Black Mask (Vol. 33, No. 4 — November 1949)

Harpie got himself a shroud when he pocketed the dough, for everywhere the two grand went — a corpse was sure to show!

Chapter One You Can’t Take It With You

Two men, one several steps behind the other, came down the stairs into the subway station at Fifty-ninth Street. There was nothing unusual about them. They were just two men about to board a downtown train. The first, a tall man with bushy black eye-brows, took long strides to the change booth. The other, shorter, not so slender, fingered a dime into a slot and pushed through the turnstile. Then he stopped, as though waiting for someone to join him. Two men intent on taking a short, jarring, noisy ride under the city.

The tall one came through, strode by the other toward the end of the platform at which the last car would stop. The little fat one seemed suddenly to decide that that end would be a good place for him to board the train, too, and eased his way through the crowd in that direction.

Neither of them were aware of Harpie Gordon, leaning against the wall between two posters. Harpie, though, was very much aware of the tall man — and of the bulge under the man’s coat just about where the rear left trouser pocket was. It was a nice coat, Harpie thought, and a nice guy to leave it unbuttoned like that. He waited and watched.

The yellow-eyed roaring monster stormed out of its tunnel, screeched agonizingly to a stop and opened its many mouths.

Harpie was just another man edging his way up to the safety line with all the insolent anxiety of the rest of the evening rush-hour crowd. He stood just behind the tall man, then seemed to suddenly change his mind, turning away as the monster’s mouths slid sibilantly open. In his retreat he had to brush by a small, fat man with glasses. When the man put out his hand to stay him, Harpie knocked it aside and sped with the discharged crowd toward the exit. The little man followed.

The door-mouth hissed as it shut on the tall one who, until a moment ago, had a bulge in his coat about where the rear left trouser pocket was.

Harpie scurried along Fifty-eighth and turned South at Third Avenue. No one was calling after him, no one pursued. He knew because he watched his rear by glancing into the slanted store windows as he went by. They were good reflectors. He made good time without hurrying enough to catch looks of wonder and suspicion. It wasn’t until he reached Forty-second, sixteen blocks away, that he relaxed into a slower gait.

A small white-fronted diner swallowed him and he made his way to the last stool, ordering a cup of coffee as he eased himself onto it. From his brown shabby coat he removed a wallet. It was initialed J.B.

Holding it below counter level, he spread it open. His eyes widened imperceptibly as he thumbed through the sheaf of bills. Most of them had three numerals in the corners. A few were singles, two were fives. He jammed it all back into its leather sheath when the counterman came over with the coffee.

“Anything else?”

Harpie shook his head.

“Okay, ten cents.”

Harpie’s fingers came up over the counter, clapped a bill down. He said, “What’s the matter? Think I can’t pay?”

“I don’t think nothing. I just want the ten cents.”

It didn’t hurt any more. It used to, but not any more. Harpie had long since become used to paying for his food as it was served, if he paid for it at all. He didn’t blame the counterman much. He’d do the same if he was on that side of the counter looking over at himself. Unshaven, tieless, hat rumpled, coat and trousers filthy and wrinkled. Yeah, he’d do the same.

Hunched over the counter, he gulped the coffee and to hell with the drops wetting his soiled shirt. He’d buy a new one, one nobody else had worn. He wiped his mouth and chin along one sleeve of his coat and walked out, scooping his change along with him.

He continued along Third, patting the pocket with the new bulge. It had a comfortable feel. His walk was abrupt and straight, not the aimless shuffle it used to be. A head that normally drooped was held erect. He was born again. It was a new, clean, happy birth — about two thousand dollars worth of birth.

The squalid, El-shadowed street took on a brightness for Harpie. Bright thoughts found their way to his throat, emerging as inarticulate mutterings. “Knew my luck would change some day... chance to start over... two thousand... need clothes... new and sharp and clean... gotta be sharp to start over in my business.”

He thumbed a match into flame and lifted it to the half cigarette he dug out of the coat. No sense in wasting it now he had it, even if he could buy a fresh pack.

Lungs full of stale smoke, he walked on. never glancing to either side. He stared full ahead, farther ahead than one can see with eyes alone. He looked into a daydream and it was a rich daydream. A daydream that started at two thousand dollars and spiraled itself into higher brackets.

A sign on a lamppost brought him to a halt. His dream and he had come as far as Twenty-fourth. He crossed against the light, unmindful of the bleating horn behind him, and continued for another three blocks. For the first time in years he knew where he was going.

The smell of the place, as he came abreast of it, hastened him. It had a cool, drunken smell. Inside, he flippantly tossed a bill on the bar and called for two whiskeys; one for himself and one for the brutish hulk of a man sitting at a table in the rear.

Drawing a chair out at the table, he sat opposite the man. “Hi, Dumbo,” he said. “Have a drink on me?”

Dumbo nodded acceptance, planted a hairy fist on the table and mumbled through thick, wet lips, “You got money, huh?”

“Yeah, Dumbo. I could buy enough whiskey for you to float in!”

The drinks arrived. The drinks disappeared. Two more were ordered and Dumbo grinned his thanks.

His name was apt. He was a pachyderm in size and strength, a mouse in intelligence. Just the man for what Harpie had in mind. Just the man, with those enormous hands; hands that could snap a neck like a matchstick.

One of those hands was curled around a fresh drink. The glass was raised toward Harpie in silent salute, then drained.

“That’s it, drink up.”

“I like you, Harpie. You’re my friend.”

“Sure I am, Dumbo. That’s why I want you with me when I’m rich.” “You got money now, ain’tcha?”

“What’s the matter with you? Having money for whiskey isn’t being rich. I mean really rich. Rich enough for all the drinks you want, rich enough for new clothes and stepping out with the girls You like girls, don’t you?”

“Yeah. I like girls.”

“You want money, don’t you?” He signaled for two more drinks and brought out the wallet. He dropped a fiver on the table carelessly and shoved the rest back into his pocket.

“Yeah,” Dumbo said, “I want money. Who don’t?” His eyes had followed the wallet into the dirty folds of its hiding place. “How come you got so much money?”

Harpie tapped his pocket. “This is nothing. I’m talking about lots of money.”

He waited until the drinks were set down and the change brought back before he continued. “Look, I’ve got a neat little racket all figured out. All you hafta do is take care of trouble makers. It’s a cinch. What do you say?”

“Can’t. Phil won’t let me.” He shook his head and his long, uncut hair flopped about his ears.

Harpie squirmed in his chair, an impatient frown knotting his face. “Don’t be a sucker,” he said. “What Phil gives you is peanuts. You do all his dirty jobs. And what do you get for it? Peanuts! His hands are clean but yours aren’t. If the cops ever put the arm on anybody, you can bet it won’t be Phil Muraco. It’ll be you!”

“Nobody’s gonna get me for nothing.” He stared at his huge hands, seemed to be looking for the dirt.

“Throw in with me and you can make a pile of dough with those hands. And they won’t hafta do any dirty work. C’mon, Dumbo, how about it?”

