“But—but who—”
The Marquis’ eyebrows went up. “Who? Jitters here, of course.” He nodded carelessly at Witherspoon.
She jumped up, shrank back, her brown eyes wild, shifting from the suddenly gray-faced Witherspoon to the Marquis.
Witherspoon blurted: “What—what—my God—you don’t mean me….”
“Don’t be silly,” the Marquis said. “Of course I mean you.”
“But—my God—I have no reason—I didn’t even know him—why would I—”
“For money, stupid—or a key worth money. The killer didn’t have to know this guy. He found where he was from and called up his home town. He got enough dope there to rouse his curiosity—and by prowling the room here once or twice, he stumbled on enough to know that he had a key worth a small fortune.”
“It—my God—I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Witherspoon cried wildly. “I—it wasn’t me—I didn’t call up anywhere—anybody’s home town—”
“That’s the catch, sweetheart. You’re a little behind the game. Rentz didn’t speak to a soul since he came to town. Got that? Nate Heyworth was the only one in town who knew where he was from. Nate wouldn’t have to phone to find the guy’s background. And apart from Nate, you’re the only person in town who could have known that his real home town was Sound Falls—not Fletcherville. You knew—because you saw him sign in—saw him scratch out the Sound Falls and write the other. I don’t doubt that’s what got you curious in the first place. Then, when you found he had a key worth thousands, you couldn’t keep from trying to get hold of it. You tried to follow him, to see what was what—and finally made a bid for the key. He was too quick for you—though you didn’t know it at the time—and mailed the key before you reached him with your lead pipe.
“I’ll give you credit—I don’t think you meant to hit Rentz so hard. When you found you’d broken his skull, I guess you went crazy with fear and really tried to finish him. But when big George lumbered in, don’t try to tell me you didn’t kill him on purpose—even if you were out of your head.”
The manager was backing toward the bureau, his face twitching, ghastly.
The Marquis said, “Now—now—” and the door burst open.
Asa McGuire stood in the opening brandishing slips of paper. “Hey, look what I found in baldy’s room. Letters!”
HE CAME in and shut the door. The Marquis took the letters from him quickly, ran hasty eyes over them. There were three—short and to the point. The first—typewritten—read—
Dear Mr. Rentz:
The undersigned was a friend of your brother, before his untimely death. I believe that he had in his keeping a small bronze key belonging to me. It is of great sentimental value, and, if I can secure it, I am willing to pay five thousand dollars for it. Haste, however is necessary. It occurred to me to write you, as you undoubtedly now possess all your brother’s effects. Please let me hear from you soon.
The second read—
Dear Mr. Rentz:
Yours received. I have given the matter careful thought and have decided that, if you are prepared to come to the city at once and obey my instructions implicitly, I will raise my price, as you suggest, to eight thousand dollars. If you will come at once to this city and register at the Frontenac hotel, you will find a letter awaiting you with instructions. I am enclosing a hundred dollars for expenses.
The third—
Dear Mr. Rentz:
As soon as you receive this—or rather as soon as it is dark—please go to Green’s undertaking parlors. Meet me in front of the shop. At the moment, I am not positive I can make it tonight, but it will be either tonight or tomorrow night. I must ask you to go there anyway, in the hopes that we may complete our business. And, of course, please bring the key with you.
All three were signed—Charles Plummer.
The Marquis looked at Witherspoon. “So these were what you found. No wonder you got itchy fingers for the key.”
McGuire burst in: “Hey—whatever’s in that box must be worth plenty—”
“Exactly twenty-five grand. Nate put it up as Elmer Rentz’s share of the Pfluger kidnap money, if the snatch went over. He had plenty in those days and the groom was hard-headed—not that his brother wasn’t. Nate probably paid the rent a year in advance, or something. When the groom was killed in the middle of the scheme, he was stymied—couldn’t get at it. He didn’t need it anyway.
“Then after a while he did need it—needed it like poison. Twenty-five grand meant a getaway in any man’s language. That’s when he made the stab to try and get the other key back, and that’s—”
The girl screamed, “Marty—look out—our guns—in that dresser drawer…” as Witherspoon spun to yank it open.
