The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard Original)

by Unknown

  When he put down the phone, his thick brows were knitted in a curious frown. In brief, he had been informed that Mrs. Bertha Ebbett had registered the previous morning at a local hotel under her own name, had paid in advance for a room, and, when told that her husband was being held for the murder of Joe Carson, had demanded permission to return home immediately. Barr had told the Hot Springs police to put her on a plane immediately and to wire him the exact time of the plane’s departure.…

  Later that afternoon, Lieutenant Barr phoned the coroner’s office and advised the coroner that the witness he had been waiting for had been located and that the inquest could be resumed the following morning.

  When Bertha Ebbett was shown into his office, Lieutenant Barr studied her with interest. She seemed slimmer and prettier than the girl whose photograph he had in a folder on his desk. Her pale face was attractive, though her eyes were faintly shadowed with gray. Her step was firm and brisk, and, when they shook hands across his desk, her grasp was cool but sincere.

  “What is it about Henry?” she demanded anxiously. “I asked and asked, but all they’d tell me is that he’s supposed to have killed Joe. It isn’t true, is it?”

  “Yes, it’s true,” Barr told her gravely, “but it isn’t as bad as it sounds. You needn’t worry about Henry. He’ll undoubtedly be released as soon as the coroner’s inquest is completed.”

  “Henry really … killed Joe?”

  “Yes.” Barr studied her with his eyes, then said: “I need to know many things about this case, Mrs. Ebbett, which only you can tell me. I’m going to put my questions to you bluntly, without any fancy trimming, and I want you to answer them truthfully.”

  “Of course! If there’s anything—”

  “Is it true, Mrs. Ebbett, that you and Carson were friendly and that he was to meet you in Hot Springs as soon as—” He paused, stopped by the look of absolutely incredulity which flooded her face.

  “What!”

  “Is it true or not, Mrs. Ebbett?”

  “Of course it isn’t true!”

  “Isn’t it true that Mr. Carson was a frequent visitor at your home, even when your husband wasn’t there, and that he often took you to the movies in the evening?”

  “Why, yes—but not the way it sounds! The whole idea is fantastic!”

  “Why is it fantastic, Mrs. Ebbett? According to your husband, you were unhappy and fought with him continually. Mr. Carson was more nearly your own age, unmarried, attractive, with many interests similar to yours.”

  “Henry told you that?”

  “Yes.”

  She closed her eyes and sank back in her chair. Barr knew by the way her teeth sank into the red of her lips that she was shocked and fighting desperately for control. When she opened her eyes, her voice was a hoarse whisper: “Tell me … please tell me what happened!”

  Barr hesitated, then reached for the folder on his desk. He removed a typed copy of Ebbett’s statement. In a dry, expressionless voice, he read it to her.

  “It’s a lie!” she gasped, when he finished. “I don’t understand what’s happening. It’s like a dream, a nightmare. But that”—she pointed at the typewritten sheets—“that’s not true!” Her eyes stared into his, dark and hollow, like two great holes in a loaf of uncooked bread. “Henry couldn’t have said anything like that!”

  “He did say it, though,” Barr assured her. “It’s signed, sealed, and sworn to.”

  “But don’t you see, I didn’t run away from him! Henry knew I was going to Hot Springs. He gave me the money, bought the ticket!”

  “Carson bought the tickets, Mrs. Ebbett. The ticket-seller at the station remembers him. He bought two one-way tickets to Hot Springs last week.”

  “But—” She shook her head helplessly. “Then he bought them because Henry asked him to. Joe often did little things like that for Henry, just as he took me to a movie, once in a while, when Henry had extra work to do at home. I tell you there was nothing to it.”

  “The second ticket was found in Carson’s pocket,” Barr said gently.

  She didn’t get the significance of his statement immediately; when she did, her hands clenched so fiercely that her knuckles stood out.

  “Then Henry put it there!” she exclaimed. “When I left, the other ticket was in an envelope on Henry’s dresser. That’s why I engaged a double room. Henry was to have followed me in a couple of days.”

  “Did any of your friends know about that arrangement?”

  “Joe Carson did.”

  “Anyone else?”

