The Fourth King

by Harry Stephen Keeler

  “When you first described it the morning of the murder,” commented Kelsey, “it meant to all of us that he used that outer ‘phone. That he trapped himself — gave himself away to the so called Star of the Night — by answering the telephone after he had decided to answer neither the door nor the’ phones. And now — well — our Star of the Night has turned out to be only a Roman candle.” He paused. “Well, let the theory stand, with a new unknown instead of Bresloff. How will that go?”

  “You have the interpretation of that peppermint clue only partly,” said Folwell politely, “so far as I see matters. With me there is now a slightly different yet far more important interpretation. I will touch that in a moment, however. Now let’s first look to the news articles: the theory given therein has held that Eaves’s murderer managed to secure, at some previous date, a master-key to the Temple of Commerce Building — that is, to all the offices on floor two; that he tiptoed noiselessly in on Eaves and stabbed him in the back. This comes from the fact that — first — Eaves’s back was toward the door, and — second — he was sitting calmly in his swivel-chair engaged in doing certain work, and — third — he would not have admitted a stranger under such critical conditions.” Folwell paused a second. “But there is a still further interpretation of these facts which may or may not link itself up perfectly with what we might make out of the peppermint odour in the transmitter.

  “Now, Lionel Pettibone, Eaves’s stepson, has given to a local newspaper — it appeared in the midnight edition and will probably continue to-day — an interview absolving me of having stolen his stepfather’s bonds. In it he goes so far as to set forth the theory that his stepfather had had an interview some time that day with a representative of, or some person knowing, John J. Jeng of New York, to whom, When he was killed, he had just finished writing out the notes of a letter on the Dictatograph. In it he states that his father would not have hesitated to exhibit to an outsider this paper, which unfortunately bore my signature, providing it would give him an excuse for being short of actual cash. In that way he could ‘wriggle out,’ says Mr. Pettibone, from making a loan upon any of the stock he had sold. This is naturally a mighty attractive theory to me, because Eaves’s use of my name and his mention of that paper in his letter to this John J. Jeng has caused me a good deal of notoriety about your city, and cast a blur on my reputation. Yet it may be that I shall have to demolish Mr. Pettibone’s theory entirely before I am done. But this I shall do: I shall retain Mr. Pettibone’s analysis of his father’s motives and actions. Like him, I am more than certain that J. Hamilton Eaves would secretly exhibit such a paper to any one with whom he required an excuse for being short of cash.”

  “I think he would,” McIlroy commented. “He couldn’t have a better excuse. But go ahead.”

  “Very well,” Folwell continued. “Then why not assume that Eaves, fretful and restless on account of the loss of time during which he was pent up in that office hiding from the Star of the Night, had some very essential business with some one to transact; business that could be transacted even better that night than next day; that he decided to clear off his calendar one business meeting which had to take place! This would account for an interview. And if such an interview was held, why is it not likely that Eaves was killed directly after it — that is, after it was apparently concluded and the interviewee, as we might call him, had gotten up and left, but who really turned stealthily back after getting near the outer door and plunged a knife into Eaves’s back with all his might?”

  “This is the very theory,” Folwell emphasized, leaning forward in his chair, “that links itself perfectly with the peppermint clue. And the reason is as follows: In regard to Eaves’s use of that telephone we are facing two utterly contradictory factors. We know that had a person called Eaves on either ‘phone — Central 9660 on his own desk, or Central 9661 in the outer office — Eaves would not have answered it. He stated that very definitely when I left him. But we also know that had Eaves called somebody up and asked him to come to his office for an important interview — perhaps instructing him to knock four times, or five times, or in some special manner — he would have used the ‘phone directly at his elbow. Why did he not use that one? I’ll tell you why. That ‘phone, as I’ve just said, was Central 9660. It would take outgoing calls, but the bell apparatus would not ring; in simpler language it would not take incoming ones. Miss Reardon told me that much; Eaves also mentioned it that night.

