Classic American Crime Fiction of the 1920s

by Leslie S. Klinger

  The Inspector nodded. “Thank you very much, Mr. Peale. That’s exactly what I wanted to know . . . Incidentally, let me apologize for having kept you people crowded back here in this fashion. We were quite busy and had no time to make other arrangements. You and the rest of the cast are at liberty to go backstage now. Of course, make no effort to leave the theatre until you are notified.”

  “I understand completely, Inspector. Happy to have been able to help.” Peale bowed and retreated to the rear of the theatre.

  The Inspector leaned against the nearest seat, absorbed in thought. Ellery, at his side, was absently polishing the lenses of his pince-nez. Father motioned significantly to son.

  “Well, Ellery?” Queen asked in a low voice.

  “Elementary, my dear Watson,”36 murmured Ellery. “Our respected victim was last seen alive at 9:25, and he was found dead at approximately 9:55. Problem: What happened between times? Sounds ludicrously simple.”

  “You don’t say?” muttered Queen. “Piggott!”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Is that the usherette? Let’s get some action.”

  Piggott released the arm of the young woman standing at his side. She was a pert and painted lady with even white teeth and a ghastly smile. She minced forward and regarded the Inspector brazenly.

  “Are you the regular usherette on this aisle, Miss—?” asked the Inspector briskly.

  “O’Connell, Madge O’Connell. Yes, I am!”

  The Inspector took her arm gently. “I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to be as brave as you are impertinent, my dear,” he said. “Step over here for a moment.” The girl’s face was deathly white as they paused at the LL row. “Pardon me a moment, Doc. Mind if we interrupt your work?”

  Dr. Prouty looked up with an abstracted scowl. “No, go right ahead, Inspector. I’m nearly through.” He stood up and moved aside, biting the cigar between his teeth.

  Queen watched the girl’s face as she stooped over the dead man’s body. She drew her breath in sharply.

  “Do you remember ushering this man to his seat to-night, Miss O’Connell?”

  The girl hesitated. “Seems like I do. But I was very busy to-night, as usual, and I must have ushered two hundred people all told. So I couldn’t say positively.”

  “Do you recall whether these seats which are empty now”—he indicated the seven vacant chairs—“were unoccupied all during the first and second acts?”

  “Well . . . I do seem to remember noticing them that way as I walked up and down the aisle. . . . No, sir. I don’t think anybody sat in those seats all night.”

  “Did anyone walk up or down this aisle during the second act, Miss O’Connell? Think hard, now; it’s important that you answer correctly.”

  The girl hesitated once more, flashing bold eyes at the impassive face of the Inspector. “No—I didn’t see anybody walk up or down the aisle.” She quickly added, “I couldn’t tell you much. I don’t know a thing about this business. I’m a hard-working girl, and I—”

  “Yes, yes, my dear, we understand that. Now—where do you generally stand when you’re not ushering people to their seats?”

  The girl pointed to the head of the aisle.

  “Were you there all during the second act, Miss O’Connell?” asked the Inspector softly.

  The girl moistened her lips before she spoke. “Well—yes, I was. But, honest, I didn’t see anything out of the way all night.”

  “Very well.” Queen’s voice was mild. “That’s all.” She turned away with quick, light steps.

  There was a stir behind the group. Queen wheeled to confront Dr. Prouty, who had risen to his feet and was closing his bag. He was whistling dolefully.

  “Well, Doc—I see you’re through. What’s the verdict?” asked Queen.

  “It’s short and snappy, Inspector. Man died about two hours ago. Cause of death puzzled me for a while but it’s pretty well settled in my mind as poison. The signs all point to some form of alcoholic poisoning—you’ve probably noticed the sallow blue color of the skin. Did you smell his breath? Sweetest odor of bum booze I ever had the pleasure of inhaling. He must have been drunk as a lord. At the same time, it couldn’t have been ordinary alcoholic poisoning—he wouldn’t have dropped off so fast. That’s all I can tell you right now,” He paused, buttoning his coat.

