Down Among the Dead Men

XVI

Mulcahey slushed down the fore-deck in his bare feet, coveralls rolled up to the knees. He waved his mop as Koski called across the Gowanus wharf. “Shove off, Sarge. On our way.”

“You look like you lost your best friend, Steve. Or is it the rib which is floating too free?”

“I lost a good witness.” Koski let himself down carefully to the cockpit, set a bundle on the transom locker. “Claire Purdo got a one-way ticket about ten minutes ago.”

“Who punched it for her?”

“Same party who’s responsible for most of the manslaughter. Person or persons unknown. I’m as guilty as anybody, Irish.”

The Sergeant raced the motor, cast off. “In what way, now?” The Vigilant rumbled out into the canal.

“I was taking her to her room for this,” Koski unwrapped the bundle. “I let her go in first. When she unlocked the door, someone hiding inside put a bullet through her throat.”

“This Bandage Face, was it?”

“No see, Irish.” Koski held the clock up with its towel wrapping protecting the prints. “The killer got away up the fire escape. I should have searched her room before she went in. I must be slipping.”

“You still have a ways to go,” Mulcahey held the wheel with one hand, dried his feet on an old shirt with the other, “before you are down to average. Did the poor kid recognize who bumped her?”

“I wish to God I knew. But she didn’t make any in extremis statement; she took the slug in the throat; died in a couple of minutes.”

“Rest her soul. How did the scut get inside her room?”

“Picked the lock, unless he had a key.”

“He seems to be handy at odd jobs. What in the name of Bulova is that monstrosity?”

“Astrological clock.” Koski weighed the clock on his palm. “Runs by electricity. Supposed to tell you the star influences of the moment. Gjersten gave it to the Purdo babe to hock. He probably stole it from that hotcha on the yacht.”

Mulcahey made a notation in the police-boat log. “We are rolling at exactly,” he eyed the clock, “half past scorpion. Speed, ten knots. Weather, but lousy. Destination...?”

“Drop the timepiece off at the Basin. Then run up to the Fourteenth Street docks.”

“Ah, now, me lad! You will not be telling me off for some chore which will cut into my accustomed period of relaxation! Because at eight this eve I have an arrangement to bask in the wiles of a certain toothsome frill. And you put a dent in my favorite recreation last night, making me labor over-hours.”

“Recreate after we get this cleaned up. You know your way around the longshoremen’s hiring hall, up at Fourteenth?”

“ ’Tis my old parish, sure.”

“Kayo. Hop over there. Collar on to a mugg by the name of Tim Joslin. If he’s in. Works for the union. Age about thirty-five. Five ten. Weighs around hundred and eighty. Thin, sandy hair. Watch your footwork. If I gauge him right, he’d be a mean hand with a cargo hook.”

“Would he be the lad with his jaw in a sling?”

“How do I know!” Koski gritted his teeth as he straightened up. “His name was on Dommy’s hotel register. He knows Merrill Ovett. He sees a lot of guys who go down to the sea in ships. Maybe he knows a thing or two about sailing dates. I’d crave to hold converse with him.”

“If he’s there, I’ll have him for you. Hot or cold.”

“Wait until I check off at the Basin. Maybe I’ll have him first; if the boys at the precinct have located his hangout.”

He put one foot up on the gunwale, gazed through the gray screen of rain at the downtown skyline. Up to about the tenth story, all the massive buildings on Manhattan’s tip were visible; above that they were veiled in smoky cloud. There was, he reflected sardonically, a certain parallel between this hazy view across the bay and what he knew about the killer he was hunting.

Part of it was plain enough; the murderer was cold-blooded enough to dissect a man he’d just slaughtered; ruthless enough to blast the life out of a poor prostitute who at best could only have been a witness against him. And quite possibly he was treacherous enough to be an agent for the funneling of ship-information to the slinking pig-boats that lurked off the twenty-fathom line...

