The Mammoth Book Of Roaring Twenties Whodunnits Part 27

"Why didn't he just call me?"

"'Cause he don't have no telephone where he is at, and he don't want to go outside of where he is at."

"Well then, why didn't you just call me?"

"I did," the Crusher pointed out. "But I didn't want to tell you nothing on the phone, 'cause how could I be sure it was you?"

"Makes sense," Bra.s.s agreed. Then his eyes narrowed (trust me on this). "Say, did the Dutchman's boys do this to you?"

"You might say that," the Crusher agreed.

"You must owe Madigan a lot, if you'd take a beating like this for him," Bra.s.s said.

Eisen shook his head, then groaned and stopped trying to shake his head. "Nope," he said. "I don't care one way or the other, 'cept I hate to see a guy get a raw deal."

"But you didn't give him up."

"It's like this," the Crusher said. "You let one gang of hoods beat something out of you, and pretty soon they'll all be trying it. It's the percentages."

"Right," Bra.s.s agreed. "The percentages."

"So you'll go talk to him?"

"Give me the address."

"One-Twelve East Eighty-Eighth, off Lexington in Manhattan. The name over the doorbell is Benchman. Ring twice, then wait maybe half a minute and ring three times, and he'll buzz you in. Don't let yourself be followed."

"Say," Bra.s.s said, "what do you take me for, an amateur?"

The Crusher croaked out a sort of laugh, which might have been an answer, and Bra.s.s got up to leave, saying he'd be back to see how the Crusher was doing.

"I'll be here for the next little while," the Crusher a.s.sured him.

Bra.s.s pulled his Auburn 8 Speedster over to the side lane on the Brooklyn Bridge and got out to inspect a front tire. The drivers behind him honked and beeped and swore colorful oaths, but none of them stopped or tried to stay behind him. He crossed Ca.n.a.l Street over to the West Side and went up Broadway to 86th Street, where he crossed through the park back to the East Side, stopping briefly in the park to admire the trees. By now he was sure that no one had managed to follow him, even if they had tried.

One-Twelve East Eighty-Eighth was a brownstone tenement like all the other brownstone tenements on the block. Bra.s.s parked the Auburn in front of the house and scanned the sky for signs of rain. The overcast was increasing, but the rain would probably hold off for a while longer, so he trotted up the steps to the front door without bothering to put up the car's canvas top.

He found the b.u.t.ton for 2B. Benchman, gave the secret signal, and was buzzed in. The building was old, but respectable. The stairs complained under the threadbare carpet runner, but the railings were polished to a shine.

The door to apartment 2B was cracked open a hair when he reached the landing, and Bra.s.s could see an eye peering through.

"Why don't you look through the peep hole?" Bra.s.s asked the eye. "It's not quite as obvious."

The door pulled open. "'Cause you can't see nothing through the peep hole, that's why," said Madigan, who stood in the doorway in a gray bathrobe, and oversized black slippers, looking like a giant pouter pigeon. "The mirror or whatever is busted, and all you can see is a little strip of floor right in front of the door. If I could get everyone to write their names on their shoes, then I could use the peephole. You're Bra.s.s, right? The newsy?"

"That's me."

"Yeah," Madigan said, squinting at him. "I recognize you from around. Come on in." he stepped aside, and Bra.s.s entered the apartment.

The living room was decorated in early French brothel. The wallpaper was some kind of flocked red flower pattern, with an occasional yellow b.u.t.terfly; the furniture was some dark wood with overstuffed cushions on the chairs and couch; the drapes were red and cream, with heavy red ta.s.sels; and the pictures on the walls were Victorian studies of spa.r.s.ely-draped maidens in heavy gold frames. The only thing missing was an upright piano being played by a short, stout Negro in a red and white suit.

In place of the piano was an oversized Stromberg-Carlson radio with a built in record player on top. At the moment a record was spinning out the sound of a Dixieland jazz band playing something that sounded like "Oh, What a Girl!" but probably wasn't. Lumps went over and turned the music down. "Glad you came, Mr Bra.s.s," he said. "I got what you might call a problem."

"So the Crusher told me," Bra.s.s said.

"I been working for the Dutchman," Lumps said, "doing a little collecting, and a little persuading, and a little of this and that."

Bra.s.s nodded.

Lumps disappeared through a doorway for a moment, and returned clutching a bottle with no label and two gla.s.ses. "Have a slug, Mr Bra.s.s," he said, pouring a generous double shot into each gla.s.s. "It's the real stuff. Canadian. Right off the truck."

