Clane turned as he felt the pressure of Cynthia’s body against his back, saw her peering over his shoulder. “Terry … Terry, what is it? … Oh, for God’s sake, is …”
“Take it easy,” Clane cautioned. “There’s a body on the floor.”
“Of course there is. I … Terry, let me past, let me in there, I say!”
Terry pushed her back.
“Terry, if That’s Edward, if…”
“Get back,” Clane commanded.
“Terry, I must. I have to …”
“You don’t have to do any such thing. Keep your hands at your sides.”
“Why?”
“Because you can’t afford to touch anything. You can’t afford to leave a single fingerprint here. Do you understand?”
The expression on his face, the earnestness of his words, carried conviction. “Oh, Terry,” she said, “I have to … Let me go to him.”
Clane shook his head. “Take a careful look, Cynthia. Is that Edward Harold?”
“I… I can’t see from here. Oh, Owl, is he dead?”
“I’m going to find out,” Clane said. “You stand right there. Don’t touch anything. Don’t move out of that doorway. Above all, don’t touch any object.”
Terry Clane, on the other hand, exercised no care to keep from leaving fingerprints. He rested his hand on the back of a chair, moved around the little square table, then walked over to stand by the larger table where he could look almost directly down on the body.
“It’s George Gloster,” he called out.
Cynthia said “Oh!” and that was all.
Clane bent over the table now, looking down at the knife and fork, the spoons, the cup and saucer, the cooking utensils. They were all clean and polished, indicating that that had been carefully washed and dried after they had been used the last time. On a corner of the table was a small ash-tray, fairly well filled with cigarette-ends and burned matches. Beside the ash-tray was a pocket-sized magazine, opened and placed face down on the table as though the reader had wanted to mark the place from which he was reading.
Nearby on the table was the end of a cigarette and a long groove was burned in the finish of the table. A chair had been pushed back from the table and was almost against the wall, separated by some two feet from the edge of the table. It was, Clane noticed, the only chair which had a padded seat.
On the desk was a clean, oblong desk blotter and impressed upon the buff unstained freshness of this blotter were the prints of four fingers, marked in what seemed to be grimy oil dust, the sort of dust which would accumulate over the years in a city warehouse. The print of the index finger was broader than the others, that of the little finger so small as to be little more than a dot.
Clane turned, walked back to Cynthia, said “Okay, Cynthia, this is where you get out.”
“And what do you do?
“I notify the police.”
“Terry, you can’t. You keep out of this … You …”
“There is every possibility,” Clane interrupted, “that the police have my telephone tapped. In that event they know George Gloster asked me to meet him here. For you to be here would be suicidal. Police would claim that you had secreted Edward Harold here, that Gloster surprised you and you shot him to keep him from notifying the police.”
“Oh, Owl. Why, That’s a nightmare.
“A nightmare,” he said, “that will come true if the police ever know You’ve been here. You should never have arranged that escape. Now you have a murder case of your own on your hands.”
“Owl, you’ll have to let me tell you all about this, how it happened that I…”
“Not now,” he interrupted impatiently. “Get on your way. I’ll give you ten seconds and then I’m going to notify the police.”
“Owl, I can’t You mustn’t. We…”
Clane gravely took her elbow, piloted her out towards the door that led from the warehouse on the north. “Did you touch anything after you came in?”
“I don’t think so. Yes, the door-knob on the inside. I…”
Clane took his handkerchief, carefully wiped the inner surface of me door-knob, held it open and escorted her to her car. Held the car door open, helped her in, then slammed the door shut. “On your way,” he said.
“Look, Owl, can’t you…”
Clane turned and deliberately walked away. Cynthia watched him a moment, then switched on the ignition. Clane heard the whirr of the starting mechanism, then the pulsing of the engine. A moment later the lights came on and the car slipped smoothly away into the fog-filled night, leaving Clane standing in the deserted side street surrounded by the buildings of the ware-house district, dark, forlorn, gloomy buildings from the eaves of which the fog moisture dropped to the ground in a steady cadence of mournful dripping.