  “The outer ‘phone, Central 9661, was in good working order. It would take incoming calls as well as outgoing ones. There you are. To me it is now as simple as A B C. Eaves used the ‘phone in the outer office because he required a call-back. Why should he require a call-back? Because he had called a party living outside of Chicago. He had to use a ‘phone on which Central could call back as soon as she got the necessary toll, or long-distance, wire and give her stereotyped announcement: ‘Your line is ready for you.’ “Folwell paused. “Is this all clear?”

  “Perfectly,” was McIlroy’s comment. Practically every head in the room nodded slowly as its owner perceived Folwell’s clear-cut interpretation of what he had called the peppermint clue. “And if the toll records of last Monday night,” added McIlroy, “show that he called a long-distance number between the time you left him and the time he was killed, then your deduction, my lad, may turn out to be a fine piece of detective work. A dozen of the boys here won’t sleep well to-night, I’m thinking.”

  Folwell smiled. “Thank you. Whatever we can make out of it, however, is the property of this department. I’ve had all the publicity I want for a year. First, though, I’m going to take the liberty of getting a report on this toll line factor.” Close at his elbow was a dingy, much-knocked-about ‘phone. He raised the receiver, and hooking his finger in the O-aperture, spun it round clear to the stop. A pause. An operator answered him. “Toll, please,” he ordered. A pause. “Toll? This is the Chicago Detective Bureau speaking. Will you please investigate your records of last Monday night and give us a report back here whether any toll calls were made from Central 9661? Yes — Central 9661 — National Industrial Securities Company. Ring us back here when you get the full data. Name? Ask for Mr. Folwell.” He hung up.

  “Now the next thing,” continued Folwell, warming up to his subject, and beginning to be oblivious to the eyes riveted on him from all corners of the room, “that may throw some light on this hypothetical interview is the testimony of no less a person than Apple Mary — old Mary Battersbee, who owns the fruit stand in the foyer of the Temple of Commerce Building. It strikes me somehow that that poor old lady has been so entangled by reporters and police questioning her, trying to get her to paint a veritable photograph of the stranger in the raincoat, that she’s lost what little descriptive powers she had. It’s the thing to be expected. Probably it will all come back to her, if she’s left alone and not confused. She claims at least that she’d know the man if she saw him again. What is of more importance in my mind, though, is this simple factor: Has any one asked Apple Mary whether the man in the raincoat went directly up the marble stairs from the foyer, or whether he stopped a bare second to examine the directory board near the elevators? If he had been premeditating murder, he would have known the location of Eaves’s offices. If he had come on business, it is more than likely he would have consulted the directory board. Did any one question her on this point?”

  Folwell gazed quizzically about him at the members of the detective bureau. No reply whatever was made to his pointed question. After a short silence, he turned to McIlroy.

  “Could we get Apple Mary over here, inspector?”

  “You bet your life we can,” snapped the Scotsman. He waved his hand toward Delamater, who instantly became galvanized into activity. “Delamater, get over to the Temple of Commerce Building right off and bring back Mary Battersbee.” Delamater, jamming his fedora hat down over his head, and threading his way through the room, was gone; and at once Folwell resumed his exposition.

>   “Now,” he went on, fumbling in his breast-pocket, “while Mr. Delamater is bringing over Mary Battersbee for a further question or two, we might occupy ourselves with examining the newspaper reproduction of Eaves’s Dictatograph notes in a little more detail. In that reproduction is something that up to this morning I confess has remained barely in my subconscious mind. Now, taken in conjunction with the factors just discussed, I believe it looms forth as something of extreme importance.” Folwell withdrew from his breast-pocket the photographic lay-out which had appeared in the paper he had read in his cell in the detective bureau at noontime, two days before. Unfolding it, and standing undecidedly with it in his hand, he gazed across the room. There on the opposite wall was a huge blackboard, evidently placed at that point to carry the assignments of cases given to the various members of the detective bureau, and still bearing a few names and scrawled notations at one side. He strode across the intervening space and picked up a piece of chalk. A rasping of chairs changing position followed his movement. Chalk in hand, he turned to the assemblage.