  Queen took Field’s kerchief-wrapped flask from his pocket and handed it to Dr. Prouty. “This is the dead man’s flask, Doc. Suppose you analyze the contents for me. Before you handle it, though, let Jimmy down at the laboratory look it over for fingerprints. And—but wait a minute.” The Inspector peered about and picked up the half-empty ginger-ale bottle where it stood in a corner of the carpet. “You can analyze this ginger ale for me, too, Doc,” he added.

  The Assistant Medical Examiner, after stowing the flask and bottle into his bag, tenderly adjusted the hat on his head.

  ‘“Well, I’ll be going, Inspector,” he drawled. “I’ll have a fuller report for you when I’ve performed the autopsy. Ought to give you something to work on. Incidentally, the morgue-wagon must be outside—I ’phoned for one on my way down. So long.” He yawned and slouched away.

  As Dr. Prouty disappeared, two white-garbed orderlies hurried across the carpet, bearing a stretcher between them. At a sign from Queen they lifted the inert body, deposited it on the stretcher, covered it with a blanket and hustled out. The detectives and policemen around the door watched with relief as the grisly burden was borne away—the main work of the evening for them was almost over. The audience—rustling, shifting, coughing, murmuring—twisted about with a renewal of interest as the body was unceremoniously carted off.

  Queen had just turned to Ellery with a weary sigh when from the extreme right-hand side of the theatre came an ominous commotion. People everywhere popped out of their seats, staring while policemen shouted for quiet. Queen spoke rapidly to a uniformed officer nearby. Ellery slipped to one side, eyes gleaming. The disturbance came nearer by jerky degrees. Two policemen appeared hauling a struggling figure between them. They dragged their capture to the head of the left aisle and hustled the man to his feet, holding him up by main force.

  The man was short and ratlike. He wore cheap store-clothes of a sombre cut. On his head was a black hat of the kind sometimes worn by country dominies.37 His mouth writhed in an ugly manner; imprecations issued from it venomously. As he caught the eye of the Inspector fixed upon him, however, he ceased struggling and went limp at once.

  “Found this man tryin’ to sneak out the alley door on the other side of the buildin’, Inspector,” panted one of the bluecoats, shaking the captive roughly.

  The Inspector chuckled, took his brown snuff-box from his pocket, inhaled, sneezed his habitual joyful sneeze, and beamed upon the silent cowering man between the two officers.

  “Well, well, Parson,” he said genially. “Mighty nice of you to tum up so conveniently!”

  31.The proverbial tale of the butcher who looked for his knife when he had it in his mouth was first recorded in England in 1639, though it undoubtedly predates that record. The English statesman John Selden (1584–1654) said, “We look after religion as the butcher did after his knife, when he had it in his mouth.” However, Ellery’s point here is obscure—as will be seen, as of this moment, he had not yet formulated a theory of who committed the crime.

  32.Canada Dry manufactured a product called Sparkling Orangeade that was widely distributed in the 1920s. The business, owned by the John J. McLaughlin family, was sold to a public company in 1923. However, Canada Dry also marketed ginger ale and other products, so it is an unlikely candidate for the purveyor in question. Orange Crush® was the orange-flavored soda produced by a California-based company that also achieved success in the 1920s, and, offering no other beverages, it is not unlikely that the distributor would have insisted on orangeade being sold exclusively.

  1920s Orange Crush advertisemen.

  33.Ginger ale, orangeade, and tonic water were popular means of
covering up the flavor of the poorly-made liquors of the Prohibition era.

  34.The manufacturer is untraceable today.

  35.Hermes, an Olympian god of the Greeks, was the messenger of the gods—Ellery alludes to Jess’s role as the delivery boy.

  36.As noted above, Lee and Dannay were great fans of Sherlock Holmes—devoted enough to have known that this phrase never appears in the Holmes Canon in this formulation. There are numerous ejaculations of “elementary” and frequent murmurings of “my dear Watson,” but Holmes never uttered this infamous formulation. Indeed, it does not even appear in William Gillette’s Sherlock Holmes, a play that had been staged hundreds of times between 1899, when it was first performed, and 1923 and filmed in 1916, though there are several permutations of the phrase.

  37.Clergymen.

