Westlake, Donald E - SSC 02 Read online

  That surprised me. "You had a key?"

  "Well," he said, with another of his little smiles, "I have a whole lot of keys. Generally there's one for the job."

  "You broke in, in other words."

  "Well, sir, Mr. Thorpe," he said, "I don't think you ought to start using harsh words, you know. There's two of us could do that."

  "All right, all right. Get to the point."

  "Well, you know what I found in the apartment."

  "This envelope," I said, waggling the fist in which I had it imprisoned.

  "Yes," he said, "and a body on top of it. From the marks on the coffee table and the floor, it looked to me as though there'd been some sort of fracas. You struck her—there's a bit of a gray spot on the side of the jaw, she was dead before it could swell up any—and she hit her head on the coffee table going down."

  "It was an accident," I said.

  He did a judicious pose, pursing out his lips and stroking the line of his jaw; Sidney Greenstreet. "That's a possibility," he said. "On the other hand, you did run away, and you did try to cover your presence in the apartment, and if you'll look at this picture here you'll see you do just look guilty as all hell."

  From inside his coat he had taken a photograph, which he now leaned forward to extend toward me. I took it, with the hand not crushing the envelope, and looked at a grainy but recognizable black-and-white picture of myself emerging from Laura's apartment building. By God, I did look guilty as all hell, with my mouth open and eyes staring and head half-twisted to look over my shoulder. I also looked very bulky, as though I'd just stolen all the silver. Mostly I reminded me of Peter Loire in M. "I see," I said.

  "Infra red," he told me. He seemed very pleased with himself. "The negative's in my desk at the office."

  I looked up from my own staring eyes into his calmly humorous ones. "What now? What are you going to do?"

  "Well, sir," he said, "I think of that as being up to you."

  And suddenly we were in a situation I recognized from the movies. "Blackmail," I said.

  He looked a bit offended. "Well, now," he said, "there you go with the harsh words again. I just thought you might be interested in buying the negative, that's all."

  "And your silence?"

  "I wouldn't want to get a man in trouble, if I could avoid it." He shifted his bulk on the sofa. "Now, I'm supposed to turn in my report by twelve noon, and it seems to me I could handle it one of two ways. Either I could say a gentleman—that would be you—brought Mrs. Penney home but left her at the street door and went away, or I could report that you went in with her and came out without her and please see photo attached."

  I said, "How much?"

  "Well," he said, "that's a very rare photograph."

  "And I'm a very poor man.'*

  He chuckled at me, disbelievingly. "Oh, come along now. You've got a nice place in a rich part of town, you've—"

  "This isn't a rich part of town. A couple blocks west of here is rich, but not here."

  "This is the Upper East Side," he informed me, as though I didn't know where I lived.

  "Look," I said. "You just walked up the stairs yourself, do you think they have walk-ups in a rich part of town?"

  "On the Upper East Side of Manhattan they do. Besides, you're a writer."

  "I'm a movie reviewer. There isn't any money in that."

  "You've had books out."

  "Film criticism. Did you ever see a book of film criticism on the best-seller list?"

  "I don't believe I've ever seen the best-seller list," he said, "but I do know from my years with the agency that successful writers tend to have nice pieces of money about themselves."

  "I don't," I said. "For God's sake, man, you're a detective, surely you could check into that, find out if I'm a liar or not. I'll show you my checkbook, I'll show you letters from my wife screaming for money, I'll show you my old income tax returns."

  "Well, sir," he said, "if you're too poor, I think I'd be better off going for the glory of making the arrest."

  A cold breeze touched me. "Wait a minute," I said. "I didn't say I don't have any money. Obviously, if I can afford to pay I'd rather do that than go to jail. It just depends how much you want."

  He frowned at me. He studied me and thought it over and glanced around the living room—and to think I'd been pleased at how expensive I'd made the place look— and at last he came to a decision: "Ten thousand dollars."

  "Ten thousand dollars! I don't have it."

  "I won't bargain with you, Mr. Thorpe." He sounded rueful but determined. "I couldn't falsify my report for a penny less."

