“So am I ”
“Really stuck. Will you listen a minute?”
“No.”
“Fires are breaking out all over Charlestown. A torch is at work. I haven’t got the rewrite man I need.”
“So?”
“One is drunk and ready for the tank. The other is pregnant and just left for the hospital to have a baby. Nothing I can do about it. I can’t find the day guy. His wife says he’s at a ballgame somewhere. I’m three short on the desk, two with vacations and one with the flu. The guy I’ve got on rewrite now is a kid; he’s not good enough for a big-story like this.”
“Sounds like very poor organization, Jack.”
“Jeez, who’d think all hell would break loose on an October Saturday night?”
“I would.”
“Can you come in?”
“For rewrite?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re crazy.”
“I can’t handle it myself, Fletch. I’ve got to remake the whole paper.”
“What time is it?”
“Ten minutes to nine.”
“What time do you go to bed?”
“We’ll front-page big cuts for the first edition which goes at ten-twenty.”
“Jack, I’m a murder suspect.”
“Ralph Locke isn’t.”
“I don’t know the city.”
“You know how to put words together.”
“I’m rusty.”
“Please, Fletch? Old times’ sake? I can’t talk much longer.”
Fletch looked through the dark at Sylvia, now on his side of the bed.
“I’ll be right there. Bastard.”
Twenty-six
“Frank?”
“Who do you want?”
The young voice was sleepy.
It was two-twenty-five Sunday morning.
“Inspector Flynn.”
The telephone receiver clattered against wood.
At a distance from the phone, the voice said, “Da?”
After a long moment, Flynn answered.
“Now who might this be?”
“I. M. Fletcher.”
“God bless, my nose. Where are you, lad? Would you be seizing upon this odd hour of the night to confess?”
“I’m at the Star, Frank.”
“Now what would you be doing there? Have you rejoined the enemy?”
“Charlestown is on fire. Someone is torching it.”
“I see.”
“An old friend from the Chicago Post asked me come in and help out.”
“You have an old friend in Boston?”
“I guess so.”
“Where was he the Tuesday last? Did you ask?”
“I know he has Monday and Tuesday nights off.”
“No matter how much you talk to a man, ply him with drink, there’s always more to learn.”
“Frank, could I make this call quick?”
“You didn’t have to make it at all.”
“I’m sorry to wake you up.”
“It’s all right, lad. I was just filling in my time by sleeping, anyway.”
“I can’t get your Boston Police spokesman to listen to me.”
“And who’s speaking for us tonight?”
“A Captain Holman.”
“Ach, he’s a police spokesman, all right. That’s precisely what he is.”
“He calls every fifteen minutes with new facts, but I can’t get him to listen.”
“That’s what a spokesman is: a person with two mouths and one ear, a freak of nature. What would you like to say to him?”
“I’ve got some facts, too. We’ve got more reporters in the field than you have bulls.”
“‘We’ now, is it? An inveterate journalist, I do believe is Mister I. M. Fletcher.”
“Listen, Frank. It’s very simple. Eleven fires have been set since seven o’clock. Mostly tenements, a few warehouses, one church. Nothing consistent.”
“All empty?”
“Yes.”
“Then that’s consistent.”
“Right. At the third, fifth, seventh, eighth, and ninth fires, empty, two-gallon containers of Astro gasoline have been found. You know, the kind off containers a gas station sells you when you’re out of gas on the road somewhere?”
“Yes.”
“I’ve sent a reporter back to the other fires to see if he can spot Astro containers there, too.”
“Haven’t the Fire Department’s arson boys caught on, yet?”
“No. They’re doing the usual. Watching the spectators. They won’t listen to the reporters who keep finding these containers. They’re just taking pictures.”
“I know their method. They’ll have a meeting in the morning, to compare notes. It gives them something to do, with their coffee.”
“The arsonist should be pinned tonight.”
“I agree,” said Flynn. “All that smoke is air polluting.”
“All these fires are taking place around Farber Hill. All sides of it, more or less equally. First a fire starts on the north side, then one on the south side, then one on the northwest side.”
“That could cause a terrific traffic jam of city equipment,” Flynn said. “Collisions.”
“I looked at a district map. In the geographic dead center of the district, at the corner of Bread and Acorn streets, is a gas station.”
“And you’re going to tell me…?”
“The map doesn’t say which company runs the station, so I asked a reporter to drive over and look.”
“Did he collide with anything?”
“It’s an Astro station, Frank.”
“So whom are we looking for?”
“A young gas station attendant, who works at the Astro station at the corner of Breed and Acorn streets, and who got off duty at six o’clock.”
“Why young?”
“He’s moving awfully fast, Frank. Over fences. In second-storey windows.”
“So he must be agile, and therefore he is probably young. Quick in the knee, as it were.”
“And he has access to a lot of Astro gasoline containers.”
“All right, Fletch.” Flynn’s voice lowered “I’ll pull on my pants and wander over to Charlestown. See if I can help out. I have a natural dislike of seeing a city on fire, you know?”
“I know.”
“Tell me, Fletcher. After we catch this arsonist boyo, will we also discover he’s the murderer of Ruth Fryer?”
“Good night, Frank. If you get the guy, will you call the Star?”
“I’ll see Captain Holman does.”
“Ask him to talk to Jack Saunders.”
“I’ll do that. I’m always very cooperative with the press, you know.”
Twenty-seven
Driving through the light, Sunday mid-morning traffic in the Ghia, very considerate of the two policemen following him, Fletch easily found 58 Fenton Street in Brookline.
He had had four hours’ sleep in one of his own guest rooms.
He had not renewed contact with the guest asleep his own bed.
Lucy Connors opened the door of Apartment 42 to him.
Purposely, he supposed, she was dressed in a full peasant skirt and a light blouse with low neck and puffy sleeves. She wore no makeup, nor jewelry.
“Martin Head?”
“Yeah,” Fletch said. “Très Magazine.”
Lucy’s eyes went from one of his empty bands to the other, possibly checking for a camera or a tape recorder.
“Good of you to see me,” he said. “Especially on a Sunday morning.”
“I wouldn’t dare have you come any other time. It might improve my reputation.”
The apartment was the usual one or two bedroom arrangement. A small dining table was in a corner of the living room. Along the wall next to it was a hi-fi rig, with album-filled shelves.
There was a cheap, old divan along the opposite wall, an undersized braided rug in front of it, a saggy upholstered chair to one side.
A drapeless window ran along the fourth wall, letting in a harsh light.