The World's Finest Mystery...

by Ed Gorman

  "Some rather bad news," said Harry. "Remember Billy Fisher?"

  "Of course I remember him," said Duncan. "We were in the same office for twelve years. What's happened?"

  "He jumped off a hotel balcony last night. Killed himself."

  "Billy? I can't believe it!"

  "Nor me when I heard. Seems he was being treated for depression. I had no idea. He was always cracking jokes in the office. A bit of a comedian, I always thought."

  "They're the people who crack, aren't they? All that funny stuff is just a front. His wife must be devastated."

  "That's why I'm phoning round. She's with her sister. She understands that everyone will be wanting to offer sympathy and help if they can, but for the present she'd like to be left to come to terms with this herself."

  "Okay." Duncan hesitated. "This happened only last night, you said?"

  Already, an idea was forming in his troubled brain.

  "Yes. He was staying overnight at some hotel in Mayfair. A reunion of some sort."

  "Do you happen to know which one?"

  "Which reunion?"

  "No. Which hotel."

  "The Excelsior… 1313. People talk about thirteen being unlucky. It was in Billy's case."

  Sad as it was, this had to be Duncan's salvation. Billy Fisher was as suitable a murder victim as he could have wished for. Someone he'd actually worked with. He could think of a motive later— make up some story of an old feud. For once in his life, he needed to throw caution to the winds and act immediately. The police would have sealed Billy's hotel room pending some kind of investigation. Surely a proven perfectionist could think of a way to get inside and pick up some personal item that would pass as evidence that he had murdered his old colleague.

  He took the 5:25 to London. Most of the other travellers were going up to town for an evening's entertainment. Duncan sat alone, avoiding eye contact and working out his plan. Through the two-hour journey he was deep in concentration, applying his brain to the challenge. By the time they reached Waterloo, he knew exactly what to do.

  A taxi ride brought him to the hotel, a high-rise building near Shepherd Market. He glanced up, counted the wrought-iron balconies until he reached number thirteen, and thought of Billy's leap. Personally, he wouldn't have gone up so high. A fall from the sixth floor would have done the job just as well, and more quickly, too.

  Doing his best to look like one of the guests, he walked briskly through the revolving doors into the spacious, carpeted foyer and over to the lift, which was waiting unoccupied. No one gave him a second glance. It was a huge relief when the door slid across and he was alone and rising.

  So far, the plan was working beautifully. He got out at the 12th level and used the stairs to reach the 13th. It was now around 7:30, and he was wary of meeting people on their way out to dinner. He paused on the landing to let a couple pass by him on their way downstairs. They didn't seem to notice him. He moved along, looking for room 1313.

  There it was. He had found Billy Fisher's hotel room. No policeman was on duty outside. What a stroke of luck, thought Duncan, it wasn't even as if a man had killed himself in there.

  He went back down to the foyer, marched coolly up to the desk and looked at the pigeonhole system where the keys were kept. He'd noticed before how automatically reception staff hand over keys when asked. The key to 1313 was in place. Duncan didn't ask for it. 1311— the room next door— was also available and he was given its key without fuss.

  Up on the 13th floor again, he let himself into 1311, taking care not to leave fingerprints. His idea was to get out on the balcony and climb across the short gap to the balcony of 1313. No one would suspect an entry by that route.

  The plan had worked brilliantly up to now. The curtains were drawn in 1311. He didn't switch on the light, thinking he could cross to the window and get straight out to the balcony. Unfortunately his foot caught against a suitcase some careless guest had left on the floor. He stumbled, and was horrified to hear a female voice from the bed call out, "Is that you, Elmer?"

  Duncan froze. This wasn't part of the plan. The room should have been unoccupied. He'd collected the key from downstairs.

  The voice spoke again. "Did you get the necessary, honey? Did you have to go out for it?"

  Duncan was in turmoil, his heart thumping. The plan hadn't allowed for this.

  "Why don't you put on the light, Elmer?" the voice said. "Now I'm in bed I don't mind. I was only a little shy of being seen undressing."

  What could he do? If he spoke, she would scream. Any minute now, she would reach for the bedside switch. The plan had failed. His one precious opportunity of getting off the hook was gone.

  "Elmer?" The voice was suspicious now.

  In the civil service, there had been a procedure for everything. Duncan's home life was similar— well ordered and structured. Now he was floundering, and next he panicked. Take control, something inside him urged. Take control, man. He groped his way to the source of the sound, snatched up a pillow and smothered the woman's voice. There were muffled sounds, and there was struggling, and he pressed harder. And harder. And finally it all stopped.

  Silence.

  He could think again, thank God, but the realization of what he had done appalled him.

  He'd killed someone. He really had killed someone now.

  His brain reeled and pulses pounded in his head and he wanted to break down and sob. Some instinct for survival told him to think, think, think.

