The fredric brown collec.., p.113
The Fredric Brown Collection, page 113
His face grow cold and hard. Iris eyes hooded. He stood up and leaned his hands on the desk, caught Wayne’s eyes with his own, and poured on the speech, his voice cold and precise and deadly.
And it was a balm to his actor’s soul that Wayne’s eyes widened as he listened to it. He said, “I’ll be damned. You can act. Okay, I’ll try to get you the role. I didn’t think you had it in you, but you have. Only if you cross me up by drinking—”
“I won’t.” Sir Charles sat down; he’d been calm and cold during the speech. Now he was trembling a little again and he didn’t want it to show. Wayne might think it was drink or poor health, and not know that it was eagerness and excitement.
This might be the start of it, the comeback he’d hoped for —he hated to think how long it had been that he’d been hoping.
But one good supporting role, and in a Wayne Campbell play that might have a long run, and he’d be on his way. Producers would notice him and there’d be another and slightly better role when this play folded, and a better one after that.
He knew he was kidding himself, but the excitement, the hope was there. It went to his head like stronger drink than any tavern served.
Maybe he’d even have a chance to play again in a Shakespeare revival, and there are always Shakespeare revivals. He knew most of every major Shakesperean role, although he’d played only minor ones. Macbeth, that great speech of Macbeth’s—He said, “I wish you were Shakespeare, Wayne. I wish you were just writing Macbeth. Beautiful stuff in there, Wayne. Listen: Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, To the last syllable of recorded time; And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out—”
“Brief candle, et cetera. Sure, it’s beautiful and I wish, too, that I were Shakespeare, Gresham. But I haven’t got all day to listen.”
Sir Charles sighed and stood up. Macbeth had stood him in good stead; he wasn’t trembling any more. He said, “Nobody ever has time to listen. Well, Wayne, thanks tremendously.”
“Wait a minute. You sound as though I’m doing the casting and have already signed you. I’m only the first hurdle.
We’re going to let the director do the actual casting, with Corianos’s and my advice and consent, but we haven’t hired a director yet. I think it’s going to be Dixon, but it isn’t a hundred per cent sure yet.”
“Shall I go talk to him? I know him slightly.”
“Ummm — not till it’s definite. If I send you to him, he’ll be sure we are hiring him, and maybe he’ll want more money.
Not that it won’t take plenty to get him anyway. But you can talk to Nick; he’s putting up the money and he’ll have a say in the casting.”
“Sure, I’ll do that, Wayne.”
Wayne reached for his wallet. “Here’s twenty bucks,” he said. “Straighten out a little; get a shave and a haircut and a clean shirt. Your suit’s all right. Maybe you should have it pressed. And listen—”
“Yes?”
“That twenty’s no gift. It comes out of your next.”
“More than fair. How shall I handle Corianos? Sell him on the idea that I can handle the part, as I did you?”
Wayne Campbell grinned, lie said, “Speak the speech, I pray you, as you haw, pronounced it to me, trippingly on the tongue; but if you month it, as many of your players do, I had as lief the towncrier spoke my lines. Nor do not saw the air—
I can recite Shakespeare, too.”
“We’ll not mention how.” Sir Charles smiled. “Thanks a million, Wayne. Good-by.”
He got the haircut, which he needed, and the shave, which he didn’t really need — he’d shaved this morning. He bought a new white shirt and had his shoes shined and his suit pressed. He had his soul lifted with three Manhattans in a respectable bar — three, sipped slowly, and no more. And he ate — the three cherries from the Manhattans.
The back-bar mirror wasn’t smeary. It was blue glass, though, and it made him look sinister. He smiled a sinister smile at his reflection. He thought, Blackmailer. The role; play it to the hilt, throw yourself into it. And someday you’ll play Macbeth.
Should he try it on the bartender? No. He’d tried it on bartenders before.
The blue reflection in the back-bar mirror smiled at him.
