by Steve Fisher
Clifton was sitting in his usual place in a straight chair he had turned around—reversed—so that he straddled it, his arms on the back of it, his feet hooked into the supports on the side.
"Ah, Juliet," he said.
Wiggam was tapping a cigarette on his wrist. "Thought you hadn't read Shakespeare?"
"I haven't," said Clifton. "I saw Norma Shearer do Juliet in the movies."
Dorothy sat down, saying nothing. Sam Tulley had an open box of candy in his lap and he generously offered her a piece. She declined. Betty came in and sat down in a corner. Grant came after her and sat on the divan beside Dorothy. Roy appeared and leaned against the door jamb. Mrs. O'Malley arrived and stood beside Roy, fumbling with her apron.
"Now, children," said Mike Wiggam, "we have gathered you all here to read you the tale of the mighty Wizard of Oz; Oz, as you must all know, is—"
Johnny West's entrance was dramatic. His face was flushed. Wiggam looked at him and shut his mouth.
Clifton looked at West and was impressed, but it was impossible for him to miss a chance to say something. "Get ready for the second act curtain," he said. "He looks as though he's going to ring it down with a smash."
"Exactly," West snapped. He folded the newspaper.
"This is a copy of the same paper Frances had when she was killed. Someone in this room thought it was of sufficient importance to commit murder—" he looked up. "Mrs. O'Malley, where's your husband?"
She shrugged. "I couldn't find him. The cop's looking now. He must be around somewhere. He wouldn't go away and leave me here."
West nodded, glanced back at the paper. "I've been all through it. It is my notion that the item about which Frances was able to get so excited was this one. I'll read it, or enough of it to give all of you the general idea: the caption is—'Pair of Socks Kills Man—Five Others in Metropolitan Area III—Strong Dye Turns Victim Blue'." West paused. Then he went on: "'Homer Certiff, 1044 Marianne Street, Bronx, died in his home today after having been stricken with poisonous aniline dye that was found to have been in the stockings he wore. The socks, the brand of which is as yet unknown, were a bright blue, a coloring given them through a rinse in the chromium fluoride of a cheap dye. The theory was offered that Certiff had done considerable walking and that the dye entered his system through the pores of the skin on his feet, being absorbed as his feet sweated. His body turned a faint blue and he died shortly after the arrival of a doctor. Had Certiff not been in poor health it was said that the extra strain the dye put on his heart probably would not have proven fatal. Police report that five other men in the metropolitan area have suffered similar attacks, though none of them is serious. Investigation is now under way to trace the source of the stockings'."
West put the paper on the table and looked. There was no sound. He glanced from face to face.
"This was the base of the killer's idea," he said. "I have already checked with the medical examiner about the clipping, so we are certain of it. The murderer—one of you here now—read that and deduced that chromium 100 poisoning could be absorbed through sweating feet and was deadly enough to kill. He went further. To obtain chromium fluoride without the coloring of a dye, and mixed in a formula several times stronger than the amount of chromium that would be used in a dye, would produce the desired death without the trace of body coloring. The killer knew that the poison would be found in the system if there was an autopsy, but because it had been absorbed through sweating feet, he knew also that there was a fifty-fifty chance it would not be detected."
"Furthermore," West went on, "he thought it even possible Mrs. Davis' death would be attributed to acute indigestion, a weak heart, or one or a number of other natural reasons. It seemed, as a matter of fact, a method of murder which would defy detection. It was Mrs. Davis herself who would not give up to natural death and first suggested murder. Her doctor and the coroner later confirmed this suspicion and an autopsy was performed. But the autopsy did not disclose that she absorbed the deadly solution of chromium through her feet."
"Proving what?" said Clifton.
West paid no attention to him. "The killer, obviously, didn't want it known that he had poisoned Mrs. Davis through the low-heeled walking shoes. They were her favorites and he or she knew that sooner or later Mrs. Davis would wear them." He glanced from Betty to Grant, and then at Mrs. O'Malley. "The killer also knew that the death would be a slow one, and because there was no coloring or stomach indication of poison, a diagnosis would be next to impossible while she lived."
