Alvarez knelt, frowned and muttered under his breath. Finally, he arose, fumbled with his watch, stroked his mustache, and announced: “One couldn’t say except roughly, without an autopsy. But—” he glanced again at his watch—“I’d judge he was killed around six o’clock last night.”
“Thanks, doc,” acknowledged Flint. “Stick around until the sergeant gets here. He’ll want to ask you a few things—”
“I’m afraid,” deplored. Alvarez, “that I won’t be able to help much.”
“We’ll worry about that,” said Flint.
Alvarez seated himself, fumbled for a match; then without hesitation strode to the far corner of the room to get a smoking stand. He evidently knew his way about the house.
McDonald, accompanied by the homicide squad, presently arrived; and as the medical examiner and fingerprint man set to work, the chief questioned Alvarez.
“Professor Kane,” began the doctor, “has been my patient for the past six months. I called on him at irregular hours most adaptable to my time. Either around noon, or in the evening. I live right next door, you know.” His gesture indicated the northern side of the citrus grove.
“Did you see anyone call here last night, around six-seven?”
“Naturally not,” answered Alvarez. “The grove doesn’t permit me a view from my windows. Furthermore, Simon Carter—of Carter, Quentin and Carter—was dining with me. Thus, I’d not notice who approached the place.”
McDonald nodded, asked a few routine questions as to the late Professor Kane’s domestic arrangements and habits, then added: “That’s all, Dr. Alvarez. The coroner will want a statement later.”
“Another blank!” grumbled Flint as Alvarez returned to his car. “Remarkable how little that guy knows about his patient! But let’s look the joint over. I’m still wondering who was eating chili with Kane.”
His second survey of the house yielded no new information; but the fingerprint-man’s findings gave significance to Flint’s last question.
“Kane’s prints are all over,” he announced. “Except on the spoon next to that bowl on the other side of the table. And it’s blank—wiped clean.”
“How about the desk and that door knob?” Flint cut in. “Where the Chinaman was pawing around?”
“Wiped clean,” was the answer.
McDonald nodded, for a moment watched his men carry on with their routine, then said: “Flint, that drive of yours, following a busy day in San Francisco, isn’t going to help a lot with what’s ahead of you. Get yourself a nap, and this evening I’ll have all the dope sorted out for you.”
McDonald was right. Flint took the wheel of Robles’ car. And as he passed Alvarez’s house, which adjoined the abandoned grapefruit grove that surrounded Kane’s place, he saw that the doctor could scarcely have noticed the psychic’s callers.
That evening Flint reviewed the evidence McDonald presented.
Alvarez’s story checked perfectly. The coroner confirmed the Spanish doctor’s opinion as to the time of Kane’s death.
“The old Mexican woman who comes in several times a week to clean the house,” said McDonald, “made that batch of chili. Kane liked it. And he always ate early, around six. Rarely left the adobe—naturally not, with the line he was running! Prepared his own meals. And according to the autopsy—based on undigested frijoles and chili—Kane was knocked off not long after he ate.”
“That,” growled Flint, “is damn helpful. But who wiped the spoon handles clean? And did that prowling Chink leave any marks?”
“Wait a minute!” McDonald broke in. “Till I tell you the rest. A Spic—Ramon Guevara—did odd jobs of gardening for Kane. Supplied him with cord-wood for the fireplace. And peddled a garden truck here and there in town.
“One of the neighbors saw Guevara in his Model-T truck heading down toward Kane’s place with a load of wood. That was around six. And, not long after, he came out empty.”
“Have you located Guevara?”
“No,” admitted McDonald. “He comes from San Cristobal, right across the Mexican line. The customs inspectors tell me he hasn’t crossed today.”
“And from now on he won’t!” declared Flint, “So I’m going over to get him.”
* * * *
San Cristobal was a collection of squat adobe shacks centering about Estrella Blanca: the White Star, now agleam with light, blatant with music and laughter and the tinkle of glass.
