“Or fifty thousand dollars.”
“Much more likely my life. I haven’t an idea where I’d get fifty thousand dollars.”
In the following silence the leisurely beat of the surf, like the delayed tempo of a tango, came to them. Out at sea some birds called hoarsely. The air was oppressive.
Essex said, “I’m not joking. Dad left everything tied up in a trust for me and Camelia. We get an allowance, but mine goes a lot faster than it comes.”
“And you couldn’t get extra money if it meant your life?” asked Crane.
“Oh sure, if the trustees thought my life was really in danger. But they wouldn’t be apt to pay fifty thousand dollars to anybody who threatened me.”
“Would you pay it on the strength of these notes if you had it?”
“Hell, no.” Essex’ pointed jaw was set stubbornly. “I’m worried, but I’m not that scared.”
“How much is your allowance?”
“Camelia and I each get two thousand a month.”
“That’s not so much,” said Crane calmly, “when you consider the upkeep of this place and the Long Island estate.”
“Oh no. All that’s paid by the trust company. Even the food and the servants. The allowance is for our personal use.”
O’Malley, still leaning against the door, let his breath run through his teeth. “A fellow could struggle along on that.”
“Not this fellow.” Essex’ expression was petulant. “I keep just one jump ahead of the bill collectors. It’s terribly annoying. Yet the trust company won’t listen to any hints that my allowance should be increased.” His voice was bitter. “You’d think it was their money the way they hoard it.”
Crane was looking at the third note. He read, “‘The time nears when you must pay your debt.’” He glanced at Essex. “Do you owe somebody?”
Essex’ voice didn’t sound convincing. “No. No, I don’t. Only a few small debts … clothes and hotel bills and liquor bills. I don’t suppose any of them run over a couple of thousand.”
“You don’t know what the note means by ‘your debt’?”
“No. Unless, of course, the fellow thinks that because I have inherited money I owe a debt to society. There are some people who think like that, you know.”
“So I’ve heard.” Crane put one of the unopened beer bottles between his knees, jerked off the top with the metal opener. “Have you any enemies?”
“I suppose there’re lots of people who don’t like me, but I’m sure none of them is gunning for me.”
“No people with shotguns?” demanded Crane.
Essex’ head jerked upward. “What do you mean? What have you heard?”
Crane deliberately poured the pale beer into his glass, allowing it to foam. “What am I supposed to have heard?”
“Nothing.” Essex fastened angry eyes on the beer. “Nothing. The trouble is there’s always so much gossip about me. It gets under my skin. I thought maybe you’d heard some of it.”
“No,” said Crane.
O’Malley said, “Open a bottle for me too.”
As Crane tugged on the cap Essex said, “I think somebody’s trying to scare me into paying him fifty thousand dollars. Probably some racketeer. If he knew me he’d know I couldn’t get my hands on any such sum.”
“I don’t know that ‘somebody’ would have much chance to stick notes in your hand while you’re asleep,” said Crane.
“That’s so. Unless he had an accomplice in the house. Do you think …?”
“I don’t know.” Crane took a long drink of the beer. “Is that the whole story?”
Essex nodded.
“No more notes?”
“No.”
“No attacks made on you?”
Essex’ face expressed mild alarm. “No.”
“And you’re sure you can’t think of a reason for the notes?”
They could hear the ocean again.
“Yes.”
“Well, what do you want us to do?”
“Oh, I suppose the usual thing.” He relaxed in his chair, allowing his chin to sag toward his chest. “It wasn’t so much my idea bringing you down here as it was old Hastings’.” He caught the inquiry in Crane’s eyes. “He’s president of Union Trust and an old friend of dad. He was worried about my safety, thought the fellow might be a crank.”
“We’re not bodyguards,” said Crane; “we’re detectives.”
“I don’t expect you to guard me; I’ve provided for that. You’re to see about The Eye … collar him if you can.”
Crane complacently drank his beer. “I wouldn’t worry much about anybody who signs himself The Eye.”
“He sounds like he’s been reading bad detective stories,” O’Malley said.
