John D. MacDonald

Nicky and the Tin Finger

This character Nicky Lugan is, from way back, a tinkerer, and since in Udella — which has no more than fifteen thousand people in it — everybody knows everybody, Kopal, on the city desk, wasted no time in shooing me off to interview Nicky when it became evident that a tinkerer had done the dirty to Big George Loke.

“Barney,” Kopal said, “trot on over and talk to this Nicky Lugan. You know him, and you have done features on him; and maybe he likes you — though why, it would be hard to ascertain.”

I used to know Nicky Lugan back in the days when he only had three vending machines. At that time he lived over Venerik’s Garage, and the only time anybody would see Nicky would be when he trotted by, because he covered his three machines on foot, and the money for a bowl of chili for dinner had to be grabbed out of one of the machines.

He still lives over Venerik’s Garage. And he has not changed in the seventeen years it took him to work up from three machines to two hundred and eighteen, the current count. The machines are in nice spots all over the county, and they vend candy, cigarettes, milk, soft drinks and so on. Now Nicky has a guy who makes the repairs and the collections, and it is long since Nicky has trotted from place to place.

He averages five dollars per month per machine after paying off his man, which is a splendid two fifty a week, and more than hay.

He is a little round man with the expression of a young owl who has found out that life can be beautiful.

And a natural tinkerer!

I went up the steps and knocked, and he opened the door and said: “Why, Barney! How nice of you to call on me! You know Moe, of course.”

I have never been able to break myself of the habit of nodding at Moe when Nicky introduces me to him.

Moe is the only robot in Udella. He is Nicky’s hobby, and the reason why Nicky hasn’t married, and the reason why he still lives over Venerik’s Garage and takes mail-order courses in electronics. You take a natural tinkerer and feed him some electronics courses, and you generally end up with something.

They say all first novels are autobiographical. Maybe all first robots are the same way. The only differences between Nicky and Moe are that Moe is two and a half feet taller and about two hundred pounds heavier, and his insides are full of wire and gunk, and his exposed parts are made of aluminum and stainless steel.

But he has the same, round, happy, contented face, and the lenses he has instead of eyes have the same warm, placid look that Nicky’s eyes have.

There is also one other difference: Where the back of Moe’s neck should be, there is a very complicated arrangement of little gimmicks like you find two of on a light plug.

“Sit down, Barney,” Micky said. “Moe is on house current, but I haven’t got him coordinated yet.”

I sat down, and Nicky trotted over to a wall cabinet and took out a small black box with a number of holes in it. He went over to Moe and plugged the box onto the back of Moe’s neck. I noticed that on the side of the black box it said, “SOCIAL” in small neat white letters.

The big metal head turned slowly, scanning the room, and came to rest on me. As usual, he gave me the shudders.

“You remember Barney,” Nicky said.

“Hello, Barney,” Moe said. His voice is somewhat like what would happen if you were flat on your back in the cellar with a tin washtub over your head.

“Hello, Moe.”

“How are you, Barney?”

“Just fine, Moe. And you?”

“I’m all right, thank you.”

“Mix us a drink, Moe,” Nicky said briskly.

Moe stood up. The floor creaked under his weight. Nicky told me once that Moe has walked and moved a lot better since he outfitted him with a mess of those tiny electric motors that were Air Corps surplus after the war. Moe used to click and chatter a lot. Now he moves with a slow hum.

He moved heavily out into the kitchen, and I heard glasses clink.

Nicky smiled. “I suppose you want to do another feature on Moe, Barney?”

I was uncomfortable. “Not this time, Nicky. We’re overdue for one, but not this time. This time I want to know if the cops have been to see you.”

Nicky looked troubled. “They had me go to see them. They sent a car. They had a lot of questions to ask. It almost seems as if they think I killed Big George Loke.” He laughed nervously. “I didn’t, of course.”

“I’m afraid they’ll be back to see you again, Nicky.”

