"If it's going to be long," she said, "we'd both better have a drink.
You always think better if you have a glass in your hand."
"Now, what is it you want to know?" I answered, after we were
comfortably settled in front of the electric fire.
"It's--it's just that everything is so queer," Germaine began. "You've
changed so that you almost seem like a different person. You even look
better, not so flabby, as though you took regular exercise. At least
I see a change, and then suddenly I find that you've been carrying on
with that Briggs girl and I can't tell whether you've really changed or
are just trying to fool me. She's a nice person, of course, and if you
_must_ have another girl, I'd rather have you pick someone--oh--safe
and comfortable like her. But you said you hadn't been playing with
the office girls. And then there's Ponto. He used to adore you and you
swore by him. Now he tries to bite you and you want to get rid of him.
And then there's all this talk about where you were during Holy Week
and that F.B.I. man and Myrtle tells me they've been asking a lot of
questions about you and Virginia. What _have_ you been doing, dear,
that you can't remember when our whole life may depend on it?"
"Jimmie," I told her. "I wish to God I knew. You must believe me when
I tell you I can't remember things before Easter Monday. That was the
second and today is the eleventh and I can remember everything that's
happened since then. Before that it is all blank and all mixed-up in
that dream I had."
She moved away from me, slightly. "You can't tell me that the F.B.I.
would be interested in your dreams," she said sharply. "Not in time of
war."
"They are in this dream," I told her. "You see I dreamed--if you want
to call it that--that a certain American ship blew up in the North
Pacific. The trouble is that the public hasn't been told that there is
such a ship, like that 'Old Nameless' in the Solomons, and that the
Navy Department doesn't know what happened to it. _I_ believe that
it did blow up. Harcourt believes my story, in the main, but from
the F.B.I. angle they have to check up on whether I'm not part of an
Axis spy-ring which could have caused the explosion. If I could only
remember where I was and what I was doing the week before I could clear
myself."
Her face lighted and she relaxed. "Oh, is _that_ all?" she exclaimed.
"I _know_ you couldn't have done anything like that. All you've
probably been doing is to go off with one of those silly girls of yours
to some out-of-the-way place. That ought to be easy to check, even if
you registered under a false name. For the first time, you know," she
added, "I'm almost _glad_ you've been chasing all those stupid blondes
of yours. It will make it easy to establish your alias."
"Alibi," I corrected her. "Let me fix you another drink. From now on,"
I added, "there are going to be no more blondes or red-heads. I like
Arthurjean Briggs--she's named Arthurjean for her father and mother.
It's one word like Marylou or Honeychile--but she's more like a friend
than a--oh--you know. You saw her. But I guess you're right. I must
have been chasing around so much my mind got tangled up in itself and
sort of blew a fuse. If I can't get my memory straightened out soon
I'll look up a psychiatrist and see if he can't fix me."
"You know, Winnie--" Germaine began and then fell silent.
"Yes, Jimmie?"
She turned towards me and smiled rather wistfully. "You know, I was
going to say that you and I--perhaps--Well, it's so long since we've
been really--oh--_close_ to each other. I wondered--"
"You mean that perhaps we ought to patch things up between us?"
"Isn't that what a wife's for?" she asked. "I mean--I mean when things
get difficult it ought--there ought to be _one_ person to whom you
could turn."
I slipped my arm around her and drew her close to me on the lounge. She
lowered her face against my coat and I could feel her shaking.
"You're crying!" I said. "You mustn't cry."
"Oh, Winnie, I've been so alone--so--"
I raised her face to mine and kissed her, tasting the wet, salt tears.
Her lips were warm and soft against mine. Suddenly she pressed herself
against me and responded to my kiss so fiercely that we were both
startled. We sprang apart, almost guiltily.
"Oh!" she exclaimed. "Oh--you haven't kissed me like that--"
She raised her lips again and this time we held it.
* * * * *
What with one thing and another, I didn't get back to the office until
the Market closed on Thursday afternoon. I found my two partners in
pretty good control of our operations but frankly mystified as to the
cause of the official mugging of Tompkins, Wasson & Cone. We had laid
out two and a half millions in all, despite the attempt to scare us
off. The market had continued steady.
Neither Graham nor Phil asked me any direct questions about the events
on Wednesday. They talked straight business and kept their curiosity
in check. It was close to half-past four when we finished our general
discussion of the operation, so I decided that they were entitled to
some kind of explanation in return for their loyalty.
"See here, boys," I told them. "You've both been perfectly swell about
this rat-race the S.E.C. started. Harry Willamer tried to put the
squeeze on me for half a million dollars to finance him and a bunch of
official bastards in a shady deal. When I turned him down he threatened
to tie us up with a Commission investigation. I bluffed him out of it
at the time by pretending there was an F.B.I. dictaphone record of
our talk, so he laid off the heavy heat and just started needling us
a little. Any time now he'll make the check at the F.B.I. and when
he finds there isn't any record he'll try to tie us up tighter than
a drum. All we can do is wait it out. The market's going to start
dropping any day now and we'll clean up."
"Oh!" Wasson said. "Was that it? Willamer's a bad actor. Thanks for
telling us, Winnie. Phil and I knew that there must be something screwy
when--"
The door flew open and Arthurjean appeared, her face white.
"God!" she said at last. "He was such a swell guy. He--"
"Who? What's the mat--"
"It's Roosevelt!" she choked. "He's dead. It just came in on the
ticker."
