The Black Lizard Big Book of Locked-Room Mysteries

by Otto Penzler

  AUTOPSY REVEALS ECCHYMOSIS AROUND WOUNDS AND TRACES FINGER PRESSURE STOP DOCTOR AND SELF PUZZLED POSSIBLE CAUSE STOP REQUEST YOUR ADVICE IMMEDIATELY

  “You answered?”

  He looked at me reproachfully. “It requires both great courage and great imagination to massage oneself to death. Why should the poor man have done that in vain? The insurance company has a capital of four hundred million …”

  THE BIRD IN THE HAND

  IN ADDITION TO HIS unprecedented popularity, it is numbers that are so impressive when considering Erle Stanley Gardner (1889–1970). He created the most famous lawyer in literature, Perry Mason, when he published The Case of the Velvet Claws on March 1, 1933. He went on to produce eighty Mason novels that, in all editions, sold more than three hundred million copies.

  The novels were the ultimate in formulaic genre fiction, with the defense attorney taking on the role of detective to prove his client innocent at trial, then turning to point a finger at the real culprit, who generally broke down and confessed. The television series based on the character, starring Raymond Burr, was enormously successful for nine years, running from September 21, 1957, to May 22, 1966, and has been available in reruns pretty much ever since.

  Before Perry Mason, however, there was Ken Corning, an equally hard-hitting, fearless, and incorruptible defense attorney, who made his debut in Black Mask magazine in November 1932. Had he been named Perry Mason, and his secretary named Della Street instead of Helen Vail, it would be impossible to tell the difference between the two. Gardner created numerous other series characters working on both sides of the law, the most famous being the Bertha Cool and Donald Lam stories written as A. A. Fair, Doug Selby in the D.A. novels, and the crook Lester Leith.

  Gardner began his lengthy writing career in the pulps in Breezy Stories in 1921, eventually producing hundreds of short stories, countless articles, more than a hundred novels, numerous nonfiction books on the law and, as a noted outdoorsman, on travel and environmental issues. At the time of his death, he was the bestselling writer in history.

  “The Bird in the Hand” was first published in the April 9, 1932, issue of Detective Fiction Weekly; it was first collected in The Amazing Adventures of Lester Leith (New York, Davis, 1980) and The Bird in the Hand (New York, Black, 1980).

  ERLE STANLEY GARDNER

  CHAPTER I

  The Missing Jewel Trunk

  LESTER LEITH surveyed his valet through a film of blue cigarette smoke. His thought-slitted eyes were brittle hard with interest.

  “Found him dead, eh, Scuttle?”

  The valet nodded his ponderous head in vehement affirmation.

  “Dead as a doornail, sir,” he said.

  Lester Leith’s eyes became speculative. He inhaled a deep drag of smoke which made the end of the cigarette glow like a coal in the half darkness beyond the floor lamp.

  There followed a silence, broken only by the crackling of the flames in the fireplace. The valet, poised on the balls of his feet, like a man about to strike a knockout blow, surveyed his master as a cat might stare at a mouse. And the flickering flames made little red reflections which danced in the staring eyes.

  But Leith’s eyes were focused upon the twisting spiral of cigarette smoke which eddied upward from the end of the cigarette.

  “Dead, eh?” he mused.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Murdered, of course, Scuttle?”

  The valet wet his thick lips with the tip of a nervous tongue.

  “Why do you say ‘of course’?” he asked.

  Lester Leith made a deprecatory gesture with the hand which held the cigarette, and the motion sent the blue smoke column tumbling about in wavy fragments of drifting haze.

  “According to your statement, the man was an international gem thief. He’d arrived on the boat with a big shipment of stolen gems, or there’s every reason to believe he had them.

  “The customs had a spy planted on the boat, a man who acted as room steward. He’d found out that a small steamer trunk, made along the lines of a miniature wardrobe trunk, had been cleverly designed with a false side that would slip out when one unscrewed the lock. And the smuggler evidently realized the steward had made the discovery, for he lured him down into a passage back of the baggage room, knocked him unconscious, bound and gagged him.

