There’s a Hippie on the Highway

Chapter Five

The only sound to disturb the silence that hung over the Detectives’ room at Paradise City Police Headquarters was the busy tapping of a bluebottle fly as it banged itself against the dirty ceiling.

Detective 3rd Grade Max Jacoby sat at his desk studying Assimil’s French Without Toil. He was silently mouthing sentences like: Le pauvre diable est sourd comme un pot and il est malin comme un singe.

Jacoby, young, tall and dark-complexioned had reached Lesson 114. He now had only 26 more lessons to complete the course. In anticipation of this event, he had saved up enough money to go to Paris for his summer vacation when he was determined to startle the Parisians with his knowledge of their language.

Opposite him, Sergeant Joe Beigler sat at his desk, a carton of lukewarm coffee in his hand, a cigarette drooping from his lips, his eyes half closed while he tried to make up his mind which horse he should back for the 15.00 hr. handicap.

A big, powerfully built man in his late thirties, his fleshy face freckled, Beigler was Captain of Police Frank Terrell’s right hand man. This afternoon, for a change, there was no immediate crime in the City. It had been so quiet, Terrell had gone home to mow his lawn leaving Beigler to hold the desk. Beigler was so used to this chore that he wouldn’t have known what to do with himself if he was given the afternoon off. So long as he had a constant supply of coffee and cigarettes, he would be content to remain at his desk until he was carried out to his funeral.

‘Would you say a monkey is a sly animal, Sarg?’ Jacoby asked, having puzzled over his lesson for some time, overlooking the fact that Assimil was hopefully offering him an addition to his vocabulary and not making insinuations against monkeys.

Only half hearing, Beigler lifted his head and squinted at Jacoby through the spiral of smoke from his cigarette.

‘What was that again?’

‘Il est malin comme un singe,’ Jacoby read with an excruciating accent. ‘Malin... sly. Singe... monkey. That’s what they say here. What do you think?’

Beigler drew in a long, slow breath. His freckled face turned a tomato red.

‘Are you calling me a goddamn monkey?’ he demanded, leaning forward aggressively.

Jacoby sighed. He should have known he couldn’t expect help or encouragement from Beigler whom he regarded as practically illiterate.

‘Okay, Sarg, forget it. Sorry I spoke.’

The door burst open and Detective 2nd Grade Lepski came into the room like a bullet from a gun. He slid to a standstill before Beigler’s desk.

‘The Chief in, Joe?’ he demanded, his voice loud and breathless.

Beigler sat back and eyed Lepski’s excited face with disapproval.

‘No, he isn’t. If you must know, he’s home cutting his lawn.’

‘Cutting his lawn?’ Lepski looked shocked. ‘You mean he’s using a goddamn power mower for God’s sake?’

‘No. He’s cutting it with a pair of nail scissors,’ Beigler said with heavy sarcasm. ‘That way he gets more suntan.’

‘Look, cut out the jokes.’ Lepski began to hop from one foot to the other. ‘I’m onto something hot. This could be my break, Joe... the break I’m waiting for for my promotion. While you punks have been sitting on your fannies, chewing the fat, I’ve found Riccard’s car!’

Beigler leaned forward.

‘Are you calling me a punk, Lepski?’

In spite of his excitement, Lepski realised he had slid onto thin ice. After all, Beigler was the Top Shot at Headquarters when the Chief wasn’t there. A slip like that could delay his promotion.

‘Listen, Sarg, when I talk about punks, I mean the rest of this dim crew like him.’ Lepski pointed to Jacoby. He was on safe ground here. Jacoby was only 3rd Grade. ‘Chiefs and Sergeants are always excluded. I’ve found Riccard’s car!’

Beigler scowled at him.

‘Well, don’t set it to music. Write a report.’

‘If the Chief is at home, I’d better go down and see him,’ Lepski said. He hated writing reports. ‘He’ll want to know about this, Sarg, pronto.’

Beigler decided Young Hopeful at 18 to I could be a slight risk but a fair chance and he wrote the name down on his blotter. He looked at the wall clock, saw he had another half hour before laying his bet and switched his mind back to police business.

