McClure gripped Byers by the coat lapel. “Jus’ one won’t hurt, fren’. S’my birthday!”
Byers laughed good-naturedly. “Okay,” he said. “Gimme the damn bottle.”
Out of the corner of his eye McClure saw Heisman take a small black box out of the attache case, hold it up to the lock, adjust a dial, and — clink. Out fell a newly-made key.
Heisman picked it up, unlocked the door, and he and O’Konski went in. Mahaffey, gun in hand, nervously watched Byers and the “bum.”
“Get rid of him!” he growled.
“Go sleep it off in some alley,” said Byers, shaking himself loose from McClure’s grasp.
McClure hurled the whiskey bottle to the pavement, where it smashed with the sound of a firecracker.
That was the signal they’d been waiting for. The six detectives erupted from their cars, guns in hand, and raced around the corner towards the jewelry store.
The “bum” yanked out his gun, but Mahaffey’s shot caught him in the right hip and he went down. As he fell he fired and hit Mahaffey in the groin. Mahaffey dropped his gun and sank slowly to the pavement, his hands clutching the wound.
Byers got off one shot that sang by Egan’s ear. Egan’s own bullet hit him in the neck and Byers flopped to the sidewalk like a stranded fish, the blood gurgling through the hole in his throat, and running across the sidewalk into the gutter.
Visconti was far enough away to make a run for the Elite Bakery truck. He got it started and raced for Saratoga Street, trying to hit Steve Kohnstamm, who was running across the street towards the jewelry store. Steve dove out of the way, breaking his wrist as he fell. His own gun cluttered to the pavement.
Egan, Clancy, Grissom, and Smyth riddled the windshield; a red flower blossomed in the middle of Visconti’s face. The truck veered crazily, careened towards the sidewalk, and smashed through the display window of a men’s clothing store.
The sudden burst of noise was now replaced by an eerie silence. The interior of the jewelry store was dark and quiet. Detective Murphy, gun in hand, had gone down an alley to guard the rear door.
The street looked like a battle scene. Visconti, dead, his face and body full of glass splinters, hung half in and half out of the driver’s seat of the Elite Bakery truck, his blood dripping on the neat window display of men’s white button-down shirts.
Byers, not dead but dying, lay face down on the sidewalk, the blood still bubbling out of the hole in his throat. Mahaffey lay groaning in front of the jewelry store, his hands over the wound in his groin, blood seeping through them.
Detective McClure, the wounded “bum” — had half propped himself against a lamp post. Detective Kohnstamm sat on the sidewalk with his feet in the gutter, holding his head down, trying to keep from fainting as his right hand flopped grotesquely at the end of his broken wrist.
Egan yelled into the dark void of the jewelry store. “You’ve had it, Heisman! Back door’s covered! Throw out those thirty-eights!”
Silence. Then a .38 was kicked out through the wide-open door, followed by another. O’Konski and Heisman, hands joined behind their necks, came out.
By now squad cars and ambulances were pouring into the area, and a small crowd had materialized out of nowhere to gape in amazement at the bodies, the blood, the prisoners. Phil Egan phoned Mike Casey, then bustled Heisman and O’Konski, handcuffed together, into the back seat of the Chevvie for the ride down to Headquarters. Clancy, gun in hand, sat with them, and Smyth rode up front with Phil.
Heisman, the brain, was calm but dejected. O’Konski, smothered in gloom, snarled and cursed and refused to talk.
Heisman, clinically interested in the failure of his ingenious plan, said: “Where did I goof? What tipped you?”
Egan replied: “Byers, when he left his car out near that Texaco station in Towson. How’d he happen to do that?”
Heisman gritted his teeth. “The fat, stupid jerk! Our three goons — the Outfit provided them, partly to protect us and partly to make sure we didn’t pull a double cross — had the Plymouth and the Bakery truck that night. Byers was the lookout. After the job, he couldn’t get the Plymouth going right away, so he panicked and jumped in the truck with the others. Next time it won’t—”
Egan interrupted. “There won’t be a next time, Heisman. You’re going on an extended vacation.”
Heisman was silent.
After Heisman and O’Konski had been booked and jailed, Egan wrote out his report. Dawn was beginning to light the eastern sky as he headed the black Chevvie towards Muriel’s apartment on Mount Vernon Place. He had promised to come up no matter what time it was, so he did.
She answered the bell in a revealing black negligee, but it was easy to tell she hadn’t been sleeping. Her eyes were red and tired-looking and the ash trays were full of lipstick-stained, half-smoked butts.
Wordlessly they embraced.
He sank into an easy chair. “I could use a drink,” he said. “Or two or three.”
She mixed him a stiff bourbon and water, and as he sipped it he told her all about it. “Heisman and O’Konski planned the whole thing when they were in the army together. It was in the army that O’Konski learned to be a baker and Heisman a pharmacist. They learned those trades as a cover. They even got married as a cover. Heisman is a genius but he has the heart of a born thief who’d rather steal ten bucks than make a hundred legit.
“If he patents that key-making thing of his he’ll pile up a fortune in prison. He took the whole plan to the syndicate boys and they okayed it for a forty percent cut. Byers, Visconti, and Mahaffey were lent to Heisman as muscle, to do the necessary stealing, act as lookouts, and stuff like that. Also to see that Heisman and O’Konski didn’t cross the big boys.
“We got to them largely through Byers, although your idea about the locksmiths was a big help. Byers is dead. So is Visconti. Mahaffey is shot up and may not make it. Con McClure has a smashed hip and Steve Kohnstamm a broken wrist.”
“God,” she murmured. “What a night!”
As Thanksgiving Day dawned, they drank bourbon and ate some scrambled eggs and finally fell asleep in each other’s arms on the floor in front of the fireplace.
C.O.D. to a Corpse
by Tighe Jarratt
“I am a licensed private eye,” Chip pointed out. “You are an evil eye,” Aunt Tilly corrected.
There were seven messages to phone Aunt Tilly when Chip Stack checked his answering service. Imperative. Aunt Tilly spoke with the authority of a million dollars and the boss of the Stack clan.
Chip snapped a cigarette into his deceptively amiable face and considered that Aunt. Tilly carried her gold-headed cane not from infirmity, but to wallop hell out of any purse snatcher or mugger foolish enough to disregard the glint of her bird-bright eyes. She knew her nephew without illusions, disapproved of him entirely, and had once characterized him a renegade to the human race. Aside from that, she liked him.
But not seven phone calls worth. This was trouble. Chip took a neat drink for fortification, expanded his breath, and intrepidly dialed her number, feeling much like a soldier charging a flame throwing tank with his bayonet.
“Chip Stack,” she greeted him. “How long since your deeply lamented Uncle Arthur was laid at rest?”
“Why,” he grunted with surprise, and flicked a glance at the calendar. “It was three weeks ago last Monday — twenty-three days. Is something desecrating his memory?”