Oliver Quade, the Human Encyclopedia

by Gruber, Frank

  “That’s right. I’m the Human Encyclopedia.”

  “But you don’t know who killed this guy?”

  Quade shrugged. “I’m more interested in knowing why he was killed. I’ve been playing with an idea how to find out.”

  “What is it?”

  “Well, Cummings, the fat play boy back there, says Thompson told him he was an accountant. Often accountants have opportunities to get their hands on large sums. My guess is that Thompson stole a wad of money and came here to hide out until the smoke blew away.”

  “I think you got something there, fella. Say, ride this hunch of yours and find out how much dough this bozo had and maybe where it is.”

  Quade knew that the escaped convict was exceedingly eager to acquire a large sum of money. It would be mighty handy for a quick getaway once he left Eagle’s Crag. It might even persuade him to leave sooner and Quade desired that very much.

  They went back to the lodge and Bonniwell herded all those on Eagle’s Crag, with the exception of Jake Somers, into the big livingroom.

  “Folks, there’s a murderer among us,” Bonniwell began and Danny Dale promptly snickered. The escaped convict stared at him coldly. “Sonny,” he said. “I’m trying hard to remember you’re just a kid and my mother told me always to treat women folks and kids with kindness.” He gestured to Quade. “You carry on.”

  “Have you thrown in with them?” asked Judy Vickers.

  Quade looked steadily at the girl and she flushed. He said then, “Harold Thompson was murdered. I’m sure of that. I’m also pretty sure that he was a fugitive from justice, an absconder. I believe he had his loot with him and was killed for it.”

  The crowd began murmuring and looking at one another. Quade continued, “Mr. Cummings, you say Thompson told you he was from Buffalo. I imagine, therefore, that he was actually from the opposite direction. New York, I’d say. You’re from there. Have you heard of anyone recently who ran off with a large sum of money?”

  Cummings puckered up his mouth. “Mmm, in New York there’s always someone stealing from his firm. The biggest one I heard of lately was a trusted employee of the Horgan Packing Company who ran off with eighty thousand dollars. But the man’s name was Miller, I believe, not Thompson.”

  “It’s him!” cut in Mrs. Mattie Egan. “I mind only last week when I was—well, sorta looking through his stuff that I found some handkerchiefs with the initial M on them. I thought it funny, seein’s how his name was Thompson.”

  “Then Thompson was Miller,” said Quade. “And he brought with him eighty thousand dollars.”

  “Eighty grand,” Bonniwell mused. “That’s a pretty good haul. Why with eighty grand I could—” He broke off, but his eyes remained speculative. After a moment he jerked his head toward Heinie and Monk. “Boys, let’s start on a treasure hunt. Eighty grand makes a pretty big package and it’s somewhere in this shebang.”

  The trio started eagerly up the stairs to the bedrooms. Quade watched them go. They would make an intensive search of everyone’s room. If the money was upstairs they would certainly find it.

  Judy’s mother, Mrs. Vickers, broke the silence that fell on the group when Bonniwell and his men went off to make the search. “How long is this going to go on? Isn’t there some way we can get aid?”

  “If we had some sleeping powders or knockout drops we might put in their food—” suggested Faraday dryly.

  “There’s a medicine chest in the bathroom,” said Mrs. Egan. “I guess it’s got some chloroform or ether in it”

  “Marty,” said Judy Vickers. “Stop joking. This is a serious matter.”

  Mrs. Vickers looked coldly at Martin Faraday, then turned to Frederick Cummings. Her face softened. “Have you any sensible ideas, Frederick?”

  Quade got the picture then. Mother Vickers favored Frederick Cummings, but the daughter preferred Faraday. It gave Quade an idea. Mrs. Vickers probably wasn’t as well off as she tried to give the impression. Cummings was wealthy—or Mrs. Vickers thought he was. Faraday? Probably a clerk or some sort who had saved for a year or more to have this outing. Faraday would like a large sum of money. It would remove parental objection. Then, too, perhaps Cummings wasn’t as well off as he pretended to be. He too, could use a large sum of money and he seemed to have been better acquainted with the dead accountant than any of the others.

