“You can ask Heyl, if he’s able to talk. Or his fake corpses. But I’ve got a good idea, already.”
The official laughed. “A flogging will make them talk! But let me hear what you think.”
Deane explained his suspicions: how Nefeyda had died for exposing the clique of looters, how Heyl had planned to blackmail him into helping sell illicit finds and outright fakes.
“Once I had embalmed Nefeyda,” he concluded, “his possession of that made-to-order mummy could at any time frame me as a madman and a murderer. But as long as I played his crooked game for him, he would of course protect me as a valuable ally. You see, he’d already started, by taking my car away. And his crowd would all swear that I’d never left Cairo with Nefeyda.”
Quasim’s presence among the conspirators clinched that. Deane had scarcely paused when there was a howling and yelling and cursing outside. The police official stroked his mustaches and smiled.
“My men seem to have gotten the prisoners into a confidential mood, Mr. Deane. Let us go out and have them confirm your opinions.” He winked. “If they did roll your car into the Nile, doubtless they already wish they had followed it.”
Deane went out. When he reached the door, he saw that the police were beating the prisoners’ feet with batons. They were all trying to speak at once, Heyl loudest of all.
“And they claim we have a third degree back home!” Deane said to Crawford. “Now, if there’s anything I can tell you about Egyptian antiques, drop in some time.”
Crawford shuddered. “I’m through! I’m looking for a safer hobby.”
For a moment Deane would have agreed with him. That was when they put Nefeyda’s body into the police car. Then he remembered his unfinished work, and the laboratory that demanded his presence.
There were still secrets of the past for him to unveil.
THE BURDEN OF PROOF
Originally published in Speed Detective, April 1943.
Taking part in the Community Chest Drive wasn’t as bad as I’d figured it’d be. So far, everyone had paid off, and at about every house, they offered me a drink. And by the time I got to Grant Hobson’s big stucco heap. I began to get a kick out of the idea of putting the bee on him for substantial dough.
When I saw the big Cadillac with a “C” sticker (gas ration, usually issued to doctors, ministers, others who had to travel a lot) on the windshield, I knew Hobson was in, the heel. And so was Bernice and her little blue Chevvie. Near as I or anyone else could figure it out, the only good thing about Hobson was Bernice.
Bernice came to the door. She was dark and shapely, and her red gown did justice to it all. That was partly because of how the gown was built, and a lot because of how the gal inside of it was arranged.
“Oh, hello, Mr. Darrow, come on in, how’s the drive?”
“Driving along, Mrs. Hobson. I got your pledge card all made out.”
That was a gag of mine, having it all filled in advance, it kept the prospect from beefing. I got the jump that way.
Then Hobson came in. He was big and important looking, and when he had a client all lined up for a real estate swindle, he was hearty and pleasant, and you’d sign almost anything without reading the fine print. But right now, he was off duty. He gave a dirty little laugh and said, “I guess you were calling him Mister Darrow all the time you two were parked up on Circle Drive.”
“Don’t be silly, Grant! He’d just changed a tire for me, and we took time out for a smoke before I drove home. How often do I have to tell you?”
Hobson turned a frosty eye on the Kit of receipt cards and window stickers and such like, and said, “I get stuck the limit down at my office, I do not see how you get this way, trying to nick me at my house.”
He was right that time, but the last five shots of “community spirit” under my belt, and the fact that he was a prime heel made me figure out my answer: “Now, see here, Mr. Hobson, I’m trying to make this subdivision one hundred percent. Instead of paying all your quota downtown, just dish out maybe twenty bucks of it here, and the rest there.”
“So I can put one of your I CONTRIBUTED stickers in the window, huh?”
Bernice was giving me the high sign to shut up. And she was saying something, only I’m no good at lip reading unless a gal is close. So I sounded off, “Well, it’d look good alongside that ‘C’ card on your windshield. I’ve worn outa pair of shoes hoofing to the train, account my ‘A’ card (absolute smallest gas ration) not going around.”
