Читать книгу Jimmie Dale and the Phantom Clue - Frank L. Packard - Страница 8

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No challenge questioned Jimmie Dale’s entry—there was only the strident voice of Little Sweeney from the rear room. The shop itself, as he had expected, was not the vantage point chosen by either of Little Sweeney’s two confederates.

Jimmie Dale stole forward to the rear of the shop, where through an open door there showed a glimmer of light, which, though it seemed to be strangely obstructed, evidently came from some sort of passage that connected the living quarters of the house with the shop; and here, slipping in behind the single counter that the shop boasted, he listened. Little Sweeney was still bawling at the top of his voice.

“I’ve been thinking it over for the last few days,” said Little Sweeney.

“Please speak a little louder.” Mrs. Kinsey’s voice came plaintively through the darkness.

“Damn it!” said Little Sweeney in low and fervent tones; and then in a veritable yell: “I said I’d been thinking it over! Thinking it over! Our little talk, you know, of a few days ago, about buying out your confectionery business. I promised to come back and let you know what I was going to do about it.”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Kinsey.

“Well,” shouted Little Sweeney, “I’ve decided to take a chance and buy it, and I’ve brought you a hundred dollars to bind the bargain.”

“But I couldn’t think of selling it for a hundred dollars,” protested Mrs. Kinsey feebly.

“Not SELLING it, just to bind the bargain,” screamed Little Sweeney. “I’ll give you the rest of the thousand when we sign the papers.”

“Would you please speak a little louder,” said Mrs. Kinsey anxiously. “Sometimes my hearing ain’t quite so good as it used to be.”

“I’ll keep your secret!” gritted Little Sweeney in a hoarse whisper; then full-lunged again: “Here’s a hundred-dollar bill. You don’t even need to give me any receipt for it. I’ll come across with the rest before the week’s out. It’s just to show that I’m in earnest, and to keep anybody else from buying the business.”

“I don’t think anybody else would buy it,” said the old lady ingenuously.

“You’ve said a mouthful!” was Little Sweeney’s sotto voce retort.

“But I’m so glad,” said Mrs. Kinsey wistfully. “I’ll be so glad, because I can’t move around as spry as once I could. And I was afraid I’d—I wouldn’t be able to go on with it much longer.”

“That’s all right, Mrs. Kinsey,” bellowed Little Sweeney cordially. “I guess we’re both satisfied with our bargain. Here’s the money. And I guess I’ll be moving along. I’ll see you again in a day or so with the papers.”

“Thank you very much indeed,” said Mrs. Kinsey earnestly. “And I do so hope that you’ll do well with it, and that you won’t lose anything.”

A chair scraped. Footsteps came from the back passageway, which, as Jimmie Dale crouched lower behind the counter, suddenly grew light. A moment more and Little Sweeney stepped into the shop, making for the front door; behind him followed Mrs. Kinsey, carrying in one hand a lamp, and clutched in the other her ear-trumpet and a hundred-dollar bill.

Jimmie Dale’s lips set grimly. Back in the corridor that was now darkened again he thought he saw a shadow move; he distinctly caught the sound of a footstep. The downstairs watcher—and Mrs. Kinsey’s hundred-dollar bill! It was quite clear now, the whole mean, sordid, contemptible business. The bait was cunning enough in a low, vicious way; amply cunning enough to succeed with a trusting, simple old woman already on the verge of her dotage. Where Mrs. Kinsey, who distrusted banks, had secreted her savings of years, she would secret a hundred-dollar bill.

Little Sweeney—in lieu, no doubt, of shouting on the street—bowed himself out politely.

“Good-night,” said Mrs. Kinsey. “And thank you again.”

She closed and locked the door, and came back through the shop, passing again into the rear hallway.

As the light receded, Jimmie Dale rose cautiously. Mrs. Kinsey’s lamp, as she had passed, disclosed the fact that just beyond the rear door of the shop, the passageway made a jut at right angles. He nodded tersely to himself as he gained this with the trained step, so silent as to be almost uncanny, that had mocked at even the creaky boards of the old Sanctuary, and, in the shadows himself now, he peered along the hallway proper.

Steep, narrow stairs, to the left and a little way down the hall, led to the upper story. Mrs. Kinsey, still carrying her lamp, still clutching at her ear-trumpet and the hundred-dollar bill, was already near the top. The lower portion of the stairs and the hall itself, since her body shaded the lamp, were in almost complete darkness.

