"Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 255 - The Devil's Partner" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Maxwell)

answered questions. But Swade had made a pleasant promise.

"I will do better than double your money," Swade had said, a week before.

Anthony Kilby wet his lips as he stared at the enormous portrait of his saintly father. They were oddly
unlike for father and son. The elder Kilby's face was round, his expression benevolent.

Young Kilby wasn't like that. He took after his dead mother. His face was sharper. There was a driving
force within him that had been entirely lacking in his father.

He was so intent on his scrutiny of the portrait that he jerked nervously when his butler knocked at the
door.

"Yes, Oliphant?"

"Mr. Swade telephoned a moment ago, sir. He said to inform you he'd be here shortly."

"Good! Admit him to my office as soon as he arrives."

Left alone, Kilby's smile flicked. If everything went well, there would be glory for him as well as his
father. It would be a more personal sort of glory. The profit he anticipated from Swade would not be
used for anonymous free milk stations for needy children. Nor would it go into distant vacation camps for
sick babies and mothers.

It would be a perpetual memorial to his father's humanitarian reputation right here in New York. A
memorial playground, completely equipped, paid for privately by Kilby's own son. A daily reminder that
young Anthony Kilby was also a psychoanalyst!

No reason why charity couldn't be made to pay. Wealthy patients had been slow bringing their mental
troubles to young Anthony Kilby. A memorial erected to the memory of his father would also be a
constant reminder to neurotic millionaires that Anthony Kilby deserved their continued patronage.

He had studied a long time to fit himself to take over his father's practice. It annoyed him that people who
had paid his father large fees were slow in coming to him.

Again a knock roused him.

"Mr. Swade," Oliphant said, and withdrew.

SIMON SWADE entered. The two men shook hands.

"What news?" Kilby asked eagerly.

"Good news," Swade replied.

He was a lean man who looked thinner than he actually was. Everything about him seemed to run to
points. His mustache, the corners of his eyes, his thin eyebrows, his elbows - all contributed to an
appearance of undernourishment that was far from the truth. Swade was a well-fed business expert who
knew which side his bread was buttered on.