The crazy kill

14

It was ten-fifteen at night when Grave Digger and Coffin Ed finally got around to calling on Chink Charlie.

First they'd had a foot race with a young man peddling skinned cats for rabbits. An old lady customer had asked for the feet, had become suspicious and called the police when told that they were nub-legged rabbits.

Then they'd had to interview two matronly Southern schoolteachers, living in the Theresa Hotel and taking summer courses at New York University, who had given a man posing as the house detective their money to put in the hotel safe.

They parked in front of the bar at 146th Street and St. Nicholas Avenue.

Chink had a room with a window in the fourth-floor apartment on St. Nicholas Avenue. He had chosen the black and yellow decor himself and had furnished it in modernistic style. The carpet was black, the chairs yellow, the day bed had a yellow spread, the combination television-record player was black trimmed with yellow, the small table-model refrigerator was black on the outside and yellow on the inside, the curtains were black-and-yellow striped, and the dressing table and chest of drawers were black.

The record player was stacked with swing classics, and Cootie Williams was doing a trumpet solo in Duke Ellington's Take The A Train. A ten-inch revolving fan on the sill of the open window blew in exhaust fumes, dust, hot air and the sound of loud voices from the congregation of whores and drunks in front of the bar down below.

Chink was standing in the glow of the table lamp in front of the window. His sweat-slick oily yellow body was clad in blue nylon boxer-type shorts. The fringe of a large purple-red scar, left by an acid burn, showed on his left hip above his blue shorts.

Stripped to her black nylon brassiere, black sheer nylon panties and high-heeled red shoes, Doll Baby was practicing her chorus routine in the center of the floor. She had her back to the window and was watching her reflection in the dressing-table mirror. A tray of dirty dishes containing leftovers from the chili bean and stewed chitterling dinners they'd ordered from the bar restaurant rested on the table top, cutting her reflection in half just below the panties, as though she might have been served without legs along with the other delicacies. The outline of three heavy embossed scars running across her buttocks were visible beneath the sheer black panties.

Chink was looking at them absently as they jiggled in front of his vision.

"I don't get it," he was saying. "If Val really thought he was going to get ten G's from Johnny and wasn't just bulling you-"

She flared up. "What the hell's got into you, nigger. You think I can't tell when a man's talking straight?"

She had told Chink about her interview with Johnny, and they were trying to think up some angle to put the squeeze on him.

"Sit down, can't you!" Chink shouted. "How the hell can I think-"

He broke off to stare at the door. Doll Baby stopped dancing in the middle of a step.

The door had opened quietly, and Grave Digger had come into the room. While they were staring, he went quickly across to the window and drew the shade. Coffin Ed stepped inside, closed the door behind him and leaned back against it. Both wore their hats pulled low over their eyes.

Grave Digger turned and sat on the edge of the window table beside the lamp.

"Well, go on, son," he said. "What's the only way to figure it?"

"What the hell do you mean by breaking into my room like this?" Chink said in a choking voice. His yellow face was diffused with rage.

The window curtain beating against the fan guard made so much noise Grave Digger reached over and turned the fan off.

"What was that, son?" he asked. "I didn't hear you."

"He's beefing because we didn't knock," Coffin Ed said. Grave Digger spread his hands. "Your landlady said you had company, but we figured it was too hot for you to be engaged in anything embarrassing."

Chink's face began to swell. "Listen, you cops don't scare me," he raved. "When you cross that threshold without a warrant I consider it as breaking and entering like two burglars, and I can take my pistol and blow your brains out."

"That's not the right attitude for a man first on the scene of a murder," Grave Digger said, standing erect.

Coffin Ed crossed the floor, pulled open the top drawer, dug beneath a stack of handkerchiefs and brought out a Smith amp; Wesson. 38 caliber pistol.

"And I've got a permit for it," Chink shouted.

"Sure," Coffin Ed conceded. "Your white folks down at the club where you work as a whisky jerker got it for you."

"Yeah, and I'm going to have them take care of you two nigger cops," Chink threatened.

Coffin Ed dropped Chink's gun back into the drawer. "Listen, punk-" he began, but Grave Digger cut him off.

"After all, Ed, be easy on the boy. You can see these two yellow people are not Negroes like you and me."

But Coffin Ed was too angry to go for the joke. He kept on talking to Chink. "You're out on bail as a material witness. We can pull you in any time we wish. We're trying to give you a break, and all we get from you is a lot of cute crap. If you don't want to talk to us here we can take you down and talk to you in the Pigeon Nest."

"You mean if I object to your pushing me around in my own house you can take me down to the precinct station and push me around there," Chink said venomously. "That's how you got to look like Frankenstein's monster, pushing people around."

Coffin Ed's acid-burned face went hideous with rage. Before Chink had finished speaking he had taken two steps and knocked him spinning across the yellow-covered bed. He had his long barreled pistol in his hand and was moving in to pistol-whip Chink when Grave Digger grabbed him by the arms from behind.

"This is Digger," Grave Digger said in a quick pacifying voice. "This is Digger, Ed. Don't hurt the boy. Listen to Digger, Ed."

Slowly Coffin Ed's taut muscles relaxed, as the murderous rage drained out of him.

"He's a mouthy punk," Grave Digger went on. "But he's not worth killing."

Coffin Ed stuck his pistol back into the holster, turned and left the room without uttering a word, stood for a moment in the corridor and cried.

When he returned Chink was sitting on the edge of the bed, looking sullen and smoking a cigarette.

Grave Digger was saying, "If you're lying about the knife, son, we're going to crucify you."

Chink didn't reply.

Coffin Ed said thickly, "Answer."

Chink replied sullenly, "I don't know nothing about the knife."