At that moment Moe came back in, carefully carrying a tray. He started toward Nicky. “Company first,” Nicky said. Moe stopped in his tracks, turned and brought me my drink. Then he took Nicky his. There was one remaining drink on the tray — a shot glass half-full of machine oil. Moe set the tray aside, sat down on the couch, said, “Here’s how,” and knocked off the machine oil. He hiccuped once.

Nicky looked proudly at me.

“Cute, huh? I added that last week. Actually, the drink lubricates his knee and ankle joints.”

“It has been known to do the same to mine,” I said. “But to get back to you, Nicky: The cops will be back.”

“Certainly they don’t think I have time to go around killing people, Barney. I’m much too busy with Moe. My goodness!”

I had to count it out for him on my fingers: “One-Big George Loke got into the vending-machine business two years ago. He’s been doing well.”

“He hasn’t, hurt me any, Barney.”

I ignored him: “Two — people think you’re a little crazy, staying up here all the time and making improvements on Moe, and then taking him down to the tavern once a week.”

“What’s queer about that? Moe is better company than most people.”

“Three — Big George was killed with just the sort of gimmick you would think up. And you’ve got the shop here to make it.”

“They wouldn’t tell me about the... ah... gimmick.”

“Don’t you read the papers? It was a cute little item: It clamped on the inside of the front wheel of Big George’s car. It was okay in the city. But when he got it up to a high speed, centrifugal force pulled a little weight out on the end of a spring until it finally touched a copper plate. That made contact and a dry cell exploded just enough powder to blow the wheel off. George was spread out over fifty feet of three-lane concrete.”

Nicky fingered his chin. “Very good. Very good indeed! If I ever decide to kill anyone, I certainly hope I think of as nice a thing as that.”

You see, Nicky has always been a tinkerer.

While I questioned Nicky, Moe fixed us another drink, knocked off his second shot of machine oil and hiccuped twice. “That way,” Nicky said, “I can tell how much he’s had. I don’t want him to flood his bearings.”

“We certainly wouldn’t want that,” I agreed.

Finally Nicky called Moe over, had him turn around while Nicky took off the “SOCIAL” black box and put one on called “COOKING.” As Moe walked around, the electric cord reeled up and unreeled through a small hole in the base of his spine. He seemed very careful not to get tangled in the cord.

“Fix dinner, Moe,” Nicky said, “—for two. Steak, baked potatoes, frozen limas, a tossed salad with French dressing, coffee, and lay out the cigars. Call us when it’s ready to serve. We’ll eat at the kitchen table.”

Moe bowed and tromped off, his little motors humming.

“That’s new, isn’t it?” I asked.

Nicky looked proud. “Not so very new. He could always cook. But now he doesn’t bum things the way he used to, and he uses more seasoning. And he hasn’t broken a dish in two months.”

I was worried, and I had no reason to keep it from Nicky. Finally I said: “Nicky, if they can’t pin it on you, the very least they’ll do is put you away in a padded cell.”

His eyes grew round with terror. “No! No, Barney! You wouldn’t let them!”

“Moe is a nice gu — a nice robot, Nicky; but he’s made you a few enemies, you know. Remember when he walked up in the dark and tapped Mrs. Berril on the shoulder? She turned and slugged him, and had to have three stitches taken in her hand. And remember the day he went into the school by mistake. Eleven cases of hysterics in the third grade alone. No, Nicky. I think they could do it to you, and I think a lot of people would be darn’ well pleased over it.”

“But... but... but—”

“Exactly. The real murderer has to be found, or you’ll go on a trip, Nicky. I’m your friend, or I wouldn’t be telling you all this.”

Dinner was an unhappy meal. Nicky kept sighing, and he didn’t eat much. I could swear that Moe kept giving him worried looks. Moe slipped up when he lit my cigar. He tried to hold the lighted match under my chin. Nicky was very embarrassed about the whole thing. “Just a minor adjustment,” he said. “Something came loose, I guess.”

