Complete works of peter.., p.108
Complete Works of Peter Cheyney. Illustrated, page 108
Geraldine falls for this line. She thinks that Sergius is the berries. The big mug then fills himself with heroics an' a double shot of vodka an' says that he is goin' to France to join the Foreign Legion. But while he is on the way Joe Stalin, who has been sproutin' about in the undergrowth like a bad-tempered whale, comes up for air an' proclaims to all an' sundry that he does not intend to fight anybody very much an' proceeds to help himself to a large slice of Poland.
Geraldine is now not feelin' so hot. Her Cossack day-dream is in France an' Buddy is still missin'. Old Willis Perriner starts rushin' round in circles an' calls in the Federal Bureau of Investigation to try an' find Buddy an' the Director assigns the case to Rodney Wilks who is a swell guy who knows his stuff backwards.
Before Wilks can do anythin' at all, Geraldine scrams outa New York, an' a week later cables her pa from Paris that she has come over to join Nakorova because she cannot bear to be parted from the guy.
This gives Wilks an idea. He believes that the whole thing is a set-up. He reckons that Buddy has slid off to Paris where he thinks he can have a good time, knowin' that Nakorova an' Geraldine will be comin' over. The idea bein' that old man Perriner will be so goddam het-up about Buddy's disappearance that he will not give two hoots in hell whether Geraldine marries the Russian cake-eater or not an' that he will be so pleased when he hears that the kid is safe that he will consent to anything an' give his blessin' an' a coupla million dollars to the bridal pair.
So there you are. Wilks scrams over to Paris to see if his theory is worth anything. But he don't seem to make out on it an' the next thing is that the Director assigns me to the case an' tells me to contact Wilks in Paris an' take over from him.
Me I have always believed in a show-down as bein' the best way out of a job. Comin' over on the boat I have made up my mind to have a straight talk with Geraldine an' get her to open up so that I can see if Wilks' idea is O.K.
But I do not propose to be Lemmy Caution of the F.B.I. on this job. No, sir. I have come over as Cyrus T. Hickory of the Transcontinental Detective Agency a private dick an' I will tell you why.
If Geraldine an' Sergius an' Buddy are stickin' around in Paris to try an' get old man Perriner to agree to the marriage they are not goin' to open up to a "G" man. They are goin' to get windy if they think that the F.B.I. is on the job. Because they know that you cannot try any funny business with a Department of Justice guy. But if they think I am just a private detective who has been put in by the old boy to find Buddy they may think it worth their while to come across with the truth an' bribe me to keep my mouth shut.
So there you are.
CHAPTER II. ANOTHER LITTLE DRINK
IT is twelve-twenty-five an' I am strollin' down the Rue des Grecs, keepin' my eyes well peeled to stop myself runnin' into the lamp posts. Believe it or not these Parisian black-outs are not so hot.
There is somethin' about Paris that always gets me. Somethin' that I like an' yet it makes me sorta shiver. Me I am not a guy who suffers from nerves an' you will understand that I do not scare very easy. But at the same time there is a sorta kink in the atmosphere while I am walkin' down that street, with the blued-out lights makin' funny sorta shadows. Well I told you people that I was a poetic sort of guy, didn't I?
I am a great believer in atmosphere especially where dames are concerned. Because I have always found that a dame reacts quicker to atmospherics than most guys. Once on a while, while I was on a case down at Agua Caliente where the warm springs ain't the only things that are hot I knew some tasty dish who was Spanish an' who didn't care whether it was last Thursday or Christmas. She was just one of them high-pressure forceful babies with a will of her own an' a six-inch knife stuck in her garter just in case she was at a loss for words at any given moment.
Well, this baby thinks that she is stuck on me an' some other doll on whom I have taken a run-out powder the week before tells this Conchita that she has been gettin' the short end of the deal from me. This female scandaleer says that while I have been takin' a tumble with Conchita I have also been givin' a heavy once-over to the girl who does the song an' dance act at the local Follies show.
So Conchita rolls her eyes like a bad-tempered alligator. She is not standin' for any stuff like this. So right then she limbers up an old six-shooter that her pa used in the Spanish war an' goes out lookin' for Lemmy.
