6

Something in Kestel’s tone carried conviction. Merely his gun carried conviction, but it wasn’t likely he’d have been standing there alone without a car nearby. A car and somebody at the wheel. Even before I looked I heard the soft swish of brakes being pressed and the faint sound of springs creaking.

A heavy black sedan, a new Lincoln, had pulled up on my left in the driveway. A hook-nosed, meaty-faced man was at the wheel; another guy sat on the driver’s right, looking at me through the open window. I couldn’t see all of his gun, only about an inch of the barrel and the fat round doohickey screwed over the muzzle. It was a silenced heat, a dumb-gat.

I looked back at Kestel. “Yeah, that big one of yours would make a lot of noise, wouldn’t it?”

“Prob’ly hurt our ears,” he said.

“What the hell is this?”

“Questions, questions,” he said. “Grab a left into Sunset.”

I looked back at the Lincoln. I didn’t recognize the driver, but I knew the short, thick, square-faced sonofabitch smiling at me over his silenced pistol.

“Hello, Stub,” I said. “I kind of hoped the worms had got you by now.”

His smile didn’t change. But it hadn’t been much of a smile to begin with. He had an eyetooth out on the left of his smile. Stub Corey could afford to pay a dentist for repairs to his chops, too. I guess he was just a slob. Hell, I know he was a slob. Anyhow, that eyetooth had been missing, to my knowledge, for two years.

That was how long it had been since I’d had anything to do with these guys. More than that. Even then we hadn’t tangled head-on, hadn’t shot at each other or even pounded on each other. I’d tagged one of their friends on a grand larceny rap and he was, so far as I knew, still doing his bit at Q.

He’d been a minor cog in the group to which Stub and Bingo belonged, not much loss, and there’d been no real friction generated. Just a lot of words, a few threats from the boys. Of course, it hadn’t made them love me more.

I turned back to Kestel. “How’s Jimmy these days?”

“Mr. Violet to you, Scott.”

“Mr. Manure to me,” I said. That’s a loose translation of a most unpalatable comment, but when with hoods you talk the hoods’ lingo, the language they understand.

He turned the gun’s muzzle away from me, and let me look at its flat side. “One more crack and you get it in the teeth, Scott.”

Most likely he meant it. But if he swung that heater at me I was going to pop him. And very likely get shot in the back of the head. Nonetheless I was going to pop him.

“Sunset,” he said.

I put the car in gear, eased down on the gas pedal and took a left, rolling along close to the divider in the middle of the road.

“Right lane for now,” Kestel said.

It was O.K. with me. For the moment, at least. I wanted a little time to think. I eased into the right lane, wondering what the hell. Why were these creeps and musclemen hard-boiling me—after all this time?

Also, how had they happened to pick me up here at the Beverly Hills Hotel? Tipped by somebody? Or on my tail for a while? I didn’t expect Bingo to tell me all of that, but maybe he’d tell me a little.

“Nice morning for a drive,” I said. “Where we going?”

“Questions, questions. But it ain’t no secret. Don’t worry. We ain’t gonna kill you.”

“I’m glad to hear it.”

“Not unless you get jerky. But I like the way you’re taking it, Scott. Just tool along nice and easy like this, and we won’t kill you.”

“Bag the bigmouth, Bingo. You should know by now it doesn’t impress me. If it’s no secret, tell me where the hell we’re going.”

“Jimmy wants a little gab with you.”

“So why didn’t he call up and ask me?”

“You wouldn’t of come.”

“Yeah, you’re right. I’d come to his funeral, but that’s the only—Don’t do it, Bingo.”

It was pretty close. He’d hauled the gun back, and maybe was going to swing it. Maybe. He wasn’t quite right in the head. Anyway, he didn’t.

“So Jimmy Violet wants to see me, huh?” I said. “What about?”

“He’ll tell you.”

I saw the amber light start glowing on the dashboard. I did not, however, reach for the phone. Not just then.

First I said, “Let me tell you something, Bingo. I never had any reason to build a real gripe against you. Not before today. But you have now earned a spot near the top of my list.”

“I just wet my pants.”

“Hell, if the smell’s a clue, it happened before you got in the car.”

He started swearing in a high-pitched voice that got even higher. He was burning, on the edge—which was where I wanted him. On it, not over it.

“Hold it,” I said. “Look at that, Bingo.” I moved a hand—slowly—and pointed at the phone light.

Breath hissed between his teeth, but he didn’t say anything. He really wasn’t right at all in the head.

“You know what this is, Bingo? It’s a phone. Radio-telephone, under the dash.”

“So what?”

“So I’d better answer it.”

“In a pig’s rear end, you’ll answer it.”

“Listen, try to use your brains just once today. I know who the call’s from, I’ve been expecting it. It’s from my secretary—not really my secretary, but Hazel Green, the gal on the switchboard in the Hamilton.”

He hissed a little more. “So? So what?”

