"Spillane, Mickey - Mike Hammer 11 - Survival . . . Zero! 1.0" - читать интересную книгу автора (Spillane Mickey)

"Roger, kiddo."
The Blue Ribbon Restaurant on West Forty-fourth had closed an hour ago, but
George and his wife were keeping Velda company in a corner booth over endless
pots of coffee, and when I came in she gave me one of those "You did it again"
looks and propped her chin on her hands, patiently waiting for an explanation. I
sat down next to her, brushed my lips across that beautiful auburn pageboy roll
of hair that curled around her shoulders and patted her thigh gently. "Sorry,
honey," I said.
George shook his head in mock wonder and poured my coffee. "How you can stand up
somebody like your girl here gets me, Mike. Now you take a Greek like me ..."
His wife threw the hooks right into him. "To see my husband, I have to work the
cash register. He loves this place more than he does me."
"Business is business," I reminded her.
Velda let her hand fall on top of mine and the warmth of her skin was like a
gentle massage. "What happened, Mike?"
"Lippy Sullivan got himself sliced to death."
"Lippy?"
"Don't ask me why. That cat never did anything to get himself a smack in the
eye. Somebody just got to him and took him apart. It could have been for any
reason. Hell, in that neighborhood, you can get knocked off for a dime. Look at
that wino last week ... murder for a half bottle of muscatel. Two days before
and a block away some old dame gets mugged and killed for a three-dollar take.
Great. Fun City at its best. If the pollution doesn't get you, the traffic will.
If you live through those two you're fair game for the street hunters. So stay
under the lights, kids, and carry a roll of quarters in your fist. The damn
liberals haven't outlawed money as a deadly weapon yet."
Velda's fingers squeezed around mine. "Did they find anything?"
"What the hell would Lippy have? A few bucks in his pocket, an almost
punched-out lunch ticket, and some old clothes. But the lab'll come up with
something. Any nut who killed like that wouldn't be careful about keeping it
clean. It's just a stupid murder that happened to a nice guy."
"Nobody heard anything?" Velda asked me.
"The way he got sliced he wasn't about to yell or anything else. Anybody could
have walked in there, knocked on his door, got in and laid a blade on him. The
front door was open, the super had his TV going and a belly full of beer and if
anybody on the block saw anything they haven't said so this far."
"Mike ... you said he had a few dollars ..."
"Stuffed into his watch pocket," I interrupted. "They don't even make pants with
them any more."
"There has to be a reason for murder, Mike."
"Not always," I told her. "Not any more. It's getting to be a way of life."
We finished our coffee, said so long to George and his wife and grabbed a cab on
the corner of Sixth Avenue. It was a corner I couldn't remember any longer. All
the old places were gone and architectural hangovers towered into the night air,
the windows like dimly lit dead eyes watching the city gasping harder for breath
every day.
New York was going to hell with itself. A monumental tombstone to commercialism.
When we reached Velda's apartment she looked at me expectantly. "Nightcap?"
"Can I pass this time?"
"You're rough on a woman's ego. I had something special to show you."