Peter Gunn

by Henry, Kane,

  “Koko works for York?”

  “I’ve heard the name mentioned. Sort of part-time bodyguard, man of all work, that sort of thing.”

  “Well,” said Gunn and smiled toward Lockwood. “Mr. York is tall, dark, handsome, curly hair, about forty. How do you like that description?”

  “It fits,” said Lockwood.

  “It fits others too, unfortunately. Ever hear of Tony Valero?”

  “No.”

  “Did you ever hear of Willie Koko?”

  “No.”

  A hunch rose up and smote Gunn solidly. He dug around in his pockets and came up with a photograph. He handed Effie Vernon’s photograph to Lockwood. “Ever see that woman?”

  “Yes,” said Lockwood, slowly. “Yes, I did.”

  “When?”

  A crease came between Lockwood’s eyebrows. “I saw her… yesterday. Yes, that’s right, yesterday afternoon. She came to my door bothering me about subscriptions to magazines. She was persistent, flirtatious, hung me up for quite a time.”

  “Enough time for somebody to sneak in the back door and clip one of your pistols?”

  “Plenty of time for that. And the back door was open. I’d been out back taking target practice.”

  “All right, kiddies, let’s go,” said Gunn. “A ray of light has begun to shine through. If you’re telling the truth, Mr. Lockwood, the first ray of light has begun to shine through.”

  chapter 15

  Harold Smith, Esquire, was slender, sandy-haired, dapper and soft-spoken, a Harvard graduate, a former United States Senator, and one of the most respected and renowned attorneys in the State of California. He did not especially practice criminal law, nor especially labor law; Steve Bain had had lawyers for both those specialties: Harold Smith had been his personal attorney. Upon their arrival at Jacoby’s office, Smith had requested a preliminary conference with his clients, to which Jacoby had graciously acquiesced, leaving Jacoby and Gunn alone. Jacoby looked harried, irritable and puffy-eyed but withal grateful and he smiled sleepily but gratefully.

  “Thanks for saving us time and energy,” he said. “Thanks for bringing him in. What’s your interest in this anyway?”

  “Steve Bain was a client of mine.”

  “He’s dead.”

  “There’s another client. Alive.”

  “Who?” said Jacoby.

  “I’ll tell you later,” said Gunn. “Here comes your pigeon.”

  Lockwood, Alice and Smith trooped in and upon a gesture from Jacoby seated themselves. Jacoby came to the point like a retriever that had flushed its quarry. “Mr. Lockwood,” he said, “first off, in the presence of your counsel, I must inform you that anything you may here say may be held against you and used as testimony against you in any proceeding that shall take place relevant to the murder of Steve Bain. Is that understood?”

  Lockwood looked toward Smith who nodded, and Lockwood nodded.

  “Mr. Lockwood,” said Jacoby, “do you have any objection to submitting to a paraffin test?”

  “What’s a paraffin test?” said Lockwood.

  “My client does not object,” said Smith.

  Jacoby pressed a button on his desk, a uniformed policeman appeared and Jacoby said, “Howard, take Mr. Lockwood to the lab for a paraffin test. And when you come back, bring a stenographer with you.” He smiled toward Lockwood. “Please go with the policeman.”

  When they were gone, Harold Smith said, “I hear you’ve quite a damning case against my client, Lieutenant.”

  “It’s bad, Mr. Smith,” said Jacoby dourly. “I think it’ll be complete after the paraffin test.”

  “What is a paraffin test?” said Alice Bain.

  Gunn said, “Warm paraffin is applied to the palm, allowed to harden, and peeled off. If a person has discharged a gun, microscopic nitrate particles become imbedded in the palm. The peeled-off paraffin has drawn these out and they can be ascertained upon test. If the paraffin test is negative—that is, no nitrate impregnations in the palm—it tends to show that that person did not shoot a gun. If it is positive, it is further evidence that the person did shoot a gun.”

  “I see,” said Alice Bain.

  “Do you wish to discuss any of the evidence with me, Lieutenant,” said Smith, “before my client returns?”

