The youth babbled, wiggled. The wiggle was a feeble effort.
Shayne yanked the hair. “Did you kill her?”
“N-not... me...” babbled the boy. “Frankie and... Slick.”
“Frankie... Frankie Booth. Slick Lawrence.”
“And you?”
“Danny... Danny Hernandez.”
“Where are Frankie and Slick?”
“I dunno!”
“Still in town?” Shayne growled.
“Oh, yeah, man... probably... probably snoozing in their pads! Hey, man, you’re hurtin’ like hell!”
Shayne drew the boy’s head back another inch, kept his knee tight against the spine. “You want a snapped back, Danny?”
“Oh, God, no, man! Look, ease off! You cops ain’t supposed to... How’d I know you was fuzz? You was supposed to be the guy with the green stuff... you was in here yesterday, you was flashing bread at her, you went outside with her... and she’s been tellin’ everybody how she was gonna fall on riches... she’s been yakking it up for three days... well, hell, man, we figured you was the Daddy, with, the loaf... you laid it on her outside... after you walked out of here yesterday... but, man, you’re nothin’ but fuzz! Just fuzz! Is that the truth, man?”
“You three hit Abby Galloway last night, figuring she had a bundle in her pillow case, huh?”
“Yeah, man... you was supposed to be the man she’s been waitin’ for! You was supposed to be... but you’re only fuzz! Oh, God!”
“What did you turn out, Danny?” Shayne asked.
Hernandez squirmed, remained silent.
Shayne drew his head back another half inch. “Twenty-three smacks!” Hernandez gasped. “I found... it in a cup!”
“You three hit her place. Frankie and Slick worked on Abby while you searched. Is that what you’re telling me, Danny?”
“That’s it, man! Hey... you’re breaking my spine! I think I’m gonna... ship!” Hernandez groaned.
“They killed her.”
“I... heard this morning! I didn’t know last night! I didn’t even think ’bout it. She wasn’t movin’ when we skinned out... but that don’t have to mean she’s dead. Then I’m coming along the street this morning and I hear... I hear she was croaked. I was coming in here to get it straight in my head, and you... you jumped me, man.”
“I’m not a cop, Danny,” Shayne said.
“Oh... damn!” Hernandez breathed. “Man, look... you ain’t fuzz, and you ain’t the bread man... hey, look, so okay, we didn’t know! You don’t hafta put the heat on me, mister! I don’t know nothin’ ’bout that old woman, I don’t wanna know nothin’. You don’t hafta dump me in a swamp, mister! I got a tight mouth!”
“Yeah, you sound like it, Danny. You’ve already told me who your pals are.”
Hernandez groaned, attempted to shake his head. “Jus’ leave me alone, huh?” he babbled. “Gimme a second chance!”
“You want to grow up to join the mob, huh?” Shayne snorted.
“Mister, I’m not bad with the knife. You tricked me, yeah, but it’s the first time that’s ever happened! Honest! I can take care of myself! What I mean is... what I mean is...”
“Take me to Frankie and Slick,” the red head growled.
“Huh?” Hernandez looked hopeful. Shayne looked grim.
“We didn’t want Abigail Galloway to die. We didn’t know, man!”
“But you didn’t kill her, Danny.”
“Yeah! Tha’s right! Frankie and Slick... they laid it on her while I was lookin’ for the bread!” The boy was panting.
“So too bad for your friends,” Shayne said. “Take me to them, Danny.”
VIII
An hour later, seated before a stonefaced Will Gentry in police headquarters, Frankie Booth and Slick Lawrence remained angry and silent. It was not their baptism. Danny Hernandez remained confused. He continued to flick periodic looks at Shayne. “I thought... I thought...”
“Will?” said Shayne.
Gentry waved a hand. “Rourke got a cut ear, that’s all?”
“We dropped him off at an emergency clinic. He bled, but he’s okay.”
“I’ll talk to you later — and thanks, Mike.”
Shayne and Randolph Foster turned out of the office, then Danny Hernandez shrieked, “Shayne, you lied to me! You made me think...” He didn’t finish it.
“Welcome to the real world of crime, kid,” Shayne snapped.
Outside police headquarters, Randolph Foster shook his head. He seemed awed. “Did those three really beat the woman to death with fists?”
“And probably feet,” Shayne grunted, sliding into the convertible.
“Is this...” Foster paused, then finished, “how murder is solved? Is it always this easy?”
“There are no mysteries to most murders, Foster,” the redhead said, piloting the convertible into street traffic. “People talk. Self preservation is a helluva thing. You accuse one guy, he tells you about another buy. Pretty soon you have a killer. Anyway, most murders are domestic, no sweat.”
Foster went silent for several blocks. Finally he straightened in the car seat and looked around. “Are we returning to the Red Fish?”
“I want to yak it up a bit with Charlie Knowles. He and Abigail Galloway apparently were close friends. She could have confided in him about your Peking Man.”
“Oh?” Foster considered it, then said, “Does this mean you are going to start looking for the collection now? I mean, since you’ve solved...”
“It means,” Shayne said, “I’m still working on the theory that if I turn up those bones I may also turn up a would-be bomber.”
The police had vacated the murder scene. But Charlie Knowles was at home in his room, and he answered Shayne’s knock immediately. A short, slight man, he stood holding the door and cocked his head slightly in curiosity. He was aged, his shirt and trousers were threadbare, but he was neat, freshly shaven, and his eyes were bright with awareness.
After Shayne had explained his presence, Charlie Knowles ushered him into a room that was large, airy, cheaply furnished, but clean. Shayne noticed the diamond stickpin and the black snap-brim hat on a dresser that had a cement block for one leg, and he thought that if Charlie Knowles had possessed a few bucks he might be a chipper Dapper Dan.
“You say the murderers of Abigail have been apprehended?” Charlie Knowles asked, seeking confirmation.
“They are in the custody of the police,” Shayne repeated.
Knowles shook his head, sat on the edge of a lumpy bed. He waved a hand to the only two chairs in the room Shayne sat on the edge of one, Foster folded into the other.
“They killed for twenty-three dollars,” Knowles said, still wagging his head. “It is difficult to accept.”
“They had more like five thousand in mind,” Shayne replied.
Knowles looked up. “I assume you are referring to the classified ad that appeared this week in the Daily News.”
“Un-huh,” Shayne nodded.
“You know,” said Knowles reflectively, “I was a newspaper printer once. It was my life’s work. But the computers came into being and annihilated the printing profession. It’s all done by buttons now. But — to Abby: I’ve known her for approximately eight years, ever since I moved in here. She already was here. We became friends the first day. I liked her. She probably should have lived in a past century, but she didn’t.
“By that, Mr. Shayne, I mean she could have been a woman of grandeur. She could have carried it off. Instead, she lived in this century and her means did not provide. So she invented. I liked that about her. I sat for hours and listened to her stories, and I enjoyed every one of them.”
He stopped and gave Shayne a sharp look. “For one thing, they helped keep my mind off my own troubles.”