William P. McGivern
Shield for Murder
With Gratitude To
Howard Browne
Whose editing makes writers
happy and. whose novels make
them envious
1
The man Nolan planned to kill came out of an all-night taproom about one o’clock in the morning. He stood for a moment, taking a few last drags from his cigarette, and glancing idly across the wet, gleaming street. His name was Dave Fiest, and he was a gambler; not the biggest in Philadelphia, but far from the smallest.
Nolan watched him from the shadow of a building entrance about twenty yards away. His hands were deep in the pockets of his suit coat and there was a dead cigar in his mouth.
Dave Fiest flipped his cigarette away and strolled south on Broad Street, the collar of his camel’s hair sport coat turned up against the fine misting rain that was falling.
Nolan spat the cigar from his mouth and moved out from the shadow of the building, traveling fast for a man his size, and came up behind Fiest at the corner of Crab Street.
“Hold it a second, Dave,” he said.
Dave Fiest turned and regarded Nolan with surprise. “What’s up, Barny?”
“I’m taking you in, friend.”
“Taking me in?” Dave Fiest turned his palms up and smiled. “What’s the gag? I’m an honest citizen, Barny.”
“Yeah, sure,” Nolan said, and reached inside Dave’s coat and fished into an inner breast pocket. He brought out a roll of papers and looked at them with an expression of satisfaction. They were horse bets and numbers slips. “Honest citizen, eh?” he said, staring at Dave.
Dave Fiest shrugged slightly. He was a small man, with narrow shoulders and a pleasant alert face. His hair was graying at the temples.
“I’m all right with the vice squad boys,” he said.
“That’s their business,” Nolan said. “Let’s go.”
“Barny, wait just a second. I don’t get this.” Dave Fiest smiled good-naturedly. “Supposing you let me buy you a drink, eh?”
“Let’s go.”
“Barny, what’re we going to prove? You slate me as a gambler, and I make a call to Delaney and he has me out on a copy in an hour. We’re just making work for everybody on a rainy night.”
Nolan took Dave Fiest’s arm and walked him down Crab Street. They passed an all-night diner, a closed cigar store, a gas station, and then crossed an intersecting street and kept walking.
“Say, Barny, is there heat coming?” Dave Fiest asked, a new interest in his voice. “I read they shifted some House Sergeants around in South Philly. Is that the angle?”
“The lieutenant doesn’t want gamblers hanging around Center City,” Nolan said.
Dave Fiest laughed shortly. “Ramussen should be leading a cub scout pack. Does he expect to clean things up by locking up a few gamblers?”
“I don’t know what he expects,” Nolan said.
Dave Fiest stopped at the intersection of Ellens Lane and Crab Street and put a hand on Nolan’s arm.
“Now listen to me just a minute, keed. I know you haven’t worked downtown long, but you must have heard by now that I’m okay. And here’s the pitch: I don’t want to hang at the Sixty-fifth even for the hour or so it’ll take Delaney to get a copy. The point is, I’ve got to meet Mike Espizito in about fifteen minutes, and you know how he feels about people being late. Especially when they owe him money.” Dave Fiest smiled as he said this, and watched Nolan’s big square face hopefully.
“No deal,” Nolan said.
Dave Fiest shrugged. “So what’re you going to charge me with?”
“Common gambler, maintaining an illegal lottery, pool selling, loitering.”
“No arson and rape?” Dave Fiest said.
Nolan didn’t answer. He glanced back toward Broad Street, scanning both sides of the dark quiet block, and then looked in the other direction.
“Come on,” he said, and turned Dave Fiest into Ellens Lane.
“Hey, what’s up? The Sixty-fifth’s the other way.”
“Walk ahead of me.”
“Are you nuts?” Dave Fiest stared at Nolan, suddenly suspicious. “What’s the deal, chum? I offered you a note, didn’t I?”
“Turn around,” Nolan said. And Dave Fiest obeyed slowly.
“Now walk,” Nolan said, and glanced up and down the street once more. A bright patch of red light from the diner lay on the wet sidewalk; and two blocks away, on Broad Street, a couple were shouting for a cab. Nolan could hear their voices clearly in the still night.
Dave Fiest had walked ten feet into the lane. He glanced over his shoulder and said, “You aren’t God, chum. I got rights, remember.”
“Keep walking.”
When Dave Fiest had gone another ten feet, Nolan pulled out his gun and followed him into the dark lane. The gambler heard his footsteps and turned around suddenly. He saw a splinter of fight break off Nolan’s gun.
“Hey!” he said, the word nothing more than a soft gasp. “What’s this, Nolan? Listen, you don’t need to make a stick-up out of it. I got dough with me, Barny.”
“Turn around.”
“Nolan, please—”
“Turn around.”
Dave Fiest turned his back to Nolan, and his body moved stiffly, jerkily.
Nolan yelled: “Halt! Stop, you bastard!”
And then fired twice, once in the air, and once into Dave Fiest’s slender, neatly tailored back.
The shots went banging down the lane and into the quiet night, and Dave Fiest’s last sob was lost in their shattering echoes.
Nolan ran swiftly forward and bent over the sprawled figure. His hands moved swiftly, surely, through Dave Fiest’s pocket, and found the thick wad of money. He stripped three bills from the roll and pushed them back into Dave’s pocket, and then straightened and walked toward Crab Street. But a powerful impulse caught him suddenly, and he wheeled and ran back to Dave Fiest’s body and kicked it twice, savagely, furiously.
Then, confused by his action, he ran out of the lane and crossed the street to a police call box. He pulled out the phone that was connected to the house sergeant’s room at the Sixty-fifth, and when Sergeant Brennan answered, he said, casually: “Nolan, Sarge. I just shot a guy here at Crab Street and Ellens Lane. Send over a wagon, will you?”
“Is he dead?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay.”
Nolan put the phone back in place and closed the door of the call box. Several people were in the street now, and two young men were running along the sidewalk.
Nolan walked back across the street and stopped at the entrance to Ellens Lane. When the two young men came panting to a stop before him, he said, “Okay, boys, everything’s taken care of. Just drift on about your business.”
“We heard some shooting,” one of them said. “Two shots.”
Nolan took out his wallet and flipped it open. The fight from a street lamp danced on his shield.
“No kidding?” he said, and stared at them until they turned and walked hesitantly back toward Broad Street.
They stopped after about twenty yards and stood together, talking in low voices and watching Nolan’s big bulky figure.
2
Three well-worn stone steps led from the street to the Sixty-fifth police station. Above them hung a single white electric globe.
The district occupied a three-story brick building that seemed sturdy, and a trifle smug, in a block of luncheonettes, shoe-shops, curio dealers, and unpainted frame homes.
The Thirteenth Detective Division had its headquarters on the second floor of the building, in three high-ceilinged rooms that were separated by wooden partitions.
A card game was going on in one of these rooms the night Nolan killed Dave Fiest.