too early in the day. I would sit still for your proposition about Louis. And I would like to know why be disappeared in the first place. Like did he get a death notice or something?"

  "I need some liquid refreshment," Crown said, suddenly. "Brother?"

  "Scotch on the rocks. Mix it in front of me, please. No hard feelings." He chuckled and moved to the bar. I thought it very significant that he didn't ask Ruth until I remembered. She was an addict of some kind and that kind and Scotch don't go together.

  "Fuzz," Ruth snapped. "Look at me when I'm talking to you."

  "Sure. If you'll stop calling me that ridiculous name. Makes me feel like a peach. My name is Ed Noon or Mister. Take your choice."

  "I'll call you Ed."

  "Progress."

  Tod Crown was a facile bartender. He came across the room with two glasses. I took one. He was having the same. I took the second glass after he offered me the first. He smiled at that but took no offence.

  Even that's risky sometimes. A smart guy could offer you the honest glass counting on you reaching for the dishonest one. You just never know. The Borgias started all that nonsense anyway.

  It was good Scotch. It warmed around in the mouth and then settled in the groove with fine emphasis. I felt a little better about everything. Though Crown had watered his drink down to almost nothing.

  "Okay. Sister Ruth, start talking. I'm listening."

  "Grab a couch," she directed. "I'll sit on the floor. Can't get used to furniture. You know—" I did. With her bones, the chair wasn't made that could make her happy about her own architecture. I sat down on one of the fantastic lounges and tried not to sink out of sight. The whole apartment layout had to cost just a little bit more than the down payment on the lobby of Radio City Music Hall.

  Tod Crown took a position by the french windows, his broad back to the sunlight. He was as formidable as a mountain because he didn't sit down. He had weakened his new drink with more water.

  Sister Truth Ruth measured me across the room. For a change, her green eyes reflected judgment and intelligence. And she had stopped shrilling from a broomstick. It was a helluva improvement.

  "What do you know about Louis, Ed? From the word Go, I mean. Or is it all just a hunk of junk to you? The Temple, the movement."

  "It is. Up to a point. I have a brilliant secretary who does a lot of my reading for me—she dug into the files and gave me a good run-down on the Guru."

  "Melissa Mercer," Tod Crown interrupted softly, for Ruth's benefit. "One of my people. A lovely woman. She is in love with Brother Edward."

  Ruth's eyes opened and her eyebrows climbed. A wicked smile parted her lips.

  "God damn, so you are a liberal! She a good lay, Ed?"

  "How would you like a knuckle sandwich?" I asked mildly but she got the message. She got off the subject but not before sticking a pink little tongue in my direction and making it do obscene things. I sipped my drink to cool off.

  "To hell with it then," Ruth agreed. "So you know about Louis?"

  I told her I did, adding all the Vietnam, fatty feast, Black Muslim chase and minor details. As she and Crown listened, they exchanged glances. The kind that so clearly wondered at the picture that the outside world had of Louis La Rosa. I didn't mention the owl tattoo or the morgue visit. I saw no need just yet.

  "Louis was not twenty-nine," Crown murmured. "He was thirty-one and that nonsense about the Staten Island ferry is merely
window dressing for the newspapers. The guru felt that it would appeal to his teenage followers. It did. In our literature and brochures, it is hailed as The Ferry Conception. The children loved it."

  I bought that, remembering how Dizzy Dean had kept sports writers guessing for years about his origin, his real name and his background. He gave every sports beat a different yarn and all it did was make good copy while he was building a fantastic pitching record with the St. Louis Cardinals of the Thirties. And it also made the turnstiles click. It was that good for business.

  "That brings you pretty up to date," Ruth said. "At least until ten days ago—yeah, it was Friday when he suddenly disappeared. Me and chocolate milk here were his partners. I was the queen of the roost and you could say Toddy was the business manager. You'd be surprised at how many nickels and dimes the teenage generation has. They made contributions every time they came to Temple. Don't make the mistake of calling it a racket. The kids got a lot from Louis. Love, understanding, someone who talked their own language. The music, the lighting, the meditation, the—"

  "—marijuana, horse and the switchblade knives," I tacked that in quietly. "Don't forget those."

  Her green eyes shot sparks.

  "That wasn't his fault. Every crowd draws rotten tomatoes. Bad eggs and bad actors. We were weeding them out. That takes time. Don't go holy on me, Ed."

  "Who me? Never happen. So all right. So Louis had a Temple, he had a following, he earned enough money to back a few clubs in town like the Grass Gardens and maybe lay out the loot for a Cadillac and a layout like this."

  "Wrong," she barked. "This pad is mine. So is the Caddie. I got money to burn. I'm a runaway from Hartford and my dear old folks at home pay me a fortune every month to keep my name out of the papers. They don't care what I do as long as I do it away from them and leave them out of it Dig?"

  "Dug." I looked at her, trying not to be wise. "Sad, lonely, misunderstood child of wealth. Never saw enough of Daddy or Mommy. Hates the world for being skinny. So she comes to New York, finds self-expression in a weird movement and indulges in her search for her identity. Please, Ruth. I'll cry."