“I wish I could believe that. This is the kind of job Maurer might pull. He’s ruthless enough. Remember that gang massacre he engineered a couple of years back? Seven men machine-gunned against a wall?”
“We don’t know for certain Maurer did pull that one,” Bardin said cautiously.
“Who else did, then? Those men were muscling in on his territory. He had everything to gain by getting rid of them.”
“The Captain wasn’t convinced. He thought it was Jacobi’s mob trying to hang something on Maurer.”
“He knows what I think of that cockeyed theory. It was Maurer, and this killing could fit Maurer too.”
“You’ve got a bug about Maurer,” Bardin said, shrugging. “I believe you’d sell your soul to get him behind bars.”
“I don’t want him behind bars,” Conrad said, a sudden savage note in his voice. “I want him in the chair. He’s been in the world a damned sight too long.”
A policeman came to the patio door, coughed and jerked his thumb expressively.
“Here’s Mr. Fedor, sir.”
Conrad and Bardin got to their feet.