Bare Trap by Frank Kane Read Free Book Online Page A

“It’ll keep.”
    “Not this. I heard from the kid,” Richards told him in a low voice. “I heard from Shad. He wants to see me right away.”
    Liddell nodded. “Good. As long as he’s okay you don’t need me.”
    “I do. The kid is scared. He wouldn’t say over the phone. He wants me to go out there. I don’t want to go alone.”
    “He’ll still be there in the morning.”
    Richards’s voice was insistent. “I found out why he took the powder. He’s been gambling. Heavy.”
    “I know all about it. I had a talk with Yale Stanley tonight. Tomorrow we can pick up the kid and figure some way to square it.”
    “But Stanley knows where the kid is. The kid said so.”
    Liddell groaned, knew he was licked. “All right, I’ll go with you. You driving?”
    “Yes.”
    “Pick me up at my place. I’ll be ready in fifteen minutes. The Marlowe, right off Wilshire.” He put the receiver back on the hook, glared at it for a moment; cursing the fate that had made him a private detective, he started stuffing his feet into his trousers. He was standing on the curb outside his hotel a half hour later when Eddie Richards drove up.
    Liddell got into the car without a word and sank back against the cushions. The morning air had a bite to it so he rolled up the window and glared at the blank-eyed store fronts along Wilshire.
    Richards headed the car north out of town. The big coupé ate up the blocks effortlessly. The fat man handled the car with sure ease.
    “Where’s he been hiding?” Liddell asked finally.
    Richards snorted. “Damn-fool kid! He’s been holed up in the lodge of an old country club north of here.” He spun the car around a slow-moving milk truck. “There’s a bottle in the glove compartment if you want a shot. It’s pretty chilly.”
    Liddell found the bottle, took a deep slug, welcomed the warming glow it produced. He was considering the advisability of a repeat dose when the big car swung off the macadam onto a winding country road. Richards throttled it down to a steady forty, bounced it along until he came to two stone pillars with a faded sign. He drove through, braked the car to a stop in front of a peeling stucco building.
    “This is it.”
    “No lights in the place,” Liddell pointed out. “You sure he was expecting us tonight?”
    Richards nodded. “I told you he was laying low. He’s probably sitting in the dark waiting. I’ll give him a tootto let him know it’s us.” He leaned on the horn for three short, shrill blasts.
    Nothing happened.
    After a few seconds, Richards tooted again. There was still no sign of life in the building.
    “That’s funny,” the producer grunted. “What do you think?”
    Liddell took another slug from the bottle, reached inside his jacket, came up with a .45. “I think I’d better have a look.”
    He left Richards in the car, followed a badly overgrown path to the doorway. At the door he strained his ears, heard nothing but the distant hum of some insect. He stepped to one side, out of possible range from inside, rapped with the muzzle of his gun, waited.
    When there was no response to his knock, he tried the knob. It turned easily in his hand. He pushed the door open, hugged the wall to avoid being silhouetted by the moonlight. For fully fifteen seconds he waited, got no sign of anybody inside.
    Still hugging the wall, he entered the darkened room beyond, gun first. His free hand groped along the inner wall for a switch. When he found it, he pressed it, spilling yellow light into the room from an unshaded overhead bracket.
    The room was big and looked even bigger than it was because most of its furnishings had been moved out. The windows were curtainless, black eyes in the dirty white paint of the walls. In the corner an old, unpainted desk wore an inch of dust on its top surface.
    In the center of the room a man lay face downward, his feet toward the door. The amount of blood that had spilled from the holes in his back made it highly improbable