Lawrence Block - Masters of Noir - Volume 1

“I don’t follow you, Liddell.”

“I got a call around one or one-thirty. It was a girl. She said she was Lane. Asked me to get out there right away.”

“So?”

Liddell shrugged. “Lieutenant Murray checked the local operator. Lane never made a call to New York that night.” He poured some more liquor into the glass, swirled it around. “Funny, huh?”

“A scream. Sounds like you’re making out a case against yourself. Then you didn’t get a call?”

“I got the call all right. And it’s not me I’m making the case out against.”

“Who then?”

“You. That call was made from right here.”

The big man’s jaw dropped. “You crazy? You said yourself you heard the shot. What are you trying to pull, Liddell?”

Liddell grinned humorlessly. “Shows how dumb I really am. I thought it was a shot.” He looked at Murphy. “That’s what I was supposed to think. That way it set the time of the kill and gave some people an alibi.”

“Look, Liddell,” Murphy growled. “I can account for every minute of my time. From show break at eleven right through to—”

“Nice big place you’ve got here,” Liddell cut him off. “Living room, couple of bedrooms. A study, too?”

The big man’s eyes narrowed. “Get to the point.”

“I’ll bet the study’s pretty well set up. Ping pong, maybe. Big leather chairs. The works, eh?”

“There a law against being comfortable? What’s the furnishing of my study got to do with it?”

“Everything. Once I learned you’d spent years in radio.” Liddell took a swallow from his glass, watched the other man over the rim. “You know how some sound effects men fake the sound of a shot on a live mike, Murph? They smack leather with a ping pong paddle. It makes a better shot than live ammo.”

The good looks of the big man had disappeared. His lips straightened out into thin, bloodless lines; hard lumps formed at the sides of his mouth. “Go on.”

“You and Claire disappeared into the study for awhile. Some way you got her to make that call, probably told her it was a practical joke. Then you set out to get her drunk. But not drunk enough, because she tumbled to the connection when I popped in here to break the news.”

Murphy’s hand dipped into his jacket pocket. When it re-appeared, he had a snubnosed .38 in his fist. “But why should I kill Lane? She was my meal ticket. Besides, I was forty minutes away. Forty minutes, Liddell.”

“She was already dead when you picked the girls up at the stage door. You didn’t have to go out there. All you had to do was try to establish the time it happened. And you almost got away with it.”

“That’s not what the police think. They’ve got your boy Tate measured for it, and—”

“No more. They know he was sapped before he was shot in the back. You want to know something else? That gun of Lane’s had a faulty breech. It spit back nitrates when it was fired. Lane’s hand gave a negative reaction to the paraffin test. Yours won’t.”

“You haven’t given me a reason why I should kill her,” Murphy grated through clenched teeth. “Go on, show me how smart you are.”

“If I were smart, I would have tumbled long ago. Those diamonds you were supposed to be buying up for her. They were phonies, weren’t they? You knew you had to put up, but it was a cinch either Lane or Arms would spot them. Either way it was curtains. You had to see to it that the diamonds disappeared before the deal went through.” He scowled at the gun in the big man’s hand. “I should have known there was something fishy about the deal when you paid the retainer in cash and made such a big deal about nobody knowing Tate was bodyguarding your client.”

Murphy nodded. “You’re as smart as I thought I was.”

“Why’d you kill the redhead, Murph?”

The big man shrugged. “I had to. Anyway, what’s the difference after you’ve killed once?” He wiped his upper lip with the side of his left hand. “She guessed the phone call was intended to set up a phony alibi. She tried to put the shake on me deeper than I was willing to go. I lost my temper and hit her with a bottle.” He licked at his lips with the tip of his tongue. “All I had to do was get her down to my car and dump her some place where it’d look like a hit-and-run. I’ve carted dames out of here in worse condition. No one paid any attention.”

“And now?”

“The last act. You.”

Liddell watched the finger whiten on the trigger. “A sucker play. You can’t get away with knocking me off. You’ll tip the whole story.”

The big man shook his head, twisted the bloodless lips into a caricature of a grin. “You wouldn’t, I suppose? I’ll get away with it. Too bad you won’t be here to see it.”

“They’ll never buy it.”

“Why not? You came up here, admitted you followed the redhead home and killed her because she heard you admit to me that you killed Lane. It might sound thin, but you won’t be in any condition to contradict it, and—”

The glass filled with liquor left Liddell’s hand, streaked for the big man’s face. Murphy tried to duck away, started squeezing the trigger. Slugs bit chunks of plaster out of the wall near Liddell’s head. Murphy screamed and pawed at his eyes as the raw liquor burned into them. He tried to raise the gun again, but he didn’t get it to firing level.

Liddell moved in relentlessly. He hit the big man’s wrist with the side of his hand. The gun clattered to the floor from nerveless fingers. Liddell slammed his fist against the side of the man’s jaw, sent him reeling backwards. He followed up, backhanded Murphy’s head into position, then took the fight out of him with an uppercut to the midsection.

Murphy went down, trying to catch Liddell around the knees. The private detective sidestepped, kicked him in the face, knocked him flat on his back. The big man lay there, moaning, pink-tinged bubbles forming between his lips.

Liddell walked to the big desk against the wall, dialled the number of the Carport Police Department. After a moment, he was connected with Lieutenant Murray in homicide. Briefly, he outlined the story as he knew it.

He could hear the sound of a sharp intake of breath from the other end. Then, after a moment, “Will he sign a statement?” Murray wanted to know.

“I haven’t asked him yet,” Liddell said. “I have an idea he will, though.”

“Not if he’s in his right mind,” the homicide man told him. “It’s a pretty flimsy story to juice up an electric chair with.”

Liddell grinned. “I’ve got an extra generator up my sleeve. When I hang up, I’m calling Arms and I’m telling him how Murphy tried to frame him for the Lane kill. Arms is a little sensitive about things like that. I’ve got an idea Murphy would prefer the law to Arms and his boys.”

Murray chuckled. “Maybe he would at that. I’ll send a couple of my boys in to pick him up.” There was a click as he broke the connection.

Murphy was moaning his way back to consciousness. Liddell walked over, caught him by the front of his shirt and dragged him to a chair. The agent was no longer dapper. His eyes were watery, the carefully combed hair hung lankly down over his face. He was sick, breathing noisily through a smashed nose.

Liddell buried his fingers in the man’s hair, pulled his head back. “Listen carefully, you rat. I’ve notified both the cops and Arms. I told them what I know — that you tried to frame Arms for this kill. They’re both sending a couple of boys for you. You understand?”

Murphy’s eyes stopped rolling. He made a visible effort to focus them on the private detective’s face. “You — you told Arms?”

Liddell grinned grimly. “Yeah. Take your pick, pal. If you haven’t written out a full statement by the time the homicide boys get here, I’ll see to it that they go home without you. I’ll bet Arms’ torpedoes won’t be discouraged that easily.”