My Gun Is Quick

Chapter Eight

I didn't get to sleep that night. Instead, I laid the contents of the bag out in front of me and sat there smoking one cigarette after another, trying to figure out what it meant. Baby clothes. Some pictures. A battered overnight bag. All of them the redhead's. How long ago? Where? Why?

There was beer in the refrigerator and I finished off bottle after bottle, sipping it slowly, thinking, letting my mind wander back and forth over the facts I had. They were mighty little when you tried to put them all together.

The sun came up over the windowsill chasing the night out, and I remembered to call Mr. Berin. He answered the phone himself and this time the sleep was in my voice. "Mike again."

"Good morning! You're up early."

"I haven't been to bed yet."

"You'll pay for lack of self-discipline in later years, young man."

"Maybe," I said tonelessly, "but tonight you pay. I left my friend a check for five hundred bucks."

"Fine, Mike. I'll take care of it at once. Did you learn anything from your--shall I say, source?"

"Not a damn thing, but I will, I will."

"Then I can consider the money well spent. But please be careful. I don't want you running into any more trouble."

"Trouble's an occupational hazard in this racket, Mr. Berin. I can usually take care of it one way or another. But what I got here won't mean trouble for me. I haven't got the angle lined up yet, but I can see it coming."

"Good! You've got my curiosity aroused now. Is it a secret or can you... ?"

"No secret. I have an overnight bag that had been packed with baby clothes. That and a folder of pictures."

"Baby clothes?"

"They were the redhead's--or her baby's."

He mulled over it a moment and admitted that it presented quite a puzzle, quite a puzzle. I agreed with him.

"What do you intend to do now?" he asked me.

"I don't know. I'm too sleepy to do much, that's for sure."

"Then go to bed by all means. Keep in touch with me whenever you think I can be of use."

I said all right and hung up. My eyes were burning holes in my head and too much beer had me stumbling over things. I took a last drag on the butt and clinched it, then lay back on the couch and let the sleep come, wonderful, blessed sleep that pulled a curtain over all the ugly things and left me with nothing but a nebulous dream that had no meaning or importance.

There was a bell. It kept ringing insistently and I tried to brush it away like a fly and it wouldn't leave. Finally I opened my eyes and came back to the present with the telephone going off behind my head. I squirmed around and picked it up, wanting to throw it against the wall.

Velda said hullo twice and when I didn't answer right away, "Mike... is that you? Mike, answer me!"

"It's me, sugar. What do you want?"

She was mad, but there was relief in her voice. "Where the devil have you been? I've been calling every saloon in town all morning."

"I've been right here."

"I called there four times."

"I've been asleep."

"Oh, out all night again. Who was she?"

"Green eyes, blue hair, purple skin. What do you want, or aren't I the boss any more?"

"Pat called early this morning. Something to do with Feeney Last. He wants you to call him back when you can."

"Well, why didn't you say so!" I sat up quickly, my hand over the cut-off bar. "See you later, Velda. I'll buzz him right away."

I held the bar down, let it up and dialed police headquarters. The guy at the desk said yes, Captain Chambers had been in, but he wasn't now. No, he couldn't say where he was. Official business, and did I want to leave a message. I wanted to swear, but I couldn't very well so I told him never mind and hung up.

It was five minutes to twelve and the day was half-shot. I gathered up the baby clothes and folded them back into the bag, stuffing the photos in the same top pocket, then I went in and took a shower.

Right in the middle of it the phone rang again and I had to wade back into the livingroom. It was Pat, but I didn't lace into him for dragging me out of the tub because I was too anxious to get the news.

He chuckled when I answered and said, "What kind of hours do you keep, pal?"

"If you knew you'd want to change jobs with me. Velda said you have something on Feeney. What gives?"

He got right down to cases. "When I put out feelers on him they all came back negative. This morning I had one in the mail from the Coast, a return feeler from an upstate sheriff. It seems like Feeney Last answers the description of a guy who is wanted for murder. The only catch is that the guy who could identify him is dead and they have to go from the poop he gave them."

