Crows Can't Count

by A. A. Fair

  Bertha got the point. Her face colored, but she pushed her lips together and kept them shut.

  I said, “It is strange that after the emeralds had been put in this pendant and after the pendant had been offered for sale, the emeralds were again removed.”

  “That point has caused me much speculation,” Maranilla admitted.

  I said, “Suppose some man had a stock of emeralds and five emeralds should disappear from that stock. He knew, perhaps, who had taken them but he did not know what had been done with them. Yet he believed those emeralds would again appear and be traced to him He was, therefore, faced with the problem of accounting for the possession of a store of emeralds which he had come by legitimately and from which he had lost five.

  “Under those circumstances, what more natural than to remove thirteen emeralds from their settings and place five where they would not, under ordinary circumstances, have been discovered? Of course, the man could hardly have anticipated that he would be murdered and that the police would disconnect the plumbing as a matter of routine.”

  “It’s a most interesting theory,” Maranilla said. After a moment, he added, “Have you anything to make it other than a theory?”

  I nodded. “The paraffin tests on Cameron’s hands showed no powder particles imbedded in the skin. Police think, therefore, that the murderer must have discharged the weapon. But there was one significant fact the police overlooked—the pair of light leather gloves which lay on the table near the gun.”

  Maranilla frowned. “Would one shoot a weapon with gloves on?”

  I said, “Only in case he happened to be wearing gloves when an occasion arose which required immediate action and there was no time to remove the gloves. In which event, the gloves would have a tendency to impair the accuracy of the shooting. One needs only to speculate on the circumstances under which one would be wearing gloves when such an emergency developed and the nature of the emergency. The possibilities become exceedingly interesting.”

  For the first time since I had seen him, Jurado showed emotion. He suddenly clapped his hands together. “Amigo!” he exclaimed. “We have it!”

  Maranilla said something in Spanish. Jurado nodded. The two got up and started for the door.

  “Excuse us,” Maranilla called back to us.

  They went out and left us sitting there in the heat with the sullen, frightened mine manager.

  Chapter Eighteen:—WORDS WITHOUT MEANING

  THE SOUND OF STEPS RECEDED FROM THE PORCH. Bertha looked at me, started to say something, then changed her mind.

  We sat in the hot silence, broken only by the drone of circling flies.

  Abruptly Felipe Murindo started to talk in Spanish, slowly, pronouncing the words distinctly. When he thought we didn’t get his meaning, he’d repeat the words several times. His eyes were pleading to be understood.

  “Where’s your Spanish dictionary?” I asked Bertha.

  “Hell, it isn’t a dictionary, it’s a phrase book. It doesn’t do you any good. They can’t understand—”

  I picked up the phrase book. In the back of it was a vocabulary of Spanish-English and English-Spanish. I opened the book, ran my finger down the column of words on the Spanish side, smiling at Murindo.

  He didn’t seem to get it.

  I took his forefinger and indicated various words. First the Spanish, then the English.

  That didn’t seem to register.

  I tried another angle, turning the pages to the word interpreter. I was surprised to find that Spanish and English were almost the same. I took his forefinger, put it first on the Spanish word, then on the English, then back to the Spanish again.

  He frowned down at the page, shook his head, and said something in Spanish.

  I made my best try at it.

  I read off the syllables as they were given in the book. “In-tair-pra-tay.”

  That registered. He went into a spasm of motions and expostulation, but through it all were interpolated negative expressions made more emphatic by the gesticulations and the frenzied shaking of the head. “No, no. Madre de Dios, no!”

  “What in hell are you two jabbering about?” Bertha asked.

  “We’re not jabbering,” I said. “I asked him about getting an interpreter and you can see what happened.”

  “What were you trying to do with the dictionary?”

  “Evidently the guy doesn’t read or write. I thought he could pick out words for us.”

  “Then we’ve got to talk to him,” Bertha said. “And how the hell are we going to do it?”

  I thumbed my way through the phrase book. Finally I found one that would do. It was: Please do me the favor of talking very slowly.

  I read out the words slowly and distinctly.

  Murindo nodded.

  He started talking and, as he talked, I took pencil and paper and wrote down what he was saying, using a phonetic means of taking down what he said.

  When he had finished, I had two sheets of stuff written after a weird spelling of my own. But I knew I could pronounce those words slowly and distinctly to some person who did understand Spanish and he could give me the gist of what Murindo was trying to tell me. I even had an idea that if I could get hold of a good Spanish dictionary, I could figure it out for myself.

  I folded the paper and put it in my pocket.

  Murindo held his finger to his lips as a sign for silence. I nodded to show him that I understood.

  He held out his right hand. “Pesos,” he said. “Dinero.”

  I thumbed through Bertha’s book looking for something listed under the word pay, or payment. I finally found something that would do. I read it out to him, pronouncing the Spanish slowly and distinctly. He didn’t get it the first time. I had to repeat it twice. Then he nodded and seemed satisfied.

  “What are you telling him?” Bertha asked.

  “Telling him that in the event he keeps his word with us, payment will be made in accordance with the value of his services.”

