tantaliz (24 page)

"No, sir," said Vare. "Not a thing."

"All right," said Sergeant Ackley. "Ill tell you a few things, and you can see how much it means to you. This fellow Lester Leith that you're working for is one of the cleverest crooks this city has ever produced. He makes a living out of robbing crooks of their ill-gotten spoils. He's slick and he's clever, and he usually dopes out the solution of a crime in advance of the police, and then shakes down the crook before we get to him."

"I didn't know that," said Harry Vare.

"Well, maybe you did, and maybe you didn't," said Sergeant Ackley. That's something for you to tell the jury when you come up for trial. But here's something else that you may like to listen to. Lester Leith picked up this chorus girl, and the two of them went out last night after they left you and picked up Bob Lamont and some other woman.

"Lester Leith is pretty much of a gentleman, and he wears his clothes well, and this chorus girl he had with him looked like a million dollars in a lot of high-priced clothes. The night club was more or less informal, and she gave Bob Lamont the eye. Bob fell for her and started to dance with her, and before the evening was finished they had moved to another table and were having a nice little foursome."

"But," said Harry Vare, gathering courage, "what has that got to do with me?"

Sergeant Ackley studied him in shrewd appraisal.

"So," he said, "they made another date for tonight, and the four of them are going out"

Harry Vare suddenly caught his breath. His eyes grew wide and dark with apprehension.

"Good heavens I" he said.

Sergeant Ackley nodded. "I thought so," he said.

Panic showed in Vare's face.

"You've got just ten seconds to come clean," said Sergeant Ackley. "If you come clean and give me the low-down on this thing, and agree to work with me, there's a chance that we may give you immunity from prosecution. Otherwise, you're going to jail for at least ten years."

Harry didn't need ten seconds. He was blurting out speech almost before Sergeant Ackley had finished.

"I didn't know the name," he said, "and I didn't know it was Lamont until you told me. But Lester Leith hired me to study detective work. He had his pocket picked once yesterday, and then gave me a jewel to carry, and it was picked from my pocket I felt all broken up about it, but Mr. Leith said that it was all right Td have to learn a step at a time.

"He told me that tonight he was going to teach me how to make an arrest He said that I was to arrest him, just as though he had been a crook. He said that he was going out to a dinner party tonight with another man and a woman, and that they would probably wind up at the man's apartment; that after they got to the apartment, he had it fixed up that Dixie Dormley—that's the chorus girl—was to take the other girl out for a few moments, and that, as soon as that happened, I was to come busting in as a detective and accuse Lester Leith of some crime, handcuff him, and lead him out"

Sergeant Ackley frowned. "That's everything you know about it?"

"Everything," said Harry Vare; "but I get more instructions later."

"Well," Ackley said, "I'm going to give you a break. If you do exactly as I tell you, and don't tell Lester Leith that I was here, I'll see that you get a break and aren't arrested."

"That's all right, officer," Harry Vare said. "I'll do anything you say."

Lester Leith handed Sid Bentley, the mournful faced pickpocket, a one-hundred-dollar bill. "Wages for another day," he said. Bentley pocketed the hundred and looked with avaricious eyes at the wallet which Leith returned to his breast pocket.

"Speaking professionally," he said, "you'd do better to carry your bills in a fold. That breast-pocket stuff is particularly vulnerable."

"I know it," Leith said, "but I like to have my money where I can get at it."

Bentley nodded, his milk-mild eyes without expression. "I," he said, like people who carry their money where I can get at it"

"Remember our bargain," Leith said.

"What do you suppose makes me feel so bad about getting a hundred bucks?" Bentley asked. "I'm just figuring I made a poor bargain."

"You mean the work's too hard?"

"No, that there are too many restrictions. I'm commencing to think I could make a good living just following
you
around."

Leith lowered his voice. "Where," he asked, "do you suppose I make all this money?"

Bentley said: "Now, buddy, you've got me interested."

Leith said: "We're working on the same side of the street"

"You don't mean you're a dip?"

"No, but I'm a crook. I'm a confidence man."

"What's the game?" Bentley asked.

