Black Mask Magazine (Vol. 30, No. 2 — July 1947)
- Автор: Голт Уильям Кэмпбелл, Rischer Bruno
- Год: 1947
- Язык: английский
- Год: Fictioneers / Popular Publications
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «Black Mask Magazine (Vol. 30, No. 2 — July 1947)». Краткое содержание книги:
The captain of waiters came back.
“How about putting my name down?” I asked.
“Yes, of course,” he said, raising his arm to signal again. I touched the arm, put enough weight on it to hold it down. “The name is John Dillon,” I said. “Let’s see you write it.”
“I’ll remember it,” he snapped, and jerked his arm free.
“By the way, did Harvey Costain get here yet?” I asked.
His eyes defrosted. “Are you a friend of Mr. Costain, sir?”
I smiled coldly.
“Even Mr. Costain has to wait, we’re that crowded,” he said, apologetically. “He’s in the cocktail lounge, if you care to join him, sir.” He pointed to the far end of the dining room.
“Thanks,” I said. “I’ll wait there, but I’m eating alone tonight. Try this for speed.” I passed him a tightly folded dollar bill and headed for the bar.
A deep-toned wall speaker brought the orchestra into the cocktail lounge. I settled on a leather-cushioned bar stool. One of the white-clad barmen was busy among the tables. The other one was serving a big-shouldered, black-haired man at the end of the bar. A slender girl with dark hair tumbling in soft waves down the back of her pale dinner dress sat next to the big-shouldered man staring moodily into her empty cocktail glass.
A huge blunt-fingered hand gripped my arm. A heavy, handsome face topped by crisp curly blond hair grinned down at me. “As I live and breathe, it’s Johnny Dillon. Long time no see. Where in hell you been keeping yourself, boy?”
“Well, well, Duke Mazonik. Hi, Duke,” I said, shaking the big paw. “I’ve been here and I’ve been there. In the Army four years. In town almost six months now. How’s police work?”
“Turned in my badge over a year ago.” He spread both hands flat on the bar top. “I’m making ten times the dough now.”
“Glad to hear it. The drinks are on you.”
“Sure. They’re on the house. Name yours.”
“Don’t tell me that you own this joint.”
“Gosh, no. Tony Zarsella is boss here.”
“Tony Zarsella? The gambler?”
“Yeah. You know him, huh?”
“About him,” I said dryly. “He used to work for another gambler, a man named Lew Gannon, out on the Strip. As a croupier or dealer or something. I hardly remember it now, but there was some stink at the time. I heard Gannon fired Zarsella for making his tables pay too well. Don’t ask me why.”
“Aw, don’t believe all you hear.” Mazonik grinned again, a faintly sheepish grin this time. “He’s in business for himself, now. Game rooms upstairs and everything. He’s got a nice setup here. I kind of keep an eye on things for him.”
A barman drifted over. He rested both hands on the inner edge of the bar and lowered his head and looked up through his eyebrows at me. “Rye, straight,” I said. Mazonik nodded and held up two fingers.
“What brings you to this den of evil?” Mazonik asked amiably.
“Hunger and thirst and a close shave,” I said.
“You sound like you’ve had a couple snorts already.”
“I had business up Ventura way today and a near head-on crash on the way home — out where your road turns in off the valley boulevard, only I didn’t know it was your road at the time. I got stalled there. Then I saw the sign and figured maybe I could get a little food up this way — so here I am.”
“Think of that. Still in the private eye racket?”
I nodded. Shot glasses clicked on the bar in front of us. They looked to be about twice the usual size and I said so. Mazonik winked at me. The barman filled the glasses to the brim without batting an eye and went away again.
“Lead in your gun,” Mazonik said cheerfully, and picked up his drink. I touched the other one. “Who is Harvey Costain?” I asked.
He lowered his drink and set it back on the bar, very gently. His eyes narrowed quizzically. “Is there a guy in your racket who don’t know?” he asked, in a soft, almost husky voice.
“Sure,” I said. “Me. The name’s familiar, but I can’t quite place it.”
“The mouthpiece,” he grunted. “You could almost spit in his eye from where you sit, only we don’t allow that sort of thing in here.”
My memory sharpened as I looked along the bar at the big-shouldered man next to the girl in the pale dinner dress. Harvey Costain had just begun to make a name for himself as the highest bidder’s attorney when the Japs hit Pearl Harbor. Now, he had a rather puffy countenance and looked somewhat drunk, in a quietly sullen way. He was too far away to hear our conversation, but I lowered my voice just to be on the safe side.
“He has nice taste,” I said. “Looks like she’s with him, anyway. His wife?”
“Yeah, she’s with him,” the big blond man grumbled in my ear. “She ain’t his wife, though. A torcher. Calls herself Gail Tremaine.”
The girl turned her head, met my stare for a brief moment, looked into her drink again. Her lips moved: Costain faced her suddenly. Even in that dim light you could see the mean glitter in his eyes. He planted a rough hand on her shoulder and pushed her backwards off the bar stool. She yelped, not loudly, and her body hit the lounge floor with a muffled thud. Women at the tables gasped. Costain curled his lip at them.
By the time I reached that end of the bar, the girl was on her feet, brushing absently at the folds of her skirt. Costain saw me behind him and stood up.
“I’m kind of old-fashioned,” I drawled. “I think you have the silliest puss I ever saw in my life.”
“It’ll pay you to mind your own business, farmer,” he sneered thickly.
I rapped a light left jab into his ribs. His chin came down, I cocked my right hand and started to throw it. A bolt of lightning cracked the walls of the cocktail lounge and hit me in the head. It flared through me. Thunder trailed it. The thunder rumbled, died. I found myself high in the air above the earth, falling rapidly. I hit the ground with a hard jar. It got dark and cold.
A tiny moon appeared in the sky. It began to grow. It grew until its rays spread a pinkish white glow over everything. Then a cloud drifted across the sky and blotted it out. I opened my eyes.
Gleaming white even teeth hung a couple of feet above my face. Heavy latin lips framed the teeth. The features above the lips were dark and latin. Hard black intelligent eyes went with the features. They watched me briefly, went away. Lamplight smacked me full in the eyes. I groaned, turned my head. My neck felt stiff.
Duke Mazonik’s blond wool and tanned handsome face leaned over me and said: “How you feeling, boy?”
“Terrible,” I growled. “Get the number of that truck?”
“Strictly corny,” he chuckled. “You’re O.K., John.”
I sat up.
We were in a long wide room with dark drapes over a row of windows and, across from them, a cheery blaze in a small neat brick fireplace. There was some rather modernistic furniture around. It included a large shiny walnut desk and a leather davenport. I was on the davenport.
The dark latin-faced man came over and shoved about three fingers of amber fluid in the bottom of a tall glass at me. I took it. My throat warmed up as the amber fluid slid down. A glow filled my stomach, spread, eased the stiffness in my neck. I gave him back the glass, rubbed my mouth with my hand.
“Meet the boss, John,” Mazonik said. “Tony Zarsella, Johnny Dillon. I’d like for you guys to like each other.”