In three jerky motions, arms raising his body, legs taking the weight over, arms shoving him into a balancing position, Essex came out of his chair. “I can take care of myself.” His face was angry. “You get The Eye, whoever he is.”
As he neared the door Crane asked him: “What are we supposed to be? Friends of yours?”
“Yes. Only Camelia and the trust company representative know you are detectives.”
Crane asked, “Is that the fellow who sent us a wire telling us to be here yesterday or we’d be fired?”
“Yes. Major Eastcomb. He’s still furious over your telegram in answer.”
“I only said ‘Nuts,’” Crane said innocently.
“Well, you are a day late.” Essex opened the door with his left hand. “I’ll tell everybody I met you both in New York and invited you down here. Anyway, Camelia’s giving a sort of house party. Is that all right.”
Crane let the last of the beer slide down his throat. “I accept the invitation with pleasure.”
O’Malley said, “Me too.”
Chapter II
“THIS LOOKS NICE,” Crane said, padding across the beach after O’Malley.
They waded through the green and silver breakers, digging their feet in the sand against each impact, and swam in the darker water beyond. The water was luke-cold; the morning sun was warm. Where it was deep there was no surf and the waves came in like great wrinkles in a bedspread, gently lifting them on rounded bulges, then lowering them into hollows.
“It’s swell,” O’Malley said.
In either direction, as far as they could see, ran a wide beach the color of camembert cheese. Oases of palms, leaning away from the ocean, made bright green breaks in the shore line, but inland the color was dull; gray-green where mangrove jungles covered swamps, brown where the tundra of the Everglades began.
O’Malley dog-paddled toward Crane. “What do you think about this business?” he asked. “Some of the servants trying to knock off a piece of dough?”
“I don’t know.” The sun warmed Crane’s face. “I don’t think our employer’s telling all he knows.”
“He’s scared, though. Damned scared.”
“Threatening letters scare most people.”
“I wouldn’t know.” O’Malley sank under the water, then emerged vertically, like a Japanese bobbing toy. “I never got any threatening letters,” he said. “They just come and take a swing when they’re mad at me. They don’t bother to write.”
Crane said, “You must have very informal friends.”
O’Malley made a noise with sea water and his cupped hand, then said, “That Eye wouldn’t scare me.”
“Nor me,” said Crane, turning toward shore. “He sounds like a guy in a melodrama. He sounds phony.”
They half swam, half coasted in on foam-smeared waves until their feet touched the sand bottom. The undertow pulled at their ankles, making a sucking noise and picking up milky clouds of fine sand. On their chests and shoulders the sun had already evaporated some of the moisture.
As they reached the strand of damp, brown, firmly packed sand at the water’s edge a flamingo ran around the left-hand corner of the house and came toward them. Behind the bird was a blonde in a tight white Lastex bathing suit, runni
ng like a boy. Her legs were slim and brown and her hair, cut in short curls, was bleached the shade of pine shavings.
“Head him off,” the girl called, still running. “Send him back this way.”
Crane obligingly ran toward the patio, but the flamingo suddenly cut loose with a burst of speed, lifting its feet off the ground with quick thrusts of his wings, passed him by a good three feet and vanished around the other side of the house.
“Oh, too bad,” cried the girl, coming to a halt. She turned to face a tall young man in blue wool trunks who had just rounded the first corner. “No use, Tony,” she called to him. “Abelard went right through tackle for a touchdown.”
Crane examined her while she waited for Tony to come up. She was a small girl, not much over five feet tall, but she was not as young as he had first thought. At least she was well developed. Her hips were curved and her breasts were rounded under the white suit. Under her arms, in the V between her breasts, on the circles of her thighs where the suit had been pulled up by running, her skin was perfectly white, contrasting with the golden tan of her legs and arms.
O’Malley, coming to a halt beside Crane, said in his ear, “I’m beginning to be glad I came.”
The girl and her companion came toward them. “Thanks for the gallant effort,” she said to Crane, her teeth white behind red lips. Her eyes matched the sky.
