Tommy pulled over a chair, dusting it off with the sleeve of his gray shirt. He offered it to the plastic surgeon. Doc dropped into it wearily.
“You look down in the dumps, Doc,” said Tommy. “Anything wrong?”
Miles told him briefly about his brother. Tommy sprang up and swore explosively.
“You name the guys that did it, Doc!” he growled, his green eyes narrow with fury. “You just name ’em and—”
“No, Tommy. All I want you to do is locate a black onyx ring.”
Miles described it.
“I’ll find it,” Tommy vowed with savage fury. “If it’s been turned in, I’ll find it. I’ll scratch every fence there is, pump every stoolie alive. You gave my Janie a new face after that car mangled it. I told you I’d never forget, that I’d go straight. I got a job tendin’ furnaces for a row of apartments, but I ain’t lost touch with the boys. I’ll find that ring for you, Doc!”
Tommy left Janie with one of the neighbors. Then he and Doc started the search for the missing ring. Tommy didn’t exaggerate. He knew the haunts, every likely place where a rat would come to turn hot gold into cool green.
The first place they visited was Uncle Sylvester’s, a cheap little pawn shop located in a none too prosperous section on the other side of town. The former Sticky-fingered Kid had done a lot of business with Uncle in the past, and Uncle had reaped handsome profits from the Kid’s pickings. He was indeed sorry to hear that Tommy had found a narrow hole in the fence and crawled through to the legal side.
“I’m lookin’ for a ring that was lifted from my pal here,” Tommy told him. “He’s an okay guy and he’s willin’ to cough up twice what you paid for it.”
Uncle’s shifty eyes settled briefly on Tommy’s gaunt face. He shrugged his narrow, hunched shoulders sadly.
“I ain’t even seen it,” he grunted.
Tommy knew Uncle Sylvester wouldn’t swim against a tide of greenbacks, which meant he hadn’t seen the ring.
Tommy wandered away with Doc, but he had a fresh idea.
“That clears some of the smoke outa my eyes,” he said. “The guy who blew them lead periods at your brother — or at least the guy who swiped his ring — ain’t local talent. If he was, he’d have paid Uncle Sylvester a call right off the bat. Every light-fingered gent operating in the city knows Uncle pays top prices and ain’t scared to take chances.
“He’d fence the Empire State Building, if anybody brought it to him. The trigger guy we’re bloodhoundin’ is from outa town, so it looks like we’ll just have to keep tryin’.”
He took Doc Murdock to every pawn shop, every fence in the city, but it was the same answer at each they visited.
“We’d be glad to turn it over for an old pal like you, but we ain’t seen it.”
It was almost dawn when the two of them sank down on a pair of stools in the Greek’s coffee house, just around the corner from Doc’s slum clinic. They were foot-weary from climbing up and down stairs. Tommy was thoroughly dejected because he had failed in his promise to deliver the ring. He ordered coffee and sinkers. While waiting to be served, he said to Doc Murdock:
“There’s just one place we ain’t tried where he mighta fenced it. And if it ain’t there, then the guy’s either blown town with it, or he’s bucking the form-sheet and holding onto it.”
“And this last place?” Doc asked.
“The Web,” Tommy replied with a none too enthusiastic expression on his skinny face. “One of the few places in this city where I ain’t welcome. I was never sorry about it before. It’s a hotel, if you want to call it that They ain’t careful about who signs the register. It’s usually the first place a ‘visitor’ holes up when he’s got cops on his tail.
“I just never got along with ‘Spider’ Kelly, the rat who owns it. If he thought I was lookin’ for the ring, and he had it, he’d sooner swallow it than give it to me.”
Doc looked with sharp eyes at Tommy.
“Why can’t I see him?”
“You?” Tommy’s eyes came around and met Doc’s. “Why, you wouldn’t last any longer in that place than an icicle in the devil’s back pocket! They’re tough monkeys over there. They’d be all over you before you got your head halfway through the door.”
“Maybe not. Maybe with your help I’d be very nicely received.”
“With my help?”
Doc waited until the Greek had served them.
“When somebody from out of town comes to visit a place like the Web,” he asked, “doesn’t he usually have a letter of introduction?”
“Yeah, but where’ll you get one?”
Doc smiled gently. “Not meaning to reflect anything — but wasn’t one of your past accomplishments forgery?”
Tommy put three heaping spoons of sugar into his cup, then answered coyly.
“Well, I wasn’t the best, but wasn’t so bad, either.”
“Do you know anybody out of town who might send a customer to Spider Kelly?”
Tommy dunked his doughnut, considered a moment.
“A couple of guys.” He took a bite. “ ‘Bugs’ Lattimer, out in Chi, for one….”
“Swell. Write a letter to Spider, from Lattimer, introducing ‘Rings’ Jackson. I’ve got a little idea to go with that name.”
Tommy turned and frowned darkly.
“I wish you wouldn’t tackle it, Doc. You don’t know this Spider. He’s bad medicine, worse than a Black Widow.”
Doc lifted his cup, sipped with the appreciation of a connoisseur, then remarked briefly:
“The Greek makes swell coffee.”
Tommy shook his head worriedly and finished his doughnut.
Chapter IV
Mister Rat Crawls In
How Spider ever picked up a fine old Irish name like Kelly was one for Ripley to decipher, but “Spider” fit him to a crooked T. He was black and creepy-looking, his face and hands covered with coarse, wiry, black hair. He was big, too, with the beef and shoulders to go with it.
He glared darkly at the unkempt stranger who handed him a smudged, wrinkled letter.
Doctor Miles Murdock’s society friends would have been shocked to see him now — if indeed any of them could have recognized him as the famous plastic surgeon.
This was Doc’s first attempt at disguise, but he had made an extensive study of make-up in connection with his work in plastic surgery. His knowledge of physiognomy was unsurpassed. He knew each plane and its relation to the other, each tiny nerve and muscle, and what caused each light and shadow in the human features.
The masterpiece he had accomplished on his own face for this dangerous mission was a tribute to his genius. He used no trick wigs or whiskers, no mechanical devices to alter the contours.
A clever ointment paled his skin. He had raised his brows and lowered his hairline. A grease which he rubbed into his hair temporarily removed the wave, besides changing it almost to gray. Bits of surgical wax, fastened to his gums, heightened his cheekbones, and an artful blending of lights and shadows made his nose look long and tapering. A cheap, frayed gray suit completed his remarkable characterization.
Spider Kelly read the letter twice with due care. Then, raising his pigeyes, he studied the stranger.
“So Lattimer sent you, eh?” he asked in a raspy voice. “What’s he doin’ these days?”
“Makin’ book.”
Tommy had told that to Doc. In fact, Tommy had primed him for all the questions Spider was likely to throw at him. Tommy hadn’t guessed far wrong. The keeper of the dilapidated hotel fired them all at Doc, but he parried each query neatly.
“What’re you runnin’ away from?” Spider finally asked.