Эд Макбейн: Learning to Kill: Stories

“We’ve got plenty of time, Steve.”

“Well, I’m in a hurry.”

“You’re not going anyplace, kid. Tell us about it.”

“What’s there to tell? There was a candy store stuck up, that’s all.”

“Did you stick it up?”

“That’s for me to know and you to find out.”

“We know you did.”

“Then don’t ask me stupid questions.”

“Why’d you do it?”

“I ran out of butts.”

“Come on, kid.”

“I done it ’cause I wanted to.”

“Why?”

“Look, you caught me cold, so let’s get this over with, huh? What’re ya wastin’ time with me for?”

“We want to hear what you’ve got to say. Why’d you pick this particular candy store?”

“I just picked it. I put slips in a hat and picked this one out.”

“You didn’t really, did you, Steve?”

“No, I didn’t really. I picked it ’cause there’s an old crumb who runs it, and I figured it was a pushover.”

“What time did you enter the store, Steve?”

“The old guy told you all this already, didn’t he? Look, I know I’m up here so you can get a good look at me. All right, take your good look, and let’s get it over with.”

“What time, Steve?”

“I don’t have to tell you nothing.”

“Except that we know it already.”

“Then why do you want to hear it again? Ten o’clock, all right? How does that fit?”

“A little early, isn’t it?”

“How’s eleven? Try that one, for size.”

“Let’s make it twelve, and we’ll be closer.”

“Make it whatever you want to,” Stevie said, pleased with the way he was handling this. They knew all about it, anyway, so he might as well have himself a ball, show them they couldn’t shove him around.

“You went into the store at twelve, is that right?”

“If you say so, Chief.”

“Did you have a gun?”

“No.”

“What, then?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing at all?”

“Just me. I scared him with a dirty look, that’s all.”

“You had a switch knife, didn’t you?”

“You found one on me, so why ask?”

“Did you use the knife?”

“No.”

“You didn’t tell the old man to open the cash register or you’d cut him up? Isn’t that what you said?”

“I didn’t make a tape recording of what I said.”

“But you did threaten him with the knife. You did force him to open the cash register, holding the knife on him.”

“I suppose so.”

“How much money did you get?”

“You’ve got the dough. Why don’t you count it?”

“We already have. Twelve dollars, is that right?”

“I didn’t get a chance to count it. The Law showed.”

“When did the Law show?”

“When I was leaving. Ask the cop who pinched me. He knows when.”

“Something happened before you left, though.”

“Nothing happened. I cleaned out the register and then blew. Period.”

“Your knife had blood on it.”

“Yeah? I was cleaning chickens last night.”

“You stabbed the owner of that store, didn’t you?”

“Me? I never stabbed nobody in my whole life.”

“Why’d you stab him?”

“I didn’t.”

“Where’d you stab him?”

“I didn’t stab him.”

“Did he start yelling?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You stabbed him, Steve. We know you did.”

“You’re foil of crap.”

“Don’t get smart, Steve.”

“Ain’t you had your look yet? What the hell more do you want?”

“We want you to tell us why you stabbed the owner of that store.”

“And I told you I didn’t stab him.”

“He was taken to the hospital last night with six knife wounds in his chest and abdomen. Now how about that, Steve?”

“Save your questioning for the Detective Squad Room. I ain’t saying another word.”

“You had your money. Why’d you stab him?”

Stevie did not answer.

“Were you afraid?”

“Afraid of what?” Stevie answered defiantly.

“I don’t know. Afraid he’d tell who held him up? Afraid he’d start yelling? What were you afraid of, kid?”

“I wasn’t afraid of nothing. I told the old crumb to keep his mouth shut. He shoulda listened to me.”

“He didn’t keep his mouth shut?”

“Ask him.”

“I’m asking you!”

“No, he didn’t keep his mouth shut. He started yelling. Right after I’d cleaned out the drawer. The damn jerk, for a lousy twelve bucks he starts yelling.”

“What’d you do?”

“I told him to shut up.”

“And he didn’t.”

“No. he didn’t. So I hit him, and he still kept yelling. So I gave him the knife.”

“Six times?”

“I don’t know how many times. I just gave it to him. He shouldn’t have yelled. You ask him if I did any harm to him before that. Go ahead, ask him. He’ll tell you. I didn’t even touch the crumb before he started yelling. Go to the hospital and ask him if I touched him. Go ahead, ask him.”

“We can’t, Steve.”

“Wh...”

“He died this morning.”

“He...”

For a moment, Stevie could not think clearly. Died? Is that what he’d said? The room was curiously still now. It had been silently attentive before, but this was something else, something different, and the stillness suddenly chilled him, and he looked down at his shoes.

“I... I didn’t mean him to pass away,” he mumbled.

The police stenographer looked up. “To what?”

“To pass away,” a uniformed cop repeated, whispering.

“What?” the stenographer asked again.

“He didn’t mean him to pass away!” the cop shouted.

The cop’s voice echoed in the silent room. The stenographer bent his head and began scribbling in his pad.

“Next case,” the Chief of Detectives said.

Stevie walked off the stage, his mind curiously blank, his feet strangely leaden. He followed the cop to the door, and then walked with him to the elevator. They were both silent as the doors closed.

“You picked an important one for your first one,” the cop said.

“He shouldn’t have died on me,” Stevie answered.

“You shouldn’t have stabbed him,” the cop said.

He tried to remember what Skinner had said to him before the lineup, but the noise of the elevator was loud in his ears, and he couldn’t think clearly. He could only remember the word “neighbors” as the elevator dropped to the basement to join them.

In this story — which first appeared in Manhunt in 1953, under the Evan Hunter byline — there’s a detective named Marelli and another one named Willis and yet another one named Ed. Is it just coincidence that I chose the pseudonym Ed McBain for the series of cop novels I would begin writing a few years later? Is it further coincidence that two of the continuing characters in the 87th Precinct novels are named Carella and Willis? I don’t know. Maybe “Kid Kill” should properly belong in the Cops and Robbers section of this book. But when I wrote it back in 1953, I didn’t think of it as the first cop story I’d ever written in my life. I just thought of it as a story about a kid.

It was just a routine call. I remember I was sitting around with Ed, talking about a movie we’d both seen, when Marelli walked in, a sheet of paper in his hand.

“You want to take this, Art?”

I looked up, pulled a face, and said, “Who stabbed who now?”

“This is an easy one,” Marelli said. He smoothed his mustache in an unconscious gesture, and added, “Accidental shooting.”

“Then why bother Homicide?”