“So,” I said, blinking a bit, “that’s why our Mr. Towne doesn’t know proofreaders’ symbols when he sees ’em. And he’s not an ex-convict after all. How’d you know where to locate the real article?”
“I didn’t. I wired his publishers. Told them a man representing himself to be one of their authors was circulating in this vicinity, and that I had doubts. They passed it along to him.”
“You suspected he wasn’t the ex-professional thief because he didn’t know any of the pickpocket lingo? And you checked up with the proofreader’s symbols and the hobo signs?”
“Yes. That and some other things. Remember that the Captain said ‘Towne’ had a pistol permit? The real Towne couldn’t have one—at least none that was legitimately obtained—because he has a felony conviction chalked up against him. And, since the Captain is satisfied, the photo on the permit must match our ‘Towne.’ And apparently the name that goes with it, though not Towne, doesn’t bother the Captain. He knows who ‘Towne’ really is, and his lack of excitement over the knowledge intrigues me no end.”
“I suppose it must,” a quiet voice behind us said. “Towne” stood there, a sober expression on his dark face. He took the red wrapper from a stick of gum which he popped into his mouth. “You’re doing all right,” he added. “I hunt you up because I’ve got a confession to make and I discover you’re already hep. Takes some of the wind out of my sails.”
“Mac find out?” Merlini asked.
“Mac? No, haven’t seen him. This is my. own idea. Mind telling me where the impersonation fell down?”
“Lack of proper background,” Merlini said. “You should have brushed up on the subjects of proofreader’s symbols, hobo signs, and pickpocket argot. You—”
“Proofreader’s signs? Is that what the rest of those hen tracks were in the note you gave me this morning?” Towne frowned. “I guess that point goes to you. I knew the tramp symbols, but I didn’t want to admit it at the time. Besides, I didn’t see why Stuart Towne should know them—I still don’t. Nor the gun talk either. Why would he be up on that? Most detective-story authors still use the old-fashioned lingo, and about all they know of that is the word ‘dip.’”
“You’re not only not Towne, you don’t seem to have read many of his books either.”
“No, I haven’t. Just the last one, The Empty Coffin thing. Read it a few nights ago before I started passing them out. But he doesn’t—”
“Not so much in that one, no,” Merlini said. “He’s using a new locale. But in most of his others there’s plenty of underworld dope, and it’s all the quill—the real thing. If you had read the book reviews or the jacket blurb on his first book, you’d have known that.”
Towne gulped and swallowed his gum. “I’ll be damned! I’m ashamed of myself. My only excuse is that the impersonation was damned impromptu. Oughta read more, I suppose. You see, when I decided to be an author, I hardly expected to run smack into a couple of mystery-story addicts. Should have pretended I was e. e. cummings, or do you read him, too? I’ve known I was on damned thin ice ever since you arrived, and the first crack out of the box you started talking about The Phantom Bullet, which I haven’t read.”
“Neither have I,” Merlini said. “There isn’t any such book, or at least no such title on the Towne list. But you still bother me, Mr. X; you’re not the ex-convict and yet you say you do know the gun talk and the tramp signs, though you hadn’t realized that, you should have admitted it. Could I see that pistol permit you showed the Captain?”
“Uh huh,” Towne assented. “High time I ran up my true colors. The pistol permit will do for identification as well as anything.” He took it from an inner breast pocket and tossed it on the table before us.
As he talked, I had been rapidly trying to fit together a deduction or two in the classic Holmes manner and construct a theory as to his identity, or at least his occupation. I had a couple of guesses all formulated, but it’s just as well I didn’t have a chance to go on record with them. The name on the pistol permit was one that, in all the excitement, I had nearly forgotten.
“Stuart Towne” was our old friend Martin O’Halloran, the private dick who had been tailing Pauline and who had subsequently followed us last Friday evening.
“This is a nice tidy development,” Merlini said in a relieved tone. “The O’Halloran loose end has been buzzing about annoyingly in my subconscious. I’m happy to see it gathering itself up. I wired Inspector Gavigan of the New York Homicide Department asking him to send me a dossier on you. No answer as yet. The Inspector’s probably up to his neck in a hatchet murder or something of the sort.”
