Headed for a Hearse

by Jonathan Latimer

  Crane thrust his hands in his pockets. “I’d hire men to dig for the bullets and—” the toe of his shoe made a wavery “I” on the sticky earth—“I’d give one hundred dollars for each bullet they found.”

  As though about to whistle, Mr. Washington pursed his lips. No sound came, however. Instead, he said, “Well, business hasn’t been so good…”

  3:30 P. M.

  Later in the afternoon, while the men were working, Crane sent a telegram to Finklestein. It read:

  PLEASE HAVE EVERYBODY INCLUDING MURDERER AT WARDEN’S OFFICE 9 P. M.

  Outside it was still raining.

  CHAPTER XVII

  Friday Night

  The warden’s big wall clock—Naval Observatory time, adjusted hourly through Western Union—said nine-twenty-two when Crane, Oscar Havermeyer, and Major Lee, followed by Williams and the diver, Finnegan, entered the office. Blue cigarette smoke shrouded the room, shadowed a confusingly large number of people. Finklestein jumped out of a chair.

  “Boy!” he exclaimed. “I was beginning to think you weren’t going to show up.”

  “I see you got my wire,” said Crane. He allowed himself to be pulled over to a tall man with heavy eyebrows and a big crooked mouth.

  Finklestein said, “This is State’s Attorney Ross. The Governor has agreed to accept his recommendation on a reprieve.”

  Crane said, “How d’you do,” and added, “Then all we have to do is convince you?”

  The state’s attorney had a slow smile. “That’s all … and I hope you do.”

  Oscar Havermeyer was wearing square-toed tan shoes and the best blue suit of store clothes $15 would buy and a straw hat. He and Finnegan backed up against the wall, stared covertly at Miss Brentino’s pale face. She had on a sleek Pernod-green wool suit with a redingote coat and black shoes; her legs were slender in sheer neutral silk. Woodbury’s dark head was bent attentively over her.

  Crane looked past Bolston’s broad shoulders to Warden Buckholtz. “Could you bring up Westland?”

  “Sure.” The warden struggled out of his swivel chair. “Right away.” His small eyes darted a curious glance at Crane as he went out the door.

  Crane peered through the smoke, saw Deputy Strom standing with Simmons against the wall, and observed, “So you brought your prisoner.”

  The deputy scowled. “As far as I’m concerned he’s free.” He chewed his short cigar viciously. “This is your party now, and I miss my guess if it ain’t a flop.”

  Crane ignored him. He asked Bolston, “Where’s Wharton?”

  Finklestein said, “He hasn’t shown up yet.”

  Emily Lou Martin was wearing a russet knit-wool dress with a red leather belt. She said, “I bet he doesn’t show up.” She was wearing silk stockings the color of ripe wheat, and she was perched on the warden’s desk with her slender legs crossed. Doc Williams could see a seductive triangle of flesh where the silk ended far above the knee.

  “Oh yes; he’ll come,” said Crane.

  Westland arrived with Warden Buckholtz. He looked as though he had just survived an attack of malaria. His face was deeply lined; there were discolored hollows under his eyes; his skin was yellow. He managed a feeble smile. He had only two hours to live.

  Emily Lou slid from the warden’s desk, threw her arms around him. “What have they been doing to you, honey?” She ran her fingers across a pancake-size circle of bare skin on the top of his head.

  Westland pulled her hand away. “They shaved me. On the head and here.” He showed, under the slit left leg of his trousers, a hairless leg. “I feel like a Spanish bolero dancer with these flapping pants.” His voice quavered, belied his sick grin.

  “We have to cut the trousers and shave the head and leg for the electrodes,” Warden Buckholtz explained. “That’s so there won’t be a short circuit.”

  “Oh, my God!” exclaimed Westland. He looked at the warden through feverish eyes. “Can’t you——”

  “It’s all right,” Crane said. “It’s all right.”

  Pushing his back from the wall, Deputy Strom said, “Like hell it’s all right. Let’s see some evidence.”

  “You’ll see some as soon as Wharton shows up.” Crane rubbed his chin. “In the meantime I’d like to ask Westland one question for the record.”