  Jacoby shrugged. “There’s no secret. Sitting right here with us are Miss Bain and Mr. Gunn, two integral parts of our case. Actually witnesses. Bain was murdered at twelve noon. They came upon Lockwood at three minutes after twelve, standing gun in hand over the murdered man. The gun itself is terribly damning evidence.” He sighed suddenly. “Of course, there are some peculiar aspects to the case, but there usually are in a case in which the estimable Mr. Gunn is involved.”

  “Do I detect a wry note of criticism?” said Harold Smith.

  “Maybe, maybe not, I’m not sure myself.” Jacoby’s grin was as enigmatic as a lover’s smile. “Gunn and I are good friends, fast friends, with a hell of a lot of respect for each other. Gunn is not one of those harum-scarum private detectives. We’ve known one another for years and years, business-wise and socially. To me he’s practically part of my department. He’s never pulled a fast one on me that’s not turned out, in the end, to be of benefit to me. So I play along with him all the time, permitting him quirks and didoes that I wouldn’t permit in members of my own staff.” A sigh again, like a rustle of wind. “Each to his own modus operandi.”

  “Quirks and didoes,” said Smith. “Very beautifully expressed, Lieutenant.”

  “Quirks and didoes, Counselor,” purred Jacoby, his eyes shifting to Alice Bain. “Would you like a for-instance, Counselor?”

  “I would very much admire a for-instance, Lieutenant.”

  “Now here sit my two star witnesses,” said Jacoby. “They caught up with the guy red-handed, they were nice and polite, they co-operated, they gave us nice, polite statements with nice, polite signatures and all. But the total impression they conveyed to us was that Sir Lochinvar, pardon, Sir Lockwood, was a complete stranger to them. Now it turns out that Mr. Gunn delivers him to us and they know one another fairly well, and Miss Bain brings in her own attorney, or her father’s attorney, to represent him.” His voice hardened. “So he isn’t a total stranger, is he, Miss Bain?”

  “No,” said Miss Bain.

  “Would you grant me the favor of an explanation, Miss Bain?”

  “I… I wanted to give him a chance.”

  “And you persuaded the good Mr. Gunn to go along with that?”

  Dryly the good Mr. Gunn said, “I was persuaded, Lieutenant.”

  “Quirks and didoes,” said Jacoby. “Does it begin to clear for you, Mr. Smith?”

  “I believe it does,” said Smith, eyes smiling.

  “All right!” barked Jacoby. “The hell with granting me explanation. I demand it. Let’s hear, Miss Bain. What about you and Lockwood?”

  “We’ve been friends. I’ve been going out with him. I’m interested in him. My father objected.”

  “Your father and Lockwood knew each other?”

  “Yes.”

  “They argued about this?”

  “Yes.”

  “I was retained,” said Gunn, “by Steve Bain to check into Sam Lockwood.”

  “And did you?”

  “I’d hardly begun before… before this unfortunate event occurred.”

  “Unfortunate event occurred,” mimicked Jacoby, shifting his glance to Smith, then returning it to Gunn. “Did Lockwood know you were checking him?”

  “Yes.”

  “That Steve Bain had hired you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Was he sore about it?”

  “Yes.”

  Jacoby flicked his hands into the air. “There’s my case, Counselor. Our casual investigations have already disclosed Lockwood to be a kid with a mean temper. There’s the case—motive, opportunity, proximity, witnesses, and this gun.” He opened a drawer and produced it. “This gun, more than—”

  The
door opened and Lockwood entered followed by the policeman Howard and another policeman bearing a stenotype machine. “The test is positive, Lieutenant,” said Howard and retired. The police-stenographer seated himself.

  “Positive,” said Jacoby. “That means—”

  “They explained to me what it means,” said Lockwood. “Sure I shot a gun. I was shooting a gun all morning at my home, target practice. Sure there are nitrate impregnations in my palms, there ought to be. I shoot a gun every day. I’ve won medals, trophies, for shooting guns. I was taking target practice this very morning. Mr. Gunn can corroborate that.”

  “But what about the target practice this afternoon, Mr. Lockwood?” said Jacoby. “With Mr. Steve Bain as the target. And these two broke in on you before you had a chance to get out.”

  “That’s a lie!”

