1972 - You're Dead Without Money (17 page)

‘This is Don Elliot calling Mr. Larrimore.’

‘Mr. Larrimore is engaged at the moment, sir. Shall I ask him to call you back?’

‘I want to speak to him right away. Tell him I’d be obliged if he would come to the phone.’

There was more delay, then Larrimore came on the line.

Elliot recognized his voice as he said, ‘Is that you, Elliot?’

‘Hello there. I’m sorry to interrupt something. Your man said you were tied up.’

‘Yes . . . I am rather occupied. How are you, Elliot? I haven’t seen or heard from you for months.’

At least, Elliot thought, Larrimore sounded cordial.

‘I’ve been recouping. You heard about the accident?’

‘Of course. I’m very sorry.’

‘One of those things, but I’ve now got on top of my tin foot. How about a game on Tuesday? I’ve shortened my swing and reduced my pivot and I’m playing better than ever. You might try that, Larrimore. A short swing gives you much more control.’

‘That’s an idea. Yes, let’s have a game. I’m so glad you are playing again. My congratulations. Then Tuesday at three o’clock?’

‘That’s a date.’ Elliot chitchatted about the stock market prices, determined to give Cindy all the time she needed, then finally, he hung up. He drew in a deep breath. ‘She must have got the number by now.’

It wasn’t until 12.45 that the three waiting men saw Cindy come up the garden path and they jumped to their feet and rushed to her, Elliot slightly in the lead.

She looked pale and he could see she was a little shaky, but she smiled at him as he asked, ‘Did you get it?’

‘Yes.’

‘Come on in . . . let’s hear about it,’ Elliot said, putting his arm around her. ‘Well done! I was sure you would succeed!’

‘What’s the drawer number?’ Vin demanded, crowding up behind them as they entered the sitting room.

‘She’s not telling you that, Vin,’ Elliot said and he pushed Cindy gently away from him so he faced Vin.

Joey, standing in the doorway, stared first at Cindy and then at Elliot, his eyes growing round.

‘Who says?’ Vin snarled. ‘I’ve as much right to know as you have! Get out of my way! I’ll talk to her!’

‘Relax,’ Elliot said. ‘When you give me the name of the buyer, I’ll give you the number of the drawer. Do you think we three are dopes? None of us trust you, Vin. Your double-cross isn’t going to jell.’

Vin’s eyes narrowed.

‘Double-cross? What the hell do you mean?’

‘Don’t let’s waste time. Get the name of the buyer. I’ll give you a thousand dollars for Judy. Get the name tonight then you and I will go to Larrimore’s house and get the stamps, but

I’m going to deal with the buyer.’

For a long moment, Vin stood staring at Elliot. This was so unexpected, his brain couldn’t cope with it. Controlling his fury, and realizing he would have to give himself time to think, he shrugged.

‘Okay, okay, no one’s asking you to trust me. I’ll get the buyer’s name, but you don’t come with me, buster. This is a job for experts and I don’t work with amateurs.’

‘Get the name,’ Elliot said quietly, ‘then we’ll talk about the rest of it.’

Vin looked at Cindy.

‘Are you going to tell me the number, baby?’

Cindy shook her head.

Vin grinned evilly at her.

‘Sure? You’d better be sure. You could be sorry later.’

She stared at him unflinchingly.

‘I’m sure.’

‘Okay.’

He turned and walked out of the bungalow and down to his car.

‘We’d better tell him,’ Joey said fearfully. ‘He could do something to Cindy.’

‘We don’t have to tell him,’ Cindy said and opened her bag. ‘I’ve got the stamps.’

Seven

T
here was a long moment of silence as Elliot and Joey watched Cindy take a plastic envelope from her bag and lay it on the table.

‘These are the stamps, aren’t they?’

His heart beating fast, his breathing uneven, Elliot looked at the eight stamps through their plastic cover. He recognized them immediately from the photocopy that Kendrick had shown him.

‘Yes.’ His voice was husky. He straightened and looked at Cindy. ‘Why did you take them, you crazy kid? As soon as Larrimore finds they are missing, he’ll call the police. They’ll come here! We wrote to him and he knows this address! What were you thinking of?’

‘I don’t think he will call the police,’ Cindy said.

‘Why do you say that?’

She sat down abruptly and looked so pale, Joey rushed to the liquor cabinet and began to pour a brandy.

