Seven Slayers Page 2

  Stokes stood up.

  I picked up the gun. “Don't move so far, Skinny,” I said. “It makes me nervous.”

  He stood there staring at the gun. The water was running off his raincoat and it had formed into a little dark pool at his feet.

  He said: “What the hell do you want?”

  “I wanted you to know that one of the kids you shot up last week at Four-mile was my boss' brother. He went along for the ride.”

  I don't think Stokes could move. I think he tried to move sidewise or get his hand into his pocket, or something, but all he could do was take a deep breath. Then I shot him in the middle of the body where he shot the kid, and he sank down on the floor with his legs crossed under him, like a tailor.

  The old man didn't get up. He sat a little deeper in his chair and stared at Stokes.

  Ben moved very fast for a fat man. He was up and out the door like a bat out of hell. That was OK with me—he couldn't get to the coffee place before the trucks got there. I had the keys to his car, and it was too far anyway.

  I got up and put the rod away and went over to the table and picked up my cigarettes. I looked down at the old man, said: “Things'll be a little quieter now, maybe. You'll get the dough for haulage through your territory, as usual. See that it gets through.”

  He didn't answer.

  I started for the door and then there was a shot out in front of the house. I ran on down to the front door. It was open and Ben was flat on the threshold—had fallen smack on his face, half through the door.

  I ducked back through the hall and tried a couple locked doors. When I came up through the hall again, the old man was on his knees beside Ben, and was rocking back and forth, moaning a little.

  I went through another room and into the kitchen and on through, out the back door. I crossed the backyard and jumped a low fence and walked through another yard to a gate that led into an alley. I sloshed along through the mud until I came to a cross-street, and went on down to the corner that was diagonally across the block from the McCary house.

  A cab came down the street and I waited until it was almost to the corner, stepped out in front of it. The driver swerved and stepped on the gas, but he had slowed enough to give me time to jump on the running-board.

  I stuck my head in to the light from the meter. That turned out to be my best hunch of the evening because in another second, the driver would have opened up my chest with one of the dirtiest looking .45's I ever saw, at about two feet. It was the kid who had picked Lowry and me up. He hesitated just long enough when he saw who I was.

  We nearly ran into a tree and I had time to reach in and knock that cannon out of his hand. He stepped on the brake, and reached for the gun, but I beat him to it by a hair and stuck it in my overcoat pocket and got in beside him.

  I said: “Shame on you—almost crashing an old pal like me.”

  He sat tight in the seat and got a weak grin working and said: “Where to?”

  “Just away.”

  We went on through the mud and rain, and turned into a slightly better lighted street.

  I said: “How did you know Ben shot Lowry?”

  The kid kept his head down, his eyes ahead. “Lowry and me have lived together for two years,” he said. “He used to be in the hack racket too, till he got mixed up with McCary....

  “Lowry won a lot of jack in one of Ben's crap games a couple day ago, and Ben wanted him to kick back with it-said everybody that worked for him was automatically a shill, and couldn't play for keeps. But Lowry's been dropping every nickel he made in the same game, for months. That was okay with Ben. It was all right to lose, but you mustn't win.”

  I nodded, lighted a cigarette.

  “Ben shot Lowry tonight at the joint on Dell Street. I know it was him because Lowry's been afraid of it—and that's why he said 'McCary.'”

  “Did you know it was Lowry when you picked us up?”

  “Not until I used the light. Then, when we got to Ben's I saw him get out of his car and go in just ahead of you—then I was sure. I took Lowry up to his pa's after you went in.”

  The kid drove me to the next town south. I forget the name. I got a break on a train—I only had to wait about ten minutes.

  Red 71

  SHANE PRESSED THE BUTTON beneath the neat red 71. Then he leaned close against the building and tilted his head a little and looked up at the thick yellow-black sky. Rain swept in great uneven and diagonal sheets across the dark street, churned the dark puddle at his feet. The street-light at the corner swung, creaked in the wind.