‘Stop jumping about like you have a stoppage,’ he said. ‘Where did you find the car?’

‘Look, Sarg, we’re wasting time. I’d better talk to the Chief.’

‘I’m the Chief,’ Beigler said in an awful voice. ‘Right now I’m in charge of this goddamn force. Where did you find it?’

‘Look, Sarg, this is important to me...’

‘Where did you find it?’ Beigler roared, banging his fists on his desk.

Lepski saw it was hopeless.

‘I’ll write a report.’ He started towards his desk.

‘Come back here! You’ll write the report later. Where did you find it?’

‘It was found in the car park behind Mear’s Self-Service Store,’ Lepski said reluctantly.

‘It was found? Does that mean you didn’t find it personally?’

‘A patrolman found it,’ Lepski said sullenly. ‘I had the bright idea of calling Miami... so in actual fact I did find it.’

‘Go write the report,’ Beigler said. He dropped his big freckled hand on the telephone receiver, talked to Miami’s police headquarters as Lepski, his face sullen, began hammering away at his typewriter.

Beigler asked questions, grunted, asked more questions, then said, ‘Okay, Jack. We’ll want the full coverage. I’ll get Hess over to you. There’s talk around that Baldy has been knocked off... Yeah... okay,’ and he hung up.

He dialled Terrell’s home number. There was a little delay before Captain of Police Terrell came to the phone.

‘Riccard’s car has been found, Chief,’ Beigler said.

Lepski stopped typing and pointed frantically to himself, but Beigler ignored him.

‘The Miami police are checking it for fingerprints. I’m sending Hess there. Okay, Chief, I’ll keep in touch,’ and he hung up.

‘I didn’t hear you mention my name,’ Lepski said bitterly.

‘I didn’t,’ Beigler returned. ‘Get that report written!’ He swung his eyes to where Jacoby was still mouthing sentences. ‘Max! Take a car, go to Fred’s place, pick him up and take him to Mear’s Self-Service Store.’

‘Okay, Sarg.’ Jacoby put his books away hurriedly and charged out of the room.

‘Hess at home cutting his lawn too?’ Lepski asked bitterly.

‘His boy is sick. He’s taken the afternoon off.’

‘That two headed little monster? Sick? That’s a laugh? That little horror couldn’t be sick if he wanted to. It’s my bet Hess is snoring his head off in the sun.’

Beigler grinned.

‘You could be right... get on with that report.’

Ten minutes later, Lepski ripped the sheet out of the typewriter, read through what he had written, signed it with a flourish and laid it on Beigler’s desk.

‘I’ve got an idea,’ he said. ‘Danny O’Brien served five years with Baldy and Dominico. Suppose I go along and twist his arm a little? He might know what Baldy was doing when he was here for three days.’

Beigler read the report, then looked up at Lepski.

‘You think Solo is lying?’

‘Of course he’s lying, but he’s too big and smart for us to twist his arm. I’m as sure as I’m standing here Baldy called on him and I want to know why. If anyone can tell me it’s Danny.’

Beigler rubbed his thick nose.

‘Well, okay. Go talk to him.’

Lepski eyed him.

‘If I were a Sergeant and read that report, do you know what I would think?’

‘Sure,’ Beigler said promptly. ‘You’d think it was written by a mental defective who had got to 2nd Grade by nepotism.’

Lepski gaped at him.

‘What was that again... nepot... what?’

Beigler was a great reader of paperbacks. When he came across a word he didn’t understand — and there were many of them — he looked them up in a dictionary and filed them away in his memory to use to impress. He savoured his triumph now by looking insufferably superior as he repeated, ‘Nepotism... favouritism to relatives in bestowing office.’

He was on safe ground here because Lepski’s wife happened to be a second cousin of Carrie, Captain Terrell’s wife. Beigler never ceased to pull Lepski’s leg about this knowing full well that the only difference the relationship made was to make Lepski mad.

‘When I become Chief of Police in this goddamn City,’ Lepski said heatedly, ‘I’ll have you retired. Don’t forget that!’

‘When you become Chief of Police of this City, Lepski, I’ll be the tenth man on the moon! Get the hell out of here and get working!’

