Trial by Fury

by Craig Rice

  She sniffed. “Are you a lawyer, or a fortuneteller?”

  “I wish I could be both,” he said unhappily.

  The interior of the courthouse seemed slightly more normal than it had on his previous visit. Typewriters and adding machines were clicking in various offices. As they came in, Buttonholes, a mop and pail in his hand, vanished through a door that led to the basement. Mr. Goudge was bent over his desk; in the next office Phil Smith, a plaster cast reaching to his chin, was propped stiffly in an office chair, dictating to one of his deputies.

  Through one of the long windows they could see the jail building and the door of the sheriff’s office. That was where the newspapermen had gathered.

  As they started up the big staircase, they met Jerry Luckstone racing down, a batch of papers in his hand. He stopped suddenly, stared at them, and said, “Thank God! Come up to my office, I want to talk to you alone.”

  Upstairs in his office he sent his secretary out and shut the door.

  “I can’t tell you how sorry I am I got him into this mess. I’ll get him out of it, though, somehow. Poor Cora Belle. Isn’t it the most horrible thing! And to think that only a week or so ago, I—” He paused, lighted a cigarette, and drew on it deeply. The smoke seemed to calm him.

  Malone started to speak, the young district attorney shook his head at him. “Before you say anything, look at this. I just got it.”

  Helene and Malone bent their heads over a hastily mimeographed sheet of paper.

  CITIZENS’ ANTICRIME COMMITTEE

  Meet for organization

  purposes at 12 noon today

  at Gollett’s Hall.

  Everybody come.

  If our law enforcement officers won’t

  take care of criminals, we citizens will.

  Malone looked at it for a long time. “Well, you know the country better than I do,” he said quietly. “Where will we hide him?”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  It was no time to quibble over legal technicalities, Malone declared. He agreed that a district attorney could not—or at least should not—have any part in evading the law. On the other hand, he pointed out, Jake was not a fugitive from justice. Jerry Luckstone had no official information that the sheriff, or anyone else, wanted him.

  Nor, Malone went on, not giving the unhappy young man a chance to get in a word, would he be aiding a criminal to escape. Jake was no criminal, he was simply a victim of circumstances, most of which Jerry Luckstone himself was responsible for. The least Jerry Luckstone could do now was provide him with a hideout.

  Helene came in with a good second chorus by looking reproachful and saying, “You couldn’t let him down now!”

  Plans were made quickly. There was, it seemed, a fishing shack belonging to the Luckstone family about eight miles out of town. No one would think of looking there.

  Jerry Luckstone would park his car by the Third Street bridge, leaving his keys in it. Helene and Malone would waken Jake, and she would lead him down the back staircase of the General Andrew Jackson House and down the alley that ran back of Wilk’s Garage to Third and Water Streets, where the car would be waiting. The rest was up to her.

  She noted down careful directions about how to find the fishing shack. “With Jake out of harm’s way,” she said, “Malone and I can pitch in and help you find who did murder all these people.”

  “The bank,” Malone said suddenly. He told the district attorney what he had reasoned out that morning.

  “But,” Jerry Luckstone said in a puzzled voice, “but there isn’t anybody in the Farmers’ Bank who would steal any money.”

  “You never can tell who would steal money,” Malone told him. “Ask any deacon who passes a collection plate.”

  Jerry Luckstone frowned. “It’ll have to be investigated, of course.” He caught his breath. “And if you’re right, it’ll have to be done right away. Before any other records are destroyed.”

  “Or anyone else is murdered,” Malone said. He looked at his watch. “This isn’t any time to stand around chatting. Let’s get Jake out of town first, and think afterwards.”

  They parted from Jerry Luckstone at the courthouse steps, he to get his car, they to go back to the hotel. There seemed to be even more activity than usual on Main Street; the crowd was no larger but it was moving around more and forming into small discussion groups on every corner. The curious glances directed at Helene and Malone were definitely unfriendly.

  Malone bought the newly arrived Madison newspaper and glanced at it as they went up the street.

