I took a stool at the bar, had a beer, and was right on their heels when they left. They walked to another hotel, got separate keys at the desk, and I was waiting for them when they got to the elevators. I eyeballed the room number on her key tab and got his by strolling by as he unlocked his door.
Back in the lobby I studied the bellhops, picked out the most likely prospect, and slipped him a ten. A few minutes later he handed me a card with two names on it. Phony, I figured, but better than nothing.
I went back to my room and tried to piece it together. The setup smelled, I was sure of it. Whatever was going on it was probably the cause of Drake’s tailspin at the plate. The woman looked like she wasn’t above some kind of a hustle and the smoothie she was with was a con artist if I ever saw one.
The answer wasn’t going to come to me without more to go on, I knew that. I picked up the phone and started to dial, but then put it back down. After a few seconds I grabbed it again. What the hell, I smelled an exclusive, and if I was right the newspaper would pick up the tab.
“That you, Marchetti?” I said when a man growled “Yeah?” on the other end of the line. He grunted and it sounded affirmative so I said, “I’ve got a job I need done right away.”
“What’re you doing in town? I thought you were on the road with the team.”
“I am. I’m calling from Cincy. Now here’s what I want you to do—”
I asked him to check out the blonde and her friend without telling him much else. Whatever it was they were up to, I figured they must have started it there at home or they wouldn’t have picked on Drake.
“Who’s paying for this?” he said when I was through.
“Maybe the paper, maybe me.”
He grunted again and told me how tough it would be. I couldn’t argue with that but I knew Nick Marchetti was as good a private eye as you’d find anywhere. When he finished crying the blues I said, “Nick, I want you to hang loose for a couple of days. Check the flights to Cincy and be ready to buzz out here in a hurry.”
“Cincinnati in July? No way, man.”
I chuckled. “It beats Minneapolis in January.”
He complained a little more, told me how many big cases he was working on, and finally said O.K., he’d come if I yelled for help. I told him I’d phone him at noon the next day for a report and hung up, grinning. Big cases, sure. He probably hadn’t left his favorite stool at Clancy’s Bar all month except to sleep. (I had called him at Clancy’s.)
I marvel at guys like Marchetti though. When I phoned the next day he knew more about that pair of hustlers than I could have found out in a month. The woman’s name — her real one — was Teresa McNair and she had served eighteen months for some kind of scam a few years earlier. Nick couldn’t be a hundred percent certain about the guy but his description fit one of Teresa’s cohorts, a two-time loser named Joe Schnell, a small-time grifter.
That didn’t prove anything, but it removed all doubt in my mind that they were pulling something and Drake was the mark. I reminded Marchetti to be ready for a fast trip to Cincy and then sat back and tried to think it through. I didn’t have any luck so I hopped a shuttle to the races at River Downs.
My luck wasn’t any better at the track and I hung around too long trying to get back even. Instead of arriving at the park three hours before game time like I should have, I jumped out of a cab at Riverfront Stadium ten minutes before the first pitch. I ran in the gate, took the elevator to the press box, signed in, hurried to the bulletin board, and began scribbling the lineups in my scorebook.
It took a while for it to soak in that Freddy De Angelo and not Drake was at third base for the Stars. Freddy was O.K. in the field but, like with most utility men, you could add his weight and his waistline and come up with his batting average. I rushed through the rest of the lineup and slipped into a seat next to Brophy.
“What’s the matter with Drake?” I said.
Brophy frowned at me. “Where the hell have you been?”
“At the track. What about Drake?”
“He didn’t show. You’da known that if you’d been here.”
“No kidding!” It was such a surprise I didn’t even think to tell Brophy he wasn’t my babysitter. Ball players below the level of superstar don’t turn up missing when a game’s scheduled. For that matter, not many superstars do either.
“That’s right,” Brophy said. “Nobody knows where he is. They checked back at the hotel but he wasn’t there. Checked the hospitals too, but he didn’t turn up.”
“Cover for me, will you?” I said and walked to the phone at the top of the press box where the Cincinnati publicity director sits. I thought better of it, went down the hallway to a room behind the broadcast booths. You could use the phones there without having half the writers in the press box listening in.
After getting past the bartender at Clancy’s and another “Yeah?” from Marchetti I said, “Grab the next plane out here.”
When I got back to my seat the Reds were still batting in the bottom of the first and already had three runs on the board. If they didn’t snap out of it in a hurry the Stars could quit looking up at the Phillies and start glancing over their shoulders to see who was coming up on them from behind.
I couldn’t concentrate on the game. The press box at Riverfront is enclosed and it’s so tight you can’t hear the crowd unless everyone screams at the same time. If you take your eyes off the field for very long you miss something. It’s a little unreal, almost like watching figures move around on one of those tabletop games. I’m not crazy about it and with my mind on Drake it was intolerable.
“Cover for me, will you?” I said and Brophy looked up, irritated as hell.
“After I write your story for you should I send it over or will you take care of that yourself?” he said.
“I’ll bring you a beer,” I said, and he mellowed a little.
“And a bag of peanuts!” he called after me.
I walked down the corridor to the press dining room, ordered a ham and swiss on rye and a beer. I spotted Joe Tyner, the Stars’ publicity director, lounging on a sofa talking to a couple of Cincinnati front-office people. I walked over, sat down, and said, “Joe, what’s this about Drake?”
“He didn’t show.”
“Hell, I know that. Any idea where he is?”
“If I had one I wouldn’t be sitting here.”
“When was the last time anybody saw him?”
“Turk Macy and Tommy Hartsfeld had lunch with him. Nobody remembers seeing him after that.”
I stood up and walked over to the windows, saw a couple of more Reds circling the bases in eerie silence far below, got Brophy’s beer and peanuts, and went back. At that point it looked like I knew more than anyone else and it sure wasn’t much.
The game was a real yawner to the end. The Stars couldn’t have looked worse if Brophy and I had handled the batting. They were shut out on three hits while the Reds sent eight men across the plate. I made sure I was on the first elevator down to the clubhouse level. I wanted to be back upstairs by eleven so I could phone my paper at a time when everyone would be there.
When we unloaded I was the only one to turn right and head for the Stars’ clubhouse. I squeezed around the bus parked right in front of the door, crossed the tiny lobby, and pulled up short when a guard stuck the flat of his hand against my chest. “No reporters until McGann gives the word,” he said. “He’s called a meeting.”
There was nothing I could do but cuss, turn around, and go back the other way. I’d have to settle for whatever I could get down the hall. Winners are always ready to talk, but I was in too big a hurry to want to hear much of it.