He looked from it to the front windows and the front windows, too, were faintly blue with dusk. And that meant it was time. Corianos might be in his office above his club by now.
He went out into the blue dusk. He took a cab. Not for practical reasons; it was only ten blocks and he could easily have walked. But, psychologically, a cab was important. As important as was an oversize tip to the driver.
The Blue Flamingo, Nick Corianos’s current club, was still closed, of course, but the service entrance was open. Sir Charles went in. One waiter was working, putting cloths on tables. Sir Charles asked, “Will you direct me to Mr. Corianos’s office, please?”
“Third floor. There’s a self-service elevator over there.”
He pointed, and, looking again at Sir Charles, he added, “Sir.”
“Thank you,” said Sir Charles.
He took the elevator to the third floor. It let him off in a dimly lighted corridor, from which opened several doors.
Only one door had a light behind it showing through the ground glass. It was marked “Private.” He tapped on it gently; a voice called out, “Come in.” He went in. Two big men were playing gin rummy across a desk.
One of them asked him, “Yeah?”
“Is either of you Mr. Corianos?”
“What do you want to see him about?”
“My card, sir.” Sir Charles handed it to the one who had spoken; he felt sure by looking at them that neither one of them was Nick Corianos. “Will you tell Mr. Corianos that I wish to speak to him about a matter in connection with the play he is backing?”
The man who had spoken looked at the card. He said,
“Okay,” and put down his hand of cards; he walked to the door of an inner office and through it. After a moment he appeared at the door again; he said, “Okay.” Sir Charles went in.
Nick Corianos looked up from the card lying on the ornate mahogany desk before him. He asked, “Is it a gag?”
“Is what a gag?”
“Sit down. Is it a gag, or are you really Sir Charles Hanover Gresham? I mean, are you really a — that would be a knight, wouldn’t it? Are you really a knight?”
Sir Charles smiled. “I have never yet admitted, in so many words, that I am not. Would it not be foolish to start now? At any rate, it gets me in to see people much more easily.”
Nick Corianos laughed. He said, “I see what you mean.
And I’m beginning to guess what you want. You’re a ham, aren’t you?”
“I am an actor. I have been informed that you are backing a play; in fact, I have seen a script of the play. I am interested in playing the role of Richter.”
Nick Corianos frowned. “Richter — that’s the name of the blackmailer in the play?”
“It is.” Sir Charles held up a hand. “Please do not tell me offhand that I do not look the part. A true actor can look, and can be, anything. I can be a blackmailer.”
Nick Corianos said, “Possibly. But I’m not handling the casting.”
Sir Charles smiled, and then let the smile fade. He stood up and leaned forward, his hands resting on Nick’s mahogany desk. He smiled again, but the smile was different. His voice was cold, precise, perfect. He said, “Listen, pal, you can’t shove me off. I know too much. Maybe I can’t prove it myself, but the police can, once I tell them where to look. Walter Donovan. Does that name mean anything to you, pal? Or the date September first? Or a spot a hundred yards off the road to Bridgeport, halfway between Stamford and there. Do you think you can—?”
“That’s enough,” Nick said. There was an ugly black automatic in his right hand. His left was pushing a buzzer on his desk.
Sir Charles Hanover Gresham stared at the automatic, and he saw it — not only the automatic, but everything. He saw death, and for just a second there was panic.
And then all the panic was gone, and there was left a vast amusement.
It had been perfect, all down the line. The Perfect Crime— advertised as such, and he hadn’t guessed it. He hadn’t even suspected it.
And yet, he thought, why wouldn’t — why shouldn’t —Wayne Campbell be tired enough of a blackmailer who had bled him, however mildly, for so many years? And why wouldn’t one of the best playwrights in the world be clever enough to do it this way?
So clever, and so simple, however Wayne had come across the information against Nick Corianos which he had written on a special page, especially inserted in his copy of the script. Speak the speech, I pray you—
And he had even known that he, Charles, wouldn’t give him away. Even now, before the trigger was pulled, he could blurt: “Wayne Campbell knows this, too. He did it, not I!”