“I’m just as glad I was too late,” said Crane. “I’ve never tackled a flamingo.”
She said, “Nobody ever has. We’ve been trying for years.”
Her companion had short-cut black hair. He was very tall and thin, and his long face was quite handsome. Crane did not think he liked him, but he realized that this was possibly due to the fact he did not care for the name Tony. The name always suggested a smooth guy to him; a sort of cocktail-hour gigolo.
The girl said, “I’m Camelia Essex. You’re Penn’s friends, aren’t you?”
“I’m William Crane,” said Crane, “and this is Thomas O’Malley.”
“And this is Tony Lamphier.”
The young man’s expression was glassy. “H’lo,” he said. He looked over their heads, suddenly thrust out a hand at O’Malley and shook hands with him. “Enjoyed your party very much, sir,” he declared. Abruptly he started for the ocean.
Miss Essex laughed, uttering a sort of flutelike giggle which made Crane regard her closely. “He’s a little drunkee,” she said.
“So early in the morning?” asked Crane in astonishment.
“Oh no. We’re just rounding out the evening.”
There were little wrinkles around Miss Essex’ mouth and temples and her blue eyes were unnaturally bright. Crane realized she was also a little drunkee. This fact didn’t impair her appeal.
“You must have had some evening,” he said.
“Oh yes. We went to Tortoni’s.” Her eyes turned from Tony Lamphier, struggling with the breakers, to Crane. “You’re the detectives, aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
Her face serious, she looked up into O’Malley’s eyes. “You can help Penn, can’t you? I’m really frightened.”
“Sure,” said O’Malley. “Don’t worry at all.”
She put her hand on Crane’s arm. Her fingers were hot. “This may be the only chance I’ll have to speak to you alone.” Her words were hurried. “Penn’s lost a lot of money gambling … twenty-five thousand dollars … Tortoni holds his I O Us and has been trying to collect. He’s dangerous.”
“Cam! Oh, Caaam!” Tony Lamphier was shouting from a point fifty yards out at sea. “Come and see the sharks.”
“Coming, dear.” She tightened her fingers on Crane’s arm. “Penn doesn’t know I know about it, but I thought you ought to be told. He doesn’t intend to pay the debt, says Tortoni’s wheel is crooked.” She took her hand from Crane’s arm.
“Wait a second,” said Crane. “How did you find out about this?”
“I overheard Tortoni threatening Penn in New York.…”
From the ocean came a petulant shout. “Caaaaam!”
“You mustn’t tell Penn how you found this out.” Crane nodded his head and she ran toward the surf. “Here I come, Tony.” Breast deep in water, she faced the shore for an instant. “See you this afternoon.”
Crane shouted, “It’s a date,” and watched her dive through a comber and swim vigorously toward Lamphier.
“Well, that gives us something to think about,” said O’Malley.
“In what way?”
O’Malley glared at him in mock disgust. “You have a low mind.”
“Perhaps I have, thank God,” said Crane.
They went up to their rooms and turned on the water in the green tiled shower. The connecting bathroom was a large one, gay with chromium, bright tile and highly colored tropical fish painted on the walls, and Crane shaved while O’Malley took his shower. Thick sunlight, reflecting from the branch of a coconut palm, cast a greenish-yellow scar along his jawbone.
“How’s your black eye?” asked O’Malley, turning off the shower and seizing a green-trimmed bath towel. “Better?”
Crane cocked his head, said, “It’s beautiful. Sort of Kelly green, like mildewed pork.” His razor made a sandpaper noise against his chin. “We better go out tonight and see if this Tortoni’s wheel is really crooked.”
“What will we use for money?”
Crane doused warm water on his face. “Maybe we could write I O Us.” He buried his face in a towel, spoke with a muffled voice. “But we don’t have to. We got dough.” Marching into his room, he returned with a pigskin wallet. “The colonel gave us a grand for expenses. Look!” His right hand drew out the contents of the wallet. “Well, for God’s sake!” he said.
