The Collection

by Fredric Brown

"That's Wheeler," Jack whispered. "It's the code tap. Cole couldn't possibly know it. Sit tight."

  I could hear him moving across the room in the darkness. I could see the streak of grayness as he cautiously lifted one side of the shade, then peered through the crack between shade and window. As quietly as he could, he raised up the shade and unlocked and raised the window.

  It was turning slightly gray outside, and a little light came from the street lamp a quarter of a block away. I could recognize the big body of Wheeler coming through the window. Wheeler, and not Alister Cole.

  I began breathing again. I got up out of the chair and went over to them. Wheeler was whispering.

  ". . . So don't put down the windows," he was saying. "I'll come in that way again."

  "I'll leave it up to Brian," Jack whispered back. "If he wants to take that chance. Meanwhile, you watch that window."

  He pulled me to one side then, away from the open window. "Listen," he said. "Wheeler saw somebody moving in back. He'd moved his car where he could watch part of the back yard. He got there in time to see a window going down. Alister Cole's inside the building. Wheeler's got an idea now, only it's got a risk to it. I'll leave it up to you. If you don't like it, he'll go out again and get help, and we'll sit tight here, as we were until help comes."

  "What's the idea?" I asked. If it wasn't too risky, I'd like it better than another vigil while Wheeler went for help.

  "Wheeler," Jack said, "thinks he should walk right out of the door into the hall and out the front door. He thinks Cole will hear that, and will think I'm leaving you. Wheeler will circle around the house and come in the window again. Cole should figure you're here alone and come in that hallway door--and both Wheeler and I will be here to take him. You won't be taking any risk unless by some chance he gets both of us. That isn't likely. We're two to one, and we'll be ready for him"

  I whispered back that it sounded good to me. He gripped my arm.

  "Go back to your chair then. That's as good a place as any."

  Groping my way back to the chair, I heard Jack and Wheeler whispering as they went toward the hallway door. They were leaving the window open and, since it was momentarily unguarded, I kept my eyes on it, ready to yell a warning if a figure appeared there. But none did.

  The hallway door opened and closed quickly, letting a momentary shaft of light into the room. I heard Jack back away from the door and Wheeler's footsteps going along the hallway. I heard the front door open and close, Wheeler's steps cross the porch.

  A moment later, there was the soft tap--tap-tap--tap on the upper pane of the open window, and then Wheeler's bulk came through it.

  Very, very quietly, he closed the window and locked it. He pulled down the shade. Then I heard the shuffle of his footsteps as he moved into position to the right of the door.

  I haven't any idea how long we waited after that. Probably five or ten minutes--but it seemed like hours. Then I heard, or thought I heard, the very faintest imaginable sound. It might have been the scrape of shoes on the carpet of the hall outside the door. But there wasn't any doubt about the next sound. It was the soft turning of the knob of the door. It turned and held. The door pushed open a crack, then a few inches. Light streamed over a slowly widening area.

  Then one thing Jack hadn't counted on happened. A hand reached in, between the door and the jamb, and flicked on the light switch. Dazzling light from the bulks in the ceiling almost blinded me. And it was in that blinding second that the door swung back wide and Alister Cole, knife in one hand and single-shot target pistol in the other, stood in the doorway. His eyes flashed around the room, taking in all three of us. But then his eyes centered on me and the target pistol lifted.

  Jack stepped in from the side and a blackjack was in his upraised hand. It swung down and there was a sound like someone makes thumping a melon. He and Wheeler caught Alister Cole, one from each side, and eased his way down to the carpet.

  Wheeler bent over him and got the gun and the knife first, then held his hand over Cole's heart.

  "He'll be all right," he said.

  He took a pair of handcuffs from his hip pocket, rolled Cole over and cuffed his hands together behind him. Then he straightened, picking up the gun he'd put down on the carpet while he worked on Cole.

  I'd stood up, my knees still shaking a little. My forehead felt as though it was beaded with cold sweat. The flashlight was gripped so tightly in my right hand that my fingers ached.

