Speedy (Holman)/Chapter 4
In the outer sanctuary guarding the executive offices of the Inter-City Railways Company, on lower Broadway, a fat middle-aged man and a lean young man occupied respectively the chair to the immediate right and the chair to the just as immediate left of red-headed Tess O'Malley, custodian of the switchboard. Both were very keen-eyed gentlemen who kept glancing alternately to a door in front of them marked "Private," from behind which came the rumble of men's voices, and then to the lone telephone resting atop Miss O'Malley's cabinet of plugs and wires.
Outwardly polite and nonchalant toward each other, the fat man was in his mind trying desperately to work out a plan whereby he might thwart the lean man, and vice versa. For they came from rival Wall Street news ticker services and the most important thing in the lives of each just now was to insure getting over the wire to the editorial office first any news resulting from the meeting of the Inter-City Board of Directors now going on behind the door marked "Private." Once flashed to the home office, the news would be instantly relayed over tickers located in brokers' offices in the entire financial district of New York and even in other cities. The Stock Exchange was in session, the news might vitally affect Inter-City stocks. Beating the rival news service with the information even by a minute or two meant glory for the victor and censure for the vanquished.
The fate of the two reporters lay in the nimble hands of Tess O'Malley, through whom the crucial telephone message would apparently have to go. Both reporters knew it. So did Miss O'Malley, though to see her calmly chewing gum and reading a pink tabloid newspaper you would never suspect it.
The fat man had already edged over toward her and sotto voce had attempted to bribe her, with the promise of a box of candy and a luncheon date, to let his call go through first when the all-important moment arrived. Tess had smiled coldly and shaken her auburn bob in the negative.
The fat man had been there before covering Board of Directors meetings and she didn't like him.
He now rose and started impatiently walking around and lighting a cigarette. The good-looking thin youth, seizing his opportunity, leaned toward her.
"Is that the only telephone around here?" he asked politely.
Tess hesitated. He had nice eyes.
"You're new at this game, aren't you?" she asked softly. When he nodded, she added, "Well, don't breathe a word to Fatty over there that I told you but there's a 'phone a few jumps away around the corner on the reception room desk with a direct connection. It, don't lead through my switchboard at all. When the time comes, let him jump for my 'phone here and you beat it around the corner to the other one. You'll lick him by three minutes even if I have to stall his call. But neither of you need worry as a matter of fact. Nothing ain't going to break out of this meeting that they'll spill to you boys. It's very confidential stuff."
The thin reporter thanked her and sat back in his chair.
The outer door opened and a tall, almost too well dressed young man with a dark moustache and a saturnine face strode briskly in. Without a glance at the three occupants of the outer office he hurried to the door marked "Private" and disappeared inside.
"Say," said the fat reporter to the telephone girl with sudden interest. "Wasn't that Steven Carter?"
"Yeh," said Miss O'Malley. "What of it?"
"Well, there's going to be something doing at this meeting after all, then. They never send for Carter unless there's important stuff in the wind—and probably it's phoney."
"Yeh, maybe they're going to drain the Hudson River and run a subway line through it, hey?" gibed Miss O'Malley not very good-naturedly.
The fat reporter seemed about to make an angry retort but thought better of it and was silent.
The entrance of Steven Carter created a stir on the inner and more secretive side of the door marked "Private." Around the long mahogany table the gray-haired, impressive looking directors of the destinies of the great Inter-City rapid transit lines sat earning the fifty-dollar gold pieces that went to each for attending a directors' meeting. The aroma of expensive cigars filled the room. At the head of the polished table sat President John B. Donaldson, shrewd but square.
Short, squatty Vice-President McGuire, seated on Donaldson's right, was shrewd only. It had been his idea to call Carter, an idea of which Donaldson did not wholly approve. Stephen Carter was the Inter-City's handy man, especially when something more delicate than refined was to be attempted. It was Carter who found and organized the strike breakers when labor troubles harassed the Inter-City. It was he who stationed the spies and other annoyances among the striking employees and dampened their morale. He was reported to have at his beck and call the largest assortment of thugs and gunmen ever enlisted under one banner. As a lobbyist at Albany or Washington he was also thoroughly at home. And at conducting confidential negotiations, from buying up land at half what it was worth to freeing transit magnates' wayward sons from predatory chorus girls, particularly when a certain amount of strong-arm work was required, he had no superior.
It went rather against John Donaldson's grain to do business with a man like Carter. But the present emergency seemed to other members of the Board to require that wily gentleman's services, and Donaldson had yielded.
