I said, “Get the hell out of my way,” and walked straight at the four of them. The one in front of me looked plenty tough. He put up his fists in the standard boxing position and came up on the balls of his feet and took a couple of dancing steps toward me. I said, “You look a little pale to be Joe Louis,” and slammed a hard right to his chin. He fell straight forward and I sidestepped and caught the next man by his belt and shirtfront and threw him into the pyramided bottles and mirror behind the bar. It sounded like Libby-Owens blowing up.
The remaining pair goggled at me and got out of the way. Not the barman, though. He took one look at the wreckage behind the bar, let out a bellow of rage and pain and charged me head-down. I stepped aside and put out my foot. He tripped and went sprawling into the booth where the blonde was crouched, landing squarely on top of her. I hoped they both would be very happy.
I scooped my gun off the floor and headed for the front door. Just as I got there a blue uniform pushed through a knot of spectators gathered outside and opened the screen. One of New York’s finest — big and wide and handsome. He took one look at the gun in my fist and reached for his holster. I yelled and jumped forward and nailed him on the side of the jaw. The blow spun him in a limp circle and he fell halfway into an open phone booth. A few of the hardier members of the mob outside let out a yell and started to come in after me, but the sight of the gun melted them like snow in Death Valley. I realized, however, that leaving by the front door would be foolish at best, and more than likely ruinous. That left the back way, if there was one, and I headed in that direction.
A swinging door let me into a combination storeroom and kitchen, with a bolted door off that. I shot the bolts and opened the door and stuck my head out for a cautious look around. A narrow alley, crowded with torn papers, overflowing garbage cans and big fat blue-bottle flies buzzing in the hot sun. The stink would have taken top honors from a family of skunks, but it was nothing I couldn’t live through.
Nobody in sight. I slid the gun back under my arm and trotted along the uneven bricks toward Eleventh Avenue, a block to the east, past loading platforms and the rear entrances to the buildings fronting on Thirty-first Street. Most of them had street numbers chalked up for the benefit of deliverymen, and my mind was already made up by the time I reached 774.
A sagging wooden door with four glass panels, three of them broken, the fourth coated with dust and cobwebs. There had been a lock on it once, but that was a long time ago. I peered through one of the broken panes. A dim and dusty corridor led toward the front of the building, with a closed door at the far end.
There was no time for advance planning. Any moment now cops would be pouring into the alleyway with blood in their eyes and guns in their hands. I pushed the door open, getting a complaining groan from rusty hinges, closed it carefully behind me and went quickly along the passageway to the inner door. I listened for a long moment, heard nothing but the faraway mumble of traffic; then turned the knob and gave it a small even tug. The door swung toward me an inch or two and I put an eye to the crack.
He was still there, no more than twenty feet away, in exactly the same position, still gulping down Marx and looking as though it agreed with him.
And between us, in the same wall as the elevator, was the entrance to the building stairs.
As a cause for rejoicing it left a good deal to be desired. Getting to those stairs without the kid seeing me depended on just how strong a hold Marx had on him. Three or tour steps would get me there, but the door had to be opened as well, not to mention the one I was standing behind. Of course, I could always shove my gun in his back, tie and gag him and dump him behind something, and use the elevator. But it would be a hell of a lot better to leave him undisturbed in case the cops came snooping around hunting for me.
I took another minute to study the kid’s position. He was facing three quarters away from me, one shoulder propped against the wall, head bent over the book. To see me at all he would have to turn his head halfway around. No reason for him to turn his head unless I stumbled over my feet on the way.
It went off without a hitch. I was across the open stretch of hall and through the stairway door and had it closed again and my back against it within the space of six heartbeats. Now that it was over with, I had the feeling I could have driven an oil truck past the kid without his knowing it.
I climbed the three flights, found the door at the top unlocked and stepped into the hot dry air of a narrow hall with office doors, closed, lining both walls. None of the frosted glass panels had legends painted on them until I got down to the far end of the corridor. Three of the doors there, side by side, had the words “Anton & Porkov — Importers” painted on them in black, with the additional word “Entrance” on the one in the center.
I was standing there eyeing the center door and wondering if the thing to do was knock first, when a telephone suddenly shrilled behind the door on the left. I froze. A second ring broke off in the middle and the heavy voice of Luke Ritter said, “Yeah?... Not yet, no... Any minute now. He was due in from Mexico City two hours ago... I doubt it, Max. I called her but nobody answered. She probably met the plane... I’ll be right here.”
The sound of a phone going back into its cradle. Some more silence behind the door. Then a chair creaked and another voice said, “That eye don’t look any too good, Luke.” It was a light, smooth voice, almost feminine.
“It hurts like hell,” Ritter growled. “I’d like to get my hands on that bastard for about one minute. One minute’s all I’d need!”
“You make him for a cop?”
“Naw. A cop would’ve pushed his badge at me. I figure him for a private dick trying to get a line on Porkov. He’ll hear about it when he calls me.”
“Any chance of the guy showing up here?”
A dry short laugh. “I sure as hell hope so, brother. The minute he walks into the lobby, the punk downstairs will ring our private buzzer. That’s all the notice I want!”
I went on down to the third of the three doors marked Anton & Porkov and tried the knob. Locked. Nothing was easy for me today. This was an old door, fitting the frame loosely after many years. I reached in behind my display handkerchief and got out the nail file I carried there. It was thin enough for my purpose; I hoped it would be long enough. By pressing the knob hard away from the jamb I was able to slip the point of the file against the slope of the spring lock. It moved slightly, then snapped back with a light, almost inaudible, click. I opened the door. Nothing moved inside. I stepped through and closed it tenderly behind me.
It was a large square room, dim in the afternoon light filtering through a single unwashed window. Heavy wooden packing cases were stacked to the ceiling in two of the corners. A roll-top desk held a clutter of invoices, bills and loose papers. A communicating door was unlocked and I passed through it into the center office. This one held metal files, a desk with a typewriter on the shelf, several chairs, a washstand behind a black lacquered screen in one corner. I could smell dust and, very faintly, a touch of cologne. Another door, closed, led to the first office, with the murmur of voices straining through it.
I went over to it, making sure my shadow wouldn’t appear on the pebbled glass. The voices went on mumbling. The .45 came out, cool and comforting against my palm. I began a slow turning of the doorknob, the way they take the fuse out of a blockbuster. The door gave just enough to tell me what I wanted to know.
I slammed it all the way open with a hard movement of my knee and said, “Merry Christmas, you sons-a-bitches!”