The Mike Hammer Collection

Trouble out there. Trouble all over, but trouble out there all the time. Someplace was a guy with a slug in him and a gun in his hand. Someplace was Marv Kania, hurting like hell, waiting for me to show up so he could put one in my gut too. It was Levitt who had done it, but me in his mind. I was the living one, so I did it. Screw him. Let him hurt.

Three million dollars. That could bring trouble to a city. That could bring a man back to power and buy muscle. That was big starter money and a prize for anybody.

Sim Torrence thought Blackie Conley could have made it. Okay, suppose he did. Suppose he sat on that three million all these years, afraid to spend it, not wanting to convert it because of the loss he’d take in the transaction. He just sat on it. It was power to him. Brother, he sure waited for the heat to cool, but it happens like that sometimes. Harmony Brothers sat on a million and a half for forty-one years and only told where it was on his deathbed. Frankie Boyle kept seventy thousand in his mattress for sixteen years, sleeping happily on it every night without ever touching it, then went out of his mind when the rooming house was burned down along with his unspent fortune.

So Blackie Conley got away and sat on three million for thirty years. In the last of his life he gets a power complex and wants to buy his way back in. He’d know how to do it all right. If he could stay undercover thirty years he could still do it.

Blackie Conley! Mr. Dickerson.

A big, fat possible.

Question: Why try to knock off Sue Devon?

Answer: A cute possible here too. If Blackie was in love with Sally, and IF Sally had a child by another man, there might be enough hatred to want the child destroyed.

There was only one thing wrong with the premise. Too many people wanted Sue dead. Basil Levitt was trying for it when Kid Hand and Marv Kania came in.

But there was an answer to that one too, a money answer. Sue was a target with a price on her head and if it was big enough the shooters would fight each other for a crack at her. Kid Hand could use the dough and make himself a big one in somebody’s eyes at the same time. That could explain why Levitt came in so fast after I got there. He thought I was after head money too.

Blackie Conley, Mr. Dickerson, three million bucks. And the vultures.

Velda came in then and laid the package on my desk. Inside the folder was a picture of Conley. I had seen one like it not too long before in Sue’s room. Blackie Conley was the guy in the nightclubs with Sally Devon.

His arrest history went back to when he was a child and if he was alive today he’d be eighty-two years old. There were a lot older people still around and some of them right up there with the best. Age doesn’t hit everybody the same way.

Pat had included some notes for me suggesting I go into a transcript of the trial if I wanted more information on Conley since it was the last that he was ever mentioned. He was tied in with the gang and his history brought out, but since the trial was a prolonged affair it would take a lot of reading to pick out the pieces.

I looked up at Velda and she stuck her tongue out at me. “I know, you want me to do it.”

“You mind?”

“No, but what am I looking for?”

“Background on Conley.”

“Why don’t you ask Sonny Motley?”

“I intend to, kitten. We have to hit it from all sides.”

I filled in the picture for her, watching her face put it together like I did. She nodded finally and said, “You could have it, Mike. It . . . seems right.”

“But not quite?”

She ran the tip of her tongue between her teeth. “I just have a feeling.”

“I know. Missing pieces. Suppose you meet Annette Lee and see if you can get any more out of her. It won’t come easy, but try. She might give you someplace to start with Conley too.”

“Okay, lover.”

“And be careful, honey. That nut Kania is still loose. So is Arnold Goodwin. Those guys could be keys to this thing.”

“Pat said he’d call you if anything came in on them.”

“Good.”

“And he said to tell you Charlie Force is protesting your association with the agency you work for.”

“He knows what he can do.”

“That Inspector Grebb is trouble. He’s covering you like a blanket. Do you know you have a tail waiting downstairs?”

“I expected it. I know a way out too.”

“You’re asking for it, wise guy. I just don’t want to see you get killed, that’s all. I want to kill you myself. It’ll take days and days.”

“Knock it off.” I swung off my chair and stood up. She grinned, kissed me lightly, and picked up her handbag.

“I arranged for an apartment for you. It’s furnished and the key’s in the desk. It’s got a big double bed.”

“It’s polite to wait till you’re asked.”

Velda cocked her head and smiled. “There’s a couch in the living room if you still want to be the gentleman.”

“Can’t you wait until we get married?”

“No.” She pulled on her raincoat and belted it. “If I don’t push you you’ll never come.”

“I suppose you have a key.”

“Naturally.”

“Change the damn lock.”