Mouthpiece (5 page)

“No,” said Delaney. “I
don't guess they did. I found this on Jackson.” He extracted a limp black thing
from his pocket and patted it against the palm of his hand.

“Huh! I've seen plenty
of blackjacks,” grunted Blackford.

“Not like this, you
haven't.” Delaney held it up. “It's stuffed with cotton batting.”

“Well, that's funny.”

“Funny as a morgue,”
snapped Delaney. “You haven't got so much as a bump on your head. When Soapy
Jackson sapped you with a cotton blackjack, you fell down and played possum to
make it look good. Furthermore, your pals have been babbling their heads off.”

Blackford's face was
frozen in stunned surprise. All his nonchalance slid away from him like an
avalanche. In the jumpy firelight his skin was ashen.

“They—they talked? You
mean—”

Delaney smiled
twistedly and knew he had scored.

“Look out there at
that squad car,” he snapped.

The investigator
looked, and if he had been disconcerted before, he was wild with terror now.
His eyes went wider and his jaw slacked, showing unclean teeth. Something like
a strangled sob came up in his throat.

And then it was as
though his entire nervous system had snapped. He was hemmed in on all sides
save one. Policemen and firemen stood to either side and in back of him. The
only cleared ground lay between the lines and the fire. Blackford choked again,
his eyes holding an insane light.

And then, before the
weary Delaney could understand what had happened, he saw with a violent shock
that Blackford had started to sprint straight toward the flames. Whether it was
an attempt at suicide or a crazed blindness, Delaney did not stop to reason.
Like a catapulted projectile, he was off in pursuit.

CHAPTER FOUR

The Family Prestige

T
HE
fire was beating hotly
against the detective's face, but he plowed ahead. Behind him Blaze Delaney was
running and shouting. A fireman tried to catch the detective's billowing
topcoat. But Blackford was already disappearing through the smoke-filled
doorway of the crackling structure. Delaney saw it with a sinking heart,
knowing that Blackford was determined not to be taken alive.

But the detective's
case was not closed. There were many loose ends he could never hope to patch
without Blackford's confession. He plunged into the welter of gray geysering
smoke, forgetful in his zeal that he himself might be engulfed and killed.

Inside there was
neither visibility nor air. The instant the lighted patch which was the door
behind him disappeared, Delaney knew that he was lost in appallingly close
confines. He was immediately deserted by his sense of direction, for in
stumbling through the blinding haze he could not walk in a straight line.

He collided with
harshly solid objects, tripping and lunging forward, groping for a wall, trying
to keep his face three feet above the floor in the air strata. And then he fell
over a soft object which lay inert. It was Blackford.

The last thing Delaney
remembered was pulling Blackford away and trying to locate the entrance. The
smoke tore at his lungs and the gray fog went black. He fell unconscious across
the investigator.

And then the detective
was trying to sit up and someone was gently holding him back. He tried several
times before he experimentally opened his eyes. He sighed with relief, for he
was looking into the face of a worried Blaze Delaney.

“Lay still, blast it!”
said the chief. “You had me worried for a while, and if you don't stay still you'll
have me worried again.”

“You pulled me out?”
croaked the detective.

“Sure. It wasn't any
trick with a gas mask. What was the idea of chasing Blackford into that place,
and why the devil was Blackford trying to commit suicide?”

“Blackford's the firebug,”
said the detective, coughing.

“Go on! You're
smoke-dippy.”

The detective shook
his head. “I'm not. How long has Blackford been in your department?”

“Why, let's see,”
pondered Blaze Delaney. “About a year. He came here from the Chicago department
with some fine letters of recommendation.”

And then Delaney the
younger lurched to his feet and kicked the stretcher away from him. There was
no holding him down, even though the old fire-eater tried hard.

Blackford was lying in
a wire basket beside an ambulance and the smoke-grimed attendant beside him was
administering oxygen.

“He's coming around,”
said the intern. “That was close.”

The detective gave
vent to a hacking cough which was immediately stilled when he saw Blackford's
eyes spring open.

“Hello, alias Blackford,”
said Delaney, kneeling down on the pavement beside the man.

The investigator shut
his eyes tightly and groaned.

