Part 13 (1/2)

The wife sniffs.

”I never heard tell of no man that couldn't eat porterhouse steaks!”

she says.

”I seen a lot of them to-day,” says Alex, puttin' on his coat.

”Where?” asks the wife.

”I was pa.s.sin' the Evergreen Cemetery!” says Alex. ”Good night, all!”

The next day, Hector comes to me before the game and you never seen such a change in a guy in your life! He looked like he hadn't slept a wink since they buried Was.h.i.+ngton and he's as nervous as a steam drill.

”Mac,” he says, ”I wanna ask two favors off of you, the first I asked in a long while.”

”Shoot, Hector!” I tells him. ”You know I can deny you nothin'.”

”I want a week off and the loan of five hundred bucks,” he says.

”I'll tell you,” I says. ”Take _two_ weeks off and forget about the five hundred, heh?”

”No, Mac--I gotta have the dough!” he says. ”With what I got saved up, I figure it'll be ample.”

”Ample for what?” I asks.

”I can't tell no man nothin' about it now,” he answers, ”but when I come back from my vacation, I'll let you in on it. I don't like to say this, Mac--but when I was slippin' it to you, I never asked whether you wanted it to get a hair cut with or to try and put Wall Street on the b.u.m. If--”

”That's enough!” I cuts him off, takin' out the roll. ”Here you are, Hector--and if you want any more they's plenty of it where that come from!”

They was--in the mint.

When Hector had put some distance between himself and the ball park, I begin to think the thing over. If he _did_ pull any startlin' stunt, I stood to lose a thousand bucks, not countin' the weddin' gift, to Alex.

They was five hundred more I'd invested right then, makin' fifteen hundred in all, which I considered was gettin' into money. For all I knowed, Hector and Alex might be framin' me and they ain't no man livin' who loves bein' a sucker.

I decided right then and there to shoot another nickel on the thing and I called up the Ryan Detective Agency. Mike Ryan had been a friend of me and Hector since we'd been in baseball. I told him the whole layout and asked for a report on the activities of Hector the followin' day, if possible.

It was three days before I seen Ryan's report. He give it to me himself by mouth.

”Say!” he says. ”This Hector bird has gone nutty, and I suppose bein'

friends of his, you and me had better have him put away where he can't do himself no violence.”

”What's he doin'?” I asks.

”Well,” says Ryan, ”I'll give you the dope since he left the ball park on Monday. The first thing he does is go to the bank and draw out every nickel he's got. Then he moves from the hotel to Cereal Crossin', N. J. This burg casts eleven votes for president every four years and they all work on the same farm. Hector hires a shack away out in the middle of the woods there and, from then on, boxes and crates begins to arrive for him from everywheres but Brazil. I met up with a Secret Service guy who had dropped in to get a line on what kinda bombs Hector was makin' before pinchin' him, and we went through this express stuff durin' the night. The first crate we tackled contained all the gla.s.sware in the world of a medical nature. They was bottles, test tubes, bowls and all the stuff usual found in a practical anarchist's workshop. After the first peep, the Secret Service guy wanted to run right over and fit Hector with iron bracelets, but I got him to hold off long enough to look over the rest of the stuff. We went through every box and what d'ye think we found in 'em?”

”I wasn't there,” I says. ”Tell me.”

”Well,” says Ryan, grinnin', ”when all this stuff was a.s.sembled, it would make a first cla.s.s delicatessen shop and that's all! They was meats, cheese, olive oil, fish, vegetables, pickles, mustard and about fifteen other eatables I never seen or heard tell of before in my life!

We busted a lot of it open, lookin' for explosives, but they was all on the level. Why, that bird's got enough stuff down there to keep him in food for the rest of his life!”