Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 19, No. 99, February 1952
- Автор: Грубер Фрэнк, Кемельман Гарри
- Год: 1952
- Язык: английский
- Год: American Mercury
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 19, No. 99, February 1952». Краткое содержание книги:
Delhanty chuckled. “G.I. trophies. My boy brought home enough stuff to equip a German regiment.”
He drew a pencil from his breast pocket and pointed with it to the desk in the photograph.
“Now I call your attention to this stuff on the desk to the right of this pile of books. It’s hard to make out in the picture, but I itemized it.”
He referred to his notes again. “ ‘Loose change to the sum of twenty-eight cents, a key to the room, a pen and pencil set, a jackknife, a clean handkerchief, and a billfold.’ It’s the usual stuff that a man keeps in his pockets and transfers every time he changes his suit. One thing struck me as funny: the billfold was empty. It had his license and registration and a receipted bill for his room rent and a little book of stamps, but I mean there wasn’t a dollar in the money compartment.”
“Nothing odd in that,” I remarked. “Students are not noted for their wealth.”
Delhanty shook his head stubbornly. “Usually you carry some money with you. The change on the desk didn’t even amount to lunch money. We searched the place carefully and found no money and no bankbook. But in the wastebasket we did find this.”
Once again he ducked down to rummage in his brief-case. This time he brought forth a long government-franked envelope.
“That’s the kind they send checks in,” he remarked. “And do you notice the postmark? He must have received it yesterday. So we checked with the local banks and the first one we tried admitted they had cashed a government check for Bennett for one hundred dollars. The teller couldn’t be sure, of course, but unless Bennett asked for bills of a particular denomination, he would probably give him the money in three twenties, two tens, three fives and five ones.
“Well,” Delhanty went on, “a young man in Bennett’s circumstances wouldn’t be likely to spend all that in a day. So that suggested to me that robbery might be the motive. And then I thought of the car parked outside with the ignition key still in the switch. It wasn’t left there overnight because it would have been tagged. That meant that it was delivered there this morning, either by a friend who had borrowed it, or, more likely, by some garage. We had luck on that too. We found that the car had been left at the High Street Garage for lubrication and was delivered around 9:30 this morning. When I asked about the key in the switch, the manager of the garage was as puzzled as I had been. They always deliver the keys to the owner, he said, or make arrangements with him to leave them somewhere.
“I asked to look at their records to see who delivered the car. Well, it’s only a small place and they didn’t keep any such records, hut the manager knew that it was a young apprentice mechanic they had there — fellow named Sterling, James Sterling. He does most of the lubricating work and delivers cars when necessary. The manager couldn’t be sure, but he thought Sterling had delivered Bennett’s car to him several times before. I considered that important because it would show that Sterling knew Bennett’s room number and would be able to go right on up without making inquiries.”
“I take it,” I said, “that there wouldn’t be any trouble getting into the hotel without being noticed.”
“Oh, as to that, the place is wide open. It’s not really a hotel, you see. There’s no desk clerk. The outer door is kept open during the day, and anyone could come in and out a dozen times without being seen.
“I asked to speak to Sterling,” Delhanty went on, “and learned that he had gone home sick. I got his address and was just leaving, when I noticed a row of steel lockers which I figured were used by the mechanics for their work clothes. I asked the manager to open Sterling’s and, after a little fuss, he did. And what do you think I found there, tucked away behind the peak of his greasy work cap? Three twenties, two tens, and three fives. No ones — I suppose he figured he could have those on him without exciting suspicion.”
“You went to his home?”
“That’s right, sir. He may have been sick before, but he was a lot sicker when he saw me. At first he said he didn’t know anything about the money. Then he said he won it shooting crap. And then he said he had found it in Bennett’s car, tucked down between the seat and the back cushion. So I told him we had found his fingerprints on the billfold. We hadn’t, of course, but sometimes a little lie like that is enough to break them. His answer to that was that he wanted a lawyer. So we locked him up. I thought I’d talk to you before we really put him through the wringer.”
“You’ve done an excellent job, Delhanty,” I said. “Quick work and good, straight thinking. I suppose Sterling thought that leaving the key in the switch would indicate that he hadn’t seen Bennett to deliver it to him personally. And you went him one better and figured that his leaving the key in the switch was in itself an indication that something was wrong. Finding the money clinches it, of course. But it would be nice if we found someone who had seen him. You questioned the residents, of course?”
“Naturally, we questioned everybody at the hotel,” Delhanty said. He chuckled. “And it just goes to show how sometimes too much investigating can hinder you by leading you off on a tangent. I questioned them before I got a line on Sterling, and for a while I thought I had the logical suspect right there in one of the residents of the hotel. You see we had gone through all the residents, and Houston, the manager, and had drawn a perfect blank: no one had seen anything; no one had heard anything. Then we called in the chambermaid. We had left her for the last because she had been kind of upset and hysterical, what with finding the body and all. Well, she had seen something.
“She had started to work on that floor at half-past eight. She’s sure of the time because the chapel clock was just chiming. She was just going into the room at the other end of the corridor from Bennett’s when she saw Alfred Starr, who occupies the room next to Bennett, leave his room and knock on Bennett’s door. She watched, and saw him enter. She waited a minute or two and then went on with her work.”
“Why did she watch?” I asked.
“I asked the same question,” said Delhanty, “and she said it was because Starr and Bennett had had a fearful row a couple of days before, and she wondered about his going in now. When I had questioned Starr earlier, he had said nothing about having gone into Bennett’s room. So I called him in again and asked him about it. At first he denied it. That’s normal. Then when he realized that someone had seen him, he admitted that he had visited Bennett that morning, but insisted that it was only to wish him luck on his exam. Then I mentioned the row he had had a couple of days before. He didn’t try to dodge it. He admitted he had had a fight with Bennett, but he claimed he had been a little tight at the time. It appears he had brought his girl down from Boston for a dance at the Medical School a couple of weeks ago. He had been tied up in the morning and had asked Bennett to entertain her. Then he had found out that after she had gone back to Boston, Bennett had written her a couple of times. That was what the fight was about, but he had later realized that he had been foolish. Bennett’s coming up for his exam gave him an opportunity to apologize and to wish him luck. He hadn’t said anything about it because he didn’t want to get mixed up in anything, especially now with final exams on.”