Dragnet

by Richard Deming

  “Yeah?”

  “Remember how he kept needling me last Thanksgiving? About the way I carved.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Lot of science to carving. When the host knows how to do it, he feels at ease, and that makes everybody else feel at ease. Fay says it’s a matter of poise. Get all flustered and wrestle around with the bird the way I did last year, everybody feels a little embarrassed.”

  I said, “I thought you did all right.”

  “Aw, I was a rank amateur. Course, it didn’t help any to have Armand sit there snickering all the time. This year he won’t have a chance to snicker.”

  “How’s that?” I asked.

  “I got it licked. You’re looking at the prize turkey carver in the whole Valley.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Been practicing up.”

  “On what?” I asked.

  “A turkey. You know O’Malley, the butcher over our way?”

  “I remember the shop,” I said.

  “Got one of those papier-mâché turkeys from O’Malley. The kind they put in windows for display. He got a new one this year, because the old one was getting a little beat up. Brown paint was beginning to peel off in spots.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Then I got me a set of instructions on carving. Had a diagram of a turkey in it, with dotted lines showing just where you’re supposed to cut. I took a fountain pen and made dotted lines on this papier-mâché turkey in the same places the lines were on the diagram.”

  I said, “I see.”

  “Then I sharpened up my carving tools and cut the thing up. Worked perfect.”

  I looked at him. “And that makes you an expert carver?”

  “Why not?” Frank asked. “I’ve got the location of those lines memorized. All I’ve got to do is cut the real turkey in the same places I cut the papier-mâché one.”

  “One thing you didn’t think of,” I said.

  “Huh?”

  “Real turkeys have bones.”

  One of the phones rang, and I went to answer it. It was Johnson in Burglary.

  “Got a man here I thought you’d like to talk to, Joe,” he said. “I’m sending him over.”

  “What’s up?” I asked.

  “Came in to report a burglary. Thinks it happened last week, but he just discovered it.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Only one item missing. Thought it might interest you.”

  “What’s that?”

  “A thirty-caliber Army carbine converted to bolt action. With the barrel sawed off to twelve-inch length.”

  A few minutes later a wrinkled little man with a hooked nose and a birdlike manner of cocking his head to one side when he looked at you came into the squad room. He introduced himself as Arthur Morrison.

  I said, “Sit down, Mr. Morrison. Understand you had a burglary.”

  Morrison took a chair, cocked his head at me, and said, “Certainly did, young fellow. Already told the whole story to the people over in Burglary Division. Don’t understand why I have to do it again.”

  “They think the burglar might be a man this division wants,” I explained. “Where’d the crime take place, sir?”

  “At my store. Morrison’s Secondhand Store on Main. Come in and try our swap-or-buy. That’s my slogan.”

  “Yes, sir,” I said. “When did you discover the burglary?”

  “Well, I found the busted lock on the back door last week. Monday, the eighteenth. Figured it was busted some time over the weekend. Didn’t find nothing missing in the store, so didn’t bother to report it. Figured it was kids. Just put on a new padlock and forgot it.”

  I said, “Then later you discovered something had been taken?”

  “Yeah. Silly thing to steal, too. Lots of good stuff in the store he could’ve took. Can’t understand what anyone’d want with a gun like that.”

  “Nothing was taken but this sawed-off carbine?”

  “Not a thing, near as I could figure. Checked my entire inventory when I found the broken lock. Missed checking the gun because it was in the window.”

  “Sir?”

  “Didn’t check the window. Same stuffs been in it for years. Junk I’d like to get rid of, mostly. Figured there was nothing in the window worth stealing, so didn’t bother to look.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Then this afternoon I was standing out front. Drum up business that way sometimes. Stand out front, a fellow comes along and stops to look in the window. I get him in conversation, invite him to come in and look around. Surprising how many customers I get in the store that way. People that’d pass right by, otherwise.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Today I happened to glance in the window myself. Hardly ever do that. Most of the stuff’s been there so long, I’m tired of looking at it. Just happened to today.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Right away I knew something was missing. Couldn’t figure what at first. Just knew the display looked wrong. Then I realized it was that worthless old gun. Fellow didn’t have to steal it. I was only asking five bucks for it, and I’d have come down to two.”

  I said, “Would you describe the gun, please?”

  “Sure. Thirty-caliber Army carbine. Fellow I bought it from had Winchester Arms convert it to bolt action so he could use it for deer hunting. Then he used it as a lever to move a big rock and bent the barrel. Was gonna cost too much to have it straightened, so he swapped it to me for a fishing rod. I sawed off the bent part and reset the front sight. Figured somebody might buy it for varmint shooting. I tried it out, and it shot pretty good up to a hundred yards. But it was funny-looking with that short barrel. Nobody seemed to want it.”

  I looked at Frank, and Frank said, “Maybe the short barrel was what made it sound so funny, Joe.” He turned back to Morrison. “Did sawing off the barrel like that make it sound different when it was fired?”

  “Sure did,” the secondhand dealer said. “Didn’t sound like either a rifle or a pistol. Sort of halfway in between. Sharper than a pistol, but flatter than a rifle.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I think I heard it once.”

