THE SIMPLE ART OF MURDER by Raymond Chandler Copyright ...

morning, Gage?"
"It is looking better," I said. "If I can have any assurance of honorable treatment, I am prepared to go through with it."
"You mean you got the dough?"
"In my pocket at this exact moment."
The voice seemed to exhale a slow breath. "You'll get your marbles O.K. --if we get the price, Gage. We're in this business for a long
time and we don't welsh. If we did, it would soon get around and nobody would play with us any more."
"Yes, I can readily understand that," I said. "Proceed with your instructions," I added coldly.
"Listen close, Gage. Tonight at eight sharp you be in Pacific Palisades. Know where that is?"
"Certainly. It is a small residential section west of the polo fields on Sunset Boulevard."
"Right. Sunset goes slap through it. There's one drugstore there--open till nine. Be there waiting a call at eight sharp tonight. Alone.
And I mean alone, Gage. No cops and no strongarm guys. It's rough country down there and we got a way to get you to where we want
you and know if you're alone. Get all this?"
"I am not entirely an idiot," I retorted.
"No dummy packages, Gage. The dough will be checked. No guns. You'll be searched and there's enough of us to cover you from
all angles. We know your car. No funny business, no smart work, no slip-up and nobody hurt. That's the way we do business. How's the
dough fixed?"
"One-hundred-dollar bills," I said. "And only a few of them are new."
"Attaboy. Eight o'clock then. Be smart, Gage."
The phone clicked in my ear and I hung up. It rang again almost instantly. This time it was the one voice.
"Oh, Walter," Ellen cried, "I was so mean to you! Please forgive me, Walter. Mr. Gallemore has told me everything and I'm so
frightened."
"There is nothing of which to be frightened," I told her warmly. "Does Mrs. Penruddock know, darling?"
"No, darling. Mr. Gallemore told me not to tell her. I am phoning from a store down on Sixth Street. Oh, Walter, I really am frightened.
Will Henry go with you?"
"I am afraid not, darling. The arrangements are all made and they will not permit it. I must go alone."
"Oh, Walter! I'm terrified. I can't bear the suspense."
"There is nothing to fear," I assured her. "It is a simple business transaction. And I am not exactly a midget."
"But, Walter--oh, I will try to be brave, Walter. Will you promise me just one teensy-weensy little thing?"
"Not a drop, darling," I said firmly. "Not a single solitary drop."
"Oh, Walter!"
There was a little more of that sort of thing, very pleasant to me in the circumstances, although possibly not of great interest to
others. We finally parted with my promise to telephone as soon as the meeting between the crooks and myself had been consummated.
I turned from the telephone to find Henry drinking deeply from a bottle he had taken from his hip pocket.
"Henry!" I cried sharply.
He looked at me over the bottle with a shaggy determined look. 'Listen, pal," he said in a low hard voice. "I got enough of your end of
the talk to figure the set-up. Some place out in the tall weeds and you go alone and they feed you the old sap poison and take your
dough and leave you lying--with the marbles still in their kitty. Nothing doing, pal. I said--nothing doing!" He almost shouted the last
words.
"Henry, it is my duty and I must do it," I said quietly.
"Haw!" Henry snorted. "I say no. You're a nut, but you're a sweet guy on the side. I say no. Henry Eichelberger of the Wisconsin
Eichelbergers--in fact, I might just as leave say of the Milwaukee Eichelbergers--says no. And he says it with both hands working." He
drank again from his bottle.
"You certainly will not help matters by becoming intoxicated," I told him rather bitterly.
He lowered the bottle and looked at me with amazement written all over his rugged features. "Drunk, Walter?" he boomed. "Did I
hear you say drunk? An Eichelberger drunk? Listen, son. We ain't got a lot of time now. It would take maybe three months. Some day
when you got three months and maybe five thousand gallons of whiskey and a funnel, I would be glad to take my own time and show
you what an Eichelberger looks like when drunk. You wouldn't believe it. Son, there wouldn't be nothing left of this town but a few sprung
girders and a lot of busted bricks, in the middle of which--Geez, I'll get talking English myself if I hang around you much longer--in the
middle of which, peaceful, with no human life nearer than maybe fifty miles, Henry Eichelberger will be on his back smiling at the sun.
Drunk, Walter. Not stinking drunk, not even country-club drunk. But you could use the word drunk and I wouldn't take no offense."
He sat down and drank again. I stared moodily at the floor. There was nothing for me to say.
"But that," Henry said, "is some other time. Right now I am just taking my medicine. I ain't myself without a slight touch of delirium
tremens, as the guy says. I was brought up on it. And I'm going with you, Walter. Where is this place at?"
"It's down near the beach, Henry, and you are not going with me. If you must get drunk--get drunk, but you are not going with me."
"You got a big car, Walter. I'll hide in back on the floor under a rug. It's a cinch."
"No, Henry."
"Walter, you are a sweet guy," Henry said, "and I am going with you into this frame. Have a smell from the barrel, Walter. You look to
me kind of frail."
We argued for an hour and my head ached and I began to feel very nervous and tired. It was then that I made what might have been
a fatal mistake. I succumbed to Henry's blandishments and took a small portion of whiskey, purely for medicinal purposes. This made
me feel so much more relaxed that I took another and larger portion. I had had no food except coffee that morning and only a very light
dinner the evening before. At the end of another hour Henry had been out for two more bottles of whiskey and I was as bright as a bird.
All difficulties had now disappeared and I had agreed heartily that Henry should lie in the back of my car hidden by a rug and accompany
me to the rendezvous.
We had passed the time very pleasantly until two o'clock, at which hour I began to feel sleepy and lay down on the bed, and fell into
a deep slumber.
SEVEN
When I awoke again it was almost dark. I rose from the bed with panic in my heart, and also a sharp shoot of pain through my
temples. It was only six-thirty, however. I was alone in the apartment and lengthening shadows were stealing across the floor. The
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