Someone would know Ramon Guevara, and by now Flint had obtained a fairly good description of him.
Flint plunged into the smoke-banded air, picked his way among the dancers, and found himself a booth where he could observe the White Star and its patrons. The bar was to his left. To the right was a side door opening into the desert night. It afforded a ready approach to the adobe shacks facing on the side street.
He eyed the crowd as he waited for his drink. He heard a woman in the booth behind him saying in Spanish: “Ramon, you’re so unreasonably jealous! That pendant isn’t a present. I bought it myself in San Francisco.”
A wrathful muttering; and then, still tinged with suspicion, came Ramon’s warning: “Oh, all right, you bought it! But listen, Valencia—if I ever find out you’re lying to me, I’ll take you to pieces by hand!”
Ramon and San Francisco were decidedly intriguing. Flint moved to another booth. That cut off his eavesdropping but it put him in line with a back-bar mirror which reflected the speakers. He saw more than he expected.
The man was tall and rangy. The heaviness of his swarthy Indian features was relieved by a quartering of Latin blood. He was not much over thirty, and with his prominent nose and grim mouth he checked closely with the customs inspector’s description of Ramon Guevara; but it was his companion who clinched it.
Valencia was the girl from Yut Lee’s. She wore an acacia-yellow sports ensemble and entirely too many jewels, including a ruby pendant that blazed redly against her cream colored skin. But Flint, as he caught the reflection of those dark eyes and the heart-stirring loveliness of her face and figure, noticed no clash in her costuming. It sufficed that this was the woman who had been conferring with the grizzled Chinaman who was the Silver Dragon’s vicar in San Francisco.
But which of the two was really the most important: Valencia or Ramon Guevara? Murder and tins of opium linked them both to Kane.
* * * *
Another half hour of bickering, and they emerged from the booth to step toward the side door.
Flint headed for the main entrance and from the veranda watched them cross the side street that intersected the main stem of San Cristobal. Their destination was one of the adobe shacks in the center of the block; and if the wrangling became heated, it would be worth listening to. Flint strode toward the barbed-wire international fence, then swung south to approach Valencia’s house from the rear.
The quarrel directed Flint to a listening post at an open window of the living room. It was illuminated by a kerosene lamp. Valencia’s colorful length was draped in a chair. Guevara turned to step into the adjoining room. He thrust aside Valencia’s detaining hand. Before she could follow, there was a wrathful growl and he came bounding back.
His powerful hand gripped a plush-lined cardboard box.
“San Francisco!” he growled, thrusting it before her eyes. “I knew you were lying. This came from a jeweler in Yuma!”
Valencia ducked, but not quickly enough. Guevara’s free hand sent her sprawling, a tangle of silken legs and acacia-yellow skirt. And then the Mexican dodged a flashing sliver of steel that Valencia plucked from a calf sheath.
Flint cleared the sill. Knife work had already thrown too many obstacles in his way.
“Basta!” he snapped. “Hold it!”
Guevara whirled, but his hand dropped from his hip as Flint’s automatic jerked into line with his stomach.
“Que hay?” growled the Mexica
n.
“Back up to the wall, both of you!” commanded Flint. “Why did you kill Kane after you dumped that load of wood in his back yard?”
“I did not kill him!” flared Guevara.
Valencia’s color perceptibly receded, but her eyes narrowed venomously. He was risking a parlay solely on the chance that his surprise attack, coming on the heels of an interrupted quarrel, might result in an unguarded admission.
“Why did you go into the basement?” demanded Flint.
“I went to the office.” Guevara started at the F.B.I. man’s mention of the opium storage room, “where he paid me for the wood.”
“And you knifed him.”
“I did not. I will prove it. While he was taking the money from the desk, some wan call heem and he reach for the telephone—”
“He did what?” Kane must have an unusually long arm.
“Reach for the telephone,” repeated Guevara. Valencia stabbed him with a glance, but the Mexican continued: “He was expect’ some wan to see heem later. He write something on the desk blotter.”