"Take this seat, Mr. Carter," proffered Donaldson, indicating the chair at his left. When Carter was seated, the President went on, "Mr. McGuire says he has already hinted to you of the necessity of the Inter-City acquiring control of the half-mile of trackage on De Lacey Street now held by the Crosstown Railways. If we are to construct our new line on Summer Street, an improvement both desirable and profitable, we must have a spur line on De Lacey to connect Summer with our present Dale Avenue line. I believe you have already investigated the ownership of the Crosstown franchise."
"Yes," replied Carter in a clipped voice. "The line is owned by one man—Jeremiah C. Dillon. It is obsolete and doing practically no business at the present time. Dillon inherited it in the will of the late William C. Rockwell, in return, I understand, for a favor he once did Rockwell. The franchise calls for one trip a day to be made over the line. If the trip is not made for even one day, the franchise becomes void. Now if we can prevent—"
"We are not interested in securing this franchise by fraud, if that is what you are intending to propose," Donaldson cut in sharply. "We are willing to pay as high as $75,000 for it. If you believe it can be bought for that, I will give you a check for that amount and authority to conduct the negotiations. We are anxious that the Inter-City name does not figure in the deal until the time comes for signing the papers. We do not want our competitors to know we are after the Crosstown. So the whole thing will have to be done in your name. And it will have to be done by not later than Friday of this week, because there is a meeting of the Rapid Transit Committee at the City Hall Saturday morning and we must have a complete plan for the improvement and unification of our lines to present at that meeting. This is Tuesday. You have three days. Do you think you can do it?"
If Donaldson had been closely observing Steven Carter as he talked, he would have seen a rather sinister glint come into Carter's black eyes.
"Yes, I believe I can," Carter answered promptly. "May I have the check before I leave?"
"Drop into my office and I will have it made out for you," said Donaldson. He turned to the other directors. "Well, gentlemen, that about concludes our meeting, unless someone has other matters to be brought up for discussion." They had not. The meeting was adjourned.
As President Donaldson walked out of the door marked "Private" two men rushed at him like football tacklers. They were the two rivals from the news ticker agencies. President Donaldson smiled indulgently.
"No news at all, boys—nothing whatever," he said.
"What about your unification plan for the Transit Committee meeting Saturday?" asked the fat man.
"We may have something interesting to tell you then," admitted Donaldson. And he turned on his heel and disappeared back behind the door marked "Private."
Tess O'Malley chuckled. "All you boys' trouble for nothing," she jibed. "I told you there wouldn't be anything doing. If you'd listened to me you wouldn't need to have stuck around all this time."
"And if your boy friend here listened to you about the 'phone around the corner," retorted the fat man, indicating his leaner competitor, "he'd have been in a swell jam if anything broke. A repair man from the telephone company has had it all apart for the last half hour. I heard what you told the young fellow here, girlie, and took the trouble to check up. When you've been in this game as long as I have, you learn to listen to everything."
"Well, what do you know about that for mistrustfulness," sighed Tess, rolling her gum and looking around at the back of the exiting corpulent reporter.
"Thanks for the tip anyway. You meant well," smiled the lean reporter. "Next time we'll fix him."
Had either reporter followed the trail of Steven Carter when he left the Inter-City offices ten minutes later, the sleuths of the news might have learned something that would have made the front page with glaring headlines.
Carter descended in the elevator to the entrance hall of the Inter-City Building. There he sought a telephone booth and called a number.
"Hello," said Carter briskly when the connection was made. "P. G. Callahan Association? Hello—Mike? Puggy there? Good. Put him on, will you?" A pause followed. Then, "Hello—Puggy? Say, I may have a little job for you. Strong-arm work. Plenty of dough. Don't worry. I'll protect you. I'll run in to see you in about an hour. Be there. Good-bye."
Leaving the telephone booth, Carter walked out of the building onto the sidewalk and hired a passing taxi. When next he alighted it was on De Lacey Street about a block from the flat occupied by Pop Dillon and Jane. Carter consulted an address written in a little red book. Then he walked down De Lacey Street, stopped, ascended four well-worn stone steps and pulled the Dillons' bell.
Jane came to the door. Carter took off his hat, smiled in friendly fashion and said, "Is this Miss Dillon?"
Jane nodded.
He went on, "I understand you have a room to rent here. I'm seeking new quarters and would like to look your room over."
Jane stared at him in some surprise. He was so well and obviously so expensively dressed that she wondered what he could be doing looking for a room in that modest neighborhood. But Carter could be very pleasant when he wanted to be and on this particular occasion he was on his best behavior.
"I'll show you the room if you like," said Jane. "But it's really quite small."
"I don't mind. My tastes are simple," Carter replied, following her down the hallway and toward the rear of the house. At the same time he was observing that Jane was a very pretty girl and that his task in this house was perhaps not going to prove so irksome and so strictly business as he had feared. Jane opened the door of a small bedroom to the left of the hallway well in the rear of the house. It was Speedy's former abode. Very clean and neatly if sparsely furnished, it lacked light and was, as Jane had confessed, very small.
