Read Online Hard Case Crime: Shooting Star & Spiderweb by Robert Bloch - Free Book Online Page A

on that part of the trip. It was bad enough for me, what with statements and questioning and more statements, and a call to Joe Fileen, my attorney. Coffee, cigarettes, and then another quiz show.
    They held me forty-eight hours. No, fifty-eight, counting the first night. I saw everybody and his brother, including the little guy at the liquor store who sold me the pint. And the man on the desk at the hotel, who—believe it or not— remembered me leaving to go out to Polly Foster’s place.
    So that gave me an alibi, of a sort. Except that I could have gone out there and shot her, then phoned immediately. She hadn’t been dead long enough for the coroner to establish any exact time for the murder.
    But they couldn’t find a gun, and they couldn’t find a motive. They looked. I don’t know where they searched for the gun, but I know where they pried for a motive. Right inside my skull, that’s where. Working in batteries, in relays.
    I’m not complaining. Thompson was my friend, and the rest of them were doing a job, a job they had to do, with the pressure bearing down on them from the D.A.’s office and the newspapers and public opinion.
    There was plenty of the latter around, although I didn’t see any papers until after the second day. Headline stuff, this Polly Foster slaying. Headline, front page, feature story, even editorial stuff. And me, right in the middle. In the middle of the yarn, in the middle of a ring of fugitives from Dragnet.
    They were looking for a candidate for the Grand Jury, and they were looking hard. They dragged up everything I’d ever done, checked my accident, went into my files and questioned my clients. A very thorough job. I had no objections, but I got awfully tired.
    And I wasn’t the only one who went through the mill. Tom Trent had his little session, although somebody swung enough weight to keep it out of the papers. Harry Bannock and Daisy were called in, too, but both of them stuck to their. story. They’d just been doing me a favor.
    Which was all I expected. I saw them at the inquest, and everybody testified all over again. There was nothing to go on, and that’s why they let me out after the inquest.
    That gave me twenty-four hours to prepare for the funeral, twenty-four hours to rest up, get myself straightened out.
    I rested, but not too much. First of all, I had to read the papers and catch up on the case. Everybody was doing it; everybody wanted to know who killed Polly Foster. Everybody except the guy who did it.
    I wondered about him. Was he reading about the case, too? And was he reading my name? Was he going to start calling up at the hotel now? Maybe I’d better move out. Maybe I’d better not attend that funeral after all.
    “Of course you will.” Harry Bannock told me that, when I finally drove out to his place to see him. “Mark, I know what it’s been like these past days for you.”
    “No, you don’t,” I said. “Nobody’ll ever know.”
    “Well, I can guess. And I appreciate it. Here.”
    He pulled out a roll.
    “Never mind that. It’s not necessary.”
    “Of course it is. I want you to have it.”
    “Yes,” Daisy Bannock added. “Please take it. You were swell, keeping Harry’s name under cover and all.”
    I pocketed the bills. “Maybe it will help some after all,” I said. “With this killing, they can’t just walk away from the Ryan tie-up. They may find the murderer, clear your boy. I hope so.”
    “So do I.” Harry sighed. “I haven’t dared go near the See-More outfit since the news broke, though.”
    “It shouldn’t be too long. The whole Department’ll be out on this.”
    “Not enough.”
    “What’s that?”
    “I want you to keep on, too.”
    “Now wait, you don’t need me. You’ve got what you wanted, the authorities are interested again.”
    “That’s not what I wanted. I wanted Ryan’s killer. I wanted his name cleared. And the authorities may not do the job. But you can.”
    “Me?” I laughed. “Know what