High Midnight: A Toby Peters Mystery (Book Six) Read Online Free Page B

Ruth told me.
    “Hold it a second,” I told him.
    Ruth stopped, surprised.
    “Can I get autographs?” I pulled a pencil and my ratty notebook out of my pocket and thrust it at him.
    Ruth took them and laughed.
    “You got a nerve, kid,” he said and passed around the notebook for the other Yankees. I got the notebook back, and Ruth touched his cap in farewell to Cooper. I watched the four Yankees disappear under the stands, Ruth walking a little slower than the rest.
    “Now talk, mister, and make it quick,” said Cooper.
    What I wanted to do was ask Cooper why the letters and number on his Yankee uniform were backward, but what I did was talk fast.
    “Some time, maybe three weeks, four weeks ago, you called my office, asked me to call you back. I got a message the next day telling me to forget it. I’d guess someone got in touch with you, said he was Peters and took the case.”
    “What case?” grumbled Lefty.
    “It’s okay,” said Cooper. “Give me a few minutes with this man, Lefty, and I’ll be right back with you.”
    Lefty shrugged and walked back toward first base.
    “From what I can piece together,” I said, “someone is trying to blackmail you or threaten you into working on a film for a producer you don’t want to deal with. Right so far?”
    Cooper’s face twisted into a pained grin, but I wasn’t sure if it was because of my remarks or indigestion.
    “This morning I was taken by two goons from Chicago for a ride to see a guy named Lombardi, who told me to help convince you to take the movie job.”
    The name Lombardi struck something in Cooper’s sad eyes. He had been giving me part of his attention. Now I had all of it.
    “Lombardi found the real Toby Peters—me. Threatened the real one.”
    “I see,” said Cooper, removing his baseball cap and rubbing his sweating brow with his sleeve. With the cap off his face, he showed every one of his forty years. He looked like a man in agony.
    “Then who is the man who posed as you?” Cooper asked reasonably.
    “Describe him,” I said.
    “Maybe fifty, roly-poly sweaty fella, bald head, smokes cheap cigars …”
    “… and wears thick glasses that keep creeping down his nose,” I finished.
    “You know him,” said Cooper.
    “I know him and he’s no private detective. He’s a dentist.”
    “A dentist?” gulped Cooper. “I’ve got to admit I wasn’t impressed with him, but you came recommended by a fella I know at Paramount and … okay. What now?”
    “I’ll take care of the detective-dentist,” I said. “How much have you paid him?”
    “Let’s see, about three hundred,” Cooper said, raising his forehead.
    “You have a few minutes to answer some questions and tell me what’s happening, and I’ll take over the case.”
    Cooper looked puzzled, which seemed perfectly reasonable to me. He looked into my brown eyes and saw no answers. He looked into the first-baseman’s glove in his left hand and saw no answers. He looked over at Lefty, who was kicking dirt behind first base, and saw no answers.
    “Okay, give me a few minutes to change clothes,” he finally said and then shouted at Lefty, “Let’s call it a day.”
    Lefty waved back and walked in our direction as Cooper disappeared under the stands, walking slowly. Lefty shook his head for the entire distance from first base to my side.
    “What the hell is going on here?” he asked. “How am I going to teach him how to throw with all these interruptions? Throws the ball like an old woman tossing a hot biscuit. Has a hell of a time getting his right arm over his head. We’re working on it, though. He’s willing enough, I’ll give him that, but he doesn’t know from old radiators about baseball. How can you grow up in this country and not know baseball?”
    “It happens,” I sympathized. “Why are the letters on his uniform reversed?”
    “Gehrig was a southpaw, a first baseman,” explained Lefty. “No way in the world I’m ever going to get Cooper to throw