Ed Lacy - Lead With Your Left

“Nope. This one just blew into town yesterday. Hear you snapped your stack. When you going to grow up, Dave?”

“The bastard called me a Jewboy and a Wop. Am I supposed to be grown up when I take that?”

“I don't know. But sometimes people say things without meaning real harm. Just been raised ignorantly.” He scratched his brown nose. “Hell, I run into that all the time but you can't take on the world.”

“Naw, Austin meant it the way he said it. And when I start taking crap you can pull a headstone over me.”

“I don't make you all the time, Dave. Would you have slugged him if he had used the names and you didn't happen to be Italian and Jewish?”

“Who knows? Look, I have enough trouble taking care of myself. When a guy low-rates me I try to slug him. All set for some Chinese chow?”

“Reed wants you.”

“Going to be a stink about my clipping Austin?”

Hayes shrugged. “Didn't sound like it, but I don't really know. He's sending me out to look at a stolen car, and I think he wants you for another call.”

I got the file together and the few notes I'd made, went through the squad room to Reed's office, told him, “There isn't much here, Lieutenant, and—”

“Forget it, for now. Go over and see what this is all about.” He shoved a slip of paper across his desk that had an address and the name Rose Henderson scrawled on it. Reed always wrote as if his pen was a barbell. “She's called in twice about being followed, men pushing her around. Sounds like some old maid crackpot.”

“I'll go right over. Lieutenant, in checking Owens' arrest record you'll notice that in 1937 he and Wales brought in a nut who was flashing a big knife in a bar. They sent him away, no trial. They must have worked the guy over, Owens busted his nose while taking the knife and Wales was cut up. Name is Dundus. If he's a psycho he could be our man, discounting the robbery angle, which I've never bought.”

“This squad is off the Owens case.”

“What? Why?”

“Mainly because it's a dead end, we're just going around in circles, getting no place.”

“Well, I'd still like to check, see if this guy is out of the hatch, and if so, where he is and—”

Reed held up a large thin hand. “I'll have a check made. And forget about the Owens case and listen to me: Wintino, this is the third man you've belted in this station house. I calmed down this Homicide man, told him you were a hotheaded kid with—”

“Instead of calming him down, Lieutenant, why didn't you tell him to watch his fat tongue?”

“How do you know I didn't tell him that too? That's the trouble with you, Dave, at times you are a hot-headed kid. But I'm not running any free-for-all here. Start another fight and you'll be back in uniform. By God, if you had pounded a beat for a brace of years you'd know how to handle people.”

“Lieutenant Reed, when a clown insults my family background, what am I supposed to do, make a complaint through channels?”

“Technically, yes.” He leaned back in his chair, his long body looking cramped, his big nose like a dagger in his face. “You're a kid, Wintino, and a cocky one. But I like you because you never goof off. I'll admit you work hard and get results. I'm going to tell you this once and remember it because I don't go in for any fatherly advice crap. There's always somebody around you have to say sir to. I don't care how important or tough you are, be at least one man who's more important or tougher. Get used to the idea. Actually, Dave, you've been lucky, you're too small to be so hard.”

I said slowly, “I understand what you mean but I'll never eat crow for any bigoted knucklehead who makes cracks about my race or religion. I don't think you'd want any man to take that—sir.”

Reed brought his chair down hard, waved his long arms. “Another thing, you talk too damn much. Gowan, get going before this old maid calls up about a mouse getting into her.”

I wasn't sure if Reed was smiling or not.

Wednesday Afternoon

It sure was getting muggy. I stopped for a soda and a hunk of pie, finished up with a couple of hamburgers. I was surprised I could eat I was so angry. I mean-this crap about closing the Owens case—that's what it amounted to—and having me off seeing this nutty old maid, Danny working on a stolen car. How important were they compared to that murder?

The address Reed gave me was near the southern end of the precinct, one of these old sections where some of the houses had been remodeled, a mixture of high and low rents.

As I walked down the block I passed this fancy Jaguar sedan. I don't especially care for foreign heaps but what attracted me was this real sharp sport jacket hanging from a side window. It was something: shaggy imported tweed with side pleats and patch pockets. It was a honey, strictly from a swank shop and made to order. I tried to see the label but couldn't make it. Anyway, I was spending too much on clothes as it was.

The house I wanted was a former six-story tenement that had been made over into small apartments. The mailbox name-plate read HENDERSON-HONDURA. I rang the bell and when I got an answering buzz walked up to the third floor and rang 3C. There was one of those one-way peephole deals and I heard it opening on the other side and a woman's voice asked, “What do you want?”

“Are you Miss Rose Henderson?”

“Yes.”

“You called the police a little while ago. I'm Detective Wintino,” I said, watching my face in the peephole and feeling like a sitting duck. My damn collar looked wilted already.

There was a long moment of hesitation, then: “Please show me your credentials.” The voice was deep.

I was off the Owens case for a loony like this! I took out my buzzer and nearly shoved it through the peep mirror. “That do it, lady? My name is Dave Wintino, Detective Third Grade, 201st Precinct. I'm assigned to your case. Now do you think you might open the door and let me get to work?”

As I was putting my shield back in my wallet the door opened. I was off balance: this short girl standing there with very dark close-cut hair hugging a warm and pretty face. The lips were thick and red and she wore a loose plain blue smock showing off one of these built-up-from-the-ground solid figures, almost heavy legs. I must have been giving her bug eyes for she glanced down at herself, then asked, “What's wrong?”

“Nothing. You're a surprise. Had you pegged for an old maid crackpot.”

“My, the frank policeman. This must be a new technique. You're a bit of a shock yourself, more like a college magazine salesman. Let me see that badge again, if you don't mind.”

“As you wish, citizen,” I said, flashing my tin. She grabbed my wrist and studied the badge for a moment, then said, “I'm sorry but I've been on the ragged edge these last few days. Please come in, Mr....?” She had a good grip.

“Wintino, David Wintino, Miss Henderson,” I said, stepping by her. She was using a nice mild perfume. I thought our apartment was small but it was Madison Square Garden compared to this cell. There was just room for a narrow foam rubber couch against one wall, a desk with a typewriter between two small windows, one of those red canvas African camp chairs in front of an unpainted bookcase stuffed with books, a coffee table piled with magazines and old newspapers, a battered file cabinet, then the door to the John, a closet you'd have to enter sideways, and what had to be the world's smallest combination sink, stove and refrigerator. There was a small radio on a shelf, a framed diploma from Barnard and a couple of very bright paintings of tropical scenes on the walls, and some sort of weird mobile hanging from the tricky ceiling light.

Closing the door she put her hands on her hips, asked, “Thinking of buying my place?”