  Westland said, “Go ahead.” He had gained control of himself.

  “It’s about your clients’ brokerage accounts. Did you know they were all loaded with phoney bonds?”

  “Phoney bonds!” Westland glanced incredulously at Woodbury. “They couldn’t be. I bought most of them myself.”

  Woodbury fingered his black mustache. “They were, though, Bob. Even some of Joan’s bonds in her safe in the apartment were part of the loot of an Indiana bank robbery.”

  “That’s impossible. I don’t see how…” Westland’s voice faded away.

  Deputy Strom said, “Not much you don’t.”

  Bolston, leaning his broad shoulders against the open door, announced, “Here comes Wharton.”

  Wharton entered at a trot, his face cherry-red. “By gad, I’m sorry to be late, Bob.” His voice was thick; he was a little drunk. “Delayed unavoidably.” He patted Westland’s shoulder.

  State’s Attorney Ross said, “It’s getting late, Crane. You better start pretty soon … or…”

  Crane went over and sat on the warden’s desk. His knees almost touched Miss Brentino’s hip. “First I’m going to reconstruct the general events of Mrs. Westland’s murder, before I go into the evidence.”

  Deputy Strom laughed unmirthfully. “You haven’t got any evidence.”

  “We’ll see. Anyway, as I reconstruct the murder, Westland was lured to his wife’s apartment by a telephone call which at the time he believed came from Miss Martin.”

  Deputy Strom asked, “Can you prove there was a call?”

  “Listen, flatfoot,” said State’s Attorney Ross. “You’ve had your turn. Give him a chance.”

  “I’m just reconstructing now,” Crane explained, “not presenting facts.”

  The deputy spat on the wood floor.

  Crane continued, “Whoever talked to Westland made him mad, and he went over to his wife’s apartment. They had a quarrel which was heard by the elevator boy, Tony. Then, according to Westland’s story, which by the way was accepted by the police, he left the apartment at 12:40. Now the Shuttles had testified that they heard a shot at 12:10, but Mr. Bolston discovered that they had been mixed up because of the change from daylight saving time to standard time that Sunday night.” Crane glanced at Bolston for confirmation.

  “Woodbury and I made the discovery,” said Bolston.

  “The shot was actually fired, then, at 1:10, or half an hour after Westland said he left the apartment. This was interesting, but of little value to us, because we had only Westland’s unsupported testimony as to when he left his wife’s apartment. From the standpoint of the state he could easily have lied about that.”

  State’s Attorney Ross nodded.

  Crane glanced at the soft curve of Miss Brentino’s cheek bone. “To continue with the reconstruction—after Westland left, the real murderer, who was waiting for him to leave, entered the apartment and shot Mrs. Westland. He killed her with a Webley automatic, but not with Westland’s Webley, as the police believed. We know this because Major Lee has proved it by ballistics tests on Westland’s pistol, which we found in the river.”

  “I’ve already talked with Major Lee about that,” said the state’s attorney. “Both Strom and I admit the State was wrong there.”

  “How do you get the murderer out of the locked apartment?” demanded Strom.

  “I’ll come to that later.” Crane lifted a dagger-shaped paper cutter from the desk, pricked the back of his left hand with it. “He did get out, however, and on the next day he stole Westland’s Webley. It had to disappear so as to incriminate Westland, but the murderer couldn’t take the risk of stealing it before the crime. Its disappearance might have aroused Wes
tland’s suspicion, or he might have reported its loss to the police.”

  “You ought to try fiction writing,” said Deputy Strom.

  “Thus we have three things which implicate Westland. First, the use of a Webley in the murder and the disappearance of his own Webley. Second, the trick of locking the apartment so that it appeared as if only Westland’s key could have been used. Third, the timing of the murder so that the medical examiner would say it could have been done while Westland was known to have been in the apartment.”

  “This is very pretty,” said State’s Attorney Ross, “but what about the motive?”

  “It was a double motive.” Crane smiled down at Miss Brentino. “The murderer wanted to get rid of both the Westlands. He saw an opportunity to kill her and at the same time to get Westland electrocuted for the job.”

