The Back-seat Murder

by Herman Landon

  In the next moment the question was answered for him. Almost soundlessly the door came open. Someone stepped out, a shadow moving among shadows. The newcomer walked with a step so light that Harrington knew at once who it was.

  “What do you want, Tarkin?” he asked sharply. The dramatic thrill was leaving him. Only a sense of disgust remained. He had been keyed up to something totally different from an encounter with a blackmailer.

  “Sh!” Tarkin whispered. “Want to disturb everybody in the house? And you don’t play any cute tricks on me this time, Harrington. I’ve got the drop on you. See?”

  There was a small, grayish gleam in the gloom, and it pointed straight to Harrington. It was too late now to reach for his pistol. Somehow it had not occurred to him that he might need it when he saw that the intruder was only Tarkin. One did not associate gun play with the slimy ways of a blackmailer. And, even now, the pistol in Tarkin’s hand did not seem as menacing as it would have seemed in the hand of someone else.

  “Oh, you’ve changed your tactics, I see. Well, what are you offering for sale this time?”

  “Not a thing. I’ve come to collect.”

  “But I told you—”

  “Yeah, I know what you told me, that you didn’t have the cash. You’ve got it now, or something just as good. I’ll take that.”

  He crept forward a few steps, and Harrington’s hand went to the coffin. Keeping his eyes on the grayish glint of steel, he edged cautiously toward the desk.

  “Stay right there,” Tarkin advised, speaking in a bronchial whisper. “Never mind the light. We can talk business in the dark. And don’t talk too loud. Somebody might hear us, and that wouldn’t be so good. Just behave nicely and hand over that pretty little box in your pocket.”

  Harrington laughed at the suggestion.

  “It’s no joke,” Tarkin warned him. “I’m out for the big touch tonight. There’s a million dollars’ worth of ice in that coffin, and I’m going to have it.”

  “Really, Tarkin? You’re an ambitious little crook, aren’t you? A cool million, eh? You astonish me.”

  “Ah, can the wise-cracks. And get this, Harrington. I’m going to have that box, even if I have to take it off your dead body.”

  There was a new note now in Tarkin’s speech. He spoke as if he meant to have the box at all costs, even if he had to commit murder for it. Harrington’s hand moved cautiously toward his hip pocket.

  “No, you don’t!” Tarkin snarled, and he leaped closer and shoved the barrel against Harrington’s midriff. “Steady now. Not a move, or I drill you. Just take it easy and—By gad—!”

  The words ended in a baffled whine. Very quickly Harrington had dropped to the floor, seized the blackmailer about the knees, and pulled his legs from under him. He hit the floor with a thud, and Harrington wrenched the pistol from his hand.

  “Get up, Tarkin,” he directed, “and answer a few questions.”

  With whimpers and mutters the blackmailer scrambled to his feet Harrington reached out and switched on the library reading lamp. It diffused a reddish glow within a narrow space and left the rest of the library in shadow.

  “Sit there,” Harrington ordered, indicating a chair. Tarkin obeyed surlily. There was a black, treacherous look in his unwholesome face. “What do you know about this box?” Harrington demanded.

  “I know the Mooreland jewels are in it.”

  “The—what jewels?”

  “The Mooreland jewels. They belonged to David Mooreland.”

  With a look of surprise, Harrington searched his sallow face.

  “Ridiculous I Mooreland never had any jewels. He was honest and poor. Where would he—Oh, well, let it pass. How did you know I had the box?”

  “I’ve got eyes and ears, haven’t I?”

  “I see. You have a great talent for appearing in unexpected places, and you’re making the most of it It’s easy for a runt like you to slip in and out. I suppose you were somewhere in the offing when Carstairs brought the box to the house.”

  “Who?” asked Tarkin, his rheumy eyes opening wide.

  “Carstairs, of course.”

  The blackmailer stared at him a moment longer, then laughed.

  “Ah, don’t kid me. Carstairs didn’t bring that box. Say, you make me laugh—Carstairs—He-he!”

  Harrington regarded him narrowly, puzzled by his demeanor.

  “Carstairs brought it, nevertheless,” he declared.

