Tenth Commandment

by Lawrence Sanders

  317

  'Where was the letter sent from?' Detective Stilton asked.

  'The one that asked permission to open the social club?'

  'Oh dear,' he said. 'No address given.'

  'How about next-of-kin?' Stilton asked. 'Have you got that?'

  'Yes, that I know we have,' the Bishop said, digging through the papers. 'Here it is. A sister, Goldie Knurr, living in Athens, Indiana. Would you like the address?'

  'Please,' the detective said.

  Percy and I were the only ones in the elevator going down. 'You did fine,' Stilton said.

  'Thank you.'

  'But I knew you would,' he went on, 'or I'd have made you rehearse. The scam was necessary, Josh, because if I had just waltzed in there and asked to see the file on Knurr, without a warrant or anything, the Bishop would have told me to go peddle my fish. He looks sleepy, but he's no dummy.'

  In the lobby, Stilton paused to light a cigarette.

  'Perce,' I said, 'how did you get on to this office? I didn't even know which sect Knurr belongs to.'

  'I looked him up in the telephone book and got the address of that boys' club of his in Greenwich Village.

  Then I called Municipal Records downtown and got the name of the owner of the building. Then I went to see him and got a look at Knurr's lease for that storefront. Like I figured, when he signed the lease he had to give a permanent or former address. It was the headquarters of his church. I called them and they referred me to Bishop Oxman's personnel offices. So I called him.'

  I shook my head in wonderment.

  'It's a lot easier,' the detective assured me, 'when you can flash your potsy.' He looked at his watch. 'I've got maybe a half-hour. You have something to tell me?

  There's a bar around the corner. Let's have a beer and I'll listen.'

  318

  In the corner of a small bar on East 48th Street I asked,

  'Perce, that story you dreamed up about Knurr swindling a girl in New York was almost word for word what he actually pulled out in Chicago. How did you know?'

  He shrugged. 'I didn't,' he said. 'Josh, the bad guys don't have all the luck. Sometimes we get lucky, too. I figured if we were right about him, that con about your client would be right in character. Now I'm wondering if we got enough on the guy for me to go to my lieutenant and ask that the Kipper case be reopened.' He pondered a moment. 'No, I guess not,' he said finally. 'What happened in Chicago a couple of years ago is just background. It's got fuck-all to do with how Sol Kipper died. You got things to tell me?'

  I told him about the reward posters and the calls that had come in, and how I had obtained copies of the chemical analyses of Professor Stonehouse's brandy.

  'Mmm,' Stilton grunted. 'Good. More paper.'

  I told him I had obtained a photograph of Glynis Stonehouse and the name of the clinic where she presently did volunteer work and the medical laboratory where she had been employed a year ago.

  'I checked out the clinic on the phone,' I said, 'and they claim they don't stock poisons. It sounds logical; it's an eye, ear, nose and throat clinic for children. I got nowhere with the medical lab.'

  'Give me the name and address,' the detective said. 'I'll pay them a call.'

  He copied the information into his elegant little notebook.

  Finally I told him about following Glynis Stonehouse to her rendezvous with Godfrey Knurr, and then tailing the two of them to the 79th Street boat basin.

  'That's interesting,' Stilton said thoughtfully. 'You're doing fine, Josh.'

  'Thank you,' I said. 'I've saved the best till last. I think I 319

  know how he killed Sol Kipper.'

  The detective stared at me for a moment.

  'Let's have another beer,' he said.

  'There's an old gentleman who lives in the apartment across the hall from me,' I said. 'He's confined in a wheelchair and he's been rather lonely. Sometimes when I come home from work, he's waiting for me in his chair on the landing. Just to talk, you know. Well, a few times in the past month I've gotten home early, and he didn't know I was already in my apartment, and when I came out later, there he was on the landing, waiting for me.'

  Stilton looked at me, puzzled.

  'So?' he asked.

  'That's what gave me the idea of how Knurr killed Sol Kipper. I was already inside the apartment.'

  He had started to take a gulp of beer, but suddenly put his full glass back on the bar and sat there, staring straight ahead.

  'Yeah,' he breathed. 'That sucker! That's how he did it.

