Spike paused abruptly. “Are they there now?”
“No, they left about an hour ago.”
When Spike first entered the room Koenig was lying with his face toward the opposite wall. At the sound of the opening door the injured man turned, and when he saw it was Spike he smiled weakly.
“Only ten minutes.” The nurse laid down the time limit as she closed the door behind her and left the two men alone.
Both of them were embarrassed. Men always are in the presence of physical weakness. Their sympathetic impulses war with their fierce masculine revulsion at anything “soft.”
Spike mumbled something about well-how-are-you-old-man and Koenig mumbled something designed to make light in an heroic manner of his wounds. With these embarrassing preliminaries off their chest they could be natural. Spike drew up a chair and bent close so that Koenig’s weak whispers might be audible.
“How did it happen?” he asked.
“I don’t know—after I left your place—I—I wrote a letter and then—then I went through the Park. I started to take a taxi and then I thought— I would walk. I was all upset. I needed to—to get hold of myself before I saw Linda—so I took the short cut through the Park. Then I don’t know—I just remember bushes close to the path—on the left side and then—” He closed his eyes and gesture d weakly.
“And the next thing you knew you woke up in the hospital.” Spike finished the sentence for him. “Listen, did anyone know you were going up there?”
“No one—except you.”
Spike grinned. “Well, I didn’t do it. And anyway that’s not quite right. Maysie Ealing and Linda Crossley knew you were coming. I told Maysie over the telephone.”
It was Koenig’s turn to grin now. “You may be a—damn fool—but you are still a little—distrustful.”
Spike forbore to argue the matter. “What about this letter you mentioned? What did you stop to write a letter for?”
“To Linda.”
“Linda? But you were going to see her, you were on your way?”
“I know—but I was afraid—afraid maybe I might not—get there.”
“Afraid of what?”
“Just afraid—a—premonition—what you call a hunch. You see—I was right.”
“Look here, where’d you write this letter?”
“The drug store—on the corner near your place. I bought a tablet and envelope—stamp—wrote it sitting down—one of the soda tables.”
“Was there anybody else in the drug store at the time?”
“Lots—lots of people.”
“Did you tell anyone where you were going, what you were going for?”
Koenig shook his head.
Spike was thoughtful, his brows knit in perplexity. He glanced at his watch. The minutes were ticking off rapidly. Koenig put out a weak hand and laid it on Spike’s arm.
“Listen—my friend—go see her now. Tell her to do as I said—in the letter—now today—tell her to do it.”
“Do what?”
“She knows—it’s in the letter. Tell her!” There was a fierce urgency even in his weakness.
“Yes, yes, I will,” Spike reassured him. Koenig closed his eyes. He was getting very tired. Spike leaned over the bed solicitously. His time was up.
“Anything I can get for you, do for you?”
“No—just see—Linda.”
“Yes, I’ll do that. But anything from your place. Any clothes or anything?”
“Bring pajamas—the blue ones with white stripes—these hospital shirts—my keys are in—pants pockets.” Even in his weakness Koenig still retained his sartorial vanity.
Outside in the corridor Spike summoned the nurse and had her show him where Koenig’s clothes were hung in a locker in the hall.
CHAPTER XXI - A Little Nifty Mail Robbing
ONE FORTY-THREE West 110th St. of a dull, warm afternoon in June was quiet except for the occasional noisy pounding of a child up and down the dark stairway. Mrs. O’Brien of the first floor front was, as usual, leaning out of the window, lazily casting her eyes up and down the street in search of a gossiping neighbor who might be passing. Mrs. Torrence of the fourth floor rear, returning from the corner market laden with a large paper shopping bag bursting with groceries, stopped to pass the time of day. Soon they were joined by Mrs. Barton, who lived in the basement.
All three stopped talking and stared when the Cadillac roadster drew up at the curb and the young man got out. In the vestibule he pressed a bell and stood and waited. The three women watched him. It was not often that number 143 had visitors who arrived in Cadillacs. Then Mrs. Torrence broke away from the group and mounted the three low steps to the vestibule.
