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 sighed, put on my hat and coat, and went out into the street.
I returned half an hour later. I was grinning happily from ear to ear. There was a soothing, gloating sensation in my heart that almost made me forget about my thirty-three bucks. Sackler looked up as I approached his desk.
“Ah,” he said, “get to the bank all right?”
“And had a very pleasant trip,” I told him. “Here.”
I groped in my pocket and laid Rawson’s check down on the desk before him. He looked at it, then looked at me.
“Well,” he said testily, “where’s the cash?”
I smiled at him sweetly. “There isn’t any cash.”
“What the devil are you talking about, Joey? What do you mean there—”
“There isn’t enough cash anyway. Insufficient funds.”
He looked for all the world as if someone had slugged him over the head with a mallet.
“My God, Joey, you don’t mean—”
“I mean that Harold Rawson, who’s probably worth several hundred thousand times as much dough as you are, has given you a bum check. Moreover, you’ve been taken for fifty bucks in cash. I might add, I think it very, very funny.”
“My God,” said Sackler in an anguished tone, “twenty-five hundred and fifty bucks. I’ve been taken for twenty-five hundred and fifty bucks. I’m a ruined man. I—”
“Do we still keep that appointment at Capek’s joint?” I asked him.
“You’re damn right we do,” he said explosively. “I’m going to see that Rawson. He can’t do this to me. Good heavens, twenty-five hundred and fifty bucks is one hell of a lot of dough, Joey.”
“You’re actually out only fifty,” I pointed out. “That’s all you gave him in cash.”
He paid no attention to me. He buried his face in his hands and muttered over and over again: “Twenty-five hundred and fifty bucks, my God!”
In my book he was still out only fifty but in his present distrait condition all the arithmetic in the world wasn’t going to convince him.
Chapter Two
You Can’t Get Cash from a Corpse
It was a raw blustery night as we drove through Long Island on the Grand Central Parkway. Sackler had recovered somewhat from his fiscal grief. He had arrived at the conclusion that it was a ghastly and horrible mistake, but nevertheless, a mistake. Considering Rawson’s position, his wealth, the fact that he was Karl Capek’s partner, I was reluctantly inclined to agree with him.
But I wasn’t so optimistic about my thirty-three bucks as Sackler was about his twenty-five hundred and fifty. All afternoon, I’d been racking my brains for some cinch bet which would enable me to win it back, without success. Now, as I heard Sackler humming gayly at my side in the car, I tried another tack.
“Hey,” I said, “I’ll make a deal with you.”
Sackler kept on humming.
“If Rawson makes good for you on that check, how about giving me back that dough I lost at dice?”
The melody died on his lips. “Why, Joey,” he said reproachfully, “they’re two entirely different things. Yours was a gambling debt. I couldn’t insult you by offering to return it.”
I sighed and said: “No, I hardly thought you could.”
We made the rest of the trip in silence. Some twenty miles out I turned through an elaborate pair of wrought-iron gates and drove through the heavily wooded estate of Karl Capek. The wind blew cold from the Sound and the sky was starless. It was a cold cheerless night that fitted in well with my own mood.
I brought the car to a halt underneath a high Colonial portico. A moment later Sackler pressed the doorbell. After another moment the door was opened by a liveried butler.
The first thing I heard was Wolley’s familiar voice. We found him in the living-room, a glass of brandy in his hand, a cigar in his mouth, holding forth on his police adventures to a politely bored audience. We were introduced all around and informed that Rawson hadn’t arrived yet, although he was expected soon.
Without delay we went into our usual routine. Sackler demanded he be assigned a room in which to mastermind. I whipped out my notebook and proceeded to do the rounds, picking up bits of information I thought might be useful. Since Sackler was actually starting to work before he had negotiated about the check, I became more certain that he wasn’t really worried much about it.
I snooped around the house for a good hour. I questioned Wolley, the servants and everybody else. I went out into the windy night and personally examined the caretaker’s lodge where they’d found Capek’s body.
I came back cold as hell, commandeered a pint of brandy from the butler’s pantry and went up to the second-floor study which had been assigned to Sackler. I took out my notebook and sat down.
Sackler was having one hell of a time with a humidor of cigars he had found. His pocket was stuffed and he was rolling one around lusciously in his mouth. Since they were free the taste, I presume, was much improved.
“All right,” he said. “What have we got?”
“Not Rawson,” I told him. “He phoned a little while ago. He’ll be another half-hour. Business held him up.”
“What else?”
“First, those guys downstairs. That watery-eyed young blond guy is a relative of Capek’s. Name of Crosher. Only living relative as far as anyone knows. He’s been here for a month. He’s broke and was trying to get some dough from the old guy. Came from Chi. Never seen his cousin before. In fact, he only just found out he was Capek’s cousin. He’s in direct line for the estate.”
I thought maybe I had something there. But as I glanced quickly at Sackler he seemed more interested in his cigar.
“Next, the Union League Club stuffed shirt in the wing collar is Granville S. Colby, of whom you may have heard.”
“Often,” said Sackler. “Lawyer. Old family. Blue-blood stock. Stiff-necked. Don’t like him.”
“Then there’s that guy Benjamin. He’s the skinny one with the thin face. Another lawyer. Colby’s assistant. They’ve both been here for a little over a month. Colby’s supposed to be resting. Doctor’s orders. But he was handling some legal stuff for Capek and Rawson. Was doing it out here.”
Sackler looked up. “Notice anything funny about that Benjamin?”
“Yeah. Face seems familiar. Can’t quite place it. Maybe I’ve seen him somewhere around in court. Why?”
“Keep talking,” said Sackler. “What about Capek?”
“There’s a caretaker’s lodge out there in the forest,” I told him. “They don’t use it anymore. It was all boarded up. That’s where they found Capek. A revolver was in his hand and his brains were on the floor. There was a portable typewriter there with a suicide note in it. Capek’s fingerprints were on the keys. The doc said he’s been dead three days.”
“He was missing two weeks,” said Sackler. “What was he doing the rest of the time? Contemplating suicide?”
“You think you’re kidding,” I told him, “but you’re dead on. That’s exactly what he said in the suicide note.”
For the first time, Sackler appeared interested. “What’s exactly what he said in the note?”
“I got it from Wolley. He didn’t have a copy of it with him. Gave it to me from memory. Something about being tired of life, retiring to the lodge alone to think things over. Deciding finally to die. Wolley seems to think it’s on the level. Thinks Rawson’s crazy for asking him to come out here tonight.”
“Don’t bother me with Wolley’s opinions. Anything else?”
“Well, there was the faucets.”
“The faucets? What about the faucets?”