He was sensitive about that “C” card. Everybody said swindlers like him ought to be walking for the duration, so they couldn’t pull in so many suckers, and he’d heard about it. Which maybe is why he took a poke at me.
Well, I took a poke back at him, but the scatter rug on Bernice’s slick hardwood floor did me dirt, and about the time I was picking a place to land, Hobson was helping me. With his boot. I skated down a couple steps, and landed in the walk. “Get out and stay out,” he howled, “and if I ever catch you two together, I’ll give you some more of the same.”
Cards and checks and window stickers were fluttering all around the garden. And a man’s house is his castle. Just to make sure of that, he had slammed the door. But Bernice was outside, caging checks and stuff.
He began hollering for her to come in before he came out and dragged her in. She turned to hand me a bunch of papers and she said, low and in a hurry, “This evening, I’ll contribute to the chest.”
Then she headed back to the house, “Grant, that was a rotten trick, and so are your insinuations, I hope you starve some day, you stingy—!”
Two gals from the neighborhood had watched the show, which I didn’t realize until I reached the street. One of them said, “Cleve, you looked the funniest, but I wouldn’t’ve laughed to save my life, not with him watching.” The other said, “Excuse it, please, but I’m going to laugh myself dizzy now.”
Which they did, and I joined in. When the two gals got the mirth out of their systems, they headed home, and I figured I’d spend the next hour or so cleaning up the subdivision; a lot of ground for a Sunday afternoon, but I’d gotten an early start.
Well, I got a contribution at the next place, and a laugh. It seems the two dames had wasted little time on the phone. But the contributions were getting bigger, and so were the drinks. By the time I made the last call, I wasn’t a bit griped.
Nobody liked Hobson. He’d sold most of the property in that suburb. He’d told some of the customers there was a bus every fifteen minutes. He’d convinced another that a house had sound foundations, when the truth was that the foundation cracked regularly, and made the doors jam. The shack was perched on a steep down slope and every winter it slid a couple inches, which is a bit too much.
I learned plenty about Hobson, at that last stop. Old man Sorenson and his wife got out a jug, and I ate supper with them. Hobson had pretty nearly had his license permanently revoked, account of slick dealing, and he’d been let off with a warning. One more beef, and he was barred from business anywhere in the state.
When I finally headed down the road, I was thinking, “If someone ever got something on that guy, it would be a blessing.”
Funny thing of it was, with all his easy and crooked money, he kept the bank roll sewed up tight. A couple months previous, he and Bernice had a big row when he said he’d be darned if she could have either a joint checking account or a personal one.
I couldn’t remember exactly when Bernice had said for me to come back. Another thing, how would she make a contribution, when she never saw the color of money anyway? It was all messed up, and she’d been talking in a hurry. So I got the idea of barging in, telling him it’d sure look like hell, booting a Community Chest Collector out of the house, and if he didn’t come across, I’d tell Dan Ingalls, the columnist of the local paper, and wouldn’t that sound swell?
A bit of the old blackmail. To make
the subdivision one hundred percent, and to make that son squirm a little.
After all, you can’t beat a man up in his own house, no matter what you think of him, but there are other ways, and this was one of them.
Her car was out, but the Cad was in. I must’ve misunderstood her. All the better then. So I went to the door. Lights were on, the radio was playing, and the latch hadn’t been caught.
I gave the knocker a couple whacks. Being full of vintages and ideas, my touch wasn’t the most accurate. And the door swung wide open, almost a hint. I got no answer, and I said, “Wake up, Hobson, I got something to tell you.”
By then I was weaving far enough into the vestibule to get a look at the living room. There was Hobson in a blue smoking jacket, the same one he’d worn that afternoon. The air was thick with whiskey from a busted decanter.
“Huh. Drunker’n a fiddler’s—!” Meaning him; but that held for me, too, or I’d not barged in to find out if the guy could get up on his feet and drink some more.