  “I—don’t know. I’m afraid not. Henry didn’t want anyone at his office to know. You see, he asked for a vacation and was refused. But he was to receive a bonus this week, and, as soon as it was paid to him, he was going to quit his job and come to Hot Springs. I’ve had a bad cough for several months, and he was going to look for work there, so we could stay permanently.”

  “In that case, wouldn’t it have been better for you to wait until he received his bonus before leaving? The two of you could have traveled together.”

  “Henry insisted that I go on ahead and look for an apartment. He said he’d pack our things and arrange to have the furniture shipped. I didn’t argue because, as I said, I haven’t been well and it seemed like a sensible arrangement.”

  Lieutenant Barr shook his head slowly. “It may have seemed sensible to you, Mrs. Ebbett—but I doubt if the coroner’s jury will believe it.”

  The coroner’s jury convened the following morning and made short work of the case. Dr. Felix Adelman, the coroner’s physician, testified to the approximate time of death, described the bullet wounds, and stated the results of the autopsy on Carson’s body. Then Henry Ebbett’s signed statement was read.

  Experts testified that the bullets found in Carson’s body were from a revolver admittedly owned by Ebbett, and that three bullets, fired from an automatic pistol registered in Carson’s name and found in his hand, had been located in the apartment: two in the sack of flour which Ebbett had been carrying, and one in the wall adjoining the bedroom. Their angles of entrance and trajectory had been established and were in agreement with Ebbett’s statement.

  The experts further testified that Carson’s—and only Carson’s—fingerprints had been found on the highball glass, the bottle of liquor, and ashtray. A paraffin test revealed that Carson had actually fired the automatic. The envelope containing the railroad ticket had borne Carson’s and Mrs. Ebbett’s fingerprints—but not Henry Ebbett’s. The ticket-seller identified a photograph of Carson and stated that Carson was the man who had purchased two one-way tickets to Hot Springs from him. A certified public accountant appeared in behalf of the Safeway Loan Company and testified that Carson had embezzled the sum of $21,125 from his employer. A locksmith identified the key found on the table as one made by him for Mrs. Ebbett. The ticket stubs were introduced as evidence, duly identified, and the theatre cashier repeated her story about Carson and Mrs. Ebbett.

  Then old Mrs. Pettigrew was called. She stated that, on the day previous to the murder, Mrs. Ebbett had left the house in the middle of the afternoon with two suitcases, and, when Mr. Ebbett returned home from work, he had been obviously shocked at discovering his wife was gone.

  On the day of the murder, she had seen Carson enter the building at least fifteen minutes before Mr. Ebbett came in. Yes, Mr. Ebbett had knocked on her door and picked up a bag of groceries. He had gone directly upstairs. And had Mrs. Pettigrew heard the shots? Yes, indeed. Mr. Ebbett had hardly stepped into his apartment when the first shot rang out, to be followed quickly by four others. Mrs. Pettigrew had screamed, but, being a victim of arthritis, had been unable to go upstairs.

  Henry Ebbett, called to clarify and amplify his statement, testified in a quiet, self-possessed tone in which his grief was evident.

  His wife, Bertha Ebbett, on the other hand, testified that everything presented to the jury was a lie, was twisted, was utterly impossible. She admitted that she had attended movies with Carson,
that she had been located by police in a Hot Springs hotel, where she had engaged a room, but she denied vehemently the implications which the admissions inferred. She also admitted that she had admired and liked Carson.

  Throughout her testimony, Bertha Ebbett spoke in a low, reluctant tone, which the jury was quick to note. They took the indistinctness of her voice to be from shame. In fact, the general tone of her charges and testimony only made them the more certain of her embarrassment and guilt.

  It took the jury hardly any time at all to reach a verdict: “Justifiable homicide, with a recommendation that Mrs. Bertha Ebbett be referred to the grand jury for possible indictment as accessory-before-the-fact to an attempted homicide.”

  Ten minutes after the jury’s verdict was rendered, Lieutenant Barr and Sergeant Jablonsky entered a lunchroom across the street from police headquarters. They sat at the counter and ordered coffee.