And then from somewhere above there came a sharp, whispered interrogation:

“Well?”

From along the lower hall, her figure shrouded in the blackness, a woman’s voice answered:

“She’s still got it. Watch her.”

Mother Margot! Limpy Mack, then, was the upstairs watcher. There seemed something incongruous in this passage of words between the two, like a stage aside that was not supposed to be heard by the intervening figure of the old woman who was climbing the stairs; but it was not the incongruity in itself, it was the callous brutality, the vulture-like preying upon helpless infirmity, that hardened Jimmie Dale’s face now in a sort of merciless intentness.

Mrs. Kinsey’s light disappeared around the landing at the head of the stairs, and then, contemptuous of any exaggerated attempt at silence, another footstep sounded on the stair treads. Jimmie Dale could not see, it was pitch black in the lower hall now, but it was not necessary to see the obvious. Mother Margot was following Mrs. Kinsey upstairs.

And now there came the sound as of some one walking about in a room overhead for a moment or so, and then silence.

Jimmie Dale moved toward the stairs, and without a sound began to make his way upward. Halfway up he paused, and stood tight-pressed against the wall. He could just detect a glow of light filtering into the upper hallway, as though the door of a lighted room, almost directly above his head, stood open into the hall. Then a footstep and still another, starting from a position further back along the hall, moved toward the lighted doorway. Came then the sound as of a piece of furniture being moved on squeaky casters; and then a low-breathed, exultant oath in a man’s voice, followed by a woman’s vicious chuckle. He could almost discern the outlines of two figures there—Mother Margot and Limpy Mack.

“Pipe de lay!” chuckled Mother Margot. “Dere goes Little Sweeney’s century buck. Look at her saltin’ it!”

“Close your trap!” ordered Limpy Mack sharply. “Maybe she can’t hear, but that’s no reason for taking a chance of spilling the beans now we know where they are.”

“Aw, forget it! Youse gives me a pain!” retorted Mother Margot acidly, but in a nevertheless more subdued tone. “Youse’d have to write her a letter to tell her youse was makin’ a noise before she’d be wise to it, an’ mabbe den she wouldn’t believe youse!”

“Shut your face!” said Limpy Mack tersely.

The sound of what had seemed to Jimmie Dale like squeaky casters came again, then a footstep traversed the lighted room, a door—obviously one connecting with an adjoining room—opened and closed again, and the light was gone.

“Come on!” prompted Mother Margot’s voice. “Dat’s her bedroom she’s gone into. It’s all clear now. Wot’re youse waitin’ for?”

“I’m waiting till the old bird’s tucked away in bed,” Limpy Mack’s voice answered out of the darkness. “I’m waiting till there isn’t any chance of her moseying out for anything just as we’re tapping the crib. I haven’t noticed that there was anything the matter with her eyes; and she’s not so dumb but that she might start something in the neighbourhood. I don’t play the fool when I can play safe.”

“Safe!” echoed Mother Margot sarcastically. “Wot’s safer dan dis de way it is now? I wanter get home. Youse ought to go down to an antique dump an’ buy yerself a suit of armour, an’ walk around in dat. Youse’d look fine—an’ youse’d always be safe. De pip, dat’s wot I’m contractin’ from youse!”

There was no answer.

Mother Margot grunted contemptuously, and relapsed into silence.

The minutes passed. There was utter silence now in the house, save for an occasional uneasy movement of one or other of the two watchers in the hall above Jimmie Dale’s head.

Jimmie Dale stood in grim patience, close against the wall, still on the stairs, an integral part of the shadows around him. The time dragged interminably, the minutes seeming to expand into endless hours. And then suddenly Limpy Mack’s voice broke the silence in a tense undertone:

“All right! Her light’s out. Come on!”

There came then the sound of footsteps receding from the hall; and Jimmie Dale in an instant silently gained the head of the stairs, and lay there crouched, half on the landing and half on the topmost treads. From his position, slightly diagonal though it was from where he had placed the door, he had calculated he would be able to see clearly enough into the room that Mother Margot and her companion had obviously just entered. He nodded now in quick self-corroboration. Out of the darkness of the room, lancing it in a little white shaft of light, there came the ray of an electric torch, and two figures were outlined as they bent over a piece of furniture that stood against the far wall, and that looked like an old chest of drawers. But there was no squeak of casters now. Jimmie Dale smiled uninvitingly. They were becoming unduly cautious! The piece of furniture was being lifted, not rolled, until it stood out from the wall, the back of it exposed.

