Classic American Crime Fiction of the 1920s

by Leslie S. Klinger

  “Well, what about them?” challenged Ellery. “We certainly can draw no definite conclusions from either their conversation or their actions. We have Parson Johnny, a thug, who was there apparently for no other reason than to enjoy a play giving some interesting sidelights on his own profession. Then there is Madge O’Connell, a very doubtful character about whom we can make no decision at this stage of the game. She might be an accomplice—she might be innocent—she might be merely negligent—she might be almost anything. Then there is William Pusak, who found Field. Did you notice the moronic cast of his head? And Benjamin Morgan—here we strike fallow ground in the realm of probability. But what do we know of his actions to-night? True, his story of the letter and the complimentary ticket sounds queer, since any one could have written the letter, even Morgan himself. And we must always remember the public threat against Field; and also the enmity, reason unknown, which has existed between them for two years. And, lastly, we have Miss Frances Ives-Pope. I’m exceedingly sorry I was absent during that interview. The fact remains—and isn’t it an interesting one?—that her evening bag was found in the dead man’s pocket. Explain that if you can.

  “So you see where we are,” Ellery continued ruefully. “All we have managed to derive from this evening’s entertainment is a plethora of suspicions and a poverty of facts.”

  “So far, son,” said Queen casually, “you have kept on mighty safe ground. But you’ve forgotten the important matter of the suspiciously vacant seats. Also the rather startling fact that Field’s ticket-stub and the only other stub that could be attributed to the murderer—I refer to the LL30 Left stub found by Flint—that these two stubs do not coincide. That is to say, that the torn edges indicate they were gathered by the ticket-taker at different times!”

  “Check,” said Ellery. “But let’s leave that for the moment and get on to the problem of Field’s tophat.”

  “The hat—well, what do you think of it?” asked Queen curiously.

  “Just this. In the first place, we have fairly established the fact that the hat is not missing through accident. The murdered man was seen by Jess Lynch with the hat in his lap ten minutes after Act II began. Since it is now missing, the only reasonable theory that would explain its absence is that the murderer took it away with him. Now—for the moment, let’s forget the problem of where the hat is now. The immediate conclusion to draw is that the hat was taken away for one of two reasons: first, that it was in some way incriminating in itself, so that if it were left behind it would point to the murderer’s identity. What the nature of this incriminating indication is we cannot even guess at the moment. Second, the hat may have contained something which the murderer wanted. You will say: Why couldn’t he take this mysterious object and leave the hat? Probably, if this supposition is true, because he either had not sufficient time to extract it, or else did not know how to extract it and therefore took the hat away with him to examine it at his leisure. Do you agree with me so far?”

  The District Attorney nodded slowly. Queen sat still, his eyes vaguely troubled.

  “Let us for a moment consider what the hat could possibly have contained,” resumed Ellery, as he vigorously polished his glasses. “Due to its size, shape and cubic content our field of speculation is not a broad one. What could be hidden in a tophat? The only things that present themselves to my mind are: papers of some sort, jewelry, banknotes, or any other small object of value which could not easily be detected in such a place. Obviously, this problematical object would not be carried merely in the crown of the hat since it would fall out whenever the wearer uncovered his head. We are led to believe therefore that, whatever the object was, it was concealed in the lining of the hat. This immediately narrows our list of possibilities. Solid objects of bulk must be eliminated. A jewel might have been concealed; banknotes or papers might have been concealed. We can, I think, discard the jewel, from what we know of Monte Field. If he was carrying anything of value, it would probably be connected in some way with his profession.

  “One point remains to be considered in this preliminary analysis of the missing tophat. And, gentlemen, it may very well become a pivotal consideration before we are through.—It is of paramount importance for us to know whether the murderer knew in advance of his crime that it would be necessary for him to take away Monte Field’s tophat. In other words, did the murderer have foreknowledge of the hat’s significance, whatever it may prove to be? I maintain that the facts prove deductively, as logically as facts can prove deductively, that the murderer had no foreknowledge.

