Primal Spillane: Early Stories 1941-1942

Clams Make the Man

Dopey Fooz of the Snooty Detective Service was “rocking the cradle’ with his yo-yo top when Stephen Smirch, the boss, stormed in.

“Fooz! Whatcha doing with that thing?” he bellowed. “I thought I told you to get down to Tony’s place to find out who was swiping all his silverware!”

“Aw, Smirch, I’m a manhunter, that’s what. A guy with my reputation can’t afford to go chasing down spoon swipers.”

Smirch tore out a handful of hair and stuffed it in his pocket. Very deliberately he picked up a desk by the leg and waved it over his head.

“If you don’t git—!”

Dopey got. When Smirch started whizzing desks around, he was pretty sure to hit something, and that something was not going to be named Dopey Fooz. He grabbed his benny on the run and made for the hall. The elevator door was open and he headed that way on the double. S’too bad that nobody told him there wasn’t an elevator there, but fortunately, he was only on the tenth floor.

Dopey picked himself up from the bottom of the shaft, dashed out, and hopped in a cab. Tony’s place was a combination delicatessen, eat shoppe and dance hall, which all the riff-raff, with less than a million fish in the bank, kept going with their orders of clams on the half shell. When his cutlery started to disappear, he called in the S.D.S. to investigate.

Tony was so fat you couldn’t get near enough to him to shake hands, so Dopey slid up on his port bow and mitted him. “I’m Fooz, of Snooty Service. Hear ya got some trouble.”

Tony grinned through his six chins and led the detective inside.

“Trouble is what I got plenty of! Alla time spoons go, till I have to serve soup with straws. That I don’t mind, but when the customers start blowing clams through straws at my pictures on the wall, then it’s gotta stop!” The recollection of this last situation turned Tony’s face a dangerous purple.

Dopey said, “Ummmmm,” and got down to business. However, he could see why any sane person would want to smear up the pictures — they really were awful. He even felt like blowing a clam at them himself. Fooz sat down to think. Spoons were silver, and silver made coins. Ah! Counterfeiters!! Now all he had to do was find out what ex-con came in here, and then put the finger on him!

He didn’t have long to wait. Danny Koople strolled in about seven with two rough-looking citizens who might have come out of a zoo. No sooner did they sit down than Dopey laid a trembling hand on Danny’s head.

“I hereby arrest you in—”

“WHAT? Why you apple head! I’ll break your bones! I’ll mash your head! I’ll... I’ll—!” Dopey got out of there under a full head of steam. He crawled under a table and stayed there until the shaking stopped. That Koople was no man to mess with. Neither were the individuals with him. He got from under the table and began to inspect the unlucky customers who were slurping clams by the dozen. They sounded like a herd of elephants wallowing in mud.

THE kitchen was next. Fooz ducked around piles of clams and coffee tables right into the chef’s breadbasket, just as the chef was gingerly tasting hot chowder out of a soup ladle. Wow! The stuff seared down his neck and he came at Dopey, red-faced, with a cleaver! Poor Dopey! He couldn’t move an inch. The chef was preparing to split him down the middle, when a deep voice boomed out.

“Up wit ’em! You, Cookie, cut out d’ nonsense en’ fix me some chowder.”

Dopey almost passed out with joy. That kitchen ax wasn’t an inch from his hair when the ruffian walked in. The burly boy had a pop-gun in his paw that should have had wheels on it. Fooz took one look, then started to shake again.

“Say,” he gulped, “ain’t you Killer Gilroy?”

“Yeah, but what of it? When I git done wit me chowder, you won’t blab to d’ cops, ’cause you two are gonna be a couple of dead boids.” His face split in a gruesome grin.

The chef dug up a bowl of clam soup and the Killer grabbed it out of his hands and poured it into his stomach.

“More, blast ya! I ain’t et for t’ree days, so I’m gonna eat now! More!”

Cookie jumped to the command.

