Collected Fiction (1940-1963)

by William P. McGivern

  He took his time answering the phone. I was ready to hang up when Central’s buzzing was interrupted.

  “Hello,” a scared, squeaky voice said.

  “Hello, yourself,” I said. I recognized Leander’s voice, but I was puzzled by its overtone of strained terror.

  “You must have the wrong number,” he said. His voice was little more than a frightened squeak.

  “This is Leander Leeds’ residence, isn’t it?” I demanded.

  “N—no. I mean y—es.”

  “Make up your mind,” I snapped into the phone. I was getting a little irritated with this cat and mouse business. “I want to talk to Leander Leeds.”

  “About what?” the voice on the opposite end of the line said with a sort of frantic desperation.

  “Hell!” I exploded. “Do I have to fill out a questionnaire to talk to him? I—”

  I stopped. There had been a definite click on the other end. The phone was dead. I banged it into its cradle and swore eloquently. I said a great number of sulfurous and uncomplimentary things about Leander Leeds and his immediate ancestors before I calmed down enough to think rationally.

  I lit a cigarette and frowned at the phone. Something was damned peculiar here. I was certain that I had been talking to Leander Leeds, but I couldn’t figure out any excuse for his actions, which were, to put it mildly, strange as the very devil.

  What had he been afraid of?

  There was no answer to that question. I stood up and paced the floor and the more I worried the problem the more curious I became.

  Finally I came to a stop in the middle of the room. I pointed a firm finger at my reflection in the full-length mirror.

  “You,” I said very distinctly, “are on a vacation. It is, I might remind you, your first in five years. Enjoy yourself, see some good plays, investigate the better bars and let your hair down generally. Okay, there’s something screwy about this Leander Leeds setup. What’s that to you? Poking your nose into someone else’s private grief leads to trouble all the way ’round. Forget it! To hell with Leander Leeds!”

  That didn’t help. I was nibbling my nails ten seconds later. Finally I realized what I had to do, I scribbled down

  Leander’s address on a piece of paper and walked out of my room. I had to see Leander Leeds.

  WHEN I paid off the cab driver in front of the address I had copied from the phone book, I was pleasantly surprised by the luxurious neighborhood. Leander’s address was an immense apartment hotel, very exclusive and very swanky.

  My bewilderment increased slightly. How could anyone living in such lush surroundings have anything serious to worry about?

  I walked across the expansive, marble lobby to the desk. The clerk, a nattily dressed young man with a frigidly impersonal stare, nodded slightly to me.

  “I wish to see Mr. Leeds,” I said.

  “Whom shall I say is calling, sir?”

  “Matt Harlow. He’s not expecting me but I think it’s all right.”

  The clerk sat down before a switch board and plugged in a line. As he waited he glanced sideways at me and I noticed a certain suspicious curiosity in his gaze.

  I began to feel slightly furtive, for no good reason at all. I resisted an impulse to turn up my coat collar and pull down the brim of my hat.

  After several minutes the clerk disconnected the line and shook his head.

  “Mr. Leeds does not answer, sir,” he said.

  “Doesn’t answer? You mean he’s not in?”

  “He’s in all right,” the clerk said, “but he just doesn’t answer his phone.”

  I pondered this for a moment and it didn’t make sense. But then nothing connected with Leander Leeds seemed to make any particular sense. However my curiosity was additionally sharpened.

  “How do you know he’s in?” I asked the clerk. “Couldn’t he have stepped out for a moment?”

  “He could have,” the clerk said, smiling tolerantly, “but he didn’t. As a matter of fact Mr. Leeds never leaves his apartment.”

  “Never?”

  “Never. For the past three weeks Mr. Leeds has not left his apartment.”

  “Why?” I asked, somewhat groggily. This thing was enough to drive a person batty.

  The clerk’s manner stiffened.