"That's something." I thought it over, knowing that a mug like Feeney wouldn't be hard to describe. A greaseball. "What are you going to do about it?"

"I wrote for the finer details. If it fits we'll put out a call for him. I had copies made of his picture on the gun license and forwarded them to the sheriff to see if Feeney could be identified there."

"At least it's handy to have, Pat. He can always be held for suspicion if we need him... and if we can find him."

"O.K., then, I just thought I'd let you know. I have a death on my hands and I have to do the report."

"Anybody we know?" I asked.

"Not unless you hang around the tourist traps. She was a hostess at the Zero Zero Club."

My hand tightened around the receiver. "What did she look like, Pat?"

"Bleached blonde about thirty. Nice looking, but a little on the hard side. The coroner calls it suicide. There was a farewell note in her handbag along with complete identification."

I didn't need to know her name. There might have been a dozen bleached blondes in the Zero Zero, but I was willing to bet anything I had I knew who this one was. I said, "Suicide, Pat?"

He must have liked the flatness of my words. He came back with, "Suicide beyond doubt, Mike. Don't try to steer this one into murder!"

"Was her name Ann Minor?"

"Yes... you... how did... ?"

"Is the body in the morgue?"

"That's right."

"Then meet me there in twenty minutes, hear?"

It took me forty-five minutes to get there and Pat was pacing up and down outside the place. When he saw my face his eyes screwed up and he shook his head disgustedly. "I hope they don't try to keep you here," he said. "I've seen better-looking corpses than you."

He went inside, over to the slab where the body was laid out. Pat pulled back the sheet and waited. "Know her?"

I nodded.

"Anything to do with the Sanford case?"

I nodded again.

"Damn you, Mike. One day the coroner is going to beat your head off. He's positive she was a suicide."

I took the corner of the sheet from his hand and covered her face up again. "She was murdered, too, Pat."

"O.K., pal, let's go some place and talk about it. Maybe over lunch."

"I'm not hungry." I was thinking of how she looked last night. She had wanted to be important to someone. To me. She was important to someone else, too.

Pat tugged at my sleeve. "Well, I'm hungry and murder won't spoil my dinner any. I want to know how a pretty suicide like this can be murder."

There was a spaghetti joint a few blocks away so we walked over to it. Pat ordered a big lunch and I had a bottle of red wine for myself. After the stuff was served I started the ball rolling with, "What's your side of it, Pat?"

"Her name is Ann Minor... which you seemed to know. She worked for Murray Candid as a hostess four years. Before that a dancing career in lesser clubs, and before that a tour with a carnival as a stripper. Home life, nil. She had a furnished apartment uptown and the super said she was a pretty decent sort.

"The last few months she's been a little down in the dumps, according to her co-workers, but nothing to indicate positively a suicide. The farewell note said she was just tired of it all, life was a bore and she was getting no place, thus the Dutch act. The handwriting checked with the signature on other documents."

"Baloney!"

"No baloney, Mike. The experts checked it."

"Then they'd better check it again."

Pat let his eyes drop when he saw the set of my mouth. "I'll see that they do." He went back to his spaghetti, forked in a mouthful, then reviewed the case. "We reconstruct it this way. Just before dawn she walked down the pier that's being dismantled off Riverside Drive, removed her hat, shoes, jacket... laid them down on the planks with her bag on top, and jumped in.

"Apparently she couldn't swim. However, even if she could, she would have drowned because her dress was caught on some bolts below the surface and held her there. About eight-thirty this morning some kids came along to do some fishing and they spotted her stuff first, then her. One of the kids called a cop who called the emergency squad. They didn't bother to work on her."

"How long had she been dead?

"Roughly, about four to five and a half hours."

I poured another glass of the wine out and spilled it down. "I was with her until two forty-five last night," I said.

Pat's eyes blazed and he stabbed his fork into the pile of spaghetti. It could have been good, but he wasn't tasting it. "Go on," he answered.

"She found an overnight bag that belonged to Nancy. She gave it to me, because before that I had asked her to poke around a little for some history on the redhead. The bag was full of baby clothes, all unused. We went up to her apartment."

