The Sunday Pigeon Murders

by Craig Rice

Bingo picked it up. It was a worn and slightly faded photograph of a girl. Across the back of it was written, in fading ink, my treasure.

  “So,” Bingo said. “It was a dame that caused him all his trouble.” He carried the photograph over to the light.

  She’d been a very lovely girl, a bit on the delicate and helpless side. Her hair was light and dressed very simply, and even in the photograph it looked soft and silky, like baby hair. Her eyes were large and appealing; her lips were curved in a slight, almost shy smile. She was dressed in the style of ten years ago, and she’d been very young when the picture was taken.

  “Gosh,” Handsome said. “That was Mr. Penneyth’s wife.”

  Bingo wheeled on him. “How do you know?”

  “Her picture was in the paper when she got married to Mr. Penneyth,” Handsome said. “I told you about it. October 22nd, 1934. Then there was the same picture of her in the paper when she jumped out of the window a year ago.”

  “Oh,” Bingo said. “I remember now.” This gentle-looking girl had married Harkness Penneyth, who’d had some dame’s negligee—probably June Logan’s—hanging in his wardrobe when he’d been killed. And she’d jumped from a window after five or six years of being married to him.

  She should have pushed him out first, Bingo thought.

  Mr. Pigeon’s treasure that had been stolen from him and destroyed.

  Bingo put the photograph carefully back into Mr. Pigeon’s wallet and said, “Let’s go and see how breakfast is getting on.”

  The pancakes were a success. There wasn’t any sirup in the house, but Mr. Pigeon had done some well-nigh magic feat with the remains of last night’s grated cheese. And, Bingo reflected, he had never realized what coffee was until he’d kidnaped Mr. Pigeon.

  Mr. Pigeon told hilarious stories about his trip, many years ago, to Siam. Rinaldo told hilarious stories about the old days in La Paz, most of them about women. Handsome remembered various entertaining incidents from the old days on the upper East Side. Mr. Pigeon made a second pot of coffee, and Bingo recalled a few tales Uncle Herman had told him about the prohibition days and the grocery-delicatessen back in Brooklyn.

  It was all very pleasant and very comfortable, and Bingo found himself forgetting about the two dollars and four cents in his pocket, about Mr. Pigeon’s “treasure” who had married Mr. Penneyth and jumped from a window, and about the visit still to be paid to one Leonora Penneyth. For nearly fifteen minutes a shaft of sunlight squeezed between two buildings to come in through the window, and while it was obviously going to be another sweltering day, here, for the time being, it was cool.

  Then there was a knock at the door. Baby’s knock.

  Bingo jumped up, almost overturning his coffee. He waved a frantic hand at Rinaldo, who rose, nodded understandingly, winked one eye, and took a nasty-looking little knife from his vest.

  “No, no, no,” Bingo whispered frantically. “Hide!”

  Rinaldo put the knife back, lifted his eyebrows, and looked around for a hiding place.

  Baby’s voice came from the other side of the door. “Hey, you in there. It’s me.”

  Rinaldo looked surprised and indignant, and said, “Hide? From a woman?”

  “You don’t understand,” Bingo said desperately. “Go on now, pal, get out of sight.”

  Baby called, “I’m coming in,” and opened the door.

  She looked particularly fetching, in blue slacks and a bright-red blouse. Her black hair was tied up on the top of her head with a plaid ribbon.

  “Ah!” Rinaldo said. “Señorita!”

  “Gosh,” Baby said.

  “This is a friend of Mr. Pigeon,” Bingo said hastily. “He just dropped in to breakfast. His name is Rinaldo—” He fumbled for the rest of it.

  “Rinaldo Juan Pablo Simon Bolivar Tinaja,” Rinaldo said, bowing.

  Bingo said, “And this is Baby. Miss Harrigan. She’s a friend of Mr. Pigeon, too.” But by that time Rinaldo was kissing Baby’s hand.

  “A very good friend of mine,” Mr. Pigeon said, smiling. “She plays a very fine game of cribbage.”

  Rinaldo exploded a burst of staccato Spanish phrases at Baby, all of them, apparently, complimentary.

  “You!” Baby said, with a small giggle.

  Handsome stared at her and said, “You don’t understand that lingo.”

  “No,” she said, “but I can dream, can’t I?”

