Читать книгу The Million Pound Deposit - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 3

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Ned Swayles, the younger of the two men seated in an obscure corner of the cheap, odoriferous restaurant of which they were the only occupants, stretched out a long, shapely hand across the soiled tablecloth, and turned towards him the watch which he had detached from its chain. His protuberant knuckles, the prehensile, electric crawl of his fingers, had awakened a great many speculations at various times as to the nature of his occupation.

"Twenty minutes after nine," he muttered. "He surely is late."

His companion, a shock-headed, weedy-looking man, with a mass of black hair, unwholesome of appearance, untidily dressed, and apparently as nervous as his vis-à-vis, grunted assent as he drummed with restless fingers upon the table. He had been seated with his eyes fixed upon the door for the last ten minutes, starting eagerly whenever a passing shadow darkened the threshold, only to relapse into gloom again as the loiterer disappeared. The place was really little more than a shop with a back room dignified by the name of a restaurant. There were a few meals served there in the daytime, scarcely any at night. On a side table, underneath the meat covers, upon chipped and unsavoury dishes, reposed half a ham, the worst remains of a joint of beef, and a fragment of tinned tongue. A weary-looking salad was protected by a piece of muslin. There were no other signs of edibles, but the odour of past meals hung unappetisingly about the stuffy apartment. It was typical of many eating houses of its class, chiefly to be found in the neighbourhood of the great railway termini. The people who eat in them seem like the ghouls of disappointed travellers.

In the doorway, the only waiter—a disreputable object, half Italian, half cockney, with a shirt front which appeared to be tied on to him, and the clothes of his profession stained with the gravy of remorseless years—was struggling to get a breath of air. The heat of a long summer's day seemed to be reflected from the pavements outside, and the coolness of night mercilessly delayed. The heat stole into the unattractive little restaurant in gaseous waves. Swayles helped himself from a bottle of whisky which stood upon a table between the two men, and the liquid splashed on to the tablecloth from his unsteady handling. He drank it after the fashion of some of his country-people—neat, with a hastily filled tumbler of flat-looking water to follow.

"Say, if I'd known what sort of a job this was going to turn out," he whined, "I'd never have got myself stuck with it. I wouldn't care so much if it were in New York or Chicago. The bulls there know well enough that in eleven years I've never parked a gun. I've turned down every show where there hasn't been a slick get-away."

His companion dabbed once more at his moist forehead with a soiled handkerchief.

"Do you think I'd have been fool enough to be mixed up in it either?" he demanded, with feeble truculence. "I've known Thomas Ryde for fourteen years—a hard, keen little man, but one of the quietest-living, most respectable fellows I've ever worked for. Like a blooming machine, he's always been—never late for an appointment, never a glass too much, just plodding away, and saving money as though there were nothing else in the world worth a thought. I don't understand it even now. To think of him knowing how to grab hold of a gun even seems ridiculous. I've never seen him raise a little finger against any one."

Ned Swayles leaned across the table.

"When I took on the job," he confided hoarsely, "the first question I asked was whether it was to be a get-away affair, or a gunning business. I give you my word, Huneybell, that I've never touched a gunning job in my life. If they catch me, they catch me, and I'm ready to do my stretch. When we heard the footsteps in the passage, heard the door open, saw the light go up, and that old guy standing there gaping in at us, I was for the window, and a get-away quick as I could leg it. Ryde was standing just behind me. He didn't move—didn't say a word. Suddenly I saw his arm shoot out, saw the stab of flame, the old man spin round. My God! Do you know, Huneybell, I've lived in Chicago mostly since I was a kid, and I've never seen a man's light put out before."

Huneybell shivered in his place. The white agony of fear seemed carved into his twitching features.

"Why the hell doesn't he come?" he groaned. "Here, give me the whisky bottle."

He poured some into a glass, added water, and drank in long, feverish gulps. A huge bluebottle came droning around their table. The waiter abandoned his vain quest for air and lumbered up the room.

"Shall I serve the chops, sir?" he enquired. "Perhaps the other gentleman's not coming."

"Of course he's coming," was the angry reply. "He's certain to come. He'll be here directly."

"The chops will be burnt all up," the man warned them.

