Authors: William Campbell Gault
“He killed Noodles,” I said. “Noodles was Harry’s friend. He’s a killer, and you don’t need him any more, Paul. You’ve outgrown the need for a man like that.”
Johnny was motionless, standing where he could face all of us, his eyes steady on D’Amico, like a dog’s eyes on his master.
“Insane,” D’Amico said quietly. “You’re crazy.”
“You’re big league, now,” I said. “A lawyer is your gun. Johnny’s a hang-over from the prohibition days. He’s as dead as the dodo. If the law doesn’t get him, I think maybe Harry will, some day. The state does it cleaner.”
Johnny’s eyes moved from D’Amico to Harry and back to his master. I think he wanted to talk. His mouth opened and closed.
“What have you got against him?” D’Amico said. “That business in the hotel with your girl, when you thought he was blocking the door? Is that it? Or are you nuts?”
“Maybe I’m nuts,” I said. “I came here to do business. I don’t want him in any business of mine. I guess you do. I guess you’re still selling cut whisky to cheap night clubs, Paul.” I finished my second drink. “Well, no dice?”
“We can do business,” he said. “Don’t rush off. I’ll never turn him over to the law, but I can pension him, if he bothers you. I like Johnny, but I don’t have to have him around.”
Johnny’s eyes flared, and his right hand jerked.
D’Amico caught it. He said, “Watch it, Johnny. You’re not shooting anybody here, not yet.”
Johnny’s hand continued, and the gun came out. It wasn’t pointing at anybody, but it was out. Looked like a .38, a revolver.
“Put it away, Johnny,” D’Amico said. Quiet, his voice, but some tremor in it.
Johnny shook his head.
“Damn you,” D’Amico said. “Put it away. These people aren’t punks, Johnny. Put that God-damned gun away!” Johnny shook his head.
D’Amico stared at him. It must have been the first time in their association that Johnny had refused to obey an order.
Then D’Amico came off the stool, his hand out. “Give me that gun, you little bastard, or I’ll — ”
The gun turned, and now it was aimed at D’Amico, and D’Amico kept coming in on it.
I saw the flare and heard the smash of the shot. I saw D’Amico hurtle backward, and then saw the barrel of Johnny’s gun swinging our way, and I hit the floor.
From the washroom, from a curtained booth, from a rear window, there were other guns, and shouts. I heard wood splinter, and then a
pang
and looked up to see the steel bar stool whirling, teetering, toppling — my way.
After
the fight, I had to get knocked out.
• • •
Sally wore only shorts, no halter. “Am I brown?” she asked.
“You’re fawn,” I said. “You’re a fawn, straight girl.”
The sea below us, the sun above, a protected sundeck on this Malibu love nest; only I could see Sally. Only Sally and I, and she’s seen herself before.
“Charley was jealous, then?” she asked.
“Mmmm. I don’t know. He was battered and humiliated and half drunk, and probably saw me leave or enter his girl’s place and maybe he was still scared of me. I don’t know. He certainly wasn’t scared of her.”
“But this Johnny, turning on D’Amico like that.”
“Johnny knew I loathed him. I’d called him a ‘pimp.’ I’d offered to rip his spine out. And then the boss wants to talk business with
me.
Temporary insanity, maybe?”
“Maybe. You couldn’t plan on that, could you?”
“No. All I could plan on was that a whole platoon of listening cops would get something they could use. I couldn’t plan on Charley catching enough lead to make him think he was going to die, either. But that’s why he confessed, and he might beat the rap. He’s got the best lawyer in town, and he was almost out of his mind that night.”
She turned over, giving me the front view. “And you still can’t remember whether you did — whether you and Brenda were, or — ”
“I can’t remember a damned thing,” I said. “That’s the gospel, according to Luke.”
She sniffed. “Maybe you can’t even remember last night, huh? How about last night?”
“I’ll never forget it, darling,” I told her honestly. “I’ve been thinking of nothing else, all morning. Fellows always told me about it, but now I know it’s true, and I’m glad.”
“Fellows told you what? What’s true?”
“It’s just as much fun
after
you’re married,” I told her.
