“Right,” affirmed Healy. “Fishy as kippered herring.”
“But how?”
“Says there wasn’t a damn thing taken. Only, he didn’t have time to check up.”
Farrell had missed that point.
“And that’s only a start,” continued Healy. “That battle scene was phony. If he cold-calked the Turk with a flower pot, why did the bust of Napoleon get all cracked up? And no matter how interested the burglar was, wouldn’t he have heard the pistol shot?”
“The fellow might have heard it, but thought his buddy was doing the gunning,” suggested Farrell. “And if they were after big game, they’d stick to the last second.”
“That’s all right,” admitted Healy. “But why didn’t Wentworth want the stuff in the safe finger-printed? Because the Turk hadn’t touched a thing that was in it! And I dropped the matter then and there just to let him think he got away with something.”
“You mean Wentworth sapped that fellow in the course of a quarrel, then when he realized he was dead, opened the safe and faked the breaking and entering?”
“That’s my hunch. And I want to know what’s eating at Martin Joseph Wentworth, Esquire. Right now, we’ve got no case, even if we knew he did just what I’m sure he did. So I’m giving him plenty of rope.”
Farrell caught the point. Unless murder could be directly proved, Louisiana law favored a householder supposedly defending himself, or ejecting an intruder. Lacking witnesses, the law could scarcely question the millionaire.
Farrell frowned thoughtfully as they turned into the midnight traffic of St. Charles Avenue.
“John,” he said, “I’m beginning to build up a bit on that slant. Wentworth, according to gossip around the Union Club, returned from Al Hasa not many months ago. That’s the seacoast province of Najd, on the Persian Gulf. And that Syrian jane, Azizah, cracked off about peacocks of Najd. Pure baloney, but she had that district on the brain, so she mentioned it instead of some Persian locality where peacocks would be more in keeping.”
Healy recollected Farrell’s account and interposed “But the King of Naj-ud—how the hell ever you say it—could have peacocks in his back yard, couldn’t he?”
“Sure he could. But the place isn’t famous for anything but sand, camels, and vermin.” Farrell squirmed uneasily in recollection of his last visit to Arabia. “And right here and now I’m going to take a hand in this case. Pull up!”
“Huh!” snorted Healy. “With the start you got since eleven P.M.!”
“I got a hunch,” persisted Farrell as Healy eased up to the curbing. “That jane was a slick customer, but I’ll trip her at her own game. You phone Wentworth’s house and jerk the boys out of there as quickly as you can without making it seem phony. You can call it justifiable homicide and nothing more to be said—for the time. And I’m going back to look around while Wentworth is grinning about what dumb clucks you and your playmates are. I want to see what I can see. And don’t crab the game. Actually pull your men, so his suspicions won’t be aroused if he checks up and learns they’re hanging around. I’ll handle this jam.”
“And get socked on the nut again.”
“My nut,” was Farrell’s contention. “And whoever gassed and beaned me is due for another inning. This mess is so crooked that even the devil-worship slant is getting cockeyed.”
“Devil worship!” muttered Healy. “These blank-blank millionaires!”
Farrell knew that he had gained his point. He stepped to the curbing, watched the tail light of Healy’s car flicker to a red pin point as it approached Lee Circle, then crossed the street to an apartment hotel, from whose phone booth he called Bronson.
“If the cops aren’t through yet,” he said, “tell ’em to close the door when they leave. You meet me near Martin Wentworth’s house, but keep strictly out of sight. If I leave there, you trail me. And if I don’t leave, bust in and collect me and the peacocks.”
CHAPTER IV
Farrell dismissed his cab a few blocks from Wentworth’s mansion and proceeded on foot.
As he approached, he saw that all the lights except those in the right wing and in the entrance vestibule had been turned off. The dim glow struggled feebly through the magnolias and sycamores that were clustered thickly about the extensive grounds. For a moment Farrell wondered whether he would have to scale the tall, glass-guarded wall that surrounded the estate; but before making the attempt, he tried the gate. It yielded to his touch. A wad of paper dropped from the socket in which the latch should have seated. Healy had paved the way.
