bar except me—I just don't like the taste of beer. Janice hurried back with a drink in her right hand and pointed her left at my holster as she said, “It's like being near a snake, same morbid attraction.”
“Not good to get too near guns or snakes,” I kidded her, watching Mary down a quickie at the bar.
“You and I should talk this out,” she said but the soap jingle came, on and everybody started chattering about the sales pitch jammed into the thirty-second jingle. The news followed and the commentator suffered from the occupational disease of his calling—self-importance, as though he was making the news instead of parroting it.
I was the only one trying to hear him: I wanted to know who'd won the fight. The TV screen was filled with film shots of the day's news—another conference in Europe, a factory fire, the President playing golf, then a picture of a small room and uniformed cops carrying out a body. I caught one word over the noises in the room. I shouted, “Shut up!... please.”
The smooth voice of the commentator was saying, ”... and in this dingy room his landlady found Wales' body when he failed to answer her repeated knocks. Police say the retired detective was killed around noon although the landlady didn't discover the body until late this afternoon. One puzzling aspect of the case was a large amount of cash in the dead man's money belt which was untouched. Now, after a word from my sponsor, I'll have the late sport results and the weather for...”
As I put on my coat I told Mary, “I have to get back to the precinct house. Want me to take you home first?”
“Don't worry about me! I'll go home when I'm ready!” she snapped.
“Babes, I have to—”
Don said, “Aren't you being rather melodramatic, Dave old man? Hear about a murder on TV and go dashing out into the night. You really have to go?”
“Melodramatic?” I repeated. “This isn't any play. Wales' partner was killed yesterday and I was on the case. Good night everybody.”
Mary ran after me to the door. I asked, “Got cab fare, Babes?”
“I was never so embarrassed in my life!” she whispered. “You had to show off that lousy gun to startle my friends!”
“I wasn't showing off. How was I to know you hadn't told your boon buddies I was a cop. Way you hid it, you'd think I was in the rackets.”
“I know you, you did it on purpose, grandstanding!”
“Stop it,” I said, opening the door. “Thought you'd like the idea of me being the big attraction tonight—unless you count the juicehound on the couch.”
“Attraction? You fool, they were making fun of you! Now you cap it all by rushing off like a child hearing a fire alarm. You're off duty, they can't get in touch with you here, why the—”
“Damn it, Mary, another ex-cop has been gunned. I'm not only on the case but if I'd followed my hunches, Wales might be alive now. Do you need cab fare?”
“We can't even have a decent evening out,” Mary said. She was on the verge of crying but held it in. “Just leave me alone!” She turned back toward the others and I walked out. I listened for a moment outside the door—there wasn't any laughter. Mary was all wrong.
I walked around the corner and found myself at a subway entrance. Riding up to the station house I didn't think much about Mary being sore—all lovey-dovey at 6 p.m. and a hot pistol by II p.m. Hell with that-Al Wales was dead! That made a monkey out of the robbery theory in Owens' murder, and murder was what it was. My hunch was the correct one-somebody was out to get both men and that could only mean a collar they'd made. Perhaps the killer did a long stretch and just got out. How else could ex-cops make enemies? Instead of horsing around with the Henderson case or writing up a report, if Reed had let me talk to Wales when I asked, the old guy would still be alive now, probably helping me solve the Owens killing.
I reached the precinct house at twenty to twelve. The midnight tour was in the muster room, studying the post condition board and shooting the breeze. The desk lieutenant was a fat slob who'd never heard about the invention of the comb. As I walked in he cracked, “Hey, sonny, where you going? Oh... it's you, Wintino.”
The sonofabitch went through this corny routine every time he saw me, which fortunately wasn't often and the patrolmen in the muster room gave it a big yak-yak.
“I came back to get a Popsicle I didn't finish this afternoon, Lieutenant,” I said to show the joker I could go along with a gag, even a cornball one.
There were only two men in the detective squad room, a guy built like a football tackle—named Wilson—and a sum, dapper (if you go for herringbone weaves) gray-haired man who was the senior detective on the squad and in charge when Reed wasn't around. He was Tom Landon, the quiet type who always looks bored and never gets excited. He asked, “Got your tours mixed, Dave? What you doing here?”
“Heard on TV about Al Wales being killed.”
