Detective Fiction Weekly. Vol. 118, No. 6, April 16, 1938
- Автор: Трит Лоуренс, Вулрич Корнелл
- Год: 1938
- Язык: английский
- Год: The Red Star News Company
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «Detective Fiction Weekly. Vol. 118, No. 6, April 16, 1938». Краткое содержание книги:
“Not necessarily,” said the detective. “It could just as easily prove you were clever enough to want to make it look that way. Lindquist, who was never in this town before, got out there without any trouble. Where is he, by the way? We investigated him and he’s exactly what he says he is.”
“I had an accident with my car.” Hobart shuddered. “He was — it was hit by a freight train at the Central Avenue crossing just now.”
All Foster said, with deadly emphasis, was, “Since when is Central Avenue the shortest way between the Harrison Hotel and your house here? Let’s get started, shall we?”
And as he half-carried the almost senseless victim of circumstances through the door with him, he growled disgustedly: “All for a little bit of colored paper! I have a letter in my pocket right now, from Mrs. Adams, in which she mentions she was going to give the stamp collection to you intact, triangular and all, as soon as the estate was settled, to show her appreciation and because neither she nor her husband are interested in stamps and you are.”
“I didn’t kill Harding!” shrieked Hobart.
“You’re the only one who had a motive,” Foster said flatly. “You’re the only one who could have. If you didn’t kill him, who did?”
Death Plays a Sucker
by T. T. Flynn
There in the quiet bank vault, Bradley’s hands began to tremble as he decided to kill Van Dyke. Steadying himself, Bradley put down the packet of hundred-dollar bills and looked furtively at the others. They hadn’t noticed, they were too busy counting the cash to find how much Van Dyke had stolen.
In the directors’ room, Fosdick, the bank’s president, and Simmons and Cleve, the vice-presidents, and that shaggy-haired badly-dressed little surety company detective, were waiting for the figures.
“Forty-three one-thousand-dollar bills,” announced Gauge, snapping rubber band about the thin packet. “I guess Van Dyke knew these would leave a trail.”
Jordan, number three teller, tossed a canvas money sack onto a heap of other sacks. “Three thousand and ten dollars in pennies.”
Steelman, the head bookkeeper, snapped, “Hurry — they’re waiting.”
Jimmy Allison, the junior teller, grinned from the sacked rolls of nickels and dimes.
“If you ask me, Van Dyke had it all planned. Remember that cutie I saw him with? I wonder if he took her along. Paris, Monte Carlo, Singapore — it’ll be good while it lasts.”
Bradley’s lip curled. Good for nothing but donning their seersucker coats, paying out, receiving other people’s money. They wouldn’t believe Van Dyke was safely away, they were sure Van Dyke would be caught. In the directors’ room it was taken for granted. But Fosdick, the president, Simmons, Cleve, the vice-presidents, were fools. Van Dyke, that hearty, back-slapping fellow, had planned too well. Ten, fifteen years Van Dyke must have planned — and only Alvin Bradley remembered.
“Twenty-three one-hundred — dollar bills,” said Bradley evenly. “Van Dyke evidently took most of the hundreds.”
They were waiting when Bradley entered the directors’ room, a meek, slightly stooped man with thinning hair and prim eyeglasses.
“Well?” said Fosdick impatiently.
Bradley read from the paper in his hand.
“Ninety-seven thousand, six hundred and forty dollars, and fifty cents. That seems to be all the cash Mr. Van Dyke got.”
Fosdick exploded. “Isn’t that enough? Don’t look so sanctimonious, Bradley!”
Bradley flushed. How he disliked them. Not one had been so long with the bank. Van Dyke, the thief, when he had been promoted past the head teller’s post where Alvin Bradley was a fixture, had chuckled, “Stop being a worm, Alvin, and thinking how badly you’re used. The lightning may strike you next time.”
Simmons, lean and good-looking in his expensive suit, mused, “I wonder why Van took that extra fifty cents.”
Cleve, the other vice-president, guessed, “I suppose for the same reason he left this note, and had the repairs rushed on his fishing rod. Van thought of everything.” Cleve cocked an eyebrow at Candleman, the sloppily dressed little man from the surety company. “It was his favorite fishing rod, didn’t his wife tell you?”
Candleman nodded soberly.
“The tip was loose. She still thinks he’s away on a fishing trip.”
“What a shock she’ll get,” said Simmons regretfully. He read again from the note before him.
Gentlemen: I’m in too deep. My bond is a hundred and twenty-five thousand. I’ll take the difference along and let the bonding company settle the even amount. My regrets and regards.