  “On account of my long familiarity with translating Dictatograph notes,” he said, “I was able on the morning of my arrest to read off easily each of those two letters, the completed one and the uncompleted one, with no hesitation beyond that caused by discovering that I myself was mentioned in a disagreeable light in the first one. Nor was I cognizant at that time of any factors present in these notes that were not present in all Dictatograph notes.” He paused. “All names and figures are typed out, of course, letter by letter, on a special alphabetical row of keys near the top of the machine. The rest of the matter comes forth from different keys in what you now know are phonetic groups of letters or else combinations of letters and symbols — phoneticisms — one key sometimes delivering to the paper a group of letters or a symbol that even represents a whole word!” He paused once more. “And a study of these letters which Eaves wrote — rather the photographic enlargement of them which has so kindly appeared in the newspapers’ sensational pictorial lay-out — reveals something that has had no significance to anybody, and has not even been commented upon. Suppose, indeed, that I post up here to one side of the blackboard the photographic newspaper reproduction of the Dictatograph notes, and then to one side I once more write out their full translation.”

  For the next minute only the scratching of his chalk was audible. He followed the photographic copy of the notes which he had already pinned to one side of the blackboard, carefully, and at length stepped back from the blackboard which now carried on its surface the damning messages:

  “Dear Sir:

  “In reply to your letter will say if you intend to loan on the Shanks stock he owns said stock according to our books, and I hold a first lien on it for $2,000, which I agreed last week to renew for one year from date of expiration. The stock is well worth a further loan, and I would be glad to advance more but am very tight myself. Only to-day my mechanical expert in this company signed a written confession to the effect that he stole $5,100 in bonds and stocks from my safe.

  “Very truly yours,”

  “To John J. Jeng,

  Hotel Courtland,

  New York City.

  Hold till called for.”

  “Dear Shanks:

  “Account of Jeng’s letter and the old error on the stock books, please send immediately the serial number of your second stock certificate. I think …”

  Folwell paused a moment. “Now if you will inspect the enlarged photographic reproduction of Eaves’s notes to the left of my translation, I should like to call your attention to an apparently trivial circumstance, but which — ”

  There was an interruption caused by a bluecoat stepping in from the outer room. “Beg pardon, Inspector McIlroy, but there’s two men outside. One of ‘em is a lawyer, and he claims he has a legal paper of some kind to serve on you. Refuses to leave. What shall I do with him?”

  McIlroy frowned. “On me? A paper? H-m — must be that same lawyer I left waiting in my hallway last night. Show him in, Rourke, and we’ll get it over with.”

  The bluecoat threw open the door. “Come in,” he ordered.

  Into the room stepped a little bald-headed man wearing gold-rimmed eyeglasses on the end of a long nose. A pair of gimlet eyes swept the room. In his hand was a folded legal document. And at his heels was Nathan Shanks, whom Folwell had last seen at Lionel Pettibone’s, his face sullen and his jaw set.

  “Angus McIlroy?” intoned the little man, squinting nearsightedly about the room through his gold-rimmed eyeglasses.

  “Right here,” said McIlroy.

  “Abrahamson’s my name, Mannie Abrahamson. Attorney for Mr. Shanks here. Sorry to disturb you, inspector, but I got an injunction at six o’clock last night before Judge Lewis of the Superior Court preventing you from giving over to one Lionel Pettibone of Chicago, the original Dictatograph notes written by J. Hamilton Eaves, deceased, now in the possession of the Chicago Detective Bureau. They’re required as evidence in a civil action. Shall I read it to you?”

  “Great Scott, no!” grunted McIlroy. “Little do I care what becomes of the original papers in the Eaves case. Here — ” He held out his hand for the document. “Consider it served. I’ll sign it on the dotted line on the back.”

  With his fountain pen McIlroy scrawled a signature on the back of the folded document. He surveyed the sullen Shanks with the least suggestion of a grin about the corner of his mouth.

  “Sorry I kept you waiting last night, gentlemen. Hope you didn’t lose any sleep.”

