He advanced ponderously, crouched forward, arms semi-circled. The stone crunched under his shuffling feet. Johnny circled, to his right, just outside the reaching arms. Tiny pursued patiently, in a narrowing orbit. Johnny speeded up suddenly. Tiny's upper body pivoted to face him, but the legs floundered. In the second the man-mountain was off balance Johnny smashed the heel of his shoe against Tiny's left knee. There was a loud pop. When the pursuing man's entire weight came down on that leg he went down like a falling tree. He lay in the crushed stone, wheezing.
Johnny walked around him to face him. “That was your kneecap, sucker,” he said in a hard voice. “Satisfied, or should I get a tire iron out of the trunk an' take a few divots out of your thick skull?”
His face gray and perspiration beading his broad forehead, Tiny muscled himself up on his forearms. “Jus' lemme get muh han's on ya, pal.” He tried to drag his great weight forward.
“Ahhh-” Johnny said disgustedly. He walked away, toward the Lincoln. “I'll send somebody in here after you. If you're plannin' on walkin' again, quit draggin' that knee.”
He drove out onto the cobblestones. At the corner of 44th he leaned out to tell a blue uniform he'd heard a man hollering behind the fence across the street. The cop took in the Lincoln in one all-encompassing glance and started across the street.
Johnny drove to the Duarte and parked in front, illegally at that time of day. In the lobby he ran into Gus. “Who's on the beat?” he asked the black-haired Greek.
“Desmond. Why?”
“I left a Lincoln out front. Tell him to use up his book of tickets on it.”
He went upstairs to his room for a drink.
CHAPTER XII
Twilight had come and gone before Johnny's vigil outside the precinct station house was rewarded by the appearance of Detective James Rogers in his unmarked black sedan. Johnny stepped from his doorway and walked rapidly to the car as Rogers parked in the only open space in the block, squarely beside a fire hydrant. The sedan's wheels were still moving when Johnny opened the door on the passenger's side and slid into the front seat.
The nose dipped as Rogers instinctively hit the brake. “Well, well, well!” he exclaimed sarcastically. “Isn't it fortunate that I'm the cool, even-tempered type who looks first before he shoots? That kind of an entrance can get you lead dimples.”
“Or a night stick behind the ear? How's my friend Cuneo?”
“Johnny, I want to talk to you.” The detective swung about on the seat until he was facing Johnny squarely. “You're going to get yourself so thoroughly-”
“I hear you're acquirin' a taste for French Seventy-fives, Jimmy,” Johnny interrupted.
“You hear a hell of a lot that's none of your business,” the sandy-haired man said acidly. “I'm warning-”
Johnny interrupted again. “You get a decent description from anyone of the guy that stepped from the car to break up Madeleine Winters?”
The detective was silent a moment before replying. “Man Mountain Dean, without the whiskers,” he said finally.
Johnny nodded. “How many arrests you made, Jimmy?” At Rogers' flat stare he grinned. “Like Perry Mason, I'll rephrase the question. Would you like to make one?”
“What do you know, Johnny?”
“Your Forty-fourth Street beat man at the wharves found a guy in a lot this afternoon with a flat wheel. You find out what hospital he sent him to, an' you toddle on over there an' tell the guy in the bed his boss is swearin' out a warrant accusin' his ex-employee of the assault. You might get some action.”
Detective Rogers' regard of Johnny was unwinking. “Who is his boss?”
“Harry Palmer.”
The resulting silence lasted fifteen seconds before the detective spoke again. “Motive?”
“Blackmail. Long-time.”
“I'll send someone over,” Roger said. He glanced at his watch. “I've a nine o'clock appointment myself.”
“Send a fast talker,” Johnny cautioned.
“Bob Hope's understudy,” the detective promised. “Well pick up Palmer, too. Would it do me any good to inquire how the man happened to be in a lot with a flat wheel?”
“He didn't believe a guy who said the odds were eight to five.”
“I guess that makes about as much sense as most of what I hear from you,” Rogers observed. He swung about in the seat again and reached for the door handle. With his hand on it he paused, looking straight ahead through the windshield, his voice uncomfortable. “This and a dime will get you a cup of coffee from me any time,” he said gruffly. “Understand? The first time that Cuneo-”
“Could Palmer have killed Arends, Jimmy?” Johnny cut in.
“The first time that Cuneo sees you,” the sandy-haired man continued doggedly, unheeding, “I won't be responsible.”
“I don't like people who carry their hardware around in back of me, Jimmy.”
“Cuneo was trying to break up a brawl in a public place, which he had every license to do!” Rogers' voice had risen sharply. “Which it was his duty to do,” he continued more quietly. “Each of us does his duty as he sees it.” He threw up the door handle and opened the door part way. With his legs already out he spoke over his shoulder. “I forget that question you just asked, but the answer is negative. Physically impossible.” He climbed out, slammed the door, walked around the car and ran lightly up the worn white stone steps of the old building.
“Thanks, Jimmy,” Johnny said softly after the departed figure. He climbed leisurely from the sedan and looked at his watch. Eight twenty-five. Thirty-five minutes to Rogers' appointment time. Johnny was more than a little curious about this appointment of Jimmy Rogers.
He walked up to the corner. Before he was halfway there two cruisers rushed out of the private police parking lot and roared past him nose-to-tail, a low rrrrrr of the sirens and the flashing red dome lights denoting urgency. Johnny smiled to himself. Tiny would be having company.
The smile faded as he walked. If he'd been sure this afternoon, that tire iron might have been a good idea. Madeleine Winters might have been and done a lot of things, but no woman deserved what had happened to her. Palmer might not have killed Arends, but he had a lot to answer for.
And it still left the question of who had killed Arends.
Johnny stepped off the curb at sight of a cruising cab, and it slowed and backed up for him. He pointed out Detective Rogers' sedan to the driver as they passed it. “See that one, chief? Circle the block an' pull in at the corner above here. Double-park if you have to. When he takes off don't let him get away from you.”
The driver looked. He flashed a glance back at Johnny, his voice unenthusiastic. “You see where he's parked, Mac? You sure it's not the fuzz?”
“I don't give a damn if it's an Episcopal bishop!” Johnny barked. “Get around this block an' in behind him. We lose him I'm gonna be mighty unhappy with you, chief.”
The driver surveyed Johnny in his rear-view mirror. The sight appeared to convince him. They circled the block in silence, and pulled in at the corner where Johnny had hailed him. Lights on and motor idling, they sat, with the cabbie casting nervous glances up and down the street.
Perhaps ten minutes had elapsed when Johnny saw Detective Rogers' slender figure run down the station-house steps, slip out of his jacket in the mild night breeze and slide under the wheel. The driver saw him, too. “I hope you know what you're doin', Mac,” he grunted, easing forward. “Anyways, I got him covered.”
They followed out to Eighth Avenue, and as Rogers turned north Johnny had a hunch. The Hotel Alden was their destination, he suddenly felt sure. He watched closely as they eased up to within a quarter block of the sedan, the cabbie with one eye on the lights ahead.
When they turned off Columbus Circle onto Central Park West Johnny sat back in the seat and relaxed. No question about it now. When they turned into 82nd he leaned forward again and watched until he was sure the sedan ahead was slowing. “Okay, chief,” Johnny said as soon as it did. “Anywhere's right here's good enough.” He dropped a bill on the front seat and got out in the middle of the block. Leisurely he sauntered up the street toward the lighted Alden marquee.