As he left the apartment, he wondered fleetingly how she had happened to meet Darrell Caraway. Well, it really didn’t matter. Perhaps she had worked someplace where he had dropped in. Or maybe he’d deliberately gone slumming one evening and picked her up.
To Bradley, the important thing was that he had identified the principals in his problem. Fortunately — and this greatly simplified the problem — one of them carried an old and highly respectable name in the local social and financial registers.
Back in his apartment, telephone in hand, Bradley realized the tremendous chance he was taking. He hesitated before dialing. Then he reminded himself of the character of the man with whom he would deal, a man capable of very little decency, honesty, or integrity. Darrell Caraway’s character was revealed in his relationship and treatment of the deceased girl.
Decisively, Bradley dialed. A servant answered the phone at the Caraway residence. He could hear someone singing and there were other background sounds that made him almost sure that a party was in progress.
“Mr. Caraway, please,” Bradley said. “Mr. Darrell Caraway.”
“Who is calling?”
“Just tell him it’s — Julia’s uncle.”
Caraway’s guarded tones sounded on the phone a few moments later. “Listen, I don’t understand this. I believe you’ve got the wrong—”
“Relax, Mr. Caraway. I’m no out-of-town relative riding a white charger.”
“Then what—”
“My name is Bradley. I have a business matter to discuss with you. If you’re wise, you’ll take what I’m saying seriously.
“Why should I? I don’t know you.”
“We can remedy that quickly enough. I’m trying to help you, really. So drop over to my place and be helped, Mr. Caraway.” Bradley added his address and waited while the line hummed.
“I have nothing to say to you,” Caraway said finally.
“Oh, stop trying to be circumspect,” Bradley said with irritation. “I’ll give you thirty minutes to come to my apartment — unless you want everything exposed. I don’t think I can be any clearer, can I?”
He hung up.
Darrell Caraway beat the thirty minute deadline by a full eight minutes. This, Bradley reflected, was a heartening confirmation of his assessment of the man. Caraway had the courage of a rabbit, when not dealing with a pregnant girl who was a nobody.
His inspection of Caraway was closer than it seemed when he opened the door at Caraway’s knock. The Caraway heir was young, in his early twenties, and almost good-looking, with chiseled features and dark, crinkly hair.
But there were lines of dissipation etched into his face and his cheeks had the unhealthy pallor of a man who has kept late hours for many nights in succession. His dark eyes were petulant and frightened. At thirty-five or forty he would be a physical wreck, an old man. Bradley’s practiced medical eye saw the incipient signs.
Caraway entered the living room of the shabby apartment with a certain disdain, his eyes noting the furnishings.
“Don’t think I came here out of fright, Bradley.”
“Oh, of course not,” Bradley said.
“I came simply because this girl you mentioned — Julia — tried to blackmail me.”
“Really?”
“Really. Just who are you, anyway?”
“A doctor.”
Caraway’s lip twitched. “Whatever she has told you is a lie. I had it out with her. She can prove nothing. I’ll fight it through every court in the land, rather than be saddled with a tramp who—”
“Calm down, Caraway. I don’t bluff so easily as Julia. And I’m not so stupid. You are in a real jam, a real scandal, and I know you’d go to any lengths to get out of it.”
“If this is an attempt at extortion—”
“Oh, shut up,” Bradley said with contempt. “I’ve entered no conspiracy with Julia. As a matter of fact, I’m only intent on helping you.”
“Helping me? Why?”
“In order to help myself.”
“I don’t think I understand, Bradley.”
“You will,” Bradley said. “You know, you’re never going to feel comfortable as long as Julia is around. You’ll not know from one day to the next what is going through her mind, when she may decide the child needs a father. Not a very pleasant future outlook, is it?”
“What are you suggesting?” Caraway said thinly.
“That it would be worth a small effort on your part to insure your future. You see, Julia staggered in here tonight. She was in great pain. She’d sought out a one-time nurse to perform an abortion. The job was done in a back room near here where the nurse left Julia. It wasn’t a very good job, Caraway.”
Staring at him, Caraway looked hypnotized.
“Of course,” Bradley said, “I did the best I could for the girl. It was too late. She began to hemorrhage.”
Caraway swallowed with a gulping effort. “She is— You mean she—”
“I’m afraid so. I really hadn’t time to save her.”
“Where is she?”
“She’s here now. I have several rooms in back.”
“And you haven’t notified—”
“No one but you,” Bradley assured him. “Recently, I had an unfortunate brush with the authorities. It’s very likely they’d say that no ex-nurse existed, that I’d done the abortion myself. This would be poor and undeserved payment for my efforts to save the girl, don’t you think?”
Caraway appeared to suffer momentary vertigo. “What... what are you suggesting?”
“I want the girl got out of here,” Bradley said. “For that, I need your assistance. You have cars, boats, city houses, and country houses. With your help, I’ll see that Julia is laid to rest, permanently.”
Caraway stumbled to a chair and sat down. “It’s out of the question!”
“Anything else is out of the question,” Bradley amended. “After all, you’re responsible for her being here. It’s only fair to consider the great service I’m offering you.”
Caraway shook his head back and forth. “No! No—”
Bradley crossed the room, grabbed Caraway by the hair, and jerked his head back.
“I don’t intend to discuss this at any length with you, Caraway. I’ll simply point out that if anything happens to me, it will also happen to you. Everything you’ve feared will be made public. And more, my friend. Very much more. If I’m charged with abortion, I’ll swear you arranged it, and that your money paid for it. You brought Julia here. Is that clear?”
Bradley thought for a moment Caraway was going to faint. Then Caraway said, “You can’t prove a word of what you’re saying—”
“You want to run the risk?” Bradley shoved him roughly back in the chair. “You’ll surely take the risk, if anything happens to me. If you try to shirk a share of your responsibility—”
Caraway closed his eyes for an instant, too shaken to keep up even a pretense of angry defiance. “How will we manage it?” he whispered. All the blood had drained from his face.
“I was hoping you’d have a suggestion.” Bradley said. “Efficiency is often coupled with simplicity. And the simplest thing, I think, would be for you to bring a car around. We’ll slip her out of here, take her to your country place, and bury her deep in a little glen where she will never be discovered.”
“How do I know I will have seen the last of you?” Caraway asked.
“You’ve no worries on that score,” Bradley said. “Neither of us has. The silence of each will be his own insurance, and in that fact lies insurance for the other.”
“I... I don’t like to think about it,” Caraway said faintly.
Bradley took him by the arm and helped him to his feet. “Come on. I have some pills in back. I’ll give you a couple.”
He guided Caraway through the gloomy hallway, to the room where the girl had died.