For a moment the two figures leaned over it, the flashlight playing on the back of the dresser; and then from its extreme edge, what looked like a very narrow drawer, its depth almost half of the dresser itself, was pulled out.

“S’help me!” Mother Margot’s voice quivered in curious, sibilant excitement. “Say, de old skirt’s rich!”

“Was,” corrected Limpy Mack’s voice curtly. “Keep your paws off! We’ll make the split to-morrow. In the meantime I’ll take care of it. See? Hold the flashlight.”

“Sure!” sniffed Mother Margot. “Youse’re de only honest one in de bunch. I know ’cause Little Sweeney told me!”

A man’s hand dipped into the projecting drawer, disappeared nearly up to the elbow, and came out again with a fistful of banknotes which he stuffed into his pocket. Again the man plunged in his hand. Jimmie Dale rose to his feet, took a step forward—and halted abruptly, as Mother Margot’s voice suddenly shrilled out tensely through the silence:

“My Gawd! Listen! Wot’s dat? Over by de door!”

Jimmie Dale’s jaws clamped together, as his automatic swung up into line. Strange! He could have sworn he had not made the slightest sound. He saw Limpy Mack step forward a pace and stand facing the doorway, listening intently. And then Jimmie Dale’s face relaxed. Behind Limpy Mack’s back Mother Margot’s hand shot stealthily into the drawer, and a wad of bills disappeared stealthily inside her blouse. Once more she helped herself.

With a queer, grim droop to the corners of his mouth, Jimmie Dale retreated suddenly back along the hall, and a little beyond the head of the stairs. Mother Margot! The gods were good! There would be more in the night after all than the mere salvaging of old Mrs. Kinsey’s savings. He had no intention now of interrupting the two at their work! Mother Margot had wrought a very drastic change in his plans!

“I don’t hear anything!” Limpy Mack’s voice growled after a moment. “What’s the matter with you?”

“I guess I’m gettin’ de creeps,” Mother Margot’s voice replied. “I t’ought I heard somethin’ creak, but I guess it was de wind. Hurry up, Limpy! I wanter get out of dis. I’m gettin’ de creeps, dat’s wot’s de matter wid me.”

Perhaps another two minutes passed, and then Jimmie Dale, far back along the hall now, heard the footsteps of the two coming from the room. At the head of the stairs they paused, and Limpy Mack spoke gruffly:

“We don’t want to take the chance of being seen leaving here together. You’re safe enough, because if any one saw you, they’d think you were just a friend of the old dame. You wait here, give me five minutes, then beat it yourself. And you go straight home! You’ll get what’s coming to you to-morrow after the Chief’s made the split. We don’t meet again to-night unless something breaks, and in that case you know where to find me. Understand?”

Jimmie Dale smiled quietly in the darkness. He owed Limpy Mack thanks for that, at least—it would save him from following Mother Margot.

“Sure!” mocked Mother Margot. “Cookin’ a pill in yer dump under Sen Yat’s! Why don’t youse come across wid de price of a bunk, an’ give de Chink a chance once in a while?”

Limpy Mack, without answer, descended the stairs. From the lower hall, faintly, there came the soft tap-tap of his rubber-tipped cane. Presently the shop door opened and closed gently.

Jimmie Dale moved silently forward. He could just distinguish Mother Margot’s figure as a dark blur at the head of the stairs. She, too, now began to descend.

And then Jimmie Dale spoke.

“I’ll keep you company downstairs, Mother Margot,” he said softly—and the flashlight in his hand, stabbing suddenly through the darkness, played its ray upon her.

She whirled with a low, terrified cry, and put her hands before her blinking eyes as though to ward off a blow.

“Who’s dat? Who’re youse?” she cried out.

“Go on, Mother Margot—downstairs,” Jimmie Dale prompted more brusquely.

She obeyed in a stumbling, uncertain way.

“My Gawd! My Gawd!” she mumbled wildly. “Who’re youse? A dick? I ain’t done nothin’! I swear to Gawd, I ain’t! I swear—”

“Quite so!” interrupted Jimmie Dale coolly, as they reached the lower hall. “But perhaps you will come across just the same.”

