Уильям Макгиверн: The Darkest Hour

When she returned to the room he was staring into the fireplace, a dark frown on his face. “It’s for you,” she said.

He turned to her, still frowning. “Are you sure?”

“Yes. She asked for you.”

He shrugged and walked into the cool, softly lighted bedroom. A gray tweed suit and a lace-edged slip were laid out on the bed, and a pair of brown leather pumps were on the floor beside two pieces of luggage. The room smelled faintly of the lavender sachets she kept with her gloves and lingerie. Retnick sighed and picked up the phone, “This is Steve Retnick.”

“My name is Kay Johnson. You don’t know me, but I’m Joe — I’m a friend of Joe Lye’s.” The woman’s voice was low and controlled, but he could hear a tremor of fear running under it.

“I’m not very much interested in Joe Lye’s friends,” he said.

“Please listen to me. Please! I know you don’t care anything about him—” She stopped and drew a deep, quivering breath. “No one cares about him! He’s just a cheap little hoodlum with a twisted face. I know that!”

“What did you want?” Retnick said. She was almost hysterical, he knew; the tight control of her voice was slipping.

“He’s going to be killed,” she said. “Nick Amato is going to kill him!”

“You’d better call the police if you’re worried about him,” Retnick said.

“I can’t! The police are going to kill him. Don’t you understand?”

“Calm down a bit. You said it was Amato.”

“Amato sent a police officer to do it. That’s how he works.”

“Was it a man named Connors?” Retnick asked her sharply.

“Yes, that’s his name. He’s going to kill Joe.”

“Why did you call me?”

“I don’t know. Joe told me you hated Amato. So I looked you up in the book. They’re afraid of you.”

“And you want me to save your boyfriend?”

“No, it wasn’t that,” she said, laughing softly. “No one can save Joe. The poor guy is all through. But nothing can save Amato.”

Retnick’s hand tightened on the receiver. “What’s that?”

“I can hang him,” she said. “I can give you his head on a platter. Are you interested?”

“Where are you now?”

She gave him the address of her apartment, still laughing softly, and Retnick said, “You sit tight. I’ll be along in ten or fifteen minutes.” Then he broke the connection and dialed the Thirty-First. Waiting for Neville he turned her story around in his mind. If she were telling the truth there must have been a major row between Amato and Lye. But over what?

When Neville answered, Retnick said, “Lieutenant, this is Retnick. Wait until I finish before you tell me to go to hell. I just had a call from a woman named Kay Johnson, Joe Lye’s girl friend. She tells me Amato has put the finger on Lye, and she says she can hang Amato. Whether she’s got anything on him or not, I don’t know. But I thought I’d let you know. I’m going to her apartment now.”

Neville took a deep breath and swore irritably. “Where does she live?” he said at last.

Retnick told him and Neville said, “All right. Meet me in front of her place. I’ll leave here now.”

Retnick put the phone down and walked slowly into the living room. Marcia looked at him and said, “You sounded excited. I hope it’s good news.”

“Yes, it’s good news,” Retnick said. He picked up his hat and she came with him to the door. With his hand on the knob he looked down at her and said, “This could be the end of it. Tonight could end it.”

“I hope you’ll have what you want then.”

He stared into her small familiar face, silently turning the painful thoughts in his mind. Then he said awkwardly, “I thought you’d be better off with a divorce. I thought you would get started over without me. I couldn’t let you visit me in jail.” He shrugged his big shoulders. “I wasn’t built to be a monkey in a cage. And I couldn’t come back to you as a jailbird. It was the way I felt about you. You were like some prize I’d won by a fluke, and I couldn’t crawl back to you—” He gestured helplessly. “I had to prove I was framed.”

“You never had to prove anything to me, Steve,” she said. “You still don’t.” She touched his arm gently. “Stay here and talk to me until I have to go. Let Lieutenant Neville finish this job tonight. You’ve done enough.”

“But it’s not over yet,” he said. “I’ve got to finish it.”

“You want to finish it,” she said, sighing and taking her hand from his arm. “It isn’t clearing your name, coming back to me like a white and shining knight. Be honest, Steve. You want to be in at the kill.”

“Maybe that’s it,” he said. Nothing made sense any more, he thought, watching her with a faint and bitter smile. “You’re still planning to leave, of course?”

“There’s nothing here for me,” she said. “I’ll be on the ten o’clock flight.”

“Well, good luck,” he said.

“Thanks. And take care of yourself, Steve.”

“Sure,” he said heavily, and opened the door.

She watched him from the doorway as he walked down the hall. He rang for the elevator and stood with his back to her looking down at the floor. The building was still and silent. When the elevator arrived he stepped into it without looking back. She waved tentatively but he was already out of sight. The doors closed on him with a dry and final ring.

Lieutenant Neville was waiting for Retnick in front of Kay Johnson’s apartment building. There was an obvious constraint in his manner as he greeted him and said, “What do you think this woman has on Amato?”

“I told you she wasn’t specific.”

“It’s probably dynamite,” Neville said, throwing his cigarette aside. “She probably knows he played hooky in third grade.”

“Then why did you bother coming over?”

Neville glanced up and down the dark street, a humorless grin touching his hard lips. “I’ll be damned if I know,” he said. “Let’s go up.”

Kay Johnson opened the door and smiled nervously from Neville to Retnick. She wore a simple black dress with pearls, and she had obviously prepared herself carefully for this role; her make-up was fresh, and her shining blonde hair was meticulously in place. But all the careful grooming wasn’t enough to conceal the fear in her eyes and the lines of tension about her mouth.

Neville sensed her anxiety and said quietly, “Miss Johnson, I’m a police officer. My name is Lieutenant Neville. This is Steve Retnick whom you talked with on the phone a short while ago. May we come in?”

“Yes, yes of course,” she said quickly. She was looking at Retnick. “I... I didn’t know you’d call the police.”

“It’s better this way, believe me,” he said.

Neville glanced around the gracefully furnished room with professional interest. Then he looked at Kay Johnson and said, “What have you got to tell us?”

She sat down on the sofa, so slowly that it seemed the strength was draining from her legs. “Nick Amato is going to kill Joe Lye,” she said. “How do you know that?” Neville said casually.

“Amato sent a detective here, a man named Connors. He rang the bell, I don’t know, around eight, I think. Joe was in the kitchen then, but Connors didn’t ask to see him. He told me to stay in the living room and he went through the apartment with his gun out. He opened the closet here in the foyer and then started for the bedroom. Maybe Joe saw him coming — I don’t know. Maybe he heard him talking to me. Anyway, when this man, Connors, reached the kitchen the back door was open and Joe was gone. I... knew from the way Connors looked and acted that he was going to kill Joe the minute he saw him.”