  “For God’s sake!” Bertha snapped. “Are you going around throwing money to the birdies? What the hell has he given us that’s any good?”

  “I don’t know,” I said.

  “You’d better find out,” Bertha snapped. “Let me take a look at it.”

  I passed the paper over to her. “Go ahead,” I said. “After you’ve read it, tell me what it’s worth and I’ll make him an offer.”

  Her eyes snapped fire at me but she took the paper and read it, her mouth forming the words as she read.

  So quietly did Maranilla re-enter the room that neither Bertha nor I heard him. It was only when Murindo uttered some Spanish phrase in such a tone of urgency that there could be no possibility of mistaking his meaning that we looked up.

  Maranilla and Jurado were standing in the doorway.

  Bertha casually folded the paper, started to put it in her purse, changed her mind and put it down the front of her waist.

  Maranilla said, “I think we have done very nicely. The gloves on the table and the extra five emeralds—ah! Now we have a case and an explanation.”

  “How about Hockley?” I asked.

  “As nearly as we can tell,” Maranilla said cautiously, “Hockley reached a conclusion that the mine was paying much more than was being reported in the trust. He believed Shirley Bruce had an income from somewhere, and he thought that income was coming from the mine. He tells us with much sincerity that he wanted to catch the trustees in some flagrant act of dishonesty. Then he could go to court and have the trustees removed, which would automatically terminate the trust.

  “In Panama he had a friend, an aviator. The name he refuses to divulge, which causes us some concern. However, he entered the country secretly. He is, of course, guilty of many technical violations of our law—and yet, his story—”

  “May be the truth?” I asked.

  “Exactly,” Maranilla said.

  Jurado’s unintelligent eyes, almost bovine in their expression, studied me thoughtfully. “
It is interesting,” he said, “to follow Señor Lam’s theory to its logical conclusion.”

  Maranilla raised his eyebrows.

  “Because,” Jurado went on, “it utterly destroys the motive which would have otherwise existed for the murder of Señor Cameron.”

  I said, “When one starts following a thread of logic, he must continue to follow it, regardless of where it leads.”

  “Exactly,” Jurado said dryly. “And would you now like to return to Medellín with us? The local man can finish the case here.”

  “Hockley?” I asked.

  “He will later be released from custody. We have no charges against him.”

  “Sharples?”

  Maranilla smiled. “Mr. Sharples will delay his journey to Medellín for a few days at least.”

  “And how about me?” Bertha asked.

  Maranilla made a courtly bow. “My dear Mrs. Cool, you are free to depart at any time. And if, perhaps, you have found your means of transportation a little uncomfortable, perhaps a little expensive, we shall be only too glad to place our car at your disposal for the return trip.”

  Bertha’s lips clamped together. “I paid him for the round trip,” she said, “and damn him, he’s going to give me a round trip.”

  Chapter Nineteen:—DEAD IN LITTLE PIECES

  THE NIGHT WAS NEITHER TOO WARM nor too cold. The balmy air, soft on the skin, caressed the senses. I felt as though I were relaxing in a bathtub of lukewarm water.

  A moon which hung over the Andes illuminated the mysterious streets of Medellín, the buildings which were old when our own country was young.

  We sat in the Club Union and sipped drinks.

  Ramon Jurado no longer saw fit to pose with me. He was now attired in white sharkskins, but his features still held that look of emotionless stolidity which, at first glance, seemed to be stupidity.

  The Club Union is a magnificent building with spacious rooms and a huge patio. In the States I had subconsciously associated clubs with snobbishness, but here one felt that the club was merely the community home of its members. The place had that unmistakable atmosphere of having been lived in—comfortably.

  We sat by the swimming-pool. The stars were paled by the half-moon reflected in the tranquil surface of the waters.

  Midnight neared and as yet Bertha Cool hadn’t shown up. I had left word at the hotel, telling her to get in touch with me as soon as she arrived.

  “One more?” Maranilla asked.

  I said, “Just one more.”

  Maranilla beckoned one of the waiters.

  As the boy came forward to get our orders, the man in charge of the club office came close to our table. He caught Maranilla’s eyes, said, “Excuse me, please,” in English and then to Maranilla something in Spanish.

  The officer immediately excused himself.

  He was still absent when the boy brought our drinks.

  “You like it here?” Jurado asked.

  “Very much,” I said. “I would like to live here.”

  “It is a privilege,” he admitted.

  “You seem to enjoy life.”

  “Can one think of a better use to which life can be put?”

  I said, “I like the way things are done here. I like the way you drink. In the dining-room tonight no one seemed to be drinking too much or drinking too hurriedly.”

  “We do things leisurely,” Jurado said.

  “But you do them well.”

  “We try. And now, because our time is so limited, I must ask you a question or two, much as I dislike to intrude a note of business upon the peace of the evening.”

  “Go right ahead,” I invited.

  Jurado said, “It is your theory that when Cameron entered from the street, he was wearing gloves. He saw something which made him suddenly reach for this weapon?”

  “Perhaps,” I said, “it wasn’t that sudden. Perhaps he tried other things first. The gun came as a last resort.”

  Jurado nodded. “Yes, that would be logical. I take it you have done some research?”

