Death from Nowhere

by Clayton Rawson

  The Inspector looked grimly at the body sitting in its chair, head and shoulders slumped forward on the desk. He walked around it slowly once, bent over to examine the scratches that streaked the side of Hagenbaugh’s face and then said, “You’ll need lawyers this trip, all right. The best there are and lots of … what the blazes is that?”

  Church was staring at the floor before the desk. Between screen and desk there was a large irregular area of carpet that was soaking wet. Near it on the beige carpet was a dark wet shape — the print of a bare foot!

  Church scowled at it and said, “Hmmmph” once or twice, looked at Don Diavolo’s shoes and then faced the magician. His voice was as hard as granite. “Well, why did you kill Hagenbaugh?”

  “The verdict’s murder then?” Diavolo asked.

  “He didn’t die from too many green apples,” Church shot back. “Not with the door barricaded and you in the room. Why did you kill Hagenbaugh?”

  Diavolo slowly lit a cigarette. His eyes, flicking sideways, noted that there were five other detectives within the room. Two had ominously taken up positions on either side of him. Two more barred the doorway. Lieutenant Brophy was scowling at the body.

  “Inspector,” Don said with a calmness that made Church boil. “Before we go into that there’s something I want to know. Why did you have me tailed today?”

  “I’ve had you watched for the last two weeks,” Church replied, scowling. “Ever since that Invisible Man case. The explanations you dished out for that were altogether too pat. I still think there was more to it than ever came to light — and I mean you. This is the third murder case you’ve been in on in as many months. It’s also the last one. Why did you kill Hagenbaugh?”3

  “I see,” Don said. “You always get your man. All you need is a red uniform and a horse. But what brought you here just now? Why did you think that because I came to see Hagenbaugh there was anything in the wind important enough for your personal supervision? It looks fishy to me.”

  “It looks fishy to— Say! What makes you think you’re conducting this investigation? Why did you kill—”

  Don cut in. “Don’t do that, Inspector. I heard you the first time. I don’t like to answer because it’s going to be a big disappointment to you. I’m very sorry to have to tell you that you don’t have a nice straightforward no-nonsense murder case on your hands. It’s another of those now-you-see-it now-you-don’t things. And a ripsnorter.”

  The Inspector’s voice had dropped to below zero and ice was forming around the edges. Incredulously he demanded, “Do you intend to stand there and tell me—”

  “That I did not kill Hagenbaugh?” Diavolo asked. “Yes, I do. Just that. I knows it looks bad, but—”

  “Looks bad!” Church thundered. “Great Scott, man! What more do you think I need? If you aren’t guilty who the blue, blazing hell am I supposed to think—”

  “That,” Diavolo said seriously, “is something I wish I knew.”

  He turned to Lieutenant Brophy who was examining Hagenbaugh’s body. “What killed him, Lieutenant? Those scratches on his face don’t seem quite adequate. Find anything else?”

  But Brophy wasn’t giving out information. “Schultz,” he ordered. “Get Doc Pepper started over here.”

  Church gave the body an inspection of his own, looked closely at the cuts along the side of the face, and then turned to the two detectives who stood watchfully beside Diavolo. “Frisk him, boys. See if you can find anything that might have done that.”

  The boys gave the magician a thorough going over. They didn’t find anything.

  The Inspector took a quick look around the room. When he saw the open window he said, “Gianelli, you take a look downstairs. He could have pitched whatever it was out the window. And check to see if all the street exits to this building are guarded like I ordered. This guy has a nasty habit of vanishing. But this time I’m going to make it really hard for him.”

  He faced Diavolo again. “Be reasonable, won’t you? Hagenbaugh was alive when you walked in here. Even if you didn’t kill him you’d have to know what hap—”

  Don shook his head. “But he wasn’t alive when I came in.”

  “Yeah? The secretary, Miss Skinner, heard him speak to you on the interoffice communicator.”

