The Heart Line. Gelett Burgess

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СКАЧАТЬ we handle the old man, and we'll clean up a fortune. They say he's a millionaire." Vixley's little eyes gleamed.

      "Let's hear what Lulu has to say, first," said Madam Spoll.

      "Why, I didn't get much," Lulu confessed. "He said he dropped in by accident as he was passing by, to see what Egyptian egg astrology was. I got his name off of some letters he had in his overcoat pocket. I made him hang it on the hall hat-rack. I did all I could for him——"

      "Did he get gay with you?" Professor Vixley interrupted. He had been overtly enjoying Lulu's plump charms with his rapacious eyes.

      Granthope smiled; Lulu Ellis colored slightly.

      "No, he didn't! I don't do none of that kind of work!"

      "The more fool you!" Madam Spoll retorted. "He's an old man, ain't he?"

      "Sixty," said Vixley, "I looked him up."

      "Then he ought to be easy as chewing gum," said Madam Spoll.

      Granthope lighted a cigarette and listened with a mildly cynical expression.

      "He ain't that kind, though," Lulu insisted. "I ain't altogether a fool, after all. Why, he don't even go to church!"

      Her three auditors laughed aloud, the Professor raucously, Madam Spoll with a bubbling chuckle, Granthope with scarcely more than an audible smile.

      "That settles it, then. You're coming on, Lulu! What else do you know?" said Madam Spoll.

      "Well, he has a daughter——"

      "Yes, Granthope knows all about that," from the Madam.

      "Her name is Clytie," said Granthope. "Twenty-seven."

      "Is she a looker?" asked Vixley.

      Granthope turned to him and gave him a patronizing glance. "You wouldn't think so, Professor. She's hardly your style. But she's good enough for me!" He languidly flipped the ash from his cigarette and took his pose again.

      Lulu went on: "I think he had a love affair before he was married, but I couldn't quite get it. I didn't dare to fish very much. And that's about all I got."

      "That's plenty, Lulu. You can go now. Here's a dollar for you and much obliged for passing him up."

      "Oh, thank you," said Lulu. "I'm afraid it ain't worth that much. He gave me a dollar himself, though I don't charge but four bits, usually."

      "Lord, what a fool!" said Vixley, watching her go out. "That girl won't ever get nowhere, she's too innocent. She knows no more about real life than a boiled egg."

      "She's all right for me, though," Madam Spoll replied. "That's just the kind I need in my business. She fools 'em every time. They ain't nothing like a good blusher for a stool-pigeon, you take my word for it. Lulu's all right in her place." She turned to wash her hands at a bowl in the corner.

      "Well," said Vixley, crossing his legs, "are you coming in with us, Frank?"

      "It looks pretty good to me, so far. But it depends. What have you got about Payson, anyway?" Granthope's tone was languid.

      Madam Spoll winked at Vixley, as she wiped her hands behind the palmist's back.

      "Why," Vixley replied, "Payson's in wool and is director of a bank, besides. He's a square-head with a high forehead, and them are easy. Gertie, here, can get him into a private sittin', and when she does, you leave him to her—she'll find a way all right. She don't do no lumpy work, Gertie don't, you know that, all right! When she passes him along to me, I'll manage him like the way we worked Bennett with the real estate. I'd like another chance as good as him."

      "You just wait," said Madam Spoll. "I got a hunch that this Payson is going to be pretty good pie; and we got a good strong combination, Frank, if you want to do your share."

      "It's a pity Spoll ain't got some of Gertie's gumption," said Vixley, smiling with approval at his partner.

      "Don't you make no mistake about Spoll—he's done some good work on Payson already." The Madam was adjusting her waist before the glass and coquetting with her hair. "The trouble with you, Vixley, is that you ain't got no executive ability—I'm going to organize this game myself. I can see a way to use Spoll and Ringa, and Flora, too. We want to go into this thing big. Payson's a keener bird than Bennett was, but they's more in him."

      "So Spoll has begun, has he?" Granthope asked.

      "Yes. He located the Paysons over on North Beach."

      "I know that much already. The mother's dead. Mr. and Miss Payson have traveled abroad. What else do you know about her?"

      "Why, it seems she's the sole heir. Good news for you, eh? High society, too—Flower Mission, Kitchen Garden, Friday Cotillions, Burlingame, everything. She could help you, Frank, if you got on the right side of her."

      Here Mr. Spoll tiptoed in, bowed to Granthope, and said:

      "Eight o'clock, Gertie."

      Madam Spoll arose cumbrously, took a last peep in the mirror of the folding bed and turned into the hall, saying, "You take my advice, Frank. We depend upon you. See what you can do with the girl." She paused to bend a keen glance upon him. "What did you do with her, anyway?"

      "Why, I did happen on something," he answered. "Do you remember Madam Grant, who used to live down on Fifth Street, twenty-odd years ago?"

      Madam Spoll came back into the room eagerly.

      "The crazy woman who lived so queer and yet had lots of money? Yes! She did clairvoyance, didn't she? I remember. She had a kid with her, too. Let's see—he ran away with the money, didn't he? And nobody ever knew what become of him. What about her?"

      There was a duel of astute glances between them. Granthope had his own reasons for not wanting to say too much. He guarded his secret carefully, as he had guarded it from her for years.

      "Miss Payson used to go down to see Madam Grant with her mother, when she was a little girl."

      "No! did she, though? With her mother? That's queer! Hold on, Vixley. What did Lulu say about a love affair before Payson was married? Do you get that? Here's his wife visiting Madam Grant; you remember her, don't you? There's something in that I believe we got a good starter already."

      Spoll appeared again, anxiously beckoning, and she went with him down the hall.

      Vixley took up the scent. "Say, Frank," he asked, "how did you happen to get on to that, anyway? That was slick work."

      Granthope turned to him and replied patronizingly, "Oh, I ought to know something about women by this time. I got her to talking."

      Vixley frowned, intent in thought, stroking his scant, pointed beard and biting his mustache; then he slapped his knee with his claw-like hand. "Say, you got a grand chance there," he exclaimed. "See here, you can get in with the swells and be in a position to help out lots. It's the chance of a lifetime, and we'll make it worth your while."

      "How?" Granthope inquired contemptuously.

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