And was, in fact, reaching down within it!
And pulling forth a paper. Which, as he took it forth, Elsa saw carried at its top, in big black type, the word DEED.
“Now here,” he said sardonically, holding up the deed, “might have been that ‘valuable paper’ of mine that you were destined to set fire to—or maybe just to hold a lighted match under, eh?—as a threat to make me write out all sorts of silly modifications of our own recorded instrument which I have absolutely no legal right to do. Yes—this might have been that paper!” He waved it tauntingly in front of her. “For it’s no less than an as-yet-unrecorded deed, to me, of some valuable South Chicago acreage which one Sol Isenberg would give his immortal Jewish soul to regain. But won’t regain, damn him! And all of which reminds me—since there’s a touch of rain in the air—and the cotton on this contraption hasn’t yet proved its seaworthiness—I’ll just put this document into my buzzum!”
And lowering the half-opened umbrella to the floor—and which remained stiffly half-opened, thanks, no doubt, to some rustiness in its wire joints—Silas Moffit hastily unbuttoned both his vest and coat, and withdrawing from the breast pocket of the latter garment a vast bulging mass of miscellaneous papers and envelopes of, presumably, no value, inserted the deed middlewise amongst them, and then buttoned them all together again—but this time in the inside pocket of his vest, where they made a tight bulging tumor.
And again—while Elsa silently watched him through narrowly closed eyes—he took hold of his umbrella handle, raised the still half-opened article slightly off the floor, and reached down into it once more with his free hand.
And up, this time, in his fingers, came a clipped sheaf of promissory notes. As was evident to Elsa from the printing at the top of the uppermost one, which read, “JUDGMENT NOTE.”
“More ‘valuable papers,’” Silas Moffit said sarcastically. “Except that these aren’t signed yet by anybody. Like—to destroy ’em?”
Elsa only gazed sourly at him.
And again he reached down. ‘Way down, this time. And up, in his talons, came a bright red crab apple.
“My customary bedtime pill,” he said. “Given me today—as every other day—by my good friend and ‘physician’—Nick the Greek—on Madison and Dearborn Street!”
And again, as though to dispel completely what he knew were Elsa’s inward ideas about him, he reached down into his Pandorean Box—wire-ribbed, cotton-covered Pandorian box, that is!—and brought forth a 2-drink liquor miniature of some sort.
“My new traveling emergency medicine case,” he pronounced. “Two ounces of pure triple-distilled grain alcohol—presented to me this afternoon by no less than my good friend, Lucius the Liquor Dealer, on Clark and Van Buren. Oh yes, Elsa. Silas Moffit has friends—believe it or not! Though that’s not the point now at issue. The point is—” And Silas Moffit waxed a bit fretful “—the point is,” he demanded, “is this light convenient thing a perfect portfolio—or isn’t is?”
And belligerently he awaited her verdict which, he manifestly believed, would decree him to be 100 per cent normal, and with every screw tight in its socket!
And Elsa rendered him her verdict! “I think it’s plumb screwy,” she said frankly. “—or, in other words, the nuts!—to use an umbrella for a portfolio, if for no other reason alone than that the resultant bumps and knobs in it are going to make it look only like the left hind leg of a spavined horse. And that I didn’t notice the knobs in yours today means that I’m even slipping myself. A fact!” He opened his mouth, to give angry retort, but she drove relentlessly on. “Moreover, from what I’ve learned this afternoon and just now, from conversation with only two members of the Tribe Moffit, and one woman who knows ’em all from Izzard back to A, I’d say that anybody who’s a Moffit shouldn’t carry any portfolio at all—whether of cotton and wire, or of leather: He should carry a hollow cast-iron life preserver around his waist, with a log-chain attaching same to his right knee, and another log-chain attaching his head to his shoulders. And now you know what the one surviving member of the Colby Family thinks!” Silas Moffit, who had just completed buckling up his “portfolio,” with, once more encased in its folds, his crab apple, his alcohol miniature, and the worthless promissory notes, made no reply however—he just threw up his hands, even the one holding the umbrella, in a gesture of profound disgust of one who had gone to supreme pains to clear up something—but had accomplished nothing because of a “stubborn female.”