“I said I can’t.”

“What’s he got over you? How come you hafta be his slave all the time?”

“Don’t talk like that, Harpie. Not if you and me wanna stay friends.”

“Aaah.” Harpie waved at him with disgust. This lunkhead was going to take some convincing. “You’re afraid of him, that’s it.”

The long uncombed hair swished again as it shook over Dumbo’s neck. His thick knuckles flexed over the table. “I’m telling you, don’t talk like that.”

“Okay, okay. How about another drink?” Harpie’s finger went up.

“No more!” Dumbo plodded out into the street as the El rattled by up above the door.

Harpie swore and told the bartender to bring both drinks over, but make them doubles. He sat there a long time, stewing. There was a human curtain shielding the bar when he finally pushed himself to his feet and shuffling again, went out into the fresh night air.

The curb got in his way and he stumbled over it, cursing the darkness, the darkness that hid things from a man’s sight. Halfway down the block he pressed his nose against a store window and peered up at the wall. An obtuse angle in the lighted circle there told him it was nearing two-forty.

Cigarette glowing, he sauntered on toward the next corner with visions of homburgs and shiny patent leather shoes, soft girls and cushy sofas, bowing waiters and hurrying bell hops. It was going to be so good for Harpie. He wouldn’t be Harpie Gordon walking along Third Avenue blowing smoke into the street light’s yellow cone for long.

Crossing the street, he climbed the stairs at Twenty-third and pushed through onto the El platform just as a downtown train squealed into the station. He had a choice of seats, took the one nearest the door and facing the station. Glancing to the other end of the car he found another passenger just boarding. Probably just made it through the turnstile as the train came in.

He kept looking at the man, sensing rather than knowing that he had seen him somewhere before. To Harpie, he was a funny man. He carried an umbrella and it wasn’t even raining. Just a funny little fat man with an umbrella, something you’d see any day. It wasn’t the man he’d seen before, he told himself. It was just the same type of man.

Eighteenth Street went by and as the train slowed for the next stop, his stop, Harpie stood on the little platform at his end of the car and waited. The door opened and he stepped from the car, headed home. Home was a grimy, dusty building about a block away, a buck-a-night residential hotel.

The block was one of squalor, few lights and many shadows. Mostly shadows. The noise of the train dug away into the night The street was almost deserted. There was a form curled up at the base of a building, but he was quiet. The only noise was that of Harpie’s feet on the pavement; a hard, unsympathetic pavement.

Passing out of range of the corner street light into the darker part of the street, he halted abruptly. It seemed that a shadow just over his shoulder to the rear had moved. He peered around slowly and saw nothing.

He moved on, shuffled past the darkened doorway that marked approximately the middle of the block. Again he had the impression that something moved nearby. This time he whirled quickly. There was only the stark, shadowed street: some stores, some windows and El pillars, the dimmed marquee of a movie house. Nothing moved.

He felt in his pocket for a cigarette and match. He tried to thumb it but his nerves were too unsteady, too drink-worn, and he had to walk over to the wall of a building to light it.

It was a coincidence that wouldn’t have occurred again in a hundred such nights. The flame flickered, then bloomed, casting a yellowish wavy light into the shadows of a doorway. He looked up and the cigarette dropped from his lips. The match shook in his fingers and his eyes and mouth made three wide O’s in the dark.

“W-what,” he gasped, “are you doing here?”

“I been waiting for you.” a voice from the doorway answered.

“For me!” An incredulous look replaced the initial look of fear now that the man in the doorway was recognized. “What the hell for?”

“Wanna talk some more about it. I been thinking it over.”

“Oh. Well... uh... walk the rest of the way home with me and we’ll talk it over. C’mon.” Suddenly he flung the match to the pavement and hooked his fingers to his mouth, cursing and sucking the burn.

They started down the street, Harpie on the inside and a little ahead of the other man, the bigger one. Harpie said, “Well, what do you think of the idea now? You know what I was talking about?”

It seemed to Harpie that he was being edged in closer to the walls, to the shadowy doorways. Shouldn’t have had that last one, he thought. They crossed Thirteenth. The other man put a hand on his shoulder as friends often do and answered: “I got a better idea, Harpie.”

“Yeah? Let’s hear it.” He fidgeted in his pocket for another cigarette, struck a match against a wall in passing and thought his friend’s hand was unusually heavy on his shoulder. It was as if the hand were trying to retard his steps, slow him, stop him. Without looking up, Harpie said nervously, “Well, let’s hear it, willya!”

He was breathing hard, though he told himself he had no reason to. Why should he be afraid? This man beside him was just — was just leaning over his shoulder and blowing the match out, just edging him with his hip gently into a doorway, just slipping a hand from his shoulder to his neck!

He had time to sweat, time to fling an arm around futilely, time to start a scream.

It was choked off at his throat by a giant, hairy hand with knobby knuckles that squeezed at his windpipe and drew him into the doorway. There, the hand met another and they squeezed together for a time, silently. Silently, except for the strangled, gargled groans of a man slipping to the floor.

There was a sharp snapping sound and Harpie Gordon fell in a limp knot. Large, clumsy hands went to a pocket and came out with a wallet that contained two thousand dollars. They were hands that passed familiarly over him, that seemed to know just where to find what they wanted.

Then the big man went out into the street. It was the second time that night he had walked out on Harpie.

Chapter Two Dumbo’s Dilemma

The detective’s name was McCardle. He was thin, with a wan skin; his features were a mask of hard, unrelenting angles that belied the fragility of his frame. One thumb hooked in a trouser pocket, he looked down from a six foot height at the back of the patrolman bent over Harpie Gordon.

The grotesque scene was bathed in unfriendly light from the spot on a patrol car. A cluster of four official men and a few curious early morning wanderers milled about a still form. Squares of light silhouetted the heads that peered over window sills. Death in the night.

“Find anything?” McCardle asked.

“Not a thing could be used for identification,” the patrolman answered up.

“Neck broken?”

“Yeah. Snapped like a twig. Guy that done it must be strong as a bull.” He rose from the twisted thing at his feet.

A flashbulb popped. Two more squares facing the street came alight.

“You find him?” said the detective.

“No. This guy did.” He pointed with his night stick at one of those standing around gaping; a man wearing a peaked cap and loose sweater tied at the throat with string.

McCardle faced the man. “Okay. Let’s hear it.”

The man’s feet shifted on the pavement. “Well, I was coming down from Fourteenth, minding my own business, when I see a guy scramming up this block and around the corner at Twelfth. I don’t pay no attention to him ’cause I’m worrying where I’m gonna flop for the night. But when I get here — I’m walking on the inside — I almost trip over that.”

McCardle’s eyes flashed grimly toward the corpse. “Then what?”

“Well, I been around here a long time, so I know about where to find the cop on this beat.” He glanced apologetically at the patrolman, who scowled back. “So I go get him. And that’s it.”

“This man you saw — the one who was hurrying away — what did he look like?” “I don’t know, mister. Like I said, I wasn’t paying no attention to him.”