Farrell stepped from the winding walk, and vanished in the dense shadows of the broad-leaved plantains and bamboos that dotted the luxuriant garden.
If Bronson was lurking about, Farrell had noted not a trace of him. This, however, was as he had expected. Bronson was a seasoned campaigner and a master of the art of taking cover.
Farrell approached the house and, circling it warily, sought to find a position from which he could command not only the front door, but also the wing which housed Wentworth’s study. In view of Healy’s suspicions, Farrell was certain that Wentworth, as soon as the police departed with the body of the intruder, would busy himself with destroying any evidence that had supposedly escaped the notice of the detectives. He stealthily climbed the trunk of a magnolia near the bay window of the library and settled down to watch from the shelter of its dark, waxen leaves.
Wentworth, as Farrell had anticipated, was clearing up some of the disorder instead of leaving it for his servants. This, while not entirely out of keeping, was nevertheless significant. The man rearranged a few pieces of furniture, shut the wall safe, then seated himself before the empty grate and struck light to a fresh cigar.
“It’s a cinch he didn’t blunder into this mess,” was Farrell’s thought as he watched Wentworth. “It would stretch coincidence all out of joint if we both accidentally got mixed up with the peacock, and on the very same night.”
But for this conviction, Farrell would have abandoned his vigil, for perching on the limb of a magnolia and watching Wentworth staring at the gathering ash on the tip of his cigar did not savor of progress. Farrell’s patience, however, was finally rewarded.
The window through which he was looking was open. Farrell heard the faint whirring of a buzzer.
Wentworth looked up, frowned with annoyance at the interruption of his pondering on a weighty problem, and stepped out of the room.
A moment later there was a click as the gate at the entrance of the estate opened.
“Rang for admittance, then found it wasn’t locked.” As he heard the click-click of heels on the concrete walk, Farrell added to his observations: “I should have latched that gate. Now Wentworth knows it wasn’t locked, which isn’t so good.”
In the darkness, Farrell could just distinguish the slender form of a woman, who a moment later was swallowed up by the deeper shadows about the house. He heard the front door opening, and then the murmur of greetings. Though he caught the note of surprise in Wentworth’s voice, he could not understand the remarks of either. The adverse breeze, and the heavy sweetness of the magnolias surrounding him, deprived Farrell of any chance of noting whether the millionaire’s visitor wore the exotic scent that had heralded the presence of Azizah.
“Even so, it might be the girl of my dreams,” he muttered grimly as the persistent ache of his head reminded him of his defeat by the peacock.
A moment later his suspicion was verified. He saw Azizah Matar preceding Wentworth into the study.
Her dark eyes burned with a smoldering, somber fire. Farrell wondered whether she might not be the advance guard of vengeance to be wreaked in reprisal for Wentworth’s killing of the unknown foreigner. He loosened his pistol in its holster. Regardless of Wentworth’s doings, Farrell was determined to thwart any crew of cutthroats that might be using the lovely Syrian girl as a decoy.
; As she seated herself facing Wentworth, Azizah resumed the conversation which apparently had begun at the door.
“I’m representing the King of Najd,” she declared. “And I can prove it.”
She took from her hand bag a document which she offered Wentworth.
“That doesn’t mean a thing!” snapped Wentworth, waving the papers aside. “Where’s the peacock?”
“Look at this and then you’ll believe me!” she flared as she unfolded and thrust before Wentworth’s eyes the document he had declined.
Farrell, even though not confronting that wrathful, high-spirited girl, nevertheless felt the compelling force of her voice and gesture, and he understood why Wentworth, brusque and violent as he was, accepted and began reading without protest or argument.
“And now it’s coming! She’s got his attention!” was Farrell’s thought. He glanced sharply about him, seeking to probe the surrounding gloom and detect the shadowy, avenging forms that he felt must be closing in on Wentworth’s house. But his momentary alarm seemed vain. He heard not a sound other than the faint rustle of leaves in the breeze.
