The Sunday Pigeon Murders

by Craig Rice

  Handsome opened his mouth to speak, shook his head, and shut it again.

  Bingo sat down on the sagging couch and reached for the remaining bottle of beer. “Shut up,” he said to the speechless Handsome. “I’m thinking fast.”

  “The prints,” Handsome began timidly. “Don’t you want me to make—”

  “This one is all we need,” Bingo told him. He went on gazing at it. “Do you know where Harkness Penneyth lives?”

  Handsome blinked. “In 1934,” he said, “he lived just off Central Park West. It was a little, sort of yellow-colored apartment house. There was a tailor shop next door.” He paused. “You want the number too?”

  “Never mind,” Handsome said. “That was seven years ago, and he’s probably moved by now. But we’ll find him.”

  Handsome asked, “Do you think he’d want to buy that picture?”

  “No,” Bingo told him, “but I think he’d like to buy Mr. Pigeon.” He looked dreamily into space. “First, Handsome, we’ve got to find Mr. Pigeon and hide him. Hide him good, and fix it so he can’t get away. Then we make a deal with Mr. Harkness Penneyth. If he’ll split that insurance-company payment with us when it comes due, seven days from now, we won’t produce the Sunday Pigeon. See?”

  Handsome gasped. “A half of a half of a million bucks,” he said. “That’s a lot of dough. Wait. Let me figure it out.” He was silent for a moment, his forehead wrinkled. “Hey,” he said at last, “that’s two hundred and fifty thousand dollars!”

  “You’re right the first time,” Bingo said. “And boy, what we can do with that money!”

  Handsome sighed. He could imagine ten dollars, he could even imagine a hundred, but—Suddenly he frowned. “Wait, Bingo. Is it honest?”

  “Honest!” Bingo stood up, his eyes blazing with righteous wrath. “Do you think I’m a crook? This guy Penneyth deserves to lose half of that dough. Why, he’s trying to gyp the insurance company. Besides,” he added in a milder tone, “it isn’t as if we were going to blackmail him.”

  “All right,” Handsome said. “If you say so.”

  Bingo drew a long, slow breath. “We’re just asking him to invest in the International Foto, Motion Picture, and Television Corporation of America, and it’s a good, sound investment if there ever was one. Why, he’s liable to double the dough he puts into it. All he needs to do is give us the check”—he started searching through the dresser for a necktie—“and I’ll find us a swell studio and start looking around for some good secondhand equipment—hell, new equipment, now that we’ve got a quarter of a million bucks.” He located the necktie, tossed it over the back of a chair, and began pawing through the drawer for a clean shirt. “C’mon, Handsome, dress. We’ve got to get going.” He started buttoning the shirt—a pale yellow one with a fine, violet stripe. That done, he tied the gold and purple plaid necktie with loving care and gazed admiringly in the mirror at the result. “Let’s go, Handsome,” he said. “Hail Columbia, we’re rich.”

  “Put your pants on first,” Handsome said, tying his own tie. He frowned again. “Bingo.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Where are we going to find him? Mr. Pigeon, I mean.”

  “Oh, that.” Bingo scowled, was silent for a moment, then snapped a bright-colored suspender over one shoulder. “I’ll figure that out. Don’t you worry. Don’t I always think of everything?” He dampened the end of a towel and sponged a tiny spot from the sleeve of a bright-checked sport jacket. “Did I ever let you down? Don’t you trust me?”

  “Sure,” Handsome said apologetically.

  Bingo said, “Don’t worry, we’ll find him.”

  “Oh, sure,” Handsome said again. He brushed back his thick, dark hair, and tucked his cigarettes into his jacket pocket. “Say, Bingo.”

  “For the love of Mike,” Bingo said. “Now what?”

  “Where are we going to hide him when we do find him,” Handsome asked timidly, “and how are we going to get him to go there?”

  Bingo was silent, brushing off his pointed, brown-and-white sport shoes. “I’ll think of that,” he said at last, “when the time comes.” He completed his toilet by carefully arranging the lemon-yellow handkerchief in his breast pocket. Then he drained the last dregs of beer from the bottle, now warm and clammy. “Tomorrow,” he said happily, “champagne.”

  At the downstairs door he paused, giving Handsome a warning look. The black-haired girl in the green slacks was still sitting on the front steps.

