Death's Not Enough
by Frederick Nebel

WHEN DONAHUE heard the dull thump against the door he twisted around in bed and listened, pipe in one hand, magazine in the other.

The cylindrical brass reading lamp, clipped to the head of the bed, sprayed light on his neck, past his ears, picked out rumpled twists of black hair and left his face mostly in shadow.

Half a minute passed without a recurrence of sound. The tenth story room was intimately quiet.

Donahue looked at the clock on the little bed-table. It was twelve-thirty. He shrugged, pyramided the coverlet with his knees, took a drag at his briar and resumed reading.

Then another sound reached his ears: a scraping, like cat's claws on wood. Then a definite thump. Donahue sat up slowly, laid aside the magazine, reached over and placed his pipe on the bed-table. He shoved big, strong feet out of bed and stood up in gray silk pajamas. He scowled at the door, a little annoyed, a little curious.

He took a flat black automatic pistol from the bed-table drawer and released the safety. He held the gun negligently, like one accustomed to guns, and moved slowly on bare feet towards the door. Silently he threw the catch. His left hand closed over the knob, he turned it as far as it would go, then yanked the door inward and stepped back.

A man fell flat on his face across the threshold. He had been kneeling by the door. He went down so fast that Donahue did not see his face. Donahue stood motionless, covering the man.

“Well, get up,” he said.

The man did not move. A muffled phlegmatic groan reached Donahue's ears. He took a step across the man and looked up and down the hall; saw no one. He stepped back in, bent down, gripped the man's shoulder and turned him over on his back. He couldn't see the face clearly, so he switched on the ceiling light.

There was a thread of blood lying from one corner of the stranger's mouth down across his jaw. The lips were pursed tightly, the face muscles taut; in the glazed eyes was a fierce white look, blind and-unseeing but awesome in its fixed intensity on space.

Donahue closed the automatic's safety, knelt down, unbuttoned the blue topcoat, unbuttoned the vest. There was a wet splotch of crimson on a white shirt. Hoarse, spasmodic breathing pumped through the nostrils and the lips twitched but remained resolutely pursed.

Donahue said nothing. He somehow knew--because of the look in the eyes--that it would be futile to say anything. He stood up, ran his hand through his hair, took three long steps and picked up the telephone.

“A doctor--quick. A man's dying. . . . Now, now, sweetheart, never mind. Get a doctor up.”

He hung up and slipped the receiver quietly into the hook. He went quickly into the bathroom, drew a glass of water and came back. He knelt down, looking at the eyes. He shrugged. He tried to get the man to drink. The man wouldn't. He wouldn't budge those lips.

Donahue set the glass down, remained kneeling on one knee, leaning with his elbow on the other. He reached down and patted the man's shoulder. But he didn't say anything. His face was somber, his brown eyes troubled.

The elevator door banged open and quick footsteps came down the hall. Donahue looked up and saw Mason, the chief night clerk--Mason, white-faced and breathless, eyes popping.

“The operator said--”

“Did she get a doctor?”

“He'll be up--he'll be right up. I called Monahan too. Good grief! What happened--what happened?”

“Ask me another,” Donahue muttered, still looking at the tortured face on the floor. “Did you do anything? Did you--is he? . . .”

“Keep your pants on, Mason. What can I do? He's been shot in the belly. He was lying against my door. I guess he couldn't make his own. Know him?”

“He's--why, he's Mr. Larrimore! My--! he's Mr. Larrimore!”

“Who's Larrimore?”

“You know--you know. That--that column in the Press-Examiner: The Awful Truth.”

“Oh,” said Donahue dully; but his brown eyes brightened. He said, “Get that doctor, Mason. He doesn't have to comb his hair. Tell him he doesn't have to comb his hair.”

“Yes--yes.”

Mason ran down the hall.

Donahue leaned close to the tortured face, tried to lock his glance with the roan's.

“Larrimore. Larrimore, who got you? Why? I'm Donahue, Larrimore--Donahue of the Interstate Detective Agency. If you can talk, Larrimore, spill it. Listen, Larrimore--Donahue, you must have heard of Donahue. Who shot you, Larrimore?”

He gave it up. He heard the elevator door open. Mason and the house doctor appeared, followed by Monahan, the house officer.

“Get him inside,” Monahan said. “We don't want to wake the hotel up. ... Hello, Donahue.”

They dragged Larrimore in and Mason came last, closing the door. The doctor changed spectacles and knelt down. He felt the pulse, shook his head; unbuttoned the shirt, pulled up the undershirt. He looked quickly at the man's face. He remained thus--looking at the face. Then he looked at his watch.

“Twelve-thirty-seven,” he said; rose, adding: “He's dead --quite dead.”

“Good grief!” choked Mason. “And we've never had a scandal--”

Donahue rasped, “That's all you're thinking about!”

The three men looked at him. He shrugged and went across and picked up his pipe, tamped it down. Monahan, a short, round-bodied man with a bald head, went to the telephone.

“Get Police Headquarters, Miss McGillicuddy. Detective-Sergeant Kelly McPard. Tell him to come right over. Mention my name. . . . Yes--yes, he died. And don't forget to mention my name.”

He hung up and looked importantly at Donahue. “You don't happen to know anything about this, do you?”

“Not a thing.”

Monahan picked up Donahue's gun, smelled the muzzle, drew out the clip. The gun was fully loaded--six in the magazine, one in the chamber. Monahan shoved back the magazine and laid the gun down.

Donahue, sitting on the bed, said: “You opened the safety, Monahan. When you monkey around with my gun leave it the way you found it.”

Kelly McPard was a big fat man with a neat, sandy mustache and rosy cheeks. His eyes were bright blue, whimsical, and he smiled easily, though a man with any sense at all could see the wiliness behind his good humor. He dressed in the height of fashion, and he drifted in through the door smoking a cork-tipped cigarette and looking like a million dollars. “Hello, Monahan. Why, hello there, Donahue. Hello, Dr. Stress. . . . Well, well, this is not so nice. Did you shoot him, Donahue?”

“Yeah. Twice in the belly.”

McPard chuckled and laid down his hat. His hair fell back in silken, shiny waves, without a part. “Who is he?”

“He's---Mr. Larrimore,” Mason said. “He lives down the hall in 1010. You know him--I mean, that column in the Press-Examiner.”

“A. B. Larrimore,” nodded McPard. “H'm.”

“Shot twice in the stomach,” Dr. Stress said. “He died a moment after I arrived here. There was nothing I could do.”

Mason said: “The elevator boy said he thought Mr. Larrimore was--well, you know, a little drunk--the way he walked, I mean. He sort of staggered into the elevator, with his coat collar up. He didn't say anything. The elevator boy knew the floor.”

“He never made his room,” Donahue said. “He fell against my door, sank there. I heard the thump. I was reading in bed.”

Mason yammered: “He wasn't shot in the hotel. I saw him come in the front, kind of staggering, his chin in his collar. He was like that a lot. But if he was shot like that, why did he come here to die?”

“He was out on his feet,” Donahue said. “A man gets like that and he steers for home. Or maybe he didn't think he was hurt so bad. Some guys don't like to slobber all over in public.”

“Might call that dying manners,” McPard said. “You were the guy told Scotch jokes at an Irish wake one night, weren't you?” Donahue said.