  “What little I could. There isn’t much material available.”

  “Most interesting,” Jurado said.

  I took a notebook from my pocket. “The Nature Lovers’ Library,” I said. “In Volume Two of a book entitled Birds of America the statement appears that apparently tame crows always display a thieving propensity, amounting to what would be considered kleptomania in human beings. They seem to have an especial passion for stealing or hiding any object of a bright color, like a spool of red or blue thread, or any highly polished metal article like scissors or thimbles.”

  Jurado nodded and said, “Most interesting.”

  “The Book of Birds, Volume Two of the National Geographic Society,” I went on, “states that tame crows are fond of collecting and hiding bright trinkets of many kinds, especially bright pebbles. They hoard their treasures in hidden nooks or sometimes even bury them about the yard or in the garden, where they are quite frequently forgotten.”

  A boy came to me, said something in Spanish. Señor Jurado interpreted. I was, it seemed, wanted on the telephone.

  It was Bertha. She was so mad she was sputtering. “Sure as hell walked into a trap,” she said. “Damn it to hell, I—” “Never mind sputtering,” I said. “What happened?

  “Those dirty local police had the effrontery to arrest me. I told them Maranilla had said I was free as air. They either didn’t understand or didn’t want to understand.”

  I said, “Well, it’s all right, Bertha. You’re all right now. Have a good bath and relax. I’ll be over and buy you a drink and—”

  “Shut up,” Bertha snapped over the telephone so angrily that the words seemed to jump at me out of the receiver and bite at my ear. “They searched me.”

  “You mean the officers?”

  “Oh, they had some fat slob of a matron who did the dirty work,” Bertha said, “but damn them, they took that paper.”

  “You mean the—”

  “Yes!” Bertha screamed over the wire at me.

  I took a little time thinking that over.

  “Well,” Bertha yelled after a minute, “say something.”

  “I’m thinking.”

  “Well, for Pete’s sake, don’t take so long about it. Get the lead out of your pants. Start doing something.”

  “Doing what?”

  “How the hell should I know?” Bertha shouted. “What have I got you for, Confucius?”

  I said, “Wait there until I can join you. They didn’t give you the paper back?”

  “Certainly not. Don’t be silly.”

  “Did they have an interpreter there—anyone who could speak English?”

  “One of those officers could speak English enough to tell me what he wanted, but he’d pull a ‘no savvy’ on me any time I wanted to tell him anything.”

  “Perhaps,” I said dryly, “he couldn’t understand your epithets.”

  Bertha didn’t see anything funny in the comment. She said, seriously enough, “Well, what the hell? If a guy’s gonna study English, he’s supposed to know the cuss-words, isn’t he? I didn’t pull any advanced stuff on him. I just told the son-of-a—”

  “All right, forget it,” I interrupted. “I think I have the picture now. I think I know what has to be done. You wait there.”

  I hung up the phone and went back to the table. Maranilla had already returned. He had hitched his chair around closer to Jurado and the two were engaged in low-voiced conversation.

  They looked up and smiled as I joined them.

  I said, “Gentlemen, I have a request to make. It may be unusual but I think it’s important.”

  “What is it?” Maranilla asked.

  I said, “I would like very much to have you get word to your local men at the town that is nearest that mine. I would like to see that Felipe Murindo, the manager, is—well, that he’s guarded.”

  “Guarded?” Jurado asked.

  “Yes. I would like to be sure that he’s safe.”r />
  The men exchanged glances.

  Jurado asked quietly, “You think that perhaps he may be in danger?”

  I said, “It has occurred to me that there is, perhaps, something I have overlooked. There is a possibility that Murindo holds a key to what may be the motive for the murder.”

  The two exchanged glances again. It was Jurado who broke the news.

  “I am afraid,” he said, “that you have been just a little tardy with your request, Señor Lam.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The telephone call which summoned Rodolfo Maranilla to the telephone just now had to do with Felipe Murindo.”

  I kicked myself then for having led with my chin. I should have kept quiet until after I had given Maranilla a chance to talk. After all, while I couldn’t have been expected to know that telephone conversation related to Murindo, I should have considered the possibility. It was too late now.

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “Apparently about five o’clock this evening,” Maranilla said, “there was an accidental explosion of a large stock of dynamite which had been stored in a powder house conveniently located to the manager’s residence.”

  “And Murindo?”

  Maranilla shrugged his shoulders. “He is dead. In little pieces he is dead.”

  Chapter Twenty:—JURADO SNAPS HIS FINGERS

  WE sat silently for some time, sipping our drinks. At length I finished mine, pushed the glass to the center of the table, and said, “Gentlemen, it has been a most delightful evening and a great pleasure—”

  “Sit down,” Jurado said bluntly

  Maranilla smiled affably. “Come, come, my dear Señor Lam, you must admit it is not flattering to be so greatly underestimated.”

  “I’m afraid I don’t understand,” I said.

  “After all,” Maranilla said, “this accident at the mine was opportune—for some people”

  “Well?” I asked.

  “And in view of your comments, we could hardly be so stupid as to let you go until you have given us a more complete explanation.”