Farrell wondered if Parr realized how truly extraordinary the transaction had been. The morning papers of course had not contained a word concerning the kidnapping. Farrell knew that despite Parr’s evident discomfort, that bland, pompous little man, whose bachelor of oratory diploma held a place of honor among his collection of framed dignities and degrees, would be a slippery customer. And seeing that Parr was itching to be alone with the peacock, Farrell lost no time in making himself a nuisance.
“Mr. Parr,” he began, giving an acceptable rendition of the orator’s formality, “I took the liberty of closely scrutinizing that unusual example of the silversmith’s art. Very closely scrutinizing it, I might say.”
He paused impressively, noted the increasing concern on his host’s pale features, he resumed, “And while I certainly can not lay claim to learning even remotely approaching your own, I was nevertheless convinced—”
The pauses were driving Parr’s consternation to the surface; therefore he indulged in an elaborate gesture, smiled engagingly.
“Convinced that this effigy has an unusual history. The inscription, ‘The work of the Slave of the Angel, Abdannar, emir of the faithful, may our Lord be well pleased with him,’ reminds me of a certain episode a number of years ago, while I was in Kurdistan. However, that which follows—”
Parr, having reached the end of his endurance, interrupted.
“Might I suggest, if you grasp my meaning, but what I intended to convey was that that inscription is figurative? One of those obscure Oriental plays on words. Exceedingly ambiguous, you understand—”
As Parr paused, not for dramatic effect, but to collect his wits, Farrell, convinced beyond all doubt that he was on the right trail, drove home.
“Right you are!” he declared in his usual decisive tone. “And a solution does tax one’s ingenuity. Otherwise, I would have delivered it last night. And now that I’m here, I want to know where you got this, and why it was necessary to have it carried to New Orleans by special courier. And why did it leave Mount Lalesh, in the Sinjar Hills?”
“I’m sure I don’t quite know what you mean,” replied Parr. His hand trembled, and his fingers played nervously with the severed cords of the cardboard box.
“I mean,” explained Farrell, “why did you smuggle it into the United States?”
Parr’s perceptibly protruding eyes evaded Farrell’s intent gaze.
“Where did you get it, and what’s behind it?” demanded Farrell as he planted his hands on Parr’s desk and leaned forward to fire his questions directly at the disconcerted scholar. “It’s none of my business, but I don’t think that you’re in any position to tell me so!”
“I bought it in Paris,” replied Parr. “From a dealer who insisted—”
“I understand,” countered Farrell with significant emphasis, and a nod of his head. “I’ve bought things myself from dealers who wanted the transaction kept confidential, only I took better precautions than you did. All right?”
“I picked up a XVI Century Persian manuscript,” continued Parr. “A most unusual document which referred to this very image. And by a happy chance I found the image itself, a week or so later—”
“Uh-huh. I got it,” said Farrell with an amiable smile.
“And in view of the unusual circumstances, I assure you, the dealer did not fully explain—it was necessary—”
“To smuggle it into this country and have it delivered by courier. Now open up and tell me the rest of it.” Farrell paused, then essayed a shot in the dark: “Or would you rather talk to Federal agents?”
Parr started. His pale face became white.
“There is absolutely nothing more to say, Mr. Farrell. I assure you nothing at all,” he replied in a low voice. “But may I ask what your interest might be?”
“You may. And if you remember something, later on, you might phone me and tell me about it, particularly when I tell you that this silver peacock ties you up with the murder of William Burnham!”
“Oh, I say, Mr. Farrell—” gasped Parr, and then stopped short.
But Farrell did not pause to await Parr’s regaining the power of speech.
“Let him simmer,” reflected Farrell as the door closed behind him. “Longer he thinks, the more he’ll cough up when I hear from him. And if he is messed up with the killing—well, we’ll see.”
He drove down Saint Charles Avenue.
“Better stop at the bank and ask Goodman to round up a hundred thousand in new bills, according to the peacock’s prescription. Humor ’em till I can open up with that pair of Brownings and let ’em smell hell!”