  By now, Elmer must have returned to the hotel to be told the room key had been collected. They'd be opening the door with a master key any minute.

  Must get out, he thought.

  The balcony exit was still the safest way to go. He crossed the room to the glass doors, slid them across and looked out.

  The gap between this balcony and that of 1313 was about a metre— not impossible to bridge, but daunting when you looked down and thought of Billy Fisher hurtling towards the street below. In his agitated state, however Duncan didn't hesitate. He put a foot on the rail and was up and over and across. Just as he'd hoped, the doors to the balcony of 1313 were unfastened. He slid them open and stepped inside. And the light came on.

  Room 1313 was full of people. Not policemen or hotel staff, but people who looked familiar, all smiling.

  One of them said, "Caught you, Duncan. Caught you good and proper, my old mate." It was Billy Fisher, alive and grinning all over his fat face.

  Duncan said, "You're…"

  "Dead meat? No. You've been taken for a ride, old chum. Have a glass of bubbly, and I'll tell you all about it."

  A champagne glass was put in his shaking hand. Everyone closed in, watching his reaction— as if it mattered. Their faces looked strangely familiar.

  "Wondering where you've seen them before?" said Billy. "They're actors, mostly, earning a little extra between engagements. You know them better as the Perfectionists. They look different out of evening dress, don't they?"

  He knew them now: David Hopkins, the doctor; McPhee, the skene-dhu specialist; Joe Franks, the trunk murderer; Wally Winthrop, the poisoner; and Pitt-Struthers, the martial arts man. In jeans and T-shirts and a little shame-faced at their roles in the deception, they looked totally unthreatening.

  "You've got to admit it's a brilliant con," said Billy. "Retirement is so boring. I needed to turn my organising skills to something creative, so I thought this up. Mind, it had to be good to take you in."

  "Why me?"

  "Well, I knew you were up for it from the old days, and Harry Hitchman— where are you, Harry?"

  A voice from the background said, "Over here."

  "I knew Harry wouldn't mind playing along. So I rigged it up. Did the job properly, Civil service training. Got the cards printed nicely. Rented the private car and the room and hired the actors and stood you all a decent dinner. I was the Hungarian waiter, by the way, but you were too preoccupied with the others to spot me in my false moustache. And when you took it all in as I knew you
would— being such a serious-minded guy— it was worth every penny. I wanted to top it with a wonderful finish, so I dreamed up the suicide," he quivered with laughter.

  "You knew I'd come up here?"

  "It was all laid out for your benefit, old sport. You were totally taken in by the perfect murder gag, and you were bound to look for a get out, so I fabricated one for you. Harry told you I'd jumped off the balcony, and when you asked in which hotel, I knew you took the bait."

  "Bastard," said Duncan.

  "Yes, I am," said Billy without apology. "It's my second career."

  "And the woman in the room next door— is she an actress, too?"

  "Which woman?"

  "Oh, come on," said Duncan. "You've had your fun."

  Billy was shaking his head. "We didn't expect you to come through the room next door. Is that how you got on the balcony? Typical Duncan Driffield, going the long way round. Which woman are you talking about?"

  From the corridor outside came the sound of hammering on a door.

  Duncan covered his ears.

  "What's up with him?" said Billy.

  Edward D. Hoch

  A Wall Too High

  ED HOCH doesn't seem to be resting on his laurels. In addition to producing the steady stream of fiction that has helped garner him his recent awards, he has been kept busy by his work in compiling a bibliography and the obituaries for the volume you hold in your hand. But the story is always the thing for Ed, as "A Wall Too High," first published in the June issue of Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, amply demonstrates.

  A Wall Too High

  Edward D. Hoch

  "I understand you are a Gypsy king," the uniformed man addressed Michael Vlado, not without an edge of contempt in his voice. He was seated across the desk in an unadorned office fifty kilometers north of Prague. It was a sunny afternoon in early autumn, and Michael would rather have been back in the village with his wife and their horses.

  He smiled, trying to cooperate with his inquisitor. "I am only a king to my people back in Romania. Here in the Czech Republic I am merely a tourist."

  The man, taller than Michael, had slicked-back hair and a tiny black moustache. He said his name was Lieutenant Lyrik and he spoke German after learning that Michael's knowledge of the Czech language was limited. "More than a tourist. Our police computer lists you as a trouble-maker, an agent provocateur."

  "Hardly that, Lieutenant! I have not traveled this distance to incite anyone to anything. As you must have guessed, I've come about the wall. The European Roma Rights Center in Budapest has commissioned me to act on its behalf, to request that the wall separating the Roma section of town from the rest be torn down at once."

  "What you refer to as a wall on Masarak Street is no more than a fence."

  Michael had dealt with this type of official before. It was never pleasant. "A seven-foot-high fence made of concrete?"

