There was a Crooked Man

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There was a Crooked Man Page 19

by George Worthing Yates


  “Look here, Mr. Bennett. Do you want to meet me at the corner of a Hundred-twenty-fifth and Broadway in twenty minutes?”

  “What shall I see there?”

  “You’ll see a lot. You’ll hear what the watchman’s been doing while you were away.”

  “In twenty minutes.”

  The taxi hissed and slithered, and Bauer cautioned the driver. Tussard stood on the corner, waiting for them. He directed the taxi. He had them put down at an undistinguished doorway, where he cheerfully bought a newspaper and put it in his pocket. He was pleased as Punch, and mysterious as the devil, and uncommunicative.

  He led Bennett and Bauer into a high, impersonal room, pungent and antiquated. Half a dozen men sat in it, smoking, talking, spitting, and teetering precariously on chairs with weak legs. The men grunted amiably at Tussard. They all resembled each other, and Tussard, remarkably. Over their heads, a bare electric bulb hung in a haze of smoke, and shed yellow light on a cluster of fly spots on the ceiling. The washy daylight at the window seemed inappropriate.

  “Sit down here, Mr. Bennett,” said Tussard. “That chair all right, sir? All right, let’s have him in, Joe.”

  Joe went out. Chairs scraped, and the men came to silent and unfriendly attention. Joe returned with a boy, whom he stood against the wall confronting the seated men. Joe softly slipped back to his own chair.

  The boy was slender, dark, Latin. He nervously brushed the faint mustache on his lip with a curved forefinger. He wore high fantastic trousers, bright blue braces, and a green silk shirt. His dark eyes were wide and mobile, frightened, cunning, almost hypnotized. Tussard growled, “What’s his name?”

  Joe pronounced slowly, “Johnnie Massopuso.”

  “All right, how about it, Johnnie.”

  The boy cleared his throat, decided upon at least a tentative nonchalance, laughed, and said loudly and boldly, “Don’t ask me. I don’t know what I’m here for.”

  “Where did you get that Chevrolet?”

  “What Chevrolet? Who got any Chewy? I didn’t see no Chewy.”

  “Where did you get that car?”

  Silence, exaggeratedly indignant.

  Tussard said, “All right. You know what murder means. You know what you get for a kill. All right, Johnnie. You had your chance.”

  Tussard had calculated perfectly. The eyes rolled. Johnnie dropped his voice to a childish whisper that seemed ludicrous. “We found it. I don’t know what was in it. How was we to know what was in it? Jesus, we didn’t do anything! “

  He was not profane; he was praying.

  “You took a good look at the stiff,” said Tussard.

  “I tell you. We didn’t do nothing. Honest.”

  “Left it in the car, huh?”

  “Sure.”

  “Who was with you?”

  “Nobody.”

  “Guy named Mike, wasn’t he?”

  “Sure. Mike Hapf. Ask him. He tells you the same thing.”

  Joe unostentatiously got up from his chair, buttoned his coat, went out of the room. The boy visibly reasoned out the departure; he watched everything, with rolling eyes.

  Tussard said, “All right, Johnnie. I’m talking to you. What was in that car?”

  Johnnie shied at the question, soaped his feet, looked desperately round the room.

  “Stiff, wasn’t it? A dead man?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who found it, you or Mike?”

  “Mike, he opened the back. I was driving. He says ‘come and look,’ and I comes and takes a look. We shut up the back. Mike says we got to dump it somewheres. I says let it alone.”

  “All right. Where did you pick up the car?”

  “It was—we found it.”

  “Maybe somebody gave you fifty bucks to find it, and dump it in the river? You were seen Wednesday night by the watchman on the pier at Hundred-eighty-fifth, and he scared you off from going out on the pier.”

  “We just found it. We was walking by and we just saw the key was in it.”

  “Where?”

  “Twenty-second near Sixth; north side of the street.”

  “What kind of car was it, again?”

  “Chevrolet coup’, a ‘34.”

  “Key in the lock. You got in?”

  “I got in. Then Mike got in.”