  I caught sight of Beautiful, again on the mantel, and she was standing up, her tail bushy and straight up, her fur back of the ears and along the back standing up in a ridge, her blue eyes blazing. "It's all right, Beautiful," I said to her soothingly. "All the excitement's over, and everything's--"

  I was walking toward the mantel, raising my hand to pet her, when Wheeler's excited voice stopped me.

  "Watch out," he yelled. "That cat's going to jump --"

  And I saw the muzzle of his gun raising and pointing at the Siamese cat.

  My right hand swung up with the flashlight and I leaped at Wheeler. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Jack stepping in as Wheeler ducked back. The corner of my eye caught the swing of his blackjack. . . .

  The overhead light was bright in my eyes when I opened them. I was lying flat on the bed and the first thing I saw was Beautiful, curled up on my chest looking at me. She was all right now, her fur sleek and her curled tail back to normal. Whatever else had happened, she was all right.

  I turned my head, and it hurt to turn it, but I saw that Jack was sitting beside the bed. The door was closed and Wheeler and Cole were gone.

  "What happened?" I asked.

  "You tried to kill Wheeler," Jack said. There was something peculiar about his voice, but his eyes met mine levelly.

  "Don't be silly," I said. "I was going to knock his arm down before he could shoot. He was crazy. He must have a phobia against cats."

  Jack shook his head. "You were going to kill him," he said. "You were going to kill him whether he shot or not."

  "Don't be silly." I tried to move my hands and found they were fastened behind me. I looked at Jack angrily. "What's wrong with you?"

  "Not with me, Brian," he said. "With you. I know--now--that it was really you who killed Dr. Roth tonight. Yes, I know you've got an alibi. But you did it just the same. You used Alister Cole as your instrument. My guess would be waking hypnosis."

  "I suppose I got him to try to kill me, too!" I said.

  "You told him he'd shoot over your head, and then run away. It was a compulsion so strong he tried it again tonight, even after he saw Wheeler and me ready to slug him if he tried. And he was aiming high again. How long have you been working on him?"

  "I don't know what you're talking about."

  "You do, Brian. You don't know it all, but you know this part of it. You found out that Cole had schizophrenic tendencies. You found out, probably while playing chess with him, that you could put him under waking hypnosis without his knowing it. And you worked on him. What kind of a fantasy did you build in him? What kind of a conspiracy, did you plant in his mind, Dr. Roth was leading against him?"

  "You're crazy."

  "No, you are, Brian. Crazy, but clever. And you know that what I've just told you just now is right. You also know I'll never be able to prove it. I admit that. But there's something else you don't know. I don't have to prove it."

  For the first time I felt a touch of fear. "What do you mean?" I asked.

  "You gave Cole his fantasies, but you don't know your own. You don't know that--under the pressure, possibly, of working too hard and studying too hard--your own mind cracked. You don't know that your million-dollar rat-killer is your fantasy. You don't believe me, now that I'm telling you that it is a fantasy. You'll never believe it. The paranoiac builds up an air-tight system of excuses and rationalization to support his insane delusions. You'll never believe me."

  I tried to sit up and couldn't. I realized then that it wasn't a matter of my arms being tie
d. Jack had put the strait jacket on me. "You're part of it, then," I said. "You're one of those in the plot against me."

  "Sure, sure. You know, Brian. I can guess what started it. Or rather what set it off, probably only a few days ago. It was when Dr. Roth killed your cat. That dream you told me about tonight-- the cat killing Dr. Roth. Your mind wouldn't accept the truth. Even your subconscious mind reversed the facts for the dream. I wonder what really happened. Possibly your cat killed a rat that was an important part of an experiment and, in anger, Dr. Roth--"

  "You're crazy," I shouted. "Crazy!"

  "And ever since, Brian, you've been talking to a cat that wasn't there. I thought you were kidding, at first. When I figured out the truth, I told Wheeler what I figured. When you gave us a clue where the cat was supposed to be, on the mantel, he raised his gun and pretended--"

  "Jack!" I begged him, to break off the silly things he was saying. "If you're going to help them railroad me, even if you're in on the plot--please get them to let me take Beautiful with me. Don't take her away too. Please!"

  Cars were driving up outside. I could feel the comforting weight and warmth of the cat sleeping on my chest.