  “Killing two birds with a single pistol shot,” Bolston murmured.

  “That’s fine,” said Deputy Strom with heavy sarcasm. “You’ve certainly convinced us with a lot of fine facts. Now if you’ll just point out your murderer, we’ll send him to the electric chair in place of Mr. Westland.”

  Crane said, “I’ve brought somebody here to point him out.” He beckoned to Oscar Havermeyer.

  Miss Brentino’s wide brown eyes watched the man advance.

  “In order to shoot Mrs. Westland with a war-time Webley, the murderer had to buy one.” Crane was talking to the state’s attorney. “Mr. Havermeyer is a salesman for the Washington Arms Company of Peoria. He sold a war-time Webley to the murderer just two days before Mrs. Westland was slain.”

  Havermeyer’s blond face was impassive.

  “Now, Oscar, do you see the man who bought the Webley in this room?”

  “Yeah,” said Havermeyer.

  “Will you point him out?”

  Havermeyer strolled over to the door. His tan shoes squeaked like mice. “This’s him.” He jerked a thumb at Bolston.

  CHAPTER XVIII

  Friday Night

  Westland’s face was ghastly with disappointment, his voice thin. “You’ve made a terrible mistake, Crane.”

  The tumult had faded now, and the room was self-consciously quiet. Deputy Strom was whispering to the state’s attorney.

  “It’s ridiculous.” Bolston’s jaw was outlined under skin as tight as rawhide. “I could prosecute you for this.”

  “No you couldn’t,” said Crane. “So far you’ve only been identified as the man who bought a Webley similar to Westland’s two days before the murder.”

  Bolston said, “Your friend is as crazy as you are.”

  Crane handed the assistant state’s attorney two notarized sheets of paper. “These are the affidavits of two more witnesses to the purchase. Both of them identified Bolston’s photographs. One of them is president of the company; the other, his secretary. They’re willing to testify that Bolston bought the gun.”

  “They recognized the photograph just like I done,” said Oscar Havermeyer.

  State’s Attorney Ross folded the affidavits, thrust them in his pocket. “Bolston, you’ll have a hard time getting around three witnesses.”

  Deputy Strom looked at him in surprise. “I thought you said——”

  “Give Crane a chance to finish,” said the state’s attorney. “A man’s life——”

  “Even if I did buy the gun, which I didn’t,” asserted Bolston, “there’s no proof in that act that I killed Mrs. Westland.” He glanced at Strom’s face. “Why doesn’t he produce the pistol he says I bought?”

  Crane said, “I can’t, because it’s too well hidden.”

  “You see…?” exclaimed Bolston.

  “But,” Crane continued, “I can do something just as good. I can prove the gun which Bolston bought was the one used to kill Mrs. Westland.”

  All of them stared at him incredulously. State’s Attorney Ross asked, “You can do it without even having the pistol?”

  “Yes. Without magic, too. Major Lee, the floor is yours.”

  Major Lee looked embarrassed. “It’s really quite simple.” He fished two envelopes from his coat pocket. “In one of these envelopes are the bullets Mr. Havermeyer brought from Peoria. They were fired from the pistol which Mr. Bolston has been identified as testing before he bought it.” He laid the envelope on the warden’s desk. “In this other envelope is the bullet which killed Mrs. Westland. Its ballistics marks are identical with those on the Peoria bullets.”

  “You mean,” asked Ross, “that the marks prove the pistol Mr. Bolston has been identified as buying killed Mrs. Westland?”

  “Exactly.”

  Woodbury’s eyes, narrowed appraisingly, were upon Bolston. “Would your evidence stand up in court, Major Lee?”

  “It always has.”

  Strom was bewildered but not licked. “If you could go to the river and find Westland’s gun, with every place in the whole city to look for it, why can’t you find the one from Peoria? My guess is you found Westland’s because he told you where he hid it.”

  “What point would Westland have in not speaking about it before?” Crane demanded. “It would have been a big help during the trial to have been able to prove his pistol didn’t kill his wife.”

  Finklestein rubbed his nose, asked, “Well, how the hell did you find Westland’s pistol, anyway?”

