The Erection Set

“Hell, I told you it was from an anonymous source. By the time I inquired, the booze was all gone. Couldn’t be sure anyway. Peggy over at the liquor store only hinted at it.”

“So Cousin Al is clean as a whistle.”

“No complaints lodged,” Bennie Sachs said. “But I bet ne sure wanted a piece of that. Pretty nice-looking dame. Only trouble was, she had two broken fingernails.”

“Observant, aren’t you?”

The big cop shrugged casually. “Cops are supposed to be.”

“How about Cross McMillan?”

“Heavy taxpayer. Minds his own business.”

“Not the other day he didn’t,” I reminded him.

Sach’s thoughts drifted back to the scene in front of the gates at Mondo Beach. He picked up a cigar, bit the end off and spat the piece out. “Mr. McMillan was planning on buying that place. He had money down on it already.”

“His deal went sour. That place has been bought up.” Without looking at me, he held a match to his cigar and nodded. “That’s what I heard. He ain’t very happy about it. He had big plans for that place.”

“Tough.”

“Not on McMillan. What he wants, he gets. ”

“I’ve heard that before too. The only thing he can t get is his own wife.”

Sachs shook the match out and flipped it in a comer. “I wouldn’t make noises like that if I was you. He’s pretty touchy on that subject. When he outsmarted Cubby Tillson on that land deal old Cubby mouthed off about the same thing and Cross knocked the shit outa him ... and Cubby’s a pretty big apple. Fleet title-holder in the Navy back in forty-five.” He pulled on the cigar and blew a smelly blue cloud of smoke my way. “Who got the beach property now?”

“Somebody in the family, I hear.”

“You hear pretty quick. The deed ain’t even been filed yet. Cross McMillan’s going to be pretty interested in seeing whose name is on that paper.”

“Public information, Mr. Sachs. Just the property is private.” I got up and put on my hat. “Thanks for the talk.”

“Anytime,” he said. He let me get as far as the door before he said, “By the way, Mr. Kelly, you got a permit for that gun you’re wearing?”

“You’re pretty good at guessing,” I said.

His eyes gave me a smile and he stuck the cigar back in his mouth.

Sharon was waiting for me in the car outside the door and moved over to let me under the wheel. I said, “How’d you make out?”

“Zilch. They’re as pure as a virginal bride, but if you could make a case out of subtle leers and vile thoughts, you’d be in. Louise even called a couple of her gossipy friends, but the general consensus of opinion is that neither of them ever strayed from the bed of bachelorhood.”

I said something nasty under my breath and pulled away from the curb. My mind kept going back to the gleeful look I saw on Alfred’s face just before he smashed me off my bicycle with his new roadster, and the shrill cursing of Dennie as he tried to piss through a gonorrhea-infected dong. Mice don’t generally sprout batwings and fly away to goodie land.

“There was one other thing Louise remembered,” Sharon added. “Right after your grandfather died there was an explosion and a fire in the laboratory building of the factory. One of the older engineers who was alone in the place at the time was hit in the head and knocked out. The investigation later reported that it was an accident since some experimental work was under way, but the engineer kept claiming he was hit before the explosion. He kept claiming it was a bungled robbery attempt and that he had seen Alfred Barrin’s car pull up just prior to the blast.”

“Robbery?”

Sharon made a vague motion with her hands. “Apparently nothing was stolen. Alfred said he was at home with his brother and the engineer never quite recovered from his injury. He retired right after that.”

“She mention the guy’s name.”

“In fact, she did. Stanley Cramer. He used to hang out at her Uncle Tod’s place. Nice old man and he’s still alive. Lives out in the Maple Hill section right near where our old house was.”

“Curious,” I said.

“Why?”

“Because any research the Barrin plant was working on then involved aluminum extrusion processes. The lab was just a highly refined mental shop.”

“Well, that’s what she said.”

“Let’s check on it.”

The library was open, nearly empty, and the little old lady who ran it very obliging. Her cross-indexes were neat rows of cards in spiderwebby handwriting and after a thirty-second perusal she selected one, consulted it, then brought out an old library copy of the Linton Herald.

Page one held the item, a three-column piece with a photo of the destroyed laboratory. The essence of the story was much the same as Sharon had given me, but with the further explanation that the suspected cause was the collapse of the bins holding the acid containers onto the chemical storage area below. From the photo, it seemed as though the explosion had released its force against the inside wall and the damage was more superficial than anything else. There was no mention at all about my cousin.