He couldn’t. His knuckles were cut, and his head was hammered all out of shape. There were a couple new twenty dollar bills on the Persian carpet. A chair turned over. The poker from the fireplace was what had beaned him. And on the Chesterfield, lying between cushion and arm, was a Colt automatic that didn’t smell as if it’d been fired.
I couldn’t get out fast enough. The guy was dead. He had to be. After such a conking, once they quit twitching, they don’t start again. And by now I was stony sober.
I hoofed it home to the leaky cracker box he’d sold me and my mother, a couple years before she died.
It was pretty nasty all around. If anyone had seen me go in there, I’d have a sweet chance of proving we’d not gone round and round. I wondered if he’d threatened Bernice with that gun, and she’d knocked him out, and then gone wild and finished him off with some extra taps. The first sight of blood does drive some people off their conks.
And I’d made it worse, leaving without reporting to the cops. If I’d called right away, they might be able to tell when he’d been socked, and might give me a good out, as I’d been eating and drinking with the Sorensons for a couple hours. Well, it might still work. Unless the guy had been conked just before I got there.
And if he had—I wouldn’t be with the gang when they lined up in front of draft headquarters next week. We’d quit our jobs, and most of us were looking forward to it. Some of us had asked the Board to set our numbers ahead, so we’d be with a couple buddies whose turn had come. Now I’d not have a friend left in town, if this mess made me miss the train.
I said to myself, “Who’d’ve seen me anyway?”
Just because I told a couple people I’d sign that guy up if it was the last thing I did, it didn’t mean I’d gone back that evening to do it, did it? Sure it didn’t.
I should have told McDougal, the radio patrol cop. At one time, his beat had been a private patrol, with every property owner chipping in to pay him, though later he got on the county payroll. He’d always been a deputy sheriff, and he had his job to do, but at least he wouldn’t jump at conclusions. I was about to follow up this notion when a car came helling up the drive.
The gal got out in a hurry. It was Bernice, and while I was still wondering what to say, she came bouncing up the steps. I stuttered, “Wait till I turn off your headlights.”
Then I followed her into the shack. Her eyes had a gleam and her hand shook when she fumbled with the clasps of her suitcase sized handbag. Funny, but I began to get shivers and thrills watching her. I could feel that something was going to happen when she spoke.
I couldn’t tell whether I was thrilled or scared. That smile and those eyes did both. I wondered where she’d been since she killed him. She was mussed up a little, but her clothes weren’t torn, and she wasn’t bruised any place where it’d show.
This didn’t take as long as the telling of it does. Funny how many shivers and thoughts you can jam into a couple seconds while a girl is getting her breath, and opening her handbag. Finally she said, “Here are my keys, run my car into your garage and lock it up.” Before I could make sense out of that, she went on, “And here’s twenty dollars, make out a receipt and everything.”
She put it on the table, and spilled a couple or three other bills the same size. Remembering she never got her fingers on folding money, I got shaky and had a tough time running my heap into the drive and putting hers under cover and behind lock. When I got back she had glasses set out.
Her laugh was shaky. “I’m through with him—through, you hear? I don’t know what to do, yet, but I’m not going back to him. Can you put me up till I decide?”
I saw the way her mouth was trembling and said soothingly: “I don’t know as I blame you. Sure, I got plenty room here. You need a drink, all right. Come on, I’ll have one with you.”
I gulped a slug, and smelled “Tabu” from behind her ears. I knew it was “Tabu” because I asked her that day I changed a tire.
I guess it was the perfume and the way she raised her head to look up a bit more. So I pulled the switch, and while we were both blinking in the dark, I grabbed her with both arms, and knocked over a glass, and didn’t even miss a beat. It ought to freeze a fellow a little, hearing a dame lead off by saying she’s dropped in to get even with her husband, when you’ve just seen the guy looking as if a tractor had given him a going over, but I was past freezing.