When they touched at the headquarters pier, Koski hustled through the dark tunnel under the building, stepped into his office. Johnny O’Malley was hammering out a report on the Remington.

“Run this over to Ident, Johnny.” He laid the clock on his desk. “What’d you get on Joslin?”

“Guy is a shifter, Lieutenant. Now you see him, now you don’t. Dozen addresses in a year. Present habitat, Nineteen Swamp Street. Kind of guy everybody knows... and either hates or goes for in a big way. A positive personality, according to hearsay.”

“Old Pathé O’Malley. Sees all, knows all. Anything come in on young Ovett?”

“Miscues, is all. He doesn’t show up at the South Street sail-loft. But he’s reported picked up in Union City while applying for a job as a ferry gateman. Slight mistake. It was two other guys from Buffalo. Then he’s positively identified as a passenger on an airliner from LaGuardia Field to Washington. Turns out the gent is an attaché of the Brazilian consulate.”

“We better run something besides rumors to ground, I’m telling you. Time is fugiting too damned fast.”

He hurried back to the patrol-boat; Mulcahey was gassing up at the Department pump. “Shoot me up to Washington Market, Sarge. I might get my hands on that hunk of beef we’re looking for. He has a domicile on Swamp Street.”

The Vigilant avoided a car-float, shaved the ends of the piers, northward, to keep out of the strength of the tide. Mulcahey grazed her up against the market dock just long enough for Koski to step off. The police-boat had disappeared behind the curtain of rain before Koski reached the pier shed.

He strode east through the warehouse district. The smells of onions, spices, coffee were as tangible as the steam from the tugs bustling about on the river.

There didn’t seem to be any Number Nineteen. Seventeen was the Haven Pool Parlor; Twenty-three was a secondhand machinery salesroom, deserted. There was nothing in between. A narrow flight of stairs climbed steeply beside the poolroom door. He tried the stairs.

On the floor above the Haven were four doors with scabrous paint, an iron sink and faucet. No names, no numbers. Two of the doors were unlocked; he peered into rooms gray with dust lighted by windows crusted with gray grime. At one of the other doors he listened, heard nothing but the click of balls and an argumentative voice from the poolroom below. When he put his ear to the last door, the knob began to turn slowly and noiselessly. He put his palm along the jamb, threw his weight against it, suddenly.

The man Koski had seen at Ellen Wyatt’s studio stumbled back into the room, nearly upsetting a table piled high with books, papers, a portable typewriter, a bottle of milk.

“Well, well.” Koski moved in. “So you’re the lad who didn’t know anything about Merrill Ovett.” He couldn’t see any closet; there wasn’t much clothing around. A canvas cot was neatly made up with sheets and pillowslip; along the floor next to the table was stacked a long row of volumes. An accordion in a battered leather case occupied a broken-down washstand.

Joslin stepped to the cot, reached under it, came up with a sawed-off billiard cue. He swung the leaded end, casually. “If you’re fixing to strong-arm me around, somebody’s going to get hurt, gumshoe.”

Koski went toward him, stiff-legged; stood with feet planted wide apart, fists on hips. He looked at the books on the table. “The word goes around you’re tough stuff. Don’t tell me you’re a brow, too.” He picked up three volumes: Theory of the Leisure Class, by Veblen; Collected Poems, by Masefield; Autobiography of Lincoln Steffens.

Koski fingered the flyleaf of the autobiography. Merrill S. Ovett was written in a broad staccato hand. Portland, June, 1934. “Where’d you get this, Joslin?”

“What’s it to you? I borrowed it. You can’t frame me on that.”

“I’m not in the picture business, hard guy. When’d you get it from Ovett?”

“I don’t recall. Long time ago. Three, four years.”

“How long’s it been since you’ve seen him?”

“Any time you blues want dope from me, get yourselves a subpoena. I’ll talk to the District Attorney, maybe. Not to a lot of finks.”