  “Then the smuggler landed, got his ingenious trunk through customs and went to the Palace Hotel. You tell me that the steward regained consciousness, managed to free himself and telephoned the police and the customs authorities. They rushed to the Palace Hotel and found their man dead. It’s a natural assumption that he had been murdered.”

  The valet nodded his head in oily and emphatic agreement.

  “Well, sir, whether it’s the natural assumption or not, the man was murdered. There was a knife driven right through his heart.”

  Lester Leith blew a contemplative smoke ring, watched it as it drifted upward and disintegrated.

  “Humph,” he said at last, “any sign of a struggle?”

  The valet’s voice lowered, as though he was about to impart a secret.

  “Now we’re coming to the strange part of it, sir. The man had been tied in a chair, bound hand and foot, and gagged, and then he’d been stabbed, straight through the heart.”

  Lester Leith’s eyes became level-lidded with concentration.

  “Yes?” he said, his voice like that of a chess player who is concentrating on the board, “and the trunk?”

  The spy’s voice became a dramatic whisper.

  “The trunk, sir—was gone!”

  And the last two words, coming at the end of an impressive pause, were hurled forth like a denunciation.

  Lester Leith’s eyes lost their look of glittering concentration, became lazy-lidded with mirth.

  “Come, come, Scuttle, there’s no need to be so dramatic about it. You’re like an amateur elocutionist at a charity entertainment, reciting ‘The Shooting of Dan McGrew.’ Of course the trunk was gone. Obviously, the man was murdered by some one who wanted the jewels.”

  The spy wagged his head solemnly.

  “No, sir, you don’t understand. The police were right on the man’s heels. He hadn’t been in the hotel fifteen minutes when the police arrived.”

  Lester Leith let his forehead crease in a frown of annoyance.

  “Well, what of it? Obviously, fifteen minutes was time enough for a murder. It should have been time enough for a robbery as well. Hang it, Scuttle, what’s the big idea? You’re as mysterious about this as an old hen with a choice morsel of gossip. Why the devil shouldn’t the trunk have gone?”

  The valet answered with the faintest touch of triumph in his voice.

  “Because, sir, every piece of baggage that’s checked in to the Palace Hotel is listed on their records, and there’s never a piece of baggage that goes out that isn’t checked against that list. They had too much trouble with baggage thieves and with guests who slipped their baggage out of the back door. So they installed a baggage checker.

  “Now that trunk of Cogley’s was distinctive. It was striped so it could be easily identified in customs. The baggage checker remembers it being taken into the hotel, and he’s positive it didn’t go out. And the bell boys and the freight elevator man are all certain it didn’t go out. The Palace Hotel is run on a system, and it’s easier to get money out of the safe than to get baggage out without a proper check!”

  Leith yawned.

  “Very possibly, Scuttle. The Palace Hotel has several hundred rooms. It’s obvious that the murderer simply took the trunk into a vacant room where he could work on it at his leisure.”

  The valet snorted.

  “You must think the police are fools, sir!” he exclaimed, and there was a trace of bitterness in his voice. “All of that was checked by the police. They realized that possibility within five minutes, and made a complete check of the place. It was done without any confusion or ostentation, of course, but it was done. A bell boy or a house detective or
a police officer, under one excuse or another entered every single room in the hotel within twenty minutes of the time the murder was discovered. What’s more, every nook and cranny of the hotel was searched.

  “And the trunk vanished. It simply evaporated into thin air. It went in, but it didn’t stay in. Yet it didn’t go out. There isn’t a single clew to the murderer, nor to the trunk!”

  And the spy smirked at Lester Leith with that exaltation shown on the face of a pupil when he asks a question which baffles the teacher.

  Lester Leith shrugged his shoulders.

  “Oh, well, there’s an explanation somewhere. Trunks don’t vanish into thin air, you know. But why bother me with it? I’m not interested.”

