The Talking Clock

Chapter Fourteen

Johnny was lying in bed the next morning, wondering whether to get up and dress or have breakfast brought up to the room. He rolled his head and saw the newspaper under the door, and after looking at it a while, decided that he might as well get up and see what was going on.

He got the newspaper and returned to bed. In the twin bed on the side nearest the windows Sam Cragg was lying on his back, covers thrown back. He wore no pajamas and his broad chest was rising and falling rhythmically.

Johnny looked at the newspaper. The British were giving the Germans hell and the Germans were beating the hell out of the British. The British downed fourteen German planes, with a loss of but one for their side and the Germans had shot down thirty-four British planes with a loss of only two of their own.

Then an item on the bottom half of the front page caught his eye:

According to the account, Joe Cornish, manager of the Quisenberry estate, had surprised a pair of burglars on the Quisenberry estate shortly after midnight. He had fought with the men, but they had overpowered him and made their escape. Reporting the occurrence to the owner of the estate, Eric Quisenberry, an examination was made in the house with the astonishing discovery that the safe was open and the famous Talking Clock, valued at $100,000 by the recently deceased owner, Simon Quisenberry, was missing. The burglars had not touched any of the other clocks in the famous collection, most of which were not under lock and key.

Johnny rolled up the newspaper and reaching over, slapped Sam Cragg’s bare chest. “Up, Sammy, my boy! The sun’s shining and the early birds are getting all the worms… We’ve been outwitted.”

Sam Cragg sat up and blinked stupidly. “Owoo!” he yawned. “What’s matter? I was just dreaming that we were in Florida and I’d picked a thirty-two to one shot—”

“And the horse stumbled in the stretch! Look at this paper, Sam. The Talking Clock’s been swiped from the Quisenberrys.”

“Huh? Say… Jim Partridge?”

“Read the description that bird Cornish gave of the burglars. One man tall and rather slender, the other shorter and very stocky. An extraordinarily powerful man…”

“Hey! Those’re our descriptions.”

“Were we at the Quisenberry estate around midnight?”

“We were pounding our ears here.”

“Sure we were. So let’s get out there and tell them.”

Sam winced. “Is that a good idea? This Cornish lad may identify us. He didn’t seem to care a lot for either of us.”

“I didn’t care for him, either. But he won’t identify us. He didn’t mention having actually recognized the burglars, did he? Furthermore… there’s something damn fishy about this burglary. Why should they pass up the other clocks? If you’ll remember, some of them looked even better than the Talking Clock.”

“But they weren’t worth as much.”

“Only a clock expert would know that. Or someone who knew about the Talking Clock.”

Johnny hopped out of bed and headed for the bathroom. When he came out a few minutes later, he began dressing. “Hurry up, Sam,” he said. “We’ve got a busy day ahead of us…”

It was then that the door resounded to the rapping of knuckles. Johnny slipped on his trousers and began buttoning his shirt. Still shoeless, he went to the door.

“Who is it?”

“Me,” said the voice of Jim Partridge.

“Ah, hell! Before breakfast.” However, Johnny opened the door. He regretted it instantly.

Partridge had a friend with him, a man who outweighed Sam Cragg by twenty pounds and most certainly had been either a prizefighter or wrestler at some time. He couldn’t have acquired such a battered face and such thick ears in ordinary encounters.

Sam began growling.

“Easy, boys,” said Jim Partridge. “I’m not looking for trouble. Not now. This is one of my operators. Call him Hutch.”

“The name is Hutchinson,” said Hutch. “Edgar Hutchinson. But don’t call me Edgar.”

“Shut up, Edgar,” Partridge said. “Look, Fletcher, I see you’ve got a paper. You’ve read about the clock.”

“Just finished. Why’d you do it, Partridge?”

“The watchman’s description fits you birds.”

“We were sleeping at midnight.”

“That’s what the bell captain says. I asked him before we came up. But you might have slipped him something. He seemed to be on your side, all the way.”