  But then the others would all do considerable for eighty thousand dollars. Mrs. Egan’s entire property was worth only a fraction of that sum. She was a formidable person, had made her own way for years.

  McClosky? Quade couldn’t overlook the cook and handy man’s original suspicious reactions to the announcement of Thompson’s death. Danny Dale? A twenty-year-old intellectual, he was the equal of anyone here, excepting Quade.

  An hour later the three convicts returned to the livingroom and Bonniwell’s calmness was gone. He was scowling and Quade knew that the frustration of not finding the money had made the killer a dangerous man.

  “We’re goin’ to search down here, now,” he snarled. “But I’m warnin’ you all if we don’t find it, I’m going to ask some questions. One of you knows where the dough is stashed and he’s gonna tell me.”

  They ripped the furniture, tapped the walls and sounded the floors while Mrs. Egan shrieked dismay. They pried in every nook and corner, but they didn’t find the eighty thousand dollars. When Bonniwell finally called off the search it was nearly dark outside and he had been compelled to turn on the electric lights. There was a portable electric light plant on Eagle’s Crag.

  Bonniwell postponed the inquisition, however. He was too hungry. He ordered McClosky to cook food. “And you’re eatin’ first from everything,” he warned. “So go easy on the rat poison.”

  The three killers wolfed their food. Monk Moon relieved Jake Somers then and the giant came in and ate. The guests of Eagle’s Crag ate sandwiches that McClosky prepared. Bonniwell herded them all together then.

  “Now, folks, let’s find that money. One of you here knows where it is. I’ll begin with you, smart guy.” He looked at Oliver Quade.

  “I came up here exactly fifteen minutes before you did,” said Quade. “Do you think I’d have had time to locate Thompson’s money, hide it and kill him, besides trying to sell books to these folks for almost all of that time?”

  “He did show up just before we found Mr. Thompson,” said Judy Vickers. “He passed Marty and myself as we were walking down the road.”

  “And how long was I trying to sell you that marvelous set of encyclopedias, Mrs. Egan?” Quade asked.

  Mrs. Egan sighed. “Too long, but actually I’d say ten or fifteen minutes.”

  Bonniwell growled and questioned the three women briefly. Mrs. Vickers was haughty and indignant, Judy frank and guileless. Mrs. Egan was truculent. Finally Bonniwell threw up his hand. “You women get upstairs. Go to bed. I don’t want you around.”

  They left and the killer turned savagely to the men. “Now, then, one of you killed that gink and swiped his money. You, Cummings, who the hell are you and why are you here?”

  Cummings flushed. “I’m a publisher of trade journals in New York City. I’m here on a vacation. Mrs. Vickers invited me to come here.”

  “She’s trying to marry you off to her daughter. Yeah, I got that.”

  Martin Faraday snickered. Cummings looked angrily at him. “You don’t think her mother would let her marry a poor schoolteacher, do you?”

  “Perhaps Judy has a mind of her own,” retorted Faraday.

  “And she’ll use it,” said Cummings, “when she discovers that her mother has already borrowed more than five thousand dollars from me.”

  Faraday paled with surprise.

  “Ah, love!” Danny said sneeringly.

  “Bub!” snapped Bonniwell. “Get to bed.”

  Danny Dale glared but when Bonniwell gestured to Big Jake h
e got up hastily and almost ran up the stairs.

  “Now, listen,” said Bonniwell. “You, Faraday, and you, Cummings, you’re both stuck on the girl and I figure one of you two know where the dough is. I don’t give a damn if you knocked off a man. I’m not a cop. But I do want that dough and one of you is going to tell me where it is. Otherwise….” He left the sentence unfinished but looked toward the stairs the women had gone up.

  A chill ran up Oliver Quade’s spine. Bonniwell had the Indian sign on the two men. He was quite capable of harming Judy Vickers if he thought by it he could force either Faraday or Cummings to reveal the hiding place of the money. “I’ll give you until tomorrow morning to make up your minds,” Bonniwell continued. “I need sleep myself. Last night was a busy night.”

  Bonniwell first sent Heinie out to stand guard with Monk Moon, then he and Somers followed the others upstairs. There was a series of bedrooms on both sides of the long hallway. Quade found one that was vacant and after locking the door, undressed and went to bed. He fell asleep at once.

