“No, no, no.”
“Just relax, we’ll get it.” Crowley was smiling easily, but he felt like shaking her. “Let’s work on the cards a little more. Joker or Thirty Days — that’s poker slang for three tens. How about Full House, Royal Flush, Deuce—”
“Deuce, deuce! That’s it,” she cried in a high, excited voice. “That’s it exactly.”
“Deuce? You’re sure.”
“No—” She gave a little moan. “It’s not Deuce. But that’s close, so close — Duke! It was Duke! I’m certain of it. His father nicknamed him Duke. He told Kitty that.”
Crowley glanced down at the black metal box from which he had lifted the single fingerprint. “Duke,” he said softly.
“It was silly of me to forget it,” Mrs. Jarrod said.
“You did fine,” Crowley said, reaching for the mike to flash Inspector West...
Shortly after eleven o’clock that same morning a florist’s station wagon pulled up and stopped in front of St. John’s Church on Thirty-second Street. A man wearing a visored cap and a smart green twill uniform climbed out, checked through a sheaf of bills, then took two long boxes from the rear of the car and walked briskly into the vestibule of the church. He returned in less than thirty seconds, hopped into the car and drove off. It was a commonplace occurrence, a millionth part of the city’s daily logistical problem; flowers for a baptism or wedding, a floral piece for the altar — the most alert observer could hardly suspect anything else.
The flower boxes had been placed on a table in the baptistery, and standing beside them now (and trying not to stare at them) was the church’s pastor, a tall, middle-aged man with strong features and deep, thoughtful eyes. He checked his wrist watch every few seconds, and occasionally cleared his throat and patted his forehead with a handkerchief. The baptistery door opened a few minutes later, and a young man in a business suit came in and smiled at the priest.
“My name is Nelson, Father.”
“Yes — I was expecting you. Your office called.”
The young man showed him an identification card with his picture on it, and the priest studied the photograph carefully. “Yes, yes, of course,” he said at last. “Is there anything else I can do? Any way I can be of help?”
“No, everything is all set.” The agent was a generation younger than the priest, and possibly many generations less wise, but he had a veteran’s confidence about him that put the older man at ease.
“The stairs are just there,” the priest said, nodding at a closed door. “I’ll see that no one else goes up.”
“Perfect.” The young man raised the lid of one of the flower-boxes and checked the equipment inside: his alert eyes moved over the reels of film, the camera, the foot-long telescopic lenses... “I’ll get busy then,” he said. “Thanks again. Father.”
Shortly after this an old but rakish convertible pulled up before the brownstone building where Crowley’s uncle lived. The driver, a tanned, crewcut young man in slacks, grinned at two small boys who were staring at his car. “She’ll do sixty-five in second,” he said.
“Yeah?” The boys sounded skeptical.
“Yeah. It’s got a special carburetor and a high compression head.”
Still grinning at them, he lifted a bag of golf bags from the back seat, and then went around to the trunk and removed two tennis rackets and a sagging leather suitcase. His manner was brisk and cheerfuclass="underline" he was whistling as he locked the car, apparently a healthy young animal with nothing on his mind but the latest popular songs and the price of tennis balls.
“You fix up your car yourself?” one of the boys asked him.
“Sure. That’s the only way to be sure of what’s under the hood. Take it easy.”
As he trotted up the steps the two boys stared after him, not speaking, hardly breathing, caught in the sudden intense thrall of hero-worship.
Inside the house the young man showed Crowley’s uncle his identification card, and then said, “I’ll go up and get things ready now.”
“Can I help you with your grip?”
“No. I can manage. Thanks anyway...”
Crowley was frowning at his watch, following the steady inevitable sweep of the second hand with his eyes. He stood facing the windows in the Bradleys’ living room, and he held the Venetian blind cords in his right hand.
“How much longer?” Dick Bradley said.
“Two more minutes.”
Bradley lit a cigarette quickly, his movements a little flurry of nerves and tension. “They’ll be outside, that’s what I can’t take,” he said. “They’ll come right to the house and look to see if the blinds are closed. And we sit here and can’t do one damn thing about it.”
“We’ve just got to sit tight,” Crowley said. He knew the cameras were turning by now, covering the Bradleys’ house, and the sidewalks and doorways and windows on both sides of the street. There were dozens of agents scattered through the neighborhood, in trucks and cabs, strolling through the block on carefully arranged time schedules. It was highly unlikely that any known criminal could walk through the area without being spotted. They wouldn’t be picked up, of course, but they’d be put under close, thorough surveillance.
“How much longer must we wait?” Ellie Bradley said. She sat on the edge of the sofa with her arms crossed over her breasts.
“One minute more,” Crowley said, looking at her. She had come down only a few minutes before, and so far had said very little to her husband. They were a million miles apart, Crowley thought. This crisis had marked the enormous gulf between their temperaments and backgrounds. They had drifted along without realizing this, lulled into a facsimile of unity by the variety of casual interests they shared; under ordinary circumstances the fact that they hardly knew each other might never have disturbed their placid and privileged existence. But now they were strangers; the pressure of the past day and night had driven them apart.
He felt sorry for them. It would help if they could help one another, but they had nothing to give, nothing to receive.
Ellie was looking at her husband, who was pacing up and down before the fireplace. She was very pale, and the strain and fear in her face was pitifully evident. “You took your father to a hotel?” she asked him.
“Yes, yes — it seemed better.”
“How is he feeling?”
Dick Bradley said a very smart thing then, probably the smartest thing he had ever said in his life. “I don’t know,” he said. “I didn’t ask him.” In a guileful man it would have been a guileful remark. But he had no guile. She knew that much about him.
“Sit here beside me,” she said. “Please.”
“Yes — certainly.”
They sat close to each other and he put an arm tentatively and awkwardly about her shoulders. “It’s going to be all right, honey,” he said. “I feel sure of it.”
“You — may be right.” She was looking down at her hands. “You’ve always had lucky hunches, haven’t you?”
“Yes, I have at that. But this is more than a hunch.”
Crowley glanced at his watch. “Twelve o’clock,” he said quietly, and pulled the cord that closed the blinds on the middle window. Take a good look at it, he thought with cold anger. Look hard. And maybe we’ll be looking at you...
Standing behind his heavily curtained windows, Creasy had been watching for the sign from the Bradleys since ten o’clock that morning. He had enjoyed the vigil; it was strangely exciting to watch the house, and speculate on the anguish growing behind those handsome walls. There was the street to study also; he didn’t let pleasure distract him from duty. His small, glinting eyes were alert for strange faces, suspicious behavior, out-of-the-ordinary circumstances. He watched each car and truck that stopped within his range of vision, scanned all passengers stepping out of taxis, every person strolling along the sidewalks. He had a flair for the police; they couldn’t hide from him.