“What does that prove?”
“That he was expect some wan later. Find out who it was! That weel prove he was alive w’en I leave. Verdad?”
Valencia’s face had frozen.
“Maybe it will,” admitted Flint. “But the both of you take a walk with me. One on each side. And act natural. First sign of trouble from the White Star and you both get the works.”
With arms folded, his left concealing the pistol that his right hand thrust against one prisoner, Flint could march them past the Mexican sentries at the International Line.
“All right, Valencia! On my left. Guevara, better be nice or you’ll need a new girl friend. This is ladies’ night.”
The grimness of Flint’s face warned Guevara that the American would make good his threat.
“Understand?”
“Sí,” breathed the Mexican.
“’Sta ’ueno!” Flint’s clipped finality was steel hard.
He gestured for his prisoners to advance from the wall, but as they moved, he was warned by the perceptible shift of the Mexican’s eyes. Instead of stepping into line with the door of Valencia’s bedroom, he jerked back and risked a glance to his left.
The Chinaman who had trailed him from San Francisco was lunging from the doorway.
As Flint whirled to drop the Chinaman, Guevara snatched a smoking stand and struck the pistol from his grasp. The American, sidestepping the highbinder’s charge, lashed out with his foot. The Chinaman tripped, crashing headlong against the leg of a table.
That gave Guevara time to close in with his smoking stand. The weapon smashed down on Flint’s shoulder as he turned, but it landed an instant too late. Though momentarily paralyzed with pain, he had weight behind his fist. The impact froze the Mexican in his tracks.
Valencia, scrambling for Flint’s pistol, reached it as Guevara’s legs sagged. But before she could jerk the weapon into line, Flint booted the Mexican against her. They pitched over the threshold and into the bedroom. Flint followed through.
Valencia was knocked breathless by the impact. Guevara was out cold, but the blank-faced Chinaman was stirring. And then the front door crashed open. Two bouncers from La Estrella Blanca bounded into the room.
Flint’s pistol cracked twice. One dropped kicking, the other was howling for help.
Guevara was too heavy to haul; and Valencia seemed more important than the highbinder. Before she recovered her breath, Flint rolled her up in a blanket, caught her in both arms, and dashed toward the back door.
A crowd was pouring from the side entrance of La Estrella, but being directed by the shouts of the bouncer who had escaped Flint’s fire, they did not perceive his direction until he was close to the international fence.
One arm squeezed his slender captive into submission as he halted and leveled his pistol. His erratically spattering slugs checked the pursuit long enough for him to slide his captive through the wire and dive after her.
He made it, with a length to spare. And once in a dry creek bed, he was out of sight. The customs guards on both sides, now aroused by the riot, would effectively block any pursuit.
Flint gagged his prisoner with a strip of his shirt, snapped a pair of handcuffs about her ankles, and left her where the dirt road dipped into the arroyo. That done, he dashed back to get his parked car.
* * * *
Forty-five minutes later, Flint pulled up at the police station with his captive; but a patrol car had arrived just ahead of him. Two men in uniform were dragging a Mexican out of the wagon and carrying him to the desk. He was far beyond walking under his own power—dead drunk.
McDonald, still on the job, watched them search the prisoner.
“What have you got there?” Flint greeted.
“Too much sotol,” explained a patrolman. “Making a good job of ganging up on the town and then it paralyzed him.”
“Miguel Smith’s the name,” announced the other patrolman, digging a crumpled letter, a handful of change, and a pint bottle from the half-breed’s pockets.
“You’ll like it here,” Flint jibed as he saw Valencia’s perceptible moué. “Better change your mind and talk.”
“At that, it’s better than your company!” she flared.
Finally they booked Valencia on suspicion.
“Last chance,” Flint reminded her.
But the slam of the cell door drowned her retort. Flint turned to McDonald and gave his account of the raid.