  “What time?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe quarter past eleven.”

  “Where did you go?”

  “Just went for a drive around. Maybe looks to see if we can pick up any girls.”

  “Where did you go?”

  “Up the Drive.”

  “Stop anywhere?”

  “We stopped by Grant’s Tomb, and Mike got out and opened up the back and he says to me, ‘Come and look,’ and I—”

  “What then?”

  “We was scared. We was going to take the car back, but we was scared. We was scared to get out and leave it, even. We was going to go out on the pier, but the watchman saw us. So we goes up along the railroad tracks and leaves it and climbs up to the Drive and goes home.”

  “What was in the back, Johnnie?”

  “A stiff.”

  “A young man?”

  “Old man, in his underwear, wrapped up in a couple blankets.”

  “Was the car in a light place or a dark place, when you found it?”

  “It was a dark place. I can show you.”

  “Don’t worry, you’re going to show me. What night was this, Johnnie, Tuesday night?”

  “No, it was Wednesday night, just after eleven...” Tussard, when he had finished, nodded to a man who had been taking down the results of the questioning in shorthand. They came to an unspoken understanding. Joe, who stood inside the door, took Johnnie away. Tussard led Bennett into the bare passage, with Bauer trailing them.

  “A coupé was stolen, Mr. Bennett, about ten after ten on Wednesday night, from West Seventeenth Street. The man who stole it fitted a key right on the spot. He dumped his key tools down a sewer on the corner, and we found them. He ran that coupé up to the south door of the Chelsac Theatre and left it there. He went inside. This is how I reconstruct it, you understand.

  “He came out with the body and put it in the back of the coupé. Maybe he didn’t have much time. Maybe he was clever enough to figure he’d let somebody else get rid of the body for him. Regular car thieves would have dumped the body in the river, but we had some luck. These kids were just going to strip the car and leave it. Our man left the key in the lock, so it would be stolen. It was.

  “The watchman is at the morgue. Our man left the car and the watchman up on Twenty-second and Sixth, took his chances, and went home, or anywhere. That’s all.”

  Bringing out his pipe, Bennett said, “Not quite all. Fingerprints?”

  “No. The owner, and these kids, but nobody else.”

  “Was your man seen by anybody?”

  “By a newsboy. Dark hat and a raincoat. No good at all.”

  “The advantage remains yours, however.”

  “How, sir?”

  “The murderer won’t know the watchman has been found, unless you tell him.”

  “I don’t mean to tell him, believe me.”

  “If he thinks he’s disposed of the watchman, Tussard, he may make some extraordinary errors. Hang himself, in fact. Quite a turn it will give him, when he learns you have the body of his second victim.”

  3.

  Leaning on his umbrella in the doorway, looking out into the rain and the wet street, Bennett waited for Bauer to come back with the taxi he had gone to find.

  “What do you think of it now, sir?”

  “Oh, delightful. Don’t you think?”

  “We’re beginning to find out a few things.”

  “What, Tussard?”

  “In case it should turn out to be blackmail, I happen to know that Levison draws money out, a thousand at a time, in cash. I know Suttro spent just forty-three dollars more this month than he did the same month last year. Outside of an engagement
ring, he never spent a thousand at one time in the whole last ten years. Box-worth throws money away all over the place, lends a couple hundred to every crook that comes along. Emma Whittacker is just half a jump ahead of the sheriff. Louis Holcomb applied for a loan of five thousand dollars, just a week ago. He didn’t get it.”

  “And Mr. Christien?”

  “That’s something I can’t talk about.”

  “Why, pray?”

  “The District Attorney’s office.”

  “Oh, come!”

  “Suttro had a pretty nasty fire over at his house. It started when the place was empty. It’s an old house, made over into a couple of flats, with Suttro downstairs, and the upstairs empty. No servants. He looks after himself, lives like a hermit; so many of these brainy guys do. We questioned the neighbors, but nobody saw anybody enter or leave the house before the fire broke out. In fact, the neighbors all thought the whole house was vacant. But they mind their own business pretty well in that part of Brooklyn. I’ll have a report from the Fire Department tomorrow, on how it started. By the way, Suttro hasn’t got a car, or a driver’s license.”

