The Lonesome Badger

12

Sparbuck was in his middle forties, a youthful-looking man with iron-gray hair. The district attorney gave him the hard ones and, to Sparbuck’s credit, he usually came through with a conviction. He had political ambitions himself and he felt that he could make a good district attorney if his superior decided to run for a higher office.

Sparbuck left nothing to chance. He wanted convictions. He said to Peel, “You haven’t a leg to stand on, Peel. Your fingerprints were all over the apartment...”

“As well as Corey’s apartment,” Lieutenant Becker put in smugly.

“...And the maid identified you as the man she saw coming out of the girl’s apartment. The man down in the garage identified you — and if that isn’t enough, there are these two letters signed by you that were in the girl’s purse.”

“I’m not talking,” Peel said doggedly. “Not until Otis Beagle gets here.”

“He’s had three hours to find Pinky,” sneered Lieutenant Becker.

The assistant district attorney looked sharply at the homicide lieutenant. “This, ah, Pinky, that wouldn’t happen to be Mr. Douglas Devol, would it?”

“He’s a pal of Otis Beagle’s.”

Sparbuck looked as if he’d swallowed a live mouse. “Is there, ah, a likelihood of Mr. Devol’s interesting himself in this case?”

“There is if Beagle can twist his arm hard enough.” Becker moved forward, his face showing concern. “This Beagle’s the worst kind of a private eye, Mr. Sparbuck. He’s been accused of blackmail, he’s represented both sides of a case and I’ve even suspected him of making cases at times.”

“This’ll sound sweet in court, when you’re up for slander,” Peel said.

“No one could slander Otis Beagle,” retorted Becker. “Whatever they’d say about him would be only half of the truth.”

“It’s one o’clock in the morning,” Peel said irritably. “Let’s get this over with once and for all. Pinky’s probably at home by now. Let’s call him.”

Alarm came over Sparbuck’s features. “I wouldn’t want to wake him up if he’s sleeping.”

“He won’t mind,” said Peel. “Not if it’s a favor for Otis.” He sneered at Lieutenant Becker. “As you put it, they wallow in the same hog wallow.”

“I didn’t say that about Pinky.” Becker swallowed hard. “Otis, yes, he’d bottle the mud from a hog wallow and sell it for... for a love potion.” His lip curled. “Otis Beagle, mixed up in a Lonely Hearts racket!”

“The phone,” Peel prodded Sparbuck.

Sparbuck did not look happy. He hesitated, then finally picked up the phone. “Get me the residence of Mr. Douglas Devol,” he said to the operator. He waited for long moments, while Peel, Lieutenant Becker and Sergeant Fedderson watched. The tension built up, but finally Sparbuck’s face lit up. “Mr. Devol? Oh... I know this is an unreasonable hour, but would you mind asking him to come to the phone? It’s Sparbuck of the district attorney’s office... I see... He’s engaged...”

Peel cried out, “Ask if Otis Beagle’s been in touch with him?”

Sparbuck grimaced, but he asked the question. Then he waited for the answer, frowning. “I see. Very well...”

He hung up. “Beagle’s there now. He’s playing gin rummy with Devol. The man said Devol doesn’t like to be disturbed when he’s playing cards.”

For a moment Peel’s jaw went slack. Then he exploded. “He’s playing gin rummy, while I’m in jail! The dirty, double-crossing moose. He knows I’m here.” His voice rose to a yell. “He’s thrown me to the wolves. I’ll fix him for this, I’ll get even, so help me!”

Lieutenant Becker moved forward swiftly. “Here’s your chance, Joe. Talk and I’ll hang Beagle so high no one’ll be able to help him. Not even Pinky Devol.”

“It’s his caper,” cried Joe Peel. “He wrote the letters to the Lonely Hearts Club. He used my name, but he wrote the letters.”

Sparbuck and Lieutenant Becker exchanged triumphant looks. “Why did he write the letters?” Becker asked smoothly. “What was the angle — blackmail?”

