The Norths Meet Murder (19 page)

“Right,” Weigand said, since the essential time was covered and his interest in the rest of the afternoon was negligible. “I think you've covered it.
You
have an admirable memory, Mr. Edwards.”

Edwards nodded and smiled, indicating that he thought so himself. And was there anything else? He was anxious to assist in any way possible. Weigand thought a moment. There didn't seem to be—oh, yes. It was, perhaps, a rather delicate thing to ask, but Mr. Edwards would understand that the police could not be too definite.

“Berex,” he said, “and Mrs. Brent. Have you heard them mentioned together? Someone has hinted that they were—well, friends.”

Edwards' expression became judicially reluctant and he shook his head a little wryly. One was to understand that such matters pained him very much.

“I fear,” he said, “that I have already been indiscreet in mentioning the friendship between Brent and Mrs. Fuller. I had hoped—it all puts me, as you will understand, in a rather difficult position. I am greatly afraid, my dear Lieutenant, that I would much rather, shall we say, not answer this last question. I would not like to play the part of, if I may use the term, a male gossip. You will understand? Particularly in view of my relationship with Louis.”

He did understand, Weigand decided. He was, he thought, intended to understand. Mr. Edwards' conversation was full of things which Mr. Edwards, being a gentleman, could not say. Mr. Edwards dripped discretion—and implications. Weigand half smiled his recognition of reticence and got up to go.

Edwards half rose from his chair, and, with grave gestures, assisted the detective to discover the door. Lieutenant Weigand discovered it. He returned to Headquarters.

At Headquarters several things awaited his notice, including Mullins, who had nothing very helpful to report about alibis. He had found both Fuller and Mrs. Fuller, who was quite a dame.

“Right,” said Weigand.

Fuller had been, Fuller supposed, on his way home from his office at the time of Barnes' death, but he knew of no way of proving it. He had come downtown on the Interborough West Side line, more convenient for his purposes than the Independent System's Eighth Avenue, and had, as a result, seen nothing of the excitement at the Fourth Street station. He had got in a little before Weigand had called to see him. Mrs. Fuller had been having her hair done at Saks and could, Mullins guessed, be accounted for if it became necessary. He hadn't checked at Saks, but could, if desired. Berex had been, again, alone in his office working on drawings, and nobody could prove it. Edwards, the laundryman, had been out delivering the wash to customers in the neighborhood, and had seen the police cars and ambulances outside the station. He had continued to deliver the wash.

“Was it my business?” he had asked Mullins.

“I said I hoped not, for his sake,” Mullins said, with the air of one who has committed a quip too good to waste.

Mrs. Brent had been out when Mullins called.

“Yes, I know about that,” Weigand interrupted and Mullins said, “O.K., Loot.”

Mullins had talked to Mrs. Brent's maid, who had told him Mrs. Brent was alone in her room with the door closed all that afternoon and evening. “Grieving,” the maid had told Mullins, who passed the word on without any conviction of his own.

“So it could have been anybody, except maybe Mrs. Fuller,” Weigand summed up.

Mullins thought that was about it. Weigand said, “Well—” and turned his attention to other things. The report of the fingerprint men who had gone over the room at 95 Greenwich Place had come through. They had found a lot of prints, several of both Norths and a great many more, unidentified, but presumably of the past tenants of the apartment. There were also various smudges, including several on the knobs of the outer and bathroom doors. “Gloves,” said Mullins. Weigand thought he was probably right. There were no prints of any of the persons who could be catalogued as suspects.

“Nobody that's in the records,” Mullins said, glumly. “It's—”

Weigand said yes, he knew.

There was a report that Western Union had sent no messenger to 95 Greenwich Place on Monday, and carried on no search for a Mr. Shavely. So that theory was confirmed. There were reports from two detectives who were familiar with, and had acquaintances in, the financial district. They had tuned their ears to gossip, but heard little. Edwards' firm was substantial and sound, so far as gossip knew.

