The Mike Hammer Collection

“Let’s say she shot him. It doesn’t really matter. She was just as guilty even if it was the other one. At least the other one carried the gun off—a pickup rod traceable to no one if it was thrown away printless. His wife delayed long enough so she and her compatriot could fake a robbery, let the guy get away, then call in the cops.

“Nor does it end there. The same wife still acts as the big Washington hostess with her same ear to the same ground and is an important and inexhaustible supply of information to the enemy. Let’s say that she is so big as to even be part of The Dragon team. He was Tooth, she was Nail, both spies, both assassins, both deadly enemies of this country.”

Behind me the water went on again, a downpour that would rinse the bubbles of soap from her body.

“All went well until Richie Cole was killed. Tooth went and used the same gun again. It tied things in. Like I told you when I let you be my sounding board—coincidence is a strange thing. I like the word ‘fate’ even better. Or is ‘consequence’ an even better one? Richie and Leo and Velda were all tied into the same big situation and for a long time I was too damn dumb to realize it.

“A guy like me doesn’t stay dumb forever, though. Things change. You either die or smarten up. I had The Dragon on my back and when I think about it all the little things make sense too. At least I think so. Remember how when Gorlin shot the radio you shook with what I thought was fear? Hell, baby, that was rage. You were pissed off that he could pull such a stupid stunt and maybe put your hide in danger. Later you gave him hell on the phone, didn’t you? That house is like an echo chamber, baby. Talk downstairs and you hear the tones all over. You were mad. I was too interested in going through your husband’s effects to pay any attention, that was all.

“Now it’s over. Tooth is nailed, but that’s a joke you don’t understand yet, baby. Let’s just say that The Dragon is tethered. He’ll sit in the chair and all the world will know why and nations will backtrack and lie and propaganda will tear up the knotheads in the Kremlin and maybe their satellite countries will wise up and blast loose and maybe we’ll wise up and blast them, but however it goes, The Dragon is dead. It didn’t find Velda. She’ll talk, she’ll open up the secrets of the greatest espionage organization the world has ever known and Communist philosophy will get the hell knocked out of it.

“You see, baby, I know where Velda is.”

The shower stopped running and I could hear her hum as though she couldn’t even hear me.

“The catch was this. Richie Cole did make his contact. He gave Old Dewey, the newsstand operator, a letter he had that told where Alex Bird would take Velda. It was a prepared place and she had orders to stay there until either he came for her or I came for her. He’ll never come for her.

“Only me,” I said. “Dewey put the letter in a magazine. Every month he holds certain magazines aside for me and to make sure I got it he put it inside my copy of Cavalier. It will be there when I go back to the city. I’ll pick it up and it will tell me where Velda is.”

I finished dressing, put on the empty gun and slid painfully into the jacket. The blood was crusty on my clothes, but it really didn’t matter anymore.

I said, “It’s all speculation, I might be wrong. I just can’t take any chances. I’ve loved other women. I loved Velda. I’ve loved you and like you said, it’s either you or her. I have to go for her, you know that. If she’s alive I have to find her. The key is right there inside my copy of that magazine. It will have my name on it and Duck-Duck will hand it over and I’ll know where she is.”

She stopped humming and I knew she was listening. I heard her make a curious woman-sound like a sob.

“I may be wrong, Laura. I may see her and not want her. I may be wrong about you, and if I am I’ll be back, but I have to find out.” The slanting beam of the sun struck the other side of the bathhouse leaving me in the shadow then. I knew what I had to do. It had to be a test. They either passed it or failed it. No in-betweens. I didn’t want it on my head again.

I reached for the shotgun in the corner, turned it upside down and shoved the barrels deep into the blue clay and twisted them until I was sure both barrels were plugged just like a cookie cutter and I left it lying there and opened the door.

The mountains were in deep shadow, the sun out of sight and only its light flickering off the trees. It was a hundred miles into the city, but I’d take the car again and it wouldn’t really be very long at all. I’d see Pat and we’d be friends again and Hy would get his story and Velda—Velda? What would it be like now?

I started up the still wet concrete walk away from the bathhouse and she called out, “Mike—Mike!”