“He’s plenty busy,” O’Halloran said. “Haven’t you two seen any papers lately?”
“Circus people don’t read newspapers. Except when they’re in winter quarters, they don’t have time. That’s been our trouble the last few days. Have we missed anything?”
“You certainly have. But I’d better start at the beginning. The reason I was tailing Miss Hannum Friday—” . Detective O’Halloran’s revelations suffered a sudden postponement. At that moment Captain Schafer strode into the tent, moving with that determined steam-roller way he had. His face was grim. Patrolman Crossen, who was with him, was also grim, and in addition somewhat white about the gills.
Schafer’s voice was hard. “Tonight seems to be bank night,” he said. “We just finished searching all the cars on the lot. In the last one—we found things.”
The statement was directed at Merlini, and he stopped there as if waiting for comment.
Merlini said, “Yes? You found something?”
Schafer’s square jaw protruded slightly. “I’ll say we did. You’d better come look.”
A distinctly uneasy feeling settled around me as we followed him out. It was caused by the fact that the Captain and Patrolman Crossen had dropped into step, one on either side of Merlini, and by the fact that they both had their hands on their guns.
We walked the length of the lot past car after car and stopped outside the side-show top at Merlini’s car itself. The trunk compartment at the rear was open. Chief Hooper and several other cops stood beside it holding flashlights.
“Don’t tell me,” Hooper said, “that you’ve got a nice pat answer for this.”
He stopped and suddenly jerked away the canvas that covered the shape on the ground.
I saw Merlini’s jaw tighten. Slowly he said, “No, Sheriff. I’m afraid I hadn’t counted on this.”
The girl’s body was dressed in blue slacks and a bright yellow sweater. Laid out beside it, I saw a blood-stained rug, a cowboy hat, and a bright two-edged sword with an ornamental hilt.
The body had no head.
*Merlini later furnished this translation: “I was running a three-card-monte game at the races in Saratoga. There was a wise guy in the crowd who knew how the swindle was worked. He had a fistful of paper money. He thought he could beat me at my own game, so I let him see me straighten out the bent corner.” (In monte one of the operator’s assistants in the crowd bends the corner of the winning card slightly so that the sucker thinks he can spot it and is betting on a sure thing. Knowing how the swindle usually worked, the sucker would expect the operator to put it in another card.) “Then I double-crossed him by replacing the bend in the same card! He was all ready to bet when Paper-Collar Ed, who was retrieving the money that other members of the mob had been allowed to win as a come-on, wasn’t successful in concealing the fact that he was passing the money back to me. Another sucker saw it, sneaked out, and called the cops. The sucker had a pull, and the police were forced to take action. Ed and I were arrested before I could stop the game and clear out, and then the protection money that had been paid out to the authorities didn’t do its work. The magistrate was about to give us a ninety-day sentence when … ”
Chapter Fifteen
Murder Charge
THIS TIME THERE WAS no trick or illusion to it. One quick look at the severed stump of white flesh projecting from the
open shirt collar was more than enough. I raised my eyes and kept them up.
Derisively Hooper said, “And I thought you were going to be a tough baby. Not so blamed smart for a city slicker after all, are you?”
“Apparently not,” said Merlini. “I should know better than to leave my trunk compartment unlocked, even when it’s empty.” He turned to the Captain. “Find anything else?”
Schafer regarded him darkly. “This is plenty, isn’t it?”
“That depends on the point of view. If you think this proves I’m the murderer, then it’s quite a bit. Otherwise not.”
Hooper’s snort was pure disgust.
The Captain asked, “You aren’t going to tell me it means anything else?”
“Afraid I am,” said Merlini. “I’ve been dealt a cold hand. And I’d like to know just how many jokers there are in the deck.”
“So that’s going to be your angle, is it?” Schafer said truculently. “Yes, I’ve got more—a damn sight more than I need. The missing photo of the auto smash for one thing, and a couple of suitcases and a hat box full of clothes. The side-show manager says they’re the Headless Lady’s. There’s also a .32 Smith and Wesson automatic.”