  Don groaned. “I’ve been waiting for that. That’s what Blondie thinks she heard, but it was me doing an impromptu imitation of Hagenbaugh. I clicked the switch of the communicator and then immediately snapped it off again, keeping my hand over it so she wouldn’t notice. I pretended to ask R.J. if I could come in and then threw out a little ventriloquism that made her think he was answering.” Somewhat ruefully Diavolo added: “Maybe I should be more careful where I throw my voice. I seem to have talked a little too much this time.”

  “I wish to heaven,” Church implored, “that you’d try saying something that makes sense. Ventriloquism! Applesauce! You’d better start practicing to throw your voice at the foreman of the jury when he comes in with the verdict. Then what?”

  “Well,” Diavolo continued, “I got to the door and I found it locked. And just then someone on the inside unlocked it!”

  “I thought you said Hagenbaugh was dead,” Church caught him up.

  “I did. Hagenbaugh didn’t unlock the door. He was sitting at his desk right where he is now and looking just like that. I got one good look at him when someone, waiting behind the door, knocked me out — cold.”

  This was too much. The Inspector rumbled like a volcano.

  “Maybe you didn’t know,” he barked, “that Miss Skinner says no one came out of this office here after you went in. What do you have to say to that?”

  “Nothing.” Diavolo’s eyes moved toward the window speculatively. “All I can tell you is that when I came to again you were pounding on the door.”

  “Are you actually denying that you jammed that chair under the doorknob?”

  The magician nodded. “I am. The guy who conked me must have put it there before he left.”

  “Before he … before he …” Church gave Diavolo a sharp look. “Oh, I get it,” he said. “Are you handing me this fairy tale so your lawyer can go to work on an insanity defense?”

  “You asked me what happened,” Don replied. “I’m telling you. I warned you you weren’t going to like it. Remember?” Gingerly Don felt the back of his head. There was a sore spot there and a swelling bump. He showed it to Church. “That’s evidence, isn’t it?”

  The Inspector nodded. “Yeah. Evidence of a crack on the head. But how do I know when you got it? And even if you produce witnesses to swear you didn’t have it when you came in here, how do I know you didn’t do it yourself so this fantastic vanishing man story would look plausible? That’s just the sort of trick I’d expect from you.”

  Diavolo protested. “Be reasonable, Inspector. If I had killed Hagenbaugh, do you think I would let you find me and the body together in a locked room? Don’t you think I’d be all set with a lot stronger alibi than a self-inflicted bump on the head?”

  “Yes, you probably intended to have one. But you had bad luck. For once your sleight-of-hand slipped. I got here too soon. You hadn’t counted on that. So you whacked yourself on the head while we were trying to get in at that door. And now you hand out a yarn about someone else being in this room. You didn’t have time to work out anything any fancier. This time I’ve got you where I want you.”

  “I suppose you have,” Don Diavolo admitted. “Provided you can twist all the evidence to fit the answer you’re set on having. But just the same, believe it or not, there was someone else in this room. Someone who isn’t here now.”

  Don rubbed his chin thoughtfully and eyed the open window.

  Church was puzzled. Usually Don Diavolo threw such nice neat pretty answers at his questions. This time they didn’t even limp; they were all stretcher cases. Church didn’t understand it all; but he was beginning to suspect that Diavolo had a fast one up his sleeve. Don, on the other hand, was only wishing that
he did have.

  “Well,” Church said. “You and your lawyers are going to have to explain how this Mr. Mystery left this room if you want anyone to believe that wild yarn. And don’t you as much as hint that this room is haunted. I won’t have it.”

  “We’d better start investigating that open window then,” the magician said slowly. “From where I am that looks like the only exit. If the murderer was prepared with a length of rope—”

  Church looked at Brophy. “Hold your hat, Lieutenant. Here we go again. He wants us to believe it’s acrobats again.… Sergeant Maurer. Find out who’s in the offices above and below this one. Ask them politely if they noticed anyone climbing in their windows lately. And bring me back witnesses that say no. I’m not leaving any loopholes this guy’s lawyer can wriggle through — not if I know it.”