Farrell’s conference with a friend who occupied an inside desk at the First Trust was brief, and involved no more than a request to have the desired quantity and denomination at Farrell’s disposal. This done, he resumed his drive down town, toward police headquarters.
“Hi, there, Glenn,” greeted Healy as Farrell stepped into the office of the Chief of Detectives. “Been trying to get you all day. Now give me an earful about the red-headed girl. How’d you happen to get in on that job, and what’s it got to do with Burnham’s death? We’ve not found as much as a tire track of the car they kidnapped her in.”
Farrell briefly outlined the entry of the silver peacock.
“She checked out,” he concluded, “before I could make her stay. She was too rattle brained to think that the gang would chase her, as they’d naturally not know she’d left the peacock with me. And when I heard a car roaring by like the hammers of hell, just a few minutes later, and the brakes squealing like a locomotive whistle as they made the turn toward the L.&N., I knew business was picking up, so I started out. Could have been a bunch of merry drunks, but I had a hunch.”
“A hunch,” admitted Healy, “is better’n a lot of good sense. But where does the bird fit in? All I know so far is that she was some girl, or you’d told her to chase herself and her peacock. Musta been the kind you buy fur coats for—”
“Nuts!” countered Farrell. “Not that kind at all. Nice girl, and I’ll tell—”
“Pipe down, pipe down,” grumbled Healy. “I know she musta been a knockout, making you forget your hide and a hundred grand. I’m interested in peacocks, now.”
“All right,” agreed Farrell, “here you go: first, there are too many peacocks in the picture all at once. Second, the engraving on the peacock.”
He quoted the first line of the inscription.
“Without going into details, that peacock and as much of the inscription as I could translate, convinces me there is a crew of devil worshippers—”
“Eh, what’s that?” demanded Healy, removing his feet from his desk.
“Devil worshippers, John,” repeated Farrell. “A tribe called Yezidees. Hang out in Kurdistan, a district in Western Persia. They worship Satan, represent him as a peacock, and call him Malik Tawus.”
“Holy smoke!” exclaimed Healy. “Do you mean there’s a bunch of heathen rats of that kind runnin’ around town, worshippin’ Satan? And—” he added as an afterthought, “killing and blackmailing.”
“Looks a lot like it,” replied Farrell. “Understand this is just a hunch, and the case isn’t proved. But I’ve been in Kurdistan and I know ’em. They have a temple in the Sinjar Hills. They let me into it, although I couldn’t go beyond a certain point.”
Healy regarded Farrell askance.
“I’ve a notion to run you in as a dangerous and suspicious character,” he muttered, still trying to reconcile the fact that a rational man had associated with devil worshippers.
Farrell laughed.
“Don’t worry, John, I didn’t spend any time worshipping Old Nick, but I did learn a few things. For instance, that it’s even forbidden to pronounce the name of Satan—Shaytan—in their dialect. The penalty is death, then and there, for using the holy name. So they say Malik Tawus instead.”
“Well, where does Parr come in?” wondered Healy.
“Don’t know, exactly,” admitted Farrell. “He went straight up in the air when I blatted right out that I knew he’d smuggled the bird into the country, and that he was tying in pretty close with the murder of Burnham. The learned doctor is worried and plenty.”
“Hell!” scoffed Healy. “He may have smuggled some antiques, but he can’t be mixed up in murder.” Then as Farrell rose to leave, “And in the meanwhile, be watching your own hide.”
“That,” countered Farrell, pausing at the door, “is something I’m giving an uncommon amount of thought. I’ll be at the Howard Memorial this afternoon, getting a bit of dope on puzzling out the rest of that peacock inscription. And this evening you can get me at the Union Club, if anything turns up. Be seeing you!”
CHAPTER IV
Nuri Plays a Stack
That evening, not more than an hour after dinner, Farrell received a telephone call from Healy. In response to the urgent summons, Farrell went immediately to headquarters, where he found the chief of detectives impatiently awaiting his arrival.