“Oh?” Merlini said interestedly. “One shot fired, I suppose? And no fingerprints.”
“I don’t know about the prints yet. You were probably careful about that. The gun’s fully loaded and, offhand, it doesn’t look as if it had been fired lately. You either cleaned it or used another.” Schafer took a forward step toward Merlini. “You haven’t got the chance of a snowball in hell, so why don’t you spill it? Leibowitz and a dozen more like him couldn’t get you out from under this rap.”
“Did you ever hear that one about appearances being deceptive, Captain?” Merlini smiled a bit wryly. “Someone seems to have given me a good dose of my own medicine. Was there any identification on the body or clothing that tells us who the Headless Lady was?”
Schafer looked at him silently for a moment. Then he said, “You’re a cool one, all right. Yes, there are clothing labels from a couple of New York shops. Classy ones. We’ll have her name in a couple of hours. That’ll give me your motive. Palmer, put the cuffs on him. We’ll go into town and have this out.”
Palmer slipped a bright steel bracelet around Merlini’s right wrist, pulled the ratchet tight, and locked it. The other cuff he snapped on his own arm. Merlini, thoughtfully surveying the objects at his feet, the open trunk compartment, and the car hardly seemed to be aware of the action.
“Do me a favor, Captain,” he asked. “Dust my car for prints—around the compartment lid there. I doubt if you’ll find any but mine. The person who’s responsible for this isn’t likely to trip up over anything as primary as fingerprints. Just the same, it’s high time he turned in at least one error. His batting average is way too high to last. Even a tight-wire walker takes a tumble once in awhile.”
I had just decided it was time I put my oar in when O’Halloran beat me to it, and with the same idea.
“Captain,” he said, “don’t you think this is all a little too obvious?”
Schafer scowled at him nervously as if the thought had crossed his mind and, though not acceptable, was still a nuisance, “I’ll ask you one,” he replied. “Why’d he slice her head off?”
“Well—” O’Halloran began uncertainly.
“It wasn’t to keep us from identifying her. He’d have ditched the clothes. Even cutting out the labels would have been lots simpler and a helluva lot less gruesome. I know the answer too—he’s off his chump. Not enough that he can duck the chair, but just nuts enough to keep a body in the wrong place. They do things like that.”
“I think you’re wrong there,” O’Halloran said. “And, crazy or not, I’ve got a hunch that if he committed a murder you wouldn’t find evidence by the bushel like this. You got enough exhibits here to outfit a complete crime museum. Besides, he wasn’t even on the show when the Major had his accident. Or are you figuring someone else for that?”
“No. He’ll do.”
I did come to bat then, indignantly. “He was with me in Albany 80 miles away Monday night. I told you that.”
“Yeah, I know,” Schafer said obstinately. “And the two of you were holed up all day working on some manuscript—so you say. You’re his only witness. That’s why you’re coming along to the station house, too.”
“Charged with what?” I asked, trying to make it sound confident and having to fake most of it.
“Nothing—yet. You’re being held as a material witness. There’ll be a charge quick enough—as soon as I get a confession. If you’d like to talk now, it’ll save a lot of wear and tear and maybe draw you a couple of years less. I can’t make any promises, but I’ll see what I can do. How about it?”
Before I could reply that in that case I guessed I’d have to take the full stretch, Merlini spoke. “Mind explaining how I removed the head with that sword when I was in the cookhouse all the time it was missing?”
“I been waiting for that,” Hooper snapped instantly. “You weren’t! You could’ve swiped the sword. That Swede left the side-show tent a few minutes ahead of you. Maybe you didn’t have time to use it, but that don’t mean a damn thing. You had already cut her up—with something else. You’re playing the sword for an alibi, but it limps like hell!” His voice rose, as he demanded, “What did you do with the head?”
Merlini’s poker face only increased the Chief’s irritation, and his calm, unruffled voice added still more fuel to the fire. “When you get your teeth into the seat of someone’s pants you hang on like grim death, don’t you, Hooper? Very commendable trait. But if I knew where the head was, I wouldn’t have a worry in the world. When you do find it, you really will have a case.”