  “It is our policy,” he said, “to respect the privacy of our tenants. If Mr. Leeds chooses to remain in his apartment he undoubtedly has sufficient reasons for doing so. It is, after all, his affair.”

  “Okay, okay,” I said, a trifle fed-up with his supercilious attitude; “what’s his apartment number? I’ll go up and see him.”

  The clerk looked doubtful, but finally he gave me the number of Leander’s apartment and I headed for the elevators.

  Leander’s apartment was on the fifteenth floor. I got off the elevator and found his door without difficulty.

  I BANGED the brass knocker twice and waited.

  There was no sound from within the apartment. I lit a cigarette and paced up and down before the door, my heels sinking a full inch into the heavy carpet.

  I stopped and banged the knocker again. Then I rapped sharply with my knuckles on the creamy enamel of the door.

  A full minute passed and then I heard a furtive footstep on the other side of the door. An instant after that, a squeaky voice said, “Who is it?”

  This time I definitely recognized the voice as Leander’s.

  “It’s Matt Harlow,” I said in a good loud voice. “Open up. What the devil’s wrong with you?”

  Cautiously and slowly the door was opened about five inches at which point a heavy burglar chain stopped it. Then, in this aperture appeared a thin, pale, be-spectacled face, topped with scant, straw-colored hair. Leander Leeds!

  “Is it really you, Matt? he gasped. His voice was high and squeaky and scared. It had always been high and squeaky but the tone of fright was something new.

  “Certainly it’s me,” I said. “Can’t you see that for yourself?”

  His wide, pale eyes behind their enormous cheaters shifted over my shoulder and then up and down the hall.

  “Are you alone?” he whispered.

  “Of course,” I said. “Did you expect me to bring along an army?”

  He didn’t appear to hear me. His eyes were still flicking furtively about the corridor, as if he expected Boris Karloff to make an appearance any second.

  Finally he looked at me and there were tears of relief in his eyes.

  “Gosh, I’m glad to see you,” he said in a broken, husky voice.

  I looked down at the burglar chain. “It doesn’t look that way,” I said. “What’s the matter with you? I haven’t got leprosy and I’m not here to steal the family’s gold.”

  His face turned a shade whiter, if that were possible, and his trembling hand fluttered to his brow.

  “Please,” he gasped in a stricken voice, “don’t mention that word to me. I’m liable to go mad. Maybe I am mad already. I don’t know.”

  He was in a bad way.

  “Take it easy,” I said. “Things can’t be that bad. If you’re in trouble maybe I can help you out a little.”

  “Trouble?” he moaned. “That’s hardly the word for it. Somebody will have to invent a new word to describe the kind of a mess I’m in.”

  His fingers began fumbling with the burglar chain. He seemed strangely excited.

  “Maybe you can help me,” he said tensely. “You were always good at getting people out of jams back in school. Maybe . . . If I don’t at least talk to someone I’ll go insane.”

  HE opened the door and when I stepped into the front room of his apartment he slammed it and I heard him adjusting the chain and throwing the night emergency locks.

  I glanced around the large living room and my eyebrows raised slightly. There wasn’t anything wrong with the room; in fact it was magnificently furnished and quite swanky, but . . .

  It was practically filled with packing cases, huge, cumbersome crates with solidly nailed-down ‘tops.
>
  “Well, well,” I said. “Moving day?”

  Leander looked gloomily at the boxes and, as he stood beside me, I got my first good look at him. He had always been skinny but now he was thin to the point of emaciation.

  He was wearing a loose dark dressing gown over a dirty shirt and baggy, unpressed trousers. He looked as if he’d been sleeping in the outfit for a week. His hands were twined together nervously and the harried desperate look was creeping back into his eyes.

  I pointed to the crates.

  “What goes?” I asked.

  “Come with me,” he said. “I want to show you something. I can’t tell you about it. You have to see it for yourself to believe it”

  He led me through the dining-room and I noticed in passing that it too was filled with large, sealed packing cases.

