Tough Cop. John Roeburt
Turn them inside out.”
The clerk complied, then watched Devereaux finger through miscellaneous and commonplace items.
“Like I said, I’m not taking bets any more.”
“Strip,” Devereaux ordered.
The clerk looked at Devereaux protestingly. The detective’s blow caught him just under the jaw, close to the Adam’s apple. His hands were up defensively when the second blow bent him forward. Then, looking sick and green and tormented, the clerk began loosening his tie. Soon, nude except for a khaki money belt around his waist, he unbuttoned the belt sullenly and handed it to Devereaux.
Devereaux emptied its contents on a table. There were scores of small, square slips of paper—the day’s numbers play of chauffeurs, shine boys, doormen, workers, sundry bettors in the area.
“I said you were a smart boy,” Devereaux said.
The clerk stooped to recover his shorts and Devereaux kicked them out of his reach. “I asked you a question a while ago!” The detective disdained the mute appeal in the clerk’s eyes. “Who did you see running out of that lobby?”
The clerk shook his head, then held his ground stubbornly as the money belt whacked across his mouth. He pressed fingers to the flow of blood from his under-lip, with his eyes studying Devereaux as if detached from the pain he felt, as if speculating on the limits or extremes of the detective’s relentlessness. Finally he said sullenly, “Nick Longo.”
Devereaux looked at the clerk blankly. The name meant nothing to him. “Longo,” the clerk repeated. “He’s an old-timer.”
“New to me.” Devereaux frowned. His encyclopedic knowledge of the city’s underworld was a matter of pride with him. Very few had eluded his ken, and when it happened Devereaux took it as a personal failure. “Unless the name’s a phony,” he said. “What does he look like?”
“Medium height, dark. Face looks like it’s been through the mill.”
“Jail?”
“How should I know?”
“What’s his racket?”
The clerk shook his head. “I just happen to know the guy by name.”
Devereaux looked at the clerk shrewdly. “How much did he throw you to play dumb?”
The clerk reddened. “Twenty bucks.” He added hastily, “But just to forget I saw him.”
4.
On the street, Devereaux made his way to a candy store-luncheonette. The pay-station phone booth was unoccupied. He entered and dialed.
“Police Headquarters,” the voice announced.
Devereaux muffled his voice. “Check Room 418 at the Hotel Orleans.”
“Who’s calling?”
Devereaux kept silent, and the voice asked, “What happened there?” The detective hesitated irresolutely. Robbery, or attempted robbery, and possibly murder. But let the police see, satisfy themselves. For now he didn’t want the events in Room 418 confused with the chore he had undertaken on behalf of a young lady. Not officially anyhow, not yet. He hung up and hurried to his car.
CHAPTER THREE
1.
The low building diagonally across from Bryant Park wore an outdoor sign on its brow that showed a shapely girl in a swim suit. The building, a pygmy in a skyscraper jungle, housed an odd variety of enterprises. Its directory listed, in part, a gypsy tea room, a check casher, a match-your-pants service, an Atheistic Pamphlet Press, a gold buyer, a schatchen, a diamond setter, a detective agency. The last, operated by a plump thirty-second-degree Mason, and a universally respected fellow to boot, was Devereaux’s destination.
The gold lettering on the door read: “Solowey Detective Agency.” Devereaux smiled a secret, reverent smile as he took hold of the doorknob. Private detective Sam Solowey wore his badge like a clerical frock. A tolerant man, with the outlook of a psychiatric social worker, Solowey used his agency as an avenue to people and life.
The moon-faced, balding Solowey looked like a laughing Buddha. He was shoeless, and a giant toe peeked through a hole in one stocking. He wiggled his toe, greeting Devereaux, and put down his open copy of Variety.
“Still around, eh?” Solowey said.
Devereaux nodded glumly.
Solowey chuckled. “You were in a big hurry to see the world.”
“Have your joke, huh? Then let’s get down to cases.”
“I’ve had my joke.” Solowey stepped into his shoes. “Now cases?”
“Job of research mainly. Do it yourself, or put a man on it. I want you to check into a girl’s parentage. Discreetly.”
“Who’s hiring me?”
Devereaux hesitated. “I’m hiring you.”
Solowey stared at him shrewdly. “You, the retired detective! Come, I’ve got a first-aid kit in the washroom.”
“I’m all right.”
Solowey shook his head. “The hair should be cut away and the wound cleaned.”
“First get a pencil.”
“Go ahead, talk.” Solowey held a pencil over a scratch pad.
“The girl’s name is Jennifer Phillips. She’s twenty. Martin Phillips is supposed to be her father.”
Solowey’s eyes grew round. “The Phillips?”
Devereaux nodded. “Find out where he was born, when married and to whom, what offspring if any. Everything. Is the assignment clear?”
“That much, yes.” Solowey’s lips pursed. “He is supposed to be her father, you said?”
“The girl thinks he’s not, but with nothing actual to go on.” Devereaux stopped. An involuntary wave of anger was surging through him. He felt Solowey’s shrewd eyes reading his face, fathoming the depth of his emotion.
“You have a deep personal concern,” Solowey observed quietly.
Devereaux nodded darkly. “From the girl’s account, and what I guessed, the man’s a sybarite, unnatural, an obscene and gilded pervert.” His voice grated. “He pressed courtesan negligées on her at fourteen, whores’ perfumes at fifteen.”
Their eyes met and Solowey said, “It lends body to the rumors I have heard about Phillips.”
“Rumors?” Devereaux’s brows lifted.
Solowey nodded. “Ugly rumors, of a kind with those that circulate about distinguished people. The many of them, of course, are false and malicious.”
“Skip the tolerance preamble,” Devereaux said impatiently. “What’s the word on Phillips?”
“Homosexual.”
Devereaux frowned but said nothing.
Solowey quit the room, then came back with scissors and a first-aid kit. “Sit,” he commanded. The plump detective’s hands worked busily. “You didn’t report this assault on you.”
Devereaux laughed. “Where do you hide your crystal ball?”
“Your insistence on discretion.” The plump detective added pointedly, “The Solowey Agency license covers you.”
Devereaux smiled his appreciation. “Odd thing is my retirement’s still verbal. Final papers won’t come through for thirty days. But thanks. It might be smarter to be your boy at