McPard had a velvet chuckle. He pulled up his trouser-legs by the knees before kneeling down. He wore sheer silk socks, starched cuffs with gold links. He pawed Larrimore's pockets casually, whistling absent-mindedly in a whisper. “H'm--right in the guts--side by side. . . . See it, Donny? Tsk, tsk! . . . No powder burns on the coat. No handshake kill. I think I'll have a look at the bullets anyhow. So you might call the morgue, Monahan? Thanks. . . . H'm, thirty-three dollars, sixty cents. And--isn't this a good-looking cigarette case?” He wrapped it carefully in a silk handkerchief.

“You never know,” he sighed.

There was a furious pounding on the door. Monahan swore, stuck out his jaw and yanked it open. Libbey, of the City Press, reeled in, turned around once and flopped down in a chair.

“My --! he's shot too!' Mason cried.

“Plastered,” Libbey said. “Bacardi cocktails again. Hello, Donny, you big tramp. Hello, Sarge. ... So Larrimore got it. Where? When? Come on, Sarge, whom do you suspect? There has got to be a suspect. Come on. I got the tip from H. Q. and I gave three other news-hawks a phony address, I think it was a lying-in hospital or a hotel for Lithuanian immigrant girls. Hello, Monahan, how's the keyhole business these nights?”

“Should I put this bum out?” Monahan said.

“You and what other two Swedes?” Libbey laughed.

“Leave him be,” McPard said, still pawing Larrimore's pockets. “Only shut up, Libbey.”

Donahue brought Libbey a drink and that shut him up.

McPard said: “Well, he has nothing on him worthwhile. If he walked here, he couldn't have been shot far away. Else he came in a cab. I'll find if he came in a cab. Was he drinking, Doc?”

“There was a faint smell of liquor. Not very distinct, however.”

“I thought he'd get it some day,” Libbey said. “That column of his was rich. He should have named it 'Private Lives--and How.' You know, my dear friends--as among gentlemen--this will create a furor. Inside of twenty-four hours the Press-Examiner will offer a reward. And other sheets, conscience-stricken because they have underpaid us newspapermen for so long--”

Donahue growled: “Pipe down, you fat-head.”

“--other newspapers will supplement the reward and, attend--you, you and you, three enterprising master minds: here you are, the three of you, in the presence of one foully murdered--”

“Jeeze, Sarge,” Monahan grumbled, “can't I throw this Stink out?”

“--Kelly McPard, Donny, and Monahan. Three of you, by a planetary coincidence, will each go his secret way with one eye on justice and one eye on the shekels. “Monahan looked guilty. McPard put a cork-tipped cigarette between his lips. His face beamed, but back of the laugh in his eyes burned a wily, speculative spark.

“But, Libbey,” he said expansively, “we're all friends.”

“Of course,” said Donahue. He bent down, picked up a cardboard packet of matches, struck one and held it to McPard's cigarette. They smiled into each other's eyes. “Aren't we all?” McPard said.

“Sure,” Donahue said. “We're all big-hearted guys, Kelly. “The phone rang. Monahan picked it up, listened, said above it: “The morgue wagon, Sarge.”

When the body had been removed from the room, when McPard and Monahan had gone and Libbey had taken the stairway down to dodge three irate reporters, Donahue locked his door. Then he opened his hand and looked at the blue packet of paper matches. He opened the flap. Printed on the inside of the flap was: The Venetian Cellar West Tenth Street

Two matches were missing. One of them he had used to light McPard's cigarette. The other was missing when McPard, pawing Larrimore's coat pocket, had tossed the packet away as something inconsequential.

“Good old Kelly McPard,” Donahue chortled.

He started dressing.
II

MASON was back at the desk in the lobby, his nerves jumpy.-But he was at least thankful that no one had been disturbed. He sincerely believed that at night he guided the destiny of the hotel. They had taken the body out in the freight elevator, then through the service entrance, and the reporters had gone along with McPard. He looked up and saw Monahan 'coming seriously across the dim, deserted lobby. Monahan had been fired from six private Detective agencies, but he still believed the agencies were wrong. The hotel had hired him because he was cheap. The hotel was small and mostly residential and a house officer was a superfluity anyhow. The owners kept him mainly to quiet drunken parties and to patrol the halls at two every morning to see if all the doors were locked.

Monahan went into a huddle with Miss McGillicuddy, whom he had awed from time to time with imaginary yarns of man-hunts. Monahan, you understand, figuring as the master mind exclusively.

“That 1005 now, Miss McGillicuddy,” he said impressively under his hand. “Keep an ear open on any telephoning; does.”

“You--you think he's--guilty?”

“Sh! No, not that. But he's a smart Aleck and if the hotel solves the death--the brutal death, Miss McGillicuddy--if one of its guests. . . . You get me? So keep an ear open. You know, there may even be a reward and”-- he leaned closer, winked--“I'm not a hog, young lady.”

“Gee!” She coughed and blew her nose. “Got an awful cough, Mr. Monahan.”

“A--uh--little pin money, you see, might fix it so you could get two weeks off and take a fling at Palm Beach.”

He walked away with a pious look on his face and his palms against his round thighs. He stopped as he saw a tall man in a brown ulster and a tan, rakish hat striding across the lobby for the doors. Donahue went out into a raw, full wind that blustered down the street. He turned south into University Place, west into Tenth Street. He crossed Fifth Avenue, reached Sixth, walked beneath the Elevated, cut across Greenwich and went down Tenth Street past Waverly Place. He crossed the street diagonally towards two blue globes that burned above a blue door in an areaway sunk four stone steps below the pavement. He elbowed the door open and entered a low-ceiled restaurant that had canals and gondolas painted on the walls. The blue lighting gave the faces of people a ghostly look.

Near the door was a cigarette showcase with a cash register alongside it and a man behind the cash register. The man had a mask-like face and a receding hair line. Donahue bought a package of cigarettes. Asked for a match. The man threw him a packet. The packet was blue.

Donahue went to a table, threw his hat and ulster on one chair, sat down in another. “Scotch and seltzer.”

He leaned back, put a cigarette between his lips, opened the blue packet. On the inside of the flap it said: The Venetian Cellar--West Tenth Street.

Nobody was eating now, but the menu was a large one specializing in Italian dishes. The waiter brought the drink.

“Where's the head waiter?” Donahue said.

The waiter looked at him blankly for half a moment, then turned and went off. He came back with a short fat man who had black marcelled hair, who carried a cigar horizontally at right angles to his uppermost vest button.

“Yes?”

“Will you sit down?”

“I'm sorry--”

“Only for a minute.”

The fat man sat down.

Donahue leaned on his elbows and looked straight into the dark pool-like eyes.

Donahue said: “Do you know Larrimore?”

“Who?”

“A. B. Larrimore.”

The fat man looked down at his fat white hands, turned a diamond ring round and round; looked up and moved his shoulders in the semblance of a shrug.

“No,” he said. “No, I don't,”

'“He was here tonight,” Donahue said. “He's a little shorter than I am, slim and well-built. Clean-shaven. Derby, blue overcoat, blue serge suit. He's about forty, I'd say. Black hair, but”--he touched the side of his head-- “gray along here, quite gray. Distinguished looking man.”

“He was in here?”

“Yeah. In here.”

“Well, sure, he might have been. There was a lot of people here tonight. I wouldn't know. I'm not out here much, only if somebody asks for me. Like you. Who's Larrimore?”

“What I want to know is, what time did he leave here, and was he with anybody?”

The fat man sat back. “How do I know?”

“Was he with a man or a woman?”

The fat man made an impatient gesture. “I tell you, how do I know?”

“I tell you, he was here. Was he alone or--”

“Listen,” broke in the fat man irritably. “I don't know who you're talking about. All right, he was here. Maybe he was. If you say he was here, all right, then he was here. But I don't remember. I can't remember every guy comes in here. Or every woman--”

“Or every woman,” said Donahue.