Leith said: "I have different rackets. Right now, it's sticking a sucker with that imitation ruby. I show the ruby to the man I'm aiming to trim. I tell him I found it on the street, that I don't know whether it's any good or not, that I presume it isn't good, but that even as an imitation, it should have some value. I ask him what he thinks about it.

"If he's a real gem expert I know it from what he says. He tells me to go home and forget it. I thank him, and that's all there is to it. But if he's a little dubious about whether it's genuine, I gradually let him think I'm a sucker. You see, this ruby is the exact duplicate of a valuable ruby that has been in the newspapers."

Bentley said: "That's what fooled me about it the first time I saw it."

"You recognized it?" Sure.

"Well," Leith said, "lots of other people will, too. They'll think it's the genuine priceless ruby. Some of them will want to buy it. Some of them won't. If the guy offers me anything like five hundred dollars for it, Tm perfectly willing to sell."

Bentley said: "I'm still listening."

"The big trouble," Leith said, "is the risk."

"How do you mean?"

"I've got too many of them out," Leith said. "These imitations cost me about fifteen dollars apiece. I've been playing the racket for a week."

"You're afraid some of the suckers have made a squawk?"

"Yes."

Bentley said: "I know just how you feel. When a racket gets hot, you know you should leave it, but there's still coin in it, so you want to hang on."

Leith said: "That's where you come in."

"What do you mean?"

Leith said: "I want you to follow me around from now on whenever I'm going to make a sale."

"What do I do?"

"Just this," Leith said. "A cop can't make a pinch until after I've made a sale. In order to do that, they'll have to plant a ringer on me for a sucker, and have the payments made to me in marked money."

"No, they won't," Bentley said. "You're all wet there, brother. They can
either
have the marked money on you, or they can pinch both you and the sucker and hold the sucker as a material witness."

Leith said: "That last is what Tm afraid of. If that happens, I want you to get the evidence."

"You mean from the sucker?"

"Yes."

"Listen, brother. That evidence will be just as hot as a stove lid. I couldn't—"

Leith took from his pocket a little cloth sack to which was attached a printed tag with a postage stamp on the tag.

"You don't keep it on you for a minute," he said. "You just beat it for the first mailbox, drop it, and let Uncle Sam do the dirty work."

Bentley said: "That's more like it"

"Whenever you do that you get a five-hundred-dollar bonus."

"And that's all I have to do?"

"That's all."

"And my cut is still a hundred bucks a day."

"That's right. You just have to follow me around."

"Lead me to it," Bentley said. "But you'll have to tell me when you're going to make a deal."

Leith said: "In about an hour, Miss Dormley, the young lady who was with me last night, and I are going out to dinner with another couple. I've fixed things up with Miss Dormley so she'll get the other girl out of the way. That will leave me alone with the man. I figure I can put the deal across with him."

"I'll be tagging along."

Leith said: "Carry this mailing sack where you can put your hand on it in an instant. Don't ever be caught without it"

"Listen, buddy," Bentley said, "don't think I was born yesterday. If you think I want to be caught with goods that will hook me up as your confederate, you're cockeyed. And don't pull your stuff in a place where there isn't a mailbox on every corner, because if you do, it's just your hard luck."

Sergeant Arthur Ackley stared reproachfully at Beaver, the undercover operative. "Right under your nose, Beaver," he said, "and you muffed it."

The spy's face colored. "What do you mean, I muffed it? I'm the one that told you he was going after that ruby."

Sergeant Ackley said: "You argued a lot, Beaver, and became personally offensive, but you didn't give me anything constructive."

"What do you mean, constructive?"

"You didn't even smell a rat when he brought that green kid in to act as a detective," Ackley said.

Beaver sighed. "Oh, what's the use. Just don't forget that we have a bet If all those various things I told you about fit into his plan to get the ruby, I win your watch."

"Not at all, Beaver," said Ackley. "You have overlooked one little fact. It was to have been done so cleverly that I couldn't pin anything on him. You overlooked that little thing, Beaver, and that's going to cost you fifty bucks—because I've already got it pinned on him."

Beaver said: "I suppose you know every step in his campaign."

Sergeant Ackley gloated. "You bet I do."

