“Mr. Restlin didn’t bother. It’s a reputable firm.”
“No last address?”
“He said he’s usually in hotels. He moved around a lot. This time I got the impression he and his wife wanted to try housekeeping for a change.”
Fellows laid the paper on the desk. “This application isn’t very well filled out.”
“I guess that’s my fault.”
“He didn’t sign it either. This his writing?”
Watly looked most uncomfortable. “It’s mine. I filled it out.” He went on to explain. “Mr. Campbell was in a hurry. He grabbed the first house he looked at. In fact, he hardly cared to go out and see it. He wanted to sign the lease right away and he had the money out as soon as we got back. That house isn’t too easy to rent, and I knew Mr. Restlin wouldn’t want to lose out on it, so I couldn’t be too fussy. Mr. Campbell chafed at the idea of an application since the house was available, so I hurriedly asked him a few questions just as a matter of form and I wrote down the answers myself. It wasn’t like he was taking it for a longer period and would be paying rent. Then we’d check very carefully on his ability to pay. But this was in advance and he certainly looked reputable. His firm is, and I know that because I did look that up. We didn’t check any further, though. Mr. Restlin and I didn’t think it was necessary.”
“I’m afraid that was a mistake, Mr. Watly.”
“I guess it was, but we didn’t dream—”
“All right, no matter. I have the idea he planned it that way. I think you were being used, so it’s not your fault.” Fellows shifted his tobacco to the other cheek. “Ever see him again?”
“No, sir. I gave him the keys and said we’d have the water turned on and the heat up by the time he was ready to take over. I did that myself on the last day of January. Neither Mr. Restlin nor I have been back since.”
“You have no samples whatever of Campbell’s handwriting?” Watly shook his head. “Only his signature on the lease, and that’s gone.”
“And that,” said Fellows, getting to his feet, “is probably the reason it’s gone.”
The chief, when he left the real estate office, drove back out to the scene of the crime. He stopped at the comer to send the shivering traffic officer off for some late lunch, then parked in front of the house where a total of eight other cars now stood. Four reporters on the front lawn converged on him when he got out. “We’ve been looking for you, Chief. They told us at headquarters you were out here.”
“No new developments,” Fellows said. “We’re right where we were.”
They trooped along with him toward the house. “The husband do it?”
“If it’s murder and he was her husband, then the husband probably did it.”
“He might not be her husband?”
“We don’t know who he was yet.” The chief opened the front door and saw one of the officers inside. “Hey, Lawlor. Have you searched the front yard?”
“All done, Chief. Didn’t find anything.”
“O.K. Get to the comer and handle traffic will you? Smitty, if you’re done, take an hour for some lunch and get back here. Take the rest of the men with you except those who’re working.” He went into the kitchen and found Wilks. The sergeant said, “I heard you. Nobody’s working.”
“All finished?”
“Finished with fingerprints. There aren’t any. Finished with the inventory, except for what’s in the suitcases. We’re brewing a pot of Campbell’s coffee. You want some?”
“What a lazy bum.” Fellows sat down at the kitchen table. Two other officers were in the room. One of them took the pot off the stove and started pouring.
“Not much food in the house,” Wilks said. “Just coffee and a few cans of things. They must have lived pretty much day to day.”
“That reminds me. As soon as everybody gets back from lunch, start them on a canvass of all grocery stores that deliver. A delivery was made here Friday the thirteenth. Campbell paid for it in person.”
Wilks made a note of it, and Fellows said, “By the way, that inventory of yours include vacuum cleaners?”
Wilks waved at the kitchen closet beside the stove. “An old one in there. Prewar.”
Fellows got up to look at it. It was a Eureka with a cloth bag and a long handle. He unwound the cord, plugged it into a socket, and tested the switch. The motor came on purring evenly and the bag filled with air. He switched it off, unplugged it, and put it away again.
Wilks said, “What’s that for?”
“Just wondering what they might need another vacuum cleaner for.” He accepted a cup of the coffee. “Any others around?”
“No. There supposed to be?”
