“LAUGH THAT OFF,” it said, and I didn’t sign it. I didn’t need to.
The Cat-Woman
Big Bill Ryan slid his huge bulk into the vacant chair opposite my own and began toying with the heavy watch chain which stretched across the broad expanse of his vest.
“Well,” I asked, showing only mild annoyance, for Big Ryan had the reputation of never wasting time, his own or anyone else’s.
“Ed, I hear you’ve gone broke. I’ve got a job for you.”
He spoke in his habitual, thin, reedy voice. In spite of his bulk his mouth was narrow and his tone shrill. However, I fancied I could detect a quiver of excitement underlying his words, and I became cold. News travels fast in the underworld. He knew of my financial setback as soon as I did, almost. My brokers had learned my identity — that I was a crook, and they had merely appropriated my funds. They were reputable business men. I was a crook. If I made complaint the courts would laugh at me. I’ve had similar experiences before. No matter how honest a man may appear he’ll always steal from a crook — not from any ethical reasons, but because he feels he can get away with it.
“What’s on your mind?” I asked Ryan, not affirming or denying the rumor concerning my financial affairs.
His pudgy fingers seemed to be fairly alive as he twisted and untwisted the massive gold chain.
“It’s just a message,” he said, at length, and handed me a folded slip of paper.
I looked it over. It was a high class of stationery, delicately perfumed, bearing a few words in feminine handwriting which was as perfect and characterless as copper plate.
“Two hours after you get this message meet me at Apartment 624, Reedar Arms Apartments. The door will be open.
I scowled over at Ryan and shook my head. “I’ve walked into all the traps I intend to, Ryan.”
His little, pig eyes blinked rapidly and his fingers jammed his watch chain into a hard knot.
“The message is on the square, Ed. I can vouch for that. What the job will be that opens up I can’t tell. You’ll have to take the responsibility of that; but there won’t be any police trap in that apartment.”
I looked at the note again. The ink was dark. Evidently the words had been written some little time ago. The message did not purport to be to anyone in particular. Big Ryan was a notorious fence, a go-between of crooks. Apparently he had been given the note with the understanding that he was to pick out the one to whom it was to be delivered. The note would clear his skirts, yet he must be in on the game. He’d have to get in touch with the writer after he made a delivery of the note so that the time of the appointment would be known.
I reached a decision on impulse, and determined to put Ryan to the test. “All right, I’ll be there.”
I could see a look of intense relief come over his fat face. He couldn’t keep back the words. “Bully for you, Ed Jenkins!” he shrilled. “After I heard you were broke I thought I might get you. You’re the one man who could do it. Remember, two hours from now,” and, with the words, he pulled out his turnip watch and carefully checked the time. Then he heaved up from the chair and waddled toward the back of the restaurant.
I smiled to myself. He was going to telephone “H. M. H.” and I filed that fact away for future reference.
Two hours later I stepped from the elevator on the sixth floor of the Reedar Arms Apartments, took my bearings and walked directly to the door of 624. I didn’t pause to knock but threw the door open. However, I didn’t walk right in, but stepped back into the hallway.
“Come in, Mr. Jenkins,” said a woman’s voice.
The odor of incense swirled out into the hall, and I could see the apartment was in half-light, a pink light which came through a rose-colored shade. Ordinarily I trust the word of no man, but I was in desperate need of cash, and Big Bill Ryan had a reputation of being one who could be trusted. I took a deep breath and walked into the apartment, closing the door after me.
She was sitting back in an armchair beneath a rose-shaded reading lamp, her bare arm stretched out with the elbow resting on a dark table, the delicate, tapering fingers holding a long, ivory cigarette holder in which burned a half-consumed cigarette. Her slippered feet were placed on a stool and the light glinted from a well-proportioned stretch of silk stocking. It was an artistic job, and the effect was pleasing. I have an eye for such things, and I stood there for a moment taking in the scene, appreciating it. And then I caught the gaze of her eyes.
Cat eyes she had; eyes that seemed to dilate and contract, green eyes that were almost luminous there in the half-light.
I glanced around the apartment, those luminous, green eyes studying me as I studied the surroundings. There was nothing at all in the apartment to suggest the personality of such a woman. Everything about the place was suggestive merely of an average furnished apartment. At the end of the room, near the door of a closet, I saw a suitcase. It merely confirmed my previous suspicion. The woman had only been in that apartment for a few minutes. She rented the place merely as a meeting ground for the crook she had selected to do her bidding. When Big Bill Ryan had picked a man for her, he had telephoned her and she had packed her negligee in the suitcase and rushed to the apartment.
She gave a little start and followed my gaze, then her skin crinkled as her lips smiled. That smile told me much. The skin seemed hard as parchment. She was no spring chicken, as I had suspected from the first.
The cat-woman shrugged her shoulders, reached in a little handbag and took out a blue-steel automatic which she placed on the table. Then she hesitated, took another great drag at the cigarette and narrowed her eyes at me.
“It is no matter, Mr. Jenkins. I assure you that my desire to conceal my identity, to make it appear that this was my real address, was to protect myself only in case I did not come to terms with the man Ryan sent. We had hardly expected to be able to interest a man of your ability in the affair, and, now that you are here, I shan’t let you go, so there won’t be any further need of the deception. I will even tell you who I am and where I really live — in a moment.”
I said nothing, but watched the automatic. Was it possible she knew so little about me that she fancied I could be forced to do something at the point of a pistol?
As though she again read my mind, she reached into the handbag and began taking out crisp bank notes. They were of five-hundred-dollar denomination, and there were twenty of them. These she placed on the table beside the gun.
“The gun is merely to safeguard the money,” she explained with another crinkling smile. “I wouldn’t want you to take the cash without accepting my proposition.”
I nodded. As far as possible I would let her do the talking.
“Mr. Jenkins, or Ed, as I shall call you now that we’re acquainted, you have the reputation of being the smoothest worker in the criminal game. You are known to the police as The Phantom Crook, and they hate, respect and fear you. Ordinarily you are a lone wolf, but because you are pressed for ready cash, I think I can interest you in something I have in mind.”
She paused and sized me up with her cat-green eyes. If she could read anything on my face she could have read the thoughts of a wooden Indian.
“There are ten thousand dollars,” she said, and there was a subtle, purring something about her voice. “That money will be yours when you leave this room if you agree to do something for me. Because I can trust you, I will pay you in advance.”
Again she stopped, and again I sat in immobile silence.