Janie Wilton lay on her stomach on the floor in the middle of the room, playing with the kitten. She had tied a long piece of string around a twist of paper and was pulling it across the linoleum in little jerks as the kitten daintily batted it with a furry paw. The child was laughing.
The novelty of the sudden change in her life fascinated her and, like all children, she had been quick to readjust herself to a new environment. Already she had forgotten her experience with Gino. She hadn’t actually been injured, and she felt about him as she would have felt about a strange dog that might have bitten her for no reason. Once out of her sight, he was out of her mind.
When Dent entered the room, she looked up quickly. And then, a second later, she smiled shyly and went back to playing.
Pearl sat on one of the cots and watched. Standing near the darkened windows was Terry Ballin, who also watched the youngster, a half-smile on her face.
Dent stood quietly in the door for several moments, his eyes on the two girls. They must be, he reflected, about the same age. He was at once struck by the sharp contrast between them. They were almost of a height, although Terry could have been about an inch the taller. Both were slender, well formed, good-looking. Both wore faint, amused smiles. But there the similarity ended.
The dark smudges under Pearl’s large, widely spaced eyes gave her an old, worn look that was probably intensified by the cigarette she carried listlessly in one corner of her large, perfectly formed mouth. Even the languid way in which she held her perfectly proportioned body seemed to emphasize the overwhelming sensuality of her peculiarly exuberant physical personality. She looked exactly like what she was—a fullblown woman of wide experience, capable and willing to satisfy desires that were ever near the surface.
Pearl was the type of woman Dent had known most of his life. He understood her through and through. Born and brought up on the streets
of a tough neighborhood in a tough city, girls like Pearl matured early and usually gained their first experience with men while they were still in their teens.
Dent had known many such girls, but few as attractive as Pearl. Cal Dent was that unusual sort of man—the sort that can be found fairly often among ex-cons—who could take his sex or leave it. Pearl attracted him, it is true, but there was nothing exclusive or personal in the attraction. To Dent, she was merely another woman, to be had or not to be had, according to the circumstances of the moment.
The man was able to put aside all thoughts of women, irrespective of their proximity, during those times when he was immersed in a job. The fact that at this time he was in the middle of the biggest thing in his life precluded any possibility of his taking more than a purely academic interest in her.
There was another thing about Dent. Knowing instinctively that Pearl, like all the others like her, was always available, he himself was emotionally immune to any deep attachment or romantic illusion. With a girl like Pearl, Dent could spend a night or a week or even several years. But once he was ready to leave, he would go without regret and without remorse.
As his eyes left Pearl and went to Terry Ballin, Dent was suddenly conscious of the vast channel of difference that separated the two.
Terry, in spite of her soft, high-breasted body and the almost overpowering physical appeal of her rounded arms and legs, had about her much of the impersonal, casual charm of a child. Looking at her, Dent found himself wondering what kind of woman she was. Whom had she known? What had she done? There was the typical candor of a young girl in her brown-flecked eyes. Vibrantly alive, she gave the impression that she was still psychologically unprepared to meet life as a mature, full-grown woman.
There was a brightness, an odd Celtic alert intelligence, about her expression, but it was basically the expression of an inquisitive, inexperienced schoolgirl. She was the kind of girl of whom Dent had known very little.
Watching het, as she in turn smiled down at the child and the kitten, Dent found her strangely attractive. He was baffled to experience one of the very few soft, almost sentimental sensations he had had in recent years.
He quickly caught himself up short and his face was a hard, neutral mask as he turned back to Pearl.
“Take the kid out in the other room and give her some lunch,” he said
shortly. “I want to talk.”
I Both girls started toward Janie and again Dent spoke.
“I mean for you to take her,” he said, nodding at Pearl. “You,” and he pointed at Terry, who looked at him with a strangely unfrightened, curious expression, “stay here with me.”
There was a sulky line around Pearl’s mouth as she took the child’s hand and started for the door. Janie hung back, but Terry nodded for her to obey and a second later the door closed behind the two of them.
Dent walked slowly over to the rocking chair and sat down. He took a crumpled pack of cigarettes from his pocket and extracted one. As he was about to light it, he seemed suddenly to remember the girl, and he held the pack toward her.
Terry shook her head. “No, thank you,” she said.
“You don’t smoke?” Dent asked, the tone of the question showing a complete lack of interest in the answer she might give.
“I smoke,” Terry said.
Dent’s gray eyes lifted slowly to her face. “You smoke, but not mine— is that it?”
Again Terry shook her head. “No,” she said, “only I don’t feel like smoking just now. I guess I’m too...”
“You don’t have to be nervous with me,” Dent said. “I’m not here to hurt you.”
“If I’m not going to be hurt,” the girl said, “why am I here? Why did you take me?”
Dent shrugged. “You were with the kid,” he said simply. “So we had to take you. Didn’t want you broadcasting our descriptions.”
For a moment Terry looked at him thoughtfully. And then, when she spoke, her voice had a soft huskiness.
“But after,” she said. “How about after? Do you suppose I won’t, as you say, broadcast your descriptions?”
For a moment Dent looked at her sharply, as though the idea had occurred to him for the first time. Then he shrugged.
“When it’s all over,” he said, “it won’t matter. Description or no description, once I have the money, I’ll be well on my way.”