"Oh, God, bring them right along," the young American ordered. "Let's eat! Let's do something! Here, waiter, got any wine in this bum place?"

The man produced a battered wine card. Swayles glanced at it in disgust. His delicate forefinger pointed to the single printed line under the heading of "Champagne."

"What is it?" he demanded. "What mark?"

"It's champagne," was the cheerful reply. "Forgetta label. Very good wine."

"Bring a bottle," Swayles directed. "Take away this filthy whisky. Don't stop for wine glasses; bring tumblers."

The man shambled off, opening a door in the rear of the place which let in a hot wave of air from below, and a smell of greasy cooking.

"Say, this junk has got me scared, and that's a fact," the young man went on, fingering his flowing tie. "Your boss may have hopped it. I don't reckon he set about this job meaning to kill two men. Supposing he's made a clear get-away—if we get nabbed they won't know who did the shooting. I guess the law's the same over here as with us. If there's a gang, and one man's plugged, the lot have got to answer for it."

Huneybell left off burying his hands in his over-luxuriant hair, took one more long gulp of his whisky, and leaned back in his chair. Alcohol had accomplished something of its task. He was feeling more of a man.

"You're a nervous sort of chap for a Chicago thug," he scoffed. "I'm as scared as you are about the whole show, but I'm not worrying about Thomas Ryde. I'll tell you something about him, Guv'nor. What he says he's going to do, he does, and that's the end of it. He's what they call an 'organiser.' That's his job in life. What he says comes to pass and don't you forget it. I tell you that except for the shooting he'd got this affair cut and dried like a master."

"I lost my pep from the moment he handed out the masks," Swayles confessed. "I sure didn't like the feel of them."

"Never again," Mr. Huneybell declared earnestly, "will I believe in these stories of slick American criminals. Mind you, I'm scared to death, but I'm going to hand it to the guv'nor that he ran that business almost as well as he reorganised the waste-stuff department. What about the get-away, Mr. Ned Swayles? Perhaps you like the way he managed that part of the business better? Ten miles in one car, eight miles in another, all of us separated, west, east, south, even north. Different numbers at every change, and different roads, and never a second to wait. Why, we scarcely knew where we were ourselves. He must have taken a week thinking that out, and, mark you, not a hitch, not a car stopped, not a word of suspicion, and here we are in London, and there isn't one of us who hasn't got an alibi in his trousers' pocket."

"It was a swell get-away," Mr. Ned Swayles admitted, "but if one of us comes a mucker, he drags the lot of us in. Where's your Mr. Thomas Ryde? That's what I want to know."

A shadow darkened the threshold. The two men leaned forward in their places. Huneybell breathed hard. Ned Swayles, from his deep-set eyes, flashed out the fires of welcome. A trim, rather short man, approaching early middle age, very neatly dressed in cool grey, with gold-rimmed, tight-fitting spectacles, Homburg hat, and carrying a carefully furled umbrella, walked precisely through the outer shop and entered what was apologetically called the "restaurant." He made his way at once to the only occupied table. The two men stared at him as though he were a longed-for vision. Something which was meant to be a greeting stuck in Swayles' throat; his companion stretched out his hand and upset his glass.

"Before you speak," the newcomer began, taking off his hat and hanging it upon a peg, "accept my apologies for this regrettable unpunctuality. For the second time since I initiated our little enterprise, things have not gone altogether according to plan. In Brighton, I had an intelligent chauffeur. At such a time, intelligence is not a quality one appreciates amongst those with whom one comes in contact. I thought it as well to get rid of him and come up by train."

Once again that expression of shivering fear whitened the face of the young American.

"Get rid of him!"

"Ah, not in that sense," Mr. Thomas Ryde protested. "The situation presented no threatening possibilities. He saw me off on a Channel steamer to Calais, or rather he thought he did, and I came up to town by train. Is it my fancy or do I find you two a little disturbed?"

Huneybell mopped his forehead but remained dumb. Ned Swayles groaned.

"See here, Mr. Ryde," he explained, "we're scared—Huneybell and I are—scared stiff. I asked you the question straight. Was it a gun job or was it not? You told me to quit that line of talk right off—swore you'd never parked an automatic in your life."

