“Could you put a false bottom to this?” I asked Maxison.
He gaped at me. “Yes, but what—”
“Skip it,” I said, and turned to Laura, who was watching me with large eyes. “Will you do something for me, kitten?” I said. I patted the coffin. “Get in here.”
“Oh no,” she said, with a shudder. “I—I couldn’t do that.”
“Please,” I said.
Maxison started forward but Tim raised the gun, bringing] the old man to an abrupt stop.
“Stay where you are, Laura,” Maxison grated.
She hesitated, looked at me and then stepped to the coffin. I lifted her up and lowered her in. She sat in the thing, her eyes dark, her mouth working. She looked like something out of the Grand Guignol.
“Lie down,” I said.
Shuddering, she lay down. I took more measurements.
“Fine,” I said, and pulled her up. “Out you come.” When she was out, I turned to Maxison. “I wanted to see if this coffin was big enough to hold two bodies. It is. You and I are putting your dead woman in and Miss Wonderly goes in under her. You’re to fit a false bottom to this box. That’s how I plan to get Miss Wonderly out of jail.”
4
I arrived at Maxison’s place at nine o’clock the next morning. There was a sedate, oldfashioned motor hearse parked outside.
I gave it a quick glance, then pushed open the glass door of the showroom and walked in.
Maxison was waiting for me. He was dolled up in a long black coat with silk lapels and a high hat. His face looked ghastly in the hard sunlight, his mouth twitched.
“Is she all right?” he asked anxiously, as soon as he saw me.
“Sure,” I said. “So long as you play ball with me, you don’t have to worry about Laura. She isn’t worrying, and she has a woman to look after her.” I tapped him on his bony chest. “But one false move from you, Maxison, she won’t be all right.”
He flinched, looked away. I felt sorry for the old geyser, but there was nothing else I could have done. I knew I couldn’t trust him, and I had to have a hold on him.
“Did you get rid of your assistant like I said?” I asked.
Maxison nodded. “He’s been wanting to do a trip with his wife to Miami for a long time. I told him he could go.”
“Okay,” I said. “We’re almost set?”
“Yes.”
“Let’s go into the back room,” I said, and pushed past him.
The coffin was standing on trestles. I raised the lid, examined the false bottom and the airholes. Maxison had made a swell job. I told him so.
“We’d better have a couple more air-holes by the handles,” I said. “It’s going to be a tight fit, and I don’t want her to have a bad journey. Will you fix that?”
While he was doing this I unpacked a grip I’d brought with me. Neither Davis, Tim, nor I had ceased to work on our plans during the night, and none of us had had any sleep, but I was now satisfied that everything had been covered satisfactorily. We had seen Mitchell again, and I had bought his co-operation for a grand. He was to play an important part in the jail break. He knew it would cost him his job, but he didn’t care. He was sick of Paradise Palms and Flaggerty, and was ready to pull out as soon as he’d done his job for me.
I changed into a prison-guard’s uniform that Mitchell had obtained for me. It wasn’t a bad fit; I studied myself for a moment in the long mirror on the wall.
Maxison watched me furtively, but he didn’t say anything. I took out a long black coat like his and put it on. It was high-necked and successfully hid the guard’s uniform. Then I slipped into my mouth two little rubber pads Tim had borrowed from an actor friend. The effect of the pads was remarkable. They completely changed my appearance, making me look plump and rabbit-toothed. A pair of horn-rimmed glasses completed a simple, but excellent disguise.
“How do you like your new assistant?” I asked, turning so Maxison could see me.
He gaped. “I wouldn’t have known you,” he said, and he sounded as if he meant it.
“I hope not,” I returned. “Flaggerty knows me a little too well. This has got to fool him.”
Maxison had refitted the false bottom to the coffin and was now ready to go.
“Right,” I said, going over to him. “We’re not going to fail. Things may get sticky, but whatever happens, you must keep your head. I’m George Mason, your new assistant. Your other assistant is on vacation. I come from Arizona, and I’m the son of an old friend of yours. I don’t suppose they’ll check up, but if they do, you must give them the answers without batting an eyelid. If I’m caught, it’s going to be just too bad for Laura. Understand?”
He licked his lips, looked sick, said he did.
“Okay,” I said, putting on a stove-pipe hat like his. “Let’s go”
I drove the hearse. Although it looked old-fashioned, there was nothing wrong with its eightcylinder engine. It had a lot of speed, and I let it out on the coast road. A mile or so from the jail I eased up on the accelerator; we drove along at a sedate twenty miles an hour.
As the roof of the jail appeared above the sand-dunes, I saw two policemen standing in the road. They had Thompsons slung over their shoulders; they looked bored, and waved to us to stop.
“You do the talking,” I said to Maxison, out of the corner of my mouth. “This is only a
rehearsal for the real thing. These boys won’t worry us.”
The two cops stood each side of the hearse, peered at us.
“Where are you going?” one of them asked Maxison.
“The jail,” he said curtly, and produced a burial certificate and the court order for the release of the body.
The two cops read the papers and handed them back. I could see by the blank looks on their faces they couldn’t make head nor tail of the legal jargon, but they weren’t suspicious.
“Okay, seems in order,” one of them said importantly. He took a yellow sticker from his pocket and pasted it on the fender of the hearse. “That’ll get you to the gates. No speeding, and stop if you’re signalled.”
“And that means stop,” the other cop said, grinning. “The boys up there are sure itching to use their rods.”
Maxison thanked them, and I released the clutch. We continued up the road.
“They’re certainly taking no chances,” I said.
Maxison gave me a surly look, grunted. “What did you expect?” he said.
On the other side of the sand-hills, I spotted four cops sitting round a machine-gun on a threelegged stand, covering the road. One of the cops was equipped with a portable radio, and he was tuning-in as I crawled by. They eyed the yellow sticker and then waved us on. It began to dawn on me that Mitchell had been right about it being impossible to get into the jail in the ordinary way.
Four hundred yards from the side- road that led through the sand-dunes to the jail was a barricade made out of a big tree-trunk on wheels.
I stopped.
Three cops in their shirt sleeves appeared from behind the barricade, and swarmed round us.
One of them, a big, red-faced guy with sandy hair, nodded to Maxison.
“Hey, Max,” he said, grinning. “Howja like the war conditions? Ain’t it hell? That punk Flaggerty sure has the breeze up. We’ve been camped out here all night, and now we’re being skinned by the sun. You going to the jail?”
“Yes,” Maxison said.
The cop looked me over.
“Ain’t seen him before,” he said to Maxison. “Who’s he?”
“George Mason,” Maxison said calmly enough. “My new assistant. O’Neil’s on vacation.”
“He would be, the lazy rat,” the cop said, spitting in the sand. “He’s always on vacation.” He looked at me. “Glad to know you, Mason. I’m Clancy. Howja like the new job?”