Azizah’s dark eyes were desperate and eager. Her slender hands were clenched, and her full, crimson lips had thinned to a hard line. Farrell felt the increasing tension, and wondered from what quarter to expect an explosion.
Wentworth finally glanced up from the paper he had read line by line. He was more perplexed than ever, and nodded abstractedly as he balanced against each other the contradictions that his scrutiny seemed to have brought out.
“And now what do you think of it?” demanded Azizah. “Phone the police and they’ll tell you that Hussayn was killed and robbed down in the French Quarter this very evening.”
Some of Wentworth’s assurance had cracked in the face of the evidence he had just received. He glanced again at the document and then shook his head.
“This does sound right, I admit—but there’s been too much monkey work already. So I’m calling for a new deal,” continued Wentworth. “Direct from the King of Najd.”
He thrust the document into his pocket.
“Wait a minute!” the girl demanded, detaining his hand. “That’s Hussayn’s! Let me have it!”
“Nothing doing!” Wentworth shook off her grasp. “I need it myself to show the king what a mess this has become. This and the phony papers. You say the peacock was stolen from Hussayn. How do I know you didn’t steal this document from him?”
“You don’t need to know.”
Azizah’s voice was low and purring and unnaturally soft, and her features were tense with wrath that was about to flame forth. Suddenly her hand flashed toward her hand bag, and emerged with an automatic pistol.
“Now give me that paper,” she demanded. “And both halves of the peacock.”
“Be damned to you! Go ahead and shoot!” the oil man challenged.
Farrell admired Wentworth’s courage more than his judgment. Wentworth was not close enough to snatch the automatic whose black muzzle was leveled at his stomach. The slender Syrian beauty was deadly as a cobra and reckless with Oriental fatalism. Farrell knew that she was on the verge of firing.
“Something’s got to happen—quick!” was Farrell’s thought. He had little sympathy for either party to the desperate tableau; but Wentworth’s foolhardiness was inviting death.
There was but one chance. Farrell prepared to take it.
“Give me that paper—and the peacock,” reiterated Azizah.
Wentworth defiantly faced her. Her body was swaying imperceptibly forward. Any instant now—
Farrell’s hand shot forward. His shoe, hurled through the open window, knocked a decanter from a lacquer cabinet and crashed through the framed picture at which it had been aimed. Azizah was distracted for only an instant, but that sufficed.
Farrell had not misjudged his man. Wentworth, alert and surprisingly agile for his portliness, lunged forward and seized her wrist.
Farrell, springing from the limb of the magnolia, caught the window still and swung himself into the room.
“I’ll take that gun,” he said, as he confronted Wentworth. Farrell’s swift gesture toward his holster was needless. The millionaire relinquished the pistol he had jerked from Azizah’s grasp. Farrell laid on the lacquer cabinet.
“I hope you’ll pardon the intrusion. But it looked as though arbitration were in order,” he continued.
“Of all the everlasting nerve!” exploded Wentworth. “What are you doing here?”
“Hunting peacocks,” explained Farrell with an amiable grin. He recovered his shoe, seated himself on Wentworth’s desk, and gestured toward chairs. “Since I’ve dodged assassination a couple of times in the past three-four hours on account of that bird of ill omen, I’m looking for a new deal myself, regardless of what the King of Najd does.”
Azizah, still paper-white, was trembling violently. Wentworth, though relieved by the turn in his favor, groped for words as he sought to assimilate Farrell’s remarks.
“Now, after having me gassed and slugged,” continued Farrell, turning to Azizah, “you’re making pretty good time in trying to get the other section.”
“But I’m not! Those thugs were working against me, not with me,” protested Azizah.
“Possibly,” he admitted. “But what is it all about? Both of you are in something up to your chins and not a rope in sight. Suppose you open up, and I’ll see that the police respect your personal whims—unless you’re both messed up in the murder of Hussayn, to say nothing of sundry climbings of my frame.”