“Take a ride with me,” he began as Farrell entered the office. “We’re going to make a pinch, right away!”
“The devil you say!” exclaimed Farrell, as he turned back toward the door, to follow Healy and two plainclothes men to the police department car that was waiting at the curbing. “Where do I come in on this show?”
“You seem pretty well posted on peacocks,” replied Healy as then, headed toward Canal Street. “And this kinda checks in with what you told me this afternoon.”
“Parr, you mean?” wondered Farrell. “Or—”
“Wait and see,” evaded Healy. “I know you’re all eaten up about that red-headed girl, but we’ve not got a thing in that quarter, so far.”
They left Canal Street and drove several blocks into the French Quarter, where they parked. Then they proceeded on foot toward Decatur Street, crossed, and picked their way through a series of alleys. They finally halted in the shadow of a warehouse which faced the River Café, a speak-easy that masqueraded as a soft drink parlor and lunch counter.
Several minutes later a laborer, drunken and mumbling, lurched past their point of observation.
“That’s Bronson,” whispered Healy. “That boy can stage a drunk in anything, starting with coveralls and working up to soup and fish, with a gold headed cane. He’ll cover the joint from the inside.”
The drunken Bronson had successfully passed the side door of the speak-easy. The doors were still swinging, although not as violently as at first, when a cab drew up at the main entrance.
“Look! By God, it’s working!” exclaimed Healy. “A Liberty cab! Just like they said.”
A small, slightly stooped man emerged from the cab. He carried a square cardboard box nestled in the crook of his left arm. After pausing a moment to peer nervously about him, he entered the speak-easy.
“Hillman Parr!” whispered Farrell.
“Right,” assented Healy. Then, to the plainclothes men, “Alcide, you and Johnson cover the side door. Farrell, you follow me. All right, get set.”
They shifted their holsters, and loosened their pistols. The two plain-clothes men were tense, and ready to charge. Healy’s broad red face was set and scowling. He lifted his hat, wiped his forehead, jammed his hat firmly down to his ears.
“Look out you don’t pop old man Parr,” cautioned Healy. “But don’t take any chances on anyone else. Pour it to ’em first and question—”
A crash of glass and a yell interrupted his remark. The quartet leaped from concealment and dashed across the narrow street. As they crashed through the swinging doors, they saw the no longer drunken Bronson covering three men with a pistol that wavered no more than the muzzle of a siege gun.
“Don’t shoot!” quavered Parr. But when Healy flashed his shield, Parr regained his courage.
“Gentlemen, this is an outrage,” he protested.
“Take those two birds away!” directed Healy, indicating Parr’s companions. And then, “Mr. Parr, I’d like to have you accompany us.”
“But I protest against this outrage!” exclaimed Parr. “These two men and I were meeting here on purely private business. I assure you—”
“Sorry. Mr. Parr,” replied Healy with courteous deference to the learned man’s substantial position in the city, “but we’ll need you as a material witness. Farrell, you and Mr. Parr take a cab and meet us at headquarters.”
“Okay,” assented Farrell. And before the collector could begin an address: “Mr. Parr, as far as I know, no Federal men are interested.”
Farrell smiled at Parr’s sigh of relief.
* * * *
The detectives had departed with their prisoners and were escorting them toward Chartres Street, where the squad car was parked. Farrell and Parr were waiting at the curbing near the side door of the speakeasy.
“Come to think of it,” remarked Farrell as he looked down the dark, narrow street, “there aren’t many cabs cruising along here. Maybe I’d better phone for one.”
Farrell stepped back into the speak-easy and glanced about him.
“That little guy left his package lying here in the mix-up,” said the proprietor, as Farrell stepped toward the phone booth.
Farrell picked up the parcel and tucked it under his arm.
“Parr must be up in the air, forgetting that precious bird,” he said to himself as he dropped a nickel into the coin box. “Main 7400—”
But the call was not completed. Farrell heard a suddenly stifled cry of alarm, then an agonized groan, and gasping. He drew his pistol, and dashed from the telephone booth toward the side entrance. Parr lay on the paving, groaning and clutching at his chest.
