In the last episode of Special Delivery, Chinatown detective James Wong touched the thumb of the statue Il Pollice Nero and fell down, apparently dead. We find Rocky in an abandoned warehouse with the statue, the body of James Wong and Dorothy Edwards, who was romantically involved with the dead man:
The clean-up began. James Wong lay there on the floor and I wasn't going to check his pulse for fear of catching whatever it was that the statue gave off. He wasn't moving and didn't appear to be breathing. I covered Dorothy Edwards and she shivered there for second as she watched the man who brought her there. The shock wore off quickly and she went from wailing and gnashing her teeth to outright anger. Her voice was pretty but her language was anything but and she was shouting at James Wong all of the broken promises he had made to her. Much as though I would have liked to listen, there were more important jobs to do. I went on a search for a telephone and after trudging around the building for what seemed like forever I finally found a working one, in an upstairs office whose door-lock I had to jimmy to get open.
A lot of calls to make. The first one went to my sister, because I knew a simple call to Jesse Weller wouldn't be enough to get those goons out of her house. I had to warn her of the plan I had in mind. The operator connected me pretty quick but a man answered it. He had the deep, slow voice of someone who doesn't think fast but knows how to handle a gun. “Yah?”
I put the phone down and started to think of another way around. I'd have to call Jesse first, much though I didn't want to, and after I'd have to call Amanda again, and at the right moment. The guy who pretended to be Dave the truck driver answered the phone.
“Call off the dogs,” I said. “I'm here with the statue. If you play nice and let my sister go free, I'll let you know where I am.”
“That'll take time,” he growled into the phone.
“It'll take fifteen minutes. That's when I'll call Amanda. If your boys haven't left by then, I'll just take this old girl someplace you'll never find her. That's how it's going to be.” I slammed the phone down.
You learn not to trust people in my line of work. The chances Jesse Weller and her boys were good for their word were the same chances I had of winning Miss America. I wasn't going to wait fifteen minutes. I got in touch with the long-distance operator and told her to place another call to my sister's house. The line was busy, she said.
“Good,” I said. “If you don't mind, keep calling her every 2 minutes until the line opens. I'll hold here.”
“I'm very busy, sir...”
“It's my sister and it's life or death, kid. I wouldn't normally ask.”
That was good enough for her. We waited another two minutes and the line was still busy, but the next call went through. “Hello?” Amanda answered. My timing was good. She was there, and as long as she was answering the phone, that meant her company had left.
“It's me. Did you see them go?” I asked.
“They went down to the corner and turned right,” she replied. “That's the last I saw of them.”
They were waiting. No way they would just take off. “Where's your car? And do they know where it is?”
“Out back. They checked everywhere so they should know my car is there. Why?”
“They'll be waiting there for you. Go out the front door and catch the nearest bus. Watch to make sure you're not followed. Get off the bus as close as you can to...” I checked my watch. “Two-thirty. They'll be expecting me to call then. Find someplace to call me at this number: DOLton 5-645. Call collect if you have to but call.”
She said she would and then hung up.
I left the office door open and checked back in to the empty warehouse area. Dorothy was pacing the floor. The leg of James Wong was just visible behind the back of the crate, in the same position it had been in when I left him, and Dorothy glanced at him from time to time as she went back and forth. He was dead all right, but it didn't make me feel any less guilty about waiting to call the ambulance for him.
The phone rang at 2:30 and I rushed over to answer it. Amanda was in a soda shop a couple miles away. They had a lavatory in the back that would make a good hiding place if she needed it, as it had a window in it large enough to climb through if it became necessary. I crossed that off my list and made another call to Jesse Weller's place. This time, as I had hoped, the boss herself answered.
“You are good, my dear,” Jesse cooed. “You won't reconsider my initial offer?”
“I will not, nor will I reconsider your second offer or your third. All I want is this package off my hands, kid. It's in a warehouse on 362 Lincoln. I'll leave the light on. Make sure you don't get in the way of the ambulances.”
I put the receiver down one more time and dialed the number for the emergency hospital.
Will con woman Jesse Weller get the statue back? Find out in the next episode of The Adventures of Rocky Stone!
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