“But thanks anyway,” Elsa continued, “for solving the riddle that so long has perplexed me. And now I go to my trial tonight, Uncle, with great peace of mind. Not because of your assurances—hacked up by nothing—that you won’t use that quitclaim-assignment paper against me. But because—well, a while back you were commiserating with me on my not having time to frame a brilliant defense tonight. But you see—I don’t really need any concrete defense tonight! Let alone brilliant defense. For my client—I’m sure this will interest you, Uncle, hobnobbing as you do with mystics and numerologists, and so forth—well, my client is in the safe hand of Voodoo.”
And if Elsa had been desirous of knocking her uncle squarely into the middle of the week to come, she fully obtained her desire!
For he turned greenish-white.
“In—in the hands of—of Voodoo?” he repeated, his eyes popping from his head. “What—what do you mean? Did that goddamned old nigger bitch of a Linda cook one of her conj—”
“Yes,” Elsa said simply, “she did! And it smelled worse than did the one that knocked your cemetery deal galleywest!”
CHAPTER XXIII
Silas Moffit’s Second Prescribes “One Horseshoe” For Each Glove
“You really mean,” Silas Moffit repeated weakly, “that that wench of hell cooked up one of her filthy conj—”
“Of—course!” Elsa repeated. “Didn’t I say so? And she cooked it specifically to clear my man. Or rather—in a far wider sense yet, Uncle—to make me win out tonight—hands down!—on all fronts!”
And at that moment, strangely enough, Elsa—the skeptic profound on such things as conjures—Elsa, who was only utilizing the fact of Aunt Linda’s “conjur” to harry Silas Moffit a bit—swung suddenly forward 10,000 years m Time and Space—to a day where Man understood the real mechanism, in the Plan of Life, of things “occult”—rather, the whole benign Web of Equi-Realities which, 20,000 long years back of that point—even 10,000 years back, in the very Age of Science—was being called “Facts” and “Superstition.” And in that bare second in which Elsa hung motionless at the furthest end of her long cosmic swing, there was given to her intuitively—and in a flash—the full understanding of Aunt Linda’s faith—of her “conjur”—how it would—must—had to operate. For it had to work not because it smelled of dead fingers—scorching stinking powders—but because of the fact that—
That she, Elsa, had told—was now telling—of its existence to one Silas Moffit, who believed therein!
And whom the knowledge of the “conjur” must, in turn, transform. Had, in fact, already obviously done so. For he now presented the appearance of one who—to say the very least—was utterly disconcerted. And was, therefore, a man now in whom new motivations—new traits of character—new impulses—new determinations—were surging, boiling, to the top. And solely because of those new traits—new impulses—new determinations—was the whole implacable “Plan of the Fixed Future” being somehow changed—altered—disrupted—wrenched—twisted—
In short, Karma! The theory of changing Destiny at its very Source. The theory of—
But Elsa knew no further. For she had swung back. Dizzily back, across the 20,000 years through which she had been momentarily projected. To the Today! Where philosophy—mysticism—superstition—are still mixed—where any inside into the Divine Plan of Things was either senseless intuition—a plain “hunch”—or downright insan—
But
Elsa had retained just enough from that mere “flash” she’d gotten at the further end of that great forward swing to press blindly on.
“The ‘conjur’ Aunt Linda made up, Uncle,” she said quietly, “was of the identical kind as the one she put on the fire that day she knocked out your luscious Olive Hill Cemetery deal—except that in this one she put the ne plus ultra of all conjurs—the Zenith of Voodoo Power—the left big toe-nail of a negro murdered in the light of the full moon!”
Silas Moffit gazed at Elsa so forlornly, that she would have laughed aloud—only she was too bitter to laugh.
“What—what for,” he inquired bleakly, “what for did you go to—to Aunt Linda—in this matter?”
“What for? Why, because I always tell Aunt Linda everything. She’s the best ‘out-of-court’ legal advisor any attorney could have. And she’s even more, for, as I’ve just conveyed to you, she’s able to add voodoo to her advice. Has—in this instance.”