Fellows brought the coffee to the table. “The woman down the road saw the guy bring a new one in one day. She didn’t see it leave.”
Wilks grinned. “Is that supposed to mean it’s still here?”
“She doesn’t miss much. Of course Campbell could have taken it away again at night. I think she might not quite see it from her window in the dark.”
“Real eager, huh?”
“I think she’s a British mystery-story fan. Kept calling me ‘Inspector.’ Any milk for this coffee?”
“There’s milk in the icebox, but it’s sour.”
“Well, it’s better if I drink it black anyway, I suppose.” He sipped the steaming dark liquid. “Henderson get the ashes out of the furnace?”
“He’s on his way to Hartford with them now.”
“Well, we’ll drink this and leave a couple of men here and go in for some lunch. I didn’t eat any breakfast and this stuff isn’t nourishing. And I want to get in touch with the Erie police.”
“What for?”
“To check on Campbell. He listed himself on his application as working for the Gary Hardware Company there. I don’t suppose he does, but I want to make sure.”
“What else did you find?”
“The girl didn’t wear a wedding ring. And I got a description of Campbell. Tall, dark, medium build, tan overcoat. No hat when Watly saw him, but he wore a brown one when the woman across the way got a look.”
“And he brought in a vacuum cleaner? What the hell for?” Fellows shrugged. “It beats me.”
CHAPTER V
Thursday, 3:30-5:30 P.M.
042 FILE 2 PD STOCKFORD CT FEB 26-59
PD ERIE PENNA
REQUEST INFO JOHN CAMPBELL DARK HAIR 5-10 WT 160
AGE 30-40 EMPLOYED GARY HARDWARE CO UR CITY WANTED
ON SUSPICION OF MURDER PLEASE CONFIRM
AUTH F C FELLOWS OPR NORTON 3-30 PM
zzzzzz
zzzzzz
ALARM 321 CODE SIG 12 AUTH F C FELLOWS FEB 26
59 ARREST FOR MURDER JOHN CAMPBELL WHITE 35-5-10-160
SLIM DARK HAIR DRIVES TAN LATE MODEL FORD
OPR NORTON 3-48 PM
064 FILE 8 PD ERIE PENNA FEB 26-59
PD STOCKFORD CT
CAMPBELL VICE PRES GARY HARDWARE CO AGE 53 HT 5-9
WT 165 HAIR GRAY REQUEST INSTRUCTIONS
AUTH T F PRENDERGAST OPR RIKERS 4-29 PM
zzzzzz
042 FILE 2 PD STOCKFORD CT FEB 26-59
PD ERIE PENNA
INVESTIGATE WHEREABOUTS JOHN CAMPBELL FEB 1-26 AGE
AND HAIR WRONG CAN YOU SEND PHOTO CAMPBELL
AUTH F C FELLOWS OPR NORTON 4-47 PM
zzzzzz
064 FILE 8 PD ERIE PENNA FEB 26-59
PD STOCKFORD CT
CAMPBELL IN NASSAU JAN 23-FEB 23 RETURNED TO WORK
FEB 24 CONFIRM HAIR GRAY AGE 53 ONLY JOHN CAMPBELL IN
GARY HARDWARE RECORDS SENDING PHOTO
AUTH T C PRENDERGAST OPR RIKERS 5-19 PM
zzzzzz
Chief Fellows was looking over the shoulder of the girl in communications when the last message came in. He tore off the sheet and scowled at it. “Tell them to hold up—no. Tell them I want that alibi checked out, Doris.” He took the paper with him back to the headquarters room downstairs.
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Sergeant William S. Gorman was on the desk and three reporters were talking with him, with Sergeant Wilks, and plainclothesman Edward N. Lewis. Fellows said, “I guess you can all see this,” and passed the message to Wilks, who read it and handed it around.
Wilks said, “I don’t suppose Watly’s eyesight could be so bad he’d call a fifty-three-year-old man in his thirties, even with dyed hair.”
Gorman, who had come on at four and been catching up on events ever since, said, “That time element, though. Campbell left for Nassau on the twenty-third of January and that was the day Campbell rented the house.”
