The Alarming Clock Page 8

  Thursday, the twenty-sixth there was a note of arrival from Washington, D.C. Maxim had made a note to himself to pick up some toilet articles. He had checked in at the Astor. Then checked out again. Friday was really interesting. I read it twice:

  Contacted the Fairways unit at four o’clock. Big argument with the swine. We agreed to work each in his own way.

  I pondered that until I couldn’t do much with it. Then went on to Saturday. Roland Ritz’s name cropped up for the first time.

  Closing in on Ritzfeld. The fool. He can never get away.

  Maxim was a bit of a prophet. Ritz hadn’t got away. But somebody else had done the stopping.

  The entries closed on a memo of a movie that Maxim had taken in. I laughed because he hadn’t exactly liked it.

  I closed the book and put it back in my pocket. Benny had come back with my fresh beer and padded away again. I picked it up, sipped some.

  The bar felt suddenly unbearably warm and close. Like a closet full of mattresses on a hot day, I loosened up my tie and tried to relax. I couldn’t. I was right in the middle of nowhere, hanging on to a handful of nothing. N-o-t-h-i-n-g.

  I missed Alma too. Like crazy. The worry had started deep down inside me and I pushed it back to think things out with a clear head. But it was still there. I could feel it.

  I started cursing myself. Inactivity does that to me. What the hell was the matter with me anyway? I was getting squirrely in my own cage. Behaving like the rawest rookie, the greenest of green hands. I knew better. A helluva lot better. I had too many things to do beside sitting around on my rusty dusty thinking into a glass of flat beer.

  Benny caught my arm waving at him and came over.

  “Got some nickels, Benny? Want to use the phone.”

  Rubbing it in, he gave me a dollar’s worth. Without batting an eye, I scooped them up and headed for the phone booth at the rear. It was about time I counted my blessings. One of which was Mike Monks, Captain of Homicide. I was a real cutie, all right, a troublemaker, a real headache to organized Law and Order but Mike had got me off the hook again. On the strength of my record in former cases. I owed him some thanks besides information.

  I dialled Headquarters and asked for Captain Monks. It was after nine but you’d be surprised the strange hours coppers keep. Even Captains. He was in. I got put through in a hurry.

  “Hello,” his bark was pleased but sarcastic. “Figured you’d get around to me sooner or later. Didn’t want to talk to you while those dicks were still there. Hell, the force doesn’t have to know all the details about what a lunatic I am for mixing with the likes of you.”

  “Thanks for the pinch hit, Mike. McAdoo, Ambruzzi and Cohn were all set for the buggy ride down to your nice jail. Buy you a drink next time I see you.”

  “That may be sooner than you think. If that Luger checks—tell me straight up and down—did you kill him?”

  “No.”

  There was a pause. “That’s all I wanted to hear. But I still have to see you tomorrow at ten. Be here. Or you’ll make a monkey out of me in front of the whole Department. Unless you can fill some of it in for me now—”

  I laughed. “Haven’t got that many nickels. It’s all screwy right now but you’ll get everything I’ve got. Right now, it’s all about an alarm clock this Ritz guy left with me this morning. A clock that about ninety-nine other guys want real bad. I’m not even working on a hired basis. And I’ll need all your help since this Ritz died on my doorstep.”

  “Damn impolite of him,” Monks snapped unsympathetically. “So you’re in up to your shoulder blades again. You never will learn, will you, Ed? Alarm clock.” His skeptical snort blasted my eardrum.

  “Okay, okay. I’ll explain it to you tomorrow. But I need your help. It has to do with missing persons. A man and a woman.”

  I could hear him scrabbling around for a pencil and paper.

  “As soon as the call came in about the shooting,” he said, “and your neighbourhood was mentioned, I knew it had to be you.”

  “That’s a song. But I’m not in a singing mood. Look, these two missing persons may not be missing. But either way, I’m interested in their whereabouts.”

  He swore on his end of the line. “Christ, what a comedian. You must have been one crazy kid.” He sighed. “Okay. Who are they?”

