When the Killing Starts by Ted Wood Read Free Book Online Page A

then I want to speak to your inspector."
    "Help yourself." The detective waved me toward the desk officer.
    I nodded and walked over to the uniformed man who was tapping something into a computer terminal. He looked up, and I took out my ID. He stood up and took it, then said, "Yes, Chief, what can I do for you?"
    "I'd like to talk to the duty inspector, please."
    He went into the inspector's office, and a minute later I was in there. And once again it was a man I didn't know.
    He didn't shake hands. He was sitting at his desk, working on some paper or other. He looked up. "You're Chief Bennett."
    "Yes, thank you for seeing me, Inspector."  
    He closed his file folder and frowned at me. "You used to be with the department here, didn't you?"
    "Yeah, until two years ago. I was a detective in Fifty-two Division."
    He nodded. "Rings a bell. You offed a couple of bikers, or something like that, got arrested, right."
    "Right. For manslaughter. Was acquitted but left the job when the papers wouldn't let go of it."
    Now he stood up and stuck out his hand. "Crawford."  
    We shook. "Reid Bennett. I've just handled a case up in my patch that involved some more bikers. I'm in town on vacation, and a woman asked me to look into a mercenary outfit that's signed up her son."
    "How can we help?" He waved to the chair in front of his desk, and I sat.
    "Thanks. Well, I found the guy in charge. Limey, name of Dunphy. According to a guy I know in the Intelligence Service, he runs an outfit called Freedom for Hire. I went looking for him, found him, and then the guy outside, who works for him, came after me with a knife. So, he's charged with weapon dangerous, but Dunphy took off in the scuffle. I want to try and track him."
    "What's your plan?"
    "According to my source, he doesn't hole up anywhere permanent, keeps moving every night. So I won't find him through a hotel registration, but he had a car, an '87 Chev. Beretta. There's a chance I could track him through the hire-car companies. I'd like to use an office, or a phone, anyway, for a while, see if I can get a handle on him."
    "That's no problem. You can use the detective office." He leaned back in his chair. "Of course, it may not help. If he thinks he's blown, he'll dump the car, or he may have used a phony ID."
    "Yeah, I know, but it's all I've got to go on. I've been trying to shake something out of Wallace; that's the guy with the knife. Only he's playing dumb."
    "He would." Crawford nodded. "I'll get one of the other guys to talk to him. Looked to me as if Hennessey was out there. He's still kinda green. Maybe we'll get somewhere with an experienced man." He frowned at me. "I can't promise anything. You know that."
    "Appreciate the courtesy, Inspector Crawford. If there's anything I can do for you up at Murphy's Harbour, like maybe show you where the pickerel are. Something unofficial."
    He grinned. "Thanks, anyway, I'm a golfer. Tell the duty officer to take you up to the detective office."
    "Thanks, Inspector."
    I went back out, and the young PC pointed up the stairs to the left. I called Sam and went up there. It was the typical detective office. Tables shoved together in the middle of a big room, a couple of old manual typewriters, phones, file cabinets, departmental memos on the walls. It brought back memories of nights like this two years ago when I'd worked a mile from this place, twelve—fourteen-hour days tidying up the mess that passes for life in the fast lane even in a law-abiding city like Toronto.
    I found the phone book, dug out the hire-car section of the yellow pages, and started calling. Between them they had seventeen dark-colored Berettas on lease. None of them was on loan to anybody called Dunphy or Wallace. Three of them were out to women drivers. In the other cases, the clerk who answered had not been on duty when the car was released. They had no idea who had taken them out, but none of the records showed a Dunphy or a Wallace.
    I was still working