Mysterious Set of Books

The American broadcasting company presents... Pat Novak for hire. Sure I'm Pat Novak. That's what the sign out in front of my office says, Pat Novak for hire. It's about the only way to make a living down on the waterfront in San Francisco,

because if you ever try to practice the ten commandments down here, they'd steal nine of them and frame you with the other. So I rent boats and do whatever else comes in handy to make a buck change pockets.

Sometimes the hustle pays off. Sometimes you get lunch instead. Last week it was neither of these. I hung around my place at Pier 19 day after day and nothing turned up at all. This when I began to wonder if people had forgotten how to phone a babe gives me a jingle.

She sounds nervous and talks about trouble. Ask me to come up and hold her hand. I ended up at a joint on the Marina Slider Webster Street. It was probably important stuff once in the way a goal played at living.

Now it's just a tired wooden boarding house with about 30 people filling up space designed for a dozen. The paint was peeling off the walls. The garden had been on its own so long it was beginning to look like a jungle.

When I rang the doorbell I had to give it even odd to zombie wood over it. I was nearly right at that. It was Helman, a detective from City Homicide who was a disposition made up of equal parts I hate people and confusion.

Right then though he wasn't himself. His fat face was wrapped in smiles. He looked like a cat who learned over the ice box. Sorry, Novak, we don't want any fish today. You're being glad somebody must have broken their neck.