“Voodoo!” was all he said. “Voodoo? Ri—ridic—ridiculous supersti—” He broke off. “I must go,” he said quickly. “Good-bye,” he added hurriedly. And was out of the door, casting back, as he went rapidly out, one last bewildered helpless glance toward Elsa.
And had Elsa been able to see through Space—as just now she had “felt” she had somehow “seen” through Time—after he had left, and to hear therethrough as well, she would have—within exactly 1 minute!—heard him talking excitedly in the telephone booth in the foyer of the old building next to the Ulysses S. Grant and saying:
“No, no, Manny, everything isn’t all right, I tell you. That goddamned old nigger bitch went and brewed a conjure!”
“A—a conjure?” the voice on the other end was saying. “What—what the hell for Popp’n’law?”
“To insure Elsa’s clearing that crook, you fool—what do you suppose for?”
“Well—well—I’ll—I’ll be damned. She—but what of it, Popp’n’law? She’s just an old ignorant black coon, and—”
“Yeah? Well, you know what happened in your house that day my Olive Hill Cemetery deal blew up?”
A dead silence followed. And then—
“Yes, I know. And of course I remember, too, the explanation that Indian mystic gave for the power of those voodoo women. But we only got Linda’s own statement, Popp’n’law, that she’s a gen-u-ine voo—um?—now if only it hadn’t been for that Olive Hill deal blowing up the very minute she stirred up that conj—listen, Popp’n’law, would you like to see that crook—Elsa’s client, I mean, of course—go to the electric chair?”
“Why shouldn’t I, you fool? Since he’s plainly guilty. And the confession of that other bird is all bunk—listen you haven’t seen any of the after-5 papers, have you?”
“No. I’ve been working here alone—for a full hour. Is there some new development—in that case?”
“Yes. Only it’s something that doesn’t mean anything. I have inside info on it, which I just picked up in Elsa’s office by overhearing her end of a confidential conversation she had with somebody else. And so when you read this new development, just forget it! And keep your mouth shut. But getting back to your question about the fellow they have indicted, of course I want to see him go to the chair. Since he’s guilty. And he’s going, moreover, means that we take over Colby’s Nugget—to hold and to have! And that goddamned little redheaded cat—”
“Yes, I know, Popp’n’law—I know! But as to the fellow’s landing in that chair, there are lots of funny last-minute slips take place in law. Though I will admit, his goose looks no less than 99.999 per cent cooked, and all Elsa can do—at best—is to play for a life sentence for him instead of the chair. Which for us, Popp’n’law, is every bit just as good as the chair, except—but, listen, did you get any inkling at all out of Elsa, whether she has anything at all in her mitt—even to try? For—”
“No! Or—or yes. I don’t know. She was talking on the phone when I came in. Just ending a conversation. And she was saying ‘the situation lies now more or less in the gas in your car—and the tires on its wheels. And God be with it—and you! I’m leaning on you, therefore, and—’ And that,” Silas Moffit broke off, “was all that was said after that, on her end of the line—of that particular conversation.”
“Hm? Sounds to me, Popp’n’law, like she’s dug up some possible alibi evidence—no actual alibi witness, no!—but something ‘evidential’—something to do with the amount of gas in the tank of some car. And maybe the wear and tear on some set of tires—new or otherwise. Some car this fellow might have started out in from—”
“And I think,” declared Silas Moffit, “that she has reference to a car that somebody is to start out in at once, and reach somewhere or somebody in—in all probability, as I figure it, some possible professional underworld perjurer who will cold-bloodedly try tonight to place that fellow Doe far and away from Chicago at the hour of that killing. For she’s been doing that ‘consulting only’ stuff just long enough now to have doubtlessly a line or two to various people in the underworld—maybe even has something on one or another. But anyway, Manny, the point’s the same. That she has something in—as you put it—’her mitt.’ And is figuring to spring it—unbeknownst to even her own client.”
“Yes. She has. And is. That’s plain. Well, all I can say, Popp’n’law, is that even if her client’s goose does seem to be cooked, he may fool you—me—and everybody else—and leap into the clear.”
