The Girl, the Gold Watch and Everything Read Online Free PDF Page A

years old. And I was a very old twenty. Charla would be all right—she might even be fun—if she weren't so damned greedy."
    "What is that about a pigeon?"
    "What else do you think you are? Do you think she's smitten by your charm?"
    "She got smitten a few times."
    "What?"
    "Miss Alden. Just for laughs. What are we talking about?"
    She frowned at him. A strand of the tan-gold hair fell across her forehead and she pushed it back. "I checked the newspapers. Omar Krepps was your uncle. That's what we're talking about."
    "I don't understand."
    "When I was fifteen years old she yanked me out of school in Switzerland and began lugging me around the world with her. She and Joseph are operators, Winter. Canadian gold, African oil, Indian opium, Brazilian girls—you name it, and they've bought it and sold it. They aren't the biggest and they aren't the shrewdest, but they keep getting richer, and it's never fast enough to suit them. They are in and out of cartel and syndicate operations with other chums of the same ilk, and their happiest little game is trying to cheat each other. I was only fifteen, but I soon learned that in their circles, the name Omar Krepps terrified them. Almost a superstitious terror. Too many times Krepps would suddenly appear, skim the cream off a deal and leave with the money. I believe they and some of their friends tried to have him killed, but it never worked."
    "Kill Uncle Omar?"
    "Shut up and listen. And believe. That fat little old man seemed able to be nine places at once. One time he skinned them good, intercepted cash on its way to a number account in Zurich somehow, and just took it, and they could do nothing about it because they'd in effect stolen it first—Joseph and Charla and some of their thieving pals. At that time Charla was wearing a ring that opened up. A poison ring, I guess, with an emerald. She opened it idly one day and there was a little wad of paper in it. She unfolded it. It said, 'Thanks, O. Krepps.' When she came out of her faint she had the wildest case of hysterics you ever saw, and she had to go into a hospital for a week. You see, the ring hadn't been off her finger since before the money was taken."
    "I can't really believe Uncle Omar would—"
    "Let me finish. Krepps died last Wednesday. They were in Bermuda. They flew here Thursday morning. You arrived at dawn on Friday, and by dawn on Saturday you're in bed in Charla's suite. How much accident is involved in that?"
    "I thought I met them by accident."
    "That pair doesn't cotton to the random stranger. There's always a reason for every move. What do they want from you?"
    "They've invited me on a cruise."
    "Tell me all of it, Winter. Every word you can remember."
    He told her an edited version of it.
    She scowled. "And your Uncle Omar left you practically nothing? I guess they must want to pick your brains and find out how he operated."
    "But I didn't have anything to do with—making money. I don't know anything about the business end of it. He told me what courses to take in college. When I got out I went to work for him, doing the very same thing right from the beginning."
    "Doing what?"
    "Giving money away."
    "What!"
    "Just that," he said helplessly. "He had some sort of clipping service and translation service and I would go and make investigations and give the money away if in my opinion everything was on the level—and if it could be kept quiet."
    "Much money?"
    "I think it averages out somewhere around three million a year."
    "To charities?"
    "Sometimes. Sometimes to individuals trying to get something started, or small companies in trouble."
    "Why did he want to give it away?"
    "He never seemed very serious about anything. He never explained. He just said he did it to keep his luck good. He was a jolly little man. He didn't like to talk seriously. He liked to tell long jokes and do card tricks and show you how he could take his vest off without taking his coat off."
    "Did you see much of him?"
    "About once a