Джеймс Чейз - There’s Always A Price Tag

‘Leave it on the table. I’ll tell him.’ I lit my cigarette and looked thoughtfully at Hammerstock. ‘You know it suddenly occurs to me that Mr. Dester might not like you coming here. Some of these big shots get mad at the drop of a hat. I take it you are still interested in keeping his account, or maybe you’re not?’

Hammerstock’s eyes grew round; before he could say anything, I went on, ‘The idea behind this new scheme on which he is working is to open up television studios right here in Hollywood. Between you and me, and it’s not to go further, a powerful combine, of which Mr. Dester is to be the chief in charge of production, is buying up one of the major film companies and taking over their studios. The deal’s about ready to go through and when it does, Mr. Dester will be entertaining on a far more elaborate scale than before. His account will be pretty big for the firm who supplies him with liquor.’

Hammerstock gulped.

‘Why, I didn’t know.’ He began to put the account in his pocket, but I reached out and took it from him.

‘I may as well settle this right away,’ I said. ‘It’s not big. I guess I can let you have it in cash.’

If he took the money I was sunk, but I have had enough experience of human nature to know it was unlikely.

His eyes nearly fell out of his head when I pulled out my roll of money: it looked big enough to choke a horse with. He grabbed back the account and said he was happy to wait. He hadn’t known the position. There had been so many rumours flying around. He saw now he had no business to have come out here. He had been out of line listening to rumours. He was only too pleased to allow Mr. Dester what credit he liked. He would take it as a personal favour if I didn’t mention to Mr. Dester he had called. He hoped that this little incident wouldn’t prejudice me against the firm.

He would have gone on and on if I hadn’t firmly eased him out of the room, into the hall to the front door.

I said I wouldn’t mention his call to Mr. Dester, but I would ask him to draw a cheque so the account could be settled. Hammerstock said he wouldn’t hear of it. I was not to say anything about the account. Mr. Dester could settle it in his own time.

When I closed the door after him, I leaned against it and laughed. I was still laughing when Helen came to the head of the stairs and stared down at me.

Helen came down the stairs, her eyes bright and a half smile on her lips. She moved across the hall to me.

‘So you were successful. I thought I had better leave him to you as you were so confident.’

‘Did you hear him beg me not to send him a cheque?’

‘The others may not be so easy.’

‘I’ll handle them. Come into the lounge. There’s still things to do.’

As she walked with me to the lounge, she asked. ‘Did you get the money?’

‘I’ve raised five thousand six hundred. It’s not as much as I want, but with any luck, it’ll do.’

I went over to the liquor cabinet and made two drinks, then I sat down opposite her.

‘How far do you trust your nerve?’ I asked.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Look, what we are planning to do will need pretty good nerves. Sooner or later we will have to take him out of the freezer and plant him somewhere. I won’t be able to do that on my own. You will have to help me. It’s not going to be easy. When his body is found and the murder hunt is on, the first person the police will suspect will be you. They’ll suspect you because you come into the insurance money. You may come in for some tough questioning. Some smart dick may try to jump a surprise on you. If you keep your nerve you will be all right. We’re going to fix this so that they will be convinced you couldn’t have killed him although you had the motive. But while they are being convinced, you may have a rough time.’

‘My nerve is all right,’ she said quietly. ‘You don’t have to worry about me.’

‘I guess that’s right, but you may as well know what’s ahead of us. We may get into a jam that looks bad. I’m not saying we will but we may. That’s the time when a steady nerve pays dividends. If we get in a panic, lose our heads, we might easily throw our hands in before we need to. You mustn’t forget we can go to the limit because if things go wrong we have always the letter to keep us out of real trouble.’

She looked at me, her green eyes searching.

‘Is your nerve so very good?’

‘I can stand up to anything with three-quarters of a million as an incentive. What we’ve got to keep clear in our minds is that we haven’t killed him. At the worst, we can get ten years in jail for fraud. If we remember that they can’t panic us. Okay. Now we’ve got to take care of the next step. Is there anyone who will want to know where Dester is? Has he any friends?’

‘No. At one time, of course, there were always people here, but when he began to drink, they dropped him.’

‘What about Burnett?’

‘He’s Erle’s attorney. They never meet. Erle writes or telephones him. Burnett doesn’t approve of him.’

‘So there is no one? You’re absolutely sure? No relations who could suddenly appear and ask questions?’

‘There is no one.’

This seemed too good to be true, but I had to take her word. It had been the one thing that really bothered me.

‘We’ve got to be careful. This guy Hammerstock will spread the rumour that Dester is handling a big deal. We want him to do that, but at the same time we don’t want the rumour checked. Burnett might hear about it and make inquiries. We’ve got to have a tale for him. When the showdown comes, we’ve got to be able to convince the police that we didn’t start the rumour. We’ve got to convince Burnett that the reason why we didn’t contradict the rumour was because it gave us time to raise money to meet Dester’s debts. You’ll have to see Burnett and tell him there’s no truth in the rumour that Dester is going into television.’

She nodded. ‘But he will want to know where he is.’

‘Yes. I’ve got that angle taken care of. How do you get on with Burnett?’

She smiled. ‘Very well. He likes me.’

I could understand that.

‘Here’s what you do: call him on Monday and ask him over. Tell him Dester has had an attack of D.T.‘s, and you’ve persuaded him to take a cure. As soon as you can arrange it, he is going into a sanatorium. Tell Burnett there is a rumour going around that Dester is going into television. You must tell him there is no truth in the rumour, but as Dester is up to his eyes in debt, you are not contradicting the rumour as it is holding off his creditors. You feel sure that if he comes through the cure, he will get back into the money and will be able to pay off his debts. You are keeping his going into a sanatorium a secret.’

She was listening intently, her eyes staring into mine.

‘He will want to know where he is going.’

‘You can tell him. There is a sanatorium for alcoholics just outside Santa Barbara,’ I said. ‘I’ll get you the name. It’ll be in the telephone book.’

‘He might check up.’

I smiled.

‘He won’t have a chance to do that. We’ll have to take this one step at a time. First, you have to fix Burnett. We’ll see how he reacts. This plan has got to be flexible. We only move forward when we know each step we take will be safe. If Burnett seems convinced and not likely to ask too many questions then bring me into it. Tell him Dester has taken a fancy to me. I started off as his chauffeur, and now he has turned his private affairs over to me. He gets me to handle his mail, his taxes and uses me as a buffer between himself and his creditors. Then call me in and introduce me.’