The Stalking Death - Part 5 of 9

The Stalking Death - Part 5 of 9

Lacey Amy’s Newest and Most Dramatic Story (Luke Allan)

A serialized novel from The Canadian Magazine, November, 1932. Illustrated by Carl Shreve

Digitized by Doug Frizzle, January, 2016.

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The Story So Far

A group of six jewellers have banded together to defraud an elderly widow, Mrs. Charlesworth, by purchasing from her some almost prieeless jade carvings, after one and another of them had declared these carvings vir­tually worthless.

Phyliss Aulinloch, wife of Adolph Aulinloch, one of the jewellers, whom she has married in a fit of pique when her engagement with Brander Charlesworth, son of the widow, was broken, is startled by the sudden blast of a police whistle. She looks out of the window to see a crumpled form on the steps of the house opposite. It turns out to be Fer­gus Stirling, one of the conspiring jewel­lers. and Aulinloch remembers that only a week before another of the group had been found dead in bed, victim of a sudden seizure.

Inspector Broughton questions Aulin­loch closely. Next day Kalmberg, an­other of the jewellers visits the inspec­tor and tells of seeing Aulinloch’s car in a suspicious place at the time of the murder. The inspector discovers that Stirling had been strangled, and by a clever ruse discovers that Kalmbcrg was powerful enough to have committed the deed easily.

Brander Charlesworth enters the scene endeavoring to force the jewellers, whose duplicity he suspects, to disgorge.

Adolph Aulinloch calls his confed­erates in conference to decide on the disposal of the jade, and while there they learn of the motor accident that is fatal to Zaharoff, another of their num­ber. under suspicious circumstances.

Terrified by this news, the group is still more terrified that one of their number will take advantage of them. They are fearful that the violent deaths that have followed the group may be the work of some native of China, to whom the jade is sacred, but they are fearful also that they may not profit by the deal, Aulinloch suggests the possibility that Brander Charlesworth may be the mur­derer, to avenge the trick they have played on his mother, and Inspector Broughton in his office entertains some­what the same idea, remembering Bran­der’s former relationship with Aulinloch's wife, and how much it would benefit the young man if suspicion of murder could be thrown around Aulinloch.

And the Story Continues

The Inspector had several minutes to wait, and he was none too patient about it. Presently Gideon McElheren was shown in. At sight of Platt he pulled up with indignant reproof. Then he coughed behind his hand and shifted from one foot to the other.

With the fear that the third party might close his visitor’s lips the Inspector broke the silence.

“This is Mr. Platt, Mr. McElheren, one of my assistants . . . one of my most trusted men.” His tone was frankly genial. “We were discussing a case when you telephoned. By the way, you’ll be interested in it—the Stirling murder. Same line of business, wasn’t he? A very puzzling one, too, I may as well admit.”

McElheren was slowly recovering himself, his un­easiness allayed by the Inspector’s friendly manner and by the mention of a subject that led so naturally to the purpose of his visit.

Ves—yes,” he stammered, his voice shriller than was its wont, “the same line of business—almost, though we all have our special trend. Naturally, I’m interested. Our business—precious stones, you know—It’s so dangerous; it offers such an attraction for rogues—and murderers.”

The Inspector nodded. “Well, it does look as if what you say may be true. Three of you gone—all in a couple of weeks! One can’t blame you, Mr. Mc­Elheren, in the same business, I mean, for taking it seriously.”

McElheren clutched at the opening. “It’s about that I came to see you, Inspector. May I sit down? Thank you. This last—death—Zaharoff’s, I mean—it has quite unnerved me.”

“It was only a car accident, Mr. Mc­Elheren. Anyone is apt—”

“Yes, yes.” McElheren, in his present mood, had not time for generalities. He looked significantly at Platt. “I suppose—I suppose it’s all right? I mean, that we’re—that we’re quite alone? Because what I have to speak about is so—so peculiar. I know you’ll think so. You may laugh at me.”

“It takes more absurd stories than you’re apt to bring us,” the Inspector as­sured him amiably, “to make us scoff. We see too many peculiar incidents, too many funny twists in life. We’ve learn­ed that so little should be laughed at . . .”

McElheren succumb­ed to the sympathy in the Inspector’s tone and manner.

“I—I wanted to speak to you, Inspec­tor—to ask you—some questions. It’s about—Chinamen.”

Not a muscle of the Inspector’s face moved—no surprise, only a sustained at­tention and sympathy.

“Yes?” he queried. “I’ve had some experience of Chinamen.”

“I wanted to ask, Inspector, are they as—as vindictive, as brutal and—and un­tiring as the stories say? I’ve a reason for asking.”

The Inspector thought quickly. Could he frighten this cringing fellow into re­vealing what lay behind his questions?

“That’s a difficult question to answer, Mr. McElheren. I don’t know what stories you’ve been reading. As accomp­lished criminals they may be no worse than some of our own. But they have attainments in that line peculiarly their own, and we Occidentals are never quite competent to deal with them. This I can say: for cold-blooded persistence, for cruelty, for ruthlessness, we’ve found them quite up to the stories I’ve read. Our in­ability to understand them is a factor that adds to our help­lessness in dealing with them. Ordinarily—as a mob, I mean—they’re even more excitable and emotional than our own crowds, but in crime they’re as stolid and unimpressionably, as impenetrable, as a stone wall. And a Chinaman never tells. In short, when they go wrong they’re a pretty tough lot.”

Beads of perspiration had gathered on McElheren’s bald head, and he mopped them away feverishly.

“The way they’re written about,” he whined, “if they’re wronged—if they fancy they’re wronged—say, they think they’re cheated, or if they think you’ve in­sulted one of their gods—then they never give up till they get their revenge. Is that so?”

Inspector Broughton flung out his hands. “I never had time to dig deep enough to get any idea what is sacred to them and what is not . . . I do know they’ve a strong sense of personal justice and honesty and when they think they’ve been victims of injustice or dishonesty they’re apt to go pretty far in revenge. They never forgive an enemy or forget a friend. Their gods? that’s beyond me. I’ve seen little figures in shops right here in the city that, I’m assured, are gods to them.”

McElheren broke in eagerly: “Little figures—yes, that’s it. I might even buy some of those figures, innocent as anything, and be getting a Chinaman on my heels, mightn’t I?” He sat forward in the chair, his gaunt hands fumbling with hat and handkerchief.

“I’m afraid that’s too general for me. Still, I fancy they wouldn’t be apt to make allowances for Occidental ignorance.”

“Have you ever known,” McElheren asked, “any cases where they’ve tried to recover those gods—right in our homes—by force—crime, I mean? Would they go that far?”

“I can’t say. Between ourselves, I wouldn’t care to incur the pious ani­mosity of a Chinaman. Revenge? We’ve had a number of cases right here in the city. Usually it’s im­possible to trace the real motive—in detail, I mean. That’s because the crime is seldom committed by the wronged man him­self but by some other member of the same tong.”

He waited for McElheren to speak, but the man was too agitated to do more than wring his hands and mop his head.

With rising impatience Inspector Broughton asked; “Now, what’s all this about, Mr. McElheren?”

McElheren’s bulging eyes dropped to the floor. “It—it isn’t for myself I’m asking. It’s a friend of mine. He bought some valuable Chinese—gems once. He lived in China. I don’t know how he got them. I mean I don’t know what the Chinese would think of it. But it isn’t any of my business—how he got them. What I was going to say—he sold them to another friend. No Chinaman had a thing to do with it, so they shouldn’t be interested, should they? Of course this second friend got them cheaply, but that’s only business, isn’t it? But my friend feels now tliat the gems are worth so much more than he paid for them that the man he bought them from must have got them—well, dishonestly. He begins to wonder if the seller was afraid to keep them. Now my friend is wondering if it’s safe to keep them, the carvings, I mean—the gems. I mean, some of the pieces are carved in a peculiar way; they may be sacred to the Chinese?”