  “I know, but you’re always interested in unusual crimes.”

  “Was, Scuttle, was. Don’t say that I am. I admit that I formerly took a more or less academic interest in crimes. But that was before Sergeant Ackley got the idea I was beating the police to the solution of the crime and robbing the robber.”

  The valet’s voice was insinuating.

  “But this is such a very, very interesting crime, sir. After all, there’d be no harm in thinking out a theoretical solution, would there?”

  Lester Leith did not answer the question directly.

  “What other clews were there, Scuttle? How did the police decide that the murderer had entered?”

  “Up the fire escape and through the window.”

  “The fire escape?”

  “Yes, sir. The room was locked on the inside, the key was in the lock. The window opened on the fire escape and it had been jimmied. The marks of the jimmy showed plainly in the wood, and there were traces of prints on the fire escape, rubber heels.”

  Lester Leith blinked his eyes rapidly, twice.

  “Rubber heels!”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Lester Leith tossed away the stub of the cigarette, took out his cigarette case, absently abstracted another cigarette and tapped it upon the silver side of the container.

  “Funny that the murderer could have worked so quickly, and it’s strange that of all the rooms in the hotel the man would have secured one that opened on the fire escape. Of course, though, that solves the mystery of the trunk. The man took it down the fire escape with him—the murderer I mean.”

  Long before Lester Leith finished, the valet was wagging his head in negation.

  “No, sir, no, sir. If you’ll only take enough interest in the case to listen to me, I’ll explain it all. In the first place, it was the most natural thing in the world for Cogley to have a room which opened on the fire escape. The murderer had made all the arrangements. In the second place the missing trunk couldn’t possibly have gone through the window. The window is small, and the trunk, although smaller than the average wardrobe trunk, is, nevertheless, too big to …”

  Lester Leith, hitching himself to an upright position in the reclining chair where he had been lounging, interrupted his valet.

  “The murderer made arrangements for the room!”

  “Yes, sir. You see, a Mr. Frank Millsap telephoned the hotel and said that he wanted two rooms, that they had to be adjoining and on the fourth floor. He seemed quite familiar with the hotel and suggested rooms four hundred five and seven. He said the name of the party who would occupy four hundred and seven was Cogley.

  “Of course, it’s all apparent now. He wanted to get this man, Cogley, in a room which had the fire escape opening from it. But the request didn’t seem unusual then. When Cogley arrived from the boat and registered he was shown at once to the room. The clerk didn’t ask him about the reservation, he was so certain that …”

  Suddenly Lester Leith chuckled.

  “That would be the police theory,” he said.

  “That is the police theory,” said the spy with dignity.

  Lester Leith raised an eyebrow.

  “Indeed!” he muttered. “You seem remarkably well posted.”

  “I only read it in the newspaper!” said the spy hastily.

  “I see,” murmured Lester Leith, “and who was this Frank Millsap?”

  “Probably a fence, a man who deals in stolen jewels on a large scale.”

  CHAPTER II

  The Bloodhound of the Air

  Lester Leith lit the cigarette, inhaled deeply, then extinguished the match with a smoky breath and smiled. There was something indulgent about that smile.

  “The loot, Scuttle?”

  “There were at the very least five magnificent diamonds. The customs detective was certain of that. And then there were some odds and ends of miscellaneous thefts, amounting in all to rather a goodly sum, but the most valuable part of the loot consisted of the diamonds.”

  Leith nodded, a meditative, speculative nod.

  “Are you interested, sir?” asked the spy anxiously.

  Lester Leith sighed.

  “In spite of myself I’m becoming interested.”

  “Ah-h-h-h!” breathed the spy, and his tone contained the satisfaction of a salesman who has just secured the name of the customer on the dotted line.

  “Yes,” resumed Lester Leith, “I can almost think of a possible solution, Scuttle. That is, you understand, an academic solution. And I say ‘almost,’ because I am afraid to let my mind complete the thought and actually secure a solution.