Suddenly Terry Ballin lost that peculiarly childlike expression and her eyes were filled with anger. Her face flushed.
“No,” she said. “No. I know about your kind of man. You’d as soon kill as not. You, and those others in there, you’re all of you alike. All of you cowards and killers. No, you haven’t the slightest intention of turning me loose. I’ll be lucky if, once you get the money, you let the child go.”
As the girl spoke, her voice filled with bitterness and loathing. Dent looked at her in quick surprise. It was hard to realize she was capable of so much sudden anger, so much feeling.
Without stopping to get her breath, Terry continued. She no longer stood still, but walked quickly back and forth as she talked.
“Yes, I’ve known men like you before. Back home in the slum where I was raised. I guess your kind are all over. All you want is money, and you don’t care what you do to get it. You rob and steal and kill. You’ll—”
Dent, aware that the girl’s voice had risen until she was almost screaming, jumped to his feet. He reached out and grabbed her by both arms and quickly shook her.
“All right,” he said. “That’ll be enough of that. Now quiet down. I told you to keep your voice quiet. What do you want me to have to do to you?”
The minute he touched her, Terry suddenly stopped talking. She didn’t struggle as he held her and her eyes were wide as she looked into his face. They stood there motionless for several seconds.
“Sit down,” Dent said then, and he dropped her arms. “I don’t want to hurt you, but I can’t have you yelling in here. I don’t know what we’ll do with you, right now. All I can say is, be quiet and do what you’re told and I’ll see you’re not hurt for the time being. You want to help the kid, then behave yourself.”
The words came from his mouth almost automatically, and as Terry fell back on the cot, her head went back so that her auburn hair fell far down over her square shoulders and her arms dropped straight to support herself. Dent saw her for the first time as a woman. Up until that moment she had been merely a cypher—another pawn in his gamble, and a not too important one. As he watched her breathing heavily and attempting to regain control of herself, he suddenly realized that he actually never had considered the girl. He had automatically accepted the idea of her eventual murder.
From the very beginning, when he had first planned the crime, and even before he had recruited the others to help him, he knew that the kidnaping would be the final, the supreme gesture of his career. He was fully aware of the impact the crime would have on the public, fully aware that with his record, he could expect to get the chair if he were captured. He had been prepared to go all out, and all out included murder if that were to prove necessary.
Up until that very moment, murder had seemed to him merely a technical probability—one that he had not considered in relation to any person in particular. Certainly, from the very beginning he had planned the
kidnaping with the full intention of eventually returning the child un-I harmed. Hardened as he was, he would have been incapable of coldbloodedly planning the killing of a child for money. But kidnaping he
could and did plan.
And now it seemed that he was being faced with a circumstance that he had utterly failed to consider. He had, of course, known all along that the girl would have to be taken at the same time the child was snatched. And in his subconscious, he realized the potential danger in turning her free once the ransom was collected.
The possibility of murder as such failed to upset his peculiar, twisted consciousness. If, in the past, he had had to kill in the consummation of a crime—well, he had looked at it impersonally, as a part of the risk he took in being a professional criminal. But this was, somehow, something different. He felt, watching the girl, strangely upset.
“Look,” he said. “I have nothing against you personally.” And then, as he realized what he had said, he was more than ever surprised. He walked over to Terry and again held out the pack of cigarettes.
“Better take one,” he said. “Maybe you’d like a drink?”
Terry stared at him as she reached for a cigarette.
“I’d like some coffee,” she said. And then she added slowly, “You aren’t like those others in there, are you? What makes a man like you—”
“Never mind a man like me,” Dent interrupted her, his voice harsh and forbidding. “Never mind about me. Just see you don’t make any trouble. I’ll send Pearl in with the kid and have her bring you some coffee. You better take it easy for now.”
He turned on his heel and left the room.
A few minutes later the child was once more playing on the floor with the kitten. Terry’s cigarette had burned down almost to her fingers and she sat with the coffee cup in her hand staring at the floor with an odd, almost blank expression on her face. Suddenly she realized Janie was trying to attract her attention.
She shook her head to clear it and automatically smiled at the youngster.
“What, honey?” she asked. “What did you say?”
“They’re funny people, Terry. Aren’t they funny people?” Janie said. “Why do they always seem so mad about everything?”
Terry did what she always did when the child seemed upset. At once she submerged her own feelings and her own fears.
“Why, baby,” she said, “of course they’re funny. Don’t you see, honey, it’s like in a game? You know, like playing cops and robbers. But you don’t want to be afraid of them. They gave you that nice kitty, now, did-
n’t they?”
Janie looked at her for a second, her eyes wide and serious. Then she smiled and nodded, her hand going out to stroke the kitten’s back.
“Yes,” she said, “they did bring the kitty. But do Daddy and Mamma know it’s a game?”
“That’s right, honey,” Terry said. “Sure they know it’s a game. And pretty soon Daddy will bring a lot of money to pay for the kitty and then you can go home and the game will be all over.”
“And will I win?” Janie asked.
“You’ll win, honey.”
After returning to the living room of the hideout and telling Pearl to take some coffee to the girl, Dent walked over to Gino and asked how he felt.
Gino looked up at him dumbly for a minute. When he spoke, his voice was a thin whisper.