“What?”

“Or every woman. You can't remember the woman he was with.”

The fat man looked surprised. “What the hell are you talking about?” He scowled suddenly, heaved up. “Go on, you're crazy.” He laughed and walked off.

Donahue got up and followed him. Tables were in the way. He had to weave among them. He followed the fat man to the other side of the restaurant and the latter was not aware of this until he was thrusting aside the rose-colored curtains leading to another room. He turned and his cigar, that had been jutting out straight from his mouth, drooped; his jaw drooped; his eyelids drooped. He looked suddenly sinister with his fat white face and his black pool-like eyes.

“This is a private room,” he said. “The door to the street is over that way.”

“Oh, that's all right,” Donahue said cheerfully. “I just want to find out what time that man left here. Be a good egg. I'm a good egg and strictly on the up and up. I'm not trying to crash this scatter and if you knew me better you'd know what a swell guy I really am.”

“Are you trying to sell anything?”

“An idea. I'm trying to sell you the idea that it would be nice for you to play ring around the rosy with me.”

The fat man started a leer. “You mean--nice for you.”

“No. I mean”--Donahue flicked a thumb-nail against the man's uppermost vest button--“for you.”

The fat man's face drooped more; he had jowls now, sagging like wet dough in the ghostly bluish light. His lower lip sagged, revealing the lower part of his lower teeth.

He said slowly, distinctly: “I don't know who you're talking about. I don't know you. Get out.”

“You feel that way about it, eh?”

The fat man said nothing. He put his cigar carefully between his lips, rolled it around with thumb and forefinger and regarded Donahue with his drooping, sinister eyes.

Donahue saw one of the waiters come up and stand beside him. He turned and saw another standing behind him. He saw a third leaning against the wall. He whistled a few bars to himself. He saw a cuspidor, squinted one eye towards it and snapped his butt into it.

“Okey,” he said. He went swiftly back to his table, gathered up his hat and coat, put the hat on but not the coat and went directly

out without looking at anyone. He walked long-legged to the next corner, swung left, stopped and put on his coat. He turned and peered around the corner. He saw a man standing on the sidewalk looking at the f twin blue lights. He knew the shape, the build, the round t shoulders. He saw Monahan go down the steps and through j the blue door.

He put his hands on his hips and bit off a sharp, caustic oath.

He heard heavy footsteps and pivoted. A patrolman came across the street, saying: “Why the hell all the hocus pocus?”

Donahue smiled, “Hello, Officer.”

“Now let it go at that. What's the idea?”

“I thought someone was following me.”

The patrolman snapped gum with his teeth and stood on wide-planted feet, his arms akimbo, nightstick dangling.

“On your way. Beat it.”

Donahue said: “Sure,” good-naturedly and strode off. He turned left into Christopher, went around the block and was again on Tenth Street. He slipped down into an area-way across from the twin blue lights. He looked at his strap-watch. It was ten past two. The street was deserted except for an occasional late-wandering drunk or a night-hawk taxicab..

Presently a man and a woman came out of the Venetian Cellar. They walked towards Hudson Street, stopping at intervals to embrace. Then a man came out putting on his coat. He staggered towards Sixth Avenue, singing. A man and a woman came out, the man supporting the woman; then two men; then two men and a quarrelsome girl.

A minute later the twin blue lights went out.

Donahue looked at his watch again. It was two-thirty.' An Elevated train rumbled down Sixth Avenue. A taxi barged east with someone thumping a banjo. Silence fell again. And Donahue waited on. Â»

At two-forty-five Donahue heard footsteps clicking from the direction of Sixth Avenue: woman's high-heels by the sound of them. He saw a woman wrapped in a dark fur coat pass beneath a street light. She walked rapidly, each heel fall distinct. She turned down into the Venetian Cellar areaway and disappeared through the blue door.

Donahue craned his neck. He was about to climb to the pavement when he saw the woman reappear, rising quietly from the areaway, walking only on the soles of her feet.

She looked up and down the-street, walked a matter of ten yards and slipped behind a stone stoop that hid her from sight of anyone entering or leaving the Venetian Cellar.

Donahue retreated deeper into the well of shadows, his eyes keen and watchful. From time to time he saw the vague blur of the woman's face peering around the corner of the stoop. There was no street light near her. He could not get even a general idea of what she looked like.

His attention was diverted suddenly by the banging open of the blue door across the street. He heard low, angry voices. Then suddenly he saw Monahan being rough-housed up the steps by a couple of men. They shoved him and he fell down, and then the fat man appeared and stood at the brink of the sidewalk.

“Now beat it,” he said. “I've stood plenty of your lousy lip. You've got this place of mine wrong.”

“You'll see, you'll see,” Monahan threatened, rising.

“All right, I'll see. You got no business to- come in my place and act wise. So scram.”

Monahan brushed his coat with his hands and reset his hat. He shook his fist.

“Don't think a dago like you can get tough with me. I got friends at Police Headquarters. You can't get tough with me.”

The fat man waved a hand. “Oh, go on and beat it, for cripes sake. You're just a loud noise. You asked for a slide to the pavement and you got it.” He turned to the others. “Come on, boys.”

They went down the stairs and through the blue door, banging it shut.

Monahan buttoned his coat, put a cigar in his mouth and stamped off.

Donahue thumbed his nose at Monahan's back and grinned with genuine satisfaction.
III

WHEN MONAHAN'S irate footfalls had died in the direction of Sixth Avenue, Donahue saw the woman slip from the shadows and enter the blue door. In a little while he saw four men come out and head east. They were the waiters. He waited ten minutes, then climbed to the sidewalk, darted silently across the street and descended to the Venetian Cellar areaway.

His right hand slipped beneath his coat to settle on the butt of his automatic. His left hand closed over the doorknob and eased it as far as it would go. He turned it in the other direction and after a firm but gentle pressure towards himself he knew that the door was locked.

His lips formed a silent oath. He turned and climbed to the pavement and returned to the areaway across the street! The fall air was cold and he turned up his collar, kept his hands thrust in his pockets.

At a little past three he heard the blue door open. After a moment the woman and the fat man climbed to the sidewalk. The man had hat and overcoat on and a red cigar-end marked his face. The woman took his arm and they started walking rapidly towards Sixth Avenue.

Donahue let them get a good lead, then followed, hugging the shadows and the house walls. He followed them through Waverly Place into Grove Street. They crossed Grove at the subway entrance, crossed Sheridan Square towards a row of three taxies parked in front of a lunch-wagon.

Donahue stopped at the north side of the Square. He looked up and down West Fourth Street. It was wide here --and deserted. He saw the fat man and the woman get into a taxi and drive off. He waited until the taxi was out of sight and then drifted across the Square and entered the all-night lunchroom.

Monahan was sitting at the far end of the counter, drinking milk, eating pie and reading a newspaper. He did not look up. Donahue gave himself a half-smile and sat down near the door.

“Cup of black coffee,” he said.

Monahan looked up. His eyes popped.

Donahue grinned. “Hello, Monahan.”

“Hello, Donahue.”

“Out late, aren't you?”

“Came out to get the air and a bite to eat.” He thought for a moment, wrinkling his forehead in perplexed indecision. Then he picked up the glass of milk, the pie and his paper, and came down next to Donahue. He leaned over, spoke out of the side of his mouth.

“What do you think of that kill, Donahue?”

“Huh? . . . Oh, that. Well, Monahan, my good friend, I really haven't thought about it.”

