“She came through here with that yellow convertible a while back,” the man said.
Benny clicked down the wall phone and ran back to the desk. “Mick, anything new?”
“Hi, Benny. Well, they just heaved again, Kip says. Maybe they seen something.”
“Heaved? What in hell-”
“Heaved the ship around, I guess.”
“O.K. Hold it now, Mick. I gotta make another call.”
He picked up the other phone and dialed. “Scotty? Tapkow. Listen close now. The kid’s gone. Pat. In the yellow convertible. Call the Bradys and get them started in town. She headed for town. Then get the guys at Alverato’s club, they’re just sitting there on their cans, and tell them to fan out over the city. Tell them to hit every parkway, Pendleton’s place on Sutton, and every viper joint. Get going and find that girl. I want her back here, get that?”
When he picked up the other receiver he could hear Mickey saying, “-beeline for it right now.”
“Mick, what, what-”
“You wasn’t listening? Alverato and Birdie took the launch and are going out there. They found the spot. Great news, huh, Benny?”
“Great, great. What now? What are they doing now?”
“Hold on, Benny. Kip? What are they doing now?”
Benny’s eyes kept jumping to the other phone, back and forth. He blinked. A sharp headache had started to spread over the side of his head.
“Benny. They’re simply chugging along there, he says.”
“Mick, can Kip see the spot? Ask him.”
“Kip, can you see the spot?… Yeah? How’s it look?… Yeah? Benny? He can see it It’s yellow, he says. He says he can-”
“Mick, shut up a minute. Fix it so I can hear Kip direct. Put the phone to the speaker or something. I’m going nuts listening to that goddamn gum chewing.”
“I can’t fix it so you can talk to him. I can-”
“Forget that part. I just want to hear him, you jerk!”
Then came a steady humming, a gritty noise that growled behind Kip’s voice: “-into the wind now. Birdie’s got a stick with a hook. The dragnet’s in the stern. They’re going to try the hook first. Alverato must have cut the motor because-”
The other phone rang.
“Scotty here. Tapkow? I did like you said. They’re all out now, but nothing yet.”
“Call back every fifteen minutes, Scotty.” He hung up, unable to wait any longer to pick up the other phone.
“-stopped dipping it in. Alverato is in the back with the net I think-I don’t know, he’s turning the other way, pointing. They’re looking up. There must be-” Kip’s metallic voice was drowned in the strong static.
Benny was frantic. He couldn’t hear, he couldn’t see, he couldn’t talk to Mick, who was holding the phone to the radio speaker. But then Mick came through. He’d heard the static and the voice fading and he was talking to Kip. “Mickey to Kip, Mickey to Kip. Can’t read you, can’t read you.” He took up the phone. “Benny? I’m trying to raise him. There’s interference.”
“Goddamnit, I know there’s interference! What’s interfering? Turn a knob or something.”
“It’s not the set, Benny. Could be a plane, though I wouldn’t know why a plane-He’s coming through again, Benny. Here he is.”
“-hands over their eyes,” Kip’s voice said. “Can’t tell from here what they’re doing. They must be-Wait!” Kip’s mechanical drone picked up speed and sharpened, sounding almost like a human voice. “By God, it’s a helicopter! The damn thing just hangs there. No, it’s starting to sag down to the launch. They-” The other phone rang again.
“Scotty, talk fast. What-wrong car? So keep them looking. I don’t care how long it takes!”
Benny was like a hunted man in a dream, trying to run and crashing from one pitfall into the next It was hard to make out Kip’s voice and Benny strained into the earpiece, his eyes on the other phone, glued there like the glass eyes of the dead pig.
“-scrambling into the front. They’re both watching the thing drop from the helicopter. Looked small, puffing. Christ, a fat cloud in the stern now. Birdie is diving for it, he-yeah, he’s got the bomb, throwing it over the side. Burned his hand, though. Keeps shaking it and dropped his gun. Al must have ducked below. I only see Birdie now. He’s grabbing the stick and swinging at the heli-Christ, that thing is low! Here’s Al coming up with a Tommy gun, and Birdie’s hauling out with that stick again. They’re so close now-My God! He can’t get the stick around. Al’s falling, Al’s got the-The goddamn hook’s into Al and won’t come out! It looks-” Kip stopped. He spoke once more, saying, “Coast Guard launch,” and then the radio went dead.
“Did you hear that, Benny? Hey, Benny! Cheeze, I’m gonna blow,” and then the phone went dead too.
The wait was over. Benny never even thought of the other phone. He could only think of Pendleton then; Pendleton, who was dead, but not without one more double-cross. He had given the tip-off. He was dead and there was nothing to be done about it.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Before he went to the village he called Scotty once more, but he knew it wouldn’t mean a thing. It was nighttime and he drove to the village slowly. He bought the extra in the drugstore and drove back to Alverato’s place.
“Dope Ring Smashed,” it said.
Holding the paper down on the desk as if it were going to blow away, he read every word.
“Acting upon an anonymous tip, the combined striking force of the Coast Guard and F.B.I. pulled one of the most spectacular raids…”
He knew that part of it.
“… resulting in the arrest of the right-hand man to a local underworld czar.”
They got Birdie.
“… virtual hand-to-hand combat for the possession of a watertight container of pure heroin. During the course of the battle the notorious Agrippino Alverato, kingpin of the local syndicate, met a grisly fate at the hands of a fearless Coast Guard commander who-”
Big Al!
“… pronounced dead from spinal injury.” And so that left no one.
“Further important arrests are imminent.”
Benny pushed himself away from the desk and stared at the far wall. There was a picture hanging on it, a picture of something he couldn’t make out He noticed that his hands were shaking again. He balled his fists, slowly at first, thumped them on the desk, both of them, harder, then hard and fast like drumsticks.
It brought him around. It came over him like the cold sting of ice, the sudden change in pace and the determination. He went to the kitchen and drank black coffee. His face didn’t tell a thing now.
“Dope Ring Smashed,” it had said in the paper. He thought about it then and saw that what was smashed was a man named Pendleton, a man named Alverato, and nothing else.
They had the shipment, and that was all. One shipment gone and nobody left to know the story. Birdie knew part of the story, but Birdie never talked. Benny Tapkow knew the whole story; the in, the out, and all the small details. Including those that even Alverato hadn’t known about.
So this was the real beginning, the Big Deal right in his lap. He sat down at the desk again.
The first call was to O’Toole, Levinson, and Levinson. He told them about Birdie, about arranging bail and preparing for Birdie’s defense.
Next he called a professional who lived in Yonkers and gave him the name and address of a purser. The professional was to pick up his advance from the office of Imports, Inc., and do a job with a purser.
A phone call to Alverato’s Construction Enterprises, Inc., got him the telephone number of the accountant for
