The Mike Hammer Collection

Twice the guy snagged himself in the brush and half fell. He took it out on me with a slap in the head and a nasty boot in the ribs. Every once in a while he’d curse and get a better grip on my coat, muttering under his breath what was going to happen to me. Fifty yards into the woods was enough. He dropped me in a heap and dragged the rod out again, fighting for his breath. The guy knew guns. The safety was off and the rod was ready to spit.

“Say it. Say it now, damn you, or you’ll never say it. What did you do with them . . . or should I work you over first?”

“Go to hell, you pig.”

His hand went up quickly. The gun described a chopping arc toward my jaw. That was what I was waiting for. I grabbed the gun with both hands and yanked, twisting at the same time. He screamed when his shoulder jumped out of the socket, screamed again when I clubbed the edge of my palm against his neck.

Feet jabbed out and ripped into my side, he scrambled to get up. In the middle of it I lost the gun. I held on with one arm and sank my fist into him, but the power of the blow was lost in that awkward position.

But it was enough. He wrenched away, regained his feet and went scrambling through the underbrush. By the time I found the gun he was gone. Time again. If I had had only a minute more I could have chased him, but I hadn’t had time to cut my feet loose. Yeah, I’d been on the floor of a car before with my hands tied behind my back. After that first time I have always carried a safety razor blade slipped through the open seam into the double layer of cloth under my belt. It works nice, very handy. Someday I’d get tied up with my hands in front and I’d be stuck.

The knots were soft. A few minutes with them and I was on my feet. I tried to follow his tracks a few yards, but gave it up as a bad job. He had fallen into a couple of soft spots and left hunks of his clothes hanging on some tree limbs. He didn’t know where he was going and didn’t care. All he knew was that if he stopped and I caught him he’d die in that swamp as sure as he was born. It was almost funny. I turned around and waded back through the tangled underbrush, dodging snaky low-hanging branches that tried to whip my eyes out.

At least I had the car. My erstwhile friend was going to have to hoof it back to camp. I walked around the job, a late Chevy sedan. The glove compartment was empty, the interior in need of a cleaning. Wrapped around the steering post was the ownership card with the owner’s name: Mrs. Margaret Murphy, age fifty-two, address in Wooster, occupation, cook. A hell of a note, lifting some poor servant’s buggy. I started it up. It would be back in town before it was missed.

When I turned around I plowed through the ruts of a country road for five minutes before reaching the main highway. My lights hit a sign pointing north to Wooster. I must have been out some time, it was over fifteen miles to the city. Once on the concrete I stepped on the gas. More pieces of the puzzle. I had something. I felt in my pocket; the later will was still there. Then what the hell was it? What was so almighty important that I’d been taken for a ride and threatened to make me talk?

Ordinarily I’m not stupid, on the contrary, my mind can pick up threads and weave them into whole cloth, but now I felt like putting on the dunce cap and sitting in the corner.

Nuts.

Twenty minutes to nine I was on the outskirts of Wooster. I turned down the first side street I came to, parked and got out of the car after wiping off any prints I might have made. I didn’t know just how the local police operated, but I wasn’t in the mood to do any explaining. I picked up the main road again and strode uphill toward Alice’s. If she was up there was no indication of it. I recovered my hat from the foyer, cast one look up to the shuttered window and got in my own car. Things were breaking all around my head and I couldn’t make any sense out of anything. It was like taking an exam with the answer sheet in front of you and failing because you forgot your glasses.

Going back to Sidon I had time to think. No traffic, just the steady hum of the engine and the sharp whirr of the tires. I was supposed to have something. I didn’t have it. Yet certain parties were so sure I did have it they put the buzz on me. It, it, for Pete’s sake, why don’t they name the name? I had two wills and some ideas. They didn’t want the wills and they didn’t know about the ideas. Something else I might have picked up . . . or didn’t pick up.

Of course. Of all the potted, tin-headed fools, I took the cake. Junior Ghent got more than the one will. That was all he had left after the two boys got done with him. They took something else, but whatever it was Junior didn’t want me messing in his plans by telling me about it. They took it all right, but somewhere between me and the wall they dropped that important something, and figuring me to be smarter than I should have been, thought I must have found it.