McHugh, page 7
McHugh got up, yawned. “The longer you look at a thing like this, the more angles you see. Some of them get pretty weird. So long, Syd.”
He went to a neighborhood bar and took his time with a bottle of beer and two shots of straight bourbon. His eyes looked at the wet circles in the dark wood of the bar without seeing them and felt himself sinking into what Loris referred to as his mad-as-a-bat mood. McHugh did not feel at home in the detective business; he hated the slow digging, the picking up of a fragment of information that might or might not be of importance, melding it with a lot more of the same, stirring, stewing and screwing around in general.
Police work was teamwork, he knew, and he was by nature a lone operator—good at slipping into a strange country fast, saying the right things to the right people, finding a way to head off a bad situation, pulling an agent out of a hot spot. But no damn good at all when it came to finding one man in his home town.
Hell, he couldn’t even find a three-and-a-half-ton automobile.
McHugh signaled for another beer and thought he might have trouble finding his butt with both hands on a sunny day.
He drank the beer and another shot and decided it was because he didn’t really give a damn. It was something he got into on account of Nadine, and now he couldn’t figure whether Nadine herself gave a damn or not.
He took a dime from his change, went to the phone booth at the rear of the bar and called Delsey at the Department of Motor Vehicles. He gave him the make and license number of Stover’s car and said, “This is a Federal case, chum. Hot it up with the electronic monster in Sacramento and get me a list of all the owners that buggy had since Mr. Pierce whacked it together. Call me back here inside half an hour and you get a night on the house at The Door.”
The bartender had bought him a round by the time the call came through.
It looked like another bum idea.
McHugh spent ten minutes writing down sixteen names and addresses and dates of transfer. The names didn’t include Dexter Orland.
The only one he knew was Gabrielle Risdon.
He finished his beer, staring at the electric clock behind the bar. It was a quarter after noon. He used another dime, called the FBI and asked for Nick Foote.
“You’ve had a cover on Orland because of some missing gold. When and where was the armored car knocked over, and where did the banditti get theirs?”
“To hell with you, McHugh,” Foote growled.
“That’s the spirit.”
“Again. To hell. In a hand basket” He heard papers shuffle, and, after a moment, Foote said, “It happened in the town of La Habra, on Highway One-oh-one just a couple of miles from the L. A. County line in Orange County. April twenty-sixth, nineteen thirty-six. Suspects shot and killed by a posse the following day near Laguna Beach. In those days, La Habra was a wide spot in the orange groves and Laguna had nothing but a lot of sand and starving artists, with a few rich characters thrown in for the artists to eat off. Want the names of the guys who did the job?” “Never mind. They’re a long time dead.” McHugh hung up and left the bar.
The office was in a grimy building three blocks from City Hall. A number and William Brixey were painted in black on the frosted glass door. McHugh shoved the door open and went in. There were two men in the first room, one behind an old desk and the other leaning against the edge of it. They had been reading newspapers. Now they put the papers down and regarded McHugh with unblinking eyes.
He let the door slam shut and returned the stares. “Tell Willie Waddle he’s got a visitor.”
The one who had been sitting stood. He looked considerably larger than McHugh, a man with a broken nose and dirty blond hair. “Nobody here by that name, dad. Why don’t you go out and come in again and try all over?” McHugh was removing his topcoat. He tossed it across the sagging leather couch opposite the desk and walked up to the men. “The name is McHugh, and I’m in already. You punks want to try putting me out?”
“Mickey,” the one behind the desk said.
Mickey was somewhat smaller than Jug Benich. He had black eyes and a thin line of black moustache. His suit was cut to show off the width of his shoulders, and there were sharp creases in the sleeves. He reached for McHugh with a hand that was calloused and hairy.
McHugh sidestepped and punched him in the nose. It was a very satisfying punch. There was a crack of bone breaking, the jellyfish feel of mashed cartilage and a spurting of blood as Mickey Drinkwater was lofted over the desk. He landed hard on the floor behind it as Benich got to McHugh.
