by Meyer Levin
“You could have dropped your glasses then?”
“Well, it doesn’t seem probable. I don’t recall bringing them along. As I said, I hadn’t used them for a few months. Unless” – he reflected – “unless I had quite simply left them in the pocket of my jacket and entirely forgotten they were there.”
They all looked at each other. A chubby, silent one, in a corner, taking notes, he didn’t like.
“Well,” Padua said, with that impersonal air of having to go on until every detail was clarified, “when you saw all this in the papers about the glasses, and you knew you had been on the spot, and even had tripped there, didn’t it occur to you that these might be your glasses?”
The moment had come for a decision. “Well, no,” Judd said.
“No?”
Horn put in, “Didn’t you check up to see if you had your own glasses?”
“Well, even if it had occurred to me, I believe I would have avoided checking on it.”
“How’s that?” asked Padua.
“In a hysterical situation of this kind” – he laughed, a bit nervously – “one wouldn’t have wanted to risk having to get involved. I might even have had some silly notions about the third degree.”
They all chuckled. Then Horn said, “Now Judd, you, a law student, ought to know better than that.”
“There were stories about what was happening to that teacher.”
“What stories?”
“Well, I happen to be acquainted with a newspaperman on the case-”
They wanted to know what newspaperman. And what had the newspaperman said. Oh, he hadn’t said anything specific, but it was just one of those popular ideas.
“Well, all right. No one denies there is a lot of talk about the third degree.” In Padua ’s smile there was almost a hint of “you’ll see for yourself”. But he persisted, “So even as a law student, you didn’t think it your duty to check whether they were your glasses, so you could identify them and save the state a lot of trouble if they were. And you also must have realized that in the meantime we were running down false clues, and giving the real culprit more opportunity to get away.”
“There might have been a question in the back of my mind,” Judd said. “But in the situation-”
Horn said, “Then you admit now that these are your glasses?”
“Why, I can’t say for sure. It could be possible.”
A point had been reached. There was a prodigious relaxation in the room; the note-taker put down his book; men moved around; Horn whispered something to McNamara, who went out.
So they had pinned that on him. But what was it? Nothing. His explanation was perfectly logical. There were half a dozen witnesses to vouch that he had been out to Hegewisch that Sunday, birding.
Horn stood up, crossed the room in the most casual way – oh what a cheap show they were putting up; wait till he imitated Horn for Artie! Horn took the glasses from the case, and put them in his breast pocket. “You carried them in your pocket like this?”
“Why, yes, that was where I would habitually carry them. I could have left them in the pocket of my jacket. I hadn’t worn the suit for some weeks. But – I believe it is this suit I have on now.”
Suddenly Horn performed a curious little shuffle with his feet, and half flopped over, like a vaudeville dancer in a buck-and-wing, nearly losing his balance. Startled, Padua and the others lunged to catch their chief. But Horn steadied himself, grasping the back of a chair. He straightened up. Then he touched his hand to his breast pocket. The glasses were still there, intact. “Would you like to show me, Judd, how you might have fallen, and the glasses dropped out? Especially since you have on the same suit.”
“Why, it seems to me that when I did use them habitually, they were always falling out of my pockets when I bent over.” Horn was holding out the spectacles. Judd slipped them into his coat pocket, smiling.
“How did they fall? Will you show us?”
“Well, I’m not much of an actor,” he said, chuckling.
“Just let’s see if they fall out.”
“Well, the terrain isn’t exactly the same, you know. I tripped, I think it was down an incline, down the overpass of the railway tracks there.”
“You do know the site quite well,” Padua remarked.
“Still,” Horn said, “let’s give it a try.”
With a slight frown at being put in a situation where he had to make a fool of himself, Judd made a few steps toward the centre of the room, and then fell forward, landing on his palms. As he straightened himself, he had difficulty concealing an angry sense of humiliation. But he made himself chuckle. “Of course when you try it never happens.”
They smiled with him.
Padua now came forward and arranged a little pile of stuff in the middle of the floor; there were a couple of telephone books, with a few smaller books on top.
“Do you want me to break my leg?” Judd said.
“I’ll risk mine first.” Padua reached out his hand for the spectacles, but then corrected himself, putting them aside, “Anybody got another pair? We might be needing these some day in court, who knows.”
The secretarial fellow, now introduced as Czewicki, also an assistant State’s Attorney, handed over his shell-rims. “Be careful. You want to leave me blind?”
“Don’t worry,” Horn said humourlessly. “The state will buy you another pair.”
Padua slipped Czewicki’s glasses into his pocket, walked back a few steps, then allowed himself, with a certain elegance, to trip over the phone books. Nothing happened. He offered the substitute glasses to Judd. “Want to try?”
Judd thought of protesting at this point. Still, this nonsense could turn in his favour. “I suppose I might stand on my head,” he joked. “That ought to do it.” Then he let himself trip over the books, pitching forward. At least, he wished that the bastard’s glasses would be smashed.