“G' on!”

“Honor bright. I couldn't sleep so I came out to the flesh-pots. What do you think about it, Monahan?”

Monahan looked uncomfortable. He stabbed a chunk of pie. “I ain't thought much about it, either.”

Donahue drank his cup of coffee, stood up and said: “Well, I'll be seeing you, Monahan.”

He went out, climbed in a taxi and said: “Head east.” When the taxi was under way, he leaned forward and thrust a dollar bill into the driver's hand.

“Duck south at the next block and let me off,” he said. “Then duck around the streets for a few minutes or go where you like. There's a dumb bunny back there tailing me.”

“Okey.”

The taxi swung south into Cornelia Street. Donahue leaped out, slammed shut the door and bounded to the sidewalk. He had barely reached the shadows when a second taxi turned the corner. He saw Monahan in the back seat. He laughed to himself, watched the tail-light disappear and then walked back to Sheridan Square.

Five minutes later a taxi drew up and the driver got out. Donahue approached him.

“Buddy,” he said, “I'll give you five dollars if you'll take me to the address where you took that fat man and the woman.”

“Says you.”

“Says I. I'm a private dick and I'm hard up for an address.” He peeled a five dollar bill from a cordovan leather folder.

“Get in.”'

Donahue gave him the bill, entered the cab and sat back lighting a cigarette. The cab cut across town to Third Avenue and then headed north beneath the Elevated structure. At the corner of Fifteenth Street it pulled up and the driver turned around, jerking his thumb.

“Up that way, opposite Stuyvesant Square. Number two hundred and--; it's a gray brick building, kind of narrow. You want me to wait here?”

Getting out, Donahue said: “No.”

“That's swell by me.”

Donahue watched him drive off, took a few drags at his cigarette, tossed it away and turned into East Fifteenth Street. Across the way Rutherford Street ran its two blocks north, flanking Stuyvesant Square on the west. The south side of East Fifteenth faces the park and is walled by substantial stone houses marking a bygone period. Some of them have been remodeled with new fronts and modern facades and hold forth as small apartment houses. Such a one was that in front of which Donahue paused.

The lobby was flush with the sidewalk, faced with two glass doors. Donahue pushed one of them in and was confronted by a large wooden door with a shiny brass knob. On the wall at the right were built-in brass letterboxes and a row of ten brass buttons- with names under them. The door was locked. Donahue studied the names intently. Then he went out, crossed the street and looked up at the front of the house. There were only two windows lighted, the shades drawn. The windows were on the third floor, at the right.

Donahue re-entered the lobby, drew a ring of keys from his pocket. He used four master keys and spent four minutes. The door eased open and he stepped into a wide, brown-carpeted hall. One little amber wall-light burned at the foot of a wide staircase with a broad banister. The stairs were carpeted, Donahue's footfalls muted as he climbed.

He listened at the head of the staircase, turned, walked along the wall of the second floor corridor and started up a second staircase. On each floor burned a single amber light, sufficient to light one's way, but overlooking many shadows. Donahue climbed stealthily, leaving his hand off the banister because banisters invariably creak.

On the third floor he stopped, getting his bearings. At the front of the hall was a window. At either side, an apartment. There was a sliver of light beneath the door on the left. Donahue slid towards it and listened. He caught the undertones of a voice, and though he could not distinguish a word he recognized the undertones. The fat man. . . . '

He straightened suddenly and stepped quickly into the corner of the hall. The door opened and the fat man came out putting on his hat. The woman came with him. She had red hair and looked to be in her thirties, and she had beauty of a sort.

“All right, Tony ...”

“Sh!” the fat man whispered. “Everything'll be jake. Just keep a stiff lip, Beryl.”

She went with him down the hall towards the stairs, leaving her door wide open. Donahue crept along the wall, entered the apartment. He was in a comfortable living-room. Back of it was an open bedroom. He slipped into the bedroom.

In another minute the woman came in, closed the corridor door, pushed fingers through her hair. She stood in the center of the living-room, holding her hands to her head, staring haggard-eyed at the floor. Donahue appeared and said: “Good morning, Beryl.”

“Oh!”' She started, tearing her hands from her head, making fists that she pressed to her thighs, and stood suddenly rigid and white-faced, her eyes wide.

Donahue scaled his hat onto a divan, sat down with his overcoat open and flaring around his neck. “Sit down, Beryl,” he said.

“How--how--”

“Go on, be a good scout, sit down.”

“Oh, my--! My--!”

He pulled out pouch and pipe, ran the bowl into the pouch, packed with his second finger. The woman kept staring at him while she moved, felt for a chair, gripped its back and let herself down slowly. Her face had drained so of color that her rouged lips looked like a vivid red gash. She began striking her fist on a knee slowly. “What do you want, what do you want?” Donahue reached towards an end table for a match. He glanced at the cabinet photo of a girl. The girl was young, reminiscent of the woman in the room. Donahue lit up.

He said: “When you left Tony's last night with Larrimore, what happened?”

“I wasn't at Tony's last night,” she said huskily. “No?”

“No. I wasn't at Tony's.”

Donahue smiled. “Why, when you came to Tony's alone at about three this morning--why did you come right out and hide behind that stoop?”

“I didn't.”

“And why, after a man was thrown out, did you go back in?”

She said, hoarsely: “You seem to get around, don't you?”

“I'm a great little getter-around, Beryl. And I'm a great guy, too, once you get to know me. If you knew me better you wouldn't try to hand me a line. I don't even nibble, let alone swallow the hook.”

Color was coming back to her face. She seemed to have got over the first shock and now a desperate, level look was in her eyes.

“I don't know what you're talking about,” she said. “My actions are my own business. Who is this Larrimore you're talking about?”

“Now, Beryl . . .” Donahue got up and stood looking down at her with eyes in which mockery danced lightly.

“Listen, you,” she said, warmly. “What business have you here? Who are you?” She stood up, trembling, her eyes burning. “You have no right here. If you don't get out I'll call the police and have you put out!”

Donahue chuckled, shook his head. “No, you wouldn't call the police.”

“Wouldn't I?” Her chin rose, her nostrils quivered. “You think I wouldn't?”

“I think you wouldn't.”

“You're a pretty wise guy, aren't you?”

“Pretty wise.”

“Well, we'll see how good your bluff is!”

She swept past him, crossed the room to an open secretary where a telephone stood, sat down, put her left hand on the telephone. Donahue took two fast strides, caught her right hand as it was drawing a small automatic from a pigeon-hole. She cried out and heaved up, tussling with him. He twisted her wrist once.

“Not in this day and age,” he said, as the gun fell to the floor.

She stood panting before him, her throat pulsing, her breast convulsing, a fierce, haunted look in her eyes.

“I knew you wouldn't call the police,” he said.

“Get out!” she choked. “You have no right here. For-- sake get out and leave me alone!”

He released her, kicked the little gun under the secretary. A v-shaped crease was between his brows, his brown eyes were steady and searching, his face suddenly somber and serious.

“You're in a tough spot, sister, and don't think you aren't. And don't try to play around me. I don't like it. There's been a lot of monkey-shines between the Venetian Cellar and this place tonight.”

“If you're a cop, show your shield. If you aren't, then get out.”

“I'm without benefit of shield, sister, but that cuts no ice with me. And don't think it's going to cut any with you. You're a liar, and you know it, and I'll tell you right now that I'm a swell guy ordinarily and a mean baby if anybody, jane or guy, tries to pull a rod on me. Tuck that under your belt and grow up and be your age.”

