Jerry Tracy, Celebrity Reporter

by Tinsley, Theodore A.

  The sight of the bright, sinister stain left Tracy completely fuddled for a moment. His whole cocksure judgment of the thing underwent a rapid change. Cora had gone upstairs, frightened to death at his searching questions. She had deliberately taken with her the handbag containing the duplicate ignition key, but she hadn’t meant to go away in the car. Someone had slugged her. A little man with footprints no bigger than Tracy’s. Not a cunning runaway by a Southern girl with dark, resolute eyes, but an assault and a kidnap job.

  “O.K.,” Jerry said. “Back to the house. I want to make a phone call.”

  “We’ve got to get a car right away. We’ve got to try and follow—”

  “Nuts,” Tracy rejoined harshly. “It’s going to take brains to find your wife, Phil; not gasoline. First thing is to notify the police.”

  “No!” Halliday said. His jaw was squared, grim.

  “Why not?” Tracy stared at him.

  “No cops,” Halliday growled.

  They entered the back door of the house and Tracy strode through to the living-room. He studied the big man’s drawn face. Was Halliday merely in a craze of fear or was there some deeper reason behind his aversion for a police investigation? Calmly, the little columnist decided to find out.

  He picked up the telephone instrument, his finger carefully holding the bar down behind the shield of his half-turned body.

  “Let me have police headquarters, please.”

  He was watching Halliday out of the corner of his eye, but he was unprepared for the grim, bearlike rush of his friend. A fist swung glancingly off Tracy’s jaw, a furious hand snatched the instrument from him and banged it down on its cradle.

  “Damn you!” Halliday said thickly.

  He wrestled fiercely with the dodging columnist, his face red with wrath. Jerry slipped nimbly out of his clutch. For a second or two the two men confronted each other warily, like enemies.

  “What kind of a crooked set-up are you letting me in on?” Tracy said coldly. “You’ve lied to me. You’ve both lied to me.”

  “Listen, Jerry—”

  “The hell with you. I’m quitting right now. I’m out.” Thoroughly angry, he walked over toward where he had left his hat and overcoat. A hand spun around and he threw up a defensive forearm. But Phil was no longer threatening him. There were tears in the man’s blinking eyes. He was trying to smile and making a botch of it.

  “Jerry, I’m sorry. Don’t let me down, please … For God’s sake—we’re friends!” He laid a trembling hand on the columnist’s shoulder. “Stick with me, will you?”

  “But no cops, eh?”

  “Call ’em in, if you insist. But I’m asking you not to.”

  There was a long silence. “O.K.,” Tracy said finally. His gnome-like face was creased in a pinched grimace. “I’ve been in screwier messes than this for guys who haven’t half the pull on me that you have, Phil. The cops are out for the present. Are you willing to string along with my judgment?”

  “I’ll do anything you say, Jerry. Anything!”

  “All right. I’m gonna call up the Scarsdale Station and order a taxi. You’re going back to town with me as soon as you pack a few things in a bag. I want you to do what I asked you and your wife to do when I first got here. I want you to register at a good hotel and stay there under cover, until you get orders from me.”

  “I don’t give a damn about myself,” Halliday muttered. “Find my wife and get her back safely.”

  “Go pack your bag. We’re wasting time.”

  Halliday halted irresolutely. “Don’t you think we ought to examine Cora’s room a bit more carefully?”

  “The answer we’re looking for,” Tracy told him steadily, “is not in this house, Phil.”

  Jerry unhooked the phone and called the Scarsdale Station. By the time he had the number from Information and had hired a cab, Halliday was descending the staircase, a suit-case in his big, bronzed hand.

  “You mentioned two men you thought might be enemies of yours,” Tracy reminded him. “One of ’em was a man named David Cullop, you said, but you don’t think of him seriously in the role of criminal or murderer?”

  “That’s right. The last time I saw Cullop was fifteen years ago. Our quarrel then was idiotic, childish, rather than—”

  “Killing a dog and a cat is childish, too,” Tracy said. “There’s a pettiness about it that suggests your malicious little friend, Cullop. Or perhaps—” His eyes glinted for an instant and he shut his mouth suddenly.

