The Ace of Spades - Dell Shannon (18 page)

“
Y0u can't do this to me— "

"Famous last words,"
said the sergeant. "In, buddy, and get your pants on. You're
going for a joy ride .... I'll bet they turned him down for the Army,
Lieutenant, he'd've learned a lot fancier cussing than that in the
service."

* * *

The telephone brought Mendoza out of deep sleep,
shrill and imperative. Mechanically he reached out to the bedside
table, only half awake, and hit his hand on the edge; swore, coming
further out of sleep, and turned over to reach the phone with his
right hand. Bast, who was curled in a ball alongside him, uttered
faint protests at being so rudely wakened.

"Mendoza speaking?

"This Lieutenant Mendoza of headquarters?"

"Yes." He was fully awake now. "Who is
this?"

"Sergeant Polaski speaking, sir Kenneth Street
precinct, Hollywood. We just had a call to a break-in and assault up
here, and the neighbors seemed to think you ought to be informed—
say the young lady's a friend of yours. A Miss Alison Weir, it's the
Blanchard Arms on— "

"I know the address, what's happened?"

"Just got here ourselves, sir— somebody broke
in and attacked her— "

"All right, I'm coming, you carry on!" He
swore steadily at his hand as he flung on some clothes: a damned
nuisance. It was five minutes before he left, leaving the light on
behind him. Bast looked at it plaintively, uttered a philosophic
sigh, curled up with her back to it and her tail across her eyes, and
went to sleep again.

On the way across town Mendoza was absently
interested to notice that the Face1-Vega was apparently capable of
what the manufacturers claimed for it. A good many  automatic
signals were off for the night at this hour, and he ignored the ones
that weren't. The force was shorthanded, but he'd have a word to drop
to Fletcher in Traffic: despite the comparative emptiness of the
streets after midnight, it wasn't until he was within a mile of his
destination that a patrol car picked him up. He didn't stop, and it
was a minute behind him when he pulled up at the curb. He got to the
elevator before a patrolman caught him up, breathing wrath, to be
calmed down and presented with identification.

There'd been another patrol car ahead of where he
parked, and on the fourth floor there was quite a crowd. People in
dressing gowns standing in their doorways, interested and excited; a
very young patrolman taking notes as a pretty gray-haired woman
gabbled at him; another on his knees earnestly studying the open door
of Alison's apartment; a sergeant looking at something on the floor
inside. Mendoza snapped out his name and pushed past the kneeling
man.

"Sergeant— "

"Lieutenant Mendoza? Good evening, sir, I mean
good morning, isn't it? I'm Sergeant Polaski." What he was
looking at was a weighted short sap lying there near the door. "The—
Miss Weir, she got a nasty crack on the head— doctor's with her
now, he didn't think it was necessary to take her into hospital, but—
The guy evidently got scared off in a hurry, before he could do much
real damage. Woman across the hall, Mrs. Corder— by what we've got
so far— she and her husband were just coming home, heard Miss Weir
call out, and when the guy heard them coming, he ran, knocked the
woman halfway down the stairs to get by, and of course the husband
was so busy helping her up he can't give a description— and the
stair light was out of commission anyway."

"
Vaya, vaya
,"
said Mendoza, and sat down in the nearest chair and took off his hat.
"Out of commission. Or put that way. All right, Sergeant, that's
good, you can carry on here just as you ordinarily would, but
whatever you get I want sent downtown to headquarters to my office,
O.K.?"

"Yes, sir."

"And I'll have some of my men up now to look
around too." He went to the phone and called downtown, asked for
a man from Prints and one of his own night staff. He discovered he'd
come away without cigarettes, and emptied the box on the coffee table
into his pocket, lit one. He dialed Hackett's number and was rewarded
by an outraged
voice.

"Don't you ever sleep? I'd think after the day
you had— "

"I'm one of those people when I can't sleep I
like to wake up everybody else. Now listen." He told him briefly
what had happened.