  “The man is Alec St. Peter. The woman is Alma Wheeler—” I filled the descriptions in for him. Last seen in the vicinity of, last seen wearing, etcetera. He remembered Alma but he’d never met Alec. So I had more to tell him about Alec than Alma but he was no dummy. He was a smart cop and there wasn’t anyone alive who knew his job better.

  “Anything else, sweetheart?” I knew he had all he needed for the time being.

  “You might check the Ritz character back to his Washington address. He worked in the Pentagon. Check with the FBI. Some valuable plans may be missing. This Ritz was connected with Security in some way—”

  “Maybe you’d better come down here tonight, Ed. This sounds awfully high-handed. If it’s that important—”

  “It’ll keep until the A.M. I’ve got work to do. Alma might pop back. Or Alec. And I want to be around when they do.”

  “You’d be much smarter if you got some sleep—” He was starting in on his old familiar theme song when I hung up on him. Grinning, I pushed the door wide and elbowed out of the booth.

  The first thing I saw was Benny’s worried face. The second thing was his fat thumb wagging at right angles to one of his booths near the silent juke box.

  I followed the thumb. Popular little me. I had company again. And all of my company ran to three. Three was the lucky number this year. Or unlucky.

  Three exceedingly well-dressed guys with clean cut faces and snappy fedoras smiled at me. One of them nodded in my direction.

  “Ed,” Benny rumbled low. “You got company. These gents want to see you.”

  “Thanks, Benny. Bring me a martini.” I put my fool face on, the blank one that does nothing, says nothing and is nothing and sauntered over. They waited for me, giving me the once-over-not-so-lightly every step of the way.

  I stopped when I reached their table.

  “Evening, men,” I said. “You wanted to see me?”

  The snappy fedora nearest me turned up to show nice blue eyes and clean white teeth in a half smile.

  “Sit down, Noon. We want to talk to you. FBI.”

  I laughed evenly. “What does that stand for—Further Back, Irene?”

  The white teeth closed over a glower.

  “Federal Bureau of Investigation, Mister. Sit down and behave yourself.”

  I sat down.

  Chapter Twelve

  “Okay,” I said. “Give me room. I’m too tired to argue anymore. Try out all your old jokes on me. All I want to do is listen.” I sat down where there was room on one side. The good looking boy all by himself made space for me.

  I’d never seen the FBI up close before. Just what you see in the movies. For once the movies were right. These boys had all their own teeth, were still in their prime and looked like three efficient businessmen. Lloyd Nolan could have played any one of them.

  The one on the left across from me opened up with a tight smile.

  “Noon, we’ll get right to the point. A man called Roland Ritz came to your office early today with a package containing a clock. That clock contains something that is mighty important to all of us.”

  “You boys are way out of your neighbourhood,” was all I had to offer. “Washington, D.C., is that way.” I pointed.

  The smiler didn’t get mad.

  “I think a satisfactory explanation is that the future welfare of this country is tied up in that clock.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “Come again.”

  The smiler pyramided his fingers. “Roland Ritz was part of a project that is top secret. Right now, missing the way he is, the clock represents a leak of the most disastrous kind. One that enemy agents would love to make use of. We can’t tell you m
ore than that. But we need your co-operation. I can’t stress that point too urgently.”

  I looked at the three of them. I smiled and toyed with the martini Benny had brought me.

  “Top secret, enemy agents—you guys sure live up to your advance billing.”

  The guy on my left took in my sloppy suit and damaged collar.

  “You aren’t exactly a surprise yourself, Mr. Noon.”

  “I see your point,” I said. “But how about some credentials? I don’t look bright, I know, but I used to fool all my teachers.”

  They laughed good-naturedly at that but produced three billfolds with those strikingly important looking cards. I’d seen FBI cards before. These were the McCoy.

  “My name is Fairways,” the smiler across from me said. “The boy on your left is Henderson. And this is Thompson.”

  “And I’m Noon. So we’re even. Now what gives?”

