Dick Tracy by Max Allan Collins Page A

hoodlum, it’s affordable.”
    “Something a gangster’s moll might wear, then.”
    “Yeah, or a movie star or a high-ticket lady of the night.”
    “Okay, then. Tell me: what was a woman doing here?”
    Catchem shrugged. “Maybe pulling a trigger. It’s happened before.”
    “There’s a hair caught on there,” Tracy said, demonstrating by turning the earring in the light.
    “So there is,” Catchem said. “Well, detective that I am, I can report that the human ear is often in the general proximity of a head of hair.”
    “In this case,” Tracy said thoughtfully, “a platinum blonde head of hair.”
    Patton was back with his evidence envelope.
    “Still got your tweezers?” Tracy asked him.
    Patton nodded, reached in his pocket, and gave the tweezers to Tracy, who carefully plucked the silver hair from the earring and held the tweezers out for Pat, who opened the small manila envelope for Tracy to drop in the platinum strand.
    “Now what?” Patton asked.
    “Now you get another evidence envelope for the walnut shells,” Tracy said.
    “I figured you’d come up with something else,” Patton said, good-naturedly smug. “So I brought a couple.”
    Tracy dropped the blue sapphire earring in a spare envelope Patton provided and handed the envelope with the hair in it to his bright-eyed partner, saying, “Give that to the lab boys, and the walnut shells, too.” He handed the packet with the earring to Catchem, saying, “Take that back to the office—maybe we can find its owner.”
    “I didn’t figure you were gonna suggest I take it home to the wife.”
    “What good would one sapphire earring do her?” Patton asked him.
    “It’s one more than she’s got now,” Catchem said.
    Brandon, who’d been talking to the two uniformed men that Pat had sent out to check the periphery, was rejoining the Major Crimes squad detectives, wearing an expression longer than this evening had been.
    “What’s wrong, Chief?” Tracy asked hollowly. The depth of the news was apparent in Brandon’s features before even a word could be spoken.
    “We’ve found Officer Moriarty,” Brandon said. “Out behind some barrels. Shot dead.”
    “Damn!” Tracy said. His eyes were burning. “That tears it. He’s killed a cop now. Big Boy’s killed a cop now . . .”
    “If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen,” Brandon said somberly, “there’s a widow to whom a few words need to said in bereavement . . .”
    And the big bear of man lumbered off.
    “You can bet Big Boy didn’t pull the trigger,” Catchem said with a sneer.
    That made Tracy stop and think; he drew a breath, gathered his composure.
    “Gentlemen,” Tracy said, all business once again, “you saw the imported talent that got shot up at the Seventh Street garage earlier tonight.”
    His assistants nodded.
    “Well, now some boys from Philly show up in cop suits and apparently help fit Lips Manlis for a cement overcoat.”
    They nodded.
    “So,” Tracy continued, “who else in town has been bringing in out-of-town guests?”
    Catchem shrugged. “Big Boy’s got three heavy-hitters on his team.”
    “Yeah?”
    “Includin’ that character from the Cookson Hills, Flattop.”
    Tracy’s eyes tightened in thought. “Flattop Jones. I thought he was running with outlaws, robbing banks, pulling payroll robberies . . .”
    “Yeah,” Catchem said. “He’s new to the city. They think he’s Robin Hood back in the hills, but robbing hood is more like it. He did a year in an Ohio county jail; no warrants out on him. They say he’s meaner than diarrhea.”
    “Who are the other two?”
    “ ‘Itchy’ Oliver, and a guy they call Mumbles, who’s got half a dozen aliases. East Coast babies. They both got records, but no outstanding warrants. Arrests on charges rangin’ from armed robbery to confidence rackets. If I had to lay odds, I’d give ten to one those three made the garage hit. Tommy gun is Flattop’s style.”
    “Sam,” Tracy said, “I respect your