But a shred of reason still clung to Joe Peel. He gulped, shot quick looks at the predatory faces of Sparbuck and Becker, caught a glimpse of Sergeant Fedderson’s gloating.

“Huh?” he gulped. “Who said anything about blackmail? I... I, uh, I mean we had a client.”

Becker saw his victory melting away. “There was no client, Joe. Beagle was trying to make a case out of thin air. That’s what it was, wasn’t it?” Then, desperately as he saw Peel cooling off, “He’s thrown you to the wolves, Joe. He’s playing cards while you’re in jail. The fire’s got too hot and he’s polishing up Pinky Devol. He and Pinky’ll be playing cards at the plushy club while they’re leading you to the gas chamber.”

But Becker had overdone it. Otis Beagle was Peel’s only hope. He had to trust the big fellow. Without him he was utterly and completely lost. With his assistance, dubious as it was, there was a chance — a slim chance.

He said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

Lieutenant Becker groaned. Mike Fedderson stepped forward, his huge right hand doubled into a fist. “Five minutes, Lieutenant, give me just five minutes alone with him and he’ll talk.”

“Give us five minutes alone,” sneered Peel, “and I’ll cut you down to size and make dog meat of you.”

Sergeant Fedderson let swing, but Lieutenant Becker threw out his own arm and averted the blow...

Beagle stepped out of the elevator and saw Lieutenant Becker and Sergeant Fedderson waiting outside the door of the Beagle Detective Agency.

“Ten o’clock on the dot,” said Becker. “Just like a bank.”

“I didn’t get to sleep until four,” growled Beagle. “I had a bad night.”

“I’ll bet you did.”

Beagle put his key in the lock. “Surprised you didn’t wait inside. Or have you already been in and snooped through things?”

“That’s what you’d have done if you were me,” said Becker, meaningly. He followed Beagle into the office. Fedderson crowded in on his heels.

“All right, Becker,” snapped Beagle, inside the office. “You got your orders about Peel, didn’t you?”

“I made a mistake,” Becker said. “I shouldn’t have taken him down in the first place. He only works for you. I should have arrested you.”

“Try it sometime — and then see how quickly you’re pounding a beat out in Santa Monica—”

“Sanat Monica’s a different city.”

“All right, Canoga Park, then!”

“Big man,” said Sergeant Fedderson.

Beagle indicated Fedderson with his head. “He talks, does he?”

“One of these days...” said Fedderson thickly.

“Shut up, Mike,” snapped Becker. Then, to Beagle, “They just brought the Sawyer girl back from Victorville. I saw her down at the morgue. A very pretty girl — except for a bullet hole in her face.”

“I get a newspaper with my breakfast,” Beagle said. “Last night you pretended that you’d found her. The Victorville sheriff picked her up and on the basis of a phone talk with him you had the nerve to arrest Joe Peel.”

Becker took two letters from his pocket. “They found these in her purse.” He pointed to the typewriter. “I’ll bet a dime the typing was done on that machine.”

“So?”

“So you and Peel are writing letters to the lovelorn. You can’t get girls any other way.”

“I’ll give you about three minutes more, Becker,” growled Beagle.

“I won’t need three minutes,” said Becker, baring his teeth. “I just dropped in to tell you... I think you stepped across the line this time. I think I can prove it, too. And when I do, Otis, I’m warning you, Pinky won’t be able to spring you.”

Sergeant Fedderson smacked his right fist into the open palm of his left hand.

Becker stepped to the door. “Think about it, Otis, think about it!”

He and Fedderson left. Beagle thought about it for ten seconds, then reached for the telephone, but before he could reach it, the phone rang.

The voice of Iowa Lee said, “Mr. Beagle? I did a little thinking last night and—”

“I’m glad you did, Iowa!” boomed Beagle. “And I’ve been thinking about you.”

“Now wait a minute!” cut in Iowa Lee. “We haven’t been thinking about the same things. This is business...”

“Oh, business,” said Beagle, disappointed.

“Yes, and I don’t like it. I don’t like it at all. First that man Corey and now this Sawyer girl... I don’t like it, Mr. Beagle.”

