Veda made a sudden little movement. It could have been a warning gesture or it might have been a nervous reflex. I didn’t know.
I went right on: “You don’t think I was sucked in by the sleep-walking act and the Cellini dagger, do you? I wasn’t. I knew the compact belonged to Brett, and for some reason or other you wanted it. I wouldn’t have given a damn one way or the other. I wanted your dough: that was all I cared about. But you weren’t smart enough to know it. If you’d told me the dagger case was a bomb I would have known what to do, but you didn’t. And when I found out it was a bomb I got rattled. Everything happened at once. I heard the ticking of the bomb and the guard coming all at the same time. I’d just opened the safe. All I could think of was to get rid of that bomb. I shoved it in the safe, locked the safe and went for the guard as he came in. I saw the compact in the safe, but I didn’t touch it. It was still there when I closed the door of the safe. I could have handled the guard, only the second guard showed up.
“It looked as if I was in a mess, and then your home-made bomb went off. The safe door was blown off its hinges and it went through those two guards the way a hot knife goes through butter. It wrecked the room too. It was a good bomb, Gorman. Whoever made it can be happy about that. I stayed long enough to see nothing but dust was left in the safe. The compact simply doesn’t exist any more. Then I came away.” I got up, walked to the sideboard, poured another drink.
Parker was sitting up now, his hand to his jaw. He stared at me fixedly, his face white and drawn, his eyes vicious. “He’s lying,” he said to Gorman. “I know he’s lying.” Gorman released a little puff of breath.
“I hope he is,” he said in his scratchy voice.
“Go and look for yourself,” I said. “Take a look at those two guards. That’s murder, Gorman.”
“Never mind the guards,” Gorman said. “It’s the compact I’m interested in. Why did you leave it in the safe when you heard the guard coming?”
“I’d be a sucker to let him find it on me, wouldn’t I?” I said evenly. “Look at it this way. If I was caught and they found nothing on me it’d make a difference to the sentence I’d get. I thought of that. I could have taken the compact after I’d settled the guard.”
“On the other hand,” Gorman said smoothly, “you might have put the compact in your pocket and chanced being caught.”
Did he think I’d come back here with the compact in my pocket? Did he think I was that much of a sucker? The way I was playing it put me in a sweet position. He might think until he was blue in the face that I had the compact but he couldn’t prove it.
“Go ahead and search me,” I said. “Look me over if it’ll set your mind at rest.”
Gorman nodded to Parker.
“Search him,” he said.
Parker went over me as if he’d like to tear me to pieces. I could feel his hot breath on the back of my neck as his hands ran over my clothes. It was an uncomfortable feeling. I expected him to bite me.
“Nothing,” he said, his voice harsh with fury. “Is it likely the rat would have it on him?”
“Now look,” I said, stepping away from him, “you guys are sore. All right, I understand that. But don’t take it out on me. I did what I was paid to do. It’s not my funeral you had to act smart and mix a bomb up in this.”
Parker turned on Gorman. He was shaking with rage.
“I told you not to go to him. I warned you, didn’t I? I said over and over again we didn’t want a man with his record. You knew he was tricky. Now look where he’s landed us: we don’t know whether he’s lying or not. We don’t even know if the case was blown to bits as he says or whether he’s hidden it somewhere.”
“Don’t get excited, Dominic,” Gorman said and looked across at me. “He’s right, Mr. Jackson. We don’t know if you’re lying. But we can find out.” He lifted his hand out of his pocket. The blue-nosed automatic looked like a toy in his thick fingers. “And don’t think I wouldn’t shoot, my friend. No one knows you’re here. We could bury you in the garden and it might be years before you were found. You might never be found. So don’t try any tricks.”
“I told you what happened,” I said. “If you don’t believe it that’s your look out. Waving a gun at me won’t get you anywhere.”
“Sit down, Mr. Jackson,” Gorman said gently, “and let’s talk this over.” He suddenly seemed to be aware that Veda was still in the room. “Leave us, my dear,” he said to her. “We want to talk to Mr. Jackson. You would only be in the way.”
