Ayn Rand - The Early Ayn Rand

There had been more loss of life from trying to get that stone than there is from traffic accidents in a big city. All of our big guys tried it. Then, it was given up as impossible. No one could get it; not with Winton Stokes as the owner.

But I told them that there was nothing impossible to Steve Hawkins, the master-criminal. I had made up my mind to succeed where all had failed. They laughed at me for giving up my brilliant hold-up career and slaving as Winton Stokes' valet. During the two years of my working at his New York residence, I never once got even a hint of where the Night King was hidden, no matter how hard I tried. I don't believe anybody on earth knew that secret, except Winton Stokes. But I waited and played the part of as honest a guy as they make 'em. I was a model valet and just as sweet and white as sugar. Then, finally, my big chance came — and oh! How it did come!

I wanted to show them all an unusual crime to knock them cockeyed with amazement. And they were amazed, though not quite in the way I had expected. But just try to mention the Night King case to the New York cops and see what happens!

It started like this: Winton Stokes was going on a trip to San Francisco. He was engaged to some charming little girl who lived there. I've seen her picture on his desk. A blonde little thing, with a smile like a glass of champagne and legs like a hosiery ad. Winton Stokes was to marry her there, in her home town. But I knew something else about this trip of his, something that no one knew, but me, and Stokes, and his girl.

I learned it in a very simple manner, but the news was as unexpected to me as a fresh orchid in a garbage can. You may be sure that for two years I've been opening secretly all of Winton Stokes' letters that I could lay my hands on. So I opened this particular one that he had ordered me to mail. I don't remember a word of it, except one sentence, and here is the sentence that took hold of my brains, memory and consciousness so as to knock out everything else I had on my mind:

"My dearest one, I'll bring with me, as my wedding gift, the thing that has been my most precious possession, but isn't any more — not since I looked into the blue diamonds of your eyes — I'll bring the Night King, that you asked me about once."

Oh boy!

The first thing I did when I read this was to take a deep breath. The second — to swear, energetically. The third — to laugh. The big fool! To give that stone away like this to a woman! Just like him, too.

Well, here was my chance.

In the day that followed I turned my brain upside down and back again, trying to figure out a way to accompany him on this trip. But I didn't have to think much. He saved me the trouble.

I was called into his study on that beautiful spring morning. He was sitting in a deep,

Oriental chair, his legs crossed, a long cigarette between his lips, looking at me with half-closed eyes.

"Williams," he said (this being the name I had adopted), "you might be interested to know that in three days you are leaving with me for San Francisco."

There must have been something funny in my face, for he added:

"What is it? Are you surprised?"

I muttered something about how grateful I was for the honor. Fact is, I was so grateful that I almost felt like sparing him and not touching his diamond at all!

"Your services have been most satisfactory during the time you have worked for me and I chose you to accompany me on this trip," he explained, adding, "I trust you more than my other men."

Now, I had to act and act quick. After some careful deliberation, a plan was ready in my mind, a brilliant plan that only a bright thinker like me could have devised.

That evening, I made my way to a certain part of New York, very far from the residential district and very different from it. I went directly to a certain pool-parlor, unofficially called "The Hanged Cat," which was a pool-parlor and many other things besides. Since the time I started on my valet job, I didn't mix with any rough work, as I've said before, but I knew where to find the boys if I needed them. "The Hanged Cat" was their favorite social club.

It didn't take me long to choose my men — three of them — and to get them into a dark corner, around an old, shaking table that had four legs all of different lengths.

"Boys," I said, "I have a job for us and if we pull it through we can all retire and start putting burglar-proof alarms on our safes!"

I explained the whole thing. I told them just what I wanted them to do and also just how much they'd get from me. Two of them, Pete Crump and "Snout" Timkins, agreed at once, and enthusiastically, too. But the third, and I might have expected it, started trouble. The third was Mickey Finnegan.

I had known Mickey back in my Chicago days and we had always been rivals in business. That sap had the nerve to think he was as good as me, and just as much of a master-crook! Every success of mine always made him green with jealousy and every one of his didn't make me pink, either. Mickey was a big, husky fellow, with fists like water-melons, hair like a floor-mop, lips like beef-steaks, eyes like a fish and an atrocious odor of tobacco that he was always chewing, slowly and senselessly, like a cow. I had no respect whatever for that big brute's mentality, of which he had a nickel's worth. But I had to admit he was strong, and that's what I needed now — strength.

I had hesitated before choosing him for my accomplice, but his hairy fists looked so promising and besides, I thought our old misunderstandings were forgotten. I was mistaken.

"It's all right, Steve," he said in his slow, dragging voice, "it's fine — except one thing, which's this: I'm gonna get half of it, see? Fifty-fifty."

"What? You don't mean that...!"

"Yeh, I do. I wasn't never Steve Hawkins' under-dog yet and I don't crave to start now, neither. I'm just as good as you, and I'll get just as much, so I will."

"Well, for pity sakes, Mickey! Isn't it my job? Didn't I prepare it? Didn't I spend two years on it?"

"That," said Mickey, "don't make no difference to me."

I argued for some time, for a long time. But what was the use? Mickey had always been as stubborn as a bull-dog.

"Shut up," he said finally, "you're wastin' yer breath and my time, and one o'them is valuable. It's either I gets half of it or I don't and if I don't you don't see none of Mickey Finnegan with your gang, either."

"Mickey," I said solemnly, "you're a skunk."

"Am I?" roared Mickey, and then followed something which is hard to describe, and which was stopped only by the other boys stepping between Mickey and me and tearing us apart. And the result of it was that I had to spit from my mouth two teeth knocked out by Mickey's fist.

My two friends assured me that we could manage the job between the three of us and didn't need Mickey at all. So I told him just what I thought of him and went home.

But when I got there and glanced into a mirror, I was terrified to see what my face looked like. My jaw was swollen and as I open my mouth very wide when I talk, the empty black hole on the side was very much in evidence.

What would Winton Stokes think when he saw his model valet with a mug like that? He might change his mind about taking me along. And he might even suspect something. My brilliant plan might be ruined because of Mickey. I shuddered.

"What happened to your face?" asked Winton Stokes calmly, when he saw me on the next morning.

"I — I had a fall..." I stammered, rather uncertainly. "I fell on the basement steps in the dark, last night."

He looked at me fixedly for some moments, as though thinking it over. "He suspects!" I trembled. But he said, rather indifferently:

"Well, see to it that you have a more decent appearance by the day of our departure, and have some false teeth put in — it doesn't look proper."