  “Or what, Jerry?”

  “Nothing. Who’s the other guy?”

  “His name is Wilbur Genung. Of the two I’d say he’s a more likely bet. He hates my guts. If he could wipe me out without danger to himself I’m sure that he’d try. He’s a colder proposition than Cullop.”

  “What did Cullop do?” Phil Halliday’s broad face creased into a grim smile. “He tried to brain me with a Chinese battle ax. It was emotion with poor Cullop; not the greed and cold nastiness of Genung. I knocked him stiffer than a herring on the floor of his apartment. The poor little guy was half mad with grief. He didn’t really know what he was doing.”

  “And this other guy—Genung? A big, tall guy? With broad shoulders?”

  “No. A little fella about your size, Jerry. A shrimp.” Halliday’s moon face flushed as Jerry grinned; then he gasped.

  “Oh—I see what you’re getting at. You mean that either Cullop or Genung might conceivably have left that small man’s footprint in the garage.”

  “Well?” Jerry said. “Could they?” Halliday’s mouth tightened. “Yes,” he said. “Either of them.” There was a sudden, blasting ring at the front door that made Halliday jump nervously. Tracy calmly picked up his overcoat and slid it over his evening clothes. “That’s our taxi. Let’s go.” He clicked out the lights in the living-room that Halliday had forgotten and made sure that the front door was securely locked.

  Tracy’s eyes sparkled as the cab got swiftly under way in the chilly darkness. His hand dropped reassuringly on his friend’s. “I’ve got a hunch about this disappearance of your wife, Phil. That’s why I’m not trying to jump on a horse and gallop in all directions. You can take my word for it, every snatch job that was ever pulled fits into a pretty general picture. This one doesn’t. It’s way out of focus. A girl doesn’t bother taking her handbag under circumstances the blood on the garage floor indicate.” They swerved together in the corner of the seat as the speeding taxi swung into the smooth blackness of the Bronx River Parkway.

  “Huh?” Halliday whispered. “Blood—handbag? What in God’s name are you jabbering about?”

  “I mean that your wife is either dead right now—hold on, Phil! I give you my honest word, I don’t think she is dead. If she isn’t, then there hasn’t been any kidnaping at all. Unless you might call it a partial kidnaping, in which event, I think I’ve got a vague glimmering of something that makes sense.”

  Halliday groaned. “Man, you sound crazy mad!”

  “Maybe. Tell me why you suspect the emotional and childish Mr. Cullop and the much more dangerous Mr. Genung.”

  The big man steadied. He gritted his teeth and gave Tracy the facts.

  David Cullop’s enmity dated back to Phil’s first marriage. He and Halliday had been rivals. Phil had won. Cullop took his disappointment rather badly. Phil, who was big and good natured and hated the thought of unpleasantness, had gone to see Cullop in an effort to smooth things over and keep the friendship of the man. Cullop had acted like a maniac. With tears streaming down his face he had accused Halliday of double-crossing him by spreading a pack of lies. With a scream of rage he had ripped a decorative Chinese battle-ax from the wall and had attempted to brain the startled Phil. Phil ducked the murderous blow and dropped the little man cold with a hard left to the jaw.

  “Ever seen him since?” Tracy asked.

  “Not once. That was fifteen years ago.” Halliday laughed harshly. “A nasty little devil. He told me he’d get me sooner or later, that he’d
wring my heart the way his had been wrung. Maybe that’s why I can’t get him out of my mind. That meticulous woman-like method of attacking everything that’s near and dear to me sounds exactly like Dave Cullop. He’s still in New York. Has an importing business down in Water Street somewhere. I’d like to know whether he’s been in Florida during the last few weeks.”

  “So would I,” Tracy murmured. “How about the other guy?”

  Halliday told him. Wilbur Genung. A little man like Cullop. But a tougher breed. A hard-bitten realist, interested only in money and the things that money bought. Originally a friend of Halliday’s. A hard and desperate market plunger. He had made tremendous profits in the boom years, basing his speculative plunges on the advice of Phil, who was his broker. When the bottom fell out of stocks, Genung was cleaned to the lining of his socks. He blamed Halliday. Called him a thief. Accused him of coppering his own bets at the expense of his clients. Made no threats but walked quietly into Phil’s office one afternoon and tried to shoot Phil to death. Phil kicked him in the stomach and wrested the gun from him. There was no publicity because Phil refused to prosecute. Genung hobbled out, looking sick and white.

