Free Dressed to Killed by Milton Ozaki Page B

deal with you."
    "What kind of a deal?" I asked suspiciously.
    Trottmann frowned at the tip of his cigarette. "You may not want to have anything to do with it," he said. "As a matter of fact, I won't blame you if you turn it down. Let me give you some of the background, so you'll know what we're shooting at."
    He ground out his cigarette. "As you may know, the police department has been in a sort of upheaval in recent months. Originally, Captain Matthews and I were with the 'Scotland Yard' detail. Trouble-shooters, more or less. Then came a shake-up and we were transferred to the west side. We raked hell out of that district and shut it up tight. Then, with no explanation, we got shifted here. This is a rough district, the kind that's a challenge to men like us."
    "It's lousy with perverts and cheap crooks!" Matthews growled.
    Trottmann smiled slightly. "And some not so cheap," he added dryly. "Anyway, we've had a feeling that Leo Gold had his fingers in things in this district, and Arnold Richmond's name has come up too often for him to be lily-white. Also, we were beginning to take notice of Eddie Sands and that joint he ran, the Silver Cloud. But we never had anything definite to work on."
    "Where do I come in?" I asked.
    "I'm getting to that. There have been several big thefts lately. One of them was the Eastman hijacking which you said Richmond told you about. It's a big haul—four hundred thousand dollars' worth—which has been kept out of the papers, so I'm inclined to think you didn't dream that up by yourself. There's been a rash of robberies—all big-time stuff— and none of the goods has gone out through the usual fences. We know that for certain. In other words, it's being dribbled out in a new way, possibly in the way you suggested when you told about your dickering with Richmond. If so, we'd like more dope on the set-up."
    "More dope, hell," Matthews growled. "We want to knock it off."
    Trottmann nodded. "Forbes, this is where you come in: We've been cops too long not to have been conscious of a feeling of unrest in the district. Something has been building up, coming to a head. Maybe the murder of Sands was symptomatic. Maybe Richmond and Gold removed him because Sands was trying to muscle in oh their racket. Whatever it is, we'd like to know."
    "The guy to ask is Sands—and he's dead," I pointed out.
    "Yes, but Sands wouldn't have been operating alone. If he was active at all, it was with a highly organized gang, one which still exists, one which is floundering now but which will have a new boss in a few days."
    "I get the picture," I said. "But that's all I do get."
    "As cops, we're handicapped. We're hampered by routine and red tape. You, for instance, could dig faster than we could."
    I laughed sarcastically. "In other words, you want me to be a clay pigeon."
    "That's about it," Trottmann admitted. "The killing of the Kent girl makes the thing jell, to my mind. It gives credence to your story. Enough, anyway, for Captain Matthews and I to feel that it's worth a chance."
    "What it boils down to, then, is this: You're willing to give me a pass on the chance that I can raise a stink big enough for you to smell—officially."
    "Yes—and no," Trottmann said carefully.
    "What the hell does that mean?"
    "Give it to him straight," Matthews interjected impatiently. He drummed his desk with his fingers. "He has to know what kind of a shake he's getting."
    "The papers have got hold of you and everybody knows you're tied in with the Sands killing," Trottmann said, nodding. "If either Matthews or I gave you a pass, we'd get hell from the papers, there'd be a difficult explanation to make to the commissioner—and, also, we'd be tipping the other parties to the fact that we're on their tail. So we can't let you go."
    "Then how the hell—"
    "But," Trottmann accented the word delicately, "but you could escape!"
    I blinked. "You'd still get hell."
    "Not as much. We've agreed that it's worth a chance."
    "But-" I stared