“I don’t think they liked it either.”

“That isn’t the point. I’m running a legitimate business. I pay a license fee to the state and to the city. I’m entitled to the same privileges as other business people.”

“Sure, Iowa, sure.”

“Don’t interrupt me, Mr. Beagle. As I was saying, I’m a reputable businesswoman. But unfortunate publicity can ruin my business, and I have a right to protect myself—”

“You certainly have,” said Beagle, suddenly getting the drift of things. “And sometimes a... a lone woman needs outside assistance. The services of a — reputable protection agency.”

“Why do you think I’m calling you? To engage your services, naturally.”

“You’ve come to the right place, Miss Lee. Yes, Miss Lee, this agency can help you.”

The office door opened and a trim, middle-aged man, wearing a gray Homburg, popped into the office. He took off his hat, revealing a bald pate circled by a fringe of gray hair. Beagle covered the mouthpiece.

“Be with you in a minute.” He said into the phone, “Could you possibly come down to the office, madam?”

Iowa Lee tumbled at once. “There’s someone with you?”

“That’s right.”

“I can’t come down now, Mr. Beagle. I’m busy. But I want you to work for me, understand?”

“Quite!”

“Very well, then, I’ll phone you later, but it’s understood you’re working for me.”

“Quite, madam.”

He put down the phone. “Yes, sir, and now what can I do for you?”

“My name,” said the visitor, “is Thaddeus Smallwood.”

Beagle was not surprised. He got up, pulled forward Joe Peel’s chair and reseated himself. “Won’t you have a seat, sir?”

“No!” cried Thaddeus Smallwood. “I haven’t time for that. Look here, I received a circular from this outfit in the mail this morning.”

“Ah, yes, our regular monthly mailing to business people.”

“This is the first time I’ve heard of the Beagle Detective Agency.”

“Oh, you’re probably in the Wilshire district,” said Beagle easily. “We’ve never covered that with our mailings, but we’re expanding our services and—”

“Expanding your services!” snapped Mr. Smallwood. “This looks like a hole-in-the-wall outfit.” He gestured angrily. “Never mind. You’re probably crooked, too, but it takes a thief to catch a thief.”

“Sir,” said Otis Beagle with cold rage, “I will have you understand...”

Smallwood took out a fat wallet. “Cash,” he sneered. “No checks, cash.”

“Mr. Smallwood,” said Otis Beagle, his eye on the wallet, “I am an honest man, if you want to employ an honest man. But if it’s a thief you want — tell me your troubles!”

Somewhere a church-steeple clock was bonging ten. The turnkey unlocked the grilled door and gestured to Joe Peel. “All right, laddie, it’s a nice sunshiny day outside and you’re free.”

“Do I have to go?” asked Peel. “I was just getting used to the cockroaches.”

“They’ll still be here when you get back!”

In another room they handed Peel his necktie, his belt and an envelope containing his money and keys.

“What is it, bail — or for keeps?” he asked the attendant.

The man shrugged. “Nobody tells me anything. I got word to turn you loose, that’s all.”

On the street Peel looked around for Otis Beagle, but could not find him. He stepped to the curb, signaled a taxi and climbed in.

“The Shelby Hotel,” he said, “on Ivar off Sunset.”

A short while later he got out of the taxi and went into the hotel. He went up to his room, took a shower, dressed, sprawled out on the bed.

The phone rang. Peel let it ring five times before he finally took the receiver off the prongs.

“What’s the matter with you, Joe?” cried the voice of Otis Beagle. “There’s work to be done.”

“Sorry, old man,” replied Peel. “I’ve got a hot solitaire hand and I’m too busy to talk to you.”

He hung up. Thirty seconds later the phone rang again. Peel took the receiver off the hook. “Mr. Peel’s busy,” he snapped.

“Listen to me, Joe,” pleaded Otis Beagle. “A hundred-dollar bonus!”

“Now?”

“Now!”

Peel slammed the receiver back on the hook and got to his feet. He left his room and descended to the lobby.

