by Craig Rice
“Miss Walker,” Dinah said, with great dignity. “Would you make perjurers out of us, for a little matter of fifteen minutes?”
Polly Walker looked at them, grinned, and said, “I wouldn’t dream of it.” The pale-gray convertible roared under her feet, and she said, “You kids better run along and mind your own business.”
The convertible raced down the road. April and Dinah stood looking after it for a moment.
“The nerve of her,” Dinah said at last, “calling us kids. She isn’t more than twenty herself.”
April sighed. “Whoever Cleve is,” she said dreamily, “I hope he’s worthy of her.”
They walked slowly back up the hill. “I feel,” April said thoughtfully, “as if we’d learned something very important, only we don’t know yet where to fit it in. Like Clark Cameron, in that book of Mother’s, where he found the man who kept buying parsley by the ton, and it turned out later the man was the murderer, only he didn’t know it at the time. He just knew that something—”
“Keep quiet,” Dinah said irritably. “I’m thinking.”
“Pardon me,” April said.
They took about twenty steps up the hill. Then suddenly Dinah said, “April! Where’s Archie?”
April looked at Dinah. She gulped. “He was right there,” she said in a faltering voice, “sitting on the curb.”
They ran up the hill to the Sanford villa. There wasn’t a sign of Archie, not anywhere.
“He’s gone home,” April said, unconvincingly.
Dinah yelled, “Archie! Arch-ee!” a couple of times, and got no response. She turned white. “April,” she said. “There couldn’t—I mean, nothing could have happened—”
“I don’t think so,” April said. She spotted a plain-clothes man parked at the stairway gate to the Sanford villa, and approached him amiably. “Have you seen anything of a dirty-faced little boy, with mussed-up hair, holes in the sleeves of his jersey, and his shoes untied?”
The plain-clothes man beamed and said, “Oh, him. Sure. He went up that way,” he jerked a thumb, “up the hill, a few minutes ago. Up to Luke’s for a malt. With Sergeant O’Hare.”
Dinah turned pink with rage, April turned white, and both of them turned speechless.
“Why?” the plain-clothes man asked pleasantly. “Is his mother looking for him?”
“No,” Dinah said. “But we are.” She muttered one word under her breath. Fortunately, the plain-clothes man didn’t hear it. The word was “Judas!”
Chapter Five
“Not the third degree, psychology,” Sergeant O’Hare was fond of saying. “That’s what gets ’em every time.” When he spotted Archie sitting alone, disconsolate and still raging, at the foot of the driveway, he decided to use a little psychology. After all, he reminded himself, he’d raised nine kids of his own. This ought to be a cinch.
“Hyah, bud,” he said agreeably. “Where’s your sisters?”
“Who cares?” Archie said gloomily, without looking up.
The sergeant pretended to be shocked. “Hey!” he said. “Is that any way to talk about such nice girls?”
“Nice girls!” Archie muttered. “Oh—shambles!” He looked up. “Y’know what?”
“No,” Sergeant O’Hare said. “What?”
“I hate girls!” Archie searched his mind for just the word he wanted. “I—I ab-dominate girls!”
“Imagine that!” Sergeant O’Hare said. “Tch-tch-tch!” He paused, and then said with extreme casualness, “I suppose if you should go anywhere, you’d have to tell them.”
“I wouldn’t tell them anything,” Archie said bitterly. “Even their own names, which they’re probably too dumb to remember.”
“Well, in that case,” Sergeant O’Hare said. “I was just about to stroll up to Luke’s for a malt, and I wondered if you’d care to join me, bud.”
Archie started to say, “Sure!” paused, and said, instead, “Well—”
He sat for a minute, thinking. Sergeant O’Hare was an enemy. On the other hand, he’d been thinking about strolling up to Luke’s for a malt. A malt at Luke’s cost twenty-five cents, without whipped cream, and not chocolate. A chocolate malt with whipped cream—
Archie stood up, thrust his hands into his pockets. “Okay, pal,” he said. “I’m your man.”
During the three-block walk to Luke’s, listening to Sergeant O’Hare’s stories, he began to revise his opinion of the policeman. Capturing nine bank robbers, single-handed! And, unarmed, invading a gangster hangout, where a machine gun was trained on every door and window. And the time two lions escaped from the zoo—
“Of course,” Sergeant O’Hare said, “to a policeman that’s simply in the line of duty. Besides, they weren’t very big lions.”