“You must have noticed if he was big, medium, thin — something.”

“Well, I can give you that much. He was small. Smaller than me and I’m only five and a half. And he looked kinda fat and was carrying something. A cane or umbrella or something like that.”

“That all?” McCardle shoved his fedora back a little on his black hair.

“That’s all.”

McCardle’s brows converged on his nose and he looked like a thing of stone, unwaveringly hard and cold. “You mean to tell me,” he spat, “that a little fat man killed him, broke his neck? Someone a head shorter!”

“I’m only telling you what I saw.”

“Sure you didn’t see a lot of little men with umbrellas?”

“I ain’t had a drink all night. I can’t even afford a drink. I got no dough. Honest.”

McCardle said, “Can it. We’re not social workers.” Another flashbulb went off. To the cop he said, “Take this man’s name and whatever address you can work out.”

Burns, the other detective, had been leaning over Harpie. When he stood again he eased up to McCardle and said, “Smells like a still. Don’t look like he could afford it, either.”

“We’ll work along that line, then. Check all the joints within blocks. I don’t believe any pudgy little guy could have done this, but we’ll see if anything turns up on him, too.” He leaned his head toward Harpie. “Motive’s another thing. Why in hell would anyone kill a broken bum?”

A siren whined. When it stopped two men and a long basket were on the sidewalk.

“Okay?” one of them asked McCardle.

“Yeah. Okay.” He and Burns strode off to their car.

The others cleaned it up. Death always has to be cleaned up by somebody...

In a cellar room lit by a cold, glaring incandescence, Dumbo looked at the wallet. He sat on the edge of a lumpy mattress and turned it over in his hands a few times. His fingers were clumsy, nervous, and the only way he could empty it was to hold it over the bed and shake the bills out. They fell in an untidy heap on the frayed, spotted blanket.

It was there, all of it. Except what had gone into drinks. He knew it was all there, but had to see it to reassure himself, to know the glow of confidence and independence that comes with money.

It was freedom. No longer do this for Phil, do that for Phil. Now he could be Phil, almost. He knew how to act with money. He’d watched Phil often enough.

It was a pleasant thought to sleep on. A slit of smile crossed his face as he stuffed the bills back into place, put the wallet beneath his pillow and pulled the light cord. In the shadows he tossed his pants and torn shirt onto the chair. He was still grinning when he creaked into the bed and pulled the blanket up over his body. Rolling onto his side, he slid a hand under the pillow and, clutching the wallet, slept.

He thrashed as in a nightmare, tossed and turned. He kicked the blanket to the floor, mumbled and angled upright. The iron bedstead rocked and creaked in the morning stillness like a rusty hinge. He was awake. He circled the room with sleepy eyes, blinking and uncertain.

Then his hand shot under the pillow, hesitated. It moved to one side, then the other, rubbing the space under the pillow with searching, anxious fingers. It found nothing.

He flung the pillow against the far wall. Nothing to be seen on the mattress. He rolled the mattress toward the foot of the bed and a gasp of relieved tension wheezed through his lips. There it was on the floor near the wall. It had fallen during the night. He bent beneath the bare spring and retrieved it in a furious clutch.

Placing it on a scratched wooden chest, where he could see it all the time, he went about dressing. At the sink in the corner he splashed his face with water and dried himself with a rag towel.

There was an exuberance in these daily ablutions, a certain energy that had not been there before. He felt an elation new to him. Why not? It was the day. The day of release from the obligation to Phil Muraco, from the fear of his wrath when things went wrong, from the shadowed, restrained existence that had been his.

The consequences of the deed of the previous night found no niche in the caverns of his thought. There just was not room for anything but this new day. He was elemental, direct.

With the wallet in his pocket he stamped out of his room, down the short, damp passageway to the door. He came out beneath the steps leading up from the sidewalk to the main entrance. Great hands swinging at his sides, he came up from the cellar into the feeble sunlight. His feet clumped down the sidewalk to the corner where he turned and made for an eatery a short distance down the block.

He shouldered aside another man coming out of the place. The man spat a curse and hustled down the street. Dumbo, unmindful of the abuse, hoisted himself up onto a white stool and said. “Coffee. And eggs!”

The counterman, in a grimy white uniform, shouted into a hole in the wall, “Draw one! Two up!”

Dumbo laid a five-dollar bill on the counter and stuck a toothpick between his teeth. The coffee was too hot to drink. He stirred, focused his gaze on the center of the little whirlpool he had created with his spoon. He was seeing things there, things he’d never dared dream about before.

He was brought up from the depths of his stupor by the grating scrape of the dish sliding down the counter toward him. He stopped it with his forefinger and plunged a fork into one of the yellow bubbles. The yolk burst and gushed and seemed to delight him. A grin crept over his still unshaven face.

A few mouthfuls later he was wiping the plate with a piece of bread and washing it down with the last sip of coffee. He crooked his finger at the counterman and mumbled through his full mouth, “Hey, bud. C’mere.”

The man in white moved slowly down the counter toward him, wiping spilled coffee and crumbs to the floor as he moved. “What’s the trouble?”

“No trouble,” Dumbo answered, pocketing his change. “Abe Alexander been here?”

“Who?” the counterman asked stupidly.

“Abe Alexander.” Dumbo scowled.

“Never heard of him.”

“Yeah, you did. Abe. Comes here in the morning.”

“Honest, pal, I don’t know the guy.” He started down to the other end of the counter. Before he had gone two steps Dumbo was leaning over the counter and had his shirt clutched in a massive fist.

He yanked the man forward so the edge of the counter cut into his stomach. “You ain’t so smart! You wanna stay healthy, you tell me was he here yet!”

“Okay, okay. You mean Abe? I didn’t know you meant him. Honest. No, he wasn’t here yet. Not yet.”

With a grunt, Dumbo pushed the man away from him and settled back on his stool to wait.

He was lounging over his fourth cup of coffee when a man with a mustache, gaudily dressed, entered. He gave his order before he noticed Dumbo. “H’ya, Dumbo. What you doing around here this early?”

“I been waiting for you.”

“Got something from Phil?” He sat beside him and began to drain his cup.

“Naw, I wanna see you myself. I got some money to bet today. On a horse.”

“You know I don’t handle piker bets, Dumbo. How much you got, fifty cents?” A snicker twitched his mustache.

Dumbo drew himself up and leaned toward the man. “Listen, I said money. See?” He drew the wallet out and spread it to show the bills. “I’ll bet a hundred dollars on a horse. That ain’t no piker bet!”

Abe whistled low and shoved a finger tentatively against the exposed money. “Where’d you get all that dough?”

“You taking my bet or not?” Dumbo asked, quickly withdrawing the wallet from Abe’s prodding finger. Holding it close to his chest he fumblingly took out the hundred and put it between them on the counter. His palm rested over it and his eyes burned into Abe’s.

“Lucky Phil know you got all this dough? He know you’re betting the ponies?”

