The Walking Wounded Page 4

  critics…rest his soul.

  Q: Then you really don't have anything else to add to this statement?

  A: Sure I have.

  Q: Go ahead. Feel free. A: I'll admit the deceased as you like to tag him is more famous than I. Far more.

  But don't jump for the obvious because it's closer to you. Why do you automatically

  assume the killer was on target?

  Q: Would you mind clarifying that remark?

  A: We seem to be in agreement that the shot came while I was bending down and

  he was sitting there in full view of the doorway. Okay. Then maybe we might agree that

  the killer aimed for the back of my head and down I went just as he triggered off. You

  see what happens? Wrong man gets killed. Think about it.

  Q: That's ridiculous. Those things just don't happen.

  A: Suit yourself, Vince. But you tell me when was the last time you heard of a

  gunman so good and fancy he could hit people between the eyes from ten or more feet

  away?

  Q: Jesus Christ! Uh---don't put that down, Connolly.

  A: Yeah, Connolly. Leave it out or you'll have an X-rated Statement. But

  please, Lieutenant---it's a possibility, isn't it?

  Q: You win. It is. I gotta admit it never occurred to me.

  A: Why should it? Now if that's all you have to ask can I get out of here? A lady

  is waiting for me.

  Q: Yes, you can go. But I don't have to tell you not to leave town on any sudden

  trips, do I?

  A: No, Vince. You don't have to tell me.

  Q: Fine. We'll be in touch. Thanks for your cooperation.

  A: It was a real pleasure. Q: Sure it was. Let me ask you something.

  A: It's your show---go ahead.

  Q: They tell me you were a cop once. Detective First Grade. Way back when.

  A: That's right.

  Q: They also tell me you quit cold. Walked out on the Department for reasons

  that aren't too clear in the record.

  A: Why are you opening this can of beans? That was so long ago I can't

  remember---as Bogart said in you-know-what.

  Q: Meaning you won't tell me now. I'm not much on movies.

  A: Meaning I won't tell you now. And you oughta be.

  Q: Okay. I'm sure Monks has a pretty good idea.

  A: He has. But even he won't be able to make you understand why. You see,

  it's all about being your own man, not having to dance to someone else's tune. Being

  responsible to no one but yourself. I couldn't be a good cop because I couldn't take

  orders. And I wouldn't ---oh, well. I've told you anyway, haven't I?

  Q: Yeah. You have. And you've also told me that you and the deceased had a lot

  in common.

  A: That's right. And guys like us are always targets. Which is a good reason to

  keep moving. Only this time Marcel was sitting down.

  Q: Look---as long as you brought the damn thing up.

  A: Yes?

  Q: Do you really think a critic would knock a guy off just because the guy hated

  him and tried to take him down a peg? A: Is this for the record?

  Q: Ain't everything? Go on. Say what you want. I'll decide whether I leave it in

  or not.

  A: Okay. As long as you ask that way---no, I don't really think so. And I'll tell

  you why.

  Q: We're listening.

  A: The deceased was one of the most vocal guys I've ever hoisted one with. But

  he also wrote more letters than there are in the dictionary. So he disagrees with an

  opinion of some critic---and what happens? They don't print the letter and they blacklist

  the intelligent man who writes in. So the critic doesn't lose a damn thing. So he knows

  Marcel Alevoinne hates him, thinks him an academic jerk---but so what? The public

  doesn't get a chance to hear both sides. And there the critic sits, atop his full pile of

  seven million readers, airing his majestic views and the opposition, the Real Opposition,

  like Marcel, doesn't get equal time. There it is. No critic would have to stop Marcel by

  popping him with a silencer pistol. He'd already been silenced the easiest, simplest way

  of all. They didn't publish his blasts. So the critic gets off scot-free. You dig?

  Q: Jesus---dirty pool. From college slobs, too. Well, like I said, Noon. Been a

  pleasure talking to you.

  A: Hell, yeah.

  Q: And if you ever do get around to those memoirs of yours and getting them

  published, put me down for a copy.

  A: I don't think you'd really be interested.

  Q: Why not? A: Is this for the record too?

  Q: No. Off the record.

  A: Well, it won't be exactly Serpico or French Connection stuff but it is after all,

  a private citizen's view of the New York Police Department. I do like you guys but I'm

  not exactly one hundred percent nuts about the way you operate sometimes. Monks

  knows that too.

  Q: If you shoot straight and stick to the facts, what's to beef? You let me be the

  judge, okay?

  A: Can it ever be any other way?

  Q: You amaze me, Noon.

  A: I do?

  Q: You do. All the time.

  A: Tell me why, kind sir.

  Q: You've got a mouth on you that would bury any ten guys I know. Sure,

  you're your own man but you kinda push your luck sometimes. Know what I mean?

  A: I get the picture.

  Q: Then frame it and remember it. Now you can go and maybe we'll both

  understand each other a little better from now on.

  A: It's been a real gas, Vince.

  Q: I'll just bet it was.

  A: If you say so.

