Росс Томас - Cast a Yellow Shadow

“Thanks.”

He picked up his bag and moved to the door. “When’s the last time you had a complete examination?” he said.

“Five or six years ago.”

He shook his head. “A picture of health,” he said. “Just yellowing at the corners.”

“Thanks,” I said.

He opened the door and said: “No charge.” Then he was gone.

Betty went into the bedroom and returned with two pillows, some sheets and a blanket. She made up a bed on the couch, talking to herself as she worked. I went over and knelt on one knee by Sylvia. She was staring at her hands in her lap. “Get some sleep,” I said. “You need it.”

She looked up at me. “Are you leaving?”

“Yes.”

“I’d like to see him — just once more.”

“I’ll tell him.”

“I don’t think I can sleep.”

“Try.”

She nodded. I rose and walked over to Betty. “Thanks for your help,” I said.

She looked up at me and grinned. It was a wide, white grin with a lot of cynical sauciness in it. “You see Hardman, you tell him he better get me a maid.”

I smiled back at her. “I’ll tell him.”

“Come on, Sylvia,” she said. “Let’s get you to bed.”

I went over to the door and opened it. “They be all right,” Betty said. “I’ll look after them both.”

“Thanks,” I said and left.

I parked Hardman’s Cadillac on I Street and started walking the two blocks to the Roger Smith. It was two o’clock, three-quarters of an hour before Van Zandt’s four-car motorcade was supposed to turn down Pennsylvania at the corner of Seventeenth. I found myself wondering how the old man liked taking a tour of Washington’s sites, believing that he had only forty-five minutes to live.

I was approaching the corner of H and Eighteenth when a figure stepped out of a doorway and said: “You’re late.” It was Padillo.

“I had a couple of things to do,” I said. “It took longer than I thought.”

“There’s a bar around the corner,” he said. “You can tell me about them.”

We walked around the corner and went into a bar that had a surplus of dark oak fixtures. The luncheon crowd was almost gone and a waitress gave us a booth in the rear. I ordered a Scotch-and-water and Padillo said he wanted a martini. When the drinks came and the waitress left, Padillo said:

“We broke the conference call when Hardman said you were taking Fredl and Sylvia to Betty’s.”

“You broke it a little soon.”

“How?”

“Sylvia had to help me kill Magda.”

I told him about it then and he listened as he usually did, without showing much more surprise than if I had been telling him that the electronics stock I had touted to him had taken a turn for the worse.

“Where did Hardman take the other man — the third one?”

“I don’t know.”

“Is Fredl all right?”

“Yes.”

“Sylvia?”

“Not too well. She wants to see you. One more time, she said.”

He nodded and looked at his watch. “Now would be a good time to back out,” he said.

“It would, wouldn’t it?”

“It’s not really our do anymore.”

“No. Fredl’s safe. Sylvia’s all right.”

“We can just walk back to the saloon,” Padillo said. “Might even catch a cab.”

“We could do that.”

“Have a nice quiet lunch with a good bottle of wine.”

“Read about it in the papers tomorrow.”

Padillo looked at me. “But you won’t.”

“No.”

“Why? Because some little girl with puppy-dog eyes saved your life?”

“Don’t knock my excuses. I’ve got better ones than you do.”

Padillo put a couple of bills on the table. “Let’s go. Mush is waiting in the lobby.”

“Which way is Philip Price going to bounce?”

“I have no idea.”

“What do we do?”

“Keep Dymec from shooting Van Zandt.”

“How?”

“By persuasion.”

“Will that work?”

“Let’s find out.”

We walked into the Roger Smith at two-twenty p.m. Mush was sitting in one of the chairs in the lobby, reading The Wall Street Journal through his dark glasses. He nodded his head twice as we walked to the elevator. He didn’t seem to look at us.

I glanced around the lobby. There was no one else I knew. The elevator came and another man got in with us. He pressed the button for the third floor. When he got off, Padillo pressed the tenth-floor button. “Mush has a description of Dymec and Price,” Padillo said. “That nod means that Dymec’s gone up. Price hasn’t shown yet.”

We got off on the tenth floor and walked down to the thick door that said “Roof Garden.” The door was painted a Chinese red and the lettering was in gold. We went through the door and stopped because of the two guns that were aimed at us.

One of the guns was an automatic. From where I stood it could have been a Colt Commander .38. I wasn’t sure. But there was no mistaking the big fist that held it. That belonged to Hardman. The other gun, a revolver, was in the hand of Philip Price and he seemed to know what he was doing. We let the door close behind us.

“Roof garden’s done closed,” Hardman said. “For the season.”

Padillo looked at me. “Your friend,” he said.

“He was on our side this morning.”

We were standing in the small landing that faced the stairs which led to the roof. Hardman and Price were up five or six steps, aiming their guns at us in a calm, professional manner. Their advantage of height didn’t hurt any.

“Just stand easy,” Price said. “Keep your hands in front of you and don’t ask if you can light a cigarette.”

“I don’t get it, Hardman,” I said.

“Money, baby. Fifty thousand is a lot of money.”

“We decided to consolidate,” Price said. “In return for our complete cooperation, your African friends agreed to raise the fee. Enormously.”

“They went way up,” Hardman said. “I just couldn’t say no.” He sounded almost apologetic.

Price glanced at his watch. “It shouldn’t be long now.”

“That little brunette gal with the pistol was supposed to hold you, Mac,” Hardman said. “What happened?”

“I killed her.”

He nodded. “That’s more for us,” he said to Price.

“So it is,” Price said.

“Your wife all right?” Hardman said.

“She’s all right.”

“I like Fredl,” Hardman said. “Didn’t want nothin to happen to her.”

“It didn’t.”

“What happened to you, Price?” Padillo said. “I thought you were going for the letter.”

“I don’t need the letter,” he said.

“Just money.”

Price smiled. “There seems to be enough for all.”

Padillo turned slowly and leaned against the wall. He kept his hands in sight. “Your friend Hardman ever try to beat a murder rap?”

“You’ll have to ask him,” I said.

“How about it, Hardman?” Padillo said.

“We’re comin out of this one nice and clean. Ain’t gonna be no mess.”

“Then you fixed it with Mush?” Padillo said.

“Mush works for me, baby.”

Padillo turned his head to look at Hardman. “What did you send Mush up to Baltimore for? Heroin?”

“I don’t fool with H. Mush was goin after acid. Five hundred grams of lysergic acid diethylamide.”

“That’s a lot of LSD,” Padillo said. “What’s the market? I thought you could mix up a batch in the bathroom sink.”

“Gettin tough, baby. Feds are crackin down and so’s the states. That much acid is good for a little less’n five million trips at five bucks per retail. I figure to wholesale it at thirty cents a trip.”

“The Englishman was supposed to have it?”

“He supposed to.”