  JACKSON VILLAGE BELLE

  ASAULTED AND SLAIN

  STRANGLED ON

  THIRD DAY OF

  CRIME WAVE

  In the center of the front page was a feature story by “Lily Lake,” headlined “Just Like a Butterfly Caught in the Rain.”

  Malone snorted, and tossed the paper into the nearest dustbin.

  “Just a lost child, coming home,” he muttered. “A fragile little butterfly, beating her lovely wings against …”

  “For the love of Mike, Malone,” Helene said.

  “I should have been a reporter,” the lawyer growled. “Just give me a catalogue of popular song titles and I’ll be a second Lily Lake.” He looked at Helene out of the corner of his eye. Her face was very white, her eyes wide and shadowy. “Just think of the life stories you can give the papers while Jake is being tried.”

  “I’ll give them the secrets in the life of a shyster lawyer,” she said grimly. “And is the entrance of the General Andrew Jackson House an unusually popular spot, or is it my imagination?”

  “Whichever it is,” Malone hissed in her ear, “just keep—”

  He was interrupted by the noisy arrival of the sheriff’s car in front of the little hotel and took a firmer hold on Helene’s arm. The crowd parted as Sheriff Marvin Kling and his deputy climbed out of the car, crossed the sidewalk, and stopped before Helene and the lawyer.

  “Where’s your husband?” the sheriff demanded, as though Helene had him hidden in her handbag.

  Malone felt the muscles in her arm tighten. “I don’t know. Are you looking for him?” Her voice was as serene as a summer breeze.

  “You’re damned right I’m looking for him,” Sheriff Kling growled.

  A reporter pushed his way through the crowd and all but climbed up the sheriff’s red necktie. “Sheriff, can you tell me if you’re—”

  Sheriff Kling straight-armed the reporter and a couple of spectators. “I’ll tell you everything you want to know later. Right now—”

  A photographer popped up from nowhere, caught a quick shot of Helene, Malone, and the sheriff, and disappeared again. Sheriff Kling pushed on into the building with his deputy, sweeping Helene and Malone before him.

  As they reached the lobby, Helene kicked the little lawyer in the ankle and said, “Mr. Kling, I think he’s gone to get the car.”

  The sheriff paused. “What car? You mean your car?”

  Helene nodded. Malone sauntered through the crowd and up the staircase of the hotel. “He said he was going to get it, when I last saw him—”

  “The car’s in the police garage,” Sheriff Kling said. “It’s evidence.” He scowled at her. “Maybe he’s gone to get it and maybe he hasn’t, but we’ll take a look in his room first.” He spotted Malone halfway up the staircase and bellowed, “Hey, you. Where were you going?”

  “I was going up to my room to change my shirt,” the lawyer said in a hurt and surprised voice.

  The sheriff charged up the stairs, his deputy and Helene right behind him. Malone waited until Helene reached his side, then took her arm and went up with her, letting the sheriff and a few courageous spectators go ahead.

  “It’s all right,” he murmured to her, under his breath. “Jake will be as safe in the Jackson County jail as any other place. Just as long as the Citizens’ Committee doesn’t get hold of him, don’t worry.”

  Ahead of them they could hear Sheriff Kling pounding furiously
on the door.

  Helene paused a moment. Her slender fingers on Malone’s arm suddenly turned ice cold, but there wasn’t so much as a tremor on her face. Rather there was a look almost of boredom, plus a faint annoyance as at some trifling inconvenience.

  The sheriff turned to her with badly suppressed fury in his eyes. Helene’s impervious calm froze any angry words that might have risen to his lips; for a moment he glared at her silently. When he did speak, his voice was almost gentle.

  “Do you have your key with you, Mrs. Justus?”

  “Sure,” Helene said cheerfully. “You mean you’re going to open the door the easy way?”

  Sheriff Kling nodded, speechless.

  Helene found the keyhole on the second try, hesitated no more than an instant with her hand on the key, then deliberately turned it in the lock, reached for the doorknob, and opened the door, stepping aside to let the sheriff and his deputy enter first. Malone’s hand on her shoulder steadied her, and she followed them in.

  The room was empty.