  “Have him try that window across the way, too,” Don suggested. “The face of the building outside makes a right turn. Thirty feet of wire strung across the angle could reach it and a good tight-wire walker—”

  “Okay, Maurer.” The Inspector’s nose wiggled as if it had been hit with a bad smell. “That one too.” He gave Diavolo a sour look. “Maybe he should ask if anybody’s seen a murder floating by in a parachute?”

  From the anteroom outside a detective’s voice came saying, “Hey, not so fast, lady! You’re staying.”

  An indignant feminine voice replied, “Take your hands off me! I—I—this seems to be the wrong office.”

  Inspector Church hurried to the communicating door. “What is it, Branner?”

  “This dame,” the latter said. “She came in from the hall. When she saw cops she turns tail and tries to lam. I grabbed her. I thought maybe you’d better—”

  Church looked at her. “What’s your name?” he asked.

  The catch Branner had made was a nice one, five feet of dark Spanish beauty — and dynamite. Her eyes, from behind the lacy veil of her smart hat, were round and frightened, but they flashed fire just the same. And she made no answer to the Inspector’s question.

  Church turned to Miss Skinner who sat at her desk twisting a small handkerchief with nervous fingers. “Who is she, do you know?”

  Blondie nodded, staring at the woman, “Yes. She … She …” The secretary seemed to have trouble talking under the dirty look that Branner’s prisoner was throwing her way. “Her husband works on the Hagenbaugh-Powers show. She is Mrs. Juan Belmonte.”

  “Belmonte.” Church repeated, a dim memory stirring somewhere within him. “What does he do?”

  The Inspector should never have asked that.

  Miss Skinner’s answer crackled with a high voltage charge. “He’s a tightwire walker.”

  3 The Invisible Man case to which the Inspector referred, that curiously inexplicable affair that concerned the murder at Headquarters, the Siva statue, and the Queen’s necklace, has previously been published in these columns under the title: Death From Thin Air.

  CHAPTER V

  Ways of Departure

  CONSIDERING what he had been through already the Inspector took that one on the chin remarkably well. He merely glared at Don Diavolo; then growled, “Keep both eyes on him, Brophy,” and went out into the anteroom. He did, however, give the door a good hearty slam as he went.

  Diavolo moved forward, hands in his pockets toward the window.

  Brophy said, “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “Do you have to yell at me too?” Don asked him. “Don’t worry. I’m not going far, not out this window at any rate.” Don stooped and from the floor just behind the corner of the screen, picked up an object that he would not have expected to find in a busy executive’s office.

  It was a large damp sponge. “I wonder,” he said aloud, “what that would be doing here?”

  Brophy was touchy. “Put it down,” he ordered brusquely. “Don’t handle things. Maybe the guy you say bopped you took a bath here.” He nodded at the dampness on the carpet and the bare footprint. “That looks like it.”

  “Then he hit me with the bathtub which he took with him when he left? Or maybe he was a snowman and he vanished by melting. Brophy, I don’t like this much. I still don’t see how …” Don’s voice trailed off as a thought hit him.

  Brophy said, “The Inspector don’t like it either. If I was you I’d get a better story than the one you got. A murderer nobody saw socks you on the skull, and then does a tight-wire walking act out the window twenty stories up, leaving you to take the rap. Well, it ain’t so hot.”

  “Maybe he’s a smart murderer,” Don said thoughtfully. “Leaving the scene of the crime by a method no one is going to believe, is a clever dodge.”

  The lieutenant shook his head. “I heard you say once that the best tricks were the simplest ones. The simplest solution to this murder isn’t an acrobat. It’s you!”

  “There’s one rule about jigsaw puzzles you should remember, Lieutenant,” Diavolo answered. “Don’t try to put them together until you’re sure you’ve got all the pieces. I’ve got a hunch that—”

  Inspector Church blew into the room again, followed by a rabbity little man with a droopy mustache, a quiet confident air, and a small black bag.

  “There’s the body, Doc,” Church said. “Find out what the hell killed him as soon as you can.”

  Doctor Pepper put his bag down, pushed his hat back on his head and went to work.

