by Otto Penzler
Church turned to Belmont. “You did. Diavolo threw his voice so that it seemed to come from the doorway just as you were about to put the necklace back in its case. You dropped it in your pocket instead!”
Belmont watched the Inspector narrowly. “You can’t prove that, Inspector.”
Don Diavolo smiled. “You’re doing better by the minute, Inspector. You’ve got that pretty straight except for the ventriloquism. Answer me this one. If I’m the Invisible Man, how did I get that stuff out of Ziegler’s shop when you had me guarded in the museum across the street?”
“Mr. Gates,” Church answered. “That was Collins doing another impersonation. The swag went out in his bag.”
“Right, Inspector. But who loaded the bag? Ziegler said he had Gates under his eye all the time.”
“Well—I … Dammit, have I got to study to be a magician in order to get you behind bars? I don’t know how you did it. It was another of your magic tricks. And when the D.A. handpicks a jury of men who have all seen your act, they won’t let a little thing like that keep them from putting you on the hot seat.”
“I suppose it was a conjuring trick that killed Sergeant Healy?” Don asked skeptically. “You’ve just seen the Invisibility apparatus in the next room. You ruined it with that shot of yours. You know it’s only an illusion. Pepper’s Ghost brought up to date with some scientific trimmings.6 Dr. Palgar’s Invisible Ray Projector, its shiny switches and weird violet light, is so much eyewash. Good showmanship, good advertising, but eyewash just the same. The illusion is all worked from the alcove.”
Don pointed to a machine nearby from which a large disk projected. “Static machine,” he said. “That furnished the sparks that jumped from my fingers when I touched the electrodes. Pressure on the right hand electrode makes the lights change which starts the illusion operating. But it’s still only an illusion. You can appear to fade into invisibility in that cabinet, but you can’t step out of it still in that condition.”
“But—but …” Church started to interrupt.
“Quiet, please,” Diavolo insisted. “The audience can ask the lecturer questions after class. There is an Invisible Man, but he’s a different sort than you expect.”
“Collins,” Church broke in. “He—”
Don raised his hand. “Inspector,” he threatened, “if you don’t pipe down, I’ll say a few magic words and vanish right now. And then you never will solve this case.”
Church hesitated, then said, “Okay, talk, but I won’t like it even if it’s good. You can hand out the damnedest line I ever—”
Don’s hand started a mystic pass and Church stopped abruptly, half afraid that perhaps the magician could make good on his threat to disappear.
“Glenn Collins,” Don said quickly, “needed a job. He got one. He played the part of the Italian who barged into Healy’s office just before he was shot. He was also Mr. Gates, Julian Dumont, and the Dr. Palgar that you’ve been trying to find. He didn’t know he was taking on a job that included murder, but when that’s what happened and when Glenn discovered that his employer had seen to it that his thumbprint was on the note left in your office, there wasn’t much he could do but go through with it. He was in a hell of a spot. That right, Belmont?”
The financier shook his head. “I’m not talking.”
“You will,” Diavolo predicted. “There was a fingerprint on the third note that the Invisible Man wrote, the one that was left at Ziegler’s shop. It was yours. Karl checked that. It matched a few prints you left on the check you gave me.”
Belmont’s face was dark. “Why that little—”
The noise of the shot that punctuated his sentence was loud in the small room. Belmont pitched forward on the floor, wounded only, but pretending death in order to avoid a second shot.
Church, Woody Haines, and two other detectives who had come in while Don was talking looked around hunting for the source of the shot. Their fingers itched on their triggers. And they saw nothing at which to aim.
Church said, “But—but that shot came from in here! It—”
“Yes,” Diavolo answered. “The Invisible Man is present. And it’s not me. If there’s any more shooting you can try that suitcase Belmont dropped. I—”
There was one more shot, but Church and the others did not reply to it. They were staring at the hole that appeared in the side of the suitcase and the slow trickle of blood that was oozing out.
After a moment Inspector Church crossed the room and opened the grip.
When he looked up, he had a dazed expression of comprehension on his face.
