The Mike Hammer Collection, Volume 2 (9 page)

“Better make it at my place. Oscar lives over on the East Side.” He rattled off the address and I jotted it down. “I told Lee to go ahead and keep his appointment. We’ll be right behind him. Lee is taking the subway up and we’ll pick him up at the kiosk. Got that?”

“I got it. I’ll be over in a little while.”

We both stood waiting for the other to hang up. Finally, “Mike....”

“What?”

“You sure about this?”

“I’m sure.” I set the receiver back in its cradle and stared at it. I was sure, all right, sure to come up with the dirty end of the stick. The dam would open and let the clean water through and they could pick me out of the sewer.

I pulled on my clothes halfheartedly. I thought of the steak in the kitchen and decided I didn’t want any more of it. For a while I stood in front of the mirror looking at myself, trying to decide whether or not I should wear the artillery. Habit won and I buckled on the sling after checking the load in the clip. When I buttoned up the coat I took the box from the closet shelf that held the two spare barrels and the extra shells, scooped up a handful of loose .45’s and dropped them in my pocket. If I was going to do it I might as well do it right.

Velda had just gotten in when I called her. I said, “Did you eat yet, kitten?”

“I grabbed a light bite downtown. Why, are you taking me out?”

“Yeah, but not to supper. It’s business. I’ll be right over. Tell you about it then.”

She said all right, kissed me over the phone and hung up. I stuck my hat on, picked up another deck of Luckies and went downstairs where I whistled for a cab.

I don’t know how I looked when she opened the door. She started to smile then dropped it like a hot rivet to catch her lower lip between her teeth. Velda’s so tall I didn’t have to bend down far to kiss her on the cheek. It was nice standing there real close to her. She was perfume and beauty and all the good things of life.

She said, “Come into the bedroom, Mike. You can tell me while I’m getting dressed.”

“I can talk from out here.”

Velda turned around, a grin in her eyes. “You have been in a woman’s bedroom before, haven’t you?”

“Not yours.”

“I’m inviting you in to talk. Just talk.”

I faked a punch at her jaw. “I’m just afraid of myself, kid. You and a bedroom could be too much. I’m saving you for something special.”

“Will it cost three dollars and can you frame it?”

I laughed for an answer and went in after her. She pointed to a satin-covered boudoir chair and went behind a screen. She came out in a black wool skirt and a white blouse. God, but she was lovely.

When she sat down in front of the vanity table and started to brush her hair I caught her eyes in the mirror. They reflected the trouble that was in mine. “Now tell me, Mike.”

I told her. I gave her everything Pat gave me and watched her face.

She finished with the brush and put it down. Her hand was shaking. “They want a lot of you, don’t they?”

“Maybe they want too much.” I pulled out a cigarette and lit one. “Velda, what does this Lee Deamer mean to you?”

This time she wouldn’t meet my eyes. She spaced her words carefully. “He means a lot, Mike. Would you be mad if I said that perhaps they weren’t asking too much?”

“No ... not if you think not. Okay, kid. I’ll play the hand out and see what I can do with a kill-crazy maniac. Get your coat on.”

“Mike ... you haven’t told me all of it yet.”

She was at it again, looking through me into my mind. “I know it.”

“Are you going to?”

“Not now. Maybe later.”

She stood up, a statuesque creature that had no equal, her hair a black frame for her face. “Mike, you’re a bastard. You’re in trouble up to your ears and you won’t let anybody help you. Why do you always have to play it alone?”

“Because I’m me.”

“And I’m me too, Mike. I
want
to help. Can you understand that?”

“Yes, I understand, but this isn’t another case. It’s more than that and I don’t want to talk about it.”

She came to me then, resting her hands on my shoulders. “Mike, if you do need me ... ever, will you ask me to help?”

“I’ll ask you.”

Her mouth was full and ripe, warm with life and sparkling with a delicious wetness. I pulled her in close and tasted the fire that smoldered inside her, felt her body mold itself to mine, eager and excited.

My fingers ran into her hair and pulled her mouth away. “No more of it, Velda. Not now.”

“Some day, Mike.”

