Read SSC (1950) Six Deadly Dames for Free Online Page A

Donahue took the corner wide, saw Alfred speeding towards Gramercy Park.
    He yelled, “Stop, you! I tell you, stop!”
    Alfred did not stop. He was swift for a small man. But Donahue stopped, clicking his teeth together. He raised his gun, looked down it, pulled the trigger. Flame and smoke burst from the muzzle. The street boomed. Alfred reeled sidewise, fell, slid on his side into the gutter.
    When Donahue came running up Alfred was crawling on his side, moaning hysterically. He was dragging his left leg.
    When Donahue reached down Alfred screamed like a maniac. Windows were grating open. Lights were springing to life. Alfred screamed till his voice broke-and then he coughed, choked-but kept on crawling, leaving a thin trail of blood. Donahue reached down again, grabbed Alfred's shoulder.
    “A guy would think you had places to go,” he said. “Snap out of it, dumb bell.”
    Alfred stopped crawling but screamed again-, until his voice broke, banged his head on the pavement and swept the air with his hands.
    Donahue knelt down and grabbed him by the throat. “And you're not going to bang your brains out!”
    Running footsteps came down the street. Metal buttons and a shield gleamed, and a gun shone dully as a policeman passed beneath a street light.
    A bull voice yelled, “Hey, you!”
    Donahue looked up saying, “Come on, copper. There's a red-hot here.”
    The policeman slowed to a heavy-soled walk. He was broad, stocky, young, with his cap raked over one ear. “What the hell's this?” he growled.
    “This guy smoked out a bird up in Thirty-seventh Street. I've been tailing him. I nailed him on the Twenty-third Street L station, but he got wise and tried a break.”
    “Yeah? a nd who the hell are you?”
    “Don't get tough, coppy. I'm an Interstate boy. This gun's mixed up in the Crosby kill.”
    “That job down in Waverly Place tonight?”
    “Yeah.... Better phone an ambulance. I potted him in the left leg.”
    “Where's his rod?”
    “I've got it here-in my pocket.”
    “How'd you happen to get it?”
    Donahue stood up. “For crying out loud, don't be a rookie, copper. I asked him if he'd mind giving it to me. He said he'd be tickled.”
    “You're a wise” guy, ain't you?”
    “Nah, I'm not a wise guy. I hate wise guys.... Do you telephone or do you want me to?”
    “I'll telephone. Just don't get wise-don't get wise.” Half a dozen persons had come out of doorways and were edging nearer. The policeman strode towards them saying, “I want a phone.” Somebody said, “Right here, officer. What happened?” The policeman didn't say what happened, and hurried through an open doorway.
    Alfred was gibbering now. He began to bang his head against the pavement again screaming, “Mother o' God!” in a frenzied voice.
    A woman's voice quavered, “Oh... the poor man.”
    Donahue dropped to his knees and held Alfred's head locked in his arm.
    He said, “No, you don't, Alfred. No, you don't.”
    Alfred groaned, “Why didn't you finish me-why the hell didn't you finish me?”
    “I should do favors for you!” Donahue said; chuckled, added, “Yes, I should!” He was running his right hand through Alfred's pockets. Something clinked in his fingers.

VIII
    WHEN DONAHUE WAS striding past the hospital desk Roper came in huddled in his threadbare coat and stepped side wise so that he blocked Donahue. Donahue stopped, smiled amiably and said:
    “Hello, Roper.”
    The dour-faced precinct bull said, “Hello,” dully. He spoke very slowly, way down in his throat. His big lazy eyes were expressionless. His lantern-jawed, muddy brown face was inanimate-and because of that, somehow threatening.
    Donahue said, “They're upstairs swabbing out the little guy's wound. They tell me Babe Delaney got it in the belly. It's funny... he's in a room next to Alfred Poore.”
    Roper never changed the expression on his face, but after a pendant interval he said monotonously, “You been going places and doing things tonight,