Fast Buck (8 page)

Kile tapped ash into Rico’s tray.

‘If he pul s the job off it’l be worth ten thousand to him,’ he said. ‘If he fails I’l give him five.’

Rico’s eyes opened.

‘Ten thousand. This must be a pretty big job, Mr Kile.’

‘It is,’ Kile said.

VIII

As Adam Gillis got into the LaSalle, he said angrily, ‘You’ve kept me waiting over an hour! You said ten o’clock. Why can’t you be punctual?’

‘I’m sorry, darling,’ Eve said. She put her hand on his. ‘I couldn’t help it. He was in one of his mauling moods. I didn’t think I’d get him to come at al . Oh, Adam! I’m so sick of al this! How much longer have I to go on with it? You don’t know what it means to live with him.’ She shivered. ‘I wish I’d never agreed to help you.’

Gillis looked at her in alarm.

‘Don’t be difficult, for God’s sake,’ he said, patting her hand. ‘I’ve enough on my mind without you sounding off. I know it isn’t easy for you, but we’ve got to have Kile in on this. You and I couldn’t swing it on our own.’

‘But the whole thing’s dangerous and crazy,’ she said, twisting around to face him. ‘I must have been insane to let you talk me into it. We’l never get away with it!’

‘Of course we wil ,’ Gil is said sharply. ‘It’s just a mat er of nerve. I don’t see what you’ve got to worry about. I have all the responsibility. I’m the one who has to lie awake at night, making plans. All you have to do is to do what I tell you.’

‘I suppose you think it’s nothing to me to have to let that old roué make love to me just whenever he feels like it?’ Eve said hotly.

‘I wish you’d concentrate on the big things instead of the little things,’ Gillis said. ‘Don’t you realise this means a half a million? For heaven’s sake, don’t you think most girls would sleep with Kile for that money?’

‘No, I don’t!’ Eve flared. ‘That’s a beastly thing to say! We haven’t even got the money, and I don’t believe we ever will get it!’

Gillis studied her; a sudden venomous look in his eyes.

‘Al right,’ he said, ‘if that’s the way you feel about it, there’s no sense in going on with it. There’s plenty of other girls who’l help me, and I dare say wil make a bet er job of it than you. I’l make other arrangements. You’d bet er tel Kile you want to go back to the Follies.’

Eve felt a little chill run through her.

‘Don’t be angry, darling,’ she said quickly.

‘I’m not angry,’ he returned. ‘If you can’t carry on, then you’d bet er chuck it before you make a mess of it.’

‘If I went back to the Fol ies,’ she said slowly, ‘would you come and live with me again?’

‘If you go back to the Fol ies,’ Gil is said deliberately, ‘you’ve seen the last of me. I mean that, Eve.

I’l have to find some other girl to help me. I’m not going to be cluttered up with two women. If you haven’t the guts to go through with this, I’l be damned if I ever want to see you again.’

He saw the fear jump into her eyes. Long experience of similar scenes in the past made him confident of his whip-hand over her. Threats, arguments and made-up quarrels marked their lives like milestones along a dark, twisting road. He had only to threaten never to see her again for her to capitulate. The chain that bound her to him had been forged in the womb.

‘Please, Adam, don’t talk like that,’ she said, taking his hand. ‘Of course I’l go through with it.

Forget what I said. I guess I’m feeling a lit le depressed tonight.’

He was quick to meet her half-way, now he had won his point.

‘I do understand, Eve,’ he said. ‘It won’t be for much longer. I promise you that. If you’l only stick it for another month. After that you needn’t ever see Kile again.’

‘I hope not,’ she sighed, acutely aware of her defeat.

He put his arm round her and pulled her to him.

‘Snap out of it,’ he said lightly. ‘Everything’s going to be fine and dandy. Think of the things I’m going to buy you when we get the money!’ His sudden good humour didn’t deceive her. She knew how untrustworthy, how shiftless and dishonest he was. There was nothing she could do about it. He was part of her: the Hyde to her Jekyll; something she was helpless to rid herself of. ‘You told Kile tonight? He knows now?’

‘Yes. I told him.’

‘How did he take it?’

‘Oh, he’s enthusiastic’ She felt the thin cloth of his suit. It had been pressed again and again. It was threadbare. Only he could have worn it and made it look something. On any other man it would have been a rag. ‘Didn’t you buy the suit, darling?’ she went on. ‘I was hoping you’d wear it tonight.’