"No!"
"He died at Warm Springs." And she hid her face in her hands and left
the room, sobbing.
Phil Cone stood up, paper-white, crossed over and turned up the radio.
"Flash!" the announcer was saying. "Warm Springs, Georgia. President
Roosevelt died this afternoon following his collapse from a severe
cerebral hemorrhage. More in a moment. Keep tuned to this station."
"Well, I'll be eternally damned!" I said. "So he was right--"
Cone whirled on me. "You knew about this," he stated flatly "When we
were talking yesterday morning. You had more than a hunch. You knew he
was going to die."
"Be your age, Phil," I told him. "How in hell _could_ I know?"
"Je-sus Ke-rist!" Wasson growled. "This will knock holy hell out of the
Market. Lucky trading's closed for the day. They can't open tomorrow.
They'll have to shut down all the exchanges. They'll have to close the
banks. God! What a mess!"
Cone still looked dazed. "No dancing in the streets?" he asked
bitterly. "I thought this was going to send values sky-rocketing."
Wasson swung on him. "The hell with that talk, Phil," he snapped. "I
was just shooting the bull. Roosevelt dead! Jesus H. Christ! You know,
he wasn't a bad old buzzard after he got rid of all that New Deal
nonsense and set to work winning this war."
Cone had recovered his poise. "Sure he did a swell job winning the war,
but now we're going to lose the peace, sure as shooting!"
"Hell!" Graham's choice of expletives was strictly rationed. "This
means that Truman will take over. What sort of a guy is he? You got any
idea, Winnie? He's not up to Roosevelt, that's sure."
I shook my head. "I don't know from nothing," I began. "Sh!"
The radio announcer resumed his broadcast. "Warm Springs, Georgia.
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt passed away at four thirty-five
this afternoon, Eastern War Time, following a severe cerebral
hemorrhage. The late President had been spending a few days at his
Georgia retreat getting rested after his strenuous trip to the Yalta
Conference. Earlier this afternoon he complained of a severe headache
and almost immediately became unconscious. He died peacefully a little
later. His death came at a moment when American troops in Germany and
on Okinawa were driving ahead toward the victory he--"
Cone switched it down again. "_He_ had a headache!" he muttered. "What
do you think _we're_ going to have?"
The telephone rang. I picked up the instrument. It was one of those
automatic phonograph recordings. "The Stock Exchange will not be open
tomorrow by order of the Governors, out of respect for the memory of
the late President Roosevelt. That is all--The Stock Exchange will not
be open--" the metallic feminine voice went on. I hung up.
"You're right about one thing, Graham," I said. "That was an automatic
message to say the Exchange will be closed tomorrow. It's probably on
the ticker, too."
It was.
Cone sat down suddenly, as though his legs had turned to rubber.
"Now it will all start again," he said. "Sell out and pack up, pack up
and clear out."
I crossed the office and put my hand on his shoulder. "Cheer up, Phil,"
I told him. "It won't be as bad as that. Graham and I will stick with
you and that's true of Americans generally."
Cone shrugged his shoulders hopelessly. "Thanks, Winnie," he remarked.
"You're a good fellow and a good friend. I've got something to say
to you. You won't like it. I got worried yesterday when you started
talking about Roosevelt maybe dying and I tipped the F.B.I. on what you
said."
I laughed. "If the F.B.I. arrested every man in Wall Street who had
ever talked about Roosevelt dying the jails wouldn't hold them. Don't
worry, Phil. In your shoes I'd have done the same thing."
The phone rang again. It was the receptionist. "Mr. Harcourt is here to
see you, Mr. Tompkins," she informed me. "Shall I ask him to wait?"
"Tell him I'll see him in a couple of minutes," I replied.
"This is it, boys," I told my partners. "It's the F.B.I. Now, the
Market's going to drop. It will be a bear market in a big way,
dignified as hell, and we're in ahead of the others. You two just carry
on. Try to get a line on this guy Truman. Some of our Kansas City
correspondents may have the dope. Phil, no hard feelings about this
F.B.I. angle. They've been riding me for days on some crazy story Ranty
Tolan started about me last week."
Wasson looked at me coldly. "If I thought that you had anything to do
with this--" he began.
"Oh skip it!" I begged him. "You know me better."
I picked up the phone and told the receptionist to send Harcourt in.
"Mr. Tompkins," he said. "I've been ordered to ask you to come up to
the Bureau's headquarters right away."
"Am I under arrest?" I asked.
"Well," Harcourt admitted, "I haven't got a warrant but I think maybe
you better come with me."
"What's the charge?"
"My chief will tell you what it's all about," he said. "My orders were
to bring you in for questioning."
"Okay," I agreed. "I'll come along quietly. Phil, will you tell Miss
Briggs to ring up my wife and say I won't be home tonight and not to
worry. I'll be all right."
Harcourt came and laid his hand on my arm. "Come along then," he
ordered gruffly.
"How about my lawyer?" I inquired. "Graham, will you phone Merry Vail
and tell him I've been taken up to the F.B.I. for questioning?"
Harcourt looked up at me. "Is Merriwether Vail your lawyer?" he asked.
"I wouldn't bother to call him. We've picked him up too. All your
associates, outside of business and--er--pleasure, are being rounded
up. The President's dead, Mr. Tompkins, and you're going to do some
talking to my chief."