“If it’s Miss Ealing you’re lookin’ for,” she said as she noted the buzzer he was pressing, “she ain’t here.”
“Not here?” The young man inquired in polite surprise.
“No, she’s moved. She moved early this morning.” Mrs. Torrence peered at the letter boxes. “I guess she forgot to tell the postman her forwarding address. There’s some mail for her.” The young man peered too.
“You don’t know where she’s gone, do you?”
“Just over the next street to a rooming house. Mrs. Parley’s. I can’t tell you the exact number, but I can show you where it is if you’d like.”
“Oh—well—no, I don’t think that will be necessary. I’ll get in touch with her through her office.”
“You a friend of hers?”
“I know her slightly.”
“Too bad about her mother, wasn’t it?”
“Very tragic.”
“Still in a way, I say it’s a good thing. I don’t mean the poor old lady goin’ off so terrible like that, but just the same the daughter really didn’t have no life of her own, and she ain’t as young as she once was. Now I guess she can go to England and marry that young man of hers. It isn’t as if she—”
“I think,” he interrupted, indicating the pay station at the back of the hall, “I’ll make a telephone call.”
He talked a long time to some fellow he called Jack. So long in fact that Mrs. Torrence, finding no further pretext for lingering, went on upstairs. At the sound of the door closing behind her, the young man abruptly ceased his conversation with “Jack” who, as a matter of fact was nothing but an empty buzzing at the other end of the wire.
He hung up the telephone and listened. There were no more voices outside. He went quietly to the open door of the vestibule and peered through the crack of the jamb. Mrs. Barton was gone and Mrs. O’Brien was no longer at the window. He pushed the door to, but did not latch it.
The vestibule now was almost in darkness. Only a faint light came through the transom above. From his pocket he pulled out a knife with a stout blade, thrust it under the letter box marked Ealing. He pried, lifted, pried some more. There was a slight wrenching sound as the little door swung open.
He snatched out the mail, leafed through it quickly—a bill from the gas company, an advertising circular, a letter. He thrust the bill and the circular back into the box, closed the little door, pressed it firmly until it was flush with the frame, so that it didn’t look as if it had been pried open.
At 102nd Street Spike turned his car east off the Avenue and drew up in front of his own building. Upstairs in his apartment he took out the letter, to obtain which he had just committed a penitentiary offense. It was addressed to Miss Maysie Ealing, but inside there was a second envelope bearing the name of Linda Crossley.
Of course… he wouldn’t put Linda’s name on the outside for every postman and mail clerk who had been reading the papers to see… wise guy…
For a moment he hesitated, looking at the envelope. Conscience… honor… a gentleman… oh, to hell with all that tripe! He ripped open the letter. There was just one page on cheap tablet paper. The writing was uneven as if the hand that had driven the pencil had trembled slightly.
“Linda, my dear: I have time for so little now. But if anything goes wro
ng and I—but never mind that now. I think I have found the family. Their name is Polk and they live in a little town called West Albion, N. J. If anything goes wrong before I see you, go to the police and tell them where you have been all the while. They will believe you and know that you have had nothing to do with all this horrible business. Go now as soon as you receive this letter. K. Koenig.”
Spike’s eyes raced over the letter. Then he went back and read it more slowly. “Their name is Polk and they live in a little town called West Albion, N. J.” For a moment he just sat there, looking at the letter. Then slowly he folded it and put it back in its two envelopes and put it in his pocket.
Presently he turned his attention to a small bundle that he had brought with him from the car.