  “Follow me closely . . . Since Monte Field’s tophat is missing, and since no other tophat has been found in its place, it is an undeniable indication that it was essential that it be taken away. You must agree that, as I pointed out before, the murderer is most plausibly the remover of the hat. Now! Regardless of why it had to be taken away, we are faced with two alternatives: one, that the murderer knew in advance that it had to be taken away; or two, that he did not know in advance. Let us exhaust the possibilities in the former case. If he knew in advance, it may be surely and logically assumed that he would have brought with him to the theatre a hat to replace Field’s, rather than leave an obvious clue by the provocative absence of the murdered man’s hat. To bring a replacement hat would have been the safe thing to do. The murderer would have had no difficulty in securing a replacement hat, since knowing its importance in advance, he could certainly have armed himself with a further knowledge of Field’s head-size, style of tophat, and other minor details. But there is no replacement hat. We have every right to expect a replacement hat in a crime so carefully concocted as this one. There being none, our only conclusion can be that the murderer did not know beforehand the importance of Field’s hat; otherwise he would assuredly have taken the intelligent precaution of leaving another hat behind. In this way the police would never know that Field’s hat had any significance at all.

  “Another point in corroboration. Even if the murderer didn’t desire, for some dark reason of his own, to leave a replacement hat, he certainly would have arranged to secure what was in the hat by cutting it out. All he had to do was to provide himself in advance with a sharp instrument—a pocket-knife, for example. The empty hat, though cut, would not have presented the problem of disposal that the missing hat would. Surely the murderer would have preferred this procedure, had he foreknowledge of the hat’s contents. But he did not do even this. This, it seems to me, is strong corroborative evidence that he did not know before he came to the Roman Theatre that he would have to take away a hat or its contents. Quod erat demonstrandum.”50

  The District Attorney gazed at Ellery with puckered lips. Inspector Queen seemed sunk in a lethargy. His hand hovered midway between his snuff-box and his nose.

  “Just what’s the point, Ellery?” inquired Sampson. “Why is it important for you to know that the murderer had no foreknowledge of the hat’s significance?”

  Ellery smiled. “Merely this. The crime was committed after the beginning of the second act. I want to be sure in my own mind that the murderer, by not knowing in advance of the hat’s significance, could not have used the first intermission in any manner whatsoever as an essential element of his plan. . . . Of course, Field’s hat may turn up somewhere on the premises, and its discovery would invalidate all these speculations. But—I don’t think it will. . . .”

  “That analysis of yours might be elementary, boy, but it sounds quite logical to me,” said Sampson approvingly. “You should have been a lawyer.”

  “You can’t beat the Queen brains,” chuckled the old man suddenly, his face wreathed in a wide smile. “But I’m going to get busy on another tack that ought to jibe somewhere with this puzzle of the hat. You noticed, Ellery, the name of the clothier sewed into Field’s coat?”

  “No sooner said than done,” grinned Ellery. Producing one of the small volumes which he carried in his topcoat pocket, he opened it and pointed to a notation on the fly-leaf. “Browne Bros.,51 gentlemen
—no less.”

  “That’s right; and I’ll have Velie down there in the morning to check up,” said the Inspector. “You must have realized that Field’s clothing is of exceptional quality. That evening-suit cost three hundred dollars,52 if it cost a penny. And Browne Bros. are the artists to charge such fashionable prices. But there’s another point in this connection: every stitch of clothing on the dead man’s body had the same manufacturer’s mark. That’s not uncommon with wealthy men; and Browne’s made a specialty of outfitting their customers from head to foot. What more probable to assume—”

  “Than that Field bought his hats there, too!” exclaimed Sampson, with an air of discovery.

  “Exactly, Tacitus,”53 said Queen, grinning. “Velie’s job is to check up on this clothing business and if possible secure an exact duplicate of the hat Field wore to-night. I’m mighty anxious to look it over.”

  Sampson rose with a cough. “I suppose I really ought to get back to bed,” he said. “The only reason I came down here was to see that you didn’t arrest the Mayor. Boy, that friend of mine was sore! I’ll never hear the end of it!”