Gossip had a little more to say about Benjamin Fuller's importing house. The Fuller firm had had considerable dealings with Germany and the animosity to Hitlerism, translated by thousands into a boycott, had been a fairly damaging blow. But everybody, quite openly, was certain that the Fuller firm could take even harder blows, if it had to, and beat the count.

It had been difficult, for a time, to come on trace of Louis Berex as an inventor, but digging had done it. In a small circle he was well enough known; his contribution to the development of cabled and wireless pictures had been small, but important. He was generally believed, now, to be working on television, and making progress. One or two were pretty sure he was on to something. It was possible, some thought, that he might be short of funds to carry on his research, since he stubbornly refused to tie up with one of the several companies which would have been glad to provide him with equipment and a salary—in exchange, of course, for a majority interest in anything he discovered. He had made reasonable money from one or two inventions, but might very well have sunk it all in his work on television. Everybody thought he was able and nobody had anything against him. And the detectives, necessarily getting what they could in a hurry, had found nobody who could profess to being a close friend of Berex's.

Weigand had got so far when the telephone rang, and a report came through from one of the detectives who had been trying to find Brent's clothes. It was a conclusive report; Brent's clothes had been found.

They had turned up at the offices of the Dime-a-lock Company, which had its public lockers scattered on subway platforms, in the railway stations and ferry buildings and wherever some burdened person might come upon them and for ten cents relieve himself of his burden. Anyone with a parcel to dispose of, temporarily, could do it in any of the lockers for a dime, which opened a steel lock-box, and released a key which the checker could take along. If he came back within twenty-four hours, his key would open the box again and make his parcel available.

But if he did not come within twenty-four hours, the Dime-a-lock Company would remove his parcel itself, and, in a manner of speaking, reset the trap. The parcel would then go to the company's office, where it would remain for fifty days, pending a claim. If no claim was made, the contents of the parcel would be sold to cover storage. The offices of the company were one of the first places the police visited when looking for stray, portable objects.

They had found Brent's clothing there, after a little search through parcels which had overstayed their welcome in lock-boxes. The clothes were in a cheap, brown suitcase and had been easy to identify because Brent's name was in the inner pocket of the suit jacket, where Brent's tailor had put it. It was a good suit, fairly new and such as a prosperous lawyer might wear; the other garments were of suitable quality. And it, was, when the clothes had been brought in and Weigand had examined them, a little hard to tell where the clothes helped them to get. They would, neatly labeled as they were, have been useful in establishing identity, but identity had already been established.

Brent's wallet was gone, assuming he had had one, but his keys, watch and loose change remained. A silver cigarette-case, half-full of cigarettes, remained also. Everything Brent would have been likely to have in his clothes remained, Weigand realized, except things that would burn. Or, of course, bills, which wouldn't need burning.

It would be nice, Weigand thought, if the murderer had left fingerprints on the suitcase, or on the cigarette-case, or anywhere. That would be fine, but it wasn't likely. Without them the find seemed to lead them back to Brent, where they had been already, and not much forward toward Brent's murderer. Weigand sighed and directed that case and clothes be' sent to Brooklyn and the Research Bureau. He was keeping a lot of the boys busy, anyway.

Weigand went in to see Inspector O'Malley. He told O'Malley where he was, and promised a full report. O'Malley nodded and made impatient sounds and said it looked to him as if Weigand certainly had enough stuff. Weigand said the trouble really was that he had too much. O'Malley said, “Well, get on with it. Crack it open.” O'Malley seemed to be giving the matter only about half his mind.

“Listen, Bill,” he said, unbending suddenly, “what do you hear about this racket investigation of the D.A.'s? What do you hear, huh?”

Weigand said he hadn't heard anything. O'Malley sighed, and said the hell of it was you couldn't tell where the so-and-so's might decide to go next. “Under his hat,” O'Malley said, angrily. “That's where he keeps it. The so-and-so.”

Weigand expressed such sympathy as becomes a lieutenant who is confronted by the woes of an inspector, and then went quietly out, leaving the inspector to his grief. He wondered if the D.A. was threatening to get something on O'Malley, and hoped not. O'Malley was all right, in his way; an honest cop, within reason.