Nevertheless, with hardly more than a perfunctory glance at the room, Carter said, "I'll take it. I'll bring my stuff right down."
"But you haven't even asked me the price!" Jane protested, puzzled.
"To be sure. Very careless of me." Carter said, in some confusion.
"It's ten dollars a week—payable in advance."
"Here's twenty dollars—two weeks in advance," Carter laughed.
Jane took the proffered bill. She was still uncertain as to what had brought such a suave man of the world to their doors, but one thing sure—he was good pay.
"We can give you breakfast and dinner here for a dollar and a half a day extra," Jane continued, trying to be every inch a business woman, though this was her first experience as a landlady.
"O.K. That's fine," grinned Carter. "I'll want to eat every meal here I can. I think I shall find it very pleasant." He smiled at Jane in an intimate fashion that made her feel vaguely uneasy.
"We couldn't serve you luncheon," Jane explained, "because I always eat that with my grandfather. He's Mr. Dillon of the Crosstown Railways."
"I've heard of him," said Carter gravely. "He lives here, doesn't he?"
"Yes. I keep house for him."
"Will he be home tonight?"
"Oh, yes."
"Good." Carter mused a second. Then he added quickly, "I'll go uptown and get my stuff and bring it down."
Jane walked with him to the door. He shook hands with her, donned his hat and was off. Two minutes later she wondered if it were all a dream; if she really had rented the room so quickly and to such a tall, handsome if somewhat sinister looking young man. She wondered who he was and where he had come from. If he were perhaps some millionaire's son preparing to hide out from his family. Or even, horrors, a criminal. Maybe she should have asked for references. Well, when he returned she would discreetly question him about himself. Meantime she had the precious twenty dollars. What if it were counterfeit! She inspected it minutely. Then decided she was acting silly and went quickly back to her job of peeling potatoes for dinner.
Meantime Carter had walked down the block to his waiting taxi. The street was nearly empty, as he noted with satisfaction. He gave the young driver a destination that made that worthy prick up his ears and gaze curiously at his fare. The chauffeur whirled his car around and started in the direction of the East River. Arrived a block from the water, he turned south a few blocks into a shabby tenement district and pulled up in front of a disreputable looking wooden structure next door to a lumber yard. A board over the entrance was scrawled "P. G. Callahan Association." Carter paid his freight and alighted.
He knocked slowly three times on the soot covered gray door and was admitted.
The room inside was filled with smoke and the odor of many unwashed human beings. The click of billiard and pool cues mingled with the sound of tough voices. The occupants were entirely roughly clad men, unmistakably hard characters. They glanced sharply toward the door as Carter entered, then, recognizing him, went back to their former occupations. All except a burly, red-faced Irishman in his shirt sleeves who left the poker game in the corner to greet the newcomer. The former led the way to the rear of the room and opened a door leading into a more private sanctum, Callahan's office. For the fat man with the hard blue eyes and undershot jaw was none other than the redoubtable Puggy Callahan, leader of the motley crew littering up the room outside. The police had long suspected Callahan of instigating or actually perpetrating "jobs" comprising everything from petty larceny to murder, but thus far they had been able to fasten nothing definite upon him. He had the utmost scorn for them.
"What's the dope, boss?" he asked Carter when they were seated around a table.
"Do you know Pop Dillon?" Carter inquired.
"Who—the old guy who runs the horse-car line over on De Lacey Street?" asked Puggy.
"Yes." Carter hitched over nearer to the hulk that was Callahan. "Listen, Puggy, friends of mine are interested in seeing that this Dillon is laid up for a while, see? Fixed so he can't run his car for a few days. Not hurt badly, you understand, but just beat up enough so he'll have to go to bed and can't run the car."
"Sure—I get you. That won't take much. He's an old man."
"I know. But everybody along the block is his friend. They'll pile on in case of a general rough house. You'll have to work quietly. Get him when he brings the car into the barn after a trip. Just sock him a few and then beat it."
"O.K., boss. When do you want it done—right away?"
"No," Carter replied hastily. "I want you to wait definite word from me before you do a thing. It will be tomorrow anyway before I give the word. I want to see first whether Dillon will listen to reason. If he doesn't, he'll have to take the consequences."
"All right, boss. I'll wait for the word from you."
The ill-matched pair rose, shook hands and parted. Carter had told his taxi to wait. He now reclaimed it and gave the driver an address in the 50's just off Fifth Avenue, Carter's own apartment. Still keeping the taxi, he got out in front of an impressive concrete and marble apartment house, was whisked up to the third floor in the elevator and opened a door with his latch key. In ten minutes he was back in the cab again with a suitcase and was heading again toward De Lacey Street.