“We’ve got one now,” Hooper growled. Then, noticing the crowd that was rapidly collecting around us, he stooped quickly and drew the cover over the body again. “Let’s take them in, Schafer,” he added. “This is no place to chew the fat.”
Schafer nodded and ordered, “Palmer, frisk Merlini and get his car key. Give it to the Chief. He’ll see to bringing in the body, and the other stuff and the car. Stevens—”
Merlini turned quickly and said, “O’Halloran, you had a story up your sleeve back there. I’d like to hear—”
“Forget it,” Schafer commanded sharply. “You’re under arrest if you didn’t know it. I’ll look after O’Halloran. He’s coming, too. I think he’s got more story than he gave me this afternoon, and I’m still checking his credentials. Get going, Palmer. Stevens, take Harte and come with O’Halloran in his car. Robbins, you go with them. Chief, have some of your men stick around here and keep an eye on this circus. It doesn’t move until I say so, and nobody with it leaves the lot.”
As Trooper Palmer started off with Merlini at his side, the latter did something that I think would have convinced the Chief and the Captain more than ever, had they heard it, that he was completely loco. He looked straight ahead at nothing and, as if talking to himself, said in a quick low voice:
“Cop a heap, Farmer, and case the can. I’ll light a rag!”
Palmer gave him a puzzled, apprehensive look. Then, as one of the flashlights sent its beam across the crowd that was moving back to let them pass, I saw the faintest ghost of a smile flicker briefly across Farmer’s lean face. Promptly, unobtrusively, he edged backward among the others and vanished.
I gathered that the maestro was not going to be caught short without a trick up his sleeve; this was obviously a bit of off-stage preparation. I decided that, once out of the Captain’s clutches, I had better query Columbia University as to whether their Romance Language Department offered a seminar in advanced Grifter’s Argot, and, if so, what the prerequisites were. Foreign languages have always been my bète noire (except for a few residual phrases like that one); but if Merlini was going to make a habit of consorting with underworld folk, it was obvious that I would have to go back and get more education. Cop a heap and case the can�
��I’ll light a rag might just as well have been idiomatic Sanskrit. It was nearly as clear as mud.
O’Halloran’s car was parked near by, and as we went toward it he whispered in a low voice, “You and Merlini may have to spend the night in jail, but I think I can spring you by morning. I’ve got some ideas about this case.”
“You know who the murderer is?”
“If you’d read the papers the last few days that might not bother you so much. He—”
“What are you two chewing the rag about?” Stevens, who had come up behind us, demanded heavily.
Neither O’Halloran nor I made any answer. O’Halloran got into his car behind the wheel and put his ignition key in the lock.
Stevens said, “No, you don’t, Mister. I’ll drive. Robbins, you take the other one in back, and keep your eyes peeled. If you ask me, these two look suspicious as hell.”
Under the circumstances our conversation from there on didn’t amount to much. I saw the Captain’s white patrol car swing in behind us as we left the lot.
We drew up a few minutes later on a quiet elm-shaded street before a brand-new jail, a hoosegow so neat and fresh that I looked down the street half-expecting to catch a glimpse of the masons as they left for home. Although the workmanlike solid construction of the walls and the heavily barred windows weren’t exactly inviting, I was reassured by the newness of the building because I had had visions of a jerk-water jail with hot and cold running rats in each cell.
Even the interior hadn’t yet attained the official coating of dust and grime which is standard decoration in jails, courtrooms and statehouses.
The Captain arrived a moment later, took over the Chief’s office and said, “You first, Towne.”
Merlini and I remained in an anteroom under the eyes of Troopers Palmer and Stevens and Officer Robbins. Palmer had removed the cuff from his wrist, and Merlini now wore them both. He was practicing his vanishing half-dollar trick and appeared pleased that he was still able to accomplish it though handcuffed. The law eyed him with more suspicion than ever. He vanished the half-dollar for keeps, twisted his arms about, and succeeded in reaching a back pocket from which he drew a deck of cards in a case.
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