Dark Maze

wasn’t going to do one freaking thing that’d make any trouble,” Halo said. His voice sounded leaky, as if he were losing all his air. He looked at Ruby. “C’mon, check out my pants.”
    “No, thanks,” Ruby said.
    “All right, Johnny,” I said. “Now I’m going to ask you some questions nice and easy, to which I want your fullest answers until I tell you to shut up. But since I can’t exactly trust you, and since my partner declines your offer to drop them for her, and since I’ve got no way of knowing who’s coming in here and when, I’m going to keep my piece handy like this.”
    “You don’t got to... ”
    “Zip it, Johnny. You make me very nervous if you speak when you’re not spoken to.”
    Halo’s face went blank. He nodded slowly, a sick smile played on his dry lips.
    “Much better,” I said. “Now, I want to know the nature of Celia Furman’s telephone calls on the day she was murdered.”
    “Like I said, she’s a gambler,” Halo said.
    “I’d heard that,” I said. “She was a big whale in her day.“
    “Yeah, but times are—times were hard for her, and she couldn’t get the action for years on account of her being some kind of a federal snitch. But she was looking for action anyhow, all the time.”
    “So she was calling you for action?”
    “No, Hockaday, it wasn’t like that. I been out of it for years, not as long as Celia but for a long time. I only got the bar and real estate now, okay? Look—I don’t want to get into something where I’m exposing myself to any kind of trouble at all. You got to promise me: no trouble.“
    “Johnny, I can tell you I’m not real interested in your sins with the dice or blackjack or whatever the hell,” I said. “You want absolution for that, go see a priest. Otherwise, listen to your better angels and also to me.”
    Halo nodded yes.
    “On the other hand, I will be all over your ass if I find out your sins had anything to do with murder.”
    Halo shook his head no.
    “Okay, then. Why was Celia Furman calling you up for action?”
    “There’s all kinds of rumors about gambling coming to Coney Island. Well hell, Hock, you seen Big Stuff and his freaking handbills for that outfit wants to legalize casinos here.”
    “I’ve seen the handbills. What’s back of them?”
    “Ever hear of Wendell Prescott, the big real estate hog?“
    “I heard of a Daniel Prescott, the real estate hog.”
    Halo said, “Wendell’s his brother, the Prescott you don’t hear about too much because The Dan—people call him that, The Dan—is also one of the biggest press hogs of all time.”
    “I’m not getting it yet, Johnny.”
    “Okay—you know The Dan’s casinos down in Atlantic
    City?”
    “I read the papers,” I said. “One of his brand-new ones is going bankrupt, which makes The Dan look like the jackass be is, and so suddenly he got rid of his press agent?”
    “That’s right. So brother Wendell—dig this, Wendell’s the older brother—figures now’s his chance to go for the glory that The Dan’s been hogging all these years.”
    Ruby interrupted, “Wendell wants to one-up his brother by building casinos right in New York? Here, in Coney island?”
    Halo said, “Right on the money.”
    “So Wendell Prescott’s doing what, the political groundwork now?” I said.
    “Yeah,” Halo answered. “He’s got this cockamamie handbilling going on out here and meanwhile he’s greasing palms up in Albany so the politicians can change the law and we get casinos out here in little old broken-down Coney Island.”
    “Has he got a chance?”
    “Over my dead body!” Halo said.
    “What have you got to say about it, and why would you want to say anything?”
    “I got three personal reasons. First off, I was a gambler like I say. I wasn’t no big whale like Celia, but I sure done my share. I got out because I finally decided one day I didn’t want to be sick in the head no more from the gambling disease, which is stupid games of fantasy up against house odds which ain’t stupid at all. Not to mention I don’t want to have to go through the rest of my days watching my back and I really ain’t saying no more about that aspect of the gambling disease on account of no matter what you say, me definitely may tend to incriminate me if I talk.”
    “All right, all right.”
    “Okay. Second, I am deep-dyed Coney like I already told you. I love this place. Maybe it don’t look so good like it did in the old days, but it’s