‘Oh, yes, I bought it,’ he said glibly. ‘If I’d known you were going to be so late I’d have stopped to change.’

She knew at once he was lying: that he hadn’t used the money she had given him to buy a suit. She knew from past sordid experience that the money had been spent on some woman.

‘But never mind the suit,’ he went on. ‘Is Kile going to approach Rico?’

‘Yes, of course. I told him Rico should be consulted. That’s what you wanted, isn’t it?’

‘Rico knows this chap Baird. If anyone can pul this off, Baird can. I’ve watched him for weeks now.

He’s terrific. Nothing wil stop him once he’s made up his mind. I wish I could say the same of Rico. Of course he may be all right, but I wish I was sure of him. Kile’s not tel ing him the details, is he?’

‘No. He’s just asking Rico if he’d come in with him, but he’s not tel ing him much.’

‘Did Kile say if he was going to give you anything for the idea?’ Gil is asked.

Eve laughed bitterly.

‘Of course not. It never entered his head. He’s quite sure I’l be with him to spend it with him.’

‘Oh, wel , he’s due for an unpleasant surprise,’ Gil is said carelessly. He glanced at his wrist-watch.

‘You’d bet er get back. For the moment there’s no point in let ing him know I’m in this. I’ll drop in tomorrow night. I might be a little late; about half-past twelve. Leave the shade down if he’s there.’

‘He won’t be. He’s going out to dinner. Can’t you come earlier, Adam? I’ll be alone from eight o’clock.’

Immediately he became shifty.

‘I don’t know if I can. I’l try. I might get round by nine. Yes, I think I could manage nine.’

Again she knew he was lying, but she hid her knowledge from him. It would be stupid and dangerous to warn him that his lies were so transparent to her. So long as he wasn’t on his guard, she knew she could spot his lies, but if he took more trouble to deceive her, he might succeed. She told herself that one day he might tell her a serious lie; a lie that might affect them both. It was this lie she knew she had to recognise when it came.

‘Al right, darling,’ she said, trying to make her voice sound gay. ‘Then, if I don’t see you at nine, I’ll expect you at half-past twelve.’

‘You’l see me at nine,’ he said, deciding that half-past twelve was quite early enough. He had no wish to sit with her all the evening. There were times when she bored him to distraction. She would be so serious all the time: she would fuss over him.

She opened the car door.

‘Oh, Eve…’

Holding the door half open, she glanced quickly at him. She knew what was coming: every parting of theirs had this sordid little postscript.

‘How much do you want?’ she asked gently.

‘Oh, damn it! You make it sound as if I were always sponging on you,’ he said irritably. ‘But you wait… in another month I’l have al the money I need. I’l pay you back. I know exactly how much I owe you. I’ve writ en it down in a book.’

‘How much, Adam?’ she asked again.

‘Well, I owe a fella thirty dollars. I had to borrow off him tonight. You were so late I had to settle an account…’

‘Never mind the details, darling, just tell me how much.’

‘Would fifty ruin you?’ he said sullenly. He liked to explain why he wanted the money. He justified himself in his own eyes when he gave her a fictitious list of debts.

She opened her bag and checked the amount of money she had in it.

‘I’ve only forty.’

‘That would do. I’l be seeing you tomorrow night. Can’t you squeeze something substantial out of Kile? I hate this continual asking. Three or four hundred would see me through to the end of the month.

He should be good for that if you’re nice to him.’

‘You mean if I behave more like a tart than I usual y do?’ she said quietly.

‘There’s no need to talk like that!’ he snapped. ‘I didn’t mean anything of the kind. You can persuade him your expenses…’

‘But don’t you understand he hasn’t any money?’ she said impatiently. ‘It was you who told me he owes thousands.’

‘A man like Kile can always raise money. People trust him. That’s why I picked on him. Hasn’t he made a hit with the Rajah? A man with his looks and reputation can always get money.’

She gave him four ten-dollar bills.

‘You must try and manage with that,’ she said. ‘I can’t ask him for any more just yet. I don’t know how I’m going to manage myself: I’m cleaned out.’

He touched the gold chain bracelet around her wrist.

‘I could hock that for you,’ he said, obviously pleased with the idea. ‘You must have a lot of junk you could raise money on. I could handle it for you. I know all the best places.’ There was a boast in his voice. He was proud of his knowledge of pawnshops. ‘We can get the stuff back when we’ve hit the jack-pot.’

‘I’ll think about it.’ The note of misery in her voice made him look sharply at her. ‘Have you forgotten this belonged to mother?’ Her fingers touched the bracelet lovingly.