When I was ready to go, Nicky said: “What would you do if you were me, Barney?”

“If I were you? Why, I think I’d darn’ we’ll try to find out who killed Big George. That seems a lot better than sitting around.”

“I wouldn’t know where to start, Barney.”

“Start where the cops start. Only be a little smarter than the cops.”

He walked me to the door. Moe, with his “SOCIAL” box back on, said: “Good night, Barney.”

“Good night, Moe. So long, Nicky.”

“Wait a minute, Barney,” Nicky said, “before you go. What does a good detective do?”

“So you’ve decided to take my advice? Good! A good detective is very observant. He has good eyes, and he sees everything and remembers everything. He tries to find the motive for a killing, and then he finds the opportunity. With everything sewed up, he puts the finger on the criminal.”

“Good night, Barney,” Nicky said.

As I went down the narrow stairs, I could hear him talking to Moe. I heard the deeper tone of Moe’s answer.

I went back to the shop and hammered out an item that editorialized between the lines, because I like Nicky, and I did not like to think of Moe rusting in a corner while Nicky was tucked into the county vacation spot.

As I had expected, they hauled Nicky down for more questioning, and he had no alibi, and Big George was extremely dead. Big George had endeared himself by passing out little favors from time to time, and the majority of the people of Udella were unhappy to see the source of the little presents stopped so suddenly, and they were more than a bit annoyed with Nicky Lugan and began to scream for his scalp.

The inquest practically turned into a mob scene when Al McGee, who worked for Big George, and was consequently out of a job, jumped up and yelled out: “My pal was killed by Lugan and that big tin monster!” It was an unfriendly way to refer to Moe.

Naturally the widow, Julie Loke, was in tears, a wet little ball of handkerchief clamped in her mitt and mascara making dark streaks down her cheeks. Big George was sufficiently popular in Udella so that nobody ever made mention of the fact that on a week-end in Philly, Big George had found Julie third from the left in the front row, which is where they generally put the lookers, and contrary to tradition, he had married her.

It is rumored that she sometimes pines for the third-from-the-left spot, particularly as they were about to put her in a stripper spot, and maybe her practicing the routine was what hooked Georgie.

The verdict was by “person or persons unknown,” and I found out later that a couple of the jury, thinking hard of Moe, wanted to have it by “person or persons or thing unknown,” thinking of Moe.

The police worked hard on it; and the D.A., solicitous of his imminent campaign for re-appointment, stood behind the police and kept jabbing them to dig up some decent evidence. Poor Nicky wore a deep track from his rooms over the garage to the police station and back. But the rest of the time, nobody saw him.

Once I went up and knocked at his door, and Moe told me to go away. I didn’t argue. There is something about Moe that you don’t want to argue with.

One night Duffy, on the Canal Street beat, came back to Headquarters, where I was consistently schneidering Archy Wandell, and mentioned that Nicky and Moe were at the tavern around the corner from the garage, and had been there for some time.

Archy paid me, and I went to the tavern. Sure enough, they were in one of the back booths. As I walked by the bar, Al McGee, still unemployed, said: “Barney, my lad, I caution you about going back there. That Lugan is criminally insane and should be put away some place where he can’t go around killing nice people with gimmicks.”

“They are my friends,” I said with dignity.

Al sneered, and turned back to the bar.

I have never seen Nicky so loosified. The black box on the back of Moe’s neck said, “PARTY.” A bottle of Scotch and a tin of machine oil stood on the table. Evidently they were drinking jolt for jolt. Nicky, yelled for a glass for me, and then poured a drink all around. Moe hiccuped eleven times. I wondered about his bearings, and I looked under the table at Moe’s big canvas shoes that cover his metal, articulated toes, and saw that they were soaked with oil.

“So you are drowning your sorrows?” I said to Nicky.

You could have hooked his grin around his ears. “Celebratin’,” he said.

