It was another bright, golden morning and it seemed that somehow things should adjust themselves on so pleasant a day.
Mr. Lansing Gallemore proved to be a little difficult to see, so that I was compelled to tell his secretary that it was a matter concerning Mrs. Penruddock and of a confidential nature. Upon this message being carried in to him I was at once ushered into a long paneled office, at the far end of which Mr. Gallemore stood behind a ma.s.sive desk. He extended a thin pink hand to me.
"Mr. Gage? I don"t believe we have met, have we?"
"No, Mr. Gallemore, I do not believe we have. I am the fiance-or was until last night-of Miss Ellen Macintosh, who, as you probably know, is Mrs. Penruddock"s nurse. I am come to you upon a very delicate matter and it is necessary that I ask for your confidence before I speak."
He was a man of perhaps seventy-five years of age, and very thin and tall and correct and well preserved. He had cold blue eyes but a warming smile. He was attired youthfully enough in a gray flannel suit with a red carnation at his lapel.
"That is something I make it a rule never to promise, Mr. Gage," he said. "I think it is almost always a very unfair request. But if you a.s.sure me the matter concerns Mrs. Penruddock and is really of a delicate and confidential nature, I will make an exception."
"It is indeed, Mr. Gallemore," I said, and thereupon told him the entire story, concealing nothing, not even the fact that I had consumed far too much whiskey the day before.
He stared at me curiously at the end of my story. His finely shaped hand picked up an old-fashioned white quill pen and he slowly tickled his right ear with the feather of it.
"Mr. Gage," he said, "can"t you guess why they ask five thousand dollars for that string of pearls?"
"If you permit me to guess, in a matter of so personal a nature, I could perhaps hazard an explanation, Mr. Gallemore."
He moved the white feather around to his left ear and nodded. "Go ahead, son."
"The pearls are in fact real, Mr. Gallemore. You are a very old friend of Mrs. Penruddock-perhaps even a childhood sweetheart. When she gave you her pearls, her golden wedding present, to sell because she was in sore need of money for a generous purpose, you did not sell them, Mr. Gallemore. You only pretended to sell them. You gave her twenty thousand dollars of your own money, and you returned the real pearls to her, pretending that they were an imitation made in Czechoslovakia."
"Son, you think a lot smarter than you talk," Mr. Gallemore said. He arose and walked to a window, pulled aside a fine net curtain and looked down on the bustle of Seventh Street. He came back to his desk and seated himself and smiled a little wistfully.
"You are almost embarra.s.singly correct, Mr. Gage," he said, and sighed. "Mrs. Penruddock is a very proud woman, or I should simply have offered her the twenty thousand dollars as an unsecured loan. I happened to be the coadministrator of Mr. Penruddock"s estate and I knew that in the condition of the financial market at that time it would be out of the question to raise enough cash, without damaging the corpus of the estate beyond reason, to care for all those relatives and pensioners. So Mrs. Penruddock sold her pearls-as she thought-but she insisted that no one should know about it. And I did what you have guessed. It was unimportant. I could afford the gesture. I have never married, Gage, and I am rated a wealthy man. As a matter of fact, at that time, the pearls would not have fetched more than half of what I gave her, or of what they should bring today."
I lowered my eyes for fear this kindly old gentleman might be troubled by my direct gaze.
"So I think we had better raise that five thousand, son," Mr. Gallemore at once added in a brisk voice. "The price is pretty low, although stolen pearls are a great deal more difficult to deal in than cut stones. If I should care to trust you that far on your face, do you think you could handle the a.s.signment?"
"Mr. Gallemore," I said firmly but quietly, "I am a total stranger to you and I am only flesh and blood. But I promise you by the memories of my dead and revered parents that there will be no cowardice."
"Well, there is a good deal of the flesh and blood, son," Mr. Gallemore said kindly. "And I am not afraid of your stealing the money, because possibly I know a little more about Miss Ellen Macintosh and her boy friend than you might suspect. Furthermore, the pearls are insured, in my name, of course, and the insurance company should really handle this affair. But you and your funny friend seem to have got along very nicely so far, and I believe in playing out a hand. This Henry must be quite a man."
"I have grown very attached to him, in spite of his uncouth ways," I said.
