with These Hands (Ss) (2002) (15 page)

It was then I started to get mad. Nobody goes through three doors, one with a combination lock, unless they are opened for him.

Moffit looked up, glaring, when I returned from my examination.

"Well?" he demanded.

"Ghosts," I told him solemnly. "Spirits who walk through walls, or maybe Mandrake the Magician waved those furs out of the vault with a wand."

Hudspeth, Moffit's chief clerk, looked up at me as I came out of Moffit's office. "He's pretty worked up," he said, "he had a lot of faith in Burgeson."

I walked over to the water cooler. "Didn't you?"

"You can't be sure. I never trusted him too much. He was always asking questions that didn't concern him."

"Like what?"

"Oh, where we got our furs, what different coats cost, and such things." Hudspeth seemed nervous, like he was worried that I might not suspect the watchman.

When I got in my car, I sat there a few minutes, then started it up and swung out on the main drag, heading for the center of town. Then I heard a police siren, and the car slowed and swung over to me. Briggs was with them. He stuck his head out.

"Found that armored car," he called. "Come along."

There was a farmer standing alongside the road when we got there, and he flagged us down. It was on the Mill Road, outside of town. The car was sitting among some trees and the door had been pried off with a chisel and crowbar. It was empty.

They had picked a good place. Only lovers or hikers ever stopped in this place. About a hundred yards back from the road was the old mill that gave the road its name.

It was one of the first flour mills built west of the Sierras.

While Briggs and the cops were looking the car over, I walked around. There had been another car here and several men. The grass had been pressed down and had that gray look grass has when it's been walked through after a heavy dew. The trail looked interesting, and I followed it.

It headed for the old mill. Skirting the mill, I walked out on the stone dock along the millpond. Even before I looked, I had a hunch what I'd find and I knew it wouldn't be nice. He was there, all right, floating facedown in the water, and even before I called the cops, I knew who it was.

When Pete Burgeson was hauled out of the water, we saw his head was smashed in. There was wire around him and you could see that somebody had bungled the job of anchoring him to whatever weight had been used.

"Burgeson was no crook," I said unnecessarily. "I knew the guy was straight."

For a private dick, I am very touchy about bodies. I don't like to hold hands with dead men, or women, for that matter. I walked away from this one and went back to the car. The cops would be busy so it gave me a chance to look around.

Backtracking the car to the road, I found the place where it had left the pavement. There was a deep imprint of the tire, and I saw a place where the tread had picked up mud.

Putting my hand down, I felt what looked like dry earth. It was dirt, just dry dirt. That brought me standing, for that car had been run in here after the rain ended!

Squatting down again, looking at that tread, I could see how it had picked up the thin surfacing of mud and left dry earth behind. If it had rained after the car turned off the road, that track would not be dry! Things began to click into place ... at least a few things.

Without waiting for Briggs, I got into my car and drove away. As I rounded the curve, I glanced back and saw Briggs staring after me. He knew I had something.

My first stop was Pete Burgeson's rooming house. Then I went on, mulling things over as I drove. It was just a hunch I had after all, a hunch based on three things: a broken window, dampness on a tarp, and a dry track on the edge of a wet road. At least, I knew how the job had been done. All I needed was to fill in a couple of blank spaces and tie it all together with a ribbon of evidence.

A stop at a phone booth got me Moffit. "What's the name of the driver of the armored truck that was stolen?"

"Mat Bryan. One of my best men. Why do you ask?"

"Just want to talk to him. Put him on the phone, will you?"

"I can't," Moffit explained. "He's getting married . . . he's got the day off but promised to make some morning deliveries for me. When his truck was missing we told him not to bother coming in."

It took me a half hour in that phone booth to get what I wanted, but by that time I was feeling sharper than a razor.

Two things I had to do at once, but I dialed the chief.

He was back in the office, and sounded skeptical.

"Why not take a chance?" I said finally. "If I'm right, we've got these crooks where we want them. I don't know what this bird looks like, how tall or short, but he's wearing a gray sharkskin suit, and it's been rained on. Try the parks, the cheap poolrooms, and the bars."

When I hung up, I hit the street and piled into my car.

As I got into it, I got a glimpse of Huber coming down the sidewalk. He stopped to stare at me, and it was a long look that gave me cold chills.

When I reached the warehouse, I headed right for the night watchman's office. Hudspeth was standing on the loading platform when I came in.

"Anyone been in Burgeson's office?" I asked him.

"No." He looked puzzled. "He always locked it when he came out, even for a few minutes, and it's still locked. I have the key here. Mr. Moffit wanted me to see if there was anything there that would help you."

"Let's look," I suggested, and men as he was bending over the lock, I gave it to him. "They found Burgeson's body. He was murdered."

The key jerked sharply, rattling on the lock. Finally, Hudspeth got it into the keyhole and opened the door.

When he straightened up his face was gray.

Burgeson's leather-topped chair was where it always had been. The windows in the office allowed him to see all over the annex. His lunch box was open on the desk, and there was nothing in it but crumbs.

My eyes went over every inch of the desk, and at last I found what I had been looking for. On the side of the desk, across from where Burgeson always sat, were a few cake crumbs. I looked at them, then squatted down and studied the floor. In front of the chair at that end of the desk was a spot of dampness. I got up. Hudspeth must have seen me grinning.

"You-you found something?"

"Uh huh." I looked right at him. "You can tell Moffit I'll be breaking this case in a few hours. Funny thing about crooks," I told him. "All of them suffer from overconfidence.