  Jacoby lifted the Colt .38. “Your gun, in your hand, with only your fingerprints on it, and Bain dead with a bullet from this gun in him, and two witnesses who bust in on you before the guy is cold. Talk your way out of that! Plus you hated the guy, he was interfering with your romance with his daughter, he had hired a peeper to check into you. Talk, Mr. Lockwood! Talk your way out of that!”

  “Now just a minute, Lieutenant Jacoby,” said Smith.

  Jacoby put the gun down on the desk, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Sorry,” he said, a twinkle in his eye, “sometimes I pop off like a policeman.”

  “Sit down, won’t you, Sam?” said Smith. Lockwood complied. “Would you like to hear his story, Lieutenant?”

  “Sir,” said Jacoby. “I would consider it a boon.”

  “Daniel?” said Gunn.

  “Joke,” said Jacoby. “It goes with the quirks and didoes.”

  “Would you tell the lieutenant your story, please, Sam?” said Smith. “Start from the beginning.”

  “What’s the beginning?” said Lockwood. “Where does one begin?”

  “You become acquainted with Miss Alice Bain. Where? How?”

  “I met her at a party…”

  “Fine,” said Smith. “Just go on from there.”

  Lockwood told his story. Jacoby, sitting back, hands folded across his stomach, listened. When Lockwood was finished, Jacoby said, without a shift in his position, “Is that it?”

  “Yes, sir, that’s it.”

  “I’m sorry, it’s not enough. We’re going to hold you, Mr. Lockwood. The weight of the evidence against you is overwhelming. All we have from you is a story without any proof—”

  “And the fact that he’s voluntarily turned himself in,” said Gunn.

  Jacoby sat up. “What alternative did he have, Pete?”

  “You don’t give any credence to his story at all?” asked Smith.

  “Look, I’m a cop,” said Jacoby. “It’s my job to accumulate facts, not stories. I have facts, damning facts, against him. Now he’s told me a story, but it’s a story without facts, without proof, without evidence.” Jacoby pointed to the gun. “Let him give me something like that, concrete, and I’d be happy to go all the way with him. His gun, his initials on it, only his fingerprints—”

  “He told me that the man he saw coming out was wearing gloves,” said Smith. “If that person wiped the gun clean first, used it, dropped it, and Lockwood picked it up—all of that would jibe, of course only his fingerprints would be on it.”

  “But all this is pure hypothesis,” said Jacoby. “It goes with his story, sure it goes with his story—but if his story is all cock and bull, it would still go with his story.”

  Soberly Smith said, “When a man is framed, all he has is his story.”

  “And when a man says he’s framed,” countered Jacoby, “that’s all he has too.”

  “What about the woman who came to my door supposedly selling magazines?” said Lockwood. “Perhaps that could be followed up. Mr. Gunn has a picture of her. Suppose you found her and brought her in?”

  “How do you know she wasn’t really selling magazines?” said Jacoby.

  “I don’t know,” said Lockwood. “But why don’t we give that a try? Why don’t we follow that up?”

  Wearily Jacoby said, “All right, let’s see that picture, Pete.” Gunn handed across the photograph and suddenly all weariness disappeared from Jacoby. He sprang out of his chair. “You know why we don’t follow this up—because we can’t! This woman was murdered today.”

  “What?” said Harold Smith.

  “You know who she is?” Jacoby said excitedly to Gunn. Mildly Gunn said, “Effie Vernon, and I also know what her trade was, and it’s a little preposterous to think that she would be at Lockwood’s door selling magazines. That’s certainly some evidence in his favor.”

  “Sure, if she was at his door selling magazines, but that’s still part of his story. No proof, no proof. Did you know this woman was dead, Mr. Lockwood?”

  “No,” said Lockwood.

  “Was Effie a friend of yours, Pete?”

  “I knew her.”

  Jacoby lowered his eyes, studying the photograph, said quietly without looking up, “Where did you get this, Pete?”

  “At Effie’s apartment.”

  Jacoby’s eyes came up. “Effie Vernon’s murder was anonymously tipped to us. Do you know anything about that, Pete?”

  “Let’s put it this way.” said Gunn. “I don’t know anything about her murder that can be of any help to you. If I get any such information, I shall communicate it to you at once.”

  Now Jacoby’s glance went to Smith. “See what I mean about quirks and didoes?” He flung the photograph on the desk. “All right, let’s get back to the case at hand. You realize we’re going to have to hold your client, Mr. Smith?”