“Could I see them?” the Inspector asked. “I know something about Chinese carvings.”

McElheren gasped. “Oh, dear, no. No, indeed. I wouldn’t for worlds have my friend know I spoke to you about them. That’s why”—he glanced at Platt—“I thought we should have been alone.”

“Platt can hold his tongue,” Inspector Broughton replied shortly. “Why doesn’t your friend get rid of the things if he’s so frightened?”

“He—he—well, there’s another friend in the deal with him. But the one who has the carvings is trying to sell them.”

“And of course he can’t be expected to sell them too cheaply, to sacrifice them. . . . Well, the only place we figure as far as I can see, will be if the Chinaman gets after him and—does something that brings him up against the law.”

“You think he’ll do that?” McElheren whined. “You think it’s dangerous to keep the carvings?”

“I think if I were as frightened as that I’d throw the things away.”

“But,” McElheren pleaded, “it wasn’t a Chinaman he underpaid but one of his own people.”

“I can’t see how that improves it—ethically or other­wise, It wouldn’t hold the hand of any vengeful Chinaman.”

“But in this country—surely in this country no Chinaman would dare—”

“Don't expect me to foresee what a Chinaman may do . . . And let me tell you. Mr. McElheren, you may thank your stars it’s a friend of yours and not your­self that’s in danger. If I had those carvings I’d get rid of them and take a year’s holiday in Europe.”

He rose to end the interview. McElheren stood up, trembling.

“It’s awful,” he moaned, “awful! I’ll see—what I can do—if I can get him to sell—even if he just clears himself. Tell me, Inspector, would the one who is in on the deal with him—though he had nothing to do with the negotiations—would he be in danger, too?”

“To a Chinaman,” said the Inspector recklessly, “a dozen murders are as one . . . I believe the word ‘amok’ is of Chinese derivation.”

“I hope I scared you dizzy,” Inspector Broughton muttered, when the door had closed. “Now what the devil mischief is McElheren up to, Platt?”

Platt shook his head. “Talk of the cruel Chinese. If that fellow had the guts he’d out-Chincse them. And it wouldn’t take a very valuable gem to get him started.”

“A frightened, man,” mused the Inspector, “is the most dangerous man in the world. And when he’s a sweating hyprocrite; besides—Lord protect me!”

XIX

The telephone at Adolph Aulinloch’s elbow rang sharply, and with a swift movement he extended his arms over the desk and looked nervously about the office. Under those outstretched arms was spread an array of small pieces of jade—scores of them, hundreds of them. There were weird carvings of weird gods, of dancing girls, of dragons and other monsters; pi discs, tiny vases with scenes carved on their bulging sides, two fish pendants in jade frames, a couple of long necklaces, a dozen solid jade rings.

The blinds were drawn, and the electric light flashed back unevenly from a thousand surfaces and lines, metallic from some, oily from others.

After a moment’s panic Aulinloch lifted off the re­ceiver and spoke through to Miss Stromberg. Then, with an added gleam to his eyes, he settled back once more to gloat over the collection. An emerald-hued necklace he picked up and fondled, an ugly monster he held against the light to catch the gleam of the dis­arranged crystals. Over six small tablets he bent almost reverently—a round one in dark green, an octagonal one in yellow, a semi-circular black one, a red, a white, and a second green, the six precious tablets of Chinese worship denoting heaven and earth and the four points of the compass.

Suddenly he jerked himself from his absorption and, wrapping each piece in a soft cotton shield, packed them all in an old leather suitcase that stood beside the chair. This he carried to the vault and thrust into an inner compartment. The door of the compartment he locked with a key from his purse; the outer door he closed but did not lock.

With a pressure of his knee on a knob beneath the desk he notified his secretary that he was prepared for the caller she had announced. Pressing another knob twice opened the double doors, and Gideon McElheren walked in.

“Good morning, Aulinloch. I hoped you’d be able to sec me. I didn’t telephone—I thought I’d take a chance on finding you in.”

Aulinloch nodded approval. “That’s right. Better not use the telephone more than we have to.”

Something about Aulinloch’s man­ner mystified and embarrassed Mc­Elheren. Always so unobtrusively calm, the man across the desk was too elaborately at his ease. Behind the sparkle in his eyes was something that boded no good. McElheren felt certain.

His bulging eyes were fixed on the edge of the platform on which the desk stood. “I’ve been thinking of our talk last night—all those deaths among us I wonder what the police are making of them?”

“I don’t suppose the police connect them at all. Not yet.”

“But—but you yourself were afraid they might get suspicious.”

Aulinloch hesitated. He was in two minds about what stand to take with McElheren. His inclination was to frighten him still more—McElheren’s cowardice called for it—and there was a chance that he might be induced to sell his share. But second thoughts warned him that terror might drive McElheren to do something foolish; and it was certain he would never sacrifice his share of the profit that offered.

“To be frank with you, McElheren,” he said gravely, “if the police don’t suspect something, then we need a new force. . . . What I’d like is to dig deeper into Larned’s death. . . . But it really doesn’t matter. With two of our group known to be murdered—”

“But we haven’t a thing to prove Zaharoff was murdered,” McElheren whined.

Aulinloch dismissed it with a wave of his hand. “See how clever the murderer was in the Stirling affair.” He told of the attempt to place the blame on him.

McElheren’s eyes bulged with consternation. “Any of us may be the next,” he piped. “If the murderer doesn’t kill us he may try to fasten some awful crime on us. It’s worse than I thought . . . But Zaharoff,“ he went on, trying to revive what little assurance he ever had, “he was a bad driver—he had accidents be­fore. And we know how easy it is—”

He turned the subject suddenly. “You should get half a million for the jade, Freyseng says so. Those necklaces, and those brooches and thumb rings—the wo­men will fight for them. If you work things right—”

“What do you figure the whole collection is worth?” Aulinloch asked. The chill tone frightened McElheren.

“Of course—of course, I can’t say . . . But I thought—I thought we might get well up to a million . . . if the sale is handled right.”

Aulinloch’s jaw set. “Do you think I’ll foozle the jade away?”

“Not at all, certainly not. You know the business too well for that—perhaps better than any of us. We must get rid of that jade as quickly as we can. That’s what I came about. After last night— I told you there was danger—from the Chinese, I mean. And there one walked in on us—and now he knows us all!’ Aulinloch studied his visitor critically. “I’m won­dering how much you knew about that danger before­hand, McElheren. Just because we happen to have some Chinese jade hardly seems enough to warrant your terror . . . I think you’d better come across.”

“I—I don’t know what you mean,” McElheren stam­mered. “I’ve always been afraid of them—and this wasn’t a—a nice transaction—”

Aulinloch was troubled. To allay his own fears, as well as McElheren’s, he said: “No one can get in that vault between six at night and nine in the morn­ing. After that hour—through the day, I mean—no one gets to me without first passing my secretary and being announced to me by telephone . . . There isn’t the slightest risk.”

