Me, Hood!

First publication in Cavalier, July 1959

First publication in book form in Great Britain, 1963

They picked me up in a bar on Second Avenue and waited for the supper crowd to flow out before they made their tap, two tall smiling lads with late model narrow-brim Kellys that helped them blend into the background of young junior executives.

But both of them had that almost imperceptible cock to their arms that comes from wearing a gun too long on one side, and that made them something else again.

When they came in they pulled out stools on either side of me and began the routine, but I saved them all the trouble they had planned to go to. I finished my drink, pocketed my change and stood up. “We go now?”

Without changing the size of his smile the one with the pale blue eyes said, “We go now.”

I grinned, nodded toward the bartender and walked to the door. On the street a gentle nudge edged me north, then another turned me at the corner to where the car was parked. One got behind the wheel and one was on my right. I didn’t feel any gun rubbing against my hip where it should have, so I knew the guy on my right had it in his hand.

At the door the squat little man stood with his legs spraddled and hands in his pockets, looking at nothing, yet watching everything. The other one sat on the window ledge at my shoulder without saying anything.

Across the city the clock on the square boomed nine. Behind me the door to the inside office opened and a voice said, “Bring him in.”

Smiling Boy let me go ahead of him, followed me in and closed the door.

Then, for the first time, I was wishing I hadn’t played the wise guy. I felt like an idiot for being so damn dumb and while I was trying to put it together I could feel the coldness creeping over me like a winter fog. I shut my mouth and grinned so I wouldn’t start sounding off and let them see the hate I wore like my own skin.

Cops. Out of uniform, but cops. Five in front, one behind me. Two more in the room outside. There was something different about the five, though. The mold was the same, but the metal seemed tempered. If there were any cutting edges they were well hidden, yet ready to expose themselves as fast as a switch blade.

Five men in various shades of single-breasted blues and greys with solemn dark ties on white that hinted at formality not found in general police work. Five pairs of expressionless, yet scrutinizing eyes that somehow seemed weathered and not too easily amused.

But the thin one at the end of the table was different, and I watched him deliberately and knew he was hating my guts just as hard as I was hating his.

From his place at the door, Smiling Boy said, “He knew us. He was waiting for us.”

The thin one’s voice had a flat quality to it. “You think much for... a punk.”

“I’m not the kind of punk you’re used to.”

“How long have you known?”

I shrugged. “Since you started.” I told him, “Two weeks.”

They looked at each other, annoyed, some angry. One leaned forward on the desk, his face flushed. “How did you know?”

“I told you. I’m no ordinary punk.”

“...I asked you a question.”

I looked at the guy at the table. His hands were tight and white at the knuckles, but his face had lost its flush. “I’ve been a while at this game myself,” I said. “Every animal knows it’s got a tail no matter how short it is. I knew I had mine the first day you tacked it on.”

The guy looked past me to Smiling Boy. “Did you know that?”

My buddy at the door fidgeted a second, then: “No, sir.”

“Was it ever suspected?”

Another hesitation. “No, sir. None of the reports from the other shifts mentioned it.”

“Great,” the man said, “just great.” Then he looked back at me again. “You could have shaken this tail?”

“Anytime.”

“I see.” He paused and sucked his lip into his teeth. “But you preferred not to. Why?”

“Let’s say I was curious.”

“You have that kind of curiosity about someone who could be there to kill you?”

“Sure,” I said. “I’m a foolish man. You know that.”

“Watch your mouth, feller.”

I grinned at him so hard that the scar across my back got tight. “Go to hell!”

“Listen...”

“No, you listen, you stinking, miserable little slob... don’t tell me to watch my mouth. Don’t tell me one lousy little thing to do at all or I’ll tell you where to shove it. Don’t try to peg me because I have a record...”

In back of me the tall boy stopped smiling and hissed, “Let him say it out.”

“Damn right, let me say it out. You got no choice. You’re not fooling with a parolee or a hooker who’s scared stiff of cops. I hate cops in general and right now you slobs in particular. This little shake has all the earmarks of a frame and brother, you’re going in over your head if you try it.”

“That all?”

“No,” I said. “Now I’m done playing. I went along for the ride to see what the bit was and it stinks. So I leave. If you think I can’t, then put the arm on me and try stopping me. Then you monkeys are going to have a pretty time trying to explain this set up to a couple of tabloids I got friends on.”

The thin one said, “Finished?”

“Yeah. Now I’m leaving.”

“Don’t go.”

I stopped and stared at him. Nobody had moved to get in my way at all. There was something tight about the way they all stood there, something all wrong about the play that I couldn’t make. I could feel my back going tight again and I said, “What?”

The thin one swung around in his chair. “I thought you said you were a curious person.”

I went back to the table. “Okay, friend. But before I get suckered in, answer me some questions.”

The thin one nodded, his face impassive.

“You’re cops.”

He nodded, but now there was something new in his eyes. “All right, I’ll qualify it. We’re cops... of a sort.”

I asked, “Who am I?”

His answer was flat and methodical. “Ryan. The Irish One. Sixteen arrests, one conviction for assault and battery. Suspected of being involved in several killings, several robberies and an uncooperative witness in three homicide cases. Associates with known criminals, has no visible source of income except for partial disability pension from World War II. Present address...”

“That’s enough,” I said.

He paused and leaned back. “Also — you’re rather astute.”

“Thanks. I went to college for two years.”

“It made a difference criminally?”

“It made no difference one way or another. Get on with the pitch.”

His fingers made a slow roll on the table top.

“You knew you had been tailed for two weeks. Do you know why?”

“First guess is that you’re figuring a fix for me to turn stoolie,” I said. “If that’s it you’ve wasted time because you aren’t that smart to catch me off base.”

“Then you think you’re smarter than an entire law enforcement agency?”

They watched me. Nobody said a thing. Finally I said, “Okay. I’m a curious guy. Spell it out slow in punk language so I won’t miss the juicy parts.”

The others left the room when the thin one nodded.

He said, “There is a job that must be done. We can’t do it because of several factors involved. One is simple enough to understand; it is possible... even probable that we are known to those of... the opposition forces. The other reason has a psychological factor involved.”

“It must be a beauty,” I said.

He went on as if he had never heard me. “Our groups are highly skilled. Although those chosen to augment our group are of the finest calibre, the most select, elite... they still have certain handicaps civilized society has inflicted on them. Maybe you can finish it for me.”

I nodded. “Sure. Let’s try a lucky guess. You need an animal. Some improver of the breed has run all shagginess out of your business-suit characters and you need a downtown shill to bait your hook. How close did I come?”

“Close,” he said.

“I’m still listening.”

“We need somebody of known talents. Like you. Somebody whose mind can deal on an exact level with... the opposition. We need someone whose criminal disposition can be directed into certain channels.”

“An animal,” I said, “the dirty kind. Maybe a jackal that can play around in the jungle with the big ones without being caught.”

“It’s descriptive enough.”

“Not quite. The rest of it is that if he’s killed he wouldn’t even be missed or counted for a loss.”

When he answered, he said, “That isn’t exactly ‘punk language’.”

“But I’m there, huh?”

“You’re there,” he said solemnly.

I shook my head slowly. “Brother!” I pushed away from the desk and straightened up. “I think you made a mistake in nomenclature, buddy. It’s not a psychological factor involved, it’s a philosophical one. Only your appeal is psychological. You posed me a pretty, laddie.”

“I... don’t suppose it would do much good to appeal on a patriotic basis?”

“You suppose right. You can shove flag-waving and duty-to-your country crap with the rest of it.”

“Then how do I appeal?”

“To curiosity and one thing more. Money!”

“How much?”

I grinned real big, all the way across my face. “A bundle, friend. For what you want, a bundle. Tax-free, no strings, in small, used bills.”

“What is it that I wanted?” he asked.

For fun I played it straight. I said, “You clued me, friend. Patriotism doesn’t exist on any local level. Suddenly we’re international and I can only think of three fields where you striped pantsers could exploit me. The narcotic trade through Italy, Mexico or China; illegal gold shipments to Europe; then last, the Commies.”

He didn’t answer.

“How much?” I asked.

“You can get your bundle.”

“Like I said? Tax free, small bills...”

“Like you said,” he repeated.

“One more point.”

“Ask it,” he told me.

“What makes you think I’ll like the bit?”

“Because you hate cops and politicians and those are the kind of people you’ll get a chance to really crack down on.”

I squinted at him. “You’re leaving something out.”

“You’re right, Irish. You’re communicating now, boy. I left out the needle. Money is a powerful motivator, but the needle still has to be there. If you take the deal we supply the toxin-anti-toxin.”

“So?”

“You’ll take it?”

I nodded. “Sure. What’d you expect me to say?”

“Nothing.” With his fingers he drew a paper from his pocket, unfolded it so the bottom showed with the signature line and nothing more, then he passed me his pen. “Sign it.”

The laugh came out of me of its own accord. Why ask to read it? I had nothing I could sign away and nothing to confess to that couldn’t be broken in court and nothing makes me more curious than signing first and asking to read later. I signed.

I said, “What’s the pitch?”

“Nothing you’d appreciate. To protect ourselves or yourself under impossibly remote circumstances you now have a certain measure of legal protection.”

“Like what?”

“Like you were just made a cop,” he said.

I took it easy and said all the words slowly and plainly so he wouldn’t miss a one and after a long time I ran out. His face had turned white and the corners of his mouth were pulled back tight.

“You finished?” he said.

“It’s all the punk language I can think of right now.”

“I don’t like the arrangement any better than you do. It’s a necessity or it never would have happened. You’re in.”

“Suppose I crap out?”

“You won’t.”

“Okay, I asked for it. Now what do you do, indoctrinate me or something?”

“Not at all. All you’re going to do is be given a name. You’ll find that person. Then whatever is necessary to do... you do.”

“Damn, man, can’t you make sense?”

The smile came back again. “Making sense of it is your job. The picture will come clear by itself. You’ll know what to do.”

“Sure. Great.” I asked the question. “Who?”

“The name is Lodo.”

“That’s all?”

He nodded. “That’s all. Just find him. You’ll know what to do.”

“Then the loot?”

“A big bundle of it. More than you’ve ever had in your life.”

“How long do I have?”

“No time limit.”

I let the laugh out easily. His eyes tightened when the laugh spread to my face. “Just for the record before we turn the machine off, friend... who steered you to me?”

“A man named Billings. Henry Billings. Familiar?”

Something choked the laugh off in my throat. “Yeah, I know him.”

Know him? The lousy slob ratted on me to the M.P.’s about liberating 10 grand of some kraut’s gold hoard back in ’45 and while I was getting the guardhouse treatment when some planted coins were found in my footlocker, he walked off with the stuff himself. The day I caught up with him would be his last.

When I knew nothing was showing on my face I said, “Where could I find him?”

“Out in Brooklyn... in a cemetery.”

I felt like kicking the walls out of the building. I had nursed that hate for too long to have it snatched away from me like that. Thirteen years now I had been waiting.

“What happened?”

“He was shot.”

“Yeah?”

“He was after the same name.”

I said, “Yeah?” again.

“Before he died he recommended you. He said you were the only one he knew who was a bigger bastard than he was himself.”

“He was lying.”

“You still with it?”

“Sure.” I wouldn’t miss it for anything now. Someplace Billings had bought something with that 10 G’s and whatever he got was mine now no matter who I had to take it away from. “Where do I start?”

“With a phone number. Billings had it on him.”

“Whose?” I said.

“You find out. We couldn’t figure it.”

Once again he dipped into his pocket. He came up with a pad and wrote a phone number on it, a Murray Hill exchange. He let me see it, then tore it out and held a match under it.

Outside, I whistled up a cab and cruised back toward the main stem, trying hard to think my way out of the situation. It had all the earmarks of a sucker trap and somehow I got elected to try it out. Me, strictly Brooklyn Irish, old Ryan himself, heading straight for the plastic pottie boobie prize.

Man, I thought, I’m not new to this business. I’ve been around a long while and made plenty the easy way without pulling time. Even the hard boys on the big team uptown stayed off my back.

At 49th St. and Sixth Ave. I paid off the cabbie and walked to Joe DiNuccio’s. I went into the back room where I knew Art Shay would be and slid in across the booth from him.

Art’s a funny guy. He does feature writing for a syndicated outfit, but he could have been a great reporter or TV analyst if something hadn’t happened between him and some broad before he got back from Germany in ’45. Now he was spending all his time on assignments, working hard to get himself killed.

His eyes peered at me over the top of the galley proofs he was checking. “What’re you crawling after now?”

I grinned at him. “Something funny’s happening to me.”

“That shouldn’t be a new feeling for you, Ryan. Who’s bump list you on now?”

“Art,” I said. “Tell me something. Have you ever known the fuzz to use a hood for anything except a stoolie?”

The corners of his eyes stretched taut. “No. Not the straight boys, anyway. What have you got going?”

“Nothing special. I’m just curious about a few things.”

“Any story in it?”

“Maybe.”

“Want to talk about it?”

“Not yet. Things aren’t squared away. Maybe you can fit in some pieces. Ever hear of a man named Billings?”

His eyes opened a little wider. “Same one who got gunned down a few days ago?”

I nodded.

“It was just a squib in the paper. Called a gang killing.” He stopped suddenly and looked at me hard. “Ryan... I remember ten years back when you were talking about killing a guy by that name. Did you tap him?”

“I didn’t have the luck, kiddo. That tap was somebody else’s.”

“The conversation is fascinating, Ryan. Keep it up.”

“Okay, read this. Billings wasn’t a small tap at all. That guy had something so big it would have made front page for a week.”

“Like what?”

I shook my head. “I’m new to it too.”

“How are you involved?”

“Because Billings had something he knew could get me killed too. It was the last thing he ever did, but he did it good. That warped slob had to live like a snake just to stay alive ever since he framed me and he made up for it, all right.” I stopped and grinned real big. “At least he thought he did.”

Art dropped his chin in his hand and nodded. “What can I do?”

“As an accredited reporter, you can get some official answers. Get any statement Billings made and any details on how he was killed. Can do?”

“Shouldn’t be hard. Those reports are on file.” He waited a moment, then said, “You’re giving me a small worm for a big hook.”

“Thanks.” I uncurled myself and got up. “Ever know anyone called Lodo?”

He thought a moment, then shook his head. “Nothing there. Important?”

“Who knows. Think on it.”

“Sure. Where can I reach you?”

“Remember Papa Manny’s old three-floor brownstone?”

“Off Second?”

“I own it now. I live in the basement apartment.”

The Murray Hill exchange the thin one had given me wasn’t a phone. It was a coded password that got you admission into a horse parlor operating right on Broadway. It wasn’t one of the things the cops could be expected to know, not even the grafters.

But I knew. I even had the latest job. The one they gave me was three weeks old. The boy on the door winked, said, “Hi, Ryan, come in an’ spend a buck.”

The place had changed some. The loot was flowing in. The board was bigger, there was free booze at a service bar and fat chairs where the benches used to be.

