“Not possible!” McWilliams sounded furious. “This – this buck private, this plain GI – just because he used to be a flatfoot pounding a beat, wants to act like a big shot and order us around, Captain? Who does he think he is? He belongs back in his barracks, the Provost Marshal should be in charge.”
Captain Coughlin let out a sigh. “Just go and – I tell you what, Lieutenant, scamper over to the mess hall and get us some coffee, will you?”
“I’ll have Sergeant Dillard send a man.”
“No, McWilliams, you go yourself.”
This time Train couldn’t restrain his grin. The Lieutenant looked as if Captain Coughlin had asked him to march around the parade ground in his skivvies. The air in the room was so full of tension you could have picked it up on a Zenith radio. But at last the Lieutenant took his leave.
Captain Coughlin said, “Train, I’ll be in my office. You call me if you need anything, otherwise just come on out when you finish in here.”
Captain Coughlin winked at Private Train. Yes, he did, he actually winked at the buck private. Then he left the safe room. He stopped and drew the damaged door shut behind him, the hole that the fire axe had gouged out admitting light from the outer room.
Train took one more, confirming look at the splintered wood and the adjacent plasterboard. The whitewash was recent enough to show traces of fingers dragging vertically on the door-jamb, then sliding horizontally onto the plasterboard.
Returning to the corpse, Train knelt and examined the two cold hands, first one and then the other. As he’d already noted, the fingertips were white. He lifted them and sniffed. There was whitewash on them.
He studied the wound on the side of Miller’s head, feeling through the bloodied hair to try and determine whether the skull was damaged. It didn’t seem to be. He scuttled across the linoleum and returned with his rifle. He stood over the body, holding the weapon so that its butt-plate was adjacent to the wound. He walked around the body and tried again, from behind.
It didn’t fit. Miller had been hit with something smaller than a rifle butt.
Train studied the safe. He wasn’t an expert safe man, he didn’t know very much about locks, but there was no evidence that the safe had been forced or blown open. If it had been, there would surely have been some reaction to the blast. Who had the combination of the safe? He’d have to find out.
In any case, Sergeant Dillard had tried to rouse Miller shortly before 0555 hours and failed to do so. He had a key to the outer lock and presumably used it – something else to check on-only to be stymied by the fact that the inner lock was dogged.
Captain Coughlin, Lieutenant McWilliams, and Sergeant Dillard all had keys to the outer lock. Only Miller had a key to the inner lock. Where was it? The lock itself was in Captain Coughlin’s office, still attached to its hasp and the splintered wood that the hasp had been screwed to. But where was the key? Train searched Miller’s pockets but failed to find it. The room was not brightly lighted, but Train searched anyway, going to his hands and knees and covering every square inch of floor.
The key turned up in the last place he looked – of course – a darkened corner of the room five or six feet away from the door.
Train stood up, squeezing the padlock key as if it could tell him what had happened. It couldn’t, but he was convinced that the contents of the room could, if only he asked them the right questions.
Once again he studied the damage to Miller’s head. He was convinced that was not the cause of death. Eventually the Provost Marshal’s people or the Quartermaster’s people would come and take away the body, and the Medics would perform an autopsy and pronounce cause of death, and Miller’s parents would get a telegram from the Secretary of War and they would go out and buy a service flag with a gold star to hang in their window in place of the one with the blue star that Train was sure hung there now.
But he didn’t want to wait.
He knelt in front of the corpse and studied its face. He leaned forward and smelled Miller’s nostrils and his mouth but detected no odor. The features were relaxed in death. There was no rictus. He stood up and placed himself behind the wicker chair and tried to imagine Miller’s last minutes.
Someone had struck Miller high on the skull on his left side. The blow didn’t look serious enough to cause unconsciousness no less death. Who had struck Miller? Who could get into the safe room once it was locked from both inside and out? Only Captain Coughlin, Lieutenant McWilliams, or First Sergeant Dillard, and then only if Miller let them in by opening the inside lock.
