Роберт Беллем - Pulp Frictions

‘Glennan,’ asked Bourse, ‘do you know why I sent for you?’

‘I’m afraid I do. But I hope I don’t.’

Bourse grinned wearily. ‘Pshaw, why are you a-worrying? That was a bad break.’ He smoked in silence for a moment. ‘Nick, you’re young—’

‘Yes, sir. I’ll be getting over it as rapidly as possible.’

‘You’ve got nerve.’

‘I hope so, sir.’

‘And brains.’

‘Well,’ said Nick.

‘Every man in my department has nerve, and most of them have got a brain or two. But you have something else. You showed it when you was a rookie cop and helped clean out that gang on Acola Street; and you showed it when you ran down those Kentucky gorillas that had us all stumped, in the fall. That’s the reason you’re wearing plainclothes. You have that strange and fortunate thing which you have through no fault of your own: instinct, my boy. A nose for it.’

Bourse wrinkled his own pug nose in demonstration. ‘Your big brother Dave is a good sergeant; I wouldn’t be asking for none better. But he ain’t got the hunch that you have — the kind of natural, hound-dog notion of being a good detective — smelling things out. Nick, did any of your ancestors, rest their souls, have second sight?’

Nick wriggled. ‘I’ve heard that my father was the seventh son of a seventh son, sir. But I’m only the second son of a seventh son.’

‘However that may be, what would you do about Hemingway?’

‘I’d like to get him, sir.’

‘I want you to tell me, me boy.’

Nicholas Glennan stood looking at the carpet for a while. ‘We haven’t much to go on, sir.’

‘Mulberry Street is right near Adamic’s place. You know about Adamic? Very good. Hemingway must have ditched his cab, walked in there, shot Adamic, and walked out again.’

‘Yes, sir. But not in taxi clothes.’

‘What would he have done?’

‘At least he would have put on a good suit and hat, and maybe taken a suitcase or travelling bag. The store was full of ’em, and some not half bad. Hemingway’s always been one to take life easy and comfortable, sir, or so his record shows. Probably he had money on him. Maybe a belt, under that bullet-proof vest.’

Bourse nodded slightly. ‘I’m ’way ahead of you, boy. But he wouldn’t show that face around town — not with the papers full of it, and a million people gasping for the reward.’

‘But he wouldn’t have had time for much disguise, sir. Not a hair-bleach or nothing like that. It would have to be quick and simple.’

‘The usual? Glasses? Moustache?’

‘That’s my notion, Inspector. This loan-broker had whole cases full of bankrupt notions — glasses of various kinds, even false whiskers, perhaps.’

Bourse sighed. ‘Blue goggles and green whiskers! I thought better of your perspicacity, me boy.’

‘It’s doing fine, sir. My per — what you said.’

Bourse played with a pen-holder. ‘And then?’

‘The witness to the killing of Ricardi said that a young man with glasses drove the car, sir.’

Bourse hunched his shoulders, as if expecting a bullet to come through the window behind him. ‘Do you think he’ll make good his boast, and stay around town long enough to get every one of us, as he promised?’

‘No,’ said Nick, promptly, ‘when he’s cooled off he’ll see that the average is ag’inst him. But he might try to get another one or two.’

‘You feel certain of it?’

‘He’s a mad dog, they say. What the stories call a Lone Wolf. A red-hot killer, and always has been. And like all of them, he is what you call an ee-gow-ist. He’ll want to write his name large before he leaves town.’

Bourse slammed up out of his chair. ‘I’m afraid we’re getting nowhere. What do you think is the best bet? What would you do if you had your choice and was playing a free hand? I’ve got men all over town, a-raiding here and a-raiding there, and every cop on every corner is on the lookout. But what would you like to do?’

‘Begging your pardon,’ whispered Nick, ‘but I’d like to stick beside the man he’s most likely to come after next.’

‘And that’s—’

‘Yourself, sir.’

Chet Hemingway looked very dignified and circumspect. He did not look at all like a mad dog, although he might have answered up to Nick Glennan’s characterisation as an egoist.

‘Drive me,’ he told the taxicab driver, ‘to 561 Alamo Street.’

‘Yes, sir.’

The minutes passed to the feeble ticking of the meter. Dusk was here, and the low-lit auto lights swished past on every side. Alamo Street was a narrow, quiet court a bare mile from the heart of town; it was here, at 558, that Inspector Bourse lived with his plump wife and his plump, old-maid daughter.

The driver set Hemingway down promptly enough in front of the old apartment building numbered 561, and Hemingway paid the bill. He tipped not extravagantly or penuriously, but in an ordinary fashion; it was not well for the taxi driver to have a too clear memory of his passenger. Then Hemingway stepped into the lobby of the building and examined mail boxes until the cab drove away.

He walked back out to the kerb and glanced to the east and west. Couldn’t be better. There were only two cars parked in the entire block, and between Number 561 and the next building ran a narrow sluice which led to a rear alley — he could see the lights back there glistening on the lids of garbage cans. Inspector Bourse lived straight across the street. If he had come home before this, he would be going out again. Hemingway’s mouth slid back in a bitter smile, his killing grin, as he reasoned how stupid the motive which had prompted Inspector Bourse to have his address and telephone number listed in the directory.

Chet Hemingway leaned among the shadows near the opening of the areaway, and waited. He could wait without jumping nerves or too eager mind; he had spent a good share of his life waiting for men to come, waiting for mail trucks and bank watchmen. Once he had even waited eighteen months in a penitentiary before his chance came. But whenever the opportunity appeared, the opportunity for which Chet happened to be waiting, no one could grasp it any quicker than he. That was how he happened to have more than three hundred thousand dollars stowed in various corners of the country, and a good fifteen thousand dollars fastened next to his skin, under his expensive silk undershirt.

Two girls passed; an old man; a plump woman; solitary young men. Homegoing folks, bound for dinner and quiet evenings in their apartments. Only one person entered the building at 558, and that was a young girl — stenographer, probably. Idly, Hemingway wondered whether she knew Bourse. He put his hand into his coat pocket, took out his usual food, and began to crack it between his teeth.

He thought of Lily. Sentimental and superstitious, like most of his kind, he began to think of Lily as a swell dame — a kind of saint — now that she was dead. ‘I’ll get the dirty louse, kid,’ he told her. This would look good in the tabloids. Lone Wolf Killer Avenges Murder of Sweetheart Slain by Cops. It was pretty good stuff.

He stiffened. Here was a cop, a big, stupid patrolman, lumbering down the street with idly-swinging club. He might flash a light into the narrow path between the two buildings, and it wouldn’t be safe to hide there. Chet didn’t want to bump off a cop. He wanted to bump off Inspector Bourse.

So he bent forward and peered into the gloom. ‘Kitty,’ he began to call, softly, ‘here, kitty-kitty.’ The cop came closer. Hemingway still called to his cat. The heavy feet ambled past.

‘Oh, officer,’ Chet said.

The man stopped. ‘Yeh?’

‘If you see a black kitten down the block anywhere, would you mind sticking it in the vestibule here at 561? My kid’s cat. Run away... Here, kitty-kitty-kitty.’