A Body for McHugh Read online

  “No.”

  “Don’t tell us that! How come you were messing around the girl’s car?”

  McHugh shook his head and said nothing. The brown shoe flicked out again. He rolled, caught the ankle and twisted. There was a cry of alarm, a struggle to get away. The man broke loose, falling, twisting as he fell so McHugh couldn’t see his face before the other feet kicked at him. Blood streamed down his forehead, blinding him. He sat and daubed at it with his fingers.

  “McHugh, I know you. You’re an operator. You pull a lot of shady stuff in that dive of yours, and you seem to get away with it.” It was another voice speaking now. A flatter voice, with less suggestion of patience in it. “Either the girl gave you the package or she made some deal with you to bring her car to her. It’s not in the car—we looked. So she’s still got it. We want it.”

  “Yeah. You said that before.” The flow of blood was slowing, his head growing clearer. “What’s the matter? Didn’t the guy you knifed have it?”

  “You’re guessing there,” the first voice said. “It doesn’t matter. No, he didn’t have it.”

  “Hey—this guy knows!” It was the voice of the third man.

  “I’ll say it for you—so what’s one more stiff?” McHugh said. His eyes were on the glaring light, measuring it as it swung slowly in a light draft. He looked at the nearest pair of legs, trying to measure his chances. These men were killers, professionals. They wanted something he didn’t have, and they would kill him whether they got it or not.

  He raised his hands to his face again and wiped at the blood. When he lowered them, he was sitting almost erect on the floor, palms close to his buttocks, right leg raised at the knee, tensed.

  “Yeah,” said the third man. From the sound of the voice, McHugh guessed it was the one in the middle.”

  He kicked then. The light bulb disintegrated with a blinding flash and a sharp cracking noise. In that same instant he was rolling, flailing his legs. He felt himself crash into two bodies, and he swung a punch, from the floor.

  A man screamed, his groin smashed. McHugh heard him topple heavily, writhing, groaning in agony. He clubbed his fist at the sound, felt the small bones of a face shatter. He dropped on the man, and his fingers found the hard outline of a gun in the pocket. He ripped the cloth away and fired the gun in one motion.

  The pulpy sound of a bullet hitting flesh mingled with the roar of the shot, and another man was screaming.

  McHugh rolled as a finger of flame reached for him. He fired blindly at the screams. They became a gurgle.

  He rolled, the gun ready. His ears rang from the shots, and the room was tar-black. Now the advantage was his—anyone who moved was his enemy, someone to be killed or broken. The hoods could not fire without the prospect of hitting each other.

  He held his breath, waiting, straining his ears for the slightest sound. Somewhere in the room the gurgling noise continued, weaker now. A foot scraped against wood. McHugh swung the gun around as a door screeched open, then slammed. He heard running feet and guessed that only one of the three was taking off.

  There had been a brief rectangle of grayish light before the door closed again. He tensed himself for pursuit, then froze. The running man had a good head start, and he knew where he was. McHugh knew only that he was in a stinking box of a room with two enemies. Two wounded enemies who might still be in shape to blast him down. He forced himself to wait, and then he was aware that the gurgling sound had stopped. He ran his fingers across the floor lightly, felt wet stickiness, He ticked off five minutes in his mind and, with his gun ready, cautiously searched his pockets.

  They had left him the flashlight, and the whisper of sound made by his fingers as they closed on it in his pocket brought no action from the two men left in the room.

  He found the button and flicked it on for an instant.

  He was alone with two dead men.

  CHAPTER 4

  HE PLAYED THE SLENDER BEAM of light over the faces and found them unfamiliar.

  One had taken a bullet through the throat, and, from the amount of blood, it looked as though the carotid artery had been torn out. The bullet had removed a large chunk of flesh from below the man’s ear.

  The second man had not been shot, but his face had been smashed. McHugh remembered the pulping of bone that had followed when he struck blindly with his fist. He sidestepped the spreading pool of blood and touched the broken face. The bridge of the nose had been shattered, and splinters of bone had been driven into the brain.

