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Authors: Louis Trimble

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BOOK: The Duchess of Skid Row
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I started to say something. Then I heard the noise; the step in the hallway. Calumet heard it too. His head came up. He tried to cover the movement but he wasn’t fast enough.

I backpedaled softly to the door. Calumet said loudly, “McKeon, get out of here and let me do my work.”

“You’re slipping, Nick. That was too clumsy even for you.”

I grabbed the doorknob and pulled. The door swung open. I stepped carefully into the hall.

I was in time to see the door leading to the movie section of the building swinging shut. I had a glimpse of Hoxey’s checked sport coat. I started running.

I got the door open and plunged into dimness. I heard movement to my right, toward the last aisle, the area where I had left Stephanie. I went that way. I saw a man moving fast.

I caromed off a customer. He grunted and stepped out of my way. I reached the end aisle. I stopped. I couldn’t hear anything but the whir of machines. I looked up the length of the aisle. Nothing moved.

I peered into the corner made by the two machines. It was dark and empty. I started up the aisle. Only a few people were watching the movies back here. None of them was Hoxey.

I saw someone coming toward me. It was Stephanie. I stepped close to her. “Did you see Hoxey Creen come up this way?”

She said, “I wouldn’t know Hoxey Creen if I saw him. What’s happened now?”

“Did anyone come up this aisle just now?”

She shook her head. She seemed strangely subdued, nervous.

“Did you see all the movies you wanted?”

“I saw enough,” Stephanie said. She sounded faintly bitter.

“Don’t feel bad. That isn’t the kind of movie work you’d want anyway. You don’t gain fame by stripping for a two-bit sideshow.”

She said, “It was rather disgusting.”

I said, “You wait right here.” I left her and went to the end of the aisle. I peered into all the dark corners. They were empty.

I went back to Stephanie. “Let’s get out of here.”

I led her out. Nick Calumet was nowhere in sight. I was just as glad. I didn’t feel like tangling with anyone right now. Something was nagging at my mind. I couldn’t get it enough in focus to see it clearly. But it was there, annoying me.

We reached Stephanie’s coupe. I helped her in and slid beneath the wheel. I turned on the headlights. They splashed across the alley mouth and lighted up a car parked there. They also lighted up a man getting into the car.

He had a face I wanted too badly to see again to forget. The dusting of pock marks on the cheeks, the hard slash of a mouth were things I’d dreamed about.

The man getting into the car was Minto. He stopped and turned his face toward us.

I opened the door of the coupe. I started into the street. Minto popped into his car. The motor roared. He took off, his wheels spraying water from the pavement.

Stephanie said, “Jeff, what is it?”

I climbed back in the coupe. I started after Minto. “That’s the boy who worked me over last night.”

She was sitting close to me. I felt her shiver. “He looks vicious.”

“He’ll look worse after I get my hands on him.”

8

M
INTO WASN’T
hurrying. I hung about fifty feet behind him. He worked his sedan over to Fifth and headed for town. He turned right on Salmon Way. Then he turned left on Southlake.

I said, “Maybe he’s going to pay me another visit.”

Stephanie sounded nervous. “Shouldn’t you call the police, Jeff?”

“This kind of rat I take care of myself.”

I started to say more but Minto made a sudden right turn. He was going to my houseboat. He jumped the low curb and crossed the wide gravel strip and swung into one of the shadow-darkened parking slots that belonged to the moorage where I lived.

I jumped the curb. I rammed the coupe down the line of parked cars. I swung behind Minto’s car. I braked suddenly and I had him pinned between a low wall in front and me in back.

I climbed out of the coupe. I walked up to his car. I pulled open the driver’s side door. I kept as much of myself behind it as I could manage.

Minto wasn’t inside.

I looked at the wall. He could conceivably have gone over it. But on the other side was the water of the Inlet. And there was no place else he could have gone in the little time he’d had before I drove up. Unless he was crouched between his car and the one to the right.

I opened the rear door. The back was empty too. That meant he had to be between the two cars. I bent and stepped into the back of his car. My idea was to crawl through to the other side.

I got all of myself in the back of the car. I was reaching for the door handle on the right side when the door behind me slammed. I tried to turn but my height was against me. I got my head swiveled around around and that was all.

But it was enough. Minto was standing inside the front door. He had his gun where I could see it. I could also see dirt on his suit. He’d been under his car, waiting to roll out.

I pushed on the handle of the right rear door. The lock clicked back but the door stayed shut.

Minto moved his mouth so that the right side matched the left. I assumed he was smiling.

He said, “Pooly’s leaning on it, McKeon. You can’t get enough leverage to open it. So just relax.”

I sat down on the seat. Minto wriggled his gun hand. “I don’t want to blast you in there. That would make the suicide angle a little hard to believe. But I will if I have to.”

I said, “And if you don’t have to?”

“Then you live a little longer. Long enough for us to set you up dead—as the law likes to put it—by your own hand.”

“You already set me up by letting me tail you here.”

He smiled some more. I said, “Who tipped you off that I was going to be at Calumet’s?”

“Maybe I was just lucky and saw you there.”

I said, “You don’t play with those kind of odds. You were there because you knew I would be.”