  The sun shining on his face awakened Oliver Quade. He yawned and, getting out of bed, walked to the window. Far in the distance he could see a tiny huddle of buildings, a little village. It was more than a dozen miles from Eagle’s Crag though and was visible only when the sun was strongest and there was no haze in the air, as this morning.

  The events of the day before crowded into Quade’s mind. He shook his head and went into the bathroom, and as he looked into the mirror over the washbowl the Idea struck him. He acted immediately.

  Lifting up a thick water glass he smashed it into the mirror, then gingerly caught a large section of the mirror that fell out. He carried it into the bedroom and found a piece of cardboard.

  He went to the window then and held the mirror, face into the sun, letting the rays flash on it. He held it steady, then covered it with the cardboard. Quickly he removed it, then covered it again. He was about to repeat the operation when there was a knock on the door. Quade laid down the piece of mirror and cardboard and, walking across the room, unlocked the door.

  Danny Dale, already fully dressed, was in the doorway. “Hello,” he said. “Just get up?”

  Quade nodded. “Come in, Danny.”

  Danny came in and Quade locked the door again. Quade went back to the window and picked up the mirror and cardboard. He operated it a couple of times and Danny Dale exclaimed, “A heliograph!”

  “Yep,” said Quade. “I’ve read of them doing this in the South Sea Islands and South Africa. They say they signal fifty and sixty miles. All I want to signal is about fifteen miles. There’s a little village out there and someone surely ought to know the Morse code. They ought to have a telegraph office there, at least.”

  “But look,” said Danny. “If you get a bunch of lawmen up here aren’t Bonniwell and his gang going to turn on us first?”

  “Look, Bonniwell’s going to want that money today so he can get away tonight. Even if he gets the money I hardly think he’ll care much about leaving anyone behind here to tell he’d been here. And if he doesn’t get the money he’ll kill us. So….” Quade went on signaling with his home-made heliograph.

  Ten minutes went by and there was no answering signal. Quade sighed, “You’d think someone would have seen the flashes.”

  “It’s only a little after six,” said Danny Dale. “Maybe they’re not up yet over at that tank-town.”

  “That’s an idea. Well, I’ll try again.”

  He rested ten minutes, then tried again. And suddenly he caught a flash of light from the distance.

  “They’re answering!” Quade exclaimed excitedly. “Look, there’s another flash.”

  “I saw it,” said Danny Dale. “It came from that little town.”

  “Here goes the message then,” said Quade grimly. He operated the heliograph swiftly and surely, spelling out the message in the Morse code of long and short flashes. At length he finished and said, “Now, we’ll see if they answer.”

  He leaned out of the window, Danny Dale beside him, breathing hard. It came then—a bright flash of directed light. Then others.

  “Y-e-s,” Quade spelled out. “They got it!”

  “What’d you tell them?”

  “About Bonniwell and the boys. And after a while—”

  There was a violent explosion outside the door. Quade, whirling, saw splinters sticking out from the panels.

  “Bonni—” began Danny Dale and then a bullet smashed the lock. Danny Dale yelped, and dropped to wriggle under the bed. Quade paled but held his ground. The man outside smashed in the door with his foot. Then he stood in the doorway. It was Bonniwell, with a huge automatic in his fist and a snarl twisting his mouth.

  “You sneaking double-crosser!” he said, his tone cold with intense fury.

  Quade backed a couple of steps until he collided with a chair. His hands went behind his back and caught hold of it. “What do you mean, Bonniwell?” he asked thickly.

  “That mirror stuff. You think I didn’t see the flashes. Yah, I ain’t that dumb. I know you was signaling and—” His face worked and then Quade brought the chair up and around in a violent swing. He anticipated Bonniwell by a fraction of a second, but of course he couldn’t beat a bullet.

  The chair was off the floor, beginning its arc when a bullet smashed against Quade’s left shoulder like a giant fist and hurled him back against the wall. He ricocheted from it to the floor, landing on hands and knees. A thousand Niagaras were suddenly roaring in his ears, a red haze swirled before his eyes. Quade fought to retain his grip on things. He half lifted himself up on his hands and then one of the Niagaras burst over his head and he fell … down … down … into oblivion.

