them.
He felt the sofa as though he were assaying a prime beef, poked it here and there and then caressed it with soft loving strokes.
'Marvelous,' he muttered to himself. 'Marvelous. More than a hundred years old. Made in New Orleans. Been through the Civil War. Extraordinary! What treasures these black cooks collect.'
Suddenly he picked up his tools and began stripping the sofa like a past master. All the while he talked to himself.
'That Rufus, what a fool. Trying to outwit Abie-ha ha.'
First he pried loose all the hidden tacks.
'The mattress-colored people's strongbox, ha ha.'
Then with a razor blade he ripped the seams of the outer fabric and skinned it back as though skinning an animal. Save for the sound of ripping threads arid his labored breathing, it was silent as a tomb. The silence oppressed him. He talked to relieve the silence, not because the words expressed his thoughts.
'Little fortunes… little fortunes… from little fortunes big fortunes grow…'
Beneath the covering was a layer of horsehair, and beneath that a layer of yellowed cotton. With immaculate care, the Jew removed each layer. His nimble fingers probed and explored every inch of padding before he laid it aside.
'He was searching for somcthing. He thinks Abie doesn't know. He thinks he had fooled Abie. The fool-ha ha…'
He thought be heard a sound.
'What's that!' he exclaimed.
His eyes flew to the basement window. Quick as a cat he moved toward a hidden switch beneath the projecting edge of a bench and turned off the light. The small rectangular window was outlined by the almost imperceptible light of a city night. No telltale silhouette was visible. He had been holding his breath. He breathed once and listened. Only the heavy muted sounds penetrating the thick wall of the brewery disturbed the silence.
'No one in miles,' he muttered.
But he did not switch the light back on yet. He felt an inexplicable nervousness-not a premonition, more a building up of tension. He walked through the darkness to the door leading to the stairs. Something brushed against his leg. Shock went through him like cold fire. He jumped to one side, feeling his hair rise from an ice-cold scalp. His hands clawed desperately along the tool rack for a weapon.
Then a cat mewed and moved forward to rub against his other leg. He looked down and saw twin ellipsoids of green light shining in the dark.
He sucked in his breath with a watery sound.
'Sheba!' he gasped. 'Sheba, little pussy.'
He reached down to stroke the purring black cat.
'Sheba! Little queen. You will make a corpse of old Abie yet.'
He crossed the room, turned on the light and went back to work. The kitten played around his feet.
He worked absorbedly. When the padding was removed he sounded the burlap-covered wooden frame with a small wooden mallet. His ear was cocked, listening to the sound of the wood. He worked along the back of the frame down the back legs, then around to the front legs and up the sides. The arms of the frame were seemingly solid cylinders of a light white wood. The mallet made small light sounds as it tapped against the solid wood.
'Impregnable,' the Jew muttered.
Disappointment showed in the creases of his face. The cat rubbed against his leg again, and he shoved it aside with a gesture of frustration.
He began tapping the other arm. Suddenly he bent his head to listen. There was a slight hollow sound beneath the mallet blows. His face lit slowly with an expression of uncontainable avarice.
The cat had withdrawn to a distance and sat washing her face with offended dignity.
The Jew knelt and examined the end of the cylinder in the bright light. It was identical with its mate, the grains of the wood unbroken as though cut from a solid beam. He exchanged his mallet for a small iron hammer and tapped the end gently, listening. Then he took a small wood chisel from the bench and began cutting a small circle. A few minutes later the plug sank in.
'Ingenious,' he muttered admiringly.
He speared the plug with a gimlet and worked it out from the arm. Behind was a cylindrical opening of an inch in diameter. He probed with his finger. His expression changed to astonishment. With a pair of pincers he fished a cylindrical packet, which fitted exactly, from the opening. The outer cover was yellow oiled silk in a state of perfect preservation. He sniffed it; it smelled slightly perfumed.
He went over to the workbench, switched on another light and smoothed the packet flat. It took the shape of a plain silk pouch, closed with a flap but unsealed. He opened the pouch and extracted a neat sheaf of bright green bank notes held by a paper band. He sucked in his breath. His face was a study in emotions.
'Fantastic!' he muttered. 'Brand-new.'
The notes were of one-hundred-dollar bills.
Slowly his tongue came out and slid from side to side on his bottom lip.
As he counted the notes, his eyes widened. There were 1,000 hundred-dollar bills.
Suddenly he bent double, laughing as though he had suddenly gone stark raving crazy. He was laughing so hard he did not hear the slight sound made by a shoe sole scuffling against the pavement outside the basement window.
But the cat heard. The cat stopped washing its face and stared unblinkingly at the silhouette of a man peering through the dirty panes.
The silhouette withdrew, and the cat went back to washing its face.
The Jew finally got himself under control. He straightened up and stared at the money. Saliva trickled from the corners of his mouth. He wrung his hands as though washing them. The cat stopped washing its face again and watched him silently. He patted the money. He turned it over and looked at the other side, then held one of the notes against the light.
'Incredible,' he muttered.
The next instant his body went rigid. He froze in a listening attitude, his ear cocked. The unmistakable sound of an automobile starter reached his ear. Before his face could form an expression the motor caught and the loud hard roar of a big truck motor racing at top speed shattered the silence. There could be no mistake. Someone had started the motor of his moving van in the shed. No one but himself had keys to the gate. Someone had broken in.
The motor raced, then was cut to idle and left running.
He stacked the money, slipped it back into the pouch, and pulled open a drawer in the workbench, moving with incredible speed. He put the pouch into the drawer and withdrew a. 38 caliber Colt revolver, loaded with tracer bullets, and a large black three-cell flashlight with an oversized lamp. He switched out the light over the bench and moved quickly toward the master switch beneath the other bench. His body, once put into motion, seemed to gather speed. The black-clad figure capped with yellow-gray hair armed with revolver and flashlight gave the impression of incalculable danger.
The switch clicked faintly, and the room was plunged into darkness. But the Jew moved through the darkness as though he could see. He ran lightly on tiptoes through the open door and up the stairs. One of the stairs creaked beneath his weight, and he swore silently in Yiddish.
The staircase turned at a landing and entered the back hall of the first floor, directly beside the back door. The Jew halted for a moment to peer through the grimy panes into the back courtyard. But, coming from the bright light of his workroom, his eyes had not adjusted to the darkness. He put his ear to the pane but could hear only the sound of the idling motor.
With infinite caution he unlocked the inner door. The slight sound made by the clicking of the bolt was barely perceptible above the sound of the idling motor. The door opened soundlessly.
He waited with his face pressed to the iron grille, looking and listening. There was still only the sound of the idling motor. The Jew figured it was a trap. But he didn't know whether it was a legitimate burglar or some teenage hoodlums. He had a telephone in the ground floor cubbyhole office. He could have phoned for the police, but he