Bra.s.s took the proffered gla.s.s and sniffed suspiciously.

"Say, didn't I tell you?" Lumps said, looking offended. "It's Canadian."

"Your word's good enough for me," Bra.s.s agreed, and took a swig. "Well, how nice," he said. "It's been pre-watered for my convenience."

Lumps frowned at this for a second, and then decided to ignore the remark. "Somebody told the Dutchman that I'm planning to sing to the McWheeter Commission," he told Bra.s.s. "Which is not so; and besides I got nothing to sing about even should I choose to warble. But Flegenheimer, the no-good s.h.i.t that's Dutch Schultz's real name, you know: Arthur Flegenheimer, the no-good s.h.i.t don't bother asking me or nothing, he just puts the spot on me."

"You have my sympathies," Bra.s.s said. "But what can I do about it?"

Lumps dropped into one of the overstuffed chairs and waved Bra.s.s over to the couch. "I figure I got two choices," he said. "First I gotta tell you that I ain't never squealed on n.o.body; it ain't in my nature."

The music stopped, and the ma.s.sive mechanical device lifted the arm from the record, hiccoughed twice, and turned itself off. "I'll take your word for it," Bra.s.s said into the silence. "It doesn't much matter to me one way or the other."

Lumps looked at him as though he'd just said he didn't care whether or not the Yankees won the series. "It matters," he said. "If a guy ain't got his integrity, what has he got?"

Bra.s.s raised his gla.s.s in a silent toast to Lumps's integrity. "Good point," he agreed.

A girl in a fuzzy pink peignoir that almost reached to her knees appeared in the inner doorway. Her overly-blonde hair hung in ringlets framing her oval face, and her overly-large brown eyes were set in rings of kohl. She leaned against the doorframe and peered blearily into the room. "It's too light," she complained. "Turn some of it off, for the love of mike."

"It's the sun, Ellen," Lumps told her. "You can't turn it off."

"Yeah? Well, who asked for it? What's it doing up this early?"

"It's almost noon," he told her.

"Yeah? Well, like I said. Say, who's this?" She leaned forward to try to get a better look at Bra.s.s.

"This is Mr Bra.s.s," Lumps told her. "He's a reporter for the World."

Bra.s.s only winced the slightest wince, and decided not to try to explain the difference between a reporter and a columnist.

"Fancy that," Ellen said, "a reporter for the whole world. Ain't that something." She advanced across the room one foot in front of the other, hips swaying, like a tipsy cat, holding her peignoir not quite as closed as possible with her left fist, and extended her right hand to Bra.s.s. "Ellen Benchman, your reportership," she said, curtseying and not quite falling over as Bra.s.s took her hand. "Want to do a story on an up and coming young actress?"

"She's in the Scandals," Lumps volunteered.

"Third girl from the left in the chorus," she said. "But I'm understudying the second girl from the left."

"Is that a step up?" Bra.s.s asked, smiling.

"It's two steps to the left," she told him. "'Scuse me now, I've got to shower and like that. I'll be back shortly." And with the slightest hint of a moue and a subtle wiggle of her peignoir, she exited the room.

"Quite a, ah, young lady," Bra.s.s commented. "Is she your girlfriend?"

Lumps stared after the retreating pink vision. "And what if she is?" he demanded.

"Then this is the first place the Dutchman and his boys will come looking for you," Bra.s.s told him. "The fair Ellen could get hurt."

Lumps thought it over for a second. "Nice of you not to mention what would happen to me," he said. "But as it happens, Miss Benchman is my sister-in-law, which is not generally known on account of my wife don't a.s.sociate with my professional acquaintances. She is the lady friend of Sammy the Toad Mittwick, who is keeping her in this apartment what he fixed up himself. Ellen, that is. Not my wife."

Bra.s.s looked more closely at the room's furnishings and pursed his lips. "Good taste, Sammy has," he said. "Does Sammy know you're here?"

Lumps managed to look insulted. "What are you suggesting?"

"Sammy the Toad is a bagman for the Dutchman," Bra.s.s said.

"You ain't telling me anything what I don't already know."

"He might sell you out," Bra.s.s said gently. "The notion of honor among thieves is greatly overrated."

"Yeah, well, I know something what you don't," Lumps said. "Namely that Sammy ain't feeling too congenial toward the Dutchman himself. He's got something worth selling to the Commission, which I don't, and he's thinking of going to talk to McWheeter himself. Only the Dutchman don't know it."

"What's he got?" Bra.s.s asked.

"Ask him," Lumps said. "If I knew, then I'd have it too which I don't."