He spoke crisply, bluntly, without malice or emotion, stating facts simply and pointedly.

She defied him. “I don't know what you're talking about. You have no right here.”

“All right, smarty, take that telephone and call the cops and see if you have a better right to be here or in jail. There's been murder done, little girl, and this man's town still looks on murder with disfavor, despite a lot of ballyhoo to the contrary.”

“Murder! Murder!” she cried. “What--what do I know about murder?”

“Nothing. Oh, nothing. Maybe you call the death of Larrimore just an act of God.”

“Death of ... I--why, my --! I haven't murdered anybody! I haven't--Oh, for -- sake, I haven't killed anybody. No! No!”

She held out her hands and fell backward, shaking her head. Her calves struck the low divan and she dropped to it.

“And death's not enough, darling, to kill a hot clue,” Donahue muttered. “Larrimore was murdered somewhere between the Venetian Cellar and his hotel--”

“No! No! Oh, no!”

“You were with him in the Venetian Cellar. You left with him. You left the Venetian Cellar with him and he was Shot. He was shot and got to his hotel--and he died. He died and by--he died for something--and you know! You know why he died. You know because--”

“You're a liar-a liar!” she broke in. “What do you think you can do? You can't come here and accuse me! Who do you think you are? I--”

“Never mind who I think I am. I've got that fat boy's ticket and I've got yours. And never mind what right I have to be here. I'm here and here, by cripes, I'll stay! Till you fork over, little one. It's my business--and I'm a business man.”

Her voice throbbed but became at the same time one-toned and incisive--“I was with--with a man named Larrimore, was I? Can you prove it? No. Nobody can. Because I went to the Venetian Cellar and backed out because they were arguing with some pest . . . what's that to you? I . went there because a friend there is a good friend of mine. And that's none of your business, either. You handed me a jolt when I first saw you here. You' handed me a jolt when you mentioned murder. It's an ugly word. But that's all there is to it. Go on. Run along. I'm getting tired of you already.”

“You're like that lizard called the chameleon,” Donahue said. “You change color quickly--but underneath you don't. You can't bluff me'.”

He toed the little gun from beneath the secretary, picked it up. It was a .25 Webley, four-and-a-half inches over all. It was fully loaded. Donahue rubbed the muzzle with his handkerchief.

“Never been used, eh?”

She said nothing.

“Oh,” Donahue said, shrugging, “I don't think you killed Larrimore. But you know who did.”

“I don't! I tell you I don't know what you're talking about!” She jumped up. “For the love o'--get out--before I do something--before I scream!”

“Don't scream, Beryl,” said the fat man from the door. “I'll take care of this buttinsky.”

Donahue wheeled about.

The fat man stood in the open-door holding a gun in his hand and looking very sinister with his-drooping eyelids.
IV

DONAHUE had taken the clip from the Webley, ejected a cartridge from the chamber. He threw the lot on the desk and when he looked at the fat man again the latter had come in and closed the door.

The woman stood digging her fingernails into her palms, biting her lips to silence, looking as if she were torn between two diverging lines of thought.

''I told you to get out of one place tonight,” the fat man said in a low, grinding voice.

“Tony--”

“Shut up, Beryl. This guy's pal is standing over on the corner of Rutherford. I saw him before I went out in the lobby, and stayed down there watching. I didn't know this egg was up here--until I heard him just now.”

Donahue looked puzzled. He said: “What are you yapping about? I've got no pal---”

“You're just about the damnedest liar I ever ran across. What kind of a line did he hand you, Beryl?”

“On--oh, a lot of nonsense about a man named Larrimore.”

“That's what he did me too.”

“Run him out, Tony. He's been talking about Larrimore being murdered and he's trying to charge me with being mixed up in it.”

“I'll show him,” the fat man said. “I'll show you. I've got a mind to blow your brains out, you lousy pest!”

“Tony!”

“Nah, don't worry, baby--I won't. But I've got a friend; right in this neighborhood who's on the cops. I'll show this bum if he can bust around here the way he does. He's a heel, Beryl--a dirty, rotten gunman, with his pal across the street. I'll get him pinched. Keep your hands up, bright boy.”

The fat man, who looked genuinely angry and indignant, backed to the telephone, kept his gun trained on Donahue, and called a number.

“Hello--hello. . . . This is Tony--you know. . . . Well, I'm sorry to get you up, Mike, but listen, do me a favor. There's a hot shot up here at my girl friend's, you know--in Fifteenth Street. . . . Yeah, that's the place. He's heeled but I've got him covered, and he's got a pal hanging across the street. . . . Do me a favor and pick the pal up and then come here and pick up this guy. . . . Well, he's got an idea in his nut that me and Beryl bumped some guy off. . . . Yeah, imagine that! . . . Will you? . . . Thanks a lot, old pal.”

He hung up. “Well, big boy, what do you think of that?”

“Swell, for the time being. But what do you think you're going to get out of it?”

“The satisfaction of seeing you get a rough deal from the cops.”

Donahue looked from the fat man to the girl. Her lips were tight, she was grinding the bent knuckles of one hand into the palm of the other. The fat man looked formidable, lowering, his black fedora pulled down to his thick eyebrows.

“So you want to turn me over to the cops,” Donahue said. “That's funny, because I like cops.”

He went on talking, rambling aimlessly, wisecracking and chiding the fat man and the woman. He appeared cheerful and nonchalant, but deep in his hard brown eyes two tiny flames burned steadily, warily--and in the set of his neck was tension.

“Oh, shut up, shut up!” cried the woman, a note of hysteria in her voice.

“You wouldn't turn me over to the cops,” Donahue said, lying his way on and on. “I know you two. I know you from cradles onward. The both of you. I know too much about you. You wouldn't be fools enough to throw me to the cops. What I know about you, Beryl, would fill a book. And you, Tony, you moon-faced spaghetti-bender. I don't care if you do know a dick named Mike So-and-so.”

“Pipe down!” growled the fat man.

“Not on your natural, kid. You can't make me pipe down. You're yellow, you beef-faced jerk. You wouldn't dare use that rod. You carry it for show. The only chance I'd have of getting plugged by you would be if the gun went off accidentally. You're just a punk.”

“Damn you, shut up!”

“Make me.”

The fat man came forward, his eyes muggy, his lip curling.

“I tell you, shut up!” he choked.

The woman beat her temples with her fists and cried:

“Oh, --! . . .” She threw herself violently on to the divan, picked up a pillow, punched it, threw it down again, clawed at her hair and rose. “For--sake, Tony--”

“Be quiet, Beryl.”

“Tony--”

“Shut up!”

She swallowed hard.

A buzzer sounded.

“Get that, Beryl,” Tony said.

She went numbly across the room towards the door, beside which was an ivory push-button. She arched her back, pressed the button. Then suddenly she choked and slumped to the floor, rolled over and lay in a dead faint.

“Don't worry about her,” the fat man said.

Presently there was a knock on the door.

“Come in,” the fat man said.

The door swung open. A neat, tall man stood there with his hands in his pocket, chewing on a cigar, half-smiling.

“You look funny with that gun, Tony.”

“Come in, Mike. And collar this bird.”

“I picked up a couple of harness bulls on Lexington and we've got the other guy downstairs. What's it all about, Tony? Oh--oh, Beryl pass out?”

“Can you blame her, with this guy picking on us?”

The fat man talked at length, and the other listened and rolled his cigar back and forth and kept looking from Tony to Donahue with polite interest.

“All right, Tony,” he said, “I'll take him over to the precinct.”