She stared at the hand which he had extended significantly in the flashlight’s glow, and from under a bedraggled hat whose brim flapped over her straggling gray hair and fell into her eyes, she blinked again; she drew the old threadbare black shawl she wore closer around her shoulders, and clutched at it where it met at her neck.

“I dunno wot youse mean,” she croaked hoarsely. “Come across wid wot?”

“With what Limpy Mack didn’t get.” Jimmie Dale was biting off his words now. “There was somebody at the door, even if you didn’t hear him. I can use that money myself that you put inside your blouse. And I’m waiting—also I’m in a hurry!”

“Youse ain’t a dick, den!” She seemed relieved in the sense that rage and fury now supplanted fear. She snarled at him. “Why didn’t youse touch Limpy? I only got a dollar or two.”

“I haven’t forgotten Limpy,” Jimmie Dale answered evenly. His hand was still extended. “Quick!” he snapped suddenly.

For an instant she hesitated, then snarling again, she felt inside her blouse and brought out a few crumpled banknotes.

Jimmie Dale thrust the money into his pocket—and extended his hand again.

“Dat’s all!” she announced tartly. “Wot d’youse expect? I didn’t have no chance!”

Jimmie Dale smiled thinly.

“Loosen the waistband of your blouse!” he ordered sharply.

She glared at him fiercely.

“I won’t,” she shrilled out. “Youse can go to blazes! I told youse dat was all. I won’t!”

“Oh, yes; I think you will,” returned Jimmie Dale grimly. “When I leave you I am going to call on your friend Limpy Mack, and if I explain the double cross you put over on him, I imagine—”

She changed front instantly. Fear seemed to have her in its grip again.

“Youse won’t do dat!” She was whimpering suddenly. “My Gawd, youse won’t do dat!”

“It depends,” said Jimmie Dale.

“Den take it!” she mumbled in a frenzied way—and from the loosened blouse a small shower of banknotes fluttered to the floor.

Jimmie Dale stooped and gathered them up.

“That’s better!” he observed coolly. “And now we’ll go a little further, Mother Margot. I want quite a lot of information. First, this Limpy Mack’s dump, as you called it on the stairs. Does he live there alone?”

“Oh, my Gawd!” She was wringing her hands together in terror. “Youse ain’t still goin’ dere, are youse? Youse ain’t goin’ to tell him, are youse? He’d pass de word along, an’ if de Chief got wise dey’d bump me off for dis. I—dey’d clean me up before de mornin’!”

“So I imagined,” said Jimmie Dale calmly. “That’s why I refrained from any interference upstairs. You see, Mother Margot, I rather think we have become indispensable to each other.”

“I dunno wot youse mean,” she faltered.

“I mean this,” said Jimmie Dale coldly, “that if you play straight with me, you are safe in so far as what you put over on your precious pals is concerned. Otherwise—” He shrugged his shoulders. “Is it quite plain?”

Mother Margot licked her lips feverishly.

“Dey’d cut me t’roat!” she whispered. “Dat’s wot dey’d do. Wot do youse want? I—I ain’t got no chance, have I?”

“We started with Limpy Mack, and we’ll finish with him first,” said Jimmie Dale tersely; “though you’ve just mentioned something much more important. Well, does he live alone?”

“Sure, he lives alone,” Mother Margot answered. “He’s got de basement—”

“Under Sen Yat’s,” completed Jimmie Dale smoothly. “All right! Now, the really important matter. This Chief you mentioned—who is he?”

Mother Margot shook her head.

“I dunno,” she said.

“You don’t know!” Jimmie Dale’s voice hardened. “That won’t do, Mother Margot! I wouldn’t advise you to try another trick to-night.”

“I ain’t!” she protested wildly. “Honest to Gawd, I ain’t! I dunno!” She was wringing her hands together again. “He ain’t nobody, he’s”—she glanced furtively around her, the act seemingly almost subconscious—“he’s—he’s just a voice.”

Jimmie Dale studied her for a moment. The woman was evidently too frightened to be anything but truthful.

“Well, go on!” he prodded.

“Dat’s all I knows about him,” said Mother Margot fearfully. “Just a voice over de telephone dat youse’re always wise to ’cause it’s a kind of a queer, thick voice.”

