The Golden Horseshoe

Radio Record, Volume XII, Issue 29, 30 December 1938, Page 21

The Golden Horseshoe

B

DASHIELL

HAMMETT

CONT. OP. NO. 7 DOES IT AGAIN, INA TALE ONLY "THIN MAN® HAMMETT COULD BO

What Has Gone Before: CONTINENTAL OPERATIVE NO. 7, hero of "The Thin Man," called in by wealthy Mrs. Norman Ashcraft to find her husband who had disappeared after a quarrel, has traced the missing man to Tiajuana’s Golden Horseshoe Cafe, where he: had adopted the name of Ed. Bohannon. With "Bohannon," was a pretty, young music-hall girl called Kewpie. Returning to Mrs. Ashcraft’s home in San Francisco * t0.report, the’ detective finds her dead, murdered, together with a maid and a Filipino boy. Cont. Op. No. 7, with Gorman, an aide, rushes back to Tiajuana. Kewpie welcomes him, but when the detective tells her that the murder will surely be pinned on Ashcraft, the girl turns on him. CHAPTER Ill. HEN I told Kewpie that Ashcraft would swing for the murder of his wife, she flew into a rage. "You liar!" she screamed. Her left hand flashed down under her short skirt. ¥ pushed her shoulder forward, twisting her body sharply away from me. The knife her left hand had whipped up from her leg jabbed deep into the underside of the table. A thick-bladed knife, I noticed, balanced for accurate throwing. , I slid my left arm around behind her and pinned. her elbow to her side just as she freed the knife from the table. "What th’ hell’s all ’is?" _I looked up. ‘ _. Aeross the table a man, stood glaring at .me-legs apart, fists on hips. He was a big man, and -ugly. A fall, raw-boned man with wide shoulders, out of which a Jong, skinny, yellow neck rose to support a little round head. His mouth was stretched in a snarl, baring a double row of crooked brown teeth. "Where d’yuh get ’at stuff?" this lovely person roared at me. He was too tough to reason with. "If you're the waiter," I told him, "bring me a bottle of beer and something for the kid. If you’re not a waiter --gneak." He leaned over the table and I gathered. my feet in. ¥& looked like I was going to need them to move around on. "ll bring yuh a " The girl wriggled out of my hands and shut him up. "WMine’s liquor," she said sharply. He snarled and wandered away. "Who’s your friend?" . "You'll do well to lay off him," she advised me. "Now, what’s all this about Ed being in trouble?" gti read about the killing in the papers?" . ‘ es." ° "You oughtn’t need a map, then," I said. "Ed’s only gut is to put the job on you. If he can’t, he’s nailed." "You’re crazy!" she exclaimed. "You weren’t too drunk to know that both of us were here with you when the killing was done." . "I’m not crazy enough to think that proves anything," I corrected her. "But I am crazy enough to. expect to go back to San Francisco wearing the killer on my wrist, and that’s what I'll do." She laughed at me. I laughed back and stood up. "See you some more," I said as I strolled toward the door. I returned to San Diego and sent a wire to Los Angeles, asking for another operative. It was late when Gorman arrived, and he smelled of mescal from San Diego to St. Lonis and back. but his: head seemed level enough.