  “Really?”

  “Ann Crofts has got a driver’s license, and no car. Boxworth never drove a car in his life, or he’s an artistic liar. Levison had his license taken away from him, and now he has a chauffeur. Holcomb is a bug on outboard motor boats, but he hasn’t got a car or a driver’s license. Paula Christien has her own car and a driver’s license both.”

  “Amazing.”

  “It may sound funny to you, Mr. Bennett, but that’s what counts in the end. Detail.”

  “Is your man in Washington as productive?”

  “He’s got nothing for us yet, Mr. Bennett.”

  “Give it up, Tussard.”

  “Not yet, sir.”

  “Thousand to a hundred against him.”

  “You know, Mr. Bennett, when you got a wife and a family and a house to keep running, you can’t risk hundred dollar bills even on a sure thing.” Seeing Bennett ransacking his pockets, he said, “Here’s a match.”

  “Ah, thank you. Hope forgets. Hope is my natural son by a gypsy. Murder seems to bruise the human mind, and soften it, and make it unable to leave what’s well enough alone.”

  “Got your prejudice yet, sir?”

  “Yes.”

  “No, you have? Who is it this time?”

  “I shan’t tell you. Here’s Bauer with a cab. No, Tussard. My last expression of opinion, you may recall, was, as you say, not so hot. I can’t give you reasonable proof as yet.”

  “Everything kind of comes back to where you start, doesn’t it? Like that Whittacker list of names. No cripples on it.”

  “Quite. I say, thank you! And good day, Tussard.” Bennett stooped fastidiously into the cab, waved a glove, and drove off. Tussard opened his morning paper.

  4.

  Bauer opened the morning paper, folded it, and gave it to Bennett.

  “Want to look at this, sir?”

  “Thank you. About me? Yes.”

  He read:

  CHELSEA DENIES

  CHANGES PLANNED

  British Lord not

  To Rule Project

  Murder Supposed

  Crank’s Work

  The rest of the article was a perfunctory journalistic yawn, brief and unsurprising. Bennett shrugged and returned the paper to Bauer without comment.

  It was then, however, that he saw the beginning of the end.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  BENNETT made up his mind to his duty, and sighed, and sat to write a letter. He stared out through a rain-washed window at a gray and liquid city while he cudgeled his uneager wits. Gloom and restlessness worked on him, both from without and from within. He forced himself to pick up his pen:

  MY DEAR MISS CROFTS,

  I undertake this fatherly office with distaste. I shall not draw the matter out with reasons and causes, for they, such as they are, must be as ready to your mind as to my own. Forgive me, I pray you.

  It is imperative, I think, that you postpone your marriage until this unfortunate affair will be concluded. Your not inexplicable loyalty to Mr. Suttro may urge to put aside my advice. Indeed, I expect it to do so. However, his present marriage would prove a disservice to him, and to you. I hope you will think of the possible consequences.

  Be assured, Miss Crofts, of my lively sympathy, and permit me to remain

  Your admiring servant,

  BROGHVILLE.

  Far from pleased with this, he blotted, sealed and addressed it nevertheless, and sent it off to be delivered by a secretary’s hand. Then he smoked his pipe and paced the room. Smoking and pacing gave him no relief from his uneasiness. He asked how much time remained before he would be expected to appear as a planter of plum trees.

  “Fifty minutes, sir.”

  “News of Raymonds?”

  “None, sir.”

  “How disillusioned you seem! Your ten dollars, I suppose? Stay here, Hope. He may telephone. He may call. Keep him here, if you can.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “If he should be hanged, your hope of being repaid would be hanged with him, you know.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Other news?”

  “Miss Whittacker asked about a tea, sir. The Secretary of the League Club telephoned about your lunch with them, a Mr. Levison telephoned, a gentleman from the Civic Committee, a Mr. Heffinger, a Mr. Rounce—he asked if you smoked genuine Havana cigars, which he can supply at an attractive price, a Miss Driwell wished an appointment for a newspaper interview, and a fellow whose name I can’t pronounce, sir, wanted to know would you consent to speak over the wireless—”

  “Go away.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  2.

