THE NOTES AND A BARGAIN
I went back slowly to where the woman sat alone.
She smiled rather oddly as I drew near, and pointed to the chair
Bronson had vacated.
“Sit down, Mr. Blakeley,” she said, “I am going to take a few minutes
of your valuable time.”
“Certainly.” I sat down opposite her and glanced at a cuckoo clock on
the wall. “I am sorry, but I have only a few minutes. If you—” She
laughed a little, not very pleasantly, and opening a small black fan
covered with spangles, waved it slowly.
“The fact is,” she said, “I think we are about to make a bargain.”
“A bargain?” I asked incredulously. “You have a second advantage of me.
You know my name”—I paused suggestively and she took the cue.
“I am Mrs. Conway,” she said, and flicked a crumb off the table with an
over-manicured finger.
The name was scarcely a surprise. I had already surmised that this
might be the woman whom rumor credited as being Bronson’s common-law
wife. Rumor, I remembered, had said other things even less pleasant,
things which had been brought out at Bronson’s arrest for forgery.
“We met last under less fortunate circumstances,” she was saying. “I
have been fit for nothing since that terrible day. And you—you had a
broken arm, I think.”
“I still have it,” I said, with a lame attempt at jocularity; “but to
have escaped at all was a miracle. We have much, indeed, to be thankful
for.”
“I suppose we have,” she said carelessly, “although sometimes I doubt
it.” She was looking somberly toward the door through which her late
companion had made his exit.
“You sent for me—” I said.
“Yes, I sent for you.” She roused herself and sat erect. “Now, Mr.
Blakeley, have you found those papers?”
“The papers? What papers?” I parried. I needed time to think.
“Mr. Blakeley,” she said quietly, “I think we can lay aside all
subterfuge. In the first place let me refresh your mind about a few
things. The Pittsburg police are looking for the survivors of the car
Ontario; there are three that I know of—yourself, the young woman with
whom you left the scene of the wreck, and myself. The wreck, you will
admit, was a fortunate one for you.”
I nodded without speaking.
“At the time of the collision you were in rather a hole,” she went on,
looking at me with a disagreeable smile. “You were, if I remember,
accused of a rather atrocious crime. There was a lot of corroborative
evidence, was there not? I seem to remember a dirk and the murdered
man’s pocket-book in your possession, and a few other things that
were—well, rather unpleasant.”
I was thrown a bit off my guard.
“You remember also,” I said quickly, “that a man disappeared from the
car, taking my clothes, papers and everything.”
“I remember that you _said_ so.” Her tone was quietly insulting, and I
bit my lip at having been caught. It was no time to make a defense.
“You have missed one calculation,” I said coldly, “and that is, the
discovery of the man who left the train.”
“You have found him?” She bent forward, and again I regretted my hasty
speech. “I knew it; I said so.”
“We are going to find him,” I asserted, with a confidence I did not
feel. “We can produce at any time proof that a man left the Flier a few
miles beyond the wreck. And we can find him, I am positive.”
“But you have not found him yet?” She was clearly disappointed. “Well,
so be it. Now for our bargain. You will admit that I am no fool.”
I made no such admission, and she smiled mockingly.
“How flattering you are!” she said. “Very well. Now for the premises.
You take to Pittsburg four notes held by the Mechanics’ National Bank,
to have Mr. Gilmore, who is ill, declare his indorsement of them
forged.
“On the journey back to Pittsburg two things happen to you: you lose
your clothing, your valise and your papers, including the notes, and
you are accused of murder. In fact, Mr. Blakeley, the circumstances
were most singular, and the evidence—well, almost conclusive.”
I was completely at her mercy, but I gnawed my lip with irritation.
“Now for the bargain.” She leaned over and lowered her voice. “A fair
exchange, you know. The minute you put those four notes in my hand—that
minute the blow to my head has caused complete forgetfulness as to the
events of that awful morning. I am the only witness, and I will be
silent. Do you understand? They will call off their dogs.”
My head was buzzing with the strangeness of the idea.
“But,” I said, striving to gain time, “I haven’t the notes. I can’t
give you what I haven’t got.”
“You have had the case continued,” she said sharply. “You expect to
find them. Another thing,” she added slowly, watching my face, “if you
don’t get them soon, Bronson will have them. They have been offered to
him already, but at a prohibitive price.”
“But,” I said, bewildered, “what is your object in coming to me? If
Bronson will get them anyhow—”
She shut her fan with a click and her face was not particularly
pleasant to look at.
“You are dense,” she said insolently. “I want those papers—for myself,
not for Andy Bronson.”
“Then the idea is,” I said, ignoring her tone, “that you think you have
me in a hole, and that if I find those papers and give them to you you
will let me out. As I understand it, our friend Bronson, under those
circumstances, will also be in a hole.”
She nodded.
“The notes would be of no use to you for a limited length of time,” I
went on, watching her narrowly. “If they are not turned over to the
state’s attorney within a reasonable time there will have to be a
_nolle pros_—that is, the case will simply be dropped for lack of
evidence.”
“A week would answer, I think,” she said slowly. “You will do it,
then?”
I laughed, although I was not especially cheerful.
“No, I’ll not do it. I expect to come across the notes any time now,
and I expect just as certainly to turn them over to the state’s
attorney when I get them.”
She got up suddenly, pushing her chair back with a noisy grating sound
that turned many eyes toward us.
“You’re more of a fool than I thought you,” she sneered, and left me at
the table.