  “You taking Ebbett up to Felony Court this afternoon?” Jablonsky asked after a while.

  “I suppose so,” Barr admitted.

  “You don’t seem too happy about it.”

  Barr took a sip from his steaming cup, then set it down on the counter. He grimaced, as though the coffee had left a bad taste in his mouth. “Frankly, between you and me, I’m not.”

  “You think Ebbett could have framed it?”

  “I don’t know,” Barr said heavily. “Ebbett is intelligent. Seems to me, if his wife had been playing around with Carson, he’d have known about it and been prepared. I’m not saying she didn’t, because it’s hard to tell a thing like that about a woman—but I’m not saying she did, either. She says she didn’t, and she certainly was shocked when I suggested the setup to her, but the evidence is all the other way. But I will say this: Ebbett is nobody’s fool. He wasn’t as surprised as he said he was.”

  “But if Ebbett framed the murder, then he framed the embezzlement, too, and where’s the dough?”

  “Let the insurance investigators worry about that. I’m a homicide man, and I hate being outsmarted. If Ebbett is working a frame, I want to get him.”

  “Yeah.”

  “The thing is,” Barr said slowly, “the whole darned thing seems to have gone off like clockwork. I’ve studied it from every angle, and it must have happened exactly like he said it did. That old woman having seen him coming home after Carson is the sticker. She saw him go up, then heard the shots fired. At that, I don’t see how Carson missed plugging him. I’d have emptied my gun into Ebbett before he got to that bedroom.”

  “One shot would have been enough,” the sergeant pointed out, “if it hadn’t been for the sack of flour. Carson still had to make a getaway. Maybe he didn’t want to fire any more than necessary.”

  “Maybe,” Barr agreed.

  “You don’t think so?”

  “I think Ebbett had to move darned fast, faster than a man surprised could ordinarily move. He had to see Carson, size up the situation, and get started for the bedroom almost before the first shot was fired. The evidence all says that that’s what happened, but somehow it doesn’t sound reasonable.”

  They sat there, sipping their coffee and looking out the lunchroom windows into the street. A car drove past, its radiator billowing steam.

  “Really cold today again,” Jablonsky commented. “Zero, at least.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  A man came in from the street and slammed the door. He wore a pair of rimless glasses on his sharp beak of a nose, and a red woolen muffler about his neck almost concealed his chin. He stopped just inside the door, stomped his cold feet, and began to grope in a pocket of his coat for a handkerchief.

  Barr’s cup hit the counter with a loud thud. “Good Lord!”

  “Huh?” Jablonsky looked up.

  “Get Ebbett and take him to that apartment of his,” Barr ordered. “Don’t tell him anything except that we want to check a few details before ordering his release. Take a couple of the boys with you.”

  Barr hesitated, then added grimly: “I’ll take the other squad car and pick up his wife. I have an idea she’ll enjoy being in on this!”

  Bertha Ebbett stared stonily at her husband, but Henry refused to look at her. He sat in a chair near the telephone, his small eyes studying a wall through his thick horn-rimmed glasses. Lieutenant Barr appeared very much at ease. With his long legs stretched before him, he sat slumped in the chair Carson had occupied beside the table.

  “This probably seems peculiar to you, Mr. Ebbett,” Barr said conversationally, “but now that the coroner’s jury has exonerated you, it’s my responsibility to take you before the Felony Court for a hearing. That may only take a few minutes, but sometimes the judge asks for details and I like to have everything in apple-pie order before proceeding. Understand?”

  “Of course, Lieutenant. If it’s anything that isn’t in my statement, I’ll—”

  “Just a detail, Mr. Ebbett. You said that, on the day of the shooting, you spent most of the afternoon calling at the railroad stations, airport, and bus depots, trying to trace your wife.”

  “Yes, sir, I did. I went—”

  Barr waved one hand airily. “Yes, we checked on that, and you really did. But we forgot one thing. When you started back home, you came by streetcar and got off on the corner of Farwell and Elson. You walked from that corner to this building, a distance of three blocks.”

  “That’s correct.”

  “How long did it take you to walk that distance?”

  “Why—” For an instant, Henry’s eyes flickered. “I don’t know, exactly. Not more than a minute or two. Is that important?”

