The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories
- Автор: Adams Cleve F., Babcock Dwight V.
- Год: 2010
- Язык: английский
- Год: A Vintage Crime/Black Lizard
- ISBN: 978-0-307-45543-7
- Жанр: Криминальные детективы
Электронная книга - «The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories». Краткое содержание книги:
Black Mask was the apotheosis of noir. It was the magazine where the first hardboiled detective story, which was written by Carroll John Daly appeared. It was the slum in which such American literary titans like Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler got their start, and it was the home of stories with titles like “Murder Is Bad Luck,” “Ten Carets of Lead,” and “Drop Dead Twice.” Collected here is best of the best, the hardest of the hardboiled, and the darkest of the dark of America’s finest crime fiction. This masterpiece collection represents a high watermark of America’s underbelly. Crime writing gets no better than this.
I introduced myself and said: “I’m just doing a little informal checking up. Please don’t get excited about it. I only want to have your corroboration of your brother’s statement that you were with him at the time of Shorty Waxman’s murder.”
Louise Harmon didn’t look at all as if she intended to get excited. She looked at me as if trying to decide whether I had all my marbles.
“I don’t understand. Why would my brother need an alibi for Waxman’s murder? He certainly couldn’t have had any reason to kill Waxman!”
I said lamely: “He couldn’t have had any love for Waxman after the way Waxman treated him at Peterson’s trial.”
Louise Harmon now eyed me as if she had made up her mind about whether I had all my marbles. Her decision was plainly in the negative.
“Don’t be absurd.”
“Well, you haven’t answered my question. Were you with Jimmie this noon?”
“No, and you know I wasn’t. He never told you that I was.”
“All right, if you weren’t with Jimmie, will you tell me where you were then?”
Louise Harmon’s eyes widened. For a split second they became angry; then they mocked me. “So I’m a suspect! Well, this is precious — little Louise has finally amounted to something! A murder suspect at last after twenty-two years of a drab, dreary existence! Are you going to take me down to headquarters for a third degree?”
“I hope not. It’ll help if you just tell me where you were.”
Her eyes gleamed with mock mystery.
“Everything’s against me. I was in the Mercury Tower at noon! I can’t deny it — the elevator starter would remember me. It’s the curse of being so beautiful that every old man ogles you. Little did I dream — well, to go on with my confession, I dropped in to see Jimmie. He wasn’t there. His office was deserted, and I waited maybe ten minutes in his reception room. Then I went out for lunch.”
“So you don’t have any alibi for ten minutes?”
Louise Harmon hung her head.
“No! It was careless of me, but then I didn’t know that Shorty Waxman was being murdered!”
She laughed in my face. My face was very red. Then I heard a noise and turned. Keever had come into the room. I recalled Louise Harmon’s ten-minute delay. So she had called my boss.
“What’s going on here, Ben?” Keever’s face was like a thundercloud.
Louise Harmon answered for me: “Oh, we’re having a wonderful time! Isn’t it marvelous — I’m getting the third degree as a suspect in the Waxman murder case!”
Keever slowly faced me. “Go outside, Ben. Wait for me. I’ll be with you in a minute.”
I went outside. I leaned dejectedly on a fender of my car and lighted a cigarette. I wasn’t half finished with it when Keever appeared. He hadn’t cooled off a bit.
“A fine spot you put me in! I had to apologize all over the place. Imagine treating Louise Harmon as a murder suspect!”
“I didn’t. That was her idea. I was merely curious as to where her brother had been while Waxman was getting himself murdered. I found out one thing, at least. Harmon wasn’t in his office — his sister just told me so.”
Keever started to speak, then eyed me carefully. His anger subsided in favor of curiosity.
“Come on, Ben, give out. Why are you pointing your finger at Harmon?”
“Well, there was a will. It was in the safe Peterson robbed. Peterson says it was Harmon’s will, and he gave everything to Louise. Somehow the will was never mentioned at the trial. Jimmie Harmon said nothing about it being stolen, and Peterson says he turned it over to Waxman. Supposing Waxman decided not to give Harmon the will. Maybe Harmon wanted it bad enough to kill him for it.”
Keever looked at me with horror.
“I never dreamed it! I never dreamed that anyone could be so ignorant of the law! Evidently you think that Harmon had to get his old will back and destroy it before he could make a new one! Why, all he would have to do to revoke the will would be to make a new one!”
“Well, I’m not a lawyer.”
“And you’re a hell of a detective! What’s the idea of holding out this long about that will? Try to remember that you’re working for me. Instead of running around in circles and trying to crack this case on your own, I want you to get Waxman’s secretary, the O’Hara girl, and bring her to Waxman’s office by eight. A locksmith’s going to try to open that safe this evening, and Waxman’s secretary should know something about the contents.”
It was one detail I could accept without urging. I had been careful to jot down Mickey O’Hara’s address, but I hadn’t hoped to be able to use it so soon. Her place turned out to be the first floor of a duplex. When she came to the door and saw me she seemed a little disappointed.
“Oh, it’s Mr. Corbett! I wasn’t expecting you. Is your visit official?”
“Only if you want it to be. I’m to take you to Waxman’s office, and I thought you might like to have dinner first.”
I could see that she wasn’t crazy about the idea, but she said: “Why, that would be lovely. I’ll only take a minute.”
Her place was furnished modestly enough. I dropped into a lounge chair and surveyed things casually. My gaze halted at a silver picture frame. It contained the smiling likeness of Jimmie Harmon. It was a good photo, but it had been mounted in such a way that the face bulged and looked a little bloated.
I averted my gaze from the photo as Mickey O’Hara appeared, but she gave the photo a sharp look, realizing I couldn’t have missed it.
“So you and Jimmie are that way?” I ventured, when we had driven a block from the duplex. Mickey O’Hara gave a nervous little laugh.
“I consider Jimmie a very good friend, that’s all. We used to bump into each other in the elevator and got to having lunch together. As for Jimmie being ‘that way,’ I don’t have to tell you about his reputation as a bite-and-run wolf.”
I let it go at that. I drove across town, out on Broad and pulled up at the Arabian Grill. It’s an expensive joint that I seldom patronize, for an obvious reason. But I had good cause for selecting it now.
“You’ll have to run along and order for both of us while I go down the street and get a check cashed. They don’t know me in there.”
I waited till she had gone inside, then turned around and drove back to the duplex. Picking its lock took only a minute, and once inside I didn’t bother to turn on the lights, for I knew where to go. I crossed the room to the silver picture frame and pried off its heavy cardboard back. The back and picture fell free to expose a folded paper between. I got out a pocket flash and scrutinized the paper.
It was the Harmon will. I read it through. It was a homemade job, all right, written by a guy who thought anyone can write his own will. I know better. I’ve whiled away quite a bit of time in Keever’s office over a book on wills, and I know they’re tricky things. A lot of people so hate to give a lawyer five dollars that they write their own wills, and after they’re dead their crude mistakes cause long-winded lawsuits that result in the lawyers getting all of their estates.
I put out my flash, folded up the will and started for the door. Then I went out like a light. I knew when I came around that I’d taken a perfect rabbit punch. I got up off the floor and fell down again. The next time I stayed up, but I knew I was going to be sick. I went into the bathroom and got it over with. Then I went back into the room. The will was gone. I didn’t waste time looking for it. My watch said eight-thirty. I went out to my car and drove to the Mercury Tower.