He perched himself on the edge of the table, his face still very white. "However, the reason the murderer didn't want it known the poison had come from the shoes—whose lining he had removed and soaked in chromium fluoride—and then sewed back in, was that he was aware the shoes could be traced directly to him. He knew that once it was out that it was the shoes which had killed Mrs. Davis, his hours of freedom were numbered.
"That's the reason he—or she—stole the shoes from the death room immediately after Mrs. Davis died—or perhaps while she was in bed still dying—and to avoid being seen in the hall with them, left them in Miss Noel's room, which he was able to reach by way of the terrace. That is also the reason he returned to Miss Noel's room Tuesday night. He wanted to get the shoes. He thought that Miss Noel was asleep and she would never know anyone had been in the room. When she screamed he silenced her, took the shoes, and escaped.
"But even without the evidence of the shoes in the lining of which the poison could be found, the newspaper item was in itself sufficiently incriminating, so that when Frances ran up the stairs in search of me to show it to me—knowing I had asked about shoes—he stopped her. There was a struggle, and in that moment of hysteria, he choked Frances and pushed her through the banister. The murderer couldn't dream that once he had burned the newspaper, we'd ever be able to discover which it was. But he lost again.
"We're close now. This thing's winding up. And I've got some questions. You first, Betty—ah, Mrs. Smyth. You don't remember anything at all about those shoes?"
"Well, I—I don't know."
"You, Grant?"
"I say, you mean the same ones I found in my closet Monday, wrapped up?"
"Yes, those were the ones."
"Of course," Grant replied. "I do jolly well know about them. Rhea gave them to me to have fixed. I took them to the cobbler mvself. When f found them I naturally concluded that the cobbler had returned them and Frances had put them in my room by mistake."
"On what day did you take them to the cobbler?"
Grant scratched his head, his mouth open. "Let's see—oh yes, it was the day I had that argument about the penny, on, ah—"
"Thursday?"
"By Jove, you're right. The same day I bought the Journal."
"I see. Do you remember what occasioned Mrs. Davis' sending the shoes to be fixed? Are you certain it was she who asked you to do it?"
"Oh, yes," said Grant. "The old girl was furious. She had broken her heel and almost stumbled down the stairs."
West pondered that a moment. "Then if we find the cobbler. Tonight. Find who it was that got the shoes, out—"
The butler came to the door. The lean man was holding a pair of low-heeled walking shoes. They had been badly burned.
"They were in the furnace," he said. "Only there was no fire. Just a crude one somebody tried to build."
Everyone in the room was staring at the butler. He: held the shoes up. His eyes were bleak. Clifton moved nervously on the reversed chair. Tulley bit the end off a new cigar. Wiggam was rubbing his cheek. Betty was staring. Grant had his hands behind him as though he: was about to rise. Roy was biting his underlip. Mrs. O'Malley just looked blank.
Johnny West moved across the room and grabbed the shoes.
"I'm going to find that cobbler," he said. "Get him out of bed if I have to." He turned and faced the people in the room, "When I come back I'm going to arrest a killer!"
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
He asked Do
rothy if she wanted to come along.
First he asked Grant the name of the cobbler, and then he turned to Dorothy and said: "I don't suppose you'd like to come with me? In this rain?" It wasn't necessary for her to answer. The relief that flooded through her cheeks, the appreciation that shone in her eyes, the way she flustered as she rose from the divan, all of these things were her answer: escape, even if for only a few minutes from this house, escape from the threads of a net which was drawing closer and closer. The eyes of everyone on her as she walked out of the room. Bleak eyes. Burning eyes. Eyes that were bloodshot. These were behind her. She was running upstairs to get her coat. She was coming down again, seeing Johnny West at the front door, his hand on the knob.
"Ready?"
