Murder with Pictures

by George Harmon Coxe

  The frosted glass panel of the door at the far end of the drab hall said: “A. Abramson,” and Murdock went into a square, high-ceilinged room that had a long rack, filled with neatly pressed suits; three benches, also filled with suits, but making, in the aggregate, an almost hopelessly snarled mass; a steam-table, and two spindly chairs.

  A tall, gaunt man was at work at this pressing-table. He continued to work without looking up, and the escaping steam kept the room filled with its moist stale odor. Murdock walked over to the fat little Jew with the three days’ growth of beard who sat cross-legged on a bench near the two windows.

  “Listen, Abe”—Murdock tossed his bundle on the fellow’s lap—“when can I get this back?”

  “When do you want it?” parried Abe, attacking the wrapping. When he drew out the dress he said: “Oy,” and squeezed it with both hands, like a sponge. “Soaked.” He separated the rest of the garments, held up the brassière.

  “So,” he said finally, nodding his head up and down. “You’re doing all right by yourself now-days.”

  Murdock grunted to repress a grin. “Never mind. I asked you when can I get them.”

  “Tomorrow.”

  “Today.”

  “Am I a miracle man? Feel. Silk. Soaked.”

  “Today,” Murdock argued. “Or else.”

  “I can’t guarantee it,” Abe said, weakening.

  “I’ll be back at five—or six.”

  Murdock took the subway at Copley and ten minutes later swung into the photographic department on the third floor of the Courier-Herald building. Nodding a greeting to two other camera men who lounged in the anteroom, he took off his coat, hung it on an oak hat-rack, and went down the darkened corridor to one of the cubby-hole-like dark-rooms.

  He had developed his film and was putting it through the fixing bath when someone called down the hall: “Hey, Kent! Wyman wants to see you.”

  Murdock called the fellow into the dark-room, held the film up to the ruby light. “The five at the end,” he said. “Finish ’em and blow ’em up to four or five if they’ll stand it.”

  He went upstairs, through the city room, and into a corridor at the rear, stopping in front of a door which said: “T. A. Wyman.” Knocking once, he went in.

  The office was small, simply furnished with a brown rug, a massive, new-looking desk, a filing-cabinet, and three chairs, all made of metal which was supposed to imitate wood. Wyman glanced up from the desk as Murdock entered, took the cigar from his mouth, and said:

  “Sit down, Kent.”

  Murdock took a chair at one end of the desk, settled into it, and crossed one leg over the other knee, waiting while Wyman gave his attention to some papers on the desk.

  The Courier-Herald Publishing Company had morning, evening, and Sunday editions. Theoretically Wyman was managing editor of the Morning Herald; actually he was the Courier-Herald Publishing Company. He did not own much stock, his financial interest was comparatively small, but he ran things just the same.

  He was a stocky man, partly bald, with a heavy face that looked fatty, but on close inspection became muscular, hard. Thick-necked, wide across the jaws, with dark brown eyes that were steady, searching, he was a dynamic, aggressive driver. Unlike most editorial men, he had a background in both advertising and circulation promotion, but he stuck to the editorial side now because it gave him a better perspective of the property as a whole. The happy combination of a business man who knew news values, Wyman had the training, the experience, and the essential knack of handling men, plus a drive which had made the Courier-Herald the most important newspaper property in the city.

  When he finished shuffling the papers to his satisfaction, he tossed them into a wire basket and leaned back in his chair, making a cradle of his hands for the nape of his neck. The cigar swiveled to one corner of his mouth before he spoke.

  “What’s this Van Husan’s been telling me about your quitting?”

  “It was just an idea of mine,” Murdock said.

  “You’re crazy,” grunted Wyman. “What’s the matter? You got a grudge against somebody or something? Don’t we treat you right?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Forget it.” Wyman leaned over, his forearms flat on the desk. “You’re the best camera in town, and you get the most money. Where can you beat that set-up?”

  “Maybe I can’t,” Murdock said, frowning. “But what does it get me? There’s no future in it. You carry around a camera and a plate-case until you get round-shouldered and your legs quit on you and then what? You get fired, or laid off, or your salary cut.”

