Silent Are the Dead

by George Harmon Coxe

  Chapter Eleven: A MAN WITH A PAST

  THE ROUTINE BUSINESS that immediately follows the discovery of a murder was going on in the living-room, and Lieutenant Logan had left the details in the hands of the headquarters experts while he took Casey and Harry Nye to the kitchen so they would not be bothered. He had accepted Casey’s statement as to why he was looking for Perry Austin, but he was not at all satisfied with what Nye had to say.

  “You just happened to stop in, huh?”

  “That’s right, Lieutenant.”

  “Last night you said Endicott told you to stop and see him. This morning it was just coincidence?”

  Nye nodded. He was sitting in a chair he had tipped back against the wall, examining his fingernails.

  “When’d you see him last?” Logan went on.

  “A couple of nights ago, I guess it was,” Nye said. “At the Club Berkely.”

  “A good friend of yours, was he?”

  “Well, yes.” Nye caressed his mustache. “He knew a lot of good numbers.”

  “So do you.”

  Nye grinned. “We’d sometimes go out on dates together.”

  Logan opened a kitchen cabinet and took out a glass. While he drew a drink of water Casey, sitting there on the kitchen table, decided Logan was getting exactly nowhere with Harry Nye. As for himself Casey had a lot of things he intended to give out, but hot in front of the private detective. Somehow the conviction had taken root that Nye had come to Stanford Endicott’s office the night before to find out just what progress the police were making and he wondered if the same thing could be true now. Such a supposition presupposed that Nye had either committed the murders, or knew who had. Still—

  “We checked on you from eight-thirty till nine last night,” Logan was saying.

  “Does the alibi stand up?” Nye asked mildly.

  “For now it does. Where were you when Austin got his?”

  Nye grinned. “I don’t know. When did he get it?”

  Logan never batted an eye. He must have expected some such answer but Casey gave him credit for trying and for passing right on to the next question.

  “You want to give me a statement now or at headquarters?”

  “About what?”

  “Where you were after nine—until you went to bed.”

  “It’s okay with me any way you want it.”

  Logan went to the door and yelled down the hall. A sandy-haired fellow with glasses appeared, pulling a stenographer’s notebook from his pocket.

  “Nye’s going to make a statement, Mert,” Logan said. “Take it down—if you can find a place to sit. In the bedroom, maybe.” He nodded to Nye. “When you finish you can shove off. And if you should happen to remember why you happened to drop in here this morning, let me know.”

  Nye said okay and trailed out after the stenographer. Casey got up and shut the door.

  “He’s lying.”

  “What makes you think so?”

  ‘There’s a lot more to this than you know. I can’t give any reasons. It’s only a hunch but—” He broke off, cocked one brow at Logan. “How do you feel?”

  Logan scowled. “What’s that got to do with it?”

  “I’m going to fix you up good,” Casey said, and went on to tell about the picture he had taken the night before and how he had given it to Austin.

  A flush crept up Logan’s neck and a look of exasperation came over his face. “You held out on me, huh?”

  “I didn’t know if it would turn Out.”

  “Sure. Somebody swipes your plate case from our car so you sound off to me. Oh, no. You didn’t know any reason why anybody should take it. You couldn’t think why those two hoods should try to knock you off last night. You were going to play cagey and crack this all yourself. You were going to outsmart the whole damn Department.”

  Casey let him go until he ran out of breath. He was in the wrong and he knew it, and for once he was willing to accept Logan’s wrath without argument.

  “I told you how it was,” he said. “I got a quick shot of the guy in the sedan. I didn’t think it would be much. There wasn’t any point in telling you about it until I found out what I had. I told you I’d seen him, didn’t I?”

  “And didn’t know who he was,” Logan said.

  “I still don’t know.”

  “And when do I start believing you?”

  The lash of Logan’s anger began to stir Casey’s own resentment. “When you get damn good and ready,” he said. “I couldn’t have turned the picture over to you anyway, could I? I didn’t have it, did I?”

