Nason dropped on the davenport and Rita Jordan said: “Well, now that you woke me up.”
“You a friend of Sam Steig's?” Nason asked easily.
“Maybe.” The girl's manner was at once skeptical and on the defensive.
“Know him pretty well?” Rita Jordan glanced at Walcott. “What is this?” she asked irritably.
Nason took out his shield, flashed it in his palm. The girl said: “Oh,” and her eyes went as round as her mouth.
Nason said: “Who did Steig pal around with?”
“Why do you want to know?” The girl's eyes narrowed again. “What's he done?” Her voice was anxious now, but she turned again to Walcott and tried to make it matter-of-fact. “A fine pal you turned out to be.”
Nason said: “Who'd he run with? He must have some friends.”
“Certainly he has friends.” The girl stopped, glared at Nason, then turned to the door and grabbed at the knob. “Get out. I don't have to talk to you.”
Nason stood up. Walking slowly up to the girl, he deliberately took her wrist and pulled her hand from the knob. She jerked back.
“You can't get away with this. I've got friends to take care of me.”
Nason studied her a moment, then moved to the center of the room. He took the little photograph out of his pocket, held it up for the girl to see.
Instantly her face paled and there was a breathless quality to her words.
“Where'd you get that?”
“You were pretty good friends, weren't you?”
“Where did you get it?” This in a low frightened tone.
“Out of his watch.”
“But—”
“Down in the City Hospital.” Nason made his voice deliberately hard and cutting. “He was shot in Alpert's. They took him to the hospital. A couple hoods broke in and gunned him out. I was wondering if you knew any of his friends.”
“You lie!” Rita Jordan whispered the words, and her face paled so that the old makeup stood out like fever blotches.
Nason's voice was low and even as he waited for the reaction. “He oughta be in the morgue by now.”
HE knew, as he spoke, that he had come to the right place. The girl was in love with Steig. She was hard, matter-of-fact, not easy to bluff. But the veneer was scraped clean now. And what he saw was a woman afraid; frightened nearly to hysteria.
Her hand came to her breast, clutched the fabric of her robe. Then she screamed.
Nason started for her. He heard Walcott's muffled curse. He took just one step when the door opened, slapped against the girl's back and knocked her aside.
In the half-light of the background, he saw two men. Or rather, he knew they were there. His eyes were fixed on the snouty muzzle of the automatic, held waist high. For a second he watched it move towards him. Then he brought his eyes up.
The pimply-faced youth, his little mustache curved like his lips in a leering smile, stared back at him. Behind him, closing and locking the door, was a bull-necked fellow with thick black hair and a nose that was flattened and twisted.
At no time in those two or three seconds did Nason have a chance to go for his gun—and he was experienced enough to know when to draw, and when not to. So he smiled purposely and made his voice bored, indulgent.
“I've been looking for you.”
“Imagine that.” The pimply-faced youth advanced a step, called over his shoulder to his companion. “Get his gun, Hymie!”
Hymie shuffled forward, a squat, long-armed figure. Circling behind Nason, he removed the service revolver.
The pimply-faced youth's glance slid sideways to Walcott, and then to Rita Jordan, who stood like a statue in chalk, one arm crossed tightly to her breast. He grinned at Walcott.
“We didn't get a chance to thank you for the camera, punk. Get over there with your copper friend.”
Walcott blinked, seemed unable to fully grasp what had happened. He moved slowly, protestingly, and the pimply-faced youth reached out and slapped him with the barrel of the automatic. Walcott cursed and spun about. This time the barrel of the gun crashed down on his head with a sickening thud. His hat flew off and he crumpled and went down on his face, joint by joint.
Nason had moved with the blow. But Hymie was still behind him. The gun jammed against his spine and he stiffened there with the sweat breaking out on his forehead.
Hymie grunted in satisfaction. “Now what, Leo?”
The thin youth glanced at Rita Jordan, reached out and took her by the arm. “Get some clothes on, sweetheart, we're goin' places.”
Color, oozing slowly back into the girl's face, kept pace with her composure. She seemed to make a desperate effort to mask her feelings, her voice.
“Sure.” She started for the doorway to an inner hall, but Leo said: “Wait a minute.”
She stopped. Leo grunted, nodded at his companion. “I'll watch the dick, Hymie. Go with her.”
“I'll go alone,” the girl snapped. “You'll go with Hymie,” Leo said, grinning derisively. “And if there's any windows you can get out of in that room of yours, he's gonna stay with you. You can dress in your closet if you're so modest.”
The girl's eyes filled with scorn and loathing, and Nason saw this and felt a certain grudging respect for her.
Leo said: “We should let you give us the slip, huh?” He chuckled. “Get started. We ain't got forever you know.”
Hymie grinned and shuffled off down the hall after the girl.
CHAPTER IV. THE HOSPITAL CLUE
RITA JORDAN was dressed in a tight-fitting blue dress when she came back into the living room with Hymie five minutes later.
Leo nodded in approval. “Now watch 'em both, Hymie. I think I'd better make a call.”
He picked up the telephone receiver, dialed a number. A moment later he said: “Hello—Leo. Yeah. Yeah, we got her. But get this: that dick and the photographer were here ahead of us. They were putting the bee on her when we got here. I don't know. No. But she screamed about something just as we came in.”
Leo fell silent for a few seconds, nodding his head slightly as he listened. “Okay,” he said finally. “Sure. How much time do you want? Fifteen minutes. Okay.” He hung up.
There was a peculiar smile on his lips now; a peculiar, pitiless look in his little eyes as. he faced Nason, and the detective sensed the answer.
Fifteen minutes. For somebody to fix plans—or frame an alibi probably. He knew too much now. And the hoods could not take chances on how much Rita Jordan had talked. And that went for Walcott, too. The thought sent a quick chill through his veins. He glanced down at the youth. Blood stained the brown hair. He had not moved an inch since he fell. Nason looked up again, and smiled.
“Whose move is it?”
“Not yours, copper.” Leo's merciless expression was unchanged. He turned to Hymie. “Take her along. I gotta wait about fifteen minutes.”
Rita Jordan gave Nason a frightened, half- appealing look as she went through the door with Hymie's hairy hand on her arm. The door closed and Nason looked back at Leo.
“It's pretty tough,” he said slowly, “knocking off a cop and a reporter.”
“So they tell me,” said Leo insolently. “But they don't put any more volts in the chair for that than for anything else. I shoulda let you have it there in the hospital.”
Nason sat erect in the straight-backed chair for several minutes before he spoke. He knew that in some way Donigan had been framed. Just why, he did not know, and this bothered him. His bitterness was like a cancerous growth in his brain.