you can have a lot of fun there—that is, if you stay friends with Topper. And I might mention, Catell, I don’t like quarrels in my organization.”
“Listen, Smith, I only—”
“Of course, you’re just here to help me out with one little job, so all this talk is really unnecessary. But while you’re here, Catell, try to keep clear of Topper, eh?”
“Sure, Smith, sure. I’m not going out there to see Topper.”
For the rest of the day Catell kept thinking of the Pink Shell and what he thought he might find there.
Chapter Ten
Chief Jones watched the teletype ticking out the end of Herron’s sentence: “…therefore requesting your decision for possible change in present plan.”
Jones tore the sheet off the machine, looked at it again, and then stepped over to the window. The St. Louis traffic was crawling along four stories down, and Jones wondered what he would do if he had to find the person with the brown hat who was just crossing against the light, and if he could ever get anywhere with his strategies, scientific methods, trained agents, and what have you, unless of course he had an informer to steer him the right way. Perhaps that man in the brown hat who was now turning the corner by the newsstand was Catell. Or perhaps Jack Herron in Los Angeles wasn’t having any success, not even a false steer, because Catell was dead someplace, dead from radiation, or starvation, or too much liquor, or too many women.
If only they knew a little more about the man. He’d been operating for years and years, he’d been caught three times, but he’d never been so successful or so menacing or so crazy that the name Anthony Catell had meant a whole lot. Catell worked fast, like an expert, and then he’d disappear. He had probably pulled twice as many jobs as he’d ever been suspected of having pulled. Not a very encouraging train of thought. Or let’s say Catell is dead; then what?
The teletype started chattering again and Jones walked over. “…dead man in ravine next to abandoned car. No license plates. Initial check indicates car driven from Detroit. Age of deceased estimated 85. Cause of death, heart failure.”
The thing was sent by the Indiana State Police and there was a brief reference to the FBI’s request that all unusual or unexplained deaths and hospital admittances be reported.
No need to jump at that one. Jones had been getting the lowdown on the death of every bum from here to Hudson Bay and he was beginning to wonder how soon they would all die out.
The machine started to clank again but Jones barely gave it a look. “Diagnosis probable,” it said, and then Jones was back at the teletype, watching the letters creep out. “Admitted 6 A.M., Winslow General Hospital, Winslow, Arizona.” Then it gave the name of the patient, a sheriff in a small desert town.
He was alive. Catell was alive and Herron’s first guess might still be right. Jones looked at both messages again. Michigan car abandoned in Indiana. No plates. That would be like Catell. Then he appeared to have shown up in Arizona, making the southerly swing through all the rural stretches he could find. Maybe Mexico next? They would take care of that, and Herron…Leave Herron in Los Angeles.
Chief Jones sent a message to Herron and stepped back to the window. He ran one hand over his face. For a minute there he had felt good, but it was still a wild-goose chase. He stood by the window and down at the street corner. The man in the brown hat was back. Or was it the same man? It could be one of his own agents, coming back from lunch. Didn’t Malotti wear a brown hat like that?
Jones left the communications room and went back to his office. He picked up the phone and asked for Agent Kantovitz. He wasn’t in. “Tell him to make another local check with his contacts on that Schumacher matter. He’ll know what I mean. And Betty, do you happen to know if Malotti wears a brown hat? He does?…No, it’s nothing. Forget it.”
The phone jangled on Herron’s desk and he looked at it for a second before answering it. Another lead, no doubt. In the movies, they always got leads coming in at the last minute. He picked up the phone.
“Hello, Herron here.”
“Where else? I figured you’d be there, seeing you’re answering the phone.”
“Larry? What in hell you want now?”
“I got