“I have one suggestion,” I said.
He inclined his head. “Name it.”
“That you call in a notary public and have them acknowledge the confessions.”
The lawyer looked at his client. He was a beady-eyed, sallow-faced rat of a man. His great nose seemed to have drawn his entire face to a point, and his mouth and eyes were pinched accordingly. Also his lip had a tendency to draw back and show discolored, long teeth, protruding in front. He was like a rat, a hungry, cunning rat.
The cat-woman placed her ivory cigarette holder to her vivid lips, inhaled a great drag and then expelled two streams of white smoke from her dilated nostrils. She nodded at the lawyer, and, as she nodded, there was a hard gleam about her eyes.
“Very well,” was all she said, but the purring note had gone from her voice.
Atmore wiped the back of his hand across his perspiring forehead, called in a notary, and, on the strength of his introduction, had the two documents acknowledged. Then he slipped them in one of his envelopes, wrote “Perpetual Escrow” on the back, signed it, daubed sealing wax all over the flap, and motioned to me.
“You can come with me, Jenkins, and see that I put this in the Trust Company downstairs.”
I arose, accompanied the lawyer to the elevator and was whisked down to the office of the Trust Company. We said not a word on the trip. The lawyer walked to the desk of the vice-president, handed him the envelope, and told him what he wanted.
“Keep this envelope as a perpetual escrow. It can be opened by no living party except with an order of court. After ten years you may destroy it. Give this gentleman and myself a duplicate receipt.”
The vice-president looked dubiously at the envelope, weighed it in his hand, sighed, and placed his signature on the envelope, gave it a number with a numbering machine, dictated a duplicate receipt, which he also signed, and took the envelope to the vaults.
“That should satisfy you,” said Atmore, his beady eyes darting over me, the perspiration breaking out on his forehead. “That is all fair and above board.”
I nodded and started toward the door. I could see the relief peeping in the rat-like eyes of the lawyer.
At the door I stopped, turned, and clutched the lawyer by the arm. “Atmore, do you know what happens to people who try to double-cross me?”
He was seized with a fit of trembling, and he impatiently tried to break away.
“You have a reputation for being a square shooter, Jenkins, and for always getting the man who tries to double-cross you.”
I nodded.
There in the marble lobby of that trust company, with people all around us, with a special officer walking slowly back and forth, I handed it to this little shyster.
“All right. You’ve just tried to double-cross me. If you value your life hand me that envelope.”
He shivered again.
“W-w-w-what envelope?”
I gave him no answer, just kept my eyes boring into his, kept his trembling arm in my iron clutch, and kept my face thrust close to his.
He weakened fast. I could see his sallow skin whiten.
“Jenkins, I’m sorry. I told her we couldn’t get away with it. It was her idea, not mine.”
I still said nothing, but kept my eyes on his.
He reached in his pocket and took out the other envelope. My guess had been right. I knew his type. The rat-like cunning of the idea had unquestionably been his, but he didn’t have the necessary nerve to bluff it through. He had prepared two envelopes. One of them had been signed and sealed before my eyes, but in signing and sealing it he had followed the mental pattern of another envelope which had already been signed and sealed and left in his pocket, an envelope which contained nothing but blank sheets of paper. When he put the envelope with the signed confession into his coat pocket he had placed it back of the dummy envelope. The dummy envelope he had withdrawn and deposited in his “perpetual escrow.”
I took the envelope from him, broke the seals, and examined the documents. They were intact, the signed, acknowledged confessions.
I turned back to the shyster.
“Listen, Atmore. There is a big fee in this for you, a fee from the woman, perhaps from someone else. Go back and tell them that you have blundered, that I have obtained possession of the papers and they will expose you, fire you for a blunderer, make you the laughing stock of every criminal rendezvous in the city. If you keep quiet about this no one will ever know the difference. Speak and you ruin your reputation.”
I could see a look of relief flood his face, and I knew he would lie to the cat-woman about those papers.
“Tell Miss Hare I’ll be at the house at nine forty-five on the dot,” I said. “There’s no need of my seeing her again until then.”
With that I climbed into my roadster, drove to the beach and looked over the house the cat-woman had selected for me. She had given me the address as well as the key at our evening interview, just before I said good night. Of course, she expected me to look the place over.
It was a small bungalow, the garage opening on to the sidewalk beneath the first floor. I didn’t go in. Inquiry at a gasoline station showed that the neighbors believed Compton was a traveling salesman, away on a trip, but due to return. The blonde had established herself in the community. So much I found out, and so much the cat-woman had expected me to find out.
Then I started on a line she hadn’t anticipated.
First I rented a furnished apartment, taking the precaution first to slip on a disguise which had always worked well with me, a disguise which made me appear twenty years older.
Second, I went to the county clerk’s office, looked over the register of actions, and found a dozen in which the oil magnate had been a party. There were damage suits, quiet title actions, actions on oil leases, and on options. In all of these actions he had been represented by Morton, Huntley & Morton. I got the address of the lawyers from the records, put up a good stall with their telephone girl, and found myself closeted with old H. F. Morton, senior member of the firm.
He was a shaggy, grizzled, gray-eyed old campaigner and he had a habit of drumming his fingers on the desk in front of him. “What was it you wanted, Mr. Jenkins?”
I’d removed my disguise and given him my right name. He may or may not have known my original record. He didn’t mention it.
I shot it to him right between the eyes.
“If I were the lawyer representing Arthur C. Holton I wouldn’t let him marry Miss Hattie Hare.”
He never batted an eyelash. His face was as calm as a baby’s. His eyes didn’t even narrow, but there came a change in the tempo of his drumming on the desk.
“Why?” he asked.
His tone was mild, casual, but his fingers were going rummy-tum-tum; rummy-tum-tum; rummy-tum-tummy-tum tummy-tum turn.
I shook my head. “I can’t tell you all of it, but she’s in touch with a shyster lawyer planning to cause trouble of some kind.”
“Ah, yes, Mr.-er-Jenkins. You are a friend of Mr. Holton?”
I nodded. “He doesn’t know it though.”
“Ah, yes,” rummy-tum-tum; rummy-tum-tum; “what is it I can do for you in the matter?”
“Help me prevent the marriage.”
Rummy-tum-tum; rummy-tum-tum.
“How?”
“Give me a little information as a starter. Mr. Holton has a great deal of property?”
At that his eyes did narrow. The drumming stopped.
“This is a law office. Not an information bureau.”
I shrugged my shoulders. “Miss Hare will have her own personal attorney. If the marriage should go through and anything should happen to Mr. Holton another attorney would be in charge of the estate.”
He squirmed at that, and then recommenced his drumming.
“Nevertheless, I cannot divulge the confidential affairs of my client. This much is common knowledge. It is street talk, information available to anyone who will take the trouble to look for it. Mr. Holton is a man of great wealth. He owns much property, controls oil producing fields, business property, stocks, bonds. He was married and lost his wife when his child was born. The child was a boy and lived but a few minutes. Mr. Holton created a trust for that child, a trust which terminated with the premature death of the infant. Miss Hare has been connected with him as his secretary and general household executive for several years. Mr. Holton is a man of many enemies, strong character and few friends. He is hated by the working class, and is hated unjustly, yet he cares nothing for public opinion. He is noted as a collector of jewels and paintings. Of late he has been influenced in many respects by Miss Hare, and has grown very fond of her.