He heard voices from the outer office and a moment later Captain Coughlin invited him to join him.
Lieutenant McWilliams was standing in front of Captain Coughlin’s desk. There was a tray on the desk, with a steaming pot and three cups. First Sergeant Dillard stood nearby looking uncomfortable.
Captain Coughlin addressed Train. “Come in, soldier. Pour yourself a cup of java.”
McWilliams, uniform pressed and buttons polished, was red-faced, his jaw clenched. With an obvious effort he said, “Sir, I must protest. This soldier – there are only three cups-it’s a violation of protocol—”
Coughlin waved his hand. “We’ll make do somehow, Lieutenant.”
McWilliams drew himself up, suddenly taller than he’d been. “If the Captain will excuse me, sir, I have to return to my duties.”
Coughlin signaled Sergeant Dillard to approach. “What’s today’s schedule, Sergeant?”
“We’ve been pushing the trainees pretty hard, sir. They have the morning off, then grenade drill this afternoon.”
“Good.”
“And, Captain-it’s payday, sir. The men expect to be paid today.”
“All right.” Captain Coughlin swung around in his chair and raised his eyes. It was impossible to tell whose picture he was consulting: President Roosevelt’s, General Pershing’s, General Marshall’s, or Douglas MacArthur’s. Or possibly, Nick Train thought, he was communing his own younger self, the bright young soldier who went to France to whip the Kaiser.
Coughlin swung back to face the others. “McWilliams, Dillard, here’s what I want. Lieutenant, find yourself a swagger stick.”
“I have one, sir.”
“I expected as much. All right. And, Sergeant, grab a clipboard. I want the two of you to inspect the trainees’ barracks. I want you to find at least a dozen gigs. I don’t care how hard you have to poke around to find ’em. If they’re not there, make some up.”
Lieutenant McWilliams’s anger was clearly turning to pleasure. Sergeant Dillard kept a straight face. Nick Train made a supreme effort to become invisible.
Captain Coughlin leaned back in his chair and drew in his breath audibly. “Go slow. Keep those trainees braced. When you finish, you get out of there, McWilliams. Sergeant, you tell those trainees they’re confined to barracks except for meals and training exercises. They’ll have a GI party tonight. The works. Swamp out the barracks, polish the plumbing, climb up in the rafters and get the dust out. They have a barracks leader, do they?”
Sergeant Dillard said, “Schulte, sir. Saint Schulte, they call him.”
“All right. You tell him that he’s responsible for supervising the party. When the barracks is ready for reinspection, he’s to notify you. You’ll bring Lieutenant McWilliams back in and reinspect.”
“Yes, sir,” Dillard grinned.
“And tell ’em that we’re holding onto their pay for them, they’ll be paid as soon as they pass reinspection.” He made a sound somewhere between a snort and a guffaw. “That’s all. Lieutenant, Sergeant.”
They saluted and left.
“Well, Private Train, what do you think?” the Captain asked.
“I think I have an idea, sir.”
“All right, soldier, what is it?”
“May I take this with me?” He filled one of the cups on the tray Lieutenant McWilliams had brought back, then held it up.
“All right.”
Train took the cup with
him, back into the safe room. He placed it carefully on top of the safe, beside the cup that had been there when he first entered the room. He studied the cups. They were identical. Of course that didn’t prove much. But there was a small Infantry School crest on each of them. That meant that they came from either the Officers Club or the NCO Club, not the mess hall, despite the instructions that Coughlin had given McWilliams.
He sniffed the coffee in the cup he’d brought, then bent over the other cup. Being careful not to touch the cup or its contents, he tried to detect an odor coming from it, but without success. Even so, he thought, even so, he was making progress.
He’d been attempting to recreate Corporal Miller’s actions when Lieutenant McWilliams had arrived. Now he resumed that effort. He squatted beside Miller’s wicker chair and reached for his coffee cup, the cup that was resting on top of the safe. He lifted the cup, sipped at the coffee, lowered the cup once more and pushed himself erect.