  CHAPTER IV

  In Which Many Are Called and Two Are Chosen

  Some natures, through peculiar weakness, cannot endure the sight of a whining man. Of all the silent, threatening group ringed about the abject figure called “Parson,” Ellery alone experienced a sick feeling of disgust at the spectacle the prisoner was making of himself.

  At the hidden lash in Queen’s words, the Parson drew himself up stiffly, glared into the Inspector’s eyes for a split second, then with a resumption of his former tactics began to fight against the sturdy arms which encircled him. He writhed and spat and cursed, finally becoming silent again. He was conserving his breath. The fury of his threshing body communicated itself to his captors; another policeman joined the mêleé and helped pin the prisoner to the floor. And suddenly he wilted and shrank like a pricked balloon. A policeman hauled him roughly to his feet, where he stood, eyes downcast, body still, hat clutched in his hand.

  Ellery turned his head.

  “Come now, Parson,” went on the Inspector, just as if the man had been a balky child at rest after a fit of temper, “you know that sort of business doesn’t go with me. What happened when you tried it last time at the Old Slip38 on the riverfront?”

  “Answer when you’re spoken to!” growled a bluecoat, prodding him in the ribs.

  “I don’t know nothin’ and besides I got nothin’ to say,” muttered the Parson, shifting from one foot to the other.

  “I’m surprised at you, Parson,” said Queen gently. “I haven’t asked you what you know.”

  “You got no right to hold an innocent man!” shouted the Parson indignantly. “Ain’t I as good as anybody else here? I bought a ticket and I paid for it with real dough, too! Where do you get that stuff—tryin’ to keep me from goin’ home!”

  “So you bought a ticket, did you?” asked the Inspector, rocking on his heels. “Well, well! Suppose you snap out the old stub and let Papa Queen look it over.”

  The Parson’s hand mechanically went to his lower vest pocket, his fingers dipping into it with a quite surprising deftness. His face went blank as he slowly withdrew his hand, empty. He began a search of his other pockets with an appearance of fierce annoyance that made the Inspector smile.

  “Hell!” grunted the Parson. “If that ain’t the toughest luck. I always hangs onto my ticket-stubs, an’ just to-night I have to go and throw it away. Sorry, Inspector!”

  “Oh, that’s quite all right,” said Queen. His face went bleak and hard. “Quit stalling, Cazzanelli! What were you doing in this theatre to-night? What made you decide to duck out so suddenly? Answer me!”

  The Parson looked about him. His arms were held very securely by two bluecoats. A number of hard-looking men surrounded him. The prospect of escape did not seem particularly bright. His face underwent another change. It assumed a priestly, outraged innocence. A mist filmed his little eyes, as if he were truly the Christian martyr and these tyrants his pagan inquisitors. The Parson had often employed this trick of personality to good purpose.

  “Inspector,” he said, “you know you ain’t got no right to grill me this way, don’t you, Inspector? A man’s got a right to his lawyer, ain’t he? Sure he’s got a right!” And he stopped as if there were nothing more to be said.

  The Inspector eyed him curiously. “When did you see Field last?” he asked.

  “Field? You don’t mean to say—Monte Field? Never heard of him, Inspector,” muttered the Parson, rather shakily. “What are you tryin’ to put over on me?”

  “Not a thing, Parson, not a thing. But as long as you don’t care to answer now, suppose we let you cool your heels for a while. Perhaps you’ll have something to say later . . . Don’t forget, Parson, there’s still that little matter of the Bonomo Silk39 robbery to go into.” He turned to one of the policemen. “Escort our friend to that anteroom off the manager’s office, and keep him company for a while, officer.”

  Ellery, reflectively watching the Parson being dragged toward the rear of the theatre, was startled to hear his father say, “The Parson isn’t too bright, is he? To make a slip like that—!”

  “Be thankful for small favors,” smiled Ellery. “One error breeds twenty more.”40

  The Inspector turned with a grin to confront Velie, who had just arrived with a sheaf of papers in his hand.

  “Ah, Thomas is back,” chuckled the Inspector, who seemed in good spirits. “And what have you found, Thomas?”