  “Yeah? Sure it wasn’t Santa Claus?” He shrugged his bony shoulders. “Makes no difference who brought it, though. I know you’ve got it. I was right in the next room when Whittaker handed it to you. I can see it peeping out of your pocket for that matter. Say, that’s another funny thing—Whittaker handing you that box. Can’t make it out I thought he had it doped out that you were the murderer.”

  Harrington dropped the blackmailer’s pistol into the desk drawer and locked it He turned and surprised a shrewd, calculating look in Tarkin’s face.

  “Well, Tarkin, what was the idea? Did you really think you were going to get away with a million dollars’ worth of jewels?”

  “Stranger things have happened, and it looked like a good chance. It was worth trying, anyhow.”

  He spoke resignedly, but Harrington knew that his mind was working frantically to find a way to gain possession of the box.

  “Who sent you here?” Harrington suddenly inquired.

  “Sent me? Why, nobody. I’m working on my own.”

  The vague suspicion left Harrington’s mind almost as quickly as it had come.

  “Look here,” said Tarkin mincingly, an ingratiating grin spreading across his unwholesome face, “suppose we get together on this. You don’t want anything to happen to those sparklers, do you? Suppose somebody should come along and grab them from you—somebody who’s slicker than I am and not half so honest?”

  “Honest?” Harrington echoed, laughing despite his disgust.

  “Yes, honest. Look here, did I ever cheat you? Didn’t you always get value for your money? As a matter of fact, you’ve got the value and I’ve got promises. That’s all—promises and a few kicks. Now, there’s a million dollars’ worth of shiners in that pretty little box, and they don’t belong to anybody in particular. No, sir, they don’t belong to anybody.”

  Harrington stared into his sallow face. The blackmailer appeared in great earnest, but his shifty eyes were constantly alert.

  “Oh, rot, Tarkin! You can’t tell me that a million dollars’ worth of jewels are kicking around without an owner. Didn’t they belong to Marsh?”

  “They did not! Not any more than they belong to you or me or Carstairs. They did belong to Mooreland, but he’s dead.”

  “Nonsense, Tarkin. Mooreland was a poor man.”

  “Was he? Well, that’s what most people thought, and it suited Mooreland to have them think so. He wasn’t advertising his wealth. Even some of his heirs didn’t know that he was worth over a million. By the way,” and Tarkin’s shifty eyes narrowed shrewdly, “aren’t you one of his heirs?”

  Harrington started. Much as he loathed the blackmailer, he was growing interested. Tarkin was talking as a man who knew.

  “I never saw the will,” he declared, “and I never heard of it. I doubt if there was one.”

  “There was. A funny kind of will, and you were named in it along with several others. You see,” with a knowing chuckle, “I know your real name—the name that appeared in the will.”

  “You seem to know a good many things.”

  “I do. Now, just think back a bit. Didn’t David Mooreland tell you once that he would remember you in his will?”

  Harrington reflected for a few moments.

  “I believe he did. I was in China at the time. Knowing he was a poor man, I regarded it as a joke, and afterward I forgot all about it.”

  “Well, some of the others didn’t forget, and they knew Mooreland was no pauper. As I said, it was a funny sort of will—a kind of murder insurance.”

&nbs
p; “What?”

  “Murder insurance. That’s what it was.”

  Harrington’s thoughts went back a few years and resurrected dim recollections of a letter he had received one day from David Mooreland. It was a most curious letter. He had wondered at the time whether Mooreland’s mind was weakening or whether he was developing a grotesque sense of humor in his old age. Afterward he had forgotten all about it.

  “I see you remember,” said Tarkin, watching him craftily. “I guess you remember, too, what sort of man Mooreland was. Some people thought he was batty in the head. It wasn’t that, but he was certainly a queer old jackass, with all sorts of funny notions in his head and—”

  “He was a man of honor,” Harrington cut in, resenting the blackmailer’s crude references to the man who had been his father’s dearest friend.

  “I didn’t say he wasn’t, did I? I only said he was queer. As queer as they make ‘em. Guess he came of a queer family, for his brother was queer, too. David Mooreland’s queer streak didn’t show till he was well past sixty. It was a funny sort of fear—fear of being murdered.”