“If I knew when she got here from ’Frisco,” Flint concluded, “I might dope out how she figures in this jam. But—”
“I’ve already covered that,” interrupted McDonald. “We’ve been checking up the trains, bus stations, and airport while you were in San Cristobal. Just to find out how much more of Chinatown traveled south.
“A girl checking up with Valencia’s description landed at the airport about one A.M.—about four hours after the riot broke out in ’Frisco. Her car was waiting. She’d parked it there when she flew north a couple days ago. And the inspector at San Cristobal says she didn’t cross the line until nearly three A.M.”
“That leaves an hour or so unaccounted for,” Flint said. “If there’s anything to Guevara’s suspicions, she must have a number two boyfriend in Yuma—which might account for the missing hour.”
“You mean Kane?”
“She might have found him dead,” admitted Flint. “Valencia and Guevara didn’t even pretend to be surprised when I sprung it on them. But neither of them seemed to know that that deadpan Chinaman was prowling around in San Cristobal. Guevara’s startled look is what saved my hide, and—”
“But where does that lead you?” frowned McDonald.
“First the Chinaman was at Kane’s place,” explained Flint. “Then he pops up in Mexico, in her shack. As though he was checking up on Valencia and Guevara in connection with Kane’s death. It’s a cinch he couldn’t have known I was going to be there.”
McDonald conceded the significance of the mysterious lurker. Then, as Flint reached for his hat: “Calling it a day?”
“Hell, no! I’m going back to Kane’s place. Guevara’s gag about Kane being at his desk and reaching for a phone is so damn impossible that there must be something in it.”
* * * *
Ten minutes later Flint arrived at Kane’s study. Drawer by drawer he examined the desk but found no hidden compartments. There were no dummy books in the cases; and after over an hour of thumping and measuring, he was convinced that the walls were solid. No chance of a concealed instrument.
The blank-faced Chinaman could have removed the desk blotter Guevara had mentioned, but he certainly could not have made away with an extension set.
From the living room came the tinkle of the telephone. Flint hastened to the front. McDonald was on the w
ire.
“Your prisoner checked out.”
“What?”
“Yes. A bar sawed through. Miguel Smith—the bird we thought was paralyzed—is gone, too.”
Flint swore. Valencia’s disappearance confirmed his hunch as to her importance in the tangle.
“Why the hell call to tell me that?”
“So you won’t be caught off guard,” explained McDonald. “Remember, that fake drunk was picked up before you brought Valencia to the station. That deadpan Chink worked fast to have her sprung.”
“What luck you having?”
“Just like yours!” growled Flint and slammed the receiver.
He turned to Kane’s study to think it out. He finally shook his head, slumped back in the swivelchair, and swung away from the desk. His gesture of disgust ended in a jerk. There was something odd about the finish of that little patch of baseboard between the ends of the two book cases along the left wall. A squarish blot showed beneath the varnish.
In an instant he was on his knees. A fixture had been removed from the baseboard of the lath-and-plaster partition that now subdivided the original rooms of the old adobe into a more modern arrangement.
Then he found puttied screw holes, and one through which wires could have been run.
Flint dashed to the front. Flashlight in hand, he skirted the adobe. He traced the wires of the telephone still in service. There was no sign of tampering.
A trip to the cellar gave him the next lead.
Wedged in between the original dirt floor of the house and the wooden floor that had been installed in modernizing it he found three dry cells with wires that rose to the wooden floor above. They led to the left wall of the study. Then he distinguished, further back, almost beyond the reach of his flashlight beam, a weatherproof cable which, leaving that same partition, sank at an easy angle into the thick foundation of sun-baked bricks.
No doubt that that was what remained of a telephone set up: a private, local circuit of the kind used between the apartments of a building, or between house and garage.
He now understood the removal of the telephone. It had been a connecting link between Kane’s study and the chief of the opium smuggling ring.
E. Hoffmann Price's Two-Fisted Detectives Page 31
