“He can blow,” Johnny said flatly.
“Don't say that,” Lieutenant Dameron winced. “I've been lying awake nights sweating out his giving us the slip ever since we found out he's not the real Frederick. Do you realize we don't even know who he is, legitimately? I've got to pick him up. Fifteen yards start and he'd melt out on us like an ice cube on a summer day.”
“If you haven't got him staked out like a uranium field you ought to lose him,” Johnny said.
“So he's staked out. Accidents happen. Look at that orange-headed female I'm plowing up the streets for now. I've got to pick this Frederick up. I want his prints.”
“That's a little different tune than you were singin' last night. Last night you needed a little help.”
The big man nodded. “I could use some, but I can't wait. I've got a boy upstairs has forgotten more law than most judges ever learn, and he's given me a couple of angles. I've got a chance to make it stick.”
“He'll spit in your eye,” Johnny predicted. “Besides, there's a better way, Joe.” He grinned into the wary glance behind the desk. “Let's introduce 'em to each other over there.”
An exhaled breath sounded gustily in the room's quiet. “Impossible!” Lieutenant Dameron exploded the word.
“What the hell's impossible about it? Outside of you sayin' so like God Almighty?”
“Just a minute, Johnny,” Detective Rogers thrust in soothingly. “Suppose we did what you suggest. What would happen?”
“Who the hell knows? Let nature take its course. It ought to flush a little of this mess out into the daylight.”
The sandyhaired man shook his head patiently. “I wouldn't try to convince you that we always go by the book, but a police action has to be a little more integrated than what you have in mind.” He glanced at the lieutenant who was tipped back in his chair with his eyes closed, the red face thoughtful. The little silence was broken when the chair tipped forward with a bang and the face set itself in stern lines.
“No. We can't do it. It's extra-legal. It's dangerous.”
“Ahhhh, let me call him, Joe. I can probably convince him he should give himself up.”
“You needn't put any extra effort into being a wise guy, Johnny. I'm telling you: don't do it. I can't stand wrong guesses and further complications. Don't even think of it.”
“You think you can stop me?”
“I can make you wish you'd never thought of the idea, and by God, I will. I'll take you off the street if I have to make a law. Don't you cross me.”
“Blow it outta your barracks bag, Joe. You think you're scarin' anyone?”
“Johnny, this is important to me!”
“So you sit here an'-ahhh, forget it!” He lurched to his feet and started for the door.
“Johnny-!”
He slammed the door heavily behind him.
In his own room he stared at himself in the bureau mirror over the rim of the double shot-glass of bourbon in his hand. He threw back his head and tossed down the contents, shivered, and solemnly inspected himself again in the glass.
“Well, Killain? You figure it out. Man told you not to do something. Did he mean it, or did he say it figurin' you'd do it anyway to spite him? An' if that's what he figured, you sure you want to do it? Go ahead, Killain. Figure it out.”
He refilled the shot-glass and sat down in his easy chair.
He lifted the glass to the light, studied its amber contents, and drank deeply. After a moment he put down the glass and got to his feet again; he walked into the bathroom and splashed water on his face. He groped for a towel, dried himself off, threw the towel aside, and walked back into the living room.
The telephone rang as he walked to the door; he ignored it. In the corridor he turned right and walked steadily on past the service elevator to the end suite in the hallway.
At the door he knocked sharply three times, folded his arms, and waited.
Chapter XI
The man who was not Ronald Frederick opened the door.
“You owe me a drink, Freddie,” Johnny informed him.
The little manager was neatly dressed in a light gray suit with the ever-present breast pocket handkerchief prominent as usual. For the count of ten the mild eyes behind the steel rimmed spectacles studied his visitor, and then he nodded, and stepped back. “I… ah… recall that I do. Come in.”
Johnny preceded him into the sitting room which was fitted out with a desk in its center, and his host scrutinized him carefully as he followed. “Are you sure that you-ah- need it now?”
“Right now.”
“Have a chair, then.” He stood beside his desk as Johnny seated himself in the armchair to one side. “Scotch?”
“Naah.”
“Bourbon, then?”-*
“Okay.”
Johnny watched as bottles were removed from a wall cabinet and two liberal drinks poured. Ronald Frederick looked at his guest. “Chaser?”
“Some other time.”
The little man handed Johnny his glass and put his own down on the desk. He walked unhurriedly to the door, turned the bolt, and slipped on the chain latch. His manner as he returned to his desk was politely courteous. “I'm assuming that we wish no interruptions?”
“You're assumin' well today.” Johnny lifted the drink in his hand. “To your beautiful blue eyes, Freddie.”
The manager smiled faintly as he seated himself and picked up his own drink. He leaned back comfortably in his desk chair. “Since my eyes don't happen to be blue-”
“Got to be,” Johnny said flatly over the rim of his glass. “San Francisco says Ronald Frederick's eyes are blue.”
The slender face behind the desk seemed to tighten up feature by feature. “San Francisco?”
“Yeah. Let's cut out the horsin' around, Freddie. I want a piece of your action here.”
The little man pursed his lips, seemed to consider for a moment, then leaned forward smoothly, slid open a desk drawer, and emerged with his right hand gripping a revolver from which the long snout of a silence projected. He sat back again with it lying casually across his lap. “You're so impetuous at times, Johnny,” he said apologetically. “You'll understand, I'm sure.”
“Yeah. That the gun you measured Frenchy with that night in the kitchen?”
Ronald Frederick picked up his drink carefully in his left hand and sipped at it, his face impersonal.
“Not very smart of you keepin' it around here, Freddie. Suppose Joe Dameron had picked you up any time in the last few days, like he'd halfway planned. Could you've explained it? They got the slugs outta Frenchy, you know.”
The silence from behind the desk lengthened. Johnny threw back his head and drained his glass, and at his first movement the revolver in the chair opposite lifted itself three inches and then lowered again as he settled back. “You didn't know the stuff was in the hotel already, did you, Freddie?” Ronald Frederick delicately removed the handkerchief from his breast pocket, flipped it open, and Spread it on his knee. He wiped his fingers deliberately by rubbing them briskly over the handkerchief, one hand at a time, the free hand in turn hovering over the gun butt. “It's funny, in a way, Freddie. Dumas hires you to do a job for him here and sets you up in business. All of a sudden to save your own neck you have to knock him off. The man with the stuff arrives; he knew Frenchy, and he's waitin' for Frenchy to contact him. Gonna be quite a wait. The man doesn't know you. You don't know him, but I know both of you.”
The voice from the opposite chair was quiet and unemotional. “You seem to have acquired a good deal of dangerous information.”
Johnny grinned at him. “You know I haven't got that kind of brains, Freddie. This is right from the horse's mouth. If Joe'd had even a halfwit to put you near the kitchen that night, your tail woulda been sizzlin' in the bacon grease long ago. How much more time you think you're gonna get?”
“I trust just time enough.” The manager lifted the gun in his lap, balanced it appraisingly a moment, and gently returned it again. “As you said a moment ago, let's eliminate the-ah-horsing around. I'm sure you didn't come here without a proposition!”