“Light the fire in the patio, Ah Kim. We’ll sit out there a while.”
The Chinese went to comply with this order, and Eden saw Madden regarding him expectantly. He smiled and rose.
“Well, dad ought to be struggling in from his hard day on the links any minute now,” he said. “I’ll put in that call.”
Madden leaped up. “Let me do it,” he suggested. “Just tell me the number.”
The boy told him, and Madden spoke over the telephone in a voice to command respect.
“By the way,” he said, when he had finished, “last night you intimated that certain things happened in San Francisco—things that made your father cautious. What—if you don’t mind telling me?”
Bob Eden thought rapidly. “Oh, it may all have been a detective’s pipe dream. I’m inclined to think now that it was. You see—”
“Detective? What detective?”
“Well, naturally dad has a tie-up with various private detective agencies. An operative of one of them reported that a famous crook had arrived in town and was showing an undue interest in our store. Of course, it may have meant nothing—”
“A famous crook, eh? Who?”
Never a good liar, Bob Eden hesitated. “I—I don’t know that I remember the name. English, I believe—the Liverpool Kid, or something like that,” he invented lamely.
Madden shrugged. “Well, if anything’s leaked out about those pearls, it came from your side of the deal,” he
