Corridan said, frowning. “You say this Peter French killed Selma
Jacobi?”
I shook my head. “No, I didn’t say that. Netta told me Peter
French killed Selma. But that’s a lie. Peter French knows nothing
about this business at all. He was a stooge, put up to lead me away
from the real killer.”
Netta got slowly to her feet, her face ghastly. Corridan took a step
forward.
“Then who killed Selma Jacobi?” he demanded.
“The same person who killed Madge Kennitt,” I said, moving
across to the kitchen door. “Let me introduce you.” I jerked open the
door, stood aside. “Come on out,” I said. “You’ve been in there long
enough.”
Detective-Inspector O’Malley and three plain-clothes dicks moved
into the room. They looked at me, at Corridan, at Netta.
“That’s the guy who killed Selma Jacobi and Madge Kennitt,” I
said, jerking my thumb at Corridan.
Chapter XXV
“I EXPECT you to exercise tact and control with Harry Bix,” I told
Crystal as I piloted her across the Savoy lobby to where Fred Ullman
and Bix were examining the latest novels on the bookstall. “He’s the
kind of wolf who knows al the ankles. Don’t encourage him, and if
you don’t stray away from me you should be safe enough.”
Crystal said, “Shouldn’t you have brought your poke bonnet and
tambourine? Who wants to be safe, anyway?”
By this time Harry Bix had seen us, and nudging Ullman, he
fingered his tie, giving us a loud hello.
“Well, well,” he said, advancing to meet us. “Bluebeard does it
again. How you collect these juicy dames beats me. You must have a
fatal attraction or something.”
I sighed. “Crystal, this is Harry Bix. Don’t trust him. Even the wool
he’ll try to pull over your eyes is half cotton. Harry, this is Miss
Godwin. I’ll trouble you to keep your hands in your pockets while you
talk to her, and just to keep the record straight, she is my property.
The gentleman with the bags under his eyes, lurking in the
background, is Fred Ullman. Fred, Miss Godwin.”
Ullman said how do you do, looked a little bored, but Bix elbowed
him farther into the background, beamed at Crystal.
“This is the most exciting moment in my life,” he said, taking her
hand. “You’re not real y his property, are you? A dish as lovely as you
wouldn’t waste herself on a half-dead numskull like him, surely?”
I unfastened their hands, took Crystal firmly by her elbow.
“Paws off,” I said. “This is the one blonde I intend to keep for
myself. Away to your own hunting-ground.” I convoyed Crystal across
the lobby into the grill-room. “Come on, let’s eat,” I continued. “And,
Fred, keep that woman-snatcher out of range.”
“Why you fellows make such a fuss about women defeats me,”
Ullman said sourily. “All my life I’ve kept away from women, and look
at me.”
“You look; I’ve seen you,” Crystal said tartly.
When we had all settled down at a corner table and had ordered a
meal, Harry Bix said, “We are gathered together here to-night, not to
be fed from any charitable reasons, but because Arsene Lupin here,”
he waved in my direction, “wishes to shoot off his mouth on the
subject of his own cleverness, and has naturally to bribe us to listen.”
Crystal tugged at my sleeve, asked me in a whisper why Bix called
me Arsene Lupin, and wasn’t Lupin French for rabbit?
I whispered back that the French for rabbit was lapin, and that
Arsene Lupin was one of the world’s greatest detectives.
She then wanted to know what that had to do with me.
“Shush, woman,” I said, annoyed. “You’re showing your
ignorance.”
“As a newspaper man I have to make sacrifices,” Ullman said
wearily. “I am prepared to eat his food and to suffer the sound of his
voice so long as he’ll explain in detail the story behind Corridan’s
arrest. That is something the great British public wish to know, and it’s
my painful duty to tell them.”
“Not in detail,” Bix pleaded. “There’re so many more interesting
things to do than to listen to details,” and he leered suggestively at
Crystal, who leered back.
I tapped him on the shoulder. “That blonde is my property,” I
reminded him. “If it wasn’t in such an inaccessible spot I’d show you
where I’ve branded her with my personal seal, so paws off and I’ll
trouble you to keep your dirty looks to yourself.”
Crystal said she liked his dirty looks, and could she have a few
more please?
“Can’t you control these two?” Ullman demanded. “I want the
story if they don’t. Why you bring a blonde to a meeting like this beats
me. Blondes are a menace to society.”
“That’s not very polite,” Crystal said, a little hurt.
Ullman eyed her coldly. “The only woman I’ve ever been polite to
was my mother,” he told her.
Crystal said she was surprised to hear he ever had a mother, and
did the old lady die of a broken heart?
“Quiet,” I said hurriedly as Ul man began to grow hot.
Bix said would it be an idea if Crystal and he went for a walk along
the hotel corridor while Ullman and I bored each other to death?
“Will you please pipe down,” I growled, thumping the table.
“Well, come on,” Ullman said impatiently. “You’ve run me ragged
these last days digging up information. How did you get on to
Corridan?”
“Suppose I tell you the set-up from the beginning?” I suggested.
“Then even Crystal, dumb as she is, will be able to follow. Ouch!”
I massaged my shin, told Crystal to behave herself, hurried on
before there were more interruptions.
“As you know, Jack Bradley, to recoup his losses, installed two
roulette tables in the Club,” I began. “There’s no future in that kind of
racket unless you have adequate protection. Bradley was smart
enough to realize that, and he looked around for a likely bird in the
police force who’d give him this protection.”
“And he picked on Corridan?” Ullman said.
“Don’t interrupt,” Crystal reproved him. “My father says that
people who interrupt . . .”
“Never mind your father now,” I broke in hastily. “Just pipe down,
honey, and let me do the talking.” I looked over at Bix. “And that’s my
knee you’re fondling under the table just in case you thought it was
Crystal’s.”
Bix snatched his hand away, had the grace to blush. He looked at
Crystal reproachful y. She giggled.
“Yes, he picked on Corridan,” I went on as Ullman began to scowl
again. “Corridan was, at that time, a rising star at the Yard, and was
handling the club rackets. Bradley offered him a big cut of his profits if
he’d tip him when a raid was likely to be made. It was easy money;
Corridan fell for it. Then George Jacobi appeared on the scene . . . .”
“How much better this’d be if it was illustrated with lantern
slides,” Bix said regretfully. “Imagine a slide depicting the arrival of
George Jacobi in a snowstorm. How gripping that’d be.”
“Especially if the slide was upside-down,” Crystal said, giggling
over the hors d’oeuvre.
“I’ll turn you upside-down and . . .” I snarled.