"
Pronto, inmediatamente
,
go and find out where they were— call the tails— "

"Who?"

“
¡Pedazo de alcornoque, imbécil!
This is the Domokous business— I think— it could be. And damn it,
would either of those we know about do it themselves?— hired men—
nevertheless, we'll look. The Bouvardier woman and Skyros. Were they
at home thirty minutes ago, and if not, where? We'll check where we
can, at least."

"You mean I'll check," said Hackett
bitterly. “Al1 right, I'm on it. How's Miss Weir?"

"She has survived, I can hear her talking. You
don't kill a woman until you kill her tongue. I'm about to hear what
she has to say. Get busy, and call me here," he named the
number, "when you've got anything." He hung up and went
into the bedroom. The doctor, a thin sandy young man, was bending
over Alison on the bed; he looked up sharply.

"Who are you? Here, young woman, you lie still,
better not sit up just yet."

"Why, Luis," said Alison in a faint voice,
sounding pleased, "you came out without a tie."

Mendoza said, "It's this damned bandage, I can't
manage a knot."

He sat down on the foot of the bed.

"Both been in the wars, have we? What happened
to you?" She propped herself up to look at him.

"A little cut, nothing. I want to hear all about
this, now. What— "

"You can't question her much now, Officer,"
said the doctor. "She's had a severe blow on the head, there's
no concussion but she must have sedation and rest, and take things
easy for a day or so. I understand you must know a few details, but
five minutes is really all I can allow— "

"¡
Qué va, qué va!
Don't be stupid, she's a big strong healthy girl and not much hurt!"
said Mendoza robustly.

Alison sat up straight and glared at him. "Of
all the insulting things to — you— you— ,
¡Monstruo
diabólico!
I might have been killed— "

Mendoza grinned at the doctor. "You see? She's
half Irish, she can't resist a fight. You ever want to insult a
woman, call her healthy."

"I'm not all right, I have a horrible headache—
"

"Those tablets should take effect soon, Miss
Weir, if you are allowed to rest."

"You haven't been in practice long, have you?"
asked Mendoza. "You or me, yes, but she's female— do her much
more good to talk about it. A nice hot cup of coffee and a cigarette—
"

"No caffeine or tobacco!" said the doctor,
looking as if he had suggested cyanide. "If people would only
realize, the most dangerous drugs easily available to— I cannot
recommend— "

"Coffee sounds fine," said Alison. "If
those pills do take effect. You go and make some, Luis. I refuse to
answer questions before I comb my hair and get into something
decent." Her silk dressing gown had been ripped down the front,
one sleeve torn away; she got off the bed unsteadily, clutching the
torn edges together.

"Really, I cannot recommend— "

Mendoza took his arm and led him out. "Thank you
very much for your services, Doctor." Spluttering, the doctor
went away. Mendoza started water heating for coffee, thoughtfully
making enough for everybody, and cast around in the refrigerator for
something to make a sandwich of; he was hungry. The men from downtown
arrived and he set one to printing the door, the other looking around
generally here and downstairs.

Twenty minutes later he installed Alison in the
biggest armchair with a cup of coffee, passed cups and a plate of
sandwiches round to the sergeant, the very young patrolman who was
ready with his notebook and pencil, and his own man Williams, who was
yawning steadily, and sat down opposite Alison. "Very cozy,
¿no
es verdad?
Do you want a cigarette now,
querida
?"

"Yes, please. Doctors!" said Alison. "If
you were going to ask, I feel better, thank you. Though there's an
awfully tender soft spot— " She fingered the back of her head
and winced. She had combed her hair, powdered her nose, and put on
lipstick, another house-robe, and looked reasonably herself.

"I should say there is a soft spot! I told you
to put the chain up and keep the windows locked, damn it!"