Ten minutes later he entered the office of the Beagle Detective Agency. Beagle sprang to his feet.

“I’m sorry, Joe, I couldn’t make it any sooner.”

“Of course not,” said Peel. “You were playing gin rummy.”

“I had to lose, Joe,” cried Beagle. “I never had such hands in my life and I had to throw them. I had to lose — deliberately. We were playing for ten cents a point and I had to lose. Pinky wouldn’t lift his finger to help. He was sore. I had to lose sixteen hundred dollars, Joe. That’s what it cost me. Sixteen hundred dollars.”

“And that put him in a good mood?”

“No, it made him madder’n hell. The sixteen hundred and the twelve-fifty I already owed him — twenty-eight hundred and fifty bucks. He asked me for a check and I told him I couldn’t pay it. I told him I was ruined, that I’d stuck out my neck and if I didn’t get you out of jail, you’d make a case against me and I’d be thrown in jail — and then I wouldn’t be able to pay him the money I owed him.”

Beagle wiped perspiration from his forehead. “You should have seen the hands. Laydown hands... and I had to lose. I could have won a thousand dollars from him. But if I had, you’d still be in jail.” He clapped a beefy hand on Peel’s shoulder. “That’s what I did for you, Joe!”

Peel pulled away from Beagle’s hand. “What was that you said about a bonus?”

Beagle’s self-pity vanished. “We’ve got a new client, in fact, we’ve got two new clients.”

“Don’t tell me... Thaddeus Smallwood and—”

“—Iowa Lee.”

“Four clients in the same case,” Peel shrugged. “Okay, I’ve already been in jail. It’s a nice jail. The food’s not bad — not for me. Of course you’ll lose some of that waistline of yours.”

“It’s too late for clowning. We’re in too deep. Besides, Iowa’s problem doesn’t conflict with the others. All she wants us to do is keep her Lonely Hearts Club out of the mess.”

“And you think that’s easy?”

“I’m just telling you that’s the assignment.”

“But Becker has two letters, written by you and signed with my name, that were sent in care of the club paper, Heart Throbs.”

“They can’t prove you’re a member of the club.”

“She’s got my name on a card.”

“Not any more she hasn’t. You picked up a copy of Heart Throbs on a bus, you were never a member of the club.”

“And Susan Sawyer?”

“She’s dead.”

“But her ad was in the paper.”

“No, it wasn’t — Susan Sawyer was never a member of the club. Her name isn’t on the list of club members... Linda Meadows’ name is, yes, but not Susan Sawyer’s.”

“I see,” said Peel. “But Linda Meadows is also a client of the agency.”

“Who says so?”

“She gave me fifty bucks.”

“In cash, Joe, in cash. Nobody can prove we ever represented Linda Meadows.”

“Nobody,” said Peel. “Nobody except Linda Meadows — and the people to whom she shows the receipt I gave her.”

“What receipt?” cried Beagle.

“The receipt, on the agency letterhead, on which it says the fifty dollars is to apply toward the fee of one hundred dollars for which we agree to find Susan Sawyer—”

“You didn’t, Joe,” howled Beagle. “You didn’t write out a receipt with all that on it!”

“The fifty bucks was when we were hungry — before you got all the other clients.”

Beagle retreated to his chair and slumped into it. For a moment he stared helplessly at Peel, but then he brightened. “For finding Susan Sawyer? All right, she’s been found.”

“But we didn’t find her.”

“A technicality. She’s been found and we’re no longer working for Linda.”

“So we’ve only got three clients: this smoothie, Charlton Temple, Thaddeus Smallwood and Iowa Lee. For which one am I getting the bonus?”

“The bonus is to make up for last night.”

Peel laughed shortly, without humor. “You’re on the spot and you need me.”

“I always need you, Joe. You know that.” Beagle coughed. “Did Becker tell you where Susan Sawyer was found?”

“They didn’t tell me anything. They wanted me to talk, but they didn’t volunteer anything — except that Susan Sawyer was dead.”