“He don’t know nothing. You want trouble, Abe?” Dumbo’s mouth was a grim, tight slit.

“Me? No, no. Sure, I’ll take the bet. What’s your choice?” He took a little pad out of his coat pocket, and a pencil. The awed counterman moved closer. It wasn’t every day he saw a hundred-dollar bet laid down in his joint.

“Choice?” Dumbo said. Then after a thoughtful pause, “I don’t know. I don’t know nothing about horses. I mean which one is good. You pick one for me.”

“Let’s see.” Abe’s eyes squinted. “There’s Lady Lu and there’s—”

“That’s the one!”

“Which?”

“Lady Lu. Sounds nice.”

“Fifteen to one in the third. Sure you like that one?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I like it.”

“Well, okay,” Abe said, like a man resigned.

The counterman’s mouth hung slack in wonder and sheer disbelief. It looked as though he was about to say something, when a quick, hard glance from Abe’s hat-shaded eyes stopped him.

When Abe reached for the money, Dumbo’s firm hand wadded it and shoved it deep into his own pocket. “You look like you think something’s funny,” he growled.

“Now, listen. If you want the bet you better give me the dough. I don’t give credit to nobody.”

“I’ll hold the hundred until the race is over. I’ll hold it, see!” He moved a menacing step closer to Abe, who shrunk from his bulk.

Abe piped, “Okay. Let’s you and me listen to the results together and when it’s over one of us will pay off. How about it?”

“Where do I meet you?”

Abe leaned up confidentially and whispered something into his ear. Then they walked out and went separate ways...

The room was small, bare, poorly lighted by a shielded bulb hanging just over their heads. There were five of them sitting in the smoke-clouded room. Abe, Dumbo and three others.

One sat at a table with sheets and pencils before him. All were listening to the radio, tuned down low so anyone in the store on the other side of the door wouldn’t be able to hear it. The third race was being broadcast.

All through the race, Dumbo stared at a wall and Abe frequently looked up from the radio to cast nervous glances at him? When it was over, Lady Lu had finished out of the money.

Abe rose and stepped over to the great figure of Dumbo sitting there, frowning. “Well,” he said, “that’s that. Let’s have the dough.”

Dumbo looked up at him, fixed him with a frightening stare. His mouth was drawn back against his teeth in an angry grimace. He didn’t like losing his hundred dollars. Now he realized what Abe had thought so terribly funny earlier in the day.

He said, “You gimme a bad horse, Abe. You gimme a bad horse and you knew it. You don’t get a cent!”

“I asked you if that was the horse you wanted and you said sure. So hand it over and don’t try to be funny.”

The two men against the wall lost interest in their conversation. The one at the table put aside his sheets. Their eyes were all on Dumbo. They faced him all at once.

So that’s the way it was going to be.

Dumbo started to come up out of his chair, ducked suddenly and threw his shoulder into Abe’s stomach, driving with his legs. The bookie went sprawling against the two men moving in from their position near the wall. In the same motion, Dumbo carried himself over to the radio on the little shelf. He tore it up and heaved it at the man at the table. It caught him full on the face, toppling him and making him drop the pistol that had suddenly popped into his hand.

Then Dumbo was through the door and away in a run. They didn’t get my money! The thought chased him down the block. I still got my money!

Every dozen or so strides he would throw a hurried look behind to see how close they were. Each time he looked he saw nothing, no one in pursuit. By the time he reached the corner he knew that they had not bothered to give chase at all.

Something told him they wouldn’t. They don’t chase you in broad daylight when other people can see them. They wait. The nights are dark and lonely and more suited to collecting a debt.

The realization came to him as he hurriedly walked down the next street, feet pushed homeward by fear. Fear of night. Fear of waiting for night while others looked forward to its pleasures. Others would be able to go abroad on the streets, laughing, living, searching.

Some of them searching for him. He’d have to stay in his room, but of sight in the dark where he couldn’t be seen. Hide, hide in the damp darkness of a cellar room until they came. Then... then there would be no running. But now, hurry to shelter.

He sat there on the edge of the bed, listening. Sounds of the night-time street filtered down through his closed window. Occasionally a taxi whizzed past, tires humming a violent city song. A stew lurched by, hurling epithets in a stage whisper. A boy and a girl strolled by the window and their giggling reached his ears through the window and the drawn shade.

For much more than an hour he had been sitting there, listening, waiting expectantly. Fearfully. His face, cheeks and chin, was cradled in two great, strong hands. Hands that caressed his unshaven face, that could grip a life around the throat and stop its breath, but that could not grip, caress or halt a bullet. In the corner the faucet dripped, and each drop was a measure of the time left; a monotonous, hypnotic reminder of what was to come. Blip, blop, less time, blip, blop...

Once, footsteps sounded outside and came to a halt in front of the building. He pushed himself slowly from the bed with moist palms and crept over to the window. Peering through a small rent in the shade he saw a man look toward his window, then up at the face of the building.

He felt relief even before the man turned away and strolled on. They would never send a man like that to do the job. They weren’t so foolish as to pit a little fat man, armed with an umbrella, against the big mitts of Dumbo. He turned from the shade and faced back into the room. A room of brooding darkness, a room that could be his tomb.

He didn’t know how long he had been standing there, searching the bare walls, before the noise registered in his ears. It wasn’t loud; a scuffing sound somewhere on the other side of his door. Then it stopped and there was only his breathing in the silence.

Then, the knock. Light but determined. He didn’t answer, didn’t acknowledge the rap. It came again and again, the insistent, unrelenting tap of a knuckle. There was no escape. The knocker knew he was there.

Dumbo flexed and stretched his fingers, hoarsely whispered, “Who-who’s there?”

Two knocks echoed his words.

“Who is it? Who’s there?” he called aloud.

A crisp voice answered through the thin panel, “It’s me. Phil. Open up. I want to talk to you.”

He put his foot uncertainly toward the door. Phil. He took a step. Phil, his friend. Phil, who might save him. He crossed the rest of the way, turned the key and opened the door.

Chapter Three Loaded With Death

The light from a bare bulb fell upon the man standing at the threshold. He was clean-shaven, six inches shorter than Dumbo. He wore brown tweeds, tan shoes and a fedora. He scowled over narrow eyes and slid by Dumbo, muttering two words: “Bird-brain!”

Dumbo stood where he was. Here in the room with him was the only man he had ever feared until tonight. Yet he was the only man who could offer protection.

They stood regarding each other’s shapes in the dark room. Finally, Phil said. “Let’s have lights.”

A dim incandescent glow stretched out for the walls and just about made it. Phi) pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and dusted off the lone chair before he sat on it. He put a cigarette to his lips and stared at Dumbo over the flame of his lighter Inhaling deeply, he let the smoke trickle out between his words. “Abe says you welshed on a bet today. That true?”

“Yeah. Phil, but he—”

“Shut up! He says you flashed a big wad of dough to back up the bet. He only took it without collecting on the spot because he knew you’re my boy, that I’d make good. I will make good — one way or another. Where’d you get that kind of dough?”