  Fairways looked me right in the eye. His gaze was level and direct just like the rest of him.

  “Noon, it’s no joke. If Ritz gave you that clock for safe keeping, don’t hold out on us. You’ve got the safety of the whole damn country in the palm of your hand.”

  I shook my head. “No clock today, boys. Ritz left one with me all right. But it was a phony. At least a fellow named Maxim said it was. And now poor old Ritz is lying on a slab at the police morgue. Or hadn’t you heard? He was shot up in my office a couple of hours ago.”

  Me and my little deathless speeches. Henderson, Fairways and Thompson exchanged glances that patted each other on the back for looking up such a fount of information like me.

  “What are you guys having?” I said. “I’m about ready for another refill.” I signalled Benny. He waddled over and looked inquiringly at the FBI boys. They shook their heads. Benny refilled my glass and waddled away again without a word.

  Fairways got grimmer looking than a storm cloud. I could understand why.

  “You’re levelling with us, Noon? Don’t joke about this. That clock is a menace to national security. I want your word on this. That Ritz didn’t leave the clock with you. The real clock.”

  I was cuckoo with clock talk but I had hold of something that made me feel good for the first time since ten-thirty that morning. I was going to keep the clock in the ceiling light to myself as long as I could.

  I made a show of emptying out my sleeves, turning all my pockets inside out. I raised my hand in a mock oath.

  “No clock. Honest. Cross my heart and hope to die.”

  Fairways nodded as if he took my word for it. Henderson bit his lips and Thompson jerked his head.

  “Noon,” Fairways said crisply. “Tell us everything that happened in your office today. It has to be important. And more about this Maxim you mentioned. The Government has been watching that baby for a long time. Everything you know will help.”

  I gave them all I had. Everything from Roland Ritz’s letter on. Everything except Alma. I couldn’t drag her in. She was a family skeleton anyway and I wasn’t going to rattle her lovely bones in front of strangers. Not these strangers at any rate.

  Fairways listened intently and Henderson took notes down in a smart-looking black book that was tooled in gold. When I got back to my drink to wet my talked-out throat, they got to their feet. I didn’t get up for Thompson. Just let him squeeze out past me.

  I showed them how much the martinis had me by spilling some over the table.

  “Hope I’ve been of service, men,” I said thickly. “Who was this Ritz anyway?”

  Fairways dropped a card on the table. I took it without looking at it. He stared down at me.

  “A man who sold out his country. Or at least tried to. It’s hard to say just yet why he was killed. But there may have been a double-cross all around. You know how thieves are.”

  “That I do,” I said, grinning up at him kind of silly.

  “We’ve got to act on this dope at once, Noon. If anything at all comes up, you can reach us at that number. Remember when you help us, you’re helping the country.”

  I couldn’t get my tongue unwound to say goodbye. I just watched them leave. They were three big boys. Real square-looking Joes. Sharp too. They could have been FBI men anywhere, any place.

  Only they weren’t.

  Thanks to Maxim’s little black book, I’d known that since Fairways had introduced himself. And thanks to Maxim, I knew that I’d just had an interview with the Fairways unit and come out on top. I hadn’t tipped them that I had the clock. I had told them that Maxim had it.

  For the first time, I had some pictures to play around with. There were two factions after the clock. Maxim and his latter-day Elite Guard and Fairways and his all-American boys. Maybe they were working together or maybe they weren’t but they were rival groups of some kind. And Fairways had just been busting to clear out and ask Maxim about the clock he had.

  I pondered my next move over the dying martini. If I only knew what had become of Alma and Alec St. Peter, I’d feel a helluva lot better. But I didn’t and sitting in Benny’s bar drinking martinis wasn’t going to help things any.

  I pushed away from Benny’s, went back up to the office and locked myself in. I turned off the overheads and flopped down on the leather couch and undressed. I lay back and thought it all out. Well, when Fairways and Maxim got together and compared notes, they’d be bound to get around to me again. All I could do was wait.

