WATER STREET was shrouded in an inky blackness that blocked out any recognizable landmarks. A driving rain lashed furiously at the closed windows of the cab, sending a stream of water cascading down the windshield. The few street lights that dotted the block were little more than a yellow aura that spilled on the oily blackness of the pavement. The cabby guided the big car to a stop, rolled down his window, peered at a big frame building across the road.
“This is Pier Twenty-Six, mister,” he called over his shoulder. “You sure this is the place? Far’s I know nothing starts around here until about four in the morning.”
“This is the place,” Liddell told him. He consulted his wrist watch. “It won’t be long now.”
The cabby shrugged, cut his motor. “You’re the boss.” He pulled a cigarette from behind his ear, lit it, sucked it into a red glow, slid down comfortably in his seat to wait.
Muggsy Kiely stirred uneasily, tried to see out the streaming windows, but gave it up as a lost cause. “Nice night for a murder,” she murmured, “or shouldn’t I even mention such a possibility?” She shuddered slightly. “I wish she hadn’t picked such a deserted spot for us to wait for her.”
“You brought it on yourself. You could be sitting in a nice dry apartment waiting for me. But no, you have to get wanderlust. Maybe we could get you a cab, and — ”
“Nothing doing. I’m here and here I’m staying.” She held her watch up to the window, tilted it until the faint light of a near-by street light hit the dial. “It’s ten-thirty now. She should be here.” She turned, peered out the back window. “This must be her now, Johnny. A car just turned that corner back there. It has no lights.”
Liddell spun around, stared out the window. “Get down, Muggs. Quick! You, too, driver!”
The black shape of a large sedan pulled abreast of the cab. Five loud roars drowned out the sound of its motor, then it picked up speed, rocketed down the street.
Muggsy got up on her elbow, her face chalky in the half-light. “Johnny, you all right?”
Liddell swore fluently, got up from the floor of the cab, brushed himself off absently. “I’m all right, Muggs. How about you, driver?”
“Okay. But look what the bastards did to my hack. Windows and everything all chewed to hell. Do we go after them?” Without waiting for an answer, he turned the key in the ignition, stamped his motor into life.
“Damn right. Better get going before we lose them.”
The cabby threw the car into gear, released the clutch. The cab flopped noisily, swayed drunkenly.
“Not tonight we don’t,” the cabby growled. “They got our tires.” He slammed open the door, stood out in the rain, sadly surveyed the damage. “And that ain’t all. Who pays for the wear and tear?”
Liddell shoved one of his cards out to the driver. “I’m at the Marlowe. The air-conditioning job is on me.”
The cabby stuck the card in his cap, jammed it back on his head, kicked at the tires unhappily.
“Now what?” Muggsy wanted to know.
“You mean we got a choice? We’re going to find out whether that black-haired witch put us on the spot or whether she wasn’t kidding about being followed. It looks like somebody doesn’t want us to stay on this case.”
“If they’re going to adopt this attitude, I second the motion.”
Liddell grinned. “You wouldn’t let a bum shot like that scare you off, would you, Muggs?”
“Maybe he’ll improve with practice. I vote we don’t stay around to find out.”
“Second the motion.” Liddell wrenched the door open. “We’ll never find anything sitting here like a clay pigeon.” He pulled his collar up, his hat lower over his face.
“Now where are you going?” Muggsy demanded.
“To find a phone. You stay here with the driver and I’ll send some help over. I’ve got to find out what happened to that girl.”
Muggsy scurried to open the door on her side. “Nothing doing, Sir Galahad. Where you go, I go.”
“Don’t be crazy, Muggs. It may be a long way to a phone and it’s pouring out here.”
“Maybe so. But if I’ve got to have something wet running down my face, I’d just as soon it was rain and not blood.”
• • •
The nearest phone was in a broken-down tobacco shop three blocks down Water Street. The proprietor watched disinterestedly as the two bedraggled figures sloshed in. In response to Liddell’s query, he indicated a rickety phone booth in the rear of the dusty store, went back to a determined study of a racing form.
Liddell consulted a battered Los Angeles telephone directory, came up with the number of Denton Towers. He stepped into the booth, fished for a coin, and dialed the number. A small puddle of water was forming at his feet.
“Denton Towers. May I help you?” a metallic voice answered.
“Miss Devine. Terry Devine.”
“One moment, please,” the receiver chirped. There was a muted buzz, followed by another; then the voice told him regretfully, “I’m afraid Miss Devine hasn’t returned yet, sir.”
Liddell nodded, dropped the receiver back on its hook.
“What’s happened, Johnny?” Muggsy asked.
“They got her. She hasn’t shown back at her hotel.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I’m going back to the Hotel Lamont and see if I can pick up her trail. I’ve got a funny idea that when we find her, we’ll find the guy who tapped out a samba on my skull, and the guy who just left his calling card with us back there on the street.”