Dumbo had sidled over to the head of the bed, near where he’d hidden the wallet beneath the mattress. He stood there, uncertain, like an amateur with stage-fright before a great audience. He faltered his lines. “I got it... I got it like I get it for you sometimes.”

He had thought himself free of Phil’s will earlier in the day, but now, standing before him, the old servility returned to confuse him. Servility and a need for protection. His tongue flicked over his dry lips.

Phil leaned forward. “Why, you two-bit bum! You got a nerve pulling a job on your own, without my say-so! I got a notion to let the boys collect the hard way. Teach you a lesson. What you want to do, get picked up by the coppers? Blab all about me under the sweat lamp?”

“They won’t get me.”

“You’re right, they won’t. You’re getting out of here and you’re giving me that dough so if they pick you up they won’t find it on you. Cough up.”

Dumbo hesitated. He pondered. He said, “No.” The money overshadowed all thoughts of personal safety now.

“No! Listen, you get that dough now, understand! Where is it?”

The large man glanced swiftly at the mattress, gave it away He cried, “I don’t work for you no more! I’m working for myself!”

Phil came out of the chair, wary, but determined. “Nobody quits on me. If it wasn’t for me you wouldn’t have a shirt on your back. That’s my dough. I’m taking it, so stand away from that bed.”

Dumbo didn’t move. He clenched his fists, unclenched them and raised himself off his heels slightly. He waited for Phil to make a move toward him.

Phil took a step, eyes narrowed under scowling brows, jaw tight. They eyed each other for a moment. Then, as if at a signal, both men moved at once — Phil toward the bed, Dumbo toward Phil.

They met head on and, toe to toe, the adagio of death began with street noises as the only accompaniment. Great hands reached out for a throat and a smaller hand darted into a coat pocket. Something silver flashed between them. But for their grunts, there was silence in the room. A little scraping noise just beyond the door went unheard by either...

McCardle sat at the desk, punishing his pale, angular face with long, bony fingers. Trying to stretch his legs in the kneehole, he barked a shin on the edge of the desk and swore under his breath. The phone to his left cried out. He wrapped his fingers about it, lifting it from the cradle.

“Homicide. McCardle speaking.”

The wire gave him a familiar voice: “Hello, Mac. Burns here. I been combing these Third Avenue joints like you said and I think I’ve found something.”

“What’s the scoop?”

“Place at Third and Twenty-first. Seems the one with the broken neck — Harpie Gordon his name is — came in here flashing a big roll last night. Bought drinks for a character named Dumbo.”

“The character, was he big?”

“Like a locomotive, and just as powerful from what I hear. They left the place separately, the big one first. Sounds hot to me.”

“Get his address?”

“Place on Stanton. Off the Bowery, in the cellar.”

“Nice work. Get to that corner and wait for me. Don’t scare him off before I get there, but if he leaves stick with him.”

“Check.”

McCardle dropped the phone, straightened out of his seat and jammed his hat on the way out.

Twenty minutes later, he braked his car near the corner and slid from behind the wheel. Walking with habitually long, slow strides he approached the man on the corner. His coat collar was upturned to ward off the cold night breeze. He stopped beside Burns and lit a cigarette. “Anything doing?”

“Can’t say, Mac. Just got here a minute ago. Nobody came or went since I arrived.”

They talked without facing each other directly.

“Know if he’s in?”

“Guess so. There’s a light on in that cellar window.”

“Let’s go and let’s not muff it.”

They crossed the street and made for a certain house. Coming abreast of the stairs leading down to a closed cellar door, they halted momentarily. Then Burns walked a few steps on, turned to watch the window. McCardle jogged down the steps and pushed through the door.

Inside, he found another door to his left and knocked. There was no answer. He knocked again, harder and louder. No answering call came through to him. He waited silently, hoping to hear sounds of motion within the room. There were none. Wondering if his quarry had quitted the place earlier, he reached out with his left hand and twisted the knob. His other hand held a revolver.

The door yielded to his pressure. His cheekbones seemed to stand out; his face took on a granite hardness. He gave the door a shove. Nothing happened. No bullets came whining through the aperture; no figure cast a shadow where he could see it. No one moved or spoke. He whirled, rolling his shoulder on the door frame and dropping to one knee all in the same motion.

Looking at the red-splotched man on the floor near the center of the room, he flushed a little at his dramatic caution. Holstering the pistol, he stepped through the outer door, told Burns to call the crew in and returned to his newest corpse.

It was a big corpse, the biggest he’d ever seen. Blood, red and fresh, oozed from five or six places on the dead man’s shirt front and from one deep gash just under the jaw.

He looked around the room, walked over to the scratched dresser and picked up three small cards scattered beside a dirty undershirt. They held his attention until Burns returned, griping, “Of all the lousy luck!”

“Tough. Locate a killer and move in on him to find him dead. Gives us another murderer to look for.”

“Unless the same man—”

“No. This is the baby we wanted. Look at the size of those mitts. My bet is this one took care of Gordon, then someone got him. Robbery, of course. Gordon had a roll when he was seen with this bird in the saloon. When we found him, he was clean. I don’t see any money around the room. Robbery again. Two corpses, two killers.

“Found these.” He shoved them at Burns. “Social security card, photostat of army discharge and an identification card. Most likely out of a wallet lifted yesterday by Gordon. All made out to Joseph P. Barnes. Look Barnes up, see if he lost a wallet with any real money in it. Enough to cause two murders.”

“Check,” Burns said, jamming them into a coat pocket.

“Better talk with the tenants, find out if anyone heard or saw anything that could give us a lead.”

Burns hurried from the room. He found nothing on his check. Two of the tenants were out. A woman on the third floor thought she heard a shot, but offered that it was probably a backfire from a passing car. An old lady on the fourth floor knew ‘that big oaf would meet a sorry end.’

When Burns returned to the cellar, the flash and print men had almost finished and the boys with the basket were there. He reported his findings to McCardle.

Someone said, “Okay?”

“Yeah,” McCardle answered, “Clean it up.”

It was ten in the morning when the cop ushered a man into McCardle’s office. The man was rounded and stooped in the shoulders and back. His hair was thick and curly, his skin sallow. He punished his hat with flexing, nervous fingers and bowed from the neck when McCardle offered him a chair.

Burns was standing over near the coat rack.

McCardle rubbed a hand over his pale features, hooked one thumb in a trouser pocket and leaned against the edge of the desk, facing his visitor. Gently, he said, “Before you say anything, Mr. Tasso, be certain of your information. In a murder investigation misinformation can slow us up, even hurt an innocent man.”

“I make no mistake. I come here by myself. Nobody ask me.” He turned to Burns with hurt pride straining his face.

“Okay, Mr. Tasso,” McCardle said, “let’s hear what you have.”

“Well, last night I was going to work — I’m a night watchman — and I see this man. He stands near the stoop. I mind my own business and walk right by him, but I see he is looking at the window.”