“About what? About being in a jam you can’t get out of?”

“About getting a way out, palsy. About being brightest guy in Udella. Have ’nother.”

The next drink did for Nicky. From then on, he couldn’t wrap his lips around the words with enough precision so I could understand them.

Anyway, when a man has somebody to take care of him, I guess he can drink a little. At the stroke of one, Moe pushed me out of the way. I ended up in a sitting position about eleven feet away. Moe stood up, picked up Nicky and put him gently over a broad metal shoulder. In the other hand he took the bottle and the tin.

I walked back to the garage beside him. All the way back Moe sang “Sweet Adeline” in a basso profundo imitation of Nicky’s voice.

Not knowing why Nicky should be celebrating, I got back to the garage bright and early the next morning-ten o’clock. When I knocked, Nicky yelled for me to come in. He was back in his workshop, and Moe was stretched out on a massive bench. He was unplugged. The two storage batteries used for his outside jaunts, the ones that go in the cabinet built into his chest, were at one side, so I knew that Moe was immobilized.

Nicky was pale, but he was whistling between his teeth. He was doing something to Moe’s eyes — fastening on a new sort of lens that made Moe look as though his eyes were out on stalks.

“Are you busy today, Barney?” Nicky asked.

“Why?”

“Stay with Moe and me, will you? There ought to be a story in it.”

I went into the other room and phoned Kopal. He said I should stick with Nicky and Moe, particularly as it was arranged that Nicky should be committed late in the afternoon when the right head doctor arrived from the county asylum. I decided I had better not tell Nicky.

When I walked back in, Nicky had the cabinet open in the front of Moe’s chest. He lifted in the two six-volt storage batteries and screwed down the terminals. Moe made a small grunting sound and sat up.

Nicky trotted over to another bench, came back with one of those familiar little black boxes. “This is brand new!” he said happily.

On the side of it was neatly printed in white block letters — “DETECITON.”

“This... this extroverted metallic personality is going to find out who rubbed out Big George?”

“Shhh! Don’t sound so scornful, Barney. Moe has feelings too.”

Nicky plugged the box onto the back of Moe’s neck, and the big head swiveled, and Moe just stared holes in me.

“What makes with the eyes?” I asked.

“Now they are both photographic. The left one is telescopic and the right one is microscopic; and when he runs into a document, there’s a little relay that kicks out, and the right one takes a photostat. I’ve been up since six working on him. But I knew last night that I’d have him ready by now.”

Suddenly Moe’s long arm flashed out and grabbed the back of my suit. He lifted me clear of the floor, and his other hand quickly emptied my pockets. “Stop him!” I yelled to Nicky. Nicky merely looked pleased.

Moe turned me in the air slowly and yanked one hand behind me. Then he released it and yanked the other one behind me. There were a series of clicking noises, a low humming sound, and I was dropped on the floor.

I spun around, still angry, and saw Moe hand Nicky a manila envelope which he apparently took out of a shallow drawer where his belt buckle should have been.

Nicky handed me the envelope. I slapped my pockets. All my possessions were back.

I looked in the envelope. The first sheet was a summary — height, age, weight, probable occupation. The second sheet was fingerprints. It was then that I noticed the black smudges on the tips of my fingers. Also in the envelope were two pictures. One full face, one profile. In each I had a startled expression.

Moe looked fatuous and complacent. He clicked again, opened the drawer and took out a set of photostats of all my personal papers-driver’s license, laundry bill, sweepstakes ticket and a letter from a heavy blonde in Detroit.

“Observant, isn’t he?” Nicky said proudly.

Moe bowed. I bowed to him.

“Now we start,” Moe said. We walked down the stairs, side by side, Moe humming and clumping behind us.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“The residence of the late George Loke.”

Since it was but seven blocks away, and since Kopal is adamant about taxi fares, we walked.

When we were a hundred feet from the modern frame house that had belonged to Big George, Nicky pointed to it and said: “There it is, Moe.”