It became too stupid. Five, six times, he must have tried it. Horn was sitting there like a school teacher. Frowning, he rose and said, “I’ve got an idea. Would you mind taking off your coat?”
“Why, no,” said Judd, “I’m getting hot from all this exercise anyway.”
The State’s Attorney took Judd’s jacket and placed it on the floor. Then, as one absorbedly performing some abstract demonstration, he picked up the jacket by its bottom. The glasses slipped soundlessly from the pocket and lay on the carpet.
All looked at Horn as though he had performed a great feat.
“That’s how it might have happened, isn’t it?” said Horn, helpfully.
“Why, obviously,” said Judd, “glasses can fall out that way. But I don’t recall having my coat off that day.” Instantly he wanted to kick himself. He tried to backtrack. “But of course I might have.”
Padua was shaking his head, thoughtfully. “You wouldn’t pick up your coat that way.”
“Why?”
“You’re pretty careful about your clothes, Padua said. “I noticed it, because I’m the same way. But perhaps – in the dark-”
Judd stared back at the fellow, unblinkingly. Certainly, he told himself, he was superior in intelligence to this wop. He must simply be careful not to be tripped by his own over confidence. He must not try to prove them wrong on each remark, as he had done so far.
Receiving no reply, Padua resumed, “Another point confuses me. When you spoke to Captain Cleary last Saturday, the question of the glasses did come up.” So during the last hour, they must have been in touch with Cleary. They must now have the report he had written.
“Yes. I told him I used to wear glasses.”
“Then, surely when you got home you checked up?”
“No,” Judd said. And as they stared at him: “Perhaps that was when it crossed my mind, and I decided not to. As I said, I would have hated to see my family get involved over an unhappy coincidence of that kind.”
Padua took a long breath, and said, quietly, “As a matter of fact, you knew they were your glasses the
whole time. You lied both to Captain Cleary and to us.”
“I resent that!” Judd snapped.
Horn looked toward Padua. There might have been a hint of disapproval in his expression.
With elaborate casualness, Padua said, “You’ve seen this ransom letter in the papers. What did you make of it?”
“Well, I didn’t study it very carefully.”
“Here.” Judd was handed the letter. He made himself read it over, word for word, so as not to seem familiar with it.
“Judd, what sort of man wrote that letter, do you think?”
“Well, obviously he is not uneducated. I would say at least a high-school graduate. There don’t appear to be any errors in grammar or spelling. Unless – the word kidnaped. It is spelled here with two p’s.”
“Isn’t that correct?”
“I think it would be the British way,” he said. “I believe we would use one p. But either could be called correct.” How he had argued with Artie about it! But now, Judd felt that making this point separated him from the letter. He replaced the letter on the desk.
After a short silence, Horn said, rather formally, “Suppose you tell us where you were on the afternoon and evening of May 22.”
“May 22?” Now, this would be the last round. “Oh, the day of-”
“Yes.”
“Well, offhand, I suppose it was a day like any other day. I went to my classes…” Now he was approaching the barrier. The alibi. The week that he and Artie had agreed upon for using the alibi was technically over. Today was Thursday. “May 22 – that was a Wednesday, wasn’t it?”
“Yes. A week ago yesterday.”
“I don’t recall any special activity on Wednesday.”
“But surely, only one week ago – you’ve got a pretty good memory about almost tripping out there in Hegewisch a few days before that.”
“Well, I had my Harvard exam on Friday morning, so I was pretty busy studying.”
“Friday morning – you took an exam?”
“For Harvard Law,” he said modestly.
“How’d you make out? Was it tough?” asked Czewicki.
“Of course it was only an entrance exam, and I boned up pretty well.”
“A Phi Bete would have no trouble,” Padua said.
“That’s a great school,” Czewicki said. “You’ll probably come back here and beat the pants off us.”
Horn brought them back to the topic. “What time did you leave the university? On Wednesday.”
“About noon.”
And where had he lunched? At home?
“Well, I usually lunch with friends. Yes, Wednesday I believe I lunched at the Windermere with a few friends – Willie Weiss and Artie Straus.” They wrote down the names. For the first time, he had brought Artie into it. “I recall driving my aunt and uncle home, in the evening.”
“What time was that?”
“About ten. Perhaps a little after.”
“They had been visiting?”
“Yes. For dinner.” Let them assume he had been home for dinner.
“You were home for dinner?”
Too easily checked. “No. I was out. I came home to drive them.” Now he would have to use the alibi. He had to tell some kind of story. Why had he and Artie chosen to put a time limit on the alibi? They should have agreed to stick to it until he sailed. He tried desperately to think of some other plausible story, but his mind seemed frozen, blank. There was only this path.
“Were you out alone?”
“With a friend.”
“Girl friend?” Padua said.
“Well, yes, in a way.”
Respectfully: “Can you give us her name?”
Judd hesitated.
After all, Padua kidded, the girl’s honour was scarcely at stake, since he had come home by ten o’clock.
Perhaps he could still keep Artie out of it. He said he couldn’t tell the girl’s name because he didn’t really know her name. It was a pickup.
