Hit on the House (22 page)

“You mean he could have done this alley-sweeper thing?”

“I don't know that,” Mulheisen said, “but he let drop a few things to me that make me suspicious. I'd like a warrant.”

“For what?” McClain spread his hands questioningly.

“I'd like to enter his apartment, his place of business, the golf club . . . He's acting strangely, Mac. He left the hospital without making arrangements for his wife.”

McClain pondered this, glancing at Mulheisen suspiciously from time to time. Finally he said, “I think I can arrange it.”

A few minutes later Jimmy called. “The shipment is gone,” he said. “The lady says it was sitting in the back room when she left last night.”

“Meet me at the precinct,” Mulheisen said. “I'll have a warrant.”

An hour later Mulheisen laid it out for Jimmy. “We've got to do something about Buchanan, Jim. I know this sounds weird, but I'd like you to make a call for me.”

A half hour later Mulheisen heard a commotion in the hall, and when he went out, the desk man told him excitedly that they had just received information from Captain Buchanan's home that an anonymous caller had warned that the commander of the Ninth Precinct would be “blown away if he showed his slimy snout in public again.”

Buchanan looked calm when Mulheisen went in to see him, but his voice was strained. “What do you make of this?” he asked.

“It must be a crank,” Mulheisen assured him, “but to be on the safe side, I'd recommend a low profile for a day or two. In fact, it might not be a bad idea if you went home to be with Alice. She'll be worried and, let's face it, she could be in danger herself.”

“Oh, Lord, you're right,” Buchanan said. “Johnson,” he shouted for the blue lieutenant, “get a car out to my house pronto!”

Mulheisen interjected, “If I might make a suggestion, sir, maybe you ought to get the Big Four in on this. They can provide a hell of a lot of security.”

Buchanan, doubtlessly thinking of a wall of tall manly flesh standing between him and an assassin's bullet—perhaps an assassin armed with an alley sweeper—nodded judiciously and said, “Good idea. Johnson! Get Dennis.”

Nineteen

J
oe was having a friendly little chat with Roman Yakovich. They were talking about Germaine Kouras. The Yak had never liked her. He thought a thirty-year-old woman should have more sense than to try to talk a sixty-five-year-old man into leaving his wife and running away to the Caymans. Big Sid wouldn't have enjoyed it for long even if he did go; he'd soon feel bad about Mrs. Sid, and what kind of food could a Greek woman cook for a man like Sid? He wasn't a Greek, he was a Serb. Still, the Yak didn't think Carmine should have iced her.

“Who says he iced her?” Joe asked.

The Yak shrugged. “That's what they say. I don't know.”

“Is there anyplace she could be,” Joe asked, “that Carmine wouldn't know about? Any special place where Sid maybe used to take her? A cabin? A cottage? Some place private where they used to meet?”

The Yak thought about it. “The boat?”

“Sid had a boat? Where did he keep it?”

“Down there by the Bayview Yacht Club.”

Joe had a vague idea where this was, on the Detroit River somewhere around the Chrysler plant. “Did Carmine know about this boat?”

The Yak didn't know.

Joe tried another tack. “The thing is, Roman, there's a lot of money missing, a whole lot of money, and Carmine wants it back.
Now, you know me . . . I don't give a damn about Carmine's money, except that I get a nice percentage of whatever I can recover. Maybe Germaine knew something about it, maybe she didn't. Maybe she's dead; maybe—just maybe—she's still around, hiding out somewhere. I can help her. I'm probably the only one who can help her. If you know anything, tell me.”

The Yak didn't know anything. “The boss allus had a lotta money” was the extent of it.

They were sitting in the Yak's neat little apartment over the old stables. It had a military look, with its neatly made bed on an iron frame and the spotless kitchenette. The television appeared to be the Yak's only source of entertainment. There was a doily on the television and on it a silver framed photo of Big Sid, Mrs. Sid, and little Helen standing on the deck of a cabin cruiser.

Joe nodded toward the picture. “What's the name of the boat?”

The phone rang, or rather, it buzzed like an intercom. The Yak picked it up, and as he talked, his face lightened slightly. “I could come over in a minute,” he said; “I was just talkin’ to Joe. Joe Service. He's a contractor.”

“Is that Helen?” Joe whispered. “Let me talk to her.”

He took the phone and said, “Miss Sedlacek? Joe Service. No, no, no, I'm not one of Carmine's . . . Miss Sedlacek . . . Miss, . . . look, I'm an independent . . . listen, can I talk to you? Just let me talk to you for a minute; it's important . . . Hey, you can have Roman throw me out on my butt if I'm too much of a pain . . . Yeah, just for a minute. I'll be right over.”

