by Lionel White
Pearl started to her feet.
Again Red leaned toward her. “Wait,” he said. “Let’s be sure it’s the right one.”
Both were straining their eyes looking out toward the hangars when the man behind the counter walked over with a pad and pencil. He stood next to the table as Pearl looked up.
“That be all, folks?” he asked.
Red started to say yes, when Pearl quickly cut in. “Make it a couple of pieces of pie and more coffee,” she said.
And then the plane, which had circled the field, came in low and made contact with the runway, some three hundred yards away. It was a red and yellow monoplane.
Pearl waited another minute, until it had come to a stop and then turned and taxied up to the nearest hangar. She watched as the pilot and one passenger alighted. Then she went to the phone booth.
Dent had given her the right number and she was able to get the operator at once.
The man who answered had a heavy Swedish accent, and for that first moment or two, Pearl wondered if she was going to be able to make him understand. She remembered Dent’s instructions and didn’t ask for Wilton at first, but said she wanted to talk to Dunleavy, the pilot. It wasn’t until she mentioned the monoplane, however, that he got the idea. Her first three minutes were up and she had to make an additional deposit before he came on the wire.
Through the glass door of the booth she could see Red watching her and she knew that he was alert and nervous. She also noticed that the man behind the counter was also watching her and she forced a smile at Red and nodded her head. Red stood up and walked to the counter, starting a conversation with the cook. Pearl was glad that the two truckers had already left the place.
When Pearl told Dunleavy that she wanted to talk to his passenger, he asked who was calling. Pearl played it smart and gave him a name, the first name that came to her mind. And then she had Gregory Wilton on the other end of the wire.
Pearl did as Dent had told her to, and didn’t attempt to disguise her voice.
Dent had said, “Don’t get fancy and try a cover-up. If they ever get a chance to test your voice, you’ll be dead anyway. Just be sure to get it across straight and so that he understands it.”
She used the McGuire name, however, in case an operator might be listening in.
“This is a friend of Jane’s,” she said. “Jane calls her Teddy bear Pug-gsy. Call a cab, go to East Hampton. Take a room at Harbor Inn. You are still McGuire. Wait for phone call.”
She started to hang up as the voice urgently came to her.
“But can’t I see you now?” Wilton said, his tone tense with worry. “Why not now? I have the—”
Quickly Pearl cut in.
“Do as you are told,” she said. “You are being watched and will be watched. Any attempt to contact anyone and everything is off. Be careful.”
She didn’t wait for an answer, but quickly replaced the receiver. A moment later she joined Red at the counter.
“Yeah,” Red was saying, “fishing was lousy. Guess we’ll call it a day.” He handed the man a bill.
“Take you about two hours,” the man said, apparently in answer to a question Red had previously asked. He gave him some change and added, “So long, now.”
Red pushed open the screen door and Pearl followed him out. Pearl looked toward the airport hangar; but saw no one outside. They both got in the car and Red took the wheel. He headed for Smithtown.
Once away from the diner and the airport, he spoke, keeping his eyes on the road.
“Cal’s too damned cautious. How did it go?”
“It went all right,” Pearl said. “But gee, he sure seemed anxious. Wanted to make the meeting right away.”
“I don’t know why Cal wants to go all through that East Hampton nonsense,” Red said. “Why not—”
“It’s a good idea,” Pearl interrupted. “Dent knows what he’s doing. The longer we keep Wilton waiting, the more nervous he’s going to get, and the more cautious. If he thinks he’s being watched, you can bet he’s going to play it safe. Right now, he’s as anxious as we are that the law doesn’t cut in a hand. Anyway, the plane had to come in before dark, and the way Cal’s working it, we don’t want to pull our stunt until the last possible moment. Certainly not during daylight.”
“Still think he’s being too careful,” Red said.
“Don’t think,” Pearl said. “Just drive.”
Several minutes later, Red pulled up in front of the roadside restaurant where Dent had told him to stop for dinner. He looked at the place for several seconds without cutting the motor.
