"I always figure a burglar takes his chances like anybody else outside the law. Your wife sounds like quite a girl."
"You'd say that. I don't suppose a human life means anything to you, either."
It was an echo of what Mac had said, and I didn't like Rosten any better for saying it, even though he was saying it to Lash Petroni, not Matt Helm.
"Well, no little juvenile slob had better try running off with any of my silver, mister. If I had any. What did Mrs. Rosten have to say about it?"
Rosten grimaced. "She said, 'I couldn't let him get away with great-grandmother Sandeman's candlestick, could I?'"
"Did she get away with it?" I asked. "I guess she must have. She isn't in jail."
"Of course she got away with it," he said resentfully. "She always does, no matter what high-handed action it may be. Well, not quite always. There was the time she tried to hold off the Federal Government with that same Purdey double-they were taking over some run-down family property she'd inherited down the Bay. For the Navy, I think. They talked her out of it, somehow. I think they just made her see she was making herself perfectly ridiculous, and there's nothing she hates worse than that. Well, here we are." He stopped the big car at a roadside joint, half restaurant, half drive-in. "We might as well have our coffee in the car," he said.
"Sure."
I told the girl who came up that I'd have coffee and a doughnut. He ordered black coffee and watched the girl move away through the lights in tight lavender pants and a frilly white blouse. At that angle, retreating, the pants were much more interesting than the blouse. Rosten licked his lips thoughtfully.
"I-I have a proposition for you, Petroni," he said.
"I know," I said. "It'll cost you five grand. Twenty-five hundred down, twenty-five hundred on delivery. Cash. No bills larger than a hundred. I like fifties and twenties better."
He turned sharply to stare at me, shocked that I'd read his mind. From his expression, I knew I'd read it right. Before he had recovered, the girl was returning. From this angle, advancing, the blouse was more interesting than the pants, but the poor guy wasn't noticing.
"I'll take the coffee with cream, miss," I said, and waited until she'd gone. "Get to the bank as soon as it opens," I said, to Rosten. "Well, there's no rush; any time today will do. Twenty-five hundred in used bills. You know the countryside; you pick a place where we can get together this evening. After dark would be best. I don't have to tell you to keep an eye on the rearview mirror. We don't want any witnesses to this little transaction, do we, mister?"
He watched me take a bite of doughnut as if he'd never seen a man eat before. He licked his lips. "I-I don't know what you're talking about," he said weakly. "I don't-there must be some misunderstanding. I didn't-"
I said, "What's the matter, is the price too steep for you? Hell, you're making a million on the deal; what's five grand to you?"
"A million!" He cleared his throat and said more strongly, "Really, Mr. Petroni, I'm afraid we're talking at cross purposes. The proposition I had in mind-"
"Was killing your wife," I said.
He turned pale and looked around fearfully. I thought he'd actually put his fingers to his lips and say hush. He started to speak, but nothing came.
"Cut it out, little man," I said. "Last night you lied for me. Why? Why did you help me stay out of jail, knowing I was a murderer? This morning you went to a lot of trouble to find me-and to make sure your wife didn't know you were trying to find me. Why? You've told me you married her only for her money. You've told me what a terrible person she is. Hell, she's a murderer herself, according to you; she deserves to die. That's what you were saying just now, isn't it? You were trying to justify what you were going to ask me to do to her. What the hell did you look me up for, if not to have me kill her? I don't do plumbing or paint houses or wash cars, mister. The police told you what my business is."
I sounded as if I'd figured it out very logically. I didn't bother to tell him I'd been able to guess what was in his mind because somebody else had already introduced me to the same idea. A coincidence? Maybe, but if you leave a loaded gun lying around, it's apt to give ideas to more than one person. To these folks, I was just that: a deadly weapon provided in the hour of need by, so they thought, a benevolent fortune.
Rosten still hadn't spoken. I said, "Okay, so it's settled. Where's a good place for us to meet?"
He licked his lips. "Well," he said, "well, there's a place down on the Bay, a little cove called Mason's cove-"
"Show me on the map, if you've got a map." He had one. He showed me. I asked, "When can you be there with the money?"
"I-we're going out this evening. A cocktail party at the Sandemans. I don't know if I can get away afterwards."
"You'd better get away, mister. I don't work for nothing. What about before the party? We'll take a chance on daylight."
"All right." His tongue came out again and discovered that his lips were still there. "All right. Four-thirty at the cove. Don't drive too far down that side road or you'll get stuck in the sand-Petroni?"
"Yes?"
"It will-" He did the tongue bit once more. "It will look like an accident, won't it?"
I said, "One day I'm going to have somebody ask me to do a murder that looks like a murder-"
He drove me back into town and dropped me a couple of blocks from the hotel. I watched the big car drive away. Then I found a phone booth in a drugstore, looked up a number in the book, and dialed it. A maid answered.
"I'd like to speak with Mrs. Rosten," I said. "Mrs. Louis Rosten. This is Jim Peters. She'll remember me."
"Mrs. Rosten's asleep, sir."
"Wake her up," I said. "It's important."
I waited. Presently I heard the maid return and pick up the phone. "Mr. Peters?'
"Yes," I said.
Her voice sounded a little breathless. "Miz Rosten say she sure do remember you, Mr. Peters, and she can't think of a thing she have to say to you this hour of the morning or any hour. She say, if you bother her again, she call the police!"
"I see," I said. "Thank you."
I hung up. Well, I wouldn't really have known how to handle it if the woman had come to the phone, but I'd had to make at least a gesture towards playing it straight, like a conscientious government agent who'd stumbled on a dark conspiracy against a citizen's life-two dark conspiracies, to be exact.
TWELVE
I SPENT THE rest of the morning catching up on my sleep. After lunch, I called Teddy Michaelis at the motel and arranged to meet her at a town called St. Alice. It was twenty miles from Annapolis, according to the map, but only ten from the cove where I was supposed to meet Rosten, later. I didn't give that as a reason for selecting it as a rendezvous, however.
I'd picked the town, but she, knowing the area a little better, had picked the meeting place: a bar and seafood joint built on a long pier sticking out over the water. The ceilings were low, the light was poor, the floor linoleum was cracked, and the tables had gingham tablecloths that could have been cleaner, but the bar was quite handsome: a great, massive, old-fashioned hunk of mahogany.
I was nursing a beer, taking it easy, when Teddy came in, carrying a folded newspaper under her arm. She was wearing snug white pants and a blue sweater with a hood, thrown back casually from her blonde head. Her mouth was as grim as such a small mouth could be, and her blue eyes were bright and angry. She came right over to the bar.
"What'll you have?" I asked.