“Thanks a lot for the vote of confidence. As you have said in the past, even a stopped clock is correct twice a day.”
Wolfe let that remark pass. “I suggest that you telephone Mr. Cohen.” Whenever Wolfe “suggests” something to me, that is tantamount to an order. “Let me guess what you want me to tell him,” I said. “That the police are conducting a sweep of a certain apartment building on Tenth Avenue near Fifty-Eighth Street, hoping to locate a man with a gunshot wound who may be connected to a murder.”
“Mr. Cohen will of course want to know how we come to have this information.”
“And when Lon asks, as he will, I will reply that we are not at liberty to divulge our sources.”
“Satisfactory,” Wolfe said, opening an orchid catalog that had arrived with the morning mail.
Lon picked up the phone on the first ring. “Cohen!” he snapped.
“And a pleasant good day to you, too.”
“Now what favor are you looking for this time?”
“That is hardly a way to greet a guy who is coming to you with information.”
“Pardon my skepticism, but I always get leery when you tell me that you have information for me. It usually means I have to cough something up for you.”
“I am cut to the quick. Here I am with something you might find interesting.”
“Okay, I’m listening,” Lon said. “What’s the information that you seem to be so proud of?”
I then proceeded to, in essence, give him the same phrasing I read to Wolfe.
“And just where did you learn this tidbit?” was the response.
“We are not at liberty to reveal our resources.”
“How often have we at the Gazette — and every other paper in the country, as well — heard those words? And now I have to listen to them from an old friend and poker-playing buddy, no less.”
“Well, you are hearing them again from this old friend and poker-playing buddy. I thought you would be delighted to get this information, and delivered to you on a platter, no less.”
“Some platter! You’re not going to tell me this came from Inspector Cramer, are you?”
“I am not. And I am also not asking you for something in return for what I consider to be a good news tip.”
“We will be the judge of that. Because of past conversations you and I have had, I assume the building to which you refer on Tenth Avenue is none other than the Elmont.”
“As I’ve often said, you are a fast study.”
That brought a snort on the other end of the line. “Cramer will be madder than a wet hen if one or two of our reporters show up while his men are scouring the Elmont.”
“So what? Surely, you are not about to tell me that the mighty Gazette is going to be intimidated by the growls and scowls of one Lionel T. Cramer of Homicide.”
“At the moment, I am not going to tell you anything,” Lon said. “I believe you have a subscription to our fine product. I will let its pages speak for themselves.”
“Spoken like a staunch representative of the Fourth Estate,” I told him. The response I got was a word his newspaper would never print, followed by a click that told me the conversation had been terminated.
Chapter 21
It would have been unrealistic of me to expect that evening’s Gazette to carry anything related to the Elmont or the man with a bullet in his leg. But the next morning, just before Wolfe came down from the plant rooms at eleven, I was out on the stoop when the carrier on his battered bicycle delivered our copy of the paper’s early edition.
“Nice to see you, Mr. Goodwin,” he said.
“Good to see you, too, Eddie. Right on time as usual.”
“Hey, I’ve gotta be on time. My real job is driving a scrap metal truck over in Brooklyn, and it begins at twelve thirty.” He cycled off along Thirty-Fifth Street, slinging papers with the accuracy of a relief pitcher onto the stoops of the shoulder-to-shoulder brownstones that line the block.
I opened our copy of the Gazette on the steps and found what I was looking for at the bottom of page seven, under the headline Homicide Cops Find Wounded Man in Hotel Who May Be Murder Suspect. The article identified the guy I had shot as William Hartz, fifty-eight, calling him “a displaced person from the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia who apparently entered the United States on a falsified visa.”
The piece went on to say that Hartz had not reported his injury and that he had a .38 revolver in his apartment, the same caliber weapon that was used to kill Chester Miller, according to the autopsy. The last sentence read, “The police refused to divulge how they learned of Hartz and his location.”
I went inside and laid the paper on Wolfe’s desk blotter. I knew Inspector Cramer was kept apprised of any newspaper coverage involving the Homicide Squad, so it figured to be a matter of minutes before we received a call from him.
Wolfe came down from his morning visit with the orchids and scanned the Gazette article as he rang for beer. “You realize who is about to (a) telephone us or (b) ring the doorbell,” I told him, receiving a glare for my trouble. Just as Fritz brought in the beer, option (b) came to pass.
“Good morning,” I said to Cramer, swinging open the door to admit him. I received a glare in return and he stormed by, heading down the hall to the office with me in close pursuit.
As I got to the door, I watched the inspector zero in on the red leather chair and land with a thump.
“Good morning sir,” Wolfe said calmly.
“And exactly what is good about it?” Cramer fired back. “Sometimes I feel like my department is being run by remote control from this goddamned office.”
“Judging by this article,” Wolfe said, picking up the Gazette, “it would appear that your minions have made some progress in the investigation of Mr. Miller’s death.”
“Maybe, but we seem to be operating in a goldfish bowl, thanks to you and your friend Cohen. My men had just got to that Tenth Avenue flop house and began their sweep when three — count ’em three — Gazette reporters show up, along with a photographer.”
“The article contained no pictures,” Wolfe said.
“You are damned right, it didn’t. At least we shagged the photog off, but the reporters were harder to discourage, like barnacles on the hull of a ship.”
“Do you feel you have your killer, sir?”
“Hell, I wouldn’t swear to it, but he’s being grilled right now. Goodwin, I want you to come downtown and look at this character through the one-way glass and make a definite identification.”
“I don’t know why you need me. As Mr. Wolfe told you, I’m the one who shot him in the leg or ankle, so it’s got to be the same guy.”
“Calf, just above the ankle. But we need to make it official so we can at least charge him with assault before we work toward a murder rap.”
I looked at Wolfe, who blinked twice, giving the okay for me to go to headquarters. “I look like hell,” I told Cramer.
He resisted a smile. “Who’s going to care?” he said.
“Thanks for the sympathy. When do you want me down there?”
“How about this afternoon, say three o’clock.”
“Okay, but remember it was dark when I got mugged, so I didn’t get a really good look at either guy. I just saw one in a silhouetted profile.”
“We’ll take our chances. Do you want a cruiser to pick you up?”
“No, I’ll grab a cab. Nothing personal, Inspector, but riding in squad cars always gives me a complex.”
“Suit yourself. And before I go, Wolfe, I’m not happy with the way you sicced those reporters on my men.”
“I have always felt you and your officers are capable of dealing with newspaper people. Besides, I know you value a free and unfettered press.”