  The taxi hummed swiftly along the smooth Parkway. There was little traffic and the driver kept stepping up his speed.

  “Ever seen Genung since?” Tracy asked.

  “Plenty of times. Never exchanged a word, though. Every time we’ve met since then, Genung always stops short, grins, and passes on. Cullop is a babe alongside of that specimen.”

  “Is he still broke?”

  “Lord, no! He’s in the money again. His kind always is. As rich now as he ever was. He’s one guy that can make me shiver.” Halliday’s huge shoulders twitched. “I keep remembering what he told me when he shuffled out of my office, all bent over and cringing with pain from the kick in the belly I handed him.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He said,” Halliday muttered, “that he wanted to apologize for coming after me with a gun. Did you ever hear a man curse so that it sounds like he’s praying? Well, that was Genung, as he swayed there in the doorway of my office, all bent over, holding his belly. He said, ‘We’re both long livers, Phil. There’ll be plenty of time for me later on. The next time I won’t use a gun. I’ll use brains.’ ”

  “That makes two little guys with feminine habits of thought,” Tracy said slowly. “It’ll be interesting to check up on Mr. Genung’s recent travel notes, if any. What line is he in?”

  “No business except the market trends. He lives somewhere on Central Park West. You can find his address in the directory, if that’s what you mean.”

  Tracy gave him a sudden glance. “Ever been bothered particularly before you married Cora?”

  “No.”

  “Was Cora ever bothered before she married you?”

  “No.”

  “No acquaintances?” Jerry persisted. “No relatives?”

  “You heard what she told you tonight,” Phil said stiffly. “She’s alone in the world. An orphan.”

  “I forgot,” Jerry said. His eyes narrowed as he thought of Cora Halliday and her handbag. He remembered the ridge against the taut cloth. The more he thought of it, the more he was convinced that the ridge came from a mounted photograph crammed into the bag. What else—unless she made a hobby of carrying around calendars? And why should she hide a photograph from her husband’s knowledge? Had her “shopping” expedition been an effort to locate someone she feared—or loved? And why had she taken the bag upstairs with her? She wanted that bag either for the key to the car or to hide a photograph that she didn’t wish her husband to see. Tracy remembered Cora’s hard little rosebud mouth and he decided not to get too excited over Cullop and Genung unless he could prove that either or both had recently been in Florida.

  He left Phil at the very swanky desk of the Albermarle Hotel.

  “Stay here as if you were glued,” Jerry told him in a low voice. “I’ll call you tomorrow morning. Keep your chin up.”

  He shook hands and grabbed a cab home. He rode straight up to the dizzy level of his expensive penthouse and went quietly to bed. There wasn’t a damned thing he could do at this hour of the night; and like most small men he liked to conserve his nervous energies by getting as much sleep as he could. He’d been whirling like a busy little comet ever since noon and he was dead tired. Five minutes after he slid naked between the sheets he was completely asleep.

  Jerry Tracy rose earlier than usual the next morning and dawdled through a long, heavy breakfast; after which he got dynamically busy. He called Halliday at the Albermarle ostensibly to report a vague overnight progress in his search for Cora, but in reality to make sure that Phil was still safely in his hotel room and not ranging the streets in an aimless hunt for his vanished wife. He repeated his warning to the big man to continue to lie low and he promised to call him back later in the day.

  He located the address of David Cullop’s importing firm in the directory and at five minutes past nine he called up and asked for Cullop’s secretary.

  “This is Mr. Tracy,” he said blandly. “An old friend of Mr. Cullop. Has he returned from his trip yet?”

  “Not yet, sir,” the girl’s voice replied.

  Jerry’s heart leaped. “I’m very anxious to get in touch with him. Do you happen to have his Florida address?”

  “Florida?” The voice sounded puzzled. “You must be mistaken. Mr. Cullop is in Canada. He left over two weeks ago on a shooting trip.”