Jake McGaffney came out from behind the pay window, saw me and came over. “Changing rackets, kid?”

“Not me, Jake. I like mine better. They got to be sure things for me.”

“We got a few of those too,” he chuckled. “What’s on your mind?”

I nudged his arm and steered him to the end of the pay window. “You getting touched by anybody?”

“You know this operation, Ryan. We’re not paying off. Hell, the cops know we’re operating, but we move too fast for them to line us up.”

“Nobody trying to cut in?”

“Get with it, boy. Since I played ball at the trial, uptown lets me go my own way. Sure, they give me limits and it’s okay with me. Nobody’s shaking me though. What’s got you?”

“Did you know Billings?”

“Sure. He got gunned.” Then he stopped and his face looked drawn. “He didn’t leave any tracks to this place, did he?”

“Nothing that can tie in. The fuzz had an old MU code he wrote down.”

Jake let his face relax and picked a butt from his pack and lit it. Through the smoke he said, “I’m okay then. They would’ve hit me before this if they figured it.”

“Jake... got any idea why Billings got tapped?”

“Idea?” He laughed in his chest. “Hell, man, I know why.”

“Why, Jake?”

“He had twelve thousand skins in his pocket when he left here. A nag called Annie’s Foot came in and he was riding it hard.”

“He been coming here long?”

“A month, maybe. I got a memo on him from his first play if you want it.”

“Who steered him in?”

“Gonzales. You know little Juan Gonzales... he’s the one pulled that kid outa the Hudson River sometime back and got his picture in the tabs. He was down the docks goofing off when this lady starts to scream and...”

“Where is he now, Jake?”

“Gonzales?” he seemed surprised. “He got killed three weeks ago. He got loaded and stepped right out in front of a truck. He got dead quick. No waiting around.”

I said, “He have a family?”

“Just some dame. You wait... I’ll get you the business.”

He went behind the window and poked around in a card file until he found what he wanted. It was a short history of Juan Gonzales and when I memorized the data I handed it back. “Keep it if you want,” he said.

“I don’t need it.”

Juan Gonzales had lived on 54th, a few houses down from Tenth Ave. It was a fringe area where total integration of the underprivileged of all classes fused into a hotbed of constant violence. Lucinda Gonzales had a second floor rear apartment. The bells never worked in these tenements so I just went up and knocked at the door. It opened on a chain and a pretty, dark face peered at me and queried, “Si... who is it?”

“Lucinda Gonzales?”

“Si.”

“I want to speak about Juan. Can I come in?”

She hesitated, shrugged, then closed the door to unhook the chain. I stepped inside and she leaned back against the door.

“I can tell you are not the policeman.”

“That’s right.”

“You are not one of Juan’s friends, either.”

“How do you know?”

“His friends are all peegs. Not even tough guys. Just peegs.”

“Thanks.”

“What you want?”

“I want to know about Juan. You married?”

She made a wry face. “Nothing by the church. But this is not what you want to say.”

This time I gave her a little grin. “Okay, chicken... I’ll put it this way... Juan got loaded and got himself killed. He...”

“He did?” the sarcasm was thick. I stopped and let her say the rest. “Juan did not drink, señor.”

“What’s bothering you, Lucinda?”

“You, señor.” Her arms were folded tightly across her breasts, making them half rise from her dress. “To me you look like the one who could do it.”

“Do what?”

“Make Juan go crazy with fear. Maybe chase him so he runs in front of the truck and gets killed. All this time I have waited because I knew soon that somebody would come. They would have to come here. There is no other place. Now you are here, señor, and I can kill you like I have been waiting to do.”

She unfolded her arms. In one hand she had a snub-nose rod and at that distance there wasn’t a chance she could miss me.

“You better be sure, chicken,” I said.

Her voice was getting a hysterical calm. There was a dull happy look in her eyes that meant she was crowding the deep end and so was I. “I am sure, señor.”

I said very deliberately, “How do you know?”

“I know those of who Juan would be afraid. You are such a one. You thought he had his money when he died. He did not. Those ten thousand dollars, señor... it was here.”

“Ten thousand...” My voice was soft, but she heard it.

Her smile was vicious. “But it is not here now. It is safe. It is in the bank and it is mine. For such a sum Juan died. Now you can follow him.”

She took too long to shoot. She thought of Juan first and her eyes flooded at the wrong time. I slapped my hand over hers and the firing pin bit into my skin when I yanked the rod out of her hand. When she started to scream, I belted her across the mouth and knocked her into a chair. She tried another one and I backhanded it loose and as though I snapped my fingers, the glazed look left her eyes and she stared at me from a face contorted by fear.

When she had it long enough I said, “Ease off. You won’t get hurt.”

She didn’t believe me. She had lived with one idea too long.

“Lucinda... I never knew Juan. I don’t want his bundle. That clear?”

She nodded.

“Where’d the ten grand come from?”

Defiance showed across her face. Then it all came back again; fear, disbelief, hatred, defiance.

I said, “Listen to me, sugar. If I wanted to I could make you talk a real easy way. It wouldn’t be hard. I could make you scream and talk and scream and talk and you couldn’t stop it. You know this?”

She bobbed her head once, quickly.

“But I don’t want anything that bad. I’m not going to do anything like that. Understand?”

“Si.”

“Then once more... where’d the ten G’s come from?”

Nervously, she ran her fingers through her hair. “He came home from the docks one day and told me that soon we would go back to the island. Only now it would not be a mud hut but in a fine building that we would live. He said we were going to have much money. We would travel around the world, maybe.”

“When was this?”

“The week before he died, señor.”

“He had it then?”

“No.” She stood up quickly and stepped to the table, turned and leaned back against it. “He was getting it then, he said. He was feeling very good. But he did not drink.”

She shrugged. “He changed. He became a scared one. He would tell me nothing. Nothing at all. The same night he... died...” she paused and put her face in her hands a moment before going on, “...he came in and took something from where he hid it in the closet.”

“What was it?”

“I do not know. It was not very big. I theenk it could have been a gun. One time he kept a gun there wrapped up in rags. He did not show me. He went out for maybe an hour. When he came back he had this money. He gave it to me and told me to pack up. Then he left.”

“Where to?”

“To die somewhere, señor. He said he was going to... how you say it... arrange things.”

“You have the dough.”

“Is it really mine?”

I flipped the rod in my hand then tossed it on top of the table. “Sure it’s yours,” I told her. “Why not?”

She picked up the gun, studied it and laid it down again. “I am sorry if I... almost shot you.”

“You could have been sorrier. You could have gotten your picture in the morning papers real easy.”

Her smile was grim. “Yes. Like Juan.” She opened a drawer in the dish closet and took out two front pages from recent tabloids and handed them to me. In one Juan was a hero. In the other he was dead.

But on his last public appearance there was an out-of-character bit for what I had been thinking. The truck driver who killed him was sitting on the curb crying.

I reached for the door. Before I opened it I said, “Did Juan ever mention a man named Lodo?”

“Lodo? Si. Twice he says this name. It was when he was very scared.”

I let go the door, all edgy again. “Who is he?”

“He was asleep when he said this name, señor. I do not know. I do not ask, either.”

I closed the door quietly behind me and went back downstairs.

It had started to rain and the street stank.

The truck that had killed Juan was one of the Abart fleet from Brooklyn. I told the harried little boss I was an insurance investigator and he told me I had 20 minutes before Harry Peeler would be in and to have a seat.

At 5:40 a short thin guy with grey hair came in and the girl there said, “That gentleman’s waiting to see you, Harry. Insurance investigator.”

“It’s about the... accident, I suppose.”

“Well, yes.”

“Terrible.” He glanced at me ruefully. “I’m finished driving, Mr. Ryan. I can’t go it any more.”

“I want you to tell me about that night.”

“But I told...”

“You’ve had a chance to think it over since then, Mr. Peeler. You’ve gone over every detail a thousand times, haven’t you?”

He moaned, “Oh, help me, yes. Yes, every night. I can’t forget it.”

“Tell me about it, Mr. Peeler.”

“How can I explain something crazy like that? It was three A.M. and nobody was on the streets. I was driving toward the bridge when this guy comes from in front of this parked truck. Right under the wheels!”

“Was he running?”

At first he didn’t answer. When he looked up, he had a puzzled expression working at his face, then he said, “He kind of flew.”

“What?”

“I know it sounds crazy, but that’s what it was like. He must have been standing there all along, just waiting. He didn’t run. He dove, like. You know what I mean. Maybe he was committing suicide. He dove, like.”

“Could he have been pushed, like?”

Harry Peeler’s eyes opened wide, startled. He swallowed hard, thinking, “He... could have been.”

“You’ve been thinking that, haven’t you?”

He swallowed again.

I said, “It wasn’t your fault. You couldn’t have done anything to prevent it.”

He wasn’t looking at me. He was squinting at the far wall and I heard him say, “Somebody ran from behind that truck. I know it. It took a while to remember, but I know it! I was yelling for somebody to get a doctor. It was a long while before anybody came. Somebody was behind that truck, though.”

I stood up and patted his shoulder. “Okay. You feel better now?”

“Sure.” He grinned. “It ain’t good to kill somebody, but it’s better knowing you couldn’t of stopped it anyhow.”

“That’s the way. You keep driving.”

I made a double check around Harry Peeler’s neighborhood. He was a long time resident and strictly a family man. Everybody liked the guy. When I got done asking questions, I was pretty sure of one thing.

Harry Peeler hadn’t been in on any killing except by coincidence.

The rain had started again, driving the city indoors. DiNuccio’s was crowded and smelled of beer and damp clothes. Art was waiting for me, in the back. When I sat down, I said, “Let’s have it.”

“Sure. Killed with a .38 slug in the chest, two in the stomach. Now here’s an item the papers didn’t have. He wasn’t shot where he died. My guess is that he was thrown from a car. The officers on the scene first aren’t talking so it’s my guess again that he talked before he kicked off. Item two: I ran into so many icy stares when I pushed this thing that I got the idea something pretty hot was being covered up. A check through a good friend came up with this bit... there’s some kind of a grumble on where the high hoods sit.”

“What else on Billings?”

“Briefly, his last address was a midtown hotel and the name a phony. He was traced back through two others, but no further.”

“Source of income?”

“His latest room had an assortment of bum dice and new-but-marked decks of cards very cleverly packaged and stamped. He was a sharpie. A few receipted bills and match covers placed him working cheap places around here and in Jersey.”

“Ten years,” I said. “All that time under my nose and I never got near him.”

“Be happy, chum.” He flipped his pages over and scanned them, picking out pieces of information. “One thing more. I found a couple of shills he played with before he died. He was talking about having a roll waiting. He was going into big time. Nobody paid any attention to him right then.”

I thought a moment, remembering how Billings operated in the Army. “Was he flush when he played?”

“Those shills said he always had enough risk capital to entice some nice fat bankrolls.” He looked at me and put his notes away. “Now let’s hear what you have to say,” he said softly.

I shook my head at him. “This is stupid. Everything’s doubling back. It starts and ends too fast. You sure you got everything on Billings?”

“Yeah.” I waved the waiter over for a beer and then knocked half of it off in a long pull. “I’m going to guess a little bit here, but see how it works out.

“Billings was a funny guy. He used to say he’d wait for the big one to come along if he waited all his life. He foxed me out of ten grand in the army and when I got out of the guardhouse, he’d been discharged. He hung onto that roll and used it as sucker bait for his rigged games. I doubt if he took anybody for too much. That would have spoiled it. Those games were listening posts waiting for that big one. All he’d bother to make would be living expenses.

“Then a guy named Juan Gonzales, who was a small time pay-off man for a friend of mine, must have sat in, saw the roll and talked up horses. He even got Billings passed into the rooms. Matter of fact, the night he was killed he had twelve G’s on him.”

Art let out a slow whistle. “He was clean when he was found.”

“Nobody would let that lay around, kiddo. It could have been a motive for his death.”

“For twelve G’s he could get a firstclass ride in this town, not just a plain mugging.”

I said, “Now listen... this Juan Gonzales had been killed a couple weeks earlier. Before he got it he was talking big money to his common-law wife, then he got scared spitless for some reason, showed up with ten grand, handed it to her and went out and got bumped.”

“I remember the case. Front page. He had just...”

“That’s the guy.”

“In other words, your point is that in either case the motive could possibly be robbery.”

“Yeah, only it isn’t. First because I’m in and next because there’s a lid on the deal. It’s real stupid. Everything doubles back. You sure you have everything on Billings?”

“He was buried at the city’s expense and the only bunch of flowers came from the Lazy Dazy Flower Shop. The graveyard attendant remembered the name. If you want him exhumed, dig him up yourself.”

“Sure.” I threw a buck on the table. “Keep in touch.”

My watch said 9:55 and I was tired. I found a cab outside, got off at my corner and started up toward my apartment.

The first pitch came from Pete-the-Dog who sold papers with a broken-throated growl. It came again from Mamie Huggins who waited until I passed by to put out her garbage and it came again by low whistle from the shadows across the street.

Two of them. Unknowns. They were waiting in my apartment.

I came through the back way Papa Manny always used when the police raided the old love factory he ran. I picked up the .45 from the shelf, cocked it under my arm so the click of the hammer was inaudible and stood there in the dark until my eyes were used to it.

One stood looking out the window. The other sat right in front of me and he was the one I put the cold snout of the gun against. I said, “Be at ease, laddies. You move and you’re dead.”

I stepped inside and prodded my boy. He got up obediently and walked to the wall. The other one got the idea and did the same. They both leaned against it while I patted them down and waited while I flicked on the light. Then I dumped the shells from the Cobras they carried in belt holsters and laid them on an end table. They both were too mad to spit.

The guy from the window I knew. I had met him a few days ago up in that apartment far above the city. The other was a new face. That one looked at me coldly, then to the gun. “You have a license for that?”

I grinned at him. “Let’s say a poetic one, cop. I signed a piece of paper up there the boss man says allows me certain liberties.”

“There’s only one copy and it can be torn up very easily.”

“Not for a simple fracture like this, you slob. Now knock it off. If you’re so damn dumb you can’t break and enter without being spotted you ought to join the fire department.”

The other one said, “Lay off, Ryan.”

“Okay,” I said. “So let’s hear what’s going on and get out.”

He hated me silently and then put on his blank face again. “To be simple about it, we’d like a progress report.”

I said, “Nobody told me anything about this junket. I got sent off cold. What do you expect from me?”

“All right. What do you want to know?”

“How did you contact Billings?”

“We didn’t. He came to us. He had something to sell.”

“Like what?”

“We don’t know. It was international in scope and big enough to cause a muss in this country. Our people overseas picked up information that there was trouble in high places. It was from there that we found out that Billings was a key figure.”

“Somebody has quite an organization,” I said.

“It’s as big as ours.”

“Go on.”