The Yak took Joe over to the house. On the way he explained that Helen had wanted him to come play racquetball. The Yak didn't like racquetball; he just wasn't agile enough to play with Helen, but sometimes she needed an opponent, so he went. He suggested that Joe play her. “You kids can play,” he said.

Helen Sedlacek was waiting for them in a kind of lounge in the basement of the mansion. She was wearing slacks and a black turtleneck jersey and Joe, who had never met her before, liked what he saw. She was small and lithe with a great mane of black hair, very pretty and, at the moment, torn between anger and curiosity.

“Miss Sedlacek, it's really kind of you to see me. I know that you're not too happy with Carmine, but believe me, I'm not one of Carmine's stooges.” Joe gave her the best smile he had. It seemed to have some effect.

“Whose stooge are you?” she asked, with a hint of a smile.

“I'm my own stooge. You can ask Roman, he knows me. Carmine and I get on . . .” he waggled his fingers, “. . . in a way. He hires me because I get results.”

The Yak nodded at Helen's inquiring look. “Joe's all right,” he said. “He works for everybody, not just Carmine.”

“What are you?” she asked, yielding to curiosity. “An investigator for the biz? I never heard of such a thing.”

“Why not?” Joe said blithely. “Even the biz needs a detective now and then. I'm a finder, Miss Sedlacek. I find people, money, . . . whatever needs finding.”

“So what are you looking for now, Joe?”

“Money . . . and Germaine Kouras.”

“I heard she was gone,” Helen said.

“That's what I heard, but the way I was told, it was not very conclusive. Maybe she's gone, but I'm not sure, and I can't help wondering.”

Helen frowned. “I don't quite understand. What's the mystery? Either she's gone or she isn't.”

Joe smiled. “Carmine says she's gone, but he doesn't say where, if you get my drift. I know what you're going to say.” He hastened to forestall her. “If Carmine says she's gone, he probably made sure of it.” He shrugged. “He could be lying. Carmine lies a lot.”

Joe looked about the area with casual interest. Through an open door he got a glimpse of a swimming pool. “Say, quite a layout,” he said, walking over and looking into an impressive recreation area. Big Sid had spent a lot of money down here. The swimming pool was forty feet long and lighted from underneath, creating dancing patterns on the low ceiling. To one side, behind a Plexiglas wall, was the racquetball court; there were weight and workout machines, a heavy bag for boxing, and a speed bag, even a little net-draped driving range where you
could hit golf balls against a projected fairway or onto a projected green. “Hey, your own court! How about a game?”

Helen laughed. “You're certainly not one of Carmine's usual mugs,” she said. “I think we could find you some shorts and a pair of court shoes.”

Roman found all the essential gear for him in the dressing room and pointed out the showers, the steam room and the sauna, then vanished. When Joe came out ten minutes later, Helen was waiting for him at the door of the court. He started to ask her where Roman had got to but forgot momentarily. Helen didn't look like Helen. She was slimmer than he had thought, dressed in very short shorts and a black tank top, and looking very much like a teenage boy—the black mane was gone. What she had was practically a shaved head but for a neat, black patch of hair that barely covered the crown of her shapely skull.

Joe's mouth was open.

“Yes?” she asked.

“I, ah, wondered what happened to Roman.”

“I sent him back to his TV. He was a little worried for me, but I told him I thought I could handle you. Come on.”

Joe was fascinated by this woman. Inside the court she bounced the blue ball for a few seconds and said, “Shall we warm up with a little volley or two?”

She was smaller than he and faster, very lithe indeed, as he quickly discovered when the game commenced. He soon fell behind by several points because he kept watching her instead of the rocketing ball. In many ways she seemed like a boy, almost sexless at first look, but then a subtle sexiness of her body and movements gripped him. She was quite erotic to watch as she spun and leapt and stretched.

Before the game got quite out of hand, however, Joe was caught up in the competitive spirit that she exuded, and he began to concentrate. It was not enough. By the second game, however, he had fully recovered, and he took it by six points. In the rubber game he thought he was coasting to an easy victory after taking an eight-point lead, but then Helen turned on a furious rally, and her stamina overcame him.

They were both drenched. Helen almost staggered off the court
and flung her racket to the floor. “Let's swim,” she said, scuffing off her shoes and socks. She peeled off the tank top and the shorts, the skimpy halter bra, and ran across the rubberized floor to leap naked into the pool, her tight little buttocks flexing. Joe was with her within seconds. He was a very good swimmer, but it was only his superior musculature that enabled him to beat Helen to the wall on the return lap. After that she swam away from him enticingly, twisting and writhing, and he dove under, pursuing her furiously but vainly, her foot always just beyond his grasp until she allowed him to catch her and they rolled to the surface, embracing and gasping.

