A Private Party Read online

  "What does the Commissioner want to see you about?"

  "This," said Bannerman, taking what looked to be a four-page newspaper from his inside pocket. Across the front page was the title The Loader and below it: The Official Publication Of The Independent Loaders' Union, Local Number One.

  "Oh, that thing," said Stern.

  "That thing. Look at this."

  Stern took his eyes from his driving long enough to read the huge black headline: Al Stanzyck Assassinated! The Truth!

  "What's the truth?" asked Stern.

  Bannerman laughed grimly. "Stanzyck had nothing to do with Bogan getting killed. Kline and Lane were paid by a rival union to say they saw him do it. Kline and Lane were cut down because they weren't going to stick to their story. I tell you, Mike, it's fantastic. They scream about it so hard you almost think they believe it themselves. But that's only half of it. You know what they print here about Stanzyck?" Bannerman asked the question sarcastically, but his eyes were intent on Stern's face.

  "What?"

  "It says here that the only person who had a motive to kill Stanzyck was a cop." He spoke slowly, searching for a reaction. "What do you think of that, Mike?"

  "If I didn't know whose paper that was," said Stern, “I’d think it was funny."

  "Is that what you'd think?"

  Stern looked at his boss. "Sure it's what I'd think. Don't you?"

  "Sure, sure. But let me read you this little thing." He held the newspaper in front of him. Your editors, he read, are in possession of definite evidence that some member of the Police Department, apparently half-demented, appointed himself as a one-man lynch mob with the sole purpose of murdering Al Stanzyck. When the District Attorney's ridiculously weak case against our fighting leader began to come apart at the seams, this gun-crazy cop laid his plans to kill an innocent man. And two nights ago he succeeded. "Well, how do you like that, Mike?"

  "If anybody's crazy it's the guy who wrote that."

  "Here's some more." Naturally, your editors can't trust this irrefutable evidence to the Police Department. You can imagine what that crowd of anti-labor Cossacks would do to protect one of their own. Instead, we have hired a top-flight private detective agency to pursue this case to a finish—and secure justice for our local. "That top-flight detective agency is your boy Dane."

  "I'm looking forward to seeing that one again."

  "Ah, he's all right as far as those birds go. They could have hired worse—some hoodlum like themselves."

  "What about that note I told you he stole last night?"

  "That wasn't good," Bannerman conceded. "Maybe he was just sore at me for trying to tie his hands on him. At least he left us the slugs."

  The car swung into Centre Street and coasted to a stop before the ancient Police Headquarters.

  "About those slugs, Lieutenant," said Stern as Bannerman alighted from the car. "You're not going to keep them in your desk, are you?"

  "For a while," said Bannerman quickly, his voice almost evasive. "I want to go over them myself before ballistics chews them all up."

  "Something might happen to them," Stern said.

  "Don't worry about it." Then, turning, "I ought to be out of here in half an hour." Stern watched him mount the steps of the building.

  Forty-five minutes later Bannerman re-entered the car, his lips tight, his face pale with anger. They drove away and for five minutes Stern waited in vain for a break in the charged silence.

  "What happened?" he finally had to ask.

  "You ever meet the Commissioner personally?" Bannerman said, his voice thin. "You ever shook hands with him?"

  "No."

  Bannerman held his right hand aloft. "See this? He shook this hand—and when we get back I'm going to scrub it till the skin breaks!"

  Stern stared at him uneasily.

  "That lousy politician! That fat, pompous, no-good bastard!"

  "Take it easy . . ."

  "Easy? That two-bit newspaper has him scared to death! You know what he asked me to do?" Stern shook his head.

  "Alibis! I have to supply alibis for every man in the squad!"

  "What kind of alibis?"

  "For the night before last. For the night Stanzyck was shot . . . !"

  "That's nothing to get excited about."

  Bannerman seemed suddenly withdrawn from the conversation. "That's right," he said, his voice calmer. "Nothing-to get excited about. Let's get back to the station, Mike.”

  Once inside his hard-used office, Bannerman sent immediately for his male stenographer.

  "This is a memo for all members of the squad," he said tersely. "You're to deliver a copy to each man personally. It’s not to go on the board. Understand?"