“Unless it was a Chinaman,” McElheren put in. “They’re so tricky. I’vc been making enquiries about them, and what I learn alarms me. That’s why I want—I want—”

“You want me to sell, yet you want to get the best price possible.” Aulinloch looked him over contemptu­ously. “What a life, McElheren! What a turmoil! When terror and greed and conscience get into a three-cornered fight it must be shattering to the nerves. But to get back to brass tacks: Are you in favor of sacri­ficing the jade, or of depositing it in a safety deposit vault? Or do you prefer having the jade kept right here where it’s available at any time and prevents pub­licity? If the jade is moved we must take others into part of our secret . . .We have to consider our reput­ations . . . and blackmail. Are you prepared to face—”

“No, no. Not that. We can’t stand any publicity, it’s not only our business reputation, but there’s Zaharoff’s death so soon after Stirling’s and Larned’s. Why—why, I wouldn’t be surprised if the police—if the police suspected one of us! With that agreement we made, I mean—about the survivors taking everything, you know!”

“Perhaps—it wouldn’t be—dangerous. The deposit vault, I mean,” Aulinloch reflected. He had no inten­tion of letting the jade leave his hands, but to show that to McElheren was the surest way to make him suspicious.

McElheren protested vigorously. “Of course,” he said cunningly, “you’ll have to give us some sort of writing to show they’re ours. That is, if—if anything happens you.”

“You mean in case I share the fate of Stirling and Zaharoff, and perhaps of Larned?”

McElheren shuddered. “It’s no more likely to come to you than to the rest of us . . . But you have the jade. You see, it isn’t fair to us—”

Aulinloch made up his mind quickly. Picking up a pen, he commenced to write, while McElheren watched.

With a flourish Aulinloch signed his name and pass­ed the slip of paper across the desk. McElheren took it and read aloud:

“ ‘This is to certify that, in case of my death, the suitcase of jade carvings, if found in my vault, is the property of Gideon McElheren.’ ”

Into McElheren’s face came a look of cunning triumph. He glanced at Aulinloch. They smiled. “It’s two against two,” Aulinloch said softly. “You and I can keep the jade here as long as we like—we can do what we like with it.”

It was typical of the man, of the roguery in which both dealt, that McElheren instantly became suspicious. He examined the slip again.

“‘If found in my vault’?” he questioned.

“Certainly. I must qualify it that way. As soon as the jade leaves the vault I cease to be responsible,” Aulinloch explained.

“Of course,” Aulinloch continued, reading his sus­picions, “I might make out a paper for all of you in­stead of you alone. Or we might share the profits with the estates of the three who have died.”

“The agreement,” McElheren opposed, “that’s all we have to think of. They weren’t to get a thing. We won’t, if anything happens to us.”

“Or,” Aulinloch continued, as if McElheren had not spoken, “we might return the jade, get the money back, and call the deal off.”

And having satisfactorily frightened McElheren, he knew he had won the fight. McElheren folded the slip of paper and thrust it into an inside pocket of his wallet.

When he was gone Aulinloch leaned back in his chair and smiled at the closed vault door.

“ ‘If found in my vault!’ Oh, yes—if . . . But, as you said, you snake, I must get rid of that jade right away.”

XX

It was within a few minutes of nine o’clock. A tall, stoop-shouldered man in a wide-brimmed Quakerish hat squeezed unobtrusively into an elevator in the Commerce Building and asked for the seventh floor. There were two others in the solitary car running at that hour, one of whom got out at the third floor.

The man in the Quakerish hat asked of the elevator attendant: “Has Mr. Brock, of Clarendon, Brock and Matthews, come in tonight? I have an appointment with him.”

The attendant didn’t know. “Unless he took one of the other elevators. Two more run to half past eight.”

The other passenger volunteered that he had heard Mr. Brock had gone to Detroit the night before.

“Dear me, I hope not,” murmured the man in the Quakerish hat. “It’s very important. But,” more cheer­fully, “someone is sure to be there. This is the floor? Thanks.”

Gideon McElheren got out and started briskly around the corner into the main hall into which opened the offices of the lawyers for whom he had enquired. But the moment the elevator reached the floor above he scurried back to the stairs and commenced noiselessly to climb.

At the ninth storey he stopped to rest. His face was wet with perspiration, and his breath came broken­ly. “I might have ridden a floor or two more,” he groaned. But at the sound of the returning elevator he commended himself for his caution.

At the landing half way between the tenth and eleventh storey he sat down on the step to wait. His heart beat painfully, his legs shook, his bulging eyes roved wildly about. A glance at the watch on his wrist added to his uneasiness, and he scowled at the wall below him. Finally he clambered to his feet, crept to the lower floor, and peeped into the corridor. For a time he stood listening, one hand on the rail, a foot on the step, ready to sprint in either direction at a sus­picious sound. But only the elevator creaked up and down, with now and then a frank hurried step on one of the other floors.

With a sigh he returned to the landing. He had scarcely seated himself when a low voice muttered almost in his ear:

“A bit stewed up, ain’t you, boss?”

McElheren whirled about. A man with a round, cherubic face on a round body stood over him, a man like an overgrown boy. But a second glance belied the early impression. The face was cherubic only in shape; a hard life and a distorted mind told their tale only too plainly.

“How—did you—get there?” McElheren whispered.

The fat man chuckled fatly. “Say, I been watchin’ you for ten minutes. I can see you ain’t goin’ to be any help to me. You’d just give the whole works away. Such a sweat! How’d you keep it up?” He chuckled again. “I guess that’s what they call a heart of water, eh?”

He dropped to the step beside McElheren and hugged his knees. McElheren shuddered away from him.

The man grinned. “Don’t like rubbin’ shoulders with the likes o’ me, eh?” A hard look flashed into his eyes. “Well, I can’t afford to be squeamish, or I’d do the shrinkin’ act.”

McElheren looked at his watch and frowned. “You’re late,” he said, struggling to attain some semblance of dignity.

“Late yourself. Wasn’t I here half an hour before you? Didn’t you find me higher up? How’d you think I got there?”

“You didn’t use the elevator, did you?” McElheren asked anxiously. “I told you—”

“Say, boss, don’t try to teach me my business—not at this time o’ day. I been lookin’ things over. When Tubby Peters gets a job he does it thorough. I can’t take no chances. . .

“It gave me time to take a look at you, too, and, gosh, you take it hard, boss. Must be purty set on this little job, eh?”

He leaned forward on his knees and stared down the stairs with un­focused eyes.

“See here, boss, I don’t dare take no risks. If they got me, it would take something to get the best law­yers. That’s all I’d need—a good lawyer or two—and a stand-in with the judge, maybe.” He sighed com­fortably. “But then, you’d have to look after me for your own sake, wouldn’t you? But you don’t know the chances I’ve took already, and not a cent to—”

“I gave you five dollars,” McEl­heren broke in indignantly.

Tubby Peters flung out a contemp­tuous hand—a fairly clean hand, too. “What’s five dollars on a job like this?” He turned and frankly stared toward McElheren’s pocket.

With an irrepressible shiver McElheren put his hand in his pocket and, after some feeling about, drew out a bill. “If you do this job right,” he said, “there’s a couple of hundred like that for you.”

“Don’t say ‘if’, boss. Say ‘when’. Tubby Peters never fails. . . But only a couple of hundred fives? Say, a thousand ain’t much for a job like this—’’

“But you said you would—”

The man winked. “If you hand out a thousand it’s worth fifty thousand to you.”

McElheren turned his face away. “I don’t mind adding five hundred. But you’re all wrong about fifty thou­sand. That’s foolish.”

“All right, it’s to be fifteen hundred. That goes with me.” He held out a chubby hand and McElheren was forced to take it with his bony one. “Now let’s get goin’, boss. These dark nights I’m a busy man. Lead me to it.”

McElheren tiptoed to the floor above and stopped before a door at the head of the stairs.

“You’ll have to get in by this one,” he whispered. “There’s another door, but it opens into an outer office, and there are double doors beyond that.”

Tubby Peters stooped to examine the keyhole. “Anyone in now?” he asked.