“We can’t get a drink in this joint,” Pearl said.
Red didn’t answer.
“The hell with Dent,” Pearl said. “What does it matter to him where we eat? Let’s find a tavern.”
“Suppose he wants to get in touch with us?” Red asked.
“Nothing to get in touch about,” Pearl said. “He just didn’t want us taking a drink.”
Red shrugged. His instincts told him to follow Dent’s instructions. On the other hand, he didn’t want to start any arguments with Pearl. He was feeling a little guilty about what had happened the previous night, and he knew that when he got drunk with Pearl, he forgot himself and frequently hurt her. Now he wanted to make it up to her, if he could, without actually bringing anything out in the open.
He decided that it probably wouldn’t really make any difference and that he might just as well humor her. He slipped the car into gear.
They found a second roadhouse with a beer sign in the window a couple of miles farther down the highway. Red pulled the car in front of the place and shut off the engine.
Red ordered beer and Pearl had a whisky sour. They looked at the menu and then Pearl ordered a second drink.
The two drinks did something to Pearl. She was still suffering a hangover from the previous night and she had eaten little during the day. When they had entered the tavern, she had been nervous and on edge. Talking with Wilton had frightened her badly. But the two drinks seemed to bring her around. For the first time in a couple of days she was feeling all right.
“God,” she said, “this is what the doctor ordered. Let’s have one more, and then we can get something to eat.”
“Watch yourself,” Red said. “You can’t get tight now.”
“I won’t get tight,” Pearl said. “It’s just that I needed something to calm me down.”
“O.K.,” Red said. “But I’ll stick to this one.”
Pearl had a third drink and then got up and went to the ladies’ room. On her way back to the table, she got change for a dollar bill and put two quarters in the jukebox. She selected ten records. The bartender turned the radio low as the jukebox began to play, and neither Pearl nor Red was able to hear the sound of the announcer’s voice over the crash of the dance music. It was probably just as well, as the announcement would have been enough to disrupt all of Cal Dent’s plans had they heard it.
Later they ordered a couple of bowls of chowder. By eight-fifteen Pearl was no longer quite sober. She wasn’t drunk, but she was in a sentimental mood and she’d got around to thinking that Red wasn’t such a bad guy after all. She sat at the table leaning on her elbows, looking up at him rather misty-eyed. Her knees pressed against his and now and then one of her hands would caress his arm.
It was almost a quarter to nine when Red suddenly came to and looked at his watch.
“My God,” he said, “we shoulda made the second call.”
Pearl looked at him dumbly for a second, and then she leaned across the table.
“Listen, Red,” she said. “Listen to me for a minute. We’re lettin’ them make patsies out of us. Sure, I know. We’re supposed to call him and tell him to stay in the barroom in East Hampton until eleven o’clock and then take a cab to Land’s End Tavern. And all that time we’re supposed to be there, watching him. And we’re supposed to follow him to Land’s End. My God, Red, can’t you see it? That’s the one dangerous time.
The one time when if anything goes wrong, we get picked up.”
Red looked at her for a moment as though he didn’t quite understand.
“But that’s what Dent told us to do,” he said at last.
“Sure, sure,” Pearl said. “He told us to do it. But you notice he isn’t doing it. No, not him. He’s playing it safe. We stick our necks out to see that Wilton isn’t followed. Then when everything’s safe, Cal moves in.”
“Yeah,” Red said. “But how else we gonna do it? How—”
“Look,” Pearl said. “Nobody has to stick his neck out. If Wilton is being tailed, we’d never know anyway. Why not just call and tell him to be at Land’s End Tavern at a quarter to twelve? Why take a chance on watching him and following him?”
Red wrinkled his forehead and he looked down at the table. His battered face had the expression of a man who was trying to think clearly through a problem that he found highly confusing. His hand played with the silverware.