  “Listen, Baby,” Bingo began indignantly. But Baby had already sat down at the table and was listening to Rinaldo, who was explaining to her that he was a poet and a patriot. Bingo glared at them for a moment and then stalked indignantly into the other room and began putting on his light-blue suit with the narrow pin stripe (75c every Tuesday), the navy-blue shirt with white stitching, the lemon-yellow tie, and the tan calf oxfords with the pointed toes.

  Handsome came into the room just as Bingo finished brushing a last, infinitesimal speck of dust from the toe of one shoe. Handsome had changed into the tan Palm Beach slacks and maroon broadcloth shirt Bingo had picked for him and never been able to get him to wear before. He’d polished the camera strap, too.

  “Baby’s going to stay here with Mr. Pigeon while we’re out,” Handsome said.

  Bingo did one last adjustment to the lemon-yellow tic. “And Rinaldo?” he asked.

  “He’s going to stay with Mr. Pigeon, too,” Handsome said.

  “Oh,” Bingo said, and then, “Well, O.K.”

  They paused in the other room on their way out. Mr. Pigeon was seated comfortably in the rocking chair, reading the World Almanac. Baby and Rinaldo were doing the breakfast dishes together. He was telling her how to pronounce buenos días.

  “We’ll be back before long,” Bingo said loudly. No one heard him. He banged the door behind him as he went out.

  He and Handsome had reached Columbus Avenue before he said indignantly, “Imagine that guy. He sleeps in our bed, he eats our breakfast, and now he tries to steal your girl.”

  “Not my girl,” Handsome said awkwardly, “your girl.”

  “All right,” Bingo said crossly, “our girl.” He was silent till they had entered Central Park. Then he said. “I don’t suppose you remember anything about the dame Mr. Penneyth married, do you?”

  “Oh, sure,” Handsome said. “There was a story in the paper at the time she jumped out of the window. She was born in some funny-named place in China.” He thought for a minute and then said, “Wanhsien.” He had a little trouble pronouncing it. “Her old man and old lady were missionaries. They died, and she got captured by bandits, and then she got rescued, and she came over here.”

  Bingo spotted a tourist party examining the sights of Central Park, signaled to Handsome to take a picture, handed out a card, saying, “You’ll want to show the folks back home a picture of you in the nation’s greatest playground—” After the tourist party had accepted the card and gone on, he said to Handsome, “Imagine a thing like that happening to a person. You don’t happen to remember who rescued her, do you?”

  “Of course,” Handsome said. Bingo nudged him; he snapped a picture of what looked like a honeymoon couple and waited till Bingo had handed out a card. “It was Mr. Pigeon.”

  This time Bingo didn’t say anything until they’d crossed the East Drive and handed out nearly a dozen more cards. What had Mr. Pigeon said once? “And on another trip, I brought back a still rarer treasure—but, unfortunately, a more perishable one.”

  At last he said, “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”

  “I didn’t know you wanted to know,” Handsome said in a hurt voice. “I didn’t know it was anything important.”

  “It probably isn’t,” Bingo said, almost crossly. “I was just curious.”

  They walked down upper Fifth Avenue to East Fifty-seventh Street. Bingo indicated the prospective customers to be photographed, carefully picking out honeymooners and out-of-town tourists. By the time they reached Fifty-seventh Street, the camera was almost empty.

  It was a mir
acle that so few prospects were missed. Bingo was lost in thought, half oblivious of Handsome and the camera and even their destination, picking out people and couples to be photographed almost unconsciously.

  Mr. Pigeon’s treasure. “A rarer treasure—but a more perishable one.” The girl, rescued from Chinese bandits, whose picture, inscribed my treasure, was carried in Mr. Pigeon’s wallet. Mr. Penneyth’s wife, who’d jumped from a window. A treasure entrusted to a false friend, Rinaldo had said, who had destroyed it.

  But then who had murdered Harkness Penneyth, and what about the dual insurance policies, and who had murdered the gangster, Art Frank, and the lawyer, Rufus Hardstone? And where did all the other people fit in?

  This is a simple little business operation, Bingo told himself, and don’t be so curious about other people’s affairs.

  Handsome grabbed his arm. He paused, blinking, half wondering where he was.

  “Here it is,” Handsome said. “This is Leonora Penneyth’s place.”