“I’m sick,” he said. “That rat tried to kill me. I should have a doctor.”
“You’ll be all right in another day or two,” Dent said. “Just take it easy.”
He turned to Fats, who, after tossing restlessly for an hour in the upstairs bedroom, had found that sleep escaped him and had returned to the living room.
“I think,” he said, “we better postpone your going into town until tomorrow. I hope this don’t set us back with our plans, but we gotta have Gino on his feet when the payoff is made. We can’t take any chances on him being laid up.”
Fats nodded. “Why not have Red or Pearl take me in today anyway?” he said.
“It’s better you stay under cover,” Dent said. “Stay around tonight and Pearl can drive you in early tomorrow morning. You better get some rest.”
“I can’t sleep in the daytime,” Morn said. “I’ll just sit here and read the scratch sheet to Gino.”
“O.K.,” Dent said. “Watch things. I’m going upstairs and hit the sack for a couple of hours. Anything breaks on the radio, let me know at once. And keep an eye on that guy fishing down on the beach. I can’t tell from here, but I think it’s that cop who drove us out last night. He was fishing there before.”
Fats Mom nodded and unfolded the paper to the racing section as Dent turned and started up the stairs.
He was lying flat on his back, his hands under his head and staring up at the ceiling, when Pearl entered the bedroom. He had stripped to his shorts and lay on top of the blanket, a small kerosene stove in the corner keeping him warm. The shades were drawn and the room was dim.
Pearl entered without knocking. She saw Dent lying there and wasn’t sure whether or not he was sleeping. Quietly she turned and closed the door.
“You awake, Cal?” she asked in a whisper.
“I’m awake.”
Pearl walked to the side of the bed and sat next to him. She took out a pack of cigarettes and lighted two of them, handing him one.
“Where’s Red?” Dent asked.
“He’s still out in the barn,” Pearl said. “Decided to do a grease job on the car after I told him we changed plans and weren’t using it today.”
Dent nodded.
“I got tired of listening to those two downstairs,” Pearl said. “My God, how crazy can you get? They sit there doping horses and neither one’s got a dime down on a race or any way of getting one down.”
Dent laughed thinly. “That’s horse players for you,” he said. “They just like to lose, whether they got a bet or not.”
“Well, I can’t take much more of them,” Pearl said. “That little louse Gino is bad enough, but at least he don’t smell. The other one—well, I just can’t stand the way he keeps looking at me. What’s wrong with him, anyway? My God, the way he looks at a girl, you’d think at least he’d take a bath and clean himself up once in a while. What’s wrong with him, anyway?”
“He just looks,” Dent said. “That’s his trouble, he can’t do anything but look.”
“Well,” Pearl said, “they sure make a good pair. Him and Gino. Gino can’t do anything except beat ‘em to death. Where’d you ever dig those two up, anyway?”
“For this job they’re good,” Dent said, his voice short. “This isn’t a tea party. They’re all right.”
“They may be all right, but I’d like somebody human to talk to once in a while.”
“Talk to me,” Dent said.
Pearl reached over and took Dent’s cigarette from his hand. She stood up, crossed the room, and reached down to snuff out both cigarettes in a tin ash tray. Then she came back once more and sat next to Dent so
that he could feel the warmth of her body against his side.
“O.K. I’ll talk to you. What about the girl?”
“What about her?” Dent said.
“What do we do with her when we leave here? My God, you can’t just let her go. She’ll blab everything she knows and—”
“So will the kid,” Dent said.
“Yes, but the kid’s different. They’ll pump the kid, of course, but she’s only a baby, really, and she won’t be able to tell ‘em too much. But that girl’s something else.”
Dent didn’t answer for several minutes. Finally he turned and half sat up, pulling his knees under him so that he faced the girl.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Once this is all over and we got the dough, we’re going to be as hot as pistols in any case. As far as I’m concerned, I’ll be out of the country in nothing flat. I’m not worried about making a clean getaway.”
“That’s all right for you,” Pearl said, “but how about the others? Take Red, for instance. You know how stupid he is. Sooner or later they’ll pick him up.”
“Well, if they do,” Dent said, “you won’t be with him.”
Pearl nodded. “Yeah, but once they get him, or Gino or Fats, it’s going to make it a lot easier to get you and me.”
“Sure,” Dent said. “But it’s six of one and half a dozen of the other. Kill the girl or the kid and they’ll be looking for us a lot harder than they will if it’s just a case of money—money they know they’ll never be able to trace.”
Pearl reached over and her hand caressed Dent’s arm.
“Dent,” she said, “you’re not going soft on that babe, are you?”
“Don’t be a fool,” Dent snapped. “I’m not going soft on anybody. You should know that. It’s only what makes sense. I’m taking no chances I don’t have to.”
“Yeah, but once they got you for kidnaping, they got you for the works anyway.”
“The point is,” Dent said, “they aren’t going to get me in the first place. That’s why I don’t want them looking any harder than they have to. The kid gets back safe, and the girl isn’t hurt, and maybe they’ll forget about it sometime. Kill somebody and they’ll never give up.”
Pearl was thoughtful for several seconds.
“How about Gino and Fats?” she said at last. “You think they’re going to stand by while you let the girl go free?”
“I didn’t say I’d let the girl go, and I’ll take care Qf Gino and Fats.Don’t worry about that.”