“Some day. Get your coat on.” I shoved her away roughly, reluctant to let her go. She opened the closet and took the jacket that matched the skirt from a hanger and slipped into it. Over her shoulder she slung a shoulderstrap bag, and when it nudged the side of the dresser the gun in it made a dull clunk.

“I’m ready, Mike.”

I pushed the slip of paper with Oscar’s address on it into her hand. “Here’s the place where he’s holed up. The subway is a half-block away from the place. You go directly there and look the joint over. I don’t know why, but there’s something about it I don’t like. We’re going to tag after Lee when he goes in, but I want somebody covering the place while we’re there.

“Remember, it’s a rough neighborhood, so be on your toes. We don’t want any extra trouble. If you spot anything that doesn’t seem to be on the square, walk over to the subway kiosk and meet us. You’ll have about a half-hour to look around. Be careful.”

“Don’t worry about me.” She pulled on her gloves, a smile playing with her mouth. Hell, I wasn’t going to worry about her. That rod in her bag wasn’t there for ballast.

I dropped her at the subway and waited on the curb until a cab cruised by.

Pat was standing under the canopy of his apartment building when I got there. He had a cigarette cupped in the palm of his hand and dragged on it nervously. I yelled at him from the taxi and he crossed the street and got in.

It was seven-fifteen.

At ten minutes to eight we paid off the cab and walked the half-block to the kiosk. We were still fifty feet away when Lee Deamer came up. He looked neither to the right nor left, walking straight ahead as if he lived there. Pat nudged me with his elbow and I grunted an acknowledgment.

I waited to see if Velda would show, but there wasn’t a sign of her.

Twice Lee stopped to look at house numbers. The third time he paused in front of an old brick building, his head going to the dim light behind the shades in the downstairs room. Briefly, he cast a quick glance behind him, then went up the three steps and disappeared into the shadowy well of the doorway.

Thirty seconds, that’s all he got. Both of us were counting under our breaths, hugging the shadows of the building. The street boasted a lone light a hundred yards away, a wan, yellow eye that seemed to search for us with eerie tendrils, determined to pull us into its glare. Somewhere a voice cursed. A baby squealed and stopped abruptly. The street was too damn deserted. It should have been running with kids or something. Maybe the one light scared them off. Maybe they had a better place to hang out than a side street in nowhere.

We hit the thirty count at the same time, but too late. A door slammed above our heads and we could hear feet pounding on boards, diminishing with every step. A voice half sobbed something unintelligible and we flew up those stairs and tugged at a door that wouldn’t give. Pat hit it with his shoulder, ramming it open.

Lee was standing in the doorway, hanging on to the sill, his mouth agape. He was pointing down the hall. “He ran . . . he ran. He looked out the window ... and he ran!”

Pat muttered, “Damn ... we can’t let him get away!” I was ahead of him, my hands probing the darkness. I felt the wall give way to the inky blackness that was the night behind an open door and stumbled down the steps.

That was when I heard Velda’s voice rise in a tense, “Mike . . . MIKE!”

“Over here, Pat. There’s a gate in the wall. Get a light on!”

Pat swore again, yelling that he had lost it. I didn’t wait. I made the gate and picked my way through the litter in the alley that ran behind the buildings. My .45 was in my hand, ready to be used. Velda yelled again and I followed her voice to the end of the alley.

When I came to the street through the two-foot space that separated the buildings I couldn’t have found anybody, because the street was a funnel of people running to the subway kiosk. They ran and yelled back over their shoulders and I knew that whatever it was had happened down there and I was afraid to look. If anything happened to Velda I’d tear the guts out of some son-of-a-bitch! I’d nail him to a wall and take his skin off him in inch.-wide strips!

A colored fellow in a porter’s outfit came up bucking the crowd yelling for someone to get a doctor. That was all I needed. I made a path through that mob pouring through the exit gates into the station and battled my way up to the front.

Velda was all right. She was perfectly all right and I could quit shaking and let the sweat turn warm again. I shoved the gun back under my arm and walked over to her with a sad attempt of trying to look normal.

The train was almost all the way in the station. Not quite. It had to jam on the brakes too fast to make the marker farther down the platform. The driver and two trainmen were standing in front of the lead car poking at a bloody mess that was sticking out under the wheels. The driver said, “He’s dead as hell. He won’t need an ambulance,”

Velda saw me out of the corner of her eye. I eased up to her, my breath still coming hard. “Deamer?”