  Queen looked up at him with a quizzical smile. “Before you go, Henry, suppose you tell me just where I stand on this thing. I know that I used a pretty high hand to-night, but you must realize how necessary it was. Are you going to put one of your own men on the case?”

  Sampson glared at him. “When did you get the idea I wasn’t satisfied with your conduct of the investigation, you old canary bird!” he growled. “I’ve never checked you up yet, and I’m not going to start now. If you can’t bring this thing to a successful conclusion, I certainly don’t think any of my men can. My dear Q, go ahead and detain half of New York if you think it’s necessary. I’ll back you up.”

  “Thanks, Henry,” said Queen. “I just wanted to be sure. And now, since you’re so nice about it, watch my smoke!”

  He ambled across the room into the anteroom, stuck his head past the doorway into the theatre, and shouted, “Mr. Panzer, will you come here a moment?”

  He came back smiling grimly to himself, the swarthy theatre-manager close on his heels.

  “Mr. Panzer, meet District Attorney Sampson,” said Queen. The two men shook hands. “Now, Mr. Panzer, you’ve got one more job and you can go home and go to sleep. I want this theatre shut down so tight a mouse couldn’t get into it!”

  Panzer grew pale. Sampson shrugged his shoulders, as if to indicate that he washed his hands of the entire affair. Ellery nodded sagely in approval.

  “But—but Inspector, just when we’re playing to capacity!” groaned the little manager. “Is it absolutely necessary?”

  “So necessary, my dear man,” answered the Inspector coolly, “that I’m going to have two men here patrolling the premises all the time.”

  Panzer wrung his hands, looking furtively at Sampson. But the District Attorney was standing with his back to them, examining a print on the wall.

  “This is terrible, Inspector!” wailed Panzer. “I’ll never hear the end of it from Gordon Davis, the producer. . . . But of course—if you say so, it will be done.”

  “Heck, man, don’t look so blue,” said Queen, more kindly. “You’ll be getting so much publicity out of this that when the show reopens you’ll have to enlarge the theatre. I don’t expect to have the theatre shut down more than a few days, anyway. I’ll give the necessary orders to my men outside. After you’ve transacted your routine business here to-night, just tip off the men I’ve left and go home. I’ll let you know in a few days when you can reopen.”

  Panzer waggled his head sadly, shook hands all around and left. Sampson immediately whirled on Queen and said, “By the Lord Harry, Q, that’s going some! Why do you want the theatre closed? You’ve milked it dry, haven’t you?”

  “Well, Henry,” said Queen slowly, “the hat hasn’t been found. All those people filed out of the theatre and were searched—and each one had just one hat. Doesn’t that indicate that the hat we’re looking for is still here somewhere? And if it’s still here, I’m not giving anybody a chance to come in and take it away. If there’s any taking to be done, I’ll do it.”

  Sampson nodded. Ellery was still wearing a worried frown as the three men walked out of the office into the almost deserted orchestra. Here and there a busy figure was stooping over a seat, examining the floor. A few men could be seen darting in and out of the boxes up front. Sergeant Velie stood by the main door, talking in low tones to Piggott and Hagstrom. Detective Flint, superintending a squad of men, was working far to the front of the orchestra. A small group of cleaning-women operated vacuum cleaners tiredly here and there. In one corner, to the rear, a buxom police matron was talking with an elderly woman—the woman Panzer had called Mrs. Phillips.

  The three men walked to the main door. While Ellery and Sampson were silently surveying the always depressing scene of an untenanted auditorium, Queen spoke rapidly to Velie, giving orders in an undertone. Finally he turned and said, “Well, gentlemen, that’s all for to-night. Let’s be going.” On the sidewalk a number of policemen had roped off a large space, behind which a straggling crowd of curiosity-seekers was gaping.

  “Even at two o’clock in the morning these night-birds patrol Broadway,” grunted Sampson. With a wave of the hand he entered his automobile after the Queens politely refused his offer of a “lift.” A crowd of businesslike reporters pushed through the lines and surrounded the two Queens.

  “Here, here! What’s this, gentlemen?” asked the old man, frowning.

  “How about the low-down on to-night’s job, Inspector?” asked one of them urgently.

