“No,” I said, “I don’t have the answer. But you’re acting as though you did. All right, if your theory ties up those loose ends, let’s hear it.”
“My theory?” he asked innocently. “Do I have to have one? Can’t a critic give his opinion of an omelet without being asked to lay an egg?”
Flint stepped up to the plate swinging. “I know damn well you’ve got a theory. I don’t think I’m going to like it either, but I want to hear it just the same. And right now!”
Merlini frowned, glanced at his wrist watch, frowned again, and then admitted grudgingly, “Well, I do have one or two ideas, but it’s a bit soon to—”
“No,” Flint said flatly. “Nothing doing. You may be able to pull that one on your friend Inspector Gavigan, but it doesn’t go with me. You’ve read too many detective stories where the amateur mastermind holds out his solution until last. Not this time you don’t. I’m giving you mine last, and you can count on that. Now talk!”
Merlini said, “Oh, you’ve got it solved too, have you?”
“Yes. Strangely enough I have. This is the pay-off. It’s all over but the shouting.”
Merlini glanced again at his watch. “Shouting?” he asked, and then added, ominously, “Or shooting?”
The lieutenant stepped toward him belligerently. “What do you mean by that? What are you waiting for?”
Merlini got to his feet. His facetious manner of a moment ago was suddenly gone. “Murder,” he said quietly. “There’s one more yet to come. It’s billed to go on almost any minute now. Upstairs in the study. I think we should attend.”
The solemn, completely serious way in which he spoke threw Flint off balance. He stared for a moment and then shook his head as if trying to wake from a bad dream.
“The hell it is. What are you trying to pull off now? How do you know that? Why—”
Merlini’s answer was short and devastating. “I arranged it.”
Chapter Nineteen:
The Spiders and the Fly
MERLINI SHOULD HAVE DISAPPEARED in a puff of smoke. The look Flint gave him was deadly enough.
The lieutenant jerked his thumb toward the livingroom. “The whole crowd’s in there,” he said, “And they’re going to stay there. That doesn’t get you a murder upstairs in the study.”
Merlini nodded. “I know, but you can’t keep them there forever. Sooner or later—”
“You think someone’s crazy enough to try another murder with the house full of cops?”
“I wouldn’t be surprised. All murderers are more or less insane. This one is desperate. Besides, just to make sure that it comes off, I want you to leave the house and remove your men.”
“Oh, you do, do you?”
“Yes. It will be a quite harmless murder and the victim won’t mind a bit. He’s quite used to it by now. You see, the victim will be the same man the murderer has already tried to get three times. Mr. Smith—Zareh Bey, the man who defies death, the man who—”
Flint glared at the magician. “Are you trying to tell me that the man we saw at the morgue is someone else, that Smith is still alive, still here in this house?”
No. Smith is Zareh Bey. He is the man in the morgue. He’s dead. But the people in the next room don’t know that. And one of them has an appointment upstairs in the study with Smith.”
“How do you know that?”
“I made the appointment. I thought that the murderer, hearing nothing of any traffic accident, would suppose that the dry-ice scheme had failed and might not be too surprised to hear from Smith. So I brought him back from the dead again, a bit of necromancy that wasn’t difficult to accomplish when you consider that it’s none too easy to identify voices over a telephone.”
Flint glared at Merlini angrily. “You did what?”
“I phoned someone, pretended to be Smith, and said that I’d come back here as soon as the police had gone.”
“Who,” Flint demanded savagely, “did you phone?”
If Flint’s manner worried Merlini, he didn’t show it. “I phoned a person against whom we haven’t a scrap of decent evidence, the person who may give us what we need by making the mistake of walking through that study door, very probably prepared to make a last desperate attempt to eliminate Smith once and for all. If you pretend to send away your men and if we secretly station ourselves in the study—”
Flint was incredulous. “Do you think I’ll play along on a stunt like that unless I know who you phoned?”
“I hope so,” Merlini said seriously. “It’s our only chance of getting evidence that will convict.”
“And who told you,” Flint said coldly, “that you could be the judge of that? When were you put in charge of this case?”
