The tires screamed in agony as they wore themselves out on the hard concrete roadway. Kay felt the steering wheel ram into the softness of her body. There was a loud cracking sound as Sue’s head hit the dashboard with terrible force. The gun went off, spitting red flame into the redhead’s middle, and Kay felt the car lurch to one side. Her ears were filled with noise and her eyes with light, flashing, blinding light. And then there was blackness — nothing but the complete blackness of unconsciousness...
It was several months later, when Kay was out of the hospital, that Don Davis was asked again to go to Albany. This time he took Kay with him as his bride. He took her because she wanted to go and because they never could get her in front of a microphone again. There was something about mike fright that got her.
Die, Gypsy, Die!
by Richard E. Glendinning
Death had struck faster than the pretty fortune-teller’s cards could predict — and still faster would be the fierce Gypsy vengeance Lieutenant Daniels had to prevent.
Lieutenant Oscar Daniels of Homicide knew better than to tell the driver to take the squad car down the side street. Inside of five minutes, the hoodlum kids in the neighborhood — and how so many Gypsy facilities could crowd into one city block was beyond Daniels’ understanding — would have the car stripped of everything portable. And if the driver raised his voice in protest, he’d be stripped along with the car.
“Pull up here, Pete,” Daniels said. “I’ll walk in.”
“Thank the good Lord,” Pete said, drawing a deep sigh of relief. “I remember one time—”
“Save it,” said Daniels, getting out of the car. “I’ll be back in ten minutes.” He walked to the corner and stopped long enough to savor a last moment of comparative quiet. Then, his feet moving reluctantly, he rounded the corner.
The noise and confusion cuffed his ears instantly, and he wondered if his pay was worth all this. The trip into the Gypsy settlement on the lower east side was senseless in any case. Getting a Gypsy to talk to a policeman about a crime was like asking the Sphinx to say something about Antony and Cleopatra.
But, Daniels thought, looking down the street, somewhere in this warren there was a young man named Michael, and Daniels wanted him for murder. This was no case of petty thievery which could be settled quickly and quietly by King Georg, the head of his Gypsy tribe. The king, who functioned almost like a ward boss for his people, could square many things. Murder was something else again.
Daniels pushed through the swarm of kids who blocked the sidewalk. Ignoring the jeers and taunts of the adults who leaned from every window and choked every front step, he walked on to the house in the middle of the block where King Georg, his wife and six kids lived. The royal family’s palatial quarters consisted of a single room on the third floor. Daniels took the rickety steps two at a time, anxious to get the interview started and done with.
The king himself answered Daniels’ knock. He was an affable man with a huge stomach, sloping shoulders and a drooping mustache. He wore gaudy earrings, patched and faded trousers and a plaid shirt, but he seldom wore shoes because his feet, allergic to exercise in any form, were always giving him trouble.
“Come in, Lieutenant,” King Georg said, bowing stiffly. “We are honored.”
“Sure, Georg,” Daniels said. He stepped in and nodded to the king’s chunky, fortune-telling wife. Three of the king’s kids were in the room but they suddenly vanished as if by magic, and Daniels knew that everyone on the street would soon be informed that a cop was calling upon the king.
The king offered Daniels a glass of fiery-looking wine, but the detective, who had been here before, waved it away.
“Who would do this thing to Sonya?” King Georg asked, mopping his swarthy brow with a red handkerchief the size of a crib sheet. “Such a brutal thing.”
“You know who did it,” Daniels said, watching the king’s dark eyes.
“Not a Gypsy,” said the king.
“Michael.”
“Not Michael.”
“He and Sonya were going to get married.”
“Michael is a fine boy.”
Daniels laughed. “He never worked a day in his life. He and his family have been on relief for years.”
“He loved Sonya.”
Daniels came close to the king and frowned down at him. “Sonya called off the wedding. She threw him over.” He read the surprise in the king’s eyes. The police weren’t supposed to know about the broken engagement. “You people are too emotional, Georg.”
“Why don’t you ask Michael about it?” the king said, staring up at a corner of the ceiling.
“You know damned well why I don’t. You’re hiding him out.”
“How could one man hide from all the fine policemen in this great city?”
“Listen,” Daniels snapped, “if every cop in town crowded around him at the same time, Michael would not only get away clean but he’d pick every pocket on his way out.”
King Georg beamed proudly but Daniels straightened his face with a stony glare.
“This isn’t a joke,” said Daniels. “A girl, Sonya, one of your own people, was beaten to death with a length of pipe. Her murderer knew her routine, knew what time she closed up her mitt-reading shop and came in just as she was closing for the night. When her body was found by the cop on the beat, she had forty bucks on her.”
“Such a lot of money,” murmured King Georg. “But why must Michael be—”
“Because,” Daniels interrupted, “robbery wasn’t the motive. For another thing, Michael was seen leaving the place.”
“No!” the king protested. “He wasn’t up there.”
“You asked him and he told you no, but he lied. He was seen by Gus Raynor, the cop on the beat, the same one who found Sonya.” Daniels thumped the king’s chest. “I want Michael.”
King Georg stared down at the dirty floor for a moment, then looked up at Daniels. “How did Raynor know it was Michael?”
“He’d seen the boy before, knew who he was. Then, last night about five-forty, he saw Michael hurrying up the steps of the shop. A little later, Raynor came along and saw the door opened down there. He went in and found Sonya.”
“And he saw no one but Michael leave the place?”
“Only Michael. Raynor comes on duty at four. Between then and five-forty Michael was the only one around there.”
The king went to the window and looked down at the street. When he turned back to Daniels, his eyes were sad. “Gypsies are not like other people. They may lie to others but they never lie among themselves. Michael has said that he was not in Sonya’s store yesterday. Your policeman says he was. Who do I believe?”
“I leave that up to you,” Daniels said quietly, knowing that the king would have to solve it in his own way. “I know which I believe. I’ll tell you something else. If you can believe the policeman, then you must also believe Michael is a murderer.”
“I can see that,” said the king.
“I still want Michael. If you don’t bring him to me within twenty-four hours, I’ll come in here with a squad of men and I’ll rip this street apart.”
“And if, as you say, Michael has lied to me,” said King Georg, “you won’t find him on this street. Look first at the river’s edge.”
“Bring him in,” Daniels ordered.
King Georg shrugged his shoulders non-committally. “His first reward will be expulsion from the tribe — Mahrimé. After that, who knows?”
The king smiled suddenly. “But if I decide he isn’t lying, it will be hard to find him in this city. Your twenty-four hours may pass, and then an endless row of days.”
Daniels walked to the door and flung it open. “I want Michael for murder. If I don’t get him, I’ll hound you to death. Your people will be arrested for vagrancy and fraud, your women for fortune-telling, your children for truancy and delinquency. I’ll get enough on every mother’s son of you to keep you in jail for a long time, and it’ll happen so fast you won’t have time to steal a gallon of gas to get out of town.”
The king bowed graciously. “We have been plagued by experts before, Lieutenant.”
“Twenty-four hours,” Daniels warned. He slammed the door and stormed down the stairs to the street.
When he got back to the squad car, Daniels was still fuming with rage.
Pete turned in his seat and grinned. “What’s the matter, Lieutenant? They lift your badge?”
“Very funny,” Daniels groused. “Let’s get uptown. I want another look at that shop.” He knew the Gypsies, knew they were constitutionally opposed to believing anything a policeman said, but if he could find some supporting evidence that Michael had been in Sonya’s store late on the afternoon she was killed, King Georg would be forced to accept Raynor’s identification.