Moe stood quite still and looked at the house. He clicked twice. There was a shuffling sound, a muted inner thump, and he hooked a flexible metal finger around the drawer pull, slid it out and handed two pictures to Nicky.

I looked over Nicky’s shoulder. Moe had used his telescopic lens. The first picture was of an upstairs bedroom window. I couldn’t figure it out at first. Then I saw that it was a shot of a dressing-table mirror. In the lower left foreground was a bare and shapely arm. In the mirror was reflected the face of Mrs. George Loke, the fair Julie. She was combing her golden hair, and she had the faint look of a Mona Lisa.

The other shot was of the picture window in the side of what was apparently the living-room. Al McGee sat there in splendor, his shirt unbuttoned, a bottle by his side, his feet on a hassock, reading a racing form.

Nicky stuffed the pictures in his pocket and said: “Nice work, Moe.”

“Elementary,” Moe said.

I knew that Al lived in a room in the Udella House (one hundred rooms — one hundred baths).

The desk clerk was inclined to be stuffy about the whole affair. “Get that tin thing out of here! Take him away!”

The lobby was deserted except for an elderly citizen who was asleep. The single elevator was on an upper floor. Moe took a long look around, then reached over, picked up the desk clerk, tucked him under his arm and started for the stairs.

Nicky and I followed along behind him. The clerk made a tiny bleating sound, and fainted. Moe shook him gently, then laid him face down on one of the leather couches.

Al’s room was locked, of course. Moe put the tip of his little finger in the key slot, and pulled the lock out of the door. We went in. The room smelled of hair oil, gin and soiled

Moe opened the bureau drawer and began clicking rapidly. I stood at the door and kept an eye on the hall. Nicky sat on the bed, proud and smiling. From the bureau, Moe, clicking again, turned to a locked trunk.

At last he lifted a tin box, a green one, out of the bottom of the trunk, opened it and began to click even more rapidly. As the shallow drawer filled up, he handed batches of photographs to Nicky.

Nicky sorted them into two piles. He brought the slim pile to me. He didn’t have to say a word. The top item was a photostat of an IOU for three thousand dollars from Al to Big George. A second was a tabulation of losses on the horses. The third was a photostat of a note addressed to “Wonderful Man” and signed “Juliewoolie.” It said: “He won’t be back from Buffalo until ten tomorrow morning.”

I didn’t understand the next few pictures. Nicky said: “Those are microphotographs of the cutting edges of some tools Moe found in that green tin box.”

“But why?”

“Simple. We match those microphotographs to the shattered bits of the device that killed Big George. Every tool leaves its own particular-signature. And this last thing here is a photostat of a diploma issued by the Triangle Trade Schools to one Albert McGee, saying that Mr. McGee successfully completed their course in metalworking.”

Sirens ground to a throaty stop in front of the Udella House. Moe, with almost incredible speed, put everything back the way it had been, hummed out into the hall, pulled the door shut and shoved the lock-tube back into the splintered wood.

Nicky found the fire escape by the window at the end of the corridor. Moe went first. A high board fence hemmed us in when we reached the alley. Moe put his hand through the fence and pulled out two of the boards. We walked into the back yard of Hotstetta’s Fish Mart, down the alley beside the laundry, and came, out on West Main.

I got the impression that Moe was getting a little bit out of control. Nicky danced along beside him saying: “Wait a minute! Wait a minute!” Moe ignored him, merely lengthening his stride so that both Nicky and I had to trot to keep up.

“What goes?” I asked.

“Well,” Nicky panted, “I tried to make him pretty independent in this detection business, and I guess I forgot to put any relay in there so that I can stop him.”

“Nice!” I said, and looked longingly across to a bar and grill. I wanted to run in there and have several double boomers and forget.

Inside of half a block we picked up some eager citizens who began to trot along with us and ask questions.