  Let me tell you: He was in the house all the time. Probably hiding in one of those empty rooms. Only Tippi knew he was there. She leaves her husband, comes downstairs.

  Knurr goes up to the master bedroom on the fifth floor and wastes Sol Kipper. Maybe with one of those karate chops of his or with the famous blunt instrument — who knows? Then he carries -'

  'No,' I said, 'that's no good. Sol Kipper wasn't a heavy man, but it would have been a difficult task to carry him up that narrow rear staircase to the sixth floor. I think Knurr rang for the elevator and took Kipper's body up that way.'

  'Right,' Stilton said decisively. 'The first blues on the scene found the elevator on the sixth floor. All right, he gets Sol up on the terrace and throws him over. I mean literally throws him. That's why the body was so far from the base of the wall.'

  320

  'Then Knurr goes down — How does he go down?'

  'He takes the stairs. Because the elevator door on the main floor can be seen from the kitchen. And also, the elevator was found on the sixth floor by the first officers to arrive.'

  'Tippi fainted,' I reminded him, 'or pretended to.'

  'Sure. To give Knurr time to get downstairs. Then he goes out the front door, turns right around, rings the bell, and waits for the butler to let him in.'

  'Yes,' I said, nodding, 'I think so. You can't see the front door from the kitchen, so even if they were inside when he exited, he was safe. Perce, I think he stayed in the house overnight. The butler keeps a house diary of visitors, deliveries, and so forth. He has a record of the Reverend Godfrey Knurr arriving on Tuesday the 23rd, the day before Kipper died.'

  'Oh wow,' Percy said, 'that's beautiful. I hate to admit it, but I got to admire him for that. The balls!'

  'Then you think that's how it was done?' I said eagerly.

  'Got to be,' Perce said. ' Got to! Everything fits. It was just a matter of planning and timing. That guy is one cool cat. When we take him, I'm bringing a regiment of marines. But what about the suicide note?'

  'I can't explain it,' I confessed. 'Right now I can't. But I'm going to give it some thought.'

  'You do that,' he said, patting my arm. 'Give it some thought. I'm beginning to think Roscoe Dollworth knew exactly what he was doing when he got you the job. Chief Investigator? You better believe it! Josh, I think now I got enough to ask my loot to reopen the Kipper case. I'll lay out the whole shmeer for him, how it ties into the Stonehouse disappearance, and how -'

  'Perce,' I said, 'could you hold off for just a day or two?'

  'Well . . . sure, but why?'

  'I'm trying to set up a conference with Mr Tabatchnick 321

  and Mr Teitelbaum. Teitelbaum's the senior partner who represents the Stonehouse family. I want to tell the two of them everything we've discovered and suggest how the two cases are connected. I want them to let me devote all my time to the investigation and stick to it no matter how long it takes. I'd like you to be there at the conference. They have some clout, don't they? Political clout?'

  'I guess they do.'

  'Well, if we get them on our side first, won't it help you to get the Kipper case reopened and maybe be assigned to it full time?'

  'Maybe it would,' he said slowly. 'Maybe it would at that.' He ruffled my hair with his fingertips. 'You're a brainy little runt,' he said.

  I didn't resent it at all.

  We were back on the sidewalk, about ready to part, when Stilton snapped
his fingers.

  'Oh Jesus!' he said. 'I forgot to tell you. There was nothing in Records on Knurr, which was why I pulled that scam at the church office. Just to get some background on the guy. But Tippi Kipper — she's another story. She's got a sheet. It goes back almost twenty years — but it's there.'

  'She's done time?' I said unbelievingly.

  'Oh no,' the detective said. 'Just charged. No record of trial or disposition.'

  'Charged?' I said. 'With what?'

  'Loitering,' he said, 'for the purpose of prostitution.'

  4

  Before I left for work early Wednesday morning, I slid a 322

  note under Cleo's door: 'Mr Joshua Bigg respectfully requests the pleasure of Miss Cleo Hufnagel's company at dinner in Mr Bigg's apartment tonight, Wednesday, at 8.00 p.m. Dress optional. RSVP.'

  I went off to work planning the menu.

  I found a memo on my desk from Ada Mondora stating that Mr Teitelbaum and Mr Tabatchnick would meet with me in the library at 2.00 p.m. I called Percy, but he wasn't in. I left a message asking him to call back as soon as possible. I then started to type notes on our meeting with Bishop Harley Oxman for the Kipper file.

