Trouble In Triplicate Read Free Page A

'It was working fine. I saw her about every three months and gave her money. Plenty. It was a break for me when she picked a school right here in town. Then Thumbs Meeker hitched it up. He sent a punk to tell me that if there was any little favor he could do for my daughter just to let him know.'
    That, of course, from my standpoint, made it even sweeter. Mr. Meeker, called Thumbs on account of his favorite method of getting information from reluctant persons, in which he used both thumbs, was the cave man on the other side of the mountain. If to be associated with Dazy Perrit in anything whatever was a doubtful pleasure, to be yanked in between him and Thumbs Meeker was enough to start ulcers.
    I went on listening to Perrit because there was nothing else to do but shoot him, and I had missed the psychological moment for that. It appeared from developments, he said, that Meeker had not actually tagged his daughter but had merely learned that he had one concealed somewhere. But, he said, the one thing on earth he was afraid of was that someone would find his daughter and tell her the facts. That was what had ruined his life, having a daughter.
    'It ruined me,' he said, 'because it put water in my guts. Where she's concerned I can't think straight and I can't act straight. You've heard I'm tough'You've heard that?'
    'Yeah, I've heard it said.'
    'Okay, I'm tough. But there's plenty of tough ones. The point is I've got brains. I've got better brains than any man I've ever met. If I had got started on another track I could have been anything you care to name. But where she's concerned my brains don't work. Look at my coming here and spilling this. Worse yet, look at what I did a year ago April. I rented a penthouse off Fifth Avenue and brought a girl there as my daughter. I knew it was dumb but my brain wouldn't work and I did it.'
    That, he explained, had been for the purpose of drawing Thumbs Meeker off, and also anyone else who might be interested in the Perrit family. With his daughter living there, in the penthouse with him, naturally no one would continue searching for her other places, especially in colleges. It was a very fine arrangement. He had his secret all sewed up.
    'Then,' Perrit said, with a sudden change in his tone and a gleam showing in his eyes that I would not have liked at all if he had been talking about me instead of to me, 'the little bitch used the pliers on me.' On that I got details, which he furnished without referring to any notes. The squeeze had started the week before Christmas with a demand for a thousand bucks cash in addition to her weekly allowance of a century. Thereafter she had requested and received:
    Late January $1500
    Middle of February 1000
    End of April 5000
    Early in June 3000
    Last of July 5000
    Last of August 8000
    'Interesting,' I said, 'how she went down, then up again, then down, then up again. Interesting psychologically.'
    'It strikes you as funny, does it?'
    'I didn't say funny, I said interesting. And by the way, there aren't many people, I'm not saying I'm not one of them, but there are very few, who would believe a word of it. She has nicked you for nearly twenty-five grand. Why didn't she happen to have an accident, say about the third nick, like getting in the way of flying pieces of metal or something?'
    'That's all exaggerated,' Perrit said as if he were disappointed in me. 'They start rumors and everyone believes them.'
    'Nuts.' I grinned at him. 'This is off the record, where I hope to God it stays. Why didn't you handle her or have her handled?'
    'My daughter'My own daughter?'
    'She wasn't. She isn't.'
    'As far as anyone knows she is. I would have had to do it myself, and even then it would have been very risky. She has got that all figured. What if she disappears'How would Thumbs Meeker and others dope it'I'd be right back where I started, and they'd be looking for trails again. I've looked at it from every angle and it's no go.'
    I shrugged. 'Then you're stuck with