We had no answers. When Moe turned left on Beechnut, I knew he was headed back for the home of the late George Loke.

I was getting winded. The nearest I have been to running for years is covering the high-school track meet.

Consequently, I had to pour on the coal to get onto Loke’s doorstep as Moe opened the unlocked door and hurried in.

Moe stopped in the front hall. Albert McGee appeared in the archway to the big living-room. His eyes were a little wide.

“Lugan,” he said, “take that son o£ a hardware store out of here!” Julie appeared behind McGee. She wore a pink dressing-gown.

Moe pointed a metal finger at McGee and said, in his hollow voice: “Albert McGee, you are accused of the murder of one George Loke. You are a metalworker. You killed Loke in a manner calculated to attract suspicion to Nicholas Lugan.”

McGee snickered, jerked a thumb at Moe and said to Nicky: “You got a phonograph record in that thing? You’re killing me!”

Moe ignored him. “You were in debt to George Loke. You are in love with Mrs. Loke. With both George and his competitor out of the vending-machine field, you could expect to marry Mrs. Loke and make a great deal of money.”

“You’re nuts,” McGee said to Moe. It was an index of his growing fear that he addressed himself to Moe.

“You lost money on the races. You have tools in your room. You could obtain explosives. You had motive and opportunity, and stand to gain by the murder.”

“You can’t prove a damn’ thing!” McGee said, but he began to look a little rattled.

“We have photostats of all pertinent documents, including microphotographs of the cutting edges of your tools,” Moe said.

The hallway was very still. A batch of people stood out on the sidewalk wondering what was going on. Sirens sounded in the distance.

I looked at Julie. Her face was blank, her eyes speculative. She ran the tip of a pink tongue along a full under lip.

She turned on McGee and said: “Now I know! You killed my husband! You murderer!” She tried to hack his face with her blood-red fingernails.

“You double-crossing—” McGee muttered.

Suddenly he ducked and scooted under Moe’s outstretched arm and ran out the front door. Moe turned like lightning and went after him. The crowd on the sidewalk scattered in all directions. The police sedan was just coming around the far corner.

A big furniture truck was exceeding the speed limit along the road in front of the house. McGee was smart. He figured he’d run across in front of the truck and delay pursuit. But at full speed, just as he went out in front of the speeding truck, Moe hooked a big finger in the back of McGee’s collar.

There was a scream of tires on asphalt, a sickening thud and a great crash which sounded as though somebody had dropped fifteen milk cans down a brick staircase.

The case was settled right out there under the elm trees. McGee was killed instantly. Bits of Moe were scattered for a hundred feet around. Nicky, beyond speech, filled with grief, knelt by the major part of the torso of Moe.

I got the ear of the Chief of Police and got the photographs away from Nicky, and turned them over, along with the whole story. McGee’s sprint was the final admission of guilt.

In hushed tones, the Chief told me that it would be okay if Nicky came in and made his statement when he was feeling better.

The body of McGee was taken away. The police collected the scattered fragments of Moe and put them by the curb. The crowd, bored with watching a little round man weeping over jumbled tinware, drifted off.

I walked over to Nicky and put my hand on his shoulder. I said: “Well, Moe did his job for you, pal.”

He twisted away from me, his face contorted. “It was your fault!” he said hoarsely.

“Are you nuts, Nicky?” I asked.

“Remember what you told me a detective should do? All those things? And end up by putting the finger on the criminal! That’s what Nicky was doing. He put the finger on him right in front of the truck!”

I didn’t know how to answer him. To change the subject, I leaned over and picked up a jointed metal finger. It seemed undamaged. I said: “Don’t feel too bad, Nicky. You can salvage a lot of this stuff for the next one.”

His eyes hot, he snapped: “What do you think I am? A ghoul?”

Four days later Moe was officially cremated in a Pittsburgh blast furnace. Nicky didn’t even ask me to go along.

Content

John D. MacDonald
Nicky and the Tin Finger