  Harrington’s brows went up. Another dim memory was knocking at his brain.

  “I guess you’d call it an obsession,” Tarkin went on, his rheumy eyes fixed on the bulge over Harrington’s pocket. “Anyhow, it was a crazy sort of fear, and it grew on him as he got older. Some people think it started when an old aunt of his was murdered. Whether that was true or not, the fear haunted him night and day. He put extra locks on his doors. He never went out on the streets without keeping one eye over his shoulder to see if anybody was chasing him with a knife. Queer, eh? And not so good for a man’s nerves. And the queerest part of it all was that there was no reason on earth for his fear. He was the last man in the world to make enemies.

  “You see, David Mooreland was a gentleman if ever there was (me. I’m no gentleman, but I can spot one a mile off. Yes, sir, he was too much a gentleman for his own good. His friends made money, and some of ‘em didn’t care how they made it, but David Mooreland made just enough for a comfortable living. And, as I said, there was no reason why anybody should want to hurt a hair on his head. In spite of that he was the scaredest man alive. Didn’t have a moment’s peace. Worried all the time and—”

  “Come to the point,” Harrington curtly interrupted. Somehow it seemed as if old Mooreland’s name was being defamed by contact with the blackmailer’s lips.

  “I’m there now,” said Tarkin smoothly. “Things come to a point one day when a man whose name nobody ever found out stepped off a boat at one of the Manhattan piers and went to Mooreland’s house with a package In his pocket. Nobody knows whether or not he paid duty on the package. If he did, he must have paid a stiff amount. Anyhow, he handed the package to Mooreland and said it came from Mooreland’s brother William, who had been living in Amsterdam for twenty years. That’s all he said, and David Mooreland never saw him again.

  “Well, the old boy had the surprise of his life when he opened the package. There was a pretty little box in it. Yes, sir, the same box you’ve got in your pocket. Mooreland opened it and almost keeled over when he saw it was crammed with diamonds. It seems William had been in the diamond business in Amsterdam. His brother David was his only relative, and so, when he felt death coming on, he did things the simplest way. He packed a million’s worth of rocks in the box and sent them over by a trusted friend. And so David Mooreland became a millionaire.”

  Harrington was listening intently now. He was learning of a strange chapter in the life of a man whose kindliness and sweetness of character had made a profound and lasting impression upon him.

  “Just try to picture the old boy with a million on his hands,” Tarkin went on. “He had lived in fear before, and for no reason. Now there was a reason. People had been murdered for much less than a million. The old gentleman worked himself into a cold perspiration. He imagined murderers were lying in wait for him everywhere. It was all foolishness, of course.

  Nobody knew he had the rocks except the man who brought than over. But Mooreland thought there was just a chance somebody might find out He got panicky. The sane thing, of course, would have been to take the box to a safe deposit vault, but people don’t do sane things when they’re panicky. And so Mooreland just sat there and looked at his diamonds, with cold shivers running all over him, and wishing the pesky things were on the bottom of the river.

  “That’s where they might have landed, too. Mooreland was scared enough to do any crazy thing. But he thought it over, and a better idea came to him. He was getting old; he wouldn’t live to enjoy his pile for long. Besides, he had no relatives he could leave it to, only a few friends, and he was very fond of those friends. He was tempted to divide the diamonds among them right away, but then he thought of a still better idea—and that was murder insurance.”

  Tarkin chuckled and rubbed his long, greedy hands.

  “Now, being a queer man, he worked the thing in a queer way. It wasn’t such a bad way at that, if he had only been a little more careful. This was his idea. The million in diamonds was to be divided among his friends after his death, but there was a string tied to it. If he should die a violent death—if he should be murdered, that is—the division wouldn’t take place until the murderer had been found, and the one who found him would get one half of the diamonds as his share and the other half would be split up among the rest of the heirs.

