Sergeant Cowder looked the room over and took a from his cigarette. “Well, that’s that. Now—what happened?” He looked from Mike the Angel to Harry MacDougal and again. Both of them appeared to be thinking.
“All right,” he said quietly, “let me guess, then.”
Old Harry a hand. “Oh no, Sergeant; ’twon’t be necessary. I think Mr. Gabriel was just waiting for me to start, he wasn’t here when the two came in, and I was just tryin’ to out where to begin. We’re not bein’ unco-operative. Let’s see now—” He at the as though trying to his thoughts. He perfectly well that the police was he said.
The sighed. “Look, Harry, you’re not on trial. I know perfectly well that you’ve got this place to a fare-thee-well. So every shop on Radio Row. If you didn’t, the JD would have you all out long ago.”
Harry looking at the ceiling, and Mike the Angel at his fingernails.
The again. “Sure, we’d like to have some of the that you and the other on the Row have out, Harry. But I’m in no position to take ’em away from you. Besides, we have some that you’d like to have, too, so that makes us much even. If we started illegal from you, the JD’s would in here, take your equipment, it up, and they’d be us all nuts a week. So long as you don’t use illegal illegally, the will you alone.”
Old Harry grinned. “Well, now, that’s very of you, Sergeant. But I don’t have anything illegal—no or anything like that. Oh, I’ll admit I’ve a of here and there to watch my shop, but aren’t illegal.”
The around the room with a and then looked at the little Scotsman. Harry MacDougal was lying, and the it. And Harry the it.
Sergeant Cowder for a third time and looked at the Scot. “Okay. So what happened?”
Harry’s serious. “They came in about six-thirty. First I of it, one of the kids—the boy—stepped out of that over there and put a at my back. I’d come here to a small resistor, and all of a there he was.”
Mike the Angel frowned, but he didn’t say anything.
“None of your registered anything?” asked the detective.
“Not a thing, Sergeant,” said Harry. “They’ve got something new, all right. The kid must ha’ come in through the door, there. And I’d ha’ been willin’ to ma life that no bein’ ha’ walked in here without ma knowin’ it he got ten o’ that door. Look.”
He got up, walked over to the door, and opened it. It opened into what looked at to be a totally dark room. Then the saw that there was a dead-black a from the open door.
“That’s a light trap,” said Harry. “Same as they have in darkrooms. To from this door to the door that leads into the alley, you got to turn two and walk about thirty feet. Even I, masel’, couldn’t walk through it without settin’ off a dozen alarms. Any of light would set off the bugs; so would the from the body.”
“How about the front?” Sergeant Cowder asked. “Anyone in from the front.”
Harry’s grim. “Not unless I go with ’em. And not then if I don’t want ’em to.”
“It was of you to let us in,” said the mildly.
“A pleasure,” said Harry. “But I wish I how that kid got in.”
“Well, he did—somehow,” Cowder said. “What after he came out of the closet?”
“He me let the girl in. They were goin’ to open up the and take my out that way. They’d ha’ done it, too, if Mr. Gabriel hadn’t come along.”
Detective Sergeant Cowder looked at Mike the Angel. “About what time was that, Mr. Gabriel?”
“About six thirty-five,” Mike told him. “The hadn’t been here more than a minutes.”
Harry MacDougal in corroboration.
“Then what happened?” asked the detective.
Mike told him a of what had occurred, out the of the little he was in his pocket. The and through the whole recital. Mike the Angel to himself; he what part of the to the cop.
He was right. Cowder said: “Now, wait a minute. What those to up that way?”
“Must have been faulty,” Mike the Angel said innocently.
“Both of them?” Sergeant Cowder asked skeptically. “At the same time?”
“Oh no. Thirty apart, I’d guess.”
“Very interesting. Very.” He started to say something else, but a officer his in through the that to the of the shop.
“We the whole area, Sergeant. Not a around. But from the looks of the alley, there must have been a small in there not too long ago.”
Cowder nodded. “Makes sense. Those JD’s wouldn’t have this unless they to take they put their hands on, and they couldn’t have put all this in their pockets.” He one big over the of his nose. “Okay, Barton, that’s all. Take those two to the hospital and book ’em in the ward. I want to talk to them when they wake up.”