Well, just at this minute I am takin' a cold shower around at the Casino an' the massage guy who is partial to me wises me up to the fact that Conchita is runnin' wild with some artillery, that she is lookin' for me, an' that the atmosphere is so electric you could run a cable car on it.
I do a little quiet thinkin' an' I wrap a Mexican blanket around me an' put on the massage guy's sombrero. Then I take my swell check linen suit an' give it to a mean guy who four-flushed me two nights before in a poker game for a present. After which I pull the sombrero over one eye, an' walk out the back way to the depot.
I get the next train out an' the guy I have given my linen suit to gets shot twice in the market place.
All this is due to the massage guy's sense of atmosphere, so you will see there is somethin' very valuable in this atmosphere business to a guy like me. Especially if you are wise to it before it gets around to you.
Walkin' along I get to wonderin' about this dame Geraldine Perriner. I have heard that this baby is a good-looker with a will of her own. If this is right then maybe there will be some fireworks.
When I turn inta Siedler's place, which is down a little courtyard at the end of the street, I see that it ain't changed much since I was here last. Somehow I expected to find the place full of soldiers, but I was wrong. The vestibule all Turkish with soft red lights is filled with the usual sorta punks who get around to Seidler's. Most of 'em have got police records and those who haven't are well on the way to gettin' them.
I give my hat an' overcoat to the girl in the cloakroom an' I walk down to the end of the vestibule where there are some Turkish alcoves with tables and chairs inside. In the last one, sittin' back in a chair, is a dame wearin' three gardenias.
So this is Geraldine!
Well, I'm tellin' you that this guy Sergius Nakorova knows his stuff, because she has got plenty.
She is of middle height an' wearin' a close-fittin' black dinner frock with a big fur coat flung open over the back of the chair, with the collar sorta framin' her face. She has a skin like pasteurised milk, big eyes, an' the boy who fixed her red hair certainly can swing a mean curlin' tong. I'm tellin' you people if I ever fell down a coal mine with this dame Geraldine I would not even shout when I heard the rescue party comin'. I would just lie doggo.
I walk into the alcove and I say to her:
"Good evenin', I am Cyrus T. Hickory. I'm glad to meet you, Miss Perriner."
She looks at me an' smiles. She has got a slow, wistful sorta smile that would do things to an impressionable guy. When she speaks her voice is very low an' soft, an' she talks sorta slow, pronouncin' her words like the dame on the radio.
"Sit down, Mr. Hickory," she says. "I'm delighted to meet you."
I suggest that before we do anything else at all we celebrate the meetin', an' I signal to a waiter an' order myself a shot of Canadian rye an' a clover club cocktail for her.
When this guy has brought the drinks an' scrammed I draw the curtains across the alcove. Then I sit down. I give her a cigarette an' light myself one.
"Look, Miss Perriner," I tell her, "you an' me don't want to waste a lotta time flirtin' around this proposition. Let's get down to cases."
"Of course, Mr. Hickory," she says, "and I think I can save a lot of your time. Believe me. I understand just the way Father is feeling about Sergius and me. He doesn't like Sergius. Why? Just because he is a Russian and a Count. Father is old-fashioned. He doesn't like anybody who isn't American, and he loathes titles. So in his opinion Sergius has to be just an adventurer who is after the Perriner money."
She flicks the ash off her cigarette an' the diamonds in the rings on her fingers twinkle.
"Well, he's wrong," she goes on. "But he's not going to believe me when I say he's wrong, and he's certainly not going to believe Sergius." She flashed a smile at me. "But he might believe you."
"Oh yes?" I say. "You mean that you want me to meet this Russian guy, to check up on him an' if I think he's O.K. to tell your Pa?"
"That's right," she says. "I think it would be an excellent thing for you to meet soon. I think it would be even better if you investigated his background to the fullest extent. He has nothing to hide."
"That's as may be, Miss Perriner," I tell her. "At the present moment I'm not in a position to argue about that. But aren't you makin' a little bit of a mistake? Have you forgotten about Buddy?"