“Call an ambulance!” Farrell shouted as the proprietor, following him, stopped short as he saw the body lying on the paving. Farrell fired at the figure he saw disappearing into an entrance several doors down the dark side street.
As Farrell reached the entrance into which the fugitive had vanished, he heard a door slam and a latch click in the darkness. The assassin had blocked pursuit. Moreover. Parr’s remarks, if he could make any, would be worth more than anything that could be expected of blundering into the darkness. Farrell accordingly retraced his steps.
Parr’s pale face was grayish, and the bland, suave features were drawn with pain. A red foam flecked his lips.
“Do you know who stabbed you?” began Farrell as he knelt beside the dying man.
“Nuri…that peacock…”
The rest of his speech was unintelligible.
“Nuri?” repeated Farrell. “That his name? Nuri?”
Parr was incapable of speech; but he made a successful effort to nod.
“And curtains!” said Farrell a moment later. “Dead as Julius Caesar.”
Farrell stepped back into the speak-easy. The cardboard box was still lying where he had dropped it in his haste to run to the attack on the sidewalk. He seized the box, hefted it and noted that it was not empty.
“Phone police headquarters,” Farrell directed.
The proprietor complied. Farrell, pistol drawn, stood guard by the body, wondering when or if a hit and run assassin would emerge from the shadows to make a clean sweep.
* * * *
A squad car arrived before the ambulance. Two patrolmen were left to watch the body. Farrell accompanied the corporal back to headquarters, and went directly to Healy’s office.
“Give me the low-down,” began Healy as they took seats at his desk. “Every detail as closely as you can remember.” Farrell complied.
“And now,” resumed Healy, at the end of the recital, “give me your guesses. All of ’em. I don’t care how wild they are. Now what was the name Parr pronounced before he croaked?”
“Nuri.”
“Huh! Don’t make much sense,” remarked Healy.
“Man’s name in Arabic,” countered Farrell.
“More of those damned Turks!” interpolated Healy. “All right?”
“Parr was stabbed in the chest, so he had a chance to recognize his assailant. And he named him,” continued Farrell. “The box contained the peacock. I peeped on my way up here; and here’s the bird, on your desk.
“Either Nuri struck before he noticed that Parr didn’t have the box, or else he didn’t want the box. If it was just the box he wanted, he could have nailed Parr later, instead of striking right under our noses.
“We do know that two men did want the peacock, and met Parr to pick it up. You’ve got them. Somebody else—Nuri—wanted Parr’s hide, and he got it. Now dope it out.”
Healy glared at the silver bird on his desk.
“That damned hoodoo! I thought your line about devil worshippers was pure hooey, but if the devil isn’t messed up in this, I’m a monkey’s uncle!”
“Who tipped you off to make that raid?” asked Farrell.
“Anonymous. Couldn’t trace it. Said Parr was being shaken down by the same outfit that got Burnham. And—”
The entrance of a clerk cut further discussion of the call.
“Look at what we found in Parr’s inside coat pocket,” he said as he laid a sheet of paper on the desk.
“Hell’s bells!” exclaimed Healy, as he recognized the familiar red wax and its sinister signet. “That anonymous caller sure knew what he was talking about.” It was a short note:
Take the peacock to the River Café on Decatur Street at 8:30 and give it to Gordon and Rubenstein. Do not go in your own car but call a Liberty cab. Do not notify the police. Obey orders or follow Burnham.
“Boy, this is hot! We got ’em now—Rubenstein and Gordon are the guys we pinched. Nothin’ to do but hang ’em for knifing Burnham!” Healy shifted his cigar stump, leaned back in his chair, and beamed with satisfaction. Farrell, however, did not share his enthusiasm.
“Maybe, and maybe not,” he objected. “There’s still something fishy about this.”
E. Hoffmann Price's Pierre d'Artois: Occult Detective & Associates Page 38