Delphi collected works o.., p.4
Delphi Collected Works of Peter Cheyney Illustrated, page 4
I heard him whistle.
“Pretty good, Lemmy,” he says. “Are you going to use me?”
“Not for a minute, big boy,” I says. “I’ve got to go easy on this thing because you know Siegella. He ain’t a nice guy to cross. Just stick around, Mac, will you? I’ll phone you in a day or two.”
“O.K., buddy,” he says.
I lit myself a cigarette and walked up the stairs out of the station. Just outside parked against the curb is a smart roadster. I take a look at it, and I see Connie, Siegella’s girl, the dame who picked me up, sittin’ at the wheel. She looks at me an’ she grins.
“Did you have a nice phone call, Lemmy?” she says.
“Listen, Connie,” I says, “ain’t you the curious dame? I’ve been phoning because like a big mug I left the outside key to my rooms inside. I was ringing the porter downstairs to see if he was up, otherwise I wouldn’t be able to get in.”
She smiles.
“I’ll drive you home, Lemmy,” she says. “Get in, I want to talk to you.”
I get into the car an’ she drives me back to my rooms, where I have to go through a big business of knocking up the porter to let me in when I’ve got the key in my pocket all the time. When he opens the door, she’s still standing there.
“Ask me up for a drink, Lemmy,” she says. “I want to talk to you.”
“Anything to please a lady,” I said. “Come on, Connie.”
I took her upstairs, opened up the flat, took her wrap and gave her a highball. As she stands there in the middle of the room, it strikes me that this Connie is a very swell dame. I wonder just how much I can trust her supposing I get the idea to pull a fast one on Siegella. But she soon puts me right on that point. She walks over to my big arm-chair, an’ she sits down.
“Now, listen, Lemmy,” she said. “I like you. You’re a nice guy, and there’s something about you that maybe I could fall for. Anyhow, I didn’t come along here tonight to tell you that.
“Siegella sent me along to give you this. He didn’t want you to have it in front of the boys.”
She threw an envelope on the table.
“Inside that envelope,” she says, “is 10,000 dollars. That’s for expenses in toting Miranda around. Siegella wants you to do this thing in a big way, expense don’t matter. Now, Lemmy,” she goes on, “you listen to me. I know your sort. You’re a born racketeer, you’re a good crook and a nice worker. We know all about you, you’ve always worked solo, an’ maybe you don’t like the idea of having to string along with Siegella an’ the boys.
“Now I’m giving you the tip off. You do what you’re told, and like it, because Ferdie Siegella is wise to the fact that you might try to pull a fast one on him.
“Remember, he ain’t quite certain of you, so he’ll be watching you like a cat, an’ if you side-slip he’ll get you if he has to do it with his own hands.”
She gives herself a cigarette outa the box beside her an’ then goes on.
“You see, this Miranda snatch means a lot to him. The Feds are after him in America, he’s got a record out there that’s so black that it would make the devil’s schedule look like a prayer book. He’s got to have a lot of money and he’s got to have it quick in order to straighten things out. He’s made up his mind to pull this Miranda snatch, an’ he’s got the job so well planned that I know he’s going to get away with it.”
She walks over to where I’m standing in front of the fireplace, an’ she stands right in front of me an’ she looks right into my eyes. This dame Connie has got very deep brown eyes. I told you before that she was a swell dame.
“Now, Lemmy,” she says, “string along, be a good guy, get your job done and take your money.”
She walks over to the chair and picks up her wrap.
“When it’s all straightened out,” she says, “maybe you and I can have a little talk. Maybe I could fall for a guy like you, Lemmy,” she says sorta sad.
I grin.
“So what, Connie?” I says, “an’ you Siegella’s girl?”
She smiles.
“That’s the way it is, Lemmy,” she says. “You don’t have to tell the world but I don’t like Ferdie Siegella, but what can I do? I’ve got to string along too, and I’m clever enough to like it. Still, there’s lots of time.”
I laugh.
“That’s O.K. by me, sister,” I says. “I’m a pretty good guy at waitin’ around if it’s worth it; but comin’ back to the main job for just one little minute, there’s one thing I don’t like so much an’ that is this guy Gallat.”