  We hadn't fooled each other. Lieutenant Vincent Di Gregorio, who was a new experience for me, thanks to

  Monks' official leave of duty, really hadn't pulled any punches. For all of his labored

  politeness and kid glove treatment, I knew it was Monks' invisible presence in my corner

  which had kept the hard-nosed, almost legendary Di Gregorio from climbing all over me.

  There were enough stories circulating around town about the tall, bony, steel-tough

  Lieutenant of Detectives in the Homicide Department whose track record included too

  many convictions achieved via the brutality route. Normally it would have been enough

  to have gotten him booted out of Fun City forever but it also happened that Di Gregorio

  was one of the bravest bulls alive and no less then ten citations adorned the wall of the

  little nook he had grilled me in. A lot of powerful politicians had pulled wires to keep

  him on his job and Monks had never been able to farm him out to Brooklyn or Staten

  Island.

  No matter how I looked at it, I'd gotten off lucky.

  Never have I seen a meaner, more intensified expression of cold, unfeeling

  contempt on the face of a man sworn to uphold the law. Proper English might issue forth

  from the zipper-thin mouth but the eyes behind the words were two flinty chips of

  desensitized mankind.

  A perfect SS man, out of his time and out of his place.

  Which is why I had lied. Better to cook up a fairy tale about writing a book than

  trying to hide behind privileged information. Hell, I was my own client anyway. I

  wasn't working for anybody else on this one. Though now it was easy enough to want to

  work for Marcel Alevoinne nee Charles Oldenfield Wilson also Chuck. I don't like it when pals get popped right before my eyes. Least of all when it might have been a shot

  meant for me all the time. I hadn't been kidding Di Gregorio abo
ut that.

  They let me out the back way of Headquarters.

  They had to.

  Reporters would be swarming all over the death of a man like Mad Marcel. I

  wanted no part of the press. Nor any of the sticky, stupid, unreal TV sidewalk-interview

  crap. God, what ghouls we've all become.

  All in the name of News and Keeping-Up-With-Things.

  It's not my scene and I don't need it. I never had.

  And I never will. I don't belong with the Crowd.

  All I did need was organization, a chance to think and ponder, and time. Time to

  wonder some more about Jo Malmedy ands play and his laying a bomb on me. And what

  that could possibly have to do with the murder of a man I had simply wanted to talk to.

  A talented, terrific guy.

  How could there be any connection between Marcel Alevoinne and all that

  Dolores stuff? I didn't know. But I had to find out. In a hurry.

  This Is Your Life, Ed Noon. Jo Malmedy was gloating, invisible and unseen at

  my ear--what are you going to do about it all?

  I had to find Jo Malmedy, too.

  And ask him

  That's what I had to do.

  The trouble was---I didn't know where to begin now.

  Now that Chuck was dead. Poor C.O.W. Chuck who could have clued me in before I looked up phone numbers and agents

  and book companies or called Information. Or Missing Persons.

  That chance was gone altogether. I'd have to do it by the numbers. And

  everything had to come out even. From the bottom on up. Unless the phantom Jo

  Malmedy got in touch again.

  I couldn't go back to my office or the apartment, either.

  The Fourth Estate probably had both retreats covered like the Normandy

  beachhead. Di Gregorio would be a lead pipe cinch to plant my name in the middle of

  the investigation, banking on my top reputation to feather his own citation-winning nest.

  His type was nothing new. A headline-grabber who would use every angle to work his

  way up the police ladder. He might even have his cold eye on Monks' desk. I didn't want

  to help him kick Mike in any way at all. I missed Mike Monks a ton already. Captains in

  your corner can be damn comforting in murder cases.

  I rapidly decided to check into a hotel, for openers.

  The Essex House on Central Park South, facing Uptown.

  It would be a good central location to unravel in.

  I needed a home base to operate all the next moves. At least, for the balance of

  that day and night. What was left of grace time.

  I had no toothbrush, no luggage, no change of underwear, and my five o'clock

  shadow had deepened into the Black Forest but I did have a couple of hundred dollars on

  me. You can't wheel and deal in Manhattan without cold cash. It's a very unfriendly

  town when you don't pay ;your own way. Ask any down-and-outer who's been turned

  away. Baghdad-on-the-Hudson, it really isn't.

  It might have been in O. Henry's day.

  But that was long ago, suckers.

  Long ago.

  I got there around a quarter to ten, signed the registry as Carl Denham,

  Producer, Hollywood, California and won a room on the ninth floor, fronting the vast,

  shadowy depths of Central Park reaching all the way up to One Hundred and Tenth

  Street. It's always a great view and not even the mugger's moon hanging poised over the

  huge green playground could lessen the impact of all that grandeur in the midst of stone

  canyons and heartless tragedies. I didn't need a bellhop because the light beach bag I'd

  bought in Whalen's on Forty Second wasn't exactly heavy with its full load of toilet

  accessories and one set of underwear and a pair of socks. It was all the protective cover I

  needed. Nobody in the stylish lobby or the plush elevators gave me a second look. I

  whistled Steiner's score from King Kong but that raised no eyebrows, either. Carl

  Denham meant something only to trivia kings and movie buffs. I played Robert

  Armstrong all the way. Energetic, fast and bright.