  Light came suddenly through a slit in the door, the door was opened. Shane went into a narrow heavily carpeted hallway. He took off his dark soft hat, shook it back and forth, handed it to the man who had opened the door.

  He said: “Hi, Nick. How is it?”

  Nick said: “It is very bad weather—and business is very bad.”

  Nick was short, very broad. It was not fat broadness, but muscled, powerful. His shoulders sloped heavily to long curving arms, big white hands. His neck was thick and white and his face was broad and so white that his long black hair looked like a cap. He hung Shane's hat on one of a long row of numbered pegs, helped him with his coat, hung it beside the hat.

  He stared at Shane reproachfully. “He has been waiting for you a long time,” he said.

  Shane said: “Uh-huh,” absently, went back along the hallway and up a flight of narrow stairs. At the top he turned into another hallway, crossed it diagonally to an open double doorway.

  The room was large, dimly lighted. Perhaps fifteen or eighteen people, mostly in twos or threes, sat at certain of the little round white covered tables. Three more, a woman and two men, stood at the aluminum bar that ran across one corner.

  Shane stood in the doorway a moment, then crossed the room to where Rigas sat waiting for him at a table against the far wall. Several people looked up, nodded or spoke as he passed; he sat down across the table from Rigas, said: “Bacardi,” to the hovering waiter.

  Rigas folded his paper, leaned forward with his elbows on the table and smiled.

  “You are late, my friend.” He put up one hand and rubbed one side of his pale blue jaw. Shane nodded slightly. He said: “I've been pretty busy.” Rigas was Greek. His long rectangular face was deeply lined; his eyes were small, dark, wide-set; his mouth was a pale upward-curved gash. He was in dinner clothes. He said: “Things are good with you—Yes?” Shane shrugged. “Fair.”

  “Things are very bad here.” Rigas picked up his cocktail, sipped it, leaned back. Shane waited.

  “Very bad,” Rigas went on. “They have raised our protection overhead more than fifty per cent.”

  The waiter lifted Shane's cocktail from the tray with a broad flourish, put it on the table in front of him. Shane looked at it, then up at Rigas, said: “Well....”

  Rigas was silent. He stared at the tablecloth, with his thin lips stuck out in an expression of deep concentration.

  Shane tasted his cocktail, laughed a little. “You know damned well,” he said, “that I'm not going to put another dime into this place.” He put down his glass and stared morosely at Rigas. “And you know that I can't do anything about your protection arrangement. That's your business.” Rigas nodded sadly without looking up. “I know—I know.”

  Shane sipped his drink, waited.

  Rigas finally looked up, spoke hesitantly: “Lorain—Lorain is going to get a divorce.”

  Shane smiled, said: “That's a break.”

  Rigas nodded slowly. “Yes.” He spoke very slowly, deliberately: “Yes—that is a break for all of us.”

  Shane leaned forward, put his elbows on the table, put one hand down slowly, palm up. He stared at Rigas and his face was hard, his eyes were very cold. He said: “You made that kind of a crack once before—remember?”

  Rigas didn't speak. He gazed wide-eyed, expressionlessly at Shane's tie.

  “Remember what happened?” Shane went on.

  Rigas didn't speak
, or move.

  Shane relaxed suddenly. He leaned back, glanced around, smiled faintly.

  “I back this joint,” he said, “because I thought you might make it go. I don't like you—never have—but I like Lorain, have liked her ever since we were kids together. I thought she was an awful chump when she married you and I told her so.”

  He sipped his cocktail, widened his smile. “She told me what a great guy you were,” he went on, “an' she stuck to it, even after you'd dropped all your dough, and hers. Then she told me you wanted to take over this place, an' I came in on it, laid fifteen grand on the line.”

  Rigas moved uncomfortably in his chair, glanced swiftly around the room.

  “Since then,” Shane went on, “I've chunked in somewhere around five more....”

  Rigas interrupted: “We've got nearly twelve thousand dollars' worth of stock.” He made a wide gesture.

