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Authors: Leslie Charteris
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than cutting each
other’s throats. They’ve got an unofficial combine, and what they’d do
is pass the word along, and every one would jack up the price of
every thing to you, and whoever you bought through they’d split the
difference. In that way, everybody gets a commission— and you’d be paying
all ten or fifteen of ‘em instead of one.”
“But that’s almost crooked!”
exclaimed the Saint, in shocked accents.
“You can say that again. But we can beat
‘em—if you’d let me have this exclusive for a while.”
“How?”
Mr. Diehl spat again, almost missing the brass
bowl in his haste.
“Like this. Besides checking everything
on our books that looks promising, I’ll have my salesmen contact all the
other real estate offices, but very casually, without mentioning any names,
see? That way, we’ll get an honest price on everything that might suit you
that anyone has got listed. And then when it comes to making an offer, I’ll
get a friend of mine who lives here to put in the bid, and they’ll
know they can’t fool him with any fancy prices, but of course he’ll make an
agreement in advance to sell the property to your syndicate at just a
reasonable mark-up for his trouble.”
“That sounds like an interesting idea.
But what have I done to deserve so much help from you?”
“Just blame it on the way I was brought
up, Count. My father, who founded this business, used to tell me, God
rest him, ‘I never want anyone who walks in these doors to walk out
saying he didn’t get a square deal.’ If I find you what you want and make
the sale, I’ll be perfectly satis fied.”
The Saint had no doubts whatsoever on that
score, but did not judge the moment opportune to press Mr. Diehl for details as to how this satisfaction would be achieved. He simply
allowed himself to look deeply impressed by a revela tion of corrupt
practices which might well have made the collective hair of the
Florida Real Estate Board stand on end if its members had heard it. Mr.
Diehl did not even give that a thought, since there were no witnesses, and in any case
there were a score of ways to explain how an ignorant foreigner
might have misunderstood him.
“I’m very glad to have met you, Mr.
Diehl,” Simon said with unaffected sincerity. “And I think I
shall give your suggestion a try. Instead to contact other agents this
week end, as I had planned, I shall let you do the work—while I go
fishing, which to be truthful I much prefer.”
“You won’t regret it, I promise you. I’ll
put my whole staff to work on it. While you go fishing. Have you arranged for a boat? I can get you the very best sailfish captain in these waters—”
“Pardon, but I was not thinking of the
ocean fishing, though I know how wonderful it is here. But I have done
so much of it—from Panama to Peru to New Zealand, you understand.
Here in the southeast United States I like to fish one thing only, for
which even in your country this is the headquarters, and
which the rest of the world does not even know—the big-mouth
bass.”
“The greatest fishing in the world,”
Mr. Diehl concurred automatically.
“I have studied it very closely, and I
think on this visit I must catch a record. At any rate I shall
enjoy proving my theory. Perhaps you yourself are a bass fisherman, Mr. Diehl?”
“There’s nothing in the world I like
better, except you- know-what.”
Ed (“Square”) Diehl would have given
the same answer, with the same leer and wink, to any customer with the same profit potential, on any subject from baseball to Balinese dancing in
which the customer expressed an interest.
“I’ve had a theory for a long
time,” Simon pursued, with a somewhat Countly portentousness, “that the
reason why it begins to be said that your Florida waters are fished
out—— is that they are. The new roads that go everywhere, the new cars
that everyone has, the new boats and outboards that everyone can afford on
installments—all this has
other’s throats. They’ve got an unofficial combine, and what they’d do
is pass the word along, and every one would jack up the price of
every thing to you, and whoever you bought through they’d split the
difference. In that way, everybody gets a commission— and you’d be paying
all ten or fifteen of ‘em instead of one.”
“But that’s almost crooked!”
exclaimed the Saint, in shocked accents.
“You can say that again. But we can beat
‘em—if you’d let me have this exclusive for a while.”
“How?”
Mr. Diehl spat again, almost missing the brass
bowl in his haste.
“Like this. Besides checking everything
on our books that looks promising, I’ll have my salesmen contact all the
other real estate offices, but very casually, without mentioning any names,
see? That way, we’ll get an honest price on everything that might suit you
that anyone has got listed. And then when it comes to making an offer, I’ll
get a friend of mine who lives here to put in the bid, and they’ll
know they can’t fool him with any fancy prices, but of course he’ll make an
agreement in advance to sell the property to your syndicate at just a
reasonable mark-up for his trouble.”
“That sounds like an interesting idea.
But what have I done to deserve so much help from you?”
“Just blame it on the way I was brought
up, Count. My father, who founded this business, used to tell me, God
rest him, ‘I never want anyone who walks in these doors to walk out
saying he didn’t get a square deal.’ If I find you what you want and make
the sale, I’ll be perfectly satis fied.”
The Saint had no doubts whatsoever on that
score, but did not judge the moment opportune to press Mr. Diehl for details as to how this satisfaction would be achieved. He simply
allowed himself to look deeply impressed by a revela tion of corrupt
practices which might well have made the collective hair of the
Florida Real Estate Board stand on end if its members had heard it. Mr.
Diehl did not even give that a thought, since there were no witnesses, and in any case
there were a score of ways to explain how an ignorant foreigner
might have misunderstood him.
“I’m very glad to have met you, Mr.
Diehl,” Simon said with unaffected sincerity. “And I think I
shall give your suggestion a try. Instead to contact other agents this
week end, as I had planned, I shall let you do the work—while I go
fishing, which to be truthful I much prefer.”
“You won’t regret it, I promise you. I’ll
put my whole staff to work on it. While you go fishing. Have you arranged for a boat? I can get you the very best sailfish captain in these waters—”
“Pardon, but I was not thinking of the
ocean fishing, though I know how wonderful it is here. But I have done
so much of it—from Panama to Peru to New Zealand, you understand.
Here in the southeast United States I like to fish one thing only, for
which even in your country this is the headquarters, and
which the rest of the world does not even know—the big-mouth
bass.”
“The greatest fishing in the world,”
Mr. Diehl concurred automatically.
“I have studied it very closely, and I
think on this visit I must catch a record. At any rate I shall
enjoy proving my theory. Perhaps you yourself are a bass fisherman, Mr. Diehl?”
“There’s nothing in the world I like
better, except you- know-what.”
Ed (“Square”) Diehl would have given
the same answer, with the same leer and wink, to any customer with the same profit potential, on any subject from baseball to Balinese dancing in
which the customer expressed an interest.
“I’ve had a theory for a long
time,” Simon pursued, with a somewhat Countly portentousness, “that the
reason why it begins to be said that your Florida waters are fished
out—— is that they are. The new roads that go everywhere, the new cars
that everyone has, the new boats and outboards that everyone can afford on
installments—all this has
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