“Use your conk, you saphead.” I stretched it a little. “She knows I’m in the car—knows I’m driving the car, for that matter. If I don’t answer she’ll also know something’s wrong. She’ll know I’ve got trouble, or somebody else is driving the heap—”

“Shut up, lemme think.”

“That’ll be the day. If I don’t answer she’ll sure as hell tip the fuzz—”

“Shut up.”

“O.K.” I grinned at him. “If that’s the way you want it, Bingo.”

He wavered for maybe three seconds, then said, “Answer it.” As I reached for the phone he added, “But make it fast. Fast, you get it? One wrong crack and she’ll hear the shot herself.”

I put the phone against my ear. “Hello.”

“Shell, I got it. Edward Walles, a home on Beverly Drive in Beverly Hills.” She gave me the number—clear up at the north end of Beverly, barely inside the city limits—then went on, “I checked the utility companies. Do you realize they’ve got electricity, and gas, and hot and cold running water in Beverly Hills?”

“Yes.”

“So it’s their home. In the name of Mr. and Mrs. Edward Walles.”

“Fine,” I said. “And thank you, Miss Green.”

Then I hung up and looked at Bingo. “O.K.? That suit you?”

He was squinting his eyes, and his hand was so tight around the gun’s butt that his knuckles were bloodless, but he said, “Sounded O.K. Yeah … O.K.”

I’d figured it would sound O.K. to him. Bingo would certainly know I didn’t have a personal secretary, and he probably knew there was a gal on the switchboard in the Hamilton. He might even know her name was Hazel.

But he wouldn’t know about the way we usually yacked on the phone.

And very likely he didn’t know her last name was not Green.

Bingo liked it that I was driving carefully, and slowly. Well, I like it too—now. So I continued to drive carefully, and even slowed down a little more. The slower the better from here on, as far as I was concerned.

“Jimmy still at the same place?” I asked Bingo.

“What’s it to you?”

“Just making conversation.”

“Well, don’t. We’ll be there soon enough.”

“He put piranhas in that lake yet?”

“What’s perahnus?”

“Little fish. You go swimming with piranhas, and they eat you up. Eat you alive.”

“You’re sure full of it, Scott. Jimmy didn’t do nothing to the lake. It’s like it always was. What’s it to you? You planning to swim in and see him?” He laughed.

“I’m not planning to go at all.”

He laughed at that, too. “You’re going,” he said.

One police car had passed us so far, traveling in the opposite direction on Sunset. The driver had taken a long look at my car—the sky-blue Cad convertible is pretty well known in the L.A.-Hollywood area. The radio car didn’t turn around or come after us, but it was a start.

We drove into the Strip, past the swank nightclubs and restaurants, the small shops, hole-in-the-wall cafés and strip joints, the black Lincoln behind us all the way. But there seemed to be more police cars passing us now, in both directions. And a plainclothes car was a few yards ahead in the left lane. I knew it was a plainclothes car because I’d recognized two of the men—the four men—inside it.

The outcome was only a matter of time. What I didn’t know was whether my getting shot in the stomach would be part of the outcome. My stomach—that’s where Bingo held the .45 pointed with a sort of what-the-hell air. I suppose from his point of view, what the hell, it was my stomach.

We were still on Sunset, but from the talk of piranhas and the lake and such I figured Jimmy Violet was living at the same place where he and his crumby pals had been hanging out two years ago. That was in a big dump on several acres well up into the hills between Hollywood and North Hollywood, less than a mile off Laurel Canyon Boulevard. So I figured we’d soon be turning north, probably on Laurel Canyon. I was right. Bingo directed me, and I signaled well in advance just in case anybody was interested.

Well, there was lots of interest. It happened about a minute after we started up Laurel Canyon. The plainclothes car was still in front of my Cad, and it slowed to a stop. At the same time a black and white cruiser appeared a block ahead, coming this way. The black Lincoln was still right behind us, but there also seemed to be an unusual amount of traffic on this stretch of road, especially back there behind us.

“Hey, whatthehell,” Bingo said as I came to a stop.

“You want me to crash into that heap?” I asked him.

“I don’t want you should stop.”

“O.K., wait’ll I put the wings on, and we’ll fly over—”

“Don’t do nothin’, that’s a cop … Oh-oh.”

You wouldn’t believe how fast it happened. At least, Bingo didn’t believe it. He just about had time for one more “Whatthehell,” and then there were cops all over the place.

All four officers in the plainclothes car had poured out and were on their way back toward us, but the black and white cruiser had already braked to a stop on my left and, at the same time, a man yanked open the Cad’s right-hand door.

Bingo jerked his head around, but before his chops had moved an inch I’d grabbed the .45 with my right hand and then swung my left in an increasingly speedy arc, which ended with a most satisfactory chuncck on the side of his jaw. Satisfactory. but not as lethal as I’d have liked, since I didn’t really have opportunity to set myself and plant my feet, but it addled him. He didn’t go clear out, but he slumped down in the corner and said, “Buh,” or something like that. Then he shook his head slowly and said, “Whuh.”