Amid the lettuce-green hundred-dollar bills was a folded sheet of paper. He opened it, noted the red ink, read aloud,
MESSRS FLATFEET—
You got till 12 noon today to get out of here … This is no joke … Get out or the gators back in the swamps will be fatter … You get the idea …
THE EYE
Crane’s voice died away. The wind in the dry palm leaves sounded as though someone were trying to fold a newspaper. Water in the shower fell in an ever-slowing tempo: drip-drip … drip-drip … drip-drip … drip-drip … drip.
O’Malley said, “The Eye’s some little letter writer.”
“I’ll bet he’s the guy who wrote ‘Nellie, The Beautiful Cloak Model,’” Crane said.
He went into his room and compared the new note with those he had received from Essex. The ink was the same shade of red and the angle at which the sheet had been torn was identical. He proudly waved the sheet under O’Malley’s nose. “A genuine Eye,” he said. “An authentic, genuine Eye. Mr O’Malley, we are fortunate indeed to possess such an example of this craftsman’s art.”
O’Malley pulled a ribbed silk underwear top over his head, thrust one lean leg then the other into a pair of Nile-green shorts. “We better scram downstairs and get some breakfast,” he said. “He gives us only three hours to go.”
“The master’s autograph,” said Crane, still examining the note with admiration.
“I wonder what we should eat.” O’Malley, a frown making wrinkles on the skin between his eyes, buttoned his shirt. “Eggs? Bacon? Pancakes? Cereal? What do you think an alligator would like?”
“I don’t think an alligator cares.” Crane put all four notes in his wallet, took a white linen suit from the closet. “Just as long as we eat a big breakfast.”
When they finished dressing Crane looked at his wrist watch. It was ten minutes past nine. He thought, but he could not remember when he had been up so early, excepting, of course, the times he had stayed up all night.
“I suppose we ought to look up Essex,” O’Malley said. “The Eye may be about to throw him to the alligators too.”
“The Eye’s a phony,” Crane said.
There was a faint noise of laughter outside and they went out on the balcony in time to see Camelia Essex and Tony Lamphie
r cross the patio and enter the house. The girl’s pretty face was gay and she half walked, half skipped, her left hand in the young man’s right. He walked rapidly, but unsteadily, as though he was still drunk.
“She doesn’t seem to be a hell of a lot worried about her brother,” said O’Malley.
“No, she doesn’t,” Crane said. “Let’s have breakfast.”
They went down the curved marble stairs with the wrought-iron balustrade into a tile-floored hall. A servingman in white came toward them. “Good morning,” he said. “If you like, breakfast will be served in the patio.”
A stocky red-faced man in gray flannel slacks and a black-and-white checked sport coat was reading the Miami Herald at a round table by the side of the swimming pool. His hair was flecked with gray; there was a white line on his neck at the point where his collar halted; he was eating liver and bacon.
He didn’t bother to get up. “The energetic detectives?” he said. His voice was hoarse and vigorous and his accent might have come from England or from Boston’s Back Bay.
“Major Eastcomb …?” Crane inquired.
The man nodded. “Time you got here.” His face was brick red, sullen. “Past time.”
“I’m sorry about that wire,” Crane said. “I didn’t know who you were.”
“You might have been more civil.”
O’Malley spoke to the approaching servingman. “Scrambled eggs.”
“The same,” said Crane, “and a scotch and soda.”
“Make it two,” O’Malley said.
The major grunted. Crane leaned confidentially toward him. “We drink because our lives are forfeit.”
The major blinked bloodshot eyes at Crane. “You got one of those damned notes?”
“The Eye gives us until noon to get out of here.”
O’Malley was drinking iced tomato juice. “Or else we are trun to the alligators.”
Major Eastcomb demanded, “How did the fellow know you were detectives?”
The servingman appeared with a bottle of whisky, a silver bowl of ice cubes, a siphon and three glasses. Crane raised his shoulders toward his ears, shook his head. The servingman started to pour whisky into the glasses, but Major Eastcomb took the bottle from him.
The Dead Don’t Care Page 2