  "I don't have the money, it's as simple as that."

  He heaved himself to his feet. "I'm truly sorry, Mr. Thorpe."

  "I'll tell them, you know. That you tried to blackmail me.

  He gave me a mildly curious frown. "So?"

  "They'll know it's the truth." I jammed the photograph into my trouser pocket. "I'll have this picture for evidence."

  He shrugged and smiled and shook his head. "Oh, they'd probably believe you," he said, "but they wouldn't care. Funny thing about police, they'd rather catch a murderer than a blackmailer any day in the week."

  "They'll have both. I may go to jail, but you'll go right along with me."

  "Oh, I don't think so." He could not have been more calm. "I'd be their whole case, you know," he said. "Their star witness. I don't think they'd want to cast any aspersions on their own star witness, do you? I think you'd generally be called a liar. I think generally people would say you were doing it out of spite."

  I thought. He watched me thinking, with his curly little smile, and finally I said, "Two thousand. I could raise that somewhere, I'm sure I could."

  "I'm sorry, Mr. Thorpe, I told you I won't bargain. It's ten thousand or nothing."

  "But I don't have it! That's the Lord's own truth!"

  "Oh, come on, Mr. Thorpe, surely you've got something set aside for a rainy day."

  "But I don't. I've never had the knack, it's one of the things my father's always hated about me. He's the squirrel, I'm the grasshopper."

  He frowned, deeply. "What was that?"

  "I don't save up my nuts," I explained, "or whatever grasshoppers save up. You know, you know, the children's story. I'm the one that doesn't save."

  "Well, Mr. Thorpe," he said, "it seems to me you should have listened to your father." And, turning away, he crossed the room toward the front door.

  I should have killed him, that would have been the most sensible thing to do. Picked up something heavy—that can containing North By Northwest, for instance— and brained him with it. Unfortunately, I wasn't sufficiently used to being a killer, so what I did was grit my teeth and get to my feet and say, 'Wait."

  He waited, turning to look at me again, the same patient smile on his face, letting me know I could have all the time I needed. But that's all I could have.

  I said, "I'm not sure I can do it. I'll have to borrow, I'll have to— I don't know what I’ll have to do."

  "Well, sir," he said, coming back to me, "I don't want to make things difficult for you if I can possibly avoid it. Here's my card."

  His card. I took it.

  He said, "You call me at that number before eleven-thirty if you decide to pay."

  "You mean, if I can pay."

  "Any way you want," he said. "I'd mostly like a cashier's check, made out to bearer."

  "Yes, I suppose you would." I looked at the card he'd given me. Blue lettering read Tobin-Global Investigations Service—Matrimonial Specialists. In the lower left was a phone number, and in the lower right a name: John Edgarson.

  "If you do call," John Edgarson told me, "ask for Ed."

  "I'll do that."

  "And Mr. Thorpe," he said, "do try to look on the bright side."

  I stared at him. "The bright side?"

  "You've had an early warning," he told me. "If you decide not to pay, you've got almost three hours' head start."

  * *
*

  It's amazing what you can do in an hour when your life depends on it. By eleven o'clock I'd converted into cash the following:

  Savings account $2,763.80

  Checking account 275.14

  To pawnshops: (Projector 120.; Leica camera 100.; 8mm camera 70.; portable tape unit 160.; 8mm projector 50.; stereo system 180.; typewriter 50.; watch 40.; wedding ring & jewelry 90.) 860.00

  Films, posters, stills, etc. 450.00

  Loan from publisher against future earnings 1,500.00 $100. bad checks to liquor store, florist, grocer, dry cleaner, barber & hardware store 600.00

  GRAND TOTAL 6,448.94

  Needed 10,000.00

  Shortage 3,551.06

  Eleven o'clock. Five after eleven. I was back in my apartment, my pockets full of cash. But where was I going to get three thousand five hundred fifty-one dollars and six cents?

  My grandmother's trust fund? Not a chance. I'd cried wolf with the people at the bank two or three times already, and they'd made it perfectly clear my well-being didn't matter to them one one-hundredth as much as the fund's well-being.