But even to say that now couldn’t save him, for that black automatic had turned fiction into fact, and although he might manage Campbell’s death along with his own, it wouldn’t save his own life. Wayne had even known him well enough to know, to be sure, that he wouldn’t do that — at no advantage to himself.
He stood up straight, taking his hands off the desk but carefully keeping them at his sides, as the two big men came through the wide doorway that led to the outer office.
Nick said, “Pete, get that canvas mail sack out of the drawer out there. And is the car in front of the service entrance?”
“Sure, chief.” One of the men ducked back through the door.
Nick hadn’t taken his eyes — or the cold muzzle of the gun — off Sir Charles.
Sir Charles smiled at him. He said, “May I ask a boon?”
“What?”
“A favor. Besides the one you already intend to do for me. I ask thirty-five seconds.”
“Huh?”
“I’ve timed it; it should take that long. Most actors do it in thirty — they push the pace. I refer, of course, to the immortal lines from Macbeth. Have I your permission to die thirty-five seconds from now, rather than right at this exact instant?”
Nick’s eyes got even narrower. He said, “I don’t get it, but what’s thirty-five seconds, if you really keep your hands in sight?”
Sir Charles said, “Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow—”
One of the big men was back in the doorway, something made of canvas rolled up under his arm. He asked, “Is the guy screwy?”
“Shut up,” Nick said.
And then no one was interrupting him. No one was even impatient. And thirty-five seconds were ample.
“… Out, out, brief candle, Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage And then is heard no more; it is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.”
He paused, and the quiet pause lengthened.
He bowed slightly and straightened so the audience would know that there was no more. And then Nick’s finger tightened on the trigger.
The applause was deafening.
“ I HEARD a rumor,” Sangstrom said, “to the effect that you—” he turned his head and looked about him to make absolutely sure that he and the druggist were alone in the tiny prescription pharmacy. The druggist was a gnarled gnomelike little man who could have been any age from fifty to one hundred. They were alone but Sangstrom dropped his voice just the same “to the effect that you have a completely undetectable poison.”
The druggist nodded. He came around the counter and locked the front door to the shop, then walked toward a doorway behind the counter. “I was about to take a coffee break,” he said. “come with me and have a cup.”
Sangstrom followed him around the counter and through the doorway to a back room ringed by shelves of bottles from floor to ceiling. The druggist plugged in an electric percolator, found two cups and put them on a table that had a chair on either side of it. He motioned Sangstrom to one of the chairs and took the other himself. “Now,” he said “Tell me. Whom do you want to kill, and why?”
“Does it matter?” Sangstrom asked. “Isn’t it enough that I pay for—”
“The druggist interrupted him with an upraised hand. “Yes, it matters. I must be convinced that you deserved what I can give you. Otherwise—” He shrugged.
“All right,” Sangstrom said. “The whom is my wife, the why —” he started a long story. Before he had quite finished, the percolator had finished its task and the druggist briefly interrupted to get coffee for them. Sangstrom finished his story.
The little druggist nodded. “Yes I occasionally dispense an undetectable poison. I do so freely; I do not charge for it, if I think a case is deserving. I have helped many murderers.
“Fine,” said Sangstrom, “Give it to me then”
The druggist smiled at him. “I already have by the time the coffee was ready I decided that you deserved it.
It was, as I said, free. But there is a price for the antidote.”
Sangstrom turned pale. But he had anticipated—not this, but the possibility of a double—cross or some form of blackmail. He pulled a pistol from his pocket.
The little druggist chuckled. “You daren’t use that. Can you find the antidote” —he waved at the shelves—”among those thousands of bottles? Or would you find a faster, more virulent poison? Or if you think I’m bluffing, that you are not really poisoned, go ahead and shoot. You’ll know the answer within three hours when the poison starts to work.”
