are T-bone steaks because you’re loaded most of the time.”
and shiny, and there was a small white circle around his tight lips. “Get the supper started,” he said.
She knew he was ready to hit her. “Sure, Eddie. I’ll get right at it. I’ll fix up something. Something you’ll like.”
“Okay, okay, stop chattering. Get with it.” He looked at Hank for an instant, then turned and walked back into the living room.
Belle rubbed her fists into her eyes, like a child fighting back tears. “He doesn’t mean half of that,” she said. “It’s just that he’s got a lot on his mind.”
“I’ll help you with supper,” Hank said. He could hear Grant moving about in the living room, his heels making a steady rhythmic sound on the pine flooring. Pacing back and forth, lighting one cigarette after the other. “I know a way to dress up those beans,” he said, watching Belle. She would crack first, he thought. “How about it?” he said. “Can I give you a hand?”
“Why, sure.” She looked at him, blinking away her tears. “It’s always easier when you’ve got someone to talk with. That’s the only reason I wanted to help with the baby.” She stood and smoothed down her skirt. “Let’s go, friend. I’m a lousy cook, but willing, so help me.”
Later, while the coffee was heating they sat down at the table for a cigarette. “What’s your son’s name?” he said.
“Tom, so he’s a Tommy, naturally.” Belle was in more cheerful spirits; the bustle and talk had restored her normal good humor. “I shouldn’t have told you about him, maybe,” she said, grinning into his eyes. “You’ll be thinking of me as an old lady in a bonnet.”
He smiled at that. “He’s on the track team, you said?”
“That’s right. Let me get you a cup of coffee, okay?”
“Fine.” When she stood up Hank glanced toward the living room, listening again to Grant’s slow, heavy footsteps...
Eight
Inspector West was playing bridge when the phone sounded in the foyer of his apartment. It was nine-thirty, a cool, lovely spring night; a breeze off the Potomac had blessed Washington with two days of surpassingly pleasant weather. The ringing phone was a reprieve for the Inspector; he was facing the formidable job of making four spades with the king and queen of trump out against him. He didn’t know where they were, he only knew they weren’t in the dummy. His wife and Tom Wilkins, a next door neighbor, sat on his left and right and he hadn’t learned anything from their expressions or first round of play. If Wilkins held the honors there was no chance of a finesse. And Wilkins would set him with relish. Tom Wilkins was a frank and pleasant chap, but bridge turned him into an irritating sort of person. The high, shrieking laugh was the worst of it. the Inspector thought.
“Excuse me,” he said, standing.
“Take your time,” Wilkins said, beginning to laugh. “And take a peek at your Blackwood while you’re away. It might help.”
The Inspector smiled as he felt a good sport would smile, and walked into the foyer to answer the phone. He was curious about the call, of course; as an FBI agent he was never off duty.
When he recognized the voice of the caller he knew immediately that this was top priority. The very top. “Yes, sir,” he said, and listened...
A few minutes later he returned to the bridge table, smiling ruefully. “Just my luck,” he said. “The indispensable man, that’s me.”
“Oh, Dave, no!” his wife said.
“What’s the matter?” Tom Wilkins asked.
“It’s work, that’s what’s the matter,” Mrs. West said, sighing with humorous resignation. She had caught her husband’s eye as he entered the room, and knew he had to leave immediately — but that he wanted to leave without any suspicious flurries or fanfare.
“We’re bringing a lot of files up to date,” the Inspector said, picking up his cards. “It’s a round-the-clock job, and when they reached my section — they planned it for Sunday night. I’m sure — they just yell for me to come in. Okay, where were we now?”
Tom Wilkins was laughing again. “Just so you don’t run out before we set you, Dave.”
“We’ll see about that,” the Inspector said.
He played carefully and deliberately, seemingly engrossed in the game. There was nothing in his manner to indicate that his thoughts were turning around a brownstone on Thirty-first Street in New York, and a baby named Jill Bradley. The nurse was gone, too. There was hope in that. A neurotic perhaps, fancying slights, unhealthily involved with the child — women like that usually turned up in a day or so, frightened silly, hysterically repentant. With the baby in perfect shape. He played a card and took the trick, controlling his impatience. Oliphant Bradley was on his way to New York with two hundred thousand dollars. The New York office would cover him from La Guardia. So far there had been no news break. That was luck — if anything about a kidnaping could be called lucky. If the story broke the chances of bargaining for the baby went down ominously.
He took another trick and grinned at Tom Wilkins’ discomfiture — but seeing him only as a red face and spectacles, an unavoidable source of delay. A hundred agents were on their way to New York now. From New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, from as far west as Chicago — specialists at this kind of work. They would be spread around the city in hotels, boardinghouses, the homes of local agents. There would be no observable increase of activity in New York headquarters, no sudden concentration of out-of-town agents. This was fundamental security. Elevator men, waitresses, cab drivers, janitors — they might talk, innocently but disastrously. “You watch, something’s breaking. I’ll bet I saw fifty new FBI guys in the building today—” and who might be listening to this? A bartender, a wife, a girlfriend — or someone involved in the kidnaping?
“Darn it, you squeaked through,” his wife said, as he took the last trick. She had held the missing honors, after all. He hoped with all his heart that this was an omen....
When Wilkins left the Inspector strode into the bedroom and began packing. It was a quick and simple task; he was an orderly, systematic man, with a physical discipline like that of a professional soldier. Everything he wanted was in its proper place; there wasn’t a second wasted searching for clothing or toilet articles. The Inspector was in his late forties, but his hair was still thick and black, and his reflexes were those of a man half his age. He was designed for function; his memory was precise, his eyes were shrewd and intelligent, and his voice, when he was angry, could cut through evasions or excuses like a whip. He was as hard to please as he was sparing of praise. But men considered it a privilege to work for him.
When he came out of the bedroom his wife was waiting for him with his hat and coat. “When will you call?” she asked him.