“I—I don’t know.”

The man regarded him with disgust. “How the devil d’you think I can work till I know if anyone’s in. The lock ain’t nothin’—I’ll get through that in three minutes . . . Say, we got to put this off till tomorrow night. Then I can hang around and see they’re all out of the office before I get to work.”

“Yes, yes,” McElheren agreed. “Do it tomorrow,” he agreed eagerly. “That’ll be better—safer. You won’t need me any more, will you?”

“Sure I won’t need you. You’d only be a nuisance. You’d be so an­xious to save your own skin—”

“I’m paying you to do the job,” McElheren told him stiffly.

Tubby Peters grunted. “Now let’s get back somewhere where we can talk things over. This don’t seem safe to me. I got to know the lay o’ the land.”

They returned to the landing and for a time they talked in low but not inaudible voices. Save for the rising and falling elevator the building was very silent.

“Is this safe a big one?” Peters asked presently.

“A very big one.”

“Then I got to bring a whole out­fit. Know anything about the lock? You seen it?”

McElheren said timidly that he knew nothing about it.

Peters noticed his hesitation. “Say, it ain’t a timelock, is it?”

“I—I’m afraid it is.”

The man’s teeth clicked together. “Then that ends it. What the blazes can I do with one o’ them time-locks? For a couple of thousand, anyway? . . . No, sir-ee, boss, not for just two thousand. But, say, make it three thousand and I’ll run it through slicker than honey.”

“If you’ll get me that old leather suitcase it’ll be three thousand,’’ Mc­Elheren agreed reluctantly. “And I don’t want you to think I’m stealing it. It belongs to a poor woman. She sold it without knowing its value. I’m getting it back for her.”

Tubby Peters grinned. “But you know its value, don’t you? Never mind, if it’s worth half a million I’ll get it for you. You’re dealin’ with an honest man now. I guess you don’t understand my kind, do you—in your line o’ business? What d’you say this fellow’s name is?”

“Aulinloch—Adolph Aulinloch. But what does it matter?”

Tubby Peters winked. “You bet it matters—matters like the devil. A fellow with brains—you can depend on them havin’ sense enough to put ’em up quick, with a gun in their ribs, but these foreigners—you never know what kind of a fit they’ll throw.”

“You’ll have your gun, of course,” McElheren said grimly.

“Gosh! D’you hate the guy that much? D’you want me to drill him anyway?”

“No, oh, no! Certainly not.” Mc­Elheren rose. “But I must have that old suitcase.”

After a few more questions they descended to the tenth floor.

As they disappeared around the turn a Chinaman tiptoed back from the head of the stairs on the eleventh floor and, climbing to the floor above, opened the door of an empty office and went inside.

XXI

Aaron Goldstein, well known in certain business and professional circles, sat in the small, untidy office at the rear of his shop making up his daily statement.

It was ten minutes to closing time—Aaron’s closing time, which was eight o’clock. Up to that hour there was always a chance that a costume might be needed for theatre or masquerade. Today had been a disappointment, and Goldstein was unhappy; not a cent had come in since four o’clock. Goldstein brooded over the day’s record.

In the midst of it the outer door opened and a tall, solemn-faced man in a broad-brimmed hat slid through and closed the door behind him.

Goldstein placed his pencil carefully between two piles of paper lest it fall to the floor and perhaps break the lead, and trotted to the front of the shop with the smile reserved for busi­ness.

The man who had entered looked through him and about the shop with its glass cupboards and hanging racks. He had taken his stand in the shadow of a rack of clothes. Goldstein understandingly pulled down the front window blinds.

“Ah—Mr. Goldstein?”

“That’s right, sir. Costumes of all kinds, make-ups, masks—almost any­thing you don’t want for everyday wear.” He waved a pudgy hand about the walls.

For an uncomfortable minute the stranger continued to stare about the breathless little room.

Goldstein had read him at a glance. Old dog that he was, he had seen them, men and women, in all walks of life, coming and going, through that narrow door, bringing and taking away costumes for every purpose for which a disguise might be useful. Lawful or unlawful mattered not to him, his business was to supply what was wanted. The man before him was an unusual type of customer, to be sure, but even that did not worry Goldstein. Such a customer would purchase, not rent. He would pur­chase, for one reason, because he would not wish to leave name and address.

“I was wanting something—some­thing for a frolic at the lodge,” the stranger said, in a high, hesitating voice. “A foolish affair we’re hav­ing—you know the kind.”

“Yes—certainly—of course,” Gold­stein agreed. “We do much business for those little affairs. We have so much here—”

“What do you think would suit me?”

Goldstein sized his customer up with flattering solemnity. “A tall, fine-looking figure like you—let’s see—a Viking, perhaps, or a sheik.” He trot­ted toward a glass cabinet across the shop. “Here’s one—a sheik—direct from Tunis.”

Without even a glance, the stranger had passed on. Goldstein did not per­sist. He knew that nothing he could suggest would alter this man’s mind: one definite costume he wanted, no­thing else.

They crossed the rear and started along the other wall. Suddenly the man stopped and slid back a glass door. Inside, packed tight to the wall, was a rack of Chinese trousers and jackets.

At his back Goldstein winked. “Ah, there’s just the thing, sir—Chinese! I was going to suggest it. Over here we have a wrong idea of the Chinese—we get only one kind, the smaller felows. The coolie type, and the bet­ter class, now, they’re fine big fel­lows, like yourself.” He pulled aside fold after fold of silk. “Real silk, these, some of them special—the real stuff, but all nicely cleaned and disin­fected. I always get the real goods. You’ll find these unusual.”

He had picked out a costume. “Just the thing. . . And I can make you up so your own son wouldn’t know you.”

“Certainly, oh, certainly. Where can I fit it on?”

In a tiny cubicle beside the office Goldstein prodded sufficient space among the boxes and garments for the fitting. Arrayed in the costume, the stranger eyed himself in the nar­row mirror with satisfaction. A little round Chinese hat perched on his bald dome gave such a good effect that for the first time he smiled—faintly.

“I’ll leave it with you now,” he said, “then tomorrow night I’ll come around at eight o’clock and get you to make me up. I want a good job of it.”

He paid the price and hurried away, mopping his face.

XXII

To the musical clangor of an electric clock beside his bed Adolph Aulinloch’s eyes opened on a dull world. It was a dull day, too. Rais­ing himself on his elbow he looked through the nearest window and, though the awnings were loo low to admit a view of the sky, he decided that life was scarcely worth the trouble it brought.

With a quick movement he slipped from the bedding and seated himself on the edge of the bed.

The sky was dull, yes, but it was not the clouds outside that depressed him, but those of his own home. A vague mental ache that seemed to have lasted for years made him miserable—a sense of futility, of loss.

His ear was turned to the door. How long it was since, rising, he had heard the running of water in his wife’s suite across the hall! For three mornings he had sat like that, listening, scarcely breathing—hoping that at last all was well. Every moment of that first half hour until, shaved and dressed, he came out into the common hall was tense with listen­ing. And he had heard nothing, for Phyliss had not come down to break­fast.

He had grown uncomfortably con­scious of Phyliss since the Stirling murder, and breakfasting alone had weighed on him. At lunch and dinner she sat across the table as usual, but nothing counted except breakfast. It irritated him that his uneasiness with her could not be ignored. He had always been thoughtful of her, consid­erate, but now he shivered at the thought of an opportunity missed. Yet, when the opportunity came, his pride would not permit him to take advan­tage of it.

As he sat there, feeling for his bed­room slippers with his feet, he won­dered if he wasn’t getting to hate her.