She looks down. Some tears come into her eyes.
"That's unkind of you, Mr. Hickory," she says. "Naturally I'm terribly worried about Buddy. I'm very fond of him, but somehow the idea persists that he's safe. After all this isn't the first time that Buddy has disappeared. He has been off on a dozen adventures and never told anyone where he was going or what he was going to do."
"Maybe that's right," I tell her, "but he's never been on one like this. Even if he has scrammed off before, somebody has known where he was or what he was doin' within a coupla weeks. He has been missin' for over four months. Nobody's heard a word from him. He's just disappeared off the face of the earth."
"I know," she says, "but I was wondering..."
I interrupt her.
"What was you wonderin'?" I ask her.
She leans forward.
"You know, Mr. Hickory," she says, "I wouldn't be surprised if Buddy didn't turn up one day in a soldier's uniform."
"O.K.," I say. "You mean you think he wants to do a Kermit Roosevelt act an' go to the war; that he's joined the French or English Army. Well, supposin' he's done that why should he keep so quiet about it?"
She shrugs her shoulders.
"Look, Geraldine," I tell her, "I think the time's come when you an' I oughta talk pretty straight to each other. Your Pa's nearly nutty about Buddy. He's worried about you too, but he reckons the worst thing that can happen to you is only to marry this Cossack guy. O.K. But the Buddy thing is different. If you coulda seen what your father was like when I left New York you wouldn't be feelin' so cool about things.
"Another thing, he's got a funny idea in his head an' when I tell you what it is maybe you won't feel so hot about this Sergius guy of yours."
She looks serious. "Tell me, Mr. Hickory," she says.
"Here is the set-up," I tell her. "Your Pa tells me that Buddy was settlin' down to do a decent job of work at the Pittsburg Works when this Nakorova guy meets you in New York. O.K. Well he falls for you an' you fall for him an' you introduce him to Buddy. The investigations that the Transcontinental have made seem to point out that from that moment this Russian did everything he could to get next to Buddy. He wanted to do all the same things, go to the same places. It has even been suggested that Nakorova spent more time with Buddy than he did with you.
"Well, it is easy to work it out from there, isn't it? Your Pa believes that this love business between you and Nakorova was just a frame-up, that Nakorova was really trying to get next to Buddy so that he could pull this kidnappin' stunt an' hold up old man Perriner for maybe a coupla million dollars."
She shrugs her shoulders.
"Ridiculous," she says. "Mr. Hickory, I tell you that the idea is absolute nonsense. I tell you also that when you have met Sergius you will know that it is nonsense."
"O.K.," I tell her. "Maybe we'll find all that out. Now you tell me something. Had Nakorova ever been in America before this last time when he met you?"
"No," she says, "that was his first visit."
"I see." I think for a minute, then I say: "When you got that radiogram to-night the one I sent to you from the Fels Ronstrom tellin' you to meet me here were you alone?"
"No," she says. She looked surprised. "Sergius was with me. We were dining at my hotel."
"An' you showed him the radiogram?" I say.
"Yes," she says. "I showed it to him. Why not?"
I grin.
"Look," I ask her, "have you ever met a dame called Juanella Rillwater a very smart, good-lookin' wise baby with a husband called Larvey Rillwater?"
"No," she says. "I've never met either of them."
"O.K.," I say.
I light another cigarette.
"We won't have to do a lot of worryin' about checkin' up on the Nakorova background," I tell her, "because that's already been done. An operative of the Transcontinental Agency a side-kicker of mine by the name of Rodney Wilks has been over here in Paris doin' that very thing. I radioed him to come here to-night too. I expect him any minute. I thought we'd make a complete show-down of this, Miss Perriner. Maybe Wilks can tell us all about your boy friend's background."
She shrugs her shoulders again. She smiles at me. Did I tell you guys this dame was beautiful or did I?
I say excuse me. I get up an' I go out of the alcove. I walk back through the vestibule an' I ask the guy on the door if a short gentleman with a nice round face by the name of Wilks has been along to the Club. He says he don't remember exactly because a lotta people have been in an' out, but he thinks a guy like the one I have described was around about twenty minutes ago.