He hit McHugh with a right hand that spun him around and drove him back against the sofa. The back of his knees hit the end of the sofa, and McHugh sprawled across it. The left side of his chest felt caved in. He rolled as Benich kicked at his face, caught the heavy foot and twisted. Benich yelled and hopped on one leg. McHugh twisted again, and Benich toppled.
Drinkwater was up again and driving toward him, a leather-covered sap in his right hand. Blood darkened his shirt and the front of his suit, and the pupils of his eyes were narrowed to pinpoints. McHugh jerked his head back as the sap came down. It glanced off the meat of his left shoulder with a little bomb of pain as Benich got his feet under him.
The two of them fell on McHugh, punching, kicking, using knees and elbows. McHugh felt his lower lip split and begin to bleed, and he thought perhaps he should have gone out and come in again. He got an arm loose and put all of his weight behind a punch that landed between Benich’s eyes. The big man bellowed, and McHugh could see the flood of tears. He jerked away from Drinkwater, kicked and felt a kneecap give. Drinkwater screamed and went down again.
Benich moved like a drunken man. The heavy arms pawed the air aimlessly as he shuffled toward a spot a couple of feet to the right of McHugh. His eyes rolled and looked in different directions. McHugh’s left arm was numb. It flopped at his side as he chopped with the edge of his right hand at the side of Benich’s neck.
Benich cakewalked in a half circle and fell. The impact shook the room.
From the corner of his eye, McHugh saw Drinkwater move. The hood was on one knee, and he was digging under his left arm, bringing out a heavy automatic. McHugh pivoted, kicking. The toe of his shoe smashed Drink-water’s wrist and the gun spiraled across the room and skidded under the sofa. He grabbed Drinkwater by the collar, hauled him up. The man winced as his weight went on the injured knee. McHugh shoved him toward an inner door.
“Get Willie,” he barked. He backed his words up by a well-aimed kick that left the imprint of his shoe on Drinkwater’s pants.
Drinkwater slammed against the door. The latch snapped, and he careened into the next room.
His scream was chopped off by the shots. There were two, so close they seemed like one shot and its echo.
Drinkwater slumped forward on a dark red carpet, almost the same color as his blood.
McHugh went in fast with his gun drawn. He jumped across the body and snapped, “Nice job. Now drop it!”
Willie Waddle dropped the gun. It was a shiny, short-barreled revolver of the type once known as a banker’s special. His heavy underlip jerked, and he gaped at McHugh from behind horn-rimmed glasses.
“Good God...” he mumbled. He continued to stare, with his gaze shifting between McHugh and the dead hoodlum.
McHugh scooped the gun from the floor. He stepped into the outer office, collected Drinkwater’s gun and found one on Benich. Benich groaned as McHugh’s hands went over him. He stirred. McHugh hit him behind an ear with the butt of his gun and left him.
He returned to Willie Waddle. Willie was slumped in an oversize, leather-upholstered chair. His eyes were on the puddling blood. McHugh thought it had been a long time since he had seen such an oddly constructed individual.
Brixey had scraggly black hair atop an egg-shaped head. Short arms hung from narrow shoulders. What he lacked in girth at the top he more than made up for around the middle. He looked to be all butt and belly. He made McHugh think of two hundred pounds of lard jammed into a hundred-pound barrel. At the moment his complexion was about the color of lard.
“Who…what do you want?” The words came out in a flaky croak.
“The name is McHugh.” He broke the guns open, tossed the shells away and threw the guns after them. “I want a little information, Willie.” He inclined his head at Drinkwater’s body. “I mean to get it.”
The fat man’s hands fluttered. McHugh saw a large stone in a gold mounting glitter on the little finger of his right hand. Willie Waddle rocked back in the chair. He wiggled around, plucked a handkerchief from the breast pocket of his black suit and began to polish his glasses. He blinked myopically at McHugh.
“I don’t know what you have in mind, Mr—McHugh.” McHugh crossed the room and sat on the edge of the desk. “What do you want with Johnny Stover? Start there.”
Willie Waddle shook his head and managed a weak smile. “Sorry. He’s not one of my clients. I don’t know him.”