“You take care of everybody,” Pearl said. She leaned close to Dent and the hand that was stroking his arm reached up and pulled his head close to her own. “Why don’t you take care of me, too?”
Her soft mouth was less than a few inches from his as she spoke.
Dent, with unaccustomed gentleness, pushed her away.
“I’ll take care of you,” he said. “But not now. Good God, we can’t have any more trouble. Red may be—”
Pearl suddenly pushed him hard and started to her feet.
“Red, nuts!” she said, her voice harsh in anger. “It’s that babe downstairs you’re thinking about. I could see it. I could tell the way you—”
She stopped as suddenly as she had started.
Dent was on his feet in a second. One arm went out and circled her waist and he pulled her to him brutally. His hand covered her mouth.
“Shut up,” he said. “Shut up. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
His lips found her mouth as his hand buried itself in her hair and he held her head hard to him. Pearl’s arms went around his waist as she pressed against him.
And then, a moment later, Dent pushed the girl away.
“All right,” he said. “Get out of here now. Get out while you can. There’ll be plenty of time for us once we get this job over. In the meantime, be sensible. I gotta have someone around I can count on.”
Pearl smiled as she quietly left the room and started downstairs.
Dent lay back on the bed and his eyes stared blankly at the ceiling. He breathed heavily. But he wasn’t thinking of Pearl. He was thinking of the girl downstairs, the girl with the flame-colored hair.
The rain started shortly after three o’clock on Thursday morning. It began, without the fanfare of thunder or lightning, as a soft shower that pattered like the tiny feet of a hundred kittens on the roof of the cottage. And then, along about four o’clock, the skies began to rumble and lightning flashed intermittently, illuminating the dingy interior of the hideout. The wind steadily increased until it reached almost hurricane proportions.
The tar-paper roofing, which had been used as a matter of economy when the place was first built, failed to keep out the gushing water, and within minutes after the first fury of the sudden storm, both bedrooms upstairs were leaking badly.
Red refused to get up when Pearl shook him awake, and so she pulled herself out of bed and went downstairs, where it was still fairly dry. Gino and Fats were sharing the other bedroom, and the two of them groaned in their sleep but did not wake up, in spite of the rain-soaked blankets.
Dent had been lying on the couch, half awake, when the rain first started. By the time Pearl came down, he was up and had a pot of coffee on the stove. As the wind gradually increased and the violence of the storm began to manifest itself, he experienced a sense of uneasiness. He wondered if they were in for several days of it. If so, it would be bad, but at least it would keep people away from the beach and the dunes.
He heard movement in the room behind the locked door and went over and listened carefully for a few seconds.
He knocked, and then, not waiting for an answer; asked if the roof was leaking.
Terry answered that it was, but that she had moved the cots. She said they were all right.
He was back at the stove and ready to pour coffee when Pearl came into the room.
“My God,” Pearl said, “this place!”
She walked to one of the front windows and pulled the curtain to one side. Sheets of water ran down the pane, giving it an odd mirror-like effect. The wind whisding around the sides of the clapboard shanty seemed to threaten to tear the place apart. A sudden flash of lightning made the scene outside momentarily as bright as day.
“It may be sand to you,” Pearl said, “but it looks like a lake of mud to me. I’ll probably have one hell of a time getting the car out.”
Dent nodded.
“Yeah, but she’ll pull through that stuff all right. Only thing is, instead of taking Fats all the way in this morning, I think you better drop him off at Smithtown. I don’t like the idea of being stuck out here with only that other car just in case anything happens.”
“What do you mean, in case anything happens?” Pearl asked. “I thought you said nothing could happen.”
“Things can always happen. This weather keeps up, it may bust into our plans. I don’t think a plane could get up on a day like this.”
“So what about Wilton?” Pearl asked.
“He waits.”
“Wait, yeah,” Pearl said. “I’m getting tired of waiting. A couple of more days like this and I’ll be blowing my top.”
“Take it easy,” Dent said. “Sit down and have some coffee. Don’t start getting jittery at this stage of the game. Everything has been going fine
up to this point. The weather is a break, in one way. Keeps people in-* doors. And I had a radio report just before you came down. It’s expected
to clear sometime late this evening.”
Pearl pulled her dressing gown closer around herself and stood with her back to the fireplace. She coughed a little as the wood smoke now and then escaped into the room. Her eyes were red and smarting.
Dent handed her a cup of coffee and pulled up two straight-backed chairs.
“The kid’s awake in the next room,” he said. “You wanna take her in a cup?”
“The hell with her,” Pearl said.
Dent shrugged and put his own cup to his lips.
At seven, as Dent was twisting the dial to cut into an early news program, Fats staggered downstairs, looking as though he had slept in his clothes, which he had.
“What a dump!”
“Coffee?” Dent asked.
Fats nodded and slouched over to the fireplace.
Dent waited until he had the coffee in his hand before he started talking.
“Got a weather report a few minutes ago,” he said. “Looks like this is going to keep up all day.”
Fats walked over and tried to look out of the window. “Won’t no planes get up in this,” he said.
Dent nodded. “That’s what I figure. She may clear by afternoon, but hell, that’s taking a chance. I think we better postpone everything until tomorrow. We can do it then just as well.”