This bunch had been pretty smart, but we've got them now. For burglary, and"-I looked right into his eyes-"murder!"

Then I went out of there on a run because when I'd said the last word, I had a hunch that scared me. I hit the door and got into my car, wheeled it around, and headed for the church. If I was right,, and I knew I was, the phone from Moffit and Company would be busy right now, or some phone nearby.

There were a lot of cars at the church when I got there, and a bunch of people standing around as they always do for a funeral or a wedding.

"Where's Mat Bryan?" I demanded.

"We're waiting for him!" the nearest man told me. "He's late for his wedding!"

"Better break it to the bride that he probably won't make it today," I advised. "I'll go look for him." Without explanation, I swung my car into traffic and took off.

When I pulled up in front of his rooming house, I could see an old lady answering the telephone in the hallway.

As I walked up to her I heard her saying, "He should be there now! Some men drove up ten or fifteen minutes ago and took him away in a car!"

Taking the phone from her, I hung it up. "What did those men look like?" I demanded. "Tell me quick!"

She was neither bothered nor confused. "Who are you?" she demanded.

"The police," I lied. "Those men will kill Mat if I don't prevent them."

"They were in a blue car," she told me. "There were three of them-a big man in a plaid suit, and-"

"You call the police now," I interrupted. "Tell them what happened and that I was here. My name is Neil Shannon."

Racing back to my car, I knew it was all a gamble from here on. Bryan was an important witness, and unless I got to him he would go the way Pete Burgeson had gone. Mat Bryan was the one guy who could tip the police on what had actually taken place, and once they knew, they would have the killers in a matter of minutes.

Yet there was an even more important witness, and finding him was a bigger gamble than saving Mat Bryan.

All this trouble had developed because Jake Brusa had come out of Joliet determined to play it smart. This time he was going to be on the winning side, but now the sweetest deal he had ever had in his life was blowing up in his face, and when he was caught there he wouldn't have a chance if I could push this through.

If I'd expected to find him with Bryan, I was disappointed.

He was just going in with Huber and Lincoff when I came in sight of the Sporting Center. I took a gander at my watch, then made a couple of calls to Briggs and the Roadside. They weren't necessary, for Jake Brusa had built his alibi the wrong way and for the wrong time.

Then I walked up to the Sporting Center and pushed the door open. Inside there was a cigar stand and a long lunch counter. You could bowl, play billiards or pool, and it was said that crap games ran there occasionally. You could also make bets on baseball, races, fights, anything you wanted.

Jake Brusa had a sweet setup there without going any further, but a crook never seems to know when he's got enough.

Huber was sitting at the counter with a cup of coffee.

He turned when I started past him and grabbed at my wrist. I knocked the hand down so quick he spilled his coffee and jumped off the stool swearing.

"Where are you going?" he demanded.

"To talk to Jake," I told him. "So what?"

"He doesn't want to see anybody!"

"He'll see me, and like it."

"Tough guy, huh?" he said with a nasty smirk.

""- "That's right. You tell him I've come to get Mat Bryan!"

When I said that name, Huber's face went yellowwhite, and he looked sick. I grinned at him.

"Don't like it, do you?" I threw it at him. "That was kidnapping, Huber. You'll get a chance to inhale some gas for this one!"

"Shut up!" he snarled. "Come on!"

I motioned him ahead of me, and after an instant's hesitation, he went. We went past a couple of bowling lanes, through a door, and up a stairway. The sound of the busy alley was only a vague whisper here. Soundproofed. That meant nobody would hear a shot, either. Nor a pushing around if it came to that. When he got to the door, he rapped and then stepped aside. "Think I'm a dope?" I said. "You first!"

His face went sour, but my right hand was in my coat pocket, and he didn't know I always carried my rod in a shoulder holster. He went in first.

Jake was behind a big desk, and Lincoff was seated in a chair at the opposite end. Brusa's face was like iron when he saw me.

"What do you want?" he growled.

"He said he wanted to see Mat Bryan!" Huber warned.

"He ain't here. I don't know him."

I leaned forward with both hands on the back of a chair.

"Which one, Jake? Don't make me call you a liar," I told him. "Get him out here quick. I haven't much time."

Brusa's eyes were pools of hate. "No, you haven't!" he agreed. "What made you think Bryan was here?"

I laughed at him. I was in this up to my ears, and if I didn't come out of it, I might as well have fun.

"It was simple," I said. "You thought you had a good deal here. So what was it that gave you the idea you're smarter than everybody else? This time you thought you were going to be in the clear, and all you did was mess it up.

"You had a finger man point these jobs for you. You had a perfect alibi last night, and all the good it did you was to help you pull a fast switch. A sucker switch. You switched your chances at a cell for a chance at the gas chamber.

"When you drove that^armored car off the road, Jake, you left a track, a track that was dry. That proved it was made this morning, after the rain had stopped. The rain stopped about seven a. M., and your alibi isn't worth a hoot. You took that truck out after the place opened up this morning!"

Brusa was sitting in his chair. He didn't like this. He didn't like it a bit. A crook can stand almost anything but being shown up as a fool.

"Smart lad!" he sneered. "Very smart! Until you walked inhere!"

That one I shrugged off. Right now I wasn't too sure I had any more brains than he did, but I'd gambled that Bryan was here and alive. If I couldn't get him out, I could at least keep them thinking and keep them busy until the police followed up.

"You thought," I told him slowly, stalling for time, "you'd have the cops going around in circles over those locked doors. They'd all think the watchman had done it.

But whoever sank that body did a messy job. It was already floating this morning."