“What difference can it make to a dead man?”

He wiggled the gun again. “All right, Pooly. He’s quiet. Move his crate somewhere and get back here. We’ve got work to do.”

I heard the motor of my car start up. I wondered what had happened to Stephanie. I didn’t like what I was thinking. Minto and Pooly weren’t the type to let their gentlemanly instincts get in their way. I was pretty sure they’d make a double suicide set-up if they thought she might know too much.

But there was no outcry, no indication Stephanie was anywhere around. Her little car spit gravel as it was backed away. It swung into a slot farther down the line. The motor died. The door slammed.

Minto said, “Pooly, hurry it up.”

His head swung away from me. The movement didn’t carry his eyes all the way off me, but it changed their angle. I lifted my right hand. I got the door latch down. I set myself to push the door open and dive for the darkness between this car and the one on its right.

Minto’s head started to swing back. A tight, nervous voice said, “Don’t move or I’ll blow a hole through you.”

Minto wasn’t moving. His slit of a mouth was hanging open. His eyes were bulging. The gun in his hand was twitching. Then it was still. I could see beyond his shoulder. A gun was pressed against the back of his neck. Behind the gun was Stephanie.

She looked as if she didn’t know whether to faint or to go off and be sick.

He said hoarsely, “You pull that trigger and so do I. McKeon hasn’t got a chance.”

I couldn’t argue with him. He just might be crazy enough to make that kind of bluff stick. I said, “He’s right. So just hang easy, dollbaby.”

Minto said, “What did you do with Pooly?”

“He’s asleep,” Stephanie said. I could hear her fighting to keep her voice steady. “He forgot to look behind the seat. I hit him with a wrench.”

She sounded proud and scared at the same time.

Minto said, “I’ll deal. McKeon for Pooly. We go; you go.”

“No!” Stephanie said. “You drop your gun or I’ll kill you.”

I said, “Yes, damn it. I’m the one on the open end of his heater.”

Minto licked his lips. I said, “Drop it, Minto. I’ll guarantee your end of the deal.”

“You got ways of making this dame play your way?” he said. He sounded worried. “I never saw a woman yet that didn’t make up her own damn rules.”

I said, “She’ll play my way all right. And my word’s good. Ask any hood down on Hill Street.” I held out a hand.

Minto took a deep breath. He dropped the gun. I caught it. I said, “All right, Stephanie, get away from him.”

“And give him another crack at you?” she demanded.

I said, “That’s right.”

“I won’t do it. I captured him. I want to take him to jail.”

I said, “What good would he be to anybody in jail?”

Minto said, “McKeon, you promised—”

It could have been funny, only he was too desperate to see the humorous side. And I was a little worried about Stephanie doing what I told her.

I said, “If you shoot Minto, I’ll have to shoot you, dollbaby. If you try to run him in, I’ll have to take him away from you.”

She took a deep breath. Her hand was shaking and so was the gun she held against Minto’s neck. Even in the gloom, I could see the color go out of his cheeks.

She pulled the gun down and turned away. I said, “That’s better.”

Minto sighed softly. He climbed beneath the wheel of the car. I could see him fighting the shakes.

I got out. I took the gun from Stephanie. I broke it and emptied it. I did the same with Minto’s. I tossed both guns in the back of Minto’s car. I went to the coupe and pulled Pooly out from under the wheel. He was still asleep. He had a turkey egg above his right ear. He wouldn’t wake up for quite a while.

I dropped him to the gravel. I said to Minto, “Help yourself.”

I put Stephanie in the coupe and drove off. She sat stiffly until I reached her place by a roundabout route. We weren’t followed.

She stayed silent while I escorted her upstairs and inside her apartment. Then she sat on the couch and started to shake.

I found a bottle and brought her a snort. She took it like medicine. She said, “Would you have shot me, Jeff?”

“That’s right. I gave my word.”

“To a—a thug like that!”

“It’s still my word.”

She shook her head. “I just don’t understand men,” she said. “No wonder the world’s in the shape it is. Haven’t you ever heard of expediency?”

I said, “You mean if you gave your word, you’d back out of it?”

“If it meant protecting myself or getting what I needed, I certainly would,” she said. “Any woman would.”

I said, “I doubt that. Some women are loyal to themselves.”

“I guess we just aren’t talking the same language, Jeff.”

She held out her hands. They were trembling badly. She said, “Come here, darling, and do something for my wim-wams.”

I woke up groggy from too much sleep. But as my body came alive, I decided I was in better shape than I had been. I decided that I was about ready to tackle even Arch—if I had to.

I blinked at the beam of daylight coming through the bedroom curtains. I tried to recall what had waked me. Then I heard the steady clang of the telephone.

I climbed out of bed. The clock on Stephanie’s dresser read 2
P.M
. I glanced at the bed. Stephanie wasn’t in it.

I went in to answer the telephone.

I said cautiously, “Hello?”

“Well, it’s about time! Where have you been, lover?” It was Griselda.

“I’ve been calling you in L.A.”

“I’m still here. What’s going on up there? Why aren’t you ever home?”

I said, “Home isn’t safe these days.”