Lepski drove to Seacombe, a suburb of Paradise City where the workers lived: a small, shabby colony of bungalows and tenement buildings, which spoilt the approach to the opulent, flower-laden millionaire’s playground.

Danny O’Brien lived in a two-room cold-water apartment on the sixth floor of a sordid tenement block overlooking the sea. At one time he had been a thriving coiner, specialising in making coins of the Romanera B.C. He had made considerable sums of money, selling these fakes to art collectors: his sales talk had been as impressive and as convincing as his forgeries. But he had become overambitious in his old age and had attempted to sell a Caesar gold piece to the Washington Museum who had unkindly handed him over to the police. Now, Danny made lead soldiers which he painted in exquisite colours and sold to a speciality toyshop that catered for elderly clients wishing to fight great battles of the previous century.

Danny O’Brien was seventy-three years of age. His only extravagance was a harmless Sunday night orgy when he hired two girls to mime the sexual act while he watched, beer in hand and projected his mind back to the time when he had been the participant and not the spectator.

Lepski found him at his workbench, a watchmaker’s glass in his eye, lovingly applying a coat of scarlet to the trappings of a cavalry officer, made perfectly in lead.

Lepski kicked the door open and breezed in, his thin, tanned face set in a cop scowl, determined to stand no nonsense from this old coot and to rip his arm off if he had to.

Danny looked up, then removed the watchmaker’s glass. He was frail looking, balding with a high dome of a forehead. His green eyes were misty and his smile kindly, but vacant. He looked harmless; a nice old man, slightly senile who could be trusted with children. Lepski knew otherwise. Behind the domed forehead was a needle-sharp, cunning brain that might just possibly be now losing some of its edge, but this Lepski doubted.

‘Mr. Lepski!’ Danny laid down his model soldier and smiled the smile of an old man who has been given an unexpected and expensive present. ‘How nice! How are you, Mr. Lepski, and how is Mrs. Lepski? Can I congratulate you yet on your promotion?’

Lepski pulled up a straight-back chair and sat astride it.

‘Listen, Danny,’ he said in his cop voice, ‘cut the oil. Baldy Riccard was in town last Tuesday. He stayed for three days. I want to know what he was doing during those three days... so go ahead and tell me.’

‘Baldy Riccard?’ Danny sat back, his old eyes widening with surprise. He was here? Well!’ He shook his ageing head. ‘Mr. Lepski, I must confess I am a little hurt that he didn’t come to see me. After all, one time, we were good friends.’ He heaved a sigh that knocked down three of his model soldiers. ‘There it is. Ex-criminals don’t keep friends. They lead lonely lives. Of course a man with your contacts and with your ambitions, Mr. Lepski, couldn’t know nor appreciate what it means to be lonely.’

Lepski smiled: an unpleasant smile of a cynical cop.

‘Danny, you may not guess it, but you’re heading for a load of trouble,’ he said. ‘You are going to sing about Baldy or else...’

Danny was far too old a hand to react to anything that sounded like a bluff.

‘You have nothing on me, Mr. Lepski. I told you I haven’t seen Baldy.’

‘I’m not deaf. Those two whores who come here every Sunday night and perform... I’m tossing them in the tank. When they are not wriggling about on your goddamn carpet, they are shoplifting. So they’ll go away for a couple of years, and I’ll tell them it was you who put the finger on them. How would you like that?’

Danny blinked, telling Lepski from the blink he wouldn’t like it.

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, Mr. Lepski.’

‘You’re wasting my time. When I have those two bags in the tank, I’m coming after you. How would you like another five years in the cooler, Danny?’

Danny flinched.

‘I’ve done nothing.’

‘Of course you haven’t, but suppose I found a couple of packets of the white stuff in this hovel? Do you imagine you could talk yourself out of that rap?’

‘You wouldn’t do a thing like that to an old man, Mr. Lepski.’

There was now a whine in Danny’s voice.

Lepski grinned evilly at him.

You can bet your rotten old life that I would and will. Now, are you singing or do I get busy?’

Danny knew when he was beaten. He sat back, his eyes defeated.

‘What do you want to know?’

Lepski nodded approvingly.