And shouldn’t he hate her—for her coldness, for her mastery of his emotions, for her stubborn resistance to his silent appeal that their old relations be resumed, distant as they were?

All his old fear of her returned, his distant, hopeless worship; and he found it not inconsistent with what he regarded as hatred. Before the trag­edy of Stirling’s murder he had settled comfortably into the belief that it was no more than calf-love. Devotion such as hers—he knew no other kind—gave the lie to such stor­ies as that. But now they swept back on him in a flood that drowned his content. For this the prods of his associates in the jade deal were partly responsible; he had no idea others knew so much. But the real origin was the conduct of Phyliss herself.

Everywhere in the house he felt her presence, started to every sound she made, was aware of her slightest move. It was unfair. Hadn’t he in­troduced her to a life of luxury be­yond anything she had known before—worlds beyond what Brander Charlesworth could ever hope to give her? Hadn’t he allowed her a free hand, not only in the life she led but in their relationship? Hadn’t he ob­served her every wish, bent his habits to hers?

And what had she given him in return?

He heard her door open, and has­tily completing his toilet, he hurried downstairs. Beyond the door of his own suite he become outwardly his old cool self. He had hoped that when again she came to breakfast with him he might receive her at the table—welcome her casually, hold her chair to her. But now she would be seated in her place, awaiting him, accusing him by waiting, accusing him by her very patience.

He greeted her in the old way. “Good morning, dear.” Nothing must alter that. It was safe, neutral, mean­ingless. He had no idea that the un­broken formality of it had never failed to startle and accuse her, for she re­cognized its inadequacy, its expres­sion of their unusual relationship. There were times when she had tried to force herself to something more intimate, but before she could make up her mind he had forestalled her and re-established the character of their association. In moments of self- examination she convinced herself that should he come to her and kiss her, as a husband should, her task would be less difficult. What could one do with a husband who opened the day so impersonally?

She returned the greeting in kind, and bent over the percolator.

He dropped into his own chair at the opposite end of the table and picked up the morning paper. But, after fumbling with it a moment, he set it down again and slowly un­folded his napkin. Catching himself in that exhibition of embarrassment, he returned to the paper and bent over it with unseeing eyes.

Suddenly he said: “I may have to run across to Paris on a business trip one of these days. I don’t suppose you’d like to come along?”

That wasn’t the way he intended to put it. He knew she would see that he hadn’t intended her to go with him, and he hurried to explain:

“I’ll be very busy—very hurried.”

“Would you be away long?” Phyliss enquired, trying to get at his meaning.

“I don’t know.” Suddenly he want­ed her to say she would go, wanted it as he had wanted nothing in his life before. But he dare not reveal his longing to her. “It wouldn’t be very long—not more than a month probably. I may have to run about a lot—Amsterdam, Paris, London. I won’t know till I get to Paris.”

Phyliss slowly poured his first cup of coffee. “I don’t think I’d care to go on a trip like that.”

It stung him deeply. “You’d be able to get along here—comfortably?”

“I’ll be all right,” she replied. “It wouldn't be much pleasure, scurrying about like that—and after an ocean voyage. I’m always miserable for a few days afterwards.”

“You could go to—to some of your people,” he suggested.

“I’ll remain here,” she told him.

“There were relatives of yours—Charlesworths, weren’t there, Phy­liss?” he went blundering on.

She flushed angrily and tried to hide it in her cup.

“Yes,” she said. “My father’s cousin was Mrs. Charlesworth. . . . I haven’t seen her for years.” Inside she was furiously angry; she thought she understood, and it enraged her that he, above all, should touch the old wound with his heavy hand.

Blindly Aulinloch stumbled on:

“She had a son, didn’t she? I seem to remember—a lad who went into newspaper work. What happened to him?”

“I said I haven’t seen the Charles­worths for years.”

“Someone mentioned him yester­day,” he explained, “and I seemed to remember you were related. Wasn’t there some trouble he got into—a dishonest report of an important meet­ing, or something like that?”

“He was accused of it,” Phyliss returned stiffly. “He had no difficulty clearing himself. It was dishonesty on the part of those who laid the charge.” Color rushed to her face as she saw how she had given her­self away. “I recall seeing something about it in the papers,” she explained lamely. But she knew her husband had got what he sought—proof that Brandcr Charlesworth and his mem­ory had not dropped from her life. “That’s all I know about it. If it’s important I can give you Mrs. Charlesworth’s address—or where she lived when I knew her last.”

It closed his lips, and he squirmed at the ease with which she had done it, particularly since a moment be­fore, he semed to have her at his mercy. It emphasized her superiority.

He finished his coffee hurriedly and she watched him leave after a good­bye more abrupt than he had ever used to her.

The drive to the office reflected the fever burning him up. Once he passed through a yellow light and from the corner of his eye saw the traffic policeman reach for his whistle. But he did not blow it. He said no word to the attendant who relieved him of the car at the top of the slope as he strode away to his office.

The elevator man, too, he ignored, though the attendant’s obsequiousness had always been a comforting and reassuring opening for his business day. A glance satisfied him that his staff was in their places and, picking up his letters, let himself into his private office.

The heavy doors clicked shut be­hind him. Except by the electric but­ton beneath his desk they could not be opened again.

His massive gold watch, gift of a philanthropy he had befriended, told him he had still ten minutes to wait before the time-lock would permit him to enter the vault, and he pulled a chair before it and sat down to wait. Something more than depres­sion made him miserable this morn­ing. He was uneasy and did not know why. Impatiently he waited to re­assure himself that the jade was there—somehow he felt that this feeling of his was connected with the jade, though his eyes told him the vault was as he left it the night before. But he wanted to be sure—to fondle the cold surfaces of the little carvings, to hear the sweet tinkle of the fish bells, to pay his tribute of worship to the six precious tablets.

A nice stroke of business it was! What was to prevent him running across to Paris and London, as he had mentioned to Phyliss? . . . If they wouldn’t trust him with the jade—well, wasn’t it there in his own safe, and only he could get at it? Why ask permission? They had nothing to show that the jade was not his—they would not dare take action against him. So many profitable schemes—.

“Just sit where you are, boss,” mur­mured a threatening voice at his back, “and stick ’em up quick. I have you covered!”

(To be continued)

The Stalking Death - Part 4 of 9

The Stalking Death - Part 4 of 9

Lacey Amy’s Newest and Most Dramatic Story (Luke Allan)

A serialized novel from The Canadian Magazine, October, 1932. Illustrated by Carl Shreve

Digitized by Doug Frizzle, January, 2016.

(Link to previous)

The Story So Far

The sudden shrill note of a police whistle brought Phyliss Aulinloch quickly to her feet, but her husband sat unmoved, curiously alert. As she raised the blind he came and stood beside her. On the step of the house opposite, Fergus Stirling, one of a group of jewellers, had been found, murdered.

Only a fortnight before, she remembered, Austin Lamed had died suddenly. She glanced at her husband with quick suspicion. She did not love him. Their marriage had been the result of a quarrel with Brander Charlesworth. But, not loving her husband, she felt an added need to be loyal to him.

Inspector Broughton has questioned them both with­out discovering anything. The next day he is visited by the giant Kalmberg, who tells of seeing Aulinloch’s car in a suspicious place at the time of the murder, while the Inspector by a clever ruse proves that Kalmberg’s powerful hands were capable of strangling a man. Just then Aulinloch is announced.

In the interview the hatred between the two is evident. When they have left the Inspector surprises his assistant with the statement that Stirling was not shot but strangled and the apparent bullet holes made after death with a nail.