One of the reporters said, “What about it, Chief?”
Fellows smiled. “Now wouldn’t I be a fool to go speculate in front of the press?”
“Is there a chance it’s the same guy?”
“The Erie police are going to check his alibi. I’ll tell you when we get the reports and when we show Watly his picture.”
“If it’s not the right Campbell, would that mean someone’s trying to impersonate him?”
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
“What’s the next move?”
“Sergeant Wilks and I are going out to look over the house again.”
Wilks said, “Hey, I’ve been all over it, Fred. It’s been checked thoroughly.”
“Not by me.” He smiled. “Come on, Sid, what do you want to do, go home early?”
CHAPTER VI
Thursday, 5:40-6:45
“It’s not going to be the same Campbell,” Wilks said to Fellows as they drove out to the house in the gathering darkness. “No man in his right mind would use his real name renting a house to kill someone in.”
“I’ll go along with that, Sid, but it’s interesting that there really is a Campbell at the Gary Hardware plant. Our Mr. Campbell told Watly everybody from the president on down would vouch for him. Sounds like he had the vice president in mind.”
“I’ll guess that’s an angle we’d better follow. It’s probably someone who knows the real Campbell, probably someone who worked at Gary at one time.”
“And,” Fellows added, “the woman wouldn’t be his wife. A wife would object to using an assumed name. Probably one or both of them were married to someone else too.”
“Why married, necessarily?”
“Same reason. Assumed name.”
“And he probably meant to kill her all along. It’s a nice love-nest setup and he could sell it to her for that, but it’s even better for a murder. She’s been dead quite a spell already and nobody would still suspect anything if he hadn’t stolen the leases.”
“That’s the one thing I wonder about,” Fellows said. “Cutting up the body was obviously for purposes of disposal. Why did he steal the lease before he finished getting rid of it?” He added slowly, “Cold feet?”
“Cold house.”
“Or a weak stomach?” Fellows turned the comer onto Highland Road and pulled up behind a lone car parked in front of the house.
“Whose is that?” Wilks wondered.
They found the answer up on the lawn where patrolman Manny was keeping the house under surveillance. With him was a young man in his early thirties, wearing a brown coat and hat with a press card in the band. The man held out a hand as the chief came up and said, “I’m Hilders of the Bridgeport Courier. I’ve been assigned to the case.”
Fellows said, “That’s a coincidence. I’ve been assigned to it too.”
“You going inside now?”
“That’s right. The sergeant and me—only.”
“Give a guy a break.”
“If we find anything, we’ll let you know, Mr. Hilders. But I wouldn’t suggest waiting out here in the cold. I’ll be making my statements at headquarters.”
“And if you don’t mind, Chief, I’ll be making my investigation on my own.”
“O.K. You find something, you can let us know.” He said to the patrolman, “Any trouble out here?”
“No, sir. Just one car of sight-seers about an hour ago. I didn’t let them get out.”
“All right. Your relief will be out any minute.” Fellows went on to the stoop with Wilks and fitted the key Restlin had turned over to him into the lock. He closed the door behind him, shutting out the reporter, snapped on the lights in the frigid and forbidding living room, and went through the rest of the house, turning on lights in all the rooms. He ended in the kitchen where he turned slowly around. “Pretty bare,” he said. “Our friend was kind of careful about clues.”
“He was,” Wilks said. “No papers in the wastebaskets, no writing, no fingerprints, no nothing that I could see.”
“Except a hair on the pillow in one bedroom and a button in a dresser drawer. We’ll have to see if that button fits any of the clothes in those suitcases there.”
“You want to break them open, Fred?”
Fellows looked down at the suitcases and shook his head. “Kind of nice merchandise to bust. We’ll let a locksmith do it in the morning.”
They started an examination of the house then. Fellows went to the rear bedroom and looked in at the stripped mattress. Two of the three windows still had their shades down. “This is the larger bedroom,” he said. “Two-view exposure and three windows. The other bedroom has two windows and one view. The button was in the drawer here, but the hair was in the other bedroom. They obviously slept there, but if the button fits any of the woman’s clothes, she must have had them here. Now why would they sleep in the worse room?”