He told his stories modestly. Archie’s mouth began to hang open. Finally he said, “Hey. You know what? Did you ever catch a murderer?”
“Oh, sure,” Sergeant O’Hare said. “Almost every day. Just routine stuff.” He sounded a little bored. “Did I remember to tell you about the time I faced a wild man who’d escaped from the circus, and he was armed with poisoned arrows—”
Archie said, “Uh-uh. Did you?” He looked up at Sergeant O’Hare with worshipful awe. “Tell me, tell me, tell me.”
“I will,” the sergeant promised. “Give me time.” He slid onto a stool in front of the soda fountain and told Luke, “A double chocolate malt with whipped cream for my friend here, and give me a cup of coffee.”
Archie said, “Golly!” He felt a sudden qualm. Dinah loved double chocolate malts with whipped cream, and she wasn’t here. Then he remembered that he was mad at her.
“As we were saying,” Sergeant O’Hare went on, stirring his coffee, “we men understand each other. Now, girls—”
“Y’h, y’h,” Archie agreed. “Girls, they don’t know nothing.” He took a gulp of the malt. It didn’t taste as good as he’d expected. He said, “Well, g’wan. About the poisoned arrows.”
“Oh, them,” Sergeant O’Hare said. “It was like this. I found this man shot full of poisoned arrows. Naturally I had my first-aid kit with me. So what do you think I gave him?”
Archie took the straw from his mouth and said, “An anecdote?”
“You’re darned right,” Sergeant O’Hare said, pleased. “You and me, we’re buddies, yeah?”
“Yeah,” Archie said, resuming work with the straw.
“And buddies, they never keep secrets from each other.”
Archie performed the interesting feat of shaking his head without taking the straw from his mouth.
“Likewise,” the sergeant said, feeling on sure ground now, “likewise, buddies always tell each other the truth. Ain’t that right?”
Archie inhaled the last of the malt, with an unpleasantly burbling sound. He withdrew the straw and said, “Yup.”
“Say, maybe you can tell me something,” Sergeant O’Hare said. “About— Oh, wait, how about another malt?”
Archie gazed into the empty glass. He was having a little private argument with his conscience, which kept whispering “Traitor!” into his ear. On the other hand, he hated girls, and Sergeant O’Hare was a great man, a hero, and likewise his pal. And, a double-chocolate malt, with whipped cream—
“What time was it when you kids heard them shots?” the sergeant asked gently.
Archie played for time and said, innocently, “Huh?”
Sergeant O’Hare glanced at Archie, detected the pangs of conscience, and started out in a new direction. “Frankly, I don’t believe you know what time it was when you heard them shots.”
“Oh, no?” Archie said, challenged. “We do, too.”
“Well, your little sister don’t know, because she told me wrong.”
Archie puffed up a bit at that “little sister.”
“So I’d be willing to bet you don’t know, either,” the sergeant said.
“I bet I do,” Archie said indignantly. The inner voice that had been whispering “Traitor” retreated to
a far place in his brain. Here was his chance to show up April and Dinah, and to show off in front of his new friend. “I do too know.”
“Yeah?” the sergeant said skeptically. “When was it at?”
“It—” Archie paused and tried to get a last half drop up through the straw. The sergeant was sitting between him and the window and, beyond the sergeant’s massive elbow, Archie could see the street. Out on the sidewalk were Dinah and April, signaling to him frantically. Girls! He hated girls! Then April made a sign that meant family solidarity, and Dinah added one that he’d seen a hundred, a thousand times at the dinner table, that meant “Don’t talk.” The straw in the malt glass made a repulsive noise. Archie slid off the stool. He said, “It was ’zactly half-past four. Because April had just gone in to see if it was time for Dinah to put on the potatoes. G’by. I gotta go home now.”
“Four-thirty?” the sergeant said, half to himself, frowning. Then, “Hey, wait, pal. How about another malt?”
“No, thanks,” Archie said. “I know when I got enough.”
Dinah and April were waiting for him in the alley beside Luke’s. Dinah grabbed him by the arm. April hissed, “What did he want to know?”
