Clues for dr coffee, p.12
Clues for Dr. Coffee, page 12
“Simple,” the pathologist explained. “The coroner says Wyman hit his head against the curb. If we find sand and cement traces in the wound, the coroner is right—which is highly unlikely. I think Wyman was deliberately conked by the person or persons who killed him. Lieutenant Ritter thinks he was conked hard enough so that even a woman with pointed shoes or high heels could have kicked him into eternity.”
“Is Leftenant Ritter suspecting Widow Wyman of homicidal tendencies toward late husband?”
“The lieutenant is an honor graduate of the cherchez-la-femme school. Anyhow, our job is to find in the wound itself some clue as to the weapon that made it. For instance, if we find flakes of enamel from a photographer’s tripod, or leather rubbings from a lady’s handbag—”
“Comprehension is now dawning,” said Dr. Mookerji.
Two hours later, Ray Bowes and Helen Wyman burst into the lab. Bowes, running interference, charged through the broken field of startled technicians, dodged around Dr. Mookerji, and burst panting into Dr. Coffee’s private office. His ruddy face was damp with perspiration, and the angry gestures of his small, plump hands were awkward. But for all his rumpled aspect, he was a knight in shining irony.
“Mrs. Wyman just heard the news from the insurance company,” he said, “so we came by to congratulate you.”
“I was glad to help,” Dr. Coffee said.
“Help? Quit kidding, Doctor. The company isn’t paying a dime, because you reported that Wyman was murdered. They say if the murderer turns out to be the beneficiary, the policy is void.”
“I hadn’t thought of that,” Dr. Coffee said. “Please sit down.”
“So you can think up some new tricks?” Bowes shouted. “Helen just wanted to let you know she regrets listening to you and—”
“Oh, stop it, Ray!” Helen Wyman broke in. Her black veil fluttered prettily as she sat down. “I do thank you for your services, Doctor; no matter how shocking the result. May I be of help?”
“The police will be handling the investigation, but I know of one question Lieutenant Ritter will ask when you meet him. It seems you saw two airline tickets in your husband’s wallet the other night. There was only one when he was found. Have you any idea whom the other might have been intended for?”
Helen Wyman looked at Bowes, whose nostrils quivered, rabbit fashion. “No,” she said.
“Look over the latest Wyman and Prentiss calendars,” Bowes added.
“Could it have been a young woman named Gladys Channing?”
Again Helen Wyman looked at Bowes. His expression was blank. She said nothing.
“You might ask Joe Prentiss about that,” Bowes said. “Joe’s been drooling around Gladys for months.”
“My husband always considered her quite attractive,” Mrs. Wyman said.
“Did your husband and Mr. Prentiss quarrel over Gladys?”
“I—I don’t know what to think.” The widow covered her face with her black-gloved hands. Bowes put his arm around her. She stood up and started for the door.
Max Ritter telephoned as Dan Coffee was getting ready for bed that night: “Put your pants back on, Doc. We’re calling on Gladys Channing. I want another look at her feet. I’ll pick you up in twenty minutes.”
On the way to Miss Channing’s apartment house, Ritter explained that he had called the San Francisco police as soon as he learned that “Mr. and Mrs. Charles Farmer” had expected to fly west on the night Wyman was killed. He had just had a long and detailed reply.
“Seems like a few weeks ago somebody opened two bank accounts in San Francisco under the name of Charles Farmer. By a funny coincidence, the total balance comes to just twenty-four thousand dollars, same as Wyman’s insurance loan. Farmer also gave the banks as reference when he rented a plushy apartment on Nob Hill, so the boys dropped in after I called. They found the apartment’s never been lived in, but the closets are busting with expensive clothes, male and female, including a cute little mink jacket and enough shoes for a couple of centipedes. They also found one-hundred thousand bucks in traveler’s checks with no signature, not even Farmer’s, locked in the bureau drawer. So I think we should call on Gladys.”
Gladys was not exactly pleased by their visit. She tried hard to give the impression that she had been waked out of a sound sleep. She yawned as she poked her well-coiffed head through a gap in the door.
“Look,” Ritter said, “we know you got constitutional rights and you don’t have to let us in without a warrant. But I’d like to ask you four-five questions. Can we come in?”
