Free The Last Cop Out by Mickey Spillane Page B

survived the economic trends and emerged as a powerful spokesman for the black community. His heavy hand and influential contacts had kept his area cool and not much went on he didn’t know about.
    When they finished, Cammie, his pretty little wife who had the only voice he actually feared, sent them into the living room to talk while she cleaned up, setting the coffeepot on the table between them.
    Junior offered Gill a cigarette from his pack and snapped the lighter on. “You been hurting since the bust?”
    Burke blew a stream of smoke toward the ceiling. “Not really.”
    “Don’t fake me out, buddy.”
    “So I hurt for a little while,” Gill said. A touch of humor showed in his eyes and he added, “I’m back again.”
    Junior nodded, showing no surprise at all. He listened while Gill sketched in the details and nodded again. “You need some help?”
    “A little.”
    “Say it, man.”
    “A young guy named Henry Campbell who’d be about twenty-five years old. His last place was a furnished room down on Bleecker Street, but he didn’t leave any forwarding address.”
    “How long ago?”
    “Couple of years.”
    “That’s a lot of time.”
    “I know, but there aren’t many places he can go, either.”
    “Yeah, I know. Being black means being located. You only got one ghetto or another to hole up in. Suppose he left the city?”
    “Doubtful. He was born here. Parents dead, two brothers in the Post Office Department who haven’t heard from him in years, but he’s got to have friends.”
    “How far did you get?” Junior asked him.
    “If he’s working, he’s not using his social security number. He isn’t listed on welfare or unemployment books. He has no known skills, but likes to work around cars. The last time I spoke to him he parked cars in a lot owned by the syndicate.”
    Junior took a drag on his cigarette and tapped the ash off into the tray. “That would be the witness who finked out on you that time.”
    “Uh-huh.”
    “You going to lean on him?”
    “Nope. I just want to know why he changed his story. Maybe somebody else leaned on him.”
    “He may not have a good memory.”
    “Not for me,” Gill said. “For you it might be better.”
    “I’d hate to see his tail caught in a sling.”
    “So would I. It hurts.”
    You can take it. He’s got the odds going against him already.”
    “There are ways and ways of sweetening things up, Junior. He does me a favor and I guarantee him a big one back. What do you say?”
    The big man sat there smoking a minute, then nodded. “Everybody needs help sooner or later. Let me see what I can do. How soon do you need it?”
    “Yesterday.”
    “Settle for tomorrow?”
    “Any choice?”
    “None at all.” Junior grinned, his teeth flashing in the light. When Gill got up he said, “You want an escort back to your end of town?”
    “Don’t be silly,” Gill smiled back. “It’s still happy time outside.”
    “Only for us cats,” Junior told him. “We’re still nature lovers.”
    Gill laughed at him and nodded toward the window. “Sure you are. Who waters your flower box, buddy?”
    “Cammie does. She’s the farmer ’round heah. I water hers.”
    “You’re a nature lover all right, Junior.”
     
    The pudgy old lady who ran the rooming house on the West Side wouldn’t go inside because she was too comfortable in her canvas chair with the sun warming her and made Gill talk to her on the platform of the sandstone stoop. A bunch of kids made a racket in the street and a pair of winos were sharing a bottle on the curb just a little bit away.
    She remembered Ted Proctor, all right, mainly because he was killed the day before his room rent was due and she never did collect it. The few items he left behind she tossed on the garbage can and were picked up before the sanitation men ever arrived. She sold his suitcase for a dollar to a whore who was leaving and his broken watch she had kept for herself and still hadn’t gotten