The Mike Hammer Collection Part 16

I picked up my beer, finished it, waited for him to finish his, then followed him out. We went back through the press section of the paper, took the service elevator up and got out at Hy's floor. Except for a handful of night men, the place was empty, a gigantic echo chamber that magnified the sound of our feet against the tiled floor. Hy unlocked his office, flipped on the light and pointed to a chair.

It took him five minutes of rummaging through his old files, but he finally came up with the photos. They were 120 contact sheets still in a military folder that was getting stiff and yellow around the edges and when he laid them out he pointed to one in the top left-hand corner and gave me an enlarging gla.s.s to bring out the image.

His face came in loud and clear, chunky features that bore all the physical traits of a soldier with overtones of one used to command. The eyes were hard, the mouth a tight slash as they looked contemptuously at the camera.

Almost as if he knew what was going to happen, I thought.

Unlike the others, there was no harried expression, no trace of fear. Nor did he have the stolid composure of a prisoner. Again, it was as if he were not really a prisoner at all.

Hy pointed to the shots of the survivors of the accident. He wasn't in any of those. The mangled bodies of the dead were unrecognizable.

Hy said, "Know him?"

I handed the photos back. "No."

"Sure?"

"I never forget faces."

"Then that's one angle out."

"Yeah," I said.

"But where did you ever get hold of that bit?"

I reached for my hat. "Have you ever heard of a red herring?"

Hy chuckled and nodded. "I've dropped a few in my life."

"I think I might have picked one up. It stinks."

"So drop it. What are you going to do now?"

"Not drop it, old buddy. It stinks just a little too bad to be true. No, there's another side to this Erlich angle I'd like to find out about."

"Clue me."

"Senator Knapp."

"The Missile Man, Mr. America. Now how does he come in? "

"He comes in because he's dead. The same bullet killed him as Richie Cole and the same gun shot at me. That package on Knapp that you gave me spelled out his war record pretty well. He was a light colonel when he went in and a major general when he came out. I'm wondering if I could tie his name in with Erlich's anyplace."

Hy's mouth came open and he nearly lost the cigar. "Knapp working for another country?" "Knapp working for another country?"

"h.e.l.l no," I told him. "Were you?"

"But-"

"He could have had a cover a.s.signment too."

"For Pete's sake, Mike, if Knapp had a job other than what was known he could have made political capital of it and-"

"Who knew about yours?"

"Well-n.o.body, naturally. At least, not until now," he added.

"No friends?"

"No."

"Only authorized personnel."

"Exactly. And they were mighty d.a.m.n limited."

"Does Marilyn know about it now?"

"Mike-"

"Does she?"

"Sure, I told her one time, but all that stuff is seventeen years old. She listened politely like a wife will, made some silly remark and that was it."

"The thing is, she knows about it."

"Yes. So what?"

"Maybe Laura Knapp does too."

Hy sat back again, sticking the cigar in his mouth. "Boy," he said, "you sure are a cagey one. You'll rationalize anything just to see that broad again, won't you?"

I laughed back at him. "Could be," I said. "Can I borrow that photo of Erlich?"

From his desk Hy pulled a pair of shears, cut out the shot of the n.a.z.i agent and handed it to me. "Have fun, but you're chasing a ghost now."

"That's how it goes. But at least if you run around long enough something will show up."

"Yeah, like a broad."

"Yeah," I repeated, then reached for my hat and left.

[image]

Duck-Duck Jones told me that they had pulled the cop off Old Dewey's place. A relative had showed up, some old dame who claimed to be his half sister and had taken over Dewey's affairs. The only thing she couldn't touch was the newsstand which he had left to Duck-Duck in a surprise letter held by Bucky Harris who owned the Clover Bar. Even Duck-Duck could hardly believe it, but now pride of owners.h.i.+p had taken hold and he was happy to take up where the old man left off.

When I had his ear I said, "Listen, Duck-Duck, before Dewey got b.u.mped a guy left something with him to give to me."

"Yeah? Like what, Mike?"

"I don't know. A package or something. Maybe an envelope. Anyway, did you see anything laying around here with my name on it? Or just an unmarked thing."

Duck folded a paper and thrust it at a customer, made change and turned back to me again. "I don't see nuttin', Mike. Honest. Besides, there ain't no place to hide nuttin' here. You wanna look around?"

I shook my head. "Naw, you would have found it by now."

"Well what you want I should do if somethin' shows up?"

"Hang onto it, Duck. I'll be back." I picked up a paper and threw a dime down.

I started to leave and Duck stopped me. "Hey, Mike, you still gonna do business here? Dewey got you down for some stuff."

"You keep me on the list, Duck. I'll pick up everything in a day or two."

I waved, waited for the light and headed west across town. It was a long walk, but at the end of it was a guy who owed me two hundred bucks and had the chips to pay off on the spot. Then I hopped a cab to the car rental agency on Forty-ninth, took my time about picking out a Ford coupe and turned toward the West Side Drive.