They were a beautiful couple, both small and dark and smoothly muscled. Lying on the warm redwood decking of the dimly lighted poolside, with the glittering light moving eerily about them, Joe thought that she was the most naked person he had ever seen. There was not a hair on her body. She was so clean, so simple looking. Her hips were narrow, her limbs so smooth and firm, even her feet were uncomplicated and smooth, as if she had been fashioned out of some miraculous plastic that was both soft and hard at the same time. Nude seemed to him a new word.

She looked cool to the touch, but she wasn't. She was intensely passionate. “Yes, yes,” she demanded in a husky whisper, “Do it . . . not there . . . like this,” and she twisted in his grasp, presenting her lean buttocks. This was by no means Joe's preference, but he was caught up in the fury of the moment, and he readily complied.

Afterward they sat, or lay, in the sauna, languorously caressing one another until they made love again, in a more conventional manner. And then they went to the showers together. Later they sprawled in thick terry-cloth robes on the couches of the lounge, tearing hungrily at ham sandwiches Helen had prepared in the kitchenette and gulping down painfully cold bottles of Pilsner Urquell. It struck Joe that he had never enjoyed himself so completely, so thoroughly, in his life. He was absolutely stunned by this woman. For the first time ever the thought that he had met his ideal mate entered his mind. It was more than a little scary.

Helen was watching him with much the same look of delight and
an almost resentful awe. “Why is it I never met you before?” she asked, when she had swallowed enough sandwich to speak for a second.

Joe chewed, raising his eyebrows and shrugging. “I've been around,” he said finally. He drank down the last of his beer and refused another. “I just don't live here. Don't like it.”

“Where do you live?”

For some reason Joe did not hesitate to answer this inquiry, which he had always previously evaded. “Out west, in the mountains,” he said, “a place you never heard of.”

“What place?”

“It's called—don't laugh—Tinstar. One word.” He laughed with her. “Sounds like a movie, hunh? It's not. It's just a little town that had to have a name, and that's the one they came up with. I don't live in the town . . . up in the mountains. I'll take you there.”

She nodded. It was agreed.

Helen finished her sandwich while he watched her intently. Finally she said skeptically, “I've never heard of a biz detective, Joe. These people, they don't like free-lancers. They don't trust them—hell, they don't trust anybody. It's their weakness. They like people like Roman, people who are bound to them . . . in blood, in marriage, in gratitude and debt . . . or in fear. Mostly in fear.”

“Are you bound in fear?” Joe asked.

“I'm not bound to them,” Helen said. “I'm bound to my papa. . . in blood, in love.”

Joe sighed. “I don't know anything about that stuff. But these people, they aren't crazy about my independence, but they put up with it. They need a guy like me, someone who is in the biz in a way but not allied to any single one of them. You see the way it is? It's no use hiring your own people to find out what your own people are stealing from you.”

“But they would never trust you,” she protested. “Papa wouldn't have trusted you to take out the garbage.”

“I worked for your Papa once,” Joe said with a laugh. “It was a while back, when I was first starting out. He thought some bartender was setting up some action on the side, on Sid's turf.”

“Was he?”

“Nanh. Guy was boffing one of Sid's ex-girls. That's all it was, but Sid didn't want to admit it to himself, that he was jealous. But I'll say this, when I told him, he saw it and laughed. Most of them don't. Hey, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that about the girl.”

“Oh, I knew about Papa and the girls. Mama did, too. It's not a big thing.”

“Anyway, Sid trusted me. They mostly do. There's nothing at stake, really. If I don't deliver, they don't pay. But a lot of them lie and try to cheat me, Carmine especially. The thing is they want me to find out who among them is a traitor, who is boffing their girl, whose hand is in the till, . . . but they don't want me to find out too much. Carmine doesn't want me to find out how incompetent and lazy and just plain foolish he is, the mistakes he makes, so he lies to me and hopes that I'll find out what he wants to know and maybe, with luck, I'll get my ass blown off, and he'll still get the info without having to pay.”

Helen leaned forward, “Are you the one who found Hal?”

Joe engaged her eyes. “Don't ask.”

Her eyes blazed back. “Did Carmine set Papa up for Hal?”

“Oh, yes,” Joe said. “What was he supposed to do? Ignore the money Sid took?”

Helen started to respond, but then she just slumped back on the couch. She tried to stare him down, but Joe refused to go on with that game. He looked away with a shrug. Eventually she took a deep breath and said, “You say you're independent, Joe. Does that mean you're for hire?”