  “’Evening,” Bingo said in a sprightly tone. “Wonderful out, isn’t it?”

  “Beautiful,” she said coldly. “A perfect night for sleeping in the park. Listen, Bingo Riggs. Ma said—”

  Bingo sighed, sat down beside her, and took one of her hands in both of his. “Look here, Baby. Much as I love you, we don’t have time to sit here and talk about your mother. Handsome and me, we’ve got a big deal on.”

  She sniffed. “I never saw you when you didn’t,” she said. “And this time you’d better make it good and big, because you’re likely to have all outdoors for an office.” She didn’t pull her hand away.

  “Now, Baby,” Bingo said in a hurt voice, “you trust me, don’t you? By this time tomorrow we’ll not only have enough dough to pay up that dinky little rent bill, but to buy this whole damn house—and throw in a couple of fur coats and a few diamonds.”

  “Honest to gosh,” Handsome added.

  Baby smiled at him and tried unsuccessfully not to smile at Bingo. “It’s too warm for furs,” she said, “and I prefer emeralds. But good luck, boys.”

  Bingo squeezed her hand and rose to his feet. “Baby, you’re a wonderful girl. When I get rich”—he paused and grinned. “Did I say get rich?”

  He had reached the bottom of the steps before she called, “If you two millionaires can just give Ma five bucks in the morning, I think she’ll wait for the rest. And don’t forget to bring back those emeralds.”

  They were halfway down the block when Bingo said, “Baby’s marvelous.” He glanced up at Handsome and said, “Someday, pal, when you get in the bucks”—he caught himself, and added quickly, “I mean, now that you are in the bucks—”

  “She don’t want to get married,” Handsome said. “I asked her once.”

  “Don’t talk like a dope,” Bingo snapped. “All girls want to get married.”

  “Not Baby,” Handsome said earnestly. “She wants a career. She’s got a swell job. Hat-check girl in one of the most elegant joints on Fifty-second Street. You couldn’t ask a girl to give up a job like that to get married, even if you were rich.” He sighed. “Say, Bingo, where are we going to find the Sunday Pigeon?”

  “We’ll go out in the park and do birdcalls,” Bingo said crossly. He paused, thrust his hands into his pockets, and looked up at the sky. “Let me think. We could try the hotels, but he might not be registered under his own name, and besides, we haven’t the dough to call ’em all up. Anyway, he’d more likely be in a rooming house somewhere, if he’s trying to keep out of sight.”

  Handsome said hopefully, “I know a lot of saloonkeepers. Know ’em well.”

  “Mr. Pigeon isn’t the sort of guy who would hang out in saloons,” Bingo said.

  “Sorry,” Handsome said.

  They walked toward Central Park in silence, through the warm New York night. Yes, Baby was a marvelous girl, Bingo thought. Marvelous, and beautiful, and intelligent, and wonderful, and sympathetic, and cute, too. When this Pigeon business went through he’d buy her anything she wanted in the entire city of New York. Including emeralds. In fact—

  “Baby’s pretty,” Handsome said, interrupting Bingo’s dream.

  Bingo said, “For the love of Mike, with all we have to do, you go around thinking about women. Help think about how we’re going to find the Sunday Pigeon, and find him fast.”

  Where in the name of daylight could the little guy have gone?

  Where had he been?

  Curiosity began to stir uncomfortably in Bingo’s brain. Mr.
S. S. Pigeon, the Sunday Pigeon, had gone along with the regular routine of his life, up to a certain date in August, 1934. Then he’d broken that routine by turning up on a weekday to feed his beloved birds, and afterward had vanished into—into what? Not into thin air, certainly, because the Sunday Pigeon had come back. But why had he come back? Where had he been all this time? And why had he gone away in the first place, if he’d gone of his own free will?

  “How are you going to look for a guy,” he said out loud, “when you don’t know where he is?”

  “Hell, we know where he is,” Handsome said in a surprised tone. He took the photograph out of his pocket and pointed. “He’s right there.”

  Bingo looked at the picture showing Mr. Pigeon, taken early that afternoon, and then stared speechlessly at Handsome.

  “I know I’m dumb,” Handsome said. “But that’s the only place we know where he was.”