Clane walked over to examine the car which was parked off the road. It was a closed car, a two-tone club coupe. The fog moisture had collected in beads on the windscreen and on the bonnet two little rivulets of water, fed by this moisture, had dropped down the windscreen and down the bonnet, trickling to the ground in vertical lines. Clane noted the licence number of the motor-car. He dared not open the door to look at the registration certificate.
He gave Cynthia Renton a full five minutes. Then he walked back into the warehouse, switched the lights off and on, entered the office, was careful to avoid the pool of blood as he tiptoed his way round to the telephone.
As he was about to pick up the receiver, he noticed near the telephone a fresh sliver where the wood had been marred by some recent injury.
Clane bent for a closer inspection.
He saw that a bullet, apparently of 38 calibre, had struck the wall and slightly embedded itself. From the size and shape of the hole, Clane would have said that the bullet had been somewhat battered before it had penetrated the wood.
Clane moved over, picked up the telephone receiver and said “Police Headquarters, please. Get me the Homicide Department. I want to report a murder.”
CHAPTER TEN
INSPECTOR JIM MALLOY OF HOMICIDE greeted Terry Clane with the cordial enthusiasm that one customarily shows towards a rich relative.
“Well, well, well, if it isn’t Mr Clane,” he said, wrapping Clane’s hand with duck, powerful fingers. “I suppose you remember me all right. I worked on that Mandra murder case—a most interesting …”
“I remember you perfectly,” Clane said.
“Well now, That’s nice of you. That’s interesting, the idea that a man like you would remember just a dumb cop. Now, of course, with me, I remember you because it’s my business to remember people. And then, of course, we don’t ordinarily meet people like you, but you’re meeting average people like me every day, lots of them. And now you say you have another body down here?”
“A body, not another body.”
“That’s right, That’s right. You’ll pardon me. I was dunking of that other case. And this body, do you happen to know who he is?”
“George Gloster.”
“Gloster, Gloster. Now I’ve heard that name… . Let’s see, this is a warehouse, isn’t it?”
“That’s right. Eastern Art Import and Trading Company.”
“Well, well, well, I knew I’d heard the name Gloster before somewhere. Now this man Horace Farnsworth that was murdered a while back—he was a member of this Eastern Trading Company, or whatever you call it, wasn’t he?”
“I believe he was.”
“Well now, let’s just go take a look,” Inspector Malloy said. I take it you didn’t touch anything? Of course, you wouldn’t—you’ve been all through this before. It isn’t like talking with an amateur, so to speak.”
“I touched me telephone,” Clane said, because it was the only chance I had to get the police department. There aren’t many phones around here. You could walk for miles in this district without finding a phone.”
“You could for a fact,” Malloy said. “Well, we’ll just discount that, then. Your fingerprints on the telephone
. Fingerprints anywhere else?”
“I may have touched a chair or two inadvertently before I realized what I was up against.”
“I see. Of course, you shouldn’t have done that, Mr Clane, but you’ll learn. You’ll learn as you have more experience. You’ll learn.”
“I don’t want any more experience.”
“Well, of course, of course! Now let’s see. We go right in here and see lights are on. Were they on when you came, Mr Clane?”
“They were not,” Clane said.
“You turned them on?”
“I did.”
“Well now, are you a member of this Eastern Trading Company?
“No, I am not a member of me Eastern Art Import and Trading Company. Perhaps I’d better tell you my story after you’ve looked around a bit.”
“Well, I’ll just take a look. Now the light switch is right here by the door. You turned this on?”
“Yes.”
“Then that’ll account for another fingerprint. You’ll have to remember that—your fingerprint on the light-switch. Then what did you do?”
“I went through this door here to the left.”