  “You could have told me Austin had it. We could have started looking for him.”

  The answer sobered Casey. There it was again. Maybe Austin would be alive if he could have been found in time. If Casey hadn’t given him the film holder in the first place— He tried to shake off that overwhelming feeling of guilt, to tell himself that no matter what had happened there was only one thing to be done now: find who killed Austin.

  “I’m not going to argue with you,” he said. “I didn’t give you the picture—”

  “Then what’re you telling me about it now for?”

  “To show you why he was killed.”

  “Oh.” Logan nodded, his tone edged. “Is that it? Well you know how it looks to us, don’t you? Austin was up in Endicott’s offices alone—when you were out chasing the killer. He’d snoop around, wouldn’t he? And suppose he found something that looked good to him. Suppose he went out later with the idea of picking up a little dough on the side?”

  Casey looked at him. His broad face was red now and his dark eyes were cold and disgusted. “I understand Navin’s building a new house,” he said quietly.

  Logan took a step forward and stopped, jaw tightening. Casey could have hurt him no more had he slugged him. Navin was attached to the vice squad. Navin was only a detective, but had a better car than Logan’s, and a better house. The inference was there and people who got around knew that such things happened. So did Logan. That’s why he was bitter about it, knowing that most men in the Department were as honest as himself. “That big mouth’ll get you in trouble some day,” he lipped.

  “Sure,” Casey said. “It don’t sound so good, does it? Okay. Then lay off Austin. He was no blackmailer. He was no pal of mine but he worked with me. He was a good camera.”

  Logan went over to the kitchen window and looked out. When he turned much of his wrath had evaporated. “Let’s start over,” he said. “You don’t have to throw that Navin business in my face. I don’t say Austin was a blackmailer, I’m only saying it was the only motive I had—until you finally come up with this picture story.”

  Casey leaned back and felt better. “I didn’t hold out because I was trying to outsmart you,” he said. “If it had come out, you’d have had it.”

  Logan nodded. “That must be it,” he said. “Somebody found out that Austin had that film holder.”

  “How did those two hoods get in on it? The killer couldn’t have known all this was going to happen. They must have already been in town.”

  “And the killer knew where to get in touch with them,” Logan said. “This thing is beginning to look like something.”

  Casey told about the call from Nat Garrison.

  “That guy is punchy,” Logan said.

  “It won’t stop him from taking pot shots at me. When’re you going to pick him up?”

  “We’ll get him. We need him. If he’s tellin’ the truth, if he left Endicott alive—and I don’t say he did, mind you—he may know plenty because that must mean the killer was already up there in that office.”

  A knock came on the door then and Sergeant Manahan entered. He had handkerchiefs spread on each palm. In one was the .32 Colt. “This ain’t the gun that killed Endicott,” he said.

  Logan nodded. “The other was a .38.”

  “And Austin had a permit for a .32 Colt. I don’t want to gum things up looking for the number on this until Len gets through, but this might be
Austin’s.”

  He put the gun down and spread the other handkerchief. It had two empty shells in it and the rouge-tipped cigarette Casey had seen. Both shells had been bent. Casey recognized the one he had stepped on; the other was practically flat.

  Logan grunted disdainfully. “Look at ’em,” he said. “A fine crew I’ve got. The only way they find clues is to step on ’em.”

  Manahan grinned. “I don’t know. We didn’t do ’em both. I found one on the desk.”

  Casey saw no point in saying he had stepped on it and put it there. He kept still, waiting for the reference to the cigarette butt. It came immediately.

  “There was a dame around,” Manahan said.

  Logan picked up the butt. “She could’ve been here any time.”

  “Len says there’s a woman’s prints on the desk. Looked like somebody’s been searching it.”

  Casey sighed but did not realize it until Logan looked at him. “What’s your trouble?”

  “I’m tired,” Casey said, and when Logan continued to Manahan, he realized he was again in the same spot he had been with Lyda Hoyt the night before.

