A Body for McHugh Page 4

  “I see,” McHugh said, with the inflection of a man who wants to help. “How so?”

  “Their demise had all the earmarks of a McHugh job.” Kline said ominously. “One shot through the throat. The other killed by a single blow that broke his head. And, incidentally, the autopsy surgeon says his private parts were mashed beyond repair, probably a short time before he died.”

  “That so? I wouldn’t know a thing about it.”

  “Yeah. Well, suppose you tell me what happened after you closed up that gin mill of yours.”

  “I went home.”

  “Not from the looks of your face. Unless your lady friend did you up like that.”

  “Oh these.” McHugh fingered the fresh scabs on his face. “It was wet. I lost my footing on the steps and fell down.”

  “You never fall down. But where did this happen?”

  “Steps outside The Door. Why, is that where you found your dead men?”

  “Never mind. I suppose this fall shook you up. So that an hour later you came to in a sewer called Lonnie’s, on the waterfront?”

  “What’s this?” McHugh had expected the bartender to keep his mouth shut; evidently the cops had a handle on him.

  “Lonnie’s place is just a couple of blocks from where we found the stiffs. I think you were in there.”

  “Now why would you think that?” McHugh said guardedly.

  “Because of a musclehead named Bobo Keever. A squad car found him face down in the gutter close by Lonnie’s while we were shaking the neighborhood on the double kill. Bobo’s an old friend of ours. He’s hit the rockpile twice for strongarm stuff, and he’s on probation now. He co-operated. Said a guy offered him twenty to drive him to the Greyhound station. The guy was beat up just about like you are, and he looked just about you in general, from what Bobo said. The barman backs his story up.”

  “So what happened to Bobo?”

  “He was jumped. His car was taken. We found the car later, off Market.”

  “Uh-huh. And?” McHugh began to feel definitely uncomfortable. He had horsed Kline around on previous occasions, but always in the interest of the nameless agency that operated from a sub-basement of the Pentagon, a section of the building constantly under armed guard, a place that could be entered only by those with Top Secret clearance. This time, he was operating on his own; if he got into a hot spot and it developed the Section was not involved, Burton Harts would take great umbrage. Kline was unsure of the powers behind McHugh, but here was a time he could slap him in the line-up and do a little fishing.

  “It just happens that the tip we got on the kill was phoned from a bar on Market. I took it myself, and it could have been you on the other end. You were gone by the time a squad car made the scene.”

  “The time?”

  “Four minutes before two o’clock.”

  “Sorry. I was at home. Entertaining friends.”

  Kline grabbed a pencil. “Their names?”

  “Ah—I’m not sure. Actually, they were some people Loris knew. Half a dozen or more. She’ll be glad to tell you.”

  The pencil point snapped. “I expected as much. Mc-Hugh, I think I’ll just stand you under a bright light and let that pair look you over.”

  McHugh shrugged. Carefully he lighted a fresh cigar.

  Kline flipped a switch on his desk intercom and ordered: “We’re going to put McHugh in the line-up. Have Lonnie and Bobo ready.” He eyed McHugh. “You’ll get out of it. I’ll get the big pressure. But you’re going to sweat first.” He broke off as his phone rang. He grunted into it. His eyebrows shot up, then met over his nose in a fierce scowl. “Get up here. And lock those two up!”

  Kline’s face was flushing dark when a plain-clothes man came in without knocking. Nervously he said, “They claim it’s a mistake. They guess now it wasn’t McHugh at all.”

  “They better unguess,” Kline snapped. “How come?”

  “Well, the reporters were talking to them. The press boys came charging as soon as McHugh was picked up. They got to talking about things he’s done before and those two bums had a change of heart.”

  So change it back. Bobo’s on probation, and we can dig up something on Lonnie.”

  “We brought that up, Inspector. I don’t think it’ll work.”

  Kline sighed mightily. His eyes burned through Mc-Hugh. “Yeah. Well, stick ‘em with something. I don’t care what, as long as it hurts.”

  The plain-clothes man went out. McHugh tapped the ash from his cigar and said, “I suppose I can go now?”

