Tough as Nails: The Complete Cases of Donahue From the Pages of Black Mask (10 page)

The man who had come out of the Avalon-Plaza was standing at the far end of the short bar watching the spectacled bartender mix a whiskey-sour. Donahue put a foot on the rail a dozen feet from the man and watched him in the mirror. When the bartender came down the line mopping the bar Donahue said:

“Scotch and soda.”

“Punk night out, eh?”

“Pretty lousy.”

Donahue was trying his drink when the big man ordered another whiskey-sour. The big man wore a voluminous tan polo coat, a brown silk muffler, and a rakish large-brimmed brown hat. His face was big, bronzed and bulged at the eyebrows. His gimlet eyes were hidden in tight folds of flesh, and his mouth was wide and drooped at the corners. When he had drunk half of the second whiskey-sour he turned and rolled to a telephone-booth, closed himself in, talked on the telephone briefly, came out again and finished the drink. He threw a bill on the bar, said “Night,” gruffly and stamped down the narrow corridor, wearing a scowl. Donahue had finished the Scotch and soda. The bartender took sixty cents out of a dollar and Donahue left the bar, pocketing the change.

When he came out into Fortieth Street he saw the big man half a block away heading east. Donahue tailed him to Broadway, where the man climbed into a yellow cab. Donahue boarded a black-and-white, said, “Follow that yellow,” and sat on the edge of the back seat watching. The yellow cab turned east into Thirty-fourth Street, crossed Fifth, Madison and Park; turned north on Lexington and west into Thirty-seventh Street and crawled into the curb on the upgrade. Donahue told his driver to keep going, spotted the three story graystone in front of which the yellow had stopped and told the driver to pull up at the taxi stand at Thirty-seventh and Lexington.

He walked down Thirty-seventh on the left side of the street, watched the right. He was opposite the graystone walk-up when he saw lights appear on the third floor behind windows that had shades drawn all the way down. All other windows were dark—had been dark when the taxi drew up. Donahue walked a little farther down, crossed the street, came back up and climbed six stone steps to an open vestibule door. Stepping into the vestibule, he saw a brass plate with four buttons running vertically beside four niches for name. The top niche was the only one that had no name.

He pressed the top button. A minute later the door clicked and Donahue opened it, looked into a dimly lighted corridor. He stood there, reached out and pressed the button again. He listened, looking at the latch. It began clicking again. When it stopped Donahue waited another minute, pressed it again, still holding the door open. The lock began clicking. Donahue smiled to himself, his eyes narrowed shrewdly. While the lock was clicking Donahue pressed his finger against the button, held it there for half a minute. The lock stopped clicking. Donahue gave the button another short push, then shoved his head into the hall and listened. He heard footfalls somewhere above.

He stepped into the hall, closed the door, went quickly and silently to the rear of the lower hall. He turned and waited in the shadows. The footfalls came down, walked the length of the corridor above, then came down the staircase to the lower hall.

Donahue saw the big man striding towards the hall door. The big man reached the door, drew the curtains aside, peered through the glass. He listened. His actions indicated that he was becoming suspicious.

Meanwhile Donahue was sliding through the shadows, hugging the shadowy base of the staircase. His right hand came out of his pocket holding the Colt’s revolver. He held the gun in front of him and was ten feet behind the big man when he said:

“Suppose you raise ’em, Babe.”

The big man whirled hugely, sucking in a breath, and his right hand tightened on something in the pocket of his coat.

Donahue’s voice was low, clipped—“You heard me, Babe! Get that hand out of your pocket! And get your hands up.”

“What the hell is this?—”

“Those hands, Babe!”

The big man snarled and thrust his big hands upward.

Donahue said, “Get over here… kneel on this lower step.”

“Say you—”

“Get over here!”

The big man lunged, fell to his knees on the lower step.

“Now lie down on the steps.”

“I’ll be—”

“Get down and keep your hands out straight beyond your head. That’s the way.” Donahue went through the man’s pockets, took out an automatic pistol. “Now bring the hands down behind your back—and be nice.”

“You’re sure a careful guy, ain’t you?”

“Pretty careful, Babe.” Donahue clipped manacles deftly on the man’s wrists, then stepped back and said, “Now get up and we’ll go up to your flat.”

“I don’t get this at all, guy.”

