A. Fair - The Bigger They Come

‘And there may not be any,’ Bertha Cool said.

‘There you go again,’ Cunweather chuckled. ‘There’s that unique personality of yours coming to the front. It’s refreshing, but we aren’t getting anywhere, and seconds are slipping through our fingers. Now there’s Lam, a clever boy. He could go to this girl and have the information in no time.’

I said, ‘Count me out.’

Cunweather said, ‘Now, Lam, don’t be like that. You’re a nice boy. You should be more forgiving. After all, what happened tonight was just a matter of business.’

‘Forget Donald,’ Mrs. Cool said. ‘You make terms with me. I’ll take care of Donald.’

‘We might make it three hundred dollars a box,’ Cunweather said.

‘No.’

‘That’s our limit.’

Bertha Cool said, ‘I’ll give you a ring and let you know — after I’ve talked with Sandra.’

‘We’d want your answer now.’

‘You have it.’

Cunweather started rocking back and forth in his chair. Mrs. Cunweather said, ‘Ask her where Morgan Birks is now.’

Cunweather said, ‘Come, come, Mrs. Cool. You’ve received a hundred and sixty-five dollars of my money. You know where Morgan Birks is. I think you should tell us.’

She pursed her lips thoughtfully, and said, ‘That information night not do you any good. Again it might be worth money. I’m not one to give something for nothing.’

The telephone rang while Cunweather was rocking back and forth thinking the thing out. ‘Would you answer it, m’love?’

‘Answer it yourself,’ she said, sitting perfectly still. He sighed, tightened his fingers around the arms of the rocking chair, heaved himself to his feet, and waddled out into the other room. He took the receiver off the hook, and said, in a cautious voice, ‘Yes, what is it?’ After that, he was silent for eight or ten seconds. Then he said, ‘You’re sure? — well, come on out here, and I’ll give you some instructions. There’s a new angle on the case.’

He dropped the receiver into place without saying ‘good-by,’ came waddling back, and beamed at Mrs. Cool. ‘I can well appreciate how you feel, Mrs. Cool,’ he said. Then he turned to his wife and said, ‘Morgan Birks is dead, m’love. A girl named Alma Hunter shot him in Sandra Birks’ apartment early this morning. She shot him in the back, just as he was trying to run from the apartment.’

‘Dead?’ Mrs. Cunweather asked.

‘Like a doornail,’ Cunweather assured her.

‘That,’ she said, ‘makes it different.’

Mrs. Cool said, ‘Come on, Donald.’

I got to my feet. She closed her purse, slid her legs back so that her feet were as far under the chair as she could get them, pushed her hands down against the arms of the chair, and got to her feet.

We started for the door. Cunweather and his wife were whispering. After a second or two, and before we were out of the hallway, Cunweather called, ‘Just a minute, Mrs. Cool. I want to ask you a question.’ He came waddling out into the hallway, and said, ‘Do you know whether Morgan Birks was in room 618 all the time? In other words, was he in there when this mistress of his registered?’

‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘How about it, Donald?’

‘No chance,’ I said, ‘unless she was standing in with the bellboy, and Morgan Birks had been planted there. The clerk rented her 618 as a vacant room. She’d telephoned and asked for two rooms with a connecting bath. She’d been assigned 618 and 620. When she registered, she gave up 620, saying the other party hadn’t—’ I broke off as something came to my mind.

‘Hadn’t what?’ Cunweather asked, interested.

‘Hadn’t shown up. The bellboy took her up to 618. The captain got me the information, and I rented 620.’

‘Who had the bath?’

‘I did.’

‘Then 618 had rented without the bath?’ Cunweather asked me.

I said, ‘I guess so-unless there was another bathroom between 618 and 616.’

Mrs. Cunweather called from the other room, ‘Let her go, William. We’ve got enough information to handle it ourselves.’

The chief said, ‘Well, Mrs. Cool, it’s been most delightful having you drop in. Do come again some time. I’ll remember you. I will for a fact — and don’t hold a grudge, Lam. After all, my boy, you were splendid, and your nose doesn’t look at all bad. I can see from the way you’re walking, your ribs are a bit sore, but you’ll get over it in another twenty-four hours. You—’

He waddled over and held the door open for us.

I walked past him out into the night. He followed me out on the porch. ‘Come, come, Lam,’ he said. ‘Let’s shake hands.’

‘Shake hands with him, Donald,’ she said.

He pushed out his hand. It was like picking a chuck of cold oatmeal out of a pot. He looked in my eyes, and said, ‘You’re still sore, Lam.’

He dropped my hand. ‘Have it your own way,’ he said, and waddled back into the house, slamming the door behind him.

Bertha Cool said, ‘He’s a customer, Donald. We can’t quarrel with customers.’

I didn’t say anything.

The cab driver was waiting for us. He held the door open. Bertha Cool said, ‘Stillwater Apartments,’ and pulled herself into the cab. I followed, and said, as the cab driver closed the door, ‘Didn’t you want to go to see Sandra?’

‘Not just yet,’ she said.

The cab lurched into motion. I said, ‘I’ve got a wild idea.’

‘How wild?’ she asked.

‘Awfully wild.’

‘Let’s hear it, Donald.’

‘A couple of things about this case are screwy. I have a hunch Cunweather is connected with this slot-machine business. He’s probably higher-up. Morgan Birks was contact man. Morgan was given money for a pay-off, and now that information about the pay-off is commencing to come out before the grand jury, it appears that Morgan Birks was making a rake-off of his own. In other words, every time he told the ring they had to pay off a hundred dollars, the pay-off was really only fifty. He was giving fifty to the cops, and salting fifty in a safety deposit box.’

‘There’s nothing wild about that idea,’ she said, groping around in her bag for a cigarette, ‘and nothing very original. It’s been done before — you’re probably right at that.’

‘Wait a minute,’ I said. ‘I’m coming to something.’

She pulled out her cigarette, and said, ‘Go ahead and come to it.’

‘Earlier in the evening Cunweather was confident that Morgan Birks never got to the Perkins Hotel. He seemed to know everything I did at the Perkins Hotel. I played one person at the Perkins Hotel for information. That person was the bell captain. The bell captain must have been one of their gang who was planted there.’

She said, ‘That’s sense.’

‘Then they must have planted the bell captain before I got there.’

‘That’s right.’

‘And it probably took a little money and preparation so they must have been working on that for a day or two.’

‘All right.’

‘But the Perkins Hotel didn’t actually figure in the play until Sally Durke went there,’ I said, ‘and I was right on her heels. And the bell captain was pretty well established by that time.’

‘That means they had a good tip-off service,’ she said.

‘It means more than that. How did anyone know Sally Durke was coming to the Perkins Hotel? She didn’t have any occasion to meet Morgan Birks until after I’d gone to her and made my play. That was what started her hunting for Morgan.’

‘Go ahead. What’s your idea, Donald?’

I said, ‘Cunweather knew Birks used the hotel as a place to meet his sweetie. He didn’t know who the girl was. He did know Morgan Birks would come there to meet the girl sooner or later. Cunweather is a pretty able citizen. You can gamble he had the hotel sewed up so Birks couldn’t get in or out. Yet Birks got in, and he got out.’