Free Stab in the Dark by Louis Trimble Page A

dollars you toss off—like that!”
    Knox said, “If it pans out, I can put it on my expense account.” He paused, considering just how much more to tell Beeker. Finally, he said, “Here’s all I have, Mel. When I took Jock to the tavern, two guys tailed me. One was Eddie Pillow and he drives a late model Ford. The other guy I never saw before.” He described him.
    “We have a check on Pillow,” Becker said. “He may be a lead or he may have just been suspicious that you’re back in town.”
    “And he may be connected with smut peddling,” Knox said.
    “Wouldn’t that mean that someone was on to your reason for being here—if Eddie was put to following you?”
    “If that’s it, I’m not very useful,” Knox confessed. “But it’s possible that he was put onto Jock, not me.”
    “Then you think Jock was somehow tied up with what you’re here for?”
    “It’s possible, if Eddie is.”
    “He might be worth a real check then,” Beeker agreed. “And the other one?”
    “He was in the bar tonight,” Knox said. “But whether he wants me or Cora Deane now, I don’t know.”
    “Probably you,” Beeker said. “Despite the business of you getting sapped over the chair, I can’t see how she’s tangled in with things.”
    Knox didn’t see either, but he wasn’t going to dismiss her so lightly. He could not get over the idea that she was playing her cards her own way, and playing them very close to her handsome chest. The result of his scribbles indicated that in more ways than one. The trouble was that he didn’t know which way was the right way. And as he saw it, knowing that could make a great deal of difference right now. The difference between success and failure on this job for Knox himself.
    After a pause, Beeker said, “At any rate, I’ll have him checked on.”
    Knox was thoughtful. “Why not let him ride a while, Mel? Maybe I can find out more if he’s free to operate.”
    Beeker snorted. “Who do you think I’d put on him, someone in uniform? I’ll use Mousy Riley. He was staked out at Jock Dylan’s place but there’s no point in keeping him there now.”
    Knox said, “We don’t know for sure, of course, but we have to assume that Jock’s death is connected with the case I’m on.”
    Beeker looked puzzled. “I was talking about Mouse Riley.”
    “So am I,” Knox said. “If we go on the assumption that Jock was killed because he learned something—or they thought he learned something—then I suggest you keep Mouse Riley on the Dylan house—and add a few men. An outfit like that won’t take any chances, Mel. How do they know what Jock might have told his wife?”
    “I hadn’t thought of that one,” Beeker confessed. “Have it your way, Paul.”
    Knox felt like hell about Jock, but he felt a little better to know that Mouse Riley—so called because he was a silent nonentity as a shadow—would be watching Jock’s wife. And now that he was alerted for possible physical danger to her, the chances of anyone doing to her what they did to Jock were slim.
    “Did she have anythng to say?” Knox asked. “Did Jock tell her anything?”
    Beeker gave him a sour grin of understanding. “Meaning, have I been holding out on you. No, not that she told us. She did say that her husband came home full of what happened. That’s natural, of course. He showed her the money you’d given him. The idea of being written up in a magazine had him all puffed up.”
    Knox felt worse than ever. “The poor bastard,” he said. “He was getting out of his league.”
    Beeker went on, “She said that at the same time he acted a little strange. I guess she knows him pretty well. She thought he might be holding something out on her.”
    “He was holding out on me,” Knox said. “Now that he’s been killed, I’m more sure of it than ever.”
    Beek er shrugged. “That’s all. About fifteen minutes before he went into the kitchen for his beer, he got a telephone call. He wasn’t gone long