I go back to the alcove.
"Wilks ain't here," I tell her. "But we'll stick around for a bit. He oughta show up any minute. Maybe he finds it's not easy to get here in the dark.
She nods. She leans back in her chair an' relaxes.
Lookin' at this dame I start wonderin' whether old man Perriner might not be wrong about this set-up. Geraldine Perriner may only be twenty-five years of age, but, believe me, she looks as if she has got plenty sense. She does not look like the sorta dame who would be rushed off her feet by a phoney Russian count.
I throw my cigarette stub in the ash-tray an' put my hand round inta my hip pocket to get my cigarette case out. While I am doin' this my sleeve catches on something that is stuck on the arm of the chair I am sittin' in. I look down an' I get a shock because what my sleeve has caught on is a scarf-pin that I gave to Rodney Wilks four years ago when we were workin' together on the Western Bankers Associated stick-up. This is a tie-pin that he always wears. I don't say anything. I disengage my coat sleeve from the pin. I get out my cigarette case, take out a cigarette.
While I am lightin' it I look down at the scarf-pin. It is stuck in the padded arm of the fauteuil that I have been sittin' on. It is stuck right down with only the head showin'. Whoever has stuck it there has done it deliberately. They meant to do it.
I look at Geraldine. She is still leanin' back in her chair with her eyes half closed. She looks quite happy. I ask her if she would like another little drink. She says no thanks. I say anyway I will have one, an' I get up, pull aside the curtain an' step out just as if I was lookin' for the waiter.
I walk across the vestibule, find the waiter, order the drink an' go into the cloakroom. I start wisecrackin' to the girl behind the counter in bad French, an' while I am doin' it I am lookin' at all the hats that are hangin' up on pegs behind her.
Every guy wears a hat in a different way, an' Rodney has got a fashion of his own. He always wears a slate grey fedora turned up at the front that makes him look more like a kid than ever.
I see it. It is hangin' up at the end of the third row.
So it looks like Rodney Wilks has been in to keep his appointment with me, an' it also looks as if he hasn't gone out again. An' it is stickin' out a mile that it was him that stuck that stick-pin in the arm of the chair so that I should see it an' know he'd been there. An' it rather looks to me as if he did that because he knew he wasn't goin' to get out.
I lean up against the wall, smokin' an' doin' a little quiet thinkin'. Then I go back to Geraldine. I tell her that I will not be a minute, that I think it would be an idea to telephone through to Wilks to see if he has left his flat. She says O.K. I go back to the hat room an' I walk down the little passage opposite it that leads to the men's room. It is dark at the end. I go down some steps and open the door. I close the door behind me an' switch on the light. I am in the usual sorta washroom that these places have. Opposite me is a half open door leading to another little room, where I can see some baskets filled with hand towels that have been used. I go over there and feel for the light switch but there isn't any. I take out my cigarette lighter an' snap on the light.
Rodney is there O.K. He is lyin' over in the corner with his head up against the wall. He's all twisted up like he didn't feel so good. When I look at his lips I see a little brown stain on 'em.
I light myself a cigarette. I reckon that Rodney has done all the investigatin' he is ever goin' to do.
I do not like this stuff one little bit because this is what the story writer would call grim. I stand there for a minute or two lookin' at Rodney, who is lyin' there not givin' a goddam about anythin'. By this time I reckon the boy is in the place where "G" men go to after they get bumped an' he is not thinkin' about Geraldine Perriner, which is what I am doin' right now.
I grab hold of the towels basket an' I put 'em so that anybody comin' into the washroom cannot see the body, after which I give myself a wash an' do a little dollin' up which is a process that I am very fond of when I am tryin' to figure somethin' out.
First of all it is a cold hamburger to all the rum in Barbadoes that Wilks was poisoned in this club. It is also a cinch that nobody knows it except the one who did the poisonin'. An' at the moment it looks to me like Geraldine Perriner is the baby who has slipped Wilks a skinful of morgue-juice while he was sittin' in that chair talkin' to her with the alcove curtains drawn.