If you liked The Canvas Coffin check out:
The Hundred Dollar Girl
H
IS ACHIEVEMENTS IN THE RING NEVER MEASURED UP TO HIS
tabloid bedroom reputation, but that didn’t make him a prelim boy. He had a lot of friends and he picked up too many tabs. He had an abundance of physical courage, and a bad manager can turn that virtue into a vice quickly enough by simply matching his boy beyond his current skill and experience.
His name was Terry Lopez and there’s a combination for you, Mexican-Irish. A handsome bastard, a middleweight. He had a wife the local papers called a “former starlet.” In this case, it simply meant she had a five-line part in a “B” picture a few years back. Before she changed her name to Lopez, it had been Gallegher, Bridget Gallegher, so if they had had any kids, they’d have been three-quarters Irish.
No kids. He was out for laughs and she rode with it for a while. He got into the top ten rating in
Ring
for a brief spell and that gave him a few big-money bouts but he had no inclination toward saving. That brought him up to the Hans Mueller bout broke and in debt.
That brought his wife into my office.
Bridget Gallegher Lopez had red hair that looked natural to me. Her nose was a little too blunt to be classic but it fitted the face, which was pure lace-curtain Irish. There is a class to this segment of the nationality that belies its origins, and she had that kind of class. It is not Philadelphia or Boston, understand, but only a shade under it.
She told me I had been recommended to her by Sid Schwartz, a criminal attorney I knew.
“And why?” I asked.
“Because of my husband,” she answered. “Do you know who he is?”
I nodded. “I’ve seen him fight. Twice. This next one is his biggest one to date, I’d say. Wouldn’t you?”
She licked her lips. “Yes.” She took a breath. “It’s a — step, as Terry says. I mean, toward the championship, the first
big
step.”
“It could easily be,” I agreed, and wondered to myself who the other woman was, the woman she had come to have me check, undoubtedly.
“Why are you smiling?” she asked.
“I didn’t know I was,” I said. “Sorry.”
“You’re thinking,” she guessed, “that I’ve come to see you about some — some floozie Terry’s mixed up with.”
I lied with a shake of the head.
“It’s not anything like that,” she went on. “It’s — money.” “In your husband’s trade,” I said, “it always is. I think you came to the wrong man, Mrs. Lopez.” She stared at me quizzically.
“I’m a one-man office,” I said. “Can I fight the major mobsters?”
“I haven’t asked you to fight anyone,” she pointed out quietly.
“You haven’t,” I agreed. “I apologize again. I should listen more and talk less.”
“I have all the fighter I need,” she said. “I’m looking for an investigator. Isn’t that what you are, Mr. Puma?”
“In my limited but determined way,” I admitted.
She met my gaze candidly. “Perhaps you’ve checked our credit and prefer not to accept me as a client.”
I stared at her and didn’t answer. I thought her chin quivered. Her voice did. “Is that it?”
“Is that what?”
She lifted her chin. She had a lovely neck. “You don’t seem to be — overeager to accept my patronage.”
“I haven’t checked your credit,” I told her. “If I believed what I read in the newspapers, it must be bad, but I don’t usually believe the newspapers. I get a lot of bad credit risks as clients in my profession and collect from most of them.”
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I suppose I expected more — salesmanship from you, but then, you’re not an automobile salesman, are you?”
“I’ve been called some despicable things,” I said, “but never that. Why don’t you tell me your problem, Mrs. Lopez? I promise to keep my big mouth shut until you’ve finished.”
“It’s the Hans Mueller fight,” she said. “I think he’s going to throw it.” She paused. “Terry doesn’t — confide in me, but I don’t think it’s his idea. He likes to win, that boy. But his manager — do you know him?”
“Gus Galbini? I’ve met him twice, I think.”
“I don’t like him,” she said. “I think he’s a crook.”
I shrugged. “His reputation isn’t much worse or better than most managers’. Boxing’s infested with crooks.”
“Terry isn’t crooked,” she said. “Except when it comes to women, Terry plays it straight all the way.” She flushed and looked away from me.
I said, “You accept that? You must love him.”
She was still blushing, but her gaze came back to meet mine. “At first, I thought he was going somewhere; I went along for the ride. And then — ” she shrugged. “Call it animal magnetism. I’ve overlooked some pretty raw — escapades.”
“You mean, at first you thought he was going to make a lot of money, and that was the attraction?”
She nodded and looked at me quietly.