‘That’s my fella. I knew you’d get smart. Baldy came to see you, didn’t he?’

‘If I tell you, Mr. Lepski, will you leave those two girls alone?’

‘Sure... why should I bother with them? I’ll leave you alone too, Danny... can’t be fairer than that, can I?’

‘Yes, he came here. First, he went to Solo, but Solo wouldn’t help him, so he came to me. He wanted to borrow five hundred dollars.’

‘Why?’

‘He said he wanted to hire a boat. I hadn’t five hundred dollars so he had to do without his boat.’

‘Why did he want a boat?’

Danny hesitated, then seeing Lepski was getting impatient, he said, ‘He told me he had to get to Cuba.’

Lepski stared at him.

‘Cuba? Why the hell didn’t he hijack a plane? Everyone is doing it now, and what the hell did he want to go to Cuba for?’

‘He was taking stuff with him. He’s a Castro fan.’

‘Stuff... what do you mean... stuff?’

‘I don’t know, but he had to have a boat so I guess it was something pretty big and heavy.’ Danny paused, then went on, ‘He was frightened, Mr. Lepski: really frightened. Just looking at him scared me.’

‘What do you mean... he’s a Castro fan?’

‘Didn’t you know? Baldy is a rabid Commie. He thinks Castro is the greatest man who ever lived.’

Lepski snorted.

‘What was this job he pulled in Vero Beach, Danny?’

‘I don’t know. I heard things, but that means nothing. All I do know it was something big.’

‘What did you hear?’

‘Rumours. They said Baldy was onto the biggest deal of his life.’

‘Who said?’

Danny waved his hands vaguely.

‘You know how it is, Mr. Lepski. You stand in a bar and you hear talk. You run into the small men and they talk.’

‘And they’re saying Baldy’s dead, aren’t they?’

Danny nodded. ‘That’s right, but it doesn’t mean anything. He could be alive.’

‘No, I guess he’s dead,’ Lepski said firmly. ‘Who killed him, Danny?’

‘I wouldn’t know. I’m not even convinced he is dead.’

Lepski believed him.

‘Baldy was a vain bastard,’ he said. He always covered his bald pate with a wig. That tells me he had an eye for the girls. Who is his present doll, Danny?’

‘I was never close enough to him to talk about his women, Mr. Lepski,’ Danny said, but by the way he blinked, Lepski knew he was lying.

‘I’ll ask that question once again, then those two whores of yours will be in the tank by this afternoon. Who was his girlfriend?’

Danny licked his dry lips, then again made a little gesture of defeat.

‘I heard her name was Mai Langley.’

‘Who is she... where does she hang out?’

‘I don’t know.’

This time Lepski knew Danny was speaking the truth.

‘Gimme the telephone book.’

Danny got up and walked over to his desk. He found a dog-eared telephone book and handed it to Lepski.

It took Lepski only a few seconds to locate Mai Langley. Her address was 1556b Seaview Boulevard, Seacombe.

‘Okay, Danny. Keep your mouth shut, and if I were you, I’d cut out this Sunday night caper. It could get you a lapful of the Vice Squad.’

Lepski left the apartment and ran down the stairs, taking two at the time.

Danny waited for a moment, then he went silently to the door and leaned over the bannister rail, watching Lepski as he rushed down the stairs. He returned to his room, shut the door, then checked Mai Langley’s telephone number. He dialled the number, thinking it was only fair to give her an anonymous tip-off.

The bell rang for some minutes before he decided she wasn’t in.

Captain of Police Frank Terrell, a big man with sandy hair, with white streaks in it and a jutting aggressive jaw, strode into the Detectives’ room and looked around.

Beigler was talking on the telephone. Jacoby was hammering at his typewriter. Fred Hess, in charge of Homicide, short, fat and shrewd, was checking through a report he had just written.

The three men looked up as Terrell closed the door.

Beigler said, ‘The Chief’s here now. Yeah, I’ll tell him. He’ll be here for the next hour,’ and he hung up.

As Terrell moved to his small office, he said, ‘Joe and Fred, come on in. Max, you take care of the desk. Where’s Lepski?’

