Southern spring is a season of constant doubt and surprise. One goes to bed innocent of sheets and arises shiveringly at three in the morning to resurrect blankets from a moth-ball depository. Overcoats are one day in order, and on the next palm-beach suits are inspected longingly. On Wednesday the fresh young leaves will struggle against the near-frost of the previous night, and on Thursday wilt before the ravages of unseasonable heat. Winter does not merge gently into summer. The thermometer fluctuates uncertainly like a woman torn between the competitive allure of two bargain counters.
Today it was hot, genuinely and unreservedly hot, and Jim’s physique had never been intended to withstand heat. He slumped miserably in a wicker chair, puffing disconsolately upon a cigar and staring with fixed distaste at the weather forecast: “Clear. Continued warm.”
A profound sigh escaped from the recesses of Jim Hanvey. “O death, where is thy heat?”31
Jim was capable of intense feeling, and this day that capability was working overtime. He was utterly and supremely unhappy both as to the present and in contemplation of the future. If this was April, what, then, would July be?
He scarcely heard the clangor of his telephone, and only when that instrument had sent its raucous summons dinning into his ears for the third time did he conscript sufficient energy to hoist himself from the wicker chair. His voice was not at all friendly.
“’Lo!”
“Hello!” A queer, interested expression flitted over Jim’s features. Woman’s voice. Hmph! “Is that Mr. Hanvey?”
“Almost.”
“This is a friend of yours, Jim.”
“Ain’t got any friends today. Too hot.”
“I’m coming up.”
“That’s fine. Apartment 4-B. Door’s unlocked. Walk right in.”
“Good!”
“And, say?”
“Yes?”
“Don’t expect me to get up. When the mercury climbs this high I stay put.”
He recrossed the room and slumped down into his chair again; but no longer did his face reflect the misery of the flesh.
His florid countenance was wrinkled speculatively. The voice of the woman had been vaguely familiar; memory probed inquisitively into the past. Jim shook his tremendous head from side to side.
“She called me Jim an’ said she was a friend of mine.”
Pudgy fingers toyed idly with the hawserlike watch chain connecting his timepiece and himself.
The front door opened. Footsteps sounded from the hallway. All outward indication of interest fled from Jim’s face leaving it as expressionful as the visage of a cow at milking time. Then the woman appeared in the doorway, and instantly Jim recognized her. The heartiness of his greeting was thoroughly sincere.
“Helen of Troy.” He smiled and added, “New York.”
The woman swept across the room and pressed a light kiss on the forehead of the detective.
“Dear old Jim! It’s good to see you again.”
“Yeh, ain’t it? Lord! I’m hot.” Jim’s eyelids drooped with exasperating slowness over his fishy orbs, held shut for a moment, then opened again. “Step over yonder, Helen. Lemme give you the once-over.”
The woman obeyed, and Jim nodded approvingly.
“Million dollars—plus, Helen. That’s you.”
She was far from unattractive as she stood by the window. True, she was not of the general type which inspires the plaudits of a connoisseur; but for all practical purposes she was there seven ways from the ace.32 In the first place she was blond—magnificently and unyieldingly blond from the shrieking crown of gold upon her head to the tips of her long, slender dead-white fingers. She was amply supplied with a figure which had been apportioned liberally and with an eye to ensemble rather than lissomeness.33 The effect was not to be denied: Floppy white panama with orchid trimmings; an elaborate street dress of white and orchid crêpe de chine; orchid stockings of chiffon, and white shoes. She pridefully submitted to his inspection and thrilled to his comment.
Said he, “Once seen, never forgotten.”
“You think I’m looking well, Jim?”
“Terrible good. Terrible.” He mopped his forehead. “How do you stand this heat?”
She laughed.
“We’ve lived South ever since we were married. That’s six years.”
“And three months,” he amplified. “Ever since Johnny finished that last stretch. Me, I’d just as lief be in stir.34 Sit down. How’s Johnny?”
The woman’s face clouded slightly.
“It’s about him I came to see you, Jim.”
