My Business is Murder

by Kane, Henry

  “Plus your way—that does it with a bludgeon.” I shook my head. “Not this baby. This one makes with a rapier.”

  Parker squinted his eyes. “What? What’s that?”

  “This guy’s complex, a brain-guy. The blackmail deal was to provide a motive for Roger Aldridge. Exactly what you fell for. All of a sudden, Aldridge needed two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. And he needed it bad. A partnership in Winston Parnell was at stake.”

  “Let’s have the story,” Parker said. “Your way.”

  “Nolan knew that Aldridge didn’t have that kind of loot. He knew that sooner or later he’d appeal to Donald Root. So he kept an eye on him and today, when Aldridge finally went to Root, Nolan was his tail. He had this on him.” I went to Nolan, opened his jacket, took the gun out of the holster and gave it to Parker. “Exhibit One,” I said.

  Parker fondled the gun. “Go on.”

  “Nolan knew that Emerson Beach was off. He knew that Beach was due back at five. Nolan is a nephew—he knew all about the old man’s habits. So … as close to five as he dared, he rang the bell, ducked when Aldridge answered, then jumped him and blasted him with the butt end of the heater.”

  “That way,” Parker said, “going along with your story, Aldridge couldn’t identify his assailant.”

  “Correct. He knew that Aldridge carried a gun. We’ll suppose, of course, he wore gloves. He took out Aldridge’s gun, threatened the old man, got the will out of the safe where it was kept and had the old man change it … under threat of death. This done, he plugged the old man. With Aldridge’s gun. Then he put the gun in Aldridge’s hand and shot another bullet. The one in the ceiling.”

  This time it was Doc who asked the question. “Why?”

  “To get cordite impregnations in Aldridge’s hand. These show up in a thing called the paraffin gauntlet test. The Lieutenant understands.”

  Parker said, “Yeah.”

  “Then he turned him around to face the door, as though he were on his way out. Then he cut a slit in the carpet to make it look as though it had torn when Aldridge supposedly tripped on it. Then he scuffed it wide with the point of Aldridge’s shoe, stuck the point in, and now it looked like Aldridge tripped and knocked himself out in his hurry to scram. He had to work fast. He wanted Aldridge still unconscious when Beach returned.”

  “Any ideas,” Parker said, “as to what he used to cut this alleged slit?”

  I went near to Nolan. “He wears this watch chain.” I reached in for the knife attached to the chain. “This, Lieutenant, is a knife. And it looks like it’s recently been cleaned.” I dug into the pocket, and then, surprise, surprise, I came up with a tuft of red carpet. “But I think, Lieutenant, that he forgot to clean the pocket.”

  This was evidence. The Lieutenant alerted to action. He grabbed the tuft of carpet, examined it, took a piece of paper out of his pocket, folded it into the paper and put the paper away. “Anthing else?” he said.

  “Plenty else. He was through, and he wanted to get out fast, away from the scene of action. He had rigged his plant and he wanted out. He knew nothing of the fact that I was due there and Warren Dodge. He knew Beach was due and he wanted to duck out. But as the elevator came down, he saw Warren Dodge in the lobby. Dodge had his back to him. It wouldn’t do for Dodge to see him there, it wouldn’t do at all. So out came the heater, and he opened Dodge’s skull with it. It took eleven stitches to close it.”

  “Where’s Dodge now?”

  “You’re Homicide. You wouldn’t know.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Means that you don’t know about every single police inquiry in the city. Dodge is at the Flower Hospital … and he’s sort of held out a bit of information on the cops. But the minute you fix him up with the facts, you’ll have his full statement.”

  “Question, please.”

  “You say his back was turned.” He jerked his thumb at Nolan. “Then how’d he see this guy?”

  “He was facing a mirror. He saw him but he couldn’t get out of the way in time. That’s positive evidence, Lieutenant.”

  To Nolan, Parker said, “Can you talk?”

  “I can talk,” Nolan said.

  “Any remarks?”

  “Strictly a frame.”

  Grimly, Parker said, “It’s a frame you’re going to punch hard to get out of.”

