Part 9 (1/2)

”He'd think of something, Frank would.”

”He'd shoot me all over the place. And you know what?” Jay's face took on the most lugubrious, the most sad and sorrowful expression it had yet attained. ”It wouldn't be worth it.”

”Jay, don't you think - ”

”Yeah,” he interrupted, almost briskly. ”Yeah. I guess you're right.” He pulled a small Beretta automatic from his pocket, aimed it casually at me, and told me to step away from the wall. When I did, he listlessly jabbed the Beretta into my back. ”Stick 'em up,” he said.

We started walking out. Jay tossed a few words to the a.s.sembled menagerie. It was approximately what I'd suggested, that he was going to reserve for himself the pleasure of knocking me off and so on. The boys seemed disappointed, but n.o.body protested out loud.

We were about ten feet from the door when Fargo came barging up from behind us. He stopped between us and the door and said, ”Where in h.e.l.l you going?” Without waiting for an answer he said to Jay, ”Boss is real pleased. Real pleased. Says go ahead like he told us. Kill the sonofab.i.t.c.h.”

”Sure,” said Jay dully. ”Yeah. Sure.”

Naturally, Fargo had no idea of what was going on. He simply saw Jay behind me, and me apparently under control. Captive. Helpless. So he balled up a fist and took a swing at my face. It was perhaps the slowest poke ever launched at me. I could probably have ducked it in both directions, but I just pulled my head aside far enough so his fist whistled past my ear, and then I hauled off and popped him with a long, looping right that landed over his right eye.

The skin split. Blood spurted, splas.h.i.+ng my knuckles. Fargo spun sideways, his arms flapped, and he crashed heavily to the floor, rolled onto his back. He was not quite unconscious, and moved a little down there, but couldn't get up. After a few seconds he mumbled something. There was a stunned expression on his face. Then he mumbled again.

It would almost have been worth waiting around to find out what he was saying. Almost. But I didn't wait.

Fargo was still mumbling on the floor when Jay and I went out to the street.

Ten.

Jay and I sat in the front seat of his Thunderbird, talking. I'd left my Cad behind, and Jay had driven us to a quiet, out-of-the-way spot, just off Laurel Canyon Boulevard.

He had been, and was continuing to be, very cooperative.

I explained to him that if he extended me a helping hand, or rather two helping hands, I would destroy all the evidence Wednesday. At that time it wouldn't make any difference; if I hadn't cleared Miller by then n.o.body ever would. However, if Jay was n.i.g.g.ardly with his cooperation, the horrifying enlargements would reach Frank Quinn within the hour.

So far in our conversation he had corroborated most of what I had already learned from others - the shooting of Casey Flagg, pressure on Heigman to make him swear falsely that Miller had purchased the murder gun, some of the other items.

I mentioned the info I'd gotten from Pinky, and Jay said, ”Yeah, Papa Ryan did the job on Heigman.” He squinted at me. ”But how in h.e.l.l did you find out about it?”

”Never mind that. What about the bagman?”

”Casey was it, all right. But it's like you said, since then Frank's been handling that end personal.”

”How does he handle it? And who gets the loot?”

”You got me.”

”Jay, if you're holding back - ”

”Dammit, Scott, I am telling you everything I know excepting only my mother's maiden name. Which, if you got to know, was Abigail Emily - ”

”Never mind. You're closer to Quinn than anybody else is, though.”

”Yeah, but Frank is a close-mouthed b.a.s.t.a.r.d when he wants to be, which is practically always. Look, he is very secret about this jazz - especially since Casey sticky-fingered part of the finances. Don't that make sense?”

”It makes sense.”

”h.e.l.l, even them meetings he has every month is just the club, exclusive. I don't go, Papa don't go, n.o.body goes but Doodle. And he's deef and dumb.”

”You lost me. Doodle?” I remembered Pinky had mentioned something about monthly meetings. ”And what meetings are these? What goes on?”

”n.o.body knows what - excepting only Doodle, who can shoot the ears off a cat at a hundred paces, and like I said is deef and dumb, so he can't hear nothin' or say nothin'. Frank'd probably blind him too, only then he couldn't see to shoot n.o.body if it got necessary. So, excepting Doodle, only Frank and the cats he meets with know what goes on.”

It took a while, since Jay kind of lunged all around the point, but finally I understood that once each month Quinn met with a dozen or so men in an office at the rear of the Gardenia Room - the lecherous ”Sully” Sullivan's office, which I'd visited briefly earlier tonight. The meetings were held there, rather than at Quinn's ranch, because if men were seen entering or leaving Quinn's they might well, and with reason, be looked upon with more than a little suspicion; whereas anybody could visit the Barker Hotel, or drop in for a drink at the Gardenia Room - then slip into that back office - without anybody being the wiser.

Jay a.s.sumed that they were extremely important meetings, this testified to by the secrecy with which Quinn surrounded them. It could also be a.s.sumed that on these once-a-month occasions Quinn personally paid off his a.s.sociates. Jay believed the men Quinn met with were local citizens of considerable power and influence, but nonetheless cooperating with Quinn either for profit or for some other good reason. In Jay's words, ”I'd say they must be very big apples, either on the take or else Frank's got them by the loins somehow.” He stated it a bit more baldly, but his meaning was clear.

”When's the next meeting?” I asked him.

”Next week. Monday afternoon. He's sort of holding off on everything till after . . . you know.”

I knew. Till after Ross Miller's execution. With Miller dead, it wasn't likely that many people would be eager to have it proved that Quinn himself had murdered Casey Flagg. Not if Miller had already been put to death for murdering Casey Flagg. If Quinn made it to 10:01 a. m. Wednesday, he'd probably make it all the way.

I said, ”You don't know anybody who's present at these get-togethers?”

Jay frowned. ”I heard a couple names once.” He shook his head. ”Semmelbaum . . . Semel . . . something or other.”

”Semmelwein? Ira Semmelwein?”

”That's it. How in h.e.l.l - ?”

”Anybody else?”

”A guy named Smith. Never heard his first name.”

Smith, great. That pinned it down. But Ira Semmelwein was one of the two names Pinky had given me; he was President of the Golden Coast Insurance Company in L.A. I tried the other name, John Porter, on Jay, but he'd never heard of him.

”Jay,” I said, ”we're going to try pulling a little bluff on Quinn. You'd like to help me, wouldn't you?”

”Sure,” he scowled. ”I'd get a real bang out of it.”

I went on, ”When you get back to the ranch tonight I want you to tell Quinn I spilled several things to you - when I thought you were going to shoot me. Among them that I know who the people are who gather at these secret meetings. Say I mentioned Semmelwein, Smith, and Porter among others.” I thought a minute. ”Tell him I even know why he holds the meetings. It might shake him up a little more, and the more the better.”

”I can do it, Scott - if he hasn't already chopped my head off. How am I going to explain it if the corpse I killed is spotted alive by one of the boys? I got the feeling you aren't going into hiding.”

”I'm not about to. But you've got the wrong idea - you don't tell Quinn you shot me.”

”But . . . I sprang you out of the club. Frank'll kill - ”

”Tell Frank you tried to shoot me, you tried very hard and loyally, but I jumped you and got away. Dream something up.”

”Dream something up?”