Эрл Гарднер - The Adventures of Paul Pry

He found a roll of bills, a penknife, cigarette lighter, cigarette case, a handkerchief, fountain pen, some small change, a leather key container well filled with keys, and a blackjack.

The blackjack, hung from a light cord under the left armpit, was worn and shiny from much carrying. It had a conventional leather thong looped around the handle so that it could circle a man’s wrists in time of necessity.

Paul Pry jerked the slungshot free and put it in his pocket. He also pocketed the roll of currency. Then he arose, took the keys and moved swiftly about the room, opening locked drawers and the cover of a roll-top desk.

It was at the back of a drawer of the desk that Paul Pry found a packet of letters tied with ribbon. He unfastened the ribbon and glanced swiftly at some of the letters.

The cursory examination showed that they were letters in a feminine handwriting, addressed to “Dearest Bunny” and signed “your own, Stella” in some instances, and “your darling red-hot mamma, Stella” in others.

Paul Pry slipped the letters into his pocket, gave a last swift glance at the figure on the floor and stepped into the bathroom. He walked across the bathroom, through the darkened bedroom, out into the corridor and down the stairs.

Stella Molay was standing in the hallway at the foot of the stairs. Her head was cocked slightly to one side, after the manner of one who is listening, momentarily expecting some noise to crash out on the stillness of the night. A noise which can well be followed by a feminine scream.

As Paul Pry crept lithely down the stairs she stared at him with wide incredulous eyes.

“Good God!” she said. “What’s happened!”

Paul Pry walked across to her and made a low bow. “Congratulations, dear,” he said. “Your honour is safe.”

He straightened to stare into the incredulous dismay of the wide blue eyes.

“Where’s Bunny?” she asked.

“Bunny?” he said.

“I mean Silver. Silver Dawson,” she corrected herself hastily. “A short man with funny teeth and a big nose.”

“Oh,” said Paul Pry, “he’s in the ballroom. Don’t you remember? The man in the devil suit standing over by the punch bowl.”

She looked at him with a sudden glint of suspicion in the blue eyes, but Paul Pry returned her stare with a look of childlike candour.

“Well,” he said, “let’s get out of here and go to the apartment.”

“Look here,” she said suspiciously, “there’s something wrong. You must have got the wrong letters.”

“What makes you think so?”

She bit her lip and then said slowly: “Just a hunch, that’s all.”

Paul Pry gently took her arm. “I’m quite sure it’s all right,” he said. “I’ve got the letters.”

She paused for a moment as though trying to think up some excuse and then reluctantly accompanied him through the door, across the porch, and down to the line of cars where Paul Pry summoned a cab that was waiting on the off chance of picking up a bit of business.

Once within the taxicab, Paul Pry switched on the dome light and took the letters from his pocket.

“You must be sure you’ve got the right letters,” she said. “Otherwise, you’ll have to go back. The letters that I wrote were — quite indiscreet.”

“Well,” said Paul Pry, pulling one of the letters from the envelope, “let’s see if this is indiscreet enough.”

He unfolded the letter while she leaned toward him to stare over his shoulder.

As her eyes saw the writing, she gave a gasp. “The damn fool,” she said, “to have saved those!”

Paul Pry, apparently heedless of the remark, read a line aloud and then broke into a chuckle. “Certainly,” he said, “that’s indiscreet enough for you.”

She snatched the letter from his hand, stared at him with blazing eyes.

“Come, sweetheart,” he said, “and give me another of those prerogatives of friendship.”

Mugs Magoo stood up as Paul Pry entered the room and gave a dramatic imitation of one who is seeing a ghost.

He swung his arm across his eyes.

“Go away!” he shouted. “Go away! Don’t hurt me! I was good to him in his lifetime! His ghost can’t haunt me! Get away, I say!”

Paul Pry dropped into a chair without bothering to remove either his topcoat or his hat. He lit a cigarette and thrust it in his smiling lips at a jaunty angle.

“What’s the matter, Mugs?” he asked.

“My God,” said Mugs, “it talks! A ghost that talks! I know it can’t be you, because you’re dead! You were killed tonight, but how is it that your ghost doesn’t have any bullet holes in its body? And it’s the first time in my life I ever saw a ghost smoke a cigarette!”

Paul Pry laughed and his hand, dropping to his trouser pocket, brought out a roll of bills. Carelessly, he tossed them to the table.

Mugs stared at the roll. “How much?” he asked.

“Oh, five or six thousand,” said Paul Pry carelessly.

“What!” Mugs exclaimed.

Paul Pry nodded.

“Where did it come from?”

“Well,” said Paul Pry, “part of it was a donation that was made to me by Bunny Myers. It was an involuntary donation and Bunny will probably not recall it when he wakes up, but it was a donation, nevertheless.”

“And the rest?” asked Mugs Magoo.

Paul Pry settled himself more comfortably in his chair.

“Do you know, Mugs,” he said, “I got the idea that possibly Tompkins didn’t trust even his own gang. He had concealed the gem where no one knew where it was. That was a funny crack he made in the note about Bunny’s nutcracker. So when Bunny Myers was making his involuntary donation to me, I examined the slungshot that he carried under his arm.

“Sure enough, there was a screw loose in it. Rather the whole handle could be unscrewed, by exerting proper pressure. Evidently, it was a slungshot that Tompkins had given to Bunny and one he intended to use in a pinch as a receptacle for something that was too hot for him to handle.

“When I unscrewed it, I found the Legget diamond, and a very affable gentleman by the name of Mr. Edgar Patten, an adjuster for the insurance company that handled the insurance on the gem, was good enough to insist that I take a slight reward for my services when I returned the stone to him.”

Mugs Magoo pursed his lips and gave a low whistle. “Just a fool for luck!” he exclaimed. “You sure picked two of the toughest nuts in the game, and you’re still alive! It ain’t right!”

Paul Pry chuckled softly. “Tough nuts to crack all right, Mugs,” he mused, “but, with the aid of Bunny’s nutcracker, I managed all right.”

Millionaires were that hunter’s only game, and when he’d bagged them he sewed their lips up tight for he knew that even dead men sometimes talk. But Paul Pry, professional opportunist, was a tailor of sorts himself, with a needle as sharp and deadly as the cross-stitch killer’s — an avenging sword cane to darn living flesh!

Paul Pry polished the razor-keen blade of his sword cane with the same attentive care a stone polisher might take in putting just the right lustre upon a fine piece of onyx.

“Mugs” Magoo sat slumped in a big overstuffed chair in the corner. He held a whiskey glass in his left hand. His right arm was off at the shoulder.

Eva Bentley sat in a small, glass-enclosed booth and listened to a radio which was tuned in on the wavelength of the police broadcasting station. From time to time she took swift notes in competent shorthand, occasionally rattled out a few paragraphs on a portable typewriter which was on a desk at her elbow.

Mugs Magoo rolled his glassy eyes in the direction of Paul Pry. “Some day,” he said, “some crook is going to grab the blade of that sword cane and bust it in two. Why don’t you pack a big gun and forget that sword cane business? The blade ain’t big enough to cut off a plug of chewing tobacco.”