Dopey reached around for something to protect himself with, but all he could get his hands on was a round box. Gilroy saw him. “T’row dat away!”

Fooz threw, and it landed in the soup, all over Cookie! The chef looked like a lobster from being boiled by his own cooking. The top had come off the box, and the red, powdery stuff soaked into the soup.

Cookie dished out the chowder, and the killer put it away in a gulp. Then — WOOSH! His face got beet-red. He hopped and he howled, fanning his mouth with both hands. “Red pepper! Help!”

Dopey grabbed a clam and let it ride. It conked the Killer on the dome and both he and the clam raced to the floor. But Gilroy won, cold as a herring.

Dopey Fooz shoved the killer in a corner with a pile of shells and tied him up good. Shucks, this wasn’t getting the spoons back. Outside the crowd was getting noisy, and even in the kitchen Dopey could hear the clams splatting against the wall pictures. He ducked through the bombardment, and went over to Tony.

“Why don’t you take those pictures down?”

“Are you batty, chum? The only reason people come here is to blow clams.”

Dopey couldn’t stand it any more. He raced around the wall yanking the clam-smeared pictures from the wall. Everybody thought it was a joke and cheered wildly. He got them in a big pile and carried them into the hall.

“STICK ’em up, bud!”

“What, again? I’m getting tired of getting stuck up.”

“Never mind that stuff, just hand over those pictures. Got wind of what we were after and tried to beat us to it, eh? Tough luck, stupid. Give!”

Dopey gave with a wild swing that sent pictures and toughies all over the floor. He yanked off a shoe and let them have it on the noggin. A window curtain provided a rope, and with a whip and a zip, the erstwhile crooks joined the Killer in the kitchen among the clam shells.

Dopey Fooz was puzzled. Why was everybody picking on him? He went back to the pictures that were all over the hallway. What was this? Some of the paint was rubbed off by the gooey clams, and there was another picture underneath! Dopey picked some more of the paint off. Why, these were the paintings stolen from the gallery last year!

He called the police, and gave them the dope, then sat back and waited. But the crowd in the dining room wanted their targets back, and were hollering their heads off. With no targets, they were shooting clams at each other. The place smelled like a fishing pier. Dopey stacked the paintings behind a curtain and took a seat in the big room. Maybe he could get a clue on the stolen spoons. It wasn’t long before Tony came over.

“Hey. Whatssa matter? You’re supposed to find my spoons, but what do you do? Clutter up my kitchen with killers, gunmen and what-not.”

“Look, spoons is spoons. They are pretty hard to find. Killers and gunmen, yes, but spoons, no. It takes time!”

“And what didja do with my pictures?”

“Here come the police, ask them.”

Tony jumped in his tracks. The bulls pushed him into his office to do some explaining, but Dopey knew he wasn’t responsible. Tony had bought the place from Danny Koople a month before, and the pictures were here then. But the scare would make him lose some weight, anyway.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw something strange. The table where Koople and company was sitting moved slowly across the floor toward the exit. By this time, Dopey Fooz was getting to be a man of few words and much action. He grabbed a handful of clams in the shell, and a bowl of hot chowder. To the top of the table he went in a great leap. Underneath, the crooks stuck their heads out to see what was the matter, and got a bath of hot chowder. Like a flash they lit out for the door, but Dopey loosed a barrage of clam shells that knocked them kicking. The cops took care of the rest.

Somehow Stephen Smirch got wind of the goings on and dashed down to Tony’s place. He stood there glaring at Dopey.

“Fooz, you did a fine job, and all that on the crooks, but if you didn’t find out what happened to those spoons — off with the head!”

“Now, you know I would not besmirch the fair name of the S.D.S. by not solving the case! I saw where they went when I picked up the clams from that guy’s table!”

“Well, for goodness’ sake, where did they go? Where?!!!”

“In the coffee! Tony’s coffee is so strong that they just dissolve when you stick them in!”