“Eddie Miller? Yep, he practically works for me. So does Peabody, the manager. Get to the point, Partridge.”

“I am. You didn’t steal the clock and I didn’t. Who did?”

“Maybe it was an inside job. Your ex…”

Partridge glowered. “She’s not beyond it, but the watchman described these two pugs—”

“Maybe the watchman’s a friend of Bonita’s.” Johnny did not know how accurate was his guess.

“What’s he look like?”

“Don’t you know?”

Partridge grunted. “How should I? I’ve never been out there.”

“In Columbus you said you were representing the Quisenberry estate.”

“That was in Columbus. I’m working for myself, Fletcher.”

“Well, you want to watch yourself. You might forget and cut your own throat.”

Sam Cragg snickered and Partridge scowled. “Cut the comedy, Fletcher. I’m not ready to go out to the Quisenberry place yet. How’s about you running out there and finding out what’s what?”

“Uh-uh, Partridge. You look like a monkey all right, but we’re out of chestnuts today. I’m working for myself, too.”

“I’ve been thinking it over,” Partridge said, deliberately, “I’ve got an alibi for September 29th…”

Johnny looked pointedly at Hutch. “What was your ring name, Stupid?”

“Stupid?” yelped Hutch. “Why you—”

Sam Cragg took one step forward and hit Hutch on the side of the head with his fist. Hutch reeled to the wall, hit and ricocheted back. Sam clipped him on the chin, scarcely seeming to exert himself. Hutch fell to the floor on his face.

While this was going on, Johnny Fletcher stepped close to Jim Partridge, so he could block any move Partridge might make. Partridge watched what happened to his operator, his nostrils flaring. When Hutch hit the floor he said: “I guess I’ll have to fire him. He told me he could take it.”

“How about you, Partridge?” Sam invited. “You look pretty husky yourself…”

“I’ll wait till I’ve got some brass knuckles with me.”

Johnny gestured to Sam and the big fellow walked around behind Partridge and pinned his arms to his sides. Johnny relieved Partridge of his automatic. He scowled. “You’ve got some bullets today, I see.”

He slipped out the magazine and tossed it into the wastebasket. Then he proceeded to frisk Partridge further. He returned everything to the private detective’s pockets, except a crumpled telegram.

“Listen to this, Sam!” he exclaimed.

“Why the rat!” snarled Sam Cragg.

“I thought there was something fishy about his threat. He didn’t have time to get himself an out-of-town alibi since last night and he wouldn’t have dared call us without a good alibi.”

“Shall I let him have it, Johnny?”

“You’re one up on me already,” Partridge replied. “Better not make it two.”

“I don’t get this telegram, Johnny,” said Sam. “How could a guy commit suicide by choking himself?”

“He didn’t. He was murdered all right. This hick county just doesn’t want to spend any money extraditing anyone and then prosecuting him. They’re taking the cheapest way out by calling it suicide.”

“Where’s the truck that hit me?” mumbled Hutch, sitting up.

Partridge kicked him in the ribs. “On your feet, Stumblebum!”

Knuckles massaged the door of Room 821 and Mr. Peabody’s voice called. “Mr. Fletcher, what are you doing in there? The guests are complaining about the racket you’re creating.”

Johnny opened the door. “Ah, good morning, Mr. Peabody. We were just doing our daily calisthenics…”

Peabody looked at Hutch who was climbing unsteadily to his feet.

“Our physical culture instructor,” Johnny said. “He comes every morning to give us a workout. See you tomorrow, eh, Professor?”

Jim Partridge grabbed Hutch’s arm and propelled him past Peabody, into the corridor. Peabody still glowered at Johnny.

“I knew I was making a mistake, Mr. Fletcher. You’re mixed up in something again…”

“Why, Mr. Peabody,” Johnny said, reproachfully. “I’m beginning to think you don’t appreciate guests who pay in advance, by the week…”

“Ah!” cried Peabody, throwing his hands into the air and turning away.