“That’s right, the door in this room. Oh—there it is. There’s the body.”
“There’s me body,” Clane said.
“Just like it was when you arrived?”
“That’s right.”
“You didn’t move anything.”
“No.”
“Good boy,” Malloy said. “You’re learning, You’re learning. Well now, let’s see. There’s a window open over there. You didn’t open that window?”
“No.”
“It was open like that when you came?”
“Yes.”
Malloy turned back to one of the men on Homicide. “Sammy, run around and take a look under that window. Be careful now—you might find a footprint or perhaps the mark of a jimmy on the window-sill. Be careful you don’t mess things up. Just sort of tiptoe around and give it the once-over. Now let’s see, There’s the body lying over mere, feet towards us, head towards the telephone, lying on its stomach, head turned a little bit to the right, right hand outstretched and about even with the head, left hand doubled back and about even with the man’s belt. You can identify him? You say that’s Gloster?”
“That’s Gloster.”
“You went over and took a look?”
“I went over and took a look.”
“You shouldn’t have done that. You should have identified him after we got here.”
“I had to use the telephone,” Clane said.
“That’s right, that’s right. You went over there to use the telephone. See anything else while you were mere?”
“I just used the phone, that’s all. I did notice where a bullet had embedded itself in the boards.”
“A bullet? Well now, that’s interesting. You looked at it pretty carefully? Sure it was a bullet?”
“I just saw the end of it. It’s a round object that looks like a bullet.”
“You didn’t touch it?”
“No.”
“That’s fine. No fingerprints of yours on the bullet, then. That’ll help. Now if you’ll just step outside, Mr. Clane, and let our men get busy here, we’ll perhaps find out a lot more things. There’s a little fingerprinting to do, and a little checking up. You know how those dungs are. By the way, here’s a pile of canned goods and a cot. Looks as though someone had been sleeping here. Did Gloster live here?”
“I don’t know. I shouldn’t think so.”
“I wouldn’t think so either. Hardly a place for a man to live. Perhaps a night-watchman has been sleeping here. But there’s been a lot of cooking, hasn’t there?”
“Apparently.”
“Someone lived here, someone who was rather neat. Yes, I’d say neat as a pin. Dishes all washed up nice and clean. Empty cans all stacked in a big waste-basket. Quite a few empty cans there. Apparently the man didn’t have much of an opportunity to get out to dispose of his garbage. Now that’s interesting.”
Clane said nothing.
“Very interesting indeed,” Inspector Malloy went on. “Now if this here Gloster was a member of this Far Eastern what-do-you-call-it Company, then there’s a pretty good chance he knew this Edward Harold that the police are looking for. Don’t you suppose he did?”
“I suppose It’s a natural assumption.”
“Do you know that he did?”
“I think that he did.”
“Well, now, that’s interesting. Now wouldn’t it be funny if … Well, I guess we won’t bother you any more right now, Mr. Clane. You’re probably a little squeamish about these things. If you’ll just step right out and wait there in the police car, you’ll find one of the boys there to talk to you.”
“And see that I don’t get away?”
“Oh no, heavens, no, nothing like that! Why should you want to get away?”
“I thought perhaps you thought I wanted to get away.”
“And why should I be dunking anything like that, Mr Clane? What have you got to get away for?”
“Nothing.”
“That’s right, nothing at all. Why, no, we wouldn’t consider for a minute that you wanted to get away. No, no, you’ll just sit there, and I know you won’t mind waiting to tell us your story. Let’s see now, you felt it was pretty deserted down here and a person would have a hard time getting to a telephone. That’s why you decided to go over and use that particular instrument to call us.”
“That’s right.”
“Well, if this neighbourhood is so isolated, how did you happen to get down here?”
“In a taxicab.”
“And then you let the cab go?”
“That’s right.”
“You should have kept it waiting. You might have had some difficulty getting another one.”
“I thought that Mr Gloster would take me home.”
