“He’s still here,” Carmody said. “Don’t worry about that.”
“How do you know?”
“Listen,” Carmody said. The police speaker in the outer room had broken the silence. “To all cars,” the announcer said in a flat, unemotional voice. “Be on the alert for murder suspect. Description following. Male, white, age twenty-five to thirty, tall muscular build, blond hair, wide face. Last seen in vicinity of Bering Street and Wilmer Avenue. Last seen wearing sports jacket, gray or tan, and sports shirt open at collar. This man is armed. Approach with caution.”
The speaker clicked twice and was silent.
“That’s going out every fifteen minutes,” Carmody said. “The killer knows it. Would you move around if you were in his spot?”
“He might have caught a plane twenty minutes after the shooting.”
“That might have been the original plan, but I doubt like hell that he followed it,” Carmody said. “He flubbed the job. He shot Eddie in front of a witness.”
“All the more reason for him to clear out fast.”
“Reason for him perhaps, but not for Ackerman. The killer put Ackerman on the spot. And Ackerman won’t let him go until it’s safe. And it won’t be safe until the witness is dead. Or the killer is dead. One or the other. That’s why he’s still in town. I’ll bet on that.”
“Then we’ll find him,” Wilson said sharply.
“Sure you will,” Carmody said. “I’m going to work now.”
“You’ve got another lead?”
“I don’t know. When I find out I’ll check in.” Carmody hesitated at the door and looked back at Wilson with a small frown. “Thanks for the break, Jim,” he said.
“Never mind that. I wouldn’t use you if I didn’t have to.”
“You’re honest at least,” Carmody said, smiling crookedly.
He was walking through the bright early morning light to his car when Myers caught up with him and put a hand on his arm.
“Hold it just a second,” he said. “I got something to tell you.”
“What is it?” Carmody faced the small detective and tried to keep the impatience out of his voice. The city was coming awake; trolleys jangled on Market Street and the sidewalks were filling up with people. He wanted to be on the move.
“Well, look,” Myers said. “Out at the sanitarium where my old lady stays, there’s an attendant named Joe Venuti. A long time ago he worked for Capone in Chicago, and he knows the racket crowd pretty well.”
“I’ve heard of him,” Carmody said. “He’s still wanted on some old charges, I think.”
“Yeah, I guess he is,” Myers said shrugging. “But he’s been going straight for years and he’s always been a big help with the old lady. You know how Italians are. They’re the best people in the world with sick people and babies.”
“What’s the rest of it?” Carmody said.
“Sure. That’s why I never bothered him I mean. Well, this morning I drove out there and woke him up. I gave him the girl’s description of the killer. And he’s going to call Las Vegas and Chicago tonight and gossip with some of his old friends.”
“How come he’s willing to help?”
“He’s got to,” Myers said, a grim little line going around his mouth. “I put it that way.”
Carmody looked at him, slightly surprised. “He might turn something up, at that. But you watch yourself, Myers. Don’t get hurt.”
“You don’t think I’m much of a cop, do you?” Myers said, smiling slowly at him. “Well, never mind that. Maybe I’m just a little dummy. But I can come up a notch or two for cop killers. I don’t like them, Mike.”
Brother cops, Carmody thought, studying the little man with a puzzled frown. Sighing he said, “You’re okay, Myers. Don’t worry about it.”
“I’ll find you when I hear from Venuti,” Myers said, and Carmody saw that his tribute meant nothing to the little detective.
“Do that,” he said slightly puzzled and angry. “And thanks.”
Forty-five minutes later Carmody walked into the small lobby of the Milford Hotel, a quiet commercial establishment off Market Street. He had stopped at his hotel to shower and change. The loss of a night’s sleep hadn’t marked him; his eyes were clear and cold, and the muscles of his body were poised like powerful springs.
Showing the clerk his badge, he asked if Johnny Stark was in his room. “Yes, sir. Shall I ring him?”
“No, I’ll go up.”
“Yes, sir. Of course.”
Carmody rode up in the elevator and rapped twice on Stark’s door, shaking the panels with his big knuckles.
Bedsprings creaked after a moment, and Stark said, “Who’s that?”
“This is Mike Carmody. Open up.”
There was a short silence. Then: “Sure, Mike. Right away.”
The door opened and Stark blinked at Carmody, an uneasy smile touching his bruised lips. He wore a bathrobe and his face was thickened and dazed with sleep. “Come in,” he said, still smiling uneasily. “I was asleep, out for the count.”
“Where did you take Nancy Drake last night?” Carmody asked, walking into the small stuffy room. Stark cocked his good ear at him, frowning with the effort to hear. “Nancy Drake? What about her?”
“Where did you take her?”
Stark rubbed his big hands together, frightened and uncertain. “How’d you know that?”
“If they needed a delivery boy, you’d do. So where did you take her?”
“To Fanzo’s bar in Central. I left her there and came home. That’s all I did.”
“Did you talk to her about anything on the way?”
“No.” Stark wet his battered lips and looked away from Carmody’s eyes. “She just did a lot of crying.”
“What happened when you got there?”
“A guy I never saw before took her away. They were expecting us, I guess. Then I came home.”
Carmody turned toward the door but Stark grabbed his arm. “Don’t go, Mike. I want to tell you something.”
“Take your Goddamn hand off me.”
“All right, all right,” Stark said quickly. “But listen to me. Ackerman fired me, Mike.”
“That figures, doesn’t it?”
“Sure; I’m supposed to be a fighter, not a clown. But that’s not what’s worrying me.” Stark took a deep breath and rubbed a hand over his lumpy, unintelligent face. “I shouldn’t have taken her to Fanzo’s. That’s what I’m trying to say. She was crying like hell and she begged me not to. It was a lousy thing to do.”
“Well, why tell me about it? If you’ve got troubles go find a bartender or a priest.”
“I just wanted to say it,” Stark said. “I shouldn’t have done it. Can I square it some way? Could I go out to Fanzo’s and knock some heads together?”
“Stay away from there. They’d use you for a pin cushion.”
“I’m a bum, I guess,” Stark said, a little flush of anger coming up under his eyes. “Say it a thousand times. Go ahead. But are you any better? You work for ’em, too, don’t you?”
“We aren’t in a moral beauty contest,” Carmody said, walking out of the room.
Stark followed him to the elevator in his bare feet, twisting his hands together anxiously. The anger was gone from his face; he looked scared and nervous. “One thing, Mike. Just one thing,” he said. “You said Ackerman fixed all my fights? Was that straight?”