  “Yessir."

  "Awright. To the Squad: Confidential. You are to make out a timetable for your activities for the afternoon and night of—You fill in the date . . ."

  "What date?"

  "The night Stanzyck was killed."

  "Yessir."

  “Period. These timetables are to be delivered to me, comma, in person, comma, and are not to be discussed with any member of this squad, comma, or any member of the goddamn police department. Skip the French."

  "Sir?"

  "I said skip the goddamn French!"

  "Yessir."

  "Read it back."

  The stenographer reread Bannerman's dictation, skipping the French.

  "What do you think that means?"

  "Well . . ."

  "I'll tell you what it means. It means this squad is finished, that's what it means."

  The stenographer stood up.

  "If I was Mike Stern," Bannerman continued, "or Bill Weir, or any of those guys and I saw an order like this one . . ." He stopped speaking and waved his hand toward the door. "Go ahead, type it up." The stenographer headed quickly for the door. "Listen. As soon as you give Weir his copy, send him in here. Understand?"

  "Yessir."

  Ten minutes later the door to the office opened and Bill Weir came in, a white sheet in his fingers, his face a mask. "You sent for me, Lieutenant?"

  "Yeah. Sit down."

  Weir took a seat.

  "You read that?"

  "Yes, I read it."

  "Well, I'm telling you like I'm telling all the men . . ." He stopped speaking, as though his mind were elsewhere, and stared unhappily at the young detective.

  "Telling all the men what?"

  "What? Oh! That it don't mean a thing. Just a routine kind of order that don't mean a thing."

  "What does it mean, Lieutenant?"

  "What does it mean? It means to give a general idea of where you were and what you wore doing that night. That's all it means."

  "Why that particular night?"

  "Aah, just some crazy idea," Bannerman scoffed. "That union Stanzyck and his pals run—the one he used to run. They got out this lunatic newspaper, a real rag . . ."

  "I read it."

  "You read it?"

  "It was handed to me this morning when I got out of the subway."

  "By who?"

  "Some guy. He shoved it into my hands and ran down the platform."

  "Then you know what they're saying—all that crazy rabble-rousing."

  Bill Weir nodded. "Did you see what else was in it?"

  "No."

  "In a box on page two," said Weir. "The new election of officers. They all voted to succeed themselves."

  "What do you expect?"

  "Nick Mayer's the new, treasurer."

  "Yeah."

  "Kind of quick, wasn't it?"

  "I don't follow you, Billy."

  "It's not important," said Weir. "Only you'd think they'd of waited till the body was cold."

  "I'd give up on that, kid," said Bannerman. "Sure somebody hired a killer to get our witnesses. And sure it had to be Stanzyck's pals. But being sure is no good. You got to prove it."

  "I'm not talking about Kline and Lane," said Weir. "I'm wondering about who got Stanzyck. You have any ideas about
that?"

  Once again Bannerman only stared at the younger man, stared with his head cocked curiously to one side, his mouth partly open.

  “Do you?"

  "Do I have ideas about who shot Al Stanzyck?" Bannerman averted his eyes, pretended to shuffle papers on his as though searching for something. "No," he said carefully. "I don't have any ideas at all. Not a one."

  Weir stood up. "I'll make out my timetable," he said.

  “You—ah—talked to Ann, Bill? About getting married?"

  Yes, I talked to her. We're going to wait."

  "Wait? Wait for what?"

  "Until the right time," said Weir. "Whenever that’s going to be."

  Bannerman watched him leave the office. Then, with a sigh and a worried expression, he did get busy with his .current work. An hour later his telephone rang.

  "This is Ann Bogan, Lieutenant."

  "Ann! How's my sweetheart?"

  "Not very good," she told him. "And I'm calling you very confidentially. You'll have to promise not to tell Bill."

  "Well, sure, Ann. What is it all about?"

  "Bill called me a little while ago. He told me—He asked me if it was all right to fill out some sort of schedule or something and say that he spent the night before last in my apartment."

  "Oh?" Bannerman's bachelorhood was put aside as his mind turned puritan. "How long has that been going on?"

  "Ever since Ralph was killed, or right afterward. But it isn't what you're thinking."

