Oliver Quade, the Human Encyclopedia

by Gruber, Frank

  Five minutes later another car drew up and Freddie Bartlett, surrounded by several of his intimates, climbed out and went into the church. Freddie was quite the picture in striped trousers, cutaway tail coat and silk hat.

  Quade bit his lip. The ceremony was due to start in another five minutes—unless there was some unusual delay. He wondered if he would have to make the delay himself. But at two minutes to five an automobile siren screeched up the street.

  “Now begins the fun,” he said, sitting up.

  “It’s the cops,” said Boston. “Wonder who they’re going to pinch!”

  “Maybe the bridegroom—or me. We’ll see. Ah, Christopher Buck is with the chief.”

  The police car screamed up to the curb before the church. The lanky Christopher Buck sprang from it even before it stopped. He was clutching something under his arm. Chief Costello and a uniformed cop piled out after the private detective. They charged into the church.

  “Holy smokes!” exclaimed Boston. “They’re busting right into the wedding and they don’t look like they’re going to kiss the bride, either. It’s a pinch if ever I saw one.”

  It was. Almost immediately Chief Costello, Christopher Buck, the policemen and Freddie Bartlett came out. Bartlett’s clothing was disarranged and he was handcuffed. Even a Freddie Bartlett will become indignant at being arrested while the clergyman is saying the words of the marriage ceremony.

  Behind the arresting party, swarmed the members of the family and the wedding guests.

  “I don’t think there’ll be any wedding today,” said Oliver Quade.

  “You knew something was going to happen here,” Charlie accused. “You were too calm about things. I know you, Oliver.”

  Quade screwed up his face. “All right, I’ll confess, Charlie. I had a tip-off from Buck. He had a hot clue that pointed to Freddie. I had a hunch he would butt right into the wedding ceremony to make his pinch. For a while, though, I was afraid he wouldn’t make it in time.”

  “Afraid? You mean you wanted him to bust up the wedding?”

  Quade did not answer. Boston threw up his hands in disgust. “O.K., Ollie, if that’s the way she stands that’s the way she stands. C’mon, let’s beat it, they’re looking over here!”

  Quade saw Lois Lanyard, very lovely in a white satin dress and bridal veil, pointing across the street at him. Christopher Buck, head and shoulders above the crowd, was looking, too.

  Quade stepped on the starter and shifted into gear. The car leaped away from the curb. “They’re yelling at us, Ollie,” said Boston.

  “Let ’em yell. I’ve had lots of people yell at me in my day.”

  Fifteen minutes later Quade walked into the dining-room of the Westfield Hotel with Charlie Boston. They were on the soup course when the dining-room was invaded by several determined looking men.

  “I’d hoped to get a good meal before going to jail,” Quade said to Boston, “but such is life…. Hello, Mr. Buck, what’s up?”

  “Your number,” Buck snapped.

  Freddie Bartlett, no longer handcuffed, pointed a lean finger at Quade. “You cheap book agent! Why’d you send this detective to look into my ashcan?”

  “Tsk, tsk,” Quade clucked to Buck. “A detective should never reveal the sources of information.”

  “That’s the last trick you’ll pull in this town, Quade,” said Chief Costello sternly. “The idea, trying to throw suspicion on an innocent man just to break up his wedding! Well, it brought out the truth and you’re under arrest!”

  “What for? For giving information to a private detective instead of a policeman?”

  “Cut out the stalling, Quade,” snapped Buck. “Miss Lanyard spilled the beans. She saw you unchain that bull-dog at the dog show—the dog fight. You started that dog fight to cover up your dirty work.”

  “The red flag,” said Quade half aloud. “Ask no quarter and give none. All right, I’ll come quietly.”

  Charlie Boston pushed back his chair and took up a fighting stance.

  “Maybe you could lick them at that, Charlie,” Quade said, “but they’d only get me later. I’ll go along with them. Look me up after they’ve booked me.”

  “I’ll get a lawyer. My cousin, Paul, in New York. He’ll put these small town cops through their hoops,” howled Charlie Boston. “He’s the smartest criminal lawyer on the east side.”