“Billings apparently overplayed it. He wanted to sell what he had. We decided to go along. We assigned four men to keep him protected... top men, I might add. They worked in teams of two and both teams were killed. Four good men, Ryan, highly trained, killed like rank amateurs. It was Billings who found the last team. He called and said he was getting out and that was when he told us about you.

“He got out, all right. He was as cute as you with a trick dodge. He didn’t last very long, though. He caught it that night.”

“Nothing was in the paper about those boys getting killed.”

“That was easy enough to fix.”

“Yeah.” I walked across the room and pulled a cold beer from the cooler. “Tell me... Billings wasn’t dead when he was found. What did he say?”

I watched their faces. They couldn’t help it, but their eyes touched, briefly.

“Okay, Ryan, you’re sharp. He wasn’t dead. He said it was Lodo. That’s where we got the name. We have nothing else on it.”

They didn’t know and I didn’t tell them that another dead man had known Lodo. How many more?

I said, “One more thing... was any money found on Billings?”

His voice was a little too flat. “What do you mean?”

“The police reports say he was clean. It earmarked a robbery.”

“So?”

“What happened to the twelve grand?”

My friend held his mouth tight. “How did you know about that?”

“I get around.”

Before he could answer, it came to me. It was all backwards and wrong, but it could make sense to them. I said, “If you’re thinking I sold him something for twelve grand, you’re gone, man. You just loused your picture up. Now I’m reading you R5-S5. You pigs conned me into taking on a kill job with hopes of hanging me. All this while I had in the back of my mind I was doing something that could make you idiots look jerky and because you asked me to at that. In fact, a couple of times I caught myself enjoying doing something straight for a change. Brother, what a sucker I was!

“So my old buddy Billings tips you to me before he’s found dead with twelve G’s in his pocket. So I’m on the spot. Oh, man, this is crazy. What was I supposed to do... get so shook that I left a hole in my scheme somewhere that I’d try backtracking until I tripped myself up?”

I let go of the mad slowly, and when I had it down where it belonged, I grinned at them. “Laddies, you’re devious thinkers, but you thunk wrong. I got you by the short hairs now. I’m in and you’re out. I’m going to ride this one for all it’s worth. I’m so far ahead of you right now it’s pathetic and it’ll stay that way. You tell the boss man to get that pile of small bills ready, y’hear?”

They didn’t answer me.

“I want one more thing,” I said. “I want a copy of my ‘appointment’ and a number where you guys can be reached sent to me care of General Delivery at 34th Street. I want a license for this gun and the number is 127569. Remember it. Now blow out of here and don’t bother laying a tail on me. It won’t work. If I want you I’ll call and that’s the only progress report you’ll get.”

You go up 16 floors and you get off in a plush foyer surrounded by antique furniture and a lovely redhead who smiles and you are encompassed by Peter J. Haynes, III. Co., Inc.

She looked up at me, button by button until she came to my eyes, then she stopped and smiled a little bit bigger. To her I was something different than the usual Haynes client even though mine was a $200 suit. The shirt was white and the collar spread. The tie was black knitted and neat and the cuffs that showed were the proper half inch below the coat cuff. The links were plain, but gold, and they showed. The only thing out of place was my face. I don’t think I looked like the typical Haynes client. I wasn’t carrying a briefcase, either. I was carrying a rod, but that was one reason for the $200 suit. It didn’t show.

The redhead said, “Good morning.”

I said, “Hello, honey.”

She said, “Can I help you?”

I said, “Anytime.”

She said, “Please...”

I said, “I should be the one to say please.”

She said, “Stop it!”

I said, “What’ll you give me if I do?”

Then she smiled and said, “You’re crazy.”

I smiled back, “Is Carmen Smith here?”

“It would have to be her,” she said. “Yes, she’s here. Is she expecting you?”

“No.”

“Then you can’t see her.”

“Who’s going to keep me out?” I said.

She got the grin back. “Nobody around here, I guess. Miss Smith is down the hall, at the end. She’ll be mad.”

“Tough.”

She went down the buttons again in reverse. “I hope so. Stop by to say so-long.”

I grinned at her. “I will, don’t worry.”

Miss Smith was encompassed by two girl secretaries and a queer. She was behind a desk talking into a hush-a-phone, doodling on an early Times edition. When I walked in, I waved a thumb at the dolls and they got out. The queer took longer until he looked straight at me. Miss Smith said something into the HP and hung up. Then she pushed back her chair and stood up.

Most times a woman is nothing. Sometimes you can classify them as pretty or not pretty. Sometimes you can say this one I like or this one I do not like.

Then one day you see one who is totally unlike all the rest and this is one you not only like but one you must have. This is one who has been waiting a long time for somebody and instinctively you know that until now she hasn’t found that one. She’s big and beautiful and stands square-shouldered like a man, but she’s full-breasted and taut and completely undressed beneath the sheath she has on. She’s not trying for anything. She doesn’t have to. You don’t have to look to know she’s long-legged and round and in her loins there’s a subtle fire that can be fanned, and fanned, and fanned.

I said the obvious. “Miss Smith?”

“Yes.”

“My name is Ryan.”

“I have no morning appointments.”

“Now you have, kitten.”

I let her take a good look at me. It didn’t take long. She knew. I wasn’t taking any apple out of her hand.

“Can I help you?”

“Sure, honey. That you can do.”

“Well.”

“A flower shop... the Lazy Dazy... in Brooklyn, tells me you sent a bouquet to a friend of mine.”

It would be hard to describe the brief play that went across her face.

“Billings,” I said. “He was killed. He got one bunch of flowers. Yours.”

Again, it happened, that sympathetic sweep of emotions touching her eyes and her mouth. She sat down at an angle, woman-like, with her knees touching, and her hand on the desk shook a little.

“You... are a friend?”

“Not of his. Were you?”

Her eyes filled up and she made a motion with her head before reaching for the tissues in her drawer. “I’m sorry. I can never quite get used to people dying whom I know.”

“Don’t let it get you, sugar. He wasn’t worth it.”

“I know, but he was still someone I was familiar with. May I ask who you are?”

“The name is Ryan, honey. In common parlance I’m a hood. Not a big one, but I get along.”

There was a silent appeal in her eyes. “I don’t... quite...”

“Where do you come off knowing a bummer like Billings?”

“Why should I tell you?”

“Because if I don’t get the answer, the cops will.”

She sucked in her breath, filling the tanned skin of her bosom, swelling it against the dress.

I said, “How well did you know Billings?”

“Tell me something first. Since you seem so interested in me, have you... let’s say... investigated me in any way?”

“Nope.”

“Mr. Ryan... I’m a gambler.”

“A good one?”

“One of the best. My father was a professional. According to his need or current morals, he would work it right or wrong. No better card mechanic ever lived. He supported me in style.”

“You...?”

“Mother died at my birth. My father never married again. He gave me everything including an education in mechanics to the point where I can clean a table any time I want to.”

“This doesn’t explain Billings.”

“I’m a card player, Mr. Ryan. I’m in on all the big games that ever happen in this city. I win more than I could possibly make at a mundane job from fat little men who love to show off before a woman. If you’re really a hood, then ask around the slap circuit who I am. I’m sure they’ll be able to tell you.”

“I don’t have to ask. But that still doesn’t explain Billings.”

“Billings was a queer draw. He was a good mechanic at times, but not good enough to work against the big ones. Straight, he was all right. One day he sat in with us and I caught him working and cut him loose. He never did figure it until I got him invited again. You see, Mr. Ryan, these types are fun for me. I was able to chop him down to nothing just for the fun of it.”

“How much did you take him for?”

“Just for hundreds. He had money, but we were playing for cards, understand? Money isn’t quite that important.”

“He was good?”

“Very. But just not that good.”

“When did you see him last?”

She didn’t hesitate. “Three days before he was killed.”

“This you can prove?”

When she had her composure back, she said simply. “I should never have sent him flowers.”

“That wasn’t the bit, kid.”

“No? What was then?”

“You’re a big gal. A VP of a promising industry. You make fifteen hundred a week in your job and while the boss is away you’re head doll here. You have a penthouse on Madison Avenue and charge accounts in the best stores. So you like to gamble. You like to play cards. This wasn’t hard to find out at all.”

“I thought you hadn’t investigated me.”

“I didn’t. I picked it all up from one talkative building attendant.”

“Then why are you considering me suspect, Mr. Ryan?” the tears were there.

“You sent him a five-dollar bouquet, kid.”

And she didn’t hesitate this time, either. “He was a five-dollar card player, Mr. Ryan.”

“And you’re sentimental?”

“No, but it was a gesture to the cheap dead.”

“The gesture could be vindictive.”

“When you’re dead it doesn’t matter. It was a gesture. Now I’m sorry for it.”

“I don’t like it, baby,” I told her softly.

When she looked up, the VP was gone and I could have been looking at her across a table somewhere. She was all woman and coldly wild, with full-house eyes ready to sweat me out. It only lasted a second, but while it did I knew there was no bluff.

She said, “My father was well known at Monte Carlo. He was even better known at Vegas. His name wasn’t Smith. One day he was shot by a crazy little man who lost his own roll with his own marked cards.”

“What happened to the crazy little man?”

“The nine-year-old daughter of the dead man blew his head off with a shotgun from ten feet away.”

I said quietly, “You?”

“Me.”

“You sent him a five dollar bouquet too?”

“No.” Her smile was clean and straight across. “The girl daddy was living with did, though.”

“I like the gesture,” I said coldly.

“I think it was fitting.” Her tone matched mine.

“Now?”

“Something has come up as regards Mr. Billings. He was killed and now you’re here. Not the police. Just you. Why?”

I said, “Billings left me to the dogs for ten grand one time. I think he did it again. I’m a little anxious to find out who’s involved in this play.”

“You think I might be one?”

“I don’t know, but baby... I’m going to find out real soon.”

“I’m not sorry he’s dead,” she said. “To me it doesn’t matter one way or another. In a way, perhaps, I’m glad, nevertheless, I don’t care. How you fit into this is no concern of mine. Is there anything else?”

I grinned and stood up and leaned over her desk. I said, “Yeah, kid, one thing more. Like you’ve been told a million times, you’re an interesting wench. I wish you weren’t out of it. From now on it’s all going to be real dull.”

Until now she hadn’t smiled. When she did it was with a wet mouth and white teeth that made something happen no matter how early it was. She was hazel eyes, and suddenly chestnut hair, then even more quickly something slippery your hands should try to hold but couldn’t.

She was big. Not as big as me, but big. When she uncurled and faced me she said, “No... I’ll have to change it for you. Nobody ever called me that before.”

“What before?”

“Merely interesting.”

“My apologies.”

“Not accepted here, Mr. Ryan.” She looked at her watch, then smiled across at me. “It’s almost noon. I’ll let you apologize at lunch.”

“It’s getting cute again, kid.”

Her smile had a question in it, then she understood what I meant. She laughed outright this time. “Let me put it this way, Mr. Ryan... there is a reason I want to be with you a little longer. You see, I’ve known many men... but I never had lunch with a real hood before. Shall we go?”

I took her to Pat Shane’s for lunch. We ate on the dark side, in a back booth away from big ears and cigar smoke. By the time the steaks were gone, there was little I didn’t know about Carmen Smith.

She reached across the table and laid her hand on top of mine. “Ryan... do you think you’ll ever find out who killed Billings?”

I turned my hand over and held hers. “I’ll find them.”

“Is it... dangerous?”

That got a short laugh from me. “It’s not exactly a soft touch. A couple of guys already died.”

“A couple?”

“Just a detail. A little guy named Juan Gonzales. Ever hear of him?”

“No... it isn’t familiar.”

A second thought occurred to me. “Look, Carmen... When Billings was around you... was he ever scared?”

“The last time he was... well, nervous. He played pretty badly.”

“Were the stakes big?”

“Very petty that time. We all kidded him about it. He didn’t say anything.”

“Tell me... did he ever mention the name Lodo to you at all?”

“Lodo?” She paused, then shook her head. “No, not Billings. But I’ve heard it somewhere. Who is he?”

“I don’t know... yet. I’ll find out, though.”

This time she took my hand in both of hers. “Please be careful, Ryan.”

“Sure, but why, kitten?”

“I might want to have lunch with a big hood again.” She took her hand away with a smile, looked at her watch and reached for her pocketbook. “Time to leave. I’ll make a quick visit first.”

“Go ahead. I’ll meet you up front.”

Eddie Mack and Fats Sebull, a pair of guys I know, were talking to Pat and saw me coming. Fats said, “Pretty company you got.”

“Great. She okay, Fats?”

“We had her checked. She’s okay. One hell of a card player, though.”

“That’s what I hear.”

Eddie Mack asked me, “How’d you meet her?”

“Checking on Billings.”

He snorted. “Him. He won’t be missed.” He stopped, looked at me with a frown. “You knew him?”

“I wanted to kill him, buddy. I got beat out.”

He glanced around him nervously and licked his lips. “Say, Ryan... you got any idea who tapped him?”

“An idea. A guy named Lodo. You ever hear of him?”

It was Pat’s face that rang the bell. His eyes had a funny look and something had happened to the set of his mouth.

I said, “Pat?”

He motioned with his hand to keep it quiet. “Man, that’s a trouble name.”

“You know him?”

“I don’t want to, kid, but a couple days ago two scared union representatives were in here and one made a phone call from the booths in back when I was in the office. He didn’t know I was there, but I could hear him. When I bothered to listen, he was saying that there were some marked boys around and that Lodo had showed up. Apparently he had picked it up accidentally and he told the other guy he was clearing out.”

“That was all?”

“Enough for me, friend. Any bumping I don’t want done on the premises. I don’t even want people around who know about them things. I’ve had all that crap I want.”

“Don’t get so shook, Patsy boy.”

“Look, Ryan, if you’re in this, then keep it someplace else.”

I grinned and nodded.

Behind them Carmen was walking toward me and everybody in the place was watching her. She said, “Hello, Fats... Eddie. You know Ryan?”

Fats said, “We’ve met.”

I nodded to them and walked out with her. We got into a cab.

“Taking me to be verified by Fats and Eddie was smart. Are you satisfied?”

I looked at her and grinned. “Not satisfied at all, kitten.”

Her smile came back fast. She reached over with her hand and pulled my head toward hers and suddenly there was a fire on my mouth that was alive and wet and a little shocking.

When she stopped it was too soon and she said, “I never kissed a hood before, either.” She touched my mouth with a finger. “Satisfied now?”

“No,” I said, and I grinned.

“You’re cool, big boy, real big and ugly and cool, man.”

“That’s not VP talk, sugar.”

“I thought maybe you’d understand it better,” she mocked.

“Talk punk language then,” I said.

For a moment she was serious. “You’re no punk. I’ve known punks before.”

“Oh?”

“I could get to like you, big man. But never a punk.”

The cab had stopped. I said, “We’re here.”

“Will I see you again?” Her eyes wanted me to say yes.

“If you say please.”

She smiled and touched my mouth with her finger again. “Please.”

