Hammett (Crime Masterworks) (25 page)

‘What good would that do?’ asked Lynch.

‘Jimmy Wright’s boys now have a tap on the Mulligan phone. Griff would be smart enough to expect this, but not Boyd. I
wanted to see who he called for help when his uncle wasn’t around. In light of the fact that Pronzini was rubbed last night, that phone call gets damned important.’

He paused to light a cigarette. The pause grew. McKenna tossed off his brandy in a single convulsive gesture. Hammett handed to Lynch the transcript carbon Jimmy Wright had given him.

June 5, 1:04 p.m
. – Out – Mulligan Bros. Boyd Mulligan.

WOMAN
: Hello?

BOYD
: Hello? Is your husband there?

WOMAN
: No. I’m sorry . . .

BOYD
: At work?

WOMAN
: Yes. Is there any message?

BOYD
: No. No message. I’ll catch him there.

June 5, 1:09 p.m
. – Out – Mulligan Bros. Boyd Mulligan.

MAN
: Detective Bureau.

BOYD
: (voice muffled): Is the Preacher there?

MAN
: Huh?

BOYD
: (voice clearer): The Preacher. Is he there?

MAN
: Oh. Wait a sec. I’ll see.

LAVERTY
: Hello?

BOYD
: Boyd Mulligan, Preacher. I want to see you.

LAVERY
: There’s only one place I want to see you, Mulligan. Looking out from behind bars . . .

BOYD
: I know all about the way Parelli really died.

LAVERTY
(after a long pause): Griff told me that’d never be used. He said he didn’t blame me for . . .

BOYD
: It won’t be used, Preacher. If you help me.

LAVERTY
: (after a long pause): All right. West Broadway by the Presidio wall. Twenty minutes.

Lynch folded the paper with exaggerated care, making sure all the creases were sharp and square.

Hammett asked, ‘Who was Parelli?’

Lynch looked up, his face dazed. ‘A cheap hood found beaten
to death in Jessie Street a few years ago. Pistolwhipped. A young girl claimed he’d been molesting her, trying to drag her into his apartment building when another man stopped him. He ran. The second man caught him and systematically beat him to death. First she said she would never forget the second man’s face, then said she
had
forgotten it. Then she left town.’

‘Yeah,’ said Hammett softly. ‘If Mulligan got her to change her story and then got her to leave . . .’

‘Dan’s always had that black Irish temper. If it got away from him then the way it did with that Egan Tokzek—’

‘I think he came around to tell me about it a couple of days ago,’ said Hammett. ‘After his talk with Boyd Mulligan. He was waiting outside my apartment building to talk to me, only he couldn’t bring himself to say it. He knew I’d brought in the hatchet men to wreck Pronzini’s joint, and he knew why I did it. Only Mulligan could have told him those things. I think Mulligan wanted him to pry out of me how much I really knew, and I think he wouldn’t play along. But you can see why I have to know where he was the night Vic was killed,
and
where he was last night when Pronzini got it.’

‘You can’t think that Preacher would—’

Hammett jerked his shoulders irritably at Lynch.

‘I’m not saying I think he did anything, I’m saying I have to find out. If he had something to do with Vic’s death, then he might have killed Pronzini to protect himself. Or if the Mulligans do have their claws into him, he might have killed Pronzini because they forced him into it.’

McKenna spoke for the first time since reading the transcript. ‘But what about the woman and her son up in Marin? What sort of threat could
they
pose to Dan Laverty?’

‘I don’t know. But there’s a lot I don’t know. Why was he out south of the park the night Tokzek was killed? Why did he chase—’

‘That I can tell you, at least.’ Lynch massaged his eyelids with blunt fingers. ‘Dan got a phone call, at home, telling him that in a few minutes a stolen car would be—’

‘There!’ exclaimed McKenna triumphantly. ‘That proves—’

‘Nothing at all, Bren,’ said his secretary in a tired voice. ‘It’s only what Dan told me himself. There’s no corroboration.’

‘Merciful God in heaven!’ burst out McKenna. He was at the sideboard again, his features pinched and drawn.

Lynch’s eyes were losing their dazed look, as if his mind had begun to function once more concerning the political realities.

‘You’re willing to let us handle this for the moment?’

‘I told Jimmy Wright to put a tail on Laverty.’

McKenna began, ‘That isn’t necessary—’

‘I think it is. But I’m willing to lay back apart from that. For the moment. But if I don’t get the answers I need –
straight
answers, and quick – I’m going to the grand jury with what I’ve got so
they
can ask the questions.’

