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

drink.
    ‘Then there is no problem. I will get the information for you. Could I ask what are your prospects?’
    Bromhead allowed his stern features to relax in a smile.
    ‘I collect autographs,’ he said. ‘It is a little childish, but I have my reasons.’ He took from his pocket a scratch pad and offered it to Marks. ‘Would you mind giving me yours?’
    Marks stared at him, then his tiny mouth like a knife cut in a lump of dough moved slightly into what might be mistaken for a smile. He took the pad, produced a pen and scrawled his signature: a shapeless mess of squiggles.
    Bromhead studied the signature for several minutes.
    ‘Not easy,’ he said under his breath, then he turned the sheet on to a fresh page, borrowed Marks’s pen and reproduced the signature. He tore off the two sheets from the pad, shuffled them and handed them to Marks.
    ‘Which is the one you wrote?’ he asked.
    Marks looked at the two identical signatures, tore the sheets into little pieces and nodded at Bromhead.
    ‘Impressive,’ he said. ‘Very well, my friend, you have unlimited credit.’
    ‘Fair enough,’ Bromhead said. ‘What will it cost me?’
    ‘Ten thousand dollars for the research.’
    Bromhead shook his head.
    ‘No . . . five thousand. It’s only worth five thousand.’
    Marks leaned forward. He looked like an overfed vulture.
    ‘Mrs. Morely-Johnson is worth five million dollars. Never cut corners, my friend . . . ten thousand or we don’t do a deal.’
    ‘Eight,’ Bromhead said without any hope.
    Marks gave a shrill little laugh.
    ‘I said ten . . . I’ll be in touch with you,’ and climbing to his feet, he waddled away towards the elevator.
    Bromhead watched him go. This was a man after his own heart.
    The dossier that Marks finally delivered was exactly what Bromhead required.
    Before parting with the dossier, Marks had asked for an I.O.U. for $10,000, and this Bromhead had given him. He was so certain his plan would eventually succeed that he was confident that sooner or later he would be in the position to repay Marks. Even the 25 percent interest charged by Marks didn’t make him hesitate for more than a second or so before he signed.
    ‘If there’s anything else I can do for you,’ Marks said, putting the I.O.U. away carefully in his billfold, ‘you know how to contact me. It will be my pleasure.’
    At this rate of interest, Bromhead thought, this was an understatement, but he had what he wanted and he had long ago learned that if you wanted something important you had to expect to pay for it.
    He settled down to study the dossier, beginning with the information concerning Gerald Hammett who he considered a danger spot being the only likely contestant of Mrs. Morely-Johnson’s will.
    He learned that Gerald was the only child of Lawson Hammett, Mrs. Morely-Johnson’s brother, a reasonably successful mining engineer who had been killed in a mining accident some eight years ago. His wife had run off with Hammett’s best friend and he had obtained a divorce with the custody of the child, Gerald. Father and son hadn’t got along together. In spite of making efforts, Lawson Hammett found he had no point of contact with the boy who was lazy, dirty and had a vicious temper. When Gerald left school, instead of returning home, he disappeared. His father, relieved, had made no effort to find him.
    On his twenty-second birthday, Gerald who by now had learned that if you don’t ask, you don’t get, called on his aunt, Mrs. Morely-Johnson at the Plaza Beach Hotel and he reminded her in no uncertain terms that he was her nephew and what was she going to do for him?
    Had he approached the old lady with tact and politeness she would have done something for him, but he had no time for rich old women and he demanded financial aid in a way that shocked his aunt.
    Marks’s investigator had talked to an eyewitness of the meeting.
    The doorman of the Plaza Beach Hotel remembered the incident, now five years ago and