“I’ll call you.”

“I’ll be waiting. Will you be long?”

“When I find a guy named Lodo.”

“Be careful.”

“Sure.”

She got out and walked away. Her legs were long and her hips wide and with each stride her thighs would play against the fabric of her dress and it was almost as if she had nothing on at all.

I had the cab take me back to DiNuccio’s. Art wasn’t there, but Joe told me he had called my place a couple times without any luck, then went out.

I grabbed a quick beer, waved to Joe and went out to the corner hoping to catch a crosstown cab.

That was when I knew I had picked up a tail.

He was a small guy in a plastic raincoat with a folded paper sticking up out of the pocket. He hadn’t been on the ball and when he first spotted me, his involuntary start tagged him. To make sure, I hesitated on the corner, then turned and walked west. He stayed with me, checking over his shoulder for a cab.

When one came, he caught it, rode to the corner and stopped. I knew he was waiting for me to get the next one and when I passed him he’d hang on. It would’ve been fun if I had more time. Instead, I turned, went back to the corner and picked up a hack just letting out a passenger. The Brooks Brothers Boys were determined to get their progress report the hard way.

The drizzle turned into a hard rain before I got to the apartment. The street was empty and even Pete-the-Dog was gone to hawk his papers around the bars. I paid off the driver, got my key out and ran for the entrance. I went inside, flipped the light on and knew I had it.

The two sitting there had their rods out smashing slugs over my head and swearing at the dive I had made to one side which put one guy in the way of the other. I rolled once behind a chair, kicked it at them and saw the top rip off it from a slug, then I had my own gun out and cocked and the chubby little guy in front caught a fat .45 dead in the chest. The other one ran for the door and I got him through both knees and he lay there screaming his lungs out until I cracked him across the mouth with the muzzle of the automatic.

He kept saying over and over again. “Marone, marone!”

Behind me the other one coughed once, then was still.

I said, “It doesn’t really hurt yet. Give it a couple hours.”

He pulled his hands away from his knees, looked at the blood and tried to reach for the rod he had dropped. I kicked it out of the way. His eyes were terrible things trying to kill me all by themselves.

I raised the .45 and pointed it at his gut. “Who sent you, bud?”

“Go...”

“Watch it. I’m no sweet law-abiding citizen. Knocking you off wouldn’t be a bit hard. I even got a license for my rod. Figure it out quick, buddy, because you haven’t got much time left at all.”

He looked at his hands again and gagged, then fell over on his side. “I need a doctor...”

“You’ll need an undertaker more.”

“Look...”

“Talk.” My hand started to go white around the butt.

“Ryan... it was orders... it was...” Somehow he knew it was coming. He threw one wild look around before the blast from the doorway caught him. I got out of the line before it could happen to me, then the lights went out and the door slammed shut.

I might have made it at that, but the dead guy in the doorway tripped me and I went down. When I threw the main fuse lever back in place and got outside, there was nobody on the street at all.

The shadows across the street moved a little bit and I went over. Razztazz, the crippled guy, was hunkered back in his basement doorway his shoulders twitching. I said, “You see him, Razz?”

“Went to the corner, Ryan. Soon’s you went in a car was standing by. Picked him up.”

“You make any of them?”

“One I knew.”

“Who?”

“Lardbucket Pearson, the fat guy.”

“How’d you know him? You can’t see faces from across here now.”

“Not by that. It was his big butt and the way he walked. Cop shot him in the behind once. He ain’t never walked right since.”

“I don’t know him, Razz.”

“Part of the Jersey crowd where I come from. Always was in the rackets around the docks.” He wiped his hand across his face. “They... still there?”

“Yeah. Dead.”

“Couldn’t hear anything from here at all. The fuzz coming along?”

“Let me work it out. Keep it quiet.”

“You know me, Ryan.”

I stuck a folded bill into his pocket and slapped his shoulder. He grinned and nodded and I went back into the rain.

Neither one of the punks had anything on them at all. No wallets, no labels, no papers of any kind. In their own way they were farsighted pros — but they’d finally walked into the inevitable occupational hazard.

I reloaded the .45, threw a handful of shells in my pocket and looked at them. Things were beginning to look up. It takes a while, but the pattern gets set and starts to look like something. When I had the idea rounded out, I flicked off the light and went out to the vestibule. The rain had made an effective muffler for the sound. There were no curious faces in the windows... no movement anywhere, and no sounds of sirens hanging in the air.

At the corner I hung back in the folds of darkness that draped the building there. Traffic was light, nothing more than a few occupied cabs moving with the lights. Nobody was on the sidewalks.

For five minutes I stayed there, watching, then across the street somebody hacked and vomited then painfully unfolded from being a doorway bundle to one of the bums you see around occasionally. He edged toward Second Ave., leaning against the building, then got on his own and wobbled off the curb and started across the street.

Down the block a car pulled away from the curb, flicked on its lights so the beams spotlighted the guy. Just as quickly it cut back to the curb and doused them.

They were waiting for me. Behind me on First would be others.

I was on a kill list now. Someplace along the line I had gotten big enough and important enough to be in somebody’s way. Someplace I did something, or I saw something, or I thought something. Someplace I had reached a conclusion that made me ready for the big bed.

Mamie Huggins never bothered to lock her basement entrance. I took a chance on not being seen and went back and down through her basement. There was one low fence to cross and I came out the alley between Benny’s grocery and the building they were tearing down.

When the block was empty, I crossed again and used the alley where Jamie Tohey kept his laundry pushcarts. I went all the way through, turned west when I reached the street and went back to Second again. Up near my own corner the car still waited. I grinned at it and walked south to Hymie’s drug store.

After five tries I reached Art through his office and told him what had happened. Tension was evident in his voice when he asked me what I wanted.

I said, “Get me what you can on a character named Lard-bucket Pearson. He’ll probably have Jersey connections.”

“Sure. What about the stiffs in your apartment? You can’t let ’em lie there and it’s damn sure nobody’s going to just stumble over them.”

“Why don’t you do it, Art?”

“Do what?”

“Make a call at my place and find them. Any one of the sheets would buy a news beat with photos for the bit.”

“You crazy? Listen...”

“You listen. Do it. Otherwise I’ll call a guy with the wire services. Give me twenty-four hours to think, then do it.”

He breathed hard into the receiver before he answered me. “Okay, friend, but it’s blood money. You’ll have the cops screaming for your hair.”

“That’ll make it unanimous.”

“Where can I get in touch with you?”

“Use the Naples Cafe on Second Street. They’ll take any messages.”

I hung up, reached for the phone book and flipped through it until I found the only Carmen Smith and dialed the number. I let it ring a good while before I hung up feeling a little sour.

The other number was Jake McGaffney. He wasn’t doing anything and said to come on up. It took me 20 minutes and my feet got soaking wet.

He looked at my face and said, “Wha’ hoppen, boy?”

I told him. He made himself a drink and opened me a beer.

“This hitting my business, Ryan?”

“I don’t think so. If that tap on Gonzales didn’t do it, then you’re clear enough.”

“You’re trying to make a point someplace.”

“Where was Gonzales collecting for you?”

“Oh, light spots, mostly. He had a string of bars... let’s say about twenty, and a few other places in his own neighborhood.”

“Did he work around the docks?”

“Gonzales? Hell, no. I’m not doing any field work in that area. That’s uptown stuff.”

“That’s what I thought. How much did he usually have on hand?”

Jake shrugged and made a face. “He’d pay off two-three hundred every day, bring back five. Small time, but with plenty small guys working, we stay in business, y’know?”

“Was he square?”

“A dream to have working. Never clipped a dime, and that I know.” He sipped at his drink. “What’s all this traffic with Gonzales, Ryan?”

“He had a dream too... of him and his broad taking a trip around the world, really living it up.”

“Him? On what? He never had anything.”

“He had ten grand.”

“Hell, you can’t even do Miami right on ten...” He stopped, put his drink down and stared at me. “Where’d he get ten grand?”

“I think from a guy named Billings.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Don’t worry about it. Neither do I. One other thing. Does the name Lodo mean anything to you?”

Jake’s memory for names was too good for him to think long. He shook his head and there was nothing more to say.

The cabs were slower now. I saw one stopped for the light, ran across the street and climbed in. The address I gave was Lucinda Gonzales’ and when I got out the street was quiet, like a sick dog.

There was a light on under Lucinda’s door and when I knocked a chair scraped back.

She smiled vacantly and I could smell the whiskey on her. I pushed the door shut behind me and said, “Lucinda? You still have your money?”

She sat down heavily and brushed her hair back. “Si... but it is no good now without Juan.”

“Lucinda... who has been here to see you?”

“To see me? Oh... the neighbors. They come. From uptown my cousin, he comes.”

“Any of Juan’s friends?”

“They are peegs, señor.”

“Do you know who they are?”

“Sure.” She swayed and tried to get up. “They are off the boat.” She leaned hard against the table, balancing herself. “One is ’Fredo. Other is Spanish Tom. They are peegs, señor. They theenk I am listening to them and they hit me. Juan, he does not even care.”

I circled the table and held on to her. “What boat, Lucinda?”

She shrugged and reached for the bottle. Her unsteady hand knocked it over and she started to cry. I eased her back into the chair and let her pass out with her head pressed into her forearms.

When I reached Times Square, I stopped, deciding which hotel to use. I settled on the Chessy on 49th and took off that way. Before I reached the end of the first block, I knew I had somebody behind me.

He came up fast, passed me and said, “Ryan,” without turning his head. He crossed against the lights, hesitated, then jaywalked all the way to the east side of the street.

When nobody could have made any connection I crossed over myself, went down to 47th and turned the corner leisurely. Then I stopped and flattened against the wall.

Nothing. I gave it another two minutes before I went to where Diego Flores was waiting for me in the shadows.

He was more scared than nervous and his beady little eyes kept poking into the night on either side of him. Diego ran numbers for Sid Solomon on the Madison Avenue run and usually he was a pretty calm guy.

I said, “Hi, Dago. What’s the fuss?”

He tapped my chest with a forefinger. “Baby... you got rocks in your head. Big fat rocks. What you doin’ in town?”

“Why leave, kid?”

“Ain’t you heard it yet? Ryan baby, what happened to all those big ears you had?”

“I’m listening now.”

“Baby... whoever throws you down makes five grand. The world’s out on you.”

“Who says, Dago?”

“None of our bunch, Baby. This one’s comin’ in the hard way. It’s all over town. First thing, the nose candy kids’ll be tryin’ for the tap. You got marked poison somehow and unless you blow out you’re dead.”

“Where’s it come from?”

“Picked it up at Bimmy’s. You know Stan Etching?” I nodded and he went on. “Him and that nutty brother of his was talkin’ about it. Since they knocked off Fletcher over in Canarsie they’re big stuff. Anyway, they’re working now and you’re their job. Everybody’s gonna be trying for you, baby.”

“Why not you, Dago?”

“Ah, baby, come off it. You favored me up plenty times when I had troubles.”

“How hot is it?”

“You better not go anyplace you’re known. They even got the hotels spotted. You’re a big one.”

“Okay, kid, thanks. Shove off before you get tied in to me.”

He glanced around again and licked his lips. “Baby... be careful, will ya? I can smell this stink. It’s from way up, ya know? Ya can tell, somethin’s burning in this town.”

“Yeah.”

When he walked off, I gave him five minutes and cruised past the Chessy. I spotted Manny Golden in the foyer and his partner Willis Holmes across the street talking to a cab driver outside the Ployden House. Both were ex-cops busted out in the graft scandal in ’49. Now they were hoods. Not cheap ones, either. They still held a few things over important precinct heads and could move around pretty good when they wanted to.

Just to be sure I made a few of the other pads off Broadway and when I saw Mario Sen, I knew just how hot I was. Mario’s specialty was big kills and he didn’t operate for under 10 grand per. That is, outside his regular job.

Mario was a tap man for the Mafia.

Mario didn’t seem to have any place to go specially so I helped him out. I stuck my gun in his back and steered him to the men’s room in the back of the lobby.

He was real embarrassed.

I let him turn around and have a good look at me and said, “You got yourself a big one this time, buddy.” Then I smashed him across the face with the rod and when he went down choking noisily, I whipped the gun across his skull until he stopped.

He was going to be a sick hood. Sicker when his boss found out.

The envelope held an even grand in fifties. It fitted my pocket nicely. There was nothing new about the rest of the contents. They were photos of me. Police photos. Something Golden or Holmes dug up, probably. I flushed them down the toilet, frisked Mario and lifted another $400 from his poke and added it to my pile.

It was turning out to be a good evening.

I grabbed a cab outside, went to 23rd St., walked crosstown two blocks and took another one back. The third one let me out on the corner of Carmen Smith’s block.

I told the officious little man at the desk I wished to see Miss Smith and that it was important enough that he should call and waken her. He didn’t believe me at first, then I smiled and he believed me.

Carmen answered the house phone, asked to speak to me and when I said hello, told me to come right up. The little man was still nervous so I put her on and let her tell him it was okay. He clacked his teeth and escorted me to the elevator and showed me which button to push. I said thanks and pushed it.

She was waiting in the tiny foyer that separated her apartment from the elevator. She said, “Well, hello! And if you don’t mind the obvious, what brings you here?”

I grinned at her. “I need a place to sleep.”

“Oh,” she said, and opened the door wide. “Come on in.”

She had on a tailored, double-breasted housecoat that fitted without a fold or a crease and when she walked, the static of her body against the cloth made it cling so that you knew she slept cool and naked and inviting.

Like beautiful girls should be, she was unruffled from sleep, still bearing the flush of lipstick. She walked ahead of me into the living room and she was tall even without shoes. When she turned on the light on the end table, there was a momentary silhouette that made me stop and look around quickly, merely sensing the expensive appointments of the place rather than appreciating them.

Carmen looked at me quizzically a moment. Then she knew. She smiled gently and waved me to a chair. She brought a drink without a word, handed it to me and sat down.

Then, very deliberately, she grinned and crossed her legs.

I could have smacked her in the mouth.

She said, “Okay, hood, what do you want from me?” Then her grin turned into a small laugh that made the mood easier.

“Kid, you can get in real trouble doing that.”

“You mean the leg action.”

“Don’t get smart.”

She made a kiss with her mouth and blew it across the room. “Now really, why did you come up?”

“I’m in a bind.”

The smile softened, then worked into a frown. “Police?”

“A little worse, sugar. The sign’s on me.”

She didn’t need any explanation. She took a few seconds letting it sink in and there was something tight about the way she held herself. “Bad?”

“Real bad. They called out the troops.”

Her eyes crinkled thoughtfully. She got up, took my glass and refilled it. When she handed it to me, she said, “Will it help to tell me?”

“No, but I will.” And I told her.

She sat wordlessly a moment; then: “What can I do, Ryan?”

“Pack me in for the night, kitten, I don’t like to be shot when I’m sleeping, and all my usual pads are off limits now.”