“Which window, Mr. Tasso?” asked McCardle.

Tasso flicked accusing eyes between the two detectives as though he were the butt of a humorless joke. “The window in the room where it happened. I read about the killing in the paper, and I think I better tell the cops about the man I see hanging around. So here I am and I told you.”

McCardle sighed patiently and looked at Burns who called out, “What did the man look like. Tasso? Describe him for us. Was he big?”

Burns had a notebook ready. McCardle watched Mr. Tasso with tired gray eyes as the man said:

“No, no. He is not big. He is small, this man. He is smaller than me. Also he is fat Fatter than me.”

McCardle rocked gently forward and put a long hand on Mr. Tasso’s chair, leaned close to him. “Go on. He was short and fat. Did he carry an umbrella. Mr. Tasso?”

“Sure. You know him? An umbrella and a hat The kind that does not turn down in the front.”

Burns muttered as he wrote. “Homburg or derby.”

A scowl V-d McCardle’s drawn face. He was unhappy about this turn. “Are you sure you saw a fat little man?” he asked through tight lips. “Are you certain he wasn’t tall and thin? How are your eyes, Mr. Tasso?”

“I got good eyes!” He all but crushed his hat in his hands “You think I don’t see this man. huh?”

McCardle gestured to the wall where Burns was standing. Burns nodded, moved away, revealing the sight-chart he had been concealing behind his back. There was a large black capital at the top and smaller letters below.

“Can you read the line third from the bottom, Mr. Tasso?”

Like a student reciting the alphabet in the normal sequence he rattled it off: “P,t,b,k,j,h,i,y,q,a. I got to have good eyes to be a watchman.”

Burns grunted

“Okay, Mr. Tasso,” McCardle apologized, “go on with your description. What about his face?”

“His face was puffed out on the sides. Fat. The eyes were small. He had a mustache, just a little one.”

“Anything else?”

“Nothing else. That isn’t enough?”

McCardle said, “Thank you, Mr. Tasso. If we need you again you’ll bear from us.”

The man put his battered hat on as Burns let him through the door.

Back in his own chair, McCardle tapped the edge of the desk with an agitated, bony finger. His eyes stared hard at the just-closed door, not seeing Burns until he spoke.

“He’s in again, Mac.”

“What?”

“The little, fat one. Two guys get killed. Two times we hear about this same man Could be this one’s our man, Mac.”

“Bully!” McCardle shouted. “He can’t be strong enough to have done that to Gordon, let alone tangle with that brute we found last night. My dough still says last night’s corpse killed Gordon for that money. Somebody in turn killed him for the same reason. This fat one is tied up in it some way. It won’t be easy, but when we wrap this up we’ll know where he fits in.”

“You’re right. It won’t be easy.”

“C’mon. Let’s think about it over coffee.”

The kitchen was small and square. The walls were discolored with age, the floor bare of linoleum. The sharp, appetizing odor of coffee permeated the close air in the three-room flat. Eve stood at the kitchen range, staring pensively at the bubbles popping against the top of the percolator.

Turning off the gas she lifted the percolator from the range and brought it to the table, where she poured two cups. Without looking from the cups she called, “Coffee’s on, Phil.”

He didn’t answer. In the bedroom, he sat on the edge of an unmade bed. Money passed through counting hands. He mumbled to himself, “Not bad. Still a good chunk left for me after I pay Abe the five yards.”

“Phil! Before it gets cold!” she called again.

“I’m coming, I’m coming.” He neatly stuffed the money back into the wallet and put that under some shirts in the bottom drawer of the dresser. It lay next to a seldom-used pistol. Then he walked into the kitchen and sat silently at the table.

Eve’s hair was black and so were her eyes. Her lips were small, finely shaped, very red. Her skin was white. She gave the belt of her faded robe a hitch, pulling it tighter about her slender waist. Without looking across the table at him, she asked, “Where did you get that money, Phil?”

Nastily, he said, “Pretty smart, aren’t you? Little spy!”

She raised hard eyes to his face. “You had the door open! I couldn’t miss seeing you. What have you been up to this time? I don’t want any cops coming around here asking me questions.”

“Some wife you are! Never mind what happens to me, just so no cops bother you. Well, if they do, you better give the right answers. Understand?” He trapped her eyes with a hard, malevolent stare. His fingers curled about the edge of the table, squeezing very hard.

She said she understood.

“Now fry me some eggs. I’m hungry.”

They finished breakfast in silence. Then he rose, pulled his coat on and started out.

Turning from the sink, where she was rinsing the dishes, she asked him where he was going. He said he was going out. When would he be back? He said he didn’t know. The door slammed behind him and she buried her face in her sympathetic hands.

Once, she had found sympathy from Phil. That had been the first year of marriage. Since then he had become calloused and quick to strike. In the brooding silence of lonely nights she longed for unobtainable things; things like kindness and love and a husband, a real husband.

She wiped her wet hands on a towel and trudged to the bedroom. She remembered when it had started. He used to make excuses for leaving her alone. Not any more. Now he hadn’t even the decency to pretend, to lie, to try to keep her believing in him.

Usually it was just ‘I got a deal on.’ She had come to know the sort of deals he meant, and with the knowledge came the will to break away. Though the will had always been there the courage was slow in coming, starting somewhere deep within her and rising, swelling at a slow but insistent pace until, now, she was ready.

She had no friends, no living relatives, no money. No money? Rolling on her hips, she came to a sitting position, looked at the dresser.

She’d never seen him with that much money at one time before. Surely there was enough there for her to make her break — fast and neat. Enough for wanted but unknown luxuries. Enough to keep her in fine style until — until it became necessary to find a means of providing for just the necessities. But until then!

In the dresser mirror, she caught her reflection grinning out at her. It had been a long time since she had smiled, even mirthlessly.

Dressed, she removed some of the bills from the wallet and primly tucked them into her purse. The rest of it went into the overnight case holding her few personal belongings. Before she closed the drawer she removed something else, something he kept for emergencies. She didn’t think he’d ever find her, not in such a large, sheltering city. But she took it just in case.

Chapter Four Umbrella Man

The hotel room seemed like a palace. One room. Three had been a nightmarish hovel; this one was a place of warmth and comfort. The beginning of luxury for Eve. The bathroom was white and clean, a place to wash off the dust of an old life and step into the new.

The bath over, she dressed hurriedly. Passing the mirror she stopped. She knew she liked mirrors, knew they showed you what you wanted to see if you looked hard enough. She cocked her head toward one small shoulder and winked at herself. She was happy; she was hungry. But before food came clothes. She put all the money together in her purse and started for the stores.

The shopping spree lasted nearly three hours. She went without lunch, returned to her room and changed her clothes, all of them. The new garments lent her a look of luxurious living, a mood of gaiety. Money could do such wonderful things, she thought.

At dusk she went down in the elevator, looking forward to sumptuous feasting and, perhaps, fulfillment of a pressing desire, an adventure. As she walked through the lobby the elevator boy stared at her. Without turning, she knew it. She liked it. She smiled for the second time that day.