He nodded. "Was she frightened... or remorseful?"

"When I left her she was a pretty happy girl. She was no suicide."

"Damn it, Mike! I..."

"When is the autopsy due?"

"Today... right now! You got me dancing again! I wouldn't be surprised to find her full of arsenic, either!" He threw his fork down and pushed away from the table and went over to a wall phone. When he came back he grunted, "Two hours and there'll be an official report. The coroner's pulling the autopsy now."

"I bet he won't change the verdict."

"Why?"

"Because somebody is pretty damn smart."

"Or dumb. Maybe it's you that's dumb, Mike."

I lit a cigarette and grinned at him, thinking of something somebody told me once about persons that drown. "I'm not so dumb, kid. Maybe we'll give the coroner a shock. I liked that blonde."

"You think this is mixed up with Nancy, don't you?"

"Yup."

"Positive?"

"Yup."

"Then get me proof, Mike. I can't move without it."

"I will."

"Yeah, when?"

"When we get our hands on someone who knows enough to talk."

Pat agreed with a flicker of his eyebrows. "I can see us making him talk."

"You don't have to," I reminded him. "When that party gets to you he'll be so happy to talk he'll spill his guts. You don't have to do a thing."

"You're going to squeeze it out him, I betcha?"

"Damn right, friend."

"You know what you're bucking, of course."

"Yeah, I know. Guys that are paying heavy for protection. Guys who can take care of themselves if that protection doesn't go through. Money boys with private armies maybe."

"We're on touchy ground," Pat grated.

"I know it. We're going to run into a lot of dirt unless I miss my guess. There will be people involved who will raise hell. That's where I have the edge, Pat. They can make you smell their stink. Me, I can tell 'em to blow it. They can't take my job away and they can't scare me because I can make more trouble than they can shake a stick at."

"You're telling me!"

Pat went back to his spaghetti while I finished the bottle of wine and I could almost hear the gears clicking in his head. When he finished he put down his napkin, but before he could enjoy a smoke the proprietor called him to the phone. He kicked his chair back and walked away.

Five minutes later he came back wearing a grin. "Your murder theory is getting kicked around. The men rechecked on the note. There is absolutely no doubt that the Minor girl wrote it. We had confirmation from several sources. Not a trace of forgery. You can't break it, Mike."

I scowled at the empty glass in my hand. At least I was smart enough to know that the police labs mean what they say when a positive statement is issued.

Pat was watching me. "This takes it right out of my department, you know."

"There's still the autopsy."

"Want to go watch it?"

I shook my head. "No, I'll take a walk. I want to think. Supposing I call you back later. I'd like to know what's on the report."

"O.K." Pat checked his watch. "Give me a ring in a couple of hours. I'll be at the office."

"One other thing..."

Pat grinned. "I was wondering when you were going to ask it."

He was a sharp one, all right. "I haven't got the time, nor the facilities for a lot of legwork right now. How about having your wire service check the hospitals for me. See if they ever had a Nancy Sanford as a maternity case. Get the name of the man, family or anything else, will you?"

"I would have done it anyway, Mike. I'll get it off right away."

"Thanks."

I took the check and paid it, then said so-long to Pat outside the door. For a while I strolled up the street, my hands in my pockets, whistling an aimless tune. It was a nice day, a lovely day... a hell of a day for murder.

Suicide? Not on your life! They worked it so sweet you couldn't call it murder--yet. Well, maybe you couldn't, but I could. I was willing to bet my shirt that the blonde had asked the wrong questions in the wrong places. Somebody had to shut her up. It fitted, very nicely. She was trying to earn that five hundred. She got too much for her money.

When I made a complete circle around the block I ambled over to the car and got in. For a change, the streets were half empty, and I breezed uptown without having to stop for a red light. When I got to Ninety-sixth Street I turned towards the river, found a place to park and got out.

A breeze was blowing up from the water, carrying with it the partially purified atmosphere of a city at work. It was cool and refreshing, but there was still something unclean about it. The river was grey in color, not the rich blue it should have been, and the foam that followed the wake of the ships passing by was too thick-almost like blood. In close to shore it changed to a dirty brown trying to wash the filth up on the banks. It was pretty if you only stopped to look at it, but when you looked too close, and thought enough, it made you sick.