The Marquis shot him neatly through the hand, sent him staggering away, whimpering in pain.
“None of that,” the Marquis said. “I’ve got to have something to hand the Homicide Squad if I ever want any peace.”
The door burst open. It had taken that long for Lebaron and his crew to locate the room where the trouble was.
The Marquis said: “Oh, hello. We were just leaving.”
Lebaron’s green eyes started to swell, as the Marquis put his arm around the shuddering girl shoulders and pocketed his gun.
“Take it easy,” the Marquis said. “Look! A nice murderer! Asa will tell you all about it. Make me trouble and I’ll yell to the papers how you’re still trying to identify the body when we’ve cleaned the case up. Out of our way.”
As they reached the now lightening street, the girl’s eyes were frightened, aghast. “Marty—you—you’re not going to—to ask me now…. Oh, please—”
“My God, no.”
“But—but you—but later—”
The Marquis eyes were somber as he flagged a cab and helped her in. “Well, we can talk about it, anyway—later.”
Death in Round Numbers
It was the first time in the career of the little czar of Manhattan’s Main Stem that he’d had murder committed under his nose without being able to do a damn thing to prevent it. When those two thugs hoisted the old Englishman over the “El” platform-railing and popped him into the street below, Lieutenant Marquis could only stand and watch. It wasn’t till the follow-up of the murder sequence that he was able to do his stuff—lift the lid off Broadway and clamp it down on Wall Street all in twenty-four short hours.
CHAPTER ONE
The Man in the Top Hat
HARRY DEROSIER saw the waiter bring the little envelope to the girl’s table in the 44 Club. He was standing, staring, in the portièred entrance to the glittering black-and-silver supper-room at about midnight, mentally humming accompaniment to the ultra-suave swing of the orchestra. He had been there upwards of fifteen minutes, his washed-out blue eyes intent in unstinted admiration of this same girl. If it had not been Derosier—if another member of the Broadway Squad rather than the stringy, sun-bleached-looking sergeant had been covering this part of the district—he would probably have been gone long before it happened. The call at the 44 Club was merely routine.
Others of the Marquis’ Squad were wandering idly through other segments of the district according to custom, on no specific assignment. This went on all the time—the constant combing and re-combing of the section. A whisper of gossip, an incautious tongue loosened by liquor and enjoyment, a glimpsed conference between individuals otherwise never seen together, an angry gesture, a furtive hand-squeeze—obscure, fantastic little items of no apparent importance—any one might, months later, become a sharp little beam of light. By the incessant, painstaking, collecting of such wisps, by patiently and carefully filing them away in his squad’s collective mind, the Marquis managed to keep tab on Manhattan’s biggest potential trouble spot, maintain his iron rule over the Tenderloin.
The only pertinent fragments available to Derosier in the 44 Club were concerned with Jack Whitelaw—the Third, to give him his full name—who was with the girl. Another man sat at
their table—a gray-haired, kindly, vaguely military-looking Englishman. They were all in full evening dress—tails. A casual question or two of Charlie Pian, manager of the club, had brought forth, first, that the blond, sullen Whitelaw had not been seen around Broadway for six months, was supposed to have reformed and gone to work in Wall Street. Second, that both the girl and the fine-looking, clear-skinned, elderly Englishman were unknown in the club.
This was the type of data that Derosier had been sent out to glean. Jack Whitelaw III was an authentic millionaire’s son, a lavish and regular—until six months ago—patron of Broadway establishments, and anything about him was of interest to the Broadway Squad. However, the susceptible sergeant had fully noted all this and should have been on about his business a full ten minutes before the episode of the note. He was, frankly, loitering, absorbed in watching the girl, unwilling to take his eyes from her really striking beauty.