Mr. Gallemore played with his white quill pen a little longer and then he brought out a large checkbook and wrote a check, which he carefully blotted and pa.s.sed across the desk.
"If you get the pearls, I"ll see that the insurance people refund this to me," he said. "If they like my business, there will be no difficulty about that. The bank is down at the corner and I will be waiting for their call. They won"t cash the check without telephoning me, probably. Be careful, son, and don"t get hurt."
He shook hands with me once more and I hesitated. "Mr. Gallemore, you are placing a greater trust in me than any man ever has," I said. "With the exception, of course, of my own father."
"I am acting like a d.a.m.n fool," he said with a peculiar smile. "It is so long since I heard anyone talk the way Jane Austen writes that it is making a sucker out of me."
"Thank you, sir. I know my language is a bit stilted. Dare I ask you to do me a small favor, sir?"
"What is it, Gage?"
"To telephone Miss Ellen Macintosh, from whom I am now a little estranged, and tell her that I am not drinking today, and that you have entrusted me with a very delicate mission."
He laughed aloud. "I"ll be glad to, Walter. And as I know she can be trusted, I"ll give her an idea of what"s going on."
I left him then and went down to the bank with the check, and the teller, after looking at me suspiciously, then absenting himself from his cage for a long time, finally counted out the money in hundred-dollar bills with the reluctance one might have expected, if it had been his own money.
I placed the flat packet of bills in my pocket and said: "Now give me a roll of quarters, please."
"A roll of quarters, sir?" His eyebrows lifted.
"Exactly. I use them for tips. And naturally I should prefer to carry them home in the wrappings."
"Oh, I see. Ten dollars, please."
I took the fat hard roll of coins and dropped it into my pocket and drove back to Hollywood.
Henry was waiting for me in the lobby of the Chateau Moraine, twirling his hat between his rough hard hands. His face looked a little more deeply lined than it had the day before and I noticed that his breath smelled of whiskey. We went up to my apartment and he turned to me eagerly.
"Any luck, pal?"
"Henry," I said, "before we proceed further into this day I wish it clearly understood that I am not drinking. I see that already you have been at the bottle."
"Just a pick-up, Walter," he said a little contritely. "That job I went out for was gone before I got there. What"s the good word?"
I sat down and lit a cigarette and stared at him evenly. "Well, Henry, I don"t really know whether I should tell you or not. But it seems a little petty not to do so after all you did last night to Gandesi." I hesitated a moment longer while Henry stared at me and pinched the muscles of his left arm. "The pearls are real, Henry. And I have instructions to proceed with the business and I have five thousand dollars in cash in my pocket at this moment."
I told him briefly what had happened.
He was more amazed than words could tell. "Cripes!" he exclaimed, his mouth hanging wide open. "You mean you got the five grand from this Gallemore-just like that?"
"Precisely that, Henry."
"Kid," he said earnestly, "You got something with that daisy pan and that fluff talk that a lot of guys would give important dough to cop. Five grand-out of a business guy-just like that. Why, I"ll be a monkey"s uncle. I"ll be a snake"s daddy. I"ll be a mickey finn at a woman"s-club lunch."
At that exact moment, as if my entrance to the building had been observed, the telephone rang again and I sprang to answer it.
It was one of the voices I was awaiting, but not the one I wanted to hear with the greater longing. "How"s it looking to you this morning, Gage?"
"It is looking better," I said. "If I can have any a.s.surance of honorable treatment, I am prepared to go through with it."
"You mean you got the dough?"
"In my pocket at this exact moment."
The voice seemed to exhale a slow breath. "You"ll get your marbles O.K.-if we get the price, Gage. We"re in this business for a long time and we don"t welsh. If we did, it would soon get around and n.o.body would play with us any more."
"Yes, I can readily understand that," I said. "Proceed with your instructions," I added coldly.
"Listen close, Gage. Tonight at eight sharp you be in Pacific Palisades. Know where that is?"
"Certainly. It is a small residential section west of the polo fields on Sunset Boulevard."
"Right. Sunset goes slap through it. There"s one drugstore there-open till nine. Be there waiting a call at eight sharp tonight. Alone. And I mean alone, Gage. No cops and no strong-arm guys. It"s rough country down there and we got a way to get you to where we want you and know if you"re alone. Get all this?"