She was wondering why she had waited so long to do this when he bumped into her near the doorway. Accidents happen, she thought, and returned the tip of his homburg with that same coquettish smile. A cute little man, but what a ridiculous mustache.

Dinner took more than an hour. Then she wanted a drink.

The neon above the bar held an auroral significance for her. The very luminosity of the letters seemed to lend credence to the beginning of her new day. She walked airily beneath it and through the door. She strode boldly to the bar and slid onto a seat. The barman took her order without expression. A highball.

She drank, sitting rigid to calm an inner trembling. Uncertainty sat with her, brought by anticipation of an inchoate something. Where was it? What was it? Why didn’t it happen?

He took the stool just to the right of her as she sipped the last drops in the glass. She asked for another. A voice beside her said, “Make it two. On me.”

Brush him off? She wanted to live. She wanted someone to show her once more what happiness was like.

Turning to face him she said, “Thank you.” Plain, simple, sweet.

Sandy-haired he was, under six feet. Eyes blue, piercing. Lips full and sensitive. She catalogued him so in the index of her mind.

Neither the barman, nor the table waiter, nor the few other patrons paid any attention to them. She looked for that in the mirror over the backbar. No one was interested. How easy, how fundamental it all was. Living.

He fumbled with the knot of his tie, seemed momentarily confused. It was as though he hadn’t expected such cordiality at the start. Recovering, he said, “Would you... would you care to have dinner with me?”

“I’ve had dinner, thank you.” She tipped the glass to her lips.

“Dancing, then? If you’re not waiting for someone.”

“I’d like to. Plenty of time and nothing to do with it.” The smile on her lips broke for the raised glass. The smile on her heart remained.

“Particular about where?”

“Why, low on cash?”

Her understanding seemed to stun him. “Limited. Enough for most, but maybe not enough for a woman of class like yourself.” He tossed off his drink.

“If you run short, let me know. I don’t want to go to any dives.”

“Well, thanks,” he said, smiling. “This is my lucky night.”

“It hasn’t even begun!”

His grin spread and he tossed two bills on the bar. He handed her down from the stool and they left together.

All through the mad whirl that followed — dancing, drinking, laughing — her feeling of happiness persisted. She pulled him from bar to bar. Their last stop was a liquor store.

In her room it was cozy. He was mixing drinks, standing there coatless. It looked right to her. Tiptoeing up behind him from the window, she kissed him lightly on the neck and said, “Excuse me, honey.”

“Take your time,” he told her. The bathroom door closed on her and he turned to look about the room.

Several minutes later she emerged, quietly, looking for him at the spot where she had last seen him. He was not there. Alarmed, she flicked her head to the left. There she saw his back. The slight movement of his shoulders from the rear gave away his anxiety. His hand came up from in front of him, carrying something to his pocket.

It couldn’t be! He was such a gentleman! He was so nice! She blinked her eyes, hoping what she saw would go away.

It didn’t. In the sooty dimness of the room she watched, horrified, as his hand appeared from somewhere on the bed, a spot blocked from her view. There was something square, something brown in his hand. It was the wallet. Her wallet! Her money; rightfully hers in payment of long-endured maltreatment by a man. And now a man was taking it from her.

“Stop!” she screeched. “What are you doing!”

He flung a hasty glance over his shoulder at her. A look of annoyance, nothing more. Then he returned to rifling her things.

Hands outstretched, fingers clawing, she threw herself at his back. Digging her nails into his neck she tried to pull him away. Her breath shot from her lungs in quick bursts. Anger left no room for words in her. She dug and tugged.

Suddenly she was moving, away from him. There was a piercing pain running along her lower ribs, where his back-swinging arm had caught her. Agonizing bolts of fire lashed through her back as she crashed against the rear wall, beside the dresser.

“Shut up and you won’t get hurt!” he growled.

He was flinging things to both sides now in frenzied search for more money, more valuables. Satisfied that her overnight case and purse held nothing more for him, he bolted for the chair across the room. Pawing hurriedly at his coat, he finally got one arm through a sleeve. He paid no attention to Eve. He was confident she had had her fill of trying to stop him from taking the money.

Panting, wracked with pain, Eve rolled from her sitting position toward the dresser. He was too sure of himself, the smart guy. If only he hadn’t opened that certain drawer.

She yanked it open as he started for the door. Impatiently, she groped around in the drawer, came upon the hard cold metal. His hand was on the doorknob. Hers was around the butt of the pistol, steadied by her other hand.

She raised it before her face. One last chance he could have. One chance.

“Come back,” she called. The door was swinging open.

Light from the corridor fell through. His back was a broad, dark silhouette — impossible to miss. Her eyes narrowed; her teeth bit into her lower lip.

She squeezed with her fingers. The noise raced around the walls of the room and the flash blinded her momentarily.

A convulsion stopped him. He leaned against the door frame and moaned something unintelligible. Then he reeled out into the corridor, hitting the opposite wall. Supporting himself against that wall, he dragged his limping, bleeding body out of her sight.

Eve slumped to the floor and wept. It was so simple. So fundamental. Dying.

McCardle slammed the door marked Captain of Detectives and walked down the small, musty corridor. His thumbs were hooked into his trousers pockets. Dejection hung about his lean frame like a shroud, and smouldering anger colored his usually bland cheeks.

Burns was waiting for him, leaning against one wall. It was time to go home and sleep. He pointed to the door and said to McCardle, “Steaming, huh?”

McCardle gave him a tired scowl, pushed his hat way back on his head.

Burns said, “Don’t tell me. I know. Action! Results!” He mocked his Captain.

“Yeah, results! Gave me bell for not concentrating more on the little fat one. Cripes! How many fat men are there in this town?

“What else do we know about it except somebody named Joe Barnes tells us he had his wallet lifted? Okay, Harpie got the wallet and Dumbo knocked him off for it. But who got to Dumbo? No prints, nobody seen near his place except that little man. Aah, when I find that guy!” He throttled the air with long, tense fingers.

“Let’s go, Mac. Even the best dicks need sleep.”

“You go ahead, Burns. I’m going to walk around awhile. Maybe something will come to me.”

Ten minutes later McCardle jogged down the steps to the sidewalk. A brisk wind played with the nighttime streets. He saw few people until he turned west, trying to walk his way out of a dilemma. The breaks had all been against him. Even a detective needs a break once in a while. One break. Just one. He kept walking crosstown, vaguely aware that he was passing more people, more lights, more life in the night.

At Broadway a man brushed his arm on the way past. A short man, a fat man, running. Up ahead a uniformed cop was breaking out of a cluster of people grouped around something on the sidewalk. He was calling for someone to “Stop!”

Just one break! McCardle whirled. His eyes narrowed, centering on the back of a man fleeing down the street. Without a word he shot into a sprint; head down, long bony arms and legs pumping the pavement away beneath him.

People turned to look after the fat man and got in McCardle’s way. The middle of the block went by before he drew within a couple of yards of the man. Without hesitation, he lurched his lean frame into a flying tackle.

