Philip Price arrived first. He said hello and looked around the office, dusted off a chair, and sat down. “Am I early?” he asked.
“You’re on time,” Padillo said.
“Good.”
We waited five minutes and Dymec arrived. He sat down without bothering to dust off anything. I don’t think he noticed the office.
Magda Shadid arrived three minutes or so after Dymec. She wore a loose, white wool coat and brown alligator shoes with wicked heels.
“It’s so dirty,” she said. Padillo gave her a handkerchief.
“Clean off a chair,” he said.
“I’ll get my coat just filthy.”
“Is this all?” Price asked.
“This is all,” Padillo said.
“Where’s the nigger?”
“He’s busy.”
“On our job?”
“On something else.”
“Today we get money, right?” Dymec said.
“Today you get money,” Padillo said. “First you get some information. Can you wait?”
“Looks as if we’ll have to,” Price said.
“McCorkle and I are meeting with Van Zandt and his people, whoever they are, this afternoon.”
“I saw in the paper that he flew in early,” Price said.
“Why does he want to meet you?” Magda said. “You’re going to kill him, or you’re supposed to.”
“We didn’t ask,” I said. “We’re not in much of an asking position. If he wants to see us, we want to see him. All we’ve had up until now are a couple of phone calls and a note.”
“We see him at three o’clock this afternoon,” Padillo said. “I’m going to name Dymec as my substitute then.”
“What reason will you give?” Dymec said.
“Would I normally tell you?”
Dymec thought a moment. “No. You wouldn’t. You’d only mention money to me.”
“Then you don’t need to know my reason.”
“Agreed.”
“They’ll probably want to check on you. Can they?”
“I have a certain reputation, not under the name Dymec, of course, but—”
“I’ll mention another name.”
He nodded.
“They’ll probably want to meet you, possibly tonight, possibly tomorrow. Keep yourself available.”
“Of course.”
“What about us two?” Price asked.
“You’ll work with Dymec after he’s given the assignment. Don’t forget; the idea is to blow it, not to make it come off. I’ll tell you what I have in mind later.”
“And me?” Magda said.
“You’ll be with McCorkle and me. You’ll help us get Mrs. McCorkle out from wherever she is. A woman will probably come in handy.”
“I will still get my full share, won’t I, Michael?”
“Yes.”
“So all we have to do is lay about and count our money until you call?” Price said.
“That’s it.”
“When will we meet again?” Price asked.
“Tomorrow. Here at the same time.”
“That will be Sunday.”
“That’s right.”
Padillo opened the briefcase that had once belonged to Underhill and put three stacks of pound notes on the dusty table. “It’s all there,” he said, “five thousand pounds each. You don’t mind if we don’t hang around while you count it?”
Magda had already picked up her stack and was thumbing it quickly. “Call me at the saloon about five-thirty, Dymec,” Padillo told him. The angular man nodded, but said nothing as he kept on counting his pile of bills, moving his lips silently as he did so. “Close the door when you leave,” Padillo said. This time Price nodded and went on counting his money.
“Let’s go,” Padillo said. We went down the steps and out the back door into an alley. We walked down to I Street and then to Ninth and caught a cab that drove us back to the saloon.
“We should have another caller soon,” Padillo said.
“Who?”
“Somebody who will want to find out what happened to Underhill and the seventeen thousand pounds he was carrying.”
We opened the thick slab door and walked towards the back. We checked with Herr Horst, made a few suggestions, okayed five purchase orders, and took a quick look at Friday’s receipts.
“We must be the richest kids on the block,” Padillo said.
“It was a typically better-than-average day. Fortunately, the average keeps rising.”
We went back into the office. “Someone call you about Underhill?”
“No. But by this time they know he’s dead and they may have had somebody bird-dogging Van Zandt.”
“If you’re right, we’ll be their next stop.”
“What should we tell them?” he asked.
“Will it be a them or a him?”
“I have no idea. Probably a him; I doubt that they have enough money to send more than one.”
“Maybe it will be his wife.”
“That’s all we need.”
Padillo picked up the telephone and dialed a number. I just listened. I didn’t really much care whom he called.
“Mr. Iker,” he said.
I could hear Iker answer over the telephone, but I couldn’t understand the words.
“This is Michael Padillo; I’d like to talk to you.” Iker’s voice made some more noise. “About the business we discussed in my hotel room.” Padillo listened again, then he said: “Whenever an attempt is made on my life, I often change my mind.” Iker’s voice went up a few notches. “I don’t bluff, Iker. Be in the lobby of my hotel at six o’clock. We’ll go up to my room and I’ll show you my stab wound.” He hung up.
“I wonder if the Wise Lady from Philadelphia is still around?” I said.
“Who?”
“There was once this family who put salt instead of sugar into a cup of tea. Their name was Peterkin, as I remember. So they went to the doctor and the pharmacist and the grocer and God knows who all, trying to make the salt taste like sugar. Nothing worked. Finally they went to the Wise Lady from Philadelphia.”
“And?”
“She told them what to do.”
“What?”
“Pour a new cup of tea.”
Padillo leaned back in his chair and put his feet on the desk and looked up at the ceiling. “You don’t remember her name, do you? If you do, we’ll give her a call.”
Thirteen
About a quarter after two we walked over to my apartment building and got my car out of the basement garage. Padillo glanced at the mileage on the speedometer.
“You don’t use it much.”
“We take long drives on Sunday.”
“Then you really need something that will do one-fifty.”
“That’s what I thought.”
I turned down Twentieth Street and then left on Massachusetts. We went past the Cosmos Club, around Sheridan Circle, and past the Iranian Embassy. The trade mission was located in a narrow four-storied house that had been converted into office space. It was flanked by similar houses that served as embassies for a couple of small South American countries. There were a half-dozen Cadillacs parked in no-parking zones and it only took us fifteen minutes to find a place to put the Corvette.
We walked a block back to the trade mission that had the solid, respectable appearance of a rich man’s house built in the 1920’s with easy money. Its roof tried to look thatched and the shingles curved around and under the edges of the roof line. The brick was a glazed dark red that seemed almost purple. The mortar oozed out between the bricks, lending something to what was supposed to be a rustic appearance. It’s hard to make anything look rustic that’s four stories high, and the leaded windows didn’t make it come off either.