McHugh shook his head sadly. He went around the desk fast, and his right hand ripped the front of Brixey’s shirt open. A spare tire of fat spilled over the waistband of his trousers. McHugh’s fingers closed on the fat, tightened and twisted.
Willie Waddle screamed and writhed in the chair. McHugh kept the pressure on while he counted slowly to ten. Perspiration boiled down Brixey’s face as McHugh said, “I don’t have much time, fat man. But enough to make you hurt. Believe it.”
“Okay—okay.” Brixey’s plump fingers caressed the blotchy place on his belly. It was darkening fast. “All I know is I was commissioned to approach this Stover. I’m not lying when I say I don’t know him. I talked to him on the phone a few times. We never got together.”
McHugh raised his hand and saw Brixey cower. “Do better, Willie.”
Brixey’s mouth trembled, and he swallowed hard. “Look, McHugh, do you know who I am?”
McHugh slapped him. The force of his hand slammed Brixey’s head back against the chair. “Yeah. Willie Waddle. The fixer. Come on, fat man. Try fixing me. I could use a good laugh.”
Brixey rubbed the red marks McHugh’s fingers had left in the sagging flesh of his face. “No—no. I didn’t mean that, for God’s sake. What I mean is, do you know how I work? I make it a point to know nothing except what I have to know. A guy who knows too much can get in trouble. Like here, I know what I asked Stover and what he said to me. I told my client what this was.”
“Suppose you tell me,” McHugh said, smiling. “Don’t leave anything out.”
“It was…ah—“ Brixey’s eyes moved to a calendar on the wall—“some seven weeks ago. I was asked to approach Mr. Stover and buy a car from him. I began...ah…negotiations.”
“Acting for whom?” McHugh demanded.
Brixey shut his mouth and nibbled his lip with yellowish teeth. McHugh raised his hand. “For Mr. Hale. Mr. Howard Hale,” Brixey said quickly.
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
McHugh took a step toward him and Brixey shrank back in the chair. “It’s the truth, McHugh. It wasn’t important for me to know his reasons. Only his wishes.” “Okay.” A small sigh of disgust slipped through McHugh’s lips. “I take it this was a Pierce-Arrow phaeton. And I take it you weren’t successful.”
“So far I have not been. However…”
“However, something scared the pure hell out of Stover. That something could have been goons like you had guarding the cave here,” McHugh said curtly. “He took off, and he took the car with him.”
“That,” Brixey said slowly, “is what I understand. Believe me when I say I haven’t the slightest idea why this is. I certainly didn’t threaten him in any way. In fact, I felt we were headed for a pleasant transaction. One which would have netted him an excellent profit on his investment. Yes, indeed.”
“Now just what would you call an excellent profit?”
“My last offer was eight thousand dollars.”
“Eight thousand dollars is a lot of money to pay for a car that’s a quarter-century old. What’s the matter? Didn’t Stover think it was?”
“I don’t really know what Mr. Stover thought,” Brixey said uneasily. “When I first approached him, I thought I might get it for five thousand or so. He told me he had other possible buyers and also that he couldn’t sell immediately because he’d promised the machine for use on some sort of television show. He indicated he would sell right after that.”
“Instead he powdered out.” McHugh lighted a cigarette. “You wouldn’t have any idea why.”
“No.”
“Suppose he got scared? Suppose he found himself getting pressured?”
“I certainly—”
“You certainly spent fifteen thousand dollars of somebody’s—probably Hale’s—money to pick up some IOU’s he had out. Some monkeys waved these in his puss and wanted to collect. Stover’s been short of cash a long time. The thing for him to do in the circumstances would be raise some before he grew a crop of knots on his head. With eight grand from you he could at least stall the collectors. But he didn’t sell. He blew out.”
“Fenton…” Willie Waddle muttered. His eyes were suddenly hard and cold.
“Fenton didn’t talk,” McHugh said curtly. “Have one of your people at the Hall check and you’ll see he told the dicks he was still holding eighteen grand in Stover’s paper. It happens Stover told his girl about the collectors having these notes. And a little looking showed Fenton had put fifteen grand in a bank account about that time.”
Brixey exhaled slowly. “That’s good to know. I like Frank.”