  Lyrik shrugged. "There is a similar structure in Ústí nad Labem and that is called a fence too. You must realize that these Gypsies are criminals, beggars, thieves, and fortunetellers squatting in decrepit apartment buildings, usually without paying rent. Can we do nothing to protect the decent neighbors who live just across the street?"

  Michael Vlado was growing impatient with this man. He had traveled from his village to do some good, not to hear a diatribe against the Roma. "You must know that seventy percent of Gypsy children in this country are shunted off to special schools for the mentally retarded. In many cases, their parents have been fired from their jobs, beaten, and killed. The police do nothing."

  "What do you want?" the lieutenant asked. "Why have you been sent here?"

  "The Roma Rights Center wants the walls here and in Ústí nad Labem torn down. They want the Gypsies free from segregation and persecution."

  "This is strictly a local matter. You have no authority here." After a moment's thought he stood up. "But we do not wish to seem uncooperative. Let me speak to my superior."

  Left alone, Michael let his eyes wander over the slate-gray walls and the framed photograph of the country's president, Václav Havel. The single window offered a view of the parking lot, and he noticed a uniformed officer checking his license plate and peering into the car. He wondered if they'd ask his permission to search it.

  Presently Lieutenant Lyrik returned. He resumed his seat behind the desk and smiled. "I have been given permission to take you to the Gypsy quarter and show you the fence."

  "Very good. That's what I wanted."

  Michael followed along to the officer's car, where the man who'd been inspecting his vehicle joined them. "This is Sergeant Cista. He will accompany us," the lieutenant said. Cista was a grim sort who shook hands and then rested his palm on the holster flap of his pistol. Michael was given the front passenger seat and he was well aware that Cista was seated directly behind him with the weapon.

  The small city's commercial and shopping district covered only a half-dozen blocks and within minutes they'd reached an area of decrepit apartment buildings, two stories in height. He saw at once that a solid concrete wall had been erected down the center of the wide street, effectively separating the apartment block from the two-family homes on the other side. As Lyrik started down the better side of the avenue, Michael said, "I'd like to visit the Roma side first."

  "Very well." The lieutenant backed out, made a sharp turn, and then proceeded past the Gypsy apartments. Behind him, Michael heard the snap as Sergeant Cista opened the flap on his holster.

  Some of the Gypsy women were on the sidewalk clustered in small groups. One older woman in a colorful skirt spit at the police car as it went by. Further along there were a few men and boys, too, shouting their defiance at the wall. "Can you stop?" Michael asked. "I wish to speak with them."

  "That's not allowed," was the answer.

  "What about that woman?" He indicated a fair-skinned redhead in her thirties. "Surely she's not a Roma."

  "Mrs. Autumn," Cista muttered from behind him.

  "Is that her name?"

  Lyrik snorted. "She is sent by an Irish relief agency to work with the Gypsies. We call her that because she comes every autumn."

  "I'd like to meet her."

  Lyrik dismissed the suggestion. "She's an agitator." They pulled around the end of the wall and started down the other side. "As you can see, this is no Berlin wall. Your Gypsies need merely to walk around it. But it does offer the neighbors some respite from their noise and rubbish."

  He stopped the car and they got out. The wall rose higher than Michael's head, probably seven feet. As they approached it, Lyrik explained that it was constructed of cinder blocks with cement facing. Michael wondered how long it would be before graffiti began to appear on it.

  Sergeant Cista had remained behind them near the car while Lyrik and Michael walked up to the wall. "Perhaps the noise and garbage you fear so much would be less if the children were not denied a proper education," Michael told the lieutenant, reaching out to touch the rough concrete of the wall.

  Lyrik opened his mouth as if to reply when a sudden sound like the crack of a rifle reached them from the distance. Lieutenant Lyrik gasped and his right hand flew to his face. He sank to his knees and toppled forward into the wall. Michael could see blood on the pavement even before Sergeant Cista ran up and turned him over.

  There was a bloody wound over Lyrik's right eye. Michael had no doubt that the shot had killed him instantly.

  * * *

  Cista's hand came up from his holster, holding the pistol he'd been so anxious to draw. "Back up," he ordered Michael.

  "I didn't kill him. I have no weapon." Not knowing how well the sergeant understood him, he raised his hands above his head.

  Cista unhooked the cell phone from Lyrik's belt and called for help. Already a few neighbors had ventured forth from the two-family homes that lined the street on this side of the wall. "I heard the shot," one man said. "The Gypsies killed him!"

  Michael was kept well away from the body as an a
mbulance and police car arrived on the scene. The body was quickly removed as the gathering crowd increased in size, and Cista escorted a police officer over to where Michael waited. "I am Captain Mulheim," the officer said briskly. "Do you wish to make a statement?" He was older and stouter than Lyrik had been, perhaps reflecting his higher rank.