She nodded.

I heard Pat busting through the crowd and saw Lee at his heels. “Beat it, kid. I’ll call you later.” She stepped back and the curious crowd surged around her to fill the spot. She was gone before Pat reached me.

His pants were torn and he had a dirty black smear across his cheek. He took about two minutes to get the crowd back from the edge and when a cop from the beat upstairs came through the gang was herded back to the exits like cattle, all bawling to be in on the blood.

Pat wiped his hand across his face. “What the hell happened?”

“I don’t know, but I think that’s our boy down there. Bring Lee over.”

The trainmen were tugging the remains out. One said, “He ain’t got much face left,” then he puked all over the third rail.

Lee Deamer looked over the side and turned white. “My God!”

Pat steadied him with an arm around his waist. They had most of the corpse out from under the train now. “That him?” Pat asked.

Lee nodded dumbly. I could see his throat working hard.

Two more cops from the local precinct sauntered over. Pat shoved his badge out and told them to take over, then motioned me to bring Lee back to one of the benches. He folded up in one like a limp sack and buried his face in his hands. What the hell could I say? So the guy was a loony, but he was still his brother. While Pat went back to talk to the trainmen I stood there and listened to him sob.

We put Lee in a cab outside before I had a chance to say anything. The street was mobbed now, the people crowding around the ambulance waiting to see what was going in on the stretcher. They were disappointed when a wicker basket came up and was shoved into a morgue wagon instead. A kid pointed to the blood dripping from one corner and a woman fainted. Nice.

I watched the wagon pull away and reached for a butt. I needed one bad. “It was an easy way out,” I said. “What did the driver say?”

Pat took a cigarette from my pack. “He didn’t see him. He thinks the guy must have been hiding behind a pillar then jumped out in front of the car. He sure was messed up.”

“I don’t know whether to be relieved or not.”

“It’s a relief to me, Mike. He’s dead and his name will get published but who will connect him with Lee? The trouble’s over.”

“He have anything on him?”

Pat stuck his hand in his pocket and pulled out some stuff. Under the light it looked as if it had been stained with ink. Sticky ink. “Here’s a train ticket from Chicago. It’s in a bus envelope so he must have taken a bus as far as Chi then switched to rail.” It was dated the 15th, a Friday.

I turned the envelope over and saw DEAMER printed across the back with a couple of schedule notations in pencil. There was another envelope with the stuff. It had been torn in half and used for a memo sheet, but the name Deamer, part of an address in Nebraska and a Nebraska postage mark were still visible. It was dated over a month ago. The rest of the stuff was some small change, two crumpled bills and a skeleton key for a door lock.

It was as nice an answer as we could have hoped for and I didn’t like it. “What’s the matter now?” Pat queried.

“I don’t know. It stinks.”

“You’re teed off because you were done out of a kill.”

“Aw, shaddup, will you!”

“Then what’s so lousy about it?”

“How the hell do I know? Can’t I not like something without having to explain about it?”

“Not with me you can‘t, pal. I stuck my neck out when I invited you in.”

I sucked in on the cigarette. It was cold standing there and I turned my collar up. “Get a complete identification on that corpse, Pat. Then maybe I can tell you why I think it stinks.”

“Don’t worry, I intend to. I’m not taking any chances of having him laughing at us from somewhere. It would be like the crazy bastard to push someone else under that train to sidetrack us.”

“Would he have time to jam that stuff in his pockets too?” I flipped my thumb at the papers Pat was holding.

“He could have. Just the same, we’ll be sure. Lee has both their birth certificates and a medical certificate on Oscar that has his full description. It won’t take long to find out if that’s him or not.”

“Let me know what you find.”

“I’ll call you tomorrow. I wish I knew how the devil he spotted us. I nearly killed myself in that damn alley. I thought I heard somebody yelling for you, too.”

“Couldn’t have been.”

“Guess not. Well, I’ll see you tomorrow?”

“Uh-huh.” I took a last pull on the butt and tossed it at the curb. Pat went back into the station and I could hear his heels clicking on the steps.