She laughs.
“Be your age, Lemmy,” she says. “This guy is a punk. He’s a big broad-shouldered kid just out of college an’ old man van Zelden pays him good to string along an’ keep an eye on Miranda. Don’t you worry about him, because Siegella will take care of him.”
“That’s as maybe,” I says, “but it ain’t so good my startin’ operations on Miranda with this feller gum-shoein’ around is it? Supposin’ he gets wise to my game.”
“Come an’ help me put this wrap on, Lemmy,” she says. An’ when I hold it up for her she looks at me over her shoulder.
“Listen, kid,” she says soft like. “Don’t you worry about Gallat. Right now he’s livin’ round at the Strand Chambers, next to the van Zelden dame’s hotel. Well, tomorrow night he’s going to get a telephone call, see... a sorta urgent call, an’ he’s goin’ to go out an’ keep an appointment. I reckon he won’t worry you any more after that....”
I grin. “Siegella’s going to take him for a ride, eh?” I say.
“Don’t be so curious an’ give me a kiss, Lemmy, she says.
That dame certainly can kiss. After a minute she goes over to the door.
“I’ll be seeing you, Lemmy,” she says.
I take her down to the street, put her in her car an’ watch her as she drives off. It’s funny that this dame should decide that she might like to fall for me some time.
Then I go upstairs and I lock the door. Then I open the envelope on the table. Sure enough there is ten grand inside it, twenty 500 dollar bills. I stand there looking at these bills for a few minutes an’ suddenly I get an idea.
I go into my bedroom, an’ I unlock my trunk. Down in the bottom drawer I got a book. This book is a pasting up book and in it I’ve got pages cut from the U.S. Federal Police news, because I’ve found that this is a very clever thing to do. It lets me know what the mobs are doing, and who the Feds are after.
Pretty soon I find what I’m looking for. Its a police report on the hold up of the Third National Farmers’ Bank in Arkansas. Now everybody knows that this job was pulled by the Lacassar mob which means Siegella was behind it. On the next page is the page from the Police News giving the numbers of the stolen bank notes — the big denomination bills.
I take the book back to my sitting room an’ I check up with the numbers of the notes that Connie has just given to me. I’m dead right. It was Siegella who pulled the Arkansas stick-up an’ the ten grand he has given me is the ten grand that he pinched from that bank. This proves to me that Siegella has been planning this Miranda business for a long time.
I start to put the notes back in the envelope. Changing these notes over here in London will be easy. The stick-up was done in Arkansas six months ago, an’ there won’t be any check up in this country I figure.
I take the envelope an’ I put it in a drawer in my bedroom. Right then I start thinkin’ about this guy Gallat who is Miranda’s protection man that she don’t know about. I can imagine this guy — one of them big college kids with no brains an’ full of la di da. I reckon this guy is not goin’ to feel so good when Siegella gets his hooks on him.
But I think that it will be a good idea if some guy I know is keepin’ an eye on this Gallat proposition, so I walk back into the sitting room and I telephone MacFee. I give him the layout an’ I tell him that this guy Gallat is on the spot an’ that Siegella will probably bump him some time tomorrow night an’ that it might be better if MacFee hung around an’ saw what was breakin’ — just so I knew that everything was cleaned up properly.
I then go to bed because I am very tired havin’ had a very busy day. As I go off to sleep I can see Connie’s brown eyes — that dame has got nice eyes — lookin’ at me.
I have got ideas about that dame.
III. GOYAZ CUTS IN
NEXT MORNING WHEN I wake up the sun is shining, and I am feeling pretty good. I have a very good breakfast with six cups of coffee, and whilst I am drinking same I proceed to do a little quiet thinkin’ about this Siegella set-up.
It’s all the tea in China to an egg-flip that this Siegella has got a very swell organisation functionin’ in this country; it is also a stone ginger that I have not seen the half of it. The bunch of tough eggs that I contacted round at the Knightsbridge flat are all guys — with the exception of about six — that I have seen around in the United States some place.
