“I was afraid of that. He didn’t make any more talk about a settlement?”
“We didn’t discuss that. I may say, he spoke of your actions since you’ve been here. He seems to think he and I could have talked the matter over and settled everything between ourselves to mutual advantage.”
“What do you think?”
“I’m inclined to think the same way.”
I thought Macintosh should be in the lobby by then. I asked: “You carry any insurance?”
“Certainly.”
“Made out to your wife?”
“Of course.”
“She’s in your will?”
“Why naturally. Connell, what are you leading for?”
I said: “You dope! I’m trying to show you the reason Crandall has turned friendly. He’s decided to go whole hog or none. If you’re knocked off, I won’t have a client and I’d go home where I belonged. Mama would collect more dough than she would from the settlement and everybody would be ahead. Everybody but you, that is. I’d win because I’m either going nuts or going out feet first. It would give me an out, you getting killed. Crandall would be ahead and so would your wife.”
“You must be crazy, Connell! Crandall wouldn’t consider a thing like that. The man was very friendly, I tell you. You’re talking about murder, man.”
I said: “The maid was murdered, wasn’t she? They can only hang you once. Though it’s gas they give you in this state.”
He mumbled something more about me being out of my head, then spoke clearly. “Just hold the wire. There’s somebody at the door.”
I waited for about five minutes. Then Macintosh’s voice said: “You, Connell?”
“Yes.”
“Everything’s okey. I’ll see you.”
I said: “You damned fool! I didn’t want him to know I put you on him.”
He laughed and said: “He doesn’t. He put up an argument and I bopped him on the side of the face with a sap. I didn’t want to do it but he went off his nut and took a pass at me. I won’t take that from any man, much less a man I’m trying to help. I’ll see you when I get back.”
“Will you make it early? I want to go out.”
He laughed again. “Naughty, naughty. You’re playing with fire.”
“What’s that mean?”
He said: “Oh hell! We’ve been keeping an eye on you, sort of. Sometime I’ll tell you about the Spanish girl that stuck a knife through my arm once. Remind me, will you.”
He hung up and so did I. There’s darn little that goes on in a town of this size that the cops can’t find out about if they’re interested. My Spanish wonder apparently was known. She was the type, at that. To be known.
Chapter Seventeen
The landlady brought me dinner at seven and was over her crying spell by then. She was even a bit ashamed of it. She put the tray down and said: “Lamb chops and green peas tonight. And like it. I shouldn’t have blown up the way I did this afternoon but I’d been thinking about it all day. It got me down. I’m getting old; I just can’t take it.” I said I was sorry and that I naturally would say nothing.
She looked at me thoughtfully and said she didn’t think I would. And then, still thoughtfully: “The place is still staked, if it means anything to you. Different man, but still on the job. You that hot?”
“It isn’t for me.”
“Was that shooting on the street meant for you?”
“Where’d you hear that?”
She said: “I’ve got ears. There’s talk, if you know where to listen for it.”
“Now look! I’m going out tonight. For a ride. Just to get out of the room. If I thought this was for me, would I do that? I’m not worried; I don’t think it’s for me.”
“You’d be safer staying in. That’s what Mac told me when you came.”
“I’d go nuts looking at four bare walls.”
She shrugged and said: “It’s your dice, mister man. I hope you like lamb chops and peas.”
“I won’t go out until after Macintosh comes. He’s coming up by and by.”
“He always comes up on this date. He hasn’t missed in years.”
She looked at me in a funny way and all of a sudden I got an idea. I said: “Say, listen! Is he some relation of yours?”
“In a way,” she said. She laughed, but it didn’t sound at all funny. “I married him once. We quit it when the girl was two. I couldn’t stand being married to a law man, I thought. I’d been on the other side too long, you see. It’s a different life. I couldn’t take it and we quit and I got the girl. Now do you see?”
“More all the time.”
“Mac’s helped with her, right along.”
“I figured him for the kind that would.”
“I didn’t tell you this, either. The man he shot was named Rucci. Gino’s brother. There were four of them; all in the same business. Gino and Luigi are left. He got one of them then, like I told you, and the third one happened to be killed in a liquor raid down in southern California.”
“Was Mac working prohibition then?”
She nodded. “Out of the Los Angeles office. The four brothers had always worked together, sort of. Mac knew that.”
I said: “Macintosh is quite a man.”
She just nodded again and left.
He came up, looking grey and grim, an hour later. He planked himself down in a chair and said: “Well, your man’s in jail and it’s a wonder to me you can’t hear him this far. He cried like a baby about it. He claimed I couldn’t do it and that was when the jailer was locking the door on him.”
“It won’t hurt him.”
“You really think he’s in danger?”
“I really do.”
“What about yourself?”
“I’m keeping out of circulation pretty well.”
“Maude tells me you’re going out tonight.”
“I’m going nuts staying inside. I’m keeping off the streets.” He shook his head. “I think you’re a damn fool to do it with this business coming to a head. Kirby’s worried; he’s afraid there’s nothing going to come of it.”
“There may not be. I won’t start anything until I’m sure of what I’m doing. I think it’ll be started for me, Macintosh.”
“This girl of yours. What d’ya know of her?”
“Not a hell of a lot. She’s just company.”
“She’s a friend of Rucci’s, Connell. If that means anything.”
“It means a lot. If she’s right, she won’t do me any harm. If she’s wrong, I may be able to use her.”
“What about your friend Kewpie Martin?”
“He’s okey, as far as I know. At least I thought so until he came up here with one of those yeggs I battled with out at the Three C. I didn’t crack to him; I don’t see how he could hurt me.”
“You can watch him, anyway. Maude says the place is staked.”
I laughed. “Who’d stake it? You and Kirby and my partner know I’m here. That’s all. If Crandall knew it, I’d have got some action before now. I think I would, anyway. I’ve come in and out pretty quiet; today was the first time out in daylight, since I moved in. It’s possible, of course.”
He said, speaking slowly: “I’m an older man than you, Connell. I’ve been an officer just about all my life and I’ve mixed with a lot of people. I’ve never made a mistake when I gave the other fella credit for more brains than I thought he had. Or for a lucky break. That figuring the other guy for a chump is the worst thing you can do.”
“I’m not figuring Crandall for a chump. Not ever.”
“And he’s with Rucci. Rucci’s smart. Plenty smart.”
I kept my face straight and said: “I figured him for it all the time.”
He looked up at the ceiling and said: “I’ve been trying to get something on the bastard for the last eight years and haven’t done it yet. It wants to be legal, if possible. I’ve been law too long to go the other route.”