SHE was small, demure, dainty, in a long black-velvet evening gown. Her jet-black hair was waved smoothly back to a crescent roll behind her small, poised head. Her midnight-blue eyes were long-lashed, sparkling, alive in a delicately smooth little face. Her skin was the color of milk. There was a rhinestone ornament against her onyx hair, matching the single strand of glittering stones that girdled her tiny waist and was the only ornament on the sweeping black gown. Her small arms and shoulders were smoothly rounded, and her breasts were two tight breath-taking curves under the tight bodice. Over it all, she had a vaguely little-girl look.
However, as the matter of the note came up, there was nothing little-girl about her perfect, calm poise.
A waiter—having literally circled the table awkwardly, twice—finally sidled up. There was no doubt that he knew he was committing an unforgivable bloomer. He almost prostrated himself, bowing, again and again apologetically, before he eventually, hesitantly, proffered the small white envelope.
Derosier became a little more the observer, a little less the nostalgic watcher. Openly sending notes to accompanied ladies in top-flight nightclubs was the act of a fool. When the lady’s escort was a millionaire’s son, it was the act of a damn fool and an ignorant one. Millionaire’s sons were a vanishing race; there were not enough of them left to go around. Those that did go around were—to club managers like Charlie Pian—to be cossetted, nurtured, indulged, even assisted should they care to take a few pokes at fellow-guests.
And judging by the dark flush on the blond youth’s sullen face as he stumbled erect and snatched for the note, he was apt to care to.
It did not for a minute occur to Derosier that he should interfere. Cabaret brawls of this sort were far beneath the dignity of the Broadway Squad. He leaned a shoulder comfortably against the entrance-jamb, eyes bright, awaiting developments with interest. His only nebulous thought—if he had one—was the bright little hope that any ensuing mixup might possibly leave the girl without anyone in shape to take her home.
Unfortunately, he had the scenario completely wrong. Even as the tipsy blond youth ripped unsuccessfully at the envelope, the military, ruddy-faced, gray-haired Englishman reached over his shoulder and took it from his fumbling fingers, patting Whitelaw’s shoulder reassuringly.
He stripped the envelope from a stiff white card swiftly, while the lobster-faced Whitelaw swayed, running a pudgy hand through his snaky blond curls.
Reading it, the elderly man smiled, showing white teeth.
Derosier felt vaguely disappointed. His interest, momentarily, began to wane.
The elderly man put an arm around the blond youth’s shoulders, forced him back into his chair. He tapped his own shirt-front with a corner of the card, looked round for the long-vanished waiter.
He stood, half leaning over the table while he made some long explanation to the other two, laid his napkin down and made a little bow, pocketing the note. Then he stepped round the table, bowed again and turned and headed for the door where Derosier stood.
Derosier casually turned his back, idled over and leaned elbows on the checkroom counter. As the mutinous little red-headed checkroom girl started to say something he told her bluntly: “Shut up.”
The military-looking man came out, hesitated a second, then turned down the hall. He had the note in his hand again and his head was bent. He walked more and more slowly, till he finally lagged to a stop facing the door at the far end of the hall.
Presently he raised his head, looked up, as though unsure of himself, turned to look along the L of the hall, a little frantically.
Derosier’s curiosity rekindled. The old man’s ruddy face had, in the moment that his back was turned, gone gray, strained. His brown eyes were hot, frightened. And even as he turned back to the door in front of him, he took a handkerchief from his sleeve, ran it with trembling fingers around his face and inside his collar.
A WAITER, laden with a tray, came suddenly out of the door and Derosier saw the kitchens beyond. The old man had to step back. Then, with a quick stiffening of his shoulders as though bracing himself, the Englishman strode through the door just before it swung closed.
For three minutes, Derosier tried blankly to figure out what it was all about. He had no luck.
Another waiter hurried out of the kitchen door. Derosier recognized him as the bearer of the note. He said, “Hey! You!” and started down the hall. The weasel-faced waiter turned a frightened face, stopped, wiped the back of his hand across his lips.
Derosier pushed him down the arm of the hall and stood him against the wall. “What’s the name of that girl you handed the note to?”
The waiter swallowed. “It—it wasn’t for the girl, Sarge. I—the guy just told me to slip it to the party with Jack Whitelaw and I made a mistake.”
