fist tightening in my belly and sending a warm, crawly sensation across my back.
CHAPTER SIX
HENRY WILDER’S dry cleaning place was a hole-in-the-wall operation that catered to the local trade. Enough business kept him from poverty, but he was never going to get rich there. He lived upstairs over his store, a prematurely balding bachelor about fifty with tired lines around his eyes and a nervous flutter to his hands. I caught him on his lunch hour, flashed my badge and got invited in to a shabby room cluttered with junk and three racks of clothes customers had either forgotten about or didn’t have the money to redeem.
When I sat down he fidgeted on the edge of his chair waiting for me to speak. Finally I said, “Ever hear from your brother Gus?”
“That bum!”
“I didn’t ask that.”
“Sometimes I get a letter. He was up on charges in Toledo.”
“Hear from him since?”
Henry Wilder was going to say no, but knew he couldn’t make the lie stick. “Sure… a phone call. After he jumped bail.”
“Where was he?”
He licked his mouth nervously and toyed with the food on his plate. “He ain’t that simple. He called direct”
“Why?”
His eyebrows went up then. “Money. What else? He wants me to send him five hundred bucks. Now where the hell am I supposed to get five hundred bucks? He didn’t even ask. He just told me to get it ready and he’d tell me where to send it”
“Going to?”
Once again, his tongue snaked out. “I… don’t know.” He took a sip of coffee to wet his mouth and added, “I’m scared of him. I always was.”
“He’s your brother, isn’t he?”
Wilder shook his head. “Stepbrother. Hell, I’d sooner turn him in, only it might not work and he’d come after me.” His eyes held a pleading expression. “What am I supposed to do?”
“The cops aren’t the only ones looking for Gus, buddy.”
“I know. That’s what I figured. So I’m caught in the middle either way,” he said.
“Then take a chance and play it right. If he calls you, call us. We have ways of keeping things quiet”
“Can… I think about it?”
“Sure. One way or another he’ll turn up, but like you said, why get caught in the middle? He asked for anything he gets.”
I went to get up, then changed my mind and asked, “You know the girls René Mills had working for him?”
For a second his face took on a startled look, then he nodded. “Rose Shaw and Kitty Muntz. They come in all the time. Rose should be in soon to pick up her stuff. That Mills, he gave ’em the boot before he kicked off.”
“So supposing we go downstairs and wait for her, Henry.”
“In the shop?” He swallowed hard, knowing what they thought of cops around here.
“Don’t worry, I’ll even help out behind the counter.” Rose Shaw didn’t show until ten after three, a flagrant little whore with a hard, tight body encased in a too-small sweater and blouse combination, her eyes showing the cynicism of her profession, the caustic twist to her mouth accentuating it. She threw her ticket down on the counter top with a crumpled ten-dollar bill from a plastic purse and stood there with a hurry-up look on her face.
I got up from the stool where I was sitting while Henry Wilder was collecting her clothes. She made me as fast as Ralph Callahan did, but in a different way. The lids half closed over her pupils and the mouth went into a semi-sneer that spat copper, and she was ready to tell me to stuff it because she wasn’t working a pad at the moment and there was nothing I could lay on her. She was too wise to get trapped by a phoney approach, and wasn’t about to get stuck with a pay off if I was a bad one.
One by one the possibilities ran through her mind, eliminating the wrong ones, and when I still didn’t make a move her face clouded because she couldn’t tap the right answer. Then she got jumpy. There is something peculiar about those on the stiffer sides of the fence, the law and the punks.
CHAPTER SIX
HENRY WILDER’S dry cleaning place was a hole-in-the-wall operation that catered to the local trade. Enough business kept him from poverty, but he was never going to get rich there. He lived upstairs over his store, a prematurely balding bachelor about fifty with tired lines around his eyes and a nervous flutter to his hands. I caught him on his lunch hour, flashed my badge and got invited in to a shabby room cluttered with junk and three racks of clothes customers had either forgotten about or didn’t have the money to redeem.
When I sat down he fidgeted on the edge of his chair waiting for me to speak. Finally I said, “Ever hear from your brother Gus?”
“That bum!”
“I didn’t ask that.”
“Sometimes I get a letter. He was up on charges in Toledo.”
“Hear from him since?”
Henry Wilder was going to say no, but knew he couldn’t make the lie stick. “Sure… a phone call. After he jumped bail.”
“Where was he?”
He licked his mouth nervously and toyed with the food on his plate. “He ain’t that simple. He called direct”
“Why?”
His eyebrows went up then. “Money. What else? He wants me to send him five hundred bucks. Now where the hell am I supposed to get five hundred bucks? He didn’t even ask. He just told me to get it ready and he’d tell me where to send it”
“Going to?”
Once again, his tongue snaked out. “I… don’t know.” He took a sip of coffee to wet his mouth and added, “I’m scared of him. I always was.”
“He’s your brother, isn’t he?”
Wilder shook his head. “Stepbrother. Hell, I’d sooner turn him in, only it might not work and he’d come after me.” His eyes held a pleading expression. “What am I supposed to do?”
“The cops aren’t the only ones looking for Gus, buddy.”
“I know. That’s what I figured. So I’m caught in the middle either way,” he said.
“Then take a chance and play it right. If he calls you, call us. We have ways of keeping things quiet”
“Can… I think about it?”
“Sure. One way or another he’ll turn up, but like you said, why get caught in the middle? He asked for anything he gets.”
I went to get up, then changed my mind and asked, “You know the girls René Mills had working for him?”
For a second his face took on a startled look, then he nodded. “Rose Shaw and Kitty Muntz. They come in all the time. Rose should be in soon to pick up her stuff. That Mills, he gave ’em the boot before he kicked off.”
“So supposing we go downstairs and wait for her, Henry.”
“In the shop?” He swallowed hard, knowing what they thought of cops around here.
“Don’t worry, I’ll even help out behind the counter.” Rose Shaw didn’t show until ten after three, a flagrant little whore with a hard, tight body encased in a too-small sweater and blouse combination, her eyes showing the cynicism of her profession, the caustic twist to her mouth accentuating it. She threw her ticket down on the counter top with a crumpled ten-dollar bill from a plastic purse and stood there with a hurry-up look on her face.
I got up from the stool where I was sitting while Henry Wilder was collecting her clothes. She made me as fast as Ralph Callahan did, but in a different way. The lids half closed over her pupils and the mouth went into a semi-sneer that spat copper, and she was ready to tell me to stuff it because she wasn’t working a pad at the moment and there was nothing I could lay on her. She was too wise to get trapped by a phoney approach, and wasn’t about to get stuck with a pay off if I was a bad one.
One by one the possibilities ran through her mind, eliminating the wrong ones, and when I still didn’t make a move her face clouded because she couldn’t tap the right answer. Then she got jumpy. There is something peculiar about those on the stiffer sides of the fence, the law and the punks.
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