She went out quickly. The room seemed empty without her. I listened to the sound of her feet on the stairs, and heard something else: the swish of a sap, and I ducked. A light exploded inside my head. I guess I ducked too late.
Before Parker belted me I had noticed the hands of the clock on the mantel showed ten minutes past eleven. When I looked again it showed half past eleven and Parker was throwing water in my face. I shook my head, stared at the clock fuzzily. My head hurt and I felt a little sick. What really bothered me, was to find I was tied to the chair.
Gorman was standing by the fireplace watching me. Parker stood over me, a jug of water in his hand, a vicious snarling expression on his face.
“Now, Mr. Jackson,” Gorman said breathlessly, “let’s talk about the compact. This time you’ll tell me the truth or I’ll have to persuade you.”
“There’s no fresh news on the compact, brother,” I said steadily. “No stop press: no nothing.”
“The weakness of your story is obvious,” Gorman told me. “No one as smart as you would have left the compact in the safe once you had opened the safe. You would have grabbed it and chanced fighting your way out or you would have hidden it somewhere in the room where you could get at it quickly after you had liquidated the guard. You would never have left it in the safe, Mr. Jackson.”
He was right, of course, but he couldn’t prove anything and I grinned at him.
“I left it in the safe,” I said. “The bomb had me rattled.”
“Let me see if I can persuade you to change your story,” he said and came towards me.
I watched him come. Now you see what I mean when I said having a woman on your mind leaves you wide open to a sucker punch. As I looked into his tight fat face I told myself what a mug I’d been to come back here. I might have known he would have turned tough. Then I thought of Veda in that white dress and thought maybe I wasn’t such a mug.
He was standing over me now, his eyes like wet stones.
“Are you going to tell me what you did with the compact, or have I to choke it out of you, Mr. Jackson?”
“I looked carefully. That compact was a heap of dust,” I told him. I tried to pull away from his hands, but the rope held me. Thick fingers circled my chin and neck.
“You’d better change your mind, Mr. Jackson,” he said in my ear. “Where’s the compact?”
I looked across at Parker, who was standing by the fireplace. He was watching, a spiteful smile on his face. I braced myself.
“Nothing to add, brother,” I said and waited for the squeeze. I said that if ever that thug got his hands on my throat he’d make blood come out of my ears. He nearly did. Just when I thought the top of my head was coming off, he relaxed. I dragged in a lungful of air, tried to blink away the bright lights that swam before my eyes.
“Where’s the compact, Mr. Jackson?” His voice sounded a long way away and that bothered me.
I didn’t say anything and he squeezed again. It was worse than being strangled. I felt the bone in my jaw creak under the pressure. I seemed to fade after that. It got dark and breathless like I was drowning.
More water hit me in the face. I came to the surface gasping. Gorman was still there. He was breathing strenuously.
“You’re being foolish, Mr. Jackson,” he said. “Very, very foolish. Tell me where the compact is and I’ll give you the balance of the money and you can go. I’m trying to be fair with you. Where is the compact?”
I cursed him, trying to
wrench away from his hand and the squeeze started all over again. After minutes of choking, flashes of pain and a horrible sensation of being slowly crushed, I passed out again.
The hands of the clock on the mantel showed twelve-ten when I opened my eyes. The room was very still and quiet. The only light came from a reading lamp at the far end of the room. Without moving my head I looked about the room. Parker was sitting under the lamp, reading a book, a fat cigarette hanging from his lies. There was no sign of Gorman. On the table at Parker’s elbow was a leather cosh with a wrist thong attached.
I didn’t make a move to tell him I was with him in spirit as well as in flesh. I had a feeling if he knew I’d come to the surface he’d start working on me. My neck felt as if the Empire State Building had fallen on it, and my nose dripped blood. I felt as lively and as fit as a ten-day-old corpse.