  Murdock sat up and warmed to his subject. “Look at Breen, and Lanning. They were pretty good, weren’t they? And what did it get them? Round shoulders and flat feet—”

  “And a living,” cut in Wyman.

  “While it lasted,” snorted Murdock. “How old are they? Fifty or so, and where are they now? Breen’s in the art department, Lanning’s in classified. Thirty-five a week maybe. They’d been out entirely if it wasn’t for you.”

  “That’s not the whole reason,” Wyman said thoughtfully. “It wouldn’t stop a guy like you. You’re not that soft. You got a bug somewhere that’s biting you. Maybe it’s wife trouble. That’s none of my business, but if that’s it, you’re crazier than ever.”

  Murdock slipped down in his chair and straightened out so that his only points of contact were hips and shoulder-blades. His dark, good-looking face held a faint, sullen smile; when he did not speak, Wyman took his cigar out, studied the end of it.

  “There ought to be future enough in newspapers for anyone with something on the ball, especially for you. You’ve got experience, and you’ve got the newspaper knack. A college graduate like you—”

  “No graduate,” Murdock said wearily, shifting his shoulder-blades; “I left by request in the third year.”

  Wyman, unruffled, said: “You had enough. You had practically a college education and—”

  “And what did it do for me?” Murdock cut in. “I’ll tell you.” The sardonic smile etched itself deeper in his lean face. He spoke in slow, almost absent tones. “It taught me to like nice clothes and how to drink; it taught me to appreciate good books and good pictures and—in short, it taught me to like most of the things money can buy. The hell of it is, I never was able to pick up any very good ideas of just how to go about getting this—”

  “Have it your way,” Wyman said shortly. “Where you going to get that future you want?”

  “Newspaper work is a young man’s game.”

  “It’s anybody’s game that can take it. I thought you could.”

  Murdock flushed, and Wyman continued:

  “You wouldn’t be satisfied if you couldn’t take pictures.”

  “Probably not.” Murdock flexed his crossed ankles. “But there are other fields besides newspapers. I thought I might go to New York and see if I couldn’t get in with some advertising photographer—maybe even portrait stuff. Do some real camera work. There’s money in it. I wouldn’t be any Steichen or Nelson maybe, but I wouldn’t need to be. Look at Bourke-White—a girl. Look at this guy Lohse—Remie Lohse. He’s got an outfit like mine and look what he’s done with it—Vanity Fair stuff.

  “I’ve been interested in cameras ever since my father gave me a box outfit for my twelfth birthday. A hobby. It helped me through college—I had a pretty fair lay-out by that time, did a pretty good business with sports pictures. But I thought I wanted to be a newspaper man. Was I dumb?”

  Murdock’s smile was disparaging and he kept his eyes on his shoes.

  This time Wyman remained silent. It was not entirely newspaper experience that put him at the top of the heap. He could never have climbed there if he had not been a keen judge of men. And his interest in Murdock was both personal and selfishly business. He knew he had not exaggerated when he said Murdock was the best camera in the city.

  He was popular. He had a wide acquaintance in all levels of society, because he was the sort
of fellow who could talk nearly everyone’s language; he was equally proficient at balancing a cup of tea and a piece of cake on his knee and acting as if it belonged there, or busting his way through a crowd with a camera and plate-case. He was loyal, square, intelligent. He could fight. He took a black eye or a torn suit in his stride. He got pictures if anyone did, and a lot more that other photographers missed.

  “So I tried it,” Murdock went on, “for three years.” He looked up and grinned. “I was a damn good leg man, too. But I couldn’t write. So I came over on the picture side. I guess that’s worse than the other. But I’ve done some nice work with a camera; I’ve got an idea I could cash in on it better if I—”

  “Wait a minute,” Wyman said. He looked at his cigar, turned it between thumb and forefinger, and stuck it in one corner of his mouth.

