The Golden Gizmo

doing everything he could to lay hands on the guy who killed her. That was his only reason for stringing along with Alvarado. Of course, the latter's offer was unusually attractive, the kind of thing he'd been looking for.

Only one setup could be prettier-to find out who the present supplier was. He'd be loaded, stooped down with dough he wasn't supposed to have.

'Mr. Kent!'

Dolores was kneeling beside him, the silken fullness of her breast pressing against his arm. The blue V-necked nightgown cast seductive shadows along the creamy planes of her flesh.

'The coffee-you have been doped. You must leave here at once!'

14

Toddy was a happy awakener; it was the one characteristic which had maddened Elaine more than any of his others. Shaking with a hangover, sick at her stomach, she would look at him in the morning and profanely demand what the hell there was to grin about.

So he looked at Dolores now, smiling not for her but himself. And then awareness came to him, and with it the chronic suspicion and hardness which life had engendered in him. But the smile still lingered, deceptively trusting and innocent.

'How's that?' he asked. 'What do you mean, the coffee's doped?'

'You saw he did not drink of it? Now you must go!'

'Why?'

'You are in great danger. I cannot tell you more than that.'

'Sure,' said Toddy. 'Sure, I'll go. Just as soon as you tell me how to dope black coffee. I've heard of almost everything, but I've never heard of that. There ought to be a fortune in it.'

'B-but I-I-'

Her mouth closed helplessly over the words which had seemed so adequate a moment ago. He looked like a different man now. The mold remained the same but the contents had undergone a fearsomely rapid change. The soft crinkles of his smile had assumed the rigid hardness of ice.

'Well?'

'All right,' she said, coloring. 'I lied about the coffee. But-'

His hand closed suddenly over her arm. With a movement too swift to analyze, she was twirled up and around and smacked down upon his knees.

'You don't mind?' he said. 'I like to look at people when I talk to them. Always look at people when you talk to them, and you won't have to wear false teeth.'

'I-let me-!'

She tried to fling herself forward… and his right foot swung with casual expertness. She fell back into the hollow of his knees, her feet swept from under her. She balanced there foolishly, fury slowly surrendering to a growing fear.

'A little bony, aren't they?' he nodded. 'You said I was in danger; I'm willing to be convinced. What danger?'

'It-the danger is not from Alvarado.'

'Well, then?'

'That is all I will say.'

'Oh, now,' Toddy drawled, 'we can't leave it there. We just can't do that. You haven't got a twin sister, have you?'

'A twin? I do not understand.'

'Uh-huh. Some girl that looked just like you chased me all over hell tonight; hunted me down with a dog the size of a Shetland pony. I had my legs run off. I damned near got killed two or three times. And after the dog had caught me and herded me into her car, she brought me out here- the last place in the world I wanted to go. I tried to bribe her. I tried to argue with her. It was no soap right on down the line. And after all that, she turns pal on me. She's my bosom-no offense, honey-friend, I'm supposed to-'

'Please! If you'll give me a chance…'

'You've got it.'

'I had to bring you here. I could not let you escape. Alvarado would have accepted no excuse.'

'Why didn't you take it on the lam? Why don't you now-if you really don't like the game? Alvarado's not in any position to make much trouble and neither are you. You'd be even-stephen.'

He waited, eyebrows raised, watching the shivering rise and fall of her breast. There were tears in her eyes. She looked pathetically sweet and helpless and baffled, like a child who has had its hands slapped in the act of presenting a gift.

'I'm still here,' he said harshly. 'Let's have it.'

'You!' she snapped, her eyes suddenly tearless, 'you are so full of your own image that you can see nothing else! Are you blind? Have you forgotten that I tried to protect you tonight? I could have received much more than a blow. To make my story conform with yours, I-'

'Uh-huh. After it wouldn't do any good. After you'd already told him another one… Did you ever get worked over by the cops, honey? It's pretty cute. You're in a soundproof room, see; you're buried where no one can get to you; you're not even booked, maybe. There's not a thing you can do but take it, the slaps, the hose, the kidney kicks; and you've had more than you can take hours ago. And then the door slams open and a nice fatherly guy comes in, and he gives these guys hell. They can't do that to you. He won't stand for it. He's going to get 'em all fired. Cute? Why, you'll fall on his neck-if you haven't been through the routine before.'

'Oh,' said Dolores, softly. 'You think that-yes, you would have to think that. You could not be expected to think otherwise.'

'Bingo, gin and blackjack,' Toddy said. 'Let's see if we can't agree on something else.'

'I had better go. There is nothing I can say to you.'

'How many times were you in my room tonight?'

'How-Why, once!'

'And the room was in order?'

'Yes! It was in order and I did not move the body-why in the world should I?-and you can believe that or disbelieve it and-and I hate you!'

'Sit still!' Toddy grabbed her arm and drew her back. 'I haven't got much more to say but I want to be sure you hear it. My wife was a tramp. They don't come any lower. But I didn't want her dead, I particularly didn't want her dead that way… No one deserves to die like that, alone, gagged, and strangled in a sleazy room in a third-class hotel. If I live long enough, I'll get my hands on the party that did it. When I do…'

'Surely, you cannot think that-'

'Think it?' Toddy shook his head. 'I don't even think that you're trying to steer me away from my one chance to find the murderer. I don't even think that I might find myself in trouble if I picked you up on that steer-if I tried to leave. I don't think a thing. All I know is that hell's been popping ever since I came to this house this afternoon, and you've been right in the middle of the fireworks. I don't think a thing, but I don't not think anything either. That's the way it is, and as long as it is that way here's a tip for you. Don't toss that pretty little butt toward me again. If you do, I'll kick it for a field goal.'

He put a period to the words with a knee jerk. It sent her stumbling to her feet, and she wobbled awkwardly for a moment, startled, furious, fighting to regain her balance.

'You!' she flung over her shoulder, and the door banged shut on the word.

She was none too soon… if it wasn't an act. For Alvarado had returned; a car was pulling into the driveway. Toddy wondered what line you took in a case like this.

If it was the chinless man's way of testing him, there was only one thing to do. Tell him about it. It