  The bed, a disheveled mass of wrinkled sheets when she had seen it last, was neatly and freshly made up. The cigarette ashes on the carpet had disappeared. So had Jake’s clothes that had been thrown across the rocking chair. So had Jake.

  “He’s in the clothes closet,” Deputy Harry Kline said helpfully.

  Jake was not in the clothes closet. Nor was he under the bed. Nor was he hanging out the window on the fire rope.

  The sheriff had a single-track mind. “Where is he?” he demanded loudly.

  Helene shrugged her shoulders. “He probably went to get the car, and get some breakfast, just as I told you. He didn’t know you’d want to see him.”

  “Oh yes he did,” Sheriff Kling said nastily.

  Malone said, “Now look here, if you’re arresting Mr. Justus, go ahead and arrest him and get it over with, or else stop annoying him. He didn’t know you’d be looking for him, or else he’d have been here waiting for you. He hasn’t any reason for hiding from the law. If you go out and walk the length of Main Street, you’ll probably find him. Try the restaurants and the barbershops.” He drew a quick breath. “The way you go on, anyone would think he was accused of a crime.”

  The sheriff roared, “He left his car last night at Milton and First Streets.”

  “Well,” Malone said, “this is a hell of a lot of fuss to make about a parking violation.”

  He ducked just as the sheriff swung at him, slid on the corner of the rug, and sat down heavily on the floor. By the time he had caught his breath, the sheriff and his deputy were standing in the doorway.

  “I’ll find him, all right,” the sheriff raged. “I’ll find him, and when I do, no Chicago lawyer is going to get him out of jail, either.” He slammed the door and was gone.

  There was a little murmur of noise from the stairway, and then silence.

  Malone waited a moment, got up off the floor, straightened his tie, and for a good three minutes talked about the sheriff of Jackson County, his origin and his personal habits, bringing in improvised facts which would have dum-founded any congress of anthropologists, and touching on his family connections, his friends, and his lack of ordinary cleanliness.

  Helene let him finish. “It’s probably all the truth,” she said calmly, “and the same thing goes for his great-grand-mother, too. But how did Jake know enough to get out of here before he came pounding on the door?”

  Malone looked at her. “Jerry Luckstone found out what the sheriff had in mind, and instead of waiting for us to walk over here, he beat it up the back stairs and got Jake out to his car.”

  “I hope you’re right,” Helene said grimly.

  They waited a few more minutes until the last excitement outside the General Andrew Jackson House had died away, and then went cautiously down the back stairs, behind the barroom, past the kitchen, and into the alley. The space between the alley door and Water Street was completely empty of people, a dusty expanse of sunlight and weeds.

  “If he came down here,” Malone said, “nobody stopped him.”

  At the corner of Water Street they turned and looked around. Near the bridge was Jerry Luckstone’s car, empty. Helene ran up to it and looked inside. The keys were in the dashboard, just as Jerry had agreed to leave them. There was no sign of Jake anywhere.

  Helene caught at Malone’s arm. “Malone, he didn’t know anybody was looking for him, and he just wandered off somewhere by himself. Maybe he went out to get a shave, or a cup of coffee.”

  “Maybe,” the little lawyer said.

  “We’ve got to find him before anyone else does.”

  She began sprinting up the weed-grown walk that ran from Water Street up to the General Andrew Jackson House. Malone reached out and grabbed her wrist.

  “Don’t look so damned hurried. Wait a minute and powder your nose and fix your hair. Somebody might see you and think you were worried about something.”

  She glared at him furiously, then paused to take out her compact and do as he had suggested.

  ‘There’s plenty of need for hurry,” Malone added, “but for the love of Mike, don’t show it.”

  They strolled into the lobby of the hotel as though they hadn’t a care in the world.

  Had the clerk happened to see Mr. Justus go out that morning?

  No, the clerk had not. In fact, nobody in the lobby had seen anything of Mr. Justus that morning. Anyone there would have remembered seeing him, because several reporters were waiting for him.

  Mr. Justus was not in the restaurant. He had not been in the restaurant since the night before.