“I don’t myself. Maybe we can figure things out. Up you go, Babe.” Donahue prodded him in the small of the back with his revolver, and the man started upward, and Donahue kept the gun against his back as they climbed more stairs and then walked into a room whose door had been left open. It was the front room, the living-room that looked out on Thirty-seventh Street. It was a big room, well furnished, and behind it was an equally large bedroom.

Donahue locked the corridor door, left the key in the lock. The big man had turned and was backing sullenly across the room, big head hunched between massive shoulders. His eyes could not be seen for the puffy rolls of flesh that drew together over them, yet at times there was a faint glint.

Open French doors connected living-room and bedroom, and Donahue went into the bedroom sidewise, keeping an eye on the big man. He pulled open a clothes closet, closed it. He looked into the bath-room. Coming back towards the living-room, he paused in front of a bureau, sniffed. He looked at the things on the bureau. He picked up a crumpled lace handkerchief, put it down, proceeded into the living-room wearing a droll smile.

“Irene wears a nice perfume, Babe.”

The big man growled, “Say, who the hell are you?”

“Who do you think?”

“I don’t think. I don’t know. The bracelets say a dick, but dicks don’t bust into houses alone.”

Donahue said, “I had a talk with Irene and I had a talk with Alfred. They haven’t got it. You must have it.”

“Got what?”

“The bulls are kind of worked up over the Crosby kill, Babe. The guy who killed Crosby got it. I got there late. You were there before me, and Alfred was there after you. I didn’t get it. Alfred didn’t get it. Irene was there, too, but she didn’t get it. You—must have got it.”

The big man knit his brows, chewed on a thick nether lip. His big nose wrinkled. He looked baffled. Donahue was a dark lean man eying him narrowly.

The big man growled, “Come on, guy, lay your cards on the table. Cut out the sparring.”

Donahue smiled bleakly. “I don’t have to lay any cards on any table, Babe. I’m top-dog. You do the laying.”

“Suppose I don’t lay?”

“Suppose you do.”

“I said—suppose I don’t?”

Donahue dropped his voice ominously. “A dick named Roper’s on the job. He’s a hard guy, Babe. I can always reach him by telephone.”

The big man snarled, “You’re a—stoolie trying to step into big time!”

“Okey… then I’m a stoolie. But that’s got nothing to do with what you are, or what I want from you. Every stoolie has his price. You know mine.”

“What do you want?”

“You know what I want. I want the same thing Irene wants, the same thing Alfred wants. They know you carved Crosby trying to get it. I know it too.”

The big man’s face was getting red. His breath rushed hoarsely through wide nostrils and his hands strained at the manacles.

“Did Irene?…” he choked.

“She did after I beat her a while. She said you must have got it when you carved Crosby.”

The big man lunged towards Donahue, brought up against Donahue’s gun. His eyes were shining dagger points in the slits of flesh.

“How the hell did you muscle in on this?”

Donahue smiled. “Open season, Babe…. Don’t shove your belly too hard against this rod.”

The big man sucked in a huge breath, held it, then let it gush out boisterously. “Damn it, I didn’t carve Crosby! Irene’s a liar!”

“Punk, Babe. You called on Crosby, turned the joint inside out and carved him. That’s open and shut. You were seen going in…. Now where is it?”

“I don’t know! I haven’t got it! Irene or Alfred’s got it. And she’s a liar if she said I carved Crosby. I was down there. All right, I was down there. What the hell of it? I was Crosby’s bootlegger. I was before he went to Paris. He called me up when he came back. I brought him around three bottles of Scotch because my runner was out. I never run around with the stuff ordinary. But Crosby was a good buyer.”

Donahue wrinkled his brown forehead. “You might have been his bootlegger, Babe, but you got in on something bigger. You had something to do with this racket the woman and Alfred’re in on. You’re Irene’s boy friend. You and Irene double-crossed Alfred.”

“Say, fella, you know a hell of a lot about this.”

“I get around, Babe.”

The big man tied his face up in puzzled wrinkles. “I’m damned if you’re a stoolie! You’re getting more like plain-clothes every minute!”

“Do you come across, big boy, or do I put through a telephone call? If you didn’t slice Crosby you know who did.”

“So you’re a dick, eh? So you’re a dick?” The big man scowled darkly, snarled, “You can go to hell! If you think I’m a red-hot, you’re all wet.”

The telephone bell jangled. Donahue started towards it, then motioned the big man over.

He said, “Sit down and answer it.”

“Me with manacles?”

“I’ll hold the receiver for you.”