“Ouch,” Archie said. He wiggled away. “He just wanted to know what time it was when we heard them shots. And I told him.”
“Archie!” April said.
“I told him it was half-past four. Because you’d gone to see if it was time to put on the potatoes. So there.”
Dinah and April looked at each other. “Oh, Archie!” April said. “You super-drooper!” She hugged him. Dinah hugged him from the other side, and planted a kiss on his cheek. Archie squealed and pulled himself loose.
“Hey,” he said. “Don’t do that! I’m a man now. I got a friend that’s a p’liceman.”
April looked toward Luke’s; her eyes narrowed. “A spy, you mean.” She looked at Dinah and said, “You and Archie go on home. I’ll fix him.”
Dinah said, “I hope!”
Archie protested indignantly. Dinah grabbed him and said, “Come on. Your friend that looks like a p’liceman is a spy, so there. And you know it.”
“Well,” Archie said. He did know it. “Oh, a’right,” he said. “I’ve been duped.”
April and Dinah giggled. “Archie,” Dinah said earnestly, “I’m going to take the money I’ve been saving for a compact and buy you the water-pistol you’ve been wanting. Now, come on home.” She looked at April and said, “Fix him good. But don’t forget, you’ve got to be home in time to wash the vegetables for dinner.”
April shuddered delicately and said, “Don’t talk about washing vegetables, at a time like this.”
She waited until she was sure Dinah and Archie were out of sight. Then she pushed up her hair, straightened the collar of her blouse, and strolled nonchalantly into Luke’s, where Sergeant O’Hare was looking unhappily into an empty cup that had once held coffee. She thought of all the things she’d planned to say to him, about spying scoundrels who took advantage of unsuspecting little boys. They were things of which Dinah—and maybe even Archie—would have approved. Then, looking at the disconsolate sergeant, she had a better idea. Besides, she didn’t know yet how much Archie had told him.
She slid onto the stool next to Sergeant O’Hare and said sadly to Luke, “I’d like to have a malt, but I’ve only got a nickel, so you’d better give me a coke.”
“Got no more cokes,” Luke said.
April sighed tragically. “O-kuk. A root beer, then.”
“I’ll look out in back,” Luke said. “Maybe I got a bottle of root beer.”
April sat still for five seconds. Then she turned her head casually, and her face brightened with pleased surprise. “Why, Sergeant O’Hare! Fancy meeting you here!”
Sergeant O’Hare looked at her and suppressed an impulse to turn her over his knee. He remembered, in time, about psychology. He beamed, and said, “Well, well, well! It’s the little lady!”
Luke came back and said, “Sorry, no root beer neither.”
“Oh, all right,” April said unhappily. “Just give me a glass of water.”
“Say,” Sergeant O’Hare said, as though the thought had just struck him. “How about having a malt, on me?”
April’s eyes widened. She looked surprised and delighted. “Oh, Captain O’Hare! That’s so nice of you!”
“Give the little lady a double-chocolate malt,” the policeman said purring. “With whipped cream. Double whipped cream.” He turned back to April and said, “I’m not a captain. Just a sergeant.”
“Oh,” April said. “You look like a captain.” She stared at him with wide-open innocent, admiring eyes. “I bet you’ve solved a lot of murder mysteries.”
“Well,” Sergeant O’Hare said modestly. “A few—” He wondered if he’d been mistaken in his first estimate of April Carstairs. She seemed like such a nice, well-behaved little girl. Intelligent, too.
“I wish you’d tell me about some of them,” April said breathlessly.
He told her about the nine bank robbers, the gangster hideout, the lions from the zoo, and the poisoned arrows. She looked at him, fascinated, all through the first malt, and halfway through the second. Then suddenly tears began to form in her eyes. “Please. Captain—I mean, Sergeant— O’Hare. I’ve got to ask your advice.”
“Why, sure,” O’Hare said. “Glad to. Any day.”
“I”—she gulped—“I know something about this murder. But I don’t dare tell anybody.”
Sergeant O’Hare stiffened. “Why not?”
“Because—” She sniffed, and began pawing for a hand kerchief. “Mother. I’ve never disobeyed her in my life. You don’t think a person should ever disobey their—I mean his or her—mother—do you? No matter what?”