  “By golly,” Bingo said slowly, “you’re not so dumb. The place to start looking for him is the place where he was seen last.” They turned south down Central Park West.

  “Maybe he’s still there,” Handsome said. “He’s been away from New York for seven years—”

  Bingo interrupted. “How do you figure that?”

  “If he’d been here,” Handsome said, “somebody’d of seen him. So he hasn’t been here. And since he’s been away all that time, I bet he’d still be hanging around those pigeons. He was crazy about those birds. I remember a picture of him once, feeding a pigeon that only had one leg.”

  “There aren’t any pigeons that have only one leg,” Bingo said scornfully.

  “This pigeon had,” Handsome said. “The picture was in the News, May thirteenth, 1933. A one-legged pigeon. Page three, in the top right-hand corner. It was a two-column cut. Right next to a story about Arthur McDermott suing for divorce on the grounds that his wife criticized the valentine he gave his mother-in-law. He got it October 20th of the same year.”

  Bingo wasn’t quite sure whether the one-legged pigeon had gotten a divorce, or Mr. McDermott, whoever he was, had gotten a valentine, but he didn’t bother to ask. They had reached the entrance to the park just south of Bolivar Hill. He led the way in, Handsome just a step behind.

  “See,” Handsome said. “That’s the place where you took the picture.”

  But there was no one in sight. Only the trees, bright under the street lights, and the moon, and the paths, still littered with the day’s debris.

  Handsome paused, his face unhappy. “That’s funny. I was sure he’d be here.”

  Bingo glanced at him and decided to be charitably silent. “This is where he was when that picture was taken,” he said at last, gently. “All we got to do now is figure out where he went from here, and go there.”

  “Oh,” Handsome said dubiously. He looked around at the network of paths and sighed.

  “That isn’t what I mean,” Bingo said, not so gently. “I mean we want to figure out the logical place for him to go.” He drew a long breath, took off his snap-brimmed straw hat, and mopped his brow. “Let’s go up on the hill and sit down. I want to think.”

  He led the way up the narrow path and flight of steps, dark and mysterious now, until the foliage parted to reveal the mounted statue of Simon Bolivar, silvery blue in the moonlight. The benches circled around the statue were deserted now. All but one.

  Suddenly Bingo caught at Handsome’s arm. “Hold everything,” he said softly.

  The small man on the bench just in front of the statue had looked up as they approached, smiled affably, the light falling on his face. There could be no possible doubt that he was the Sunday Pigeon.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Mr. Pigeon was a pleasant-looking little man with mild gray eyes, and thinning gray hair that fell over his forehead as the wind tumbled it. He was polishing a pair of steel-rimmed glasses as Bingo and Handsome approached, and when they paused in front of him, he placed the glasses carefully astride his nose and peered out through them amiably.

  Handsome glanced anxiously at Bingo. Here was Mr. Pigeon, all right. But what was to be done now? Of course, he reminded himself quickly, as though the very question had been a disloyalty, Bingo would know what to do next. Bingo always knew.

  “There’s not even any breeze up here, is there?” Bingo said casually to Mr. Pigeon.

  “Not a breath,” Mr. Pigeon agreed.

  Handsome drew a long breath of relief. Just leave it to Bingo.

  Bingo and Mr. Pigeon discussed the fact that the day had been unusually warm, even for August, but that it was very pleasant now after sundown, and that tomorrow would probably be another scorcher. Then Bingo said in a casual tone. “Have you seen a one-legged pigeon here in the park, by any chance?”

  Handsome looked up sharply. What was Bingo up to?

  “Not—” Mr. Pigeon paused. “Not recently.”

  Bingo said, “Funny, I can’t find anybody who’s seen him here. I thought maybe he came over to the park some of the time.” He paused, and then added, “You’d think this would be just where he’d come.”

  “He?” Mr. Pigeon said. There was a new look of interest on his amiable face.

  “Our pet,” Bingo explained. “Anyway, he seems like a pet. Only one-legged pigeon I ever saw in my life.”

  “That’s very interesting,” Mr. Pigeon said. The light in his mild gray eyes showed that he meant it. “Did he lose the other leg, do you know, or was he born that way?”

  Bingo kicked Handsome’s ankle. Handsome ran his memory quickly over the newspaper story of 1933 and said, “Born that way.”