  Church turned to Don. “Miss Skinner says that Belmonte’s wife has been playing games with Hagenbaugh. That gives Belmonte a motive. You knew that all the time, didn’t you? That’s why you’re trying to make me think a tight-wire walker might’ve gotten out of here by that—” He turned suddenly. “What’s that, Pepper?”

  The doctor, bending over the body, repeated himself, “I said I was surprised this hadn’t happened long ago.”

  “Surprised what hadn’t happened?”

  “Hagenbaugh getting killed.” Pepper said. “I’ve been looking forward to doing an autopsy on him. Knew I’d get to some day.”

  Church stared at the man. “What do you know about Hagenbaugh?”

  “Patient of mine once. When I had a private practice before I went to work for the city. He was a first-class candidate for murder. Shouldn’t wonder if half the people he knew wouldn’t have liked to knock him off. Do we have to find out who did it?”

  “You’re a fat lot of help!” Church growled. “What killed him?”

  “I don’t know yet. If there were any marks to show he’d been strangled, I’d say asphyxiation, but there aren’t. When can I have him?”

  Church turned to Brophy. “Where’s that photographer? We haven’t gotten any pictures yet. Get him.”

  Don Diavolo ventured a question. “Any idea what made those scratches on his face, Doc?”

  Pepper glanced at Church and jerked a thumb toward Don. “Who’s he?”

  “Oh,” Church said, “that’s just the killer. Don’t pay any attention to him.”

  “I see,” Pepper replied. “Good question though. You find any gadget that might have made marks like these?”

  “Not yet,” Church answered. “We’re looking. I put a man on it downstairs. He probably fired it out the window.”

  “Hmm,” Pepper murmured. “Yes, maybe. Five nice neat parallel scratches. Not too deep, not a lot of blood. New one on me.” He cocked an eye at Diavolo. “I never saw a wound quite like this before. Did you?”

  Don said, “Yes, I think I have.”

  The Inspector scowled at him, not liking what he was going to say before he said it. Pepper looked interested. “Where?” the latter asked.

  “Sarasota, Florida,” Don replied. “Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey winter quarters. Animal trainer working a cage of cats. A leopard made a pass at him. The wound looked a lot like that one.”

  Pepper was scowling now too. “Didn’t kill him, did it?”

  “No.”

  “Hmm,” Pepper said. “Hagenbaugh’s dead though.”

  Church growled. “Dia
volo, I’ve had more than enough of your pipe dreams. You’ll be telling me next that leopards can walk tight ropes too.”

  “They are the most difficult and dangerous animals to train,” Don replied. “But I wouldn’t say it couldn’t be done. Had you noticed that?” He pointed to a framed photograph on the wall behind Hagenbaugh’s desk. It showed a trainer in his cage standing beneath a taut heavy cable. Above him a lion snarled and gingerly felt his way across the slender strand.

  Then, before the Inspector had time to erupt again, Diavolo said quickly, “One thing I’d like to know, Inspector. It might prove interesting. Miss Skinner, when I arrived, said that R.J. was in conference. I thought then that it was just the usual soft soap. Now I’m not so sure. Would you mind asking her — or have you?”

  The Inspector considered that a moment wondering what the catch was. Then he said, “The condemned man gets what he wants for his last meal. Sure. I’ll ask her.” He turned and opened the door. “Miss Skinner. What was your employer so busy at when Diavolo barged in? He says you told him Hagenbaugh was in conference.”

  Miss Skinner’s voice was thin and shaky. Little of the confidence she had used on Diavolo remained. “Mr. Hagenbaugh” she answered, “was interviewing Toro Zalini.”

  “He was what?” Inspector Church acted as if he had stepped on a high voltage wire, or a live cobra — or both. “Why didn’t you say so before? When did he leave? You said no one came out of this office after Diavolo.”

  “Leave?” Miss Skinner’s voice overflowed with pure astonishment. “Leave? He didn’t leave! Isn’t he there now?”

  The homicide squad’s awaited photographer came in from the corridor just then and moved toward Hagenbaugh’s office. He noted the thunderstruck look that covered Inspector Church’s face like a mudpack.