Gladys Channing’s violet eyes made a quick appraisal. “Please do,” she said. “I’ve got nothing to hide.”
“The stewardess on that San Francisco flight Wednesday is due back in Northbank tonight,” Ritter said, as he sat down. “Shall I bring her here?”
Gladys hardly batted an eye. “What for?” she asked.
“To save you a trip to the airport. Maybe she’ll identify you as the Mrs. Charles Farmer who jumped ship just before the take-off.”
“So what?” Gladys crossed her legs.
“So why were you going west with the late K. Wyman?”
“That’s easy. He was taking his secretary on a short business trip.”
“I been in touch with San Francisco,” Ritter said. “You and Wyman weren’t taking no short business trip. Wyman was going for good. And so were you.”
“I got on that plane with just an overnight bag,” Gladys said. “A girl don’t usually start a new life with just an overnight bag.”
“She might,” the detective said, looking at the girl’s tiny purple-feathered mules, “if she knew there was a cozy little nest lined with fine feathers at the other end of the flight. Feathers like a Size Fourteen mink jacket, for instance.”
“There must be 14,000,000 Size Fourteen girls in this country, by the last census,” Gladys said.
“Could be. But there ain’t 14,000,000 Cinderellas who could squeeze their tootsies into a three-and-a-half shoe. You got a very damned pretty little foot.”
Gladys paled. She breathed deeply and audibly for a moment.
“Okay,” she said finally. “What do you want from me?”
“Why did you get off the plane?”
“Ken didn’t show up. Was I going out there all alone?”
“You knew he was dead, didn’t you?”
“Oh, my God, no! I—I was furious. I thought he stood me up, that’s all.”
“You knew Joe Prentiss would do anything to keep you from running off with Wyman—that he’d even kill the guy.”
“Aw now, how stupid can a man get—even a cop? Joe Prentiss wouldn’t kill a fly to keep me here because he knows it wouldn’t do him any good. Oh, sure, he’s been making passes at me for months, but he knows I loved Ken Wyman.”
“It don’t make sense. Prentiss is single. Wyman was married.”
“My hard luck,” Gladys said. “I wouldn’t go for Joe Prentiss if he was the last millionaire on earth, tax free.”
No, Gladys didn’t know of any enemies Wyman had. No, she didn’t know any trouble he was in. No, he’d had no visits from strangers—unless you counted that FBI man, who really came to see Prentiss, only Prentiss was home with the flu, so he’d talked to Wyman. She thought his name was Tufts.
“He was investigating paper and inks made by certain manufacturers,” Gladys said. “He looked around the shop and took samples of our work. He hasn’t been back since.”
“Did Ray Bowes ever make passes at you?”
“Ray?” Gladys laughed. “Ray never made passes at anybody. He just makes calf eyes at Helen Wyman. Any more questions, big boy?”
“Thank you, no. But stick around. People are going to be watching the airport and places like that. Good night.”
Two days later, Dr. Coffee got his spectrographic analysis report from Northbank University. He sat at his desk, poring over the strips of photographic paper on which unevenly spaced lines made long, dark ladders. Light from the incandescent vapor arising from heating a tiny fragment of Wyman’s scalp wound in an electric arc had produced a different pattern from that made by vaporizing a fragment from another part of the scalp. Heavy lines on the graph indicated that particles of copper, carbon, and manganese were present in the wound. There were also indications of some complex organic oil which would be difficult to break down without long, intricate computations and measurements of wave lengths in millionths of a millimeter.
“I think,” the pathologist said to Dr. Mookerji, who was looking over his shoulder, “that I shall be very unscientific and make a long guess that the oil is linseed oil.”
“On what basis are you deducing character of seeds?” the Hindu asked.
“A report from San Francisco, for one thing,” Dr. Coffee said. “And on the presence of carbon and manganese. The drying qualities of linseed oil are increased when it’s boiled with manganese oxide. Boiled linseed oil plus carbon blacks equals printer’s ink. Wyman was in the printing business. Therefore—Great stars! I think I’ve got something, Doctor.”
He snatched up the telephone to call Lieutenant Ritter. “Max, have you stopped looking for Wyman’s brief case?”