“Larry Keeler,” Don said, “is a dwarf. That gives him a headstart at invisibility. He’s also a magician—Wizzo, The World’s Smallest Prestidigitator. And that made the rest easy!”
Chapter XIV
Hocus Pocus
Inspector Church wasn’t too sure he was satisfied. He still eyed Don Diavolo with a jaundiced eye. It wasn’t until Glenn Collins had told his story that Church finally let Don and The Horseshoe Kid leave.
With Karl Hartz and Woody Haines, they sped in a taxi toward the Manhattan Music Hall.
“I took a look at the gun Glenn was going to knock us off with,” Horseshoe said. “It was loaded with blanks. He was trying to give us an out, after all.”
“Yes,” Don said. “He had to do it that way because Keeler was watching him from beyond the wall. There’s a peephole behind that illusion alcove. Driver”—Don leaned forward—“step on it, will you? Kaselmeyer is probably having kittens one right after the other. Litters and litters of them. I’ve got to stop helping Inspector Church and tend to some of my own knitting.”
“He’ll calm down after my story hits the papers,” Woody said. “Invisible Man Loses in Magician’s Duel! Kaselmeyer can paint himself a permanent S.R.O. sign in his lobby. But I want more details. Glenn Collins only hit the high spots before they popped him into the ambulance. Why did he barge into Healy’s office, impersonate an Italian, and hand out that line about thanking him for finding his daughter?”
“He had to say something,” Don answered. “He and Keeler had been following Healy. They’d just discovered that Healy, posing as a crook, had joined the gang the same way we did. They wanted to get him before he reported that he’d found Palgar’s machine and told about the use to which it was being put. They trailed him to his office trying to get a chance to jump him.
“Then they became desperate and used drastic measures. Glenn broke in on Healy excitedly, jumped across the office and shouted his thanks in Healy’s face so that Healy wouldn’t see Keeler sneaking in at the door behind Glenn. I’d guess that Larry crawled across the floor and when Glenn left, stayed hidden down below the level of the desk top. Glenn, as he just told Church, didn’t realize that Keeler was going to murder Healy. Keeler had said he was only going to hypnotize Healy and make him forget what he had seen.
“Glenn swallowed that one because he knew that Larry was a magician. He didn’t know that hypnotism won’t work on people who don’t want to be hypnotized—not the first time around anyway.
“Keeler then shot Healy and when he heard Church coming, locked the door so he’d have a moment’s time to cut the phone cord and to hide.”
“Hide?” Woody asked. “But I’ve been in Healy’s office. There isn’t any place—”
“You sure?” Don replied. “What is in it?”
“Desk, two chairs, a table, wastebasket, a single-drawer filing cabinet, a hall tree.”
“Where was the filing cabinet? A buck says it was on the table behind the door.”
Woody’s eyebrows went up under his hat. “Yeah. It is, but—”
“Keeler folded himself up in that,” Don said. “Left it open, maybe three inches or so, and when Church came in and was staring at the body, Keeler, behind him, reached out, gave the door a push and said, ‘See you later, Inspector.’ When Church whirled around all he saw was the door swinging to. And when he dashed out into the hall, Larry closed his filing
cabinet the rest of the way like a turtle drawing into its shell. Simple as that.”
“Oh yeah?” Woody said skeptically. “The filing cabinet wasn’t empty. It had letters and memos in it.”
“Larry could have taken them out, hid them in the wastebasket under some waste paper, and later, when he left, put them back.”
“Well—” Woody said doubtfully. Then he shook his head. “No. Too much is too much. Keeler may have been a dwarf, but he wasn’t a blooming midget. He was four feet tall and he weighed a good ninety pounds. No filing cabinet, even an empty—”
“Filing cabinets,” Karl Hartz cut in, “are mostly about 12×12×24. That’s 3456 cubic inches. I could almost squeeze into that space myself. It’s just a matter of knowing the proper way to fold up. I built a trick for Thurston once in which we got a five-foot-six assistant into a 14×14×24 box. The audience saw it all the time, but it looked way too small to hold a man and they didn’t give it a thought. They are still wondering where the man disappeared to. That was the whole secret of the trick. That guy weighed 137 pounds. That’s 3900 cubic inches of man fitting into 4704 cubic inches of space. He was a wee bit cramped, but after I taught him how to fold, he did it twice a day. Keeler, in the filing cabinet, would have even more space to spare than—”
“Haven’t you been around to see the new illusion in this week’s stage show?” Don Diavolo asked. “Thirty girls from a cabinet the audience thinks is only big enough to hold nine.”