  "Don't worry, Brian," Jack said quietly. "That cat'll go wherever you go. Nobody can take it away from you. Nobody."

  LISTEN TO THE MOCKING BIRD

  When the phone rang, Tim McCracken grabbed for it. Then he pulled back his hand and made himself count up to ten, slowly, before he lifted the receiver. Just because it was the first time the darned thing had let out a peep in a week, he didn't want whoever was calling to think he'd been sitting there waiting for the call.

  Sure, business was bad, but a guy had to bluff. Or did he? While he was counting to ten, McCracken let his eyes run around the well-furnished office that constituted his bluff. He wondered again if he hadn't been foolish to sink the profits from his first three cases into that layout.

  But those cases had come so easily and so quickly after he'd quit his job with the police department, and gone out on his own. They'd all come, though, when his office was a secondhand desk in a ramshackle building. And since then--

  Eight, nine, ten. He picked up the phone, and said:

  "Timothy McCracken Detective Agency. McCracken speaking."

  "About that rent, McCracken," came a gruff voice. "When you going to pay up?"

  "I explained about that yesterday, Mr.--Say, who is this? You're not Mr. Rogers."

  There was a baritone chuckle at the other end of the line.

  "Mack, you ought to be a detective, the way you catch on to things. This is Cap Zehnder. How're tricks? Never mind, you just told me."

  McCracken grunted disgustedly. "Cap, if I didn't used to work for you, I'd come over and slap your big ears down for that gag."

  "Keep your scanties on, Mack," said Zehnder. "That ain't why I called you. If you still think you're a private detective, I got a client for you. He asked for you by name, even. I didn't have to recommend you. Now what do you say?"

  "My God!" said McCracken. "Give quick! Where is he?"

  "In the jug, right here. Suspicion of murder. It says it heard of you and wants you to help it beat the rap."

  "It? What do you mean, it? You started out with a 'he.' "

  "Did I?" The captain chuckled. "My error. It's a mocking bird. And it crochets."

  "It what?"

  "I said crochets. For a hobby. But it's a mocking bird for a vocation. But, I'm not going to explain everything over the phone. If you want to make twelve bucks, come on over."

  McCracken gasped. "Twelve bucks? Listen, Cap, they didn't transfer you to the narcotic squad and put you testing samples, did they? What do you mean, twelve bucks?"

  "Okay, don't come then," Zehnder said stiffly. "That's all the money, in cash, he's got. But maybe you can blackmail him for more if you get him off. He'll have a salary check coming from the theatre, if they don't fire him."

  "But holy cow, Cap, I can't handle a murder investigation for a twelve buck advance. What's it about? Who'd he kill?"

  "Don't you read the papers? Story's in the Morning Blade. Of course, if you haven't got three cents--"

  "Okay, okay! Save your breath to cool your soup. I'll drop around and see what the guy looks like."

  "Fine, Mack. Listen, Jerold Bell's coming over to see him, too. I told him to stop by and pick you up. Thought I'd save you cab-fare or a walk."

  "Bell?" echoed McCracken. "Oh, the insurance guy.I remember him. Where's he figure in?"

  "He insured the ring," Zehnder explained. "It's in the papers. Buy one, and I'll refund your three cents." There was a click in the receiver.

  McCracken took his hat from the bottom drawer of his desk, and put it on his head. He'd wait for Bell in the lobby and read the newspaper meanwhile.

  He looked at his reflection in the mirror of the elevator and wondered if he'd been a triple-dyed sap to quit a paying job for a gamble on being his own boss. Six months ago, he'd been drawing down a paycheck every week, and no overhead to worry about. And this morning, he'd had a cup of coffee for breakfast, instead of the ham and eggs he usually ate.

  Twelve bucks would buy a lot of ham and eggs. He hoped Zehnder hadn't guessed how badly he needed that twelve bucks.

  The elderly walrus at the cigar counter was waiting on another customer, and McCracken fished up the contents of his pockets and looked at them. There was a folder of matches, three keys, and two pennies in cash, one of which was Canadian.

  He shoved his hand back into his pocket, as the walrus turned.

