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“Uh. What was in the safe?”
“You’d be better off not knowing.”
I shook my head. “If it’s what you think it is, the mob will react. The kind of reaction will depend on what was inside the safe.”
She took a suicidal drag on her cigarette and stabbed it out in the ash tray. With smoke trailing from her mouth she said, “Let’s just say there was enough to make it worth their while to kill half the population of this town to get it back.”
“Cash?”
“A lot of cash. And files—the kind they couldn’t afford to see in print.”
“How much cash?”
“I never counted it,” she said, snappish. “It was a hell a lot, millions I suppose, but I don’t know. I’m supposed to be Sal Aiello’s secretary but there are a lot of things I don’t get to see.”
“Go on.”
“Look, Simon, I’m only part of the front. All the big shots try to look like legitimate businessmen, and part of the act is having a pretty secretary who doesn’t look as if she came out of a reform school typing course. Aiello has his finger in quite a few legitimate businesses, enough to keep me busy with correspondence and phone calls and filing. I know it’s all a front and he knows I know it, but it’s the kind of thing you never say out loud. I don’t get to see the books and I’ve never even been in the same room when he had the safe open. The safe isn’t in the office, you know—it’s in the library. But I’ve absorbed enough loose talk to know they keep dynamite in that safe. Aiello isn’t the only one who uses it. Vincent Mado
“How old?”
She blinked. “How should I know?”
“It’s not a silly question. If it’s old enough, it’s easy to crack—and they wouldn’t keep top-secret dynamite in a cracker box.”
“Of course they would,” she snapped. “My God, Simon, sometimes Aiello keeps a hundred thousand dollars in cash lying around the office in unlocked drawers. Nobody has the nerve to rob the Mafia.”
“Apparently,” I remarked, “somebody did.” It occurred to me this was the first time I’d ever heard her use the word “Mafia.” I said, “Who else knows about this?”
“I don’t know. Maybe they haven’t discovered it yet. What time is it?”
“Nine-thirty.”
“He didn’t have any appointments for today. But Mado
I watched her for a moment, then headed for the bedroom. “Stay put a minute,” I told her, and went to the phone by the bed. I dialed Nancy Lansford, my neighbor down the road, a two-hundred-pound spinster who lived on a small inheritance and spent the winters taking tourists and school children on nature walks in the desert. She owed me a few favors—her house was full of polished rocks I’d given her. She was a relaxing old windbag, tart and practical as only a fanatically conservationist old maid could be.
She answered breathlessly on the fifth ring; I identified myself.
“Oh, Simon, good morning, isn’t it a beautiful day?” She had a reedy, chirping voice. “I was outside watching a buzzard with my field glasses. Aren’t they remarkable birds? Why, only last week I—”
I cut her off: “Nancy, I need a little help.”
She answered immediately: “Name it.”
I gri
“Of course. But why—”
“I haven’t got time to explain,” I said. “If anybody drives by your house, just dial my number, let the phone ring twice, and hang up. Don’t wait for me to answer, just hang up after two rings. Got it?”
“I’ve got it. I must say you sound very mysterious.”
“I’ll tell you about it later,” I said, thanked her and hung up.
When I looked around, Joa
I nodded. “If they want to find you, this is one of the first places they’ll think of looking. I’ll feel better with a few minutes’ warning.” Nancy lived three miles away, at the foot of my road.
She said, “I’m glad—because I’m sure they’ll be after me.” She went back into the living room. When I got there she was back on the couch with her coffee, lighting another cigarette. She was addicted to menthol cigarettes and strong coffee.
She said, “You never asked me any questions, but I suppose you must have figured out that they had something on me, to keep me—loyal.”
“Yeah,” I said, without inflection.
“It was in that safe.”
“What was it?”
“I don’t want to tell you. What difference does it make? Papers, tape recordings, pictures, movie films. It was there. Now whoever took it has it, and I’m scared of what they may do with it.”
There wasn’t much for me to say. I waited. Presently she resumed: “Naturally they know I knew it was there. They’ll assume I wanted to get my hands on it so they wouldn’t have a hold over me any longer. And they’ll assume I told you about it, and you and I cracked the safe, to get it, and got rid of Aiello somewhere. They’ll assume that,” she added with a shudder, “because if fantasies came true, it’s exactly what I would have done.”
“You mean you were pla
“Don’t be silly, I wouldn’t know how. But I wanted to—a silly dream, I guess, but it was the only hope I had. I even thought of co
She made a face, drew her shoulders together, and sat hunched forward with her elbows between her knees. “Simon, I’m scared to death they’ll kill me for something I didn’t do.”
I sat down by her and squeezed her arm. She pulled away, out of my reach. “Don’t—please. Don’t try to comfort me, I didn’t come here for that.”
“What do you want me to do, Joa
She shook her head violently. “God knows. I’m just ru
Her voice trailed off; she was tense, expecting an argument. I wanted desperately to give her one. But I had my own injuries. I looked down at her: she sat hunched, brooding, ready to jump, hating the dismal trap she was in. She couldn’t accept it with the bleak resignation of a tough alley broad because that wasn’t her style; she had never belonged in the world they had trapped her in, which was one reason, I supposed, why she was valuable to the mob. She was animated, tidy and alive, slightly vain, often careless with risks, ruthlessly amorous yet amazingly—even after all of it—i