Black Mask (Vol. 22, No. 2 — Mary 1939)

Gaga led them through a bedroom, and into a large closet. He fiddled with something at the back of the closet, and suddenly a door opened in the back wall, revealing a narrow staircase which led upward.

Gaga led the way, Paul followed, with Fatty’s gun touching his spine.

The staircase brought them into a similar closet on the tenth floor, and they emerged into another bedroom. This one was completely furnished. There were twin beds, and a cot against one wall, and carpets on the floor.

“Frenchy owns this house,” Fatty explained to him. “He wouldn’t tell us to bring you through that closet if he thought you was going to stay alive much longer.” He shook his head in commiseration. “Too bad. Such a nice looking guy, too!”

The bedroom was fairly dark, for there were shutters on all the windows, and Paul could see that they were fastened on the inside with padlocks. He guessed that he was not the first prisoner that had been brought to this place.

Fatty saw his glance, and grinned. “The people what live here is supposed to be in Florida for the winter. Nice set-up, huh?”

They went through a short hall, and into a kitchen. The kitchen windows were likewise shuttered. There was a litter of dishes in the sink, and a pile of opened cans in a carton on the floor. Paul guessed that this had been used as Baby Face Matt Squeer’s hideout, while the police and the Federal Agents searched for him all over the country.

What especially attracted Paul’s glance was a nice shiny vacuum cleaner in one corner of the kitchen. His eyes lighted with professional interest when he saw the brass name-plate on the machine: Easy-Way Vacuum Cleaner.

Although he had only been in the vacuum cleaner business for one day, he still experienced the reaction of pride at finding a product of his firm in such an unlooked-for place. He saw that the bag was bulging with accumulated dust, and through his mind there started to run the patter he had learned out of the manual.

“Now, madam, a vacuum cleaner is like an automobile. It requires frequent cleaning and constant care...”

He was rudely snapped out of it by Fatty, who gave him a shove that sent him staggering into the next room. Before he could regain his balance, Fatty was in after him, and gripped him by the arm, pushing him up against the wall.

Gaga came in after them, and spoke to one of the two men who were in the room.

“Look what we won, boss! We were outside Hastings’ house, like you told us, expecting Baby Face to come out shooting’. And what do we get, but this!”

Paul recognized the bigger man of the two, as the much-photographed Lawrence Cleverly.

Cleverly, the political boss, was a well set-up man in his middle fifties, with iron-gray hair, and a square, determined jaw.

Frenchy Peck was small, thin, with black hair oiled back in a flat pompadour, and a small turned-up mustache. He looked like a visiting foreign count, but there was a ruthless glitter in those coal-black eyes of his.

Frenchy had prospered greatly in the last five years, since Lawrence Cleverly began to give his mob protection. Throughout the gambling fraternity it was an accepted fact that you couldn’t buck or compete with any gambling house that Frenchy opened, because Cleverly was on his payroll. And Frenchy reciprocated by doing any odd little jobs that Lawrence Cleverly needed done to maintain his political leadership.

Paul Tyler knew all this from having read the editorial pages of the evening newspapers. But he had never expected to come into such close contact with the vicious set-up.

Frenchy Peck came across the room and said coldly to Gaga and Fatty, “All right, boys. Frisk him.”

They went through Paul’s pockets and took away Fowler’s service revolver. Frenchy snatched the gun eagerly and turned to Cleverly.

“Is this the gat, Larry?”

Cleverly frowned. “No. I told you it was a pearl-handled pistol.”

“O.K., O.K.” He swung back to Paul. “What about it, guy? Did you knock off Groh? Or did Matt Squeer get him?”

“Squeer got him,” Paul replied. “I was only in there trying to sell a vacuum cleaner.”

Fatty snickered. “That’s his story, boss, and he sticks to it. Personally, I think he’s a dick working for the D. A.”

Lawrence Cleverly snorted. “Would he have shot Fowler then?”

Frenchy’s eyes narrowed. “We don’t even know that he did shoot Fowler when he escaped. Maybe they framed it to make it look like he made a break—”

Just then there was the sound of a buzzer.

“That’ll be Tony,” said Gaga. “He stuck around downstairs to look over a dame that might of been tailing us.”

They heard the creaking of the secret door in the closet, at the other end of the apartment, and in a moment there were steps in the kitchen. The door opened, and Tony appeared there, grinning contentedly, and pushing Helen Hastings in front of him.

Her coat was ripped across the front, and the little hat was hanging down the side of her head, and she was flushed and angry.