“So do I,” McHugh said amiably. “If anything should happen to him, I might come talk it over with you.”
Willie Waddle fluttered his hands.
“Keep talking, Willie. When Howie Hale buys a car, I imagine he buys a new one. So who wanted that Pierce?”
“I wouldn’t have any idea.” Brixey managed a weak grin.
McHugh caught him by the right ear, twisted and yanked Willie Waddle half out of the chair. He slapped the pasty face again and let go. Brixey tumbled back into the chair, whimpering.
“You wouldn’t last ten minutes,” McHugh said in disgust. “Let’s quit jackassing around, Willie. Let’s put a few things together. Like Dex Orland being broke a couple of months ago and now getting five bills a week in the mail—for doing nothing. Like Hale being the banker for the organization and spending all kinds of dough to get a freak car. Like a hood getting killed in a girl’s apartment—Stover’s girl.”
“1 don’t know anything about Orland,” Brixey said sullenly. “What’s more, I don’t want to know. Believe me.”
“Nothing? Nothing at all?” McHugh said coldly.
“Just I had a few words with the precinct captain some time back when Orland was getting rousted every time he turned around. It was just a favor I did for a friend, and I don’t mean Orland.”
Willie Waddle was gazing at the stiffening body on the floor again. The blood had soaked into the rug, making it dark and ugly, obscuring the pattern. Willie, McHugh thought, looked like a man who honestly wished he had more information to give so he could get off a hot spot. McHugh shot a glance into the outer office. Benich had not moved.
“I’ll travel on now, fat man,” McHugh said. He ground his cigarette into the rug and moved toward the door.
“Hey!” Willie Waddle was hoisting himself to his feet. The sphere of his stomach jiggled as he came from behind the desk. McHugh decided he did move very much like a duck. A duck with sore feet. Willie wet his Ups and blurted, “What the hell do I do with this stiff?”
McHugh stopped with his hand on the doorknob. “You shot him. You’re the fixer. Figure that one out yourself.” He walked around the unconscious form of Benich and went out.
Chapter 7
The Door had a few early-afternoon drinkers. Benny was at a corner table, working on the books, when McHugh came in. He looked up, grinned and said, “You got a fat Up, boss.”
McHugh scowled. He went to the bar, got a bottle of Scotch and glasses and brought them to the table. “I got a fat head, too, I think.” He poured liquor into the glasses and drank a shot neat The lip burned at the touch of the whisky. He grimaced and did it again. “Anything out of the ordinary?”
“Nothing ordinary ever happens in this dump that I know of,” Benny said philosophically. “When the hell is Loris coming back?”
“Few days, maybe.”
“I hope so. The house is a lot easier to handle with her around. Characters just don’t seem to get out of line much when she’s on the piano.” Benny sipped his drink. “Chapman was in, asked for you.”
“Say what he wanted?”
“Just he might have to go away for a few days maybe. That it looked like his charter here wasn’t showing.”
“Uh-huh.” With a twinge of impatience, McHugh wondered what sort of action was stirring in some remote place. If Bud Chapman was pulling out it meant he was expecting orders. In an old barn carefully made to look like an old barn, an airplane would be getting a new paint job and a new set of numbers. In the next few nights, it would lift its wheels from the runway of an abandoned wartime airfield near a cotton town in the San Joaquin Valley. An intelligence agent, American or foreign, would be aboard, or it might be an outlaw moving on to what he hoped would be a healthier climate. Too bad, McHugh thought. Because if Johnny Stover had been the person who had used his name in contacting Chapman, the sure way to find Stover was wait and let him walk into Chapman’s hands. “Anyone else interesting?”
“The Dutchman,” Benny said.
“Talking?”
“Does he ever?” Benny made an entry in the book and totaled a column of figures. “Just hanging around a lot the last week or so. I mean night and day, like he expected the house to buy a drink any minute.”
“Yeah. Well, buy him one.” McHugh lighted a cigarette, wondering if the Dutchman was part of it or just going about his usual business. The Dutchman’s name was Jan Koolwyk, and he was a free-lancer. McHugh had known him to work as a double or triple agent on occasion. He was not a good agent, but he knew his way around.