  McHugh made a clucking sound of regret. Better either or both men had lived to talk. Quickly he searched the bodies, noting the flashy, second-rate clothes. Not San Francisco clothes, he decided. More like the stuff to be found in the walk-up places around lower Main Street in Los Angeles. He was not surprised when he found no identification. The man who had been shot was carrying two hundred and thirty-nine dollars in a money clip. His companion had seventy dollars and some loose change.

  Bending over them had started his head throbbing again. McHugh drew himself to his feet, marked the location of the door, darkened his flashlight and slipped out, gun ready.

  The street was empty, dark, strong with the smell of brackish waterfront.

  He moved with caution, seeking the blackness that bunched around the tumbledown buildings. The gun was in his pocket, and his fist was tight around the butt. The nearest street light was two blocks distant, at a corner. He reached the first intersection, noting the street names on the faded signs.

  There was a bar in the third block. It made The Door look like the cocktail lounge of the Algonquin in New York. He watched for a moment through the grimy window and saw that the bartender was engrossed in a late TV show. He slipped through the door, face averted, and strode through the long, narrow room. He found what passed for a rest-room in the rear. The equipment reminded him of a Mexican jail in which he had once spent some time. He persuaded the cold water tap to produce a rusty-looking liquid and used his fist to scrub dirt from the peeling mirror. There was no soap. He wet his handkerchief and wiped the bloodstains from his face. When he finished he did not look good, but he doubted the customers of this particular bar were attractive anyway.

  The bartender was in shirt-sleeves, and there were dark circles under his armpits. McHugh climbed onto a rickety stool.

  “Yeah?” The barman did not turn his head.

  There were no other customers. “Whisky. Straight.”

  The barman sighed, showing no sign of interest in McHugh’s battered face. He poured.

  McHugh put money out. “How about you?”

  “Why not?” The bartender poured himself a shot. His eyes slid over McHugh, not missing the expensive cut of his clothes, the thickness of his wallet, holding with new interest on the fresh gashes on his face. “Cheers.”

  They drank. McHugh thought Harvey Dunn would enjoy this particular brand of booze. “Do it again. But make it what you’re drinking.”

  “Yeah. Heh heh. That stuff would give a goat a belly-ache.”

  McHugh swallowed half his second drink, found it better. “I want to get uptown.”

  “You got a long walk, friend. Cabbies won’t come down here at night. Not that I blame ‘em much.”

  “Not a cab. You know somebody with a car?”

  “Maybe.” The barman gave him a long, speculative look. Cab drivers kept notes on their fares. This guy would be easy to remember. Soft, expensive clothes, but nothing soft about that face. A hard man who likes good stuff and can pay for it. “How much?”

  “Twenty.”

  “Uh-uh.”

  “Twenty for you. Includes forgetting it.”

  “It figures.” He nodded, pulled a phone from under the bar and dialed. He spoke briefly, then hung up. “You’re on. Five minutes.”

  “Build another.” McHugh pushed a twenty across the bar. The barman went back to his television. McHugh waited.

  The man came in less than five minutes. He was huge, beetle-browed, dressed in the
heavy, rough garb of a longshoreman. The bartender nodded at McHugh.

  McHugh put a twenty on the bar. “Greyhound station will do.”

  “Yeah.” He eyed McHugh’s wallet. “Now?”

  “Now.”

  The big man folded the twenty into a corded fist and started for the door. McHugh followed. The door slammed behind them, and they were out in a night that was thick with fog. The rain had stopped and their footsteps were muffled. The man walked on McHugh’s left, and after a moment he began a thin, nervous whistling between his teeth. He was well over six feet tall, half a head over McHugh, and he moved with lumbering power.

  “Car’s right here,” he said after they had covered half a block.

  They stopped at an old coupe. McHugh bent toward the doorhandle, and he heard a sudden intake of breath. He ducked then, springing back from the car, and the massive fist that had been aimed at the back of his head slammed against the window of the car, shattering it. The man cursed and tried to regain his balance. McHugh caught the hand, found a clutching finger and bent it back with sudden violence. The big man screamed when the bone snapped.