  “We waited till one o’clock this ‘orning,” said Shanks. He was eyeing Folwell curiously, evidently wondering what brought the latter to the detective bureau. He turned to McIlroy. “Sorry to distur’ you, ins’ector, ‘ut got to ‘rotect ‘yself fro’ that young crook of an Eaves’s son. Going to fight if he tries any ‘onkey-shines at law.”

  “Go to it,” said McIlroy disinterestedly. He handed back the crisp paper to Mannie Abrahamson. “Sit down gentlemen. Have a chair, Shanks. We’re just discussing Eaves’s Dictatograph notes. Maybe you can hand Folwell a tip or two on the business points involved.”

  Shanks, obviously relieved now that the injunction had been served, dropped into a nearby-chair. His look of sullen combativeness gave way to one of interest. His attorney took up a chair near by. Whereupon Folwell now that the interruption was over, resumed his demonstration.

  “We left off,” he declared, “just where I was about to draw your attention to the spaces between the phoneticisms representing separate words. These spaces are created by the ever-continuous travel of the platen to and fro, impelled by clockwork and not by any action of the operator. In fact, the spaces, instead of varying within the same letter, should conceivably with a facile operator be slightly longer in the beginning when the platen is travelling rapidly, and shorter to the end of the letter where the rundown platen spring is impelling it more slowly. In fact, if we knew the actual lineal speed of the platen, we could measure in exact seconds the time taken by the operator to compose each phoneticism, to grasp the proper one out of the brain, as it were; but we do not even need to know this to find the relative difficulty between various words, for the newspaper copy, so nicely enlarged for publicity’s sake, brings out this difference so that no one need hesitate to mark it or distinguish it. You will notice that there are some spaces fully one and a half inches long preceding some of the phonetic groups: the rest of the spaces between groups never exceed one inch. If the short spaces represent four seconds pause, the long ones assuredly denote a full six seconds.

  “Let me, in fact, tabulate for curiosity’s sake,” Folwell went imperturbably on as a look of intense interest and bewilderment on the part of all his hearers grew into being, “the particular words before which the longer spaces occur. We may assume that the mental processes of J. Hamilton Eaves were appreciably slower before these words than before others. At any rate, tabulating those words before which he paused once and a half as long
as he did on the average before all others, they run as follows”:

  And glancing at the photographic copy he listed quickly the following column of words:

  reply

  books

  from

  expiration

  be

  more

  but

  myself

  my

  mechanical

  expert

  bonds

  from

  my

  books

  please

  immediately

  number

  Amidst the silence following his compilation of the list, the ‘phone bell rang sharply. Folwell lay down the chalk and stepped over to it. He lifted the receiver. “Yes, this is Mr. Folwell speaking.” He listened for a moment. His face changed to a look of profound satisfaction as he digested the information coming from it. “Thank you,” he said finally, and hung up. He turned to McIlroy.

  “This information from the toll department of the Chicago Telephone Company closes our case as to the murderer of Eaves,” he said, with a note of finality in his words. He nodded his head slightly toward the list he had written on the blackboard. “As I was just about to add when the ‘phone bell rang, the Dictatograph notes before which the longest-thinking pauses of Eaves obviously took place are in each case, strange to say, notes representing words which contain the labials P, B, and M. That indicates nothing else than that to the operator phoneticisms for words containing labials required a slightly more extended search than phoneticisms for words which did not. In simpler language, words which the operator himself pronounced differently from other people were more difficult of proper transcription phonetically. Such a man was certainly not Eaves. And such a man would be — say — one with a mutilated upper lip. For such man, pronouncing ‘Books‘ as ‘ ‘Ooks,’ would have to be extremely careful not to transcribe it ‘ ‘Ooks,’ and thus leave him a glaringly obvious clue to his identity. There have never been but four people other than Eaves who have had an opportunity of mastering the operation of the Dictatograph. Miss Reardon and myself were two of these. We have alibis, thank heaven. Phineas Shanks, the inventor, was another of them. He is long since dead. Therefore it could be no other than Nathan Shanks, sitting over there.”