“That’s all?” She stood up and studied me with the edge of her forefinger between her teeth.

I stood up too and took her hand away. “No, there’s more, but I wouldn’t inflict it on you, sugar.”

She was there in my arms without seeming to move. Suddenly she was just there, pressing tightly against me and she was warm and woman and I could feel the life inside her. Her finger touched my mouth, then her own. “Why, Ryan?”

Softly, I said, “For a hood I got certain sensitivities.”

She reached up and kissed me lightly. She smiled, did it again and took my arm under hers. She showed me the guest room and opened the door.

Once more she came back into my arms. “I have certain sensitivities too. I wish you would inflict them on me.”

“Later.”

Her mouth was warm and very wet. “All right, later.” Lightly, she touched my lips with her tongue, deliberately tantalizing.

Her grin got impish and she did something with her hands. Then she shrugged and handed me the housecoat, stepped back and smiled again. She walked away from me into the light, turned into her room and was gone.

When I began to breathe again, I tossed the housecoat on a chair, took a real cold shower and went to bed. Before I could sleep my mind dwelt on the litheness of her, the swaying stride, the lush, yet muscular curves that seemed to melt into each other and dance in the subdued, shadowy tones of dark and light. Brunette, I thought, a luscious, chestnut-hued brunette.

The radio alarm beside the bed went off softly. Awakening, I knew where I was at once, knowing, too, that I had never set the alarm. But the door was partly open and the housecoat gone, so I knew who had. The note on the clock was brief. It said, Call me, hood. And the P.S. was just as brief. She had written, You look pretty. There were no covers on the bed and now we were even for the housecoat.

Coffee was ready in the electric perc and there were some Danish in a basket. While I grabbed a bite, I called the Naples Cafe, got a number for me to call Art and dialed it.

In the background there were morning noises of people eating, and strange, loud languages. There was juke music and somebody yelling and Art was drunk. He was all-night drunk, but purpose-drunk and there’s a difference. He felt his way through his words, mouthing each one. “Ryan... I got what you wanted.”

“Good. Let’s have it.”

“You see the papers?”

“Not yet.”

“Those punks... you hit... your place?”

“Yeah?”

“Cullen and... and Stanovich. From Elizabeth, Jersey, y’know? Muscle boys... docks. This here... Lardbucket Pearson... him... I mean, he and Turner Scado car piled into... big ditch outside Hoboken. They got killed. Looks like your boys... muff it, they get it.”

The picture was clear enough. It even made the deal bigger than ever. When somebody can afford to knock off help who flubbed, it was big time, real big-time.

I said, “What’s their connections, Art?”

He fumbled against the phone for a second. “Topside Big. It reaches, Ryan. Goes far... to... to Europe.”

“What names, kid?”

I could hear ice clink in a glass, then he paused to swallow. He finally said, “Those Jersey Joes... Mafia musclemen. Used to be part of... Lucky’s crew. You know what that means?”

“It’s making sense. What else?”

He laughed sourly. “I’m gonna... beat you... on this one, Irish. I have a friend in Rome. Good friend. In their organization over there. For... American cash... he’s tipping me to your mysterious buddy.”

“What buddy?”

“Lodo,” he chuckled. “Lodo... pretty big stuff. Lodo’s... code name for Mafia’s East coast enforcer. Big killer. Little while I’ll know who.”

I said, “Okay. Go home and stay there. You hear?”

“I’ll go slow.” He paused a moment, coughed and said, “You’re lucky, Irish.”

“How?”

“You’re going to get to die real... soon.”

I hopped a cab to 34th St., picked up an envelope at General Delivery in the Post Office and opened it on the street.

The laddies were real efficient. Usually it took a month to get a gun permit. This one came through quick. I tucked it in my pocket and looked at the other slip of paper. There were seven digits there, and the first two had to be exchange letters. I found a pay phone and dialed.

A male voice said, “Yes?”

I said, “Big Man?”

He said, “That you, Ryan?”

“Me. And don’t trace this.”

His voice sounded strained. “What do you need, Irish?”

“Two guys. They work a ship that was in around the week a certain Juan Gonzales was killed. All I know is the alias. One’s Spanish Tom, the other ’Fredo... probably Alfredo. You big enough to handle it?”

“We’re big enough.”

I left the booth, walked to the corner and had two minutes before the unmarked cruiser drew up and the guys hopped out. Another one blocked off the street at the other end and a fast, systematic search started. I laughed at the slobs and walked away. Big Man was playing both ends from the middle.

I gave him an hour. It was plenty of time. They had men and equipment and millions and could do nearly any damn thing they wanted when they wanted.

I called and said, “Big Man?”

He said, “Both men are on the Gastry. It’s in port now. Spanish Tom is Tomas Escalante. The other one is Alfredo Lias. Both from Lisbon. They’ve been on the same ship since ’46. Both have had numerous drunk arrests in various ports but nothing more serious. The line vouches for their honesty.”

“Thanks. You haven’t bothered to look for them, have you?”

He caught the sarcasm. “They’re in port, Ryan. We’ve been looking but so far we haven’t found them.”

I laughed. “What would you ask them if you did?”

“We’d think of something.”

“Good for you,” I said. “There’s just one more thing I never bothered asking. You guys don’t operate without certain facts or at the most without ideas.”

“So?”

“What did you suspect Billings of having for sale?”

Quietly, he said, “A month ago two skin divers were killed going down on the wreck of the Andrea Doria.”

“I read about it.”

“There were three on the expedition. The last one hasn’t shown.”

“Go on.”

“It should be obvious. Highly classified material went down in that wreck and if found by the wrong parties could jeopardize the safety of the whole country. Possibly the whole world.”

After a moment he said, “That enough?”

I said, “That’s enough,” and hung up.

Nobody was outside and I walked away from the phone thinking about it. There were just too many possibilities now. Some of them had to go. I walked slowly and let things dribble through my mind. A pattern began to come out of it.

Further down the street I stepped into another phone booth, rang the apartment to see if Art was there. I let it ring a dozen times then decided he was either asleep or passed out, then gave up.

I picked up a paper from a newsstand. They had given me pretty good coverage. Pictures and all.

Police opinion seemed to be that it was a gang killing of some kind, that I had been poaching in foreign fields. There was speculation that I had been taken for an old-fashioned ride. So far their leads were lousy.

So was their liaison. The big agency upstairs that had conned me into this rumble wasn’t talking either.

Natural coloration is the animal’s best protection. In the slop chutes that were the playgrounds for the dock crowd I fitted smooth and easy. They could smell money on you, they knew you were brand new to the neighborhood, but all the time they knew the other thing they saw in your face. You just weren’t takable.

A couple I knew, tough apples who’d work any kind of a touch for pocket money. They passed me over with a nod and gave me room at the bar.

If the word was out all the way, it hadn’t reached here yet. But maybe they were figuring it the usual way... a hood hates to leave his own back yard. Every step away from his own hole and he becomes more vulnerable. His own distorted sense of security that led him into a hole in the first place makes him stay close to it even when he’s dying.

There could be another reason too. New York was a big town. The word can only travel just so fast... and it wasn’t good to think about it. Any time now the posters could go up and in this section hired guns were handy to get to.

The pair I spoke to on the Gastry didn’t have much to say about Escalante or Lias. As far as they knew, all they did in port was visit around the Spanish-speaking sections and get gassed up. Neither had steady women or much to do with the rest of the crew.

Neither one of them was very smart. Both were dull, plodding types who were at the peak of their earning capacity in the grimy hold of the freighter.

It just didn’t figure right. They weren’t 10-grand types. They weren’t international types. They weren’t the type anybody should get excited about or interested in for any damn reason whatsoever. Their being around at all had all the earmarks of a crazy, distracting coincidence like a fly in the soup but until I found them I couldn’t be sure.

A long time ago I learned how to get answers without ever having to ask the questions. But it took time. It took me from 57th Street down to the Battery and halfway back and by then it was night again with the same damn rain thick with dirt and soot that steamed up from the pavement and got inside your clothes.

But I found Spanish Tom. He was in the middle of a crowd of dock workers and the center of attraction, sitting on the pavement with his back against the overhead highway support and if you didn’t see the hole in him right away you’d think he was sleeping.

The uniformed cop taking notes squatted and held his coat open with the tip of his pencil and for a moment everybody quieted down and craned to see the business better. It was quite a tap, a real professional job, one hard knife jab under the ribs and up into the heart and that was the end.

I worked my way through to the front and stood there trying to figure the angle on it. I kind of started a trend and a few more wanted in close and when the cop stood up he yelled for everybody to get the hell away. He scared the half-drunk sailor beside me and he nudged the body and Spanish Tom flopped sideways on the pavement and one leg kicked out like he was still alive.

The cop yelled again and shoved the nearest ones away. He turned to me, but by then I had already backed off and the pasteboard ticket that had come out of Spanish Tom’s pocket was under my foot. I scraped it back, retrieved it, and squeezed back through the crowd.

In the one second I saw it I had thought it was a pawn slip, but when I got back under the light I could have spit. It was an ADMIT TWO in Spanish to some shindig up in the quarter. I crumbled it in my fist and threw it back in the gutter and mouthed a curse at it.

Then I thought about it again and picked it up. If Alfredo Lias had one of these too it could be the place he’d be at. The date was tomorrow; the place a bloody-up with an olé olé band. The clientele was the kind you saw in the tabloids leaning up against a wall while the fuzz frisked them.

But that was tomorrow. I had now to think about. Until tomorrow I had to stay out of sight of everybody and it wasn’t going to be easy. I flagged a cab down, gave an address a block away from Art’s and got out on an empty corner.

Halfway down I found the Wheeler Apartments and touched Art’s bell. The vestibule door was open so before he could answer I went ahead up. I knocked at his door and waited, knocked again and listened for him stirring around.

There wasn’t a sound from inside.

I tried the door and the knob turned under my hand. I pushed it open, stepped inside, shut it behind me and waited there in the semi-gloom of the room. It was too still, much too still. I pulled the .45 out already cocked and held it ready, then flicked on the light.

Nothing.

It wasn’t much of a place. Something a bachelor would have. One main room with the kitchen separated from it by a bar, an open door leading to the bath and another door, cracked a little, going to the bedroom.

I walked over to that one, pushed it open the rest of the way and reached for the light switch inside the frame.

And then I found Art.

The spare pillow beside him showed powder burns and one corner had been ripped off from the bullet blast the pillow had muffled. It had caught him in the temple and without ever realizing it Art had reached the goal he had striven for.

All I could say was one word. There was nothing else. I was being hung higher all the time. Nobody knew I told Art to make a feature yarn out of the kills at my place and now the fuzz would lay this tap at my door and label it a revenge kill. Whoever coined the word shafted had me in mind.

There was a whiskey, cordite and burnt feathers smell still in the air, a smell that could hang for hours. I felt Art’s face, knew by the heat of it that death came only a short time ago. I went back to the door to see if it had been forced, but there were no marks around the lock. Art had made it easy for the killer. He had come home drunk, opened up and shut the door. The lock was a type you had to hand turn from the inside to latch and he had done what a thousand other drunks did before him. He forgot about it. He flopped in bed and that was it.

I went through his pockets carefully, tried his jacket thrown over a chair, then the clothes in the closet. There was something not quite orderly enough about the clothes in his dresser and I knew that all this had been done earlier by an expert and if there had been anything important, it was gone now.

I wiped the spots I had touched with my handkerchief and backed out of the apartment. I went upstairs and over the roof to a building near the corner and came out there in case anybody was waiting for me outside Art’s place. Two blocks further down I found a cab and gave him Carmen’s number.

The important little man remembered me from before, but even then he double-checked. He told me reluctantly that Miss Smith would see me, then huffed away, so supreme in his own importance that he never recognized me even with the paper on his desk open to my picture.

I went upstairs to where she was waiting and grinned at the worry that showed around her eyes. Then suddenly she was tight inside my arms and her mouth was a hungry thing tasting me almost painfully, her body taut with life that has been confined too long and for the first time senses a release;

Tears made glistening streaks down her cheeks and when she took her mouth from mine she kept it open, sobbing against my neck.

I said, “Easy, baby,” and held her away to look at her, but only for a second because she grabbed me again and hung on fiercely.

Very softly she repeated over and over, “You crazy hood. You crazy hood, you!”

I wiped off the tears, kissed her lightly, then took her arm and went inside. There was still a sob in her breathing and she wasn’t ready to talk to me yet. I said, “I’m not used to such pleasant receptions.”

She forced a smile, then it became real. “You crazy Irishman. Every paper, every TV newscaster, every radio broadcast has you in it. Ryan... you haven’t got a chance... you haven’t... I don’t know how to put it...”

“It’s bad, huh?”

“Why, Ryan? Why does it have to be you?”

“Why all the concern, sugar?”

She said nothing for a moment. Her eyes frowned and she took her hand from mine and folded them in her lap. “I’m not the type who should do something like this. I know better. I’ve been familiar with... wrong situations a whole lifetime. It’s never happened before. Now, for the first time I know what it’s like, having to... care for somebody who feels nothing, well, very special about you. It’s happened to others. I never thought it could possibly happen to me.” She looked up, smiled and added lightly, “And with a hood too. I’ve never been in love with a hood before.”

“You’re crazy.”

“I know,” she said.

“You’re class, baby. With me a fling could be fun. Some excitement, like playing cards, maybe. But sugar... like I’m not the kind of slob kids like you fall in love with. You’re class.”

“Irish... you’ve never had trouble getting a woman... ever. Have you?”

I squinted and shook my head. “Tomatoes, though.”

“So let me be a tomato. Or should I ask please?”

“You’re talking crazy, girl.”

“I have nothing else, Irish. I never had.”

“Hell, I could be cut down any time. You know what that means? You get connected with me and you’re done, kid. Done. Maybe it’s like you said... you’ve never been in love with a hood before, but it’s like the excitement of drawing three cards from the dealer and finding yourself with a royal flush. It’s great if the stakes are high, but when the other hands are twos and threes and go out on a small pot the big excitement is all wasted. It only seemed big. It wasn’t worth anything. Damn it, you’re crazy!”

I was tight on talk and that scar on my back began to draw up again. I had to tell her. She knew what the score was!

Carmen’s eyes were clear now. While I was talking she had made up her mind. She said, “Will you let me be a crazy tomato, Irish?”

“Kitten...”

“You don’t have to love me back at all,” she said.

I tried hard to keep it inside. I didn’t want to let it out, but it wasn’t the kind of thing you can squash into pieces and forget. “That’s the bad part, kid,” I told her. “You see... I do.”

She was there in my arms again, softly at first and hungry-mouthed again. Her fingers were velvet cat claws, kneading me gently, searching and finding. When I touched her, things seemed to melt away until there was only the warmth of flesh and a giddy sensation of being overpowered by a runaway emotion. As I lay there, time ceased to exist and as she came down on top of me she murmured little things only the mind heard and it was different. So very different.