Grave Digger didn't look at his partner, Coffin Ed. Doll Baby had backed over to the far corner of the bed and was sitting on its edge as though expecting it to explode underneath her any moment.

Coffin Ed asked her suddenly, "What racket were you and Val scheming?"

She jumped as if the bed had blown up as expected.

"Racket?" she repeated stupidly.

"You know what a racket is," Coffin Ed hammered. "As many rackets as you've been up with in your lifetime."

"Oh, you mean did he have a hype?" She swallowed. "Val didn't do nothing like that. He was a square-well, what I mean is he was straight."

"How did you two lovebirds expect to live? On your salary as a chorus girl or were you intending to do a little hustling on the side?"

She was too scared to act indignant, but she protested meekly. "Val was a gentleman. Johnny was going to stake him to ten grand to open a liquor store."

Chink turned his head about and gave her a look of pure venom. But the two detectives just stared at her, and suddenly became completely still.

"Did I say something?" she asked with a frightened look.

"No, you didn't," Grave Digger lied. "You told us that before." He flicked a glance at Coffin Ed.

Chink said quickly, "That's something she dreamed up."

Coffin Ed said flatly, "Shut up."

Grave Digger said casually, "What we're trying to find out is why. Johnny's too tight a gambler for a deal that tricky."

"After all, Val was Dulcy's brother," Doll Baby argued stupidly. "And what's tricky about opening a liquor store?"

"Well, first of all, Val couldn't get a license," Grave Digger explained. "He did a year in the Illinois state reformatory, and New York state doesn't grant liquor store licenses to ex-cons. Johnny's an ex-con himself, so he couldn't get the license in his own name. That means they'd have to bring a third party as a front to get the license and operate the business in his name. The profits would be split too thin, and neither Johnny nor Val would have any legal way of collecting."

Doll Baby's eyes had stretched as big as saucers during this explanation. "Well, he swore to me that Dulcy was going to get the dough for him, and I know he wasn't lying," she said defensively. "I had him hooked."

For the next fifteen minutes the detectives questioned Chink and her about Val's and Dulcy's past life, but came up with nothing new. As they turned to leave, Grave Digger said, "Well, baby, we don't know what game you're playing, but if what you say is true, you've just about cleared Johnny of suspicion. Johnny's hot-headed enough to kill anybody in a rage, but Val was killed with cold-blooded premeditation. And, if he was trying to shake Johnny down for ten grand, that would be the same as if Johnny left his name on the murder. And Johnny ain't the boy for that."

"Well how about that!" Doll Baby protested. "I give you a reason for Johnny to have done it and you turn around and say that proves he didn't do it."

Grave Digger chuckled. "Just goes to show how stupid cops are."

They went out into the hall and closed the door behind them. Then, after talking briefly with the landlady, they went down the hall, left by the front door and closed that door behind them.

Neither Chink nor Doll Baby spoke until they heard the landlady locking and bolting the front door. But the detectives had merely stepped outside, then had turned quickly and re-entered the flat. By the time the landlady was bolting the front door they had stationed themselves in front of Chink's bedroom door and were listening through the thin wooden panel.

The first thing Chink said, jumping to his feet and turning on Doll Baby furiously, was, "Why in the Goddamned hell did you tell 'em about the ten grand, you God-damned idiot?"

"Well for Christ's sake," Doll Baby protested loudly. "Do you think I wanted them think I was goin' to marry a mother-raping beggar?"

Chink grabbed her by the throat and yanked her from the bed. The detectives glanced at each other when they heard her body thud against the carpeted floor. Coffin Ed raised his eyebrows interrogatingly but Grave Digger shook his head. After a moment they heard Doll Baby saying in a choked voice, "What the hell you trying to kill me for, you mother-raper?"

Chink had released her and had gone to the refrigerator for a bottle of beer.

"You've let the mother-raper out the trap," he accused.

"Well, if he didn't kill him, who did?" she said. Then she caught the expression on his face and said, "Oh."

"Whoever killed him it don't make no diflerence now," he said. "What I want to know is what he had on Johnny?"

"Well, I've done told you all I know," she said.

"Listen, bitch, if you're holding out on me-" he began, but she cut him off with, "You're holding out on me more than I'm holding out on you. I ain't holding out nothing."

"If you think I'm holding out anything, you had better just think it and not say it," he threatened.

"I ain't going to say nothing about you," she promised, and then complained, "Why the hell do you and me have to argue? We ain't trying to find out who killed Val, is we? All we're trying to do is shake Johnny down for a stake." Her voice began getting confidential and loving. "I'm telling you, honey, all you've got to do is keep pressing him. I don't know what Val had on him, but if you keep pressing him he's got to give."

"I'm going to press him all right," Chink said. "I'm going to keep pressing him until I test his mother-raping nerve."

"Don't test it too hard," she warned. "Cause he's got it."

"That ugly mother-raper don't scare me," Chink said.

"Look what time it is!" Doll Baby exclaimed suddenly. "I gotta go. I'm goin' to be late as it is."

Grave Digger nodded toward the outside door, and he and Coffin Ed tiptoed down the hall. The landlady let them out quietly.

As they were going down the stairs, Grave Digger chuckled. "The pot's beginning to boil," he said.

"All I hope is that we don't overcook it," Coffin Ed replied.

"We ought to hear from Chicago by tomorrow or the day after," Grave Digger remarked. "Find out what they've dug up."

"I just hope it ain't too late," Coffin Ed said.

"All that's missing is just one link," Grave Digger went on. "What it was that Val had on Johnny that was worth ten G's. If we had that we'd have it chained down."

"Yeah, but without it the dog's running loose," Coffin Ed replied.

"What you need is to get good and drunk one time," Grave Digger told his friend.

Coffin Ed rubbed the flat of his hand down his acidburned face. "And that ain't no lie," he said in a muffled voice.