“Oh, you knew Mr Gloster was here?”
“Naturally.”
“Well, we’ll find out all about that later on, Mr Clane. If you’ll just go out and sit in the car now, I’ll get to work and do the chores here. Just a lot of routine, you know, covering things with powder, looking for fingerprints. And, by the way, I guess you’d better give the boy your fingerprints out there. Just a little messy, you know, gets the ends of your fingers smeared up with ink but It’s one of the things we have to do. You’ve been in this room and You’ve left fingerprints here and there, and of course we want to be able to identify those fingerprints of yours when we find them. Wouldn’t want to find some real good latent print and think we had the print of the murderer, and then after a while find out that it was the fingerprint of Mr Terry Clane. That would be embarrassing, wouldn’t it, ha, ha, ha!”
“Very embarrassing,” Clane agreed.
“All right, just step out there. Fred, would you mind taking Mr Clane’s prints? Then you can sit out in the car with him and talk to him. he’s an interesting chap to talk to. isn’t interested in baseball and prize-fights and the things you’d ordinarily talk about. He’s interested in Oriental philosophy. Don’t try to talk with him about that because you don’t know anything about it, but perhaps you can get him to talk with you while you listen. And don’t ask him any questions about the case. Leave that for me. I wouldn’t want him to have to repeat what he has to say. I’ll be out just as soon as I can get things going here. Now if you boys will set up the cameras there, we’ll get some pictures first rattle out of the box. You can plug into that outside socket and string your wire in for your floodlights. And we might start taking some measurements of the position of the body and the location of the furniture. The district attorney will be wanting a map of the place. You know how it is, Clane. Lawyers have a certain rigmarole that go through with, and the district attorney will want something he can produce as People’s Exhibit Number One. All right, Fred, just take Mr Clane out in the car and try to keep him interested, keep him talking.”
Clane followed the off
icer out to the car, where he was duly fingerprinted, and then given a rag on which he could wipe off the surplus ink from the tips of his fingers. The manner in which the officer whom Inspector Malloy referred to as Fred tried to keep up a conversation, coupled with what Malloy had said, made Clane realize that these officers were trying to keep him from having a chance to think up some good story. They wanted to keep his mind thoroughly occupied.
Fred asked Clane all about China, all about the Chinese people, about the Chinese religion, about Clane’s trip across on the boat, about a hundred and one incidental things. Some of the questions were searching and intelligent, some of them were just questions but there was a continuing stream of questions. Clane had no opportunity whatever to relax into thoughtful silence. He was peppered with verbal question-marks, coming with what at times seemed to be the unceasing rapidity of hail falling on a tin roof. But Clane, realizing that this was part of Malloy’s test and that any attempt on his part to become silent would be duly reported to the Inspector and considered as a suspicious circumstance, kept his good nature and answered the questions, for the most part making his answers brief so that the burden of carrying on the conversation fell upon Fred. But at the end of fifteen minutes Clane was forced to admit that this was a game at which Fred was adept. evidently he had done it before. Clane had a shrewd suspicion that the officer was hardly listening to his answers, but was using the period during which Clane was talking to formulate some new question.
At the end of twenty minutes Inspector Malloy came barging out of the building, his genial, bluff good nature a mask behind which his busy brain went about its business.
“Well, well, well, Clane,” he said, “I can see that Fred’s been pumping you to find out all about the Orient. I should have cautioned you about Fred. He’s after information all the time. Too bad you don’t know more about baseball. Fred’s an expert, can tell you everything about any player in any of the leagues. You get to talking with him about baseball and he’ll be betting you money first thing you know, and you won’t stand a chance, Mr. Clane. But I suppose Fred’s an expert on the Orient now. Now if you wouldn’t mind stepping right in here, Mr. Clane, and … But before you do that, perhaps you’d better show us just what happened. Now you came here in a taxi.”
The Case of the Backward Mule Page 8