"Well, but, Luis, it just didn't seem possible—
Oh, all right, I know it was careless, but I was tired, and after
everything else— Coming in to find that note I couldn't make head
or tail of, and then that the apartment had been searched-"

"¡
Por el amor de Dios!
The apartment-and that didn't tell you to take extra care-
¿Para
qué,
what's the use? Females! And where in
hell have you been all day? I— "

"And where were you when I tried to get you
then? I called— Well, I wasn't sure, Luis, nobody could be, it was
just little things, you know— "

"I don't know, but I'm going to hear every last
little thing about it right now— come on, come on, tell!"

The young patrolman looked uneasily astonished at
this peremptory manner of examining a witness, so contrary to the
regulations in the police mannual, but set down his cup and poised
his pencil. "Aren't you feeling tactful tonight!" said
Alison. "The cave-man technique."

"Don't be obtuse, I had the hell scared out of
me and this is reaction, the way a mother spanks her lost tot she
thought was kidnaped. Real redheads, they're not picked up on every
street-corner, it might be all of a couple of months before I found
another. Let's take this in order, now. Where have you been and what
time did you get home?"

"I went to the Vesperian exhibition. It was only
on today, he's really quite an impossible autocrat, you know, does
things just as he pleases and if it's inconvenient for other people
that's just too bad. I had to close the school for the afternoon, I
wanted to see it, he had all sorts of things never on view before
.... The museum? Certainly not, I'm talking about Vesperian the
dealer— gallery out on Santa Monica Boulevard. I picked up Pat
about one o'clock and of course we met various other people there,
and afterward— about five-thirty it'd have been— some of us went
on to the Bradleys', and then just as it was breaking up Tony Lawlor
came in wanting to talk about it all over again— really some very
interesting things— and the upshot was we all went out to dinner in
a crowd, to that Swedish place— "

"Yes, yes, this Bohemian riffraff you associate
with, I know the kind of thing. What time— "

“
That's a very old-fashioned view," said
Alison kindly. "Bohemians are a good thirty years out of date.
And we went back to the Mawsons' because Sally wanted us to look at a
new thing Andy'd just finished. It was about ten-thirty when Pat and
I left, and I dropped her and came straight home. There was some
mail, and I brought it up with me and looked at it, and this
note-left by hand— I couldn't make out what on earth it was— —
"

"Yes, and you've left your prints all over it, I
suppose, and maybe some of the sergeant's men have too— where is
it?— the bedroom— "

Mendoza went to get it, brought it back delicately
balanced on his palm, and laid it on the desk. "We'll have to
isolate the extra prints, if possible, that's all.
¿Qué
mono
, isn't this pretty? Ladylike fancy
stationery, a very fine-pointed pen, and a mysterious message. You
will tell your Irishman gangster that since he does not come in touch
with me to conclude the bargain, all is cancelled, for his
dishonorable greed— I do not buy, I pay him nothing! Let him come
and ask now for his original price, perhaps I think about it, but if
not by tomorrow, I seek the police and tell them his name."

"Exactly like Agatha Christie," said
Alison. "Isn't it? And of course, I thought of that Lydia right
away— "

"So do I. Caray, yes, and so we know who Lydia
is— and,
de paso
,
I'm vindicated. A lot of names I've been called by a lot of people,
but nobody ever accused me of being an Irishman. Yes, well, I want
this gone over for prints— oh, hell, Hellenthal's gone with the
rest of what he picked up— have you got any wrapping paper?"
He went and got it, and covered the note carefully in an improvised
folder with its envelope. "All right, go on."

"Well, I couldn't make head or tail of it, but I
thought you'd better hear about it, so I called you at home, and you
weren't there. So I thought I'd wait until morning, and then I
noticed that the top drawer in my dressing table wasn't closed. And
that's a sort of complex with me, you know, drawers left open— I
never do— I may stuff things away all untidy, to keep it neat on
the surface, but I don't like clutter, and I always shut drawers
properly. Even if I'd been in a particular hurry when I left— and I
wasn't, today. I— Luis, you devil, is this that special Roquefort I
had in the— ? It was for a party, I'm having some people in on
Sunday— "