Mac looked startled. Ed Byerly said: “Easy, gumshoe. If you’re looking for trouble—”
“Shut up,” I said. “Go some place else. If you’ve got some trouble, start unloading it. If you haven’t, beat it.”
There was one of those silences. Byerly was glaring at me, and Mac was making some inarticulate sound.
Byerly stood up, finally. He said: “You talk pretty rough for a little guy, Hawkshaw. I’ll be seeing you again.” He threw a half dollar on the table and stalked out.
I smiled at Mac. “I’m sorry I was rude to your friend. But it’s a hot day, and he was so damned crude. Where’d you get friends like that, Mac?”
Mac shook his head. “Look, Jonesy, you hadn’t oughta blow up the way you did. It ain’t like you. Ed’s a windbag and all that, but he’s no punk. He ran with the roughest boys in town, back during Prohibition. You shouldn’t take chances like that.”
The constant shadow, I thought. “You’re right,” I said. “I don’t usually let guys like him get me. But he was waiting here for me, wasn’t he? He was asking questions about me before I came in.”
Mac’s mouth was open. “How’d you know that?”
“Because when you told him my name, when you told him I had an office over the cigar store, he knew I was a detective. I haven’t much of a sign up there. You must have been talking about me.”
Mac wiped off the table top with a rag. “O.K. So we were. He didn’t know you were a friend of mine. He and I did some business back in the old days, and he figured I’d be the guy to pump, I suppose.”
“What’d he want to know?”
Mac straightened out a chair. “Oh, what it really amounted to, he wanted to know if you could be had. Bought, that is.”
“I see,” I said, though I didn’t. “And you, no doubt, told him of my unimpeachable standards.”
Mac went back to the bar. “Matter of fact,” he said, “I told him just about anybody could be bought, that it was mainly a matter of the right price.”
I stared at him, but he wasn’t looking my way. I said: “I’ll have my coffee, now.”
“Coming right up,” he answered.
Another customer came in after that, and Mac proceeded to get involved in a discussion of the merits of Bruce Woodcock and Billy Conn. I turned my thoughts to this morning’s business.
This would be a twenty-four hour job, undoubtedly, and I’d need some help. I thought of Jack Carmichael. Jack had had a lot of bad luck, since he’d opened his agency. Some mess over a woman, a woman with connections. But Jack was a good operative. Besides which, he was into me for a couple hundred. I’d get some of that back. The doc was paying me five a day over my standard rate, and he probably hadn’t meant a twenty-four hour day.
I decided to look up Jack. But first, I wanted to see Doc Enright. Doc was a friend of mine; he’d give me the low-down.
Doc’s office was over on Atwater near Vine. It was a big office with a lot of windows, but Doc’s name was on only one of them. That ethical he is.
He was busy, this warm day, but not too busy to see me. He’s a short, fat gent with an angelic smile. He’s a rough man in a poker game.
He said: “Some repugnant disease brings you here, no doubt. But you can rely on my discretion.”
“Don’t give me that quack-quack,” I said. “I’m here for information.”
“Free, no doubt.”
“I’ve been hired,” I went on, “by one of your colleagues. Relying on your self-asserted discretion, I will reveal his name. It’s Dr. Curtis Randolph.”
His face stiffened, and he studied me sharply. “Well?”
“Well, yourself. I wondered about him, that’s all.”
Doc studied his hands, rubbing them. Then he looked up again at me. “Maybe in the top five in America for surgery.” He paused a moment, his eyes thoughtful. “You relied on my discretion. I’m relying on yours now. How long Dr. Randolph will keep his license is controversial. He’s squashed two malpractice suits, but they were some time ago.”
“What’s his specialty?” I asked.
“It was plastic surgery, then. Some think it might still be his specialty, but not for the public, generally.”
“Criminals?” I said.
Doc Enright smiled that angelic smile of his. “Jonesy, I’ve already told you more than any respectable doctor should. I’ve told you this because I know you and have a deep respect for your standards and your work. I will see you again, and next time don’t bring any embarrassing questions with you.”
I left him and went out to the Dusy. When I started her, she chuckled, in that nasty, mechanical way she has when I’m perturbed. I ignored her.
I drove over to Jack Carmichael’s office, but nobody was there. There was a note on the door — Out for Lunch. I went down to the Dusy to wait.
Malpractice, Doc Enright had said. In plastic surgery, that could be horrible. That would be motive enough for murder. There was a chance the shadow had more than one agent gunning for Randolph.
There must have been a definite threat, to bring Dr. Randolph down to my office. If it was mental, if it was as nebulous as he would have me believe, he wouldn’t be taking a trip, today, without some protection. It was some human he feared, and dealing with criminals, it could be any one of a number of potential killers.
I always get the easy ones, I reflected. I always get the clean, simple cases.
A Chev club convertible was stopping at the curb behind me now. In my rear view mirror, I saw Jack Carmichael lean over to kiss the blonde behind the wheel.
Then he stepped from the car.
He saw me and came over as the Chev gunned off. He was waving at the blonde.
I said: “You do all right, don’t you?”
“This time, it’s different,” he told me. “With this one, it’s wedding bells. If I can rustle up a few honest dollars.” He was a tall, engaging sort of lad, dark and casual. He opened the door of the Dusy and slumped into the seat beside me. “You want something on account, no doubt, Jonesy.”
“Not quite,” I said. “I got a job that’s a little too much for one man. I thought we could make some kind of deal.”
“If it’s honest,” he said, “and doesn’t involve physical labor, you came to the right guy.” He shook his head. “This love is a wonderful thing, Jonesy, you know that? It’s got to be honest.”
“Would I be handling it if it weren’t?” I asked.
He grinned. “Well, probably not. Let’s have it.”
I told him what it was, omitting any reference to the information Dr. Enright had given me. I told him what I thought would be a fair division of the spoils, including that portion of his pay I wanted on account.
He nodded when I was through. “Fair enough,” he said. “And I’m not forgetting the two hundred, Jonesy. Or the good word you put in for me with the Chief when the boys down at headquarters were out for my scalp.”
It was Devine who’d been out for his scalp. And any time I can buck Devine, I do. We have a reciprocal agreement; he hates my guts and I hate his.
I said: “O.K., I’ll take the night shift, seven to seven. I can sleep days, even in this weather.” I thought a moment and added: “I’ll phone you after I see Dr. Randolph tonight. You’ll be at home?”
He nodded. “I’ll make it a point to be.”
I left him, and went back to the office. There, for lack of anything better to do, I drank a bottle of beer, and sat near the window, watching the kids play ball.
A little later, I turned on the radio and listened to the Yanks. But St. Louis had too much for them that day and I turned it off.