“Much obliged to Johnny.” He relighted his cigar. “What’s he doin’ now? Con?”
She shook her head.
“We’ve been straight ever since we hitched up. You ought to know that, Jim.”
“Ought to. Just thought maybe he was keepin’ away from my line. I’m with the Bankers’ Protective now, you know.”
“I know it; that’s why I came to you.”
He stretched out.
“Spill it, Helen. I’m all ears—all ears and perspiration, I mean.”
“You’ve always been a friend of ours, Jim. You play square. You sent Johnny up once, but he didn’t hold that against you; it was all his fault for gettin’ caught. And he made a regular killin’ that time, Jim—you remember they never did get the stuff. Well, when he got out we decided to get married and go straight. Of course we didn’t know how we’d like it, but we did think it was worth trying—understand?”
“Sure! Novelty. Any time you didn’t like it you could turn crooked again.”
“That’s it. Well, I’ve liked it, an’ so has Johnny. No dicks worryin’ us, everything running smooth. It’s been a real nice experience, Jim. I never would have believed there was so much fun in bein’ honest. And after a while—well, it sort of gets to be a habit. Now I’ve come to the point where I wouldn’t change for anything.”
She paused. He blinked with disconcerting slowness.
“Well?”
She leaned forward tensely.
“Johnny’s planning to pull a job!”
“Huh?”
“Johnny’s planning to pull another job. He’s got a chance for a neat killing, and he’s going to try it.”
Jim’s head rolled sorrowfully upon his fat shoulders.
“That’s too dog-goned bad! After runnin’ straight this long!”
“It is too bad, Jim. That’s why I’ve come to you.”
“What’s why?”
“I want you to keep him straight. I know I can trust you, so I’m going to slip you the whole works, and I want you to steer him off. There ain’t a bit of sense to his going crooked again. We’ve got all the money we need; but the thing looks so easy—you know how it is.”
“Uh-huh. I know. What you expect me to do?”
“The job he’s planning, Jim, is a bank job. That would bring you into it.”
Jim’s lips drew into a protuberant circle and a low whistle escaped.
“Bank job, eh? His old line. That’s plumb silly.”
“I’ve told him so; told him a dozen times. But he says it’s a cinch. Sure thing. Bah!”—bitterly. “It’s a sure thing he wouldn’t get away with it.”
“But he thinks he can.”
“That’s it. I know just how he feels, Jim. I’ve felt that way myself a dozen times when I’ve seen some dame out at the race track wearing a million dollars’ worth of sparklers. I’d remember how good I used to be at that sort of thing and my fingers would just naturally itch. It seemed a shame to pass it up. But”—righteously—“I’ve given temptation the go-by, Jim. I haven’t pulled a job since I got hitched up to Johnny, though I’ve had chances enough. You always have when you’re running straight. Sometimes I’ve felt like I’d give everything I had just for the sport of reducing the
weight of some fat dame to the extent of a coupla carats. Well, the bug’s got Johnny now. Things have played into his hands and he’s rarin’ to go. I told him you was down in this part of the country, but he only laughed. ‘Reckon I can get away with this in spite of Jim Hanvey,’ he said. The poor fish! You know good and well, Jim, there ain’t any crook can buck you and get away with it, is there?”
Jim grinned.
“What you tryin’ to do—vamp me?”
“Lord forbid! It would be too much trouble for the result.”
“That sounds more like my frank friend. Now please continue to go on.”
“I’m going to give you a straight steer on this job of Johnny’s. I want to leave it all in your hands. You ought to be able to head him off. I know I’m foolish to be so dead set on honesty and all that sort of romantic stuff, but I can’t help it. Reckon I’ve been seeing too many movies or something.” She leaned forward tensely, giving off an aroma of heavy and expensive perfumes, her fingers glittering with an imposing array of rings. “I want to stay straight, Jim—I sure do! And I want Johnny to do likewise.”
Jim reached for a fresh cigar and settled back comfortably in his chair.
“You don’t mind these, do you, Helen?”