“But s’pose,” he began, “he is followed. We’d never know—”
“We wouldn’t know,” Pearl said. “But we wouldn’t be nabbed, either”
Red looked at her carefully. “What’ll Cal say when he finds out?”
Pearl shook her head in annoyance. “He won’t find out,” she said. “Don’t you see, Red? I’ll just go and phone now. Tell him when to be there. The only difference is, we can sit here and take it easy. We saw him with the suitcases and I’ve already talked with him. He’s got the money, all right. So! Let’s sit tight. We’ll stay here for a while and then go back to Land’s End. It’ll work just as well that way.”
It wasn’t Pearl’s logic that convinced Red in the end. It was merely his laziness. He was listening to the music and Pearl was friendly again. He was happy and he didn’t want to move.
“Well, just don’t let Cal know,” he said at last. “Go ahead and make the call, but don’t let nobody know.”
Pearl went to the phone booth. If she had been completely sober she would have waited until they were ready to leave before calling.
Red smiled at her loosely when she returned. “Well?”
“I got him,” Pearl said. “Told him to be there at a quarter to twelve.”
She slumped into her seat.
“Order up another Red,” she said. “We’ll get out of here by ten-thirty. That’s plenty of time.”
Chapter Sixteen
Terry heard the seven o’clock broadcast. She was in the living room of the hideout, cooking food for Janie, when the announcer went on the air. Fats and Gino were at the card table playing two-handed pinochle at the time, and Dent sat on the couch loading a machine-gun magazine. The moment the announcer began talking, everyone in the room stopped what he was doing and sat like a statue. This was the broadcast that Red and Pearl had missed after Pearl had put the fifty cents in the jukebox at the roadhouse.
“A definite break,” the announcer said, “has come in the Wilton kidnaping case. It has been learned that Gregory Wilton, who has been missing for more than eight hours, has made contact with the kidnap gang. Although police officials refuse to confirm the report, it is understood that at this very moment negotiations are under way for the payment of the ransom money, now definitely known to be a half-million dollars, and the return of seven-year-old Janie Wilton.
“Although it is believed that police and FBI men are giving Wilton a free hand to deal directly with the mobsters, this reporter has it on unimpeachable authority that Gregory Wilton is meeting the representatives of the gang somewhere on Long Island.”
As he listened Dent’s mouth tightened and his fingernails dug into the palms of his hands. Fats swore under his breath.
“It is also known,” the voice continued, “that police are looking for a well-known gambler and racketeer known by the name of George ‘Fats’ Mom in connection with the crime. Mom is reported to have been seen early this morning in the Long Island Railroad station.”
Fats jumped to his feet as though he had been shot. The card table tipped and crashed to the floor. Swiftly Dent stood up and waved him to be quiet. Gino had a sick smile around the corners of his mouth.
“While Mrs. Gregory Wilton, accompanied by the family attorney, anxiously waits in her Connecticut home, the eyes of the nation are focused on what has developed into the greatest man-hunt of the century. Although it is believed the Wilton child is probably still alive and unhurt, grave fear is felt for the fate of her twenty-two-year-old nursemaid, Miss Terry Ballin. Crime experts have pointed out that the kidnapers have without doubt liquidated her in order to eliminate any possible witness.
“In spite of the efforts of the greatest collection of crime experts and man-hunters ever to get together on a single case, and the undoubted cooperation of most of the known underworld, as dusk falls tonight over an aroused city and nation, no definite news of the—”
Dent reached up and turned off the set. He turned to Terry.
“Get in with the kid,” he said.
Fats was shaking as he spoke. “Goddamn it, how the hell did they get my name? How did they connect—”
“The first phone call,” Dent snapped at him. “I told you, damn it, that you should never have used your pal’s joint. I told—”
“It doesn’t matter now,” Gino cut in. “They got it. But this Long Island deal—that I don’t like a little bit.”
“Listen, you guys,” Dent said. “Hang on to yourselves. So they connect Fats up—but they don’t know. They don’t know! So they saw him in the Long Island Railroad station. But that don’t mean they have anything definite.”