“I’m sorry, Lieutenant. You’re quite right. But I can’t tell you who I phoned. I know exactly what would happen if I did. You wouldn’t like my answer. You’d give me an argument and you’d want proof of a kind I can’t give you. While we argued we’d miss our chance. Even if I managed to convince you that I was right, I’m afraid that you would think my trap is too theatrical. You’re not used to doing things that way. It’s not recommended by the manual of procedure. You’d want to use the orthodox tactics—make an arrest and hope that a taste of jail and some third degree would get results. That may work sometimes, but when a murderer is as clever and as stubborn as events have indicated this one is, you wouldn’t get to first base.”
For a long moment Flint stood silent, regarding Merlini with cold appraisal. Finally he said, “I could take you into the station and sweat it out of you.”
“And we’d lose our chance that way too,” Merlini answered. “You’ll get what you want a lot quicker my way. You can’t lose. If my plan works, you get the murderer and the evidence you need. If it doesn’t, I’ll tell you who I phoned and you can take it from there any way you like.”
Flint hesitated again. Then, suddenly, he made up his mind. “Okay,” he said. “Sergeant, put a pair of cuffs on him.”
Merlini blinked. “What do you mean, ‘Okay, put a pair of cuffs—’”
“I’m playing it your way because there’s something I want to know. But it’ll look damned funny if we pull out of here without a good reason. Since you’re so stubborn, you can be it.” He turned to Lovejoy. “Handcuff him, take him out through the living-room so those others get a look. I’ll tell ’em the case is solved and we’ve made an arrest.”
“But the murderer,” I objected, “the one person you want to fool, will know that’s not so.”
“So what? Murderers all think cops are dumb as hell. That’s why we catch so many. This one’ll think I’ve made a mistake.”
Lovejoy clicked one steel circle of the handcuff around Merlini’s wrist, the other about his own, as Flint added, “Take him right through to the hall. Tell Tucker to get outside, put a man in each of the police cars, and tip off the rest of the boys to stay under cover. Have Ryan stand by the front door. When I come out and we start up the stairs he’s to slam the front door so it sounds as if we’ve gone out. Right after, the cars drive off, the boys park them down the drive out of sight, and come back on the q.t. Got that?”
“Yes sir.”
Flint crossed the room to the living-room door. He looked back at me. “You stick with them and don’t stop to look in any shop windows. Ready?”
We all nodded. Flint opened the door. We heard the conversation in the room outside the away. Lovejoy and Merlini went in and I followed closely. We turned left and moved quickly toward the door to the hall. We had covered half the distance before any of the group around the fireplace spoke.
Then Kay’s voice came. “Ross, wait!” I looked back and saw Flint step in front of her as she started toward me. I looked back and saw Flint step in front of her as she started toward me.
“Just a minute, Miss Wolff,” he said. “You can talk to him later. I’ve got something to say.”
She wasn’t to be stopped that easily. She started to move around him.
I called back, “Kay, do as he says. He’s making the bonehead play of the year. But they haven’t built the jail yet that will hold Merlini. Wait here and sit tight. We’ll be back.”
I hurried after Lovejoy and Merlini, leaving Flint to fight the rest of the rear-guard action. I heard him begin to talk as I closed the door.
Then we hit the first snag. Tucker and Ryan, worried looks on their faces, hurried toward us from the rear of the hallway.
Tucker asked, “Where’s the lieutenant? I’ve got to see him.”
“Later,” Lovejoy replied. “This is rush,” He gave them their orders rapidly.
As he finished Merlini said, “Leonard’s not with the others in the living-room. Is that what’s bothering you, Tucker?”
The fingerprint man nodded. “Yes. The lieutenant told me to round everybody up. We can’t find him.”
Merlini frowned. “That’s awkward, but it’ll have to wait. Flint will be out here in a moment. We’ll tell him. Get going.”
The sergeant seconded the motion and they left, Tucker going out and Ryan taking up his position at the front door.