“We-e-ll, I haven’t any right to kick when I’m asking you a favor.”
“Thanks.”
He snipped off the end of the cigar and lighted up with gusto.
“Since Johnny turned straight he’s been gambling,” she explained. “No rough stuff, nor nothing like that. Of course I’m not claiming that he hasn’t rung in the works once in a while when he’s hooked a particularly easy mark or that maybe he hasn’t managed to read the backs of a few cards; but that’s all part of the profession. The point is he hasn’t been crooked—understand?”
“Sure! I get you.”
“Last two seasons he’s been oralizing35 down in New Orleans—both tracks there: Fair Grounds and Jefferson Parish. Business has been pretty good, but nothing extra. New Orleans is a wise town on horses. They’re the very devil on backing the favorites and that’s awful tough on the bookies. Anyway racing has kinder got into Johnny’s blood. He started off last year by buying a few cheap platers—called himself owning a stable. And finally he come into a two-year-old that is a colt. Lightning Bolt is the name. Y’oughter see that angel run!
“Major Torrance clocked that baby one time in a workout and wanted him; wanted him bad. Johnny didn’t hanker to let him go. They talked price, but nothing come of it. Everybody knew the old gent was nuts on Lightning Bolt and was gonna get him sooner or later—everybody except him. And just recently Johnny found out that the major had booked passage for Europe on the Homeric, sailing out of New York day after tomorrow—Thursday. Also that Torrance’s stable was bein’ shipped North for the New York season. And that’s where Johnny fell.”
She paused, one white-shod foot tapping the floor. Jim sat in supine silence, apparently oblivious of her presence.
“Yes,” she continued tensely, “that’s where Johnny took his tumble. He told the major he’d sell Lightning Bolt, provided the old geezer would buy all the rest of his stable—four other horses. The price for the bunch was eight thousand dollars. The deal went through. Those horses went North with the Torrance stable the other day when the season ended in New Orleans. Old man Torrance sails from New York in a couple of days. Of course you can prove up on all of this; the real point being that Johnny holds the major’s check for eight thousand dollars.”
Her voice died away. Out of the silence which followed came Jim’s drawling voice:
“An’ one little teeny letter added onto an eight makes an eighty.”
The luxurious blonde glanced sharply at the big man in the wicker chair, her eyes narrowing slightly.
“What made you think——”
“Two an’ two always did make four, sister.”
Her fingers interlaced nervously.
“That’s the layout, Jim. He’s planning to raise that check and make a get-away——” Her voice trailed off. “And that isn’t all.”
“No?”
Jim’s query was a mere indication of interest rather than an effort to extract further information.
“Not all, Jim. It’s this way——” She hitched her chair closer and laid one ringed hand on Jim’s knee. The ponderous man seemed unmindful of it—for a moment. Then he moved away. “Just before Johnny turned straight and married me he pulled one last big job. It was regular and all that. The poor sucker they caught was hog-tied; he didn’t dare let out a yap. Johnny made a clean-up on it and with that amount added to what he had he retired with about a quarter of a million bucks.” There was conscious pride in her final declaration: “Johnny never was a piker.”
“He sure wasn’t, Helen. Great chap, Johnny.”
“That quarter of a million has been salted away in Liberty Bonds. Johnny bought ’em at about 84 and they’re pretty near par now. He’s dead stuck on ’em; says when they jumped in value it was the first honest money he ever made. He never would touch ’em. Kind of superstitious. But, Jim, he’s planning to dig into ’em now.”
“Yeh?”
“He’s got a chance of opening a big gambling place down near Juarez. Things like that take cash—a wad of it. So Johnny is fixing to borrow on his Liberties.”
“Borrow?”
“Yes. He’s superstitious about them, like I told you, and he don’t want to sell. He figures he can borrow two hundred thousand on the things. Then he’s going to raise that Torrance check from eight thousand to eighty. That’ll give him $280,000 in cash—more than enough for what he wants. He’ll sink a heap of that into the business, and at the first opportunity he plans to come back, redeem his Liberties and salt ’em away again. Understand?”