Dent looked at his wrist watch.
“We’ve got less than five hours now,” he said. “Five hours more and we have a half-million bucks. So hang on and take it easy. Let ‘em know about Fats. Let ‘em know about Long Island. In another five hours we got the dough and we’re on our way.”
“Yeah,” Gino said. “You got the dough and you’re on your way. But I’m here with the girl and the kid. Why the hell don’t I go in with you? Why should I be the one to stay here?”
“You stay to see the girl and the kid don’t get away until we’re sure we got the dough,” Dent said.
“We could take care of ‘em,” Gino said. “We could—”
“We could,” Dent interrupted. “But we’re not going to. Where the hell’s your brains? Suppose something should go wrong? Suppose Wilton tries a fast one and doesn’t have the money, or has the wrong kind of dough? Suppose the law should have followed him? Can’t you see it? As long as we got the kid, we still got a hope.”
“I still don’t like it,” Gino said. “Why don’t you or Fats stay here?”
“Look,” Dent said. “We do it the way I planned it. Fats is in better
shape for the job tonight, and so am I. Damn it, all you gotta do is stick tight. That should be simple enough.”
“Yeah, I sit tight while you guys get your hands on the dough. I sit—” “You sit is right,” Dent said. “What the hell you think we’re going to do, anyway? Take off and leave you here? You should be able to see it. We have to come back for you.” Dent looked at the little man coldly for
a moment.
“We have to come back for you,” he repeated. “And I have to come back to see that that kid’s all right, also,” he added, a threat deep in his voice. “It’s my only insurance for a clean getaway. So plan to stay here and behave yourself. And remember just one thing: Touch that kid”— he hesitated, then added, “or the girl—and you’ll wish to God you’d never seen me or heard of me.”
“You take care of your end,” Gino said. “I’ll take care of this end.”
“They got my name,” Fats mumbled to himself. “Damn, that’s the kind of luck I play in. They have to connect me.”
“So what?” Dent said. “You think they aren’t going to connect us all before they’re through? Of course they are. We knew that from the beginning. They connect us, but with the dough we’ll have, that can be the end
of it. We don’t plan to hang around and get picked up, you know.”
Fats took out a cigar and bit off the end. “I just wish it was over,” he said.
“It’ll be over soon enough,” Dent said. He returned to the couch and began to recheck his guns.
Janie, ladling a spoonful of cereal from a heavy crockery mug, looked up inquisitively at Terry. She sensed the excitement in the older girl and knew that something must be happening.
“Terry,” she said between mouthfuls, “I’m getting tired of this game.
I want to go home. I don’t like this food anymore. And I was cold last night. You made a lot of noise and kept me awake.”
Terry looked at the child for a long moment, her face gray and sick. Her wide shoulders shook slightly and she swallowed before she spoke. “Soon, honey,” she said. “It’ll be soon now.” They kept the light on until almost eleven o’clock, playing together with the kitten, and then Janie lay on the cot and listened as Terry read to her from one of the comic books. Janie kept the wooden pistol that Red had carved for her under her pillow. As Terry was tucking the child in and preparing to turn off the light, she heard sudden movement in the other room.
Gino sat with his back to the wall, the two front legs of the chair up in the air and his feet on the table. He watched Morn as the fat man carefully wrapped up the four sticks of dynamite and attached the fuse. Dent had placed the two sub guns on the table and was strapping on his shoulder holster. He pulled a leather jacket over his shoulders and filled the pockets with extra shells. Morn already wore his gun.
Fats’ thick fingers were amazingly delicate as he handled the explosive.
“It should do it,” he said. “It should do it, all right.”
“How long you figure, after you light it?” Dent asked.
“Two minutes, no more,” Fats said.
Gino said, “It’ll wake the dead.”
“I don’t care about the dead,” Dent said. “I just want it to wake the local cop, and any other heroes who might be hanging around town.”