  My father? Another blank. He had the money, all right, and plenty to spare, but even if he was willing to help—which he wouldn't be—the cash would never get here from Boston in the next twenty-four minutes. Besides, if I did ask him the first thing he'd say—even before no-would be why.

  Would Edgarson take less? Six thousand dollars in the hand was surely better than ten thousand dollars in the bush. I dialed the number on the card he'd given me, and when a harsh female voice answered with the company's name I asked for Ed. "Minute," she said, and clicked away.

  It was a long minute, but it finally ended with a too-familar voice: "Hello?"

  "Edgarson?"

  "Is that Mr. Thorpe? You're a few minutes early."

  "All I can raise is, uh, six thousand, uh, dollars. And four hundred. Six thousand four hundred dollars."

  "Well, that's fine," he said. "And you've still got twenty minutes to get the rest."

  "I can't. I've done everything I could."

  "Mr. Thorpe," he said, "I thought we had an understanding, you and I."

  "But I can't raise any more!"

  "Then if I were you, Mr. Thorpe, I'd take that six thousand four hundred dollars and buy a ticket to some place a long way from here."

  South America. The Lavender Hill Mob. But I liked the life I had here in New York, my career, my girl friends, my name on books and magazines. I didn't want to run away to some absurd place and learn how to be somebody else.

  "Well, goodbye, Mr. Thorpe," the rotten bastard was saying, "and good luck to you."

  "Wait!"

  The line buzzed at me; Edgarson, politely waiting.

  "Somehow," I told him. "Somehow I’ll do it."

  "Well, that's fine," he said. "I'm really relieved to hear that."

  "But it might take a little longer. You can give me that much."

  He sighed; the sound of a just and merciful man who knows he's being taken advantage of but who is just too darn goodhearted to refuse. "I'll tell you what I'll do, Mr. Thorpe," he said. "Do you know a place in your neighborhood called P. J. Malone's?"

  "Yes, of course. It's three or four blocks from here."

  "Well, that's where I'll have my lunch. And I'll leave there at twenty after twelve to go turn in my report. Now, that's the best I can do for you."

  An extra twenty minutes; the man was all heart. "All right," I said. "I'll be there." And I broke the connection.

  And now what? I went to the John to pop another Valium—my second this morning—and then I sat at my desk in the living room, forearms resting where my typewriter used to sit, and waited for inspiration. And nothing happened. I blinked around at my pencils and reference books and souvenirs and trivia, all the remaining bits and pieces of the life I was on the verge of losing, and I tried to think how and where to get the rest of that damned money.

  From my brother Gordon? No. My sister Fern? No. Not Shirley, not Kit, none of my friends here in New York. It was too much money, just too much.

  What story could I tell my father? "Hello, Dad, I want you to wire me four thousand dollars in the next ten minutes because—" Finish that sentence in twenty-five words or less and win ... a free trip ... a free chance to stay home.

  There was a pistol on my desk; not a real one, a mock-up that had been used in a movie called Heller In Harlem. I'd watched some of the filming uptown, for a piece in Third World Cinema, and the producer had given me this pistol as a kind of thank-you. His name and the name of the movie and my name and a date were all inscribed on the handle.

  I picked up this pistol, hefted it, turned it until I was looking into the barrel. Realistic little devil. If it actually were real I could kill Edgarson with it.

  But it wasn't real. So there was only one thing to do.

  * * *

  "This is a stick-up," I said.

  The teller, a skinny young black girl with her hair in rows of tight knots like a fresh-plowed field, looked at me in amused disbelief. "You're putting me on, man."

  "I have a gun," I said, drawing it out from beneath my topcoat lapel and then sliding it back out of sight. "You'd better read that note."

  It was a note I'd worked on for nearly fifteen minutes. I'd wanted the strongest possible message in the fewest possible words, and what I had eventually come up with—derived from any number of robbery movies—was printed in clear legible block letters on that piece of paper in the teller's hand, and what it said was:

  MY BABY WILL DIE WITHOUT THE OPERATION. PUT ALL THE MONEY IN THE SACK, OR I'LL KILL US BOTH.