  “Yes,” Kline said heavily. “You can go. And do it before I have a stroke. And keep your nose clean!”

  McHugh stood, smiling, and picked up his hat. He looked at the case folders. “You know, I’ve sort of got an interest in this case now, Inspector. Mind letting me wade through what you’ve got so far?”

  “You can wade through...” Kline muttered a four-letter word. “Go buy a paper. Read it there.”

  CHAPTER 5

  HE BOUGHT COPIES of the Chronicle and Examiner from a cigar store and read them thoroughly as he devoured a large pizza and washed it down with a split bottle of Dago red.

  The identity of the man killed at The Door was not yet established. He was thought to be about thirty years old, possibly thirty-five. He was either a foreigner or a citizen who favored imported clothes. Suit, shirt, and underclothing were of British manufacture. His shoes were handmade Italian pumps. His raincoat and hat were likewise British. At press time, the FBI had not been able to find his fingerprints in their files.

  Police said they felt it significant that such a man had been killed at The Door, a known gathering-place for shadowy foreign elements.

  Police also felt there was a definite connection between this victim and the demise of two known criminals in a vacant warehouse on the waterfront less than two hours later. There was a report of an anonymous tip to that effect.

  The thugs were identified as Little Joe Leoni, 41, of Los Angeles and Boston (Auburn ‘44, Stateville ‘47, Folsom ‘54) and Francisco (The Fisherman) Bomarito, 37, (San Quentin ‘39 and ‘57), no known address. The list of their transgressions was long and impressive.

  Police could offer no immediate explanation of the killings, and had no definite knowledge of the connection, if any, between the hoodlums and the unidentified victim.

  McHugh’s name wasn’t mentioned. Nor was there any reference to the girl. Police did not know why any of the three dead men were in San Francisco.

  Folding the papers under his arm, McHugh guessed he knew more than the police at the moment. He knew Bomarito and Leoni were waiting for the girl when they clubbed him. He knew they had killed the European, if that’s what he was, and that a package of some sort was involved. He finished his wine, walked out to the street and hailed a cruising cab.

  Nick Foote and Jim Murrell were waiting for him when he walked into The Door. The FBI agents were at the ell end of the bar, untouched bottles of beer in front of them. McHugh nodded to Chester, the dayside bartender, and took a stool beside Foote.

  “Working?” he asked, signaling for a bottle of ale.

  “You guess,” Murrell said, eyes steady behind his glasses. “Better give us the whole story, Mac.”

  “The Bureau is interested?”

  “There could be a question of internal security,” Foote said in a controlled voice. “We have an unidentified body of apparently foreign origin. We have a notorious location. The Door. For once we have something that doesn’t involve the CIA or the five-sided doghouse.”

  “Hard to tell yet,” McHugh said pleasantly.

  “You tell us what you’ve got. We’ll decide,” Murrell said flatly. “We’ve already talked to Kline. He’s not happy with you, McHugh.”

  McHugh shrugged.

  “Having him not happy is one thing,” Murrell went on. “Having the Bureau on your tail is another. You know the difference.”

  McHugh drank from the bottle of ale before replying. He knew Burton Harts wo
uld prefer friendly relations with the Bureau—if possible. But the overlapping jurisdictions of the various alphabet agencies in Washington was a fearsome thing to deal with. Harts was loath to yield any ground that belonged to his section.

  “You were on the scene. You saw as much as I did.”

  “The girl, McHugh.” Foote’s eyes were narrowed, his voice flat. “The girl.”

  “Like I said. You saw her just like I did. Maybe more, because I was busy back of the bar. She took out the back way when the fuss began. She used cash, not a Diner’s Club card.”

  The FBI men exchanged calculating looks. Without speaking again they drained their beers, set the bottles down hard on the bar and strode from the room. McHugh toyed with his ale, thinking. He finished it slowly, then walked to the rear of the barroom and locked himself in the soundproofed storeroom. He manhandled whisky cases away from the concealed panel in the wall, unlocked it and lifted down the scrambler phone. He spun the dial once and waited a few seconds.