  But Quade scarcely heard him. He was being dragged off to jail. It was the swankiest jail Quade had ever been in; quite in keeping with the town itself. It wasn’t a very large jail, neat cells, a wide corridor and a clean, large bull pen where the guests were permitted to exercise during prescribed periods.

  The inhabitants of the jail unfortunately were not up to its standards. They were unfortunates from the city who had wandered out to rich Westfield hoping to better themselves and had fallen afoul of the law. There were eight or ten of them. As the cells adjoined one another and were separated only by bars, communication among the prisoners was easy.

  The prisoners knew all about Quade by the time he was locked into a cell and they greeted him with the respect due a capital crime violator.

  Quade bore up cheerfully enough that first evening in jail. He entertained the other prisoners for an hour or two with his fund of knowledge, then pleaded fatigue and they left him alone. Quade examined the bunk and blankets closely and sighed with relief when he found no spots that moved. He threw himself down on it.

  An hour later he sat up. “Lord, why didn’t I tumble before?” he said, half aloud. He went to his barred door, cried out loudly, “Turnkey!”

  The other prisoners took up the cry and a moment later a uniformed man came clumping into the cell corridor. “What’s all the racket about here?”

  “It’s me,” Quade cried. “I want to talk to Chief Costello.”

  “You wanta confess?”

  “Confess, hell,” snorted Quade. “I didn’t kill that man. But I just thought of something I want to tell the chief.”

  “Ah, do you now? Well, tell him tomorrow morning. This is the night the chief plays poker and he don’t like to be bothered with little things.”

  “This isn’t a little thing. It’s important.”

  “Nuts,” said the jailer. “If you keep up the racket I’ll turn out the lights on you even though it’s only eight o’clock.” He went out through the door and slammed it behind him.

  Quade yelled for him to come back. The other prisoners, thinking to help him, yelled also. And then the lights in the entire jail went out. The turnkey had kept his threat. Quade cursed and threw himself on his cot. After a while he fell asleep.

  A new jailer came around in the morning and asked the prisoners if they preferred the regular jail breakfast of oatmeal and coffee or a more complete breakfast sent from a restaurant, at their own expense. Quade stripped a ten dollar bill from the roll that had not been taken from him and ordered breakfasts for all the prisoners. He was roundly applauded for his generosity.

  After breakfast the jailer came into the cell room and distributed a few letters. There were two for Quade. One from Charlie Boston, telling him that he was going to the city to get his lawyer-cousin, Paul, and not to worry about a thing. The other was an unsigned note, written the evening before. It said merely:

  “That was a very detestable thing for you to do. I hope you stay in jail for keeps.”

  Quade winced as he read the note. He had treated Lois Lanyard pretty shabbily, but still he couldn’t regret it. Given time to think things over, Lois couldn’t help but realize that she shouldn’t marry Freddie Bartlett. In innumerable ways she’d shown that she didn’t love him; she was going through with the marriage merely because it had been rather expected of her and because several people, including her family, had been opposed to it. Quade had taken a high-handed way of helping her out of her quandary and sooner or later, he believed, she would
appreciate it.

  The prisoners’ cells were unlocked a little while later and they were herded into the bull pen. The men crowded around Quade then, thanking him for the breakfasts and assuring him that he was the Number One man of the jail as far as they were concerned.

  “That’s very fine of you, boys,” Quade thanked them. “But I’m expecting to get out of here today.”

  One of the prisoners had not joined in the eulogy to Quade. He was a surly, dark man, who sneered when the others crowded around Quade, but a little later he came up alone.

  “Here’s something for you,” he said.

  His hand came out of his pocket and Quade threw himself backwards. The gleaming knife blade ripped his coat sleeve from elbow to shoulder.

  The prisoners in the bull pen began yelling, but the knife wielder received the surprise of his life. Quade was totally unarmed, except for his quick wits and lean, strong body. But even with a knife the attacker was no match for him.

