The Money Tree

He tugged at the stem a bit and it still clung to the bill, so he folded the whole thing up as neatly as he could and stuck it in the watch pocket of his trousers. Then he picked up the rest of the bills and stuffed them in another pocket without counting them.

Twenty minutes later he walked into Benny's Bar. Benny was mopping the mahogany. One lone customer was at the far end of the bar working through a beer. 'Gimmee bottle and a glass,' said Doyle.

'Show me cash,' said Benny.

Doyle gave him one of the twenty-dollar bills. It was so fresh and new and crisp that its crinkling practically thundered in the silence of the place. Benny looked it over with great care.

'Got someone making them for you?' he asked.

'Naw,' said Doyle. 'I pick them off the street.'

Benny handed across a bottle and a glass.

'You through work,' he asked, 'or are you just beginning?'

'I put in my day,' said Doyle. 'I been shooting old J. Howard Metcalfe. Magazine in the east wants pictures of him.'

'You mean the racketeer?'

'He ain't no racketeer. He went legitimate four or five years ago. He's a magnate now.'

'You mean tycoon. What kind of tycoon is he?'

'I don't know. But whatever kind it is, it sure pays off. He's got a fancy-looking shack up on the hill. But he ain't so much to look at. Don't see why this magazine should want a picture of him.'

'Maybe they're running a story about how it pays to go straight.'

Doyle tipped the bottle and sloshed liquor in his glass.

It ain't no skin off me,' he declared philosophically. 'I'd go take pictures of an angleworm if they paid me for it.'

'Who would want pictures of any angleworm?'

'Lots of crazy people in the world,' said Doyle. 'Might want anything. I don't ask no questions. I don't venture no opinions. People want pictures taken, I take them. They pay me for it, that is all right by me.'

Doyle drank appreciatively and refilled the glass.

'Benny,' he asked, 'you ever hear of money growing on a tree?'

'You got it wrong,' said Benny. 'Money grows on bushes.'

'If it grows on bushes, then it could grow on trees. A bush ain't nothing but a little tree.'

'No, no,' protested Benny, somewhat alarmed. 'Money don't really grow on bushes. That is just a saying.'

The telephone rang and Benny went to answer it. 'It's for you,' he said.

'Now how would anyone think of looking for me here?' asked Doyle, astounded.

He picked up the bottle and shambled down the bar to where the phone was waiting.

'All right,' he told the transmitter. 'You're the one who called. Start talking.'

'This is Jake.'

'Don't tell me. You got a job for me. You'll pay me in a day or two. How many jobs do you think I do for you without being paid?'

'You do this job for me, Chuck, and I'll pay you everything I owe you. Not only for this one, but for all the others, too. This is one that I need real bad and I need it fast. You see, this car went off the road and into this lake and the insurance company claims — '

'Where is the car now?'

'It's still in the lake. They'll be pulling it out in a day or two and I need the pictures — '

'You want me, maybe, to go down into the lake and take pictures underwater?'

'That's exactly the situation. I know that it's a tough one. But I'll get the diving equipment and arrange everything. I hate to ask it of you, but you're the only man I know…'

'I will not do it,' Doyle said firmly. 'My health is too delicate. If I get wet I get pneumonia and if I get cold I have a couple teeth that begin to ache and I'm allergic to all kinds of weeds and more than likely this lake is filled with a lot of water lilies and other kinds of plants.'

'I'll pay you double!' Jake yelled in desperation. Til even pay you triple.'

'I know you,' said Doyle. 'You won't pay me nothing.'

He hung up the phone and shuffled back up the bar, dragging the bottle with him.

'Nerve of the guy!' he said, taking two drinks in rapid succession.

'It's a hell of a way,' he said to Benny, 'for a man to make a living.'

'All ways are,' said Benny philosophically.

'Look, Benny, there wasn't nothing wrong with that bill I give you?'

'Should there been?'

'Naw, but that crack you made.'

'I always make them cracks. It goes with the job. The customers expect me to make them kind of cracks.'

He mopped at the bar, a purely reflex action, for the bar was dry and shiny.

'I always look the folding over good,' he said. Tm as hep as any banker. I can spot a phoney fifty feet away. Smart guys want to pass some bad stuff, they figure that a bar is the place to do it. You got to be on your guard against it.'

'Catch much of it?'

Benny shook his head. 'Once in a while. Not often. Fellow in here the other day says there is a lot of it popping up that can't be spotted even by an expert. Says the government is going crazy over it. Says there is bills turning up with duplicate serial numbers. Shouldn't be no two bills with the same serial number. When that happens, one of them is phoney. Fellow says they figure it's the Russians.'

'The Russians?'