  “This confounded Sergeant Ackley is so obsessed of the idea that I beat the police to the solution of crimes, simply by reading of them in the newspaper … bah! The overzealous, pigheaded boor!”

  Lester Leith took the cigarette from his mouth to snort his contempt, then added, scornfully:

  “As though a man could sit on the sidelines, read of crime in a newspaper and then beat the police to a solution, in spite of all the advantages the police have. If I were a policeman, Scuttle, I’d hang my head in shame if I were ever driven to make any such confession of incompetency.”

  The valet followed the conversational lead.

  “But you yourself have admitted that it’s sometimes possible for one to reach what you refer to as an ‘academic solution’ through a study of the newspaper reports of crime.”

  “Certainly,” acquiesced Lester Leith. “Many times the facts necessary to solve a crime are all in the hands of the police, and in the hands of the newspaper reporters. They simply don’t fit those facts together—don’t seem capable of fitting them together.

  “It’s like one of these jig-saw puzzles. There may be all the parts in one’s hands, but fitting each part so it dovetails with the corresponding part to make a complete picture is something else.

  “What I was commenting on, Scuttle, was the attitude of the police. I would be ashamed to admit such a degree of incompetency as the sergeant admits when he accuses me of doing what he thinks I have been doing.”

  The valet nodded, impatiently.

  “Yes, sir. But I’ve always admired your academic solutions immensely. And you can confide in me quite safely. I’d sooner lose my life than breathe a word of anything you say, sir—so, if you have any ideas about a solution—er—an academic solution of the present crime, sir, I should like to hear them.”

  Lester Leith yawned.

  “You’ve given me all the facts, Scuttle?”

  “Yes, sir. All the facts the newspapers have published.”

  “Let me see the papers.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The valet passed over the newspapers. Lester Leith read them through. His eyes were clouded with thought, his forehead furrowed in concentration.

  “So the police have been watching every one that checked out of the Palace Hotel since the crime, eh?”

  “Yes. That is, the police have felt that there might have been an inside accomplice, due to the disappearance of the trunk. If that were the case, it would undoubtedly be some transient guest, some one who checked into the hotel merely in order to help in the commission of the murder. And so they’ve been keeping an eye on those who checked out. Nothing offensive, but just a check-up t
o see who they are and what they do for a living.”

  Leith nodded again. His eyes were narrowed now.

  “Very interesting about the woman, Scuttle.”

  “What woman, sir?”

  “The kleptomaniac. Didn’t you read about her? The one who can’t remain away from department stores and who always tried to pick the pockets of gentlemen friends?”

  The valet moved his massive shoulders in a gesture of impatience.

  “Bah!” he exclaimed. “That’s just an ordinary case. She can’t be interested in this murder mystery. That’s what we’re interested in. That’s where the missing loot is!”

  Lester Leith raised sternly disapproving eyes.

  “Scuttle! Are you insinuating that you’d like to solve this murder case and find the missing loot?”

  “Just an academic solution,” muttered the spy.

  Lester Leith let his lips expand into a grin.

  “Well, if I were getting an academic solution, and, mind you, it would have to be academic, I’d get the kleptomaniac and a bloodhound-canary and after that there’d be nothing to it.”

  The spy blinked twice, as a man blinks who has received a heavy blow on the head, and hasn’t enough sense left to know exactly what has occurred.

  “A bloodhound-canary!” he said.

  Lester Leith nodded, casually.

  “In a big cage, Scuttle. And I should say that the cage should be kept covered with canvas or a very heavy twill.”

  The sigh of the police spy was much like a gasp.

  “And the kleptomaniac. Whatever would she have to do with a solution of the case?”

  Lester Leith arched his brows in well simulated surprise.

  “But she’s a thief!”

  “Well?” demanded the spy.

  “And,” proclaimed Lester Leith, “there’s an axiom to the effect that it takes a thief to catch a thief. And one can’t disregard axioms, Scuttle. You know that as well as I do—or should.”