Woody saw that Karl was making a diagram on the back of an envelope. “Okay,” he said quickly. “I give in. But no more mathematics and no diagrams please. I’ll take your word for it. You should know. So Half-pint stayed filed in the cabinet—under M, I suppose, for Monkeyshines and Magicians—until the room was clear. Then he hops out, leaves his first note about the Siva statue on the Inspector’s hat and scrams.
“How did he get out of headquarters? Every exit was covered. Why didn’t the cops notice an outsize little shrimp like him? They don’t have dwarfs running in and out of headquarters every day. They were looking for something odd. He was.”
“They didn’t see him,” Don replied, “because he did make himself invisible—or as close to it as possible. He was wearing a Western Union messenger’s uniform. I found it in the room back there just now. And Western Union boys do run in and out of headquarters every day. So much so, nobody ever notices them. They’re as good as invisible—like mailmen, doormen, milkmen, waiters, conductors—”
The Horseshoe Kid spoke up. “That explains how the Ziegler loot got into Gates’s suitcase. Collins, playing the Gates role, carried Larry into the shop in the suitcase. The threat to steal the Siva statue from the museum across the street was a low down trick to get everyone’s attention—especially that of Ziegler and his clerks—glued on the wrong spot.7
“Then Keeler pops out of the suitcase like a damned jack-in-the-box, cleans the safe and puts the loot in the grip. He was wearing his uniform. He hides behind the door. Ziegler and Gates return. Gates gets Ziegler’s attention again, and Keeler steps out from behind the door, pretending to have just come through it. He hands Gates a wire, and walks out. If the clerks outside notice him they don’t even think twice about it. It’s sorta neat.”
Don Diavolo leaned forward, lifted the taxi-driver’s cap, and took from under it a lighted cigarette. Then he growled in mock dismay. “I thought I was going to get asked to explain this case! I can’t get a word in edgewise! Maybe you know-it-alls can tell me why Keeler and Gates took the sort of stuff they did from Ziegler’s safe. Rare, priceless pieces of art, but a fence would give you more for old papers. Every single item was so well known it would have been as hot as six kinds of hell. And you can’t take a jade cup or a rare book apart to prevent identification as you can with a diamond necklace.”
“That’s easy,” Horseshoe replied. “You gave us that answer yourself, yesterday. You said that some collectors were so bats they’d buy stolen rarities, knowing they’d always have to keep them under cover. Belmont was that way. Great jumpin’ catamounts! Of course—he was the bird who’s behind the whole thing! He hired Keeler to swipe the stuff for him!”
“Yes,” Don said disgustedly. “And darned if I know why I bothered to figure it out with you masterminds on the job. Who solved this case anyway? Blast it!”
“I suppose you knew all along that Belmont was one of the niggers in the woodpile?” Woody gave Don an incredulous look.
“I did just as soon as that necklace vanished under our noses,” Don insisted. “Belmont was the only guy who could have taken it—and the only person Church didn’t search!”
Woody wasn’t listening. He snapped his fingers. “I’ve got it now. The reason for all this Invisibility business. It’s as transparent as—as—”
“As an Invisible Man!” Don suggested glumly. “Well what? Let me in on it. I can’t wait!”
“Ziegler,” Woody said, “had some things that Belmont wanted, but wouldn’t sell him. So Belmont propositioned Keeler—hired him to swipe them. Keeler agreed, but he had to have help. A sawed-off half-pint like him couldn’t head a gang of crooks. They’d have handed him an all day sucker and told him to climb back into his baby carriage.
