A Stone's Throw by James Ziskin (best story books to read .txt) 📗

what happened to Thoroughbred horses that didn’t earn their keep. I wasn’t forgetting either that Lou Fleischman had procured a prostitute for Johnny Dornan the very night he was murdered. No zayde I knew did that kind of thing and then dandled his grandson or granddaughter on his knee. But a man who felt the need to keep a shady type such as Carl Boehringer as a right hand might. He’d called Johnny a bad name in Yiddish, too. Had Johnny Dornan done something to provoke Lou to put him out to pasture? I liked Lou, but I hardly knew him. And what I’d seen left me suspicious.

My list grew. The gamblers, thugs, and racketeers. Jimmy Burgh—he of malapropisms and gold tooth—may have sounded like an understudy from Guys and Dolls, but I was laboring under no illusions; this was a dangerous man. And though we’d seemed to have reached an entente cordiale, I hadn’t forgotten that he’d once threatened me—obliquely—to keep his name out of the newspaper. Furthermore he traded in sex, blackmail, and extortion. He’d told me to my face that he intended to use compromising information to force Johnny Dornan to throw a race or two as a favor. Only Johnny’s death had prevented him from following through on his plan.

Jimmy was also the only person I’d met who came close to knowing both victims, and he was the man who’d set up Micheline’s appointment with Johnny Dornan on the night he died. Until Micheline resurfaced, who could say for sure if she hadn’t met with foul play herself? I imagined any number of scenarios to explain her continued absence, and most of them ended badly for the pretty young girl with the shapely caboose. Maybe she was an unlucky remainder in the Johnny Dornan–Vivian McLaglen equation. A witness? Sitting in the car waiting while Johnny met with Robinson—whoever he was—and then disposed of by the murderer to tie up all loose ends? Eventually she had to turn up, one way or another. Dead or alive.

I hadn’t met Bruce, Jimmy’s source on Johnny Dornan’s past, but he sounded like a prince. Of course he knew the betting scandal would sink Johnny’s career. Again. And he’d sold the information to a man who had the means to parlay a two-hundred-dollar investment into a healthy profit. My only question about Bruce was why he hadn’t used the dynamite himself? Perhaps he didn’t have the stomach or muscle to play rough. Maybe he was content to pocket a small-but-sure bundle and watch the action from the safety of the grandstand. I wanted to talk to this Bruce fellow, ask him where he’d secured the dirt on Johnny, but Jimmy Burgh wasn’t about to arrange that meeting.

I added Micheline’s name to my list. She might well be a victim, I reasoned, but, for all I knew, she could also have been an accomplice in the double murder. Maybe Jimmy Burgh had cooked up the scheme when his attempts at blackmail failed. At the very least, I couldn’t eliminate her as a possible victim or suspect.

Moving on, I entered Joyce and Brenda’s names below Micheline’s. I doubted Joyce was a murderess. She’d sought me out on her own, driven from Rensselaer to New Holland to tell me she was sick with worry for her friend. Then again, she was one of only a couple of people on my list who’d actually met Johnny Dornan. And I realized at the same time that she was happy to play for pay. But loose morals did not a killer make. I supposed I was proof of that.

Brenda Schuyler, on the other hand, intrigued me. A tough dame, she was levelheaded and fearless, willing to stand her ground with me and even a goon like Jimmy Burgh. But what reason might she have to do Micheline harm? She seemed to want to protect her at all costs. And did she even know Johnny Dornan?

I needed a new page. I added Vivian’s husband, Tommy, to the cast of characters. He claimed he hadn’t seen her in three years, but in my experience guilty people are not averse to lying to hide their crimes. She had humiliated him and broken his heart, after all. And he certainly had a checkered past with arrests and underworld connections. I couldn’t absolve him of any crimes until I knew more.

Which brought me to the end of my catalogue. Only one name remained, and I had no idea how to find that person. Who was Robinson, and why had Johnny Dornan planned to meet him at midnight the previous Friday? Learning about Johnny Dornan had proved hard enough, but this Robinson was a ghost. No trace beyond the scribbled name in a newspaper. Could he have been the squatter at Tempesta? Or was it one of the others I’d catalogued in my list? One thing was certain: whoever had been skulking around the abandoned farm knew who I was and where to find me.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

I got to the store at 11:30 a.m., armed with a small overnight bag containing a change of clothes, some makeup, and toiletries for my evening transformation. Fadge and I were driving separately, but I’d promised to meet him before to synchronize watches.

Zeke was there, all smiles in a brilliant white apron, happy to be in the lineup. Uncle Sal, too, was standing by, though rather less enthused at the prospect of a long afternoon shift. I suspected Zeke would be doing most of the work.

“Where’s Ron?” I asked.

“In the back room,” said Zeke. “Getting dressed.”

And on cue, the big fella emerged from the rear of the store wearing a pair of white linen trousers, a red-and-white-striped jacket, and—if you please—a scarlet cravat.

“What are you all duded up for?” I asked. “The Oxford-Cambridge Boat Race?”

He gaped at me open-mouthed. When he finally found speech, he said he was dressed for Travers Day. “That’s too informal,” he said, referring to my