Sam Cragg kicked the door shut. It made a good loud slam. “Well, that settles that, Johnny. Since Minnesota no longer wants us, we can drop out of the Quisenberry business.”

“Why,” said Johnny, “if the law’s no longer interested in punishing a culprit, it’s up to the private citizen and you and I, Sam—”

Sam put his head between his hands and groaned. “Trouble, here we come again!”

They left the hotel ten minutes later and had breakfast at the orange stand on the comer, a glass of orange juice, two doughnuts and a cup of coffee. Finished, Johnny hailed a taxicab.

Sam grumbled as they got in. “A ten-cent breakfast and then a taxi…”

“We’re in a hurry. West Avenue, Cabby.”

“The clock man, huh?”

“That’s right. I want to see whether he looks happy or mad today. He was pretty keen about that clock yesterday.”

Twenty minutes later they climbed out of the taxi before a tall building, facing the Hudson River docks. Johnny paid the taxi bill, adding a nickel tip, over which the cabby muttered, then faced the building.

“Aegean Sponge Company,” he read the inscription on the brass plate beside the door of the building. “Nicholas Bos, President. You wouldn’t think they sold enough sponges in this country for that bird to pay seventy-five G’s for a fancy clock.”

They went into the building. A receptionist with buck teeth and a complexion like Roquefort cheese had them spell out their names, then telephoned them to an unknown person. After a moment she covered the mouthpiece. “What is your business?”

“Clocks,” said Johnny. “We met Mr. Bos in Hillcrest yesterday.”

The girl relayed the additional information, then nodded. The door beside her desk burst open and the olive-skinned Nicholas Bos reached out with both hands.

“Come in, gentlemen. I am so glad seeing you. Come in, please!”

They followed the sponge importer to an office which contained forty or fifty clocks, all of them showing the correct time, nine forty-eight.

Bos closed the door and turned eagerly to them. “Yes, gentlemen? You have gome to sell…”

“Sell what, Mr. Bos?”

“The clock maybe?”

“The Talking Clock?”

Nicholas Bos almost drooled. “You have it?…” he whispered.

“No,” said Johnny. “It was stolen last night from the Quisenberry house.”

Disappointment swept across the importer’s olive face. “But I am reading that in the paper. I t’ink maybe you…”

“Why should you think we stole it?”

“But you are what you call — ex-gonvic’. I am seeing you yesterday and this morning when I am reading in the paper, I t’ink, they have stolen the clock, those gonvic’s…”

“I figured you for the burglar,” Johnny said bluntly.

“And I’m not an ex-convict,” Sam added.

“Oh! I am so sorry. But Meesus Queesenberry, she say…”

“Since I’m a gentleman,” said Johnny, “I can’t say anything against a lady. Except that Mrs. Quisenberry reminds me of a clip-joint taxi dancer who picked my pocket one time.”

“Ah, then you don’t having the clock?”

“That’s the general idea, Mr. Bos. I came here to get some information about that clock. What makes it worth so much money?”

“Because is Talking Clock.”

“I could have a small phonograph made and put in a Simple Simon clock for a hundred bucks. It would talk and it wouldn’t be worth a lot of money.”

“Ah, but this clock is very, very old. Three hundred year. Four hundred—”

“Going at five,” chimed in Sam Cragg.

“Five? No. Not that old. Is beautiful work. Fine engraving and the jewel… worth much money alone.”

“Melted down, how much would it bring?”

“Melted down?” Horror popped wide Bos’ eyes. “You would not melt down this beautiful clock, Mister. Oh no. Don’t doing that!…”

“I’m not melting it down. I haven’t got the clock. I’m just trying to get an idea how much the thing’d be worth as old gold…”

“Old gold? Oh, not much. The jewels, yes, are worth maybe five t’ousand dollar. But I giving fifty t’ousand—”

“You said seventy-five yesterday.”

