Murder at the Movies

by A. E. Eddenden

  “I don’t like this Dundurn Castle thing either,” Tretheway said.

  “Either?” Wan Ho asked. “There’s another one?”

  “The stolen horse last month.” Tretheway nodded at Jake. “Jake can explain.”

  “Well…” Jake looked at his boss.

  “Go ahead.” Tretheway prepared himself for a brief embarrassment. “Tell him the whole story. Including the bowler.”

  As Sergeant of Detectives, Wan Ho had scanned the stolen horse report. He had not, however, heard about Tretheway’s and Jake’s part.

  Wan Ho played euchre regularly at the Tretheways’. From time to time he joined Tretheway and Jake on movie nights, particularly if a Charlie Chan was on the bill. He and Jake were familiar with all the Honolulu detective’s many aphorisms.

  Charles Wan Ho had been born in Canada to Chinese parents. His oriental features, refuting ancient Far Eastern legends, usually reflected his emotions; in his own words, not inscrutable. Wan Ho had barely made the minimum height and weight requirements for the police force, but more than made up for this by moving and thinking more quickly than his occidental colleagues. He had risen rapidly throughout the ranks to the impasse of sergeant. In Tretheway’s opinion, the FYPD was lucky to have him as a detective.

  It was the end of the week. Tretheway had asked Wan Ho to the house ostensibly for some Saturday night euchre, but in truth he was worried about the condor episode. It bothered him for the same reason the stolen horse bothered him; no explanation to scratch the itch of his curiosity. He wanted to talk. The three were sipping hot tea in Addie’s kitchen before the card game started. Tretheway sat by while Jake brought Wan Ho up to date on the bowler saga. He suffered their suppressed mirth in silence.

  “How come your hat?” Wan Ho asked finally.

  “Dumb luck on his part,” Tretheway said. “He must’ve somehow come across the hat after he’d seen Flying Deuces. Fit right in with the movie. Triggered a plan in his mind. A good starter.” He blew on his tea. “In any case he, or for that matter she, was in the theatre. And for the sake of argument, let’s assume our very own West End. Let’s see.” Tretheway looked at Jake. “We saw Flying Deuces on Monday.” Jake nodded. “That means whoever found the hat probably saw the movie on Monday also.”

  “It ran for three days,” Wan Ho reminded him.

  “The hat could’ve been stuck under a seat for a night or two,” Jake said.

  Tretheway reconsidered. “You’re right.” He drained his tea cup. It was twice the size of anyone else’s. “So let’s say this joker took my hat and saw Flying Deuces on the Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday.”

  Jake and Wan Ho nodded in agreement.

  “But we still don’t know why,” Jake said.

  “No,” Tretheway said. “But I’m going to find out.”

  Neither Jake nor Wan Ho envied the bowler thief.

  “But back to this condor thing,” Tretheway said.

  “You think it’s related to the stolen horse?” Wan Ho asked.

  “I don’t know that either,” Tretheway said. “Just a feeling. It seems more than random violence. With no purpose. For one thing, whoever did it had to bring heavy wire cutters.”

  “You keep saying condor,” Jake said. “Why? What about all the other birds?”

  “The rope,” Tretheway explained. “The rope on the condor’s leg. As though someone tried to hobble the bird beforehand.”

  “Like the SPCA men eventually did,” Jake remembered.

  “With the help of three or four uniforms, don’t forget,” Wan Ho said.

  “Which suggests why our vandal was unsuccessful,” Tretheway said.

  “He worked by himself?” Jake asked.

  Tretheway nodded. “Or herself.”

  Jake and Wan Ho took a moment to digest this food for thought.

  Tretheway spoke to Wan Ho. “Now we need your help.”

  “Mine?” Wan Ho said. “In what way?”

  “You have access to all the reports and information received in the detective division.” It was a statement, not a question.

  “That’s right.”

  “If I want to see them, I have to make an official point of it. You know Zulp.”

  Wan Ho and Jake both grinned at Tretheway’s reference to their leader Horace Zulp, an old-line policeman from a time when long service meant more than competence, who had simply outlasted his competition to become Chief Constable. His career was framed with uncrossable boundaries. Beat constables walk the beat. Detectives investigate. Cadets do what they’re told. And traffic police handle traffic.