  "Morning Blade, George," said McCracken. He grinned engagingly. "Got a case today, George! So don't let the credit worry you. I'll be back in the money soon. Give me a pack of cigarettes, too."

  "That's fine, Mr. McCracken," said George. "But if you're working, how come you can't pay--"

  "Don't quibble, George. I'm going over now to pick up my retainer. I'll pay you this afternoon."

  The walrus looked at him darkly, and then passed the cigarettes across the counter. McCracken had meanwhile picked up the top newspaper from the pile alongside the cash register.

  The banner line read: "Italians Suffer New Reverses." That wouldn't be it. "President Vetoes --" No. But there was two-column head at one side halfway down the page. It read:

  SLIMJIM LEE MURDERED, ROBBED

  The walrus had followed the direction of his gaze. "Say, is that the case you're gonna work on, Mr. McCracken?" he asked, and there was respect in his tone of voice.

  McCracken's eyes caught the words "Mocking Bird" in the second paragraph. He nodded absently, continuing to read.

  "Golly," said the walrus. "Reckon whoever's hiring you has all kinds of dough, then. Slimjim used to be the biggest bookie in town. And the way he sometimes threw money around . . . You stick 'em for plenty, young feller."

  "Mmmm," said McCracken, and started to add that you couldn't throw money around the way Slimjim Lee had thrown it, and still have much left, and that the big-shot gambler was reputed to be broke. Anyway, he wasn't working for Slimjim's heirs, if any.

  Then he closed his mouth again. The way the walrus was looking at him awakened new possibilities.

  "Say, George," he said, "I'm short of cash until I get that retainer. Let me have a buck and put it on my account, will you?"

  "Sure, Mr. McCracken." The walrus rang up "No Sale" on the register and passed over a bill from the drawer. He made a notation on a slip of paper on the ledge.

  "Makes it eleven dollars and--no, twelve dollars even." McCracken winced slightly. "Thanks, George," he said, and moved a few steps away to lean against the wall, while he studied the article in the Blade. It was quite brief--understandable as the murder had been discovered only half an hour before deadline of the Blade's final edition.

  Slimjim Lee, whose real name was James Rogers Lee, had met his death probably between midnight and three A.M., although the body had not been discovered until four-thirty. Autopsy might determine the time of death more closely.


  His body had been found in the visiting parlor of a theatrical rooming house on Vermont Street. He had been killed, presumably, by a long slender needle called a crocheting needle in one part of the story and a knitting needle in another paragraph. It had been thrust into his heart.

  He was known to have been wearing, shortly prior to the murder, his famous ring with the huge solitaire diamond for which he was reputed to have paid six thousand dollars. His billfold was found empty. Undoubtedly, according to the police, robbery had been the motive, and the solitaire diamond the principal objective of the murderer.

  Mr. Lee, according to the newspaper article, had been a close friend of Perley Essington, who roomed at the house in question, and was a frequent visitor at the Vermont street address. Perley Essington was a vaudeville performer specializing in whistling and bird imitations, and he was billed as "The Mocking Bird" on the Bijou's current bill.

  Harry Lake, another vaudevillian and inmate of the rooming house, had seen Slimjim Lee enter the house at around midnight, and had assumed he was calling on Perley Essington.

  Another vaudevillian and roomer, one LaVarre LaRoque, a dancer, had discovered the body when she came in at four-thirty in the morning. She had opened the parlor door when she had noticed a crack of light under it.

  McCracken read the story for the third time, and was putting the paper in his pocket, when he saw Jerold Bell coming through the revolving door into the lobby.

  "Hi, Mack," Jerry greeted him. "Haven't seen you since you left the force. Have a quick one before we go see our fine feathered friend?"

  Over a Scotch-and-soda, McCracken asked:

  "You're in this because Continental insured the ring? How much was it really worth, Jerry?"

  "He paid four thousand for it," Bell said. "I doubt if it could be sold now for over two and a half. Openly, I mean. As stolen property, whoever has it will be lucky to get a thousand. It's insured, incidentally, for two thousand."

  McCracken nodded. "Cap Zehnder said you sold the policy. How come? I thought you handled only investigations for Continental."