June 5, 1:04 p.m. — Out — Mulligan Bros. Boyd Mulligan.
WOMAN: Hello?
BOYD: Hello? Is your husband there?
WOMAN: No. I’m sorry…
BOYD: At work?
WOMAN: Yes. Is there any message?
BOYD: No. No message. I’ll catch him there.
June 5, 1:09 p.m. — Out — Mulligan Bros. Boyd Mulligan.
MAN: Detective Bureau.
BOYD: (voice muffled): Is the Preacher there?
MAN: Huh?
BOYD: (voice clearer): The Preacher. Is he there?
MAN: Oh. Wait a sec. I’ll see.
LAVERTY: Hello?
BOYD: Boyd Mulligan, Preacher. I want to see you.
LAVERY: There’s only one place I want to see you, Mulligan. Looking out from behind bars…
BOYD: I know all about the way Parelli really died.
LAVERTY (after a long pause): Griff told me that’d never be used. He said he didn’t blame me for…
BOYD: It won’t be used, Preacher. If you help me.
LAVERTY: (after a long pause): All right. West Broadway by the Presidio wall. Twenty minutes.
Lynch folded the paper with exaggerated care, making sure all the creases were sharp and square.
Hammett asked, ‘Who was Parelli?’
Lynch looked up, his face dazed. ‘A cheap hood found beaten to death in Jessie Street a few years ago. Pistolwhipped. A young girl claimed he’d been molesting her, trying to drag her into his apartment building when another man stopped him. He ran. The second man caught him and systematically beat him to death. First she said she would never forget the second man’s face, then said she had forgotten it. Then she left town.’
‘Yeah,’ said Hammett softly. ‘If Mulligan got her to change her story and then got her to leave…’
‘Dan’s always had that black Irish temper. If it got away from him then the way it did with that Egan Tokzek-’
‘I think he came around to tell me about it a couple of days ago,’ said Hammett. ‘After his talk with Boyd Mulligan. He was waiting outside my apartment building to talk to me, only he couldn’t bring himself to say it. He knew I’d brought in the hatchet men to wreck Pronzini’s joint, and he knew why I did it. Only Mulligan could have told him those things. I think Mulligan wanted him to pry out of me how much I really knew, and I think he wouldn’t play along. But you can see why I have to know where he was the night Vic was killed, and where he was last night when Pronzini got it.’
‘You can’t think that Preacher would-’
Hammett jerked his shoulders irritably at Lynch.
‘I’m not saying I think he did anything, I’m saying I have to find out. If he had something to do with Vic’s death, then he might have killed Pronzini to protect himself. Or if the Mulligans do have their claws into him, he might have killed Pronzini because they forced him into it.’
McKenna spoke for the first time since reading the transcript. ‘But what about the woman and her son up in Marin? What sort of threat could they pose to Dan Laverty?’
‘I don’t know. But there’s a lot I don’t know. Why was he out south of the park the night Tokzek was killed? Why did he chase-’
‘That I can tell you, at least.’ Lynch massaged his eyelids with blunt fingers. ‘Dan got a phone call, at home, telling him that in a few minutes a stolen car would be-’
‘There!’ exclaimed McKenna triumphantly. ‘That proves-’
‘Nothing at all, Bren,’ said his secretary in a tired voice. ‘It’s only what Dan told me himself. There’s no corroboration.’
‘Merciful God in heaven!’ burst out McKenna. He was at the sideboard again, his features pinched and drawn.
Lynch’s eyes were losing their dazed look, as if his mind had begun to function once more concerning the political realities.
‘You’re willing to let us handle this for the moment?’
‘I told Jimmy Wright to put a tail on Laverty.’
McKenna began, ‘That isn’t necessary-’
‘I think it is. But I’m willing to lay back apart from that. For the moment. But if I don’t get the answers I need — straight answers, and quick — I’m going to the grand jury with what I’ve got so they can ask the questions.’
29
At this time on a sunny day, Hammett was pretty sure where he’d find Pop Daneri, and he did. The old man was basking in the sun like a turtle on the minuscule open landing that overlooked the Weller Hotel’s enclosed court. The door was open behind him so he could hear the sound of the buzzer if anyone came in off Post Street.
‘Was she able to identify anyone?’
Hammett took the old man’s arm, not gently. ‘Who?’
‘The Chinese girl. Identify the pictures of the Chicago-’
‘Oh, goddammit anyway!’ exclaimed Hammett.
There was sudden anguish in the old man’s voice. ‘He was… from the Treasury Department of the United States government. He.. ’ His voice faltered. ‘He had a… a badge and everything. Said you’d given him the address. He took her away with him…’
‘How long ago?’
‘Three o’clock this morning. I was still up. He rang the bell, came up, showed me that badge…’ The old man said softly, ‘He was a ringer, wasn’t he, Sam?’
Hammett merely nodded, frowning in thought. Nearly nine hours before. An impossibly cold trail. He could mobilize the men under Jimmy Wright’s command, but as for the police…
Hell, any one of them — particularly Dan Laverty — could have been the one who came and got her. The only cop he really trusted was Jack Manion…
The old man’s face had changed. His eyes had gone dull, as if something opaque had been drawn across them. He doubled up his fist and struck himself in the face with it.
‘Cut it out,’ growled Hammett.
The old man hit himself again. His brass shell-casing ring gashed his cheek. Blood trickled down his face.
‘Stupid!’ cried the old man. ‘Worthless! The oldest trick in the book and-’
‘Cut it out, Pop,’ said Hammett again. ‘You were taken by experts, they’d know how you feel about the government, how you’d respect a man from the Treasury Department. What bothers me is how they knew where she…’ He broke off. Comprehension flooded his face, tightening the lean features. ‘The goddamn phone call!’ he burst out softly.
He looked over at the old man. Pop had a handkerchief pressed against the purple-lipped cut on his cheek.
‘Were you in the room with her when she called her parents?’
‘In the next room. But, Sam-’
‘Could you hear what she was saying? Did she tell them anything about where she was?’
‘Couldn’t hear words, just her voice.’
‘English or Chinese? The cadence and tenor would be different, even through a wall.’
The old eyes, more alive now, sought backward through memory. ‘English.’