“The black Linc behind us,” I told the guy who’d yanked open the door.

He shook his head. I glanced back and saw a plainclothes car, a black and white cruiser, and two motorcycles around the Lincoln. There were cops—and guns—everywhere you looked. I guess there were at least a dozen policemen, and I figured that was approximately the right number.

Stub Corey and the driver were getting out of the Lincoln, leaning forward with their hands on its top as the officer shook them down.

Bingo straightened up, rubbing the side of his face. “Where’d they all come from?” he said wonderingly.

The officer who’d pulled the door open was a detective sergeant, and I handed him the Colt .45.

“Here’s Kestel’s gun,” I said. “He was—”

Bingo didn’t let me finish. “Gun?” he said. “It ain’t my gun. I ain’t got no gun. Gun, you crazy? What would I be doing with a gun? Why, Scott and me, we was just takin’ a drive. Then you guys started beatin’ me up.”

I looked at the sergeant and he looked at me. Neither of us said anything. There was no need. That was Kestel’s story and he’d stick with it. And it was eight to five he’d be on the streets again an hour after he was booked. Hoods have expensive lawyers. And the hoods’ expensive lawyers have read, with delight, all of our omniscient Supreme Court’s decisions defining and clarifying the rights of hoods.

“Why don’t you confess, Bingo?” I asked him. “Hell, it can’t do you any harm.”

“Confess what? I didn’t do nothin’. Here we are, takin’ a little ride and cops come out of the bushes. You beat me up. Everybody shoves me around—”

“You want me to sock you again, Bingo?”

He shut up.

I got out of the car and went back toward the Lincoln, A lieutenant named Dan Peterson, a gray-haired detective working out of the Hollywood Division, was standing before Stub Corey and the pudgy-faced driver with the hook nose and speaking to them as I walked up next to him.

I’d heard the refrain before. So, undoubtedly, had Stub and the other hood.

“—that you have the right to remain silent,” he was telling them politely. “Anything you say can be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to the presence of an attorney to assist you prior to questioning and to be with you during questioning, if you so desire. If you cannot afford an attorney you have the right to have an attorney appointed for you prior to questioning. Do you understand these rights?”

Corey smiled, exposing the hole in his row of teeth. “What?” he said. “Would you say that again, officer?”

Peterson’s jaw muscles bulged slightly, but he said, “Will you voluntarily answer my questions?”

“Why should I do that? You some kind of nut or something, officer?”

Peterson looked up at the sky, then stepped back, turned his head and nodded to me.

“Thanks, Dan,” I said. “Spread my very large thanks around among the boys, will you?”

He smiled. “Stub Corey and Little Phil here,” he said. “Who’s the other guy?”

“Lester Kestel.”

“Old Bingo, huh? What was going on?”

“He had a .45 in my gut. The boys were escorting me out to see Jimmy Violet.”

“What for?”

“Nobody told me. I’ll probably ask Jimmy after a while. I suppose you got Corey’s silenced pistol. That should count as at least a misdemeanor—”

“Pistol, yeah,” he interrupted. “No silencer on it, though.”

He showed me the gun. There were grooves around the barrel’s end, but the bulky cylindrical silencer wasn’t on the gun.

I swore—knowing we’d probably never be able to prove he’d ever had a silencer. Possession of which is a felony and thus illegal. Even today. And he just might have a permit to carry the heater.

I said, “It’s probably around here, somewhere close. Stub must’ve had time to give it a toss before you grabbed him.”

Peterson called over a uniformed patrolman, told him what to look for. He found it in a minute and a half. Stub Corey of course expressed great amazement when shown the silencer. “What in the world,” he said, “is dat?”

Lieutenant Peterson quietly screwed “dat” over the bore of the gun he personally had taken from Stub Corey.

“I wouldn’t of believed it if I hadn’t seen it,” Stub said, once again showing us the empty space in his grin.

I took a step toward him. “Stub,” I said, “I think you need a tooth out on the other side. In the interest of harmony, balance, and beauty—”

Lieutenant Peterson grabbed my balled fist in his hands. “Easy, Scott. You want to get us all tossed in jail?”

“Yeah, that’s right,” I said. “At least I got to hit Bingo.” I paused. “I just hope he doesn’t sign a complaint. Hell, let me hit Stub, and they can both sign complaints.”

“Be a good fellow, Scott,” he said wearily. “We got enough troubles. O.K.?”

“O.K.” I sighed. “Well, here’s what happened.”

I told him and then followed the gang down to the Hollywood jail and told it again to a stenographer. I signed the statement, jawed five minutes, and left. It was my guess that I was getting out of jail about half an hour before Stub Corey, Little Phil, and Bingo.

But even half an hour, I figured, would give me time to get to Jimmy Violet’s hoodlum sanctuary before his boys were sprung.