Maybe that was because we started kissing each other. But it just couldn’t be stopped. I was thinking, “I’d’ve been a sap, phoning the cops, and missing all this…”
It wasn’t just the girl. It was the way she’d dropped in. It happens all the time to people in books, but us mill run fellows get our faces clawed crosswise.
When I heard the siren, Bernice was cuddled up with her head parked on my shoulder and she was saying, “I guess you think I’m awful.”
I did not have to help her to her feet. I said, “That’s Mac.”
She found her way in the dark. The door out of the living room closed before Mac pounded at the front. I snapped on the lights and said, “What the devil?”
Mac was short and solid. He wore khaki breeches and a cap, a gun and a star, but this time he wasn’t cocking his head and chuckling like he always does. I said, once more, “What the devil? Isn’t a blackout, I didn’t hear the sirens downtown.”
That was silly. My lights hadn’t been on. He eyed me, and I began to think of lipstick. Mac said, “When you went to get Hobson’s contribution, this evening, was he in?”
“Nobody answered when I knocked.”
I was doing a slick job, my voice was steady, but I was breaking out in a sweat.
Mac said, “You didn’t go in at all?”
“Not without knocking. Not after getting kicked out on my fanny this afternoon.”
Mac made a funny face. He was trying to be hard, and trying to forget I was one of the first people in the hills to chip in a buck a month for his radio patrol. He said, “The sheriff and I found a Community Chest pledge card all made out except for his signature, it had his name and everything on it.”
That took quick thinking. “I guess I dropped that in the yard when he booted me out. Mrs. Hobson helped me pick up a lot of stuff and we skipped that probably.”
“You aren’t asking what it’s all about?”
“You aren’t giving me a chance so far. I bite, what is up?”
“You want to talk to Hobson now and find out?”
“I never did want to talk to that heel, and I don’t want to now, but if it is business, it is business. What’s Mrs. Hobson say?”
“I haven’t asked her. She’s still out.” He gave me a queer look. “Hobson’s dead. Some prowler conked him. We’re trying to find out who saw him alive last.”
“The guy that conked him did. Anything else you want to know?”
He began sniffing
the air. Then he pointed at the woman’s handbag parked on a chair. Bernice had forgotten the obvious. Mac said, “Where’s the girlfriend?”
“She checked out. Or don’t you know how peevish women get sometimes?”
Mac made a face. “Jim, I hope your girlfriend can fix you up with an alibi. We’re looking for whoever gave Hobson the works, and the whole neighborhood knows you two wrangled, and she told some neighbor about how he raised hell about you and her having a smoke in her parked car.”
“It was broad daylight, and I changed a tire, and what the devil?”
“They got to find someone, Jim. I don’t say the D.A. is going to elect you, but you are going to be asked things. And a fellow working for the Community Chest getting the bum’s rush is likely to get hot headed. A guy that’d give a Chest worker a boot is still a human being, as far as law is concerned.
“You mean I am pinched?”
Mac shook his head. “Can’t pinch people on suspicion unless they’re plain fly by nights. But you may end up by having to dig up good answers if you don’t want to face a hearing and an indictment. Even if you beat it hands down, you’ll miss going to camp with your buddies. Come clean and tell me what is what; I do not promise a thing, but I’ll do everything I can for you.”
“I’ve spoken my piece. It is your move.”
Mac shrugged. “Good luck, fellow. It is none of my business, but I would sure love to know who left her bag on the chair, her lipstick on that glass, and her smell all over the room. That’s hot stuff she wears. You know, I smelled stuff like that not long ago.” I didn’t ask him where. He didn’t say it was in Hobson’s house. He just went to the door. And after he pulled out, I got pretty nearly sick wondering what’d’ve happened if Bernice’s car had been in the drive. But he knew, he must have known whose bag was on the chair.
E. Hoffmann Price's Two-Fisted Detectives Page 53