  The last thing I saw before falling off was the round reflection of the clock stuck behind the overhead glass shining through. Just like Milland in that movie.

  I fell asleep lulled by a ticking noise in my head. Tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock—

  Chapter Thirteen

  Dreams I had. What dreams. There was this big clock, as round as the earth, with slowly moving hour and minute hands. I was standing in front of it no bigger than a cockroach trying to climb up the face of the thing. Instead of numbers, there was a face in each spot.

  In my dream the only thing that bothered me was my size. Not the fact that there were faces instead of numbers. I seemed to take that for granted. Because Alec St. Peter was in the one o’clock spot, Alma was smiling down from three o’clock. Two was a helluva lot hazier but I guessed this was supposed to be Roland Ritz whose face I had never got a good look at. But Maxim was leering at me from the fifth position and Fairways smiled at me from number six. Seven to eleven was taken up by a lot of faces that had popped in and out of my life all day yesterday. McAdoo, Ambruzzi and Cohn and two of Maxim’s brutal playmates. Ambruzzi still seemed to be telling Cohn how right his friend Louis had been about me. And Cohn looked as disgusted as ever.

  Number twelve spot was vacant and that’s what the dream was all about. Because that’s where I belonged. Ed Noon. And I was doing my damnedest to get up there where I belonged. But no one was trying to help me except Alma. She kept extending a long, lovely arm that I couldn’t quite reach. Alec wanted to help too but all he had were those meaningless stumps. His face told me as much.

  The hour and minute hands that were slowly turning down to six thirty seemed like my safest bet. I could climb aboard and take the ride back up and get in position. This made me feel wonderfully clever and smart about everything. But something happened before I could do it.

  A dead body came down from nowhere, thudded into the hands and jammed the works. And the alarm went off, jangling away to beat a sixteen piece brass band. And all the faces that were where the numbers ought to be disappeared and—I woke up. To find the telephone ringing. Ringing long, hard and loud.

  It stopped ringing by the time I fumbled sleepily over to it. I shook my head out of the fog and stared down at the silent Ameche. I looked at my wrist watch. It was almost nine. I rubbed my chin trying to get my brain functioning. It might have been Monks seeing as how we had a ten o’clock date. But somehow I didn’t think so. Well, if it was important enough to call me this early, whoever it was would call back soon enough.

  I put myself together. It was going to be a long d
ay anyway. So I washed, brushed my teeth, got dressed—this time I was able to shave both sides of my face without interruption—and got behind my desk to check on a few things.

  I didn’t have my .45 any more thanks to Maxim’s earlier visit. Hell, I didn’t know where it was any more. So I rummaged into a lower left desk drawer and fished out a spare that I seldom get a chance to use. I hefted it in my hand and checked the chambers almost gleefully. It was a German gun—a P38, which is the direct descendant of the Luger. I’d taken it off an SS man in Europe during the war. Maybe now I’d get a chance to use it again. I prefer the .45 but a P38 isn’t exactly a poor substitute.

  It was almost nine-thirty but I had one more thing to do before I cleared out. I went down the hall to Alec’s office and scouted his work bench until I found what I wanted. I took it back to the auditorium with me and set it down on my desk. It was an alarm clock. Just as crummy and just as cheap as the one I had stashed up under the lighting. It would do just in case something came up where I had to work a stall again. It’s always better to have two of one thing anyway. And there was one thing in my favour. Maxim seemed unable! to really know what he was looking for. And like the joke goes—how would he know when he found it if he didn’t know what was lost?

  Fairways was another matter entirely. But I’d have to take my chances.

  I was just straightening my tie and ready to leave when there was a knock on my door. Soft and low. It sounded like the rap of a woman. But you never can be too sure. I put my hand on the butt of P38 in my pocket and said, “Come on in. We’re home.”

  She did. A tall, well-dressed brunette with white gloves and a dark ensemble of tailored clothes. She closed the door without saying a word and turned with her back to it, staring at me out of eyes that made me think of two in the morning and alcohol and dark bedrooms. Not nine-thirty and working hours.