‘No, daddy . . . I don’t want it,’ she protested. ‘I’m all right.’

Joey regarded her, stared at the brandy in the glass and then swallowed it himself.

‘Why do you say he won’t tell the police?’ Elliot repeated, sitting at the table and facing her.

‘There was a letter in the drawer with the stamps,’ Cindy told him. ‘It was from the Central Intelligence Agency, Washington. It said it was an offence to have these stamps and the owner would be prosecuted if he didn’t notify the C.I.A. if he had them. The letter was dated two months ago. They said the maximum sentence would be three years and a fine of thirty thousand dollars. When I read that I saw Mr. Larrimore couldn’t complain to the police without getting into trouble . . . so I took them.’

‘The C.I.A.?’ Elliot’s voice shot up a note.

‘Yes.’

‘Suppose you tell us just what happened, Cindy.’

She drew in a deep breath, then said, ‘I arrived at the house and Mr. Larrimore took me into the stamp room. He was nice and kind. He told me to sit down and he looked through the stamp album. The only stamps that interested him were the ones dad had bought. He said they might be worth three hundred dollars. Then just as I was wondering how I could get the index from him, he took it from his pocket and looked at it. Then he took me over to one of the drawers and showed me other stamps in the same series as the ones in the album. He left the book on his desk. It was so easy. He asked me if I would leave the stamp album with him. I got a little behind him, opened my bag and gave you the signal. Then you phoned. He excused himself and left me in the room. I found the drawer number in the index. I could hear him talking to you so I went to the drawer and found the stamps. Then I saw the letter. He was still talking to you so I read it. It seemed to me that if I took the stamps he couldn’t call the police . . . so I took them.’

‘For Pete’s sake!’ Elliot leaned forward and took her hand. ‘That was quick thinking, but he could tell the police.’

‘I don’t think he will,’ Cindy said. ‘Anyway, it’s worth the risk. Now, you don’t have to break in.’

‘You shouldn’t have done it,’ Joey said, his voice quavering. ‘You should have left it to Don and Vin.’

‘We have them,’ Cindy said.

‘We can’t keep them here.’ Elliot paused to think. ‘Joey take them right away to the Chase National Bank. Buy an envelope, write your name on it and put the stamps in it. Rent a safe deposit box. Get going, Joey! If the police come here and find them we’re sunk.’

Joey nodded. Picking up the plastic envelope he put it in his pocket.

‘What shall I do with the key?’

‘Bring it back here. We’ll hide it some place.’

When Joey had gone, Elliot regarded Cindy.

‘You shouldn’t have done it, Cindy.’

She smiled at him.

‘I just couldn’t bear the thought of you going with Vin into that house. Vin’s dangerous. Once he got the stamps, he might have done something to you.’

‘But why is the CIA. interested?’ Elliot said. ‘Was it a personal letter to Larrimore?’

‘It was a circular letter addressed to philatelists.’

‘And it said it was an offence to hold the stamps?’

‘Yes.’

Elliot didn’t like this.

‘I don’t understand it, but it looks as if the temptation to keep such rare stamps was too much for Larrimore.’ He thought, then nodded. ‘Yes, I think you’re right. He would be asking for trouble if he complained to the police.’ He stared uneasily at Cindy. ‘But why the C.I.A.?’

‘Perhaps we’d better not try to sell them,’ Cindy said.

‘They’re safe for the moment. Let’s find out who the buyer is before we make up our minds. And not a word about this to Vin.’ Elliot got up and coining around the table, he put his

arms around her. ‘You’ve done a marvellous job, Cindy.’

She put her head against his shoulder and clung to him.

* * *

Barney had been talking now non-stop, apart from eating and drinking, for the past two hours. The time was after 23.00 and the Neptune bar was now lined with fishermen, noisy in their demands for beer and Sam, the barman, was being kept busy.

Barney paused to regard the backs of the men as they leaned on the bar and his fat face wore an expression of disapproval.

‘Fishermen!’ he said scornfully. ‘No good riff-raff. You take my word for it, Mr. Campbell. They spend all their nights drinking when they should be home keeping their wives and children company.’

I asked him if he was married.

‘I know better, mister,’ he said. ‘The thing I object to about marriage is a guy never gets a chance to talk and if there’s one thing I like - excluding beer - it’s talking.’