• • •
Things were pretty much the same when Johnny Liddell and Muggsy Kiely re-entered the Kangaroo Room of the Hotel Lamont an hour later. The same crowd was huddled against the bar, a blue-gray pall of smoke hung over the place, giving it an appearance of opaqueness. The same white-shirted bartender assuaged his boredom by polishing the bar with desultory semicircular motion. He acknowledged their return with an upward twitch of his heavy eyebrows.
“Back so soon? You must like the joint,” he greeted them with what approximated a smile. “Still raining hard?”
Liddell nodded. “Pouring.”
“More of the same?” the barman asked, reaching back for a cognac bottle.
“Two.” Liddell turned his back to the bar, squinted through the smoke, but failed to see a familiar face in the room. “Say, where’s that waiter who brought me the message last time I was here?”
The bartender shrugged. “Must be Tony. He’s the only one in here regularly. Little guy with a greasy pompadour?”
“That’s him. He still on?”
“Sure. He don’t go off until two.” He glanced up at the clock on the far wall, narrowed his eyes nearsightedly to bring it into focus. “Not even twelve yet.”
Liddell nodded, waited until the barman had filled both glasses. “Where is he?”
“Probably out chinning with the short-order cook. Why? Want something?”
Liddell folded a bill suggestively, made a tent with it on the bar. “I want to have a talk with him. Privately. Any place we can be alone?”
The bartender scratched the hairs on the back of his neck with his index finger, eyeing the bill with interest. “We got a back room we use for lunches and things. Nobody using it now.”
“That’ll do. Just send him back, and, Mac — you needn’t mention it’s me.” The bartender nodded, snagged the folded bill, slid it into his watch pocket. “You wait here, Muggs. This shouldn’t take long.”
The back room was set off to the right of a telephone booth in the rear of the room. Liddell waited almost five minutes before the door opened. The smile on the waiter’s face froze as he recognized Liddell, saw the .45 in his hand.
“Come on in. Close the door.” Liddell’s voice was cold, hard.
The waiter hesitated, his eyes glued to the gun. They rolled up to Liddell’s face, the man’s brow glistening with perspiration. “I — I — ”
“Inside, I said.”
The waiter walked in, closed the door behind him. He wiped the perspiration off his upper lip with a shaking hand. “I — I thought you’d left, Mr. Liddell — ”
Liddell got up from the chair he’d been straddling, walked over to the waiter, caught him by the lapel, shoved him Back into the room. He showed him the muzzle of the .45, close up. “Never mind the small talk, Tony. We got important things to talk about.”
“Say, what is this?” The waiter’s face was a murky gray; he couldn’t seem to control the twitch under his left eye.
“This?” Liddell stuck the muzzle of the gun closer to the man’s nose. “This is a gun. One end spits lead, the other splits skulls. But why should I tell you? You’re in a pretty good spot to find out first hand.”
The waiter made a feeble attempt at a smile, managed only to look sick. “I — I guess you’re ribbing me. I don’t know anything you’d want to know. I never seen you before you came in tonight.”
“Keep playing games with me, Buster, and you’re going to be sorry you ever did see me. Who saw that note before you gave it to me?”
The flutter in the man’s eyes became more pronounced. “Nobody. I didn’t even know what was in it myself. The girl asked me to hold it until she was gone, and then — ”
Liddell’s open hand described a short arc, resounded with a loud slap across the waiter’s mouth. A red patch dyed out the grayness where the hand had hit. “Who saw it?”
“Honest, Mr. Liddell, I-”
Johnny Liddell raised his hand again. The waiter cringed back in his chair, his eyes sick with fear. “Don’t hit me. I’ll tell you.” He licked his lips. “I didn’t mean any harm. The guy said — ”
“Never mind the autobiography. Who saw it?”
“I don’t know his name. As soon as the girl ran out the door, he came over to me. He told me he’d break me over his knee if I didn’t let him see it, so — ”
“What’d he look like?”
The waiter wiped his streaming forehead with the side of his hand. “He was big. Bigger than you, even.” The left eye fluttered maddeningly. “I think he was a pug or something. His nose was smeared all over his face. He had on a sports jacket, and — ”
“That’s all I need to know.” Liddell poked his .45 back into its holster, grabbed the waiter by the collar of his jacket, and yanked him to his feet.
“Look, pal. You almost put me on the spot tonight. I’m narrow-minded about guys who help guys try to rub me out. If I were you I wouldn’t be around here any more when I come in. And I’m figuring on coming in from now on.”
“But my job,” the waiter protested. “I’ll lose my job.”
Liddell’s hand brushed off an imaginary speck on the man’s lapel. “If it was me, I’d rather have my next contact with the newspapers in the Help Wanted Column than in the Obituary Column.”