“Her body was found late yesterday afternoon between Victorville and Barstow, in a ravine only a hundred feet off Highway 66. She’d been dead twenty-four hours, more or less.”

“But that would make it right after I saw her at the apartment!”

“Think, Joe. Dave Corey was on the floor when you woke up. But Susan was gone. Where was she?”

“In Corey’s apartment?”

“And then Corey disappeared in the minute or so from the time you heard the police siren until they came into the apartment. Where did he disappear to so quickly?”

“His apartment.”

Beagle shook his head. “Try it this way. Corey popped you and then Mr. Murder stepped in, with the rooty-toot in his hand. He shot Corey. Could he let Susan Sawyer walk out? Of course not. He let her have it at the same time. He carried her body down to the garage, put her in the car, then went up to get Corey. That’s when you woke up. While you were taking the stairs, he stepped out of the elevator and picked up Corey. He took him down to the garage and...” Beagle hesitated, frowning in thought, then nodded. “He dumped Corey on Mulholland, but he kept on with the girl — to Victorville...”

“Why would he carry her that far?”

“He was on his way to Las Vegas, where else? But he didn’t want to pass the inspection station at Yermo with a corpse in the car. That’s what he’d like us to think, anyway. And that’s why we’ll find him right here in town.”

“There’s one thing wrong with your figuring, Otis,” said Peel. “There’s an attendant at the Hillcrest Towers garage. He leaves now and then for a minute or two to take a guest’s car to the front, but he always gets back pretty quick. The killer couldn’t take a chance on bringing down two people and putting them in his car—”

“The police siren — that’s why he called the cops. He figured the siren would get the man out of the garage.”

“Mmm,” said Peel. “Maybe. But that’s slicing it pretty thin. And speaking of slicing, how much did you nick Smallwood for?”

“Just a nominal sum, so far...”

“How much?”

“It isn’t what he’s already paid, it’s—”

“How much, Otis?”

“Five hundred.”

“A thousand. You always lie in that proportion. You nicked him for a grand and you’re figuring to hook him for another thousand or so.”

“Don’t worry about the bookkeeping, Joe. I’ll take care of that. You’re getting a hundred—”

“Two hundred!”

Beagle hesitated. “You’re holding me up, Joe!”

“Two hundred or I remember last night.”

“Two hundred it is then.”

Peel held out his hand. Beagle took out a fat wallet and skinned out two hundred-dollar bills. “I’ll remember this.”

“You remember it and I’ll remember last night.”

Beagle made a gesture of impatience. “To work. You know what to do about Smallwood.”

“How should I know? You haven’t told me.”

Beagle squirmed. “Dammit, Joe, there are some things you don’t have to talk about. You just do them.”

“Such as what?”

“What made him come in here?”

“I scared the hell out of him.”

“All right, scare him some more. He’s got a guilty conscience.”

“About what?”

“Find out.”

“What about our other clients?”

“I’ll handle Iowa Lee...”

“You would.” Peel scowled. “Why don’t you take Smallwood and let me have Iowa?”

“We’re not supposed to do anything for Iowa — except keep her club out of the mess.”

“That’ll take some doing. The club pops up every time you turn around. Iowa’s a nice armful of woman, if you ask me, but those are the kind. Look at Susan Sawyer. The face of an angel... and a mink coat in the closet.”

“Iowa’s a businesswoman. She’s got a legitimate racket that brings her in a hatful of money.” He stopped. “You’re not listening, Joe!”

Peel shook his head. “How do I know the mink coat was Susan Sawyer’s?”

“Eh?”

“I’m a sucker for dames,” said Peel. “I believe everything they tell me.”

“Oh, come now. Linda was wearing the mink last night, but she merely borrowed it. She’s a working girl. You said so yourself.”

“Yeah, she’s working for Thaddeus Smallwood. And then again, maybe she’s working Smallwood.”

Beagle grunted. “You have a suspicious mind. But to be on the safe side, you’d better check on the beautiful Linda Meadows a little more.”

“That’ll be a pleasure. I haven’t forgotten that Iowa Lee kept saying that her name was familiar.”