I reckon that there must be a lot more people in this thing. If Siegella has got somebody tailing me it must be somebody I don’t know — otherwise I’m goin’ to spot ’em right away, an’ Siegella is too clever by a mile for that.
By the time I have finished with the coffee and started on a bottle of bourbon I am gettin’ worried as to how I can figure out some way to get wise to the whole Siegella outfit here. I am a guy who likes to know what he is doin’ an’ what is goin’ on around an’ I do not fancy takin’ some chances against something I don’t know.
In the middle of this Siegella comes through on the telephone.
“Say, Lemmy,” he says, how’re you feelin’ this mornin’?”
I say I am feelin’ O.K. an’ he then asks me if I have got the jack which he told Constance to hand over to me — ten thousand dollars.
I say I have got it all right. I also say that I know where he got it from, an’ I can hear him laughin’.
“There ain’t any flies on you, Lemmy,” he says, an’ suddenly his voice goes serious. This Siegella is a funny guy, when he means business his voice droops sort of — it gets thin, an’ low an’ menacin’.
“Listen, kid,” he says. “Here’s where you start work. We gotta get a move on an’ I want you to get busy right away. Your little lady friend is stayin’ down at the Carlton. What about gettin’ along there an’ makin’ that contact. I want to get this job movin’ as soon as I can.”
“That suits me,” I says. “Directly I’ve finished this bourbon I’ll be gettin’ right along.”
“O.K., Lemmy,” he says. “I’ll be seein’ you.”
“Right, sweetheart,” I says “an’ don’t do anything that you wouldn’t like photographed.”
I hang up on this crack an’ proceed to do a little more thinkin’.
At twelve o’clock I get dressed. I have got some very good English clothes an’ some swell silk shirts that I bought the day before, an’ by the time that I am ready to go along and see Miranda I am lookin’ like all the flowers in May.
I finish the bourbon, an’ walk down the Haymarket and turn into the Carlton. I go up to the reception and I ask for Miss Van Zelden.
They tell me that Miss van Zelden is not there. Also they do not know when Miss van Zelden will be there. They think she has gone away for a few days.
This is not so good, I think. I then ask if Miss van Zelden has got a secretary or a maid, as I have some very urgent business, an’ after a lot of palooka I go up in the elevator an’ I am shown into a drawin’ room. I give my name to the bell-hop and I sit down an’ wait.
Presently in comes a jane that I take to be the maid. I am right in one guess. This dame is a neat baby an’ she looks good an’ knows it.
She hands me some stuff about Miss van Zelden bein’ out of town for some days.
When she has finished I get up.
“Listen kid,” I says. “I have got some very important business with Miss van Zelden, an’ I am a guy that she will see almost any time. Now I want to get in touch with her an’ it ain’t no use your tellin’ me she’s away an’ you don’t know where she is. Now where is she baby? I guess you gotta know something?”
Whilst I am talking I have pulled a fifty dollar bill out of my pocket an’ am foldin’ it nice an’ straight. I see her eyes fasten on the bill.
“Honest I don’t know, Mr. Caution,” she says. “But maybe this will help you.”
She goes off an’ in a minute she comes back with a bit of notepaper which she hands over to me.
“I found this waitin’ for me when I went in with her early mornin’ tea,” she says.
I look at the note. It says:
“I shall be away for two or three days. M. van Z.”
I give the maid fifty bucks.
“An’ you haven’t an idea where she is?” I says.
She shakes her head.
“Honest — I don’t know a thing,” she says.
I pass her a couple of wisecracks an’ I then scram. Outside I start walkin’ towards Strand Chambers which is where Gallat — Miranda’s bull-dog — lives according to Connie, an’ whilst I am walkin’ I am still doin’ some heavy thinkin’.
First of all it is a bit screwy Miranda bein’ away at a time when Siegella gives me the tip-off to contact her. I know Siegella ain’t the sort of guy not to know what she was goin’ to do. I do not like this one little bit.
