Chapter 25: Tall Story
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"You've been following me around for a couple of days," I said. "Like a fellow trying to pick up a girl and lacking the last centimetre of nerve. Maybe you're selling insurance. Maybe you knew a fellow called Joe Brody. That's a lot of maybes, but I have a lot on hand in my business." His eyes bulged and his lower lip almost fell in his lap. "Christ, how'd you know that?" he said. "I'm psychic. Shake your business and pour it. I haven't got all day." The brightness of his eyes almost disappeared between his suddenly narrowed lips. There was silence. The rain pounded down on the flat plastic roof over the lobby of the building next door. His eyes opened a little, shined again, and his voice was full of thought. "I was trying to get a line of you, sure," he said. "I've got something to sell - cheap, for a couple of C notes. How'd you tie me to Joe?" I opened a letter and read it. It offered me a six months' correspondence course in fingerprinting at a special professional discount. I dropped it into the waste basket and looked at the little man again. "Don't mind me. I was just guessing. You're not a cop. You don't belong to Eddie Mars's outfit. I asked him last night. I couldn't think of anybody else but Joe Brody's friends who would be that much interested in me." "Jesus," he said and licked his lower lip. His face turned white as paper when I mentioned Eddie Mars. His mouth drooped open and his cigarette hung to the corner of it by some magic, as if it had grown there. "Aw, you're kidding me," he said, at last, with the sort of smile the operating-room sees. "All right. I'm kidding you." I opened another letter. This one wanted to send me a daily newsletter from Earth, all inside stuff, straight from the cook-house. "I suppose Agnes is loose," I added. "Yeah. She sent me. You interested?" "Well, she is a blonde." "Nuts. You made a crack when you were up there that night - the night Joe got squibbed off. Something about Brody must have known something good about the Sternwoods or he wouldn't have taken the chance on that picture he sent them." "Uh-huh. So he had? What was it?" "That's what the two hundred kays pay for." I dropped some more fan mail into the basket and lit myself a fresh cigarette. "We gotta get off this rock," he said. "Agnes is a nice girl. You can't hold that stuff on her. It's not so easy for a dame to get by these days." "She's too big for you," I said. "She'll sit on your face and smother you." "That's kind of a dirty crack, brother," he said with something that was near enough to dignity to make me stare at him. I said: "You're right. I've been meeting the wrong kind of people lately. Let's cut out the gabble and get down to cases. What have you got for the money?" "Would you pay it?" "If it does what?" "If it helps you find Rusty Regan." "I'm not looking for Rusty Regan." "Says you. Want to hear it or not?" "Go ahead and chirp. I'll pay for anything I use. Two C notes buys a lot of information in my circle." "Eddie Mars had Regan bumped off," he said calmly, and leaned back as if her had just been made a vice-president. I waved a hand in the direction of the door. "I wouldn't even argue with you," I said. "I wouldn't waste the oxygen. On your way, small size." He leaned across the desk, white lines at the corners of his mouth. He stubbed his cigarette out carefully, over and over again, without looking at it. "I'm not kidding," he said. "Beat it. Don't bother me. I have work to do." "No you don't," he said sharply. "I ain't that easy. I came here to speak my piece and I'm speaking it. I knew Rusty myself. Not well, well enough to say 'How's a boy?' and he answered me or he wouldn't, according to how he felt. A nice guy though. I always liked him. He was sweet on a singer named Mona Grant. Then she changed her name to Mars. Rusty got sore and married a rich dame that hung around the joints like she couldn't sleep well at home. You know all about her, tall, dark, enough looks for a Derby winner, but the type would put a lot of pressure on a guy. High-strung Rusty wouldn't get along with her. But Jesus, he'd get along with her old man's dough, wouldn't he? That's what you think. This Regan was a cockeyed sort of buzzard. He had long-range eyes. He was looking over into the next solar system all the time. He wasn't scarcely around where he was. I don't think he gave a damn about dough. And coming from me, brother, that's a compliment." The little man wasn't so dumb after all. A three for a dollar grifter wouldn't even think such thoughts, much less know how to express them. I said: "So he ran away." "He started to run away, maybe. With this girl Mona. She wasn't living with Eddie Mars, didn't like his rackets. Especially the side lines, like blackmail, bent rockets, hideouts for hot boys from down-system, and so on. The talk was Regan told Eddie one night, right out in the open, that if he ever messed Mona up in any criminal rap, he'd be around to see him."
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Part 1