'Fatalities?'
'Two,' Ness said, and gave particulars, as many as he knew, anyway. 'And thirteen more inhaled a lot of smoke. The Salvation Army's helping us get them to Mount Sinai and Glenville General.'
Burton nodded gravely. He looked over at the burning house across the way. 'When I heard an old-age home was on fire, I envisioned something else.'
'Me, too. I wonder how many of these rattraps are passing for nursing homes.'
'We'll have to find out.'
'And we will. You know, we have to talk money.'
The mayor snorted. 'Is there any other subject?'
'The fire department's in sad shape.'
Ness began giving details, but Burton interrupted, saying, 'Let's get away from the smell of smoke.' He gestured down the street, past the thinning crowd of gawking neighbors. 'Let's walk and talk.
'You've obviously seen why my overriding concern is getting our budget past the council,' the mayor said, as they strolled down the dimly lit streets lined with ramshackle frame houses.
'I can certainly see why we need money for the police department,' Ness said. 'Money other than the graft some cops are pocketing, that is.'
'You've spent the past two days on the prowl, haven't you, Eliot?'
It was the first time Burton had called Ness by his first name.
'I spent most of the afternoon in my office. But yes, I've been out and about. Went on a sorry excuse for a bookie-joint raid this morning. Toured some of the precincts.'
'What have you seen?'
Ness shrugged. 'A bunch of sloppy, poorly trained cops who are low in morale, to say the least, some of whom-perhaps many of whom-are so corrupt they make a Chicago cop look like St. Francis of Assisi.'
'These are rank-and-file cops you're talking about. Any sign of corruption higher up?'
'Not specifically, but I heard an interesting rumor.'
He told Burton about the so-called 'outside chief.'
'Damn,' Burton said, his voice breathy. 'If such a man exists, and you could nail him…'
'You'd have your top-ranking corrupt cop for the papers, and at the same time we'd knock the pins out from under our 'department within the department.' We'd accomplish something substantial.'
Burton had started to smile just thinking about it. 'The city council wouldn't dare withhold your budget requests.'
'I'd think not. And all I have to do is turn that rumor into a man. And find him, and arrest him, and make it stick.'
'And do it by early March,' Burton added, the dreamy expression gone. 'Sorry you took this job?'
'No.'
'You seem less enthusiastic than you were in my office Wednesday. What do you propose to do at this point?'
Ness stopped. 'Well, to do anything much, I need money, now.'
Burton's face tightened. 'I thought you understood that we don't get any money until you produce.'
'I'm not talking about money on a budget level.'
'What level, then?'
Ness gestured in frustration. 'I need to be able to hire men outside the department. I need to be able to bring people in when I need to.'
'Men? People?'
'Investigators. Including private detectives. I know some pretty good operatives. A friend of mine in Chicago might come in handy now and then. I can't get this job done if I have to draw from the police department for my staff.'
Burton sighed. 'Hardly.'
They began to walk again.
'These investigators would mostly work undercover,' Ness said. 'So we need new faces. They can't be a part of the current system. Oh, sure, I can call on rookies for occasional help-young kids who haven't lost their fire yet, who became cops for some reason other than a pension and/or a chance to tie into some graft.'
'But your investigators can't be rookies.'
'No. And they may come and go, like I said. I'll only need a handful, but they'll have to be paid.'
The Mayor stopped and stood with his arms folded; he rocked on his feet a while and thought. 'What if we could come up with something like the Secret Six, in Chicago?'
'Businesspeople, you mean?'
The two men stood in a pool of light under a street lamp.
'Merchants,' the Mayor said. 'Industrialists. I have friends in the Chamber of Commerce and the American Legion who are good and tired of being shaken down.'
Burton had long been associated with the Legion, having been its county chairman.
Ness raised a hand. 'They could have no say over my actions.'
'None at all.' Then, thoughtful, Burton said, 'But I think perhaps I could put together a secret fund for your investigators. A slush fund of sorts. Perhaps just to tide us over until we get our budget. Assuming we do, of course. And it wouldn't be bottomless, by any means.'
Ness smiled tightly. 'Just so I can get my feet wet in it.'
Burton's eyes narrowed; he gestured with a gently lecturing forefinger. 'Any investigators you hire will draw a public salary, but they'll be listed on the city's payrolls as laborers. We'll supplement their salaries with money from our new Secret Six.'
'That would be just about perfect, Your Honor.'
Burton smiled a little. 'Don't get your feet wet just yet. Let me see if I can get something like this off the ground, first. You, uh, haven't made Inspector Potter very happy, now, have you?'
'All I did was promote him.'
'Interesting promotion.'
'I hope you don't mind the way I handled it. If I could've busted him on corruption charges, you'd have had your top-ranking bent cop to feed the press. At this stage, though, all I know for sure about Potter is he plays political games. He'll be investigated, but I had to act sooner than that. I had to get him out from under me, now.'
'No, no,' the Mayor said, patting the air with his hands. 'I wholeheartedly approve. I'm pleased. Even amused.'
Ness had put the inspector in charge of a traffic survey designed to study placement of traffic lights, boulevard stop signs and other matters 'materially affecting traffic.' Stressing the 'high priority' of dealing with traffic problems, Ness had announced to the press that the investigation needed to be done 'intelligently' and there-fore the 'highest technical intelligence' available in the entire department needed to be employed. Hence, the safety director had relieved Inspector Potter of his duties as chief of the Detective Bureau, and placed him at the head of the survey.
'The papers treated you kindly, where the Potter ouster is concerned,' Burton commented.
They began to walk again, heading back.
'They did like it, yes.'
'That's the kind of publicity we're looking for. That's the kind that can get me that slush fund you need. That's the kind that can help us get our budget past even an unwilling city council.'
Ness stopped again. 'You say that as if I've generated some other kind of publicity, as well.'
The Mayor stopped, too. 'Uh, then, I take it you didn't see the last edition of the Plain Dealer?'
'No.'
'It's in the car,' Burton said. 'I'll show you.'
They walked quickly to the limo, where Burton got the paper from the front seat and handed it to Ness. A head-line said, FORMER G-MAN'S FIRST RAID A FIZZLE
Under Wild's byline, the article went on: 'Director Ness accompanied police in a raid on a barbershop and came up empty-handed. Ness found a man with earphones listening to a radio broadcast of a horse race, but there