Brander Charlesworth, in a small house in the suburbs, is talking bitterly to his mother of the group of jewellers whom he believes have swindled her of valuable jade carvings. While he is there McElheren, one of the group, arrives and tries to induce Mrs. Charlesworth to go back on her bargain. When he had gone. Brander decides to visit Phyliss to try to secure from her some information. As he nears the house he sees the Inspector enter.

Meanwhile in his office Aulinloch is calling his four confederates in to a conference on the disposal of the jade. It is here that Freyseng, one of their number, announces that Zaharoff has been killed in a motor accident—the third violent death among the group that had banded together to defraud Mrs. Charlesworth of her carvings.

AND THE STORY CONTINUES

“NEVER mind how I know,” Aulinloch went on, anticipating their questions. “That young scamp threatened me, too, and I made up my mind he was worth watching . . . Yesterday he was supposed to be writing up that golf tournament. After the games he disappeared. It doesn’t take long to drive seventy-five miles. If you add two and two—”

“I knew it—I knew it!” McElheren exclaimed. “I knew I heard him—he was there listening in the stairs.”

He shrank before their surprise, but more before the grim suspicion behind the surprise. “I—I was there today—at the Charlesworth house.” He mopped his forehead with the sodden handkerchief.

Aulinloch’s teeth closed. “Go on—and quick about it!”

The lump in McElheren’s throat worked up and down. “I thought of young Charlesworth. I can’t for­get his threats, and I wanted to know. About Stirling’s murder, I mean. Just like you, Aulinloch. Why, he—he shook his fist right under my nose after we bought the jade. So this morning I went to see his mother.”

He saw their unspoken questions were unanswered, that their suspicions were even increased. “I—I made an excuse, of course. I asked her if she had sold the jade.”

Freyseng’s fury found expression in a blast of foreign oaths. “Yeah, ve know all about that. You vanted her to get them back for you. You told her she vas robbed.” He raised a clenched fist and cursed again. “Vy did ve let you in the deal, I ask? You vere born a fool and you grow more foolish every day.”

McElheren’s protestations were vehement, indignant—but unconvincing.

He had risen and was striding about the room, wringing his hands. They watched him with disgust, with contempt too deep for words, and he felt the crowding antagonism in the air, their hatred, and was frightened.

“What does that matter—now?” he pleaded, stoop­ing before Aulinloch’s desk. “If what you say is true—that Larned and Zaharoff were murdered—”

“I didn’t say so,” Aulinloch snapped.

McElheren ignored the snub. “We could make sure of it. We should. We might write the police an anonymous letter. They’d follow it up.”

“Sure they would,” Aulinloch agreed. “They’d fol­low up the letter—and find who wrote it. Will you write it?”

“Me—me write it?” McElheren coughed. “Yes—I see. It wouldn’t be wise.”

Kalmberg peered at them from his small eyes; there was something slyly significant about it, and they waited for an explanation. “Why do we need to worry? There is only young Charlesworth. Surely four of us are a match for him! . . . Besides, there are ways—of stop­ping him.

“I know a fellow,” he added slowly, “who makes a business of it. Just a few hundred dollars—and young Charlesworth won’t trouble us any more . . . or anyone else.”

Kalmberg waited only a few seconds. When none answered, he chuckled; the joke, he wished to imply, had gone far enough.

“Let’s see,” he murmured, his eyes on the ceiling, “isn’t this Charlesworth a relative of yours, Aulinloch—or is it your wife’s. I seem to remember hearing their names together—”

Aulinloch sat very still, so still that Kalmberg stop­ped before finishing the sentence. “My wife,” he said distinctly, and paused, “is my wife.” He waited for someone to take up the challenge, but they were silent “Yes,” he said, “my wife is distantly related to the Charlesworths, I believe. She used to see something of them at one time. May I ask, Kalmberg, where all this is leading?”

“I was wondering,” Kalmberg replied, still staring at the ceiling, “if she couldn’t keep track of this young spitfire for us.”

Cold anger blazed in Aulinloch’s face. “Be good enough to leave my wife out of this.”

Freyseng said: “Ve all must look after ourselves, of course, but there’s vun thing ve can do—ve can put the jade vere it vill be safe.”

“That’s what I say.” Kalmberg had not thought of it before, but he saw how it would annoy Aulinloch. “It should be in a safety deposit vault.”

“Are you afraid I’ll run off with it?” Aulinloch asked, with a cold smile.

Kalmberg elaborated with ill-concealed delight. “We’ve got to face the fact that someone is after those carvings. If we—”

“If that were so,” Aulinloch argued, “it would be me he’d murder, not Stirling, or Zaharoff—”

“Not at all.” Kalmberg waved a contemptuous hand. “What would be the use of murdering you, with six of us, and your estate, to fight him afterwards for possession? No, he knows you have the jade, so he plans to get rid of the rest of us and then there’s only you between him and the jade. If it was kept in a safety deposit vault he could never hope to lay hands on it, even if he did away with us all. Of course, that’s assuming you’re right, Aulinloch, that there’s anything in these three deaths.”

Aulinloch was plainly impressed, but he stiffened against the suggestion that he should give up possession of the beloved carvings. He pointed to the vault at the end of the room. “Isn’t that as safe as any deposit vault? And if—if anything happens us all—and that’s silly, of course—the jade is still as safe there—”

“And it would be your wife’s—your estate’s, I mean!” Kalmberg protested, with a cunning leer, would be yours no matter what happened even if you’re the next to go—because it would be found in your safe. Where would our agreement be then, I’d like to know.”

“Do you wish a legal document drawn up by a lawyer?” Aulinloch scoffed.

There was a chorus of dissent, that broke into re­newed discussion of the deposit vault. Kalmberg knew one where arrangements could be made that the jade would go to the survivors. Freyseng supported him. McElheren trusted no one and was unwilling to sup­port them. Aulinloch saw the argument going against him.

“I can do something better,” he said. “I’ll place a paper in the suitcase with the jade, saying anything you wish. You see,” more genially, “I must have the carv­ings where I can show them to a prospective buyer.”

Their dread of publicity, their distrust of one an­other, ended the discussion there.

“It ain’t likely,” Freyseng said, “after Stirling being done in shoost last night—and maybe Zaharoff today, if vat Aulinloch says is right—it ain’t likely they’ll do anything more right avay. The police could get sus­picious—all us dealers in precious stones kicking out.”

They rose to go. Aulinloch led to the side door opening on the stairs. Each was to go down as he had come up. Softly he opened the door, after listen­ing a moment at the keyhole. Then he staggered back. A Chinaman stood in the opening, a gun covered them.

“Get back to the other room!” the Chinaman ordered.

They retreated before him, hands raised, constern­ation and bewilderment on their faces. The Chinaman lined them against the wall.

“Open that safe!” he ordered of Aulinloch.

Aulinloch’s lips twitched. “I can’t. It’s a time-lock. No one can open it till tomorrow morning.”

The Chinaman scowled toward the safe. “Serve you right if I plugged you right now,” he hissed.

He glared at them, then slowly backed to the side door and, turning, bolted out of sight, slamming the outer door behind him.

Freyseng sprang to the telephone, but Aulinloch caught his arm.

“Not that, for God’s sake! Don’t you see the mess we’d be in? Do we want the police to know about the jade—about this conference?”

XVI

Arnold Platt walked into Inspector Broughton’s office and sank into a chair with a sigh of satisfaction. The Inspector lifted his eyes from a report he was reading and regarded his assistant with some excitement.

“Got something more, Platt?”'

“Got a lot, sir,” Platt replied. “But I don’t see yet how it gets us any nearer the murderer of Fergus Stirling. Seems to me it gives Adolph Aulinloch a complete alibi.”