  He was fast for his size, fast and bull-strong. He threw a left that glanced off the side of McHugh’s head. It was like getting sideswiped by a trolley car. McHugh reeled against the car and kicked out sharply. The kick was slowed by his raincoat, but the point of his shoe found a kneecap. The big man yelped, and his leg buckled.

  McHugh stiffened his fingers and found the man’s throat with a karate chop. The big hands came up protectively now, and the man folded to his knees. McHugh kicked him in the unprotected belly and, when he bent forward in a spasm, chopped him again behind the right ear.

  The man sprawled forward, face in the littered gutter. McHugh stepped around him and got behind the wheel of the car. The keys were in the ignition, and the motor sounded healthy. He started to pull away from the curb, then set the brake.

  He got out, rolled the unconscious giant over and went through his pockets until he found the twenty-dollar bill. He smoothed it carefully and replaced it in his wallet. He drove to a section of Market Street that was lined with cheap saloons, shooting galleries and all-night lunchrooms. He parked the car on a deserted side street and found a bar with a fair crowd in it.

  Inspector Kline sounded harried and ill-tempered. Mc-Hugh would have been suspicious if it had been any other way.

  “Get this straight, I’m only going to say it once,” he said into the phone. He made no attempt to disguise his voice; the clatter and clang of a couple of pinball machines being played outside the phone booth would cover him enough. He gave the address of the building where the men lay dead and added, “They did the knife job tonight. There was another one, but he got away. Enjoy yourself.”

  He hung up before Kline could reply. He left the phone booth, found a side exit from the bar and walked rapidly down Market Street until he came to a cab stand. He had the driver drop him a block and a half from the Nob Hill apartment he shared with Loris. He felt a small bit of satisfaction as he rode the elevator and let himself into the penthouse.

  The night had not been exactly productive. He still had no idea who the dead man was, where the girl fit or whether her name was really Cecille Marie Harnois. He had no idea who the men he had killed were, who their companion was or what was in the package they had demanded.

  But at least it had not been dull.

  He stripped his clothes off in the dressing room and stepped into the shower. The heat eased his aching muscles, and later he stood naked in front of the big mirror over the basin, doctoring his cuts. He belted a robe around himself, got a cigarette going and went into the big bedroom with its glass walls and panorama of the city and the bay.

  Loris was waiting up, stretched out on the lounge with a cup of coffee and a book She wore a pale blue gown that emphasized the clean-limbed body, the high, small breasts. She looked him over and nodded solemnly.

  “I thought you’d get into it,” she said matter-of-factly. “How’d the other side do?”

  McHugh went to the cellarette, poured a glass of Scotch and swirled an ice cube in it. He told her what had happened.

  She nodded from time to time. She had heard such recitals a hundred times before. “Kline will love you.”

  “Of course.” He finished his drink, smacking his lips. He crossed the room to the lounge, scooped her up in his arms and carried her to the big bed. He turned the light off, then pressed the switch that backed the full-length drapes away from the windows. The lights of the city, muted by fog, came into the room.

  She clung to him, sleek and warm through the sheer gown. “You’re going away again.”

  “I don’t know. Not yet.”

  “You are. I can tell.” She nibbled his ears and pulled him hard against her. “The way you always try to get enough to last a while.”

  “Do I?” He stroked her in the dimness.

  “You will this time. I saw that little girl.”

  At precisely nine o’clock in the morning, the fist of authority beat upon the door.

  “Cops,” McHugh said, yawning. He swung his legs out of bed, fumbled his feet into slippers and reached for his robe with one hand and a cigarette with the other. The pounding continued.

  “You better—” Loris began.

  “Cops,” McHugh replied with the authority of experience. “Only cops would wear their knuckles out when there’s a doorbell.”

  He closed the bedroom door behind him and crossed the carpeted living room to the door. The pounding stopped when he unlocked the night latch. The cops were of a size and shape. Solid, middle-aged frames, suits of neutral gray, snap-brim hats, expressionless eyes that missed nothing. The one who was doing the pounding flashed a potsy.

  “Sergeant Meyers, Homicide Division. My partner, Detective Johnston. You’re McHugh.”