  “Well, I’ll be blessed,” Mr. Pigeon said.

  Now it was Bingo’s turn to look interested. “Did you ever see him?”

  “Not since—quite some time ago,” Mr. Pigeon said, almost breathlessly. “I didn’t dream that he could still be alive. I’d like to see him again.”

  It developed, as Bingo went on with his story, that the one-legged pigeon had a habit of showing up on their window sill every night about ten o’clock to be fed. Regular as clockwork. For how long? Oh, four or five years. Gotten to seem like a real member of the family. What time was it now? Let’s see—Mmm, about nine-thirty. That reminded him, he’d better be getting home. He’d forgotten to leave any food on the window sill.

  “Would you like to see him?” Bingo asked hospitably. “We’re only a few blocks from the park.”

  Mr. Pigeon hopped to his feet. “I’d very much like to see him,” he said briskly. He paused a moment. “I was going to meet someone here, but—he’ll wait, I’m sure.”

  On the way to the rooming house, Mr. Pigeon turned out to be what Bingo mentally labeled “a swell little guy.” He was interested, it seemd, not only in the one-legged pigeon, but in Bingo and Handsome themselves, and even in the International Foto, Motion Picture, and Television Corporation of America.

  “We take people’s pictures when they’re out walking,” Bingo explained, “and then we give ’em a card with our address. If they send us the card, with two bits, we send them the picture.”

  “Remarkable!” the Sunday Pigeon murmured.

  “But when we move into our new studio,” Bingo said, “now that we’re gonna expand—” he paused. What were they going to do when they moved into the new studio? With all that wonderful equipment, and a quarter of a million bucks put into the business, it seemed a little silly to go on taking pictures of people in the park, at two bits a head. Oh, well, he’d figure that out when the time came.

  He said, “There’s a lot of possibilities in this business that we haven’t even scratched yet.”

  “I’m sure there are,” Mr. Pigeon said pleasantly. “And I’m sure you’ll take every advantage of them, too.”

  Bingo glanced at him gratefully. He was beginning to like Mr. Pigeon more and more. He was such a quiet, unassuming little man. Fifty, maybe sixty years old. Soft-voiced, and gentle, and friendly. Acted as though he wanted to be friends with everybody in the world. Yes, Bingo liked h
im, and he could see that Handsome did. He could see, too, that Handsome was worried, and he suspected that the two of them were worrying about the same thing.

  It did seem like a mean trick to play on agreeable, trusting little Mr. Pigeon.

  But, Bingo told himself firmly, it wasn’t as though they weren’t doing it, actually, for Mr. Pigeon’s own good. Why, as a matter of fact, they were saving his life. If somebody else who knew about that insurance policy got hold of Mr. Pigeon, somebody who wasn’t so scrupulously honest—that would be bad. Bingo felt a lot better about the whole thing after coming to that conclusion.

  Another anxiety seized him as they neared the rooming house. It wouldn’t be so good if Baby, or especially Baby’s mother, were out on the front steps. To his great relief, the steps were deserted.

  “It’s not a very elegant house,” he told Mr. Pigeon, half apologetically, “but my partner and I have very simple tastes.” He paused, and added, “We keep the third floor and rent out the rest of the rooms.” He managed to avoid Handsome’s disapproving look.

  “It’s a very pleasant neighborhood,” Mr. Pigeon said politely. He glanced at the mailbox as they passed through the vestibule.

  “We’re using this for our business office too, temporarily,” Bingo said quickly. “Just until the new studio is—ready for us.” He added, “I hope you don’t mind the climb.”

  Mr. Pigeon said, “Not a bit,” and started up the narrow stairs.

  Handsome grabbed Bingo by the arm and held him back until Mr. Pigeon was halfway up the first flight.

  “Listen,” he said in a hoarse whisper. “Give me fifty cents.

  “What for?”

  “I can’t tell you now. But, Bingo, I gotta have it.”

  Bingo sighed. “O. K.” He found a couple of quarters in his pocket and handed them over. “Wait—where you going?”

  “Just next door. I’ll be back in a minute, honest.”

  Bingo said, “All right, but hurry. Remember we got important business.” He started up the stairs after Mr. Pigeon, wondering what the devil Handsome was up to. Oh, well, whatever it was, it couldn’t be terribly serious.