Weigand got back to his desk just as the telephone started ringing. He said, “Hello,” and the telephone assured him, with uncharacteristic clarity, that this was Pam North.

“I'm into something,” Mrs. North said.

“Huh?” said Weigand. “I mean—what?”

“
On
to,” Mrs. North corrected herself. “Can you come up?”

“Well—” Weigand said. “Is it important?”

“Well,” said Mrs. North, “sort of, I think. And bacardis, anyway. Jerry and I think maybe it's important.”

Weigand said he would try to make it.

“Or martinis if you'd rather,” Mrs. North said.

Weigand said he was pretty sure he could make it.

14

T
HURSDAY

4:30
P.M.
TO
5:30
P.M.

Weigand made it, and sat comfortably before the little fire in the Norths' living-room. It had turned enough cooler to make the fire just possible.

“If you open all the windows,” Mrs. North said. “So we did. And we left that chair so you could sit by it.”

“Both,” Mr. North said, “being roasted ourselves.”

Weigand said it was nice of them. And what—?

“He's going to make cocktails,” Mrs. North said. “You can have martinis, though.”

Mr. North went out to the kitchen, and made several trips back with his hands full of bottles, shakers, ice containers and lime-juice.

“Why not there?” Mrs. North said.

“Martha,” Mr. North said. “We bumped.”

He dumped the ice from the container into a canvas bag, picked up a short wooden mallet and, laying the bag on the hearth, began to beat it. Weigand watched him idly. Then Weigand stiffened suddenly, and stared. Mrs. North watched him and Mr. North looked up.

“Well,” said Weigand, “I'll be damned!”

Mr. North nodded and Mrs. North said she had thought he would. Mr. North waved the ice mallet and then handed it to Weigand, who balanced it in his hand.

“Right?” said Mr. North.

Weigand nodded, slowly. Then he looked at the Norths with a new expression, and Mrs. North gave a little gasp.

“Oh,” she said. “I never thought! Of course he would.”

Mr. North nodded and said it was inevitable.

“Only,” Mr. North said, “we still didn't. Weapon or no, we didn't. And I was in Central Park. But it could have been a mallet like this, couldn't it? Not necessarily a croquet-mallet? We thought so, but we wanted to see what you thought. It's heavy enough?”

“Quite,” Weigand said. “Quite heavy enough. If you didn't know.”

The Norths looked at each other, and Mr. North stood up.

“Listen, Weigand,” he said. “It's up to you. You're a cop. We've understood that all along. If you suspect either of us, we'll go along on that basis, and you can prove and be damned. If you've any doubts—”

Mr. North's voice had a timbre which Weigand had not expected to hear in it. He stood up, too, and then Mrs. North stood up. The moment stiffened, and both the Norths waited for Weigand. Mrs. North's expression was expectant, waiting, and Weigand looked slowly at her, and steadily. She stood very erect and slim and challenging. Weigand turned from her and looked at Mr. North, whose expression waited, too. There was hardness in Mr. North's gaze, when it met the detective's. Weigand, all at once, felt rather silly.

“Hell,” Weigand said, rather helplessly. He hesitated a moment and said: “Right.” It didn't mean much of anything, as he said it. Then he noticed that a smile was beginning on Mrs. North's lips.

“Oh,” Weigand said, “all right. Take it as said. I don't—that is,
I
don't. The cop—well, we'll skip the cop, for a while. Right?”

He looked at Mr. North.

“Right, North?” he said.

Mr. North looked at him a moment.

“Well,” Mr. North said, “do you want a drink? Or don't you?”

“Sure,” Weigand said. They both sat down, and Mr. North took back the mallet, which Weigand had been holding, and returned to pounding ice. Then he mixed the drinks, while nobody said anything. He poured a martini for Weigand, and bacardis for Mrs. North and himself. He was, he thought, probably making an issue, but it was an issue curiously hard to break.

“Well,” he said, and lifted the glass. He waited for Mrs. North to lift hers, and then both waited for Weigand. Weigand picked his glass up, quickly, and drank half the martini. “Maybe I'm a fool,” he thought. But he didn't, he decided, really think he was a fool.