  He side-stepped the man’s second rush and, snaking out a hand, imprisoned the knife wrist. He jerked swiftly on the wrist, then smashed the forearm across a raised knee. The knife clattered to the concrete floor and the prisoner yelped in agony.

  Quade stepped back from the prisoner and brought up his right fist in an uppercut. The blow caught the man under the chin, lifted him from the floor and deposited him on his back on the concrete.

  Quade scooped up the knife. The prisoners crowded around him.

  “What the hell’s the matter with the Greek? He go nuts?” asked one.

  “Greek, huh?” Quade rubbed his chin. “I think I know what’s wrong with him. He got a letter this morning, didn’t he?”

  “Yeah,” replied one of the men. “He tore it up in little pieces and flushed it down the toilet.”

  Quade filled a tin cup with water and sloshed it on the unconscious man’s face. The prisoner gasped and began moaning. In a moment he sat up.

  “All right, partner,” Quade said. “Who told you to carve me up?”

  “No one,” grouched the prisoner. “I just didn’t like your looks.”

  Quade reached down, caught hold of the man’s shirt and yanked him to his feet. “Fella,” he said, glaring into the man’s face. “I asked you a question and I want a straight answer. Was it Bill Demetros?”

  The prisoner looked at the fist that Quade shook in his face and said, “Yeah. He said you was getting in his hair.”

  Quade threw the man away from him. “I ought to report you and you’d get a good deal more than you’re due to get now, but I can’t be bothered with small fry.”

  The turnkey stormed into the bull pen. “Quade, Mister Quade, you’re wanted up front.”

  Quade brushed off his new blue suit, frowned at the slashed sleeve, and followed the turnkey to the front part of the jail. Christopher Buck and the chief of police were both there and both looking serious.

  “I guess we’ve got to let you go, Quade,” Costello said.

  “You’re convinced that I didn’t kill Wesley Peters?”

  “Yeah. Bob Lanyard confessed that he did it.”

  “What? Why, he confessed that a couple of days ago. You don’t believe him this time, do you?”

  “Got to,” grouched the chief. “He left a letter.”

  Quade became rigid. “What do you mean, he left a letter?”

  “He shot himself last night.”

  Quade gasped. “Bob Lanyard shot himself? He’s dead?”

  Both the chief and Buck nodded. Quade shook his head in bewilderment. “The letter—could I see it?”

  Chief Costello pointed to a piece of paper lying on the desk before him. Quade looked down at it. It was just an ordinary sheet of white bond paper, crumpled, as if it had been clutched in a dead hand. There were two lines of typing on it. They read:

  “I killed Wes Peters. He was annoying my wife. Forgive me, Jessie, for making this exit.

  Bob.”

  “When was he found?” Oliver Quade asked.

  “About five-thirty this morning,” replied the chief. “The caretaker heard the dogs whining and howling and when he went to see what was the matter, there he was. The gun was in his hand.”

  “He was found in the dog kennels?”

  “Yeah, in the vacant stall where Miss Lanyard usually kept those woolly dogs she’s got at the show, now.”

  Quade’s forehead wrinkled. Then suddenly smoothed. “Buck, you still interested in this?”

  “I’ve lost my client,” growled the cadaverous detective. “But I haven’t been paid off yet. What do you want me to do?”

  “Go out there and point out things to me.”

  Buck looked at the chief, who nodded. “My men should be through by now. Let him look around.”

  They rode out to the Lanyard home in the private detective’s expensive roadster. Quade looked at the drawn shades of the house and shook his head. Lois had been fond of her brother. And it would be a terrible shock to the parents, too.

  The backyard was still swarming with newspapermen, but a couple of police were keeping them out of the dog kennels. Buck was known to them and they let him pass through with Quade.

  The dog house was a long, low building, divided into three individual stalls. There was a door at each end of the building and connecting doors between the stalls. Quade had to stoop to enter and the tall detective had to walk bent almost double. Quade’s eyes were gleaming by the time they had entered by the small door into the wire runs.

  They passed through the huskies’ kennel to where Bob Lanyard had been found in the vacant woolly kennel just beyond. The body had already been removed but the coagulated blood on the floor was mute proof of where the body had lain.