As we hurried up the stairs Lovejoy said, “I don’t like this. If you ask me, Leonard’s the guy we’re after. A chauffeur’s just the kind of guy who’d figure out a stunt like that dry ice in the car—Hey!”
His exclamation arose from the fact that he had just noticed that Merlini was ascending the stairs several feet ahead of him. Lovejoy lifted his wrist and stared at the open cuff that dangled from it.
Down below, Flint stepped through the living-room door, closed it behind him, and ran for the stairs. As he hurried up he asked, “Lovejoy, where the hell is Leonard? He’s not in there with the others.” Then, at the stairs’ top, he turned and signaled Ryan. The latter went out, slamming the front door behind him.
The sergeant said, “I don’t know. Tucker couldn’t find—”
Merlini, who had reached the study door and pushed it open, said, “Here he is, Lieutenant!”
The window across the room was partly open. The chauffeur stood before it, facing us. A heavy glass inkwell which he had snatched up from the desk was in his hand.
Flint’s gun came out. “Drop it!” he commanded.
“Okay.” Leonard replaced it on the desk. “Take it easy. You should knock before you—”
Merlini cut in quickly, “Sergeant, close that door. All of you keep your voices down.’’
Flint moved toward the chauffeur. “Merlini, is this the guy you phoned?”
Merlini sat down at Wolff’s desk. “No. It isn’t.”
Leonard said, “I guess this is where I talk.” He sat on the edge of the desk, lifted his foot, and slipped off his shoe. From it he took a small white card which he handed to Flint.
“I didn’t want you to find that when you frisked everybody this morning,” he said.
The lieutenant took it and read: Leonard Doran, Doran Detective Agency, 3414 Broadway. So that’s why I have trouble checking back on you. Who hired you?”
“Wolff. He wanted a bodyguard. He got threatening letters every now and then from crackpots. He didn’t act it, but he scared easy and I—”
“Why’d you hold out on me?”
“Well, business hasn’t been so hot lately. When Wolff gets shot I figure if I can crack the case on my own the publicity’ll do the agency some good. Maybe Mrs. Wolff will pay—”
“Business,” Flint cut in, “is going to be lousy. You won’t have a license starting tomorrow.”
Doran shook his head. “I wouldn’t do that, Lieutenant. You see, I know who the murderer is. And if you play ball with me—”
“Play ball hell! What do you know? Spill it fast!”
“Okay, Lieutenant, okay. Take it easy. It’s the secretary, Dunning. He’s the guy who was trying to blackmail Wolff. He’s the guy who loaded that car heater with dry ice. Stopping in at my room to bum a cigarette was just a gag to make sure I was out of the way. Then he goes in the garage and plants the ice in the car. But his pal Smith doesn’t go in for such fancy methods. He shows, knocks Dunning out, and—”
Flint’s voice was ominous. “How do you know anything about a traffic smash—or about dry ice?”
As Doran answered, I saw Merlini quietly remove the receiver from the desk phone and press his forefinger against one of the buttons on its base.
“I got an earful,” Doran said, “downstairs at the kitchen door just now. When I heard what I did, I figured Dunning for the job. Then I came up here to have a look around and dope out how he shot—”
Merlini cut in suddenly. “Quiet a moment, please.”
His voice as he spoke into the phone was low, rapid, and almost completely muffled by the hand he held cupped around the mouthpiece. The only words I could distinguish were “in the study” and “tell the police who killed—”
He hung up just as Flint jumped toward him. “Now,” he said, “keep quiet and watch that door!”
Flint’s voice was a low mutter of thunder. “Damn you! You never made a call before! That’s the one—”
Merlini nodded. “I had no chance earlier. And you wouldn’t have let me—”
“Who did you phone?”
“If you don’t let everyone in the house know we’re here, you’ll find out in about two minutes.”
Flint hesitated. He looked at the door and then at Merlini again. He shook his head obstinately. “You didn’t call anyone. But you’d like me to think you did. This is more of your damned misdirection. We’re going down to the station right now. Lovejoy—”
Quickly, Merlini said, “All right, Lieutenant. I’ll tell you who I called. But give me a chance to prove it. If you’ll stay away from that door for a few minutes we’ll catch her red-handed. Otherwise—”
“Her? Are you trying to give me the Mrs. Wolff yarn too?”
