“We’re leaving now, Mr. St. Ives,” Mbwato said. “Is there anything I can do for you?”
I waved my empty glass at him. “Another drink to cut the phlegm.”
Ulado hurried forward and took my glass, looking at Mbwato, who nodded. “You need to sleep, Mr. St. Ives,” he said.
“I know,” I said. “For a couple of years.”
“I’ll be anticipating your call tomorrow,” he said as Ulado handed me the fresh drink.
“Man your phone,” I said. “I shall be calling.”
Mr. Mbwato stood by the door to the hall and stared at me. “I hope, Mr. St. Ives, that you know what you’re doing.”
“I hope so, too, Mr. Mbwato,” I said. “I hope so very much.”
Chapter twenty
The pain had eased a little by the time that Demeter and Fastnaught arrived. Perhaps the Scotch had helped after all, or it may have been because I had stopped thinking about what I had to do the next day. The thoughts had been more than unpleasant; they had been nasty ones born of apprehension and dread and they had burrowed into my mind like a small, wet furry animal with stainless-steel teeth and claws that scratched and chomped around in my head. The giddiness had gone, too, and when I answered the policelike banging on the door I was as sober and composed as one could hope to be on four very large drinks.
“There’s a bell,” I said when I opened the door, “or don’t you believe in them?”
“He’s drunk,” Demeter said. “You can smell it.”
“Come in, gentlemen. All by yourselves, I see.”
“If this is a joke, St. Ives, we want to enjoy it in private,” Demeter said, and pushed himself past me into the hall. Fastnaught followed, chewing on a stick of gum. His eyes looked more bloodshot than usual.
“You look like hell,” Fastnaught said.
“I’ve got a headache, but it’s better now.”
“All right,” Demeter said. “What’s the story?”
“Jack and Jill are upstairs on the third floor,” I said. “Jack and Jill are the thieves. They’re also the murderers, as nasty a young couple as our stricken society has yet produced.”
Demeter stared at me suspiciously. “Just sitting there waiting for us, huh?”
“They’re all tied up,” I said. “Securely.”
“Okay, let’s check it out, Fastnaught,” Demeter said. He produced a revolver from a shoulder holster and waved it vaguely toward the stairs. Fastnaught also drew his revolver and started up the stairs, still chewing his gum. “You coming, St. Ives?” Demeter said.
“Too far,” I said. “Far too far. And I’ve got a headache.”
I watched them slowly mount the stairs until they were out of sight on the second-floor landing. Then I went back into the living room and poured myself another drink, mentally assigning it curative powers that would have done credit to a dozen or so of the more progressive wonder drugs. I sat on the couch and waited. A few moments later there was a sharp sound as if someone had kicked in a door. Or maybe they had just banged it open against the wall. I took a sip of my drink and waited some more. In a few minutes I could hear them descending the stairs. Fastnaught came in first, his gun still drawn. He was followed by the girl with her hands handcuffed behind her. Then came the man, also handcuffed, and Demeter, still with his revolver in his hand.
“Ah, you caught them, Lieutenant,” I said. “Good work.”
“Shut up,” Demeter said.
Fastnaught turned and waved his gun at two chairs. “Sit down over there,” he said to the girl and the man. They moved over to the two chairs and sat down.
“The suitcase with the money is by that chair,” I said.
“I saw it,” Demeter said, reholstering his gun. “You count it?”
“No. Should I’ve?”
“Didn’t you even look?”
“No.”
“Take a look, Fastnaught.”
Fastnaught bent over the suitcase, turned it on its side, and opened it. The tens and twenties were still there, wrapped in neat brown paper bands.
“Jesus,” Fastnaught said, and I felt that there was pure reverence in his tone.
“All right, close it up,” Demeter said. He turned to me. “Now tell us all about it, St. Ives.”
“I got a call at my hotel, an anonymous tip. He said that the thieves and the money were at this address, all safe and sound. So I caught a cab over, found it to be just like the man on the phone said, and then called you.”
“You lying son of a bitch,” said the man who claimed that his name was Jack. “Two big niggers got us. They talked funny, like Englishmen. They were going to shove a curling iron up my ass if I didn’t tell ’em and he was gonna help.”
“Tell what?” Demeter said.
The man called Jack looked away. “Nothing. I don’t have to tell you nothing. But he’s a lying son of a bitch.”
“Strange,” I said. “They were both extremely talkative a few minutes ago. They were telling me how they had managed to steal the shield and do away with four persons — Sackett, Wingo, Spellacy, and your former classmate, Lieutenant Ogden.”
Demeter slipped his revolver back into its holster, looked around the room, picked out a chair, and eased himself into it slowly. He reached into the inside pocket of his jacket, found a cigar encased in a metal tube, and went through the ritual of lighting it. When it was well lighted he looked at me with black, beany eyes. “Nothing like a good cigar,” he said.
“That suitcase would buy a lot of them,” I said.
“What do you think, Fastnaught?” Demeter said to the sergeant, who had also tucked away his gun and was now leaning against the mantel of the fireplace, which looked as if it really worked.
“About what?” Fastnaught said.
“Do you think the suitcase would buy a lot of cigars?”
“Plenty,” Fastnaught said.
“Cigars for me, little girls for you, and punchboards for St. Ives here.”
“What about our two friends here, Jack and Jill?” I said.
“I don’t think their names are Jack and Jill really. What’d Ogden tell you just before he died? He said something about ‘Freddie and his whore,’ didn’t he?” Demeter turned to look at the man in handcuffs. “Are you Freddie and his whore, son?” he asked mildly.
Freddie, or Jack, told Demeter to go fuck himself. Fastnaught sighed, left his spot at the mantel, crossed over to the man and struck him twice across the face with an open palm. Fastnaught seemed neither to like nor dislike striking the man. He said nothing after he had done it and a moment later he was back leaning against the mantel, rubbing a corner of it into the spot between his shoulder blades where the itch seemed to persist. The man’s face had crumpled again and I saw that he was crying. He didn’t like being hit.
“I asked you a question, son,” Demeter said. “Is your name Freddie?”
The man sat with his head bowed. He was almost through crying. The girl looked at him blankly and then giggled.
“Fred,” he said.
“Fred what?”
“Fred Simpson.”
“All right, Fred Simpson, what about the girl? She your wife?”
“No.”
“He’s my pimp,” the girl said. “He’s my pretty little pimp. Freddie the pimp.” She giggled again.
“What’s your name, lady?” Demeter said.
“Wanda.”
“Wanda what?”
“Wanda Lou Wesoloski.”
“A Polack,” Freddie said. “A dumb Polack.”
“Tell us about it, Freddie,” Demeter said.
“I want a lawyer. I don’t have to say nothing.”
“That’s right, Freddie, you don’t,” Demeter said, and shifted his gaze to me. “You say that Freddie was talkative a little earlier?”