“Well, then,” I said, “what’s wrong with throwing a fight? A lot more money is made on fixed fights, you know.”
She was silent.
“Do you want to be more frank?” I asked quietly.
“I didn’t come in here, Mr. Puma, to hire you to investigate
me.
My motives are cloudy even to me. I want you to investigate Gus Galbini.”
“In what way? Do you mean in regard to the Mueller fight?”
“In that way and all the ways,” she said. A pause. “Gus Galbini seems to know every gambler and
every chippie
in town. I want you to investigate his influence on Terry.”
And every chippie…
. That’s what was bugging her. The fixed fight gambit had been only to save face. The dames were what was bothering Mrs. Terry Lopez.
But she hadn’t asked me to check her husband, which I wouldn’t have done, not for infidelity. Galbini was my target and I could use the business. It had been a slow month.
“His credit, too?” I asked her.
“Everything,” she said. She smiled and stood up. “But not
our
credit. Do you usually get a retainer?”
“I’ll bill you,” I said. And thought, in my lecherous way:
One way or another, you’ll pay!
She went out, leaving some perfume behind. I sat there, pondering on philanderers. So often, they had beauties like Bridget for wives. And still they went to Newcastle for their coal.
Except for the credit report, investigating Gus Galbini was not a chore that suggested the direct approach. I went down to the old two-door and drove over to Delamater’s. Delamater’s is a gym and health studio out on Olympic where a number of fighters train.
And also a place where a number of wise guys hang out, including some gamblers, big and little. The hoodlum involvement in boxing was getting a lot of current publicity, but it had always existed in this country. Boxing had been born in the saloon district, it had achieved the salons, but it was still a mugs’ game.
Barney Delamater ran a two-faced store. The gym, which fronted on Olympic, was barnlike, old and gray, weathered stucco and faded redwood. The health studio connected with this but fronted on Eighteenth, all white tile and shining plate glass set in polished aluminum casements. Barney rarely came over to this newer section; his origins were humble and his tastes simple.
He was in the gym, in a littered, glass-enclosed corner office from where he could view each of his three rings and all the multitudinous light and heavy bags and other paraphernalia of his shop.
He’s bald and short and jovial and he grinned at me when
I
came into his office. “Decided to listen to me?” he asked.
It was an old private joke. In a bar fight, I had decked one of the local promising heavyweights a few years back. Ever since, Barney had insisted I had a future in the ring.
“Listen to you?” I answered. “On some subjects, I will.”
He leaned back in his office chair and smiled at me, waiting.
“On Terry Lopez, for instance,” I said. “How good is he?” Barney shrugged. “He’s no Greb.”
“Nobody ever was, except for Greb. Is Lopez good enough for that German?”
“Hans Mueller?” He shrugged again. “Who can tell, with them foreigners? They build up a big rep on stumblebums, come over here — and get clobbered.”
“Not Mueller,” I said. “He’s been in this country a long time. He’s beat some pretty good boys.”
“That he has,” Barney agreed. “Why the interest?”
“I’d like to get a bet down,” I said. “I can always use an easy buck. Which way should I bet?”
“You’re lying,” he said mildly. He leaned forward. “You heard something, huh?”
I stared at him. He stared at me.
“From Gus?” he asked quietly.
“Galbini? We’re not that close.”
“Who, then?”
“Maybe, just maybe, from somebody very close to Terry Lopez.”
“His wife,” he said. “That’s it. She came to you?” We went through another staring session. Barney said, “Good-looking girl, isn’t she?” I didn’t answer.
Barney leaned back in his chair again, and his voice was musing. “A model, I guess she used to be. Though I got it on real good authority that she wasn’t above answering a call, now and then, if the caller pleased her. At one grand a night, I heard.
One thousand dollars for one night.”
He shook his head wonderingly. “Now, who’d pay that, when you can get a good steak for five bucks?”
I said, “Somebody who had one thousand and five dollars, I suppose, Barney. You’re old, don’t forget.”
“I’m not old,” he said peevishly, “and I was never young enough to be that dumb.”
Another silence. He stared at his desk and I stared at him.
He looked up. “So? What else is new?”
“Don’t you want to talk about the Mueller-Lopez fight?”
“I don’t know anything about it,” he said. “It looks like you know more than I do about that.”
“What kind of man is Gus Galbini?”