Koski put the books down. “You’ll talk to me. Here. Or at headquarters. Suit yourself. But don’t get snotty with me because some pratt from a private agency has shoved you around.”

Joslin gave a sardonic “Ha!” He jabbed a stubby forefinger at the scar on his chin. “See that? A uniform cop did that to me. A dumb ox of a strike-breaking cop. I was in the hospital a week. You think I’m going to throw my arms around you just because you took a civil service exam! That’s for laughs.”

Koski pushed his hat back from his forehead, hooked his thumbs under his lapels. “How much you weigh?”

Joslin scowled. “Hundred and eighty-five pounds. Why?”

“Nothing much. Only you’re the cockiest hundred eighty-five pounds I ever met. I’ll cut it right off the rare end. You may be covering up for Ovett—”

“You won’t get me to admit he needs covering.”

“The big-hearted pal act. All right. Leave Ovett out of it, time being. There are a few little coincidences that tie you in with these murders.”

“Murders.” The organizer’s eyes narrowed. “You told Ellen one man had been killed.”

“That was so. Then. Today a girl got shot to death. Either by the same crut. Or someone working with him.” Koski took a step closer. “In addition to which, there’s a good chance the slob we’re after has been pipelining out dope on ship clearances... to enemy submarines—”

Joslin gritted: “You—!” The billiard, cue swung up.

Koski crowded up against him; clutched the other’s right biceps, broke the force of the swing. He jammed his forearm up under Joslin’s chin, shoved the man’s head back. The cue thudded on the Lieutenant’s shoulder. He grapevined one leg behind the organizer, leaned on him. Joslin went backward, off balance. Koski bored in, got a wristlock on the arm holding the cue. He levered down, heard the weapon clatter to the floor. He pushed Joslin back against the wall, held him there, kicked the cue behind him, turned to one side, bent down, picked it up.

“How you want it, hardboiled? Either loosen up. Or grab your hat and hang on. Because you’re going over the jumps.”

Joslin edged over to the table. “You might bang me around some. But you’re not going to get away with saying I’m working against the merchant marine.”

“If you’re not, why don’t you give out, help me get the snake who is?”

The organizer reached for the milk bottle. Koski lifted the cue, warningly. But all the other did was to thumb out the cardboard cap, put the bottle to his lips, drink. It took him ten seconds, it gave him time to think. He set the bottle down, recapped it, wiped his lips on a paper napkin that had been tucked under the bottle. Then he pulled a kitchen chair out from the table, swung it around, sat down and leaned his arms on the back. “I can’t buck you on that. How am I supposed to be involved?”

“Where were you Sunday afternoon, Sunday evening?”

“In the afternoon I was speaking to a rank-and-file meeting of the union. At the hiring hall. In the evening I was giving a concert,” he waved toward the accordion, “to the essie-eyes. Seamen’s Church Institute. Maybe I murdered a few pieces, but that’s all.”

“Plenty of people saw you? Both those places?”

“Plenty.”

“Then who the hell signed your name to a register in a scummy dive over in the Jungle?”

“Somebody else—”

“Lured a man up to the room or followed him up there? Killed him?”

“—Not me.”

“Cut his body up? Packed it in a suitcase? Heaved it in the drink?”

Joslin’s ears began to get red. “I’d like to lay my hands on the fellow who signed my name to that.”

“You don’t know anything about any of that.” Koski didn’t make it a question. “All right. Let’s tune in a different station. That was Sunday. This is Tuesday. Where were you about an hour ago?”

“Right here.”

“All by yourself?”

“All by myself. This girl you spoke of, — she was shot an hour ago?”

“Over in Brooklyn. Treanor Place. Know that section?”

“Never heard of it.”

“Maybe young Ovett has.” Koski walked around the room, scrutinized a Gropper cartoon pinned to the wall, a National Geographic map of the Western, Ocean in colors, unfolded over the foot of the cot. “When’d you see him last?”