  “Well, Inspector,” replied the detective, ruffling the edges of his papers, “it’s hard to say. This is half of the list—the other half isn’t ready yet. But I think you’ll find something interesting here.”

  He handed Queen a batch of hastily written names and addresses. They were the names which the Inspector had ordered Velie to secure by interrogation of the audience.

  Queen, with Ellery at his shoulder, examined the list, studying each name carefully. He was half-way through the sheaf when he stiffened. He squinted at the name which had halted him and looked up at Velie with a puzzled air.

  “Morgan,” he said thoughtfully. “Benjamin Morgan. Sounds mighty familiar, Thomas. What does it suggest to you?”

  Velie smiled frostily. “I thought you’d ask me that, Inspector. Benjamin Morgan was Monte Field’s law partner until two years ago!”

  Queen nodded. The three men stared into each other’s eyes. Then the old man shrugged his shoulders and said briefly. “Have to see some more of Mr. Morgan, I’m afraid.”

  He turned back to the list with a sigh. Again he studied each name, looking up at intervals reflectively, shaking his head, and going on. Velie, who knew Queen’s reputation for memory even more thoroughly than Ellery, watched his superior with respectful eyes.

  Finally the Inspector handed the papers back to the detective. “Nothing else there, Thomas,” he said. “Unless you caught something that escaped me. Did you?” His tone was grave.

  Velie stared at the old man wordlessly, shook his head and started to walk away.

  “Just a minute, Thomas,” called Queen. “Before you get that second list completed, ask Mr. Morgan to step into Panzer’s office, will you? Don’t scare him. And by the way, see that he has his ticket-stub before he goes to the office.” Velie departed.

  The Inspector motioned to Panzer, who was watching a group of policemen being marshaled by detectives for Queen’s work. The stout little manager hurried up.

  “Mr. Panzer,” inquired the Inspector, “at what time do your scrub-women generally start cleaning up?”

  “Why, they’ve been here for quite a while now, Inspector, waiting to get to work. Most theatres are tidied early in the morning, but I’ve always had my employees come immediately after the evening performance. Just what is on your mind?”

  Ellery, who had frowned slightly when the Inspector spoke, brightened at the manager’s reply. He began to polish his pince-nez with satisfaction.

  “Here’s what I want you to do, Mr. Panzer,” continued Queen evenly. “Arrange to have your cleaning-women make a particularly thorough search to-night, after everybody is gone. They must pick up and save everything—everything, no matter how seemingly trivial—and they’re to watch especially for ticket-s
tubs. Can you trust these people?”

  “Oh, absolutely, Inspector. They’ve been with the theatre ever since it was built. You may be sure that nothing will be overlooked. What shall I do with the sweepings?”

  “Wrap them carefully, address them to me and send them by a trustworthy messenger to headquarters to-morrow morning.” The Inspector paused. “I want to impress upon you, Mr. Panzer, the importance of this task. It’s much more important than it seems. Do you understand?”

  “Certainly, certainly!” Panzer hastened away.

  A detective with grizzled hair walked briskly across the carpet, turned down the left aisle and touched his hat to Queen. In his hand was a sheaf of papers resembling the one which Velie had presented.

  “Sergeant Velie has asked me to give you this list of names. He says that it’s the rest of the names and addresses of the people in the audience, Inspector.”

  Queen took the papers from the detective’s hand with a sudden show of eagerness. Ellery leaned forward. The old man’s eyes traveled slowly from name to name as his thin finger moved down each sheet. Near the bottom of the last one he smiled, looked at Ellery triumphantly, and finished the page. He turned and whispered into his son’s ear. A light came over Ellery’s face as he nodded.

  The Inspector turned back to the waiting detective. “Come here, Johnson,” he said. Queen spread out the page he had been studying for the man’s scrutiny. “I want you to find Velie and have him report to me at once. After you’ve done that, get hold of this woman”—his finger pointed to a name and a row-and-seat number next to it—“and ask her to step into the manager’s office with you. You’ll find a man by the name of Morgan there. Stay with both of them until you hear from me. Incidentally, if there’s any conversation between them keep your ears open—I want to know what is said. Treat the woman courteously.”