“She wasn’t with me. I was alone in the hotel.”
“Where was she?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’re sure she isn’t going back with you?”
“No, of course not.”
“How do I know she isn’t? After she’s spent half the night...”
“Good heavens, hon, she looks on me as an old, old man. These girls in the early twenties think a man of forty is a doddering old relic.”
“Some of them do, but the girls that are on the make go for anything that wears pants. And where do you get the idea she’s in the early twenties? She looks thirty to me.”
“You can’t tell from a newspaper picture. She...”
“Oh, so you think she’s more beautiful than the picture then, do you?”
Gibbs said, “To tell you the truth, hon, I was awfully sleepy. I didn’t pay much attention to her. I slid down against the back of the seat and slept most of the way in. She wanted to drive.”
“What did you two talk about?”
“We didn’t talk. Now I’ve got to get out of here and catch that train back to Santa Delbarra. Don’t be foolish. After all, I’m working for a living.”
His wife stood in the doorway, looking after him dubiously as he walked down to the corner where he waited for a street-car. Gibbs turned to wave to her. She didn’t return his wave, simply went back into the house.
Gibbs sighed, conscious that she was standing behind the lace curtains of the living-room window, looking at him. She was driving him crazy. He’d almost put his foot in it by saying Nita Moline was in the early twenties. She was getting worse all the time, wanting to know where he’d been, what he’d been doing, what time he did this, what time he did that. Of course, she was lonesome, staying there by herself. She’d trapped him into telling her about that gap in time after he met Nita Moline and before he started for Los Angeles. He hadn’t intended to let her know anything about the interval between midnight and three o’clock. She’d have more questions to ask him by the time he got back. And she’d have long hours to brood. The more you tried to humor her and kid her along, the worse she got. Gibbs was a man who hated friction. If he had anything to say, he said it and got it off his chest. That nagging left him all churned up inside. He couldn’t put up with it much longer. And he didn’t want her asking too many questions about what had transpired between midnight and three o’clock. It would be dangerous to have her start brooding over that. No telling what she’d do, once she got one of those jealous ideas in her head.
Chapter 12
Jack Elwell and Ned Fielding returned to their office shortly after two-thirty. The aroma of fragrant cigars trailed along behind them. Elwell’s waistcoat was stretched taut. His face held a placid expression of well-fed satisfaction. Ned Fielding seemed thoughtful, but he couldn’t keep the triumph out of his eyes. Younger than Elwell, broad shouldered, and not as yet putting on weight, he wore his double-breasted suit with an air of distinction. He lacked Elwell’s quick decision, was definitely more cautious, but he knew how to use his magnetic personality. That, and his even, regular profile were responsible for the names of many feminine investors which appeared on the books of Elwell & Fielding.
Martha Gayman looked up as they came in.
“Any telephone calls?” Elwell asked.
“Mr. Hazlit of Hazlit & Tucker wants you to call.”
Elwell grinned at his partner. “Anything else?”
“No, sir, that’s all. Shall I get Mr. Hazlit?”
“Not right away,” Elwell said. “He’s going to be disagreeable. I’ll finish my cigar first.”
“What shall I say if he calls again?”
“Tell him we’re still out.”
“Yes, sir.”
She looked up at them with wide bluish-green eyes in which there was not the slightest trace of expression. She seemed like some human automaton who, as Elwell had said, knew just enough to do the filing, to take down what was said in short-hand, and pound it out afterwards on the typewriter. She was not bad-looking, yet her features were too heavy to be beautiful. Her attempt to keep up her personal appearance was hampered by poor judgment and a limited budget. She did her hair herself. In place of buying a few clothes of better quality at the end of the season, she tried to keep abreast of the very latest styles. Her limited salary necessitated clothes which were cheap copies of the things she should have been wearing.
Elwell regarded her as an office fixture, very much the same as the typewriter, the adding machine, or the office safe. She was, of course, animate, but, so far as Elwell was concerned, hardly human.
Fielding never discussed her with his partner — not after that night when Fielding had some dictation to do before catching a train, and had asked her to stay down and help him get caught up. They had gone to dinner together, and had re-turned to the office. Fielding’s train had left at midnight.
Elwell led the way into the private office, closed the door carefully behind him, took from his pocket the signed type-written document and dropped it on his desk. Then he said slowly and impressively, “Two... hundred... and... fifty... thousand... dollars... net... profit!”
The two men reached across the desk and shook hands.
“Suppose Hazlit finds out about that letter having gone out on Saturday?” Fielding asked in a low voice which was hardly above a whisper.
Elwell said, “What the hell do we care? We never received any letter. If it had been mailed on Saturday, we would have received it this morning.” He closed one eye and said, rather loudly, “I know damn well there wasn’t any letter in the mail because I made it a point to ask Martha about it.”
There was a pad of paper on the desk. Fielding pulled it toward him and scribbled a message to his partner. It read, “Be careful what you say. There’s a lot involved in this deal, and they may have a dictograph planted somewhere in the office.”
Elwell read the message, nodded. Fielding struck a match to the corner of the paper, waited until it had burnt off all of the part which had any writing on it before he dropped the remaining corner into the ash tray.
Elwell said, “Hazlit will want to talk with Martha. I think it’s best that he should. We’d better talk with her before he does. Just explain to her that she isn’t to get rattled or confused because someone asks questions, but simply to keep her head and tell the truth.”
Fielding nodded.
“Want to get her in here now?” Elwell asked.
Fielding said, “I think you’d better do that yourself, Jack. Two of us talking with her might confuse her.”
Elwell flashed his partner a quick glance, said, “Okay, Ned.”
“I’m going out and get a haircut,” Fielding said. “You talk with her.”
Elwell said, “It won’t take long. Thank heavens all she has to do is tell the truth. She’s too dumb to lie. That’s going to be a big help.”
“She isn’t so dumb,” Fielding said. “She does good work. You don’t ever catch any errors in her letters.”
“Oh, she’s all right in a way,” Elwell said. “Sometimes she gets on my nerves, looking at me with that ox-like expression on her face. Now that we’ve put this deal across, we can get better offices — really fix them up, and get a secretary that really amounts to something. Martha’s a good enough stenographer, but we need a real secretary. I don’t know about you, Ned, but it irritates me to have a stupid woman around.”
“She isn’t stupid,” Fielding said. “She’s just average.”
“To men like you and me,” Elwell pointed out, “being aver-age is being stupid. Well, I’ll get her in here, and explain things to her. Gosh, Ned, think of it. Thirty days ago we were thinking we’d be sitting on easy street if Addison Stearne only took up that option and we unloaded for a hundred thousand. Now, we’re getting two hundred and fifty thousand above the price we paid.”