Rovere, with considerable difficulty, managed to collect the sum required without attracting the attention of the press. Police work on the case was discreet and good. After the necessary seven days were up, the F.B.I, was called in. No word had been received from the kidnapers. After staff conferences, it was decided to substitute money that could be identified. A half million in brand new tens, twenties and fifties was secured in exchange for the money Rovere had accumulated. The bills were mechanically and manually aged, shuffled so as to destroy the sequence, then repackaged. It was thought that with such a large amount, it was unlikely that the kidnapers would discover the serial sequence of the bills. The money filled two good-sized suitcases.
Ten days after the kidnaping a letter came to Rovere’s office. It had been mailed in Dallas. It was impossible to trace the paper or the envelope. It detailed a plan for transfer of the money that was so clever and so foolproof that it was never leaked to the press. It promised that, after the money was inspected, the boys would be released in a major city. The frustrated police had to permit the transfer of the money. It proceeded without incident, twelve days after the kidnaping. The three tables of serial sequence had been quietly distributed to all banks. Two weeks passed and the boys were not released.
The bodies of the two boys were found a mile from the town of Vanderpool, a little over twenty miles from Rovere’s summer place. Both children had been killed by a blow that broke the skull, and they had been placed in a shallow arroyo and carelessly covered with sand and rock. Wind had blown the sand and uncovered the feet of one of the children, and an Angora goat herder had discovered the cairn. It was then that the crime exploded in the papers, complete with all known details except the serial sequence of the money.
The money began to turn up in the banks of Youngstown, Ohio. It was traced to a young man who drove a pickup with Pennsylvania plates. He had rented a small farmhouse near Orangeville, just over the Pennsylvania line. The farmhouse was surrounded, and there was a gun battle during which one officer was seriously wounded and the three occupants of the farmhouse were slain: a young man, an older man, and a young woman. They all had police records. The young man and the young woman were known drug addicts. A single suitcase containing just over a hundred and sixty-five thousand dollars was brought back to headquarters in Youngstown.
There were conflicting stories about whether or not there had been another suitcase, and, if so, what had happened to it. The story of the serial numbers appeared in the newspapers and over radio and on television. State, county, and city police had co-operated with federal officers in the operation. There were intensive inquiries. The other suitcase, if indeed there had been one, was not traced. Some believed there had been at least one and maybe two other principals involved, and that the group had split up. Others thought a cop had grabbed the rest of the money. If others were involved, they would have learned they could not spend the money.
Paul Verney had not been thinking of that money when he was contacted by a man named Roger Dixon. He had known Dixon in law school, had known him quite well in fact, but had lost touch with him after graduation. Dixon had gone into criminal law in Detroit and had been very successful until, in 1949, he was tried and convicted of bribery of a city official, fined, given a suspended sentence and disbarred. Verney had read of the incident and was astonished at Dixon’s carelessness.
It was about two months after Catton’s heart attack that Paul Verney returned one evening from his office to the private club where he lived and found Roger Dixon waiting for him. Dixon looked prosperous, confident and sleek. He came up to Verney’s room to talk to him.
Verney’s room was sedate, old-fashioned and comfortable. Verney fixed him a Scotch. “Old Paul,” Dixon said. “You look just like I imagined you’d look. You’ve fulfilled your early promise. I used to think you must have been born looking like a self-satisfied bachelor. What ever happened to Melissa?”
“We were married. She had a breakdown six years ago. A very tragic and unexpected thing, Roger. She’s in an institution down-state. The boy is away at school. He’s fifteen.”
Verney had expected the usual expression of sympathy. Instead, Dixon grinned at him, a bright malicious grin. “And you love every minute of it, don’t you?”
“Exactly what are you trying to say?”
“Just that I know you pretty well. Skip it.”
“You’re looking very prosperous, Roger.”
“You know about my little difficulty. I can see you do. And you’re disappointed not to find me on a corner with a tin cup and pencils.”
“I’m glad you’re getting along.”
Dixon smiled in a mocking, unpleasant way. “I’ll bet you are. Good old Paul. Wants the best for everybody. Don’t try to kid me. You don’t care and never have cared what happened to anybody else in the world. I roomed with you, Paul. Maybe nobody else ever got behind that facade, but I did. I don’t know what it was that twisted you. It must have happened real early. Because by the time we met, you were solidified.”
“I don’t have to listen to this.”
“But you will, Paul. You will, because I know you’re in a hell of a jam and you just squeaked out from under an indictment for fraud, and you have the correct impression that I’ve come here with some kind of an offer where you can make money. So you just let me tell you what you wouldn’t listen to a lot of years ago.”
“You were always emotional.”
“But you weren’t, Paul. Emotions were left out of you. I watched you go after everything you wanted. Cold as a machine. No mercy, no scruples, and no ethics.”
“The disbarred attorney gives a lecture on ethics.”
“I mean ethics in human relationships. When anything or anybody got in your way, you bulldozed the obstacle aside. I’ve never seen such cold-hearted, cold-blooded, frightening ambition. You didn’t make one friend. I was the poor, warm, stupid slob who tried to be your friend. I even tried to understand you and find out what made you what you were and what you are.”
“Shouldn’t you be accompanied by violins?”
“I should have caught on quicker. Absolute greed plus perfect selfishness plus a ruthless and methodical intelligence. I should have caught on and stayed away from you. Then you wouldn’t have gotten the idea of marrying Melissa. The only reason you wanted her was because I wanted her.”
“She made the choice.”
“On insufficient data. I’ve kept track of you, Paul. You were getting money and power just as fast as I expected you to. Maybe a little faster. And then you got clobbered. You tripped up and you went down like a horse on ice. I got pleasantly drunk the night I heard about that, Paul. It was a celebration. I bought drinks for strangers, and I made them all drink to my toast. Here’s to the utter ruin of Paul Verney, the blackest-hearted bastard of them all.”
“You’re still emotional, Roger. You mentioned my methodical intelligence. It causes me to ask a question. You seem to... disapprove of me. And you hint of some offer that will bring me a profit. Thus the offer is suspect, isn’t it?”
“The direct mind at work. I’m an agent in this matter. When you hear the whole story, you’ll see why you’re the logical one to come to. You have larceny in your soul, but you’ve stayed relatively clean. You are desperate, and you’ve got guts. I’ll never deny you that. This is going to take careful planning on your part, and you’re capable of that. You can make a couple of hundred thousand tax-free dollars. I make a commission and please my boss. I’d foul you up if I could see a way to do it, but I can’t think of a way. You’re ideal for this proposition.”
Verney folded his pale, powerful hands. “I am listening.”