He crossed the room to the door and extracted the padlock key from his pocket.
So far, so good. But Miller had not opened the lock. Instead he had struck the wood and plasterboard repeatedly with his hands, as if he was trying to grasp the lock and insert the key. The key had tumbled from his fingers and clattered across the room.
Why would it do that? Why did that happen?
If Miller was dizzy, losing consciousness, trying to leave the room, he would have done that. He would have opened the lock, trying to get out of the safe room. Of course he would have failed, the outer padlock would have stopped him. But if he was confused, struggling, he might not have thought that through.
With the key lost, lying in a dark corner of the room, his vision and equilibrium failing, Miller would have staggered backwards.
Train duplicated the act.
Two, three, four steps and – Miller would have collapsed into the wicker armchair. Train collapsed, found himself sitting in the lap of a cold cadaver, leaped to his feet.
No, the blow to Miller’s head had not caused his death. It was a red herring, designed to direct the investigation of Miller’s death – the inevitable investigation of Miller’s death-away from what had really happened. He’d have to have Miller’s coffee tested, but in all likelihood that was the means by which a lethal dose had been administered.
Train peered into the corpse’s face again. If it hadn’t been for the blow to Miller’s head, any investigation would have found that he’d died of natural causes. Even young men have heart attacks, and the rigors of military life on a man whose former lifestyle had been sedentary could bring on a sudden deadly embolism.
But who had administered the blow to Miller’s head, and why, and when?
Nick Train retraced his route from the door to the wicker chair, to the safe, back to the door, back to the chair. Then he stopped, staring down at the remains of Corporal Fred Miller, company pay clerk.
He wasn’t an expert on poisons but he’d learned a little bit about them, first in high school and then at the police academy. Miller had apparently realized there was something seriously wrong with him, tried to get help, then staggered backwards and collapsed into his wicker armchair to die. The only mark on his body was the obviously superficial head wound.
What would cause a death like Miller’s?
Based on Train’s police training, the likely suspect was digitonin, an easily soluble form of digitalis. That would come from a common plant called purple foxglove, also known as bloody fingers or dead men’s bells. The victim might well drink it, for instance in a cup of coffee, and not notice anything for as long as several hours. Then his heart action would slow, he would become dizzy and disoriented, lose consciousness and die quietly.
Just as Corporal Fred Miller had died.
Train made his way to Captain Coughlin’s office and told the captain his conclusions. He described his reconstruction of Miller’s movements from the wicker chair to the padlock, the struggle with the key, and Miller’s collapse and death.
“I don’t know what an autopsy will show, Captain. I’m not sure what signs that poison would leave in the body. Maybe none. I’m not a trained toxicologist, sir. But I’d bet my month’s pay that a chemical test will show digitonin in Miller’s coffee.”
Captain Coughlin grunted. “Sounds very plausible, Train. And we’ll get the right people in to check those things damned soon. I don’t think I can hold out on this thing more than another hour or two.” He put his face in his hands and rubbed, as if that would stimulate the blood flow and help his brain to work.
“Great job so far,” he resumed. “But if that’s how Miller was killed, you still haven’t told me how the money was removed from the safe. Not to mention – what do you call it in the detective business, Train-Who Dunnit?”
“Sir, I’m not a detective. But I have an idea of how the money was removed. I think that Miller was working with his killer. Whoever was his partner double-crossed him.”
Coughlin picked up his cup of coffee and raised it to his lips. An odd expression crossed his face. He lowered the cup without taking any coffee.
“What would you call that, Train – an inside job, right?”
“Yes, sir.”
Train paused for a few seconds to gather his thoughts. The silence was punctuated by a booming sound. An artillery unit was practicing coordination with an infantry brigade on the other side of the post. The sound was that of a 155-millimeter howitzer.