Instead of Jane greeting him at the door of the Dillon flat this time, it was Pop Dillon himself.
"I'm the new boarder—Steven Carter," said the confidential agent.
"Jane's been telling me about you," said Pop looking him up and down. "Come in. I guess you know where your room is."
As soon as Carter had disappeared into his room, Jane, an apron tucked around her slender form, hurried in from the kitchen and, bright eyed and anxious, asked Pop, "How do you like him, granddad?"
Pop, who had in the meantime shed his coat and abandoned his shoes in favor of carpet slippers, shook his gray head slightly, "Well, you can't go much on first appearances. But, tell the truth, Janie, I don't get what a swell looking young man like that is renting a room from us for. Looks funny. And those sharp black eyes of his—they ain't missing much. However—we'll see—we'll see. Is Speedy coming over after supper?"
"I'm sure I don't know, granddad," replied Jane rather primly. She was a little miffed because her new boarder had not scored a bigger hit. And lately she had been exhibiting a little shyness when questioned about the calls, past or potential, of Speedy Swift.
Hearing Carter coming up the hallway fon his room, Jane now fled back to the kitchen. The new boarder sank into a well-worn easy chair opposite his landlord and made a few perfunctory remarks about the weather. Pop dropped the evening paper he had picked up and surveyed Carter curiously.
"Stranger in this part of the city, aren't you, Mr. Carter?" he asked.
"Yes," returned Carter, endeavoring to summon a very frank and engaging smile to his sharp, swarthy face. I've been living farther uptown. To tell the truth, Mr. Dillon, I decided my expenses were mounting too high and I'd seek cheaper quarters. A friend of mine recommended this neighborhood, I saw your 'Room for Rent' outside your door and here I am."
"What business are you in?" Pop Dillon persisted.
"Brokerage concern—down in Wall Street," said Carter. "And you, I understand, are the sole owner and operator of the Crosstown Railways."
Pop nodded.
"Funny," Carter continued, watching Pop shrewdly, "I heard a man down in Wall Street just this morning remark that he might make a bid for your franchise if he could pick it up cheaply enough."
Pop was instantly alert. "What did he want it for?" he asked.
"Oh, he had nothing in mind for the present. He would just hold it for speculation purposes." Carter hitched his chair over closer to the old man. "I like you and your family, Mr. Dillon, and I'll tip you off to something. In all probability what this man had in mind was that some day the Inter-City people would want to buy up this franchise in order to consolidate their system. Perhaps you've been holding on to this unprofitable business all the time with the same idea. Well, I had a straight tip this morning from a high offiicial in the Inter-City that they've given up all thought of any further development of their lines in this section of the city and at the Transit Committee meeting Saturday they'll announce it. So your franchise isn't worth a nickel, Mr. Dillon, and never will be."
"That so?" Pop asked dully. He tried to conceal it but Carter's words had dashed a long-cherished hope. He had been figuring that some day the Inter-City people would come to him to buy his franchise. The new boarder seemed very convincing. Dillon believed him—almost. There was, however, some sixth sense that warned the old man to be cautious.
"I'll tell you what I'll do, Mr. Dillon," Carter went on. "I'll talk to this Wall Street man in the morning, if you say so, and get him to make you a definite offer through me. He doesn't wish to be identified personally with the deal himself. The amount he mentioned to me that he was willing to pay was—a thousand dollars."
"It's worth more than that," said Pop stubbornly.
"It isn't worth anything," Carter almost snapped back, dropping his disguise for an instant. Then quickly regaining it, "I think a thousand dollars would be a Godsend to you for that property. Shall I tell him you're interested?"
"Nope—I don't care to sell," said Pop.
Carter shrugged his shoulders. All right, he was saying to himself, if you're going to balk, I'll get you in a cheaper and rougher way. At this moment the smiling and somewhat flushed face of Jane appeared at the entrance to the living room and announced dinner.
The meal, somewhat more elaborate than the usual Dillon evening repast due to the presence of the newcomer, passed pleasantly enough. Jane and Carter carried on most of the conversation, with the girl springing up now and again to clear the table and wait upon the men. The urbanity and manners of Carter impressed her. She had never met such a man of the world before.
After dinner Carter announced that he would have to leave them for a while but would be back later. His errand took him to the drug store on the corner where a telephone booth was located.
"Go ahead and get Dillon when he brings his car back to the barn after his last trip tomorrow," Carter said to Puggy Callahan over the wire.
Then Carter bought a good cigar at the drug store counter and, well satisfied with himself, took a turn around the block before starting back to his new boarding house.
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