The Big Contract (Book #702) by Larry Kent

Author:Larry Kent
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: detective novels, the mafia, piccadilly publishing, hard boiled novels, thrillers and mysteries, don haring, larry kent detective
Publisher: Piccadilly

Chapter 5 ... big joke ...

I opened the door. Stanley Carpathian was a short, squat man in a pin-stripe suit. The material was beautiful and expensive and his tailor was probably first class, but it would have taken a truly gifted wizard to make Carpathian look like anything but a little tub of lard.

“You’re alone?” I asked.

“Alone,” he said.

I opened the door wider and he entered with a mincing little walk. Then I closed the door and he looked around.

“Nice,” he said. “Goodwin is being very generous.”

It was his way of telling me that he knew exactly what was going on. I said, “Very generous. Sorry I can’t say the same about you.”

He smiled. “Well, you can’t blame a man for trying to save some money.”

“It was more than money,” I said. “You wanted to have your own way. When you pay off a man it makes you less than brilliant. Pushing a man into a corner, that’s something else.”

Carpathian held his smile and nodded. “You’re absolutely right, Mr. Kent. A man in my position has to make an impression. However, when things don’t go my way I’m willing to compromise. I tried something and you won. You have a lot of front. You don’t panic. I congratulate you.”

“Thanks. Now let’s get around to why you’ve come to see me.”

He blinked his small black eyes and looked like a cherub. He ran a chubby hand over thinning black hair and sat down on the edge of an over-stuffed chair. “You’ve won,” he said. “I’ve swallowed my pride and I’ve come here to close the deal you mentioned to Otto Kruger. Seven thousand, five hundred, correct?”

I shook my head.

Carpathian’s eyes went to blinking double time. “That was the figure Otto mentioned. He doesn’t usually make mistakes about money.”

“That was the figure,” I said. “It’s gone up.”

Carpathian chuckled deep in his belly. “I should have expected that. Very well, Mr. Kent, how much is the, er, trouble worth to you?”

“Another two and a half thousand.”

“Bringing the figure to a round ten thousand.”

“Right.”

“Fair enough. However, I don’t carry that much money with me. The money will be delivered at about eleven tomorrow morning, by Otto Kruger. Will that be satisfactory?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Now ... I’d like to be certain about what I’ll be getting in return.”

“Name it.”

“I’d like to see the district attorney, tomorrow, and tell him that you aren’t certain at all what you saw from that alley.”

“I told Kruger about that.”

“But now you’re speaking to me. What you must do is convince the district attorney that it would be foolhardy to try Benjamin Madera for the murder of Ronald Barclay.”

“That’s plain enough,” I said.

Carpathian grunted, nodded, heaved himself to his feet. “I don’t suppose I have to tell you what might happen if—”

“Please,” I said, “no threats.”

Another deep laugh. “You’re a proud man, Mr. Kent. Well, fine, I understand that sort of thing. I’m a proud man myself.” He looked at me for a long moment. “You also have a good deal of self-control.

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