  “I am.” McHugh swung the door wide, stepped back.

  “Inspector Kline wants you down at the Hall,” Meyers said.

  “Okay. Come on in a minute.”

  “He said right away. He meant it,” Johnston said.

  McHugh grinned, flipped his robe open. “Like this?”

  “He warned us you were a wise guy,” Meyers growled, “Hurry it up.”

  “So come in.”

  They followed McHugh into the kitchenette. An electric percolator waited on the counter. He plugged it in. “It will be ready when I am. Make yourselves comfortable.”

  In the bedroom he took his time selecting a nubby tweed from Brooks Brothers, a narrow black tie, white shirt with button-down tabs and expensively plain shoes imported from Ireland. He used an electric razor and combed his short salt-and-pepper hair carefully. He pondered a choice of hats, then settled for a somewhat shaggy grey one with a dark green feather thrust in its wide band. He imagined Kline would be annoyed; Kline would much prefer to see him dragged into the Hall of Justice wrapped in a blanket.

  Satisfied with his appearance, he headed for the kitchenette, grinning at Loris’ lazy, mocking whistle. The detective team was glumly eying the percolator and a row of cups near it.

  “Don’t just stand there. Join me,” McHugh said pleasantly. He filled three cups, put out cream and sugar. “Excuse me a moment, gentlemen.”

  He poured a fourth cup, brought it to Loris. She sat up in bed, took it, watched him with laughing eyes.

  “If the boys at The Door could see and hear you now.”

  He arched an eyebrow and snagged a bottle of brandy from the cellarette on his way to the kitchen.

  “Little touch?” he offered. “Improves the coffee no end.”

  “No,” Johnston snapped.

  “Thanks,” Meyers added.

  McHugh shrugged and poured a shot in his cup. He drank, with an appropriate sigh of enjoyment.

  “Look, McHugh, Kline is mad as a billygoat with a headache,” Meyers said. “You better drink that up quick and shag out of here with us. We’ve been waiting half an hour already.”

  “
Does the Inspector feel I may be able to assist him in some inquiry?” McHugh took a dainty, mocking sip. “He had occasion to call on me at my place of business last night.”

  “God damn it!” Meyers spaced the words carefully. He shoved his chair back and poured what remained in his cup into the sink. “We came here to get you, McHugh, and we are damned well going to do it right now. If I have to put the irons on you and drag you!”

  “All right. We’ll go.” McHugh put on his hat and raincoat. The detectives were grimly silent in the elevator and in the unmarked police car. Johnston drove, and after a glance at his watch, he cut the siren in. The tires screeched as the car stopped at the red curb in front of the Hall of Justice. McHugh had to hurry to keep up with the cops as they pushed through the main door and climbed the stairs into Kline’s office. McHugh paused inside the bull pen rail to light a thin cigar.

  Kline was hunched over his desk in the glassed-in cubicle that he liked to think of as the nerve center of Homicide. A steam radiator spat and hissed at him lethargically. He pressed the palms of his hands flat on the desk and turned malevolent eyes on Meyers and Johnston.

  “You bring him by way of San Jose?” he rumbled.

  “Well, he wasn’t dressed,” Johnston said defensively.

  “And he wouldn’t come until he had coffee. With brandy,” Meyers added.

  “I don’t care if he was wearing a fig leaf. Go on.” He swiveled his eyes to McHugh. “Siddown.”

  McHugh sat in a straight-backed wooden chair at the side of Kline’s desk Carefully he tapped the ash from his cigar into the inspector’s wastebasket.

  “Don’t do that!” Kline roared. He shoved an ashtray at McHugh. “The last time you were here you set fire to it and I had to buy a new window because I threw it—oh, to hell with it...”

  McHugh used the ashtray. He judged that Inspector Kline had had little if any sleep. He had the appearance of a man beset by demons. “What’s new, Inspector?”

  Kline balled his fists. He picked up a manila folder and flipped it open. “This is new. It concerns the violent end of two cheap hoods on the waterfront early this morning. They may have been involved in the knifing at your place last night. With my childlike faith in my fellow man, I thought you might enlighten me, McHugh.”