  “You want to know about stop signs or crosswalks?” Jake said. “We’re your man.”

  Tretheway smiled briefly and got back to business. “What I want to know is if anything unusual happened around that time. Mid-February. Think about it.”

  Wan Ho stared into his cup as if he were reading the tea leaves for a long, quiet fifteen seconds before answering. “Nothing springs to mind.”

  “Something you can’t explain,” Tretheway prodded.

  Wan Ho went quiet again. “Nothing important.”

  “But there was something?”

  “I don’t see how it could relate.”

  “Try me.”

  “A prowler.” Wan Ho took a notebook from his inside pocket. He leafed through it and stopped. “Last Wednesday. The fifteenth. A prowler was reported. Again on Thursday and Friday. Three separate complaints. Three consecutive nights.”

  “The same one?” Tretheway asked.

  “We don’t know. Never caught him.”

  “What’d he look like?” Tretheway asked.

  “Man or woman?” Jake asked.

  “A shadowy figure lurking in the bushes,” Wan Ho read.

  “But still just a prowler,” Tretheway said.

  “Except for the complainants’ name.” Wan Ho checked his note book again. “Dabb. D-A-B-B. Last name of Dabb.”

  “Which one?” Tretheway asked.

  “All of them.”

  “Eh?”

  “They all had the same name.”

  “Were they related?” Tretheway asked.

  Wan Ho shook his head. “Nope. They didn’t even know each other. All from different parts of the city.”

  Tretheway leaned against the protesting back of his chair. He folded his arms across his chest as far as they would go. “Doesn’t that stretch the laws of coincidence?”

  “I’d say so,” Jake said.

  Wan Ho shrugged.

  The swinging doors of the kitchen flew open as Addie pushed through. “Euchre time, gentlemen.”

  For the next couple of hours cards prevailed. They played in the sizable common room next to the kitchen. On a card table in the middle of the room stood two thin euchre decks, counters, a deep dish of peanuts, a glass of beer each for Wan Ho and Jake and Tretheway’s mandatory quart bottle. A small crystal flute of dandelion wine marked Addie’s place. Three matching bridge chairs plus Tretheway’s substantial wooden special, which Addie had bought at a farm auction and slipcovered with her own brightly coloured crocheting, surrounded the table. An occasional student boarder passed through, exchanging pleasantries with the card players, on his way to the kitchen. The students generally had free rein in tea- and sandwich-making as long as they cleaned up after themselves. Two of them sat now on one of the common room’s cushiony chairs perusing text books and term papers. A third rose when necessary to change records on the victrola. Sounds of Mozart, Paul Whiteman, Benny Goodman or, Jake’s favourite, Duke softly intruded by turns. Fred the Labrador sat on the hearth facing the action. Behind her the fire crackled comfortingly in the red brick fireplace, reminding everyone that, although the weather outside appeared still and clear, the temperature still hugged zero on this last day in February.

  “Albert,” Addie said. “You just trumped your partner’s ace.”

  “What?”

  “Your trump.” Addie pointed to the offending black spot on Jake’s red virgin ace.


  “Sorry.” Tretheway retrieved his card and followed suit.

  “Now it’s my turn.” Addie trumped the ace and pulled the cards into her neat pile of tricks. “That’s a euchre. And game.”

  Jake frowned.

  “Good play, Addie,” Wan Ho said, gathering all the cards together. He couldn’t stop smiling. “My deal.” He and Addie were well ahead of the resident champions in games and rubbers.

  “You’re not playing with your usual fervour,” Addie said. What she meant was that Tretheway hadn’t been smacking his aces or bowers enthusiastically onto the green felt table top, threatening its stability. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m just fine, Addie.” Tretheway smiled, lips only. “Just got things on my mind.”

  Jake and Wan Ho exchanged glances.

  It had been one of those evenings. Tretheway had not played his customary aggressive game. He hadn’t even criticized Jake on a couple of improper leads. And although someone had made sure a Blue was always within reach, he hadn’t actually asked for it. They played two more fast games that he and Jake lost.

  “Maybe we should call it a night,” Tretheway suggested.