Fats put his cup back on the table and took out a cigar. He chewed off the end and spat it on the floor and then lighted up from a twist of paper that he put into the fireplace.
“So what do I do?” he asked. “Hang around here all day?”
Dent shook his head.
“No,” he said. “I think you better go on in anyway. Only don’t go into New York tonight. Get off in Jamaica and take a train to Brooklyn. Stay there overnight and then go to New York in the morning. Get there by nine-thirty and make your call at ten. In a way, this will work out better, anyhow. You got more time. All you have to do is be careful and keep out of trouble.”
“And how about tomorrow,” Fats asked. “Suppose the weather stays like this? Then what?”
“It won’t,” Dent said. “It’s supposed to clear tonight. But if worst
comes to worst, we just postpone another day.”
“And how will you know? How will you know if Wilton...”
Dent shrugged. “If you aren’t back here tomorrow afternoon by four, we’ll know, all right.”
Fats walked to the couch and fell on it heavily. “And I handle it exactly the same way tomorrow, then?” he said. “The same way, right?”
“Right,” Dent said. “You got everything straight now?”
Fats nodded.
“We better go over it in any case. Tell me again exactly what you do, just so there won’t be any hitches.”
Fats grunted. “I got it all straight.”
“It won’t hurt to be sure,” Dent said.
The round little man looked sour. “All right,” he said. “I go to the messenger service in Penn Station. I give ‘em the two letters and pay them to deliver them at once. And then, at ten o’clock, I make the telephone call. Once I got Wilton on the wire, I ask him if he’s got the money. He says he has and then I tell him to duck the cops, grab a cab, and go to the Waldorf and pick up a letter at the desk addressed to G. H. McGuire. I hang up.”
Dent shook his head.
“Goddamn it Fats, that’s what I mean. You’re forgetting something. You gotta do this perfect. You can’t screw it up at all, or the whole thing flops.”
Fats looked at him silently for a moment, his eyes as expressionless as a pair of soft-boiled eggs.
“You have to identify yourself,” Dent said.
“That’s right. I tell him the kid’s Teddy bear is named Puggsy.”
Dent nodded.
“And the bags?”
“Yeah, I tell him to buy two suitcases on his way to the hotel.”
Pearl looked up.
“You really think he won’t be followed?” she asked.
“It’s a toss-up,” Dent said. “A chance we got to take. What I’m counting on is the fact they’ll want to get the kid back more than anything else. And I don’t think that even the FBI is going to risk something going sour until the direct contact is made. In any case, if he is followed, the switch at the airfield will throw them off.”
“They’ll leave him alone,” Fats said. “They’ll figure to mark the dough and that will be enough for a tracer.”
Dent’s hands nervously played with a pack of cigarettes. “You gotta impress on him that he must follow the instructions in the letter. Follow ‘em perfectly. That he will be watched. And you can’t be on that phone for more than a minute and a half.”
“Don’t worry. I’m taking no chances.”
“Look,” Pearl again interrupted. “Why wouldn’t it be better for Fats to actually tail him?”
“I want Fats back here in plenty of time,” Dent said. “Anyway, what difference will it make? We have to take the chance that he’ll play ball. If the cops do follow him, you can bet that they’ll be so damn cagey we’d never spot ‘em anyway.”
“He’ll play ball,” Fats said.
“O.K. then,” said Dent. “Here are the letters.”
He took two envelopes from the jacket pocket of his coat. From the one addressed to G. H. McGuire and marked “To be called for,” he extracted a single typewritten sheet of paper. Carefully he laid it on the table and reread it. Pearl walked over and stood behind him, reading it over his shoulder.
Dent had a pencil in his hand.
“It is now just before noon, Thursday morning,” Dent read.
He took the pencil and carefully crossed out the word “Thursday” and substituted “Friday.” Then he went over the rest of the note:
You have the money with you, probably in large bills that you have undoubtedly listed. Without telephoning anyone or making any attempt to contact the police or FBI, you will at once go to the corner of Fifth Avenue and Forty-fourth street. You will find that there are banks on all four corners. Start with the Fifth Avenue Bank, on the northwest corner, and work around to the others.
Go into the bank, ask for the manager, and when you get him, identify yourself. If he doesn’t know you already, with the publicity you have been getting, he will at least know who you are.
Tell him that what you have to do must be done immediately and that any attempt on his part not to co-operate, or to contact police, will endanger the life of your child.
And then have him change one hundred thousand dollars of the money you are carrying into small bills. Do this in all four banks, and then go to the National City Bank at the corner of Fifth and Forty-third and change the last hundred thousand. You will be under observation during this time and you will be allowed exactly twenty minutes in each bank. Change the money so that the bulk of it is in five-, ten-, and twenty-dollar bills. We will accept no
more than one third of it in fifties and hundreds.
Any attempt on your part to have these new bills marked or the numbers registered will be fatal. It is up to you to see that the bank officials keep the entire transaction confidential. Any slip-up and we will drop contact at once. Your daughter’s future rests entirely in your hands.
As soon as you have finished changing the money, take a taxi and go to Teterboro Airport. Ask for a Mr. James Dunleavy, pilot of a private charter plane.
Dunleavy will have received a letter of instructions prior to your arrival. Tell him you are G. H. McGuire and are ready to take off.