“How much for the antidote?” Sangstrom growled.
“Quite reasonable. A thousand dollars. After all, a man must live. Even if his hobby is preventing murders, there’s no reason why he shouldn’t make money at it, is there?”
Sangstrom growled and put the pistol down, but within reach, and took out his wallet. Maybe after he had the antidote, he’d still use that pistol. He counted out a thousand dollars in hundred—dollar bills and put it on the table.
The druggist made no immediate move to pick it up. He said, “And one other thing—for your wife’s safety and mine. You will write a confession of your intention—your former intention, I trust— to murder your wife. Then you will wait till I go out and mail it to a friend of mine on the homicide detail. He’ll keep it as evidence in case you do decide to kill your wife. Or me, for that matter”
“When it is in the mail it will be safe for me to return here and give you the antidote. I’ll give you paper and pen…”
“Oh, and one other thing—although I do not absolutely insist on it. Please help spread the word about my undetectable poison, will you? One never knows, Mr. Sangstrom. The life you save, if you have any enemies, just might be your own.”
THE SEED of murder was planted in the mind of Wiley Hughes the first time he saw the old man open the safe.
There was money in the safe. Stacks of it.
The old man took three bills from one orderly pile and handed them to Wiley. They were twenties.
“Sixty dollars even, Mr. Hughes,” he said. “And that’s the ninth payment.” He took the receipt Wiley gave him, closed the safe, and twisted the dial.
It was a small, antique-looking safe. A man could open it with a cold chisel and a good crowbar, if he didn’t have to worry about how much noise he made.
The old man walked with Wiley out of the house and down to the iron fence. After he’d closed the gate behind Wiley, he went over to the tree and untied the dog again.
Wiley looked back over his shoulder at the gate, and at the sign upon it: “Beware of the Dog.”
There was a padlock on the gate too, and a bell button set in the gatepost. If you wanted to see old man Erskine you had to push that button and wait until he’d come out of the house and tied up the dog and then unlocked the gate to let you in.
Not that the padlocked gate meant anything. An able-bodied man could get over the fence easily enough. But once in the yard he’d be torn to pieces by that hound of hell Erskine kept for a watchdog.
A vicious brute, that dog.
A lean, underfed hound with slavering jaws and eyes that looked death at you as you walked by. He didn’t run to the fence and bark. Nor even growl.
Just stood there, turning his head to follow you, with his yellowish teeth bared in a snarl that was the more sinister in that it was silent.
A black dog, with yellow, hate-filled eyes, and a quiet viciousness beyond ordinary canine ferocity. A killer dog.
Yes, it was a hound of hell, all right.
And a beast of nightmare, too. Wiley dreamed about it that night. And the next.
There was something he wanted very badly in those dreams. Or somewhere he wanted to go. And his way was barred by a monstrous black hound, with slavering jowls and eyes that looked death at you. Except for size, it was old man Erskine’s watchdog. The seed of murder grew.
Wiley Hughes lived, as it happened, only a block from the old man’s house. Every time he went past it on his way to or from work he thought about it. It would be so easy. The dog? He could poison the dog. There were some things he wanted to find out, without asking about them. Patiently, at the office, he cultivated the acquaintance of the collector who had dealt with the old man before he had been transferred to another route. He went out drinking with the man several times before the subject of the old man crept into the conversation — and then, after they’d discussed many other debtors. “Old Erskine? The guy’s a miser, that’s all. He pays for that stock on time because he can’t bear to part with a big chunk of money all at once. Ever see all the money he keeps in—?”
Wiley steered the conversation into safer channels. He didn’t want to have discussed how much money the old man kept in the house.
He asked, “Ever see a more vicious dog than that hellhound of his?”
The other collector shook his head. “And neither did anybody else. That mutt hates even the old man. Can’t blame him for that, though; the old geezer half starves him to keep him fierce.”
