Free The Plague of Thieves Affair by Marcia Muller

lock and search the premises, as he had Lansing’s that morning, there was nothing damning for him to find. Unlike Lansing, Corby evidently kept his ill-gotten gains elsewhere; there were no loose floorboards or other hiding places here. The three rooms were sparsely furnished and kept neat as a pin, but utterly lacking in personal items of any value. The only wall adornment was an illustrated calendar from a supplier of chickens and eggs in Los Alegres, an agricultural and ranching community in the North Bay. Even the clothing in the bedroom wardrobe was mostly old and threadbare.
    The Spartan atmosphere explained, perhaps, why Corby had succumbed to the temptation to turn crook and slayer. His bookkeeper’s salary could not have been much, and he may well have yearned for the finer things life had to offer. But if he had been paid some or all of his blood money, he’d hoarded it just as Lansing had, though much more carefully. Had it been anywhere in these rooms, Quincannon would have ferreted it out.
    Across the street from the boardinghouse was a bakery and coffee bar. He claimed a table at the window overlooking the street. The night was beset with coils of fog, and the interior warmth caused the glass to mist up a bit, but he could see the boardinghouse stoop and gaslit entrance well enough. He ordered coffee and a plate of sweet rolls, and settled down for what he hoped would not be a long wait.
    It was, however. Long and ultimately futile.
    Quincannon sat filling and distressing his bladder with too much weakly brewed coffee until the shop closed at ten o’clock. The only individual who entered the boardinghouse was a gent far too tall and corpulent to be Elias Corby.
    Where the devil was he? It was unlikely that he’d taken it on the lammas; as far as he knew, he was under no suspicion for either Ackermann’s murder or Lansing’s bogus suicide. It was possible he’d been paid enough for his role in the theft of the steam beer formula to head for parts unknown and the establishment of a new life. But it would have been a foolish act to disappear suddenly, with no word to anyone, thereby calling attention to himself—and Corby, unlike Lansing, was no fool. He would surely have followed the more prudent course of remaining at his job for the present.
    Unless he’d been unable to. Unless something had happened to him, too—that payment for his evil deeds had not been money but hot lead or cold steel. Would Cyrus Drinkwater go so far as to order Corby’s death? He might, if the bookkeeper had been witless enough to demand more money for his deeds; a scoundrel such as Drinkwater would not take kindly to threats and an attempt at blackmail. On the other hand, he was a businessman whose shady enterprises depended on payoffs; so far as anyone knew, he had never resorted to violence. Or ever would, in all probability, except as a last desperate recourse.
    Quincannon debated the wisdom of lingering in the neighborhood a while longer, but there was no telling when Corby would decide to return; it might be the wee hours if he was out spending some of his ill-gotten gains. Besides which, it was a cold night and Quincannon was tired; the prospect of shivering in doorways for even a short while held no appeal. Yaffling Corby could wait until tomorrow.
    *   *   *
    Quincannon had lived in the same bachelor digs on Leavenworth Street since his arrival in the city a dozen years before, when as an agent for the Secret Service he’d been transferred to the San Francisco field office in the U.S. Mint. He’d been a hard-drinking man in those early days, and something of a hell-raiser; the large flat had been the scene of several small but raucous parties, and more than a handful of willing young wenches had shared his bed. Not that he’d been a celibate monk since taking the pledge, leaving the Service, and establishing his partnership with Sabina. On the contrary.