A
t this time on a sunny day, Hammett was pretty sure where he’d find Pop Daneri, and he did. The old man was basking in the sun like a turtle on the minuscule open landing that overlooked the Weller Hotel’s enclosed court. The door was open behind him so he could hear the sound of the buzzer if anyone came in off Post Street.

‘Was she able to identify anyone?’

Hammett took the old man’s arm, not gently. ‘Who?’

‘The Chinese girl. Identify the pictures of the Chicago—’

‘Oh, goddammit anyway!’ exclaimed Hammett.

There was sudden anguish in the old man’s voice. ‘He was . . . from the Treasury Department of the United States government. He . . .’ His voice faltered. ‘He had a . . . a badge and everything. Said you’d given him the address. He took her away with him . . .’

‘How long ago?’

‘Three o’clock this morning. I was still up. He rang the bell,
came up, showed me that badge . . .’ The old man said softly, ‘He was a ringer, wasn’t he, Sam?’

Hammett merely nodded, frowning in thought. Nearly nine hours before. An impossibly cold trail. He could mobilize the men under Jimmy Wright’s command, but as for the police . . .

Hell, any one of them – particularly Dan Laverty – could have been the one who came and got her. The only cop he really trusted was Jack Manion . . .

The old man’s face had changed. His eyes had gone dull, as if something opaque had been drawn across them. He doubled up his fist and struck himself in the face with it.

‘Cut it out,’ growled Hammett.

The old man hit himself again. His brass shell-casing ring gashed his cheek. Blood trickled down his face.

‘Stupid!’ cried the old man. ‘Worthless! The oldest trick in the book and—’

‘Cut it out, Pop,’ said Hammett again. ‘You were taken by experts, they’d know how you feel about the government, how you’d respect a man from the Treasury Department. What bothers me is how they knew where she . . .’ He broke off. Comprehension flooded his face, tightening the lean features. ‘The goddamn phone call!’ he burst out softly.

He looked over at the old man. Pop had a handkerchief pressed against the purple-lipped cut on his cheek.

‘Were you in the room with her when she called her parents?’

‘In the next room. But, Sam—’

‘Could you hear what she was saying? Did she tell them anything about where she was?’

‘Couldn’t hear words, just her voice.’

‘English or Chinese? The cadence and tenor would be different, even through a wall.’

The old eyes, more alive now, sought backward through memory. ‘English.’

‘Yeah,’ he said softly. ‘Could you identify the guy who took her again?’

‘
Big
man,’ said Pop. ‘Tall, bulky, hat and overcoat . . .’
Chagrin entered the eyes. ‘Now I remember, kept his scarf up around the bottom half of his face, casual like . . .’

‘Silk scarf? Wool?’

‘Silk.’

Hammett squeezed the old man’s thin upper arm. ‘Okay, Pop, keep safe.
He
doesn’t know you can’t identify him.’

Late afternoon sunlight slanted through the dusty windows of Hammett’s apartment to lay a cool pale oblong on the rug. Summer fog, rolling silent and gray through the Golden Gate and across the western rim of the city, soon would blot it out.

Jimmy Wright was annihilating a Fatima in Hammett’s ancient Coxwell. His round tough sleepy face was placid, almost stupid with thought.

Hammett was on his feet as usual, prowling from hallway to window, throwing questions and remarks and comments as he did. He hadn’t shaved and his shirt was open to show the top two buttons of his balbriggan undershirt. A lock of hair hung down across his forehead. His eyes were bloodshot. From the kitchen came the plock-plock-plock of his Challenge electric percolator.

‘All right, what have we got on the snatch itself?’

‘Post Street at three in the morning is what we got. Nobody saw him in or them out. Nobody saw any cars at the curb with the motor running. Nobody saw—’

‘The cop on the beat?’

‘Five blocks away rattling doorknobs. He says. More likely drinking coffee in the Pig’n Whistle.’

‘This afternoon I did what I should have done as soon as Pop told me about it. Checked up on her phone call.’

He paused beside the op’s chair to stab his cigarette into the ashtray, then fished for another in his pocket.

‘Jack Manion checked with the girlfriend at the chemist’s shop in Spofford Alley. No phone call from Crystal. He checked with the folks. No phone call. They didn’t even know she’d
been found and was in a safe place.’ He gave a sudden angry burst of laughter. ‘Safe place!’