“In which event,” declared Silas Moffit grimly, “there’ll be no building, by your father, on the Nugget—and you and Bella won’t be taking that trip around the world. And I—”
“Listen, Popp’n’law—hold it! Conjures are strange things—I don’t understand how they work, but work they sometimes appear to do! But slips in law are stranger things yet. Take it from me—who’s fooled around plenty with accident suits! And so, Popp’n’law, there’s two things you got to do now to prevent any such slip.”
“Two things? What single one thing can I do? I—”
“You’d be surprised, Popp’n’law! However, there really are two things you can do. And, I think—will! For—but now, first, about this fellow they nabbed today near Old Post Office. Now when it really comes right down to things, he ain’t got any defense whatsoever, at best, but some cock-and-bull story such as that he picked up that Wah Lee’s skull somewhere, and that he never said—as the story of his arrest claims he did—to any witness or witnesses that it was Wah Lee’s skull, and that he’d broken into the State’s Attorney’s safe to get it. And that he was 2 miles—10 miles—maybe even 500 miles—if there’s ‘auto-tires’ and ‘auto-gas’ involved in this thing!—away, at 10:43 last night, when that German night watchman was killed.
But you, Popp’n’law, can knock out even that cock-and-bull defense completely—and put him in that electric chair where, after all, you know goddamned well he belongs. And then we can quick make that transf—”
“Now you hold it, you half-wit! What the hell can I do! I’ve no connection with that case. And have been lucky even to be able to be a spectator at that trial tonight, since—”
“But you ain’t gonna be that tonight, Popp’n’law. Not altogether, no. For you’re going to be a witness also! In short—but here’s the point exactly: Where were you last night at around, say, 10:45?”
“At 10:45? Well, I happen to know exactly where I was at that hour. If the clock on Bush Bourse—on the near-North Side—is at all correct. And I’ve never yet known it to be wrong! I was waiting there for a Clark Street car, to go North—and home—after looking over that godawful old building there where that well-to-do nose surgeon, Doctor MacLeish MacPherson practices—and also those Dove Brothers, Dentists, who racketeer on pyorrhea—the building that wants a second mort—”
“Yes, I know. But don’t let us mind the building itself now, Popp’n’law. You were on the southeast corner then—so you think?”
“So I think? Why, you damned little whel—”
“Now wait, Popp’n’law! Wait. I ain’t Saul, y’know! And there’s method back of my—my madness! And besides, you got to admit that you and Saul have got a loose scr—um—deficiency, when it comes to remembering even where you’ve bee—now hold it, Popp’n’law, for I know what I’m driving at now—anyway, here’s the point: was anybody with you there last night? Like, I mean, to help you appraise that old shack?”
“Say—listen you—when the day comes that I can’t appraise an old shack like that for myself, I’ll—but evidently you do know what you’re driving at, so—no, nobody was with me.”
“Good! Well, exactly what, Popp’n’law, was your movements—that is, as you recall ’em!—between 10 and 11 last night?”
“As I recall them? Well, by godfrey, if this is some sort of a subtle campaign of insults, I’m going to tell you—listen, don’t you toss out any more hot shots against my mentality—and second, don’t you ever again couple me, in any way whatsoever, with that—that—that goddamned—”
“All right—I won’t! I won’t. Now what was your movements last night between 10 and 11? Rather,—to be exactly exact—from 10:01 to 10:59—inclusive!”
“From 10:01—to 10:59 inclusive? Well, just what in hell you’re trying to cook up, I can’t fathom, but—well, at 10:01 last night, I was standing on the sidewalk, in front of the LaSalle Street depot—”
“Okey-dokey! You’d know that from the big clock above the entrance to the LaSalle Street depot reading 9:01 railroad time, if not by the big crowds pouring out of the entrance from that streamline train that comes in nightly from Detroit at exactly 10 sharp, Daylight Saving time. For I happen to know there ain’t any other incoming trains all the way from 8:45 to 11:30. All right, station clock—and crowds. And then—Popp’n’law?”
The Man with the Wooden Spectacles Page 26