  Tussard telephoned shortly before Bennett left his hotel. The voice was brusque and faintly minatory. The conversation established two things; a certain forthright fairness in Tussard’s nature, and the advent of the worst.

  “I asked you once before, Mr. Bennett. Just how much are you tied up with Chelsea Project, sir? Just what connection have you got with that place?”

  “None.”

  “That’s what the papers say this morning.”

  “Quite.”

  “Am I being kidded along, Mr. Bennett? I want to know.”

  “Kidded? I’m sure I don’t know.”

  “Let’s get it straight. I’m not sore. I know it’s my own damn fault. If you say you got no connection with that place just because you want to keep it quiet, that’s one thing. But if you really haven’t got any connection, why—”

  “No connection, Tussard. None. Really.”

  Tussard said gently, “I told you a whole lot of stuff, Mr. Bennett. I could be broke,’for it, if anybody knew.”

  “I shan’t speak of it.” ‘

  “You got to trust some people in this world, I guess.”

  “Very sorry, Tussard.”

  “Oh, I’m not blaming you. Well, I guess that’s all...” The period of co-operation was closed, like a clam. Bennett regretted it.

  3.

  It was like a raw morning in mid-Atlantic, with a strong sea smell in the air. Masses of low, ragged cloud swept over the city. Steamy wisps of it twisted about Moore House, and hid the upper half of the twin towers from sight. In the streets below, pedestrians pushed about with surly preoccupation, blundering into each other’s umbrellas like earnest beetles.

  In the reception room of De Lancey College, Bennett fastidiously shook the rain from his umbrella. The rain had washed much starch out of his reception. Indeed, an affable gentleman greeted him, deprecated the weather, and supposed he’d rather not go out on the roof before it was absolutely necessary.

  “Just beginning now,” said the affable gentleman. “Ah. Beginning what?”

  “Singing the Star Spangled Banner.”

  “In the rain? Not comfortable, no. As for me? My dear chap, no, impossible. The gout.”

  “I always say,” said
the affable gentleman, now affably confidential, “that it takes a garden party to bring on a real rain. This is nothing. But you stay here, sir, where it’s dry and cozy, and I’ll come for you when you’re needed.”

  Bennett was left to amuse himself as well as he could with a copy of Punch, three stale and damp assistants at the celebration, and a view through the large double French window. Bennett had read the copy of Punch. The damp assistants seemed too tongue-tied and formal to be of use. The view was of a wet garden and a lot of wet people. When, after a few minutes of waiting, he saw Lowes Levison’s face appear at the far end of the room, Bennett almost cooed with inward relief.

  “See you a minute, sir?”

  “Yes. Of course.”

  “Let’s step out in the hall. It’s about a man named Mapes.”

  “Ah?”

  “He telephoned this morning.”

  Levison smoked a cigarette and marched up and down the passage with his head bowed. Bennett marched beside him.

  “Look here, sir. The man wants to make trouble for you. He seems to think he’s been handled roughly. You fired him, I understand. Anyhow, I was a little afraid to do anything before I spoke to you. What’s it all about?”

  “He was no use to me. I dismissed him. Merely that.”

  “Then he’s trying to get even with you for finding him out. He called me up twice this morning. I talked to him. He said he was given to understand he’d been hired by you to work on the case for the Chelsac Theatre Company. And that you were a responsible official. In other words, that you had misrepresented your position.”

  “Devilish cheek!”

  “He wanted us to swear out an action against you. Or he wanted us to pay him a bit of blackmail to shut him up. I think he was a little too fuddled this morning to make up his mind which he wanted.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  “I put him off. I wanted to see you, sir.”

  “Good. You see me. What do you suggest?”

  “I think you can send him to jail, if you want to take the trouble. A nasty bit of work, that Mapes. Or you can hand him from one to five thousand dollars and shut him up.”

 

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