  “Oh, no, you don’t.” Wan Ho eagerly stacked the cards into a pile and pushed them towards Addie. “Your deal, partner.” A wide toothy grin split his face. “Take no prisoners.”

  Tretheway sat back resignedly. He half closed his eyes and dreamily listened to the hypnotic repetition of Addie’s shuffle. A log in the fire popped. Strains of “Mood Indigo” flowed from the victrola. Fred sighed noticeably. Outside a fresh breeze wafted several brittle leftover maple leaves against the glass of the French doors. The sound of a low flying airplane buzzed clearly through the frosty night air.

  Tretheway blinked; not a delicate, tear-cleansing flick but a snapping, close-to-audible cartoon click. His eyes flashed.

  “That’s it.” Tretheway straightened up. His fist whacked the centre of the card table. The peanuts jumped upwards. Jake, alerted in time by the blur of his boss’s arm, steadied the beer glasses. The students stopped talking. Fred barked.

  “Albert!” Addie protested, hugging her wine glass to her chest.

  “You know what our trouble is?” Tretheway glared around the table.

  Jake and Wan Ho shook their heads.

  “We see too many movies.”

  “You could cut down,” Addie said.

  “No, no. I mean it’s hard to remember them all.”

  “What are you driving at?” Wan Ho said.

  “About three weeks ago we saw Only Angels Have Wings.” Tretheway pointed to the sky. “About flying. In South America. The Andes. If you remember, in one scene a giant bird …”

  “A condor.” Jake came to life.

  “Crashed through the windshield of Thomas Mitchell’s plane,” Tretheway finished.

  “I didn’t see that one,” Wan Ho said.

  “I remember it,” Jake said. “The co-pilot landed the plane. But Thomas Mitchell died.”

  “Broke his neck,” Tretheway said.

  “Maybe I’ll get the sandwiches,” Addie said. She left the table.

  “You feel there’s a connection between the movie and the Dundurn aviary thing?” Wan Ho asked.

  “Yes,” Tretheway said.

  “You’re still guessing, though,” Wan Ho said.

  “There’s more,” Tretheway said.

  The students left the room. Fred settled down. Tretheway leaned back in his chair again and reached for a cigar. Jake struck a wooden match and held it up in front of his boss. Tretheway made a small ceremony of puffing life into the White Owl.

  “Sometimes it takes longer than other times to happen.” His large hand waved away the excessive smoke. “But if you’re patient, push the clouds away, let a little light in, eventually …” Tretheway smiled at his two listeners. “Thomas Mitchell played the part of a man called Dabb. Kid Dabb.”

  “The prowler,” Wan Ho said.

  “Prowlee,” Jake corrected.

  “Let me take you all the way down the path.”

  Tretheway listened for a moment to Addie slamming cupboard doors in the kitchen before he went on. “I say our perpetrator, let’s call him or her the Fan, saw Flying Deuces, got an idea, found my hat, stole a horse and did his trick.”

  Jake and Wan Ho nodded.

  “Then a few weeks later he saw Only Angels Have Wings, became inspired again. Decided to recreate Thomas Mitchell’s or Dabb’s scene.” Tretheway picked up some of the peanuts that had jumped onto the table and popped them into his mouth. “So what’s the first thing he’d do?”

  “Get a condor,” Jake said.

  “No,” Wan Ho said. “He’d look for a Dabb.”

  “Right,” Tretheway said. “He’d have to decide what to do with the bird first. So he reconnoitered all the Dabbs.” He looked at Wan Ho. “Not a common name?”

  “Only three in the phone book,” Wan Ho said.

  “So he had to choose the one that best suited his purposes,” Tretheway continued. “Check the layout of the house and grounds. Make sure there is a Mr Dabb living there. And anything else he might stumble across.” He took a long puff of his cigar. “What I like to call ‘accidental technique.’”

  Jake and Wan Ho waited.

  “One of the Dabbses might be called Kid. Or look like Thomas Mitchell. Or be a pilot. Or even be from South America,” Tretheway explained. “But it doesn’t matter. Because the capture of the condor didn’t come off.”

  “So this was not vandalism?” Wan Ho asked. “This was a plot to steal the condor?”