  “Where’s motive?” Nolan said. “I wouldn’t kill Root to make Roger richer. You may be able to hold me, Lieutenant, but a jury’ll throw you out of court.”

  Parker twisted to me. “He’s got a point there.”

  “No he hasn’t.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I can show you motive. This is a shrewdie. He works boths ends against the middle. It only looks like no motive.”

  “Show me,” Parker said.

  “You know that Nolan is the only heir-at-law of Donald Root. The only one beside the guy you’ve got in the clink.”

  “So?”

  “Where’s the will?”

  Parker produced it.

  “Notice,” I said, “that the additional bequest is written after the signature.”

  “I also notice that the bequest is to Roger Aldridge, not Jonathan Nolan. Where’s the percentage?”

  “Hold it,” I said. I strode to the law book, real legal-counsel-courtroom-manner, and opened it to the place I had marked. “My reference,” I said in my best lawyer-like tones, “is to a case entitled In Re Ryan’s Will, 252 N.Y. 620. Therein we have a rule of law. A will is void when not signed at its physical end. Thus, if after the signature, there is more writing of a dispository nature, the will is not signed at its physical end, and it is therefore void in its entirety. That’s the law, Lieutenant.”

  The Lieutenant scratched his head. “Sure,” he said. “If the will is void, Donald Root dies intestate. Intestate—which means without a will—then his heirs-at-law inherit. That cuts Nolan in for half the estate.”

  “Very good, Lieutenant.” I snapped the book shut.

  The Lieutenant beckoned one of the police officers. “Nippers,” he remarked in his most acidly courteous manner, “for Mr. Nolan.”

  The officer grinned and complied. Jonathan Nolan was finished and he looked it. I wasn’t.

  “Just in case that wouldn’t work,” I said, “there’s another rule of law.”

  Parker beamed. “Hidden talents,” he said. “A real legal eagle.”

  “There’s a rule of law that states that a criminal cannot profit by his wrongdoing. Thus, if Nolan’s plant worked, Aldridge would be convicted of the murder … which covered Nolan two ways. First, if the will were declared void, then the entire estate would go to the heirs. Since Aldridge could not profit by his own wrongdoing … the entire estate would go to one Jonathan Nolan.”

  “And second?” Parker said.

  “If, by chance, the will would hold up—”

  “How?” Parker said.

  “There are lawyers and lawyers, and the law’s got more curves than … than … even Anabel Jolly.”

  Demurely, Miss Jolly said, “Thanks. Lots.”

  “Anyway, if it did hold up, then the charitable bequest would go to the charity named—but, once again, Aldridge’s share could not go to Aldridge—same reason—criminal cannot profit by his own wrongdoing. Then—what would happen?”

  “What?” said Miss Jolly, her eyes wide now, her red mouth puckered in the beginning of a small smile. “Terrific, this boy, isn’t he?” Now the smile was big and beaming.

  “If you’ll look, Lieutenant, you’ll see there’s no residual clause in the will, no direction as to what happens with any part of the estate that, for some reason, cannot go as the testator wished. For that share of the estate, then, the testator, Donald Root is deemed to have no will. And his heir-at-law inherits. Who dat? Jonathan Nolan again.”

  “So the worst that could happen to him,” Parker said, “is that he winds up with half the estate, which would be—from what our investigation shows—at
least half a million, maybe plenty more.”

  “How’s that for motive?”

  “Pretty good,” Parker acknowledged. “And pretty slick.”

  “Finished?” inquired Anabel Jolly.

  “All done,” I said.

  “Put the book away.”

  I put the book away.

  She took me under the arm and led me to the door.

  Parker called: “I need this guy.”

  “Not more than I do,” Jolly called back. She smiled, winked, composed her face to elfish innocence. “I’ll save some of him. Got some cross-examining of my own to do.”

  “Cross-examining?” Parker said.

  “He’s good at making like a detective, and he’s good at talking like a lawyer. I’m curious to discover how good he is at ringing bells.”

  “Bells?” said Parker.

  “Bells, Lieutenant.”

  She opened the door and marched me out.