Pretty soon I arrive at Strand Chambers which is a block near Trafalgar Square. I go into the entrance an’ walk along a little passage until I come to a side window that looks out front. I have a careful look through this an’ I see some guy standin’ over the other side of the road pretendin’ to read a newspaper. I guess this guy is keepin’ an eye on the Gallat proposition. He is a fat, dark guy an’ looks like a mobster, but I don’t know him to look at. He might be one of Siegella’s mob an’ then again he might not.
I walk back to the elevator man, and ask if Mr. Gallat is around, an’ he says yes, an’ we go up. On the third floor this guy gets out an’ shows me along the passage to a room. He knocks on the door an’ I go in.
Inside, readin’ a newspaper an’ eatin’ breakfast is a big, young-lookin’ feller. He is a blond guy an’ he has one of them faces that make you think of when you was young.
“What can I do for you?” he says. An’ by the way he says it, I sorta get the idea that this guy is expectin’ something to happen an’ he don’t quite know what, an’ that is why he has given orders that anybody who comes along an’ asks for him should be shown right up.
“Right now you can give me a drink, Gallat,” I say, “an’ then you an’ me can talk a little bit. By the way,” I says casual like, “I suppose you wasn’t expectin’ anybody about now?”
He goes over to a sideboard an’ gets a bottle of whisky an’ a glass an’ he pours out a stiff one which he hands to me.
Whilst I am drinkin’ this whisky he looks at me. I put the glass down an’ I light a cigarette.
“You wouldn’t know where Miss Miranda van Zelden was, would you?” he says.
I blew a puff of smoke an’ grinned at him.
“Say buddy, I thought that was your job knowin’ where that dame was an’ what she was doin’” I says.
“And how would you know that?” he says.
I grin some more.
“There’s an old proverb that says that two watchdogs are better than one.”
He thinks this over for a bit.
“When did you find out she was gone?” he says after a while.
“Just now when I went round to ask for her,” I say. “You see I’ve got some business with her. I’ve known her for some time.”
He nodded.
“I reckon she knows too many bad eggs like you,” he says.
I get up.
“Thanks for the whisky, buddy,” I says. “An’ so long. If you don’t know where she is, I guess you’re no good to me. Remember me to your mammy when you write.”
He gets up too.
“Say listen,” he says. “Just who are you?”
I do some quick thinkin’.
“I’m John Mulligan, representin’ the Illinois Trust Insurance,” I say. “Miss van Zelden is carryin’ a very big jewellery insurance with us, an’ the firm ain’t particularly sure that it’s worth their while. You know how she gets about an’ loses jewellery or just leaves it about where somebody’ll pinch it.”
He nods, an’ I guess he is fallin’ for this line of punk I am handin’ him.
“Well, to cut a long story short I’m supposed to check up on Miss van Zelden an’ see what the risk looks like, an’ if my report is bad then the firm won’t renew, that’s all. I went round this mornin’ to see her an’ the maid told me that she had scrammed, leavin’ a note sayin’ that she’d be back in a few days. It looked a bit screwy to me.
“I knew about you because my firm was advised that old man van Zelden employed you to keep an eye on the girl, an’ I thought you might know something about where she was, that’s all.”
He picked up my glass an’ took it to the sideboard and filled it again.
“Sorry I was rude, Mulligan,” he says. “But I’m a bit burned up about that girl. I wish I knew where she was. I’ve a scout in the hotel, but he couldn’t tell me a thing.”
I sat down again and lit another cigarette. The whisky wasn’t too bad, but it was not as good as my bourbon.
“Listen, Gallat,” I says. “Maybe I’ve been knockin’ around a bit longer than you have an’ I’ve seen one or two things. Now when I come in here just now I see some guy over the road who is keepin’ tabs on this place.
“Now it stand to reason that either Miranda van Zelden has just slipped off for a day or so on some scheme of her own or there is something screwy goin’ on. If there’s something screwy afoot then whoever is behind it is goin’ to keep an eye on you just to see what your reaction is goin’ to be, an’ it looks to me as if that is just what is goin’ on.
I take him over to the window an’ I show him this guy on the other side of the road, still readin’ the newspaper.
In a minute he comes back to the table.
“It don’t look so good to me,” he says.