I heard the door open and I played dead, shutting my eyes and sitting as still as a dummy in a shop window. I smelt her perfume as she paused to look at me. I heard her go over to Parker.
“You shouldn’t be here,” he said sharply. “What do you want? You should be in bed.”
“Has he said anything?” she demanded.
“Not yet, but he will.”
He sounded too confident — much, much too confident.
“Is he conscious?” she asked.
“I don’t know and I don’t care. Go to bed.”
She came back to stand close to me. She had changed out of her white dress and was wearing the canary-coloured slacks again. I looked up at her. She was pale and her eyes were over-bright. For a brief second our eyes met, then she turned quickly away.
“He’s still unconscious,” she said to Parker. “He looks very bad.”
I felt a tingle run up my spine.
“Not half as bad as he’ll look when Gorman gets back. Go away. You shouldn’t be here.”
“Where is Cornelius?”
“He’s gone to Brett’s place to see if he can find out anything.”
“But what can he find out? The police will be there, won’t they?”
“How do I know?” His voice snapped at her. “Go to bed. I don’t want you here with him.”
“You’re not angry with me, Dominic?”
I moved my head slowly so I could watch them. She was standing over him, her slim fingers playing with the cosh, her eyes on his face.
“No, I’m not angry,” he said. “But go to bed. You can’t do anything.”
“Do you think he’s hidden it?”
Parker clenched his fists.
“I don’t know. That’s the trouble. That’s where he’s been so smart. It could have been destroyed. All this trouble: all these plans, and now we don’t know.” He thumped the arm of his chair. “Cornelius was crazy to trust this cheap, tricky crook.”
“Yes.” She was swinging the cosh idly in her hand now. “But Cornelius won’t be able to get near the house, will he? I don’t understand why he has gone.”
“He can’t do anything. I told him that, but he wouldn’t listen. He can’t rest until he knows. If he doesn’t find out anything he’ll kill Jackson. I don’t care what he does. I’m past caring.”
She pointed down at his feet.
“Is that something of yours?”
It was well done, casual and quiet; an ordinary everyday question. It fooled Parker; it nearly fooled me. He leaned forward to look. The back of his head was a perfect target. He spread out on his face on the floor. He didn’t even groan.
She stepped back, dropped the cosh; one hand went to her face.
“I liked your follow through,” I said.
She turned swiftly to look at me.
“What happens now?” I asked.
She continued to stare at me.
“There’s nothing else I could do, was there?” she said. Her words tumbled over themselves. “I couldn’t let them torture you.”
“That’s right,” I said. “How about cutting me loose?”
She moved quickly to the sideboard, found a knife and came over to me.
“I have a car outside. If only I knew where to go,” she said as she sawed at the ropes.
“You mean you want to come with me?” I knew she couldn’t stay here after sapping Parker, but I wanted to hear her say she would go with me.
“What else can I do?” she asked impatiently. “If Cornelius ever finds me after this — I don’t know what he’ll do to me.”
I threw off the last rope, got unsteadily to my feet.
“That’s fine,” I said, feeling my throat with tender fingers. “The moment I saw you I knew you and me were going to tie up. We’ll make a fine partnership.” I tottered over to the sideboard, poured myself a large drink. It hurt as it went down but it did me a power of good when it was down. “We’ll talk when we get out of here. I can’t go like this. Where does Parker keep his clothes?”
“The door facing the top of the stairs. Will he be all right?”
“Sure. He’ll sleep for hours. Wait for me. I won’t be long.”
I went over to Parker, turned him over, relieved him of his gun and stuck it in my hip pocket.
“I’ll be right with you,” I said and left her.
It took me ten minutes to wash and change into one of Parker’s less fancy suits. It was a little tight across the shoulders, but it would do at a pinch. I found a white silk scarf that I wound round my throat to hide the bruises. My head ached and my neck felt as if it’d been fed through a wringer, but taking me by and large, I felt pretty good.