  “You’ll get all the information you want, boys, from Detective-Sergeant Velie—inside.” He smiled as they charged in a body through the glass doors.

  Ellery and Richard Queen stood silently on the curb, watching the policemen herd back the crowd. Then the old man said with a sudden wave of weariness, “Come on, son, let’s walk part of the way home.”

  49.Gardien de la Paix means literally guardian of the peace, the term is applied to the common French policeman, so Ellery is jestingly calling his father “Mr. Policeman.”

  50.“Thus, the thing has been demonstrated.”

  51.Another fictitious vendor.

  52.In 2017 commodity values, this is over $4,200.

  53.Tacitus was a Roman senator and one of Rome’s greatest historians—an odd nickname for the District Attorney.

  PART TWO

  “. . . To illustrate: Once young Jean C— came to me after a month of diligent investigation on a difficult assignment. He wore a forlorn expression. Without a word he handed me a slip of official paper. I read it in surprise. It was his resignation.

  “‘Here, Jean!’ I cried. ‘What is the meaning of this?’

  “‘I have failed, M. Brillon,’ he muttered. ‘A month’s work gone to the devil. I have been on the wrong track. It is a disgrace.’

  “‘Jean, my friend,’ said I solemnly, ‘this for your resignation.’ Wherewith I tore it to bits before his astonished eyes. ‘Go now,’ I admonished him, ‘and begin from the beginning. For remember always the maxim: He who would know right must first know wrong!’”

  —From Reminiscences of a Prefect

  by Auguste Brillon.

  CHAPTER VIII

  In Which the Queens Meet Mr. Field’s Very Best Friend

  The Queens’ apartment on West 87th Street was a man’s domicile from the pipe-rack over the hearth to the shining sabers on the wall. They lived on the top floor of a three-family brownstone house, a relic of late Victorian times. You walked up the heavily-carpeted stairs through seemingly endless halls of dismal rectitude. When you were quite convinced that only mummified souls could inhabit such a dreary place, you came upon the huge oaken door marked, “The Queens”—a motto lettered neatly and framed. Then Djuna grinned at you from behind a crack and you entered a new world.

  More than one individual, exalted in his own little niche, had willingly climbed
the uninviting staircases to find sanctuary in this haven. More than one card bearing a famous name had been blithely carried by Djuna through the foyer into the living-room.

  The foyer was Ellery’s inspiration, if the truth were told. It was so small and so narrow that its walls appeared unnaturally towering. With a humorous severity one wall had been completely covered by a tapestry depicting the chase—a most appropriate appurtenance to this medieval chamber. Both Queens detested it heartily, preserving it only because it had been presented to them with regal gratitude by the Duke of—, the impulsive gentleman whose son Richard Queen had saved from a noisome scandal, the details of which have never been made public. Beneath the tapestry stood a heavy mission table, displaying a parchment lamp and a pair of bronze book-ends bounding a three-volume set of the Arabian Nights’ Entertainment.

  Two mission chairs and a small rug completed the foyer. When you walked through this oppressive place, always gloomy and almost always hideous, you were ready for anything except the perfect cheeriness of the large room beyond. This study in contrast was Ellery’s private jest, for if it were not for him the old man would long since have thrown the foyer and its furnishings into some dark limbo.

  The living-room was lined on three sides with a bristling and leathern-reeking series of bookcases, rising tier upon tier to the high ceiling. On the fourth wall was a huge natural fireplace, with a solid oak beam as a mantel and gleaming iron-work spacing the grate. Above the fireplace were the famous crossed sabers, a gift from the old fencing-master of Nuremberg with whom Richard had lived in his younger days during his studies in Germany. Lamps winked and gleamed all over the great sprawling room; easy-chairs, armchairs, low divans, foot-stools, bright-colored leather cushions, were everywhere. In a word, it was the most comfortable room two intellectual gentlemen of luxurious tastes could devise for their living-quarters. And where such a place might after a time have become stale through sheer variety, the bustling person of Djuna, man-of-work, general factotum, errand boy, valet and mascot prevented such a dénouement.