Bra.s.s nodded. "Makes sense," he said. "So, what help can I be to your efforts to disentangle yourself from this situation?"

Lumps thought that over for a minute. "Like I said, I figure I got two choices," he said. "First I can convince the Dutchman that I ain't going to squeal, no way, or second I can go to the McWheeter Commission myself and get protection in return for what I got to tell them."

"Two choices," Bra.s.s agreed. "Either swear that you'd never squeal, or squeal."

"Only both of them are no good," Lumps continued. "I got a Chinaman's chance in h.e.l.l of making it home alive if I try to see Flegenheimer, the s.h.i.t, to tell him anything. And McWheeter's going to want something in return for protection, and I ain't got nothing to give him."

"So, what can I do?" Bra.s.s asked.

Lumps turned and thumped Bra.s.s on the arm with his index finger. "You're my third choice," he said.

Bra.s.s looked at him dubiously. "And just what must I do to receive this honor?" he asked.

"There's a little town in Nebraska where the Dutchman would never think of looking for me at. I need for you to help me get there."

"Help how?"

"Maybe to the extent of springing for a couple of G's, 'cause what I ain't got is cash. And in return, I'm going to tell you things that you can write down and use in your newspaper."

"I thought you didn't know anything," Bra.s.s said.

"I don't know anything for the McWheeter Commission; they want names and dates and amounts of money and like that. Which I ain't got. But if you want to know how bootlegging works from the inside, how the stuff is shipped in from Canada or England or Cuba, how it's distributed, and that, then I'm your man. And I'll throw in with some great stories about moving the stuff around the city and hijacking and leg breaking and like that. The kind of stories that read good, like that Damon Runyon stuff, but don't get n.o.body specific arrested."

Bra.s.s thought it over. "It might be good for a couple of C-notes," he allowed. "I'll get you to a rewrite man to take down your story, and if it's at all of interest, I'll spring for train fare and a little over."

"Say!"

Ellen was standing in the doorway, wearing a blue skirt that showed just as much leg as a good girl ought to show, but only if she had great legs, and a light blue sweater that was just too tight enough, and white stockings, and it was her "say" that had just stopped the conversation.

"What's that?" Lumps asked.

"If Mr Bra.s.s here is going to help you, why then he should help my man. Sammy's in a bind, and he's got a lot more to tell than you, if words is what's gonna help get him outta this mess."

"Sammy's not on the spot," Lumps said. "n.o.body's on the look for him carrying a Thompson in a violin case."

"Not yet," Ellen said, "but they're gonna be if he don't figure a way out pretty fast." she turned to Bra.s.s. "He's worried, Mr Bra.s.s, he's worried for his life."

"He didn't tell me nothing about this," Lumps objected.

"He don't go around advertising it," Ellen said. 'He don't want word getting back to Mr Schultz that being what he's worried about."

"It ain't likely I'm going to be speaking to Mr Schultz anytime soon," Lumps told her.

"What does Mittwick want," Bra.s.s asked, "money to get out of town?"

"Money ain't his problem," Ellen told him. "Or, let me say, money is his problem, but not because of the lack of it."

Lumps stood up, and then dropped back down again. "Don't tell me he's been skimming," he demanded, his voice tight.

"Not exactly," Ellen said.

"Not exactly? Say, I better get outta here. If the Dutchman sends some of his boys after the Toad, they'll find me instead. And that won't be good."

"Hey, listen," Ellen said. "I wouldn't do that to you. Mr Schultz don't know about Sammy yet and don't call him 'the Toad,' it ain't respectful."

Bra.s.s stood up. "I could listen to this for hours and hours," he said, "but maybe we all have better things to do."

"Yeah, that's right," Ellen agreed. "I got to get to work. You going to help the Toad, Mr Bra.s.s?"

"Hey, that ain't respectful," Lumps mocked her. She stuck her tongue out at him.

"I'll have to know what he wants before I can tell whether or not I can help him," Bra.s.s told her.

"Yeah," Ellen agreed, wrapping a fur boa around her neck. "Well, he wants to talk to the Commission, that's what he wants. And then he wants he and I should go away somewhere."

"Yeah," Lumps said. "Like maybe Mars?" He stood up. "I better get dressed so's I can get outta here." And he lumped out of the room.

"Why does Mittwick want to talk to the Commission?" Bra.s.s asked Ellen. "And what has he got to tell them?"

"He'd better tell you that. He's meeting me after the show. Come around backstage at around ten thirty, and I'll introduce you. Or if you like, I can leave a ticket for you at the box office."