I ran down the stairs, back into the lounge. She was waiting for me. There was an alert, watchful expression in her eyes and she was still pale.
I looked from her to Parker. He wouldn’t come to for hours.
“All set?” I asked, smiling at her.
“Where are we going?”
“Santa Medina. That’ll do us for tonight. We can make plans when we know more about each other. Taking anything with you?”
“My bag’s in the car.”
“Sounds like premeditation.”
“As soon as Cornelius left I knew what I was going to do.”
My heart was beginning to hammer against my ribs again.
“Now I wonder why you picked on me?” I asked.
She didn’t say anything and didn’t look at me.
“Maybe we’d better go,” I said after I’d given her time to answer if she was going to answer.
“Kiss me,” she said.
Well, that certainly took care of that. She had an unnerving effect on me. I was shaking when she pushed me away.
“Now we’ll go,” she said and went with me to the door.
We both stopped abruptly as we opened the front door.
Gorman was standing at the foot of the steps, looking up at us.
He was as startled as we were. I beat him to the draw.
“Watch it!” I said. My voice sounded like someone ripping a sunblind in half.
Gorman dropped his hands. His little black eyes went from me to Veda. His face was empty.
Max was in the car. He stared out of the window at me, his eyes wide with fright.
“You,” I said. “Get out of that. There’s a gun in his right-hand pocket. Get it.”
Max got out of the car, went up behind Gorman, dipped into his pocket and fished out the gun.
“Take it from him,” I said to Veda.
She went down the steps. Max held the gun out to her, butt first. She took it.
“You foolish child,” Gorman said to her. “You’ll be sorry for this.”
“Cut it out!” I said. “She’s coming with me.”
“Well, you’re lucky this time, Mr. Jackson,” he said quietly, “but I shall find you again, and I shall find you too, Veda.” He was very calm and controlled: it made him all the more dangerous. “I shall find you again; you can be sure of that.”
“Go in and keep Parker company. He’s kind of lonely in there. And I’ll have the ring. I’m a little pressed for c
ash.”
He looked down at the diamond and then at me.
“If you want it, you must take it,” he said and closed his hand into a gigantic fist.
“You forget I have the gun,” I pointed out. “A guy with a gun always gets his own way.”
“Not this time, Mr. Jackson.”
“Hand it over, pally.”
He didn’t move.
I felt Veda’s eyes on me. If I let this fat thug get away with it I’d lose caste. Besides, I needed the ring. But I wasn’t going near him. I knew if he got his hand on me I wouldn’t stand a chance.
“I’m sorry about this, Fatso,” I said and meant it. “But I want the ring. You’ll get a smashed foot if you don’t hand it over. I’ll give you three seconds.”
He stared at me, then his mouth twitched. It was the only sign of rage he had shown up to now. He saw I wasn’t fooling.
“Then take it, Mr. Jackson,” he said, pulling the ring off his finger. He threw it at my feet. “It’ll make it harder for you when next we meet.”
I picked up the ring and put it in my pocket. It’s a funny thing, but now I had it I knew all along I’d made up my mind to take it off him: the moment I’d seen it when he first came to my office.
We left him standing on the steps looking after us. Veda drove. Her car was an open coupe, fast and slick. I knelt on the seat, the gun in my hand, watching Fatso until I lost him in the darkness.
I had an uneasy feeling I’d meet him again.
CHAPTER SIX
NO TOURISTS ever go to Santa Medina and the millionaires shun it like a plague spot. After you’ve seen San Luis Beach I guess Santa Medina looks like a plague spot.
The only thing that thrives in this small compact town of wooden buildings, sun-bleached awnings and beer saloons is Mick Casy’s gambling joint, where sooner or later every crook, twister, con man and gambler from the four corners of the States looks in to say hello and shoot craps. Casy’s joint is famous along the whole of the Pacific Coast. They say if it wasn’t for Mick Casy, Santa Medina would have folded up long ago, and some think the sooner Casy clears out of town and lets it fold up the better.
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