  “Yes, I realize that. I just don’t want you to think that you have an open-and-shut matter here. There has been no confession, quite the contrary. My client’s statements completely refute that well-supported theory of yours. True, as yet we have no evidence, no actual proofs—but we, at our end, we have not yet even begun to work on it. You have an excellent reputation in this town, Lieutenant, as being a fair and just man. I beg of you to keep an open mind.”

  “I have a suggestion,” said Gunn.

  “Here we go,” said Jacoby.

  “Let’s get back to the man he saw coming out of Bain’s place.”

  “How are we going to get back to him?” demanded Jacoby.

  “Let’s study some rogues’ gallery photos.”

  “There are thousands and thousands and thousands of those. How do we limit it? How do we narrow it down? By what process? Dark, good-looking and curly-haired this guy says. Well, there are thousands and thousands of those.”

  “I’d suggest we look at three.”

  “Three thousand?”

  “No. Just three.”

  Jacoby’s head wiggled about wildly. “Three? What three?”

  “Please do go along with my alleged quirks and didoes, Lieutenant. It was your opinion that this was an open-and-shut case, for which, of course, no one can blame you, and your people concentrated on locating Mr. Sam Lockwood. On the other hand, because of a promise I made to Miss Bain, plus certain other retainers paid to me, I have also had an interest in this matter, and I approached it from a viewpoint other than your own. I have a vague hunch that one of the three photographs will be identified by Mr. Lockwood as the Mister X whom he saw hurriedly depart the Bain residence. Let’s give it a try, shall we?”

  Glumly Jacoby said, “What three, Monsieur le Prefect?”

  “First I should like to make this provision, Monsieur Arsène Lupin.”

  “Shoot, Sherlock.”

  “I shoot, my dear Watson. I don’t want to put any of the three on a spot. If Mr. Lockwood doesn’t make identification of any of the three, I’d like you not to ask me why I picked them, no sense getting them into trouble with the law. If he picks one, please don’t ask me why I selected the other two. Okay?”

  “Mine not to reason why, with a guy like you, mine but to do. All right. I do.
What three?”

  “First, Tony Valero. I know he’s got his picture in your gallery.”

  “Yep.”

  “Then, Willie Koko. That’s a hood who should—”

  “We’ve got his picture. I didn’t know he’s still around these parts. Maybe he’s been behaving himself.”

  “And then Mike York, the union official.”

  “Vice president of Bain’s union?”

  “That’s the one. Did he ever do time?”

  “He did. We have his picture.”

  “Those three, Lieutenant, and let’s see what happens?”

  The photos were sent for, and when they were brought they were placed side by side on Jacoby’s desk, and five pairs of eyes, bodies crowded together, peered down upon them. Gunn, contiguous to Lockwood, could feel Lockwood tremble.

  “Gosh,” said Harold Smith, “they’re quite similar, aren’t they?”

  “Maybe that’s why Mr. Gunn picked them,” said Jacoby, “to further confuse your client.”

  “Man, they’re sure look-alikes,” breathed Lockwood, “but one of them’s the guy all right—this one.”

  He pointed. At Mike York.

  “You sure?” said Jacoby as they all moved back from the desk.

  “I think…” Lockwood licked his lips. “You can’t really tell from a picture. I’d like to see the guy face to face before I say positively.”

  “Very commendable,” said Jacoby.

  “If you’re being sarcastic, Lieutenant,” said Smith, “I think it’s uncalled for.”

  “He kind of picked a winner, didn’t he?” said Jacoby.

  “And just what does that mean?” said Smith.

  “Means that everybody and his brother knows that Bain and York were kind of battling in union affairs. No love lost there.”

  “I didn’t know,” said Lockwood.

  “The man is a musician,” said Smith, “not interested in labor affairs. Just because you and I may know certain facts in certain spheres, Lieutenant, doesn’t mean that everyone else does.”

  Jacoby grunted. “Check. Maybe I’m tired. Apologies all around.”

  “I suggest you have him picked up right away,” said Smith.

  “You betcha,” said Jacoby.

  “May I have a word with you, Lieutenant?” said Gunn.