"I am not entirely an idiot," I retorted.
"No dummy packages, Gage. The dough will be checked. No guns. You"ll be searched and there"s enough of us to cover you from all angles. We know your car. No funny business, no smart work, no slip-up and n.o.body hurt. That"s the way we do business. How"s the dough fixed?"
"One-hundred-dollar bills," I said. "And only a few of them are new."
"Attaboy. Eight o"clock then. Be smart, Gage."
The phone clicked in my ear and I hung up. It rang again almost instantly. This time it was the one one voice. voice.
"Oh, Walter," Ellen cried, "I was so mean to you! Please forgive me, Walter. Mr. Gallemore has told me everything and I"m so frightened."
"There is nothing of which to be frightened," I told her warmly. "Does Mrs. Penruddock know, darling?"
"No, darling. Mr. Gallemore told me not to tell her. I am phoning from a store down on Sixth Street. Oh, Walter, I really am frightened. Will Henry go with you?"
"I am afraid not, darling. The arrangements are all made and they will not permit it. I must go alone."
"Oh, Walter! I"m terrified. I can"t bear the suspense."
"There is nothing to fear," I a.s.sured her. "It is a simple business transaction. And I am not exactly a midget."
"But, Walter-oh, I will will try to be brave, Walter. Will you promise me just one teensy-weensy little thing?" try to be brave, Walter. Will you promise me just one teensy-weensy little thing?"
"Not a drop, darling," I said firmly. "Not a single solitary drop."
"Oh, Walter!"
There was a little more of that sort of thing, very pleasant to me in the circ.u.mstances, although possibly not of great interest to others. We finally parted with my promise to telephone as soon as the meeting between the crooks and myself had been consummated.
I turned from the telephone to find Henry drinking deeply from a bottle he had taken from his hip pocket.
"Henry!" I cried sharply.
He looked at me over the bottle with a s.h.a.ggy determined look. "Listen, pal," he said in a low hard voice. "I got enough of your end of the talk to figure the set-up. Some place out in the tall weeds and you go alone and they feed you the old sap poison and take your dough and leave you lying-with the marbles still in their kitty. Nothing doing, pal. I said-nothing doing!" He almost shouted the last words.
"Henry, it is my duty and I must do it," I said quietly.
"Haw!" Henry snorted. "I say no. You"re a nut, but you"re a sweet guy on the side. I say no. Henry Eichelberger of the Wisconsin Eichelbergers-in fact, I might just as leave say of the Milwaukee Eichelbergers-says no. And he says it with both hands working." He drank again from his bottle.
"You certainly will not help matters by becoming intoxicated," I told him rather bitterly.
He lowered the bottle and looked at me with amazement written all over his rugged features. "Drunk, Walter?" he boomed. "Did I hear you say drunk? An Eichelberger drunk? Listen, son. We ain"t got a lot of time now. It would take maybe three months. Some day when you got three months and maybe five thousand gallons of whiskey and a funnel, I would be glad to take my own time and show you what an Eichelberger looks like when drunk. You wouldn"t believe it. Son, there wouldn"t be nothing left of this town but a few sprung girders and a lot of busted bricks, in the middle of which-Geez, I"ll get talking English myself if I hang around you much longer-in the middle of which, peaceful, with no human life nearer than maybe fifty miles, Henry Eichelberger will be on his back smiling at the sun. Drunk, Walter. Not stinking drunk, not even country-club drunk. But you could use the word drunk and I wouldn"t take no offense."
He sat down and drank again. I stared moodily at the floor. There was nothing for me to say.
"But that," Henry said, "is some other time. Right now I am just taking my medicine. I ain"t myself without a slight touch of delirium tremens, as the guy says. I was brought up on it. And I"m going with you, Walter. Where is this place at?"
"It"s down near the beach, Henry, and you are not going with me. If you must get drunk-get drunk, but you are not going with me."
"You got a big car, Walter. I"ll hide in back on the floor under a rug. It"s a cinch."
"No, Henry."
"Walter, you are a sweet guy," Henry said, "and I am going with you into this frame. Have a smell from the barrel, Walter. You look to me kind of frail."
