“Sure!” grunted Red Vallon corroboratingly. “But Karlin’s never been here before.” He pushed a chair with the toe of his boot across the floor toward Karlin, and appropriated one beside the table for himself. “Well, spill it, Bundy!” he invited. “We got to hurry! It’s too bad you’re laid up an’ can’t sit in on the showdown, but Merxler’s plum’s got ripe, an’ we got to pick it to-night. Savvy?”
Billy Kane duplicated the first smoke ring. Merxler! He had identified Karlin now! Karlin and Merxler! That was where he had heard Karlin’s name—in connection with Merxler—and it must, necessarily then be the same Merxler. Was young Merxler, whom he had heard of and had even met through David Ellsworth, more then than simply the notorious spendthrift that he was credited with being? Karlin, it was obvious, was leading a double life. Was Merxler another of the inner circle, another from the higher ranks of society—and the greater criminal therefor!
“Piker stuff!” commented Billy Kane complacently.
Karlin leaned forward with a jerk in his chair.
“Piker stuff!” he ejaculated, and the little black eyes contracted and fixed on Billy Kane in a puzzled glitter. “Piker stuff!” he echoed challengingly.
Billy Kane nodded indifferently. He was skating on thin ice, on perilously thin ice. Whatever the “Merxler plum” might be, it was obviously far from the definition he had given it, and having apparently displayed an intimacy with the affair, an intimacy that he was evidently supposed to possess, it was decidedly best left alone!
“That’s what I said,” he drawled deliberately. “Piker stuff—compared with what I’ve got. I told you I had something, Red—didn’t I?”
Red Vallon hitched sideways in his chair, his head thrust forward.
“Go to it, Bundy! Spill it!” He circled his lips with his tongue. “If you say so, that goes! What’s the lay?”
“Five hundred thousand dollars—a half million—cold”—Billy Kane had lowered his voice.