They exchanged looks again.
“I thought you were so busy studying,” said Horn.
“Well, you know how it is before an exam. You bone on the last day – at least I always do. I stay up all night before the exam, as I find that a sleepless night makes me extremely alert. So I did my intensive studying on Thursday.”
“And Wednesday you were out on the town.” Padua clucked his tongue.
Judd gave them the alibi, but without Artie. How he had gone birding most of the afternoon in Lincoln Park, then he hadn’t returned home for dinner because – well, his dad might then have expected him to stay in and study. So he had eaten in a restaurant and then he had picked up this girl on 63rd Street, and taken her to the wooded island in Jackson Park, and tried to make her, but she wouldn’t come across, so finally he had let her out to walk home. She had said her name was Edna.
And just where had he picked her up?
He gave the corner again.
Could he find her?
Well, possibly she hung around that neighbourhood. He was pretty sure he could recognize her.
“By the feel?” Padua cracked and they all laughed.
Padua resumed. And was there no one else to substantiate his whereabouts on that day? Judd smiled, as if to recognize that it sounded pretty fishy. But all the more reason for them to believe it.
“A lone wolf,” Padua said.
They went over the whole thing again, and again and again.
Horn, sitting on the edge of a table, remarked in a toneless voice, “Look, Judd, you see where that leaves us. Your family is one of the most respected in town. Now, we don’t want to prolong this. If there is anyone at all who can corroborate this account of yours, that would be a great help.”
For what happened at this point, Judd blamed himself. What made him bring Artie in, he never quite understood, unless it was a sense of fairness – he had been going through this ordeal for a couple of hours, and it was only fair for Artie to share part of it. Perhaps there was even a feeling that Artie would want to share the experience. And beyond this was a certain terror. Despite all their soft expressions, he had reached a stone wall.
“Well,” he said, “I wouldn’t want to involve anyone.”
They jumped on it. Surely it would simplify things if someone had seen him, been with him.
“Well, a friend of mine was along with me, but the fact is, his mother is a highly refined woman and it would be quite a shock to her to hear that her son participated in such-”
“-pastimes?”
He waited.
Padua asked, “You had another fellow with you when you picked up this girl?”
“Who was it?” Horn demanded.
He couldn’t back out of it now. “Artie Straus.”
Once more, the sigh of relaxation spread through the room. Judd hated baseball, but from way back in his Twain School days, when they had tried to get him into things by making him the baseball manager, he recognized the feeling among the men: the second out.
“Straus was with you when you picked up this girl?”
“Well, we picked up a couple. The fact is, we had some drinks, in the afternoon while we were watching for the birds.” Somehow that always tickled them. “And we thought we had a little too much on our breath to go home – it would show – so we went to the Coconut Grove for dinner, and then we drove around and picked up these girls.”
“Straus,” Horn repeated as he wrote down the name. “That the Straus Corporation?”
Judd nodded.
A low, appreciative whistle came from Czewicki.
“Can you give us his address?”
McNamara was already coming forward to take the slip of paper. “Say, that’s right across from the Kessler house,” he said. “Say, I know this Artie Straus – he gave us all that dope on the school teachers.”
“He’s been extremely interested in the crime,” Judd said. “His little brother was in Paulie’s class at Twain. And Artie is a kind of amateur detective.”
“I could eat,” Padua agreed.
To Judd’s surprise, Horn suggested they all go down to the dining room.
It was an amiable meal. Not once during that hour did they touch on the crime. Various law schools were discussed, and, as Judd had suspected, it turned out that Padua was a product of evening courses at a downtown school.
The University of Chicago’s law school was outstanding, Padua said – it would certainly have been good enough for him, without going off to Harvard.
“My father insists on Harvard because Harvard is the best,” Judd remarked. “That has always been his attitude. Buy the best.”
He said it inadvertently. He would not have wanted to antagonize them. And indeed, none of them seemed to take it as a bragging remark.
During that dinner, the feeling began to grow in Padua that he would soon understand this case. No such feeling had come to him with any of the other suspects. Now, with Judd Steiner, Padua had that unmistakable glimmering, the feeling that, even aside from the material facts of the case, the crime would become comprehensible.
Had the glint in his mind come from Judd’s remark about buying the best, always having the best? A pampered kid, a prodigy, a young man who had always had everything he wanted. How did that lead to the murder? And the ransom? To prove he could get something on his own?
Padua remained quiet while the conversation flowed into other channels. Judd was discoursing on ornithology now, explaining about the stuffed birds McNamara had seen in his room, throwing in Latin names of species, and mentioning some rare specimen he had discovered.
One of the squad, a sergeant named Fleury, said bird shooting was his favourite sport; he knew a fine lake in Wisconsin.
It wasn’t the shooting part, Judd broke in. He didn’t particularly enjoy killing birds, but when there was a scientific reason, the killing became incidental. He went on elaborating his point, his voice becoming somewhat clacky as his self-assurance mounted.
But once more, a word, a phrase, had glimmered for Padua. “… the killing became incidental.”