  I realize there was a certain ambiguity in that word "us," that I might have been threatening either to kill the teller and myself or my baby and myself, but I was relying on the context to make the message clear. My baby wasn't present, but the teller was.

  The only sack I'd had available, unfortunately, had originally come with a bottle of champagne in it, and in white lettering on its green side it clearly stated Gold Seal Charles Fournier Blanc de Blancs New York State Champagne. I'd been using it to hold the tiles in my Scrabble set. I knew it wasn't quite the right image for somebody trying to establish himself as driven to crime by the financial crisis of his baby's operation, but I was hoping the note and the gun and my own desperate self would carry the day.

  I also had the impression, from some newspaper article or somewhere, that banks were advising their employees —telling their tellers—not to resist robbers or raise any immediate alarm. They preferred to rely on their electronic surveillance—the photographs being taken of me at this very instant, for instance—and not risk shoot-outs in banks if they could possibly avoid it.

  Well, this time I was ready to have my picture taken. The clear-glass hornrim spectacles on my face were another movie souvenir, the black cloth cap pulled low over my forehead had just been purchased half a block from here, and the pieces of tissue stuffed in on both sides of my face between cheek and lower gum altered my appearance just as much as they'd altered Marlon Brando's in The Godfather. So click away, electronic surveillance, this is one picture I won't have to buy back.

  In the meantime, the teller was reading. Her eyes had widened when I'd flashed the pistol, but they narrowed again when she studied the note. She frowned at it, turned it over to look at the blank back, picked up the champagne sack and hefted it—an R fell out, dammit— and said to me, "You sure you on the level?"

  "Hurry up," I hissed at her, "before I get nervous and start shooting." And I flashed the gun again.

  "You're nervous, all right," she told me. "You got sweat all over your face."

  "Hurry up!" I was repeating myself, and running out of threats. Once a toy gun has been brandished, there's nothing left to do with it; brandishing is its entire repertoire.

  Fortunately, nothing else was needed. With an elaborately unruffled shrug—I envied her calm under pressure —the teller said, "Well, it's not my money," (my point exactly) and
began to transfer handfuls of cash from her drawer to the sack.

  At last. But everything was taking too long. The big clock on the wall read five minutes past twelve and I was a long long way from P. J. Malone's. (I'd thought it better to do my bank robbing outside my own immediate neighborhood.) I wanted to again urge speed on the girl, but I was afraid to emphasize even more the contrast between her calm and my frenzy so I remained silent, jittering from foot to foot as wads of twenties and tens and fives disappeared into my nice green sack.

  She filled it, till it looked like Long John Silver's Christmas stocking, and then she pulled the little white drawstrings at the top and pushed the sack across the counter to me. "Have a nice day," she said, with an irony I found out of keeping under the circumstances. She might not be taking this seriously, but I was.

  * * *

  I was three minutes late but Edgarson was still there, lunching at his leisure in a high-sided booth at the back. I slid in across from him and he gave me his encouraging smile, saying, "There you are. I was beginning to worry about you."

  "Save your worry." In his presence I realized how much I hated him. I'm not used to being helpless, at the mercy of another person, and if I ever had the chance to even the score with this bastard I'd leap at it.

  He must have seen something of that in my face, because he became immediately more businesslike, saying, "You have the money?"

  "You have the negative?"

  "I sure do." He withdrew from inside his coat a small envelope, opened it, held up an orange-black negative, and then put it back inside the envelope.

  "Ill want to inspect that," I said. (Scenario: He hands me the negative, I pop it into my mouth and swallow it. Then what does he do?)

  But he was smiling at me and shaking his head. Revised scenario: He keeps the negative, mistrusting me. "First you give me the money," he said. "Then you can inspect this picture all you want."

  "Oh, all right." Reaching into my pockets, I said, "I didn't have time to get a cashier's check. You won't mind cash, will you?" Fistfuls of the stuff began to pile up on my paper place mat.