  Arthur Morrison was unable to give us any further information. He had no idea who the thief had been, and could recall no customer who had shown any particular interest in the missing gun.

  After Morrison had left, I phoned Burglary and talked to Johnson again. He said he planned to have Latent Prints go over the display window, but there wasn’t much else that could be done in the way of an investigation. The only bit of evidence, the broken padlock, had been thrown in a trash can by Arthur Morrison, and the trash can had subsequently been hauled off to a dump.

  When I hung up, Frank said, “Guess it was the gun he tried to use on you, all right.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Morrison was wrong in thinking no one would want a gun like that. It’s got one big advantage for a guy like the Courteous Killer.”

  “How’s that?”

  “You can carry it under a topcoat.”

  We got out a supplementary bulletin on George Whiteman describing the cut-down carbine with which he was now believed to be armed.

  Later that night Johnson of Burglary dropped by and said Latent Prints had been unable to come up with anything from the display window. All prints in it had been old, and all were made by Arthur Morrison.

  CHAPTER XXI

  Two nights later, Friday, November 29th, Frank and I were sitting in the squad room discussing the previous day’s Thanksgiving dinner at his house. It was just past midnight. It had been a slow night. We had had one call about a telephone threat, and had gone out on one battery case. Otherwise we had just sat around the squad room.

  “You were right about those bones,” Frank said. “According to that dotted-line diagram, the knife should have cut right down to a joint each time. Guess every bird is built different inside, though.”

  “How’s that?” I asked.

  “Seems I was always a quarter inch from the joint, one way
or the other, when I got down to the bone. No way to tell which way, either, without an X-ray machine.”

  I said, “I thought you did pretty good.”

  “Well, at least I kept it on the platter. Had an awful time sawing through those bones, though. And Armand didn’t help any, sitting there with that condescending grin on his face.”

  “Next time why don’t you let Armand carve?” I suggested.

  “Wanted to last year,” Frank said. “But Fay says it’s the host’s place. Says every man ought to know how to carve. It’s one of the marks of social grace.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Tell me something, Joe.”

  “What?” I asked.

  “You think I lack social grace?”

  I looked at him. “Why do you ask that?”

  “Well, when Fay told me knowing how to carve was one of the marks of social grace, she didn’t exactly say I didn’t have any. But she knows I’m not very good at carving. So in a way she implied I didn’t have any social grace, didn’t she?”

  I said, “Listen, Frank. I want to tell you something.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Whatever Fay’s opinion of your social grace, I know one thing she thinks.”

  “Huh?”

  “She thinks you’re the top guy in the world.”

  Frank thought this over for a moment and then looked pleased. “You know something, Joe?”

  “What?”

  “Maybe this sounds conceited, but I think she does, too.”

  A young man of about twenty came hesitantly into the squad room and looked from me to Frank. He was a stockily built youngster with a pug nose and flaming-red hair worn in a brush cut.

  “They told me downstairs to come here,” he said. “This Robbery Division?”

  Frank said, “Right across the hall, son. Room Three-twenty-seven.”

  “Oh,” the young man said. “What’s this place?”

  “Homicide.”

  “I see.” He started out again, then stopped in the doorway. “I should think you fellows would be interested, too. It was just a robbery tonight, but after all, he’s killed a lot of people.”

  “Huh?” Frank said.

  “The guy who stuck up me and my girl. I recognized him from his pictures in the paper. Good thing I did, too. Looked so easy to take, think I’d have jumped him if I hadn’t known who he was.”

  “What are you talking about?” I asked.

  “The Courteous Killer. He just stuck me up and took forty-seven dollars out of my wallet.”

  He turned and was halfway across the hall, heading for Robbery Division, before Frank and I yelled together, “Hey!” The young man halted and looked back. I reached the door first and crooked an index finger at him. “This is the place you want, son. Come on back and have a seat.”

  Shrugging, he returned. I led him over to a table, pointed to a chair, and said, “Sit down, son. My name’s Friday. This is my partner, Frank Smith.”

  Formally shaking hands with both of us, he said, “Arnold Reiter is my name. I’m a senior out at U.C.L.A.” He took the proffered chair and looked at me expectantly. “Okay. Go ahead.”

  “Go ahead what?” I asked.

  “Cross-examine me. Isn’t that the way you do it?”

  I smiled at him. “Be better if you just told us about it. We’ll ask questions later.”

  “All right,” he said agreeably. “To start off, I can’t tell you the name of the girl I was with.”

  “Oh? Why not?”

  “She’s in nurses’ training. Wasn’t supposed to be out tonight. Sneaked out the shower-room window. They all do it, you know. Rules are much too strict for this day and age. Can’t expect to keep a girl penned up like she’s a criminal.”

  I said, “Uh-huh.”

  “Give the girls a little freedom, and they wouldn’t sneak out that way.”

  “We understand.”

  “They’d bounce Georgia right out of school if they knew she was out tonight, you see. So after the robbery, I drove her back to student nurses’ quarters before coming here. Boosted her back through the shower-room window. You can see that she couldn’t afford to have it appear in the paper that she was with me when we were held up.”

