I leaned forward. “Dick? That wouldn’t be Dick Blazen, would it?”
“Right. Did you know the guy, Mike?”
I put out my Lucky. “No, but a friend of mine did.”
Velda asked, “’Did’? Past tense?”
“Very damn past,” I said to her. “That’s the regular customer who got run down in front of Billy Batson’s newsstand last month.”
I filled in some blanks for him on the incident — all Hy knew was that Blazen had been hit by a car — including Billy getting a good look at the driver but having no success identifying him, despite numerous line-ups at HQ and going through countless mug books.
Hy rested his cigar in the ashtray and leaned on an elbow. He was peering over the glasses again. “Are you thinking Borensen may have hired a contract killer to remove Dick Blazen? A hit-and-run for hire?”
“Why not?”
My phone caller of the night before had made a point of saying many of his contract kills had been passed off as accidents.
I continued, “On the other hand, maybe Borensen pulled that one off himself.”
“If so,” Velda said, “all we have to do is show Billy a picture of our client.”
Hy said, “Easier said than done. One of the things Dick asked me to help him with was finding pics of various lesser-known but key people he was mentioning in his book. He already had art on many of them, but Borensen was on a short list that Dick needed help with. I checked the Trib photo morgue and came up a goose egg. I called around to the other papers and nobody else had anything on the guy either.”
Velda asked, “Isn’t that unusual? Borensen was an actor on stage and television — several decades ago admittedly — but he’s a well-known producer today.”
“He was a minor actor in his early days,” Hy said, “and a schlock producer now. Some of his productions have generated good ink, but the werewolves and sweater babes got the press photos, not him.”
“Then,” I said to Velda, climbing out of the booth, “we’ll haul Billy’s behind over to Borensen’s apartment right now, for a personal appearance from our client.”
Velda was at my side in an eye blink.
“Hold up,” Hy said. “Did it ever occur to you that this Billy character might have been paid off?”
“No way,” Velda said.
“Billy’s okay,” I said. “He’s Captain Marvel in disguise, you know.”
That got a head shake and a laugh out of my cynical pal.
“Good luck, you two,” Hy said. “Call me at the Plaza if you get anything newsworthy.”
I said, “You’re sitting this one out?”
His smile was a friendly fold in a well-used face. “I’m a little long in the tooth to be going down bullet alley any more. But I’ll do what I can from the sidelines, starting with taking care of the check.”
I gave him a grin of thanks and took Velda by the elbow, heading out.
A light misting rain was just enough to all but empty the sidewalks and make the streetlights hazy. Neon smears turned Manhattan into an impressionist painting, taking the hard edges off and blurring the grime into something damn near romantic.
Neither Velda nor I minded the rain. We walked in it often, sometimes when it was coming down good and hard. Mist we just laughed at. Right now we were both in raincoats, having anticipated a damp evening, and we strolled the few blocks over to Lexington arm-in-arm, as something almost cold enough to be snow put tiny tears all over our faces.
But I won’t pretend that this was just another walk in the rain for us. I caught Velda keeping an eye peeled for somebody following, either on foot or on wheels, and outside the restaurant, I’d shifted my .45 to my right-hand trenchcoat pocket. And my hand was in that pocket. Call me over-cautious, but when they keep shooting at you, you can get a little gun shy.
Clutching my left arm, Velda asked, “Assuming Borensen didn’t hire it done... what does Billy seeing him run down Hy’s friend have to do with one Michael Hammer?”
There was just enough moisture to curl the tips of her black hair into something gypsy-like.
“First,” I said, “probably nothing. Second, we don’t know for sure Borensen’s responsible. We’re going to find out.”
“And if he did do it?”
I grinned into the mist. “Well, that Viking will get something from me and it won’t be a refund. A Viking funeral, maybe.”
Billy stayed open till nine-thirty and it was almost that. As we neared, he was just a small figure overwhelmed by the corner newsstand’s many magazines, particularly the side displays of comic books. Famous faces smiled at us as we approached. They didn’t care about the rain either, but then they were protected by the overhang of the stand.
He was arranging and stacking stuff and didn’t see us at first. When he heard our wet footsteps, and turned toward us, the wizened little guy in the plaid cap and flannel jacket had a stack of newspapers in his arms. Seeing Velda, Billy grinned and hugged those papers like he did her in his dreams.
“Hiya, Velda,” he said, the way a farmer says Aw Shucks. “When you gonna throw this bum over?”
She beamed at him and put something sultry in it. “I would, Billy, but then who would have me?”
He grinned goofily. “I think you know. I think you do.”
Then he acknowledged me with a regular smile; he was standing there between us, like a paperback between a couple of big bookends. He lowered those papers to fig leaf level.
“Y’know, Mike, that pic the News ran of you, after that cabbie took your bullet? Much better.”
I nodded toward Velda. “I took your criticism to heart, Billy. My faithful secretary here sent around a newer shot to all the papers, professionally done — not snapshots from paparazzi rats.”
“That kind of off-the-cuff stuff sells a lot of papers, Mike. You got a good business goin’. Don’t begrudge me mine.”
Right now, this late, there was no business. Lately the city had a habit of emptying out everywhere except the theater district, even before dark. Traffic on the rain-slicked street seemed steady but light.
“Listen,” I said, a hand on his shoulder, “I have a lead on that hit-and-runner of yours. How would you like to put his ass away for a long damn time?”
His whole face smiled. “Nothing better. What’s the deal, Mike?”
“I may have him identified.”
“You got a picture?”
“No, that’s the thing. The guy is a ghost where the papers are concerned. Hy Gardner tried every photo morgue in town looking for a pic.”
“Hy Gardner,” he sighed. The little man shook his head and his half-a-smile was bittersweet. “Them was the days.”
“Weren’t they just?” I patted his shoulder. “So now if this is the guy, Billy, you’re gonna have to put the finger on him. Look right at him, and not in a line-up, either, and say yay or nay. You up to that?”
He was grinning big. “If you’re at my side, Mike, I ain’t afraid.”
I glanced around. What few cars were going by kept right at the limit, taking advantage of the lack of competition, their headlight beams grainy with mist, chasing the pools of light they cast on the reflective surface. If it got any colder, they might get an icy surprise. Meanwhile, the sidewalks remained nearly empty but for the three of us in front of Billy’s comic-book-lined stand.
“You mind shutting down to do this, Billy?”
He frowned. It was against his principles to close up early.
I said, “You can’t do business in this rain, anyway, Billy my boy. We’ll grab a cab and go over to the guy’s place.”
His eyes widened. “What, he knows we’re comin’?”