“Where did you get the note?”
“I—it was a fellow in the alley. I was settin’ out garbage for the chef and this guy was out there. He—he made me take it in.”
“Made you? How?”
The waiter swallowed again. “He—he called me out. He knew my name, see? He showed me his rod in one hand, a saw-buck in the other.”
“Who was he?”
“I—gosh, I dunno, Sarge. It was dark and I couldn’t—”
Derosier’s hands went up to the other’s ears. There was no change in the rather stupid expression on his long, droopy face. He palmed the waiter’s ears and wrenched. The waiter cried out in agony and fell to his knees.
“My God! Leggo, Sarge. Al—Al Corcoran.”
Derosier cuffed him absently, let him scamper away.
He pulled thoughtfully at his chin for a second, then turned back and walked again to the checkroom, his eyes on the front door. He began to think he had something. Al Corcoran, a deadly little gunman, was news any time. He was one of the few of his type who were tough enough to play a lone hand—to be on hire for the proper people at the proper time but to belong to none of them.
HE pushed through the door, went down the steps under the club’s red canopy, turned west and looked along at the alley entrance, a black little slot, two houses away, that L’d around to the back door of the club.
Just beyond the alley, a thinnish, wiry dark man was walking quickly away. He had large bucket-ears and wore a long camel’s-hair coat, belted and pleated, a green pork-pie hat, under which black hair showed. He had his hands in his pockets. He could have been Al Corcoran and he could have come out of the alley.
For a minute, Derosier could not decide if any action was called for. He stood fingering his close-clipped blond mustache, vaguely troubled, watching the camel’s-hair coat disappear down the street.
The matter passed out of his hands there.
The doorman hurried out at the top of the 44 Club stairs and called down: “Sarge—oh, Sarge! You down there? Hey—phone! Lieutenant Marquis.”
His forehead knotted, Derosier went back up. The elderly Englishman was standing by the checkroom now. He was just buttoning his black topcoat. His gloves, stick and opera hat were in one hand. He coughed apologetically and asked the
headwaiter the location of the men’s-room. He put on his opera hat as he went back up the hall and turned along the L-arm. Derosier, with his hand on the knob of the manager’s office, watched him with uncertain eyes.
The Marquis’ soft voice said over the phone: “Harry—they’re raiding Goodman’s on Fifty-second in fifteen minutes. I want you to go up there and hang around. See what happens. I don’t want to show.”
Derosier hesitated. “O.K., Marty, but I wish you’d send someone to take on what I’ve got. I’ve a hunch there’s a damn funny one here.”
After a minute, the Marquis said: “I’ll come over.”
FIVE minutes later the Marquis’ dapper, blocky little black-clad figure came unhurriedly through the door. His small, black-gloved hands were flat in the pockets of his expensive Chesterfield coat. There was a black silk muffler tight at his throat. Under the brim of his imported hard hat, his round, weathered-pink cheeks and shaded, deep-set China-blue eyes were, as always, placid and deceptively cheerful-looking. Johnny Berthold, big, shaggy, his too-small hat on the back of his thick blond head, lumbered at the Marquis’ heels.
Derosier unloaded his information and went out.
As the Marquis strolled over to the vantage spot in the portièred entrance foyer, Big Johnny growled: “So what? What are we supposed to do? Harry’s getting dopey.”
They almost collided with Jack Whitelaw and the vivid little brunette.
The playboy’s irritated eyes glowered as all four came to a sudden halt. Then his blond face brightened. “Hey! Marty! Remember me? Jack Wh—”
The Marquis’ vermilion lips smiled and he let his gloved hand be pumped. “How are you, Jack?”
“Hey—” Whitelaw pulled him around to face the girl. “Martha—meet Marty Marquis. Lieutenant Marty Marquis— the boss of Broadway. Marty—this is Miss Shaughnessey.”
The Marquis uncovered his crisply curling, shiny black hair and bowed over his hat, mumbled his pleasure.
The Complete Cases of the Marquis of Broadway, Volume 1 Page 30
