THIRTY-EIGHT

“Damn,” Della said one morning at the breakfast table a week after the robbery. “If I’d known you were having that much fun I would have come up there myself some night.”

“It wasn’t all that lurid, I promise you.”

“Does this mean the end of the legendary Weilback poker game?” she asked.

I shook my head and laughed indulgently. “Of course not. The city will go on a reform bender for a few months, but this business will all blow over and things will be back to normal before you know it.”

“But the town will be rid of Will Scoggins.”

“Yes, and Clifton Robillard too,” I pointed out.

“He’s completely disgraced, isn’t he, darling?” she asked. “I mean his reputation is absolutely ruined.”

“It appears that way,” I said.

She was up getting us more coffee a few minutes later when the doorbell rang. “I’ll get it,” she said, and headed off toward the living room. She was back in a matter of seconds with Ollie Marne in tow.

“Well, look what the cat dragged in,” I said.

“Sit down, Ollie,” Della said. “Would you like some breakfast?”

“That’s nice of you,” he replied. “But I’ve already eaten. I might take a cup of coffee, though, if you still have some.”

“What brings you calling this early?” I asked.

“Oh, I had a little news I thought you night find interesting.”

“Really? What’s that?”

He looked at me with his hard, impassive little eyes and smiled his benign, Shmoo-like smile. “Ever heard of a couple of guys named Tobias Perkins and Charles Needam?”

I shook my head. “No. Should I have?”

“Probably not, but I sure as hell know who they are. They’re both old-time bank burglars. Master safecrackers, is what I’m talking about.”

“Ahhh … I see. And you think they did the bank job.”

He shook his head. “Nope.”

“Then what?” Della asked.

He burst out laughing. “This is a great story, so don’t you two hurry me.”

We both grinned. “Take your time, Ollie,” I said. “Savor it.”

“Don’t worry. I will,” he said. “Perkins has been straight ever since he got out of the pen about ten years ago. Needam? Well, nobody knows for sure about him the last few years, but apparently he’s going straight now. See, both these guys are almost sixty, and they’re ready for a little peace and quiet. But according to Perkins, about three months back a guy he knows in the outfit up there in Kansas city wanted to give them five hundred dollars each to come down here and talk to a man about a job. That’s all … Just talk. No strings attached. Perkins knew what kind of job they were talking about, but for him five hundred bucks is nothing to sneeze at. So down they came and who do you think they meet with once they are here?”

“It must have been Clifton Robillard,” I said.

“Right you are. And as you probably have also figured out that he wanted them to crack his bank—”

“But why?” Della asked. “That doesn’t make any sense at all.”

“Sure it does,” Marne said. “It was to cover up his embezzlement.”

Her mouth hung open for a few moments, then snapped shut. “I got it!” she said excitedly. “The papers said almost three hundred thousand dollars was taken in the robbery, right? But only ninety-four were found at the tourist court in Sweetwater.”

“Correct,” Marne said. “And the difference between what the books showed was stolen and the amount of money found at Sweetwater is what he embezzled from his own bank.”

“Does this happen often?” she asked.

“It’s happened a jillion times in the past, even way on back into frontier days. It’s harder to pull off these days, but occasionally some rascal like Clifton has a shot at it.”

“How did you find out about this, Ollie?” I asked.

“Hell, every cop in town knows about it. That was what Bob Crowder’s trip up to Kansas City was all about. You see, Perkins and Needam got to worrying that somebody had seen them with Robillard, and they were afraid the job would be hung on them even though they’d turned him down. So they called Crowder.”

“How about the contact up in Kansas City?” I asked.

“He’s dead now, but it was a mob hit. They’re in the clear on that too, and Clifton Robillard is finished. They’re going to testify in court, and Crowder says they’ll be fine witnesses. And why not? Hell, what have they got to gain by lying?”