  I said, “We won’t put her name in the paper. Afraid we’ll have to talk to her, though.”

  He looked dubious. “Be just as bad if you went to see her. Old Battle-Ax would want to know why she was being questioned by police.”

  “Who?”

  “Old Battle-Ax. The nursing supervisor.”

  I said, “Let’s table your girlfriend for a while. Where and when did this robbery take place?”

  “Mulholland Drive, up near the Outpost Estates. About a quarter to eleven.”

  “I see. What happened?”

  “We were sitting in the car sort of talking. Didn’t even hear this character come up. We were—well, kind of preoccupied at the time.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded,” he said quickly. “Georgia’s a nice girl. A really nice one. We’re kind of engaged. She wouldn’t do anything wrong.”

  “We understand,” I said.

  “All we were doing was a little cuddling. She doesn’t even let me—well, you know. Nothing except kiss her. She’s a nice girl.”

  “Sure,” I said.

  “Well, all of a sudden we heard this voice say, ‘Sorry to disturb you.’ And there stood this guy on the left-hand side of the car pointing a gun at us. Funniest-looking gun you ever saw.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Kind of a snub-nosed rifle. Barrel wasn’t much longer than a pistol’s. About twelve inches, I’d say. But it had a regular rifle stock.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Asked us real politely to get out of the car. Didn’t order us out. Just asked us. Course, the gun made it a pretty definite invitation.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Backed off a step to let us get out. Soon as we were outside, and I got a good look at him, I realized who he was.”

  “You’re sure it was the Courteous Killer?” I asked.

  “Absolutely. Wasn’t wearing glasses, and his hair wasn’t gray, but it was him all right.”

  “His hair wasn’t gray?” I said.

  “Black as the ace of spades. There’s a bright moon tonight, and we could see him good. Guess he must have dyed it.”

  I grunted. The suspect was again practicing the same art of simple disguise he’d bragged about to me. With his average looks, even a minor change in appearance would be an effective disguise.

  “Then what happened?” I asked.

  “He had me hand over my wallet, and took the money out of it. Gave the wallet back to me and told Georgia to give him her bag. She only had a dollar and a half in it. He took that.”

  “Go on.”

  “Then he said he’d shoot us if we made a sound or motion before he got out of sight. Walked up the road and disappeared around a bend. We thought we heard a car pull away after a minute, but neither of us was sure. May have been imagination.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “We climbed back in the car, I made a U-turn, and we got out of there. I drove Georgia to student nurses’ quarters and then came here.”

  We continued to question Arnold Reiter. Eventually, on our assurance that we would make every effort to keep from getting his girlfriend in trouble, he told us that the name of his companion at the time of the robbery was Georgia Fen. He also gave us the name of the hospital where she was in nurses’ training. He said he would arrange for her to come down to the Police Building the following afternoon, as she got off duty at noon on Saturdays.

  We took the victim across to Robbery Division and briefed Marty Wynn and Vance Brasher on his story. Then we drove him out to the place on Mulholland Drive where the robbery had taken place and had him point out the exact spot. The ground was too dry for footprints to show, and we were unable to find any physical evidence of any sort.


  Back at the office again, we got out a supplemental bulletin describing the change in George Whiteman’s hair color.

  Meantime, while we were taking young Reiter to Mulholland Drive, Lieutenant Newton had phoned Captain Hertel at home to tell him the Courteous Killer actually was back in Los Angeles and had resumed operations. Chief Brown had left instructions to be informed the moment we had definite evidence that Whiteman was in the area, no matter what time of day or night we learned of it.

  Lieutenant Newton left the duty of phoning the chief at that time of night to Captain Hertel.

  CHAPTER XXII

  The next afternoon we met Georgia Fen in the Homicide squad room at 2:00 p.m. She verified the story Arnold Reiter had told us, but was unable to add any new information. Like Reiter, she said she had immediately recognized the Courteous Killer from his newspaper pictures.

  After the girl departed, Captain Hertel came into the squad room. “Meeting in the chief’s office,” he said.

  We followed him up the hall to Chief Brown’s office. The chief was alone. He waved us to chairs and waited until we were seated.

  Then he said, “Talked to the boss this morning about George Whiteman. The order’s to go all out for him. As of now, all department leave is canceled until he’s caught.” Hertel and Frank nodded, and I said, “Want us to try rolling stakeouts in the canyon-roads area again?”

  “We’re going to do better than that this time,” Chief Brown said. “It’s a big area, but we’re going to blanket it with decoys. Hertel, you’ll be in charge of setting up the operation. The suspect’s MO has been to pick cars near bends on the road, so that after he hits, he can disappear around a bend, where he apparently has a getaway car parked. I want an undercover car parked near every bend along Mulholland Drive, and along every canyon road that runs into it.”

  The captain emitted a low whistle. “There must be a hundred or more curves in that area, Chief.”

  “Then we’ll use a hundred or more cars. It’s been arranged for Metro to furnish as many extra teams as you need. When you run out of radio-equipped undercover cars, ask for volunteers to furnish their private automobiles. This is an all-out operation. The next time this guy sticks a gun through a car window—”