Sam West let his right hand slide over to the top of the table, so that it was within some two feet of the gun. “I’ll bite,” he said, his eyes hard and glittering. “What has it done?”
“It’s made me bored with life,” George Brokay said. “It’s made me feel like an old man, when I’m not yet thirty. Now, what I want is to get away from the whole damn business. I want to have some adventure; I want to have some fun. I want to have some excitement. That’s the reason I’m making this proposition to you.”
“What’s the proposition?” West asked.
“I want to become a burglar,” Brokay said.
Sam West, whose hand had slid across the table until it was less than a foot from the butt of the gun, became rigidly immobile. “You what?” he asked.
“I want to become a burglar,” Brokay said. “You’re getting a great kick out of life; you’re living a life of excitement; you’re matching your wits against the police; you’re taking chances all the time.”
“You’re taking chances on getting put away for a long, long time in the big house,” Sam West said bitterly. “Did you ever stop to think what that would mean? Locked in a stone cell with iron bars staring you in the eyes all the time? No women — no life — no action — no variety — no—”
“That’s exactly it,” Brokay said. “That’s what makes the game so interesting. If there wasn’t a big penalty if you lost, there wouldn’t be so much fun winning. That s why I can’t get a kick out of gambling. No matter how much I lose, I still have plenty left. Money means nothing to me.”
“By God!” Sam West said, his eyes staring intently into Brokay’s steady, gray eyes, “I believe you mean it!”
“Of course I mean it,” George Brokay said.
Sam West abruptly leaned forward and picked up the gun from the table. He snapped the mechanism back far enough to make sure that there was a cartridge in the chamber.
Brokay laughed at him. “Now what are you going to do?” he asked.
Sam West pocketed the gun. His eyes were glittering. “I’m going to ask you a couple of questions,” he said.
“Go ahead and ask them.”
“Who do you want to rob?”
“Oh, anyone,” Brokay said.
“What do you want to do with the stuff?”
“I’d send it back after I’d stolen it,” Brokay said carelessly. “Or give it to you, or give it to some poor panhandler I met on the street, and then I’d send the man I’d robbed a check for about twice the value of the stuff I’d taken, so that he wouldn’t be losing anything.”
“A check would hardly be advisable,” Sam West said, a smile twisting the corners of his mouth.
“Well,” Brokay told him, “we could leave him the money on his doorstep or send it to him by messenger, or break into the house again and drop it in a bureau drawer. I don’t care how he gets it, just so he gets it.”
He made an impatient gesture.
“Can’t you get the point?” he said. “I’m fed up with life. I’m a good judge of character. I look at you and see in you a man who is living an existence that is outside the law. From a moral stand point, it’s probably wicked. You’ll probably wind up by being killed, executed or imprisoned. But I can see from the expression on your face that you’re enjoying life while you’re living, and I’d like to enjoy life with you for a while.”
“And,” said Sam West, “you don’t know one single thing about me, or who I am, or where I come from.”
“I have invested a great deal of money during past few years,” Brokay said, “because of my ability to judge character. I can see that you’re no ordinary crook. I don’t know your history and I don’t care to. All I want is a partner in excitement.”
Sam West suddenly strode across the room, his hand outstretched. “O.K., chief,” he said, “you’ve made a sale.”
The two men shook hands.
“And,” Brokay said, “I want to start tonight.”
Sam West slipped a leather-covered notebook from his pocket, turned the pages, read a notation, then looked up at Brokay and grinned.
“No questions asked?” he inquired.
“No questions asked,” Brokay said.
“O.K.,” Sam West told him. “Put your hat back on. We’re going out.”
Chapter Two
Monkey Business
Shadows clung to the vacant house like soft road tar clings to an automobile tire. Crouched in the shadows, George Brokay peered at the dark structure which blotted out the stars.
“And there’s no one home?” he asked, in a whisper.
“We’re just taking a chance on one person,” Sam West said. “Everyone else is accounted for. The servants are out. The chauffeur sleeps out over the garage in an apartment. He couldn’t hear a stick of dynamite explode in the house.”
“Who’s the one person we’re taking chances on?” Brokay asked in a low, cautious voice.
“She’s a young woman,” Sam West said. “You should be interested in her, because she’s the same sort that you are — a woman who has more money than she knows what to do with.”
“Who is it?” Brokay inquired curiously.
“Her name’s Ordway,” West told him, “Gladys Ordway. She’s about twenty-six — perhaps twenty-seven, and she’s easy to look at.”
“You’ve met her?” asked Brokay.
“Never seen her in my life, but I know what she looks like and I’ve got all the dope on her.”
“You’ve looked this place up?”
“Oh, yes, I look up every place before I go into it.”
“Did you know that you were likely to encounter me tonight?”
“No. I knew that you had gone to the Van Dusen’s, and I knew that the affair wouldn’t be over until two or three o’clock in the morning. I thought I had at least an hour.”
“That’s what I got for being bored with the party,” Brokay said.
“This is what you get for being bored with the party,” West told him, and chuckled. “Come on, we’ll try the window over there on the south side — the one that has the shade tree growing near it.”
“You mean we’ll climb up in the shade tree?”
“No, we’ll take advantage of the shadow. Let’s go.”
“Suppose the window’s locked?” Brokay asked.
“I’ll show you all about that,” Sam West said.
He led the way across the narrow strip of lawn, to the place where the tree flung an inky shadow against the house. Calmly, methodically, he took a small leather case from beneath his coat, selected a curved steel bar, fitted a telescopic handle to it, placed one end of the curved bar beneath the sill of the window, and pressed downward.
There was a sharp clicking noise, and the window rose for an inch or two, shivering slightly. Sam West casually inserted gloved fingers and raised the sash. “Remember,” he said in a whisper, “no matter how inconvenient it is, keep the gloves on your hands. We don’t want to leave any fingerprints.”
With the lithe grace of an athlete, West swung up from the ground, flung one leg over the window sill and then disappeared in the darkness. “Want a hand?” he whispered.