  The roaring was the last thing he heard when he passed out. Water was the first thing he felt when he came to, dripping water, cool and soothing on his fevered brow.

  Quade opened his eyes and looked up into the white face of Judy Vickers. He grinned. “I’m still here.”

  “With a bullet in your left shoulder,” she replied, soberly. “And if Bonniwell discovers you’re not dead he’ll put another bullet in you.”

  Quade sat up and fought giddiness for a moment. Gingerly he felt his left shoulder with his right hand. There was a thick bandage already wrapped around it. “You did this, Miss Vickers? Thanks. Where are the rest?”

  “Bonniwell and his men are getting ready for a siege.”

  Quade frowned. “I had hoped they’d light out instead. But out there he couldn’t possibly hope to last another day or two. The mountains are swarming with posses. He figures this is as good a place as any for the last fight. And he’s right, of course.”

  “You’re very lucky, you know,” said Judy Vickers. “McClosky—wasn’t.”

  Quade exclaimed. “Bonniwell killed him?”

  She shook her head. “He says not, but this morning McClosky was found in the kitchen with his head smashed in with a stove poker.”

  “Stove poker? Bonniwell or his men wouldn’t have bothered with that. I guess the same man who got Thompson finished McClosky. He knew something. I suspected it.”

  “There was a hypodermic needle in his pocket.”

  “Ah? That’s what made the rattlesnake punctures in Thompson. McClosky found the needle and knew who had thrown it away.”

  “Miss Vickers!” called a voice from out in the hall. “Judy Vickers!”

  “Here,” replied Judy.

  Danny Dale bobbed into the room. He grinned when he saw Quade sitting up. “I knew it was just a shoulder wound, but I didn’t tell Lou. He would have slipped you a couple more.”

  “That was mighty decent of you,” said Quade dryly. “How come you didn’t get one yourself? You were in here with me.”

  “Oh, I talked him out of it,” said Danny Dale glibly.

  “From under the bed?” Quade rose to his feet. “
What’s going on downstairs?”

  “Lou wants everybody down there. He’s plenty burned up about things and my hunch is that it’s going to be an interesting session.”

  Judy Vickers looked at Quade, her forehead creased. “He’s been after Marty and Mr. Cummings all morning.”

  Quade sighed. “I guess we’d better go though, or he’ll be coming up here.”

  Everyone on the mountain-top, with the exception of Jake Somers, was gathered in the livingroom. Lou Bonniwell’s eyes flashed when Oliver Quade came in with Judy and Danny Dale. “My aim’s gettin’ lousy,” he said, “but I’ll talk the thing over with you again in a little while. Right now, his tone became brittle, “I want to find that roll!”

  Frederick Cummings was jittery. Martin Faraday was trying to be calm, but not doing a good job of it. The women, even Mrs. Egan, were frightened.

  “The cook,” said Bonniwell. “None of my boys finished him. So it was one of you birds. I figure McClosky knew something and one of you shut him up. Now which one was it?”

  “Not me,” cried Frederick Cummings, trembling visibly.

  Faraday looked scornfully at him. He remained quiet.

  Bonniwell gestured in a frenzy. He looked suddenly like a dog gone mad. Quade could understand now why the man was such a cold-blooded killer.

  “Monk, grab the girl and give her a working over. One of them will talk or else.”

  Mrs. Vickers shrieked. The perspiration rolled off Cummings’ face, but he made no move. Faraday did. He stepped up beside Judy Vickers. “Keep your hands off her,” he said to Monk who was advancing, his long gorilla-like arms swinging at his sides.

  Roly-poly Heinie Krausmeyer grinned vacantly and stepped up to Marty Faraday. The gun in his hand swished up and clouted Faraday along the right side of his face. Faraday yelped in pain and went down to his knees. Heinie struck him again, on the top of his head. Faraday fell flat to the floor and lay still.

  “You fool!” snarled Bonniwell. “How can he talk now?” He looked at Cummings. “You white-livered coward,” he sneered. “You wouldn’t talk even if I cut off her nose.”