“I’ll take your word for it,” Porky said, and rapped the table with one knuckle piously, scattering ashes from his cigarette. He brushed them away. “May my own tones remain pear-shaped and pain-free! But, to get back to business, how does the tone of Mike Holland’s voice on a tape help to identify the man you spoke to on the telephone?”
“I don’t know. What I’m trying to say is I have a feeling the guy was getting a kick out of playing that tape, and the reason he was getting a kick out of it was precisely because Mike was in pain when they taped it, if you know what I mean.”
“You mean the guy was a mean bastard,” Porky said quietly.
“Yeah,” Reardon said, and wondered why he had pushed the matter. “I guess that’s what I mean.”
“Well, it was a good assumption he wasn’t an angel to begin with,” Porky said logically.
“I suppose so,” Reardon said, and yawned. He finished up with a shudder and glanced at his watch. “Well, that’s about it, I guess. Keep your ears open. My guess is there’ll be a pretty good reward for any information leading to the et cetera, et cetera.” He yawned again and shook his head. “I’m about ready to fall asleep on my feet.”
“In a moment,” Porky said. “Let’s see if we can’t make us a few assumptions before we break up for the evening.” His tone indicated that if he couldn’t take a young fortune from Sawicki shooting pool, but had to devote his energies to detecting instead, he might as well do a proper job of it. He brushed ash from his cigarette and leaned back, one hand fondling his empty ale mug. “One — whoever spoke to you on the telephone knew the dinner was being held at Marty’s. How?”
“It wasn’t any secret.”
Porky shook his head, unimpressed by the argument.
“It isn’t any secret that Molly’s Future can’t run in mud for a damn, but I know lots of people who don’t know it. Or I hope they don’t know it. For instance, I didn’t know you were running the dinner, or I’d have asked for an invite.” Porky drummed his fingers on the table, thinking. “He also knew about the dinner far enough ahead of time to check out the place and find out they only had the one telephone. Did you know that? I didn’t, and I eat there about as often as you do. Item three — or is it two? No matter — he also knew you were in charge of the affair, but he had never met you in person—”
Reardon’s eyebrows went up. “Sherlock Holmes stuff?”
Porky waved it away. “You’re tired, Mr. R. If he’d have met you, or even spoken to you in person at some time, it’s doubtful he would have called you direct. Why take a chance you might recognize his voice? All he had to do was speak with someone else. Right?”
Reardon thought, not for the first time, that Porky Frank would have made a very fine police officer in the Detective branch. He also thought, again not for the first time, that Porky Frank would have been vastly amused at the concept.
“Right. Still, the affair was scarcely a secret. The newspapers even mentioned it.”
Porky’s eyebrows rose in respect. “The newspapers?”
“Well, at least the man who writes the ‘View from Nob Hill’ column in the Express, whoever he is.”
“Doesn’t he have a name?”
“If he does, he doesn’t use it to sign his column. Anyway, he had a big spread about how here we are, the good citizens of San Francisco, with insufficient police protection as it is; and there they are, the police, screaming for more money all the time, just to feed their wee ones; but still we cops can afford to waste our time and money on a retirement dinner for a cop who should be made to work, instead of being put out to pasture when he’s capable of doing a day’s work, and not allowed to feed at the public trough, et cetera, et cetera. A typical anti-cop blast. You know the sort of thing.”
“You seemed to have memorized it by heart,” Porky said shrewdly. “Did he mention you by name? He must have.”
“He did. He said that people like Lieutenant James Reardon ought to be doing some useful work on the many unsolved murders in our town, work for which he’s overpaid, instead of chasing around to restaurants, comparing menus and prices, and tasting the soup to make sure nobody left out the salt.”
Porky grinned. “The man has a point. Did you speak with him in person?”
“No, his secretary called. But the column didn’t mean anything. As a matter of fact, there was an editorial in the same issue that practically disagreed with everything the columnist said.” Reardon shrugged. “It didn’t bother me. You know newspapers.”
“Fortunately,” Porky said, “I don’t. Anyway, that sort of publicity doesn’t sound like bait for any kidnapper unless, of course, they mean to hold this Holland for the gold watch I assume you meant to give him. Anyway, don’t worry about it. Who reads the newspapers?”
“I’m not worried, and lots of people read newspapers,” Reardon said, and smiled. “If you don’t read the papers, how are you going to know when World War Three starts?”
“If W.W. Three isn’t running in the fourth at Aqueduct,” Porky said loftily, “it’s going to miss me. Which is more than I’m going to do for it.” He settled back. “All right. This dinner was mentioned in this ‘View from Nob Hill’ column. And the column accused you of soup-detecting. But did he specifically say that you were in charge of arrangements? After all, soup-checking is a chore often left to a minor subordinate on the committee.”
Reardon’s smile faded. He tried to think. “I don’t remember.”
“Well,” Porky said, “it’s easy enough to check on. Since you seem to be an Express fan, we’ll leave that bit of detection to you. And if your being in charge of the dinner wasn’t in the article, who else might have known?”
Reardon thought a moment and then realized how ridiculous the question was.
“Well, hell! The whole department knew. I said it wasn’t any secret. It was on the bulletin board; they had to send their checks to me. So their families knew, and their kids—”
“And their uncles and their cousins who are numbered in the dozens. Well, maybe. Still, I find it hard to picture everyone sitting around the fireplace of an evening saying to each other, ‘Say, did you hear the big news? Mr. R is in charge of the dinner for Mike Holland!’”
Reardon frowned. “Just what point are you trying to make?”
“I’m not trying to make a point. I’m trying to hand you what is known, in detective parlance, as a clue.”
Reardon’s frown deepened. “You mean you think someone in the department might have...?”
“I don’t mean anything of the kind,” Porky said sternly. “On the other hand,” he added, thinking about it, “I don’t rule it out, either. Cops have been known to be naughty before. But in this case I honestly don’t see a cop snatching another cop. If Holland had forty years on the force, he’d have recognized the man, and some of that would have come out in that tape. No, let’s scratch cops.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. However, let us go on. You say the man on the telephone told you would receive a tape in the mail tomorrow morning with further instructions. Right?”
“Demands, he said.”
“Same thing. But,” Porky said quietly, fixing Reardon with a steady look, “in that case he must have mailed the tape even before he picked up your good sergeant.”