Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, Vol. 12, No. 6, May 1963

Car Y replied: “Investigate hold-up of liquor store at Howard and Fayette.”

Egan said: “Will do. Roger.”

O’Konski had left the bakery on. Belair Road in the blue Ford panel truck.

O’Konski arrived at 9:32. He parked the Elite Bakery truck in the alley right in back of the Chesapeake Telephone Company’s Volkswagen. The three repairmen in their, blue jumpers paid — or seemed to pay — no heed as he went in the back door and up the stairs to the third floor of 674 Preston.

Ten minutes later the Fiat came slowly down Preston Street, found a parking space in front of the house next door to 674, and Heisman got out. He went in the front door of 674.

Byers’ black Plymouth was parked in front of the apartment house, right where it usually was. The house had no garages; its tenants had to leave their cars on the street.

By 11:30 the tensed-up men had begun to feel somewhat let down. Nobody had come out of the house, and it looked like a dry run. Egan slouched behind the wheel of the Chevvie, chewing the stub of a little cigar, his topcoat pulled up around his ears against the November chill. He never wore a hat.

At 12:10 A.M. O’Konski and Heisman came out of the front door of the house, conversed briefly for a moment, and then O’Konski went back to the alley where he had parked the Elite Bakery truck. Heisman headed for the Fiat parked in front of the house next door. Upstairs in Apartment 3B the lights went off.

Had Byers, Mahaffey, and Visconti gone to bed so quickly? Egan’s heart dropped into the pit of his stomach. But he picked up the walkie-talkie.

“All right, everybody,” he said. “Here’s the way we’ll play it: Clancy and I’ll take Heisman. You telephone guys stay with O’Konski. If and when the black Plymouth goes, Grissom and McClure will stick with it. Looks like a dry run, but we’ve got to play it out.”

The racy little Fiat, with the tall, tweedy, pipe-smoking Heisman at the wheel, turned north on St. Paul Street with Egan and Clancy in the Chevvie three cars behind it. It went right at North Avenue, turned into Belair Road, and proceeded northeast at a leisurely pace. Heisman put it in the garage of his attractive two-story house. Fifteen minutes later all the lights were out.

Gone to bed. A goddam dry run. But Egan decided to hang on. The hunch was fading, but it was still there. He located the stakeout car and told the two detectives in it to go home; he and Clancy would take over, and stay on the job all night, if they had to.

The men going off duty left them a thermos half full of black coffee. Egan and Clancy sat there, about half a block down from Heisman’s house, on the other side of the broad street. There were several other cars parked along the highway that was also U.S. Route 1, and the black Chevvie was inconspicuous. They sipped coffee, smoked, and listened to the police radio. Even at that hour of the night, there was a good deal of traffic.

At about 3:30 A.M. a light came on in an upstairs room of the Heisman home. Egan nudged the dozing Clancy.

At 3:45 Heisman, carrying a small tan attache case, came out of the house, went into the garage, and drove out a car they hadn’t seen before, a black Mercury about two years old, as inconspicuous as their own. It turned southwest, towards the downtown area. The Chevvie followed, keeping two blocks and several cars back.

Suddenly Heisman gunned the powerful Mercury and it shot ahead. Tires screaming, it turned right on Belvidere Avenue. Phil Egan cut out and passed several trucks, racing after it. Had Heisman spotted them, or was he merely taking the usual underworld precaution against a possible police tail?

Heisman, tires screeching, turned right on Loch Raven Boulevard. By the time the Chevvie got around the corner, the Mercury had vanished, in the maze of side streets.

“God damn!” the frustrated Egan shouted.

Heisman had shaken them. They searched the side streets between Belvidere Avenue and Cold Spring Lane for fifteen minutes, without success. The pigeon had flown the coop.

Shaking with anger and nervous tension, Egan headed for Preston Street. He turned on the walkie-talkie, but couldn’t raise anybody. The other cars were out of range. He didn’t dare use the police radio — he hadn’t made up any code to cover this situation.

A few minutes later he tried the walkie-talkie again. This time there was an answering click and a faint voice said: “I read you, Phil, but just barely. This is Lou Grissom in the Buick. We’re tailing Byers’ black Plymouth. He and his two pals left the apartment about half an hour ago. They’ve just been driving around. Right now we’re on Erdman Avenue, heading northwest towards thirty-third Street at about thirty-five miles an hour. Over.”

Egan shouted: “Hang on, Lou! We’ve lost Heisman. We’ll pick you up at the corner of Loch Raven Boulevard and thirty-third. Over and out.”