He moved lithely toward Johnny, a thin-bladed knife materializing in his left hand. Johnny unbuttoned the two bottom buttons of his overcoat and bounded eighteen inches straight up into the air. From this altitude he unleashed a doubled-up right knee, and the sole of his shoe caught the oncoming Cy explosively at the junction of neck and shoulder and landed him on his back in the street. The recoil slammed Johnny's shoulders back against the wall; fifteen yards away approaching footsteps halted, and two men crossed the street hurriedly. Back on balance, Johnny turned to the man on hands and knees on the sidewalk.
“No!” Manuel exclaimed harshly when he sensed Johnny's intention.
“No?” Johnny barked incredulously. “You crazy?”
The ex-fighter took his arm. “We mus' get away from here,” he said resolutely. “Come.” Reluctantly Johnny permitted himself to be towed down the street; at that hour the few pedestrians were as carefully incurious as the first two, and there was no outcry from behind them. By turning his head Johnny could see the thin trickle of blood oozing from the blue welt on Manuel's impassive face.
“Man, you're outta your head,” Johnny steamed. “With your eyes like they are, how many knucks shots you think you can take before the lights go out for good?”
“I think you know there mus' be a reason,” the dark man replied patiently. He looked at Johnny curiously. “Where did you learn la savate?”
“Marseilles,” Johnny said shortly. “On the street in overcoat weather your hands are no good.”
“My hands, perhaps,” Manuel Ybarra said significantly. At the corner of Seventh Avenue he looked north for a cruising cab. “Never have I seen a more formidable bull in the plaza, my friend.” White teeth flashed in a smile as he turned again, and then the smile faded. “You gored them most prettily, yet almost-” He hesitated-“almost I wish I had been alone.”
He raised an arm, and a block and a half north a cab accelerated and darted toward them at the curb. “But why the sittin' duck act?” Johnny demanded. “You could have taken him.”
“I made a mistake with a dangerous man, amigo. If his men had punched out the little debt on Manuel, it might prevent the unhealthy mind of him from turning to the idea of repayment through Manuel's sister.”
“Is that right?” Johnny said with interest. “That puts you in the same club as a guy I know.” He stepped down from the curb into the cab. “It was Manfredi you made the mistake with?” he asked as the thick-shouldered man crowded in beside him.
“Rick?” Manuel turned to stare in surprise. “Rick is my friend!” He said it proudly. He leaned back in his corner of the cab, dabbling at the purpling bruise on his cheek with a handkerchief. “You meant it of the best, and Manuel Ybarra does not forget,” he said with a flat finality that closed the conversation. The hum of the tires was the only sound in the cab for the balance of the downtown ride.
Johnny rose from the shabby chair in the sitting room of the second-rate hotel suite as Manuel entered from the room beyond with a chubby, moon-faced man with short, curly hair. In the second before the door closed behind them, Johnny had a fleeting glimpse through a smoky haze of intent, soft-hatted men circled about a green-baize table top.
Manuel introduced them. “Rick Manfredi, Johnny Killain.”
Johnny shook a soft, plump hand that retained a surprising firmness in its grip. Manfredi wore an eggshell-white silk shirt with a buttoned-down collar, a bolo tie whose tips glittered with something more than glass, a green velvet smoking jacket, tan slacks and Italian shoes with very pointed toes.
“Glad to meet you, Killain,” the gambler said genially. “Any friend of Manuel's-” He waved a hand. He had a wide, boyish smile, and his youth surprised Johnny; Manfredi must still be in his early twenties, he thought, although the dark eyes in the smooth, olive face looked as though they had been around considerably longer.
The chubby man turned back to Manuel. “I didn't want to ask you inside,” he said in Spanish. “How is he?” He moved to one side to get a better look. “And what's the matter with your face?”
“He is-fair,” Manuel replied in English with a significant glance at Johnny. “The face is nothing.”
“You speak Spanish?” the gambler asked Johnny, surprised. “Yeah?” He smiled broadly. “Good joke on me.” A fleshy hand fumbled in the breast pocket of the smoking jacket and removed a slim panatela. “Try one?” Johnny accepted the cigar and stripped the cellophane from it. Rick Manfredi did the same for its twin after Manuel had refused it. Johnny bowed his head to accept the proffered light from an initialed gold cigar lighter with a big, steady flame. “My mother was Spanish,” Rick Manfredi said almost absently as he rotated the tip of his cigar in the flame, drew on it until he had it going to his satisfaction, and flipped off and pocketed the lighter. He exhaled a thin cloud of blue smoke.
“Good cigar,” Johnny told him.
“Ought to be, what I pay for 'em.” The gambler waved Johnny back into his chair. “You didn't come over here to compliment me on my cigars. What's on your mind?”
“I'm here stoolin' for the police,” Johnny said.
An opaque film seemed to descend over the dark eyes. “Now there's an openin' line I don't seem to have run across before,” Rick Manfredi said softly. His glance at Manuel was expressionless.
“This I have not heard before,” Manuel admitted wryly.
“Jimmy Rogers couldn't locate you,” Johnny said easily.
“I know Rogers,” the chubby gambler said warily. “I'd talk to him. I think.” He stabbed at Johnny with the cigar. “Just where the hell do you wire into Rogers?” he demanded in a hard tone.
“Roketenetz was the kid brother of a good friend of mine. I'd like to find out who killed him. Or had him killed.”
Manfredi looked skeptical until he encountered Manuel's confirming nod. For a count of twenty he thought it over; then his head moved fractionally and Manuel left the room quietly by another door. The gambler seated himself, crossed his legs and made a thorough inspection of Johnny in the chair opposite. “I could be makin' a mistake talkin' to you, Killain,” he said finally. “I wouldn't like to find out later that I had.” The dark eyes were like twin bits of quartz. “If Manuel says you're all right, you're all right, see? But you better be all right.” He leaned forward in his chair. “I don't want no beef with Rogers I can help. Now. How did I get into the act?”
“It's all over town you dropped a ton on the kid to go by the fourth. Since he didn't, it could leave you with an itch.”
“Not that kind of an itch, mister. I'm a gambler, not a hood. I've made losin' bets before. You got me wrong, you an' Rogers, too. I don't go for that kind of action.” He gestured impatiently. “Now this damn fight. I got no use for fights, see? I was touted onto the thing, an' I got burned. I should've known better. That's all there is to it.”
“But you're makin' like hard to find,” Johnny said quietly.
“So I'll tell you,” the gambler said resignedly, “an' you can believe it or don't. I'm clean, where it counts. The fix was in, see? The kid was supposed to go in the fourth. That's from next door to the horse's mouth. I didn't fix it, and I don't know who did, but I had the program. Like I said, it's not my game-horses and cards are my action-but when you get it like that, what're you gonna do? I went but good. So it didn't come off. I was touted in the first place against my better judgment. With fights I'm through. Right?”