“Is that the way you get your orders, then?”

Mother Margot nodded assent.

“But there isn’t any telephone in your room,” said Jimmie Dale sharply. “I happen to know that you’ve just moved in where another pal of yours, Mr. Isaac Shiftel, used to live.”

Mother Margot swallowed hard. She drew back a little.

“How’d youse know?” she stammered.

“Never mind! How about that telephone?”

“It ain’t done in de room,” she said tremulously. “I didn’t know anythin’ about to-night at all. Den dis afternoon w’en I was wid my pushcart down on Thompson Street I’m called into a store to de telephone, an’—”

“What store? Where is this telephone?” Jimmie Dale interrupted tersely.

She hesitated.

“Aw, it’s in a booth in de back room of Mezzo’s second-hand store, if youse’ve got to know,” she blurted out.

“All right,” said Jimmie Dale. “Go on!”

“Well, I was called to de telephone,” she said, “an’ told to go to de Wistaria Café to-night an’ meet Limpy Mack.”

“And Little Sweeney,” added Jimmie Dale quietly; then abruptly: “Who else is in this gang?”

Again Mother Margot shook her head.

“I dunno dem all,” she said. “I guess we don’t all know each other neither. I only know Limpy Mack an’ Shiftel, an’ a man named Laroque; but I ain’t seen neither of dem last two for weeks, an’ I dunno where dey’ve gone. Little Sweeney was a new one on me to-night.”

“H’m!” observed Jimmie Dale curtly. “Then who fixed it for you to move into Shiftel’s rooms?”

“The Voice,” she replied readily. “I was told to go an’ hand de agent de rent in advance.”

“Good!” said Jimmie Dale pleasantly. “We’re getting on, Mother Margot; and since you and I have become such friends, I’m going to take the liberty of calling on you in a day or so—unless perhaps you can tell me how, well, say, a man like Shiftel can get in or out of those rooms without bothering himself with either doors or windows?”

She drew still farther back, a startled look and a new terror in her face.

“I know who youse are now,” she gasped. “Little Sweeney an’ Limpy was talkin’ about youse. Youse are de Gray Seal! My Gawd!” She wrung her hands. “Don’t youse come dere! I’m playin’ straight wid youse. I don’t know why, an’ I don’t know nothin’ phoney about de rooms, but I knows dat’s wot dey wants youse to do.”

Again Jimmie Dale studied the dishevelled and distraught creature.

“Yes,” he said quietly, “so I believe, and I believe you are playing straight. Well, we’ll leave the rooms in abeyance for the time being. I shall always know where to find you—on Thompson Street. You may be called to the phone by another voice. Now, one thing more, Mother Margot—I don’t want to keep Limpy Mack waiting! What was that paper Little Sweeney gave Limpy Mack in the back room of the Wistaria to-night?”

“Youse—youse know about dat, too?” She stared at him in terrified amazement.

“What was it?” repeated Jimmie Dale.

“Dey didn’t let me see it,” she said. “Some sort of dope about de gang, I guess, ’cause Little Sweeney was a new man. Little Sweeney just says, ‘I got it pat,’ he says, w’en he hands it over. I dunno wot was in it; dey didn’t let me see it.”

“Perhaps Limpy will be more considerate with me,” observed Jimmie Dale dryly. He motioned along the hall, switched off the flashlight, and taking Mother Margot’s arm, led her into the shop. “You go home now,” he ordered.

She hesitated. His hand still on her arm, he felt her shiver.

“If youse—youse’re goin’ to Limpy Mack’s,” she quavered, “youse—youse won’t split on me? Swear youse won’t! Dey—dey’d kill me before de mornin’!”

“You needn’t worry,” said Jimmie Dale gruffly. “As long as you play straight with me, it’s as much to my interest as yours to see that no harm comes to you. You’re out of this. The only person I know is Limpy Mack, whom I saw come out of here alone—understand?—and I followed him because I thought perhaps he had made a little haul that—since you’ve saved me introducing myself—the Gray Seal could use himself.”

“My Gawd!” She was whimpering again. “I—I’m afraid. Youse swear it?”

Jimmie Dale opened the door, and with a precautionary glance up and down the street, pushed her not ungently out into the night.

“I swear it,” he said. “Good-night, Mother Margot.”