“Yeah?” said Donahue. “Well, if you take me, brother, you'll take him too.”

“Now don't give me any lip. Get your hat and come along.”

The fat man said: “See if he's heeled, Mike.”

“Ain't he had his rod out yet?”

Donahue said: “When I pull a rod, I mean it. Not like this guy here.”

“Stick that in his back, Tony, while I take it. This guy sure acts tough. Keep your hands way up, brother.”

He removed Donahue's gun from its armpit holster, hefted it and unlocked the safety in a kid-gloved hand.

“Get Beryl too, Tony,” he said. “Then you better come around to the precinct and we'll thrash this thing out. On your way, you,” he said to Donahue.

Donahue scowled at the fat man. “Don't forget what your boy friend just said.”

“Get,” said the laconic boy friend.

Donahue jabbed him with a contemptuous look, then strode out of the room and down the corridor.

“Hey, take it easy.”

Donahue stopped short at the head of the staircase and spun around. “Listen; use your head. You're not getting anywhere by hauling me over the coals. I'm a right guy, copper.” He began gesturing with his hat.

“Get down them stairs.”

“On the up and up now, give me a break. You're just wasting your time by dragging me over. No kidding. I tell you, I'm strictly kosher. Tony's the guy you want. The fat boy and the jane. Not me.” He tapped the man's chest with a forefinger. The man stiffened. “Listen, copper. Honest. Don't arrest me. Please. I ask you in a nice way. And don't press that gat in my stomach that way.”

He winced and put his hand on barrel of the gun. The gun pressed harder, the men's eyes locked.

“You fool, take your hand off that gun or I'll let you have a bellyful!”

Donahue's forefinger shot forward almost imperceptibly, closing the safety. At the same time he gripped the gun hard and heaved it and the man's hand outward and upward, his finger tight on the safety.

The man snarled in his throat, tussled. Donahue hit him with a hard short left to the point of the jaw and both went tumbling down the stairs. They landed sprawling at the bottom.

“You will, will you?” rasped Donahue. “You will try to fake you're a cop! What a laugh you hand me!”

“Let go this rod!”

They heaved up, wheeled around, crashed against the

wall. Donahue cut loose with his left again. The blow caught the man on the jaw and slammed his head against the wall. He cursed and Donahue planted a hard left in his stomach, followed with another to the jaw and a third between the eyes.

By sheer force he tore his gun from the man's hand, flattened him against the wall with the gun jammed against his stomach. With lightning-like speed he took the man's own gun, a .45, from its armpit-holster, released the safety.

“Now get downstairs,” he said.

The man hesitated.

Donahue clouted him with one of the guns and booted him along. People in the house were stirring. Donahue drove the man down to the main hall and kept prodding him towards the lobby. He made him open the inner door. He planted him against the wall of the lobby with his two guns.

“Now, you poor dumb heel,” he rasped, “what about the other guy standing across the street?”

“Hell! Go out and find out!”

“Listen, you! So help me living--!”

“It was a stall. There wasn't any guy out there. I didn't see any. It was just a stall. I was fooling you.”

“It was, eh?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, pipe this, sweetheart. I don't fall for that. I want it straight.”

“I told you straight.”

Donahue cracked him across the jaw with a gun-barrel. “Did you?” he said, all playfulness gone from his manner. “Did you? No, you didn't, you louse! No, you didn't!”

The man crouched against the wall, his teeth drawing blood to his lips, murder and hatred and fear toiling in his eyes. He did not look so neat now, nor was he as laconic as he had been.

Sounds increased in the house. There were voices in the corridors and a bell ringing somewhere.

“Get it out,” grated Donahue. “Give it to me straight.”

Blood dripped from the man's cheek, from the lips he . had bitten.

The inner door whipped open and a group of men in bathrobes bunched there. Before Donahue could say a word they sailed upon him.

“Here--here!” Donahue snapped. “Let go! I'm--”

From the hall yelled the fat man “Get him! He tried to waylay me in the hall! The two of them!”

The man who had been laconic--and wasn't now-- ducked out through the swing doors.' The fat man barged through and tore after him.

“You damned fools, let go!” roared Donahue.

Anger in him became fury. Fury gave him wild, devastating strength and cyclonic speed. He tossed one man clear over his head, floored another with a swung gun, kicked another, drove a fourth reeling back into the hall. He still had the two guns. He gripped them hard. He kicked open a swing door and poised outside, hefting his guns.
V

THE TOP OF HIS HAT was crushed in. The wind caught his baggy coat and ballooned it, flapped his upturned collar. He saw the fat man and the other running side by side; saw the latter receive the fat man's gun. Beyond, near Third Avenue, was a parked car, with no tail-light. The fat man and the other ran across the street towards it.

Because the men in the lobby were picking themselves up and gathering for a new attack, Donahue ran out to the sidewalk and slid along the house-fronts. He saw the fat man and his boy friend reach the parked car. They looked back. Donahue was hiding in the shadow of a facade. His hands were hard on the guns.

He heard the roar of the motor as the fat man and the other climbed in. Donahue knelt down on one knee, raised his left arm, laid the gun in his right hand across the crook of his elbow, aimed. Three times the black muzzle spewed jets of flame, and the echoes banged violently in the street.

He saw the car start to limp off. He had ruined the rear left tire. Still kneeling, still aiming, he fired again--broke an unlighted spotlight attached to the left of the windshield. The car turned north on Third Avenue and Donahue broke into a long-legged, bounding run. He saw it bouncing up the avenue on its flat tire, swinging among the Elevated pillars. Donahue knelt between the street-car tracks, took aim again over his left arm, cut loose with the remaining three shots in his gun. He blew out the right rear tire, switched the .45 to his right hand and raced up the side-walk. He was half a block from the car when it swung east into Eighteenth Street. He stopped short, raised the .45 and put five shots through the long hood. He piled in a doorway as a half dozen jets of flame issued from the tonneau; slipped a fresh clip into his own gun, switched it to his right hand, gripped the .45 in his left and started off again.

Turning the corner, he saw the car half-way down Eighteenth Street. But he didn't hear its motor, and he saw men piling from its door: four men. He let fly with a shot from his left hand, and the men pounded for the sidewalk. One of them didn't reach it; he plunged headlong into the gutter. Donahue flattened against a house as one gun spoke twice and two bullets whistled past and shattered a window.

The neighborhood crackled with the dying echoes of gun shots. Somewhere far distant a police whistle shrilled. Donahue heard the pound of running feet again and saw three men racing towards First Avenue. He left the house wall and broke into a run. He had gone but a dozen steps when he saw gun flashes at the end of the street. He stopped in his tracks, saw the darting figures of three men; saw other figures--cops, uniformed cops.

He went on at a fast walk until he came to the form of the man in the gutter. He bent down. The man was on his face. Donahue turned him over. It was the man who had been laconic. He was dead, his gun frozen in his hand-- the gun the fat man had passed him in Fifteenth Street.

Donahue looked up. Over on First Avenue the guns were still banging. Donahue shoved his guns in his pockets and started off on the run. He reached the intersection and looked north. He saw two cops crouched behind a truck on the west side of the street. They were firing across towards the opposite sidewalk, and jets of flame spat from a dark doorway, bullets rang in the metal of the truck.

A taxicab was parked nearby, its driver crouching in a doorway. Feet hammered up the avenue and two more cops came on the run, guns drawn. A few windows grated open but no lights appeared. Donahue leaned at the corner and watched the exchange of shots across the street. The two running cops slowed down, held their guns out, advanced cautiously. In a brief lull they broke into a run and joined the two behind the truck. The firing opened again.