“Snap out of it,” said
the detective. “You're going to do some talking right here and now. What did
you do with the original Blackford?”

“I'm him,” whined the
investigator with a beseeching look at the chief of fire-eaters.

Tom Delaney looked up
with a slow wink as though to inform Blaze Delaney that this game was being
played in the dark.

“Yeah?” said Delaney
the younger. “I happen to know you murdered him and took his papers before he
had a chance to contact the department here. And you might as well not try to
deny it!” He snatched at the dirty coat front and lifted alias Blackford up,
shaking him. “Talk or I'll pound you into hamburger!”

Fear widened the
investigator's eyes as he saw the hard, set jaw. His mouth twitched and he
tried to swallow.

Delaney shook him
again and raised a knotted fist.

“That's right,”
croaked the investigator, quickly.

“That's better,”
rapped Delaney the younger. “Who paid you to make these phony reports and
overlook fires that had been set?”

“Nobody,” whined
“Blackford.” “We got hold of owners that needed the insurance money and split
with them.”

“I thought so. And
your favorite trick was taking a bottle of nitroglycerin, wrapping it in
excelsior and putting electric wires over the mouth. That right?”

When the other had
nodded weakly, the detective went on:

“And you hooked the
electric wires to doorbells so that the fires never started until your pair of
henchmen were miles away with a good alibi. You started the Tyler Department
Store fire by connecting several ‘soup' bottles to the light switch which you
knew would be turned on just before closing.”

Dismally, alias
Blackford nodded assent. His was the expression of a thoroughly whipped dog.

“Well,” continued
Delaney, standing up, “you'll face murder on a dozen different counts, and
arson. You and your pals out there in the squad car will certainly get mighty
burnt. Did you set any more fires for tonight?”

“No,” whimpered the
investigator. “Don't I get anything off for turning state's evidence?”

“You didn't have to
talk,” snapped Delaney, “but I've a dozen witnesses that you did. It'll take
more than a smart mouthpiece to clear you of this rap. And furthermore, you're
going to turn over a list of every man who allowed you to work on his property.
Understand?”

Alias Blackford
understood. He lay like a sack of soggy straw and nodded only with an effort.
Dully he watched the two Delaneys move away.

“But how . . . how,”
began the old fire-eater, “how did you ever get next to all this? You're
leaving a lot of it out. I've done some detecting in my time, but I never
grabbed clues out of thin air that way.”

“Thin air,” grinned
the detective. “No thin air about that. I had to take some awful beatings to
get that dope. Don't I look like it?”

“You sure do,”
affirmed the elder Delaney, gruffly. “What happened to you?”

“They caught me at the
Tyler store when I came out with Blackford. Smashed me on the head with a sap,
carried me off and set a fire under me. They thought I knew a lot more than I
did. Blackford thought I was wise when he first laid eyes on me. He tipped off
his boys to be on the alert and then when I found some bottle glass inside—”

“Bottle glass?”

“Sure. I was going to
take it up to the laboratory for analysis just on a hunch. And Blackford knew
that I'd find a trace of nitroglycerin on that fragment. And when I did, I'd be
sure the fire was of incendiary origin. He was scared, and when we came out he
signaled his boys to jump me.

“They tied me up in a
closet and wired a bottle of ‘soup' to the doorbell. Then they went out and
established an alibi and sent a messenger boy back to the house to ring the
bell. He rang it and blowie! The place was on fire.”

“Nitroglycerin set off
by electricity,” growled the fire-eater. “What the devil will pyromaniacs think
up next? You were mighty lucky to get out, Son. It looks like those fellows
meant business.”

“I'll say they did.
They weren't going to have their game
queered
if they could help it. You see,
Blackford made that snatch look good by having himself knocked out, supposedly.
I found a cotton blackjack on one of his boys. If it hadn't been for the
blackjack and that piece of glass, we'd still be fighting fires all over the
town.”

“And thanks to you, we
aren't,” said old Delaney with more than a hint of pride. He pulled at his
mustache and then looked up to see an acquaintance coming toward him. “Hello,
Morley.”

Morley of Graysons'
Insurance came up beside them.

