Free Scarlet Imperial by Dorothy B. Hughes

for this kind of thing.
    He told her, “A client wanted it, wanted it badly. He was willing to pay a collector’s price for it. I knew I could get it for him.”
    Bryan Brewer bought and sold rare objects. He didn’t trace the history of the objects. He bought from responsible, reliable sources. There was no transaction in his files, and she’d finecombed through them during his frequent out of town trips, feeling low and dishonest. He wouldn’t deal with a thief. Not with a murderer and a thief. But there was nothing in his files about the Scarlet Imperial. Not one letter, not one line. Yet he had a client for it and he knew from whom he could obtain it. Why were there no records on it?
    She said slowly, “You knew where you could get it.” He didn’t appear to notice her disturbance. He said, “Yes. From Gavin Keane.”
    He knew the Imp was dangerous; did he know it was stolen? He couldn’t know that. He wouldn’t touch it if he knew. She couldn’t ask the questions she wanted to ask; she couldn’t give away her knowledge. How had Gavin Keane come by the Imp?
    Bry strode into his own office but he didn’t close the door tightly. She could hear him at the phone, doggedly calling down the endless list of hotels. She could hear the hopeless replacing of the phone as the answer to his question was never the hoped-for one. He could ask her to make the dreary calls but it was as if he alone could handle anything this important. That, and because he must be active, not twiddle his mind and wait.
    She sat leaden in the outer office. She could stop this. Tell him where Gavin Keane was. Gavin had asked her to inform Bry. If they were allowed to get together, Gavin would give the Imp to Bry. She’d been sent to New York for one purpose, to intercept what Keane was sending to Brewer’s before it got into Bry’s hands. To keep it from reaching the collector who had ordered it. She wasn’t doing just another job for Towner. It was for this, to lay hold of the Imp, that she’d worked with Towner for years. She couldn’t, with the job this near done, cause the years of work and plan to be undone. Not if Bry Brewer was anxious to the point of despair. Bry Brewer didn’t mean anything to her. He couldn’t. No man could, not ever, no one but Towner who had cared for her, who had taken a miserable alley cat and given it kindness. When this was all over, the wrong made right, then if a man like Bry Brewer came along, she could begin again. She could dare warm her hands at happiness. Only it wouldn’t be Bry; she’d be gone. Someone like Bry, someone that made your heart stir just a little when you saw him come into the room. Someone whose rare smile quickened the beat of your stirring heart.
    He’d pushed the bell. She took her pencil and stenographer’s notebook, hid errant thought behind secretarial calm. She went in to him. He said, “Take a wire, Eliza.”
    She sat down on the straight chair near his desk, opened the tablet.
    “Feroun Dekertian.”
    It was well she was seated, well that her pencil was tight between her fingers. Her eyes had darted up at the name. She covered with an apologetic smile. “Will you spell that please, Mr. Brewer?”
    He spelled, “F-e-r-o-u-n D-e-k-e-r-t-i-a-n.”
    She was prepared now. He wouldn’t hear the thumping of her curiosity, he was too engrossed in his trouble.
    “The Iranian Embassy. Washington.” He pushed his fist against his forehead. “Has Gavin Keane—no—” He broke off abruptly. “No use worrying him too. Here it is.” He thought it out loud. “‘Have you heard from Keane? Wire collect.’ Sign Bryan Brewer.” He looked at her with some relief, small relief but even that was good. “Get that off right away, Liza. That doesn’t sound as if Keane has vanished into thin air. He might have heard from Gavin. Maybe Gavin went to him when he couldn’t find me. If someone was trying to take the Imp from Gavin, he might have played it that way.”
    She sat