  It was a tall, narrow building, obviously once a magnificent dwelling. The first-floor exterior had been entirely remodeled, with a large, glassed show window. Bingo found himself looking through a white, elaborate, and probably costly lace curtain into what was undoubtedly a lady’s boudoir. He felt a little embarrassed.

  A sign over the door said: LEONORA PENNEYTH, INTERIORS, in small, chaste lettering. Bingo drew a long breath, pushed open the door, and went in, Handsome at his heels.

  A stern-looking young woman, in a navy-blue dress with a white collar, ushered them into a room with pale-pink and gray satin striped walls, big sofas covered with what looked like white fur, and a china statue of a headless lady with big hips. She left them there for a moment, then came back and said, “Miss Penneyth prefers to see you in her private apartment; it’s upstairs.” She led them to a tiny private elevator decorated with blue wallpaper and Victorian prints.

  So Miss Penneyth was an interior decorator, Bingo thought. Well, she seemed to be a successful one. And living above your shop was a good idea. Uncle Herman had done the same thing, with the grocery-delicatessen, back in Brooklyn.

  The little elevator let them out into a big room where everything was made of pale, shiny wood, plate glass, and mirrors. It was very beautiful, Bingo told himself, but he couldn’t see a place to sit down.

  Before he could look around much, there was a violent movement behind the heavy light beige drapes at the far end of the room. A woman’s voice said angrily, “If I catch you listening behind doors one more time, I’ll break your damned neck, you little bastard.” There was the sound of a hard, sharp slap.

  Then there was a little pause, and then the curtains parted. A woman came into the room and said, “Well, I’m Leonora Penneyth. Tell me what your game is and state your price. Let’s get it over fast.”

  She pulled the curtains shut behind her, the rings sliding on the rod made an unpleasant little metallic screech. Bingo turned around fast and looked at her. He’d been prepared to say something (he was never able to remember what), but it died in his throat.

  She started to repeat, impatiently, “I’m Leonora Penneyth,” but halfway through the last word, the sound faded away into nothing.

  It was the blonde babe.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Bingo’s first thought was flight. Just say, “Sorry, lady, we made a mistake,” grab Handsome, and break for the nearest exit.

  In almost the same instant, he realized that, this time, he had the blonde babe, Leonora Penneyth, right where he wanted her.

  “Well, well,” he said happily, “isn’t this wonderful?”

  She glared at him and said, “So. It’s you again.” Her voice was hung with icicles.

  “Hey, wait a minute,” Handsome said. “Bingo, do you know this dame?”

  “Sure,” Bingo said, “only she never formally introduced herself. She’s the babe who wanted to move Art Frank’s body and park it at Marty Bucholtz’s door.”

  The blonde said, “Why you—!” and started to take a swipe at him. She stopped herself even before Bingo had time to duck.

  “Now, now,” Bingo said reprovingly. “Keep your temper, Miss Penneyth. Or is it Mrs. Penneyth?”

  “It’s Miss Penneyth,” she said, her teeth clenched, “and Mrs. Fuller. Mrs. Fenley Gibbs Fuller.”

  “Nice name,” Bingo said approvingly. He turned to Handsome. “Say, what relation is this lady to Mr. Penneyth? Wife, daughter, sister, or”—he added it maliciously—“mother?”

  “She’s his sister,” Handsome said seriously. “There was a picture of her in the paper when she married this Fuller guy, who’s one of these society people.” He blinked, trying to remember every detail. “They got married at St. Bartholomew’s, September 2nd, 1935. It was the day they had that big storm down in Florida. About three hundred people were killed.”

  “At the wedding?” Bingo asked incredulously.

  “In Florida,” Handsome said. “The picture of this dame was killed in the late editions because of stories from the storm area.”

  “What is this?” Leonora Penneyth demanded. “Do you play games?”

  “It’s just Handsome’s memory,” Bingo told her. “He never forgets a thing.” She was rattled now, he could see it. He picked out a white leather and chromium contraption he hoped was a chair, sat down in it, reached for the transparent plastic cigarette box on the nearest table, helped himself, and passed the cigarettes to Handsome. “You don’t mind if we make ourselves at home, do you, lady?” He lit the cigarette, and said, “Go on, Handsome, tell me more.”