  Tracy laughed as though at a great joke. “Oh, did Dave change his mind? I told him he would! Do you happen to have his Canadian address?”

  “Just a minute. … It’s at Moose Gap, Ontario. Care of Seeger’s Camp.”

  “Thank you.” Tracy pronged the receiver, lifted it and called Western Union. He dictated a carefully worded telegram to Seeger’s Camp and again pronged and lifted the busy phone. This time he called the Biddle Detective Agency and to his delight got Fred Biddie himself on the wire.

  “I want a little quiet sleuth work, Fred,” he said. “Put the best man you’ve got on the job. The name of the party is Wilbur Genung. He lives at 10425 Central Park West. I want to find out if he’s been out of town during the last two or three weeks—and if so, when he returned. Don’t go near Genung himself. Get all the details you can without letting him know he’s the object of surveillance.”

  “Right. How will I get in touch with you?”

  “I’ll call you back myself later on.”

  Five minutes later Jerry Tracy was in a taxicab, riding leisurely down to Broad Street. He went straight to the brokerage office of Phil Halliday. Tracy gave the switchboard girl his name and asked for Miss Clarkson. A moment later the door of an inner office opened and Halliday’s secretary emerged with a friendly, questioning smile.

  “Mr. Tracy? I’m afraid you won’t find Mr. Halliday here today. As a matter of fact, he’s been away since—”

  “It’s you I wished to see, Miss Clarkson.”

  “Me?” She looked briefly puzzled and then laughed. “You’re not trying to sell me insurance, I hope?”

  She was, Tracy thought, one of the most unassumingly attractive women he had ever met. Doubly pretty because of the contrast between her young, unlined face and her frosty gray hair. Tracy’s admiring guess was that she wasn’t a day over thirty. There was a large square of adhesive tape on her forehead and she flushed as she saw Tracy looking at it.

  “I fell off a subway platform yesterday,” she said with a faint shudder. “Perhaps that’s why my mind is on insurance. What was it you wished to see me about?”

  Tracy lowered his voice. “I’m a private detective, Miss Clarkson. Mr. Halliday hired me to investigate your accident. He doesn’t think it was an accident. He hired me after you called his home at Scarsdale to report what had happened to you. Suppose we go into your private office.”

  “Why—yes. Come in.”

  She seemed suddenly ill at ease. The smile left her lips as Tracy closed
the door behind them. “You frighten me. Does Mr. Halliday think that someone pushed me off that station?”

  “Where did it happen?”

  “The Fulton Street platform.”

  “I think,” Tracy said slowly, “that you were meant to be killed, Miss Clarkson.”

  “But why? In heaven’s name why?” The terror in her eyes was growing. “Who could possibly want to harm me?”

  Tracy picked up a pencil, played with it for a moment. “You see, a peculiar series of accidents have been happening to Mr. Halliday down in Florida. He returned to New York yesterday morning. And the moment he gets back—the accidents begin up here.”

  “But, why me?” she whispered. Tracy was amazed at the swift manner in which her composure had fled. There was horror in her eyes, but it was an inward horror as though she were contemplating a sudden sickening idea.

  “Did Halliday mention to you over the wire yesterday anything that happened in Florida?”

  “No. He—joked. Said I must have got dizzy from drinking too many co—cocktails.”

  “His dog died first. Then his cat. Then the captain of his boat narrowly escaped death. And the very day he returns to New York, you miss a tragic accident by pure luck. In other words, everyone that Mr. Halliday depends on, is fond of … ” Tracy’s voice got careless. “And now his wife has disappeared.”

  “What!” The horror ebbed from Miss Clarkson’s eyes, leaving her dully incredulous. “It wasn’t she, then! It must have been the brother!”

  Tracy’s lean hand vised instantly on Miss Clarkson’s wrist. “What are you talking about? Whose brother?”

  “Mrs. Halliday’s,” she gasped. “I—I suspected it was she who pushed me from the platform. I was afraid to say anything.”

  “You knew then that Halliday was married again?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s funny. He told me he hadn’t mentioned his marriage to you at all.”

  “He didn’t.”

  “Then how the devil—” Tracy began.