"Yes," she said, and the door opened, and she moved out into the rain and the wind. Johnny opened the door of his car and she climbed in. Then he was beside her, shifting gears, windshield wipers moving evenly back and forth, motor humming, wheels turning over in the wet gravel of the road. The car was a police coupe. He glanced toward her, but he was too tense to smile. His gloved hand moved from the wheel and he turned a switch. Police reports growled in through a loud speaker. He switched the dial again. Dance music. An orchestra. The intermittent staccato of static touching through the wave band. Rain beating on the roof of the car. He reached the end of the driveway and turned into a dark road. The wheels spun as the car picked up speed. Cab Calloway was coming through the loudspeaker. Edie was a lady, hadie, hadie, hadie... They reached the Boston Post Road and he stopped, watching the traffic, then the car moved forward again, slipping across the rain-covered pavement. Grinding in second gear. Moving around a truck and trailer, slipping into third, settling to the middle of the road, headlights shining through the nickel-coated rain.
"Scared?" he said.
"Some."
"It'll be all over pretty soon."
"Thank God."
"You'd hate anything like this again, wouldn't you?" he said. "Suspense. No guarantee how things are going to turn out. Maybe losing sometime."
"Losing?"
"Death," he said. Then: "There's trouble in Port Chester. They told me tonight at the station."
"What is it?"
"Murder."
"Oh."
"You see? It never ends. I may have to go."
She looked up startled.
He kept both hands on the wheel, and his eyes were on the road straight ahead. But his face had hardened in a set smile. "They keep me jumping," he said.
They swung left suddenly on Mamaroneck Avenue. Banks stood on the corners, across the street from each other, like book ends for the uneven line of shops and stores that marched up a little incline to the Playhouse Theatre, and then sagged downhill another three blocks to the railroad station. This one street, from the banks to the station, was the entire business section of the Village. It was quiet, dark now, and almost a little quaint.
"It may look small," Johnny said, "but if you could read the local politics in the Herald you'd think it was a young New York. There was a mix-up somewhere in history. Sometime after the white men had wrested Mamaroneck away from the Indians. And ever since we've had two governments. Two mayors, two police forces, two city administrations, two tax bureaus, and two dog catchers."
"But how do they tell them apart?"
He grinned. "Well, one is the town, the other the village. The town has a manager. The village has a mayor. Manager and mayor are one and the same thing. I'm a town cop and I'm not allowed to talk to a village cop. Since both town and village has its own elections and collects its own taxes, they pay off individually. The only thing that's one and whole in Mamaroneck is the citizenry. They vote twice. When they call for the police the operator won't ring until they specify which police are desired. Both also have their own volunteer fire department."
"It sounds silly," said Dorothy, "but don't the people have to pay twice as much taxes?"
"No. They got together there. They have an arrangement by which each collects only half of what one municipal government would ordinarily collect. And lately they've divided up city jobs. But they're always fighting. Anyway, the County Seat really has charge of things. They run all the towns in Westchester. Ours is just a little inter-village—ah—town squabble."
She laughed, then caught herself, for laughter sounded hollow, and the rain was crashing against the windshield with greater intensity.
He turned and parked in front of a low frame building. "Do you want to wait—or, no, I guess you'd better not."
She got out and they crossed the wet sidewalk to a cobbler shop. It was closed up tight, but there was a one family apartment above it, and light trickled from behind the drawn curtains. Johnny West rang. He looked at his wrist watch, then down at Dorothy.
"Think you'll like it?"
"I think so," she said. "It's—it's different."
"We wouldn't live in this district," he said. "We'd live out—probably in Harbor Heights."
Her hands were in the pockets of her slicker and she was shivering. "I like Spanish stucco," she said.
He rang again "There's one on Knickerbocker. An elegant place—used to belong to—but I guess it'd be too steep." He kept his thumb on the bell.
There was sound presently, and then the lights went on in the shoe repair shop. An old man came to the door and pulled back the shade, cupping his hands on either side of his eyes to peer out.
Johnny took a flashlight out of his pocket and turned it up into his own face.