  We walked down a dark corridor and finally came to a stop before a closed door.

  Leander fished a key from his pocket and unlocked the door.

  “This is my laboratory,” he said.

  I followed him through the door and he switched a light on, flooding the large room with bright illumination.

  This room, too, was filled with packing crates but they were open and I saw that they were about half-filled with dull bronze metal bars about three inches thick and twelve inches long.

  In the center of the room was an intricate machine mounted on a low table. As I was examining it I heard a metallic clink and I saw that a bar of the dull metal had dropped into a receptacle in the front of the macchine.

  Leander walked to the machine, picked up the metal bar and, with a sad sigh, tossed it into one of the open packing crates.

  I studied the machine carefully. It was about two feet square and constructed of brilliantly gleaming metal. The lower half was simply a stout square box with a slot-like receptacle on the side facing me. The upper half of the machine was like nothing I had ever seen before. Filament-like wires twined together and disappeared into the interior of the machine in a sort of orderly disorder.

  I heard another metallic clank. Glancing down at the machine’s receptacle I saw that another dull bronze bar had dropped into place.

  Leander picked this bar up, too, and tossed it into one of the packing crates. He seemed more dejected and listless than ever.

  “See that?” he asked moodily.

  “Yes. What’s the idea?”

  HE looked at me for an instant and then he sighed heavily. His large weak eyes were damp.

  “It’s no use,” he said. His voice was anguished and despairing. “You’ll never believe me. You’ll think I’m mad.”

  I put a hand on his skinny shoulder. “I came here with the idea of helping you,” I said. “At least give me a chance.”

  My words seemed to lend him a little courage. He straightened his shoulders and took a deep breath.

  “All right,” he said. “I—”

  A metallic clank interrupted him. He stooped and removed the bronze-colored bar, but he didn’t toss it into a packing crate. He held it in his hands.

  “Matt,” he said slowly, “do you know what this machine is doing?”

  “I haven’t the slightest idea,” I said. “I’m no engineer. Why?”

  Leander’s fingers tightened nervously about the metal bar. A beady nervous perspiration popped out on his pale forehead.

  “Matt,” he gulped, “this machine is making gold!”

  I didn’t get it right away.

  “That’s nice,” I said, “but—”

  “Didn’t you hear me? Leander cried, grabbing my arm. “It’s making gold! Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Nothing but gold, gold, gold.”

  I stared at him and gradually the meaning of his words filtered into my brain.

  “Gold?” I said. I looked rather stupidly from the machine to Leander. “Gold, eh?”

  “Yes, yes,” he cried. He shoved the bar he was holding into my hands. “See for yourself. Solid gold.”

  I took the bar and examined it. It was heavy. It looked like gold. Who knows? It might be gold. I snapped myself to with a jerk.

  I shoved the bar back to Leander. “You’re nuttier than a fruit cake,” I told him. “What kind of a fairy story are you handing me? Even in Washington I’ve never heard anything to top it. A gold machine! Working twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Overtime for Sundays, I suppose?”

  I was pretty sore and, as a result, pretty sarcastic.

  Leander made no defense. He simply tossed the metal bar into a packing case and sighed mournfully.

  “I told you,” he said tragically. “I knew you wouldn’t believe me.”

  He turned away and his skinny shoulders shook.

  “The whole thing is simply absurd,” I said, defensively. A metal bar dropped into the receptacle and I picked it up automatically. I glanced at the machine in irritation.

  “Why don’t you shut this damned thing off?” I demanded. “It’ll drive you crazy if you don’t.”

  “It is driving me crazy,” Leander said wildly, “but I can’t turn it off. There isn’t any way to turn it off.”

  I STARTED to say something, then I changed my mind. Leander was hysterical, but there was no mistaking the sincerity in his voice. I looked dubiously at the half-dozen or so halffilled packing cases and thought of the dozens more piled throughout the apartment. Maybe there wasn’t any way to turn the machine off. But that was silly. I’d be worse than Leander if I didn’t watch myself.