“Yeah, quite a thing. Eleven thousand bucks in a money belt wrapped around his gut. Shame a man has to kick the bucket with that kind of dough unspent.”
“Where's everybody? Where's Lieutenant Reed?”
Landon leaned back in his chair and ran dental floss through his phony teeth—he was always playing with those false choppers. “Home, I guess. Why? Something go wrong in Night Court?”
“No. I thought with this Wales shooting, I mean it proves Owens wasn't in any stick-up, he was deliberately gunned... figured we'd all be working tonight.”
“Sure does throw a different light on the Owens thing,” Landon said, starting to work on his uppers. “But Wales wasn't killed in this precinct and anyway, Central Office is handling both killings now. I got my paper work to write up before midnight so... Wintino, you actually came here because...? If we wanted you we would have phoned. Beat it.”
“We should be working. These two are former cops!”
Landon held the dental floss up toward the light for inspection, dropped it in the waste basket. “Cops die too, like everybody else. Tell me, what were you doing when you heard about Wales?”
“I was at a card party with my wife.”
I heard Wilson snicker behind my back as Landon said, “And you dropped everything and came a-running. Dave, why don't you grow up and stop playing cops and robbers?”
“But I had a hunch on Owens all along and if I'd seen Wales today, as I wanted to...”
Landon shook his little head. “Don't take your job home with you, Dave. Leave it in your locker with your walking shoes. What are you made of, Dave? You have two days off, take your wife to the movies, get high... young fellow like you should be in bed a lot. And never come a-running, they'll get you out of bed often enough. All an eager beaver gets is tired.”
“Cut the eager-beaver bull. Owens and Wales are different than an ordinary case and I thought —”
“Why don't you get drunk with your wife and stop thinking so much?” Landon said, turning back to his desk. “And let me finish my work, I'm going home in a few minutes. You ought to do the same.”
“Is that an order?” I asked sarcastically.
Landon looked up quickly. “Don't act the snotnose around me, Dave. Heard you slugged one of the boys today. Okay, you don't have to prove to me you're young and tough and full of ginger. Me, I'm just tired. Now beat it. And that is an order.”
I was so damn mad I waited a second before I asked, “Be okay if I do some looking around on my own—on my off days?”
“It's your time, wear your nose down to the bone. Look, Dave, I'm not eating you out. I'm just busy and in a hurry to get home and get my sleep. Sure, look around if you like, only take it easy, don't get in the hair of those supersleuths downtown, the glory hounds.”
I suddenly felt let down as though all the air had gone out of me. “Sorry I blew up, Tom. Just that... two retired cops... Hell, guy can't help thinking that it could be me, in time.”
“Nobody is goofing on the case, so don't worry about it. You got to learn how to unwind, Dave. That's as important as getting steam on.”
I started for the door, stopped. “What's the latest dope on Wales?”
“He was shot with a .22 through the right eye, at short range. Whole side of his face has flash burns. Must have used a silencer. There were two other men in the rooming house at the time, one asleep, one reading in bed —they say they didn't hear a thing. Wales hadn't been to work today so he must have been sleeping off a drunk when he got it. Medical Examiner places it around noon. Nothing was touched. Wales was fully dressed, probably passed out in bed. Maybe the killer didn't know about the money belt and the eleven grand. So far, no leads, no prints—nothing. Now go home and let me finish up.”
“I suppose they're checking the arrest record and—”
“Central Office boys know their business.”
“Hell of a way for a couple of good cops to end,” I said, making for the door.
Landon nodded. “Wales was especially good. This isn't out yet, so keep it damn quiet, Dave. They found a .38 Smith & Wesson that belonged to Wales in his room. Ballistics says it's the gun that killed Owens.”
Thursday Morning
We had a rough night. Mary came home half-bagged, which didn't help my mood. Then I stupidly told her what had happened at the precinct and she said, “The boy wonder got his prat booted home where it belongs. And you had to dash out like a fool, before my friends.”
“Your friends keep up their clever conversation, did they ever find put who was on the gate?” I asked, and we took it from there.
I couldn't even keep up with her, most of my mind was busy trying to figure why Al Wales shot his partner. After a while Mary fell off and I stared at the darkness and nothing made sense. Wales had said a crime was like an iceberg. This one was sure hidden, needed a lot of spadework. Two old coots, friends and partners for nearly a quarter of a century and when they're both hanging around, taking it easy before they die, one