Joslin rummaged around the table for a stick of gum, concentrated on unwrapping it, before he answered. “Sunday noon. Just before I went over to the union meeting.”

“Where?”

“Here.”

“Say where he was going after he left here?”

“I suppose he was going home.”

“Skip the suppositions. Didn’t expect to see him again before he shipped out?”

“No.”

“Hadn’t figured on his wiring your girl he’d see her today?”

“Listen. You can’t work up any antagonism on that score. Merrill’s been a friend of Ellen’s longer than I have. He introduced me to her.”

“On pretty good terms with young Ovett, weren’t you? Isn’t usual for a union man to be pally with a shipowner’s son.”

“Merrill is a union man as well as a shipowner’s son. That’s why I like him. Any individual who can snap out of his environment enough to see the other fellow’s viewpoint has a lot to him. Merrill does that; he even goes so far as to make trips on one of his father’s vessels, — against the old man’s orders, — to see for himself how the men are being treated.”

“Under an assumed name, hah?”

“He couldn’t get aboard any other way. They’d toss him off on his ear; Hurlihan practically jumped out of his socket when I told him he couldn’t deny the conditions on Ovett ships any longer since an Ovett was getting a firsthand look at them himself, — and would do something about it.”

“Oh! Hurlihan knew?”

“Sure. I told him, when it was too late for him to do anything except rave about it.”

“Sunday morning, maybe?”

Joslin scowled. “No. I saw Hurlihan Sunday. But it was about a different matter.”

“Was, eh? What name’d Merrill sign under, this last voyage?”

“Now you’ve got me. What difference does it make?”

“Might make a lot.” Koski stacked the volumes, again. “Maybe he used T. Joslin.”

The organizer smiled frostily. “That wouldn’t be any passport with Hurlihan. What the hell’s this got to do with the submarines, anyway?”

“Ovett line seems to have been singled out for attention by the U-boys. Merrill Ovett was sunk in one of them. Knows a lot about Ovett sailings. Ovett yacht has a short-wave sending set that could broadcast dope, if anyone could get to it who was so minded. Yacht had the inside track on Cee-Gee activities, being an auxiliary and all.”

“That doesn’t spatter any mud on me.”

“You work around the docks. You could find out when ships clear, — or somebody might pump you and find out. Your name was on the register for the room where the murder was committed. You talked to Ovett Sunday; that’s the day he disappeared.” Koski threw the billiard cue on the cot. “Let’s go over to the hiring hall, find somebody who can corroborate your oratory.”

Joslin put on his cap without comment, led the way downstairs.

They went along West Street. Under the pillars of the express highway, trucks ground their gears and made obscene bombilations. Along the sidewalks, in doorways of saloons, mission halls, pawnbrokers, flop-houses, — men greeted the organizer; seamen, stevedores, truck drivers, winch-men, gunners, stokers. Men, Koski knew, who loaded the fighting ships that had no armor and made ten knots in a heavy sea, men who sailed them across in spite of mines, bombers, periscopes in the dusk...

Joslin might have been reading his mind. “Lot of these boys have been over and back a dozen times.”

“Yair. Wonder what they’d do to a guy if they found out he was setting them up for the subs to shoot at?”

The organizer only grunted.

Koski made one more attempt. “Understand young Ovett is a bug about radio. You up on that short-wave stuff, too?”

Joslin didn’t look at him. “I don’t know an amplifier from an aerial. If you’re intending to get me to say Merrill does, go spit into the wind. I don’t know any good reason why he shouldn’t, — but don’t try to trap me into giving his answers for him.”

At the door to the hiring hall, Mulcahey was waiting. Beside him was Frankie Salderon.

The Sergeant beamed fondly at his prisoner. “Look what wriggles out from under a rock, skipper. The lad who was up in the deckhouse while you were on the yacht.” He patted the Filipino on the shoulder. “Says he aims to get himself another berth. I figure maybe we could make one up for him over at the hoose-gow. No?”