The taxi driver in the doorway said: “Jeeze, those guys mean business!”

“Yeah,” said Donahue.

Stray shots broke windows. Glass rained down, wood; splintered, brick chipped off.

A siren moaned up the avenue and the headlights of a police car rushed through the darkness. It pulled up at the northwest corner of Fifteenth Street. Uniformed men jumped off, and two carried sub-machine guns, one carried a riot gun. The men behind the truck yelled instructions.

The men from the riot car got a line on the doorway from which the flame issued and two sub-machine guns began to hammer. One kept hammering while the man with the other ran up to join the men behind the truck. Then it opened fire, its mad stutter raising unholy bedlam in the street.

Cops began to appear from all directions. Another police car arrived. People appeared warily, got bolder. Soon a crowd was formed, and the policemen had to drive them back. Nightsticks waved, commands were harsh and urgent. The machine-guns poured stream after stream of lead into the doorway. A powerful searchlight was thrown on the doorway. It revealed brick pockmarked with bullets, glass shattered, wood splintered and shining in long tears. And mixed with the bedlam of the guns were the cries and exclamations of women, the excited shouting of policemen, the arrival of more cars and the wailing of sirens.

A cop reported to a sergeant within earshot of Donahue: “A guy dead in the gutter up Eighteenth--and a car with two flats and a busted hood.”

“Go up there and watch it. Anybody in the car?”

“No.”

“All right, go up there.”

Donahue lit a cigarette, turned and walked away. He pushed through the crowd, reached the fringe of it and headed south. The wind blew sparks from his cigarette and there was a brown grim look about his mouth. He reached Fifteenth Street, turned east, crossed Second Avenue on the south side of the street.

He could see that many of the windows were lighted â€ž now in the small apartment house. He saw a couple of men out front. He saw a policeman twirling his stick and listening, and then he saw Monahan. He did not slow down. He kept right on walking until he reached the group and then he stopped. He stopped and he eyed Monahan with a withering hard look.

“Hello, Monahan,” he said dully.

One of the men in the doorway said: “That's the man!”

The cop wheeled, gripped his stick hard. “Hey, you!”

Donahue overlooked him. He kept looking at Monahan. His face was stony, his eyes cutting, and there was a bitter twist to his mouth. He looked angry--angry and filled with loathing.

“So you did tail me after all, Monahan,” he said.

“Now be reasonable, Donahue--”

“Be reasonable your sweet aunt's eye! And just like you, you went and balled up the whole shooting match. You copied every move I made, you dirty poacher. So it was you was hiding out here. Why didn't you give me a hand when there was action?”

“Jeeze, Donahue, I was in that car--”

“You were in that car too, I suppose, when you saw me look at that stiff in the street. But you didn't come out. You . thought there might be more fireworks. You let me go and then you sneaked back here to try to steal a march on me. A poacher, Monahan--that's you all over your dirty face.”

“Now look here, jazzbo,” the cop broke in.

“And you,” Donahue snapped. “I don't like that word jazzbo from any harness bull. Keep your jaw out of this.”

“He was the man that struck us,” repeated the man in the doorway.

Donahue looked up at him. “Oh, go inside and put your pants on.”

“Did you bust these people?” snarled the cop.

“Sure I did. I had a red-hot in my hands and they jumped me. The result of that is all the banging you hear up on Eighteenth Street. Now don't take yourself serious, officer. I was on a hot tail. I had it sewed up, only this thick mick Monahan got his fingers in the pie. When the cops up on Eighteenth Street finish with the wipers they're after they won't know what all the shooting's about. I had it sewed up --get me? Sewed up! Until this”--he looked at Monahan-- “until this-- Oh, what the hell's the use!”

“Hell, Donahue,” Monahan complained, “don't blame me. I was only trying to do my duty--”

“Duty? Why, you two-faced So-and-so, you were after the same thing I was. A pinch, to make a reputation and to get a probable reward. Don't tell any fairy stories, Monahan. It doesn't fit you at all.”

The cop poked him with his nightstick. “Now cut out the arguing. What I want to know is, what was all this about? Never mind any beefing. Just spring a little information. We're trying to find out where the hell in this place the trouble started.”

Donahue knocked the nightstick aside, “Don't get free with that, copper. Not on me. I'm touchy.”

Monahan was nervous. “Donahue, be reasonable. We can all share--”

Donahue, his nerves raw, his temper at its peak, took one step and made a furious swing at Monahan. Monahan ducked so fast that he fell down. The cop gripped Donahue and spun him around.

“One more break like that, Donahue, and I'll crown you!”

“I never saw,” Monahan said, “such a guy!”

Donahue glared at the cop. “Call Headquarters,” he said. “Tell Detective-Sergeant Kelly McPard to come over.”

“Why?”

Donahue said: “Grab hold of that guy Monahan and hold him!”

“Look here, Donahue!” Monahan cried.

“Grab him!” Donahue shouted.

The cop cursed and grabbed Monahan, saying: “I didn't like your story in the first place!”

They went inside to an apartment on the first floor. Monahan couldn't speak. He was flabbergasted. Far away the sounds of shooting were beginning to diminish. Baffled and angry, the cop used a telephone. He asked for Kelly McPard. Kelly McPard was over at the morgue. He called the morgue.

“Sergeant McPard? . . . This is Patrolman Swansen.”

While he spoke Donahue looked out into the corridor. He stepped out casually, moved towards the staircase, then began climbing. When he reached the first landing he looked down. Then he went on, swiftly--climbed the next staircase two steps at a time. Listened again. Then he went down the corridor and stopped before the door at the left. He tried the knob cautiously. The door was locked. He looked around. Halfway down- the hall a door stood open, the occupant of the apartment was downstairs.

Donahue stepped back, gathered his strength and rushed his shoulder against the door. He smashed the lock and burst into the living-room.

Beryl was standing in the middle of the room, holding the .25 Webley. It barked as Donahue lunged, holding out his left hand. The bullet pierced his hand, was deflected, and glanced off his cheek, leaving a silver-like streak. He crashed into the woman, grabbing her gun hand. A second and third shot thudded into the floor. He ripped the gun from her hand with his bloody left hand. He grabbed her with his right and hauled her out of the room, down the hall, into the vacated apartment. He slammed the door, locked it, turned on her and backed her across the room. He set her down in an overstuffed chair.

He took out a handkerchief and wrapped it around his wounded hand. He picked up the telephone and called the City Press. He asked for Libbey. He waited half a minute. '

“Libbey? . . . This is Donny, you old soak. Hang on and get your pencil poised. I've got a red-hot here. Hang on.” He set the phone down on the oblong library table. He pulled a chair up to it. He looked at the woman. “Sit down there,” he said.

Her eyes looked green, glazed, murderous. Her red hair stood on end. She didn't move. Donahue pulled her up and shoved her into the chair, pushed it closer to the table so that she faced the telephone. Then he went around to the other side of the table, sat down on another chair and drew out both guns.--'“Get it out,” he said. “As I came in the door you fired and wounded me in the hand. I grabbed you and took the gun away from you.”

She began to laugh hysterically, in a cracked, mad voice. “You fool--you fool. I took poison--just before you came. I saw the knob turning. I took poison. A double overdose of veronal. Laugh that off! In a few minutes I'll be out of all this. I'll never burn, damn you!”

She seemed not to notice the telephone. She stared at Donahue with green burning hatred.

Donahue spoke in a low whisper. “You took the easy way out, but I can make it harder.” He moved his guns. “I can make it messy and harder--with these.”