  “General Harts, please.” The direct line to the Pentagon crackled momentarily before the brigadier came on the line. McHugh gave him a condensed report of what had happened.

  “I’ve already had the standard report from the briefcase boys that you’re running wild again. I was waiting for a report.”

  “And now what do you think, sir?” McHugh replied.

  “They could be right. You may be poaching their grounds, probably are.”

  “Should I drop it?”

  “I—not for the moment. The Section has too big a stake in The Door. Bad luck that this sort of thing had to happen there. If we get too many local cops stamping around, we could find ourselves without a headquarters on the Coast. Keep on it for now. If you satisfy yourself it’s something for the FBI, turn it over. But try to clean it up yourself. And do it fast.”

  “Yes, sir.” McHugh found himself talking to a dead phone.

  He drank a second bottle of ale and thought about possible moves. He could see nothing to be done at the moment in San Francisco. Police routine would eventually turn up more information on Leoni and Bomarito—when they had come to town, where they had stayed, who had business with them. The same applied to the man who had been knifed. Meanwhile, he had two things which the police presumably did not—the Dutchman’s lead to a man named Girolamo and his boat Rosa, and a wide-eyed, frightened girl who had probably carried a package for the knifing victim.

  The girl was probably from the Monterey Peninsula. The Carmel address on her license could be the real thing, or it could be long out of date. McHugh knew that area. One in which the population was constantly shifting. A lot of military types, and a lot more who liked the scenery and the action but couldn’t stay put more than a few months. The girl might have lived there once but moved away, forgotten to change her license.

  One thing he knew: Girolamo came from there.

  McHugh made a phone call to Loris. He went back of the bar, picked up the attaché case that was there and checked its contents. Two extra shirts, spare underwear, a Browning automatic and ammunition, a flat silver flask filled with Scotch. He counted the money in his wallet, helped himself to more from the cash register, got his hat and waved a silent goodbye to Chester. Two blocks from The Door, he hailed a cruising cab and rode to Union Square. He stopped briefly at a ticket agency and rode the limousine to the airport.

  There were fat, dark clouds marshaling over the Pacific when the twin-engined United plane taxied to the terminal at Monterey Peninsula Airport. McHugh mingled with the other passengers as they filed into the glass and Carmel-stone lobby of the main building. He stood for a moment by the stairway leading to the upper floor.

  “Don’t sweat, Hudson. I’m right here.”

  The man who had come down the steps two at a time skidded to a halt on the tile floor, eying McHugh with annoyance. He was from the Salinas office of the FBI, and he had been waiting for the plane since getting the call from the agent who had followed McHugh to the airport in San Francisco. He was a slender young man with dark-rimmed glasses, a pale brown suit with vest and broad-brimmed hat.

  “They said you would be,” Hudson replied without enthusiasm. “They said you’re like an eel. An electric eel, and I shouldn’t get too close to you.”

  “But don’t lose me, either. That’s what the rules are. How about a ride into town? I have to get a room and rent a car.”

  “Okay.” The FBI man led the way to the parking lot and unlocked a dusty Ford sedan. McHugh got in beside him, and they rolled along the curving road into Monterey. “What hotel?”

  “The Casa Munras is fine. I can see about a car from there.”

  “Understand, McHugh, there isn’t anything personal in this, I’m told to stick with you, and I intend to do it. I also know about you. You can ditch me anytime you feel like it. But I’ll pick you up again. We work just fine with the local police and sheriff. If you ditch me in Monterey, there’ll be a cop on your tail before you hit the city limit.”

  Fine,” McHugh replied, smiling. “It gives a man a feeling of security, having police protection like that.”

  Hudson grunted sourly and stayed silent until he parked the car at the hotel. McHugh got out, carrying the attaché case and asked, “Want me to register for you, too?”

  Hudson grimaced and slammed the car door.

  The car, a new Chev hardtop, was in the painted slot assigned to McHugh’s room. The room was one of a dozen on the second floor of a Spanish-styled motel unit. It was separated by some seventy yards from the main hotel building, with its dining room and softly lighted bar.

