Detective Fiction Weekly. Vol. 105, No. 5, October 10, 1936
- Автор: Вулрич Корнелл, Tinsley Theodore
- Год: 1936
- Язык: английский
- Год: The Red Star News Company
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «Detective Fiction Weekly. Vol. 105, No. 5, October 10, 1936». Краткое содержание книги:
Twenty minutes later, Louis Tavelli rose from his seat by the table in the living room. The gorgeous collection of jewels was still glittering there. Tavelli’s face was grim as his eyes lifted from contemplation of them, circled slowly over the three people before him. He shoved his hands into his pockets.
“That’s my figure,” he said sharply. “Take it or leave it.”
Kessler’s heavy face went purple. “It’s a damned outrage, Tavelli. It’s not a tenth of what they’re worth.”
Tavelli stated calmly, “It’s fifty per cent more than you’d get from an ordinary fence.”
Paget said angrily, “It’s a hell of a deal, if you ask me. Why do you think we’ve stalled around, holding the damned things for six months just to get in touch with you, Tavelli?”
“That’s easy,” Tavelli replied coolly. “Because you know that I pay higher prices, ask fewer questions and take more chances than anyone else.”
“There’s nothing been said tonight to indicate it,” Kessler snarled.
Tavelli shrugged. “I’ve offered all I can consistently. They’ll be watered stock for at least a year. They’re hot, and smell of the morgue. Too bad it was necessary to iron old Vanderfelt on the ‘lift.’ It soured the ‘sugar.’ ”
“And makes pikers out of us,” Kessler said savagely.
Tavelli smiled thinly, spreading his hands. “Twenty-five grand. Take it or leave it.”
Silence beat heavily.
“Bring the loose change with you, Tavelli?” Kessler asked, voice suddenly quiet.
Tavelli lifted brows. “What’s your guess, Kessler?”
“Maybe you’d like to know,” Kessler, leaning forward, tattooed the smooth oaken table surface with thick fingertips.
The tenseness in the smoke-filled air had grown suddenly acute.
“What—” shrilled Irene, but her husband lifted a hand. His small eyes clashed Tavelli’s leveled glance. His tones stayed low, deceptively soft. “Maybe you’re on the up and up, Mr. Tavelli, but I think you’re a damned impostor!”
Irene gasped faintly and sank back, face paper white. Paget jerked to his feet. “Kessler! You’re nuts!” Tavelli remained at ease, but his face went chisel hard and the eyelids drooped.
He spoke evenly. “Yes, you are a fool, a damned fool, if I may say so but it’s interesting. Continue.”
Red mottled Kessler’s face and he lurched forward. Suddenly regaining control of himself, however, he relaxed, even managing a crooked smile.
“The picture suggests possibilities,” he gritted. “A man whom we’ve never seen arrives under damn strange circumstances, announcing himself as Tavelli — the man we’re expecting. Now I suggest you prove that identity before we go further.”
“What the hell—” snapped Paget, but Kessler quieted him with a viselike pressure on his arm.
“I may add,” continued Kessler, still holding Tavelli’s eyes, “your piker offer for a hundred and fifty grand in rocks doesn’t sound like — Tavelli.”
Tavelli straightened, speaking pleasantly enough. “I’ve papers, driver’s license — but, of course—”
“Not worth a damn,” Kessler said. “If you waylaid the real Tavelli, as I think you did, you’d cop his stuff. Still you might have something, say, in your briefcase—” His small eyes darted sidewise at Irene, jerked back; they were blank as marbles.
“By George, I have! Wait a minute. I’ll run along and get it.” Tavelli crossed toward the stairs, then turned. “Perhaps you’d like to come along, Kessler. I might—”
“Oh, no, you won’t,” Kessler affirmed grimly. “Try skippin’ and we’ll know you’re phony.”
Tavelli shrugged, turned and ran lightly up the steps.
After a moment Paget said, “You’re nuts, Kessler. You’ve made the guy sore now. The biggest, slickest fence in the States. You had him here all ready to bite on this bunch of swag” — he motioned to the table — “and then you go get your neck feathers ruffled—”
“Shut up,” Kessler rapped. “I’m running this show. Think I’d take a lousy twenty-five grand for this ice after all the build-up?”
“Then why the hocus-pocus of sending him upstairs for identification?”
Kessler’s narrowed eyes filmed. “So we can take him when he starts back down. If the guy’s a phony he’s got it comin’ to him. If he’s really Tavelli, stickin’ on the thumbscrews, well, that goes for him, too.” He nodded his big head. “We’ll have the ice — and the gravy,” he added.
Paget said through suddenly white lips, “You mean—”
“Sap him?” gasped Irene.
“Count me out,” Paget kicked over his chair and swung toward the fireplace. He pivoted, tromping back.
“Welcher, eh?” Kessler’s face went purple with rage. “Well, you’re takin’ this trick with Irene and me or else—” He was slowly rising to his feet.
Paget stood wide-legged, hands resting lightly in his pockets. “You’re a damned fool, Kessler,” he said clearly, “and a detriment to the combination. Irene and I could do a hell of a lot better without you.”
“What?” Kessler lurched forward, over the table, struggling for speech. “You dirty swine!” he choked. “You... you and Irene—”
Paget’s hand jerked up, vising a gat. He shoved it against Kessler, squeezed the trigger. There was a dull plop. Kessler grunted, whirled round, clutching at his thick chest. He took half a dozen stumbling steps, body bent forward grotesquely, then he collapsed and lay twitching on the rug. Paget returned the gun to his pocket.
Irene Kessler gave a low, whimpering cry and closed her eyes. Paget did not look at her. He looked at the dead man on the rug. He said jerkily, “You didn’t like postponing our plans, Irene. Well... we... haven’t—”
She cried thinly, “Oh, Vance, get him out of the way. Get him some place. I can see his eyes — his eyes—” Her voice rose to a shrill scream. Paget clapped a hand brutally across her mouth.
“Shut up,” he ordered, rounded the table, seized Kessler’s limp body, dragged it across, rolled it into a corner and pulled the divan around to cover it.
“We’ll tell Tavelli he’s gone out to examine the car, see? We’ll put through the deal in a hurry, collect the cash and scram.” He straightened, mopping sweat from his face. “It isn’t the way we planned it — cruder somehow — but sometimes that’s the best. We can get out of here in a hurry, hit the Canadian border before daylight—”
“The girl!” Irene said gaspingly. “That — damned girl!”
Paget stopped with the suddenness of completely arrested motion. For a moment his face was blank as plaster. “Girl?” he repeated dully. “Girl?”
Irene was fumbling with the cloth of her skirt. She said, through stiff lips, “I locked her door when she was out.”
“You what?”
“I didn’t trust her. I saw Dilke lock her in. Later I tried the door. It was unlocked; the girl was gone — so I locked it and took the key—”
Paget said slowly, “Why did you do that?”
Irene clawed at her throat. “I thought it would prove something. If she were straight — I figured she’d come down and tell us she was locked out, explain where she’d been. If she didn’t say anything—”
“How long ago?”
“Oh, two hours — or more—”
“And she hasn’t shown up? Where is she?”
“I don’t know—” Panic twitched Irene’s slim body. “Oh, how should I know? I’d forgotten her—”
Paget lunged for the door. “I’ll have to find her. She’s loose somewhere in the house. She may be—”
The door slammed behind him. Irene sat motionless, staring with sunken eyes at the gleaming heap of jewels on the table. Rain sluiced against the windows. Kato howled a long, doleful cadence.