“So you're the
fair-haired lad that cleared up this mess.” He touched the detective's
shoulder. “Is it against your code to accept rewards?”

“Well,” hesitated the
younger Delaney, “we don't usually— Wait a minute. You need some new carts and
hose, don't you, Dad?”

“Gosh, yes. They got
me cut to the bone.”

“Fine,” said the
detective. “Hear that? Tell your company to make out the reward as a donation
to the fire department. They shouldn't be very slow in doing that.”

“I'll say not,”
replied the insurance agent. “You've saved us something like a million dollars
in claims, maybe more. I don't think Graysons' will forget it very fast. In
fact, we'd like to get you appointed in Blackford's place. We've got the
influence, you know.”

“Huh,” grunted the
fire-eater. “That isn't such a bad idea. Better pay and shorter hours. What
about it, Son?”

“Not bad. Maybe I
could keep you out of hot water. An hour ago, extras were on the streets saying
that you were going to be kicked out. Hurts the family prestige, things like
that. I guess I'd better take the job.” The detective grinned.

“I always said I'd
make a fireman out of you,” growled Blaze Delaney, and then fell to tugging
fiercely at his mustache to hide the pleasure in his smoke-stung eyes.

Calling Squad Cars!

CALLING SQUAD CARS!

J
IM COLLINS
lowered
his troubled head and hunched his broad, capable shoulders against the rain.
Idly he kicked at a paper which lay in his path on the sidewalk and then, as
his foot opened a soggy page, he stared ruefully at the headlines which greeted
his eye.

POLICE DISCOVER NEW LEAD
IN HUNT FOR “ONE-EYE” TASCORI MOB.

POLICE DISCOVER NEW LEAD
POLICE RADIO ANNOUNCER COLLINS
DISCHARGED FROM HEADQUARTERS
AS INSPECTOR GRIFFITH LINKS HIM
WITH EVASIVE MARAUDERS.

Jim
Collins, police radio announcer, was released on bail tonight as net tightens
in the search for the mob of “One-Eye” Tascori whose citywide robberies and
depredations have amazed and shocked citizens.

 

There
was more to it. A great deal more. It covered part of the front and slithered
over to the second page in a slimy trail of water-soaked ink. Collins kicked at
it once more and then resumed his aimless wandering.

For weeks an ugly
cloud of suspicion had hovered over his brown head. For days his soft southern
voice had borne a slight edge of worry, and then, tonight, the blow had fallen.

Collins had been
seated behind his mike in the control room utilizing an idle moment to drive
home the last plate in the miniature microphones he was perfecting. Through his
mind had run the endless chain of remarks which had drummed in upon him.
Neither detectives nor policemen had spoken to him kindly for days.

The chief had appeared
beside the control board. Glaring down at Collins, he had said, “
The jig's up
,
sonny. You're under arrest!”

They had led him back
to the dreaded
degree rooms
at the rear of the building. They had placed him in
a hard chair, turned a brilliant light on his face, to begin their endless
chain of questioning.

Collins had shaken his
head dazedly. “I can't explain why calls go out which never appear on my
record. I can't explain why a voice like mine calls squad cars away from the
scene of Tascori's crimes. I don't know, I swear I don't know!” His usually
soft voice mounted slightly in his earnestness.

The chief had clicked
his teeth together, his jaw close to Collins' face.

“Listen, Collins,
every time ‘One-Eye' Tascori has robbed a bank or stuck up a
speakeasy
, you've
been at the mike. And every time the cars have suddenly been called away from
the scene of the robbery to attend a fire which wasn't burning, to rescue a
drowning man who didn't exist.

“I know that you use
that police radio to help Tascori, so come clean. Where does he hang out? What
is the name of his gang?”

For hours the
inquisition had gone on but young Collins, worn and haggard by the unceasing
fire of the chief's snarling voice, had been adamant in his protest of his
innocence.

Finally the chief had
given up with the threat that Collins would cool his heels in jail until he
cared to divulge the information. But the chief had been thwarted in that for
McCarty, the other announcer, had gone his bail.