Hanvey was apparently not listening. He stared moodily through the window, lower jaw drooping, the ash on his cigar perilously lengthy. Finally he turned his glassy eyes upon her.
“How c’n you look so cool when it’s so durned hot?”
She bit her lip.
“Do you understand, Jim?”
“Eh?” He blinked with interminable slowness. “Oh, about Johnny an’ his gamblin’ house an’ the Liberty Bonds an’ all that? Sure, that’s easy. Johnny’s just naturally plannin’ to get wicked again, ain’t he?”
“And I don’t want him to. There ain’t anything in the world like being honest, Jim; I’ve found that out. It’s the grandest feeling I’ve ever had. I wouldn’t turn crooked again for anything in the world—unless we really needed the money. I don’t want Johnny to. He’s been out of the game so long he’s liable to pull a boner and lose what he’s got.”
“You sure spoke a mouthful then, sister. That’s a downright crude stunt Johnny is figgerin’ on pullin’. Of course, him plannin’ to beat it into Mexico, anyway——”
“I’d hate to live there. Never did like Mexican cooking—chili an’ hot tamales and all that sort of thing. And the climate——”
“Hotter’n this, ain’t it?”
She didn’t answer. For a few moments silence held between them, tense silence punctured only by the ticking of the cheap alarm clock on the mantel and the bellowing of a group of boys playing in the street below.
“You’ve got to help me, Jim—got to help me keep Johnny straight. He’ll listen to you where he laughs at me.”
“Awful glad to do a little job like that, Helen. I’m real anxious Johnny shouldn’t turn crooked again. He’s got brains enough to make an honest livin’. Lemme see—when’s he plannin’ to pass this bum check?”
“Two or three days. You see, Jim, he’ll borrow the two hundred thousand on his bonds—borrow it from a local banking house—Starnes & Company. When he deposits their check for that amount he’ll deposit along with it Major Torrance’s check for eighty thousand; and the eighty-thousand one being so much
smaller than the other, they won’t pay a whole lot of attention to it. Then he’ll check against the total sum.36 Ain’t that clever?”
“Awful!” He inhaled deeply. “Awful clever! A good check for two hundred thousand and a bum one for eighty, passed right through the bank. Then he checks against ’em. Johnny sure uses his head for somethin’ more than a hatrack.”
She rose and threw a light scarf across her plump shoulders.
“You promise to keep him straight, Jim? You promise?”
“Sure! Sure I promise, Helen! Dog-gone this weather!”
She made her adieus and swung down the street toward the city’s largest hotel. One or two traveling men ogled her and she expanded to the pleased consciousness of the effect she was creating. It had always been thus, ever since her girlhood in Troy, New York. Blessed with voluptuous blondness, men had always flocked about her. Adulation had been all in all to her until the advent of Johnny Norton, and to him she capitulated utterly.
Johnny had been an honest and efficient wooer. They teamed up and knocked about the country until he made his final big killing. Then they married and turned straight; but the strain of the past five years had been terrific.
Helen rapped on the door of her room and Johnny opened it in person. He was a small man, slender and wiry and very much of a dandy in his lavender silk shirt, his white sport shoes and his aggressively checkered suit. He kissed her dutifully, then stepped back, twisting his near-mustache.
Three other men lounged about the room. There was Slim Bolton, a card sharper, whose practice had been largely confined to transatlantic liners; Happy Gorman, who had attained fame—and a jail sentence—by means of an astoundingly clever oil-stock swindle; and Connie Hawes, one-time counterfeiter and generally expert flimflam artist. Their eyes were focused interestedly upon the Junoesque figure of the woman who stood with her back against the door, enjoying to the ultimate her calcium moment.37
“Well,” she announced pridefully, “Jim Hanvey fell for it!”
There was a moment of tense silence.
At last, Johnny Norton pulling nervously at his mustache, voiced the question which was uppermost in the minds of all of them:
Jim Hanvey, Detective Page 10