  II

  LOOSE END

  You think, sometimes, philosophically.

  You think of wars that were and wars to come and big wars and little wars and so-called comic opera wars, and you think about the human beings that were involved in all of them, and you know that to each of these, no matter, it was a big war, an immense war, a gigantic war—because he was in it—it was personal to every one of them and soul-consuming and all-out distracting and big and important as life itself—and I hear tell that life is considered important. Bring it down to tiny things. Bring it down to a nose. You’ve got a nose and it’s natural to breathe through it, and who thinks about having a nose; but you get yourself an ingrown hair, you get yourself an inside blown-up boil, and it sounds like a laugh to the next guy—but brother, all of a sudden, it’s just not a nose like everybody’s got a nose—all of a sudden it’s big, vast, and hurting-important—all of a sudden there are doctors probing and shaking their heads and telling you how near the brain it is—and all of a sudden you can die from it—and it’s big, then, isn’t it?—it’s vast, big, personal, devastatingly-near-to-death important.

  Because it’s your nose.

  And wars are like that, if it’s your war.

  I’ll never forget that kid, straight and serious, moving there opposite me, up and back like a caged animal, a boy thrown up at the tail end of a little war—police action it was called—a kid whose face had a strange look of wax. He was tall and thin and intent and he kept filling my ashtray with cigarette butts. His face was sunburnt but the look of wax came through. It was an old face for a young man; there were anguish lines, and the eyes were tired and careless.

  He paced in front of my desk, ground out the cigarette and lit a new one. He used the same hand for lighting the cigarette as he did for placing it between his lips. He had no other hand. The sleeve of his blue suit was in the pocket of his jacket, and it was empty all the way down from the shoulder. He said, “I came to you because I’d heard about you. Been hearing about you for a long time.”

  I said, “Thanks.”

  He said, “I got no dough.”

  I said, “Let’s not talk about dough. Yet.”

  He came near and he sat down in the chair facing me and he grinned. “I’ve been here fifteen minutes maybe twenty, and we haven’t said a thing to each other, I mean anything real, have we?”

  “Smoked a lot of cigarettes for fifteen minutes. I’d say it’s nearer an hour that you’ve been here.”

  “An hour?” The grin was wider, and young, but the eyes stayed old. “Maybe you’re good company, Mr. Chambers. Maybe I am. But you don’t know yet why I’m here.”

  “I’m in no hurry. We’ve chatted. I know things about you. I know your name is Casey Moore.”

  “And that I’m holed up at the Montero on upper Broadway.”

  “And that you were in a prison camp for two years and were returned with the truce. I know that you were here in a hospital in the States for four months. And I certainly know more about Commie prison camps than I knew before we had out chat.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “And you know that I’ve got no left arm and a lot of my belly ain’t where it used to be … but you don’t know what brings me to a private detective.”

  “Not yet I don’t.”

  “I repeat I’ve got no dough.”

  “I heard you the first time, Casey.”

  “And I don’t want charity, either. I’m not trading on a war record.”

  “Save that, Casey, huh? Let’s get the story first. Let’s worry about the dough when we get up to that.”

  He pushed his hand across his mouth. “You … you’re a nice guy. You’re cracked up to be a tough one, real tough. I don’t know.” The grin came again. “I think you’re a softie.”

  “Think so myself.” I shrugged. “Of course, there are people who’ll disagree with that. But what the hell. There are people who’ll disagree with anything. Let’s have the story.”

  “There ain’t much, really.”

  “Okay. Let’s have what you’ve got.”

  He sighed. Long, deep and whistling. From all the way down. Then he said, “There was me and there was my old man and there was nobody else. My mother died when I was a baby. The old man brought me up.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “Henry. Henry Moore. We lived out in Queens, out by the edge of Flushing. A little wooden house in Queens. That’s where I was raised.” The lids came down on his eyes and he looked past me in reminiscence. “Great guy, the old man. Dreamer-type guy. Used to paint pictures. Had them all over the walls of the house. Everybody thought they stank. Except me. And him. I thought they were beautiful.”

  “What’d he do for a living?”