I said I could understand that

‘Yeah.’ He paused to wave his empty glass in Sam’s direction. ‘You take these men over there. All they think about is money, women and drinking. I’ve never been mercenary. If you offered me a million dollars I wouldn’t take it. I wouldn’t know what to do with it. What the hell does a man want with a million dollars?’

I could have told him, but I got the impression he wouldn’t be interested. He paused while Sam rushed a beer to his table, then went on, ‘But this Vin Pinna I’m telling you about had the itch to get his hands on this million Judy Larrimore had told him about. He had the itch the same way as a dog gets the itch for a lady dog every now and again if you’ll excuse the comparison. Now Vin had been brought up in a tough world. I don’t say he didn’t know better, but knowing better and doing better are two different things . . . right, Mr. Campbell?’

I said that was indisputable.

‘Well, when he realized that Elliot wasn’t going to give him the number of the drawer and also had said he would go to the buyer himself, Vin decided Elliot had to be got rid of. He had driven to the cliff head and was sitting in the Jaguar and he gave his mind to the problem. He decided after getting his brain to work - and this was a slow process because up to now Vin seldom used his brain - that the only way he could get his hands on all this money was first to find out from Judy who the buyer was, then get rid of Elliot, then scare Cindy into telling him the number of the drawer.

‘For perhaps five or six minutes, Vin hesitated about getting rid of Elliot. Up to now he had kept clear of murder. Once or twice, when he had been disturbed by a householder while he was robbing a safe, he had been tempted, but he found by threatening the householder with a gun, murder hadn’t been necessary. But, thinking about the past, he did see that if the householder had turned awkward he would have pulled the trigger.

‘Turning all this over in his sluggish mind, Vin came to the conclusion that for a million dollars he would commit not one murder but several if anyone tried to outsmart him. For that sum of money, he would take murder in his stride.

‘Having got that little problem solved, he turned his mind to Judy. It was no good knocking Elliot off without first knowing who the buyer was. Judy was a tricky chick. She had already told him that she wasn’t giving him the name of the buyer until he got the stamps and even when he had them she was doing the deal with the buyer. This meant he would be lucky if she didn’t gyp him out of the two hundred and fifty thousand she had promised him. This was pretty frustrating to Vin because he had no intention of taking that kind of money when he could get a million if he worked at it.’

A massively built man, wearing a dirty sweatshirt and oil stained white ducks, knots of black hair on his arms, shoulders and chest, came into the bar. He was around twenty-five years of age, his ugly face good-natured and he was hailed by the other men standing up at the bar with a warmth that told me he was a bar favourite.

He spotted Barney and waved to him.

‘Hi, Fat-guts!’ he bellowed in a voice that made my eardrums quiver, ‘having a ball?’

Barney didn’t deign to look his way.

‘He will come to no good, Mr. Campbell,’ he said as soon as the massive man had been absorbed in the crowd. ‘No respect for his elders or his betters . . . just a low fisherman. Fat-guts! Wait till he’s my age. Like I said . . . no respect’

I said that was the trouble with the younger generation.

‘You’re right, Mr. Campbell.’ Barney sipped his beer. ‘Well, getting back to Vin . . . he sat in the car and wondered how he was going to handle Judy. The more he thought about her the more irritated he got. Now when a thug like Vin gets irritated, he becomes like a vicious dog. Sooner or later the dog will snap and then bite and Vin was built on the same lines. He decided he would force Judy to give him the name of this stamp buyer. He would scare her into opening her mouth even if he had to rough her up. Once he had made this decision, he considered how he was going to do it.’

* * *

He had no illusions about Judy. She was tricky and he was sure she was tough. Even if he roughed her up so she parted with the buyer’s name, as soon as he let her go, she would squeal to the cops. Once the cops moved in, it was goodbye to all that money. Vin thought about this for over half an hour, then he came to the logical solution. If he was going to knock Elliot off, what was the matter with knocking Judy off too?

Once rid of her, once rid of Elliot all he had to do was to make Cindy talk and if she got tricky why not knock her off as well? If he had to knock her off, then to make a nice clean job of it, he would also knock off Joey.

Vin now realized that it was one thing to think about knocking off four people but quite another thing to do it successfully. By successfully, he naturally meant having no trouble with the cops. What was the use of getting a million dollars if you had the cops breathing down your neck?