  "I'm glad to hear that."

  "But that's beside the point," said the girl. "The thing is—Bill wasn't with me that night."

  "He wasn't?"

  "No. In fact, I thought he was working that night."

  "Did he tell you that?"

  "No. He just said he wouldn't be with me. It was right after the news flash about Stanzyck being freed—I just assumed he had a special duty that night."

  "I see. Well what are you going to do?"

  "Bill's worried about something, Lieutenant. There's something terrible on his mind. I want-you to help him.”

  "Didn't you think I would?"

  "That's why I called you."

  "Good. Ann, why don't you just go along with him? Let him say he was with you—in a movie or something."

  "You want me to lie for him?"

  "There are all kinds of lies, sweetheart. Just go along with him on this. Chances are you'll never be asked."

  "All right," Ann said after a pause. "But if I am asked I'll have to tell the truth. I'm a terrible liar."

  "All of us innocent ones are," said Bannerman.

  "And I know that Bill isn't in any kind of trouble. Not really."

  "So am I, so am I. Men are just funny sometimes, that's all it is."

  They said goodbye and Bannerman sat gazing miserably at the telephone for several minutes.

  In another office, across town from Bannerman's precinct, sat three other worried-looking men. Limey King occupied a seat behind an ornate desk, Nick Mayer sprawled in an easy chair, one leg swinging over its side, and Bert Hill paced the rug restlessly.

  "You're making me nervous," Mayer told him. "Sit down."

  "You'd better stay nervous," the lawyer snapped. "Did you know that Purdy doesn't have that briefcase?"

  "He has to have it," said the blond.

  "That's what I thought—that he was holding out on Roxy and me when we went to pick up Al's stuff. But I happen to think differently now."

  "Why?"

  "I took Roxy back up there yesterday for one last try. But Purdy had visitors. One of them was our man, Dane. The other was that city cop—Stern."

  "What the hell were they doing together?"

  "They weren't together," snapped Hill. "I stayed around to see what the cop was up to and Roxy had a talk with Dane. Neither one of them had the briefcase."

  "Then Purdy's still holding on to it."

  Hill shook his head. "I think Purdy's hollered for help," he said. "I think he's turning over everything he has to these cops."

  "That's not good," said King ponderously.

  "It stinks," agreed the lawyer. "If the police come up with that briefcase we'll be in the soup. But I've got Roxy working on Dane, just in case he finds it first."

  Nick Mayer's dangling leg swung to the floor. "What the hell do you mean, you've got her working on Dane?"

  "What does it sound like? And why the sudden interest in Roxy? I thought she was Al's girl . . ."

  "Al's dead, Bert. Or haven't you heard?"

  "And you seem to be moving in fast."

  Mayer smiled. "You thinking about Al, little man, or about yourself?"

  "I'm thinking about one thing," Hill snarled. "Our necks. And if you're really going to work at your new job then you'd better change your attitude."

  "Meaning what?"

  “Meaning getting off your backside and getting something done. The treasury's running low, lower than it's ever been. You ought to be down at the pier right now making a collection."

  "And what's the pitch this time? We're already into them for plenty."

  "Then let them borrow it back from us! We've got to have more money."

  Limey King cleared his throat. "I could use some myself," he said. "But what's the assessment for?"

  "Read this," said Hill, pointing to a stack of the four-page newspapers on the desk. "We assess them for the investigation we're conducting. Nick'll tell them we're offering a reward for information. What difference does it make?"

  King pulled at his bony chin. "They're getting a little hard to handle, that's what I'm thinking about."

  "Hard to handle! They wouldn't be hard for Al to handle. He'd have taken those few troublemakers and broke them in two."

  "You miss him, don't you, Bert?" drawled Mayer.

  "I miss the way he ran things. Al was an organizer. And if you can't take up where he left off, you'd better get out."

  "Is that a threat, lawyer?"

  "It's a fact of life, Mayer. Don't believe everything you read in the newspapers, even our own. Limey and I gave you Al's job and we can take it away."

  Mayer swung slowly to King. "Is that how it is, Limey?"

  "Well, we need dough, Nick. And somebody's got to bring them wise guys in line. No more petitions."