She removed her hat, shoes, jacket... laid them down on the planks with her bag on top, and jumped in. That would be a woman's way of going it... a woman who had given suicide a lot of thought. Not a sudden decision, the kind that took a jump and tried to change her mind in mid-air. A suicide like this would be thought out, all affairs put in order to make it easy for those who did the cleaning up--if it was a suicide. Neat, like it had been planned for a long, long time.

My feet had carried me down to the grass that bordered the water, taking me over towards a pier that was partially ripped up. They had a watchman on it now in a brand-new shack. I was conscious of a face curling into a nasty smile. It was still there when the watchman came out, a short fat guy with a beer bottle in his hand. He must have picked me for another cop because he gave me the nod and let me walk down the runway to the end without bothering to ask questions.

I could hear the music going off in my head. It was always like that when I began to get ideas and get excited. I was getting a crazy, wild idea that might prove a point and bring Pat into it after all, then the crap would really fly. Heads would roll. They'd set up the guillotine in Times Square and the people could cheer like at a circus, then slink back and get ready to start the same thing all over again.

There was an empty peanut-butter jar with dead worms in it on top of the piling. I shook the things out and wiped the jar clean with a handkerchief until it shone, then threw the handkerchief away, too. I climbed down the supports and filled the jar nearly full before I worked my way back, then screwed the lid back on and went back to the street.

Instead of calling Pat I drove straight to his office. He shook hands and invited me down the hall, where he picked up a report sheet, then took me back to his cubicle. He handed me the form. "There it is, Mike. She died by suffocation. Drowning. We called the time right, too. No doubt about it now."

I didn't bother to read the report. Instead I tossed it back on his desk. "The coroner around, Pat?"

"He's downstairs, if he hasn't left already."

"Call and find out."

He was about to ask a question, but thought better of it and reached for the phone. After a minute he said, "He's still there."

"Tell him to wait."

"It better be good. He's pretty cranky. Besides, he's with the D.A."

"It's good."

Pat told the operator to hold him, his eyes never leaving mine. When he hung up he leaned forward over his desk. "What is it this time?"

I laid the jar on his desk. "Have him analyze that."

He picked up the jar and scrutinized it, shaking it to bring the sediment to the top, frowning into the murky ooze inside the jar. When he saw I wasn't going to explain it he got up abruptly and went out the door and I heard the elevator take him downstairs.

I went through half a deck of Luckies before I heard the elevator stop again. His feet were coming towards the office fast and hard and I knew he was mad.

He was. He slammed the jar on the desk and swung around with anger written across his face. "What kind of a steer did you call that? He analyzed all right... he told me it was nothing but water filled with every kind of mess there was. Then he wanted to know the whys and wherefores. I looked like a damn fool. What was I going to say, that a private cop is using the police for a workbench to figure out a crazy scheme? I didn't know what I expected to find in there, but I thought it would be better than that!"

"Why didn't you ask the coroner if it was the same stuff he found in her lungs? Not her stomach, mind you, but her lungs. When you drown you suffocate because that little valve in your throat tightens up the air passage to keep anything from running into your lungs. It doesn't take much to suffocate a person just enough water to make that little valve jam. There's water in the stomach, but very little in the lungs. Go ahead, ask him."

Pat's eyes were ready to pop. His teeth bared in an animal-like grin and he said, "You brainy bastard, you!"

He picked up the phone and called downstairs. The conversation didn't take more than a minute, but there was a lot of excited talk going on. He put the phone back and slid into his chair. "They're double-checking now, I think you called it."

"I told you that before."

"Don't go too fast, Mike. We have to wait for the report. Now tell it your own way."

"Simple, Pat. Ann Minor was drowned, most likely in her own place. Then she was tossed into the river."

"That means carrying the body out of the house without being seen, you know."

"What of it? Who's on the street at that hour? Hell, getting her out isn't the hard job. Dumping her wouldn't be a hard job either."

"There's only one catch: the suicide note."