CHAPTER XXIV - The District Attorney Bites the Dust
THE DISTRICT ATTORNEY, R. Montgomery Tracy, sat in his office and scowled at an editorial in the New York Herald-Tribune. The chief of the homicide squad, Inspector Herschman, sat in his office at the opposite end of the corridor and scowled at an editorial in the New York Times.4
The case—the famous Crossley-Ealing-Koenig-stamp-murder case—had reached that stage where editorial writers take the covers off their typewriters and unleash their choicest denunciation. It’s tradition, just one of those things that’s done, like tails at a formal dinner and walking on the curb side when you’re with a lady.
Comes a time in every well-regulated murder when the press feels it necessary to call attention to the fact that the district attorney and the police are by way of being just a bunch of wet smacks. Of course the editorial gentlemen phrase it in a more erudite manner. It usually runs something like this:
The present police and legal administration may seek to camouflage successive failures with grandiloquent talk of ‘civic progress’ and ‘worthy reforms’ but the man in the street is not deceived by such high-sounding phrases. The fact remains that during the last two weeks there have been two bloody and atrocious murders— Prentice Crossley and Mrs. Deborah Ealing—and an attempted third—Kurt Koenig—to say nothing of the theft of $85,000 in valuable property. The failure of the district attorney and the chief of the homicide squad to bring to justice the criminal is but another proof of their inadequacy. As officers of the people…
The district attorney put down the paper and spoke into the inter-office telephone on his desk. “Ask Inspector Herschman to come to my office.”
The scene which followed is a depressing one and there seems little point in going into it. The district attorney took a firm line, glowered and insisted that “something has got to be done.” The “got” was emphasized by a decisive pounding of the fist on one corner of the desk. The inspector with an air of righteousness outraged protested that “everything humanly possible is being done,” emphasizing the “is” by pounding on the opposite corner of the desk. The district attorney pressed for details, and the inspector was vague. Between the two of them they added little to the gaiety of nations.
It was at this point that a fresh breeze of spring swept into the gloom-charged atmosphere in the person of a debonair young man with a gardenia in his buttonhole and a jaunty swing to his walking stick.
Both the district attorney and the inspector were startled, and their scowling faces lit up with something akin to hope. Then remembering their position and dignity, and the disreputable reputation of the intruder they quickly resumed their scowls.
“Philip,” the district attorney said with the impatience of one who has weighty problems on his shoulders, “I can’t see you now. Inspector Herschman and I are having a very important conference. Please wait outside and…”
But dignity and gloom and weighty problems, having no part in the young man’s makeup, slid easily off his shoulders leaving no impression.
“Inspector! Richard! How godawful you look, both of you.” He greeted them with cheerful good humor. “Just like the before-taking photograph in patent medicine ads. The air in this place is lousy.” He threw the window wide open and the breeze merrily scattered papers from the district attorney’s desk. “What you two need is a little riotous living. Drink and women. Nothing like drink and women for toning up the system, opening the pores, and all that. I can furnish you with some telephone numbers if you’re interested. What have you both been doing with yourselves? Why don’t you—”
“Philip!” The district attorney’s stem voice broke through the bright chatter.
“Yes, Richard.” The young man was suddenly meek.
“Will you please do as I ask?”
“No, Richard.” The voice was that of a docile child. He sat down and lit a cigarette.
“Philip!”
“Yes, Richard.”
“Kindly leave this room—immediately.”
“No, Richard.”
“Philip!”
“Yes, Richard.”
“I will ask you once more to le—”
“Listen, old dear, are you purposely doubling back on your tracks, or is this just an ad lib because you’ve forgotten your lines?”
The district attorney’s mouth tightened and his face grew slightly apoplectic. One could hardly summon a patrolman to forcibly eject one’s own brother. There was, after all, the Tracy family dignity to consider. His eyes met Herschman’s. The inspector quickly veiled a smile and joined the district attorney in glowering at the insouciant young man.
But the insouciant young man still refused to be impressed. “You know,” he said lightly, as he blew a long, lazy cloud of cigarette smoke into the air, “I was thinking—”
He paused and looked at his two companions. “At that point,” he reminded them, “you’re supposed to pull a wise crack.” But wise cracks were not in line with their present mood.
