Roger Torrey - 42 Days For Murder

Macintosh’s five friends kept order and we went through the crowd. Fast. We got two more that Mac thought might be friendly with Rucci, and that made eight good ones altogether. The one I’d smacked across the back of the head was breathing as though he had asthma and that meant a good chance of a fractured skull. The one in the front room that Kirby had shot through the shoulder didn’t warrant a full count either, any more than the bartender I’d busted through the knee. The one I’d shot in the booth had died before his head had hit the table, and Macintosh had shot Rucci through the chin with the slug ranging out halfway down his back. Rucci had been looking up when he’d made his play but had still been crouched on hands and knees. The one that had shot three times at Macintosh and missed all three was just as dead. Mac had shot him through the side of the neck. So I said:

“Let’s call it nine and a half on the score and not figure the three stiffs. They’re out of the picture.”

Mac said: “That’s fair. How much time have we got?”

I looked and said: “Thirty minutes.”

Lester was in by that time. He said, in an awed voice: “My God! All this happened in ten minutes!”

I said: “It all happened in less than that many seconds after it started. We’ve just wasted the rest of the time in cleaning up.”

Macintosh said: “We’ve still got time,” and went over to the third of the three young fellows that had been in the booth. The only one left. The kid was standing against the wall with the other prisoners, and Heinie was watching them with the riot gun and a mean look. Just wishing for one of them to make a break. Mac reached out and took a hearty cuff at the kid’s face and said:

“Where’s Luigi Rucci? Quick now, punk.”

The kid stammered: “He’s... he’s with Crao... Crandall.”

Mac turned and looked at me and grinned and I said: “Be right with you. Can these boys of yours keep this crowd here for another hour? We don’t want this tipped.”

“They can keep ’em here all night,” he said, keeping the grin.

I said: “Fine,” and went back to see how Spanish was making out. I’d put her back in a booth, with Hazel to look after her.

She was feeling better. She had big black eyes and she stared up at me and said: “Honey, I thought they were going to kill you. I was sc-scared.”

I said: “It’s all over now. You stay here until the boys let you go and then go home. I’ll see you tomorrow, for sure.”

“Why can’t I go back with you?”

“I’ve still got some business.”

“Please, honey.”

The shooting had knocked hell out of my nerves but I hadn’t realized it until that minute. I snapped back at her: “Did you hear me tell you I had business? Now stay here like I tell you. Don’t give me these arguments all the time.”

She said, like a little girl: “Yes, honey.”

I said: “I’m sorry, babe. It’s just that I’m nervous. You stay here like a good girl.”

She said again: “Yes, hon’. I don’t mean to be a pest.”

I said to Mrs. Wendel: “But you, lady, you’re coming with me.”

She put her nose in the air and said: “I refuse. I will not speak to my husband under any circumstances. If you persist in annoying me I’ll be forced to ask Mr. Kirby to make you stop.”

“Ask him, why don’t you?”

Kirby was standing about ten feet away, talking to Macintosh. She called out: “Oh Mr. Kirby. Will you come here a moment?” He came over and she said: “This man insists on annoying me. He now wants me to go back to town with him.”

Kirby swung back to Macintosh and said over his shoulder: “Then I’d go if I was you. I don’t think he feels like fooling.”

Macintosh said: “You ready, Connell. We are.”

I said to Mrs. Wendel: “You’re holding up the parade. Let’s get going.”

She stood up, came over to me, and said: “Damn you, I’m not going.”

I took her by the arm and said: “Now be nice. I don’t want to get rough.”

She reached out for my eyes with the hand I wasn’t holding and I got my head away just in time to save the left one. As it was, I could feel her nails rip down my cheek. She panted out: “You can’t talk to me like that.”

Then Spanish took over. She’d managed to rip off one shoe, and she went in past me like a streak of light and started nailing away at Mrs. Wendel’s face with the high heel. She got home with it three times before I could catch her and before Kirby could grab Mrs. Wendel and get her away, and I said to Kirby: “Let’s go, for God’s sake.”

Spanish, when I left, was sitting in a booth with her head down on the table and crying as though her heart was breaking.

Just a bundle of nerves. Both of us.

We got to the hotel at ten minutes of twelve and I got out and said: “I’ll go up and get them.”

Macintosh said: “I’ve been thinking. It would make it better if he talked to Crandall without her being along...”

He jerked his head at Mrs. Wendel.

I said: “What are we going to do with her?”

He said: “Now look! Both Kirb and I know that building. Suppose he and Lester and I go up there now. We’ll stake out and be handy. We’ll take her with us. Then you come up with Wendel and Mard. How’s that?”

I said: “It’ll be swell, if you don’t leave me on any spot. That’s liable to be tough.”

“We’ll be there.”

I said okey and went inside. I stuffed fresh shells in my gun, going up on the elevator, and the boy gave it a goofy glance and said:

“Gee, mister, that’s a regular cannon, ain’t it?”

I said: “Why fool around and expect a boy to do a man’s work,” and started down the hall toward Wendel’s room.

And met him right at the door. He was coming out with his head turned back toward the room, and he was saying to Mard: “I certainly shall keep the appointment after I made it. I tell you Connell is crazy.”

I stuck my finger in his ribs and said: “BOO!” and back he went, caroming into Mard and almost knocking him down. He was shaking so he could barely stand. I said:

“That stubbornness of yours is going to get you in trouble, Mr. Wendel. Are you ready?”

He got himself together and said he was. I said: “Okey then, let’s start. We’ll go in my car.”

“Where... where is Mr. Macintosh?”

“He went home and went to bed. He decided the whole thing was a fake, right from the start. That I’m crazy, just like you thought.”

He said he’d known I was wrong and that he’d tried to tell me but that I wouldn’t listen. Then the door across the hall opened and Joey Free came out of it and saw us and said: “Hi, Shean! What’s going on?”

I said: “I’m crazy, that’s all. Wendel, here, is going up and talk settlement with Crandall. After all, Crandall got him out of jail after I put him in. Maybe Crandall is really okey, after all.”

Wendel said: “You have to expect him to do his best for a client. After all, he’s my wife’s lawyer, not mine. He’s bound to look after her interests.”

I said: “You bet. Even if he has to frame you with an assault charge against a minor to blackmail you into a settlement. He’s a fighter, that man.”

Wendel shut up and I could see Mard’s grin. Joey said:

“Should I come along? After all, I’m Tod’s friend.”

I said: “Sure, why not? You and Mard can go in your heap and Wendel and I will ride in mine.”

“Tod and I can ride together. We’ll meet you; we’ll just stop at the Rustic and have one drink.”

I said: “Tod’s going with me, because he’s late now. You follow us.”

I got Wendel by the elbow and started him out the door, which stopped the argument. He told me, all the way down in the elevator, and all the time it took for us to drive to Crandall’s office, just what a fool he’d been to try and fight the divorce. That if his wife didn’t think enough of him even to talk it over with him he was better off without her.