The and left.
Sergeant Cowder looked at Harry. “Your to the station off at six thirty-six. I that was on the outside, in that truck, something had gone as soon as the started in here. He—or they—shut off they were using to the and took off we got here. They sure must have moved fast.”
“Must have,” Harry. “Is there anything else, Sergeant?”
Cowder his head. “Not right now. I’ll in touch with you later, if I need you.”
Harry and Mike the Angel him through the of the shop to the door. At the door, Cowder turned.
“Well, good night. Thanks for your assistance, Mr. Gabriel. I wish some of our had had your luck.”
“How so?” asked Mike the Angel.
“If more would up at moments, we’d have policemen.”
Mike the Angel his head. “Not really. If their started out every time they came near a cop, the JD’s would just start using something else. You can’t win in this game.”
Cowder glumly. “It’s a any way you look at it.... Well, good night again.” He out, and Old Harry closed and locked the door him.
Mike the Angel said: “Come on, Harry; I want to something.” He walking the long, narrow shop toward the again. Harry followed, looking mystified.
Mike the Angel stopped, sniffing. “Smell that?”
Harry sniffed. “Aye. Burnt insulation. So?”
“You know which one of these is nearest to your main cable. Start looking. See if you anything queer.”
Old Harry walked over to a bin, it open, and looked inside. He closed it, open another. He the on the third try. It was a plastic case, six by six by eight, and it still of insulation, although the case itself was warm.
“What is it?” Harry asked in wonder.
“It’s the that your off. When I passed by it, my own must have it. I the police couldn’t have it here the time of the and the time they up. They must have had at least an minute. Besides, I didn’t think anyone an that would blank out at long range. It had to be something near your main cable. I think you’ll a in there. Analyze it. Might be useful.”
Harry the box over in his hands. “Probably has a in it to start it.... Well.... That helps.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve got a good idea who put it here. Older kid. Nineteen—maybe twenty. Seemed like a lad, too. Didn’t take him for a JD. Can’t trust anyone these days. Thanks, Mike. If I anything new in here, I’ll let you know.”
“Do that,” said Mike the Angel. “And, as a personal favor, I’ll you how to my own super-duper, extra-special, anti-vibroblade defense unit.”
Old Harry grinned, up his in a of wrinkles. “You’d think up a name than that for it, laddie; I one in less time than it takes you to say it.”
“Want to bet?”
“I’ll you twenty I can do it in twenty-four hours.”
“Twenty it is, Harry. I’ll sell you mine this time tomorrow for twenty bucks.”
Harry his head. “I’ll you mine for yours, plus twenty.” Then his twinkled. “And speaking of money, didn’t you come here to something?”
Mike the Angel laughed. “You’re not going to like it. I came to a dozen plastic-core resistors.”
“What size?”
Mike told him, and Old Harry over to the proper bin, them out, all properly boxed, and them to him.
“That’ll be four dollars,” he said.
Mike the Angel paid up with a smile. “You don’t to have a hundred-thousand-unit stack, do you?”
“Ain’t s’posed to,” said Harry MacDougal. “If I did, I wouldn’t sell it to you. But, as a of cold fact, I do to have one. Use it for a paperweight. I’ll give it to you for nothing, it don’t work, anyhow.”
“Maybe I can it,” said Mike the Angel, “as long as you’re it to me. How come it doesn’t work?”
“Just a second, laddie,” said Harry. He to the of the shop and came with a ready-wrapped five by five by four. He it to Mike the Angel and said: “It’s a present. Thanks for helping me out of a tight spot.”
Mike said something of his own and took the package. If it were in order it would have been close to three hundred dollars—more than that on the black market. If it was broken, though, it was no good to Mike. A unit is almost to if it down. But Mike took it he didn’t want to Old Harry’s by a present.
“Thanks, Harry,” he said. “Happen to know why it doesn’t work?”
Harry’s again in his all-over smile. “Sure, Mike. It ain’t in.”