‘Talking to Danny O’Brien,’ Beigler said, following Hess into Terrell’s office. ‘Should be here any time now.’

Terrell sat down.

‘Charley bringing coffee?’

Like Beigler, Terrell found serious thinking hard without coffee.

‘He’s coming,’ Beigler said as the door opened and Charley Tanner, the desk sergeant of the Charge room, came in with three cartons of coffee which he set on the desk.

‘Thanks, Charley,’ Terrell said, and when Tanner had left, he looked at Hess. ‘Well, Fred?’

‘It’s the car Baldy hired all right,’ Hess said. ‘Miami got the Hertz man from Vero Beach to identify it. The Lab boys are working on it now.’

‘Chief Franklin said he would phone a report any moment now,’ Beigler put in.

Terrell nodded.

‘Lepski?’

‘He thought it might pay off to talk to O’Brien,’ Beigler said and grinned. ‘He’s bursting with ideas.’

Terrell puffed at his pipe, frowning.

‘All this talk about Baldy pulling a big one,’ he said, looking at Hess. ‘Do you think it means anything?’

‘Yes... there’s too much talk for it not to. It’s my guess he pulled a hijack... that’s why there’s been no complaint.’

Outside, they heard an excited voice bawl: ‘Is the Chief in?’

‘Lepski,’ Beigler said with a grin. He got up and opened the door. ‘Come on in Sherlock.’

Lepski shoved by him and rushed up to Terrell’s desk.

‘Chief, I’m on to something hot!’ Concisely, he told the three listening men of his interview with Danny O’Brien, carefully omitting how he obtained his information, knowing his method would have been frowned on by Terrell. ‘So I did a quick think and came up with Cherchez le femme.’ He too had been slightly influenced by Jacoby’s efforts to better himself.

‘La femme, stupid,’ Hess said.

‘Who the hell cares?’ Lepski cut the air impatiently with his hand. ‘I knew Baldy had to have a piece of tail: that wig of his pointed to it. So I dug around and found her name and address. I went out there after her but she had scrammed and in a hurry. The old biddy who runs the apartment block told me she went off with Baldy on Thursday afternoon in her Volkswagen car.’

Terrell absorbed this, then turning to Beigler, he said, ‘Let’s pick this woman up, Joe. We know her, don’t we?’

‘Sure. Mai Langley. One time taxi dancer. Three times convicted for possessing reefers. Now working as a hostess at the Spanish nightclub.’

Lepski gaped at him,

‘How the hell did you know that?’

‘She’s well known as Baldy’s girl. I keep tabs on girls like her.’ Beigler looked insufferably smug. ‘That’s why I’m a sergeant, Lepski.’

The telephone hell rang stopping Lepski’s frustrated retort.

Terrell scooped up the receiver.

‘Frank?’ Terrell recognised the voice of Chief of Police, Miami. ‘I thought I’d save you the run out. The lab report’s just come through.’

Terrell listened for some minutes while the other three officers watched him.

Then Terrell said, ‘Fine... thanks, Phil. I’ll get my boys moving. No, thanks... I can manage. Tell your boys from me they’ve done a good job and I appreciate it.’ He hung up. ‘That was Franklin. The Mustang is clean of prints. Someone has gone over it very carefully: not one print, but the Lab boys have identified the sand found in the tyre treads. It’s from Hetterling Cove: that out of the way bay outside Miami.’

‘I know it,’ Beigler said, getting to his feet. ‘It’s a good place for a burial.’

‘That’s right, Joe. So we get a dozen men with spades and we’ll take a look.’

Beigler left the office, went to his desk and picked up the telephone receiver.

‘Fred, when the gang’s ready, you take charge,’ Terrell went on. He turned to Lepski. ‘I want Mai Langley. Find her car number and put out an alert for her.’

Lepski went tearing out of the office to his desk.

‘That guy sure works at it,’ Hess said sourly.

‘When I eventually promote him,’ Terrell said, shaking his head, ‘he probably won’t work at all.’

By 17.00 that evening, Baldy Riccard’s tortured body had been lifted out of the sand dune.