"T,ooked like I was going to have to shoot you loose from the place for a moment," he grinned. "Between the twist flashing the pick and the big guy loosening a sap in his pocket, it looked like action was coming." . "You let me alone," I ordered. "Your job is to see what goes on, and that’s all. If I get carved, you can mention it in your report, but that’s your limit. What did you turn up?" . "After you blew, the girl and the big guy put their noodles together. They seemed kind of agitated. He slid out, so I dropped the girl and slid along behind him. He came to town and got a wire off. I couldn't crowd him close enough to see who-it was to. Then he went back to the joint." a "Who is the big guy, did you learn?" : _ "He's no sweet dream, from what I hear. ‘Gooseneck’ Flinn is the name on his calling cards. He’s bouncer and general utility man for the joint." ° So this Gooseneck party was the Golden Horseshoe’s clean-up ‘man, and he hadn’t been in sight during my threeday spree?. And it had been on one of those three days that Mrs. Ashcraft and her servants had been killed. "{ wired your office for another op.," I told Gorman. "He's to connect with you. Turn the girl over to him, and you camp on Gooseneck’s trail. I think we're going to hang three killings on him, so watch your step. Pll be °* in to stir things up a little more tomorrow; but remember, no matter what happens, everybody plays his own game. Don’t ball things up trying to help. me." "Aye, aye, Cap," and he went off to get some sleep. The next afternoon I wandered around looking for _ some fellows I needed. I spotted the first one-a sunburned man who was plainly a farm-hand in his Sunday clothes. "How'd you like to pick up five bucks for a few minutes’ work?" I tempted him. He would like it, but what was the work? ; . "T want you to go over to the Old Town with me and look at a man. Then you get your pay. There are no strings to it." ; That didn’t exactly satisfy him, but five bucks are. five bucks. He decided to try it. I put the farm-hand over by a door, and went after . another-a little, plump man with round, optimistic eyes and a weak mouth. He was willing to earn five dollars in the simple and easy manner I had outlined. Then I got a Filipino-and a stocky young Greek. _ Four men were enough. I put them in a jitney and took them over to the Old Town. "Now this is it," I coached them when we had arrived. "t'm going into the. Golden Horseshoe Cafe, around the corner. Give me two or three minutes, and then come in and buy yourselves a drink." I gave the farm-hand a fivedollar bill. "You pay for the drinks with that-it isn’t part of your wages. There’s a tall, broad-shouldered man with a long, yellow neck and a small ugly face in there. You can’t miss him. I want you all to take a good look at him without letting him get wise. When you’re sure you’d know him again anywhere, give me a nod, and come. back here and you get your money. Be careful when you give me the nod. I don’t want anybody in there to find out that you know me." , ? It sounded queer to them. They asked me questions, which I refused to answer, but they stuck. yy Gooseneck was behind the bar, helping out the bartenders, when I entered the place. I couldn’t find Gorman’s freckled face in the crowd, but I picked out the hatchet-sharp white face of Hooper, another Los Angeles operative, who, I knew then, had been sent down in response to my second telegram. Kewpie was farther down the bar, drinking with a little man. ‘She nodded at me, but didn’t leave her table. Gooseneck gave me a scowl and the bottle of beer I had ordered. Presently my four hired men came in. They did their parts beautifully! First they peered through the smoke, looking from face to face, and hastily avoiding eyes that met theirs. A little of this, and one of them, the Filipino, saw the man T had described, behind the bar. He jumped a foot in the

excitement of his @iscovery, and then, finding Gooseneck glaring at him, turned his back and fidg reted, The three others spotted Gooseneck now, and sneaked looks iat him that were as conspicuously furtive as a set of false whiskers. Gooseneck glowered at them. The Filipino turned around, looked at me, ducked his head sharply and bolted for the street. Another of my eonfederaies, the Greek, cleared his throat with the noise of a gasoline engine’s backfire. Gooseneck was edging down the bar, a bungstarter in one hand, his face purple. I looked at my assistants. Their nods wouldn't have been so terrible had they come one at a time, but they were taking no chances on my looking away again before they could get their reports in. The three heads bobbed together-a signal that nobody within twenty feet could, or did, miss-and they scooted out of the door, away from the long-necked man and his bung-starter. I emptied my glass of beer, sauntere? out of the saloon and around the corner. They were clustered there where I had told them to wait. "We'd know him! We'd know him!" they chorused. "That's fine,’ I praised them. "You did great. Here's your pay. Now if I were you boys, I think I’d sort of avoid that place after this." They grabbed their wages and were gone before | had my speech. I returned to the Golden Horsc-shoe-to be on hand in case one of them should decide to come back there to spill the deal to Gooseneck. Kewpie had left her table and met me at the door, She stuck an arm through mine and led me toward the rear of the building. I noticed that Gooseneck was gone from behind the bar. When we had dropped down in front of a vacant table, she asked: "Who were your friends?" "What friends?" "The four jobbies who were at the bar when you were there a few minutes ago." "Too hard for me, sister." I shoo: my head. "There were slews of men there. Oh, yes! I know who you mean! Those four gents who seemed kind of smitten with Gooseneck’s looks. I wonder what attracted them to himbesides his beauty!" , She grabbed my arm with both hands. "So help me, Painless," she swore, "if you tie anything on Hd, I’) kill you!" Her brown eyes were big and damp. She was a hard and wise little baby, but she was only a kid, and she ‘was worried sick over her man. ~ -E patted her hands. "T could give you, some good advice," I said as I stood up, "but you wouldn’t listen to it. It won’t do any harm to tell you to keep’ an eye on Gooseneck, though--he’s shifty." There wasn’t any. ‘special meaning to that speech, except that it might tangle things up a little more. One way of finding what’s at the bottom of either a cup of coffee or @ situation is to keep stirring it up. Hooper came into my room in the San Diego hotel at @ little before two the next morning. -. "Gooseneck disappeared, with tailing him, immediately after your first visit, " he said. "After the (TURN OVER PAGE.)

