Albert let out a snarl of rage as the gongs in his head suddenly crescendoed and let loose a right hook that smashed Gutsy full in the face. There was a splintering—but not of teeth. Albert howled in pain and began to hop up and down, cupping his broken knuckles in his left hand.
“You keep that up, you’re going to hurt yourself,” said Gutsy.
“Get out of here before I—” The other suddenly stopped as the part of him that was still Albert realized that there wasn’t anything he could do.
“Before you what?” asked Gutsy curiously.
“Oh, nothing,” said Albert. “Just go away. I got some thinking to do.”
“Then you don’t want to talk to Cosmo?”
“No!”
“O.K.!” said Gutsy as he lumbered out the door. “But remember that you only got ten minutes before that tomato of yours starts to get it.”
As the lock clicked shut on the door again, Albert turned toward the center of the room and growled.
“All right, punk, turn yourself on again.”
Whooping Water materialized. Only this time he was back in his Indian form again.
Albert picked up his blasting rod and advanced purposefully toward him. “I feel like bashing somebody!” he snarled, “and it might as well be you.”
The little Indian took one good look at the advancing figure of wrath, jerked his hands up to his head, and wriggled them in a reverse direction. Albert stumbled to a stop as the alien character who had been controlling his nerve ends suddenly vanished.
“Easy does it,” said Whooping Water consolingly. “It’s all my fault and I apologize. I forgot that a disposition like Hammer’s needed more beef to back it up than you’ve got. If you were up against a couple of amateurs, they’d run screaming. I’ve got another idea, though. How about this—”
“Shut up!” said Albert in a most un-Albertish voice. “I’ve got some thinking to do.”
The Indian opened his mouth to protest but a threatening twitch of the blasting rod closed it again.
“I’m getting something,” said Albert at last, “but I’m haying trouble pinning it down.” He ruminated in silence for a moment and then asked suddenly. “Who was that Bosworth that Gutsy was asking bout during the séance?”
“An old pal who got the inside track with a woman Gutsy wanted. He got part of his head taken off with a .45 slug.”
“Got it!” exclaimed Albert.
“Got what?”
Albert explained and the little Indian let out a whistle of admiration.
5
Once Gutsy was safely tucked away in the closet, his hands and feet tied with strips torn from the curtains and a crude but effective gag in his mouth, they were ready for Cosmo. Whooping Water licked out of sight and then materialized as a large block of dripping and barnacle-encrusted concrete. Albert started toward the door but just as he got to it, it swung open and Cosmo came storming in.
“Where in the hell’s Gutsy?” he demanded. “And what’s that?”
“I haven’t the slightest idea,” said Albert. “One minute it wasn’t and the next minute it was. It talks.”
“You’re crazy!” snorted Cosmo.
“Maybe so, but just go up to it and listen.”
Cosmo approached the dripping block cautiously and bent over it.
“Let me out,” said a muffled voice.
Cosmo jumped back in fright and then suddenly turned to Albert.
“Funny guy, eh? Trying to make like a ventriloquist, eh? Well, I don’t scare punk.”
“It’s not me,” protested Albert. “Listen.”
A chanting voice came from within the block.
Got a clock to fix,
Got a watch to stop,
Got a bone to pick,
Got a floor to mop.
Going to break some bones,
Going to suck some blood,
Going to spill some guts,
Someone’s name is mud.
Before the gang chief could make another accusation of ventriloquism, the block began to rock back and forth like a gigantic Mexican jumping bean. Then, as Cosmo watched wide-eyed, there was a splitting, sound and a large fissure opened. A scrabbling sound came from inside and then slowly a hand appeared, a hand with swollen purple fingers that plucked at the edges of the split as if they were trying to force it open wider.
Cosmo had long prided himself on being a man of action. Now, if ever, action was called for.
“I’m getting out of here,” he said.
“Not yet, my friend.”
A soft voice from inside the block of cement froze him in his tracks. As he stood paralyzed, there was a sudden splintering crash and the whole block disintegrated into a pile of jagged shards.
Something moved in the debris, moved and then slowly squirmed out toward the shaking gangster. It was a man, a long dead man with his hands and feet wired together.
“I’ve been waiting for you, Cosmo,” it croaked. “I’ve been waiting for you a long, long time.”
Cosmo tried to raise the .45 that his reflexes had pulled out of its shoulder holster, but it hung limply from nerveless fingers.
“I’ve been wanting to ask you why you went and did it, pal. Me that gave you your start and was like a father to you. It weren’t friendly-like to sap an old pal and put him in a box of wet concrete while he was still alive and then toss him in the bay. It weren’t friendly-like at all. That’s why I’ve come to take you back with me.”
The bloated fingers curled around the gangster’s ankles. He tried to raise his automatic again but it slipped from his fingers and went crashing to the floor. Then something snapped inside him. He let out a high-pitched scream and, kicking loose the clutching hands, dashed whimpering out of the room.
The swollen-faced man looked up at Albert and grinned.
Albert pointedly looked the other way.
“If you don’t mind,” he said. “Your Bosworth was bad enough, but this one—ugh!”
“All clear,” said Sir Whooping Water Gawain.
Albert turned and greeted the sight of the little brown Indian with a sigh of relief.
“Thanks a million!”
“Really wasn’t anything, old man,” said Whooping Water with a depreciating gesture. “What time is it?”
Albert glanced at his watch. “Two forty-five. We made it with three minutes to spare.”
“It’s later than I thought,” said the other. “Now that I’ve got all your troubles straightened out, I guess I might as well toddle on back. I’m due to go off shift at three.”
Albert’s momentary feeling of elation vanished. “What do you mean, ‘all straightened out’? I’m no better off than I was this morning.” Unable to restrain himself, he launched into a long narration of his woes.
“I don’t get it,” said Whooping Water when he had finally finished. “You let those thugs beat you unconscious rather than give up, but over at the University you let everybody and his brother shove you