know saw him at the Paradise Club last night. He overheard Johnny asking Louie where he could find Fay. I thought maybe he was going to start trouble. I called her apartment, but couldn't get an answer.' He looked hard at Adams. 'It's my bet Johnny found her.'
Adams sat motionless, staring down at his hands.
Johnny Dorman! He remembered him well: a fair, slim, good-looking boy who used to haunt the pool rooms on 66m Street.
'Did you tell Donovan this?'
Darcy shook his head.
'He didn't ask me for ideas.'
Adams rubbed his jaw.
'Dorman: why, yes, that makes sense. Okay, I'll have him picked up. No harm in finding out where he was at the time of her death.'
'You may not know it, Lieutenant,' Darcy said quietly, 'but Dorman's sister is going to marry Sean O'Brien.'
Adams stubbed out his cigarette. His face remained expressionless.
'I didn't know.' He stood up. 'That could make the set-up tricky. Thanks for the information. Keep this close to your chest. I don't want anyone to know.'
'No one will,' Darcy said. 'The guy who told me and Louie are the only two who know besides you and me, and I can take care of them.'
Adams began to move slowly about the room.
'This is going to be damned tricky,' he said. 'If O'Brien finds out I want to talk to Johnny I could get blocked off. You don't know where Johnny is, do you?'
Darcy shook his head.
'Any ideas?'
'He might be holed up with his sister. She thought a lot of him in the old days.'
Adams grimaced.
'That makes it worse. Yeah, he could be with her. Can you check for me, Sam? I'll have to keep out of sight on this. Will you see if you can find him for me?'
Darcy hesitated.
'It'll pay dividends,' Adams went on, watching him. 'I'm in with Burt. I'll see you don't do it for nothing.'
'Okay,' Darcy said. 'I'll pass the word around. I can't promise anything. But don't get the wrong idea, Lieutenant. He probably never went near Fay last night.'
'Oh, sure. All I want is ten minutes with him. Find him fast, Sam. This is urgent.'
Once more out in the drenching rain, Adams walked down the alley to his car. He got in and lit a cigarette. He sat staring emptily at the lighted dashboard, his brain busy.
So Dorman's sister was going to marry O'Brien. If Dorman had killed Fay, O'Brien could be in a hell of a spot.
Adams inhaled smoke deeply, and let it drift down his thin nostrils.
There were two ways of playing this hand, he thought. There was the long-term or the short-term policy. He could get in with O'Brien if he went to him, but it would be better to be patient and go to Burt. Before he could do either of them he had to prove Johnny Dorman did it.
He trod on the starter and the engine woke into life.
This could be big enough not only to unseat Motley, it's big enough to unseat O'Brien, he thought. This is the chance I've been waiting for, and brother! I've got to handle it right!
He engaged gear and drove fast to headquarters.
CHAPTER IV
I
Sean O'Brien drove his big Cadillac along a lonely stretch of the river bank. The dirt road was pot-holed and dusty. No traffic came that way since the canning factory had closed down. The few remaining sheds and the broken-down jetty made a convenient place to leave a car and board the motorboat out to Tux's cruiser.
He drove his car into the rickety lean-to shed, cut the engine and got out of the car. He walked down to the jetty where the motorboat was waiting.
Willow Point, an ancient, rusty, eighty-foot cruiser, lay at anchor, half a mile from the mud flats. Ostensibly used by Tux to fish from when he happened to be in the mood for fishing, it also provided a convenient and safe hide-out for any of Tux's friends who were in trouble.
O'Brien climbed into the motorboat, nodded to the mulatto who sat in the stern and settled himself into the bucket seat.
The mulatto cast off, shoved the nose of the boat clear of the jetty, men started the engine and headed across the muddy estuary towards Willow Point.