  Nick Mayer climbed to his feet. "Okay, boys," he said disarmingly. "I'll go down to the pier and get us some dough. And I'll take care of the soreheads." He smiled at both of them. "And about this other thing, I just want to remind you I've got a friend down at the pier. A real good pal."

  "Good God," said Hill, his face alarmed. "Don't tell me he's still in town!"

  "Augie likes it in New York. The pay is good and the work is interesting. You ought to meet him sometime, Bert."

  "Keep him away from me. Far away. I don't want a thing to do with that maniac."

  Nick Mayer laughed. "I'll tell him that, Bert. I want to see Augie's face when I tell him." He picked up a hat from a table, set it on the back of his head and walked to the door. "Oh," he said, turning around. "I almost forgot. Don't let Roxy get too involved with that private detective. A girl like her shouldn't be mixed up in business." Then he was gone.

  CHAPTER 7

  The building, fronting on Park Avenue in the expensive Sixties, was of stone, not brick, and squatted only, two and one-half stories against the giant apartment hotels all around it. It had been built in the 1920's as a townhouse for a millionaire, a place to change his clothes between Newport and Palm Beach, but the stock market had changed that and a bootlegger with ready money, all cash, had taken over the mortgage and changed the place into a famous speakeasy. The new owner could have ridden out the depression, but not repeal, and, until a mayor named LaGuardia personally ordered it closed, a woman from Montreal named Maude had run it as a comparatively high-priced call house for visiting Hollywood celebrities, several Senators, the City Hall elite and anyone else who wasn't worried about where his next five hundred dollars was coming from. But after the departu
re of Maude and her girls no one seemed to know quite what to do with the building. The owners, in fact, had even more important problems. Not only from LaGuardia, but from an apple-cheeked little lawyer named Dewey who had been appointed—by a Democratic, Tammany-backed Governor, of all people—as Special Rackets Prosecutor. Three of the five-man syndicate who owned the property were sent to jail and the other two were hounded out of the state—one to Nevada, the other to California. And like so many others, the durable town-house-speakeasy-bagnio reverted to a bank that decided to board it up and see what happened.

  What happened was World War II and a flood of loose money—and one morning a trim little woman who called herself Annette Rampelle bought the building outright with hundred-dollar bills. Fifteen thousand of them. The bank's credit investigators had established that Annette Rampelle was once known as Maude, but if they guessed that she was reopening the old stand they were wrong. Maude was on her own, and on her own she had discovered a new racket. A racket that needed women, but one with sensible hours, no drunken men, no regular raids by grafting vice squads—and, above all, respectability. Maude was in the beauty salon business—and from the day it opened its heavily curtained door, Annette's Of Park Avenue was the highest-priced gymnasium in the city and the one to which appointments were hardest to get. It was not a press agent's dream, though she had a trio of highly imaginative ones, that three motion picture stars—one of them a former girl at the original Maude's—left a Beverly Hills party in evening gowns, flew three thousand miles to New York, got worked over at Annette's and caught the next plane back to California.

  And it was in front of Annette's, at about the time that Bannerman was worriedly returning to his stationhouse, that a cab stopped and Roxanne Garde stepped to the sidewalk. She had the curtained door opened for her from the street side by a Negro giant and entered a curious, oval-shaped room. Extending above the door to the high ceiling were several thousand dollars' worth of draperies. Carpeting the floor was a custom-made Oriental shaped to fit the elliptical back wall. That wall, with the two straight ones that adjoined it, was the canvas for a vivid mural. The artist, a world-renowned Frenchman, had haggled with Maude over the price of the project and lost. He finally signed a contract to paint one of his famous nudes for forty-five thousand dollars, and Maude, thinking that this temperamental genius had taken his fifty percent cut in good grace, had agreed to let him work in complete privacy for thirty days before the place opened. Then, before a celebrated audience in the room—except for the artist who was en route to Cannes with his trunkful of Maude's money—the great work was unveiled for the first time. At first there was silence. Then a woman screamed. Another immediately fainted to the soft Oriental rug. There were several gasps, and in the shocked silence that followed, Mme. Annette was heard to say: "That miserable, blackbearded son-of-a-bitch!"