  I was interrupted by a nervous call from Mrs Gertrude Kletz. She had broken a tooth and the dentist could only take her at eleven o'clock. Would it be acceptable if she came in from twelve to four? I told her that would be fine.

  A cabdriver called who claimed to have picked up Professor Stonehouse on the night of January 10th. He described his passenger as being short, in his middle 40s, with a noticeable limp.

  'Sorry,' I said, 'that's not the man.'

  'No harm in trying,' he said cheerfully and hung up.

  The next call was from Percy Stilton. I told him about the meeting with Teitelbaum and Tabatchnick at 2.00

  p.m., and he said he'd do his best to make it. Then he told me that he had visited Glynis Stonehouse's former employer, Atlantic Medical Research, that morning.

  'They stock enough poison to waste half of Manhattan,'

  Stilton reported. 'And they've got a very lax control system. The poison cabinet has a dimestore lock that could be opened with a heavy breath. The supervisor is the only one with a key, but he keeps it in plain view, hanging on a board on his wall, labelled. He's in and out of his office a hundred times a day. Anyone who works in the place could lift the key, use it, and replace it without being noticed.

  Every time a researcher takes some poison he's supposed to sign a register kept in the poison locker stating how 323

  much he took, the date, and his name. So I had the supervisor run a total on the arsenic trioxide withdrawn and check it against the amount they started with and how much was there this morning. Over two ounces is unaccounted for. He couldn't understand how that could happen.'

  'I can,' I said. 'Two ounces! She took enough to kill the old man ten times.'

  'Sounds like,' Stilton agreed, 'but no way to prove it.

  Now they're going to tighten up their poison control procedure. By the way, Glynis Stonehouse wasn't fired; she left voluntarily. Cleaned out her desk one Friday and called on Monday to say she wasn't coming in. Didn't even give them a reason or excuse; just quit cold. Well, I've got to run, Josh. I'm going to try to get over to the 79th Street boat basin around noon. And if possible, I'll see you at two o'clock.'

  I finished typing up my notes on the Bishop Oxman interview and began trying to compose a rough agenda for the meeting that afternoon with the two senior partners. I knew I would make a better impression if my presentation was organized, brief, succinct.

  I was scribbling notes when the phone rang again. It was another cabdriver and the conversation followed the usual pattern:

  'How much is the reward?' he asked in a gargling voice.

  'A hundred dollars,' I said automatically, continuing to make notes as I spoke.

  'Well,' he said, 'it isn't much, but it's better than a stick up the nose. I think I picked up the guy. About January 10th. It could have been then. On Central Park West and maybe 70th or 71st. Around there.'

  'What time?'

  'Oh, maybe nine o'clock at night. Like that. I was working nights then. I'm on days now.'

  'Do you remember what the weather was like?'

  324

  'That night? A bitch. Lousy driving. Sleety. I was ready to pack it in when this guy practically threw himself under my wheels, waving his arms.'

  'Do you remember what he looked like?'

  'The only reason I remember, he gave me such a hard time. I wasn't driving fast enough. I was taking the long way. The back of the cab was littered and smelled. And so forth and so on. A real ball-breaker, if you know what I mean.'

  I put my pen aside and took a deep breath. It was beginning to sound encouraging,

  'Can you describe him physically?'

  'Hat, scarf, and overcoat,' the cabdriver said. 'An old geezer. Tall and skinny. Stooped over. Ordinarily I don't take a lot of notice of who rides my cab, but this guy was such a fucking asshole I remember him.'

  He was sounding better and better.

  'And where did you take him?' I asked, closing my eyes and hoping.

  'The 79th Street boat basin,' the cabdriver said. 'And he gives me a quarter tip. In weather like that! Can you beat it?'

  I opened my eyes and let my breath out in a long sigh.

  'Would you tell me your name, please?' I said.

  'Bernie Baum.'

  'And where are you calling from now, Mr Baum?'

  'Gas station on Eleventh Avenue.'

  'We're on East 38th Street. If you'd be willing to come over and sign a short statement attesting to what you've just told me, you can pick up your hundred dollars.'

