“I call it home. You going to put Hugo back on my tail?”
“I told you he was back on a beat. But... you won’t play ball?”
“Lieutenant,” Sargent said seriously, “I actually haven’t the slightest idea who it is. It may well be Thayer. But I hope to get a lead by tomorrow afternoon. When I do I’ll let you know.”
“That’s a promise, Sargent. After all, there is such a thing as withholding information from the police.”
“That’s right. And here comes my train, lieutenant.”
He waited on the platform until the train was moving to see if Fanning intended to follow him back to the city. But the Homicide lieutenant was walking away.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Back in the Loop he telephoned the offices of Business Journals, Incorporated. He could easily have run over, but had no taste for a session with Chapman. The publisher sounded ill when Sargent got him on the phone.
“Bad news,” Sargent told him. “I talked to Mrs. Pelkey and I’m sure she hasn’t got the stock.”
“Ohmigawd!” groaned Chapman. “Then I’m a ruined man. Mrs. Sligo has it and it’ll cost me twenty thousand to get even a draw — if Ruth doesn’t double-cross me.”
“I thought you said you didn’t have twenty thousand?”
“I might barely make it if I mortgage everything I own. Even my sword collection! Sargent, I’d counted on you and you’ve let me down.”
“I didn’t let you down. Stop crying. There’s still a little hope. What’s Lew Thayer’s address?”
Chapman’s eagerness was pathetic. “You think Lew might still have it? Tell him I’ll pay him that twelve hundred dollars and take him back if he’ll only help me out. I’ll even give him a bonus.”
“Make him a partner.”
“All right, I will! Tell Lew—”
“What’s his address?”
“Just a minute. I have it right here. Lew Thayer, care of Barney’s Tavern. That doesn’t sound right.”
“Maybe it is. What’s the street and number?”
“Willow, near Bissell.”
“Why, that’s right near my own neighborhood. Odd, I didn’t recognize the name. All right, I’m going to talk to him.”
“Call me after you do, Sargent. I’ll be waiting. At home after five-thirty.”
Sargent got a Wilson local elevated train and after a while descended to the street at Sheffield and Bissell. He walked a block eastward and then saw the sign: Barney’s Tavern. Alleys.
The main door opened on a barroom, in which were several pool tables. In the rear was a door leading to the bowling alleys. Several men were knocking balls around the pool tables and a half dozen loafers were holding up the bar.
Sargent ordered a glass of beer and after sipping about half moved across the room to watch the pool players. He edged his way carelessly around to the door of the bowling alleys and looked in. Lew Thayer was not in sight. He worked his way back to the bar, finishing his beer on the way.
“Fill it up,” he said to the bartender, then as the man brought the refill, “Lew been around today?”
“Lew who?”
“Lew Thayer.”
“Never heard of him.”
“Lew Thayer, I said, a stocky redhead.”
The bartender shook his head. “Don’t know him.”
“But you must know him. He hangs around here a lot.”
“Look, mister,” said the bartender, “I don’t know what your business is, but I saw your maneuvers a minute ago — and I still say I never even heard of Lew Thayer.”
Sargent grimaced. “I know how it is; you think I might be a bill collector or a process server. But, honest, I work at the same place he does — I mean at the same place he worked up to a couple of days ago. I’m Frank Sargent; he may have told you about me.”
“Uh-uh,” said the bartender. “You know what? Before I got this place I worked in a factory and one day somebody called up my home and said he was an old pal of mine from South Dakota and he was just passing through town and wanted to see me and couldn’t my wife tell him where I worked so he could get in touch with me? Well, my wife knew I’d once been in South Dakota, so she told the guy. And you know what? He was a process server and I got my pay garnisheed and it cost me sixty-six bucks.”
“Ah, hell!” Sargent said, in disgust.
“Ain’t it the truth, pal?” The bartender smiled and, turning, leaned his left elbow on the bar.
Then he gasped and his face became a study in chagrin. At the end of the bar was a door, which apparently led upstairs. It flew violently inward and Lew Thayer, eyes bloodshot and wild, staggered into the barroom. He stopped with feet spread wide apart and threatening to buckle under him at any moment.
“What the hell kind of a hotel is this, anyway?” he roared. “Can’t a man sleep around here?”
Barney, the bartender, hurried around the bar. “Shh!” he said in a hoarse whisper, “this isn’t a hotel, it’s—”
“The hell it isn’t a hotel!” Lew Thayer thundered. “You think I don’t know where I am?”
“Sure, sure, Lew,” soothed Barney. “You’re home, this is Barney’s place.”
“Don’t gimme any of that!” Thayer retorted. “I know where I am. I’m at the Pollock Hotel in Columbus, Ohio. I just went to bed and I can’t sleep with all this noise. D’you have to tear down the hotel now?”
Frank Sargent stepped around Barney, the bartender, and took hold of Lew Thayer’s arm. “Hello, Lew,” he said.
Thayer looked at him owlishly. “What the hell you doing in Columbus, Ohio?”
“Ben Chapman sent me to see you. He wants to pay you the twelve hundred he owes you.”
“I don’t want it,” Thayer snarled. “I’m suing him and after I get through suing I’m going to punch him in his face.”
Barney relaxed. “Okay, Lew? You know this man?”
“Sure, who is he?”
“Frank Sargent, editor of Turkey Talk,” Sargent said, quickly.
“That’s a lie!” snapped Thayer. “Ernie Pelkey’s editor of Turkey Talk. Damfine fella, Ernie. Best friend I got in the world. Best friend...” Thayer leaned against Sargent, until the latter was holding up most of his weight. “Bes’ frieninaworld. On’y Ben Chapman drove him nuts, the dirty, double-crossin’ rat. Igonna-punchiminanose...” Thayer’s knees buckled under him.
Barney caught Thayer under the armpits and shoved Sargent aside. “Beat it, fella. I’m going to put him to bed.”
“All right,” said Sargent wearily. “I guess it’s the best place for him. How long has he been like that?”
“All week, more or less.”
Sargent left the tavern and walked down Bissell Street to Dayton and from there to North Avenue, which brought him out within a block of the Ajax Hotel. A clock in a store window showed ten minutes after five but he wasn’t in a mood to report to Ben O. Chapman. It would do Ben good to stew.
He walked down North Avenue to Larrabee and turning the corner saw the branch post office. He stared at it for a moment, then suddenly whirled and rushed back to North Avenue. He burst into the first store he came to, which happened to be a millinery shop.
He stabbed a finger at a red straw hat which had a green and white cockfeather sticking up about six inches above the crown.
“I’ll take that,” he said to a salesgirl.
The girl recoiled as if struck. “This hat?”
“Yes. How much is it?”
“Six dollars and fifty cents.”
“Put it in a box,” Sargent said. “And wrap the box in the brightest wrapping paper you’ve got. Have you got some red?”
“Why, yes.”
The girl got a hatbox, then went to the rear of the store and got some brilliant red wrapping paper. She started to wrap the box in the paper. When she finished, Sargent said, “Put another sheet around it. I’m going to mail it.”