  “Nothing to do with the other birds?” Jake added.

  “Right.” Tretheway answered them both.

  “But what was he going to do with the condor?” Jake asked.

  “We’ll never know,” Tretheway said. “Maybe throw the bird through his living room window. Or the car windshield. Maybe just leave him in the garage like the horse. But, once again, it doesn’t matter. Our illustrious Fan aborted number two. Let’s wait for number three.”

  “Number three?” Wan Ho said.

  “You mean … ?” Jake began.

  The kitchen door swung open. “Sandwiches, Gentlemen.” Addie swept through, carrying a large circular tray laden with three-year-old cheddar cheese sandwiches; not the two-bite, triangular, green-dyed cocktail specimens, but solid, two-handed specials made with thick slices of whole wheat bread that she had baked the same morning. A dish of strong onions and pickles stood on the side. Addie stopped abruptly. “I mean, unless you’re still talking shop.”

  “No, Addie,” Tretheway said. “We’re all finished.”

  Addie put the heavy tray in the centre of the card table. Everyone dug in. Two students returned and split one sandwich. Fred had half of Jake’s. Addie and Wan Ho enjoyed their share, but Tretheway ate more than anyone. In his hands, the sandwiches appeared regular sized. The tray emptied quickly.

  Tretheway brushed the last bread crumbs from his chest onto his stomach. “Now let’s play some real cards,” he said.

  “But you said …” Addie began.

  “I think it’s your deal,” Tretheway said.

  Addie started shuffling the cards. She frowned across the table at Wan Ho.

  “Jake,” Tretheway said. “Just nip out to the kitchen and get me a brew.”

  Jake pushed away from the table. He smiled. Tretheway was back in the game.

  At the end of the evening, Tretheway walked Wan Ho to the front door while Jake and Addie attacked the post-euchre clutter of the common room. Wan Ho was mumbling to himself; phrases like ‘bad run of cards’, Tucky splits’. He and Addie had lost five quick consecutive games with Tretheway holding four lone hands.

  “There’ll be another day,” Tretheway said. He helped the grumbling detective on with his coat.

  Wan Ho pushed his feet into an open pair of galoshes. He looked around at Tretheway. The muted bantering of Jake and Addie floated down the hall.

  “You sa
id something about number three,” Wan Ho said.

  Tretheway nodded.

  “You think there’ll be another one?”

  “Maybe not. It’s hard to tell. One is just an event. Two could be a coincidence. But three changes the picture. That’s a series. A pattern.”

  “Meaning?”

  “That there could eventually be a number four. And a five. Six. And so on.”

  Wan Ho pulled on his gloves. “Anything we can do about it?”

  “I think not. It depends on which movie our Fan sees. And if it gives him an idea. As I said before, there are just too many movies. If he can find a Laurel and Hardy sinister, then …” Tretheway shrugged.

  Wan Ho nodded. “And really, a derby on a horse and an escaped bird are nothing to lose sleep over.”

  “That’s right.” Tretheway reached out and pulled the lapels of Wan Ho’s overcoat snugly together. “As far as I’m concerned, they’re just two interesting but petty unrelated incidents.”

  “Not a series?” Wan Ho smiled.

  “Not a series.” Tretheway smiled back. “See you at the movies.” He opened the door. Arctic air rushed into the hall. They both shivered.

  After The Wizard of Oz a pattern was formed, a series began.

  Chapter

  4

  One of the first things Tretheway did in 1937 when he became the youngest inspector (traffic or otherwise) on the FYPD was to organize a children’s safety club. It started innocently enough. A first grade teacher from the local George R. Allan Public School approached Tretheway with the strong opinion that her pupils were not sufficiently aware of traffic rules and regulations. And could the police do anything about it.

  Tretheway thought so. He began one slow Monday morning by giving her class of six-to-seven-year-olds a short talk on road safety. The school invited him back. Addie typed up membership cards. A student could join by filling out the card (no charge) and memorizing a half-dozen traffic safety rules. Addie also came up with the name “Little Shavers Road Protection Club” while Jake thought the words “Traffic Dodgers” should be included. Tretheway put his conservative foot down by christening the group simply “The Fort York Children’s Safety Club.” It caught on.