“No, I still got a man on it, Doc. He’s getting nowhere.”
“Can you get five or ten more, Max, to canvass every checkroom and checking locker in town? I got a hunch they’ll find something. The picture is beginning to clear up, Max.”
After he had hung up, Dr. Coffee drummed on the desk top for a moment. Then he took the telephone directory and looked up the number of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
When Max Ritter telephoned, Dr. Coffee was halfway through dinner. “We found it, Doc! The brief case. In a checking locker at the airport. It weighs a ton.”
“I should think it would, Max. Besides a toothbrush, razor, and other toilet articles, I’ll bet it’s full of flat copper plates.”
“Doc, you should of been a detective. How—”
“Put the brief case back in the same locker, Max. Leave a man there, but tell him not to stop anybody taking it out. Where’s Helen Wyman?”
“Home. She hasn’t left the house for two days.”
“Good. Now listen. I want you to round up Mrs. Wyman, Ray Bowes, Joe Prentiss, and Gladys Channing. Have them all brought to the police station right away. Use any pretext you want—to sign statements, or anything. When you get them all together, give them a group lecture on the evils of obstructing justice and all that sort of thing. Then announce that you’re going to hold Mrs. Wyman overnight. Say that an FBI man named Tufts is coming in from Washington on the midnight plane. Is there a midnight plane from Washington, Max?”
“There’s one at twelve-forty.”
“Good enough. Then announce that this FBI man wants to question Mrs. Wyman on the whereabouts and contents of a brief case that disappeared on the night Wyman was murdered. Say you’ve been asked to keep Mrs. Wyman in custody until he arrives. Got all that straight, Max? … Good. After that, you turn the other three loose. Once they’re out of sight, jump on your white horse and meet me at the Wyman house. I assume you have a key.”
‘To the back door,” the detective said.
“Fine. At the back door, then. And don’t leave your car around.”
It was nearly two hours before Ritter joined the pathologist.
“What gives, Doc?” The detective unlocked the back door. “You’ve been holding out on me. What are we looking for in here?”
“We’re not looking, Max. We’re waiting in the dark.”
“Who do we expect?”
“The murderer. If I’m wrong, you can sue me. I got the hunch when I saw the spectro analysis of Wyman’s scalp wound today. The graphs indicate that Wyman was slugged with a copper object containing traces of printer’s ink—”
“So he was killed in the print shop?” Ritter asked.
“Not necessarily. But I happened to think of those unsigned traveler’s checks in ‘Mr. Farmer’s’ San Francisco apartment. It struck me that unsigned checks in that amount must be either stolen or counterfeit. The FBI interest in the W. and P. print shop spells counterfeiting. I checked with the FBI. There are bum traveler’s checks in interstate circulation, all right.
“Now, if the checks were printed here, the plates they were made from wouldn’t be left lying around the print shop, where they might excite the curiosity of an honest journeyman printer. Since Wyman was the skilled artisan of the partnership, it’s logical that he should have custody of the plates—Hurt yourself, Max?”
The detective had bumped into a chair in the dark and was muttering profanely.
“We’ll wait here in the living room,” Dr. Coffee went on. “As you pointed out the other day, the murderer has Wyman s keys. So sit over here, where you can train your artillery on the front door. As I was saying, Wyman was probably custodian of the plates. Let’s say he kept them in his brief case when they were not in use. Let’s say that when the FBI man dropped in, Wyman knew the game was up, flew to San Francisco to establish a new identity and lay the basis for a new life, then came back to cover up his traces. Let’s say that on the night he was due to skip, he decided to leave the damning evidence behind, pointing to somebody else. So before boarding his plane, he took his brief case—”
Dr. Coffee stopped abruptly. He heard footsteps on the walk—and a faint click as Ritter moved the safety catch of his gun. The footfalls grew more distinct, climbing the front steps. A key grated in the lock. The door opened slowly and closed quickly. The footsteps crossed the foyer to the living room. A cone of light leaped through the darkness from Ritter’s flashlight.
“Drop that brief case,” Ritter ordered, “and lift those lily-white paws, Prentiss!”
Joe Prentiss recoiled from the glare. He obeyed.
