Mental Case by James Neal Harvey

Author:James Neal Harvey
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: MysteriousPress.com/Open Road

46

Tolliver hung up, thinking the caller probably had gotten a wrong number. Then he went back to trying to figure out who had made an effort to kill him the night before.

First off, he doubted the would-be assassin was a professional. The effort had been too clumsy for that, and too ineffectual. The guy had tried to run him down with a car, and then he’d blasted away with a gun that could have stopped a bear. And he’d missed with both weapons. Very sloppy work, all the way around.

A hit man, in contrast, would never have resorted to either method. A car was almost completely unreliable for such a purpose, too easy to misdirect. Also, trying to run over an enemy was an act of rage, not one you’d call coolly objective. It was the kind of mad-dog thing a husband would do when he thought his wife was screwing around, or vice versa. Here, take that, goddamn you.

No, a car was out. And a gun? A professional would have used one, but not of that caliber. The weapon of choice with the boys was a .22 semiautomatic equipped with a silencer.

In addition, the shooter would have made a different approach. He would have waited in the shadows, stepping out when Tolliver was unlocking his car. And then, pop, pop. Two in the back of the head, creating no more noise than a couple of farts. After that, he’d quietly walk away. End of story.

Still another factor that ruled out a hit man was motive. Although Ben was an investigator who’d been working on mob activities for months now, he was hardly the kind of target the Gambinos or the Genoveses or any of the three other New York families would go after. They had enough trouble these days without taking out cops.

And lastly, there was the question of the poison on the slug. Alan Stein had said the stuff was one of the deadliest substances known to man, that even a tiny bit in your bloodstream was enough to kill you. That was yet another strange wrinkle. Mob guys never messed with such high-tech innovations. At least Tolliver had never heard of them doing so.

What did that leave—somebody who’d been nursing a grievance? Maybe some mope Ben had helped put away, and who’d been sitting in the can for a few years, plotting revenge? That was a possibility, maybe even a good one.

The more Ben thought about it, the likelier the theory seemed. Wouldn’t be the first time something like that had happened. There was a case in Brooklyn a while back, involving an ex-con who’d done fifteen in Ossining for armed robbery, second trip. First thing he did when he got out was to buy a shotgun. Sawed off the barrel and went looking for the judge who’d sent him up. Blam. Now we’re even, Your Honor.

Yeah, that could fit. Without even straining his memory, Tolliver could think of a dozen guys who’d love to get square with him.

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