She said tartly, “Anyplace should be safer than where you are.”

I winced. I said, “How did you get this number?”

“Your boss gave it to me. My God, I thought you’d have better taste, Jeff McKeon!”

I yelled into the phone, “When I’m in trouble, I take help where I can get it.”

“What kind of help can you get from that walking pair of mammary glands?” she demanded. Her voice lowered. “I know the agreement we made, Jeff. Who you shack up with is your business. But, my God, Stephanie Bartlett….”

I said, “What makes her so different from any other dame I might climb into bed with?”

She sniffed. “I just hope she’s worth the effort. Down here the word is she wasn’t.”

“What did you hear about Stephanie down there?”

Griselda made a harsh sound, which I took to be a laugh. She said, “Just walk down Sunset Strip and drop her name, lover. She left a long string of happy TV and movie people when she went back home. One man described her as being like a chocolate rabbit he got once for Easter. It looked so good, but when he bit into it, there was nothing inside.”

I said, “You’re making noises like a wife. And you sound full of gin.”

“Of course I’m full of gin,” she said. “I miss you, lover. And I’m not jealous. Not really. Only I hate to think of you wasting all that talent on anything so cheap.”

I said, “Just because she puts out doesn’t mean she’s cheap, dollbaby. Mind your language.”

Griselda made a hiccoughing sound. “What she did to try to get a break down here was cheap. Or do you think the backlot movie makers make a girl rich?”

I dropped the subject. I had something more important I wanted to talk to her about. I said, “Speaking of names, do you know an Archibald Archer?”

“Of course, lover. Are you jealous?”

I said, “No. I’m in trouble. I told you that. Blow away some of those gin fumes and listen. Did you lease the old Forum to Nick Calumet?”

“Yes, lover. Is there anything wrong with that?”

“I have a feeling there is. But I don’t know why yet. How did Calumet contact you—and when?”

She said, “Before I ever left Puget City to join you down here last month. As soon as the court gave me full title to that Hill Street property, I put an ad in the paper. Calumet leased the Forum and Teddy Jenner and I made a deal. I gave her free rent for a year and she fixed up the old bank building. Then I met Arch down here and talked him into taking the saloon for a restaurant. Does that help your trouble, lover?”

I said, “One more question. Have you met any of the Combine boys down there?”

Her voice turned stiff. “Damn it, just because I worked for a crook, it doesn’t mean that I—”

“Okay. Skip it. Now listen carefully. The rumor is that you used your old boss’s contacts to make a deal with the Combine. The police here think that’s why you went to L.A. They also think you roped me in on the deal so we could both make a killing.”

“That’s ridiculous. I’m coming right home and say so!”

I said, “You stay where you are. I’ve got all the grief I can handle. By the way, Maslin is having you checked out. If you’re clean, the L.A. cops will tell him.”

“Of course I’m clean,” she said indignantly.

I said, “Unless this Arch character works for the Combine. Then you could be in hot water yourself.”

“I don’t believe it!” she said. “Arch is a very nice man.” Then she said plaintively, “Are you in real trouble, lover?”

“Real enough. A murder rap.”

Griselda said slowly, “Did you kill someone?”

“Not yet. I’m being framed all the way around. I hoped you could help me get off the hook.”

“I can’t,” she said. “This Combine bit is new to me.”

“Can you remember anything Calumet might have said that could help?”

Griselda was silent a moment. I was glad she’d inherited money as well as property from her former boss. I wasn’t in any shape to pay the phone bill we were running up.

She said, “I can’t think of a thing. He told me he’d won a pile on the horses and that he wanted to expand his business. But that doesn’t help, does it?”

I said, “It’s the same story he told me. Okay, dollbaby. You hang tight down there. I’ll call you as soon as I have anything.”

I looked at my watch. It was three-thirty. I left the apartment. Stephanie’s coupe was parked where I had left it the night before. I drove it downtown and into the Tower employees’ parking lot. I hiked down Salmon Way to the garage where she had stored my sedan. I got it out of hock and drove away.

I felt better in the sedan. I didn’t know how much hurry-up driving I might have to do and Stephanie’s little coupe wasn’t much on speed.

I took Southeast Boulevard out to the raw suburb where Kay Itsuko lived. Seeing her wasn’t something I looked forward to, but I couldn’t think of any other way to learn what I had to know.

Kay opened the door and looked quietly out at me. I said, “Are you alone?”

She was wearing a fresh housedress. She looked tiny and fragile, and lovely in a gentle way. It hurt me to see the lines of grief that marred her face.

She said, “Come in, Jeff. I was wondering when you’d call.”

I went into her kitchen. She nodded at water boiling on the stove. “Tea?”

I said, “Great.” I felt awkward and clumsy. I couldn’t find the words I wanted.

Kay made a pot of tea, put it on a tray with two cups and a bowl of sugar. I picked up the tray and followed her into the living room. She had me set the tray on a coffee table.

The room was neat with its mail-order, overstuffed furniture, its tiny fireplace, its pleasant lived-in look. I noticed that Johnny’s piperack and big ashtray were gone.

I said, “How’s the boy?”

BOOK: The Duchess of Skid Row
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