Dr. Coffee switched on the ceiling lights.
“Look for the plates, Doc. I’ll look for knives and guns.”
The detective searched Prentiss. Dr. Coffee opened the brief case. A stack of copper plates slid out. Crosshatched lines and etched shadows made dark oblongs on the gleaming metal.
“I—when you mentioned Wyman’s brief case tonight, lieutenant,” Prentiss stammered, “I remembered seeing it under his desk in the shop. So I—I brought it over.”
“You didn’t get that from Wyman’s desk, Prentiss. You got it from Locker Six sixty-nine at the airport. And don’t forget it’s been there long enough for us to develop your prints off the copper, test the edges for bloodstains, and put it back again.”
“But—but why in the world would I—”
“You tell him, Doc. You were just getting to that part.”
“As I was saying,” Dr. Coffee resumed, “Wyman decided to leave the incriminating evidence pointing to someone else. Since Prentiss was away the day the FBI called, why not leave the plates in his desk? But Prentiss knew his partner was up to some sly tricks, because Mrs. Wyman had phoned about the air tickets. So Prentiss was waiting.
“I assume, Mr. Prentiss, that you grabbed the plates out of Wyman’s hands as he was preparing to plant them, that you banged him on the head with them, and, as he fell, that you jumped on him repeatedly or kicked him to death. Then you loaded the body in your car and abandoned it in an alley. Your taking his keys puzzled me for a while—until I decided you were planning to reverse Wyman’s trick and carry the plates back to his own home whenever you could do it unobserved.”
Deathly pale, Prentiss collapsed into a chair. “I—he was going to leave me holding the bag!” he mumbled.
“You fooled him after all,” Ritter said. “You won’t have to face that counterfeiting charge. Homicide gets priority in this state. Stick your hands in these, buster.”
Kiss of Kandahar
The woman in Suite 232 of the Southside Apartment Hotel was certainly young, probably under twenty-five. She was tall and blonde and, if not breath-taking, at least striking in appearance. Although she had lived at the Southside only ten days, both day and night clerks remembered the exact color of her eyes, the fact that she was always well-dressed, and the names and descriptions of the three persons who had visited her after her arrival. They also suspected that she was well-biiilt, a suspicion that was confirmed by the night clerk who found her lying in her bathtub, dead.
The woman in Suite 232 was registered at the Southside as Belinda Ford Holliday. The night clerk who found her dead in her tub had been trying to raise her for an hour on the house phone to announce the arrival of a telegram. He knew she had not gone out, and when she failed to respond to the bellhop’s repeated knocking, the night clerk had let himself in with a passkey. As a radio was playing in the bathroom, the clerk investigated, took one good look, gasped, and immediately called the police.
The Northbank Police Department arrived in three successive waves. The shock troops came within a few minutes, with the sirens of the prowl cars screaming bloody murder. The squad cars drove up with a low growl of authority. The two carloads of technical men deployed in comparative silence, followed by the solitary, slow-gaited dignity of the final link in the chain of command: Lieutenant of Detectives Ritter.
Saturnine Lieutenant Max Ritter made his long-legged way to Suite 232 without a word. When he entered the bathroom, instinctively taking off his soft felt hat, his big ears gave him the silhouette of a pogo stick. He looked at the body in the tub and noted the pungent, sweetish aroma that permeated the white-tiled brilliance of the bathroom. He observed that the peachcolored silk lingerie, neatly folded beside the portable radio on the clothes hamper, was hand-embroidered. He also saw that an ash tray on the flat rim of the bathtub contained three cigarette stubs smoked to within half an inch of the straw tips. On the cerise bath mat, a mystery novel lay face down on its opened pages.
Ritter took another look at the late Belinda Ford Holliday. His long nose wrinkled as he sniffed pensively at the scented atmosphere. Then, as required by law, he telephoned the coroner. However, since the coroner was prone to regard all unexplained deaths as due to heart failure, apoplexy or accident—unless, of course, the head was missing or a knife protruded from the back—Ritter also telephoned his friend Dr. Daniel Webster Coffee, pathologist at Northbank’s Pasteur Hospital, who had a great and useful scientific curiosity.
