Honest Money and Other Short Novels

He shrugged his shoulders.

“The fortunes of war,” he said.

But his voice contained something which had been kept from the expression of his face, a cold, hard something.

“What can you do?” she asked.

“I can fight the devil with fire,” he told her. “I started out to play a decent ethical game. They come along and pull this stunt. It’s crooked. All right. Now let them watch out. I’ll pull some fast ones myself.”

She shook her head.

“I don’t like that, Ken. You know they’re laying for you. If they can get you suborning perjury or fixing a jury or anything like that, they’ll railroad you right over the road.”

“Yes,” he said, tonelessly, “If they can, they will.”

She stared at him.

“I found another witness,” he went on in that same dispassionate tone of voice. “They won’t get him. I’ve got him buried.”

“Witness to what?” she asked, and her voice lacked enthusiasm. It was as though she doubted the testimony of this witness, even before hearing what it would be.

“Do you know,” he said musingly, “that this mystery witness of theirs, this Bob Durane, must be the man that drove the death car. They’re using him both as the man to pull the murder, and as the star witness for the prosecution.”

“You mean the D. A. is?” she asked.

“Of course not. Don’t be silly. The D. A. isn’t in the thing. But he’s got a political office, and he knows the side of the bread that has the butter. D. A.’s are human just the same as anybody else is human.”

“Well,” she said, “what you talking about then?”

“I’m talking about the gang that did this and want to make Dangerfield the fall guy. Briggs got a look at the face of one of the men who wheeled the car out. It had a scar on the cheek, and the man answers the description of this guy, Durane, who is the star witness for the prosecution.”

“How you going to prove it with Briggs gone?” she asked.

He walked wearily across to his desk, picked up the receiver, and gave a number. After a moment he said: “Is Reed Nixon there?... Put him on, please... Hello, Nixon? This is Corning... Yeah... Fine stuff. You’ve given me the breaks, now I’m going to give you one... Yeah, I’ve got another witness... Yeah. This one saw the whole thing. It’s a fact. He’s a taxicab driver. He was parked in a cab that was at the curb. He was sitting there with the lights out, waiting for the owl street car to come along. He figured he’d pick up the street car and trail it, hoping that one of the passengers who got off somewhere would give him a short ran instead of walking for a few blocks in the dark.

“Well, he saw the car come, and then he saw the two machines, and he saw Copley get off the car, and saw the murder. But as the death car went by, the lights of the street lamps Hashed in it for a second, and he saw the face of the man who was driving. He swears that he can identify that man if he sees him again. The man had on a light hat and a tweed suit, and there were other things about him that can be identified.

“You can spill that yarn all over the front page of your paper if you want. I’ve got this witness buried where he can’t be found until Fm ready to produce him. I don’t like the way the D. A.’s office messes around with my witnesses. I’m going to let him tell his story from the witness stand.”

Ken Corning sat silent, grinning wearily into the transmitter, while the receiver made rasping metallic noises.

“Sure,” he said at length, “use it as a rumor if you want to. I’d rather you made it seem it hadn’t come directly from me. You can label it as coming from ‘a source close to the defendant.’ Yeah, that’s the line. Okey. G’bye.”

He slid the receiver back on the hook.

Helen Vail looked at him with hurt eyes.

“If you suborn perjury,” she said, “and they can catch the witness before he testifies and break him down, they can still hook you for conspiracy or something, can’t they, Ken?”

He said, his voice flat and weary, “Are you asking me for legal advice, or just talking?”

“Neither,” she snapped. “I’m trying to tell you something.”

He shook his head.

“Go on home, kid. It’s way after five o’clock. There’s nothing to stick around here for any more.”

She put on her hat.

“Okey,” she said. “I’m going to find where Briggs went and make him come back.”

He shook his head listlessly.

“Not a chance, kid; they’re too slick for that. You won’t find even the ghost of a trail to follow.”

She said: “I won’t know until I try, will I?”

“Not if you won’t listen to me,” he said.

She started for the door, turned, walked back to the desk, stood by him for a moment, and then patted his cheek.

“ ’Night, Ken,” she said tenderly.

“ ’Night, kid.”

She walked swiftly across the two offices, let herself out of the outer door, and threw on the night latch.

Ken Corning sat at the desk, his eyes heavy, his chin resting on his hand, elbow propped on the desk.