The big man sat down at the library table. Donahue took off the receiver, placed it near the big man’s ear, put his own ear near it.

Irene’s voice said, “Babe!”

Babe said, “Yeah.”

“I’m coming over! I’ve got to see you! I’ll be over in twenty minutes!”

Donahue whispered, “Tell her sure, Babe.”

Babe grumbled, “Sure, come on.”

“Oh, Babe, I’ve had one hell of a time! I’m all in! But I’ll be over—in twenty minutes.”

“Sure, Irene.”

Donahue hung up saying, “This is sure a break, Babe. Now be a strong silent man…. So you and the broad have been two-timing on Alfred all along, eh?”

“——for you.”

“And you think I’m a dick, eh?”

“I don’t know what you are. I’m beginning to think again you’re a stoolie doublecrossing the cops.”

Donahue chuckled drily. “We’ll wait and see what Irene thinks about it.” He took out a key-ring. “I’m going to plant you in that easy chair facing the door. Your hands are going to be manacled in front, and there’ll be a newspaper over them. You stay in the chair, taking it easy: the prosperous bootlegger at home. I’ll be in the bedroom watching you. One step out of turn and you get the works.”

“I’d give a thousand bucks to know just what you are, guy.”

Donahue laughed good-naturedly. “Hell, what a piker you turned out to be!”

The big man growled petulantly, “Jeeze, you’re an aggravating kinda guy!”

When the door-bell rang the man called Babe was sitting in an easy-chair with a newspaper lying across his lap.

Donahue said, “When she knocks, just say come in to her. Don’t get up.”

“You’re boss just now, fella.”

“Okey.” Donahue walked to the corridor door, pressed a brass button on a brass plate beside it. Then he unlocked the door. The entrance to the bedroom was to the left of the corridor door as one came in, and one entering would be unable to look into the bedroom until he had reached about the center of the living-room. The big man sat across the room from the corridor door but faced it squarely. One of the two front windows was directly behind him.

When Donahue entered the bedroom he turned its lights out and took up a position behind a highboy, around whose front corner he could peer into the living-room and see the big man but not the corridor door.

He called quietly, “For the time being, Babe, you’re on the spot. Play ball.”

The big man droned sullenly, “Okey, fella.”

A moment later a light knock sounded on the door.

The big man said, “Come in.”

There was a pause. Then the door banged open.

Donahue saw the big man heave in the chair, throw off the newspaper, open his mouth, start to get up.

A silenced gun popped.

The big man slammed back into the chair snapping out his legs. He toppled with the chair.

Donahue leaped across the bedroom.

Footfalls were hammering down the stairs.

Donahue streaked out into the hallway, looked over the balustrade. The feet were hurrying down the staircase below. Donahue forked the balustrade, shot down backwards, landed on his feet, raced down the next staircase. He heard someone stirring in one of the apartments. He rapped the door as he sped past and yelled, “Man shot on top floor!” He boomed down into the lower hall, burst out into Thirty-seventh Street.

There was a man racing towards Lexington Avenue, hugging the buildings. Donahue started long legs flying, swung south on Lexington. The man was half a block ahead of him. He was a small man, swift as the wind. He was Alfred.

He shot down Thirty-sixth Street, turned south on Third Avenue. The avenue was deserted. Store fronts were dark. An Elevated train threshed by overhead, southbound. Alfred reached the Thirty-fourth Street station, bolted up the stairway. Donahue hammered up behind him. When he reached the platform the train had pulled out. Alfred had crossed the tracks, was rushing through the turnstile on the northbound platform.

Donahue turned and went down the steps he had climbed, crossed Third Avenue and saw Alfred running north, now a block distant. At Thirty-eighth Street Alfred leaped aboard a cruising taxi, disappeared in the back. Donahue yelled, ran out into the street, flagged a southbound taxi.

“Tail that blue cab, bud!” he clipped as he jumped in the back and slammed the door.

The taxi wheeled about in the middle of the block, shifted into high, roared north beneath the Elevated structure. The blue cab made a left turn into Thirty-ninth Street, turned north on Lexington. It went through a red traffic light. Donahue’s cab went through a red traffic light. The blue cab swung left at Forty-second Street, skidded on streetcar rails. Alfred jumped off at Grand Central. Donahue handed the driver fifty cents, dropped off before the cab stopped, galloped on the sidewalk and shoved in through heavy swing-doors.