  'You mean that was the guy?' he said.

  'That was the guy,' I said.

  'Well, yeah, sure,' he said, 'I'll sign a statement. It's the truth, ain't it? But listen, I wouldn't have to go to court or nothing like that, will I?'

  325

  'Oh no, no,' I said hurriedly. 'Nothing like that, it's just for our files.'

  Maybe someday he would have to repeat his statement in court, but I wasn't about to tell him that.

  'Well, I want to grab some lunch first,' he said, 'but I'll be over right after.'

  'Fine,' I said heartily. 'Try to make it before one o'clock.'

  I gave him our address and told him to ask for Joshua Bigg. I hung up, grinning. Percy Stilton had been right; the bad guys didn't have all the luck.

  I typed out a brief statement to be signed by Bernie Baum that said only that he had picked up a man he later identified from a photograph as Professor Yale Stonehouse at approximately 9.00 p.m. on the evening of January 10th in the vicinity of Central Park West and 70th Street and had delivered him to the 79th Street boat basin.

  I kept it as short and factual as possible.

  Mrs Kletz arrived while I was finishing up. She said her tooth was feeling better and she felt well enough to put in her four hours.

  I told her about Bernie Baum and she was as pleased as I was.

  'A lot has happened since you read the Kipper and Stonehouse files,' I said. 'Sit down for a moment and I'll bring you up to date.'

  She listened intently, sucking her breath in sharply when I told her about Glynis and Knurr.

  'And that's where the cabdriver took Professor Stonehouse the night he disappeared,' I finished triumphantly.

  But she was thinking of something else. Those young eyes seemed to have taken on a thousand-yard stare.

  'Do you suppose, Mr Bigg,' she said in her light, lilting voice, 'do you suppose that either of the two women, Tippi Kipper or Glynis Stonehouse, knows of the other?'

  I blinked at her. The question had never occurred to me, 326

  and I was angry with myself because it should have.

  'I don't know, Mrs Kletz,' I confessed. 'I'd say no, neither is aware of the other's existence. If there's anything Knurr doesn't need right now it's a jealous and vindictive woman.'

/>   She nodded thoughtfully. 'I expect you're right, Mr Bigg.' She went back to her desk and began answering some of the routine requests. As for me, I ordered a pastrami on rye, kosher dill pickle, and tea from a Madison Avenue deli. Bernie Baum arrived and turned out to be a squat, middle-aged man with two days' growth of grizzled beard and a wet cigar. He was wearing a soiled plaid mackinaw and a black leather cap.

  I handed him the statement I had prepared, and he took a pair of spectacles from his inside shirt pocket. One of the bows was missing and he had to hold the ramshackle glasses to his eyes to read.

  Then he looked up at me.

  'What'd this guy do?' he asked in his raspy, gargling voice. 'Rob a bank?'

  'Something like that,' I said.

  'It figures,' he said, nodding. 'Since I talked to you on the phone, I been trying to remember the guy better. I figure now he was nervous — you know? Something was bugging him and that's why he was bugging me.'

  'Could be,' I said.

  'Well,' said Bernie Baum judiciously, 'if he had a yacht stashed in that boat basin, he's probably in Hong Kong by now.'

  'That could be, too,' I said. 'Now if you'll just sign the statement, Mr Baum, I'll get you your money.'

  He signed Bernard J. Baum, with his address, and I made out a petty cash voucher for $100. We shook hands and I sent him up to the business office with Mrs Kletz. She was back in five minutes and told me Bernie Baum had received his cash reward and departed happily. She also 327

  told me that Hamish Hooter had okayed the request with no demur. In victory, magnanimous...

  Percy Stilton showed up right on time, dressed, I was happy to see, very conservatively in navy blue suit, white shirt, black tie. No jewellery. No flash. He had judged his audience to a tee. I showed him the statement the cabdriver had signed.

  Percy sat there a moment, knees crossed, pulling gently at his lower lip.

  'Uh-huh,' he said finally. 'We're filling in the gaps — slowly. Know what I think? Professor Stonehouse is down in the mud at the bottom of the Hudson River at 79th Street with an anchor tied to his tootsies. That's what I think. I checked out the boat basin about an hour ago.