[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Astounding Science
Fiction April 1960. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
_If you should set a thief to catch a thief, what does it take to
stop a racketeer...?_
Detective Sergeant Fitzgerald found a package before his door that
morning, along with the milk. He took it inside and opened it. It was a
remarkably fine meerschaum pipe, such as the sergeant had longed
irrationally to own for many years. There was no message with it, nor
any card. He swore bitterly.
On his way to Headquarters he stopped in at the orphanage where he
usually left such gifts. On other occasions he had left Scotch, a
fly-rod, sets of very expensive dry-flies, and dozens of pairs of silk
socks. The female head of the orphanage accepted the gift with
gratitude.
"I don't suppose," said Fitzgerald morbidly, "that any of your kids will
smoke this pipe, but I want to be rid of it and for somebody to know."
He paused. "Are you gettin' many other gifts on this order, from other
cops? Like you used to?"
The head of the orphanage admitted that the total had dropped off.
Fitzgerald went on his way, brooding. He'd been getting anonymous gifts
like this ever since Big Jake Connors moved into town with bright ideas.
Big Jake denied that he was the generous party. He expressed complete
ignorance. But Detective Sergeant Fitzgerald knew better. The gifts were
having their effect upon the Force. There was a police lieutenant whose
wife had received a mink stole out of thin air and didn't speak to her
husband for ten days when he gave it to the Community Drive. He wouldn't
do a thing like that again! There was another sergeant--not
Fitzgerald--who'd found a set of four new white-walls tires on his
doorstep, and was ostracized by his teen-age offspring when he turned
them into the police Lost and Found. Fitzgerald gave his gifts to an
orphanage, with a fine disregard of their inappropriateness. But he
gloomily suspected that a great many of his friends were weakening. The
presents weren't bribes. Big Jake not only didn't ask acknowledgments of
them, he denied that he was the giver. But inevitably the recipients of
bounty with the morning milk felt less indignation about what Big Jake
was doing and wasn't getting caught at.
At Headquarters, Detective Sergeant Fitzgerald found a memo. A memo was
routine, but the contents of this one were remarkable. He scowled at it.
He made phone calls, checking up on the more unlikely parts of it. Then
he went to make the regular investigation.
When he reached his destination he found it an unpretentious frame
building with a sign outside: "Elite Cleaners and Dyers." There were no
plate-glass windows. There was nothing show-off about it. It was just a
medium-sized, modestly up-to-date establishment to which lesser
tailoring shops would send work for wholesale treatment. From some place
in the back, puffs of steam shot out at irregular intervals. Somebody
worked a steampresser on garments of one sort or another. There was a
rumbling hum, as of an oversized washing-machine in operation. All
seemed tranquil.
The detective went in the door. Inside there was that peculiar,
professional-cleaning-fluid smell, which is not as alarming as gasoline
or carbon tetrachloride, but nevertheless discourages the idea of
striking a match. In the outer office a man wrote placidly on one
blue-paper strip after another. He had an air of pleasant
self-confidence. He glanced up briefly, nodded, wrote on three more
blue-paper strips, and then gathered them all up and put them in a
particular place. He turned to Fitzgerald.
"Well?"
Fitzgerald showed his shield. The man behind the counter nodded again.
"My name's Fitzgerald," grunted the detective. "The boss?"
"Me," said the man behind the counter. He was cordial. "My name's Brink.
You've got something to talk to me about?"
"That's the idea," said Fitzgerald. "A coupla questions."
Brink jerked a thumb toward a door.
"Come in the other office. Chairs there, and we can sit down. What's the
trouble? A complaint of some kind?"
* * * * *
He ushered Fitzgerald in before him. The detective found himself
scowling. He'd have felt better with a different kind of man to ask
questions of. This Brink looked untroubled and confident. It didn't
fit the situation. The inner office looked equally matter-of-fact.
No.... There was the shelf with the usual books of reference on textiles
and such items as a cleaner-and-dyer might need to have on hand.
But there were some others: "_Basic Principles of Psi_", "_Modern
Psychokinetic Theories_." There was a small, mostly-plastic machine on
another shelf. It had no obvious function. It looked as if it had some
unguessable but rarely-used purpose. There was dust on it.
"What's the complaint?" repeated Brink. "Hm-m-m. A cigar?"
"No," said Detective Sergeant Fitzgerald. "I'll light my pipe." He did,
extracting tobacco and a pipe that was by no means a meerschaum from his
pocket. He puffed and said: "A guy who works for you caught himself on
fire this mornin'. It happened on a bus. Very peculiar. The guy's name
was Jacaro."
Brink did not look surprised.
"What happened?"
"It's kind of a strange thing," said Fitzgerald. "Accordin' to the
report he's ridin' this bus, readin' his paper, when all of a sudden he
yells an' jumps up. His pants are on fire. He gets 'em off fast and
chucks them out the bus window. He's blistered some but not serious, and
he clams up--but good--when the ambulance doc puts salve on him. He
won't say a word about what happened or how. They hadda call a ambulance
because he couldn't go huntin' a doc with no pants on."
"But he's not burned badly?" asked Brink.
"No. Blisters, yes. Scared, yes. And mad as hell. But he'll get along.
It's too bad. We've pinched him three times on suspicion of arson, but
we couldn't make it stick. Something ought to happen to make that guy
stop playin' with matches--only this wasn't matches."
"I'm glad he's only a little bit scorched," said Brink. He considered.
"Did he say anything about his eyelids twitching this morning? I don't
suppose he would."
The detective stared.
"He didn't. Say aren't you curious about how he came to catch on fire?
Or what his pants smelled of that burned so urgent? Or where he expected
burnin' to start instead of his pants?"
Brink thought it over. Then he shook his head.
"No. I don't think I'm curious."
The detective looked at him long and hard.
"O.K.," he said dourly. "But there's something else. Day before
yesterday there was a car accident opposite here. Remember?"
"I wasn't here at the time," said Brink.
"There's a car rolling along the street outside," said the detective.
"There's some hoods in it--guys who do dirty work for Big Jake Connors.
I can't prove a thing, but it looks like they had ideas about this
place. About thirty yards up the street a sawed-off shotgun goes off.
Very peculiar. It sends a load of buckshot through a side window of your
place."
Brink said with an air of surprise: "Oh! That must have been what broke
the window!"
"Yeah," said Fitzgerald. "But the interesting thing is that the flash of
the shotgun burned all the hair off the head of the guy that was doin'
the drivin'. It didn't scratch him, just scorched his hair off. It
scared him silly."