The group of policemen who had dug him out, sweat streaming off them from their labours in the sweltering sun, stood back, some with handkerchiefs to their noses while Dr. Lowis, the Medical Officer, with two Interns, had the unenviable task of examining the bloated, half-cooked body.

By 22.00 Terrell was reading the M.O’s report while Beigler, a carton of coffee in his hand, sat opposite him and while Hess stared out of the dusty window at the ribbon of traffic moving along Main Street.

Finally, Terrell sat back and laid down the report.

‘Looks like you’re right, Fred,’ he said. ‘It smells of a hijack. His left foot was held in a fire until his heart gave out. He had three minor stab wounds, not enough to cause death, but he bled a lot. There are no bloodstains in the Mustang so he wasn’t carried to the Cove in the Mustang, but in some other vehicle.’ He paused to think, then went on, ‘Fred, check along Highway 1. See if you can find anyone who saw the Mustang. Check every bar, café, gasoline station... I don’t have to tell you... check.’

Hess grunted and moved his short, heavily built body with surprising swiftness from the small office.

Terrell leaned back in his chair and reached for his pipe.

‘Any ideas, Joe?’

‘A few.’ Beigler sipped some of the half-cold coffee. ‘This Commie angle... the Cuban angle... the fact Baldy wanted a boat. If you want to go to Cuba these days, it’s dead easy to hijack a plane... so why didn’t he do it? Danny says he had stuff with him... too heavy to take on a plane. So I’m asking myself what did he steal that was too big and too heavy to take on a plane and something Castro would want?’

‘You think he was working for Castro?’

‘It adds up, doesn’t it?’

‘Yes.’ Terrell looked worried. We’ll give it a couple more days, then if we don’t come up with something, we’ll have to hand it over to the C.I.A.’

Beigler grimaced.

‘So let’s come up with something in a couple of days, Chief,’ he said.

The guidebook tells us that Vero Beach is a citrus shipping port, extending across Indian River to the open sea. It is also a small, busy town with streets bordered with coconut trees, date palms and flowering shrubs.

Lepski arrived at the waterfront around 18.00. He had driven fast with his siren blasting, taking a delight in scaring the traffic the hell out of his way: Lepski still had something of the little boy in him.

During his years as police officer, he had made it his business to develop contacts in every town within two hundred miles of Paradise City. His contact in Vero Beach was Do-Do Hammerstein who ran a waterfront restaurant called The Lobster & The Crab which was a meeting place for the big and little crooks, the drug pushers, and the hot boys who stopped off at Vero Beach to find a motorboat that would take them out of reach of the long arm of the F.B.I, and the C.I.A.

The Lobster & The Crab was a shabby three-storey wooden building sandwiched between a Bottled Gas Suppliers and a Deep Sea Fishing Tackle Emporium. Even as Lepski approached it, he could smell lobsters grilling and the whiff of garlic that Do-Do used in all her sauces. His stomach rumbled with appreciation, but he knew he would have no time for a free meal.

He shoved open the double swing doors and entered the big room, crowded with tables at which sat an assortment of Do-Do’s regular clients: flashily dressed men, most of them dark skinned, small with flat gangster eyes and their raucous women, most of them wearing stretch pants and minute bras which squeezed their soft breasts into gross balloons.

There was an immediate hush as Lepski made his way to the bar. Four men, sitting near the entrance, abruptly got up and slid out into the fading sunshine. The rest, their faces sudden blank masks continued to pick at their lobsters. Even the women, compulsive talkers as they were, lowered their voices so the roaring sound that Lepski had first encountered as he had entered was like a bellowing transistor abruptly tinned down.

Do-Do regarded him with a furious how-could-you-do-this-tome expression as Lepski came to rest at the bar. She was a big woman with an enormous, floppy bosom, dyed red hair and an uninteresting face that could have been carved out of hard pig fat. Only her eyes showed that behind the facade of fat and floppiness, she was as hard as teak and as unreliable as a greased pole.

‘Scotch,’ Lepski said, resting his elbows on the counter. ‘How are tricks, Do-Do? You look good enough to be stuffed and put in an oven.’

Do-Do poured the drink.

