"Shadow - 351015 - Back Pages - Grace Culver - Bombproof Baby" - читать интересную книгу автора (Brown Roswell)

statement, the haggard laundry magnate stared down at the wreck of his
truck, sombre-eyed.
"So there it is, Mr. Noonan. The whole industry has received notes like
those. Some of my rivals have seen fit to pay the Сdues' and Сassessments'
this Mr. Almond demands. I did not. You saw what happened."
Big Tim flicked the little stack of notes through his fingers. All of them
typed. All signed with one name, in a round uniformed hand: "Mr. Almond."
And all pompously decorated with blobs of red sealing wax in which the
letter "A" had been stamped with the sort of stock signet available at the jewelry
counter of any cheap department store!
"Look like kid stuff, don't they?"
Horner smiled wryly.
"That truck down there doesn't look much like a child's game, Mr. Noonan.
At least, my three at home don't play that rough."
Tim's eyes, following the smaller man's, inspected the wreck of the blasted
vehicle below. Shreds of charred clothЧall that was left of the two o'clock deliveryЧ
were swirling in the eddies of wind that fanned the neighboring gutters.
"How about the police?"
Horner frowned.
"No. We haven't gone to them. Police mean publicity Publicity means
ruin. No sane housewife would send out a wash she knew was going to be
blown to atoms before it was returned to her."
Noonan fanned the letters in his big hand.
"The Laundrymen's Protective Combine, eh? Who is this Almond guy?
What's he look like? Could you identify him?"
Horner couldn't.
"Nor can any other laundryman in Brooklyn. His letters are all we have
on him. Except his bombs."
Tim tossed the collection of papers into his secretary's lap. She scooped
them up eagerly. There had been too much time wasted already, she felt.
"What you make of them, Redsie?"
She grinned.
"There is no Mr. Almond."
Horner lurched forward. His eyes were wide. He was quivering with emotion.
"No Almond? Young lady, if you think that truck is a mere hallucination or-"

Grace interrupted. "It's real enough. And whoever wrote those letters means
business. But his name isn't Almond. See how slowly be has formed each letter? That's not
the way you'd dash off your own familiar signature."
WhoЧwho is he, then?"
"I don't knowЧyet His right name doesn't begin with A, because the signet
is evidently brand-new. He's illiterate, of course. And he isn't a business man
or used to seeing letters, or the 'Mr.' would have been a first name or initials.
Aside from thatЧ"
A door at the opposite end of the office opened. Horner's secretary, a drab
female in tweeds, shuffled in.
"They've finished the emergency treatment on Wally, Mr. Horner. The
ambulance is on its way."
"Wally?" Tim rumbled.
"Wally Mapes, the driver. Badly messed up, he was."