Now he was on the
loose. His job was gone. His reputation was ruined. Newspaper headlines
screamed at him from the racks along the sidewalk. With a meager final paycheck
in his pocket he faced imminent poverty, perhaps starvation, for although he
was a crack radioman, firms would hardly hire one who dwelled under a constant
cloud of suspicion.

Ahead of him, Collins
could see the light of a doorway below the street. He knew the place well. It
was a speakeasy of considerable size. He examined the contents of his pockets
with damp fingers.

The two miniature
microphones he had taken from his desk clanked together lonesomely. Aside from
that small check, he was broke. But he shrugged his shoulders and headed for
the doorway. Though he rarely drank, he felt the need of a stimulant now.
Perhaps it would aid his buzzing head.

At the head of the
stairs, the crash of a pistol met him from below. Rapidly it was followed by
two others. A scream and a babble of voices burst through the suddenly opened
door as four men jumped up the stairs. They brushed Collins aside roughly and
ran for a car which waited at the curb with running motor. But Collins had seen
just enough. The man in the lead had only one eye!

The radioman's eyes
went blank for an instant as he remembered newspaper pictures of Tascori. Then,
with a leap, he was to the curb, unseen by the hastily embarking men. Collins
jumped into a ring of tires on the back of the car and the machine sped away
through the rain.

Collins puckered his
mouth. Now that he was this far, where did he go from here? Quickly he tried to
fit a plan together. The machine's rubber tires were whining over the pavement
as it sped southward through the city.

Coming darkness and
the increasing rain hid him from the eyes of the traffic police, but he dared
not signal as the car passed directed intersections lest the men ahead might
notice.

It suddenly came to
him that he was weaponless, save for his two fists and his wits. Where the car
was going he did not know, nor did he know his course of action when it
arrived. He could only crouch in the darkness and await his chance.

There were five in the
car, counting the driver. Five men who had just committed the most heinous of
crimes, murder for robbery. They were the most dangerous men in the underworld,
daring everything and anything. They had indirectly ruined the radioman, and so
he clung to the tires and gritted his teeth against the ache which was seeping
up his taut muscles.

Collins hunched down
and tried to map out some plan. What if he were spotted when the men stopped
the car? What if they halted at some well-lighted filling station? What if the
car blew a tire? He held himself in readiness with aching arms and waited, his eyes
narrow as vivid bits of this chain of events passed through his mind.

Well in the outskirts
of the city, on an unlighted street, the car stopped in the driveway of a huge
unlighted house which loomed dark and forbidding in the rain. Holding his
breath lest a light suddenly betray him, Collins stepped gingerly away from the
car and slid under a dripping bush. The headlights had been switched off at the
moment of arrival, but through the rain-soaked blackness, the radioman caught
the movement of figures mounting the steps to the building. Wet leather
crunched against stone and gravel.

An ugly voice said,
“Take the bus around back, Tony, and gas her up. Look over the motor, check the
tires, and see you don't let her fall down on us! Get going!”

The car slid back to
the street and headed for an alleyway. By the light of his lamps, Collins saw
four men trudge up to the high doorway. He stiffened as he glimpsed again the
black patch which hid Tascori's sightless socket.

The door slammed, and
with rain trickling down inside his light topcoat, Collins crept to the side of
the house. Looking up he saw a crack of light on the first floor. A light
flickered through the blinds of another window.

Decisively, the
radioman returned to the front. With wet hands he examined the pillars which
supported the porch roof. With a grain of luck he saw that he could climb them
noiselessly and swing himself to the top of the porch roof with the aid of a
lattice.

Carefully he mounted
the railing and reached up. He swung his legs around the post and began the
ascent. It was tedious, difficult work, for his arms were tired from the long
strain of hanging to the back of the car.

Cautiously he felt for
the latticework, grasped the thin slats with a silent prayer that they would
support his weight, and heaved his long body up and out.

Doubling suddenly, he
projected himself onto the roof. Hanging with his head down he felt along the
slippery shingles for holds, found them and drew himself toward the white frame
of a window which gleamed dully in the blackness.

He felt in his pockets
for a knife, disentangled the clasp from several coils of thin wire which he
had absently picked up from his worktable at headquarters, and inserted the
blade under the sill.