  McHugh was in the bar, pondering ways and means of separating himself from the FBI man. A phone call to Harts in Washington would do the job, but he considered this a last resort. And, in the places he intended to go, he had to go alone. Hudson was well-known on the Peninsula; the people McHugh had to talk to would not so much as comment on the weather with Federal ears listening.

  Hudson was not co-operating. He refused to drink even beer, keeping only a glass of quinine water with a squeeze of lemon in front of him. He even kept his hand over the top of the glass, as though expecting McHugh to slip a pinch of knockout powder into it at the first opportunity.

  McHugh gave it up for the moment. He got dimes from the bartender and went to the phone booth.

  Hudson did not follow. There was no need; from his position he could watch both the booth and the car McHugh had rented.

  With his third dime, McHugh got the name of the bar where Bill Palme was working. He hung up, went back to the bar and finished his Scotch and soda.

  “Been a long day. Think I’ll hit the shower. Want to watch?”

  “They didn’t say I had to sleep with you. But I’ll be around.”

  McHugh grinned, paid his check and went up the exposed stairway to the room. He knew Hudson was not overly worried: There was only one door, and it could be competently watched from the parking lot. McHugh closed the door, turned the floor lamp on low and drew the curtains across the big window. He watched for a moment, then saw the FBI man saunter from the bar and stand, looking steadily in his direction. He had a cigar, unlit, in his mouth.

  Stripping, McHugh went into the bathroom. He turned the shower on but did not step into it. He brought with him a small knife that had a screwdriver blade. He began attacking the frosted glass window that opened on the rear of the building, quickly removing the screws that held the frame in place. In a strong voice he sang a Confederate marching song. Combined with the rushing water, the din was enough to cover anything short of the explosion of a bomb. The window yielded in a matter of minutes, and he placed it carefully out of the way.

  He stepped into the shower for a few seconds, grabbed a heavy towel from the rack and knotted it around his waist. He went out to the bedroom, still singing, and he saw the shadow against the drawn curtains, a shadow of a slender man in a broad-brimmed hat with a cigar in his mouth, bending toward the door in a listening attitude.

  Sile
ntly he crossed the room to where he’d emptied his pockets. He picked up the gold cigarette lighter, staying close to the wall as he went to the door. He yanked the door open, thrust his arm out and snapped the lighter into flame.

  “Light?”

  The FBI man straightened, eyes owlish in surprise behind the glasses.

  “Aah-gh!” He threw the cigar down and stamped on it. The rapping of his heels on the tiled walkway was rapid and angry.

  McHugh chuckled. Quickly he dressed, leaving the light in the bedroom on as he slipped into the bathroom. He turned off the light there and poked his head through the open window. To break up the severity of the rear walls, the management had encouraged vines to climb a trellis. McHugh had guessed earlier the vines might hold his weight; if they didn’t, it was only fifteen feet to the ground, and what came down with him would cushion the impact.

  He threw a leg over the sill and reached to his right until he found a stout cord of the vine. He tested it. The vine swayed under his weight, but held. He eased his other leg out, found a toe hold and lowered himself a few inches. There was a ripping noise, and he felt himself slipping as one of the trellis supports pulled out of its foundation in the wall. He froze, looking around carefully. Several feet lower, a twisted oak tree thrust a limb alongside the building. The trellis creaked warning. He let go, crashed into the tree and caught the limb with his left hand. He twisted with the fall, almost losing his grip before he could kick away from the building. He got his legs wrapped around the limb and swung himself until he was sitting on it. He rested, massaging the shoulder that had threatened to pop from its socket. He hitched himself along until he could touch a lower branch. In a matter of moments he was on the ground, moving silently along the wall.

  It brought him to the edge of the parking lot. He could see Hudson leaning against the front of his sedan. He had another cigar, lighted this time. The tip glowed red as McHugh moved through the shadows and reached a back street. He paused to orient himself, then headed, quickly and without sound, for lower Alvarado Street.