"My dear young friends, be reasonable," the newcomer urged. "Principles depart with the coming of necessity. What else was to be done? Who could have divined that that poor fool Rentoul would have stayed in his laboratory till the middle of the night, and then have blundered down upon us? There he stood, with his hand within a foot of the main electric alarm bell—a single touch, and you know what that would have meant. You must remember too, Huneybell, that, notwithstanding our masks, you and I are not altogether strangers at Boothroyds' Works."

"That's all right," Huneybell assented, "but what about poor old Michael?"

The slightest possible shrug of the shoulders. "Poor old Michael" apparently failed to evoke any sympathetic reaction.

"One regrets, of course," was the cool reply, "but he would have had the gates closed upon us in a minute if he hadn't been dealt with. By-the-by, does this somewhat unsavoury restaurant possess any attractions in the shape of food?"

"We ordered chops," Huneybell confided. "They've been keeping them waiting for you I don't know how long."

Thomas Ryde looked around him disparagingly.

"It is not the spot I should have chosen on a hot summer's evening," he observed, "to celebrate the termination of a successful enterprise. Still, so far as privacy is concerned, it has its points."

Luigi, who preferred to be called William, came tumbling in through the back door. He carried in the crook of his arm a chipped, japanned tray, upon which reposed a covered metal dish and some plates. In his other hand he carried the bottle of champagne. In cheerful and unembarrassed silence, he placed the dish upon the table and displayed its contents, distributed the plates, fetched from the cupboard an attenuated-looking bottle, containing a few tablespoonfuls of Worcestershire sauce, put salt and pepper in coarse utensils of battered glass within reach of his clients, and stood back to survey the result of his labours.

"You didn't order any veg.," he reminded them. "It wouldn't have been no good if you had, because we no got any."

Ned Swayles, described as of no occupation, who boasted an address in Riverside Drive, and was a well-known patron of one of New York's famous night clubs, gave vent to a little groan. Thomas Ryde, however, helped himself to the least repulsive of the chops, passed the other two to his companions, and commenced his meal. The waiter, with a flourish, opened the wine. Ned Swayles and Huneybell held out their glasses eagerly; Thomas Ryde shook his head.

"A larger tumbler," he directed, beckoning for the whisky bottle, "some ice, and Schweppes soda."

"No gotta ice," the waiter explained equably. "Soda water in syphons."

Thomas Ryde motioned him a little nearer.

"Opposite to us," he confided—"just across the road, as a matter of fact—is a public house where Schweppes soda water can easily be procured. Ice too—just one tumblerful of it—should present no difficulties."

He produced a ten-shilling note, and the waiter, after a moment's hesitation, disappeared with it. Ned Swayles gulped down his glass of champagne, and the tang of it, young and sour though it must have been, apparently gave him courage. He addressed himself earnestly to Ryde.

"Look here, Boss," he demanded, "what I want to know is, where am I on this deal? I opened the safe for you—a job not another lad in England could have done—and all we found was six thousand quid and a lot of musty old papers. According to you, the thing should have been worth a lot more. You guaranteed me—now, Boss, don't you go denying this, because I can be nasty if I try—you guaranteed me twenty-five grand."

"Quite correct," Mr. Ryde acknowledged. "Could I trouble you for the salt—just by your sleeve, there?—Thanks. Twenty-five grand is, I believe, equivalent to five thousand pounds, Mr. Swayles. A good deal of money, but I must confess that you earned it. Your opening of that safe was without a doubt a masterpiece of scientific ingenuity."

"I'll agree I earned it all right," the young man affirmed anxiously, "but am I going to get it, Boss? That's what I want to know."

Mr. Ryde seemed a trifle hurt.

"My dear Mr. Swayles!" he remonstrated. "I can assure you that I am not a man who fails in his engagements."

"Well, where's it coming from?" the other persisted. "There was only six thousand in the safe altogether."

Mr. Thomas Ryde looked critically at his napkin and, finally deciding in its favour, wiped his lips with a corner of it.

"Following my usual custom, Mr. Swayles," he said, "of taking into my full confidence the members of any enterprise in which I am concerned, I will confess to you at once that we others were not out altogether for treasury notes. To tell you the truth, I did not expect to find much more than we did find in available cash. You may have noticed, however, that I removed a number of papers at the same time as the money. It is from them that we expect to derive our share of the booty. With the exception of one thousand pounds which we need for current expenses, the five thousand pounds is yours, according to arrangement. The papers are ours."