  “I’ve been thinking about this for a long time. It’s not original; plenty of papers are doing it. See how it sounds. We’ve got two papers—fourteen cameras; and it’s about time we made a regular department; put a man in as the head of it and let him run the whole picture side instead of letting the editors give out assignments. Of course he’d have to work hand in hand with the news men, but there’d be more freedom, plenty of latitude to work with. What do you think? A photographer running the photo department. Don’t that sound better than having a news man give all the orders?”

  “Sure.”

  “Then take the job, try it out. If it works you can write your own ticket; I’ll give you a contract.”

  “An inside job,” Murdock muttered. “Take the blame for every camera and get no credit and not much chance to work on anything of my own.”

  “Ah—” Wyman clamped his heavy jaws on the cigar and pushed back in the chair. “You cry because you’re afraid your legs’ll give out, but when you can’t get out and dig, you cry about that too. What you oughta do is go out and get drunk. Take a couple days off and—”

  “It isn’t that.” Murdock pulled in his legs. “I’ve changed my mind about quitting anyway—since last night. I want a leave of absence—a couple of weeks.”

  “What for?”

  “Well”—Murdock spread his hands—“you were partly right. I’ve had some wife trouble and I can buy her off. I understand the Bar Association is putting up a five-thousand reward on that killing last night. I was in at the start and I might get lucky. I’d like to—”

  “How much of the five would you get even if you were lucky? You’d have to split with a half-dozen detectives and—”

  “That’s just part of it. The Eagle is offering five thousand for the exclusive story of the arrest and conviction of—”

  “Oh,” Wyman said. “You’re that kind of a chiseler, huh?”

  “That’s the kind I’m going to be until I get a divorce,” Murdock said flatly. “And I’m asking for the leave—”

  “All right,” snapped Wyman. He snatched the cigar from his mouth and threw it into a brass cuspidor. “I can think of some guys that would take salary checks from the business office and then, if they did get the story, sell out to the Eagle under an assumed name. You at least asked for the leave. So go get the story. You haven’t got a prayer—not even you—but go get it. Get it and I’ll match the Eagle. But this is just between you and me—and I’ve got to have pictures.”

  Murdock sighed in satisfaction and reached for the telephone. When he got the photo department, he said: “Bring those prints to Wyman’s office, Eddy. Mac blew them up and they ought to be on the drying-rack.”

  Wyman’s eyes snapped as Murdock hung up. “Got something?”

  Murdock said: “Bacon gave me a break,” and waited until a freckled, tow-headed office boy came in with five damp prints. Murdock glanced at them and passed them to Wyman.

  The managing editor’s eyes went wide and there was a sudden feverish cast to his face as he grabbed for the telephone. He kept pawing at the pictures with his free hand until he got his connection. Then he bawled:

  “Stop the presses!”

  Murdock jerked to his feet. “No!” he rapped, and clamped his palm over the mouthpiece.

  Quick anger flooded Wyman’s heavy face, flashed in his eyes. He fumed: “What the hell do you mean, no!” and tried to wrench the telephone free. “Why didn’t you bring ’em up before?”

  Eddy stood in the doorway, goggle-eyed.

  Murdock said: “Wait! You’re only running the bulldog.”

  “What of it?” Wyman ceased struggling, as though he sensed that there was a real reason for Murdock’s tardiness.

  “Pictures in mail editions have been stolen before,” Murdock said levelly. “They can’t do much of a job with ’em, but it’s been done. You won’t lose any circulation in the country whether you run ’em or not. You’ll pick up twenty-five thousand in city circulation if you have those shots exclusive.”

  Wyman banged down the receiver and glared at Eddy, who hastily withdrew. He took out a fresh cigar and stuck it in his mouth without biting the end.

  “That’s what burns me up about you,” he growled finally. “You can think. You’re not just a photographer, your a newspaper man. But there’s no future, huh? Well, get the hell out of here, I got work to do.”

  Murdock smiled, and moved towards the door. “Okay. I just wanted to give you the first installment on this private assignment.”

  Wyman’s brows came down. “Wait,” he said skeptically. “How’d you get these? Have the outfit at home?”