  “Bank guard. That’s the best picture my mind makes. The old man in a light blue uniform with a Sam Browne belt and a gun in a holster. Never used that gun in twenty years, as it happens. Directed ladies to the right window, helped old guys make out withdrawal slips, changed up the pen points in the pens … worked that bank twenty years, all branches, never had one minute of excitement.

  “He still there?”

  His face clouded. “No.”

  “Retired?”

  “Let me tell you.”

  “Sorry.”

  “He never saved a sou, spent it on me, mostly. He insisted I get an education. I was always a bug on flying. I got my degree out of Columbia and I learned all they could teach me about aeronautics. Went to flying school too. Then I got a job as pilot on one of the airlines, pushed one of the big ones, transcontinental.”

  “And your dad?”

  “Arthritis was plaguing him. Don’t get me wrong, Mr. Chambers, he wasn’t an old man. He was fifty. But I was earning enough for the two of us now, so I talked him into it. He retired.”

  I reached across for one of his cigarettes and lit up.

  “Then what?”

  “Then I got drafted into that Korean mess.”

  “And then?”

  “I went over as a bomber pilot.”

  “Your father stay retired?”

  “No. He took a part-time job as a night watchman. Worked three days a week.” He got up and started pacing again. “The Korean thing went quick for me. We got shot down early right after the Chinese moved in. Twelfth mission they got us. Two of us were flung clear, and then the thing blasted like a fire rocket. I learned later the whole crew was listed as dead, including me.

  “How about the guy that was flung clear with you?”

  “We were picked up by an enemy patrol. He died on the march back. I don’t know how I made it but seems I did. They took off what was left of my arm, pushed my belly together and sewed it up, but I made it. And I made it through the years at the prisoner of war camp.”

  “Yeah,” I said. I dumped the cigarette. “Then the truce, and the four months here in the hospital. I bet the happiest man in the world was your dad.”

  He stopped walking, and turned his back to me. I could see his shoulders hunch. He said, “I didn’t hear from him. Not a
word.”

  “Come again?”

  “Not a word. I was informed that he couldn’t be found.” Now he turned and came back to me and he leaned his one hand on the desk and bent toward me. Something stirred in his old eyes. “Four months of rehabilitation and then two days ago, the day of discharge, they told me. One of the top medics called me into his office and told me.”

  “Told you what?”

  “That my father was dead. That he had been killed during the committing of a crime, a burglary, of which he was the perpetrator.”

  What do you say to that? What do you say to a boy with one arm and part of a stomach and tired eyes and an old face marred by anguish lines? What do you say to a kid bent over your desk, jaw muscles working in a sunburnt face, the strange look of wax coming through, the pallor that won’t stay hidden by the burn of the sun, pallor of years in a prison camp, a kid without an arm and a hole in his stomach? What do you say to him?

  You say nothing. You sit still and you stare up at him and you wait.

  The hand came off my desk and he straightened. He went away, walked about the room, came back and slumped into the chair facing me. He said, “They made it easy for me. They gave me an old newspaper clipping.” He fished in his pocket, brought out the clipping and handed it across. I watched him light a cigarette and then I went to work on the clipping.

  It was dated a year ago, May 11th. It told of an attempted burglary at the Westchester home of one Edward Adams. The attempt had been made at two o’clock in the morning. The intruder, one Henry Moore, had entered by the front door. The lady of the house, Dorothy Adams, had heard a noise, had called to her husband, and then without waiting, had gone to investigate. The intruder, in panic, had emptied a gun at her. Edward Adams, who had stopped to take his own gun out of a drawer, a gun for which he had a proper license, had quickly followed his wife and had, in turn, emptied his gun at the intruder, killing him. A person by the name of Matthew Bennett, a house guest, had awakened, and had been a witness to the latter part of the proceedings. Henry Moore had once been a bank guard and the gun he used belonged to him. Mrs. Dorothy Adams had been critically wounded. The police had been called and a doctor, who had attended her, but she had expired before she could be taken to a hospital. Henry Moore resided at 116 Whitehall Place, Flushing, Queens.