Read Killing Cousins for Free Online Page B
Authors: Fletcher Flora
are a dull tribe.”
She was slightly annoyed by his complacency, and the feeling of annoyance must have pricked her to a higher kind of criticism, for something immediately occurred to her that seemed such an egregious oversight on his part that it made her uneasy about everything else he had suggested.
“Quincy,” she said, “it’s all very well to make clever plans about disposing of Howard and the bags and the Buick, but who is going to believe that he would go off without making any financial arrangements whatever?”
She was quite proud of having thought of this, for it seemed to her a very important consideration, but Quincy was clearly not in the least impressed. His attitude of complacency became, if anything, somewhat more pronounced, and she could see that he had not overlooked the matter of finances at all, but obviously was holding something in reserve with respect to them.
“Cousin,” he said, “this raises a point that may shake you up. My position at the bank has put me in possession of a bit of intelligence of which you are apparently ignorant. The fact is that old Howard, only yesterday, wiped out your joint savings account in the amount of $10,587.27, and cashed, at the same time, somewhat more than $9,000 worth of government bonds, face value, at least half of them matured.”
“What?” she said. “What’s that?”
“It’s true. I didn’t handle the transaction myself, but I made it my business to learn the facts.”
“Why in the world would he do such a thing? Do you suppose he’s been gambling or something?”
“Howard? Fat chance. In my opinion, Cousin, old Howard was planning to do exactly what we are planning to make him appear to have done. Our little indiscretion last night may have caused him to advance his time of departure a few hours or days, but it was not really the precipitating factor at all. Old Howard was getting out in any event.”
“Well, what a damn dirty trick. I’ve never before heard of anything so deceitful in my life. Whoever would have thought Howard capable of such a deception?”
“You’d better be thankful that he was. As it is, our case is supported nicely, and you could hardly have picked a better time to do old Howard in if you had planned it deliberately.”
“It’s easy enough for you to be philosophical, Quincy. You can afford it, I suppose, since you haven’t been deprived of almost $20,000.”
“Fortunately for you, old Howard was the kind of fathead who puts everything in the sort of husband-and-wife joint ownership that makes it possible for either to tap the till without the concurrence of the other. The twenty grand is legally as much yours as his. All you need to do is keep it.”
“I’d be happy to keep it if only I knew where to find it.”
“Well, that’s a problem we should now apply ourselves to. First, I’ll just have a look in old Howard’s wallet. He certainly couldn’t have all the money there, of course, but any part of it is at least a beginning.”
He went over and deftly explored pockets with light fingers. From the inside pocket of Howard’s jacket he extracted the wallet, and from the wallet several crisp bills.
“Eight hundred,” he said, after counting. “I judge that the rest is in the smaller of the packed bags on the floor.”
“So far as I can see,” Willie said, “it might just as well be in the larger one.”
“No. Old Howard would have wanted to keep that much cash pretty close to hand. The smaller bag would be easier to lug about, and that’s where he probably put it.”
He opened the bag, and there, sure enough, it was. It was in a heavy Manila envelope, 9 × 12, and Quincy handed the envelope to Willie, together with the eight hundred, and closed the bag again.
“All this money!” Willie said. “It’s simply incredible that Howard intended playing me such a dirty trick.”
“Well, it hardly matters,” Quincy said, “since it turned out in the end to be a favor.
She was slightly annoyed by his complacency, and the feeling of annoyance must have pricked her to a higher kind of criticism, for something immediately occurred to her that seemed such an egregious oversight on his part that it made her uneasy about everything else he had suggested.
“Quincy,” she said, “it’s all very well to make clever plans about disposing of Howard and the bags and the Buick, but who is going to believe that he would go off without making any financial arrangements whatever?”
She was quite proud of having thought of this, for it seemed to her a very important consideration, but Quincy was clearly not in the least impressed. His attitude of complacency became, if anything, somewhat more pronounced, and she could see that he had not overlooked the matter of finances at all, but obviously was holding something in reserve with respect to them.
“Cousin,” he said, “this raises a point that may shake you up. My position at the bank has put me in possession of a bit of intelligence of which you are apparently ignorant. The fact is that old Howard, only yesterday, wiped out your joint savings account in the amount of $10,587.27, and cashed, at the same time, somewhat more than $9,000 worth of government bonds, face value, at least half of them matured.”
“What?” she said. “What’s that?”
“It’s true. I didn’t handle the transaction myself, but I made it my business to learn the facts.”
“Why in the world would he do such a thing? Do you suppose he’s been gambling or something?”
“Howard? Fat chance. In my opinion, Cousin, old Howard was planning to do exactly what we are planning to make him appear to have done. Our little indiscretion last night may have caused him to advance his time of departure a few hours or days, but it was not really the precipitating factor at all. Old Howard was getting out in any event.”
“Well, what a damn dirty trick. I’ve never before heard of anything so deceitful in my life. Whoever would have thought Howard capable of such a deception?”
“You’d better be thankful that he was. As it is, our case is supported nicely, and you could hardly have picked a better time to do old Howard in if you had planned it deliberately.”
“It’s easy enough for you to be philosophical, Quincy. You can afford it, I suppose, since you haven’t been deprived of almost $20,000.”
“Fortunately for you, old Howard was the kind of fathead who puts everything in the sort of husband-and-wife joint ownership that makes it possible for either to tap the till without the concurrence of the other. The twenty grand is legally as much yours as his. All you need to do is keep it.”
“I’d be happy to keep it if only I knew where to find it.”
“Well, that’s a problem we should now apply ourselves to. First, I’ll just have a look in old Howard’s wallet. He certainly couldn’t have all the money there, of course, but any part of it is at least a beginning.”
He went over and deftly explored pockets with light fingers. From the inside pocket of Howard’s jacket he extracted the wallet, and from the wallet several crisp bills.
“Eight hundred,” he said, after counting. “I judge that the rest is in the smaller of the packed bags on the floor.”
“So far as I can see,” Willie said, “it might just as well be in the larger one.”
“No. Old Howard would have wanted to keep that much cash pretty close to hand. The smaller bag would be easier to lug about, and that’s where he probably put it.”
He opened the bag, and there, sure enough, it was. It was in a heavy Manila envelope, 9 × 12, and Quincy handed the envelope to Willie, together with the eight hundred, and closed the bag again.
“All this money!” Willie said. “It’s simply incredible that Howard intended playing me such a dirty trick.”
“Well, it hardly matters,” Quincy said, “since it turned out in the end to be a favor.