‘Do you have to come in here?’ she asked, keeping her voice low. ‘Haven’t you enough brains to see you are ruining my business?’

‘I want to talk to you. I’ll go around the back in a moment. Be there.’

Do-Do scowled at him and moved away.

Lepski took a little time with his drink, then when he had finished it, he dropped a dollar on the counter and made for the door. As the door’s swung after him, the noise of voices started up again.

Five minutes later, he was sitting in Do-Do’s private living room on the first floor nursing another Scotch while she stood by the window, looking down at the busy harbour where the sponge fishing boats were unloading.

‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ she said, keeping her broad back turned to him. ‘You scared away four good customers. You’ve fouled up my restaurant. Don’t you understand a cop is as welcome here as a skunk?’ She swung around; her eyes flashing furiously. ‘Another visit like this, Lepski, and you and me don’t work together.’

Lepski sipped his Scotch.

‘Put that big fanny of yours in a chair, Do-Do,’ he said. ‘You and me will always work together until I say so.’ He paused and stared at her with his cop eyes, then grinned. ‘Come on, you great, fat baby, sit down and don’t talk rough to me.’

‘One of these days I hope someone with sense will put a slug into you,’ Do-Do said, but she lowered her great body into a chair. ‘I’ll send flowers, but I won’t cry. What is it?’

‘I’m looking for Mai Langley,’ Lepski said.

Do-Do sighed and shook her head with grudging admiration.

‘You’re a clever bastard. I can’t think why you haven’t been upgraded.’

‘Jealousy,’ Lepski said bitterly. ‘You mean she’s here?’

‘Yes, she’s here. Is she hot? I wouldn’t have taken her in if I’d known she was hot.’

Lepski sneered.

‘Oh, yeah? I want to talk to her... she isn’t hot yet, but she could be. When did she arrive?’

‘A couple of days ago.’

‘Alone?’

‘Of course. This is a respectable house!’

‘I knew there was something about it I didn’t like,’ Lepski said, grinning. ‘Is she in now?’

‘In? She hasn’t moved from her room for two days. She’s acting like a fugitive from a Hitchcock movie.’

Lepski finished his drink and stood up.

‘What room?’

Do-Do held out her big white hand. With a resigned shake of his head, Lepski produced his wallet and handed her a $10 bill.

‘Don’t ruin yourself,’ Do-Do said with disgust. She put the bill down into her cleavage.

‘You keep that there long enough and it will hatch out,’ Lepski said. ‘What room?’

‘Twenty-three.’ As Lepski started for the door, she went on, ‘Next time you call come around the back.’

‘Sure. So long, Do-Do. Watch out you don’t catch your dairy in a revolving door.’

He made his way up the stairs to the next floor. He paused outside Room 23, put his ear against the door panel and listened. He could hear a radio playing swing softly. He put his hand on his gun butt and the other on the door handle, then walked in.

The girl who was lying on the divan in bra and panties cowered against the wall at the sight of him, her large eyes opening wide, her mouth turning slack with terror. She was around twenty-five years of age, vapidly pretty, with long blonde hair and a fringe.

Lepski could see in a moment she would begin screaming. He said sharply, ‘Police... relax. Take a look.’ He tossed his shield which fell by her side, then he closed the door.

She stared at the shield, then grabbed up a wrap and covered herself. She stared at him, her eyes still dark with terror.

Lepski pulled up a chair, sat astride it, pushed his hat to the back of his head and produced a pack of cigarettes. He fed one into his mouth, set fire to it with a kitchen match which he ignited with his thumbnail then satisfied he was giving her a movie image of a tough cop, he suddenly smiled at her.

‘Hi, Mai... what’s scaring you?’

‘What do you want?’ she said huskily. ‘You can’t come busting in like this... get out!’

‘I’m looking for Riccard,’ Lepski said. ‘You and he left Paradise three days ago. Where is he?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Try and do better than that, baby. Who is he running away from?’

She flinched and shook her head.

‘I don’t know.’

Lepski stabbed a forefinger in her direction.

‘If this is all I’m going to get out of you, you and me will have to take a ride back to headquarters when you will be shut up in a smelly cell and you won’t get your fix. You wouldn’t like that, would you?’