Morning was a soft light that bathed us both, and we got up smiling, yet saying nothing. Words were no good any more. I watched her shower and dress. All the naked, all the clothed beauty of her belonged to me and nobody could take it away.

Then the luxury of sleep-drugged morning was over and I knew how stupid it was and the vomit sour taste of cold hate for all the things that had happened to me was in my mouth.

I dressed quickly and followed her into the kitchen. She had coffee ready and handed me a cup, knowing by my face that something was wrong. She didn’t ask. She waited until I was ready. I said, “I had a friend who was killed last night. I know how, I know why and I know who, but I don’t know what the killer’s face is like.”

“Can I help somehow?”

“You can but I won’t ask you. The gamble is too big.”

“You forgot, Irish?”

“What?”

“I am a gambler.”

“That kill is going to be laid at my feet and there isn’t a chance in the world for me to cut out.”

“The police...”

“Can be stalled a while. They can be stymied, but only for a while. When they concentrate all the resources of their system, they can do anything.”

“You think they will?”

“They have to, baby. Now it’s a newshawk who’s dead and the papers will hammer the brass silly. They have to shake that heat and the only way is to find me.”

“But first we gamble.”

I looked at her hard. She wasn’t kidding. I said, “Okay, baby, it’ll be you and me. We’ll give it a try. Maybe we can make the good parts come out.”

“What will we do?”

“Tonight’s Saturday night, kid. We’re going dancing.” A puzzled frown creased her forehead. “You’ll need a costume for the act, sugar. Where we’ll be you’ll want the west side trollop look. Think you can make it?”

She nodded, the frown deepening.

“A missing link was killed last night,” I continued. “He had a dance ticket in his pocket. Chances are his partner had one too. On top of which, if he knows his buddy’s dead, he’ll want to be with a crowd. It’s easy to die alone.”

“This one... he can clear you?”

I grinned at that one. “Not him. But this bird can supply a lot of answers.”

“Then what can I do?”

“First you can go out and buy some clothes. Cheap and flashy. Get perfume and accessories to match and if you can get the stuff secondhand, do that. Guys alone at those jumps can’t move around the way a couple can and locating this guy will be easier with two of us asking questions.”

I took her shoulders and looked into her eyes. “Still want to try it?”

She grinned impishly, made like she was going to give me a tiny kiss, then stuck her tongue in my mouth. Before my hands could tighten on her she pulled away and went to the door.

“You’ll stay here?”

“I don’t know.”

She opened her purse, took out a key and tossed it to me. “If you come in the back way you can by-pass the clerk.” She blew a kiss and was gone.

I got up, yanked my coat on and shoved the .45 under my belt. I went out the back way and headed for the old brownstone. The sun died before I reached Sixth and the air had a cold, clammy touch to it. I stopped at a candy store and had a Coke, then another, trying to think the pieces together.

A pattern was there, all right. Crude and irregular, but it had a purpose.

Outside it began to rain again.

A beat cop sauntered by and looked in, but I was in the shadows and my face didn’t mean a thing to him. When he was gone, I picked up my change and walked out, my collar up around my neck, the hatbrim screening my face.

I was almost at Lexington when they had me. It worked real easy, the faint nudge of a gun barrel in a hand with a paper around it and that was all there was to it.

I looked around and Stan Etching was smiling at me, the scar on his chin pulling his mouth out of shape. He said, “They told me you were a tough guy, Ryan.” He stepped around in front of me, lifted out the gun and dropped it in his raincoat pocket.

His smile was nervous and I knew what he was thinking. It was almost too easy. I said, “Now what?”

“You’ll see. My brother Stash saw me grab you, feller. He’ll be here with the car in a minute. Maybe you’d like it better to run or something.”

I grinned and his eyes got nervous along with his mouth. “I’ll wait,” I said.

The car was a three-year-old Caddie sedan with Jersey plates. It pulled up noiselessly and Stan opened the back door. I got in and he sat on my right, his gun pointed at my belly.

When we pulled away from the curb Stash turned the radio up and said, “How’d he take it?”

“Like pie. How else?” He poked me with the gun and grinned. “You’re a chump, Ryan. You shoulda hid out. Me, I knew you’d come back though. Six of us had your dump staked out, but I even knew which way you’d come.”

“This is the old Chicago touch you’re giving it,” I said. “One way ride and all that crap.”

He laughed. “Sure. Glad you don’t feel bad about it. Hey Stash, this guy’s all right.” The gun bumped me again. “You know, Ryan, I’m gonna burn you out quick. No fooling around. You give me no trouble. I give you no trouble.”

I told him thanks and leaned back in the seat and watched Stash approach the Lincoln Tunnel. Traffic was heavy.

Stan looked across at me and grinned again, turning a little to point the rod square at me. I took a deep breath of disgust, leaned back further into the cushions and completely relaxed.

Then I moved my hand before he could pull the trigger, slammed back the slide on the automatic so it couldn’t fire, twisted it so his finger broke and while he was still screaming with surprise and pain, shoved the muzzle against his gut and pulled the trigger.

Up front Stash let out a crazy startled yell and tried to look back, but there wasn’t a thing he could do, not a damn, stinking thing. I got my .45 back from Stan, cocked it and let Stan feel the big “O” of the mouth of it against his neck. His head jerked like a spastic’s and he kept making funny little noises.

I said, “When we get out, I’ll tell you where to go. Don’t do anything silly.”

He didn’t. He stayed calmly hysterical and when we reached the scrap iron works in Secaucus, we stopped and I let him get in the back. The shock was wearing off and Stan’s face was white with pain and fear. He kept asking for a doctor, but I shook my head.

Stash said, “What’cha gonna do?”

“It depends on you. I want to know about the word. Who put it out?”

Stash looked hopelessly at his brother. Stan said, “...doctor.”

“Not yet. Maybe when you talk a little.”

It began to dawn on Stan gradually. I wasn’t kidding. He shook his head feebly. “I told ya. Nothin’. You know... how them things are.”

I raised the gun again and watched his eyes. He couldn’t even speak, but he was telling it straight. I said, “Who else is around my place and where?”

“Golden... and Holmes. They’re on the south end. Lou Steckler, he’s... across in... in the gimp’s house.”

My hand got tight on the gun. “What’d they do to Razztazz?”

“Geeze... I dunno... I...”

“Who else? Dammit, talk fast!”

“Mario... he’s in your dump.”

“No fuzz?”

“Nobody. They... they got pulled off. Hymie the Goose, he’s covering trains and all with his bunch. Babcock and... the Greek... they... Jersey. They...”

He fainted then. I gave him five minutes and let him come around. He started to retch and vomited all down his chest. Stash was still hysterical and shook all over.

I said, “What else, Stan?”

He shook his head.

There wasn’t any more and I knew it. I told Stash to get out of the car and walk around the side. I had him pull his brother out and they stood there like animals watching me. I said, “Whenever and wherever I see you again, you catch one between the antlers, buddies. I don’t think I’ll have to worry about it because somebody else will get to you first like with them Elizabeth hoods. Now beat it.”

Stan’s eyes went wide. “Jeez... ain’t you even gonna call a doc? Ain’t you...”

“They were right when they said I was a tough guy.”

“Ryan... Ryan...”

I started the car up. “Drop dead,” I told him.

I took the car back through the tunnel and parked it on a cross street. When I wiped the wheel, door handles and sills off I climbed out and left it there. I found a phone, dialed the number I wanted and said, “Big Man?”

“Ryan...”

“Okay, Big Man, just listen for once. Where can we meet?”

“It’s no good.”

“Brother, I’m going to blow the whistle if you don’t square off.”

He paused. He didn’t muffle the phone to talk to anyone or anything. He just sat there a minute, then: “We’ll see you.”

“Just you, friend.”

“Where?”

“The Naples Cafe. It’s on...”

“I know.”

“Okay, then. Have a squad standing by a phone, but first you come alone. Quick.”

He hung up without answering. I hopped a cab to the Naples and stood across the street. In 10 minutes another cab came along and the big man got out. He walked inside and when I was fairly certain nobody else was around, I crossed over and went inside. He was sitting there at a table with a cup of coffee in front of him, waiting.

I said, “It’s not so snotty like the first time, is it?”

His face was hard. “Let’s hear it, Ryan.”

For some reason I wasn’t edgy any more. I put my face in my hands and rubbed hard, then leaned on the table and stared at him. “Art Shay was killed,” I said.

He nodded again. “We know. The police think you did it.”

“Who found him?”

“Young kid upstairs who used his typewriter. Trying to be a free-lance writer. He’s clean.”

“So am I. No alibi. No proof. I’m just saying.”

He tried one on me for size. “Spanish Tom showed up.”

“Yeah, dead.”

“You get around. We squelched the story.”

“I was there right after it happened.”

His eyes slitted a little bit. “What did you know about him?”

“Nothing, but I’ll damn soon find out.”

“How?”

“I’m pretty sure I know where his partner will be tonight.”

“You want to tell me?”

“Not me, Big Man. I’m going all the way on this party.”

“All right, Ryan, what did you want to call this... this meeting for?”

I sat back and sucked in my breath. “I want some answers. I want them straight and to the point. I have a funny feeling that I’ve touched something someplace and I’m close to what I want. I never did like any part of this business, but I’m in it all the way and if I want to stay alive and you want to get your answers, check me off with the truth.”

He made a short gesture with his hand. “Go ahead.”

“Was I suckered into this thing with big talk or because I was suspect?”

For a moment he looked at my face, then made his decision. “A little of both. You were suspect because you were brought into it by Billings. We had to grasp at straws no matter how small.”

“Why?”

“You know why. Whatever Billings had was an international affair. The underworld of two continents was breaking out the war drums. We knew something was developing but we didn’t know why, where or how.”

“And how far are you now?”

The smile he gave me was cold. “In our own way we have made progress.” I waited and smiled back, just as cold. If he wanted anything, then he couldn’t afford to stop. He knew it and said, “Coincidence is the killer of men.”

“It’s late for philosophy.”

“Yes, it is. We know something about Spanish Tom and Lias. We can guess at what happened.”

I swung at a wild one. “They overheard something they shouldn’t’ve.”

The swing connected and big man squinted at me. He nodded, then went on. “A dock watchman remembered them drinking behind some bales of rags. It wasn’t too uncommon and it was easier letting them sleep it off than fight them off so he just forgot it.

“Later he was pulled away by someone yelling for help in the water and it took about an hour to drag some dame out who apparently didn’t want to go. She stalled as long as she could. Our guess is that it was a feint to get the watchman off so a plant could be made on the Gastry.

“We figure that sometime during the action, either Escalante or Lias overheard or saw what was going on and figured it for the usual smuggling bit and thought they could step into the play and make a fast buck for themselves.”

“How could you confirm it?” I asked.

“At that time Spanish customs, acting with Interpol, cracked down hard on all points. Nothing was getting out by the usual routes and four big outfits were broken up. Still, traffic had to get through and it’s well known that these operations all have emergency plans and in this case one went into effect. Whatever it was couldn’t stay in Lisbon without being uncovered sooner or later so the Gastry became the transporter.”

“Who was involved on board?”

“Nobody. These affairs are not of the moment. They’re set up far in advance. Undoubtedly the Gastry was fitted with a hiding place a long time ago to be used when necessary and without anyone on board being the wiser. When in the other port another operative would remove the shipment by preconceived plan. These groups are pretty smart. They’re big business. Even big government. We checked out every man on the Gastry so far and they’re clean. Lias and Escalante were there by coincidence. Some time we’ll strip the ship down and find out how it was done.”

“That brings us to Billings.”

The big man looked across the table at me, the question in his eyes a genuine one. “Do you know how, Irish?”

“I think so.”

“Are you going to wait to tell me?”

“No.” I let all the pieces come together slowly and began to fit them in place. I said, “Through a language association the two met a guy named Juan Gonzales. They mentioned what they had and wanted a buyer. Juan got greedy all of a sudden, I think. He knew he could buy for peanuts and sell big. Maybe the two knew what a good going price was and kept it fairly high. Anyway, Juan knew the guy with the loot who was looking for a touch. Billings had ten grand of ready money. He let Juan make the buy, probably on a partnership basis. Later he killed him and had the buy for himself. Juan was a scared lad. Maybe he knew he was set up to be tapped off. Billings was scared too. The original owners wanted possession and were going after it. Billings couldn’t run fast enough. They caught him. He went out letting me hold the bag.”

“Who was it, Irish? Who is Lodo?”

“Art died because he was about to find out. Lodo was the code name for the Mafia enforcer on the east coast here.”

He didn’t say anything. It didn’t seem to register on him.

“It’s important, isn’t it?” I said.

“Maybe. The Mafia is a catchall term sometimes. It’s still big, but sometimes is the patsy for other big outfits. We have leads into most of the Mafia sections and haven’t heard of this angle yet.”

“There’s always something new,” I told him. “Now... how new was what I told you?”

“New enough. It’s going to change our operation.” He paused, stared at me and rubbed his chin with his fist. “You left out some parts, Irish.”

“Like what?”

“Why everybody wants you dead.”

I let him see my teeth. “I wish I knew. When I do, I’ll have your Lodo, laddie.”

“Maybe you’ve done enough right now.”

He saw more teeth. “No no, daddy-o. Remember in the beginning... that big bundle of bills? I want them. I got plans.”

“Care to talk about them?”

“No. But I will give you something to look at. Whoever wants me has my place staked out. Some of those boys you’d like to have and you can get them if you try putting a decoy into my pad. It could prove real interesting.”

“We know where they are. We even had it in mind. We were there when the Etchings picked you up this morning.”

My mouth must have hung open. “Damn,” I said. “That was a ride. Why didn’t you move in?”

He shrugged casually. “I didn’t call it because I knew you’d come out of the trap. By the way, where are they now?”

I played it just as casually. “Someplace in Jersey and Stan Etching has a hole in his gut.”

“Fine,” he said. “I’ll put it down as a verbal report.”

He stood up and said, “Be careful tonight. If you need help, you can call.”

“Sure,” I said. “Sure.”

It was 3:35 and the day hadn’t changed yet. I waited in the doorway until a cab showed with his toplight on and I flagged him down. I rode up to where the Peter J. Haynes III Co., Inc. was out of sight 16 floors up and gave the business to the elevator boy. He looked at me, shrugged and sent the car up.

The place was quiet. From some distant room came the soft clack of a typewriter and from another angle there was the muted monotone of someone on the telephone. An unmarked door beside the reception desk opened and the redhead came out, saw me and grinned all over. She was in tight green and knew what it was doing for her. “I could hope you came to see me but I know you didn’t.”

“How come you work on Saturdays?”

“Only some Saturdays. It’s quiet then and on busy seasons you can catch up.”

“I get the kick. Carmen here?”

“Miss Smith?”

I shook my head. “Carmen. We’re buddies.”

Her eyes flicked away, then came back annoyed a moment before the smile touched them again. “Second best. That’s how I always come out. No, she’s not here. She was shopping and was in and out a couple of times. Did you call her home?”