  “It was a piece of pure deductive reasoning, and a damn good one at that,” said Crane modestly. “First I assumed Bolston was the murderer and that he had disposed of Westland’s pistol so as to throw suspicion on him. Secondly, as I told you before, I knew the pistol must have been taken after, not before the murder. Then I remembered Bolston had called Westland’s man, Simmons, after the murder was discovered, told him the police had gone to arrest Westland, and asked him to go down to the Detective Bureau. Simmons says the call came at 11:30.”

  “That’s right, sir,” said Simmons.

  “With this time fixed,” Crane continued, “I looked around for some other evidence with which I could place Bolston’s actions on that morning. We know he was at Mrs. Westland’s apartment while the police were there, and Miss Dea and Deputy Strom both say Bolston left to go to his office sometime after eleven o’clock. As Simmons got the call from him a few minutes later, it is logical to assume Bolston phoned him from a near-by drugstore, though this doesn’t make much difference.”

  Bolston said, “This is all surmise. I don’t see why we have to listen——”

  “Let him go on,” said State’s Attorney Ross.

  “Simmons got the call at 11:30 and left the house five minutes later to go to the Detective Bureau. Bolston watched him leave, let himself in the apartment with a key he had, stole the pistol, and started for the office in his Rolls-Royce.”

  Westland said, “He didn’t have a key.” His face had some color in it now.

  “I’ll explain later,” Crane said. “At the very fastest, Bolston would have taken three minutes to get the pistol, so he couldn’t have left Westland’s apartment before 11:38. But 24 minutes later he stepped into his office. Wharton, who had been waiting there for Westland since 11:30, was leaving as Bolston came in. Mr. Wharton’s sure the time was 12:02 because he had resolved to wait only until 12 o’clock for Westland.”

  “Right,” said Wharton.

  “I reasoned that Bolston would want to dispose of the stolen pistol before he reached his office. He couldn’t afford to have it found on him, or in his car, yet he wasn’t certain the police might not take him into custody for questioning. There was a possibility someone had seen him coming out of Mrs. Westland’s apartment after the murder.

  “Next I tried to imagine where he’d be likely to hide it. He couldn’t afford to throw it in somebody’s bushes, or in the gutter, or even down a manhole, because somebody might find it, see Westland’s name on it, and give it to the police. The two most likely places seemed to be the lake and the river.”

  Crane ran his fingers through his hair, grinned across at Doc Williams.

  “Now, Bols
ton didn’t have time to go to the lake and still make his office in 24 minutes, so I decided he must have tossed the pistol in the river. By an expensive method of trial and error with a taxi, Doc and I found there are only about six ways you can drive from Westland’s home to his office and still keep within 25 minutes. You have to cross the river on each of these ways, but all but one of them take you over open, crowded bridges with a watchman’s tower at each end—not very good places from which to throw a weapon that could involve you in a murder.

  “The time element again told me Bolston couldn’t have parked his car and walked along the river bank until he found a good place to throw the Webley away, so the choice was narrowed down to the one bridge which seemed suitable: the Michigan Avenue underpass, which is dark, not crowded and not guarded.

  “Once I had decided this, it was an easy matter to pick out the most likely spot on the bridge for pistol-throwing, and to determine by tossing in a monkey wrench just how far out a pistol would go if the driver of the car slung it backhand through the window next to the passenger’s seat. Then we sent a diver down with an electro-magnet, and he found both the wrench and the pistol.”

  “What do you say to that, Strom?” asked State’s Attorney Ross.

  “He probably planted the pistol there himself,” said Deputy Strom stubbornly.

  “If I did, I threw it in the river six months ago. Major Lee will assure you it had been under water for some time, and Mr. Finnegan, the diver, will testify it was pretty well buried in the mud.”

  Finnegan took his blue eyes off Miss Brentino. “That gun wasn’t just trun in there, let me tell you. We’d never of found it if it hadn’t been for the magnet.” He spoke directly toward Miss Brentino. “You understand about divin’, miss? You can’t see——”

  “Never mind,” said Finklestein. “There’s only forty minutes left. Let Crane go ahead and tell us about the key Bolston used to get into Westland’s apartment.”