“Of course not,” Sergeant O’Hare said.
“Well,” she said, “that’s why I want to ask your advice.” She looked around the narrow little drugstore to make sure no one was listening in. Luke was out in front, arguing with a customer over a magazine that hadn’t been saved. A man in a gray suit was dozing in the one booth. An old lady in a flowered hat was reading the patent-medicine labels on the shelves in back of the store.
“It’s like this,” April said. “Do you think a person who had important information that would benefit the police in a murder case ought to give that information to the police, even if that person’s mother had strictly forbidden the person to have anything to do with the murder case?”
“That’s rather a difficult problem,” Sergeant O’Hare said slowly, though he knew the answer he was going to give. “You wouldn’t want to disobey your mother. On the other hand, you wouldn’t want a murderer to run around loose.”
April shivered delicately. “Oh, no! But, you see—I wasn’t supposed to be over there, listening. I’d be in a lot of trouble if anyone knew I was there. It was just that Henderson—that’s Archie’s pet turtle—got loose, and I was chasing him. I didn’t mean to listen, really. I just couldn’t help hearing. Because she was so frightened, and he was talking so loud.”
“Yes?” Sergeant O’Hare said, controlling the excitement in his voice with an effort. “Who was frightened?”
“Why, Mrs. Sanford. Because he threatened—” April broke off and said, “I better finish my malt and get home. I’ve got to wash the vegetables.”
“There’s plenty of time,” Sergeant O’Hare said soothingly. “Finish your malt, and have another. On me.”
“Oh, thanks,” April said brightly. She remembered she had a one-malt limit. Still, this was a special case. She finished the malt in two gulps. The next malt arrived, double rich. April took a sip and looked at the rest of it with loathing.
“I wouldn’t have remembered it,” she said, “if he hadn’t threatened to kill her. Of course I didn’t know he really meant it. Oh, but no. I shouldn’t talk about it. Because Mother told us not to mix up in the trouble next door.”
“Well,” Sergeant O’Hare said, “I’ll tell you.
I’m your friend. You can confide in me, confidentially, if you know what I mean. I mean, I won’t tell anybody it was you told it to me.” He said solicitously, “Is there anything the matter with your malt?”
“Oh, no.” April said. “It’s swell.” She managed to swallow some more of it, and reminded herself that it was in a good cause.
“Go on,” the sergeant said gently. “It will be safe with me.
“It was like this,” April said. “Henderson—that’s the turtle—ate through his rope and got away. We were looking for him. There’s a little summerhouse over on the Sanford place and it had a lot of vines around it. I thought Henderson might have gone there, so I was looking there. Then I heard voices in the summerhouse, and I kept quiet because I knew Mrs. Sanford would be terribly cross if she found me over in her yard. I wasn’t really eavesdropping, honest I wasn’t.” She raised wide, moist eyes to the sergeant’s. “You know that, don’t you?”
“Why, sure, little lady,” Sergeant O’Hare said. “You wouldn’t intentionally eavesdrop on anybody.”
“Oh, thank you,” April said. She looked down at the floor and murmured, “Only maybe I hadn’t ought to tell anybody. Because he was threatening her. And I wouldn’t want to get anybody in trouble.” She flashed a wan smile at the sergeant. “Maybe we’d just better skip it.”
“Now, listen,” he said earnestly. “If this party is innocent, you want him to have a chance to clear himself, don’t you? And how is he going to clear himself, if the police don’t have all the facts?”
“Well,” April said. “Looking at it that way—”
Sergeant O’Hare felt triumphant, but he spoke softly. “What is this party’s name, or do you know?”
“Of course I know,” April said. She tried to think of a name, fast. The only one that entered her mind was a character from the stories Mother had written for them when they were very little. Persiflage Ashubatabul. That wouldn’t do. She said, hastily, “It was like this. They were talking about some letters. He said he didn’t have ten thousand dollars. She—I mean, Mrs. Sanford—laughed and said he’d better have. He said”—she squinted up her brow, as though trying to remember—“oh, yes. That before he’d pay her ten thousand dollars for a bunch of letters he’d written when he didn’t know his own mind, he’d see her—dead.”