The old man nodded, and smiled, and at once opened the door.
"Come in, West," he said, "come in."
Johnny ushered Dorothy ahead of him and entered. They pushed the door shut against the rain. The stoop-shouldered cobbler was dry-washing his hands.
"What can I do for you?"
"You had a pair of shoes belonging to Mrs. Rhea Davis? They came in last Thursday."
"Yes. I had those," said the cobbler. "Walking shoes. Heel off one. I fixed it, put new laces in both of them, and shined them."
"Do you remember who it was came and got them?"
The old man scratched his head and screwed up his mouth. "Let me see—I should know that. Yes, I remember now. She sent a boy over after them."
"A boy?"
"Uh huh. A kid about twelve or thirteen, I'd say."
Johnny looked disappointed. "What day was that?"
"Saturday afternoon. About four."
Johnny West nodded. "Remember anything about the kid? Can you describe him?"
"Well, I've seen him before somewhere. I know that. He must be the youngster of one of my customers. But you know. You don't pay much attention to kids. They're in and out all day. Off-hand, I'd say he had kinda black hair, and freckles around his nose. Right nice-looking kid."
Johnny pushed back his felt hat which was soaking wet. He leaned against the door and folded his arms. For a moment he said nothing, then: "Would you know him if you saw him again?"
"Sure."
"Do you know your customers by name?"
"All of them that's been in more than twice or three times I do."
"Could you recognize the names from the Mamaroneck telephone pamphlet?"
"Most of them. Maybe not the Wop names."
Johnny pushed himself away from the door. "All right. Go up and be getting your hat and coat on. I'll send a couple of men over here and you'll go around with them to every name and address you can recognize out of the telephone book. Find out if they have any kids. If they have, get them out of bed and look them over. When you find the right one call me at Rhea Davis' house."
"But," the old man whined, "I can't go out on a night like this."
Johnny's teeth were set. "You've got to. It's perhaps the difference between arresting a killer tonight and not arresting one, because whoever hired that kid to get the shoes Saturday, is the murderer of Mrs. Davis."
The old man gaped.
Johnny West opened the door. "Come on, Dorothy." Returning t
o Orienta Point they circled around, turned on the corner past Teddy's Candy Shop, which was still open, its windows gleaming out against the rain, and drove a short block to where the brick post office was on the right hand corner. They made still another left hand turn, and then another, completing a square block. They passed the library with its white pillars like a Southern mansion, and Johnny said: "Those girls in there have helped crack a lot of cases looking up research for me." They nosed down a hill and back down onto Mamaroneck Avenue. They were presently on the Boston Post Road, retracing their route. Johnny went on: "It's a quiet life, honey. You're boxed in. There's only one picture show and no plays. Your life begins and ends here. The worries about town and village are your worries. It sounds foolish, but it's the difference between having a job or maybe going on relief. New York is a million miles away. This is your world."
"I'm beginning to see," Dorothy said quietly.
He said: "Wholesome living and kids, that's all."
He didn't say any more, he kept watching the road, and she, too, was silent.
* * *
She felt the new tenseness in the atmosphere the moment she walked into the house. Johnny shrugged off his slicker and hung it up, then went into the study to telephone the station about men to take the cobbler around,, so that she was left alone. The walled-in quiet oppressed her. She came into the living-room and saw Clifton sprawled back, halfway over the divan, smoking a cigarette, and looking more pale than she had ever seen him look. When he glanced up at her his eyes were burning, curiously hard.
"Hello," he grunted huskily, "how's the country air?' How's the pigs and the chickens? Better than a nose dive from the second floor, I'd say; or shoes with poison in them. You didn't run up to Harrison and get married, did you? We were thinking of throwing a party for you, if you did." He waved out his hand and nicked cigarette ashes on the floor. "Just a little sentimental gesture out of the goodness of our black hearts." She would have suspected that he was drunk, but Clifton didn't drink. She knew he was bitter with hysteria.