“Oh, very well, if you will waste your opportunities. I was thinking, though, that if you haven’t already discovered the bird that knocked off Prentice Crossley and old Mrs. Ealing and winged Koenig, you might be interested in something I found out about…”
Here too is another scene which we will pass over quickly. It is not pleasant to witness the rout of the righteous before an advocate of light living and debauchery. It is still less gratifying to see dignity confounded, and the might and majesty of the law brought to the point where it eats gratefully out of the hand of a young man who is himself guilty of (1) compounding a felony, (2) willfully withholding evidence from the police, (3) false impersonation, and (4) robbing, the United States mails. Let us cravenly turn our face on this seamier side of a district attorney’s life and skip forward fifteen minutes.
But let us not get the impression that in those fifteen minutes Spike revealed all that he had discovered since that day almost two weeks before when he had sat in the Crossley library sunk in sham slumber.
As a matter of fact he was chary with his revelations. He did not, for instance, tell them of Linda Crossley’s sojourn on Sark Island, and Koenig’s subsequent visit to the Island. He made no mention of his interview—under false pretenses—with Maysie Ealing, and those other interviews—also under false pretenses—with Mr. Heffenbaugh and Mr. Yoder. And naturally, since he was talking to “officers of the people” pledged to the punishment of those who transgress the law, he did not confess that he had just filched a letter from Maysie Ealing’s mail box.
“It’s Fairleigh who intrigues me,” he said. “You know after that episode in the Crossley library, you remember that first day, I had one of those indefinable hunches. I reasoned that if Fairleigh did have anything on his mind, the first thing he’d do after getting back to town was to get it off. That morning he’d come directly from the landing field to his office and then to the Crossley place. He didn’t have time to do much but what you demanded of him— get the Crossley will from his own safe and meet you at the house. But afterward—Well, I followed him.”
Briefly he related the story of his first trip to the little town on the edge of the forestry reserve in New Jersey.
“Then when I read about
this second murder in the paper, I had another hunch. I went out there again and talked to the woman.” He sketched in his conversation with Mrs. Polk.
“I was wondering,” he said innocently, “just what story Fairleigh told you about his activities that afternoon.”
“He told us a damn lie, that’s what he told us,” Herschman burst out. “Said he was at a friend’s private library—place on the Drive, but he couldn’t produce a single person to back him up.”
“Really,” said Spike with mild interest. “What, I wonder, is the idea?”
“If what you say is true, Philip,” the district attorney put in, “Why did—”
“Can the ‘if,’ old dear. You know I’m the soul of honor.”
The district attorney looked slightly skeptical but recast his sentence.
“Since Fairleigh was in New Jersey all afternoon, what is his motive in withholding that information?”
“Because, obviously, he didn’t want anyone to know that he was in New Jersey all afternoon,” Spike explained.
“But that’s a perfect alibi,” Herschman protested.
“Exactly! And he had a perfect alibi for the other murder—Crossley. That’s why I don’t quite trust him. I’d be inclined to talk things over with him. Incidentally, where was he the night Koenig was shot?”
“At the theater with his wife. And they went straight home afterward.”
Herschman picked up the telephone. “Get hold of Fairleigh,” he said when a connection had been put through to his own office, “and tell him to come over here. We want to talk to him. Handle him easily. Don’t let him think there’s anything up.”
“And in the meantime,” said Spike as the three of them sat waiting for Fairleigh’s arrival, “we should be investigating his financial affairs. You remember that clause in old Crossley’s will? Fairleigh gets a big cut. And when anyone is due to inherit a lot of money and the guy gets popped off, one must always investigate the financial affairs of the guy that’s left. He, of course, has juggled the firm’s books to get money to speculate in the stock market and the worst has happened, and unless he can produce the $50,000, he’ll go to jail and the wife and kiddies will… By the way, Fairleigh does have a wife and kiddies, doesn’t he?”
A Most Immoral Murder Page 12