Уильям Макгиверн - Collected Fiction - 1940-1963

“I’ll take care of it, Linda,” Joe said.

“Thanks a million. I’ve got to change now and get back to work, or the boss will have a hemorrhage.”

She turned, flicked Ryan with an incurious glance, and hurried back toward her dressing room. Ryan finished this beer, paid for it, and walked outside. He was grinning. Now he knew he was on the right track. “So it’s a girl she used to work with in Dallas, eh?” he said to himself, still smiling.

“We’ll see about that, he thought.

Linda Nelson entered the vestibule of her apartment house at three-thirty in the morning. The light was out, she noticed as she fumbled about in her bag for the key. She was tired and irritable. It had been a long dull night, with one table of drunks asking for Stardust again and again, until every word and note in the piece was a torture to hear and to sing. She found her key and began to fumble for the lock.

Suddenly, without seeing or hearing anything suspicious, she knew that she wasn’t alone in the dark vestibule. There was a blackness on the right of her that was deeper than the other shadows in the hall. She caught her breath, forcing herself not to cry out: a paralyzing shudder went through her, and her heart began to hammer painfully at her ribs. There was nothing to do, no place to run to, or hide. But she had to get away...

A hand came down powerfully across her mouth.

“Okay, just relax,” a low, harsh voice said. “You’re not going to be hurt.”

Ryan put up his free hand and screwed the light bulb back into the socket. Illumination flooded the hallway. He released the girl, and put both hands down at his side. “That’s right, be smart,” he said.

She was too terrified to scream. “What do you want?” she said.

“I want to talk to you,” Ryan said. “You met a guy in the street about this time yesterday, didn’t you? A little character with silvery hair. He’s the baby I’m looking for.”

“I’ve seen you before. You...”

“That’s right. At the Kit-Kat. But let’s stay with the little guy. He’s upstairs, ain’t he? He’s the one you ordered the food for.”

“Are you a cop?”

“I was, until your little friend got me into trouble. I’m suspended. But I won’t stay that way. I’m going to teach him what trouble is. Real trouble. He’s upstairs right now.”

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

“Don’t get cute with me, baby. We’re going upstairs to take a look. You’re going to let me into your place, and if you say or do anything to tip him off you’ll wish to hell you hadn’t.”

“I’m not taking you anywhere,” she said, and her voice was suddenly tense and furious. “Roll your hoop the hell out of here. You’re no copper now. I wouldn’t help you if you were after a guy who’d murdered my mother.”

“I didn’t ask for help,” Ryan said softly. “I just told you what I want.” He caught her wrist and twisted it sharply behind her back. She tried to scream but his big hand closed over her mouth smothering it, and he held her that way, the back of her head pressed against his chest, and her arm twisted cruelly, until she stopped struggling and bean to moan softly.

“I don’t like doing this,” Ryan said, breathing hard. He was ready to blow wide apart from the tangled pressures inside him. He didn’t want to hurt her. He had liked her looks, liked the toughness and spunkiness about her, but she was standing between him and that nameless little man who had started all the trouble.

She raised herself to the tips of her sandals, straining against the pain in her shoulder.

Ryan removed his hand from her mouth. “He’s upstairs, isn’t he?”

“Y-yes.”

“Okay, let’s go up!”

“You’re the one who beat him up yesterday, aren’t you?” she said softly. “You’re a big hero, a real tough guy.” She was crying now, bitterly and silently. The tears fell on Ryan’s hand, which was close to her face, ready to clamp across her mouth if she tried to scream. He jerked his hand away as if the tears were drops of molten lead, and rubbed it savagely against the fabric of his overcoat. It reminded him of something evil and repulsive, of his ritual of washing his hands after he’d struck a man...

“Stop it, damn you,” he said, releasing her arm. “I— I didn’t mean it. But I’ve got to get this guy.”

“All right, you can get him,” she said, in a weary lifeless voice. “That’s the trouble with this whole dirty mess. Guys like you are always right, and guys like him never have a chance. I’ll take you up, big man. I hope they give you back your gun and badge, and have a mile-long parade in your honor.”

“I’m doing my job,” Ryan said desperately. “Now let’s go...”

She opened the door of a third-floor apartment and snapped on a light. The small, neatly furnished room was empty. “It’s me, Mr. Smith — Linda,” she called out, and an instant later a door opened and a little man appeared, blinking slightly in the light, and looking as bewildered and lost as he had the night before. He smiled at Linda, tentatively, and then he looked at Ryan and began to nod his head slowly.

“I thought you would find me,” he said, spacing the words out slowly and carefully. “I hoped so, at least.”

The scene wasn’t as Ryan had imagined it would be, and he felt the stirrings of an immense and defeating confusion. “I’m taking you in,” he said. “Your little game is over, friend. This time we’ll find out all about you, don’t worry.”

The girl sat down slowly, lifelessly, on the edge of the sofa and put her hands over her face. “He made me bring him here,” she said in a muffled voice. Ryan saw her thin shoulders begin to shake, and that sight hurt him in a place he had never suspected existed.

“Yes, I know he did, Linda,” the little man said, looking down on her with compassion. “Please don’t worry about it.”

“You ready to go?” Ryan snapped. He had to break this mood of indecision, of paralyzing, unexplainable weakness.

“Of course.”

“Okay, come on.”

The little man smiled. “But I’m not going with you. I’m going home.”

“Very funny,” Ryan said. “You got a great sense of humor. Now, do you come on your two feet, or do I clout you one and carry you in like a sack of potatoes.”

“I am going home,” the little man said.

Ryan moved toward him slowly, his big hands swinging heavily at his sides, and then, as he was ready to leap, he heard a sound behind him, the sound of a closing door, and he turned quickly, frowning, and stared at a big man with a broken nose and deep-set glittering eyes. The man held a gun in his right hand and his broad back was blocking the closed door.

“Hiya, Ryan?” the big man said.

Ryan knew the man. His name was Myers and he worked for Donello in West Philly. “Don’t make a mistake, Myers,” Ryan said. “This is police business. Clear your tail out of here.”

“I been following you,” Myers said. “Donello thought you might lead us to this character. Donello’s smart, ain’t he?” Myers glanced at the little man with the silvery hair. “Come on, chum. Step over this way. The boss wants a talk with you.”

The little man didn’t move. He regarded Myers with puzzled eyes. A muscle worked along Myers’ jaw. “Do as I’m telling you,” he said softly.

“What do you want him for?” Ryan said.

“I don’t want him, Donello does,” Myers said in the same soft voice. “Lots of big people are after him, the talk says. Donello wants to know the score, that’s all. Maybe he can strike a trade with the big people, he figures. Maybe. I just take orders. And you’ll be smart if you do too.”