“If he’s married and went back to his wife at night, one room could be for love and the other for sleeping.”
“Now, Sid, do you think that makes sense?”
“It makes as much sense as the question. What’s the answer got to do with finding Campbell?”
“If we can find the answers to enough questions, we’ll turn him up.”
“That’s not the kind of question I’d ask.”
Fellows turned. “All right, Sid, what questions have you got?”
“I’d ask why was the bed stripped? Why are the shades down? And I’d answer by saying that if the house was completely furnished, including linen, and the sheets aren’t in the place, he did something with them.”
“You didn’t find the sheets?”
“They aren’t here, Fred. What linen there is is on a shelf in the kitchen closet and they’re clean. My guess is she was probably killed here or hidden here and he got rid of the sheets to hide the fact he had a body rotting on them for a week.”
“O.K., I’ll go along. Next question?”
“What did he do with the missing parts of the body? The only shovel in the house is a snow shovel. There’re no signs of digging on the property and the ground’s like a rock anyway. There’s no new-laid concrete in the cellar. That, plus the burned saw and knife means to me he burned those parts.”
Fellows laughed. “I guess that’s a fair deduction all right.”
“Those are the kind of questions that lead us somewhere, Fred. What difference does it make where they slept?”
“I don’t know, Sid. I just ask them to satisfy myself, I guess. For instance, I’d kind of like to know where he burned the head, arms, and legs.”
“The furnace, of course. And maybe the fireplace. We’ll know when the lab analyzes the ashes.”
“But if the fireplace, why, Sid? You try it there and you’ll smell up the neighborhood.”
“Which may be why the guy got panicked and didn’t finish the job.”
Fellows clapped him on the shoulder. “You’re quite a detective, Sid. I’d promote you except that’d put me out of a job and I’m not aiming to retire for quite a spell.”
“What you mean is you get the same answers.”
“I’ve got to go along with you. My only problem is the whys.”
“The girl was pregnant. I can answer that one.”
Fellows edged past him in the tiny hall and looked into the bathroom. “You’re making an assumption there, Sid. The doc hasn’t sa
id that yet.”
“Why else were some of her organs removed other than to hide the fact?”
The chief shrugged. “Removing organs doesn’t hide it, Sid, it points to it.” He got down on one knee beside the tub and studied its scummy appearance. “What’s your detective ability tell you about this? You think maybe he sawed her up in here?”
“That’s where I’d do it and there’s no blood anywhere. It would have to be here.”
“Seems so. But I’m pretty damned ignorant. For instance, if you wait four or five days before you cut up a body, will there be any bleeding or will the blood be all caked?”
“That’s something to ask MacFarlane.”
Fellows moved on into the smaller bedroom, the room where the shades were up. He’d had the foresight this time to bring some envelopes and he took one from his shirt pocket as he gently pulled back the bedspread, uncovering the indented pillows. The hair was where he had left it and he carefully placed it in the envelope. He licked the flap, glued it in place, and wrote an identification of the contents on the front.
After tucking the envelope back in his pocket, he got down on his knees and peered beneath the bed and bureau. “Mrs. Banks told me there was dirt in the corners,” he said, getting up, ‘‘but there’s a lot more under the bed. I’m going to want the dust from all of these rooms, each room separate, and we’ll send that along to the lab. Better empty that vacuum cleaner too.” He made a face. “I hate working with dust, but that’s about all the guy’s left us.” He moved into the dining room and looked in all the comers and under the furniture, then opened the drawers in the buffet. The top left-hand one contained knives, forks, and spoons. There was table linen in the bottom large drawer. The others were empty. “You fingerprint the silver?”
“No.”
“He might’ve forgotten to wipe that, Sid.”
“All right. First thing tomorrow.”
In the living room, Fellows stopped by the telephone table. A blank pad stood beside the phone, and the chief regarded it thoughtfully. Wilks said, “We did the phone. It’d been wiped.”
Sleep Long, My Love Page 4