  Mr. Justus was not in the barbershop, nor in the drugstore, nor in any of the barrooms. He was not in the offices of the Jackson County Enterprise, nor in the courthouse.

  Mr. Justus had not made any attempt to retrieve the Buick convertible from where it had been left the night before, nor had he called at any garage to inquire after it.

  The sheriff appeared to be covering the same ground as Helene and the little lawyer, but in a far less casual and unconcerned manner.

  It was near noon, the hour set for the meeting of the Citizens’ Anticrime Committee in Gollett’s Hall, when Helene and Malone faced each other in a room of the General Andrew Jackson House and came to the same unavoidable conclusion.

  Whether or not of his own volition, Jake had simply disappeared from the face of Jackson, Wisconsin.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  The Citizens’ anticrime Committee was swiftly renamed, under the direction of Alvin Goudge, the Citizens’ Law Enforcement Committee. Citizen Goudge restrained himself to a plea for restoring law and order to Jackson, Wisconsin, and a recommendation that a reward be offered for the apprehension of the criminal, but Danny Gollett (brother of the Golletts of Gollett’s drugstore) rose up to declare he was all for finding the dirty so-and-so and hanging him. (Muffled applause.)

  Beyond that point the meeting confined itself to organization work and plans for a second meeting to be held at five in the afternoon. “At which time,” Citizen Goudge said ominously, “we may be forced to take the law into our own hands.”

  The meeting adjourned at twelve-forty-five. By one o’clock a hastily lettered poster appeared on a telephone pole at the corner of Third and Main Streets, offering a reward of $1,000 for finding the murderer of Senator Peveley, Magnus Linker-mann, and Cora Belle Fromm. A local wit declared that $500 had been subscribed by Florence Peveley, and $500 by old sweethearts of Cora Belle, at a dollar a head.

  Helene and Malone spent the rest of the morning and the noon hour in the back shed of the Jackson County Enterprise, a refuge from both the heat of the day and the curious stares of the Main Street crowds, repeating to each other at intervals, “Jake’s all right.” “Jake can take care of himself anywhere.” “Someone must have tipped him off, and he had sense enough to beat it.” “Jake will get in touch with us as soon as he can, there’s no need to worry.” Tom Burrows returned from covering the meeting of the Citizens’ Committee t
o report on its deliberations and conclusions.

  “I might be able to carry off that thousand bucks,” Malone said wistfully. “It’s not very much, though, for the trouble I’d be put to.”

  Tom Burrows unloaded a paper bagful of beer cans. “Do you know our local murderer?”

  “I feel as if I ought to,” Malone said. “I feel as if some one little fact that would point to him is right at my finger tips, something that I already know. Only I can’t seem to think what it is.”

  “Don’t mind him,” Helene said. “It’s the way his mind always works.”

  “Is there anything one can do about it?” the young newspaperman asked. “I mean, could we jar him, or something?”

  “Nothing does any good,” Helene said. “Nothing but time.” She paused. “I don’t suppose it’s important, but had you heard about the fair Arlene being bounced out of her bed and board?”

  Malone said, “A very crude, unladylike way of putting it,” and popped open a can of beer.

  “Of course I’ve heard about it,” Tom Burrows said. “Do you think anybody could keep anything like that a secret in Jackson, Wisconsin, for more than an hour?” He added, “I’m not the man she was out with, if that’s what you were trying to find out.”

  Partly because he was curious, and partly to take Helene’s mind off Jake’s disappearance, Malone asked, “Are you in love with this Arlene girl?”

  Tom Burrows threw a beer-can top into the river and watched it floating down toward Beloit. “No, I’m not. She’s unbelievably appealing, in a limp, lost-kitten kind of way, but it’s a different thing from love. She doesn’t love me, either, which simplifies everything.”

  “My first impression,” Helene said, “was that she did.”

  Tom Burrows shook his head. “I’ve asked her to marry me three times since that night, and she turned me down every time. She’s even confided to me that I’m not required to marry her, if you know what I mean. Of course those two facts, even taken together, don’t prove anything. But the truth is, that sad look on her little mug when you saw her calling me up from the courthouse just meant that she thought she’d lost her last boy friend.”