  Quade’s eyes made a sweeping, searching tour of the sheep dog stall, then he nodded to Christopher Buck. “All right, let’s go.”

  Buck looked at him with narrowed eyes. “That’s all?”

  “Yes. I just wanted to make sure he didn’t commit suicide.”

  “But he did,” protested Buck. “The gun was in his hand.”

  “Placed there by the murderer. If Bob Lanyard wanted to kill himself, why would he come out here? He could have done it in his room just as well. Someone forced him in here, probably at the point of a gun. Didn’t want the people to hear the shot.”

  “Quade,” Buck said thoughtfully, “there may be something in what you say. That confession note was typed, but not signed. Anyone could have written it. I’m going to check up on the typewriters around here.”

  “That won’t prove anything. Almost all the people interested in this matter could have got to one of the Lanyard typewriters. You forgot they almost had a wedding yesterday and there were plenty of guests.”

  Christopher Buck swore. “I’m still on this case. Christopher Buck never quits until he gets his man, even if his client is murdered!”

  Quade almost grinned at the man’s dramatic self-­appreciation. He left the building and almost bumped into Charlie Boston who was arguing with one of the policemen.

  “Ollie!” cried Boston. “I just got back and they told me at the jail that you’d been let out. I brought my cousin, Paul.”

  “Jail?” cried a cameraman nearby. “You’re Oliver Quade, the man who was jailed last night?”

  Quade gritted his teeth and smiled. “All right, boys, Oliver Quade was never modest. Bring up your cameras.”

  They did with a will. They snapped Quade from all angles. It was ten minutes before Boston could drag up his lawyer cousin, a mousy looking man of indeterminate age, who was, in Boston’s own words, “the best lawyer on the east side.”

  “Sorry you won’t be needed,” Quade said to him. “But as you see, I’m a free man. Give me your card though and I’ll give you a ring the next time I’m pinched.”

  “It’ll be a pleasure to defend you,
Mr. Quade.”

  The liveried butler came up then and spoke to Quade in a low voice. “Beg pardon, sir, but could you come into the house for a moment?”

  “Yes, I could. Charlie, wait out front by the car.”

  Quade trudged behind the butler to the house. In the living-room, his face strained and white, was Guy Lanyard. And Lois. Lois, in a black dress and clutching a wadded handkerchief in her hand. Her eyes were dry, but they had been wet before, Quade knew. Quade mumbled his sympathies and Guy Lanyard nodded.

  “Mr. Quade,” Lois said. “I’m sorry about yesterday. I shouldn’t have told the police about seeing you unchain that dog.”

  “I had it coming to me. It was a dirty trick I pulled on you.”

  Guy Lanyard cleared his throat. “Lois had the idea that Bob didn’t shoot himself.”

  “He didn’t,” said Quade.

  Guy Lanyard gasped. Lois sprang to her feet. “I told you so, Dad. I knew Bob wouldn’t do that. He was moody and all that, but I know he’d never take his own life.”

  “Someone killed Bob,” Quade said.

  “Mr. Quade,” said Guy Lanyard. “My son had employed—that detective person, who hasn’t impressed me much. I wonder if I could persuade you to do some investigating for us. I’d expect to pay, of course.”

  “That won’t be necessary. After the things that have happened nothing could stop me from running down the killer.”

  Lanyard heaved a great sigh of relief. “That will be some small satisfaction. Even though it won’t bring back Bob. Perhaps you suspect someone already?”

  “I don’t suspect. I know. I’ve known right from the start, but I couldn’t prove it. I can’t yet.”

  “Who is it?” cried Lois. “Tell me and I’ll—”

  Quade shook his head. “It isn’t time yet. I’m going into the city today—on this case—but I expect to be back this evening. Don’t worry.”

  Outside, Christopher Buck pounced on Quade. “What’d the family want, Quade?”

  Quade shook his head, continued walking. Buck swore, caught hold of his arm. “Come clean. I just heard through the grapevine about that fellow who tried to kill you in jail.”