Bone thudded against flesh. The two sprawled to the pavement, hats flying. From one there came a futile, wheezing gasp. From the other, a satisfied grunt.

McCardle put a knee into the other’s back and pushed the palm of one hand down on his neck. With his free hand he fished a leather folder out of his pocket and thrust it up into the face of the onrushing cop. “What’s it all about?” he asked the cop.

“Some guy with a slug in him came staggering out of the hotel back there and fell.” He was talking between pants. “When I got there I see this one yanking something from the corpse’s pocket. I hollered and he ran.”

“Okay, get him up.” McCardle stood and let the cop pull the blustering prisoner to his feet.

The man adjusted his glasses. One lens was cracked and the frame was warped. Puffing, he picked up his battered homburg. A little mustache wiggled when he spoke. “Cops, always interfering! A man cannot make a living without interference.”

McCardle put his palm out, said, “Give, Mister.”

The man sighed, took a wallet out of his coat pocket and slapped it defiantly into McCardle’s hand. “That money belongs to my client. There should be almost two thousand there.”

“Client? What’s your business?”

With pink, pudgy fingers the fat man withdrew a card from his coat. McCardle took it and read: Criterion Collection & Investigation Agency.

The cop, flashing scornful eyes over the man, grunted disdainfully, “A private.”

McCardle inspected the wallet. In one corner were the initials J.B. Spreading it, he found the sheaf of bills. He flapped it shut and the three started back to where a man was sprawled on the sidewalk...

They sat in McCardle’s office, facing each other across the desk. McCardle’s taut face was tired, determined. His hat was pushed back on his head. The other’s features glowed with confidence. He had learned there was to be no rough stuff, no games with him as the ball.

“Quade, eh?”

“Yes. Wilbur Quade.”

“All right. Let’s start at the beginning, Quade. Tell it to me straight and I won’t have to ring for the help. Understand?” He leaned forward, made a shelf of his hands for his chin.

“I understand perfectly. My client — nameless for now — was fleeced of two thousand dollars in a stock swindle. He is a reputable man. If the public were to learn of his gullibility in the deal he would be ruined, yet he could not afford to throw away two thousand dollars. So he came to me. I agreed to make the collection for suitable compensation.”

Quade crossed his hands over the handle of his umbrella.

“This man, Barnes, was the swindler. I located him and followed, determined to collect.”

“So determined you’d kill him for it?”

“No. An intelligent man need not resort to violence. I would have used any other method, however. On a subway platform some derelict picked his pocket. Fortunately I saw that, but I could not stop the pickpocket. So I followed him. Barnes, without the money, was of no use to me.”

“Did you follow the dip to the bar where he met his friend?”

“Yes. I am not a cowardly man. Detective, but I wanted to get the money and escape unhurt. I waited until he left, stayed behind him. I don’t know just what I was going to do. Before I could hatch a definite plan, we were on and off the elevated train. Then—”

“Yes?” McCardle’s voice was hard, incisive.

“Then he was killed, by the same man he’d talked with in that bar A giant of a man! Again it was a case of following the money. It changed hands again, as you probably know. Again, a man was killed for it. I was waiting for him to go to sleep. I was going to let myself into his room and take it. I was too late to do anything. It was distressing.”

McCardle slid out of his chair, came around to the front of the desk. “You know who killed him?”

Quade nodded.

McCardle’s mouth worked silently. The veins stood on his temples like jagged lightning bolts. He was pointing a finger at Quade.

The fat man shifted in his chair, went on before McCardle could unleash the words crowding his throat. “I kept following the wallet and the man. All my thoughts were so futile, all my work in vain. The next day. his wife packed her things and moved to a hotel, taking the money with her. I watched them from the roof of an adjoining building.”

He blushed and went on.

“I waited around the entrance. When she came out I went in to ransack her room while she was gone I found only some clothes and a pistol No money. She had taken it with her. Annoyed. I returned to the lobby to await her return More difficulty When she came back she had a man with her.”

McCardle was pacing, hands jammed into his pockets, lips set in a grim granite line. He would wait the man out.

“Some minutes later I went up again. As I approached the door I heard her shouting at him. He shouted back It sounded as though he hit her. I backed away down the corridor and the door opened. There was a shot from within the room. The man who had gone in with her staggered across the hall. I was hesitant When I finally entered the room, she was slumped against a wall, sobbing. Her purse lay empty on the bed.”

Quade settled back in his chair, thoughtful.

McCardle spread his feet, glared into the man’s florid face. “Mr. Quade,” he said. “I have never known a more inconsiderate, cowardly rat! I’d like to send you to the chair. Mr. Quade! Do you know that two murders could have been prevented if you’d come to the police as soon as you’d seen the first killing?”

“In the past, you detectives have been a hindrance. By the time you were through with me. I’d have lost all trace of the money. Questions! Questions! I had my client to consider and I couldn’t waste the time!” He clenched his umbrella.

“You’ll have plenty of time to waste! Do you know I’m going to have your license? Do you know I’m going to stack an accessory-after-the-fact charge against you? Do you know you’re going to jail, Mr. Quade?”

Quade blinked behind his damaged glasses, managed a weak smile. Insolence in his voice, he asked. “Haven’t you forgotten something, Detective?”

“No, Mr. Quade. I haven’t.” He spat the words angrily through his teeth. “Who killed Dumbo? The big one? Give!”

“I can be obstinate, but there’s no need for it. A bargain, Detective.”

“What?” McCardle reared upright.

“A bargain or you’ll never get what you want. You let me have my money, let me walk out of here, and I give you the name and address of the murderer you want. At the same time, the name and address of the woman who shot the man in the hotel room. She registered under an alias, you know. You didn’t bring her in with me because she escaped. Be sensible. You get credit for apprehending two killers; you get two convictions. All I get is my fee. How about it, Detective?”

McCardle’s hand shot out at Quade’s puffy face. The echo of the slap bounced from the ceiling of the quiet, dim room.

Quade put trembling fingers to his cheek. “You’re wasting your time getting tough!”

Swiftly running his fingers through his hair, McCardle paced some more. Abruptly, he tossed a tablet and pencil into Quade’s lap. “Write it down.”

“The money?”

He lifted the wallet thoughtfully, let it drop on the man’s legs with a tired sigh. Quade scribbled something, gave it back to McCardle.

“Good-by, Mr. Quade.”

“Good-by.” He walked to the door. When he was halfway out, McCardle called:

“Mr. Quade!”

The fat man turned, raised his brows.

“Remember, Mr. Quade, you could have stopped two murders.” His eyes burned with hatred. “You could have saved human life, but you chose your fee. Isn’t it blood money? Don’t you have two deaths in your hands in exchange for a crumby fee, Mr. Quade?”

The man’s jaw dropped a bit; the color left his face. He looked a little sick.

McCardle said, “Good-by, Mr. Quade.”

He was tired, tired as only a man who trods death’s heels can be.