Inspector Broughton was unconcerned. “If it didn’t—well, I don’t personally need an alibi for Aulinloch . . . and it isn’t that I have a soft spot in my heart for him. I’ve certain ideas about Aulinloch that don’t in­clude the murder of Fergus Stirling, and I’m rather glad to have them substantiated . . . Of course it would be a lot easier for us if he were guilty—we have plenty of evidence against him—but nothing so upsets my self-confidence as to read a man wrong­ly. But go on with your story. A little thing I have here before me doesn’t help any.

“Give me a prod, Platt, if I don’t seem to be listening. I’ve a lot on my mind this morning.” He tapped the sheet of paper. “Things are getting complicated . . . or per­haps it simplifies the whole affair . . . Again, perhaps—but what’s the use of speculating? Go ahead.”

“I started out, sir, as you suggested, after Mrs. Aulinloch, and it wasn’t long before I ran down some interesting facts. Surpris­ing, too. She’s rather well known socially—or she was before her marriage to this fellow—so it wasn’t difficult to ferret out her story. She’s so much younger than her husband, and sort of different, that I suspected one of those rebound cases. I find that’s just what it is. She’s a member of a golf club where I happen to have a friend, and he told me a lot about her. Her name was Brander before her marriage. Where that figures is that she was supposed to be engaged at one time to a second cousin by the name of Brander Charlesworth. Brander is a family name.

“Well, it appears she and her young cousin had a quarrel; at any rate they broke it off. It seems that young Charlesworth refused to take advantage of the money she would bring him. She rides a pretty tall horse, it seems—or she did.

“Anyway, Aulinloch intruded into the picture, and caught her on the rebound.”

“And yet, you know,” Inspector Broughton said, “she’s as loyal as a loving wife can be . . . In fact, her loyalty has already blocked me—and it promises to block me more. What you tell me explains an attitude that puzzled me. It makes me a bit reluctant to pump her. I can rather admire her. Go on.”

“I Haven’t started yet,” Platt said. “I found where this young Charlesworth lives and I wandered around that way. You see, we’ve decided that someone is trying to fasten the crime on Aulin­loch, and I figured who more likely than his wife’s former lover. Particularly when, if anything happened to her husband now, Mrs. Aulinloch would be well fixed. I began to make enquiries among the neighbors . . . I learned more than I anticipated, more than I ever hoped for.

“The Charlesworths live on the west side, right across the city from the Aulinloch’s. It must be seven or eight miles. There’s only mother and son. Asking a question here and there, I discovered that Aulinloch could not have murdered Fergus Stirling because at the time we fix the murder he was away out near the Charlesworths—poking about the house.”

He nodded to the Inspector’s surprise. “Yes, by good luck I found two neighbors who saw Aulinloch there night before last at the time the murder was committed. It’s a complete alibi. A woman who knows him by sight, because her husband works in the Com­merce Building where Aulinloch's office is, saw him on the street at a few minutes to nine—not more than ten minutes before.

“Then the druggist on the corner two blocks from Mrs. Charlesworth’s saw him at a few minutes after nine about the same place. He is certain of the time because he closes at nine exactly, and he was on his way home when he saw Aulinloch.”

“But what in the world,” the Inspector puzzled, “would he be doing there? Jealousy? But then, if this former lover of his wife’s isn’t even in the city!” Platt looked thoughtful. “I wonder if we couldn’t follow that up. You see, this young Brander often pays flying visits to his mother. He’s very secretive about it and never lets anyone see him if he can help it.”

“Perhaps,” suggested the Inspector, “young Charles­worth includes someone else in his secret visits. That would account for Aulinloch prying about the house—if he suspected anything.”

Platt nodded. “Aulinloch certainly didn’t wish to be seen. The woman almost ran into him as she hurried out to post a letter for the nine o’clock collection, and he dropped his face quite noticeably. He acted much the same way when the druggist passed him . . . At any rate, it puts Aulinloch right out of the picture so far as the murder is concerned.”

The Inspector thought it over. “Then Aulinloch was lying when he said he telephoned Kalm­berg about nine o’clock. Though he may have tele­phoned from some place around the Charlesworth’s . . . The one thing that stands out is that he threatens to give us trouble. He’s a smart one, Platt. If his car was used in connection with the murder, then he must have gone to the Charlesworths some other way. We can gather from that, apart from the fact that he did not wish to be seen, that he was out there for no honest purpose. That exact measurement on his speed­ometer—as he says—”

“But I’ve checked up on that, sir,” Platt interrupted. “I’ve been to the garage where Aulinloch parks his car during the day. I had a stroke of good luck there, too. Everything—everything seems to combine to support his story. The garage man who attends to his car says he’s the most methodical man be ever knew. That’s how I happen to be able to check up on the mileage Aulinloch changes the oil in his car every eight hundred miles, and he expects the garage attendant to keep an eye on the mileage for that purpose. On the day of the murder he had noticed the mileage—it was getting near the eight hundred—and again yesterday when the car was put in by Aulinloch. The distance it had gone in the meantime is very close to what Aulinloch says it went during the night, plus twice the distance be­tween the garage and his house. The small difference—a matter of two miles—would be accounted for by the little run Aulinloch says he took through the parks before going home to dinner. If all that is cleverness, then he’s too clever for roe.”

“Did you happen to enquire, when you were out in the Charlesworth neighborhood, if young Charlesworth was at home night before last?” Inspector Broughton enquired.

“1 was coming to that, sir,” Platt replied. “This same woman who saw Aulinloch says she got up about midnight to close the window—there was a strong wind, you remember—and she saw a car pull up before the Charlesworth house and then go on. It looked like Brander Charlesworth’s. Also she had an idea Brander was at home because all day long she only saw Mrs. Charlesworth once out­side the house, though usually she spends most of the day pottering about the garden. They’ve learned to connect that with her son’s visits.”

“And that,” declared the Inspector, “gives us another slant to follow.”

“But if young Charlesworth had wished to get rid of his rival, sir, surely he’d have taken more direct means. Why do Stirling in when he could just as easily murder Aulinloch himself and be sure of clearing the way?”

The Inspector smiled. “My dear Platt, have you ever been in love? No? Then you may be ex­cused for your ignorance. It’s not the object of one’s affections that satisfies one, but the love of that object. In other words, it isn’t Mrs. Aulinloch this young fellow would want but Mrs. Aulinloch with her love. He might get Aulinloch out of the way and be no nearer his goal; but if he could get rid of Aulinloch by convict­ing him of murder—surely you see the difference in his chances with Aulinloch’s wife!

“But I’m inclined to go further in considering this secret visit of Aulinloch’s to the neighborhood of his former rival’s house. Isn’t it possible there may be other, more immediate, reasons? He couldn’t spend every evening spying about Charlesworth’s house . . . Which proves again what a liar Aulinloch is. He told me he had been at home for an hour and a half before the police found Stirling’s body. Why should he do that? It may be only because of the secrecy of his visit to the Charlesworth neigh­borhood—or it may be for a more substantial reason . . . And then the fact faces me that Mrs. Aulinloch supported him in that lie. No, she did not say so, but her silence meant the same. I did notice that her back look­ed uncompromisingly stiff as her hus­band talked. I was right behind her at the time, going upstairs . . .

“It’s up to us, Platt, to find out if young Charlesworth really was in the city night before last. But that can wait for the time being. More im­portant is the purpose of Aulinloch’s visit out there. Did he really call on Mrs. Charlesworth—and why?”

He leaned his head on his hands and bent over the written sheets on the desk. “Now there’s more, Platt, a great deal more. Here,” tapping the paper, “I have another mystery, and I’m wondering if they overlap. Zachary Zaharoff was killed in a motor accident this afternoon. I sent Falkner out to nose about. I’ll get him in.”

