Give the Boys a Great Big Hand
- Автор: Хантер Эван
- Серия: 87th Precinct #11
- Год: 1960
- Язык: английский
- Год: Simon & Schuster
- Жанр: Полицейские детективы
Электронная книга - «Give the Boys a Great Big Hand». Краткое содержание книги:
“Hey!” he yelled after the bus. “You forgot your bag!”
Genera picked up the bag — a small, blue overnight bag issued by an airline. He unzipped the bag and reached into it. Then he gripped the bus-stop sign for support.
The bag held... a severed human hand.
The police lab gave both bag and hand a thorough examination and discovered next to nothing. Steve Carella, Cotton Hawes, Meyer Meyer and the other 87th Precinct detectives had a murderer to find, and they had to begin without even knowing who the victim was.
The Missing Persons Bureau files supplied two leads, both of which led nowhere.
Everything that looked even faintly like a clue was checked and double-checked and they all led to the same place — a dead end.
Then, when the break finally came and several clues turned up at once, they neatly contradicted each other. It was the toughest case the 87th Precinct detectives had ever faced.
“What’s this about?” Simms asked. “Some violation? I had the other doors put in, and I put up the occupancy signs. So what is it this time?”
“We’re not firemen,” Carella said. “We’re cops.”
“What difference does it make? Cops or firemen, whenever either of them come around, it costs me money. What is it?”
“You know a girl named Bubbles Caesar?”
“I do,” Simms said.
“She work for you?”
“She used to work for me, yes.”
“Any idea where she is?”
“Not the vaguest. Why? Did she do something?”
“She seems to have disappeared.”
“Is that a crime?”
“Not necessarily.”
“Then why do you want her?”
“We want to talk to her.”
“You’re not alone,” Simms said.
“What do you mean?”
“Only that everybody who ever walked into this joint wanted to talk to Barbara, that’s all. She’s a very attractive girl. A pain in the ass, but very attractive.”
“She gave you trouble?”
“Yes, but not in a professional sense. She always arrived on time, and she did her act when she was supposed to, and she was friendly with the customers, so there was no trouble that way.”
“Then what way was there trouble?”
“Well, there were a couple of fights in here.”
“Over Barbara?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
“What do you mean, who?”
“Who did the fighting?”
“Oh, I don’t remember,” Simms said. “Customers. It’s a funny thing with strippers. A man watches a woman take off her clothes, and he forgets he’s in a public place and that the girl is a performer. He enters a fantasy in which he is alone with this girl, and she’s taking off her clothes only for him. Well, sometimes the fantasy persists after the lights go up. And when two guys share the same fantasy, there can be trouble. A man who thinks the girl belongs to him, is undressing for him, doesn’t like the idea of another guy sharing the same impression. Bang, the fists explode. So we heave them out on the sidewalk. Or at least we did. No more now.”
“Now you let them fight?” Hawes asked.
“No. Now we don’t give them a chance to fantasize.”
“How do you prevent that?”
“Simple. No strippers.”
“Oh? Have you changed the club’s policy?”
“Yep. No strippers, no band, no dancing. Just a high-class jazz pianist, period. Drinks, dim lights, and cool music. You bring your own broad, and you hold hands with her, not with some dame wiggling on the stage. We haven’t had a fight in the past two weeks.”
“What made you decide on this new policy, Mr. Simms?”
“Actually, Barbara had a lot to do with it. She provoked a lot of the fights. I think she did it purposely. She’d pick out two of the biggest guys in the audience, and split her act between them. First one guy, then the other. Afterwards, when she came out front, she’d play up to both of them, and bang, came the fists. Then she didn’t show up for work one night, so I was left with a string of second-run strippers and no headliner. It looked like amateur night at The King and Queen. And the trouble with the band, believe me, it wasn’t worth it.”
“What kind of trouble with the band?”
“Oh, all kinds. One of the guys on the band was a hophead, the trombone player. So I never knew whether he was going to show up for work or be found puking in some gutter. And then the drummer took off without a word, just didn’t show up one night. The drummer is a very important man in a band that accompanies strippers. So I was stuck without a headliner, and without a drummer. So you can imagine what kind of a show I had that night.”
“Let me get this straight,” Carella said. “Are you saying that Barbara and this drummer both disappeared at the same time?”
“The same night, yes.”
“This was when?”
“I don’t remember when exactly. A few days before Valentine’s Day, I think.”
“What was this drummer’s name?”
“Mike something. An Italian name. A real tongue twister. I can’t remember it. It started with a C.”
“Were Barbara and Mike very friendly?”
“They didn’t seem to be, no. At least, I never noticed anything going on between them. Except the usual patter that goes on between the girls in the show and the band. But nothing special. Oh, I see,” Simms said. “You think they took off together, is that it?”
“I don’t know,” Carella said. “It’s a possibility.”
“Anything’s possible with strippers and musicians,” Simms agreed. “I’m better off without them, believe me. This piano player I’ve got now, he plays very cool music, and everybody sits and listens in the dark, and it’s great. Quiet. I don’t need fist fights and intrigue.”
“You can’t remember this drummer’s last name.”
“No.”
“Try.”
“It began with a C, that’s all I can tell you. Italian names throw me.”
“What was the name of the band?” Carella said.
“I don’t think it had a name. It was a pickup band.”
“It had a leader, didn’t it?”
“Well, he wasn’t exactly a leader. Not the type anybody would want to be taken to, if you follow me. He was just the guy who rounded up a bunch of musicians for the job.”
“And what was his name?”
“Elliot. Elliot Chambers.”
“One other thing, Mr. Simms,” Carella said. “Barbara’s agent told us she was living with two other girls when she disappeared. Would you know who those girls were?”
“I know one of them,” Simms said without hesitation. “Marla Phillips. She used to be in the show, too.”
“Would you know where she lives?”
“She’s in the book,” Simms said. He paused and looked at the detectives. “Is that it?”
“That’s it,” Carella said.
Outside, Hawes said, “What do you make of it?”
Carella shrugged. “I’m going to check with the musician’s local, see if I can’t get a last name for this Mike the drummer.”
“Do drummers have big hands?”
“Search me. But it looks like more than coincidence, doesn’t it? Both of them taking a powder on the same night?”
“Yeah, it does,” Hawes said. “What about Marla Phillips?”
“Why don’t you drop in and pay a visit?”
“All right,” Hawes said.
“See what a nice guy I am? I tackle the musicians union, and I leave the stripper to you.”
“You’re a married man,” Hawes said.
“And a father,” Carella added.
“And a father, that’s right.”
“If you need any help, I’ll be back at the squad.”
“What help could I possibly need?” Hawes asked.
Marla Phillips lived on the ground floor of a brownstone four blocks from The King and Queen. The name plate on the mailboxes listed a hyphenated combination of three names: Phillips-Caesar-Smith. Hawes rang the bell, waited for the responding buzz that opened the inner door, and then stepped into the hallway. The apartment was at the end of the hall. He walked to it, rang the bell set in the door jamb, and waited. The door opened almost instantly.
Marla Phillips looked at him and said, “Hey!”
He recognized her instantly, of course, and then wondered where his mind was today. He had made no connection with the name when Simms had first mentioned it.
“Aren’t you the cop who was in Mr. Tudor’s office?” Marla asked.
“That’s me,” he said.
“Sure. Cotton something. Well, come on in, Cotton. Boy, this is a surprise. I just got home a minute ago. You’re lucky you caught me. I have to leave in about ten minutes. Come in, come in. You’ll catch cold standing in the hallway.”