Fifty-to-One

wasn’t any money stolen. There couldn’t have been. I mean, I made it as realistic as I could—I based it on what I know about the place and what I’ve read in the newspapers—but everything about the robbery itself? I made it up. It never happened.”

Borden looked at her sideways, started to say something, then lapsed into silence again.

“Maybe,” Erin said, after the silence had stretched on long enough to become uncomfortable, “those two guys don’t really work for Nicolazzo—but they’d like to. Maybe they’re small timers, they read the book, they figured the robbery really happened, and they thought if they could find the man who stole the money from Nicolazzo they’d have an inside track to his affections—”

“Oh, sweet Jesus,” Borden said, kicking a couple of books against the wall, “have you been reading these things again? I don’t pay you to read, I pay you to answer the phones and keep the riffraff out.”

“You hardly pay me to do that,” Erin muttered.

“Wait a second,” Tricia said. “I’m confused. He pays you? I thought you worked for Mr. Hoffman.”

“Who do you think Mr. Hoffman works for?”

“Some woman named Madame Helga.”

“Kid,” Erin said, waving a hand in Borden’s direction, “you’re looking at Madame Helga. He’s the Edmund of Edmund and Edmund, too.”

“Ladies, ladies, if I can interrupt this little tea party,” Borden said, “we’ve got a big problem here. There are men—large men, angry men—who would be happy to do me great physical harm if I don’t give them a piece of information you’re telling me I can’t give them. This is not an acceptable situation.”

“So what do you want me to do about it, boss?” Erin said. “I already gave you an idea and see what that got me. Last time I ever—”

“Trixie,” Borden said, “Trixie, Trixie, Trixie, I’m asking you one more time, my hat in my hand—” he lifted his fedora off a peg on the wall, actually held it out toward her “—you’ve got to give me something here. Something I can use to get those apes off my back. Because if they came after me right now, I’d have no name to give them— other than yours.”

Tricia blanched. “You wouldn’t.”

“I wouldn’t want to,” Borden corrected her. “But after I’d gone a few rounds with the big guy, who’s to say what I would or wouldn’t do?”

While they all stood there pondering that question, a knock came on what was left of the glass of the door.

Through the jagged hole they saw a blue sleeve with metal buttons at the cuff.

Then the sleeve went away and a face appeared in the hole. The skin was ruddy and pocked beneath the glossy bill of the man’s uniform cap. “Hello?” the man said. “Is this the office of the Hard Case Crime book publishing company?”

Above the bill, the cap had a little metal insignia on it that featured an eagle, a shield, and what looked like a frontiersman standing with a musket by his side—it was a little hard to make out all the details. But you didn’t need to make them out to know what insignia it was.

“I thought you said you didn’t call them,” Tricia said.

“I didn’t!” Erin said.

Borden put his hat on, swung the door open.

“Yes, this is Hard Case Crime,” he said. “What can I do for you, officer?”

The man stepped inside. He was beefy and barrel-chested and he moved with the careless manner of an outdoorsman used to having plenty of room to swing his arms. You could picture him felling redwoods with an axe.

He doffed his cap, pointed with it at the overturned desk. “What happened here?”

“We’re renovating,” Borden said.

“I’ll say,” the policeman said. “Listen, I want to talk to the man in charge.” He took a leather-covered pad from a clip on his belt, flipped through its pages till he found the one he wanted. “A mister Charles Borden.” He shut the pad. “That you?”

“For variety’s sake,” Borden said, “let’s say yes.”

“And who are these two?” Pointing at Erin and Tricia.

“Colleagues of mine.”

“I suppose that’s all right then,” the policeman said. “Just as well for you all to hear this. I need some information about one of your authors.”

Tricia’s heart fell.

“And which of our authors would that be,” Borden said. “As if I didn’t know already.”

The policeman reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a battered copy of I Robbed the Mob!.

“The one who stole three million dollars from Salvatore Nicolazzo last month,” he said.

7.

Home Is the Sailor

“Funny story,” Borden said. “That book isn’t what you think it is. You probably think it’s a true story, and I can certainly understand why, what with the word ‘true’ on the cover and all. But it isn’t. It’s actually a novel, same as all the other books we publish. One hundred percent fiction. Some of us just thought it would be,” he took a deep breath, “amusing to present this one as if it had really happened.” Borden smiled weakly. “But it didn’t.”

“Well, now, that is a funny story,” the cop said. “Because someone did steal three million dollars from Sal Nicolazzo last month.”

“Really,” Borden said.

“Oh, yeah. Walked into the Sun after hours, made his way to the counting room, opened the safe, emptied it out, and got away with three million smackers, pretty much to the letter the way it’s described in this fictional book of yours. Nicolazzo’s managed to keep it under wraps, but we’ve got people on the inside and word is the big man’s beside himself.” He pointed to the desk again. “You want some help with that?”

“Sure,” Borden said. “Why not.” Together, he and the cop turned the desk over, set it on its stumpy legs again. Borden was breathing hard when they were done, but the exertion didn’t seem to have bothered the cop at all.

“Mr. Borden,” he said, “I’ve been doing this a lot of years. I know where renovations like these come from. They come from men with names that end in vowels.”

“Like O’Malley?” Borden said, aiming a thumb at the nameplate pinned to the cop’s jacket.

“Wiseass,” O’Malley said. “ ‘Y’ isn’t a vowel.”

“Sometimes it is.”

“Well, the ones I’m talking about are your ‘I’s and your ‘A’s and your ‘O’s. Especially,” he said emphatically, “your ‘O’s.”

“You trying to say something, officer,” Borden said, “or is this the Police Benevolent League’s version of a crossword puzzle?”

“All right, Borden. I’ll make it plain, so that even a two-bit smut peddler like you can understand it. I think the men who did this to your office work for Nicolazzo, and unless you gave them what they wanted, I don’t think they’re through with you. Now, I want the same thing they do—but me, I don’t put holes in people’s doors, or in people. What I do is put people in holes. And I can put you in a deep one for a good long time if you don’t come across with a name.”

“Mother of mercy,” Borden said. “What a day. O’Malley, I’m going to tell you something and you’re not going to believe me, but it’s going to be the god’s honest truth. There’s no name to give you. None. This book was not written by a man whose name ends with a vowel, or by one whose name ends with a consonant, or by any other sort of man. It was written by a sweet young girl with an overactive imagination and no more knowledge of gangsters than you have of ballet. If there was an actual robbery at the Sun it’s a pure coincidence, and I’m sure Nicolazzo will figure that out soon enough. Now would you please leave us alone so we can clean the place up and go home?”

“I don’t think you appreciate the position you’re in,” O’Malley said. “You think this guy is a run-of-the-mill