"I got ideas on that, too."

Pat dropped his head in his hand. "You know I'm pretty smart. I've been tied, up in police work as long as you have. I love it, I'm good at it. But you come up with the ideas. Do you think I'm getting too set in my ways any more? Am I reverting to type or something? What the hell is wrong with me, Mike?"

The only thing I could do was chuckle at him. "You aren't slowing up, kid. You just forget... sometimes a smart crook knows as much as a smart cop. You ought to start thinking like one of them sometimes. It helps."

"Nuts!"

"We have two murders now. They both looked like something else. We haven't proved the first one, but this second shows you the kind of people you're up against. They aren't amateurs by a long shot."

Pat looked up. "You were talking about an idea you had..."

"No dice. Get your own. This one's a little cock-eyed even for you. If it's what I'm thinking it's just another piece in the puzzle. Maybe 'it's even from a different puzzle."

The phone rang again and Pat answered it. His face stayed blank until he finished the conversation. He wasn't too happy. "My department has it now. The water in her lungs was clear. Traces of soap. She was drowned in a bathtub, probably. Not a sign of contamination."

"Then cheer up."

"Yeah, I'll break out in smiles. They're patting me on the back downstairs, but they want to know how I got wise. What the hell will I tell them?"

I pushed the chair back and stood up. "Tell 'em you made it all up out of your own two little heads."

When I left, Pat said damn, soft like, but he was grinning now.

And I was grinning because I wanted the police in on this thing. Where I was going was too much trouble for one person. Much too much--even for me. The cops had the boys and the guns. They had the brains, too. Pretty soon now those heads were going to roll.

I had my supper in the Automat before I went home. I loaded up a tray with everything they had and picked a table where I was alone and able to think. When I finished I felt better and kept thinking, over a cigarette. All the assorted pieces of the puzzle were clear in my mind, but I couldn't get them together. But at least they were clear and if I couldn't see the picture on the puzzle I knew one thing... there would be one thing when I got it together. I looked at Nancy's ring again and said, "Soon, Red... very soon now."

In an hour the day had lost its brightness and a light rain rolled in with the dusk. I turned up my collar and stayed close to the buildings until I reached my car. Traffic was heavier now, but I got on an express street that was running freely and headed home. By the time I made my apartment the rain was coming down hard with no signs of letting up. I drove into the garage, and ran for it. Just the same, I got soaked before I reached the canopy over the gates.

When I tried to get my key in the lock it jammed. I tried again and it jammed again. Then I saw scratches on the brass. The lock has been jimmied. I hauled out my rod with one hand and kicked at the door. It flew open and I charged in there like a jerk wide open to get myself killed, only there was nobody else in there with me.

The lights were on in every room and the place was turned upside down. Nothing was where it belonged. The cushions in the chairs and couch were ripped apart and the breeze was blowing the stuffing through the air like a field of ragweed.

Drawers were emptied and discarded in the middle of the floor. All my clothes were out of the closet and heaped in a pile, the pockets turned inside out. They didn't even overlook the refrigerator. Bottles, cans and cold cuts were drawing flies and dirt on the table and under the sink.

I grabbed the phone and dialed the house number downstairs and waited for the doorman to answer. When he came on, I had to fight to keep my voice down. "This is Mike Hammer in 9-D. Was anybody here looking for me?"

The guy replied in the negative.

"Was anybody hanging around the place today? Anybody who doesn't belong here?"

Another negative. He asked me if there was any trouble.

I said, "No, but there damn soon will be. Somebody's ruined my joint."

He got excited at that, but I told him to keep quiet. I didn't feel like answering questions or scaring the neighbors. I went into the bedroom and started to yank the covers from the heap in the corner. The overnight case was there under the layers of wool, the top gaping open and the baby clothes scattered around it. Some of them hadn't even been unfolded. Both side pockets and the top pocket had been ripped completely off and the lining opened so a hand could search underneath.

And the folder of pictures was gone.

I took an inventory of everything in the house, a search that cost me two hours, but the only thing missing was the pictures. Just to be sure I looked again. I needn't have bothered. Fifty-four bucks and a wristwatch lay on top of the dresser untouched, but an old set of films was gone.