XVII

He rang a bell and asked that Falkner be sent in. In a few moments a tall, rangy man with a peculiar lift to one eyebrow and ab­normally long arms slouched into the room and stood waiting. In appear­ance, in carriage, in the inquisitive, indifferent lift of that eyebrow, he might have been one of the unemployables. As a matter of fact he was a partic­ularly brilliant detective. In his hand he carried a sheet of foolscap.

Inspector Broughton waved him to a chair. “I want to talk over this Zaharoff affair, Falkner—the three of us.”

Falkner placed on the desk the sheet he carried. “I was just putting down there, sir, some points I missed in the first report.”

“Then you can save time by telling me. I’ve read the report through, and I don’t wonder you felt it necessary to supplement it. You’ve got a lot of stuff down here—your deductions, I mean—that call for some explaining. I hope you aren’t taking to pipe-dreams, Falkner, at this stage of your career.”

Falkner grinned. “I never felt more certain of anything, Inspector, and the more I think it over the more certain I am. Maybe you’ll think I didn’t see enough to justify what I make out of the affair, but that’s because I haven’t thought to include everything—a dozen little things that all point the same way but are difficult to de­scribe. I’m surer than ever Zaharoff was murdered!”

Platt lifted his head sharply and stared from Falkner to the Inspector.

“Murdered?” he cried. “Isn’t this Zachary Zaharoff a jeweler, too?”

“Ah! So that struck you, too?” The Inspector’s eyes twinkled. “Great minds, you see. I thought of it right away. And that makes the third—in two weeks! Larned, then Stirling, and now Zaharoff!”

“But Austin Larned died of heart trouble—in his bed,” Platt protested.

Inspector Broughton paid no atten­tion. “Let’s have the whole story from the beginning, Falkner.”

“I went straight out to the accident yesterday afternoon, sir, as you order­ed,” Falkner began. “The country police were a bit peeved at first, but I let on it was sort of accidental . . . and I soon had them interested.”

“I hope you didn’t give away all that’s in this report,” the Inspector said, tapping the paper.

“Not likely.” Falkner settled him­self in his chair. “There was so much about the whole affair that was sus­picious that I scarcely know where to start. In the first place Zaharoff was supposed to have run into the ditch, and the smash was supposed to have started a fire that burned the car and Zaharoff in it. Now Zaharoff’s car was a large coupe, a heavy, well-built affair that doesn’t break into flames every time it jabs into things—”

“But,” the Inspector reminded him, “this was no little jab but a real crash. Zaharoff was badly smashed up”

Falkner smiled. “That’s one of the funny things about it, sir: Zaharoff was badly smashed, more badly than the car. That’s what roused my sus­picions first. The accident happened on an unfrequented road, a bad motor road that leads nowhere. That in it­self is peculiar. The road runs off Number 25 and serves only a few small farms. What was Zaharoff do­ing there? Again, in all that side- road there is only one spot where such an accident could have occurred. I mean, one that would look serious enough to do what this one seemed to do. At that point there’s a swamp on the left of the road, and to stop the mucky earth from caving into the ditch a log wall has been built on the swamp side. It’s the one spot where a car could upset, because it’s a three-foot ditch.

“If it had upset—if it had fallen on Zaharoff—one might expect what hap­pened. But it didn’t upset. What’s more, almost the only wreckage was caused by the fire itself. The left end of the front bumpers struck the logs, to be sure, but so lightly that the bumpers are scarcely bent, and the mark on the logs is a mere scratch.”

“Then how the devil did the fire follow?” the Inspector asked.

“That’s what I asked myself, sir. And the only answer is that the car was set afire!” He paused, pleased with their interest. “What is more, Zaharoff was intended as part of the wreckage. He, too, was set afire—after being knocked unconscious by some blunt weapon! No, it was not the shock of the accident did it. The shock was not great enough for that. To do that the marks on the car and the logs would have been much more extensive. Zaharoff’s skull was crush­ed in: and even if the crash had been severe, I could find no part of the machine that could have made the mark on his temple.

“Now, sir, what started the fire?” He looked at the Inspector, as if ex­pecting an answer.

The latter shrugged. “What usual­ly causes it—if it isn’t a real smash: the gas in the carburettor or the pipe line getting on the hot engine.”

“But the fire did not reach the en­gine at all, sir. Nor was the pipe line broken. No, it burned only around where Zaharoff sat. It was gasoline, yes, and enough of it to make a satis­factory job under any other condi­tions. There was a puncture in the tank, but what the devil caused it? As the car stood there was no explan­ation, nothing to account for that puncture. In fact, the first man on the scene declares that the fire had not reached the tank at all until he had Zaharoff’s body dragged from the flames. And then there was nothing but a shoot of flame from the hole, proving that the tank was already drained. There was, too, almost no fire on the ground, where the gas would surely have run from the hole.”

“Go on,” urged the Inspector.

“My conclusion was this: That Zaharoff had been struck on the head and killed, and then the car was run into the ditch, the tank holed and drained, the gasoline poured on the body and seat and set afire. There’s something more: I was particular to find out how the first man to come on the wreck found the body. The body, he said, was lying along the seat, the head toward the road. Not at all the position it would have taken had the crash knocked him unconscious, espec­ially when it was severe enough to crush the skull.

“I went further. Zaharoff’s car had been stopped some thirty yards from the point of the accident. Stopped suddenly. I saw the marks of the wheels skidding under the brakes. I gather that someone met him on the road and stopped him.”

“Had be been robbed,” Inspector Broughton asked.

Falkner shook his head. “Money and watch and everything that would­n’t burn was there. In fact, the burn­ing of the body was not so very great; it concealed nothing I wanted to find out”

Inspector Broughton leaned his el­bows on the desk and fixed his eyes vacantly on a map on the wall. His two subordinates did not speak. Sud­denly he drew the telephone to him and called a number. It was Zahar­off’s office. After a short conversation he rang off and got another number, this time a rural one.

The result was surprising: Zaharoff, he learned at his office, had been call­ed on the telephone to a farmhouse on the very road where he met his death; an aged relative was visiting there. But at the farmhouse it was denied that a message had gone from there to Zaharoff. Indeed, the rela­tive had never expressed a wish to see Zaharoff with whom he had not been on speaking terms for years.”

Inspector Broughton whistled through his teeth.

“What did I tell you, Platt? Three of them! Two we know were murd­ered . . . I wonder if it’s too late to disinter Larned and have an examin­ation . . . Boys, we’re just beginning to realize how deep this affair is . . . It seems to tell us this—that Larned and Stirling and Zaharoff were some­how associated, that someone profits from their deaths . . . Perhaps it’s be­side the question that Kalmberg and Aulinloch, two more in the gem busi­ness, arc tangled up in Stirling’s death, at least; perhaps it’s more than co­incidence. What—if any—is the con­nection? Are there more in it? Are more to be murdered as these were—or as the two we know of were? . . . Is it love—or money—or revenge . . . or fear? Any connection there is must have something to do with precious stones. Precious stones—and these men—it’s a combination that—”

He broke off as the telephone jangled. He frowned at it, hesitated, lifted it from the hook and asked im­patiently what was wanted. As he put the receiver back a light of excitement shone in his face.

“Speak of the devil, boys!” He glowered at them. “It’s another of them. I guess, Falkner, you’d better clear out. I’m receiving visitors—im­portant visitors . . . under the circum­stances . . . A very sensitive caller he is. Well, what a funny world this is!”

(To be continued) (Link to Part 5)