‘But then that means—’

‘That she called a friend we don’t know about, who sold her out to whoever the hell was looking for her. Or that she herself called whoever the hell—’

The doorbell rang.

Hammett poked his head into the hall to yell, ‘It’s unlocked.’ He used the interruption to light the cigarette he’d gotten out.

Goodie came in. She wore a new silk satin Charmeuse frock that looked expensive. Pearl drops glowed at her earlobes, and her golden hair was freshly marceled.

‘There’s a telephone call for you, Mr . . . um . . . Wright.’

Hammett waited until the stocky detective had disappeared, then said to Goodie, ‘Long time no see, sweetheart.’

She made an abrupt gesture with one hand.

‘Your coffee’s done.’

He could hear the sounds of her unscrewing the electric cord from the wall socket, the rattle as she got spoons and cups, the grunt of the icebox door as she looked for milk. She called from the kitchen in a voice falsely light and gay.

‘I’ve been busy.’

‘Sure.’ Hammett watched her set the tray with two steaming cups and other paraphernalia on the davenport table next to his typewriter. When she handed one to him and carried the other over to Jimmy Wright’s chair, he added, ‘You’re not having any?’

‘I’ve . . . got a date . . .’

The fat little op bustled back into the room. He did not sit down, nor did he take any notice of the coffee.

‘And there’s something else that don’t make sense. Our people finally got hold of the police report on the Pronzini kill. He was gunned down at three
A.M
.’

‘That’s solid?’ demanded Hammett in a surprised voice.

‘Eyewitnesses, three of them. They didn’t get a description of
the killer or a license number on the car, they were too busy trying to fit into the same six feet of gutter. But they’re sure of the time. Three
A.M
.’

Hammett tugged at his mustache, then caught the look on Goodie’s face and shrugged slightly. She had been turning from one to the other, frowning, not understanding.

‘At three
A.M
.,’ said Hammett, ‘Crystal was snatched from the Weller Hotel.’

‘Oh, Sam,
no!
How
terrible
for her.’

‘If we count out the eastern mobsters, the only suspect we’ve got for the snatch and the Pronzini kill is Dan Laverty, the Chief of Detectives. Since the simplest way is usually the easiest way, we’ve been trying to fit him for both the killing and the kidnapping. But if they happened at exactly the same time . . .’

Goodie was still quite a way behind him. Her voice was shocked. ‘Sam, a
policeman?
’

‘I told you a long time ago that everybody’s for sale in this burg.’ He turned to Jimmy Wright. ‘What’s Laverty been doing since we put the tail on him?’

‘Down at the Hall, doing his job. Hasn’t seen anybody he shouldn’t have. No phone calls when he’s been out and around. Which ain’t saying much, since we can’t tap into his phone at the Hall.’

‘Tell the boys to stick tight.’

‘Will do. If anything develops, you’ll be where?’

‘Here. I’m waiting for a phone call from Lynch. He’s supposed to be working on it from the other end.’

The op nodded and put on his hat and left.

‘You don’t seem terribly worried about that girl, Sam,’ said Goodie.

‘I think she called whoever came and got her. I think she arranged for him to spring her out of the hotel with that phony badge. It’s the only thing that makes sense.’

‘Then she’s not
really
in danger at all?’

‘Oh, she’s in danger, right enough. She just doesn’t realize
how much. She’s playing some sort of game, and she thinks she can handle whoever it is.’

‘I don’t see how you can believe that, Sam!’ she exclaimed. ‘You say you count out the eastern mobsters, but if Al Capone himself is after her for—’

‘Sometime when I’ve got a week, I’ll tell you all the holes in
that
story.’

Goodie’s eyes softened. She put a hand on his arm.

‘Sam, if you have to stay here for a phone call, I’ll stay and make us something to eat and . . .’

‘What about your date?’

‘I could break it.’

He almost said yes. But he still hadn’t told her about Josie and the two girls. Tell her now. Let her know how futile it is. Hurt her now so you hurt her less later. Can’t. He said, ‘I wouldn’t want you to do that, kid.’

As if to punctuate the sentence, an auto horn sounded twice in the street below. Color rushed into Goodie’s face. She checked her wristwatch. Hammett hadn’t seen it before. He knew jewelry from his years at Al Samuels’ store: This looked like the Elgin eighteen-karat white-gold bracelet watch that retailed for seventy dollars.