  “Now, Leander,” I said, in my most soothing voice, “suppose you tell me the whole story.”

  I felt it would do him good to talk. Also I knew if I didn’t get the whole story I was liable to go bats myself.

  Leander turned and faced me and his features were lined and haggard. His prominent Adam’s apple moved in a sad gulp.

  “All right,” he said tonelessly, “I’ll tell you the whole story. I invented a machine that would make gold, that’s all there is to it. I had the idea in college and I’ve worked on nothing else since I graduated.”

  He waved a tired hand toward a paper-stuffed filing case in the corner.

  “The formula is over there. It took me six months just to copy after I had figured it out. Building the machine was a year’s job. Four months ago it started to work.”

  He paused and sighed heavily, despairingly.

  “I was able to sell the first few bars. I moved here, built this laboratory. I was going to enjoy life.” He laughed bitterly. “But the machine wouldn’t stop. There isn’t any way to stop it. The gold kept piling up. Finally I had these packing cases delivered here and I’ve been storing the gold for the last two months. I can’t leave the apartment. I can’t eat, I can’t sleep, I can’t do anything.”

  The machine disgorged another metal bar. Leander picked it up, threw it into a packing case. I felt some of my doubt slipping away.

  After all the machine had made a half dozen bars of metal while I was standing in the room. I scratched my head.

  “Leander,” I said weakly, “is this stuff really gold? I mean, are you sure?”

  “Of course it’s gold. I’ve had it analyzed by the best authorities in the city.”

  He sagged against one of the packing cases and covered his eyes with his hands.

  “God!” he groaned.

  I frowned. “Well, what’s your problem? If all these cases are filled with gold I’d say you’re in a pretty nice spot. You’re about the only man I know who’d be annoyed by a super-abundance of the most precious metal in the world.”

  “You don’t understand!” Leander cried tragically. “What can I do with it? I can’t sell it. It’s against the law to hoard it. And I’m running out of space.”

  I lit a cigarette and started pacing. What a ridiculous situation! It was too fantastic to be funny.

  “JUST a minute,” I said suddenly, J “there’s nothing for you to worry about. You haven’t done anything criminal. You’ve just invented a rather peculiar machine, that’s all. They won’t ha
ng you for that.”

  “You still don’t understand. I can’t turn this thing over to the government.”

  “Why not?”

  Leander waved his arms frantically.

  “Think of what would happen. It would make our gold reserve valueless. Our entire monetary system would be destroyed. With all the other problems the government has, I can’t dump this into its lap. It might cripple our war effort. It might drive all the banks out of business. There’s no telling what might happen, not only in this country but all over the world, if the people realized that the value of all money had been undermined.”

  I hadn’t thought of those things. They were worth thinking about. I started pacing again.

  Another gold bar dropped into the slot. I started slightly. The damn thing did get on your nerves. The effect was probably something like the Chinese water torture. I felt a new pity for Leander. He’d been listening to those bars of gold fall for the last four months. No wonder he looked about ready to fly to pieces.

  An idea occurred to me.

  “Why don’t you get rid of some of the gold?” I asked. “That would relieve the congestion here and in the meantime you might think of some way to stop the machine.”

  “I’ve tried,” Leander said dismally. “After the first month I started taking an armful out every night and throwing it into the river. That helped a little, but then one night a policeman almost caught me. I probably looked suspicious and he started after me. I barely had time to get rid of the gold bars and duck into an alley. It was close. If he’d caught me the jig would have been up.”

  “How about giving it away?” I suggested hopefully.

  Leander threw up his hands in despair.

  “We can’t do that. Can you imagine what would happen if we stood on street corners giving bars of gold away?”

  I could. That was out. I started pacing again and lit another cigarette.

  “We’ve got to do something in a hurry,” Leander said. “In a little while it may be too late.”

  “Why?”