Neil Fargo went to the open door of his office, which offered privacy from his secretary only with the door shut. He leaned against the frame with his arms folded. The two men clattered up the stairs.
“You’ve met my secretary, Pamela Gardner,” said Neil Fargo. He made appropriate gestures. “Pamela, Gus Rizzato — Mr Hariss’ chauffeur.”
Hariss followed him into the inner office, then after Neil Fargo had sat down behind the desk, said, “This is private.”
The detective nodded amiably and went to the door again. Gus Rizzato was beside Pamela’s chair, leaning down to say something to her. He was built like a jockey and had black hair and a swarthy face with a bad complexion. His tie was six inches wide, just barely wider than the lapels on his suit. The girl was shaking her head at what he was saying, making her short brown hair dance around her temples. Her face was set and pale.
“Will you go downstairs to Stempel’s and get us some doughnuts, doll?” The girl nodded hurriedly and stood up. Neil Fargo added, “And then go over to the Seventy-Six station and tell Emil to fill up the Fairlane. Don’t hurry.”
“Yes, Mr Fargo.” There was relief in her voice.
She got her purse and started down the stairs. Rizzato looked appreciatively after her. He winked at Neil Fargo, made obscene gestures that crudely suggested sexual intercourse, and swaggered out after the girl.
Neil Fargo stared after him, then returned to the cubicle where Hariss waited impatiently.
“Sometime I’m going to do something about that little son of a bitch,” he said to the importer.
Walter Hariss made a dismissive gesture with his hand. He was a small-boned, solid man in his late forties, with a good tan and a round, slightly fleshy face and full lips, who wore very expensive clothes well. He wore his grey hair medium length, brushed back from his face in a modified pompadour. His shoes gleamed. Only the overripe diamond on his pinky finger destroyed the illusion of solid businessman.
Neil Fargo sighed and nodded. “All right. What went wrong?”
“We got knocked over.”
“Knocked over!” The detective’s thin lips tightened into a wolfish grin, emphasizing the Indian cast of his features. He made it an exclamation, not a question.
“At the drop point. My courier, Julio Marquez, got killed and my chemist got laid out. And then the cops showed up before he could get out.”
“Tipped,” muttered Neil Fargo.
He got up, paced twice back and forth beside the desk, cracking his fisted right hand into his left palm.
“Your fucking friend Docker is missing and so is my kilo of H,” said Hariss. “To say nothing of the attaché case.”
“Docker called here before I got in. Docker. Hah!” He struck the desk suddenly with the flat of his palm. His calender jumped an inch off the polished hardwood. His eyes got mean. “Well, you’re the fucker who wanted everything done through intermediaries. Didn’t want to be there yourself. Didn’t want me there. A hundred and seventy-five thousand bucks was in that attaché case and I’m responsible to the money man for it!”
“Was there?” asked Hariss. His pale eyes burned softly in his ruddy face. He had a well-modulated voice that suggested he had spent quite a lot of time learning to speak well.
“What the fuck’s that supposed to mean?”
“You’re the one came up with Docker as the drop man. Old Army buddy from Vietnam, would lick the sweat off your balls for you.” He leaned closer. He jabbed Neil Fargo in the stomach with the forefinger of the hand that held his dollar cigar. “Maybe you just kept the money, told your buddy to knock off the courier and Addison, my chemist, and—”
“Sure,” said Neil Fargo in a savage voice. “We plan murder in an apartment I rent in my own name that has my fingerprints all over it so the police will be sure to know where to look. Quit fucking around. I’m on the hook to the money man, Hariss!”
“Who is the money man?”
Neil Fargo just shook his head. “How did you get onto this so fast? The seven o’clock news?”
“It was a phone tip, one of the prowlies who responded called me, he owed me a favor and knew I used Addison. He said there was a pottery figure broken on the floor — you know what that means.”
“And no attaché case,” muttered Neil Fargo.
“I asked my man about that, casually. That’s when he remembered he saw someone getting on a Bryant Street bus with an attaché case. Just as they were pulling up. He didn’t know it was important at the time.”
“Observant cop,” said Neil Fargo. “Any description?”
“Big man, long blond hair, glasses — that’s your fucking Docker, right?”
Neil Fargo nodded sourly. “Docker.”
“Do you know where to find him? Where he’d go? What he’d do?”
“He’s only been in town three weeks — he was supposed to be staying in that apartment.” He took his nervous turn around the little office again. “Christ, Hariss, he needed the money, he looked right for this. He was square with me in Nam, kept me from getting my ass shot off a couple of times.”
Precision lent heavy menace to the importer’s voice. His gestures wreathed his head in cigar smoke.
“I want that fucker, Fargo. A quarter of a million in smack in that clay figure, and—”
“Street prices,” said Neil Fargo almost contemptuously. “I figure you paid maybe twelve, thirteen thou for it in Mexico. If it was ninety-five percent pure, as you claimed.”
“Your chemist.”
“I had a chemist there in good faith—”
Walter Hariss suppressed whatever he had been going to say. He stood up. He was a stocky five-eight, the top of his razor-cut grey hair came to Neil Fargo’s upper lip. He put an arm around the detective’s broad shoulders. He found a smile that cost him something extra.
“We don’t have to fight, Neil. We both want the same thing, right? The money back, the heroin back. You—”
He broke off as the street door opened, closed; Pamela’s light, nervously cheery tones came up the stairwell ahead of the sound of her heels on the stairs.
“Find Docker, we’ll get the rest of it straightened out,” said Neil Fargo hurriedly. “Have Alex Kolinski get his street people on Docker, and add to the description that he’s got a slight limp — nicked in the right knee in Nam. Partial disability. I’ll start at the other end — phone, utilities, driver’s license, the usual skiptracing routines.”
He stood aside for Hariss to leave first, trailing aromatic cigar smoke. Outside, Pamela Gardner was back behind her desk, the white paper bag of doughnuts on the blotter in front of her. She looked as if the desk were a breached redoubt. Gus Rizzato was sitting on the edge of it, one hand on her shoulder, talking earnestly. In talking, he used eyebrows and mouth and his entire mobile Latin countenance. He looked up at the detective and grinned.
“I like this little girl, Fargo. Why don’t you tell her it wouldn’t be a bad idea for her to act a little more friendly?”
Neil Fargo said heartily to Hariss, “Good to have you drop by, Walt. I think we can clear up that little matter today.”
Then his long arm shot out and his big hand gathered in the front of Rizzato’s shirt, tie and jacket lapels as well. The arm twitched. It jerked Rizzato off the desk and slammed him down on his feet like snapping a towel in a locker room.
“You put any more hands on that girl, Peeler, I’ll break them off.” His voice and mouth were cool, contemptuous. His eyes were hot and vicious. He let go of the shirt front and stepped back.