The thin lips tightened, but Lewes said nothing.
“What’s the sense, Shivy?” Mike was mildly persuasive. “Why take a rap for a mug you hardly know? A guy that’d turn you up as soon as he’d eat breakfast...”
“Talk sense, shamus.”
“The Homicide boys’ll be talkin’ sense to you with a rubber hose, Shivy. They’ll want to know where you get them marked ten-buck Federal Reserve notes; the ones Schultzman had the bank fix up this afternoon. Maybe you’ll understand that sort of sense.”
The laugh which came to the thin lips was forced.
“Be ya age, Irish. I don’t know any Schultzman. I ain’t got a tenspot in the world, an’ I been here since four o’clock — see?”
Mike finished the drink.
“That’s your song,” he said sorrowfully. “The boys at Center Street will line you up against the witnesses who saw you in the heap and watched you drive away; Schultzman’s woman will identify the rat who shot her husband. You’ll be charged as an accessory, and you’ll get just as black as the punk who did the kill — once the juice is on.”
“Hell with you, you fat slob,” snarled Lewes. His fingers trembled as he tightened the knot of his necktie. Also, he glanced at the phone. It was a wall-instrument, with no chance for privacy.
Mike left without a good-bye, waited outside the Vesuvius in a nearby doorway, saw his man sneak through the side door, walk rapidly away.
Half a block behind Lewes and on the other side of the street, Hansard drifted along as unobtrusively as the shadows that concealed him.
Shivy Lewes looked over his shoulder, nervously, every block. Finally he stopped to study a store window which reflected the street behind him — then he vanished up a brightly lighted staircase, above which flashed a neon sign:
Mike gave him time to check his hat; then he followed up the stairs, paid the fifty cents admission.
He saw a long hall, dim under orange-shaded bulbs — a chocolate rhythm unit and a dozen couples doing the shag. At the far end of the room was a railed-off enclosure with little tables and a bar.
At one of these tables sat Shivy with a flat-faced, broad-nosed youth with greasy hair and dead-fish eyes. Mike knew the other by reputation. Augie Sado, trigger-boy for the Calini mob, was no snow-drifter or booze-fighter. A calculating killer, a money murderer. So Hansard kept his hands in plain sight as he walked down to the table...
“Ah! There!” he smiled.
“Jeeze! You get in my hair, gumshoe. Why don’t you peddle your papers?” Lewes was white with rage.
Augie sat impassive.
“Don’t say that.” Mike sat down. “We’re all pals, ain’t we?”
“Who’s your wise friend?” Augie stared at Hansard’s chin.
Lewes spat on the floor... “No double-talking dick is a friend of mine.”
Augie licked his lips... “What you after, louse?”
“Just wanted to give Shivy here a tip. I just learned they got the numbers of them tenspots, so watch your step.”
“What tens?” The rod-man spoke tonelessly.
Mike looked surprised... “Ain’t Shivy told you? Some cheap gun knocked off a bird named Schultzman an’ walked off with twenty tens the bank marked up for him.”
Sado slumped down in his seat; his dead-fish stare went from the plainclothesman to Lewes.
Shivy bent low over the table... “You goddam liar,” he exclaimed. “Try-in’ to shake down on th’ boss. Two yards you got from Schultzman... you told me you didn’t get a dime.” He started to get out of his chair.
“Sit still!” The whisper was a command. A pudgy hand flashed to a coat-lapel, stayed there.
Mike sighed, put both hands on the table. Shivy watched the hand at the lapel, wiped beads of sweat from his forehead.
“Stand up! Close together. One yelp, you get it. Walk! To the washroom— now!”
One look into the staring eyes brought Mike to his feet, started him walking. Augie meant business.
Three men strolling to the washroom caused no comment in Girland. The clarinet said “Woe-woe-woe” as Augie closed the door.
Lewes blubbered... “Lissen, Augie you can’t do it, Augie. Give it to th’ dick, Augie — not to me... I’m with ya, Augie. F’ God’s sake, Augie... don’t...”
Mike thought fast. No use playing for time. Only way out was a window... they were up one story. Well, a broken neck couldn’t hurt more than a slug in the belly. Thank God the window was open!
Shivy was bawling now. Augie had the automatic out of his shoulder holster. Four steps to the window was about right, he figured. Mike gave the sobbing Lewes a smashing shove in the back, right into the muzzle of the automatic... then he turned, dived.
He heard a high-pitched scream, a crashing roar and then he was in the air. A sickening moment of dropping through space, a roaring blackness, a sensation of floating — then sinking...
He tried to move his head — it weighed a ton. He opened his eyes, groaned at the splitting ache in his head. Slowly his brain started to function... something about Augie — Shivy — the gun — the window. He had jumped through a window and he was alive! He spat out bits of gravel, licked at a warm wetness, recognized blood. His legs felt numb — maybe he had broken them. He stirred heavily.... Then he wasn’t dreaming. There really was a weight on his neck. He gathered all his energies, heaved to his knees.
The weight rolled off, fell with a sickening thur beside him. He put out a tentative hand, felt warm flesh and grimaced in the darkness at the sticky wetness of his fingers.
Painfully he got to his feet, took a step, tentatively... and crouched in fear. There was nothing under that foot but air. He got a match out of his pocket, lit it. He was at the edge of a low roof, a dozen feet below the washroom window. He looked up, blew out the match quickly. Suppose Augie was waiting up there to take a pot-shot at him! But the washroom was dark. There was no sound of the swing band.
He ventured another match. There was only one bullet hole, but it was exactly between Shivy’s eyes.
Mike crawled to the edge of the roof, got a grip, swung over and dropped. He felt as if his head would jounce off his shoulders when he hit the ground, but he stayed on his feet.
He kept on them until he stumbled into a saloon, where he mumbled something about a fall, a nosebleed. He got three drinks under his belt, washed up, and put a cigarette between puffed lips.
Then he climbed into a cab and said, “Merrit Lakemin Social Club.”
It wasn’t a club; yet, after its fashion, it was quite social — to the right people. No one knew who Merrit Lakemin was, but he certainly had nothing to do with the pool, billiard and bowling parlors which masqueraded under his name.
Those who know their upper East Side simply call it “Jack Calini’s place.” There is a nice little bar, a couple of poker and black-jack rooms, and on the top floor — according to rumor — private apartments wherein Calini’s friends or enemies are entertained or looked after, as the case may be.
Mike climbed the stairs to the second floor wearily. No one paid much attention to him. Augie was not visible, which relieved Mike considerably.
“Where’s Jack?” he asked a desk-man.
“Back there.” A nod indicated the bar.
The plainclothesman strolled in casually, said “Hi” and “Hello” once or twice, and found Jack Calini sipping a glass of Three Star. He was a short, squat, swarthy man with the face of a prize fighter, the mind of a shyster and the manners of a head waiter.
“ ’Lo, Mike. What’s wrong?” he grinned genially.