  “It may be—and it may not,” Barr said succinctly. “But I want to check on it, just to make sure. Jablonsky, suppose you take Mr. Ebbett to the corner of Farwell and Elson in the squad car and put him on the corner. Note the time he starts walking back, then drive slowly along beside him. You, Mr. Ebbett, I want to walk at about the same speed you did the other day. When you reach this building, knock on Mrs. Pettigrew’s door, say a few words, and then come right upstairs. Maybe you’d better pretend you’ve got a bag of groceries in your arm, too.”

  “But, I don’t understand,” Henry said. “What possible bearing can that have on—”

  “It’s just a detail, like I told you,” Barr informed him gruffly. “Remember, walk at about the same speed you did the other day.”

  For the first time, a worried frown creased Henry’s forehead. But he went out with Sergeant Jablonsky, and a moment later those sitting in the small apartment heard the engine of the squad car roar into action.

  Minutes ticked by, the silence broken only by the quiet hissing of the steam radiator in the corner. Barr sat with his head leaning comfortably against the back of his chair. Once Bertha Ebbett moved restlessly and glanced at the window. She got up and started toward it.

  Without opening his eyes, Barr said: “Better leave the window alone, Mrs. Ebbett.”

  Her lips trembled, but she went back to her chair and sank into it with a helpless little sigh. More minutes passed; then they heard the sound of the downstairs door opening.

  Henry’s rap on Mrs. Pettigrew’s door was loud and distinct. “Just wanted to tell you I was back, Mrs. Pettigrew,” he was saying. “Thank you very much for speaking up for me at the inquest.…”

  Then they heard Henry’s feet on the tread. The apartment door began to swing open.

  Barr leaned forward intently.

  Bertha Ebbett stifled a scream.…

  For as Henry came into the warm room, he stopped and stood utterly still before them, blinded by the vapor which immediately condensed on the lenses of his thick horn-rimmed glasses.…

  Try the Girl

  Raymond Chandler

  RAYMOND (THORNTON) CHANDLER (1888–1959) was born in Chicago, then taken to England as a child and became a British citizen in 1907, but returned to America in 1912 and eventually regained his American citizenship in 1956. He worked in numerous jobs before selling his first short story to Black Ma
sk in 1933 at the age of forty-five. Although he is regarded today as perhaps the greatest private-eye writer who ever lived, his pulp stories brought him little fame and not much financial benefit. The detectives in those stories bore different names (Carmady, Dalmas, Mallory, Malvern, and an unnamed protagonist), but they were essentially interchangeable with his most famous hero, Philip Marlowe. After he achieved success with the publication of his first novel, The Big Sleep (1939), the stories were collected in several volumes and the protagonists’ names were all changed to Marlowe. Chandler produced only seven novels in his career, six of which were filmed (the seventh, Playback, is markedly inferior to the others). Farewell, My Lovely (filmed as Murder My Sweet, 1944) starred Dick Powell as Marlowe; it was followed by The Big Sleep (1946, with Humphrey Bogart), Lady in the Lake (1947, with Robert Montgomery), The High Window (1947, filmed as The Brasher Doubloon, with George Montgomery), The Little Sister (1969, filmed as Marlowe, with James Garner), and The Long Goodbye (1973, with Elliott Gould in a memorable masterstroke of miscasting).

  “Try the Girl,” Chandler’s last Black Mask story, was published in January 1937.

  Try the Girl

  Raymond Chandler

  THE BIG GUY WASN’T ANY OF MY business. He never was, then or later, least of all then.

  I was over on Central, which is the Harlem of Los Angeles, on one of the “mixed” blocks, where there were still both white and colored establishments. I was looking for a little Greek barber named Tom Aleidis whose wife wanted him to come home and was willing to spend a little money to find him. It was a peaceful job. Tom Aleidis was not a crook.

  I saw the big guy standing in front of Shamey’s, an all-colored drink and dice second-floor, not too savory. He was looking up at the broken stencils in the electric sign, with a sort of rapt expression, like a hunky immigrant looking at the Statue of Liberty, like a man who had waited a long time and come a long way.