Fast Buck by James Hadley Chase Page A

put up her feet. ‘I’m al right here.’
    ‘Suit yourself,’ he said, shrugging. ‘I’l be okay by tomorrow.’
    She reached out and turned off the light.
    ‘Go to sleep,’ she said.
    Baird lay in the darkness, staring at the night sky through the open window. Below, the police still went on with their search for him. The voices, the trampling of feet and the hammering on doors became fainter as they moved farther down the street.
    He felt an odd stirring inside him as he thought of the girl. She had saved him. Why? It was something right out of a book. He owed her something, and the thought made him uneasy. Gratitude was a new sensation to him. He felt restricted. No one had ever done anything for him up to now. He tried to push this feeling of indebtedness out of his mind, but he couldn’t. Sooner or later he knew he would have to do something about it. He felt in his hip pocket for the five hundred Rico had given him. He could always give her some of the money, he told himself. From the look of her, she could do with it.
    Yes, he’d do that. But at the back of his mind, he was aware that money wouldn’t square himself with her. His mind recreated the struggle on the bed. That had been something no other woman he could imagine would have done, and she had done it for him. No, money wouldn’t square that.
    The sound of her quick, light breathing told him she was asleep. She had guts, he thought: guts and nerve.
    Eventually he fell asleep himself. He dreamed the girl in the drug store, with blood on her white coat, came and sat at the foot of the bed and looked at him. He wasn’t afraid of her.

PART TWO

I

    Rico put down his pen and sat back with a little grunt. His swarthy, pock-marked face plainly showed his dissatisfaction. Five hundred and twenty dollars up on last month’s figures. Six months ago he would have been pleased, but now he knew it wasn’t enough. A month’s work for five hundred and twenty lousy dollars, he thought, pushing back his chair. He got to his feet and began to pace up and down. Not enough, he thought, scowling. Already he was overdrawn at the bank. His standard of living had gradually risen, and he was now living well beyond his income. Recently he had moved from his three-room apartment to a six-room one that cost him four times as much. His taste for tailored suits and silk shirts had given him a tailor’s bil he couldn’t set le without pinching himself for ready cash. He had bought himself a Roadmaster Buick, and that had to be paid for. The erotic pleasure he derived from several of his carefully selected hostesses was also a heavy drain on his income; and they had to be paid in cash.
    Since the Bruce killing he had stopped dealing in illicit jewellery. He knew Olin was watching him, and until things cooled off a little, it would be unwise to tempt providence. He sadly missed the extra income from his activities as a fence.
    He went over to the cellarette and mixed himself a whisky and soda. Three weeks had gone by since Kile had come to him with the mysterious proposition that might put fifteen grand in his pocket. For three weeks Rico had been hunting for Baird, but Baird seemed to have vanished off the face of the earth. No one had seen him: all Rico’s spies were hunting for him, and so far had nothing to report.
    Kile was fast losing patience. He had been in last night and had bluntly said he would give Rico three more days to find Baird, and if he wasn’t successful the deal was off.
    Fifteen grand! Rico sipped his drink and scowled down at his expensively shod feet. Where the hell was Baird? Why hadn’t he got into touch with Rico as he had promised? Had it been Baird who had been chased across the roofs and shot at that night the cop and girl in the drug store had been murdered?
    How long ago was that? Rico thumbed back the leaves of his calendar. Twenty-three days. The papers had said the killer had been wounded. Maybe Baird had holed up somewhere and had died.