They didn't mean anything to me, but they did to somebody else. That's why Ann died. I sat on the wreckage of a chair with a butt dangling from my lips, tallying things up. A lock lay on the floor, smashed from a heel. A cigarette box was forced open, broken. A socket fixture on the wall had been pried loose, leaving the wire ends hanging out like broken fingers.

I looked around me more carefully this time, noticing the pattern of the search. They took the pictures, but they were looking for something else, a something small enough to hide in almost anything. The inkwell had been emptied on the desk, and I remembered the salt and pepper shaker that had been dumped in the kitchen.

Sure, it was simple enough. I lifted my hand and grinned at the ring. "They'll be back, kid," I told it. "They didn't get you that time, so they'll be back. And we'll be waiting for them."

I could relax now. It was going to cost me, but I could relax. The pattern was taking shape. Nancy was the figurehead. The ring was Nancy. And they wanted her pictures back. What for, I couldn't say. They were old and they didn't show anything, but they were important, too. The baby clothes didn't mean anything to them, but the ring and the pictures did.

My eyes were staring into the distance and I was seeing Nancy's letter to me. Some day she might need me again... she was doing many things... only one of which had any meaning to her... ours was a trust.

Words. Now I had a lot of words. Some of them were tugging at my brain trying to claw their way into the clear. What was it? What the hell was it I was trying to remember? It was shrieking out to be heard and my mind was deaf. I was listening but I couldn't hear it. Damn it, what was there? What was I trying to remember! Somebody said something. It didn't mean a thing then, yet it sank in and stayed there until now. Who said it? What was it?

I shook my head to clear it, hoping to bring it back. The shrill clamor of the phone snapped me out of the fog and I got up and answered it. Pat's voice said hullo with a tone that had a snap to it.

"What's up, Pat?"

"I just want to tell you we went over the thing again. It works out. The coroner and the D.A. are calling it murder. Now they want an answer to the suicide note. It was authentic as hell. What was the idea you had?... I'm up the creek without a paddle."

I answered him listlessly. "Go ask some questions of her friends. See if she ever talked about committing suicide. There's a chance she did at one time and wrote the note. Somebody could have talked her out of it, then kept the note for future use."

"You think of everything, don't you?"

"I wish I did, Pat."

"It isn't going to be as easy as that. I put the whole question to the D.A. and it stood him on his ear. He thought the idea was preposterous."

"What do you think?"

"I think we got a snake by the tail."

"That's the only safe way to pick up a snake."

"I hope you're right. You still playing ball, Mike?"

"All the way, kid. You'll hear from me when I have something. Like now. Somebody broke into my apartment and wrecked it. They were looking for Nancy's ring. They didn't get it, but they did take those snapshots I got from the blonde."

"Hell!" Pat exploded. "What made you keep them? You know better than that!"

"Sure, I'll close the barn door after the horse is stolen. I wouldn't have known they were important if they hadn't been lifted. I'm not worried about them. They wanted the ring, why, I don't know. It's impossible to trace the thing, but they wanted it."

Pat was silent, then he said, "I've got news for you, too. I got an answer from a hospital in Chicago. We were lucky to get it back so quickly."

I squeezed the receiver. "Yeah?"

"Nancy Sanford had a baby there four years ago. She was an unwed mother. She refused to divulge the name of the father and she was put in a charity ward sponsored by a group that takes care of those affairs. It was a stillbirth. Nobody knows where she went after that."

My hand was shaking and my voice was almost a whisper when

I thanked him for the information. Before I could hang up he said, "That ring... better drop it off with me, Mike."

I laughed harshly. "Like hell! Nancy is still an accident on your books. When you call it murder you can have it."

Pat was arguing about it when I interrupted.

"What are you going to do about the blonde?... and Murray?"

"He was just picked up at his club. On his way over now. Listen, about the ring, I want..."

I said thanks and cradled the receiver. Murray was about to be questioned. That meant a couple of hours at least, unless he had a good lawyer and good connections. It was enough time.