“Did you see the ransom money?”

“Carl has a lot of money in his luggage.”

“If you knew Carl kidnapped the boy, why didn’t you call the police?”

The putty face managed a frown. “If I did that, they’d come take Carl away. And I love him very much.” She clutched my lapel. Something human entered her eyes. “You know, that boy just put his little hand in mine…he was just so trusting.”

Then her eyes rolled back in her head and she was snoring again.

From a phone booth down the street, I called Lt. Lou Shoulders, getting him at the Newstead Avenue Police Station, his work number.

I brought him up to date, then said, “You need to put some men on the apartment house. This woman Bonnie is the accomplice, and Steve or Carl or whoever the fuck is going to lead us to Tom Marsh.”

Shoulders groaned, “And the kid’s body, sounds like.”

“Yeah. Look, this is going to break real soon. You should post men at the Coral Court, too. Plenty of rooms to watch from. But don’t rush it…and don’t rush him. He’s armed and screwy as hell. I’ve got his confidence, though, and I’m on top of it.”

“Brother, you better be.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

The Pink House was indeed pink, a dirty coral, but not what you’d call a house—just a dive with a red overhang roof that bore its name. Though typical bar food was on offer, its rationale for existence was clearly stated by the vertical sign near the front door, red letters on pink:

D

R

I

N

K

The cigarette smoke within was no thicker than carbon monoxide fumes in a suicide garage, the grizzled regulars at the U-shaped bar consisting of that breed of working men who never seemed to be working. The dark-wood interior had half a dozen dark-wood tables and dark-wood chairs, on loan from the kind of jury room where guilty verdicts are frequent and deserved.

Only a couple of the tables for four were taken, and the one I chose was away from those patrons, a bald guy negotiating with a redheaded hooker at one table, and at another two guys laughing too loud as they drank too much. Maybe they were trying to be heard over the jukebox—Tony Bennett, “Rags to Riches.” After I collected a bottle of Schlitz from the bar, I made sure to sit on the opposite side of the room from the corner where a currently not-in-use dart board dwelled, in case some barroom athlete got ambitious.

I’d been right on time but my cabbie pal Hagan was five minutes late. I almost didn’t recognize him, and he sure was in the wrong bar for his new duds—navy felt hat and blue gabardine suit, blue-and-white tie on a crisp white shirt, wing-tip Oxford shoes. Florsheim, probably.

He got himself a bottle of beer and joined me. “Any sign of Steve?”

“No. But that gives us a chance to talk. We’ll start with his name isn’t Steve. It’s Carl.”