  “What for?” Shane curved his mouth to a pleasant sneer. “So you can be knocked over, and keep the enforcement boys in vintage wines for a couple of months.”

  Rigas shrugged elaborately, turned half away. “I cannot talk to you,” he said. “You fly off the handle....”

  “No.” Shane smiled. “You can talk to me all you like, Charley—and I don't fly off the handle—and I'm not squawking. But don't make any more cracks about Lorain and me. Whatever I've done for you I've done for her—because I like her. Like her. Can you get that through that thick spick skull of yours? I wouldn't want her if she was a dime a dozen—an' I don't like that raised eyebrow stuff. It sounds like pimp.”

  Rigas' face turned dull red. His eyes were very sharp and bright. He stood up, spoke very softly, breathlessly, as if it was hard for him to get all the words out: “Let's go upstairs, Dick.”

  Shane got up and they crossed the room together, went out through the double door.

  On the third floor they crossed an identical hallway, Rigas unlocked a tall gray door and they went into another large room. There were two large round tables, each with a green-shaded drop-light over it. There were eight men at one of the tables, seven at the other; Rigas and Shane crossed the room to another tall gray door.

  The stud dealer and two players looked up from the nearest table, one of the players said: “H' are yah, Charley?” Then Rigas opened the tall door and they went into a little room that was furnished as an office.

  Rigas pressed the light switch, closed the door and stood with his back to it for a moment. His hands were in his coat pockets.

  Shane sat down on the edge of the desk. Rigas crossed to the desk slowly and when he was near Shane he jerked his right hand out of his pocket suddenly and swung a thin-bladed knife up at Shane's throat.

  Shane moved a little to one side, grabbed Rigas' arm near the elbow with one open hand; the knife ripped up crosswise across the lapel of his coat. At the same time he brought his right knee up hard against Rigas' stomach. Rigas grunted and one of his knees gave way and he slumped down slowly, sidewise to the floor. The knife clattered on the glass desk-top.

  As Shane slid off the desk, stood over Rigas, the door opened and a very tall, very spare man came a little way into the room.

  Shane glanced at the man and then he looked down at Rigas and his eyes were almost closed, his mouth was a thin hard line. Rigas groaned and held his hands tight against his stomach, his chin tight against his chest.

  Shane looked up at the tall man, said: “You'd better not let this brother of yours play with knives. He's liable to put somebody's eye out.” He spoke with his teeth together. The tall man stared blandly at Rigas. Shane went past the tall man, to the door, went out and across the big room. All of the men at the tables were looking at him; all of them were very quiet. Two men were standing up at the nearest table.

  Shane went out and closed the door behind him, went swiftly down two flights. He found his hat and coat and put them on. Nick came up from the basement as he was knotting his scarf.

  Nick said: “Shall I get you a cab, Mister Shane?” Shane shook his head. He slid the big bolt and opened the door and went out into the driving rain. He walked to Madison Avenue, got into a cab and said: “Valmouth—on Forty-Ninth.” It was five minutes after eight.

  Shane's rooms at the Valmouth were on the eighteenth floor. He stood at one of the wide windows and looked down through the swirling, beating rain to Fiftieth Street.

  After a little while he went into the bathroom, turned off the water that was roaring into the tub, slipped off his robe.

  Someone knocked at the outer door and he called: “Come in,” looked into the long mirror in the bathroom door that reflected part of the living room. A waiter with a wide oval tray opened the door, came in and put the tray down on a low table.

  Shane said: “There's some change on the telephone stand.” He kicked off his slippers and stepped into the tub.

  In five minutes he was out, had put on a long dark-green robe, slippers, and was sitting at the low table cutting a thick T-bone steak into dark pink squares.

  As he poured coffee the phone buzzed; he leaned side-wise, picked it up, said: “Hello.” Then he said: “Mister Shane is not in.... She's on the way up!... What the hell did you let her start up for?...”