  Ever since Logan had arrived he had been thinking about the girl whose picture he took. One reason he turned in more exclusive pictures than any other camera in town was because the police knew he played ball and trusted him because of this. They didn’t have to worry about him. They knew he was out to get pictures and not to solve cases. When he had information he passed it along for what it was worth.

  This co-operation paid dividends, and yet there were drawbacks; times when he would rather not have had any information whatsoever. It was like this now. He wanted to help Logan and yet he was deliberately withholding vital information. He had done this with Lyda Hoyt’s picture last night, and now he found himself doing the same thing again. The reason was clear, but he didn’t like to be in the middle this way. Experience had shown him that innocent people became involved in murders and that once involved it was not always easy to extricate themselves without a lot of unpleasant publicity.

  Logan was a cop. It was his job to pry into every bit of information that came his way. If he knew about Lyda Hoyt he’d have to question her; perhaps the D.A. would. It was the same with this girl. She knew something and Casey wanted to find out what it was. To tell Logan, to show the picture, would mean that the police would run her down. Some of the newspapers might get it. If she was a material witness, that was one thing, and she’d have to take the publicity that followed. But if she wasn’t, if she was just some friend of Austin’s—

  Casey made up his mind. Right or wrong he knew what he was going to do. Something about that girl impressed him. He liked her looks, the way she held herself. She wasn’t any tramp. He’d find out about her first. Then, if he had to, he’d go to Logan. Logan would steam all over again, but in the end it would be all right so long as the information helped the case.

  “Okay, Flash.” Logan was rising and moving toward the door. “We’ll pick up Garrison but—well, watch yourself until we do.”

  When Casey got back to the Express, he found Wade and O’Hearn talking about Austin and he sat down and gave them a brief account of what had happened.

  Casey ducked most of the questions they asked, pleading ignorance and telling them nothing about his own theory as to the motive behind the murder. He wanted to develop the picture of the girl he had surprised in Austin’s apartment, but he did not want an audience and he was glad when an assignment came for O’Hearn. To get rid of Wade, he gave him the second film holder he had exposed in the apartment, keeping the one with the picture of the girl.

  Wade disappeared in the darkroom corridor and Casey went over to Austin’s desk. He sat down, his brow creased and his stare remote. Finally he tried the desk drawers and found them locked; then something—stubbornness, an unwillingness to give up his search while any hope remained—drove him out of the studio and down the hall to the engraving-room where he borrowed a screwdriver.

  For a moment as he sat down at Austin’s desk again, he hesitated. He told himself this was a crazy idea, but he couldn’t convince himself. There was still a chance that Austin had returned to the studio last night and left the film holder Casey had entrusted to him in the desk. He wedged the screwdriver in between the lock and the frame of the desk and began to pry at the drawer. Seconds later he had it open.

  He glanced through it, looking for a film holder but finding only papers and bills and a few prints that were of no importance. He tried another drawer, released now by the forcing of the lock. He found some notebooks and stationery. In the deep drawer on the right, he found a steel box and took it out. It was perhaps a foot long, six inches wide, and three inches deep, and fashioned of heavy, enameled steel. Putting it aside until he had searched the remaining drawers, he came back to it, turning it over in his hand and thinking hard.

  This was the sort of thing a person would keep his private papers in—insurance policies, bonds, stock certificates—if he had any. He’d never put that film holder in there, Casey thought. Why should he?

  At that he experimented with the screwdriver for a few seconds, not trying very hard, feeling pretty guilty about what he was doing. It was with some relief that he decided the steel was too tough to be forced by a screwdriver, and he had put the box back in the lower drawer when the telephone jangled on his desk. He crossed to it, answered it.

  “Yes. This is Casey.… What? Yes … yes, sure. That’s great. I’ll be right over.”