Her eyes widened, staring at the black muzzles. “You're a killer, Beryl. I can see it in your eyes. You killed Larrimore.”

“In a few minutes--”

“I can still cut the time short with--these.”

The whites of her eyes shone. Suddenly she screamed.

“Yes, I killed Larrimore! I killed him--killed him--killed him!”

“You killed him.”

“I said I killed him!” she screamed. “Yes, and meant to. What does it mean now? I fooled you. I'll not burn. Larrimore thought he was smart--smart. And I--showed him.”

“Why?
What did he do?”

“You mean what was he trying to do! The snooper. I put him on the spot.”

“Why?”

Down below there were shouts and men running around, yelling up and down the stairways, trying doors.

Donahue said: “Tony and the rest just got smoked out. You heard the shooting. The cops got them.”

“Tony!” she cried, with bitter scorn. “He ran out on me. I asked him to stay--pleaded with him. The lousy bum had to go down the stairs. He said he would be back. He didn't come back. And he left without paying me.”

“Paying you?”

“Yes, you fool! Do you think I would have shot Larrimore for love? I was paid. You never heard of a jane yet who got a guy on the spot, did you? Well, you're hearing one now!”

She picked up a book and flung it on the floor. “Larrimore was just a nosy newspaperman,” she rattled on. “He got some dope and he tailed it down. Tony, the bum, was a pay-off man for that vice ring the cops have been trying to run down. Larrimore began to nose around the Venetian Cellar. He had brains, that guy. It was tough. I had to smoke him--but the dough looked good.”

Men were in the hall outside now.

Donahue urged: “Keep it up, keep it up.”

“What will you get out of it? I can feel the heart now. ... So this guy Larrimore hangs around Tony's for a few nights. But Tony didn't know who he was then. Larrimore was getting the lay of the land all the time. Every night he was there he picked up one of Tony's janes. He never picked the same one twice. After the janes began to compare notes it comes out that Larrimore would do nothing but take them to swell night-clubs and then send them away in a taxi. He always called himself Jack. He used to get them tight and then send them away so drunk they couldn't remember what they'd said.

“Tony began to get worried. So then one little dame comes back after one of those sessions with a stroke of con science. She used to be a friend of Magistrate Paglioni--”

“Who?”

“The boss of the vice ring. Magistrate Paglioni. Or he was a magistrate till last month. He resigned because the vice ring takes most of his time and there's more money in it. He lives in class now.

“This little dame says she can't remember whether she bragged about her playmate days with Paglioni, but she thought she did. She said Larrimore got her pretty drunk. But she did remember--she did remember that some guy slapped Larrimore on the back in one of those night-clubs and called him--Larrimore.

“Tony got a line on him. Get it? Larrimore, the newspaperman. The guy that's been exposing things for the last year. Tony went to the boss. Paglioni went crazy--almost. I'll tell it. Didn't Paglioni give me the air once? I'll tell it. Paglioni tells Tony to get rid of Larrimore.

“So I'm called in. How do you like that? I'm camped in and Tony says it's worth five thousand to bump off Larrimore. I angled so that Larrimore picked me up. He picked me up in Tony's.”

Fists pounded on the door.

“Keep going,” Donahue said.

“We hung around and drank and then he said we should go somewhere else. To a ritzy place. I said sure. See, he never figured there would be any danger from a jane. He never figured that I packed a rod. I had it, baby, in my purse. We had the cab all ready. The guy who came in and took you out before--he drove it. It was parked outside, waiting.

“Larrimore and I got in and we drove off. We went over to Third Avenue and started north. I was a little tight and nervous, because I hadn't bumped off a guy in a year and I was using a new gun. I heard an Elevated train coming up. I thought quick. I told Larrimore I would like some bourbon and pointed to a door where I said he could get some. Mike pulled up to the curb.

“Larrimore backed out, but he was suspicious. He looked it anyhow. He stood on the curb as the Elevated roared by overhead and then I let him have it. He dropped like a log. I was sure I'd finished him. I told Mike to drive off.”

Donahue heard the fists pounding at the door. He heard a key grating and withdrawn. But he was transfixed by the woman. Age had crept upon her. She looked haggard and vicious and dissipated. She was no longer the superb actress she had been earlier in the morning. Donahue, who had seen crime in its many strata, looked upon a gun-woman for the first time.

“Open this door or I'll break it down!”

Green-eyed, the woman clutched at her breast. “Say, let's have a gun. Let me blow those cops apart when they break in. Give me a break--before--I go.”

Donahue, who had a stomach for nasty sights, shuddered and began to wear a sickly look. Blindly, the-woman flung herself across the desk, tried to grab one of his guns. He had no difficulty preventing her. She whimpered and lay on the table.

Donahue pocketed his guns, rose, picked up the telephone. “Hello, Libbey. . . . The name? Downstairs on the door it says Miss Beryl Mercine. . . . No, not mercy-- M-e-r-c-i-n-e. . . . That's right. . . . She's lying on the desk now, dead, I believe. . . . She says veronal. I wouldn't know. . . . Will that make the daylight editions? . . . Just, eh? Good. . . . Oh, that noise you hear is a hot-headed cop about to break in. ... Now remember, sweetheart, the Interstate Detective Agency nabbed this case, with Donahue, if you please, to be credited. Don't by any chance slip in any such name as Monahan-- Just a minute, Libbey. Hang on.” The door had burst inward. The patrolman loomed there with his gun drawn. A man in plain-clothes held a gun. Behind them, looking over their heads, was rosy-cheeked Kelly McPard, and farther back, Monahan.

The patrolman stamped in, red-faced, angry. “What the hell's the idea? I've been, looking all over this dump for you!”

Monahan yapped: “It was a trick! See! He's got a woman!”

Kelly McPard came in, wearing his fixed cherubic smile. He crossed to the woman, took hold of her hair, lifted her head, looked at her face and let the head down again. Then he looked at Donahue, who was sitting on the desk, holding the phone in both hands and dangling one foot.

“Well, well, Donny, everybody is mad at you,” he said. “I see your hand is all messed up. Tsk! Tsk! What's all the noise, and who's the woman?”

“Beryl Mercine, who murdered one A. B. Larrimore and then died by her own hand.”

Kelly McPard almost lost his smile. But not quite. “I feel downhearted, Donny. I'm just after finding a woman's fingerprints on that cigarette case I picked up, you remember. But it was a woman who was supposed to be out in Akron now. Bernice Marks. Also Barbara Markall. Also--he nodded towards the woman on the desk--“this woman. Good, good work, Donny.”

“But, Sarge,” said the patrolman, “he went and--”

“And,” broke in Monahan, “he said I was mixed up in it. I want an apology!”

Wearily, Donahue spoke into the telephone. “Libbey. . . Say that Detective-Sergeant Kelly McPard was on the scene ten minutes after I was shot by the woman. He took full command in a very aggressive and thorough manner. . . . That's right. And also--also, Libbey, mention Monahan's name. . . . Yeah, good old Monahan. Mention the fact that I saved Monahan from being taken for a ride. He was already in the car. I shot the gunmen smack out of the car. Monahan has just asked me to apologize. I here-by apologize.”

Kelly McPard laughed.

Monahan said: “I'm going. I see I can't depend on any of my friends any more.” He glared at McPard.

McPard said nothing, only winked at Monahan good-naturedly, and Monahan, bristling at the wink, turned and stamped out.

Donahue said: “Monahan ... on the way down the stairs, Monahan, please fall and break your neck.”

THE END