It had turned out to be a beautiful day, it was almost noon, the sun was hot, and once on the New York Thruway I had the wide concrete road nearly to myself. I stayed at the posted sixty and occasionally some fireball would come blasting by, otherwise it was a smooth run with only a few trucks to pa.s.s. Just before I reached Harriman I saw the other car behind me close to a quarter mile and hold there. Fifteen miles further at the Newburgh entrance it was still there so I stepped it up to seventy. Momentarily, the distance widened, then closed and we stayed like that. Then just before the New Paltz exit the car began to close the gap, reached me, pa.s.sed and kept on going. It was a dark blue Buick Special with a driver lazing behind the wheel and as he went by all the tension left my shoulders. What he had just pulled was a typical tricky habit of a guy who had driven a long way-staying behind a car until boredom set in, then running for it to find a new pacer for a while. I eased off back to sixty, turned through the toll gate at Kingston, picked up Route 28 and loafed my way up to the chalet called The Willows and when I cut the motor of the car I could hear music coming through the trees from behind the house and knew that she was waiting for me.

She was lying in the gra.s.s at the edge of the pool, stretched out on an oversized towel with her face cradled in her intertwined fingers. Her hair spilled forward over her head, letting the sun tan her neck, her arms pulled forward so that lines of muscles were in gentle bas-relief down her back into her hips. Her legs were stretched wide in open supplication of the inveterate sun wors.h.i.+pper and her skin glistened with a fine, golden sweat.

Beside her the shortwave portable boomed in a symphony, the thunder of it obliterating any sound of my feet. I sat there beside her, quietly, looking at the beauty of those long legs and the pert way her b.r.e.a.s.t.s flattened against the towel, and after long minutes pa.s.sed the music became muted and drifted off into a finale of silence.

I said, "h.e.l.lo, Laura," and she started as though suddenly awakened from sleep, then realizing the state of affairs, reached for the edge of the towel to flip it around her. I let out a small laugh and did it for her.

She rolled over, eyes wide, then saw me and laughed back. "Hey, you."

"You'll get your tail burned lying around like that."

"It's worse having people sneak up on you."

I shrugged and tucked my feet under me. "It was worth it. People like me don't get to see such lovely sights very often."

Her eyes lit up impishly. "That's a lie. Besides, I'm not that new to you," she reminded me.

"Out in the sunlight you are, kitten. You take on an entirely new perspective."

"Are you making love or being clinical?" she demanded.

"I don't know. One thing could lead into another."

"Then maybe we should just let nature take its course."

"Maybe."

"Feel like a swim?"

"I didn't bring a suit."

"Well . . ." and she grinned again.

I gave her a poke in the ribs with my forefinger and she grunted. "There are some things I'm prudish about, baby."

"Well I'll be d.a.m.ned," she whispered in amazement. "You never can tell, can you?"

"Sometimes never."

"There are extra suits in the bathhouse."

"That sounds better."

"Then let me go get into one first. I'm not going to be all skin while you play coward."

I reached for her but she was too fast, springing to her feet with the rebounding motion of a tumbler. She swung the towel sari-fas.h.i.+on around herself and smiled, knowing she was suddenly more desirable then than when she was naked. She let me eat her with my eyes for a second, then ran off boyishly, skirting the pool, and disappeared into the dressing room on the other side.

She came back out a minute later in the briefest black bikini I had ever seen, holding up a pair of shorts for me. She dropped them on a chair, took a run for the pool and dove in. I was a nut for letting myself feel like a colt, but the day was right, the woman was right and those seven years had been a long, hard grind. I walked over, picked up the shorts and without bothering to turn on the overhead light got dressed and went back out to the big, big day.

Underwater she was like an eel, golden brown, the black of the bikini making only the barest slashes against her skin. She was slippery and luscious and more tantalizing than a woman had a right to be. She surged up out of the water and sat on the edge of the pool with her stomach sucked in so that a muscular valley ran from her navel up into the cleft of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, whose curves arched up in proud nakedness a long way before feeling the constraint of the miniature halter.

She laughed, stuck her tongue out at me and walked to the gra.s.s by the radio and sat down. I said, "d.a.m.n," softly, waited a bit, then followed her.

When I was comfortable she put her hand out on mine, making me seem almost prison-pale by comparison. "Now we can talk, Mike. You didn't come all the way up here just to see me, did you?"

"I didn't think so before I left."

She closed her fingers over my wrist. "Can I tell you something very frankly?"

"Be my guest."

"I like you, big man."

I turned my head and nipped at her forearm. "The feeling's mutual, big girl. It shouldn't be though."

"Why not?" Her eyes were steady and direct, deep and warm as they watched and waited for the answer.

"Because we're not at all alike. We're miles apart in the things we do and the way we think. I'm a trouble character, honey. It's always been that way and it isn't going to change. So be smart. Don't encourage me because I'll only be too anxious to get in the game. We had a pretty h.e.l.lo and a wonderful beginning and I came up here on a d.a.m.n flimsy pretext because I was hungry for you and now that I've had a taste again I feel like a pig and want it all."

"Ummmm," Laura said.

"Don't laugh," I told her. "White eyes is not speaking with forked tongue. This old soldier has been around."

"There and back?'

"All the way, buddy."

Her grin was the kind they paint on pixie dolls. "Okay, old soldier, so kill me."

"It'll take days and days."

"Ummm," she said again. "But tell me your pretext for coming in the first place."