“Too many guns around, these days,” Boynton said briefly, and bent down to frisk the man on the floor.
Tuesday — 12:30 P.M.
Harry Wittwer sat behind the wheel of the large Cadillac and bit his lip. Whatever labor problem this Maxwell had, Harry sincerely hoped George could solve, because the one thing they had to have was newsprint, and getting it on a moment’s notice from some other company than Western American was damn near impossible. And without the “Neighborhood Shopping News,” they would have plenty of problems—
He suddenly looked up, aware that someone was speaking to him. It was a man dressed in work clothes, crossing the street in front of the car, pointing downward.
“Hey, mister,” Jennings said. “You’re getting a flat.”
Harry started to open the door, his back turned to the sidewalk, and then froze as a gun dug into his ribs.
“Just sit real nice and quiet and don’t reach for anything,” Johnny Merchant said pleasantly, “or I’ll take your pillow away and you won’t be able to see over the steering wheel.”
Tuesday — 6:00 P.M.
The party that was going on this time was taking place in the front room of Marty’s Oyster House, in a booth in the rear, and since Jan was present the service was not only prompt but waiters seemed to be standing in line to handle her every whim. The fact that this meant they also had to handle the irresponsible whims of the two men with her was unfortunate, but with one accord the waiters felt it was worth it. Dolls like that didn’t walk into Marty’s every day of the week! Reardon had been telephoning from the cashier’s extension; he came back and sat down next to Jan, taking one of her hands in his.
“Pop’ll be fine,” he said, pleased. “The hospital doesn’t expect any complications from the finger, and outside of that he’s just tired. They think he’ll be out and around in a few days.”
“Great!” Dondero said. He was wearing dark glasses to hide a badly battered eye, and his split lip made drinking painful, although that did not prevent him from drinking. He just drank carefully. He set his glass down and patted his lip gently. “When I walked in on him and he pulled the exact same line you’d said he’d pull, I was so surprised I said, ‘Shut up, Pop, for Christ’s sake!’ instead of using my head.”
Reardon looked at him critically. “It looks to me like you did use your head. Or somebody did.”
“Somebody sure did,” Dondero said bitterly, and reached up gingerly to touch the edge of his eye. He thought of something. “Hey! Who got to talk to Patrone?”
“Several of us,” Reardon said grimly. “In depth. The two and a half kilos were in a suitcase at the checkroom of the Mark Hopkins. At least they picked a stash point that was classy.” He frowned. “The thing that surprises me the most about the whole thing is why Morrison bought Maxwell’s story so easily. Why should he get so up-tight about not being able to buy some paper?”
“I can tell you all about that,” Dondero said. “You don’t think I wasted all my time just being a punching bag, do you? I listened, pal; and they didn’t worry too much about talking in front of me, either, because they also mentioned what they were going to do with me and Pop once they got their hands on Patrone. It didn’t involve survival.”
“So what’s the secret?”
“So they had a good setup,” Dondero said half-admiringly. “The shopping news gimmick was legitimate, and for all I know it may have even made them a buck or two, but it was also the basis of their distribution setup. They delivered the papers by hand, and while that meant they couldn’t stuff mailboxes — because that’s against the postal laws, you know — they didn’t want to stuff mailboxes, anyway. They wanted to drop them behind screens, or shove them under doors, or even hand them over to people who opened the door when their delivery boy came up on the stoop. And inside those papers that were accepted by hand, or shoved under a door completely, they had a small glassine envelope pasted, with a deal of horse in it.” He grinned. “I’d give eight to five some narc, doing a surveillance, probably saw the stuff handed over under his nose and thought nothing of it.”
“Cute,” Reardon said. “Well, it’s all busted up, now, and maybe we can all get some sleep.” He pressed Jan’s hand. “Want to eat here, honey?”
“Why not?” Jan said, happy to be with him and pleased to see him relaxing. “The service is wonderful.”
Dondero choked on his drink.
“Why not, indeed?” Reardon asked, smiling. He picked up a menu from the stack behind the napkin holder and then handed it to Jan. “You order for me, honey. I’ve got one more call to make.”
“Hurry back.”
“I’ll be there before the waiter,” Reardon said, and walked back to the telephone.
Tuesday — 6:20 P.M.
Sawicki, proprietor and principal hustler of his pool emporium, wondered what he could possibly have done to irritate Lady Luck to make her treat him like this! A miscue on an absolutely-dead-as-Kelsey-combination-break ball had to rank with the Titanic as a major disaster! Now look at the goddamn table! It looked like a couple of high school kids were playing rotation, for crissakes! Sawicki tried to control his temper, retreating bearlike to one of the high stools against the wall, shaking his head.
Porky Frank smiled gently and studied the layout, chalking his cue carefully as he did so. Sawicki did not offer his largess so frequently that one could afford to be careless in the acceptance thereof. His eye went from ball to ball, planning strategy and position, and when his plan was completed, he bent down to the table, prepared to put Sawicki out of his misery as quickly as possible. At that moment the telephone rang.
Sawicki leaned his cue against the wall and went to answer it. His tiny molelike eyes lit up at the sound of the familiar voice; he forced himself to present a poker face as he turned to address his opponent.
“Telephone, Porky,” he said in his gravel voice. “For you.”
“Oh? Thanks.” Porky Frank laid his cue on a nearby abandoned table, being more protective of his property than Sawicki, and walked over to the phone, raising the receiver. Sawicki politely refrained from listening. Porky smiled at him and spoke. “Hello?”
“Porky?”
“Ah, Mr. R! What can I do for you?”
“I tried your apartment, but I guess you’d already left.”
“A reasonable assumption,” Porky said in a congratulatory tone. “Is anything new on the you-know-what?”
“Quite a bit,” Reardon said. “I would have let you read all about it in the Express, except I remember you don’t read newspapers. Well, you’ll be pleased to know that Mike Holland is in the hospital — under our care — and that a couple of bad boys named George Morrison and Harry Wittwer are being held for kidnapping, among other things.”
“Congratulations,” Porky said, honestly pleased. “Morrison and Wittwer, eh?”
“You know them?”
“Only by reputation,” Porky said. He thought a moment and nodded. “That would explain a few things...”
“Such as?”
“Well, you recall at our last meeting I mentioned a temporary lack of powdered Nirvana in the marketplace? As I hear it, George Morrison was one of the lads involved in that field.”