Say nothing beyond this and board the plane at once. When you arrive at your destination, you will receive further instructions.
Dent looked back over his shoulder and saw that the girl was through reading. Carefully he folded the sheet and reinserted it in the envelope.
“Did you watch your prints on that?” Pearl asked.
“Enough,” Dent said. “It isn’t as easy as you think to get prints off of
paper.”
“You shoulda cut out words from a newspaper,” Fats said.
“Nuts,” Dent said as he pulled the second letter out of its unsealed en
velope.
“Well, they traced the typewriter in the Leopold-Loeb case,” Fats said. Dent looked at him coldly.
“Every time some smart operator starts to get fancy, cutting out letters and so forth, he gives the cops just so much more to go on. I like these things simple. I bought a secondhand typewriter. I’ve written several letters on it. When we get through with it, I’ll dump it in a hock-shop. There isn’t one chance in a million it will ever be traced. I still think the simple way is the best way to do a big job.”
He laid the second letter on the table. It was addressed to James Dunleavy, Teterboro Airport, Teterboro, New Jersey. Once more Pearl looked over his shoulder as he read it.
Enclosed are five one-hundred-dollar bills [she read]. Soon after you get this, I shall arrive at the airport.
My name is G. H. McGuire. Be prepared to take off at once. I want to be flown to the airport just northeast of Smithtown, L.I. The five hundred is to pay you for the trip and to pay you to keep your mouth closed about it. When I get to Teterboro, I shall look you up and tell you my name. Beyond that there will be no need
for conversation.
“This guy Dunleavy—” Pearl began.
“Yeah, Fats interrupted. “How the hell you know he’s going to go for the deal? What makes you think that five hundred will convince him? And how can you be sure he won’t be out on another job anyway?”
“Look,” Dent said, disgust in his voice. “How long do you think I been planning this thing, anyway? I told you I had all the angles covered. I know Dunleavy like 1 know the back of my hand. Didn’t I run booze with him out of Miami once? Hell, he’d kill his mother for five bills— and keep quiet about it. And I already sent him another five hundred, several days back, telling him to keep the last four days of this week open for a job that would be coming in. I know the guy and I know what he can be expected to do.”
“You know him so well,” Fats said, “how come he isn’t in on the job, then?”
“Because,” Dent said, speaking as though he were explaining something to a child, “he isn’t the kind of guy who would ever go for a caper like this. But for a fast buck, he’d fly anyone anywhere, no questions asked. Just so he doesn’t have to know the details. He doesn’t want to know. He can be counted on.”
“I hope you’re right,” Fats said.
Dent again folded the sheet of paper and put it back in its envelope.
“Be damn sure your messenger gets the letters out in plenty of time. Give ‘em something extra. And you don’t need to worry about this end of it. We’ll have Wilton paged, under the name of McGuire, at the time he lands, and he’ll get the rest of his instructions then. Just be sure to get here as quick as you can. When you get off the train, take a cab out.”
Fats nodded. He reached for the two envelopes. “Well, I better get started,” he said.
Pearl went back upstairs and got a slicker and her bag. Five minutes later; Dent watched through the window as the car pulled away from the house with the two of them.
Silently Dent congratulated himself for not having taken the others in on his final arrangements with Dunleavy.
They didn’t know anything about the deal he had made with the pilot to land on the beach and pick him up, and Dunleavy himself was in the dark about the snatch himself.
Playing both ends against the middle was dangerous, but in the long run it would prove the best policy. Dent’s secrecy wasn’t designed to double-cross anyone; it was designed strictly as a personal insurance policy.
He started upstairs to get Red and Gino out of bed.
The storm seemed to have increased in intensity, and subconsciously he was aware of the heavy static on the air; which made it almost impossible to hear the radio.
Fats waited until they had left the house far behind them before he started to talk. He sat in the front seat of the Packard, next to Pearl, who was driving slowly and carefully because of the blinding rain. Looking straight ahead, he spoke out of the side of his mouth to his companion.
“Dent trusts too much to luck,” he said.
For a moment Pearl didn’t answer. She had known Fats Morn for less than a month. What she had seen of him she hadn’t liked.
A stocky, truncated figure of a man with a completely bald head overshadowing tiny, reddish eyes with pure-white lashes, Fats Morn looked fifteen years older than he actually was. He had a flabby, loose mouth and a livid, pock-marked skin. His clothes were shabby and unpressed, his white shirt frayed and dirty. There was invariably the stench of stale perspiration about him.
Fats stuttered slightly and his eyes were very nearsighted. He refused to wear glasses. He coughed incessantly, without bothering to cover his mouth.
But if he was physically unprepossessing, there was nothing wrong with his mentality. He had a reputation for being a clearheaded man in a pinch, as well as being tight-lipped. He was also, in spite of his obesity and poor vision, an excellent man with a gun. He loved money, but unfortunately he loved gambling more, As a result he was always broke.
The windows of the car were raised to keep out the rain, and Pearl unconsciously moved as far from her companion as she could. The air in the closed vehicle was stale and she was anxious to get to the station.
“The trouble with Dent,” Fats went on, “is he wants too much. He should have asked for a couple of hundred thousand, not five.”
Pearl kept her eyes on the road when she answered. “Five is better. We all get more that way.”
