“You remember a woman called Elsie Verriner?”
“Yes,” acknowledged Blake, with a pang of regret which he could not fathom, at the mention of the name.
“Well, we could fix it through her.”
“Does Elsie Verriner know where that pile is?” the detective inquired. His withered hulk of a body was warmed by a slow glow of anticipation. There was a woman, he remembered, whom he could count on swinging to his own ends.
“No, but she could get it,” was Binhart’s response.
“And what good would that do me?”
“The two of us could go up to New Orleans. We could slip in there without any one being the wiser. She could meet us. She’d bring the stuff with her. Then, when you had the pile in your hand, I could just fade off the map.”
Blake rode on again in silence.
“All right,” he said at last. “I’m willing.”
“Then how’ll you prove it? How’d I know you’d make good?” demanded Binhart.