Уильям Макгиверн - Rogue Cop

“Who’s that?” a voice said quietly.

“Message from Bill Ackerman,” Carmody said.

The door opened an inch and stopped. Carmody saw one eye shining softly from the light in the hallway, and below that the cold blue glint of a gun barrel.

“Walk straight in when I open the door,” the voice said. “Stop in the middle of the room and don’t turn around. Get that straight.”

“Okay, I’ve got it.”

“Start walking.”

The door swung open. Carmody entered the dark room with the hall light shining on his back. He was a perfect target if the killer wanted to shoot. But he wasn’t worried about that. Not yet.

A switch clicked and a bare bulb above his head flooded the room with white harsh light. He heard the door swing shut, a lock click and then a gun barrel pressed hard against his spine. The man’s free hand went over him with expert speed, found his revolver and flipped it free of the holster.

“Take off your hat now,” he said. “Real slow. Raise it with both hands.”

He knows his racket, Carmody thought, lifting his hat. Occasionally even a cop might forget that a small gun could be carried on the top of a man’s head under a fedora.

“Lemme look at you now,” the man said.

Turning slowly, Carmody faced the man who had killed his brother. Look down here, Eddie, he prayed. This is for you.

“You’re Joie Langley, right?” he said quietly.

“Don’t make conversation. What’s with Ackerman?”

Langley’s youth surprised Carmody. He was twenty-four, or twenty-five at most, a big muscular kid with tousled blond hair and sullen eyes set close together in a wide brutal face. The gun he held looked like a finger of his huge hand. He was wearing loafers, slacks and an unbuttoned yellow sports shirt that exposed his solid hairy chest. About Eddie’s age, Carmody thought, but a different breed. He was a hard and savage killer; Eddie wouldn’t have had a chance with him, even from the front.

“Ackerman wants you to clear out,” Carmody said. “I’m a cop, and I work for him. I’ll set it up for you.”

“A cop?” Langley said softly, and took a step back from Carmody. He went down in a springy crouch, his sullen eyes narrowing with suspicion. “I don’t like this, buddy. The whole deal stinks. I’m the hottest guy in the country but he won’t pay off, won’t let me clear out. Where’s your badge, buddy?”

“I’ll take my wallet from my hip pocket,” Carmody said quietly. “I’ll do it nice and slow. You’re getting all excited, sonny. What’s the matter? This your first job?”

Langley swore at him impersonally. Then he said, “I’m making sure it ain’t my last, that’s all. Take out your frontpiece.”

Carmody opened his wallet and flashed the badge. “Look at the name on the identification card,” he said. “That’s important, too.”

Langley stared at him, the gun steady in his big fist. “I like this less all the time, buddy,” he said.

“You’d be spending your dough in Las Vegas right now if you hadn’t fumbled the job,” Carmody said. “Look at the name in that wallet. Then we’ll get moving.”

Langley took the wallet in his free hand and held it at eye-level. He was still watching Carmody. “You sound like you think you’re tough,” he said casually.

“Look at the name.”

Langley grinned and glanced at the identification card, keeping the gun fixed steadily on Carmody’s stomach.

“Michael T. Carmody,” he said, reading the name slowly. A puzzled line deepened above his eyes. “That’s the name of the guy I—”

Carmody had raised his hand casually — as if he were going to scratch his chin — and now he struck down at Langley’s wrist, gambling on the hoodlum’s momentary confusion and the speed and power of his own body.

He almost lost his bet.

Langley jerked back from the blow, his lips flattening in a snarl, and the rock-hard edge of Carmody’s hand missed his wrist — but it struck the top of his thumb and knocked his finger away from the trigger. For a split second the gun dangled impotently in his hand, and Carmody made another desperate bet on himself and whipped a left hook into Langley’s face. It would have been safer to try for the gun; if the hook missed he’d be dead before he could throw another punch. But it didn’t miss; Langley’s head snapped back as Carmody’s fist exploded under his jaw and the gun spun from his hand to the floor. Carmody kicked it under the bed and began to laugh. Then he hit Langley in the stomach with a right that raised him two inches off the floor. When Langley bent over, gasping for breath, Carmody brought his knee up into his face and knocked him halfway across the room.

“It was your last job, sonny,” he said, grabbing the slack of the sports shirt and pulling him to his feet. “You shot a good kid, my brother. But you shoot nobody else.”

Langley stared at him, breathing raggedly, hate shining from his bleeding ruined face. “I’d cut off my hands and feet for one chance at you, copper,” he cried softly. “I’d fix you good.”

“You had your chance, sonny,” Carmody said. “A thousand more wouldn’t help.” Turning Langley around, he twisted his wrist up between his shoulder blades and locked it there in the vise of his own big hand. “Eddie could have taken you front to front,” he said. “You’re not big-time, you’re all mouth. We’re going downtown now and I’ll turn you over to my brother’s friends. If you want your troubles to start sooner just get balky. I’ll break this arm of yours off and make you carry it.”

“I don’t scare, copper,” Langley said angrily.

Carmody hesitated in the bleak room and stared with bitter eyes into his own past. “No, we don’t scare, sonny,” he said. “God Himself can’t scare us. So we wind up like this. Little men begging for a break.”

“Who’s little?”

“You’re little enough to fit in the chair,” Carmody said. “That’s what counts. How old are you?”

“Twenty-six my next birthday.”

“A ripe old age,” Carmody said, and sighed. “Let’s go.”

He retrieved his revolver, opened the door and shoved Langley out into the dimly lighted hallway. The house was still and quiet. It was just about all over, Carmody knew, and he was restless and impatient for the final end of it. The power and drive that had always been a pressure within him seemed to be gone; even his anger had watered down to a heavy pervading bitterness. He was reaching for the knob when the doorbell broke clamorously through the silence.

Carmody froze, tightening his grip on Langley’s wrist.

“Easy now,” he whispered.

“Maybe you got trouble, copper.”

“You’ll get it first.”

Carmody was in an awkward position. With one band he couldn’t open the door and still keep an effective grip on the gun. And Langley might break if he put away the gun to open the door.

“Maybe we got action,” Langley said, laughing soundlessly.

“You won’t see it,” Carmody said; raising his gun he slugged him at the base of the skull, not hard enough to injure him but hard enough to silence him for a few moments. Langley sagged against him and Carmody caught his arms and lowered him to the floor.

Then he turned the knob, releasing the catch, and stepped quickly back to the shadow of the stairs. The door swung open and Myers, the little detective from his shift, walked into the hallway.

“Good Lord,” he said closing the door quickly, and glancing from Carmody down to Langley’s sprawled body.

“How did you find me?” Carmody said.

Myers was breathing rapidly, his small cautious face tense with excitement. “That can wait, Mike. Ackerman’s sitting across the street in his car. With Hymie Schmidt. Did you know that?”