Her eyes burned with sudden hate.

‘I tell you I don’t know!’ she said shrilly. ‘You can’t take me in! You’ve got nothing on me! Get out!’

Lepski shook his head sadly.

‘When I call on junkies who I think won’t cooperate, baby, I bring along some of the white stuff. I tell my Chief I found it in her purse. Invariably he believes me, invariably he puts her in the tank. That’s the way it is, baby. Sorry... it’s a rotten way to live, but we all have our jobs to do. Where’s Baldy?’

‘I don’t know.’ She hesitated, then seeing Lepski was losing his smile, she went on hurriedly, ‘Someone was after him. He came to me and asked me to drive him here. I did. He was trying to hire a boat, but after the first time, no one would rent him one. He was in a terrible state. He told me to stay with Do-Do and he hired a car and went back to Paradise City. He said he was going to leave his bag at the airport. He said he had friends in Paradise and he could raise some money. He left me here and I haven’t seen him since.’

Lepski turned this over in his mind. He decided that most of it was true, but not all of it.

‘What do you mean... he was trying to hire a boat, but after the last time, no one would rent him one?’

‘He was here a couple of months ago. He hired a motor boat and ran into trouble. The boat was sunk.’

Lepski squinted at her.

‘Sunk? How?’

‘Someone shot holes in it. Don’t ask me. I don’t know. He didn’t tell me. All I know is the boat was sunk.’

‘Who rented the boat to him?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Who were his friends in Paradise?’

Mai hesitated, then said sullenly, ‘Solo Dominico and Danny O’Brien.’

Well, that checked, Lepski thought. At least she seemed to be telling the truth.

‘So he left you here and took his bag back to Paradise City’s airport. Why did he do that?’

‘He wanted a safe place to leave the bag.’

‘Why?’

‘There was something in it he wanted to guard.’

‘What?’

She clenched her fists.

‘I don’t know. Why don’t you leave me alone?’

‘Did he say he wanted to guard something in the bag?’

‘Yes.’

‘But he didn’t say what?’

‘No.’

‘And you didn’t ask him?’

‘No.’

‘How big was the bag, Mai?’

‘An ordinary suitcase... white plastic with a red band around it... an ordinary suitcase.’

Lepski stiffened. He had a feeling he was walking over someone’s grave.

‘Let’s have that again.’

She stared at him. The tip of her tongue passed over her lips.

‘It was just an ordinary suitcase.’

‘Go on... describe it.’

‘Oh, for God’s sake. It was old and shabby and white, made of plastic with a red band painted around it.’

Lepski decided fate was taking a hand in getting him his promotion. It was only with difficulty that he kept his face deadpan.

‘Now tell me who he was afraid of.’

She shifted further back on the divan, her eyes suddenly scared.

‘I told you... I don’t know.’

Lepski got to his feet. He picked up his shield and put it in his wallet. He was now sure she did know who was after Baldy and this could come out only under an official interrogation. He was wasting time trying to get anything further out of her.

‘Okay, Mai, get your clothes on. We’re going to Headquarters.’

‘I told you, I don’t know! You can’t take me back!’

‘Don’t get excited,’ Lepski said. ‘You’ve got to come, baby. You’ve already talked too much. So get your clothes on. Don’t mind me. I’m a married man.’

Then two things happened almost at once. The door flung open and Mai screamed as she threw herself flat on the divan, burying her face in the cover as if trying to hide herself.

Lepski swung around.

A short, squat man, a white handkerchief masking his face, was already shooting. Lepski saw the gun flashes, saw Mai bounce high on the divan, saw blood spray the wall as bullets smashed into her head. Then he threw himself flat, clawing at his gun as the door slammed shut.

He was up again, gun in hand, racing for the door as feet pounded down the stairs.

He could hear Do-Do screaming and again the deafening bang of a gun. He reached the head of the stairs to find Do-Do’s vast body blocking the corridor. He took the flight in a leap, crashing onto the lower landing, jarring his bones, staggered, recovered himself as he heard the roar of a high powered car taking off.

By the time he had got onto the waterfront, the large, excited milling crowd made any attempt at pursuit impossible.