Slowly, lest he snap
the thin blade, he pulled up. With a sigh, the window opened. The dank smell of
a cold, damp room greeted his nostrils and he placed his dripping legs over the
sill.

He rested his weight
on one foot and tested the boards around him. Finding that none of them
creaked, Collins turned and closed down the window.

At last he was inside
the house, a floor above Tascori. Unarmed, yes, but confidence swarmed in upon
him as he realized that luck, so far, had been with him.

At the door of the
room, he pressed his ear to a crack and listened. Far below him he could hear
the murmur of men's voices. Silently, Collins opened the door and cast his eyes
over the hall which lay before him. At his right, a stairway led down, allowing
some of the light from below to flicker on the walls.

The sound of voices
had grown louder and Collins knew that Tascori was in the room at the bottom of
those stairs. Tensely he waited for all of the men to take their turn at
talking.

One, two, three, and
then the harsh, ugly rasp of Tascori as he derided one of the men for a clumsy
piece of work.

A chair creaked and
one of the men started across the room, his voice growing louder in the
radioman's ears.

Suddenly something
told Collins that the man was about to ascend the stairs and he glanced up to
see if a light lay above him. But the house was too old to have such a thing as
remote light control, and Collins breathed deeply.

The man's feet were
stomping on the boards. He had ceased to talk.

Knowing that inky
blackness lay behind him, and that the gangster's eyes were accustomed to the
bright light of the room below, Collins glanced around the corner. In his belt
the other carried a heavy automatic.

Excitement tugged at
the radioman's heart, causing it to beat out of time. All the bitterness which
he had borne suddenly leaped up and became strength. His strong, dark face
tensed. He felt the blood throbbing in his temples until he was almost certain
that the other could hear the rapid hammering of his heart. Wages of failure
here would be a quick death.

The gangster reached
the last step below the upper landing but a few inches away from Collins. With
a lunge, the radioman snatched out and grasped the butt of that gun. It came
free with a wrench.

Surprised, the other
grunted and stepped back, tottering on the stairs.

Collins smashed the
pistol into his startled face with such force that the gangster plunged
backwards, left the stairs and with a long crash hurtled toward the bottom.

Collins plunged after
him three steps at a time. A moment's hesitation would cost him his victory.
Almost as the other hit the first floor, Collins was beside him.

“Freeze!” he shouted
to the others. “Grab for the ceiling!” He thrust the gun out as though the very
force of it would hold the others motionless.

Tascori spat like a
caged tiger. His two henchmen remained where they were and slowly raised their
arms upward. Caught sitting down and with only an instant's warning, they were
helpless.

“Stand up!” cried
Collins. He motioned with the gun. “Stand up and turn your faces to that wall!”

Tascori's one eye
kindled and darted to a door which was now behind the radioman's back. He
stiffened and then slumped wearily. For an instant a crafty light had gleamed
darkly in that one orb, but flushed with excitement and the elation of victory,
Collins had not noticed.

The three, hampered by
their upraised arms, climbed to their feet. Sullenness and despair marked each
face. In fact, their sudden expressions of dejection were so complete and
spontaneous that the radioman might have been warned. Following Tascori's meek
example, the other two turned and faced the indicated wall.

Collins, with a glance
into the automatic's breech to make sure that it held a cartridge, strode
forward. A bulge in Tascori's hip pocket caught his eye. With intent to disarm
the gangster, the radioman reached out. It had been too easy! A smile played
over his face.

He had just touched
the bulge when the room seemed to split apart with a roar. The wall and men
spun before his eyes. A mighty hand was dragging him to the floor, relentless,
dark, awful. Suddenly he stopped fighting against the force. He had never been
so terribly tired in his life. Everything gave a final spin and vanished in
blackness.

Tascori leered down at
the motionless figure. “Nice work, Tony,” he said tonelessly to the newcomer
who stood in the door by the stairs, holding a smoking pistol.

The one-eyed man was
tall and gaunt with a pinched face and narrow, cruel lips. The black patch over
the empty socket stood out starkly against the yellow pallor of his skin. He
stooped down over the body and examined the wound in Collins' head. The man
called Tony stepped to his side.