“That’s right. I give you seventy-five t’ousand dollar for the clock.”

“You ought to hire a detective to locate it, Mr. Bos.”

“A detective? A policeman?…”

“No, a private detective. There’s a lot of them, you know. They work for you, not the city. You could get an awfully good man… for about a hundred bucks a day, with a small bonus when he finishes…”

“You know good detective?”

Johnny spread out his hands and looked at them, modestly. “I’ve had some good results as a detective. You know, I returned the clock to Diana Rusk, after locating it in Ohio…”

“Yes, I am hearing. Ha! I do it. I hiring you find the Talking Clock. You bring him to me and I give you beeg bonus… Maybe ten t’ousand dollar.”

“And the hundred dollars a day.”

Bos frowned a moment, then beamed. “Fine, I also paying that. How many day you t’ink it take?”

“Not more than five or six… if I’m lucky.”

“Is fine. I am hiring you.”

“How about a couple of days’ pay in advance? It’s customary. Sort of retainer, you know…”

The sponge importer took a long, flat wallet from his inside breast pocket and skinned out two bills. Each was a hundred-dollar denomination.

He showed even, white teeth in a wide smile. “You are sport, Mister Fletcher? Tossing coin, double or nothing?”

“Nix, Johnny,” Sam Cragg said out of the side of his mouth.

Bos took a half dollar from his pocket. “You call?…”

“Tails,” said Johnny.

Bos flipped the coin into the air, caught it and smacked it on the back of his left hand. He uncovered it. “Heads, sorry…”

Sam groaned. “Looks like I’ve got to save the day, now…” He drew out his pack of cards from his pocket. “How much change we got, Johnny? We’ll cut Mr. Bos high card for it. Huh?…” He half turned his face and winked at Johnny.

Johnny looked thoughtfully at Sam for a moment, then he drew out all the money they had in the world. He counted out fifty dollars and put two dollars and some silver back into his pocket.

“We’ll cut you high card for fifty dollars, Mr. Bos.”

“Why not?”

Sam riffled the cards, squared them and slapped the deck on the importer’s desk.

Bos placed his hand over the cards, pressed down on them and cut. He held up the ace of spades.

Sam exclaimed in horror and a shudder seemed to run through his body.

“Go ahead and cut,” Johnny said coldly. “Maybe you can get an ace yourself and tie.”

“Sure,” said Nicholas Bos, cheerfully.

Sam’s trembling hand fumbled with the remaining cards. Finally he picked up part of them and revealed the three of diamonds.

“You win,” he said, thickly.

“Some fun, yes?” Bos smiled fondly. “You coming my apartment some time and playing poker. I like gamble.”

“So do we,” said Johnny, glaring at Sam Cragg.

When they reached the street, Johnny caught Sam’s arm in a savage grip. “You sap! What’d you have to pull out those cards for?”

“Because they’re stripped, Johnny!” gasped Sam. “I… I fixed them, so I could cut the ace myself and he beat me to it.”

“Why, the dirty—!” Johnny swore. “He outslicked us all around. I didn’t like that coin toss of his.”

“Neither did I. I was reading in my book about tossing coins and there’re six or seven ways you can beat a man. That’s… that’s why I tried the card cutting.”

Johnny pulled out the remainder of their stake and gave Sam one of the crumpled bills. “Not enough for us both to run out to Hillcrest. You’ll have to stay in town. Here’s some money for grub. Go easy.”

Sam was too crestfallen to protest over Johnny’s going out to Hillcrest. He merely asked, weakly: “When’ll you be back?”

“When you see me,” Johnny snapped. “You might run over to Mort’s and get some more books—”

“Ouch!” cried Sam. “We promised to bring him some money today.”

“You lost the money. You and your card tricks. Tell that to Mort. And you might show him the rest of your tricks. Carmella, too, if he comes around while you’re there… So long, Sam…”

Johnny headed for the subway toward which they had been walking.