We argued for an hour and my head ached and I began to feel very nervous and tired. It was then that I made what might have been a fatal mistake. I succ.u.mbed to Henry"s blandishments and took a small portion of whiskey, purely for medicinal purposes. This made me feel so much more relaxed that I took another and larger portion. I had had no food except coffee that morning and only a very light dinner the evening before. At the end of another hour Henry had been out for two more bottles of whiskey and I was as bright as a bird. All difficulties had now disappeared and I had agreed heartily that Henry should lie in the back of my car hidden by a rug and accompany me to the rendezvous.
We had pa.s.sed the time very pleasantly until two o"clock, at which hour I began to feel sleepy and lay down on the bed, and fell into a deep slumber.
SEVEN.
When I awoke again it was almost dark. I rose from the bed with panic in my heart, and also a sharp shoot of pain through my temples. It was only six-thirty, however. I was alone in the apartment and lengthening shadows were stealing across the floor. The display of empty whiskey bottles on the table was very disgusting. Henry Eichelberger was nowhere to be seen. With an instinctive pang, of which I was almost immediately ashamed, I hurried to my jacket hanging on the back of a chair and plunged my hand into the inner breast pocket. The packet of bills was there intact. After a brief hesitation, and with a feeling of secret guilt, I drew them out and slowly counted them over. Not a bill was missing. I replaced the money and tried to smile at myself for this lack of trust, and then switched on a light and went into the bathroom to take alternate hot and cold showers until my brain was once more comparatively clear.
I had done this and was dressing in fresh linen when a key turned in the lock and Henry Eichelberger entered with two wrapped bottles under his arm. He looked at me with what I thought was genuine affection.
"A guy that can sleep it off like you is a real champ, Walter," he said admiringly. "I snuck your keys so as not to wake you. I had to get some eats and some more hooch. I done a little solo drinking, which as I told you is against my principles, but this is a big day. However, we take it easy from now on as to the hooch. We can"t afford no jitters till it"s all over."
He had unwrapped a bottle wlile he was speaking and poured me a small drink. I drank it gratefully and immediately felt a warm glow in my veins.
"I bet you looked in your poke for that deck of mazuma," Henry said, grinning at me.
I felt myself reddening, but I said nothing. "O.K., pal, you done right. What the heck do you know about Henry Eichelberger anyways? I done something else." He reached behind him and drew a short automatic from his hip pocket. "If these boys wanta play rough," he said, "I got me five bucks worth of iron that don"t mind playin" rough a little itself. And the Eichelbergers ain"t missed a whole lot of the guys they shot at."
"I don"t like that, Henry," I said severely. "That is contrary to the agreement."
"Nuts to the agreement," Henry said. "The boys get their dough and no cops. I"m out to see that they hand over them marbles and don"t pull any fast footwork."
I saw there was no use arguing with him, so I completed my dressing and prepared to leave the apartment. We each took one more drink and then Henry put a full bottle in his pocket and we left.
On the way down the hall to the elevator he explained in a low voice: "I got a hack out front to tail you, just in case these boys got the same idea. You might circle a few quiet blocks so as I can find out. More like they don"t pick you up till down close to the beach."
"All this must be costing you a great deal of money, Henry," I told him, and while we were waiting for the elevator to come up I took another twenty-dollar bill from my wallet and offered it to him. He took the money reluctantly, but finally folded it and placed it in his pocket.
I did as Henry had suggested, driving up and down a number of the hilly streets north of Hollywood Boulevard, and presently I heard the unmistakable hoot of a taxicab horn behind me. I pulled over to the side of the road. Henry got out of the cab and paid off the driver and got into my car beside me.
"All clear," he said. "No tail. I"ll just keep kind of slumped down and you better stop somewhere for some groceries on account of if we have to get rough with these mugs, a full head of steam will help."
So I drove westward and dropped down to Sunset Boulevard and presently stopped at a crowded drive-in restaurant where we sat at the counter and ate a light meal of omelette and black coffee. We then proceeded on our way. When we reached Beverly Hills, Henry again made me wind in and out through a number of residential streets where he observed very carefully through the rear window of the car.