  He slammed the telephone down, said, “Hah!” softly, and the worry unfolded temporarily from his brow. He looked round for his coat, grabbed it, and clamped on his hat; then he strode down the darkroom corridor, thrust his head around the corner, and yelled through the blackness of the developing cubicles. “Tom. Just got a call from the hospital. Finell’s come around. He wants to see me.”

  “Hey, wait!” Wade called.

  “Wait, hell!” Casey said. “Put those prints on my desk. I’ll probably be back in a half-hour.”

  Chapter Twelve: PICTURES, GOOD AND BAD

  FINELL WAS PROPPED UP on a pillow, his face strangely pale under the carroty mop of his hair that jutted out from the two-inch bandage on his head. His grin was quick and broad when Casey stamped into the room and stopped beside the bed.

  “Hyuh, boy.”

  “Hy, Flash.”

  “How’s the head?”

  “Okay. I think I could get up if they’d let me.”

  “You’re crazy.” Casey pulled up a chair and sat down, fanning out his coat. “Can you smoke?”

  Finell said he could and Casey lit a cigarette for him.

  “What happened? Who slugged you?”

  “I don’t know, Flash.” Finell’s grin fled. “I was just coming in—”

  “Didn’t you see the guy?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Okay,” Casey said. “You tell it.”

  “It was about twelve-fifteen, I think. Blaine sent me out on a fire and a fireman got hurt and I stuck around, that’s why I was so late. I came in and saw somebody bending over your desk.”

  “Oh.”

  Finell glanced at him, hesitated, then went on. “For just a second I thought it was you and then I knew it wasn’t because he wasn’t big enough. I may have said something. I’m not sure.” Finell spread his hands. “That’s all. The guy turned and then, wham! Out went the lights.”

  “In your head?”

  “Yeah. There must have been another one. I didn’t see him.”

  “The guy at the desk didn’t hit you?”

  “No. I was looking at him when it happened.”

  Casey got up, walked over to the door, came back and sat down. “We found you in the printing-room about fifteen or twenty minutes later, I guess. They must have dragged you in there out of the way. What did the guy look like? The one at the desk?”

  Finell glanced out the window. “I only got a glimpse of him when the ceiling fell on me but I think he was thin, abo
ut medium height. I think he had a dark hat on.” Finell looked distressed. “I can’t seem to remember anything else.”

  “Did he have a funny-looking nose?”

  Finell snapped his fingers. “Yes. Yes, sure he did.”

  “Like what?”

  “Kinda flat at the bottom and”—he paused and put his finger to the bridge of his nose—“up here it looked like a piece had been hammered out of it.”

  “You’ll do,” Casey said. “You got the eye, boy.” And then the soberness was on him again and he said, “I think we got him—and his pal, too.”

  Finell wanted details but Casey didn’t want to tire him unnecessarily and merely said the police had picked them up. He didn’t know what they were doing in the studio. A couple of prowlers probably, he said, but all the time things were adding up in his mind and he knew that the gunmen tied in with the rest of his theory. They had stolen his plate case, brought it back when the picture they wanted was missing. Finell had walked in on them while they were forcing open his desk. They’d found the picture of Lyda and taken it.

  “Did you see Perry Austin last night?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  Casey sat up. “When?”

  “Oh—about nine-thirty. He was there about a half-hour or so.”

  Casey digested this. He took a breath. He asked the next question quietly, as though he was afraid of it. “Did he say anything about a film holder of mine?”

  Finell grinned. “Sure.”

  Casey waited, holding his breath.

  “He gave it to me,” Finell said.

  “What?”

  Finell looked startled. “He told me I was to hang on to it. He told me I shouldn’t leave it around.”

  Casey swallowed. He tried to keep his voice steady and not get Finell all upset. “What’d you do with it?”

  “Put it in my pocket.”

  “What pocket?”

  “Of my topcoat. That one.” He nodded toward the gray raglan hanging on the rack in the corner. “He told me not to leave it—the film holder, I mean—so when I went out—”