“So he started by picking up Glenn who was down on his luck. Told him he had a job of acting, but didn’t tell him what it was all about. Glenn played the Dr. Palgar part first, and got some nice publicity through the auto show for the Invisibility Machine that Keeler cooked up from an old magic illusion he knew about.
“Then Glenn stepped out of the Palgar part and vanished with the machine. It hit the papers. Big mystery. That’s when Keeler recruited his gang. They thought they had an invisible man for a leader instead of a half-pint dwarf that they’d have laughed at. Psychology. The way he worked it, he put across the idea that he was visible only for a short time—during the meetings when he dished out orders.
“He worked behind Glenn’s skirts there too. The rest of the time he was invisible and, for all they knew, watching every move they made. They didn’t dare disobey any orders he gave out.”
“Inferiority complex,” Karl put in. “Larry’s lack of height has always kept him from getting top-drawer bookings as a magician. He’s always had a feeling that everyone laughs at him behind his back. He figured he’d have himself a quiet laugh at everyone else by outwitting all the cops in town, all the newspaper readers in the country, and make a monkey of the Great Diavolo to boot.”8
“And—” Don began, vainly, trying to put in his oar. But The Horseshoe Kid talked louder.
“That was the reason for the Great Necklace Robbery, then—to get the laugh on Don. But why did Belmont play along with him on that? Why’d Belmont swipe his own necklace? Don’t make sense to me.”
Don Diavolo shrugged. “How would I know? You boys are doing the explaining.”
They were, too. “I can give a guess,” Woody grinned. “Belmont figured Ziegler would suspect him. But if he too were a victim of the Invisible Man, it would be a nice fat red herring across the trail. But say—” He turned to Don. “Larry did put it over on you just a bit, you know. You’re the guy who sneaked the Invisible Man into Belmont’s place in your suitcase, hoping he’d get an eyeful of something that would tell you who the Invisible Man was!”
Don grinned. “That’s what he thought too. Belmont had intended to hide him in the house before the cops came; but when I suggested the suitcase stunt to Larry, he thought it was a swell joke on me. Trouble was, his joke backfired.
“It told me that he was The Invisible Man. A magician must never make a trick look too blamed impossible—his audience won’t believe it. That was Larry’s mistake. When we heard the voice and saw the door close. I knew Larry was the only person at Belmont’s who could possibly have worked it. He was planted smack outside the door! It was as obvious as the Empire State Building.
“He got out of the suitcase, listened to our conversation and, at the psychological moment, pushed the door open,
spoke his little piece and then pulled the door to with a length of black thread. He was probably standing in the suitcase again by then.
“As soon as the door slammed, he ducked down and when Church got there, the hall was empty. Swell trick—but too impossible—unless Keeler was the Invisible Man himself! And now, you guys are so all-fired smart, tell me this: why were some of the objects that the gang found in Ziegler’s safe exact duplicates of those that were taken from his store?”
“They what—?” Woody exclaimed. “I don’t get that.” The Horseshoe Kid and Karl both shook their heads.
“Gee thanks, fellows,” Diavolo said. “Nice of you to give me a chance. Ziegler was a collector like Belmont. He couldn’t bear to sell some of the rare art objects he bought. But he had to make expenses so he made duplicates. He sold those and kept the originals. When Belmont’s expert took a look at the Ziegler haul, Belmont discovered that some of the stuff was phony.
“So Larry got orders to have Glenn and the boys make a second try, at Ziegler’s apartment this time—and he had them do the job while the Inspector and I were out watching the little show at Belmont’s. More of Keeler’s magician’s misdirection. He was a good conjurer and he came within inches of being a first class criminal. Only, like a lot of amateur magicians and criminals, he put in a shade too much fancy work.”
“Whoa, there!” Woody exclaimed. “That doesn’t hold water. Forgers fake paintings, books, autographed letters and such, but not jade cups, rock crystal crosses and medieval enameled reliquaries. It’s too blamed much work and there are too many ways to get tripped up.”
“You forget who Ziegler was, Woody. The hot shot art expert. The guy whose business it was to know all the fine points of detecting forgeries. Collectors brought their things to him for an opinion. When he said they were authentic, that was the last word.