“Uh-uh.”

She reached for the phone and dialed a number. I heard it ring about half a dozen times then the redhead said, “Nobody’s there, but do you want to leave a message?”

I didn’t get it and she caught my look. She reached behind her head and slid a wall picture to one side. There, built in, was a tape recorder with half-filled spools. “Cuts in after the tenth ring,” she said. “Canned voice asks for a message and you’re free to talk for three minutes. Besides, they record all outgoing calls. Shall I leave a message?”

“Clever,” I said. “So tell her I’ll be there for supper at six.” I heard the flat enunciation of the canned secretary, then the message was passed on.

When she hung up the redhead said, “Tell me, Mr. ...”

“Ryan.”

“...Mr. Ryan... you’re not going to hurt... Miss Smith, are you?”

“I don’t get it.”

“She has lights in her eyes.”

I waited for the rest of it.

She said, “I know who you are, Mr. Ryan. Although the pictures in the papers hardly flatter you.”

I could feel myself go warm with a flash that only fear can start. Like a jerk I left myself wide open and this kid could put a damper on the whole thing. Maybe she saw what I was thinking. It should have been plain enough.

She smiled again. There was no malice, no guile in it at all. “I’m concerned about Miss Smith. Does she know?”

“She knows. She’s helping out.”

“You didn’t do those things?”

“Some of them,” I told her without hesitating. “They were justified. I think in the end it’ll all come out clean.”

“Think?”

“If I get knocked there’ll be no washday, sugar. I’ll be all dirty socks and bad memories, no wash, just a burial like skunk-sprayed clothes.”

For a short space the laughter left her eyes and she said seriously, “Don’t let that happen, Mr. Ryan.”

“I’ll try not to,” I grinned.

There were some packages Carmen had left there and I took them with me. In their own way they provided a good cover on the street. A guy with packages has a normal look about him.

By the time I reached Carmen’s apartment it was a quarter to six and I took the back way in. I got off the service elevator and used the key she had given me. When the door opened some crazy low-beat jazz flowed out at me and I saw her dancing to it in the middle of the room.

I put the packages down, walked in and watched her. She was great. To that jangled sound she danced a sensuous dance that didn’t match the beat, but fitted the mood perfectly. Her sweater was tight and black and her breasts were free beneath it. Under their lovely swelling the mesh stretched and the flesh tints made startling contrasts against the black. The skirt was a full thing, deeply maroon, and when she spun it mushroomed out, giving a brief glimpse of long legs, beautifully rounded. Very deliberately, almost professionally, she twisted fast, and the mushroom flattened for a single moment and you knew that like with the sweater, there was nothing else at all. She laughed at me across the room and I caught at the studded belt she wore and drew her convexly against me and tasted her mouth.

Her breathing was deep and fast and there was a bloom in her face. Her eyes were lit up like stars and she touched my cheeks with her fingers. “I’ve never felt like this before, Irish.”

“I haven’t, either.”

“I wish this were... for real. That we weren’t... looking for anyone.”

“We’ll do it again. Another time.”

“All right. Shall we eat? I have steak.”

“I want you.”

“Later,” she said.

You got to see these places to believe them. It was what somebody had done to an old building to get floor space in one room and at the far end built a platform for the band. The Johns were on either side, but you could smell them when you came in. Later, with sweat, gin and cheap perfume you wouldn’t notice it, but early, they stank.

The guy at the door took the ticket and gave Carmen a double take. She went all the way with the act even to a mouthful of gum and a shoulder strap bag that was nothing more than a weapon. The robbers inside hadn’t started up-pricing the soft drinks yet, waiting for the whiskey crowd to come in. All five pieces of the band were there, real gone already in a cloud of smoke. They were doing a soft cha-cha with closed eyes, not playing for anybody but themselves as yet.

I took Carmen into the dance, playing it snug right in front of the sax man. He winked down at us and let it moan low. In back of us, at the door, they were coming in fast, about three stags to every couple. It was a trouble night.

Saturday, rain, not enough dames.

I said, “You need any prompting?”

Her hair swirled to the tempo of the music. “I know what to say.”

“Tell me.”

“Alfredo Lias. Off the Gastry. I gave him money to buy me a watch overseas. He said he’d meet me here.”

“And watch out for the wolves.”

“I like wolves,” she said.

At 10 the place was crowded. Only stragglers were still coming in. All sides of the room were lined with the stags, eyeing the women, cutting in on those they picked out. Roaming around like restless dogs were a half dozen big ones, stopping the fights that started and getting rid of the troublemakers.

I took Carmen to the soft drink concession and bought two ginger ales for a buck. Before she finished hers, a sleek-looking gook in sharp duds came over and without looking at me, asked her to dance. She glanced at me for confirmation and I said, “Go ahead, it’ll be a rare experience.”

The gook’s face pulled tight, but he took her arm without speaking and melted into the crowd on the floor. The little guy tapped my arm and said, “Señor, be careful of that one. He did not come here just to listen to the music.”

I waited until they came around again and when the gook protested, I poked my finger in his eyeball and we walked away. In back the guy screamed into his hands.

We asked around and neither of us found the one we were looking for. At midnight they drew for the door prize and some dame won a bottle of Scotch.

At one the band was looking at their watches and two good-sized fights had broken out across the room. The bouncers took care of them in a hurry and a few were hustled out lengthwise. Couples had started to leave and even the ranks of the stags were thinning out. If Lias knew his friend was dead it wasn’t likely that he’d be in a gay mood. If he were anywhere he’d be on the fringe of the crowd, taking advantage of numbers.

I sent Carmen into the ladies’ john to see what she could find and began to tour the stags. Most of them were in bunches, talking, arguing, drinking and all the while thinking they were having a good time. I went all around the room without seeing anyone I’d tag as Lias, then I stopped for a Coke again. Carmen had been gone quite a while and I searched for her in the crowd, trying to pick her out of the mess. The guy with the apron full of money said, “You lose your gorl, señor?”

Without thinking I said, “No... my friend. Alfredo Lias. He’s off the Gastry.”

“’Fredo? He was just here. He walk right behind you with that Maria.” He stood on his toes and craned his neck, then shot his finger out. “See him, there he is, señor!”

I pretended to look, missing the direction. The guy said, “There, señor, the grey suit, by the empty soda boxes.”

“I see him. Thanks.”

“Sure, señor.”

I crossed the floor, picking my way through the couples who were applauding the band. I looked at the sax man taking a bow and Carmen grabbed my arm. I pushed her ahead of me weaving through the groups.

“Ryan... he’s here! A girl said he’s with Maria and...”

“I know it, kid. There he is right there.” I pointed to him and just then the band started another cha-cha-cha. I folded her into my arms and danced toward the one called ’Fredo. Before I reached him he stepped out onto the floor with the pretty black-haired girl and began to lose himself in the maze.

But he didn’t lose me. I steered Carmen closer and then there he was, looking down at the girl Maria without really seeing her at all. His face was a mask that hid another face that was pure terror.

We moved in close until I was standing beside him. I said, “’Fredo...” and the white of fear blanched the tan of his face and when his eyes met mine they were sick to death.

I made with a laugh, old friends meeting again, forced a handshake on him and herded us all outside the dance square. I told Carmen to take Maria and powder their noses while we said hello and when they left put my arm around the guy and for everyone’s benefit who wanted to look did a palsy bit that went over all the way.

But not with Alfredo Lias. His eyes came up to mine, deep and black. For some time now he had been living with this and now he thought it was here.

“You will keel me now, señor?”

I talked through a laugh and motionless lips. He was the only one who heard it. “I want you out of this mess, mister. I’m the only chance you got to get out, understand?”

He didn’t but he said, “Si!”

“First we got to talk. You been here before?”

“Si. Often we come here.”

“Anything out back? We have to talk somewhere.”

His hand was like a talon around my forearm, hope giving him new life again. “By the corner is a door. Out back is where the garbage is put. Señor, they will kill me, no?”

“I hope not, kiddo. You go back there. I’ll tell the girls to stay put and cruise on out.”

“Si! I go. I tell you anything.”

He walked away and angled across the dance floor. I waited beside the Johns until Carmen and Maria came out then told them to hang on. Neither asked any questions. They seemed glad to talk.

I cut across in front of the bandstand where they started the next number. Halfway across I stopped and stared at the guy dancing with the tall, raven-haired doll. I said, “Hi, kid.”

Jake McGaffney looked at me and said, “What’re you doing here, Irish?”

“What about you?”

He grinned at the doll. “Hell, ask Bets here. She drags me to all these damn native affairs.”

The doll smiled, said something to me in Spanish and danced off with Jake.

I got across to the other side, behind two kids wheeling out cardboard containers of refuse. The first one pulled at the door and while it was all the way open the night was split apart by the slamming reverberations of three close shots and right behind it every girl in the place began to scream her lungs out.

There was one mad rush for the front exits and curses spit out in a dozen different languages. Up front they clawed their way to the street over one another, knowing full well what those blasts meant. The two kids had jumped off like startled rabbits leaving the container wedged in the doorway and I had to climb over it to get outside.

My hand was tight around the butt of the .45 and I sucked myself into the shadows. I waited a full minute, but it didn’t matter at all. Whoever fired the shots had gone.

But I wasn’t alone. The small sound came from behind the stacked soda crates and I saw the dull grey of his suit and the contrasting brown of his face. He was almost white now. He had one hand across his stomach and he had no reason to be alive at all.

I knelt beside him, the gun still in my hand. He saw it, but I shook my head. “I didn’t do it, ’Fredo.”

His voice was a harsh whisper. “I know... señor.”

“Did you see him?”

“No. He was... behind me. I thought... it was you.”

“Look, I’ll get you a doctor...”

His hand touched my arm. “Señor... please, no. It is too late. I get bad. Now I pay. Like Tom. I pay. It is better.”

I didn’t argue with him. I said, “You know what you took from the ship?”

He nodded, his eyes half closed.

“What was it, ’Fredo?”

A hiccup caught at his chest and I knew there were only seconds left. “Eight... kilos... señor,” he whispered.

Then I knew what it was all about. I wanted one last confirmation. “’Fredo... listen. Juan talked you into selling to Billings?” His nod was weak and his eyes closed. “Somehow you heard about Lodo. All of you knew about Lodo?”

I put my ear close to his mouth. “We... are all... dead men... señor.”

“Billings had the eight kilos last then?”

Another whisper. “Si.”

“’Fredo... who is Lodo?”

There was nothing more he could say.

From outside you could hear the sirens and the voices, and more sirens and more voices. They were getting louder and I couldn’t wait. I went over the fence the way the killer had gone and like the way a city-bred animal can, found my way back to the open street and the safety of the night and the rain.

I had to show the cabbie the money before he’d take me back. He let me off where I asked and I found Pete-the-Dog selling his papers on the ginmill beat. I took him outside, bought all of his sheets for a couple minutes talk and got what I wanted. Some unknowns had brought action into the block. Somebody shilled Golden into popping off and he was dead. Holmes was in an emergency ward with a couple of slugs in his chest and not expected to live. Steckler was picked up on an assault charge against Razztazz and to top it a Sullivan Act violation which kicked his parole out and he was due in the big house for the rest of his stretch. Razz was okay. A little beat, but okay. I gave Pete his papers back and started back to the house.

The womb.

The familiar pattern, I thought. That’s all a hood had was his house. His womb. You die in sleep. Each awakening was a birth. It was something precious, something you couldn’t take away.

There hadn’t been time to find Carmen, but I knew, somehow, that she’d be all right. Tomorrow I’d see her. Tomorrow.

I walked down the street paying no attention to the rain at all. It slashed down at me, the wind giving it a sharp bite. I held my head up and let it lick at my face. The stinging sensation had a cleansing, astringent effect and I thought over all the things that had happened. Not just tonight. All the other nights. There didn’t have to be any more looking because I knew I had all the pieces. They were there. They would just take a little sorting out in the morning and I’d have the whole picture. Then the money. Then Carmen. Then life.

I opened my coat, held the .45 in my hand while I fumbled my key out. I shouldn’t’ve bothered because the door was already open. I took my hat off, held it while I felt my way to the living room and flipped on the switch.

Even before the first blossom of light filled the room I remembered what was wrong. Pete-the-dog hadn’t mentioned one name: Mario Sen.

And here he was waiting for me to come in the door and his gun was leveled right at my stomach. He waited to let me see him smile his killer’s smile and it was a smile too long. He never noticed the .45 in my fist under the hat I was holding and my first slug blew his brains all over the wall. The cordite and blood stink rushed into the room and for the first time I felt a little sick.

Out in the kitchen I let the water run until it was cold, took a long drink to wash the bitterness away that stained my mouth and went to the phone. I dialed the Big Man’s number and when he came on I said, “This is Ryan. I found Lias. He’s dead.”

“I heard the report.”

“He wasn’t dead when I reached him, Big Man.”

The intake of his breath made a sharp hiss. “What was it?”

“Big Man... about how much would eight kilos of heroin be worth on the final cut?”

He tried to keep the excitement out of his voice but couldn’t make it. “That’s way up in the millions. There hasn’t been a single shipment that size in twenty years!”

“That’s what was in your package mister. That’s why everybody died.”

“Have you located it?”

“Not yet. But I will. If you had a tail on Billings all the while, where did he hang around?”

“Hold on.”

I heard a file drawer slide open, the rustle of papers, then the drawer slam shut. He picked up the phone again. “His movements were pretty well regimented. Mornings at the Barkley for breakfast and a shave, on to the Green Bow or Nelson’s, several bars in the Forties and generally into the Snyder House for a card game at night. Just before he was killed he made two trips to where the city’s planning that new Valley Park Housing Development. Walked around the block, but that was all.”

“Those buildings are going to be torn down,” I said.

“In a few months. There are still some families there yet.”

“I know,” I said.

“Any help?”

“Yes. Yes. Lots of help. Meantime you can pick up another dead man at my place. His name is Mario Sen. He won’t be missed. He was planted here to get me and you guys passed him over. I took care of it myself.” I paused, then added, “I’ll call you back.”

I hung up the phone while he was still trying to talk and sat down. It made lots of sense now. I knew what Billings was doing in that old section. I had an apartment there for 10 years and he found out where. He was going to plant the stuff in my pad before he died and let it go from there.

The only thing he didn’t know was that I had just moved out!

I reached for the phone again, held my hand on it and thought back, all the way back to the beginning and ran it up to date. There was no more puzzle then. The pieces became a picture and faces and times and events and now there was nothing left to find out at all... except for one thing.

All the tiredness left me and I felt good again, like that day in the beginning. The sucker trap was over and I was out of it and after tonight there wouldn’t be a kill list at all. Not for me. For a lot of others, maybe, but not me.

I grabbed at the phone, rang Carmen’s number and she had it before it finished ringing the first time. Her voice almost cracked with anxiety when she said, “Ryan, Ryan, where are you?”

