Call in the Feds. Gordon Landsborough

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      “What the—?” he swore and turned and looked into Bright’s tight-grinning face. Heard Bright saying, “Gee, I did for him. Right in the belly. Gee, bet he don’t feel so good with that in him.” His eyes were going all over the place in excitement.

      Eddy snarled, “Goddam you, you don’t kill cops like people. Cops is different. It’ll make ’em mad, and we ain’t in no position to make cops mad.”

      Not at this moment, turning the car in the only direction they could go, back into Freshwater. Freshwater—a town at the end of a line, as New Yorkers called them.

      A trap, if all roads out were watched, and they guessed they would be.

      CHAPTER THREE

      CALL IN THE FEDS!

      As they sirened their way out of town. Lanny saw an ambulance pull on to the road just ahead. It beat them to the river road by a hundred yards.

      There was a traffic jam just round the bend, with cars being examined by harassed cops and then going awkwardly over rough ground to get around the shattered police car. There was someone wrapped in some coats on the ground by the rear wheel of the wrecked car, and as Lanny got out he saw stretcher-bearers and white-coated interns run across to the fallen patrolman.

      Lanny put his men on to clearing the road, to help the two squad men, and went across to speak to the sergeant of the squad car. It was Alec Pedersen, a blond athlete and a pretty square guy in a town of crooked cops.

      Lanny said, “Well, sergeant, how is he?”

      Pedersen didn’t look happy. He said, “There was a doctor in one of those cars. He says he hasn’t a hope in hell. Don’t reckon he’ll survive the ride back to hospital.”

      They watched while the stretcher was skilfully slid under the injured patrolman; then he was lifted and carried gently across to the ambulance. They were having to hurry. There wasn’t much life left.

      They got him in and started to shut the doors. The ambulance didn’t move.

      Lanny said, “It was Kippax, Ronnie Kippax, wasn’t it?”

      Pedersen nodded. “He was quite a good guy,” he epitaphed. Lanny didn’t say anything because he wasn’t so sure. Most of these cops were grafters, he had found; perhaps even Pedersen, on the quiet.

      One of the interns came down the ambulance steps. He slipped off his rubber gloves slowly. He wasn’t hurrying at all now. Lanny strode across to him.

      The intern said, casually, “You got a murder case on your hands, captain.”

      “He died?”

      “Just now.”

      Lanny wheeled on Pedersen. “Your radio’s still okay?” Pedersen nodded. “Then get through to HQ. Tell them that Patrolman Kippax just died. They’ll know what to do.” Pedersen lingered. “The F.B.I.?”

      “Sure. It’s a Federal offence to kill a cop in the United States. It’s now a job for G-men. We can get back to our job of tracking Pretty Boy.”

      When Pedersen came back from radioing HQ, Lanny said. “Now, tell me what happened.”

      Pedersen took off his hat and wiped the band. Lanny noticed how thin the sergeant was getting on top, though he was still in his early twenties. He said, “We got a radio call from HQ saying Pretty Boy was in town and for us to block the New York road. We were outside Marty’s Tavern, so it only took us half a minute to get here and pull across the road.

      “Well, first car that comes along is some old boy who might have been pretty a long time back. Next, a black Pontiac came tooling round the bend. We weren’t ready for what happened. Suddenly it accelerated and drove straight into our car, then went back in reverse. We tried to stop it with a bullet in the tyres, but I guess we weren’t aiming too steady and it just went on. Then someone fired a gun from the back of the car and Kippax went down, screaming his guts out. The car turned, out of range, and went on back into Freshwater.”

      He looked at the wrecked car. “We couldn’t do a thing. That wing’s crushed against the tyre and so we couldn’t use the car. And it was a couple of minutes before anyone else drove up. So I got through to HQ and reported the matter.”

      “That’s one good thing,” said Lanny. “It didn’t wreck the radio. They’re pretty well trapped, now.”

      The police maintenance wagon came screaming up just then, and Lanny went back to his car. Pedersen followed. He seemed to want to talk.

      He said, “They won’t get away?”

      Lanny shrugged. “I don’t see how. Thanks to Pretty Boy, every road out of town is watched, and so’s the pier, railroad, and airport. And Freshwater’s not such a big place.”

      Pedersen stood with one foot on the front tyre. He was still wanting to talk. Lanny didn’t get in yet.

      “Any idea who they might be?”

      Lanny exploded, “Jesus Christ, what a question! They operate like New York gunnies, but we don’t have them around Freshwater that I know of.” Except Myrtle’s mob, he could have added, but didn’t.

      “Maybe they’ve pulled some job in town and were on their way out?”

      “Maybe. But we haven’t had word of any big job being pulled in the last hour or so,” returned Lanny. Then he said, exasperated again, “This is a day! Pretty Boy is seen in town, and within minutes someone goes and shoots a cop—a gang of gunnies!”

      “You don’t think they’re connected?”

      “I don’t. Pretty Boy’s no professional criminal. He’s got the killer lust, and he doesn’t kill prettily, at that. But you don’t get that kind running around with a bunch of hoods. No, this is coincidence, sergeant.”

      And then he said, abruptly, “Now tell me what’s on your mind, Pedersen.”

      Pedersen took his foot off the tyre, startled by the directness of the order. He was flustered, spoke defensively. “I don’t get you, captain—”

      Lanny shoved his face close up to the sergeant’s. He was bigger than Pedersen, broader, dark-haired where the sergeant was blond; more aggressive in his manner...a more intelligent, more dangerous man.

      He said, “You’ve been trying to say something for the last five minutes, Pedersen. Why don’t you come out with it? Think you might he talking out of turn?” There was a rasp of unpleasantness in his voice.

      Pedersen suddenly looked him squarely in the eyes. “That’s it, captain. I’m goin’ to talk out of turn. Look, when I first started on patrol I used to get things given me. You know, parcels of fruit and meat and groceries, and lifts out to the races. We all get them, don’t we?”

      Lanny nodded, his face hard. Pedersen squinted after the departing ambulance and said, “Of course the idea’s to soften us up in case there’s something a little bit wrong at times—if they park their cars where they shouldn’t, you know.”

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