Fifty feet from tire Avenue he looked back at the gathering crowd — and saw a black sedan creeping slowly along behind him, close to the curb. It had a cracked head-lamp and a dented fender.
He broke into a run, pulling out his gun. At the corner is a church; the car caught up to him as he dodged into the blackness of the chapel door. Orange blades of light knifed through the sedan’s windows... Stone chipped from the portals and lead rang against bronze doors.
Johnny steadied himself, fired three times from a crouch as the car passed. The black car swerved suddenly, hurdled the opposite curb and smashed head on into an iron railing; finally flopping on its side.
4
Two men got out of the rear of the car and ran around the corner; one was a short stocky figure, the other thin and taller. The driver of the car did not move; looked as if he were asleep at the wheel. Traffic whistles shrilled; down the block behind him a motorcycle stuttered into rapid-fire.
Johnny tried the church door. It was unlocked. He wandered through the high-vaulted chapel, sat in one of the pews for a minute to pull his shaken nerves together.
Voices came to him from the dim, quiet vault above him... then he realized, with a start, that those voices were real. Here, in the church, close to him. He dropped on his knees and crouched low.
“... all covered... if we can smoke this high-hat baby... what’s his name?”
It was Kippy. Johnny began crawling on one hand and a knee, but he kept his gun in the hand on which he rested his weight and went softly.
“John Hiram Gear... Hotel Metropole... what a break... ” said the other, shrill voice. Johnny cursed through his teeth; they had taken his wallet — he had forgotten that. In his wallet were cards, papers and... a sweet roll of the ready. Well, he had to get them before they got him... and he had been planning to do just that, for Little Joe’s sake, as well as his own...
He reached the door of the anteroom, through which one might have access to the great hall of the church... and the Avenue. The voices had ceased. He got his head around the corner of the door, his gun lifted.
The place was but faintly lighted, but he could see that it was empty. He got to his feet in time to hear the sound of a gently closing door. He walked unsteadily through the minister’s room, down the long, carpeted aisle past the high pulpit, to the high, paneled doors.
By the time he reached the Avenue, there was only a cruising yellow to be seen... and a knot of curious men being shoved back from the ruin of the black sedan.
Johnny hailed the taxi.
“Metropole... in a rush, buddy,” he said.
“My—! fella!” The driver turned around in his seat. “You been hurt. Better let me take you to a hospital.”
“I said... the Metropole. And snap it up. If I wanted to go to a hospital I’d—”
There was a backfire noise and the side window of the cab made a queer tinkling sound: a thousand little cracks radiated from the round hole a foot from Johnny’s head.
“Now... will you step on it?” Johnny swore harshly... the driver galvanized into activity, jerked his clutch in and the car leaped forward.
“Listen... you,” he said in a scared voice, as he wheeled the machine around a corner by inches. “I gotta damn’ good mind to take you around to Forty-seventh Street. By jeeze... I think that’s where you belong... you look as if you’d mixed up in something... ”
Johnny worked his gun free once more, kept it where the jockey wouldn’t see it and chuckled:
“Don’t be a sap. If there was anything wrong with me, would I be asking you to take me to the Metropole? I live there... you can check me up with the doorman. And if you get me there fast, so’s the house doc can fix these scratches of mine... ” he gritted his teeth as his arm jolted against the rocking side of the taxi... “there’s a ten-spot in it, for you.” There was something less negotiable in it, if he refused, Johnny thought, grimly.
“Say, get me right... I’m no yellow-belly,” said the driver. “But I don’t hire out to be shot at... and somebody’s got to pay for that glass.”
Johnny grunted. They were pulling up before the hotel now.
“Coupla stick-up gees, that was. They tried to put the stopper on me once before, tonight... that’s all there is to it.” Johnny tried to make his voice convincing.
“Oh, yeah?” The driver was skeptical. “And don’t forgetsis... I gotta make a report on this... you better be on the up-an’-up, or they’ll be puttin’ the finger on you.” He stopped the car with a jerk.
The doorman was there. Johnny got out of the car, painfully.
“What’s my name, Timmy?” He grinned at the big, jovial, uniformed Irishman.
“Ye don’t even know th’ name of yourself, is it?” The doorman came closer. “And have ye been hittin’ th’ high spots, th’ night, Mister Gear?”
“Hell,” said the driver. “I thought I’d seen your pan before... you’re Johnny Hi Gear, the big dice an’ card boy, uh?”
Johnny said: “Lend me a ten-spot, Timmy.”
Timmy looked wonderingly at the bruised face, the shattered window and the coat-sleeve stuck in the right-hand pocket.
“Sure... sure,” he hastened. “You better git inside, Mister Gear... I’ll take care of the taxi.”
“Give him a tenner,” said Johnny from the revolving doors. “And much obliged.”
He got up to his room, with no more attention than the surprised glances of early morning scrub-women cleaning the lobby, the proffered assistance of a bellhop and the unexpressed curiosity of the elevator-boy.
When he got to his room, he locked the door, got out a cigarette and sat on the bed beside the phone.
“Let me talk to Doc Benter,” he said to the sleepy phone operator. “Hello, Doc... this is Johnny Gear. C’mon over. And bring your kit of tools... Oh, I had an argument with a telephone pole,” he finished with a chuckle. He eased himself down to wait.
Three minutes later there was a knock on the door.
He opened it.
“Positively my last appearance,” said Kippy. “Get back... go on.”
5
The cigarette was between Johnny’s lips. He took a drag on it, blew the smoke in Kippy’s face and walked slowly backward. The other followed closely; shut the door and locked it.
“We was expectin’ you to buzz th’ house-doc,” he said in a flat, brittle tone. “So little Egghead is sittip’ on Benter’s belly, right now.” He backed Johnny into the. armchair before the little writing table, put a hand against his chest and shoved him to a sitting position. “Anyhow, you ain’t gonna need no doc.”
Johnny said: “Hell you say.”
Kippy reached over his shoulder, got the desk drawer open and pulled out paper and pen.
“You’re gonna go bye-bye, sucker. But I’ll deal you a break... you can pick y’r exit.”
“That’s nice.” Johnny thought he knew what the letter-paper meant.
“Yeah. If you act wise, you can take a punch on the chin and let the bulls pick you up f’r the Massetti kill. Just write a little note right now telling ’em how you happened to bump him off with one ’f these Dago footballs... make it plenty strong, too. Then... ”
Johnny grinned.
“—Then you put a rod in my chest and let go — that it?”
Kippy lifted gross eyebrows in mock amazement.
“Don’t be like that. Why should I trig you when you’re a swell out f’r me an’ Egghead? Huh? Be your age.”
Johnny tapped the pen with his left hand.
“No sale. I can’t use my right mitt, at all.”