“More?” Fats’ voice was a husky wheeze as he spoke. “Dent gets more, you mean. Look at the split he’s handing us. He takes two hundred and fifty of it, and we split the rest. What kind of a deal is that?”
“It was Dent’s idea,” Pearl said. “And he put up the dough to finance it.”
Fats shrugged. “What dough? A lousy couple of grand.”
Pearl didn’t answer, and the fat man continued.
“No,” he said. “It ain’t a good split. Hell, look at the chances we’re taking. Red and Gino had to make the snatch. I gotta do the contact work. I think we should get a better break.”
Pearl suddenly knew that Fats was feeling her out, trying to find whose side she’d be on in case of a break-up at the end. She decided to play along.
“Things aren’t going too smooth, anyway,” Fats continued. “That brawl between Red and Gino. You know Red hurt him pretty bad, and Gino isn’t going to forget it. Sooner or later, when Red ain’t watching, he’s gonna get him.”
“Red can take care of himself,” Pearl said. “Anyway, let ‘em kill each other. Who cares?”
Fats looked at the girl sharply. “Don’t you care?”
Pearl shrugged. “Red ain’t the only guy in the world,” she said. “Anyway, once this thing is over and I have my cut, I won’t need Red any more.”
“That’s one reason a bigger split could come in handy,” Fats said. “Another thing, if Red and Gino tangle again and somebody really gets it, that’ll make one less to take care of.”
Once more Fats closely watched the girl as she handled the wheel. Her attitude about Red hadn’t surprised him and he suspected that Pearl was secretly mixed up with Dent. He threw out another feeler.
“Cal seems a little gone on that nurse,” he said.
Pearl blushed and answered too quickly.
“Nuts,” she said. “Cal Dent isn’t gone on anyone. He’s not the boy to let a woman get at him.”
“Hope you’re right,” Fats said. “It’s bad enough to have Red and Gino fighting; we don’t want any extra complications. If it was up to me, I’d knock the dame off first thing. It’s crazy to have her hanging around. She could still cause plenty of trouble.”
“Dent’ll take care of her when the time comes,” Pearl said. But already she was beginning to doubt it. The fat man must have caught it too. Dent did seem a little soft on her. She slowed the car a little and spoke softly to her companion.
“Just to make sure,” she said, “maybe you better put her out of the way, first chance you get.”
Fats nodded. “You got something there,” he said. “Get her out of the way and we cut down the risks. And one or two more out of circulation and you raise the ante. You see it that way?”
“I see it that way.”
Fats leaned toward her and one pudgy white hand patted her thigh.
“You and I can see together,” he said.
“Maybe we could,” Pearl said, finding it difficult not to draw away from the man’s ugly hand. “Who knows?”
“I know,” Fats said. “You think it over.”
Yes, Pearl decided. I’ll think it over, all right. And as soon as I get back to the shanty, I’ll talk it over. With Cal Dent.
Pearl was busy with her thoughts as they neared the village. Things were, in a sense, working out better than she could have hoped. She had planned, from the very beginning, to ditch Red when the job was completed. If possible, she’d tie in with Dent. But now, with Dent getting interested in the Ballin girl, she realized that she must be prepared to make a switch in plans if necessary.
Red himself would prove no problem. The chances were that Gino would take care of him, sooner or later. In any case, she’d have no trouble telling him off.
And here was Fats, all set to double-cross Dent. Well, God knows, Fats was no bargain, but he might be an answer if worse came to worst. She couldn’t imagine herself in any personal relationship with the grubby little mobster, but she saw no reason why, if events called for it, she couldn’t make a temporary deal with him. She would always be able to handle a man like Fats, once they had made a getaway.
She turned to her companion, and for the first time spoke with warmth in her voice.
“We got time for some breakfast,” she said. “Suppose I pull up to the diner up ahead?”
Fats looked at his watch, a heavy gold-cased old-fashioned railway timepiece, which he carried on a long gold-plated chain.
“Run into town first,” he said, “and we’ll pick up the morning papers. We can grab a bite at the station. We got almost a half hour.”
Once more the headlines were devoted entirely to the Wilton kidnaping. With nothing new on the case and the police and FBI giving out no information, city editors had been hard pushed to find a fresh angle.
All morning papers carried, however, stories emanating from Wilton’s attorney, who pleaded with police and public alike to give his client complete freedom of movement to make contact with the kidnapers, so as to protect the child. One tabloid ran an open letter to the kidnap gang, based on no known authority, which promised them that no effort would be made to seek their identity until such time as the child had been safely returned. Ironically, however, another column carried news of large-scale rewards being offered by a number of diverse persons and organizations for the apprehension of the gang.
Fats ordered ham and eggs and coffee and Pearl had a piece of Danish pastry as the two of them sat at the counter, side by side, and casually looked over the morning stories.
Later, standing on the platform waiting for the train to pull in, Fats turned to the girl, handing her the newspapers, which he had carried under his arm.
“You better take ‘em back to the cabin,” he said. “Not but what it’s all a lot of hogwash.”
Pearl nodded and took the papers.
“Think over what I said,” Fats said in a low voice as the train pulled in. “Keep your eyes open. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Pearl nodded and smiled at him.
“I’ll see you,” she said. “Good luck.”