  Handsome’s brow wrinkled. “According to Mike Mallory—he was with the Gazette, but he quit in 1938 and went to work for a newsreel company—this Fuller guy didn’t have any dough, and he had two kids by his first wife. She had this big swell furniture joint—I guess that’s why she kept her own name—and that’s why he married her. One of his kids—”

  Leonora Penneyth had been standing there like a well-carved piece of marble. Now she put her fists on her hips, fixed an angry eye on Handsome, and said, “Now, listen. A gag is a gag, but—”

  “Shut up, lady,” Handsome said. He meant it in the friendliest fashion imaginable. “I just remembered. Daphne Fuller. They call her Dottie. She’s her stepkid. There was a story in the News, January 24th, this year. She got into a fight with some dame at the Swan Club and got tossed out, but for good. It said in the story she was seventeen, and this Fuller guy was her old man, and this Miss Penneyth was her stepma. I guess that’s all I remember about them, though.”

  “Never mind,” Bingo said. “I remember enough to make up for anything you’ve missed.” He smiled pleasantly at the blonde and said, “And if I have happened to forget anything, I’m sure this lady will remember it.”

  She sat down on what Bingo had mistakenly believed to be a table and lit a cigarette. He watched approvingly. She rattled easily, but she made a nice recovery.

  “Well,” she said at last, “what’s this Pigeon business? And, more specifically, what do you want?”

  “Specifically,” Bingo said, “two hundred and fifty thousand bucks. Not immediately of course, but after the insurance company has paid off; though,” he added hastily, “you can kick in with a little of it in advance, just to show your good will.” It was a good speech, and he was proud of it.

  “So that’s the racket,” she said. Then she said, “I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Oh now, lady,” Bingo said. There was a touch of reproof in his voice. “With Mr. Penneyth dead, you’ll get that half-million bucks from the insurance company.”

  She said sharply, “Just what are you proposing?”

  “And we have Mr. Pigeon,” Bingo said. “He’s in a good safe place, where nothing can happen to him and nobody can find him. For half of that five hundred thousand dollars, we’ll keep him there until the dough is paid over. Otherwise, we turn him over to the insurance company, and nobody gets any dough. Now, do you w
ant to make a deal?”

  She smiled. It was a nasty, almost snaky smile. “With all the people who are mixed up in this, now you two amateurs have to chisel in.”

  “We may be amateurs,” Bingo said. “But we have Mr. Pigeon.”

  Leonora Penneyth regarded him thoughtfully. “Half of the money is a lot to have to pay.”

  “Better pay half of it than not get any of it,” Bingo said.

  She offered him a fifth of it, then a third. Finally she decided to admit that Bingo was a better bargainer and gave in.

  “And some of it in advance,” Bingo said. “I should ask for ten per cent, but I won’t. Twenty-five hundred, just to show your intentions are good.”

  “And for subway fare,” she said nastily.

  Bingo rose and walked to the door in the most dignified manner he could assume. “All right, lady,” he said. “There’s other people who’ll be interested.”

  “Wait a minute,” she said quickly.

  Bingo waited, and finally said, “Well?”

  “How do I know you’ve got Mr. Pigeon?” she demanded. “Am I supposed to take your word for it? Because I warn you, that isn’t enough.”

  Bingo thought that over. “All right,” he said at last, “I’ll let you see him, alive and in the flesh—when you show up with the down payment.”

  “Fair enough,” she said. She stood for a minute, thinking. “I’ll have to wait till tomorrow to get the money. So I’ll meet you tomorrow night, and you can take me to wherever you’re keeping him.”

  “O.K.,” Bingo said. “Shall we come here?”

  She shook her head. “I’ll meet you at—Harkness’ apartment.”

  “Huh-uh,” Bingo said fast. “I’ve seen enough of that place.”

  “All right then,” she said, “at—my apartment. I think you can find it again.”

  “I’ve seen enough of that place, too,” Bingo said. “But if that’s the best you can think of, O.K.”

  “Nine o’clock,” she told him.

  There was a shrill, masculine scream in the hall outside. Bingo wheeled around fast and flung open the door.

  The scream had come from a boy of fourteen or fifteen, with a pasty, unpleasant face, and badly mussed oily black hair. He was being clawed by a somewhat older girl, thin, and plastered with make-up, who had pale-yellow hair hanging over her shoulders.