  Once behind a locked door in the pleasant, ultra-modern single room, I got down

  to cases. Or rather, the case. Right after I ordered a pot of coffee and a batch of toast

  from a sweet-voiced woman who answered the Room Service button on the phone line. I

  hadn't had any dinner.

  Long before the coffee and toast got to the room, the menu provided a startling

  variation. One altogether unexpected. Completely stunning. It not only isn't the world I made, it is also the one I don't really want. I imagine

  a lot of people feel the same way.

  There was a knock on the door.

  It was too fast for Room Service. And it wasn't Room Service.

  "Come in," I called, sliding the lock back, hand to the .45 at my left armpit,

  standing to one side. Not sure of anything at all.

  The door pulled and then pushed inward.

  A man stood framed in the entranceway. Hatless. Seersucker suit.

  Short, squat, powerfully built. With a black Jesus Christ hair-do.

  For a flashing second, I couldn't make out his face.

  "I'm Jo Malmedy," the man said in a surprisingly youthful voice. "I think you'd

  like to talk to me, Mr. Noon."

  What an ad-libber.

  At that precise point in time, he was as welcome as the airplanes sent to knock

  King Kong off the top of the Empire State Building. That is if you were Bruce Cabot

  worrying about gorgeous Fay Wray. And not Carl Denham concerned about his precious

  beast.

  I was all Cabot, at the moment. "….the crows that screech in a blue sky

  full of sparrows…they are what critics are…"

  Jean Cocteau

  ANOTHER MALMEDY MASSACRE

  I glared at the young playwright who had blighted my life, even if only

  temporarily. He didn't look like the ball-breaker he had been. Or could be. It was still

  too early to tell, though.

  He nodded at me. The expression on his curious face could not have been called

  a smile. Rather a bleak and tragic grin.

  "Hello, Jo," I said, "so what's the story?"

  "Don't get your hackles up, Noon. Am I in or out?"

  The light voice had taken on some steel all of a sudden.

  "You're in. Getting out might be harder."

  He marched past me, a bold bounce to his walk. I closed the room door and

  followed him warily. He strode to the high windows, took a deep crimson chair whose

  broad back was to all that part panorama and sat down. He seemed to be built like a runt

  sized football tackle.

  The seersucker suit showed no suspicious bulges. No hidden firearms or

  concealed hand grenades. I walked to the long cream colored bureau riding before the

  left wall. I remained on my feet, putting my rear to the three-mirrored backboard,

  resting the rim of my rump. I stared across the deluxe hotel room at Jo Malmedy. In

  person, at last.

  For a long moment, neither or us said anything. Or had to. We were sizing up the situation, both from our own end of the personal spectrum.

  I didn't know what he was up to and he couldn't have known what I was doing in the

  Essex House. Or--did he?

  "I don't usually camp out when I'm in New York," I said. "And I haven't used

  Carl Denham in years."

  "Nice touch that." His smile at last was slightly genuine. Amused, at least. "I

  followed you from the big bad police station. After you arrived here, I hung around the<
br />
  lobby until you took the elevator. You didn't see me---I made sure you didn't."

  "Obviously. I wouldn't have recognized you if I had. I've seen photos of you.

  Papers and magazines but you don't photograph the way you look. You used to have a

  square haircut and a pencil moustache."

  "That was when I wanted to look older. That's not important, anymore.

  Suddenly, the whole age scene sucks."

  "Then why the Last Supper hairdo?"

  "I let it grow," he said simply, "because I don't cut it. No more, no less. Now,

  let's forget all that. We have a lot to talk about. You're with me on that I suppose?"

  "All the way. But there's one more interruption we'll have to put up with. Room

  Service. I've ordered coffee and toast."

  "None for me. But you go ahead."

  "Gee, thanks," I said, dryly. While he was watching me a few minutes later,

  accepting the tray of goodies from a uniformed waiter who set the whole shebang smack

  on the bureau before the three mirrors, I watched him in the glass. He didn't seem on

  edge or nervous but his bullish young body, complete with long-haired, broad-planed face parked solidly on barn door-wide shoulders, was again oddly alert and coiled. As if

  he would be ready to spring when a bell of some kind would go off. But all of that

  restlessness was very much under control. Kind of like a ballet dancer flexing his toes

  before going onstage. Nureyev ready to dazzle the paying public.

  I sipped my coffee, still using the bureau for a roost.

  "Your move, Jo," I said, not changing my position. "I want to know so I'm

  asking, Jo."

  He was sitting back in the deep chair, arms extended, hands splayed to the outer

  limits of the red wings. His eyes were calm, too.

  "You got the play?"

  "Check."

  "You've read it, of course."

  "Of course."

  "And?"

  "What do you want me to say?"

  "Anything. Anything at all."

  "I'll say something, all right. Are you for real?"

  "You'll find out about that soon enough, Noon."

  "I better," I said, putting down the coffee cup and straightening up from the

  bureau, "or you won't get out of this room in the same fine physical condition you came

  in, Malmedy."

  He rocked his head back gently and laughed. A funny kind of laugh. I let him

  laugh until he saw I wasn't sharing the joke with him. "They're right what they say about you, Noon. One of a kind. A nonpareil.