The spy scraped back his chair and got to his feet

Sergeant Ackley said: "Don't go to bed until after midnight, Beaver. Ill be calling you some time before then to come down to headquarters. Leith will be booked and in a cell. Then you can have the pleasure of telling him that you helped put him there—and you can pay over the fifty bucks to me."

Beaver lunged toward the door. "You've thought you had him before," he flung back, on the threshold.

Sergeant Ackley laughed. "But this time, Beaver, I
have
got him. I threw a scare into that green kid Vare, and he told me everything."

The four people left the taxicab and walked across the sidewalk to the entrance of the apartment house. Dixie Dormley, attired in soft white, was vibrantly beautiful. The other young woman, although expensively gowned, seemed drab in comparison.

Lester Leith, well-tailored, faultlessly groomed, wore his evening clothes with an air of distinction. Bob Lamont was quick and nervous. He seemed ill at ease.

The four people chatted as they went up in the elevator, and Bob Lamont opened the door of his apartment with a flourish.

It was an apartment which was well and tastefully furnished. As secretary to George Navin, Lamont had drawn a very good salary.

When the two young women were seated, Lamont went to the kitchenette to get the makings of drinks.

Lester Leith gave a significant glance at Dixie Dormley.

She caught the glance, turned at once to the other young woman, and exclaimed, "Oh, my heavens, I left my purse in that taxicab! Or else it may have fallen out on the sidewalk; I don't know which. It seems to me that I heard something drop to the running board as I got out"

The young woman said: "Never mind, Dixie, you can telephone the taxicab company, and they'll have it in the Lost and Found Department."

"Yes," wailed Dixie, "but suppose it dropped to the running board. Then it would have spilled off at the corner." Lester Leith reached for his hat. "I'll run down and see."

Dixie Dormley got to her feet quickly and started to the door.

"No, please," she said. "You wait here. I can't explain, but I'd much rather go by myself, unless Vivian wants to come with me."

She flashed the other young woman a smile of invitation, and Vivian promptly arose.

"Tell Bob that we'll be right back," she said.

As the door closed behind the two women, Lester Leith strolled out into the kitchenette where Lamont was taking ice cubes from a refrigerator.

"Well, Lamont," said Lester Leith casually, "you pulled that murder pretty cleverly, didn't you?"

Lamont dropped the ice-cube tray with a clatter, and stared at Leith with bulging eyes. "What the devil are you talking about?"

"Oh, you know well enough, Lamont," he said. "The police were a little bit slow in catching up with you, that's all, but the scheme wasn't really so clever. The guards shut all of the windows and locked the shutters on the inside when they went into Navin's room, but you were the last one in there. It would have been very easy for you to have moved against one of the windows and unlocked one of the shutters. Then you left the room, went directly to the safe, took out the gem, and went to your conference with the lawyer, which gave you your alibi. In the morning you walked in and locked the shutter again from the inside.

"You'd probably been bribed by the Hindus to leave one of the steel shutters unlocked, and had specified that they must break in and do the job promptly at four o'clock, so that the police would be properly confused.

"Where the police made their mistake was in thinking that whoever had committed the murder had also stolen the gem from the safe. It didn't occur to them that they could have been independent acts. And apparently, so far, it hasn't occurred to the Hindus. They thought simply that they failed to find the gem, and that Navin had placed it in some other hiding place.

"But you can't get away with it long, Lamont. The police will be here inside of half an hour."

"You're crazy!" said Lamont Lester Leith shook his head.

"No, Lamont," he said, "you're the one who's crazy. You overlooked the fact that, if the Hindus should start to talk, they had you strapped to the electric chair. And that's exactly what happened. The police got a confession out of one of the Hindus about fifteen minutes ago. My paper telephoned me."

Lamont's face was gray. "Who—who are you?" he asked.

"I'm a free-lance reporter," said Lester Leith, "who works on feature stuff for some of the leading papers. Right now I'm assigned to cover the story of your arrest in the Navin case. The newspaper knew it was going to break sometime within the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours. Now if you would like to pick up a little money that would come in handy when it becomes necessary to retain an attorney to represent you, you can give us an exclusive interview. In fact, the only thing for you to do is to confess and try and get a life sentence. If you want to make your confession through my newspaper, we would bring all the political pressure to bear that we could to see that you got off with life."