  “Pretty good, eh? You see how he was protecting himself all around. He knew that prospective heirs get impatient sometimes, that now and then they feel an awful temptation to hasten things along with a knife or a dose of poison. Under this kind of arrangement, they wouldn’t be so likely to do that. It would be to their interest to let Mooreland die a natural death. What’s more, each one would be a sort of bodyguard and would take it on himself to see that nobody went gunning for Mooreland. And anybody that might feel tempted to bump him off would be discouraged by the fact that there would be a reward of half a million for the one who nabbed the murderer. Yes, Mooreland fixed it up pretty neatly. There was just one bad hitch.

  “You see, if he went to work and made a will with such provisions in it, a lot of people would say he was crazy. That might give somebody a chance to contest the thing. Besides, Mooreland had a horror of publicity, and the newspapers, if they got wind of a will like that, would yell themselves hoarse. That wasn’t the worst of it, though. What Mooreland liked least of all about the arrangement was that some people might read between the lines and think he was afraid of his friends. Maybe he was doubtful of one or two, but he realized he might be wrong, and he didn’t want to do anybody an injustice. The upshot of it all was that he didn’t make a will at all, except what you might call an unofficial one. And he appointed an unofficial executor. That is, he took the pretty little box, with the million’s worth of diamonds in it, and handed it to Christopher Marsh.”

  “What?” Harrington exclaimed, incredulously.

  “Can you beat it?” Tarkin snickered disgustedly. “Yes, he handed Marsh the diamonds and made him his unofficial executor. If Mooreland died a natural death, Marsh was to divide the diamonds evenly among the heirs. If he was murdered, Marsh was to keep the diamonds until the murderer was found, and the person who found him would get half. If the murderer wasn’t found, Marsh would keep all.”

  Harrington stared at him with open mouth.

  “Marsh, of all persons!” he exclaimed.

  “Yes, Marsh, of all persons! Don’t ask me to explain. What Mooreland didn’t know about human nature would fill all these books.” Tarkin made a comprehensive sweep with his hand. “Maybe Marsh worked on his simple nature. Anyhow, he thought Marsh was the best friend he had. He would have trusted him with his life and soul. Maybe he was right You can’t tell. Marsh might have been the best and squarest man in the world till he got his hands into that million dollars’ worth of rocks.

  “Well, Mooreland sat down and wrote a letter to each of his heirs, telling them what he had done.
You see, the murder insurance wouldn’t be any good unless they knew the conditions. I guess the heirs were surprised. They couldn’t imagine Mooreland having a million dollars to divide. Maybe some of them thought he was joking. Maybe one or two thought he was a bit cracked.”

  “Just what I thought,” Harrington mumbled. “Anyway, I never took it seriously. What happened?”

  “Mooreland thought all his worries were over and that he could sit back and enjoy his old age. He was only partly right. The diamonds were off his mind, but he couldn’t rid himself of his old fears. They grew worse as he got older. Finally he went and hid himself in the old hilltop hotel he owned, with only a servant for company. He thought he would be safe there. His friends, including Marsh, had homes all around. But one day he got an inkling—I don’t know how it came to him—that something funny was going on. Marsh was doing queer things. He began to wonder about his murder insurance. And one day he went down the hill to ask Marsh a few straight questions. He never left Marsh’s house.”

  “I know,” said Harrington grimly. “Marsh murdered him. I suppose Mooreland asked too many embarrassing questions, and he wanted the million for himself. The murder insurance didn’t work very well.”

  “No, it didn’t turn out so good. I guess Marsh figured nobody took it seriously. Anyhow, he made a neat job of it. Mooreland just faded out. Nobody knew what became of him.” The blackmailer grinned shrewdly. “Look here, Harrington? Didn’t you come here with the idea of nabbing Mooreland’s murderer and getting half a million dollars’ worth of rocks as your reward?”

  Harrington fixed him with a look of aversion.

  “No,” shortly. “I lack your commercial talents, Tarkin. I only wanted to see the murderer of a lovable old man brought to justice.”

  “Yeah? Have any luck?”

  “Not a great deal.”

  “Too bad. You might have grabbed the prize. Instead, it seems to me, you stand a good chance of getting die chair.”

  A cold, hard smile twisted Harrington’s lips.