‘Well, she wouldn’t mind,’ Gillis said, scowling. ‘She hocked it herself, if I remember rightly, when the old man wouldn’t give me a new suit.’

‘Good night, Adam.’

‘I wish you wouldn’t look so damned miserable at times,’ he said crossly as he got out of the car. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow night. You might look through your things. That fur coat he gave you… you don’t need it until the winter…’

‘Good night, Adam,’ she repeated.

They stood facing each other for a moment. She was glad he couldn’t meet her eyes. She leaned forward and kissed his cheek.

‘Try and come early,’ she pleaded. ‘I want to talk to you, darling.’

‘About nine,’ he said, his voice flat and disinterested. Already he was thinking of more important things. He had forty dollars in his pocket. The night was still young. He might do worse than take Lois back to his room. He might persuade her to do that comic dance of hers again. She had wanted fifty dollars the last time: ridiculous! She might do it for twenty if he could convince her that was all she would get. Yes, he’d go along and pick her up. He felt in the mood for Lois’s kind of fun.

He watched Eve as she moved back to the club. She was an odd girl. Sometimes he wondered about her. She didn’t treat him as if he was her brother. There were times when she acted as if she were in love with him. He touched his pencil-lined moustache, frowning. Odd!

After he had left the parking lot, Dallas came out of the shadows and stood looking after him.

IX

Harmon Purvis had a small villa on East Boulevard: a modest, three-bedroom affair with a small garden crammed with roses and a
Clematis Jackmanii
over the front door.

A light showed in one of the downstairs rooms, and through the open window came the brittle notes of Chopin’s
Etude
in E Flat.

Dallas got out of his car, pushed open the gate and walked up the path. The night was hot and still, and the perfume from the roses was a little overpowering.

He dug his thumb into the bell-push, leaned forward to sniff at the purple flower of the clematis – as big as a breakfast plate.

Purvis came to the door and opened it. He was in his shirt sleeves and had changed his shoes for slippers.

‘You’re late,’ he said, giving Dallas a sharp look. ‘I was thinking of going to bed.’

‘You’re lucky to have a bed,’ Dal as said, fol owing him into the comfortable front room. It was lined with books and restfully lit by table lamps. Purvis was a bachelor, but he knew how to make himself comfortable. He had a Filipino boy to run the house and cook, and in his spare time he looked after the tiny garden himself. ‘I don’t get any time for my bed,’ Dal as went on, lowering himself gratefully into a comfortable easy chair.

Purvis wasn’t paying at ention. He was listening to the concluding passages of the
Etude.

‘You should listen to this,’ he said, leaning against the radiogram and beating time with his finger.

‘It’s the most difficult of any of Chopin’s
Etudes.
Even Paderewski used to make some mistakes when he played it.’

‘Never mind Paderewski – he’s dead,’ Dal as said, rubbing his eyes with his knuckles. ‘Turn it off for the love of Mike. I’m here on business.’

Reluctantly Purvis turned off the disc and sat down opposite Dallas.

‘Do you good to listen to some of the classics,’ he said, placing his finger-tips together and staring at Dallas from over them. ‘You’re losing your sense of culture.’

‘Never had one. Don’t offer me a whisky: I’d accept it.’

‘I haven’t any in the house,’ Purvis said happily. ‘I don’t touch the stuff: wastes money, dul s your perception and rots your liver.’

Dallas sighed.

‘So that’s what’s the mat er with me. Maybe I’d bet er switch to gin.’

Purvis watched him light a cigarette.

‘You’ve been to the Frou-Frou Club tonight?’ he asked tentatively.

Yeah,’ Dal as said, ‘and I’m wil ing to bet my eye-teeth Kile’s get ing set to grab the Chit abad collection.’

‘What makes you think that?’ Purvis asked, sit ing forward.

‘He saw Rico tonight, but maybe I’d bet er start in at the beginning. Talk about a break! It fel into my lap,’ and he gave Purvis a detailed account of what he had seen and heard at the club, as wel as the conversation he had overheard between Eve and Gillis as they sat in the car.

Purvis was enthralled. He just sat still, staring at Dallas, drinking in every word, and not interrupting.

When Dallas had finished, he got up and began to pace up and down.

‘What a break!’ he said. ‘It’s unbelievable! I’ve worked on this goddamn case for fifteen years, and never thought I’d get anywhere with it, and then suddenly it’s handed to us on a plate.’