Merlini’s answer was straight out of a nightmare. “No,” he said slowly, “I’m not.”
I stared at him and felt a sick spasm of fear tighten in my stomach.
Flint’s voice seemed to come from far away. “You mean—”
“Yes. I phoned Kathryn Wolff.”
I have never been hit on the chin by Joe Louis, but I know now exactly how it feels.
Then, as though that first shattering blow were not enough, Merlini followed through with a barrage of body punches that had all the swift impact of machinegun bullets.
“Smith vanished from this room just as Ross said. He left by the door while I was still downstairs. I know where he went then, too. I’ll come to that in a moment. But first let me answer one of the questions I asked Ross. Why did he shove Ross out the window? The answer is that, since he had no reason he did nothing of the sort. The moment he knocked Ross out, he went away fast. And then, also before I returned, Kay entered the study from her room. She found Ross lying on the floor but assumed, in the dark, that it was Smith’s body. Why? Because she expected to find Smith there, and, since she set the trap gun that nearly got Smith, she expected to find him dead. That was why she came to the study. She had to get rid of the body. And that’s why Ross was shoved out the window!
“The other joker is that when she shot her father a moment later, she did it because he had threatened to cut her out of his will if she continued to be obstinate about seeing Ross. She wanted to have her cake and eat it too, not knowing that she’d just pushed it out into the Sound!”
I finally found my voice. “Merlini!” I exploded. “That’s completely impossible and you know it! What the hell are you trying to—”
He turned in his chair. “No, Ross, it’s not impossible and you know it. When her escape from the room by the door was cut off she got out the same way Flint said that you did. She’s an expert swimmer. She dived out the window. You saw her! But you’re in love with her and, murderess or not, you’re covering her!”
Then, as I stared at him in a blank paralysis of astonishment, Flint turned to face me. And behind his back Merlini’s right eye opened and closed in a
broad wink.
The successive shocks had almost completely demoralized my nervous system, but somehow it managed shakily to absorb this new one. Merlini had not phoned Kathryn. He was improvising in a desperate attempt to keep Flint interested long enough for the real murderer to come in answer to the phone call.
I picked up my cue. I looked at Flint and said what I would have said if Merlini’s charge had been true, the only thing I could say in any case.
“He’s lying!”
Merlini shook his head. “It won’t do, Ross. Not when she walks in through that door.”
The uncertain look that was on Flint’s face said that these unexpected accusations had rocked him too. Merlini gave him no chance to recover.
“Then, because Kathryn had twice before tried to kill Smith, because Smith knew it, and because, if he talked, you’d know she was capable of murder, she had to get rid of him. And so she put the dry ice in the car. What’s more, I can tell you how she made that flower vase tip over in the living-room. Ice is the answer there too. She moved the vase so that it stood just on the table’s edge, its base overlapping. She tilted it back slightly and inserted a small piece of ice beneath its outer edge. As it melted the vase tipped slowly forward. Then, finally overbalanced, it dropped to the floor. Dry ice would leave no clue at all. Ordinary ice would leave only a small puddle that would pass unnoticed in the bigger splash of water that spilled from the vase when it broke.”
As Merlini spoke, Flint’s uncertainty vanished. He smiled grimly. “And the fingerprint. What about that?”
“Sleight of hand,” Merlini said. “If you’ll try putting the pieces of that vase back together again you’ll find that the one bearing the fingerprint won’t fit. It’s an extra piece cracked from a similar vase in the butler’s pantry. Kathryn had previously arranged that Smith should handle it. Later, when she placed the ice beneath the vase in the living-room, she dropped the fingerprinted fragment in among the flowers. It was a simple but effective piece of hocus-pocus that—”
“No,” Flint contradicted suddenly, “it’s not nearly as effective as you think.”
No Coffin for the Corpse Page 23
