1965 - The Way the Cookie Crumbles Read Online Free Page A

kit.
    ‘Tom,’ Terrell said, ‘I want you to find out if anyone heard the shots. Check up and down the boulevard and I want some background on Williams.’
    ‘You don’t want me to start checking now, do you, Chief?’ Lepski said. ‘It’s only just after six o’clock. You don’t want me to get people out of bed, do you?’
    Terrell grinned.
    ‘Give them half an hour. They rise early this end of the boulevard.’ At the sound of an approaching car, he went on. ‘Here’s the ambulance now. I’ll leave you to handle this.’ He turned to the finger print men. ‘You got anything?’
    ‘Lots of prints,’ one of them said. ‘This room hasn’t been dusted in months. Mostly his prints, but there are others. We’ll run a check on them all.’
    Terrell nodded, then went to the front door as the ambulance pulled up. He told the two interns where to find the body, then he got into his car and headed for Police headquarters.
     

CHAPTER TWO
     
    A few minutes after Terrell and his men had left La Coquille restaurant, heading for Seaview Boulevard, Ticky Edris took off his drill jacket and slipped on a light grey alpaca coat. He then trotted to the stillroom door, opened it and glanced into the bar.
    Louis and Jacoby were talking at the head of the stairs.
    ‘Going home now, Mr. Louis,’ Edris said in his piping voice. ‘That okay with you?’
    Louis waved his hand, not pausing in his talk with Jacoby. Edris returned to the stillroom, his movements quick and bustling. He let himself out through the Staff exit, bounced down a flight of steps and into the parking lot reserved for the Staff’s car. He half ran, half bounced to where two cars were parked. One of them a Cooper Mini; the other a Buick Roadmaster convertible with the top up.
    A broad shouldered man sat at the wheel of the Buick, smoking a cigarette. He wore a brown straw hat and a well cut fawn-coloured suit. His shirt was white and immaculate; his tie expensive and conservative. The thick wings of his gold blond hair went well with his heavy suntan. He was handsome: a young looking thirty-eight, and the deep cleft in his chin gave him the little extra personality that appeals to most women.
    He could have been mistaken for a successful law officer, a bank official or even an up and coming politician, but he was neither a law officer, a bank official nor a politician. Phil Algir used his impressive appearance, his wealth of general knowledge and his charm to fool the greedy out of their money. Algir was a con man who had spent fourteen years of his life in prison and who had left New York in a hurry for Florida at the very moment a warrant was being sworn out for his arrest. He had remained quietly in Paradise City, short of funds, afraid to set up another of his smooth swindles, knowing the next time he was caught, he would go away for another fourteen years.
    Behind his handsome, charming facade, there was a streak of vicious ruthlessness in Algir. Up to this night, he had managed to get the money he needed without resorting to violence, but now the facade was down. If this job he and the dwarf had planned didn’t work out, it wouldn’t be fourteen years in a cell this time. A seat in the gas chamber would be waiting for him. But he had every confidence in Edris and himself. This job was going to work out - it had
    to.
    ‘Going like a dream,’ Edris said, resting his stumpy fingers on the door of the car. ‘No fuss - no trouble. All right your end?’
    ‘Yeah.’
    ‘They’ve gone to the bungalow. They’ll then come on to East Street. You’d better get moving, Phil. You know what to do.’
    ‘Yeah.’ Algir started the car engine. ‘Think they’re satisfied she knocked herself off?’
    ‘Looks like it. I’ll watch Terrell. He’s smart. Don’t get to the school before half-past seven.’
    ‘I know. I know. We’ve gone over it enough times, haven’t we? You handle your end. I’ll handle mine.’
    Edris stepped back, and with a brief