“Home, Baby, I’m okay. What happened?”

“We left with the rest. The police came up as I came out but there weren’t enough to catch us. We heard those shots and I thought it was you. I couldn’t get over there. It was like being caught in the tide. Everybody was screaming and pressing forward...”

“You can forget it now.”

“Who was it?”

“’Fredo. They got him.”

“Oh, Ryan.”

“He was alive when I got there. He talked, kitten, and now I can really twist some tails. You want to see it happen?”

“Only... if I can help.”

“You can. Look, grab a cab and come over here, I’ll be waiting outside. We can go on from here.” I gave her my address, hung up and went in and changed my shirt. I walked past Mario Sen to the street and stood in the shadows, waiting.

When the cab stopped I got in and there was my lovely Carmen. Her breath half-caught in a relieved sob. She said my name and buried her face against my neck. I gave the driver my old address.

The street was dying. What life it had left showed in the few windows glowing a sickly yellow. Only a handful of kids made noises under the street lights. The plague it had even seemed to reroute traffic which hurried by as if anxious to get away from the old and decaying.

I stopped, and Carmen looked up at me quizzically, her hand tight on my arm. “Thinking?”

“Reliving a little.”

“Oh?”

“I used to live here.” I nodded toward the blank row of windows that faced the second floor.

A thin stoop-shouldered old man, his face gaunt under the grey velvet of a beard, shuffled out of the darkness, glanced at us suspiciously, then twisted his mouth into a grin. “Evenin’, Mr. Ryan. You come back for a last look?”

“Hi, Sandy. No, just a little unfinished business. How come you’re still here?”

“That Kopek Wrecking outfit got a bunch of us around. Supposed to keep out sleepers. You remember when they knocked down that place with them two bums holed up inside? Cost them for that.”

I motioned toward the hallway on my right. “Anybody here?”

“Steve. He’ll be drunk. You want to see him?”

“Not specially.”

He flipped an off beat salute and said, “Well, have fun. Can’t see why anybody’d come back here. Three more weeks everybody’s out and down they come.”

We watched him walk off and Carmen said, “Sad little man.”

I took her arm and we went up the time worn brownstone steps into the open maw of the tenement.

The scars of occupancy were still fresh, the feel of people still there. The pale light of the unshaded bulb overhead gave a false warmth and cast long, strange shadows around us. From somewhere in the back came a cough and the mumble of a voice thick with liquor.

A box-like professional torch with Kopek Wrecking stenciled on it was wedged in the angle between the bannister and the newel post. I picked it up and snapped on the switch. Then I smiled at Carmen, took her hand and started up the stairs.

At the door I stopped and turned her head toward mine. “You haven’t said anything.”

Her eyes laughed at me. She waved her hand at the darkness outside the light. “What can I say? Everything is so... strange.” An involuntary shiver seemed to touch her and she drew closer to me. “The things you do... are so different. I never know what to expect.”

“They’re hood things, kitten.”

For a moment she seemed pensive, then she shook her head lightly. “You’re not really, Ryan. In the beginning you were, but something’s happened to you.”

“Not to me, sugar. Nothing in this whole lousy world is going to shake me up. I like being a hood. To me it’s the only way I can tell off this stupid race of slobs. I can keep out of their damned organizations and petty grievances and keep them away from me. I can drink my own kind of poison and be dirty mean when they want me to drink theirs.”

I tried the knob. It turned easily and the door opened.

In a way it was like visiting your own tomb.

There was my chair by the window. The drop leaf table Mrs. Winkler gave me was still in its usual position by the wall. Somebody had stolen the mirror and the magazine rack. When I turned the light into the bedroom the framework of the iron bed made a grilled pattern in shadows on the wall. Somebody had swiped the mattresses too.

I walked to the window and looked out into the street. The haze of dirt put things out of focus. I turned the head of the torch ceilingwise and put it on the floor, then sat down in the armchair.

Almost softly I said, “It’s a ‘once-upon-a-time’ story. It started in Lisbon where two drunks named ’Fredo and Spanish Tom accidentally witnessed the caching of a narcotics shipment. In cubic displacement it only made a small package, eight kilos worth, but in value a multi-million dollar proposition. They never realized the full value of it. A few grand was as far as they could think.

“But others knew what it meant. In port they contacted a Spanish speaking buddy, Juan Gonzales. He knew a guy who had the loot to make the buy. That takes us to my old friend Billings. The louse.”

For some reason I didn’t feel the quick flush of hate I used to feel when I thought of his name.

“Juan made the buy for Billings, all right, and probably before he could pass over the ten grand he paid for it to Tom and ’Fredo, they shipped out. Juan didn’t care for ten grand... you see, he was going to be Billings’ partner in something really big. He even told his wife the great things they’d do... things you don’t do on only ten grand.

“And now the rub. Billings didn’t want a partner. The big cross was coming up and Juan could feel it. He didn’t have a chance in the world and he protected his wife the only way he could. He gave her that ten grand then tried to skip out. He didn’t get far. Billings was waiting. He shoved him under a truck and that took care of Juan. He didn’t worry about the other two since they never knew who made the buy.”

The curiosity in her eyes deepened. Her tongue made a slight movement between her teeth as she followed my thought. She said, “But those other two... they’re dead.”

“I know. I’ll come to that.

“Billings put eight kilos of junk on the market. I can’t figure how he could have been so incredibly stupid, but apparently his greed got the better of him. Eight kilos! This was the biggest load that ever hit the states in one piece!”

I stopped a moment, thought about it, then said reflectively, “You know, this was what they were waiting for.”

“They?” She was perched on the edge of the dropleaf table, her hands folded under her breasts making them strain against the fabric of the raincoat.

“They, sugar. Whenever eight kilos of H gets away from its handlers there’s some hell waiting for somebody. An organizational hijacking they could cope with, but not coincidence. They didn’t know where it was, but they knew it would show up in time. When it did they went after it and Billings was their target. The slob got smart too late.

“When the word went out how hot the junk was nobody would touch it. There were no buyers. That’s when Billings knew he was about to be tapped. He tried to protect himself by going to a policing agency, but again it was too late. The stakes were too high. They knocked off his protection, moved in close and were ready to tap him out.

“Buddy Billings made his final move. He knew they wanted the stuff as well as him, so like he had done once before, he included me in the mess. Hell, he knew where I lived. He wanted me dead or imprisoned... anything to pay for the anxiety I had made him live with all the days I had hunted for him.”

I stopped, sucked in a deep breath and looked at the ceiling patterns again.

“He hid the junk in my place, kid. He probably figured on writing an anonymous letter or something but they caught up with him beforehand. He wasn’t quite dead when a cop found him. His last words implicated me.

“Now catch this. By now the underworld has been rattling with this story. The policy agency involved have a good picture of what they’re after. This stuff has to be found before the original owners get it and put it into circulation.

“The catch, kiddo. They have two names. Mine, and a certain Lodo. The last one is a killer. The head of operation kill. The wheel that Mafia HQ keeps set up to enforce its east coast programs and keep things in line. Lodo is rarely called upon, that’s how clever the organization is, how big it is, how tightly it can work within the frameworks of certain governments. Narcotics are big... and legal... businesses in several countries. Lodo is an important cog in the machine... and Lodo is only a cover name.

“Lodo must be smart, untouchable, able to operate without suspicion. And now Lodo is responsible for recovery of eight kilos of H.”

She began to see what I was driving at. “And all that time it was... at your place?”

“That’s right.”

She looked around quickly. “Here?”

I nodded. “Billings’ mistake. He didn’t know about the move.”

“All that... is here?”

“I could almost say where.”

She waited, her face reflecting her interest. I got up, went to the kitchen and in the barren limits of the light felt for the obvious wall partition by the sink that opened onto a series of valves. I hauled the carton out and shut the partition. My arm hit a cup that still stood on the sink and it crashed to the floor.

In the living room I heard Carmen gasp.

I put the carton beside the torch and sat down. “There was no other place in this dump to hide anything,” I said.

The box fascinated her. I tapped it with my foot. “Eight kilos. Millions. Not one or two. Not ten. More than that. Enough to get a whole city killed off.”

“It... doesn’t seem like much,” she admitted.

“It never does.”

“And you found it. Nobody else could. Just you.” Her voice held a touch of admiration and she was smiling.

“There were red herrings. Money Billings won on the nags. The fuzz thought it was loot I paid him for the stuff. You know, all that time they sucked me in thinking I had possession and were trying to get it out of me. They knew I had to play their little game or else.”

“Game?”

“Sure, sweetie. In my own crazy way I’m a fuzz too. They played the game to the hilt. They played it two ways at once and played it smart. I was the complete unknown and they didn’t know what to do with me. What they pulled might be called the Ultimate Stunt. I like that. It fits real well. But what I like best is what I told them in the beginning. I was right. I was bigger than their whole damn department. Hoodtown’s my back yard too and the game is my game as much as theirs. If I felt like it I could bust this play open like a ripe egg. Alone.”

I said suddenly, “What made you do it. Carmen?”

She frowned and asked the question silently.

“Take the job, I mean.”

“Job?”

“Lodo,” I said softly. “My beautiful big lovely is Lodo.”

Her breath came in a gasp. “Ryan!”

“I’m going to guess again, kid. Check me. You probably never have before. But look deep. Look at a kid brought up around the gaming tables whose ears catch talk and intents kids shouldn’t hear. Look at a kid who gets used to wrong money young, who learns the mechanics of card handling from an expert and who finds a taste for those things develop into a lust for them.”

The next thing I let come out slowly.

“Look at a kid who blew a guy’s head off from ten feet away and think of what impact that had on a mind already decaying.”

For a moment a terrible shudder touched her shoulders and the beauty of her face was twisted with anguish.

“Stop it, Ryan! These things you’re guessing...”

I shook my head. “I’m not guessing any more, kitten.”

Her teeth bit into her lip and the tears that made her eyes swim flooded out and coursed down her cheeks.

I said, “Lodo left a line to Billings... a slim one, a deliberate one. Lodo had to maintain that connection to be in on things if they ever developed, yet not enough to be suspicious. That line was the sweet bouquet you sent the departed. The eventuality paid off. I followed it.

“Your next move was easy. On our first lunch date you went to the ladies room as per usual, but made a phone call that had me tailed. You made all the provisions for a tap job in my own apartment using organization punks and sat back and waited.”

“Ryan...” her eyes were pleading, “do you think I could do that?”

“Sure. The kill wasn’t yours directly. You just made the call. Operation tappo went into effect automatically. Trouble was, it didn’t come off. The big second phase began. I was cultivated for information. I was still an enigma. Nobody could figure my part in it at all. Hell, don’t feel sorry about it, I didn’t know either.”

She shook her head, telling me it was wrong, all wrong, but I didn’t watch.

“My friend Art died before I could catch on. He had some great connections, that guy. They went pretty far. He was a big hero in the Italian campaign during the war. He made a lot of friends over there. He called on one to do some poking for him. He found out Lodo was a cover name and was about to find out who Lodo was. So Art had to die.

“Coincidence entered the picture again. You weren’t deliberately set up for it... the gimmick was just there, that’s all.”

“Gimmick?” Her voice was quiet, her face expressionless.

“The tape recorder attachment on the phone. One in the office, one at home. You picked up my conversation with Art, went to his place and while he was asleep, killed him yourself or had him killed.”

“No!”

I shrugged. “It really doesn’t matter who did it. I prefer thinking it was you. By this time your organization had run down the Lisbon kids. One was bumped, one to go. The game was all yours when I figured when the last one would be. You had your stooges there and waiting and when the contact was made they beat me to the guy and the tap cleaned up that end of things.”

I leaned back in the chair and stretched out my feet. “Pretty quick now this outfit of yours will take plenty of lumps.”

“Please, Ryan...”

“You suckered me, kiddo. I’m sore at the whole business now. I’m sore because when things were getting tight you called out the troops. I was on everybody’s kill list. All the big ones were called in, guns from all over the country. Suddenly I’m thinking like fuzz and want the whole damn bunch slammed. Suddenly I know that for a change I can be useful. Suddenly I see that playing hood isn’t the big thing after all because it’s playing with the things I hate.”

I took a big, deep breath. “And suddenly I’m hating those things especially hard because I started to be in love for the first time and now I don’t know if it will ever happen again. Suddenly I have a terrible feeling like when I walked in the room here. It’s all over. Everything’s all over. The mistakes have all been made and now it’s all over.”

And then she showed me how the first part was wrong and the second right. The mistake still to go was mine in thinking I could get my rod out before she could move. I was wrong. It was about to be all over. In that I was right.

I could see the hole in the end of the hammerless automatic she pointed at my head. It was a fascinating thing, a bottomless black eye. I looked over it at Carmen’s smile. It was strained at first, then relaxed.

She was still very beautiful.

“What would you have done, Ryan?”

I shrugged, gauging the distance between us. I’d make the try, all right, but it would be no use.

“You were right, you know.” She tossed her head, making her hair swirl again. “The Peter Haynes Company is a front. Very legal, economically sound. A wonderful place to keep... other records. A good source of income to keep key personnel in funds and in style until their services are needed. My file of personal correspondence there would be very enlightening to a cipher expert, but completely meaningless to anyone else.”

When I gave her a hard smile she said, “That one little fact could break and smash half of the whole organization.”

And now it was too late.

“What would you have done, Ryan?”

“I don’t know.”

“Killed me?”

I didn’t lie about it. “No.”

“Being a hood never became you. The one act of turning me in would have justified you. You could have walked straight again. I think now you really want to.

“Two things would have happened. In this state, the chair... or with a good lawyer, permanently confined to a mental institution. I couldn’t live that way. It would be better to be dead.”

Her face softened and the light glinted on the wetness that lay along her cheeks. “Only you couldn’t kill me, Ryan. Why?”

“What difference does it make?”

I could hardly make out her words. “It makes a difference.”

“I told you. I was falling in love. I was a jerk. So now I pay for being a jerk. A whole lifetime I laugh at the idiots who get tied up in love knots and then it happens to me. Well at least I won’t be hurting for long. I’m going to make you do it to me fast, kitten.”

“Please don’t.” Her lip was tight in her teeth, choking something back. “Did you really love me, Irish?”

“Okay, kid, get the last laugh. Make it loud. It was true. You were the one. I loved you very much.”

Inside my heart was slamming against my ribs because I knew it was coming and I didn’t know whether it would hurt or not and I was scared. I looked at her and tried to see inside her mind but I couldn’t get past the tears. For some reason she smiled and it was like before when I didn’t know all the things I did now and when I could look at her and want and hope. Her eyes were soft and misty and in their depths saw what happened to her... saw the realization come, the analysis, the rejection of the future and the decision. I saw her suddenly love and give the only thing she had to give and with the yell still choked in my throat and before I could move to stop her she said, “I love you, man.”

Then she folded her arms and turned the gun against her heart and said the same words again only this time they were shattered by the blast of the gunshot.