“Well?” Chesty says.
“Well, Chesty,” The Macarone says, “I go to the home of your Mr. Cleeburn T. Box a little while ago. It is a nice place. A little more shrubbery than we like in Kansas City, but still a nice place. It must stand somebody maybe half a million. I follow your diagram, Chesty,” he says. “I find the wing marked X and I make my way through plenty of cactus and Spanish bayonets, and I do not know what all else, and enter the house by way of an open French window.
“I find myself in a room in which there are no lights, but,” The Macarone says, “as soon as my eyes become accustomed to the darkness, I can see that is all just as the diagram shows. There is a bed within a few steps of the window and there is a character asleep on the bed. He is snoring pretty good too. In fact,” The Macarone says, “he is snoring about as good as anybody I ever hear, and I do not bar Willie, who is a wonderful snorer.”
“All right,” Chesty Charles says.
“Show me the dough again, Chesty,” The Macarone says.
So Chesty goes to his safe and opens it and outs with a nice package of the soft and places it on the back bar where The Macarone can see it, and the sight of the money seems to please The Macarone no little.
“All right,” Chesty says. “Then what?”
“Well, Chesty,” The Macarone says, “there I am with that thing in my hand, and there is this character on the bed asleep, and there is no sound except his snoring and the wind in some palm trees outside. Chesty,” he says, “are you ever in a strange house at night with the wind working on the palm trees outside?”
“No,” Chesty says. “I do not care for palm trees.”
“It is a lonesome sound,” The Macarone says. “Well,” he says, “I step over to the bed, and I can see by the outline of the character on the bed that he is sleeping on his back, which is a good thing, as it saves me the trouble of turning him over and maybe waking him up. You see, Chesty,” he says, “I give this matter some scientific study beforehand. I figure that the right idea in this case is to push this character in such a manner that there can be no doubt that he pushes himself, so it must be done from in front, and from close up.
“Well,” The Macarone says, “I wait right over this character on the bed until my eyes make out the outline of his face in the dark, and I put that thing down close to his nose, and just as I am about to give it to him, the moon comes out from behind a cloud over the bay and spills plenty of light through the open French window and over the character on the bed.
“And,” The Macarone says, “I observe that this character on the bed is holding some object clasped to his breast, and that he has a large smile on his face, as if he is dreaming very pleasant dreams, indeed; and when I gently remove the object from his fingers, thinking it may be something of value to me, and hold it up to the light, what is it but a framed stand photograph of a young friend of mine by the name of Miss Mary Peering.
“But,” The Macarone says, “I hope and trust that no one will ever relate to Miss Mary Peering the story of me finding this character asleep with her picture, and snoring, because,” he says, “snoring is without doubt a great knock to romance.”
“So?” Chesty Charles says.
“So,” The Macarone says, “I come away as quietly as possible without disturbing the character on the bed, and here I am, Chesty, and there you are, and it comes to my mind that somebody tries to drop me in on a great piece of skullduggery.”
And all of a sudden, The Macarone outs with that thing and jams the nozzle of it into Chesty Charles’s chest, and says:
“Hand over that dough, Chesty,” he says. “A nice thing you are trying to get a respectable character like me into, because you know very well it cannot be your Mr. Cleeburn T. Box on the bed in that room with Miss Mary Peering’s photograph clasped to his breast and smiling so. Chesty,” he says, “I fear you almost make a criminal of me, and for two cents I will give you a pushing for your own self, right here and now.”
“Why, Mac,” Chesty says, “you are a trifle hasty. If it is not Mr. Cleeburn T. Box in that bed, I cannot think who it can be, but,” he says, “maybe some last-minute switch comes up in the occupant of the bed by accident. Maybe it is something Mr. Cleeburn T. Box will easily explain when I see him again. Why,” Chesty says, “I cannot believe Mr. Cleeburn T. Box means any fraud in this matter. He seems to me to be a nice, honest character, and very sincere in his wish to be pushed.”
Then Chesty Charles goes on to state that if there is any fraud in this matter, he is also a victim of same, and he says he will surely speak harshly to Mr. Cleeburn T. Box about it the first time he gets a chance. In fact, Chesty Charles becomes quite indignant when he gets to thinking that maybe Mr. Cleeburn T. Box may be deceiving him, and finally The Macarone says:
“Well, all right,” he says. “Maybe you are not in on anything, at that, and, in fact, I do not see what it is all about, anyway; but,” he says, “it is my opinion that your Mr. Cleeburn T. Box is without doubt nothing but a great scalawag somewhere. Anyway, hand over the dough, Chesty,” he says. “I am going to collect on my good intentions.”
So Chesty Charles takes the package off the back bar and hands it over to The Macarone, and as The Macarone is disposing of it in his pants’ pocket, Chesty says to him like this: “But look, Mac,” he says, “I am entitled to my twenty-five percent for finding the plant, just the same.”
Well, The Macarone seems to be thinking this over, and, personally, I figure there is much justice in what Chesty Charles says, and while The Macarone is thinking, there is a noise at the door of somebody coming in, and The Macarone hides that thing under his coat, though I notice he keeps his hand under there, too, until it turns out that the party coming in is nobody but Willie.
“Well,” Willie says, “I have quite an interesting experience just now while I am taking a stroll away out on the Boulevard. It is right pretty out that way, to be sure,” he says. “I meet a cop and get to talking to him about this and that, and while we are talking the cop says, “Good evening, Mr. Box,” to a character who goes walking past.
“The cop says this character is Mr. Cleeburn T. Box,” Willie says. “I say Mr. Box looks worried, and the cop says yes, his nephew is sick, and maybe he is worrying about him. But,” Willie says, “the cop says, ‘If I am Mr. Box, I will not be worrying about such a thing, because if the nephew dies before he comes of age, Mr. Box is the sole heir to his brother’s estate of maybe ten million dollars, and the nephew is not yet of age.’
“‘Well, cop,’ I say,” Willie says, “‘are you sure this is Mr. Cleeburn T. Box?’ and the cop says yes, he knows him for over ten years, and that he meets up with him every night on the Boulevard for the past week, just the same as tonight, because it seems Mr. Cleeburn T. Box takes to strolling that way quite some lately.
“So,” Willie says, “I figure to save everybody a lot of bother, and I follow Mr. Cleeburn T. Box away out the Boulevard after I leave the cop, and when I get to a spot that seems nice and quiet and with nobody around, I step close enough for powder marks to show good and give it to Mr. Cleeburn T. Box between the eyes. Then,” Willie says, “I leave that thing in his right hand, and if they do not say it is a clear case of him pushing himself when they find him, I will eat my hat.”
“Willie,” The Macarone says, “is your Mr. Cleeburn T. Box clean-shaved and does he have thick black hair?”
“Why, no,” Willie says. “He has a big mouser on his upper lip and no hair whatsoever on his head. In fact,” he says, “he is as bald as a biscuit, and maybe balder.”