She turned and left the platform as the engine pulled to a stop. The light raincoat she had thrown over her shoulders had kept some of the water off, but her feet were soaked and her hair was dripping as she climbed into the Packard. She took a rag from the glove compartment and shivered slightly as she tried to dry herself.
Shortly after the car had passed the turnoff to the cottage on the way back toward Land’s End, the windshield wiper suddenly stopped working. Pearl drove on for a matter of a minute or so, and then pulled over to the side of the road. She was unable to see through the glass.
For several minutes she fooled with the wiper button, and then she opened the door and walked to the front of the car. She tried manipulating the blade by hand and found that it worked freely but that the rain at once covered the windshield after she moved it.
She damned Red under her breath as she darted back to the front seat of the car. She wound down the window on her left, and holding her head out of the side, slowly put the car in motion. A moment later she heard the sound of a horn in back of her. Barely able to see, she again pulled to the edge of the road.
The car passed her slowly and then a second later came to a full stop in front of her. Once more Pearl jammed on her brakes. Pearl recognized Jack Fanwell as he stepped from the patrol car and swung back toward her. He was protected by a southwester and the rain poured from his hel-meted head. He recognized her at once.
“Having trouble, Mrs. Mason?” he asked, leaning against the opened window.
Pearl was torn between anger and a peculiar sense of fear as she looked
up into his steady eyes.
“Windshield wiper,” she said finally. “It seems to be broken.”
The man reached through the window and played with the button. He shook his head.
“Pull the button that opens the hood,” he said.
A moment later he slammed the hood shut. The wiper was once more working.
“Hose connection came off,” he said, again leaning on the door. “Out kinda early this morning, aren’t you?”
Pearl nodded. “Had to take one of our guests to the station,” she explained.
Pearl had taken a pack of cigarettes from the seat at her side and was attempting to light one. But the matches had become soaked and refused to ignite. Fanwell watched her silently for a moment and then smiled.
“I have a dry one,” he said. “Better let me help you.”
He walked around in front of the car and came to the other side. Opening the door, he crouched a little to climb into the front seat. He pulled the door shut, and then, not taking a match from his pocket, he pushed in the lighter on the dashboard. Carefully he watched the girl as he waited for it to heat up. He noticed that her hand was shaking as she held the cigarette to her lips and he extended the lighter.
“Nervous?” he asked.
Pearl looked at him, her eyes wide.
“I got up early to go to the station. This storm—it makes everybody nervous, I guess. Lightning frightens me.”
The policeman nodded, making no move to leave. “How is Mr. Mason?” he asked.
“Well, he’s better.”
“He seems to have a lot of friends,” Fanwell said.
“They’re business friends,” Pearl answered.
“What business is your husband in, Mrs. Mason?”
For a moment Pearl looked startled. But then, quickly, she caught herself up and smiled.
“He was in the Army,” she said. “Right now he’s resting up for a time.”
“And then he will go back to business?” Fanwell asked, with what struck Pearl as an odd persistency.
“Yes,” Pearl said. “And then he’ll go back to business.”
“You should have taken your guest to the station at Land’s End,” Fan-well said. “It’s shorter.”
Again Pearl looked full into the man’s eyes.
“I wasn’t sure the early train stopped there,” she said at last. “Do you
think this storm is going to keep up for long?”
“It may. Are you people keeping dry and comfortable out there? You know, I can stop by later, if you’d like, and see that everything is all right.”
Pearl felt the blood drain from her face.
“No,” she said quickly. “No, we’re fine, thank you. Everything is all right.”
Fanwell reached for the door handle. He smiled again as he stepped to the side of the road. He spoke as he started to close the door.
“Well, just let us know if you need anything,” he said. “Out here in the sticks, that’s mostly what cops are for—to kind of help out in case of any sort of trouble.”
He closed the door of the car as Pearl stared at him.
Once more driving toward the village, she suddenly decided to head directly back to the hideout rather than stop for groceries, as she had planned. She didn’t like it at all. Definitely, Fanwell had seemed suspicious. Why had he asked her all of those questions? What business was it of his what she was doing on the road early in the morning, or where she decided to deliver a guest?
And that suggestion of coming out to see that everything was all right. She was more sure than ever that he suspected something. She swung the wheel and turned back to the cutoff road.
The roar of the heavy surf was deafening as the Packard pulled through the saturated sands of the road, crossing the dunes toward the hideout. Pearl threw the gear shift into second, and then finally into low. The wind had steadily risen, and the water was coming down in sheets. The nervousness that Pearl had been feeling ever since the village policeman had stopped by the side of her car to help her with the windshield wiper had gradually increased until now she felt complete terror overcoming her. She was half sobbing as she drew up in front of the place.
Automatically she switched off the ignition and she stumbled as she opened the door. Grabbing the newspapers, she made a dash for the porch.
The three of them, Dent, Red, and Gino, were standing like statues as she entered the unlocked front door. For a second, while she stood there in the opened doorway with the wind and rain slashing in around her, they seemed like some strange and almost unreal characters in a tableau.
Dent was the first to move.
Without a word, he crossed the room and grabbed her by the arm, pulling her in and out of the rain. And then he quickly reached for the knob and pulled the door shut.
“Shut up and listen!” His voice gritted out the order between closed
teeth.
Automatically Pearl turned like the others and faced the radio. The words, harsh with static, were coming from the speaker.