The American remained suspicious. The psychology of Mr. Thomas Ryde was a thing hidden from him. He had a vague idea that he was being talked at for some occult reason.

"Blast your papers," he muttered, with a little twist of the lips. "Let me see the five thou."

"A trifle impetuous surely, my young friend," was the gently reproving rejoinder. "However, since you insist—"

Mr. Ryde looked around to be sure that the waiter had not returned. Then he laid down his knife and fork, picked up the small black bag which he had deposited under the table, and handed across a packet.

"You will find there," he announced, "five thousand pounds, a considerable portion of which sum, being evidently intended for the purpose of wages, is in treasury notes which cannot be traced. The larger bank notes I should take with you to the States and part with them gradually."

The young man clutched at the parcel, cut the string, and looked inside. There seemed to be endless folds of treasury notes there, side by side with a thick roll of crisper white paper. He drew a deep sigh of relief and thrust the spoils of his enterprise into his pockets.

"Well, I'll say this for you, Boss," he admitted, "you've kept your word, and well up to time too."

"I always keep my word," Thomas Ryde assured him. "You earned your money, Mr. Swayles, and if," he added, with a slight smile at the corners of those straight lips, "you would like a testimonial, you can have it. I am not an expert in such matters, but your opening of that safe still seems to me a marvellous piece of scientific ingenuity."

The young man moistened his lips with his tongue. He had lost his distrust of the speaker but he still looked at him as though fascinated.

"There's only one I've known as cool a hand as you, Boss," he acknowledged, "and that was King Cole of West Chicago. Still, you oughtn't to have done that killing on us."

Mr. Thomas Ryde seemed mildly puzzled.

"I fail to understand your complaint," he protested. "Without the killing, we should probably all have been in prison by now and not one of us would have made a penny out of all the time and labour we have given to developing this little affair. Our careers, too, would have been ruined. I will leave you to judge of your other associates, but you must remember that Huneybell here and myself are no more criminals than they are."

"Gee, you're not criminals!" Ned Swayles gasped.

"By no means. I doubt whether either of us has ever previously committed an unlawful action. To have been convicted, therefore, would have been a very serious affair for us. We should have lost our position in society and at the end of our terms of penal servitude we should have been paupers. You will see, therefore, that I had no alternative but to insure against such a lamentable prospect."

The waiter came bustling back. He produced two bottles of Schweppes soda water, and a tumblerful of ice. Mr. Thomas Ryde indicated his approval and waved away his change from the ten-shilling note.

"I am very much obliged to you," he said. "I shall now be able to enjoy my supper."

The American filled his glass once more, drained it to the dregs, and rose to his feet. There was at last a slight flush of colour in his cheeks. He patted the very obvious protuberances which quite spoilt the shape of his well-cut suit of clothes.

"Well, I'm through, Boss," he pronounced. "I've worked in a few queer jobs in my time, but this one has the lot of them smothered."

Mr. Ryde nodded an affable farewell.

"Your boat sails at midnight," he reminded his departing associate.

"You needn't be afraid that I'll miss it," was the emphatic comment. "This old country is too full of surprises for me."

Huneybell, too, staggered to his feet. He was looking ghastly ill.

"You're not going?" Thomas Ryde queried.

"I shall die if I stay another five minutes," he gasped. "I can't eat, I can't drink any more—I'll go home and lie down."

Thomas Ryde adjusted his spectacles and stared at the speaker curiously. There was no sympathy in his observation—simply a slight expression of intolerant wonder.

"Just as you like," he agreed. "Keep your mouth shut and be at the office at ten o'clock to-morrow morning. You had better get into a taxi," he added, as he watched his departing employee stagger towards his hat.

"I shall be all right as soon as I get out of here," was the feverish response.

The two men left the place together, Ned Swayles' hand still caressing those exhilarating extensions of his pockets, Huneybell with black fear creeping like mortal sickness through his body. Mr. Thomas Ryde looked after them curiously for a moment. Then he selected the better cooked of the two remaining chops, mixed himself more whisky and soda, listening with obvious pleasure to the tinkle of ice in his glass, and continued his meal.