  He slammed the phone down, went swiftly to the door and turned the bolt. He stood near the door a moment, then shrugged slightly, turned the bolt back and went slowly back and sat down.

  Lorain Rigas was slender, dark. Her black eyes slanted upward a little at the corners, her mouth was full, deeply red, generous. She wore a dark close-fitting raincoat, a small suede hat. She closed the door and stood with her back to it.

  Shane said: “Coffee?”

  She shook her head. She said: “Charley called me up this afternoon and said he was going to give me the divorce-that he wouldn't fight it.”

  “That's fine.” Shane put two lumps of sugar in a spoon, held it in the coffee and intently watched the sugar crumble, disappear. “So what?”

  She came over and sat down near him. She unbuttoned her coat, crossed her slim silken legs, took a cigarette out of a tiny silver case and lighted it.

  She said: “So you've got to help me locate Del before he gets to Charley.”

  Shane sipped his coffee, waited.

  “Del started drinking last night,” she went on, “an' he kept it up this morning. He went out about eleven, and some time around one, Jack Kenny called up an' told me that Del was over at his joint—roaring drunk, and howling for Charley's blood. He gets that way every time he gets boiled—crazy jealous about Charley and me.”

  She leaned back and blew a thin cone of smoke at the ceiling. “I told Jack to let him drink himself under the table, or lock him up, or something—an' in a little while Jack called back and said everything was all right—that Del had passed out.”

  Shane was smiling a little. He got up and went to the central table and took a long green-black cigar from a humidor, clipped it, lighted it. Then he went back and sat down.

  The girl leaned forward. “About three o'clock,” she said, “the Eastman Agency—that's the outfit I've had tailing Charley for evidence—called up and said they'd located the apartment house up on the West Side where Charley's been living with the McLean woman....”

  Shane said: “How long have they been on the case?”

  “Three days—an' Charley's ducked them until today—they traced a phone call or something.”

  Shane nodded, poured more coffee into the little cup.

  Lorain Rigas mashed out her cigarette. “I told Eastman to keep his boys on the apartment until they spotted Charley going in—then I figured on going over tonight and crashing in with a load of witnesses—but in a little while Charley calls me and says everything's okay, that he'll give me the divorce any time, any place, and so on.”

  Shane said: “You've had a busy day.”

  “Uh-huh.” She reached over and picked up the cup of coffee, sipped a little. “I didn't call Eastman back—I figure on going through with it the way I int
ended to—get the evidence an' the affidavits an' what not. Then if Charley changes his mind....” She put the cup back on the tray, leaned back and lighted another cigarette. “But we've got to find Del.”

  Shane said: “I thought he was cold at Kenny's.”

  She shook her head, smiled. “I called Kenny to see how Del was, and Del was gone. He came to and started where he left off—stole a gun out of Jack's trunk, and went out the back way. I don't think he'd really go through with it, but he goes nuts when he gets enough red-eye under his belt....”

  Shane was leaning far back in the deep chair, staring vacantly at the ceiling. He said: “If you think Del would really make a pass at Charley—” He puffed at the cigar, finished slowly: “You don't seem quite as excited about it as you should be.”

  “What the hell's the use getting excited?” She stood up. “It's a cinch they won't let Del into 71——an' he wouldn't wait outside for Charley—not when he's drunk. He gets big ideas about face to face and man to man when he's drunk. I know Del.”

  “Then what are you worrying about?” Shane looked up at her, smiled gently. “He's probably at home waiting for you.”

  “No—I just called up.” She went over to the window.

  Shane looked at her back. He said: “You're pretty crazy about Del—aren't you?”

  She nodded without turning.

  Shane put his cigar down, reached for the phone. “Where do you think we ought to start?”

  She turned, cocked her head a little to one side and looked at him sleepily. “If I knew where we ought to start, Dick,” she said, “I wouldn't have had to bother you. You've known Del for years—you know the screwy way his mind works as well as I do—and you know the places. Where would he go, do you think, looking for Charley—besides 71?”