James Chase: Fast Buck

He drank the whisky greedily, drained the glass and immediately refilled it. His heavy, bloodshot eyes moved to the mirror over the dressing-table, and he stared at himself.

Well, at least he looked as strong, handsome and ruthless as he had ten years ago when he was at the height of his career. Of course his hair was grey at the temples now, and he was getting a little thick around the middle, but his figure wasn’t bad for a man of his age. What was he thinking of? Age? Why, damn it, he wasn’t fifty-six yet! But at this moment he felt like an old, feeble man instead of a man in his prime. There was this dull ache under his heart. That worried him. He was afraid to consult a doctor: no news was good news. If his heart was bad, he didn’t want to know it. Probably indigestion, he told himself, his hand touching the smooth face of his evening dress shirt.

He took out a cigar-case from his inside pocket, hesitated, then put it back. Perhaps not just now. He was smoking too much. He would wait until Eve came out of the bathroom. What an interminable time she spent in the bath!

He sat down amid the confusion of her clothes. She had thrown them off, leaving them scattered on the bed and floor, saying she wanted to think, and she thought best in a bath. A beautiful woman like her had no right to think!

He picked up the sheer silk stockings and pulled them slowly through his fingers, thinking of Eve.

He had known her for two months. At first, he had thought of her merely as a woman to amuse him in his leisure moments. He had got rid of that dark girl — he had to think a moment to remember her name

– Cora Hennessey.

Eve had moved into the apartment five days later. He was glad to be rid of Cora. She had demanded so much of him. He supposed she was too young for him, and he frowned uneasily at finding himself admitting such a thing. But how she had tired him! A week of her, and his nights became something to dread. There had been no satisfying her.

She hadn’t been easy to get rid of, and it cost him much more than he could afford. She had gone eventually, taking his gold and diamond cuff-links, his cigar cutter, and the little jade statue of a naked boy he had bought in a San Francisco brothel, an amusingly obscene bit of carving, and which he valued. He wanted these things back, but it would mean going to the police, and just now he was particularly anxious not to attract the attention of the police.

His mind shied away from this unpleasant channel, and he began to worry about Eve. What an extraordinary girl! How completely mistaken he had been about her! He had imagined she was an empty-headed little beauty whose only asset was her body. For the first six weeks he had no reason to believe otherwise. Then suddenly he realised she had been lulling him into a position of false security while she had been digging into his private affairs. Her apparently innocent questions about his past and present mode of life hadn’t been, as he had thought, the idle chatter of an empty-headed blonde. She had been building up a picture of him until she knew him almost as well as he knew himself. She had managed to find out about his financial position. How she had got the information he couldn’t imagine.

He supposed a girl with her looks could find out anything if she made the effort. Someone must have talked: someone possibly at his bank.

She had surprised him horribly one night by saying in her quiet, cool voice, ‘What’s the matter with you, Preston? Why are you drifting like this? You could be making piles of money instead of loafing here with me. Have you lost your ambition, or what is it?’

Startled, he had told her abruptly he had no need to work.

‘I have all the money I want,’ he had said sharply. ‘I’ve retired from business. Besides, so long as I give you what you want, I really can’t see it’s any business of yours what I do.’

But that hadn’t touched her. She had gone right on confounding him.

‘Why do you lie to me?’ she had asked; her big blue eyes seemed able to see right inside his mind.

‘You don’t have to pretend with me. I want to help you.’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he said irritably. ‘I don’t need anyone’s help.’

‘You’re broke,’ she said calmly, and put her hand on his. ‘Already the tradesmen are talking about you. You owe thousands. Whatever money you did have, you’ve spent. Isn’t it time you did something about it?’

He had been so shocked that he had said nothing for some moments. True, he had immediately begun to bluster, but the expression in her eyes told him she was sure of her ground, and the bluster died sourly in his mouth. Instead, he tried to defend himself, though why he should make excuses to her he couldn’t imagine. After all, it was no business of hers. He could have told her to pack up and get out if she didn’t like him as she found him. But deep down, tucked away in his innermost being, Kile was afraid. He knew he was slipping. He knew unless a miracle happened, the slip would turn into a slide, and he would go down and down to the final crash where a revolver bullet would be his only way out.

There was something about this girl — not yet twenty-five, very beautiful to look at, detached and quietly determined — that gave him a sudden feeling of hope: something he hadn’t had for the past two years: not since they had told him to get out of the Stock Market or they’d prosecute.

He told her he hadn’t been feeling wel .

‘It’s not that I’m a young man,’ he said lamely. ‘Perhaps I’ve lived too hard. I’m burned out, Eve. Not for long, but right now, I’m tired and disillusioned. In a little while I’l begin again. I just want to rest.’

He could see at once she didn’t believe him, although she gave him a sympathetic smile.

‘I think I can help you,’ she said. ‘Something I happened to overhear…’

That was how he had been committed to this Rajah business. At first he had thought she was joking.

‘My dear girl,’ he had said, pat ing her long, sleek leg as she lay across his lap, her head against his shoulder, ‘I’ve never heard of such a thing. It’s fantastic, and there’s nothing I could possibly do about it. Even if I could, I don’t think I’d care to dabble in such a venture. It’s quite out of the question.

Besides, this Rajah wouldn’t want me to interfere.’

‘He might,’ she had said thoughtful y. ‘I think I’l ask him.’

Kile didn’t believe for a moment she would approach the Rajah. He had dismissed the whole thing from his mind, and he was startled when she told him a few days later that the Rajah would see them at his hotel that evening.

Immediately he had refused to go, but she had persuaded him.

‘At least let’s hear what he has to say,’ she had said, her face against his, holding his hand over her breast. ‘He may not agree. He may not offer enough. Even if he does agree and offers something reasonable, we don’t have to go through with it if we don’t want to. We can always say it wasn’t possible.’

Reassured by this argument, and a little flattered to be received by a Rajah, Preston allowed himself to be persuaded. The meeting had turned out far easier than he had expected.

It was pretty obvious that Eve had already laid a solid foundation for the interview. The Rajah said he would be delighted if they could help him recover the jewels. They were, he said, heirlooms of the utmost value. If they found them and returned them to him he would pay the sum of half a million dollars and their expenses; the only condition being the deal must be secret.

Kile realised the Rajah was out to gyp the insurance companies, but that didn’t worry him unduly. If he had the chance he wouldn’t hesitate to gyp any insurance company himself. He considered them fair game. But five hundred thousand! Why, with such a sum he could make a new start; he could even get back on to the Stock Market.