1972 - Just a Matter of Time by James Hadley Chase Read Free Book Online

and her attorney would be recorded while he waited for the attorney to reappear. He drove him back to his office. Then returning to his own room, he made himself a ham sandwich, opened a can of beer and settled down to listen to the playback.
    Mrs. Morely-Johnson was leaving two million dollars to the Cancer Research Fund. Two million dollars, plus 1,000 acres of building land to Oxfam. A million dollars to the blind. Her pictures were to be sold and the proceeds (perhaps two million dollars) to UNICEF.
    Then followed the bequests: An annuity of $100,000 to be paid to Christopher Patterson for his lifetime in recognition for his constant kindness and attention. An annuity of $15,000 to Jack Bromhead and the Rolls-Royce. An annuity of $20,000 to Miss May Lawson, her companion-help.
    There had been a pause of silence on the tape, then her attorney’s voice asked, ‘How about your nephew, Gerald Hammett? Are you providing for him?’
    ‘Gerald?’ Mrs. Morely-Johnson’s voice shot up. ‘Certainly not! He’s a horrible boy! He will get nothing from me!’
    There was a lot more, but it wasn’t important. Bromhead sat back and studied his notes.
    An annuity of $15,000, plus the Rolls-Royce wasn’t what he expected. This must be readjusted . . . somehow. At the moment he didn’t know how.
    Her nephew, Gerald Hammett? Who was he? This was the first time that Bromhead knew that Mrs. Morely-Johnson had a relative.
    After some thought, he cleaned the tape and locked his notes away. There was time, he told himself. The nephew interested him. He now needed to make inquiries. A relative could upset a will . . . wills were tricky, and he had to be careful. One false move and the police would arrive. He flinched at the thought.
    Then he remembered Solly Marks. Before he had been released from prison, he had been told by the man who shared his cell that if ever he needed anything when on the Pacific coast, the man to contact was Solly Marks. This man lived in Los Angeles, some hundred miles from where Bromhead was now living. Solly Marks was a shyster lawyer, a property owner, a moneylender and a man with his ear to the ground.
    After some thought, Bromhead decided he had to have help and Solly Marks, seemed, on recommendation, to be the man to help him. He found his telephone number and called him. As soon as Bromhead had mentioned the name of the man with whom he had shared his cell and mentioned his own name, Marks had become extremely cooperative.
    ‘I’ll come over,’ he said. ‘Better not talk on the phone. You name the place and I’ll be there.’
    ‘Book in at the Franklin Hotel,’ Bromhead said. ‘I’ll meet you there at six o’clock tomorrow evening.’
    Bromhead had a slight shock when he saw Marks sitting in the lounge of the hotel, waiting for him. The man looked like an inflated toad: short, squat with tremendously wide shoulders, his face resembling a ping-pong ball with tufts of reddish hair glued to its sides. His features disappeared into fat. His small, black eyes, peering out from puffy bastions were like jet beads, sparkling, lively, cunning and shrewd.
    Yet within minutes of talking, Bromhead knew this was the man he was looking for.
    ‘You don’t have to know why,’ he said as they began to talk business. ‘This is what I want: I want a complete breakdown on Mrs. Morely-Johnson who lives at the Plaza Beach Hotel. I want the same on Christopher Patterson, the assistant manager of the Pacific Traders Bank. When I say a breakdown, I want all details about him: especially about his sex life. Then I want details of Gerald Hammett, Mrs. Morely-Johnson’s nephew. Can you do this?’
    Marks laid a small hand that looked like a lump of badly fashioned dough on Bromhead’s arm.
    ‘I can do anything, but at a price. I don’t imagine you could pay just yet, but would you say you have good prospects?’
    Bromhead stared into the tiny, black eyes.
    ‘I have good prospects.’
    Marks finished his