Azizah and Wentworth exchanged glances, which in an instant changed from mutual inquiry to understanding.
“Tell me, unofficially,” urged Farrell. “It’ll be easier than letting this get to a point when you can’t stall off an indictment. Right?”
Farrell’s voice was crisp, but his smile seconded the amiable twinkle of his eyes.
“Fair enough,” agreed Wentworth. The Syrian girl nodded.
“All right; spill it.”
“The fellow I beaned this evening brought me the right half of that peacock to identify himself as the envoy of the King of Najd. But the papers he handed me were all screwy, and I told him to get the hell out of the house. He insisted on taking both halves with him. I needed them myself to convince the King of Najd that something went haywire, or prove that his agent tried to gouge me!
“So I reached for the faker. He ducked and pulled a knife, and I beaned him.”
“Why the devil didn’t you tell Healy?”
Wentworth grunted.
“If that story got out, my deal with the King of Najd is shot! And I’m out plenty dough. Nothing stirring. So—”
“That ees verree interesting,” murmured a voice from the hallway. “But will all of you please lift the hands?”
CHAPTER V
Farrell, turning to face the arched entrance, saw that the evening’s work had but started. A tall, well-dressed man was covering them with an automatic. His crafty eyes and air of complacent superiority would have been enraging under any circumstances. At his left and slightly to the rear stood three swarthy ruffians whose drawn pistols spoke for themselves.
“Who the hell are you?” demanded Wentworth, rising from his chair.
Azizah stifled a cry of alarm. Farrell saw the color suddenly leave her cheeks. Her dark eyes were wide with terror and recognition.
“I am Demetrios Pappadopoulos,” said the leader, with the air of a herald announcing royalty. “It is indeed a pleasure to meet you all assembled in one room.”
Farrell knew that an attempt to draw his own pistol would be fatal. He would have risked shooting it out with one man; but with four covering him, the odds were hopeless. Reaching for Azizah’s pistol might catch them off guard—but the distance was too great.
“And an added pleasure, I assure you,” conti
nued Pappadopoulos with a thin, sallow smile, “is this meeting the distinguished Federal agent with the rest of my ever dear friends.”
His bow seconded the irony of his voice. Farrell appraised the master of the situation as one of those international hybrids whose names afford not the least clue to their mixture of breeds. The Greek name could camouflage Slav, Latin, and Semite, with none of the virtues of any of the components, and packed with the villainies of all four at their worst. Pappadopoulos was a well-groomed and well-barbered cutthroat, in contrast to his henchmen, who were saddle-colored ruffians from the Near East. The entire quartet was a composite portrait of iniquity.
“All right, out with it!” snapped Wentworth angrily. “What’s the game?”
Pappadopoulos smiled again. He did it charmingly. It saved words and maddened the spectator.
“The peacock,” he said as his eyes shifted from face to face. “Where is it?”
“I’ll see you in hell first!” retorted Wentworth.
Farrell, who had been scrutinizing the sinister features of the three who accompanied Pappadopoulos, recognized a familiar face. The tallest was the one who had grappled with Farrell in Pirate’s Alley. His jaw was still swollen where Farrell’s fist had landed; and the ferocity of his eyes confirmed the recognition.
“Tie them, Habeeb,” murmured the Greek adventurer. “Suleiman! Ali! Watch closely—you have seen Meestair Farrell in action before. And search them all.
“One move,” he continued, “and I will—”
His gesture and the muzzle of his pistol completed the needless warning.
They had come prepared with two hanks of clothesline.
Wentworth, confronted by odds that subdued even his blustering, stubborn belligerence, muttered in inarticulate wrath. Azizah, regaining her poise after the initial shock of the encounter, gazed fixedly ahead of her, and ignored the quartet.
“Father of many little pigs,” murmured Habeeb as he lashed Farrell’s ankles. “You escaped me a few hours ago—but you won’t get away this time—neither you, nor that Feringhi dog.”
E. Hoffmann Price's Pierre d'Artois: Occult Detective & Associates Page 44