Loring, of course, only cared about protecting Paragon’s interests. He wanted me to drop everything and plan a stakeout that would provide definitive proof of Diamond Head’s reselling Paragon raw materials. The way it stood right now I only had evidence that they were loading copper onto trucks in the middle of the night, not whether they were reselling it or whether Diamond Head management was involved.

I let him argue his case while I tried to figure out answers to my own problems, but at four-thirty I showed him the door. “You were so late getting here you’ve backed up the rest of my schedule. I need to get going. You can talk to me tomorrow after you’ve spoken to your board.”

“Then you’ll take the case if they approve hiring you?”

“I don’t know. But I can’t discuss it until I know whether you’re a serious customer or not.”

He didn’t like it, but when he saw I wasn’t going to budge he finally left, wrinkling his face in disgust at the stench on the stairs. I stayed long enough to strap on the Smith & Wesson before heading for the el.

50

Saint Stevenson and the Truck

I stopped on my way out to let Mr. Contreras know where I was going. As a full-fledged partner in crime, he deserved to know. Besides, the fact that someone had been waiting in the stairwell last night made me extra cautious. I wanted him to monitor the building’s traffic even more rigorously than he usually did.

“Vinnie may be letting thugs into the place. Just keep an eye out. Don’t expose yourself unnecessarily—but if strangers go clomping up to the third floor, call the cops. In fact, call Conrad.” I gave him Rawlings’s home number as well as the number at the station and took off before he could flood me with accusations over my intimacy with an officer.

During the slow el ride south I wondered what I could do about the Picheas and Vinnie and Mrs. Frizell. Even if I proved Vinnie and Chrissie persuaded Mrs. Frizell to buy some of Diamond Head’s useless bonds, I wasn’t sure the state’s attorney would think that rotten enough to remove the Picheas as her guardian. I wondered whether Mrs. Frizell’s strange estranged son might be persuaded to take action. Since his main rivals to her affection, the dogs, were out of commission, maybe he would at least want to protect his own measly inheritance.

The el let me out at Twenty-second and Kedzie around five-thirty. It was more than two miles down to Barney’s from there, but I longed for a good walk to clear my body. Thunderheads had started to cloud the sun about the time I changed trains downtown, but I thought I could walk fast enough to beat the storm.