“Didn’t you get enough out of him?” sneered Johnny. “Mink coats, jewelry, this apartment — the money you gave Harry Flanagan.”
She was sensitive about the name Flanagan, wincing again when Johnny tossed it at her.
“Leave Flanagan’s name out of this,” she said. She became suddenly vicious again, “and you can tell that old goat that the price is going up. Tomorrow it’ll cost seventy-five thousand.”
“Tomorrow,” said Johnny, “you can eat that small change. And the limping goose bank, too. Although I suggest you use some salt and pepper on it. I imagine your stomach is pretty tough, but the bank is made of bronze and it may be a little hard for even you to digest.”
“Get the hell out of here!” cried Alice Cummings.
“Baby,” said Johnny, “I’m going.”
He opened the door and went toward the elevator. She ran after him.
“Wait!” she called.
Johnny punched the button for the elevator.
“A rivederci! Auf wiedersehen — good-bye.”
The elevator door opened.
“Forty thousand. Tell Mr. Carmichael I’ll take forty thousand...”
Johnny grinned nastily and pushed the “down” button.
On the first floor he walked through the lobby, winking at the switchboard operator. Outside the apartment house, Kilkenny stood by the door. And at the curb was the Lucky Clover taxicab, with Harry Flanagan standing by the door.
“All right, Fletcher,” Flanagan sang out. “I’m through monkeying around with you.”
Kilkenny closed in from the side. “Now, you and me are going to have this out!” he snarled.
Johnny danced aside. “Do you boys know each other? You’re both being played for suckers by Alice Cummings.”
Flanagan and Kilkenny had apparently never met before. Both looked at each other with hostile eyes.
“Who’re you?” barked Flanagan.
“Punk!” sneered Kilkenny.
“Good-bye, now,” called out Johnny. He turned and ran swiftly down the street. Both Flanagan and Kilkenny made as if to take after him, but each was suspicious of the other. When he reached the corner, Johnny stopped and looked back.
Flanagan and Kilkenny were facing each other, both gesticulating angrily.
21
Sam Cragg was free, but he was thirty-five miles from New York City, without a nickel in his pocket. And the Law was after him. He ran from the rear of the jail to a street and he walked swiftly down the street and then ran through another alley. It wouldn’t be long before the police would be after him. The old tramp would yell the moment he thought Sam was clear of jail and not likely to return.
They’d be after him. He walked swiftly up another street, cut through a third alley and saw railroad tracks. This was safer than the highway, he thought. A train.
Of course he had no money, but Johnny and he had ridden the rods in the days of old. A freight train was all Sam needed.
A long platform was ahead of him. There were two or three people waiting for a train. Sam went up to one of the men. “When does the next freight train go through here?” he asked politely.
“Freight train? I don’t think I’ve ever seen a freight train on this line.”
“All railroads have freight trains,” insisted Sam. “How else would they move their freight?”
“Search me. All I know is that there’s my train coming right now.”
A train, pulled by an electric engine, rolled smoothly into the depot. The few passengers on the platform began to board it. Sam looked around him, caught sight of a blue uniform at the far end of the platform. He sprang for the steps of a car, scrambled in.
The train began to move. Sam went in and found a seat. The conductor entered the front of the car, scanned the tickets of the passengers, stuck into the metal wedges beside the windows. He took a ticket from a new passenger, came down to Sam.
“Ticket?”
“Huh? Uh, didn’t you get my ticket at the last station?”
“I don’t believe so,” said the conductor. “I’d have left the slip there.” The conductor indicated the ticket wedge by Sam’s window. It was empty.
“I was sure I gave it to you,” grumbled Sam.
“I’m sorry, you didn’t.”
Sam began to search his pockets. Deliberately he explored his coat pockets, then stood up and went through his trousers pockets. The conductor waited patiently.
“I know I bought a ticket,” Sam insisted.
“You may find it later.”
“Yeah, sure — I’ll give it to you later. When I find it”
“I’m afraid I’ll have to have it now. Or the price.”
“How much is it?”
“To Grand Central? A dollar ten.”
“Okay, I’ll pay.” Sam thrust his hand into his trousers pocket, showed exaggerated alarm. “Holy smoke!” Quickly he reached into his breast pocket. “My wallet!” He snapped his fingers. “I left it at home on the piano.”
“You have no money then,” said the conductor, “and no ticket.”
“Tell you what buddy,” Sam suggested, “I’ll pay you tomorrow.”
The conductor had played the game all the way. But he was an old hand at this sort of thing. He said nastily, “You’ll get off at the next station.”
“I can’t,” cried Sam. “I’ve got to get to New York. It’s... it’s important.”
“You’ll get off,” snapped the conductor, “or I’ll kick you off.”
“You and who else?” challenged Sam.
The train was already slackening speed for the next stop. The conductor pointed to the door. “Out!”
“I asked you, who’s going to make me?”
“I’ll call a policeman,” the conductor said. “It’s against the law to try to swindle the railroad out of a fare.”
The word “policeman” was enough for Sam. He got up meekly and went into the vestibule. When the train stopped he stepped off to the platform. The conductor swung out and kept his eye on Sam until the train was moving again.
Five miles. Perhaps six. He could wait for the next train and try the same routine and advance himself another five or six miles. In seven or eight tries, he would be in New York. But it was the slack time of the day and the trains did not run too frequently. Sam waited on the platform for fifteen minutes, then left it — suddenly.
A policeman had appeared out of nowhere. There were always policemen around railroad stations.
Sam gave up the idea of riding into Manhattan by train. He walked through a little village and found himself upon a winding macadam road. A grocery delivery truck came along and Sam gave it the old thumb. The truck stopped.
“What’s the matter?” the driver asked.
“I want a ride.”
The man grinned. “Okay, I’ll give you a lift — as far as I go.”
Sam got in and the grocery truck drove all of a hundred yards and stopped before a house. “This is as far as I go. I deliver these groceries, then go back to the store.”
Sam got out of the truck. “Thanks,” he said curtly and started walking again. He walked a mile. The road wound to the right, to the left, went up a small hill and down into a small valley. It was a back road.
Ahead, there was a crossing. Sam quickened his steps when he saw the road markers. When he came up, he read: “Peekskill, 3 Miles.”
He cried out in chagrin. The winding road had led him back ward Peekskill. Almost half of the distance he had made on the train was lost. He sought the sign on the cross road and found a marker: “White Plains, 22 Miles.” That was no good. He had been in White Plains before and if he remembered correctly, White Plains was at least twenty miles from Manhattan.