  Murdock shook his head. “My private rig. On the side. For the glory of the good old Courier-Herald and—”

  The shrill of the telephone interrupted him, and Wyman said: “For you.”

  Murdock leaned across the desk and accepted the instrument.

  The voice at the other end was hoarse, jerky. “Murdock? This is Sam Cusick. Did you tip off the cops about seeing me last night?”

  Murdock felt his pulse quicken, but he kept his voice level as he answered: “I might have mentioned it.”

  “Oh?” The word was a sneer. “You might have, huh? Well, get a load of this. You forget you saw me. You made a mistake, see?”

  “I hear you, if that’s what you mean,” Murdock told him.

  “You hear me, and you’ll do what I say. I’m not gonna let ’em frame me for that job just because you saw me there. I got a way of keeping guys’ mouths shut. And I’m gonna stay in the clear until I’m damn sure you can’t do me any harm.”

  “What am I supposed to do?” growled Murdock, “Go down and—”

  “Figure it out for yourself. You made a mistake.”

  The receiver clicked in Murdock’s ear. He replaced the telephone and straightened up.

  Wyman, watching him suspiciously, asked: “Who was that?”

  “Just a pal of mine,” Murdock said. A grim little smile pulled back his lips as he opened the door and stepped into the hall.

  9

  TOM DOANE WAS loitering in the main corridor of police headquarters when Murdock arrived at three that afternoon. The young reporter grabbed Murdock’s arm, started to accompany him to the elevators.

  “What you down here on?”

  “Bacon wants to see me,” Murdock said.

  “Hah!” Doane grinned, and stepped into the elevator, banging against the plate-case slung over Murdock’s shoulder.

  They rode to the fourth floor, turned right into the hall, and walked down to the far end where an open door led to a small anteroom. A uniformed officer at the desk nodded to Murdock, who crossed to the door in the right wall and knocked.

  Keogh opened the door. Murdock stepped past him with Doane at his heels. The Sergeant scowled and grabbed the youth by the arm.

  “Hey, you,” he growled.

  “I’m with him,” protested Doane, reeling back through the doorway under Keogh’s unrelenting propulsion.

  “Not now you’re not,” Keogh said, and his broad face took on a satisfied grin.

  “He’s all right,” Murdock said.

  “He’s
a pest,” Keogh said, and slammed the door.

  The room was not an office, really; it was more like a conference room. The walls were bare; there was a long table of golden oak, scarred along the edges by official and unofficial heels. A half-dozen chairs were strung along both sides. Lieutenant Bacon, sitting at the far end of the table, was the only one in the room.

  He said: “Sit down,” and Murdock moved to a chair beside him. The photographer unbuttoned his coat, shrugged off the plate-case, and put the box-like camera on the table. Bacon asked: “You got anything new?”

  “Not much,” Murdock said. “Only Cusick made a friendly call.”

  “Cusick?” Bacon was all interest. Keogh circled the end of the table and sat down opposite Murdock. “When? What did he want?”

  Murdock told of the telephone conversation, then lit a cigarette and pushed back his hat.

  “We’ll get him,” Bacon said grimly.

  “And I want to be there when we do,” Keogh added. “He blackjacked a guy from Station 6 early this morning. That was before we knew about this other and the fellow met Cusick and started to question him about something else.”

  Keogh scowled, glanced out the window. “Somebody’s gonna have a lot of fun when we get him.”

  Bacon hooked his thumbs in his lower vest pockets and studied Murdock a moment before he spoke.

  “Archer and Redfield had a quarrel—a fight, last night.”

  “So—” Murdock said, and tried to look interested while Bacon gave familiar details.

  “And we know who that dame is now,” the Lieutenant finished. “Archer’s sister. I can’t hook her up—unless she helped somebody else.”

  Murdock asked: “Did you find the gun?”

  Bacon nodded. “A twenty-five. It was in an overcoat, in that closet where we think the girl was hiding.”

  Murdock’s brows lifted. “Prints?”

  “Smudged.”

  The brows came down and Murdock, pulling thoughtfully on the cigarette, finally asked: “How about Spike Tripp?”