second visit, the girl went around to a ‘’dobe house on the edge of town, and she was still there when I knocked off. The place was dark." Gorman didn’t show up. _ & bell-hop with a telegram roused me at 10 o’clock in the morning. The telegram was from Mexicali: Drove here last night holed up with friends sent two wires. GORMAN. That was good news. The longnecked man had fallen for my play, had taken my four hired stooges for four witnesses, had taken their nods for identifications, Gooseneck was the lad who had done the actual killing, and Gooseneck was in flight. I had shed my pyjamas and ‘was reaching for my union suit when the boy came back with another Wire. This one was from O’Gar, through the Agency. It was short, and to the point: Ashcraft disappeared yesterday. I used the telephone to get Hooper out of bed. "Get down to Tiajuana," I told him. "Stick up at the house where you left the girl last night, unless you run across her at the Golden Horseshoe. Stay there until she shows, Stay with her until she connects with the big blond Englishman, and then switch to him. He’s a man of less than forty, tall, with blue eyes and yellow hair. Don’t let him shake you-he’s the big boy in this party now.: T’ll be down. ff the Englishman and I stay together and the girl leaves us, take her, but otherwise stick to him." ' I dressed, put down some breakfast and canght a stage for the Mexican town. The boy driving the stage made fair time, but ‘you would have thought we were standing still to see & meroon roadster pass us near Palm City. Asheraft was driving the roadster. . The roadster was empty, standing in front of the adobe house, when I saw it again. I knocked on the door of the t adobe house,

Kewpie’s voice: "Who is it?" "Me-Painless. Just heard that Ed is back." : "Oh!" she exclaimed. A slight pause. "Come. in." I pushed the door open and went in. The Englishman sat tilted back in a chair, his right hand in his coat pocket-if there was a gun in that pocket it was pointing at me. "Hello," he said. "T hear you have been making guesses about me." "Call ’em anythiag you like," I pushed a chair over to within a couple of feet of him, and sat down. "But don’t let’s kid each other, You ‘had Gooseneck to do the turn-a sap who went on a killing spree and then lost his nerve. Going to read and-write just because three or four witnesses put the finger on him! And only going as far as Mexicali! I suppose he was so scared that the five or six-hour ride over the Lills seemed like a trip.‘te the end of the world!" The man’s face told me nothing. He eased himself around in ‘his chair an inch or two, which would have brought the gun in his pocket -if a gun was there-in line with my thick middle. The girl was somewhat behind me,. fidgeting around. I was afraid of her. I had seen the blade she wore on one leg. The man and his gun didn’t worry me much, He was not rattlebrained, and he wasn’t likely to bump me off. . I kept my chin going. "You aren’t a sap, Ed, and neither am I, I want to take you riding north with bracel-ts on, but I’m in no hurry.. ‘What I mean is, I’m not going to stand up and trade lead with you. There’s a rod between my vest and my shirt. If you'll have Kewpie' get it out, we'll be all set to talk." He nodded stowly, not taking his eyes from me. The girl came close to my back. One of her hands eame over my shoulder, went under my vest, and my old black gun left me. Before she stepped away she laid the point of her knife against

the nape of my neck for an instant -a gentle reminder. "Good," I said, when she gave my gun to the Englishman. "Now here’s my proposition. You and Kewpie ride across the border with me-so we won’t have to fool with extradition papers-and Ili have you locked up. We'll do our fighting in court. I’m ‘not absolutely certain that I can tie the killings on either cf you, and if I flop, you’ . be free. If I make the grade-as . I hepe to-you’ll swing, of course. | But you might win. "What’s the sense of spending the rest of your life dodging bulls? You'll maybe save your neck, but what of the money your wife left?. That money is what you're in the game for-it’s what you had your wife killed for. Stand trial and you’ve a chance to collect it. Run -and you kiss ‘it goodbye. Are you going to ditch it, or are you going to stick to the finish-win or lose everything?" My game just new was to per--suade Ed and his girl to holt. if they let me throw them im the can I might be able to convict one af of them, but my chances weren't any too large. It depended on how things turned out later. Tt de--pended on whether I could prove that Gooseneck nad been in San Francisco on the night of the killings, and I imagined that he would — be well supplied with all sorts of proof to the contrary. We had not been able to find a single fingerprint of the killer’s in Mrs. Ashcraft’s house. And if I could convince a . jury that he was in San Francisco at the time, then I would have to . show that he had done the killing. And after that I would have to prove that he had done the killing for one of these two. NEXT WEEK: Cont. Op. No. 7 mixes up the ingredients of this ‘startling climax and brings it to a smashing and unexpected climax.