“Captain, here’s the way I think it happened. Miller’s partner opened the outer padlock, Miller opened the inner one. The partner brought a cup of coffee with him. Miller thought that was nice. He left it on top of the safe. Miller’s partner opened the safe.”
He stopped, then asked, “Who knows the combination to the safe, Captain?”
“Same people who have keys to the padlock. Lieutenant McWilliams, Sergeant Dillard, and myself.”
“Yes, sir. Well, Miller’s partner opened the safe and removed the cash. Then he hit Miller. The wound looked to me as if it could have been inflicted with the butt of a forty-five. Miller was still conscious. His partner left, taking the money with him. Miller relocked the door from the inside and his partner relocked it from the outside. The idea was that Miller would claim he’d been attacked by an unknown assailant, maybe a masked safecracker who managed to open the safe and get away with the payroll. That would send the CID off on the trail of an imaginary crook from outside, someone who had managed to get copies of the keys to both padlocks, while in fact Miller and his partner had the money.”
“And what would they do with the payroll?”
Train shrugged. “I don’t know, sir. But I have a suggestion.”
There was another boom, another howitzer round fired.
“The first thing to do is check Miller’s belongings. No telling what we’ll find there.”
Captain Coughlin summoned the Sergeant of the Guard and had a corporal and a private stationed outside the company office. They had strict orders not to step inside, not even to look inside, on pain of court martial. Then the captain told Nick Train to come with him.
Train was feeling less like a soldier and more like a cop by the minute.
Permanent party had better housing than transients at Benning. Corporal Miller had lived in a tiny room, partitioned in an NCO barracks. Train used a pair of bolt-cutters to open the padlock on Miller’s door and then to remove a second padlock from Miller’s foot locker.
The locker contained clean uniforms, underwear, toilet articles, all in inspection-ready order. Boots and shoes lined up beneath Miller’s bunk. Civvies on wire hangers on a wall-mounted rod.
The only non-regulation items in Miller’s foot locker were his religious paraphernalia. Rosary, Douay Bible, religious pictures, a couple of saint’s medals.
Train was kneeling in front of the foot locker, carefully examining its contents. He sensed Captain Coughlin standing behind him and turned to look at him. Captain Coughlin was studying the contents of the locker, as well.
“I don’t see anything here,” Train said.
“I do.” Captain Coughlin frowned.
“Sir?”
“You know Miller was a very religious man, don’t you?”
“Yes, sir.”
“His most precious belonging was his Missal. He always carried it around with him. But it wasn’t in the safe room, was it, Train?”
“No, I’d have seen it.”
“Then it should be in his foot locker. Not here, is it?”
Train shook his head.
“Where is it?”
“Don’t know, sir.”
“How’s this, Train? Maybe the old man can play detective, too. It was just a little book, you know. He could have put it in a uniform pocket. Could have had it with him in the safe room. Probably did. It’s a long night in there, no companions, no entertainment, another man might ask permission to bring in a radio, or might smuggle in some comic books or magazines. But a man like Miller would bring either a Bible or a Missal and spend his time communing with the Almighty.”
Train struggled to his feet. He was pushing a quarter century and his knees weren’t as flexible as they’d been ten years ago.
“You think Miller’s partner took the Missal?”
“Yep.”
“But why, Captain?”
Coughlin shrugged. “Who do you think Miller’s partner was, Train?”
“It had to be someone who had the key to the outer lock.”
“Yes.”
Another distant howitzer boom.
“Who, Train? Don’t be afraid. Who was Miller’s partner?”
“It had to be Lieutenant McWilliams or Sergeant Dillard, sir.”
“Or – who else?”
“You, sir.”
“That’s right. We have three suspects now, Train. That’s progress. That’s real progress. It has to be McWilliams or Dillard or Captain Coffin. Oh, I know what they call me. Don’t be naïve.” He paused. “Three suspects. Don’t be afraid to say it.”
The Mammoth Book of Perfect Crimes & Impossible Mysteries Page 45
