The Greatest Crime Novels of Frank L. Packard (14 Titles in One Edition). Frank L. Packard

carrying in one hand a lamp, and clutched in the other her ear-trumpet and a hundred-dollar bill.

      Jimmie Dale's lips set grimly. Back in the corridor that was now darkened again he thought he saw a shadow move; he distinctly caught the sound of a footstep. The downstairs watcher—and Mrs. Kinsey's hundred-dollar bill! It was quite clear now, the whole mean, sordid, contemptible business. The bait was cunning enough in a low, vicious way; amply cunning enough to succeed with a trusting, simple old woman already on the verge of her dotage. Where Mrs. Kinsey, who distrusted banks, had secreted her savings of years, she would secret a hundred-dollar bill.

      Little Sweeney—in lieu, no doubt, of shouting on the street—bowed himself out politely.

      “Good-night,” said Mrs. Kinsey. “And thank you again.”

      She closed and locked the door, and came back through the shop, passing again into the rear hallway.

      As the light receded, Jimmie Dale rose cautiously. Mrs. Kinsey's lamp, as she had passed, disclosed the fact that just beyond the rear door of the shop, the passageway made a jut at right angles. He nodded tersely to himself as he gained this with the trained step, so silent as to be almost uncanny, that had mocked at even the creaky boards of the old Sanctuary, and, in the shadows himself now, he peered along the hallway proper.

      Steep, narrow stairs, to the left and a little way down the hall, led to the upper story. Mrs. Kinsey, still carrying her lamp, still clutching at her ear-trumpet and the hundred-dollar bill, was already near the top. The lower portion of the stairs and the hall itself, since her body shaded the lamp, were in almost complete darkness.

      And then from somewhere above there came a sharp, whispered interrogation:

      “Well?”

      From along the lower hall, her figure shrouded in the blackness, a woman's voice answered:

      “She's still got it. Watch her.”

      Mother Margot! Limpy Mack, then, was the upstairs watcher. There seemed something incongruous in this passage of words between the two, like a stage aside that was not supposed to be heard by the intervening figure of the old woman who was climbing the stairs; but it was not the incongruity in itself, it was the callous brutality, the vulture-like preying upon helpless infirmity, that hardened Jimmie Dale's face now in a sort of merciless intentness.

      Mrs. Kinsey's light disappeared around the landing at the head of the stairs, and then, contemptuous of any exaggerated attempt at silence, another footstep sounded on the stair treads. Jimmie Dale could not see, it was pitch black in the lower hall now, but it was not necessary to see the obvious. Mother Margot was following Mrs. Kinsey upstairs.

      And now there came the sound as of some one walking about in a room overhead for a moment or so, and then silence.

      Jimmie Dale moved toward the stairs, and without a sound began to make his way upward. Halfway up he paused, and stood tight-pressed against the wall. He could just detect a glow of light filtering into the upper hallway, as though the door of a lighted room, almost directly above his head, stood open into the hall. Then a footstep and still another, starting from a position further back along the hall, moved toward the lighted doorway. Came then the sound as of a piece of furniture being moved on squeaky casters; and then a low-breathed, exultant oath in a man's voice, followed by a woman's vicious chuckle. He could almost discern the outlines of two figures there—Mother Margot and Limpy Mack.

      “Pipe de lay!” chuckled Mother Margot. “Dere goes Little Sweeney's century buck. Look at her saltin' it!”

      “Close your trap!” ordered Limpy Mack sharply. “Maybe she can't hear, but that's no reason for taking a chance of spilling the beans now we know where they are.”

      “Aw, forget it! Youse gives me a pain!” retorted Mother Margot acidly, but in a nevertheless more subdued tone. “Youse'd have to write her a letter to tell her youse was makin' a noise before she'd be wise to it, an' mabbe den she wouldn't believe youse!”

      “Shut your face!” said Limpy Mack tersely.

      The sound of what had seemed to Jimmie Dale like squeaky casters came again, then a footstep traversed the lighted room, a door—obviously one connecting with an adjoining room—opened and closed again, and the light was gone.

      “Come on!” prompted Mother Margot's voice. “Dat's her bedroom she's gone into. It's all clear now. Wot're youse waitin' for?”

      “I'm waiting till the old bird's tucked away in bed,” Limpy Mack's voice answered out of the darkness. “I'm waiting till there isn't any chance of her moseying out for anything just as we're tapping the crib. I haven't noticed that there was anything the matter with her eyes; and she's not so dumb but that she might start something in the neighbourhood. I don't play the fool when I can play safe.”

      “Safe!” echoed Mother Margot sarcastically. “Wot's safer dan dis de way it is now? I wanter get home. Youse ought to go down to an antique dump an' buy yerself a suit of armour, an' walk around in dat. Youse'd look fine—an' youse'd always be safe. De pip, dat's wot I'm contractin' from youse!”

      There was no answer.

      Mother Margot grunted contemptuously, and relapsed into silence.

      The minutes passed. There was utter silence now in the house, save for an occasional uneasy movement of one or other of the two watchers in the hall above Jimmie Dale's head.

      Jimmie Dale stood in grim patience, close against the wall, still on the stairs, an integral part of the shadows around him. The time dragged interminably, the minutes seeming to expand into endless hours. And then suddenly Limpy Mack's voice broke the silence in a tense undertone:

      “All right! Her light's out. Come on!”

      There came then the sound of footsteps receding from the hall; and Jimmie Dale in an instant silently gained the head of the stairs, and lay there crouched, half on the landing and half on the topmost treads. From his position, slightly diagonal though it was from where he had placed the door, he had calculated he would be able to see clearly enough into the room that Mother Margot and her companion had obviously just entered. He nodded now in quick self-corroboration. Out of the darkness of the room, lancing it in a little white shaft of light, there came the ray of an electric torch, and two figures were outlined as they bent over a piece of furniture that stood against the far wall, and that looked like an old chest of drawers. But there was no squeak of casters now. Jimmie Dale smiled uninvitingly. They were becoming unduly cautious! The piece of furniture was being lifted, not rolled, until it stood out from the wall, the back of it exposed.

      For a moment the two figures leaned over it, the flashlight playing on the back of the dresser; and then from its extreme edge, what looked like a very narrow drawer, its depth almost half of the dresser itself, was pulled out.

      “S'help me!” Mother Margot's voice quivered in curious, sibilant excitement. “Say, de old skirt's rich!”

      “Was,” corrected Limpy Mack's voice curtly. “Keep your paws off! We'll make the split to-morrow. In the meantime I'll take care of it. See? Hold the flashlight.”

      “Sure!” sniffed Mother Margot. “Youse're de only honest one in de bunch. I know 'cause Little Sweeney told me!”

      A man's hand dipped into the projecting drawer, disappeared nearly up to the elbow, and came out again with a fistful of banknotes which he stuffed into his pocket. Again the man plunged in his hand. Jimmie Dale rose to his feet, took a step forward—and halted abruptly, as Mother Margot's voice suddenly shrilled out tensely through the silence:

      “My Gawd! Listen! Wot's dat? Over by de door!”

      Jimmie Dale's jaws clamped together, as his automatic swung up into line. Strange! He could have sworn he had not made the slightest sound. He saw Limpy Mack step forward a pace and stand facing the doorway, listening intently. And then Jimmie Dale's face relaxed. Behind Limpy Mack's back Mother Margot's hand shot stealthily into the drawer, and a wad of bills disappeared stealthily inside her blouse. Once more she