Flynn’s Weekly Detective Fiction. Vol. 27, No. 1, September 17, 1927
- Автор: Valentine, Corley H. W.
- Год: 1927
- Язык: английский
- Год: The Red Star News Company
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «Flynn’s Weekly Detective Fiction. Vol. 27, No. 1, September 17, 1927». Краткое содержание книги:
To the bluff, hearty Wacker’s other hearers, the word meant nothing. They wanted to know about the sheep. Some of them said so. Wacker, glowing with self-confidence because his story had been so well received, told them.
“Sure, Alvarado had been drinkin’,” he said in conclusion. “I suppose that’s why he tried to drive his flock o’ ewes into th’ office out there, an’ got them drunken punchers sore, an’ one of ’em shot him. All you fellers know what that big husky, Alvarado, was like when he was lickered up.” He paused a moment, reflectively.
“I suppose,” he went on, “if he hadn’ been such a big husky, he wouldn’t have busted his skull, droppin’ to th’ floor, that-away, after bein’ shot.”
During the brief space of silence which followed the triumphant Bill Wacker’s statement of his theory regarding Alvarado’s fractured skull, a theory which he had been public-spirited enough to suggest to the coroner’s jury and with which that learned body had agreed, a small wiry man thrust himself through the crowd.
When he spoke, his voice, identified as the lover of fair play who, a few minutes before, had assured Bill Wacker that the prosecuting attorney would be made to listen to his vindication.
Facing the prosecuting attorney, what he now said was: “What I’d do is offer a reward for them two cow-punchers.”
“Would you?” inquired young Barrett evenly, and turned his back on him to confront the self-satisfied proprietor of the Bella Union. “Well, what I’m going to do, Mr. Wacker, is to take you to jail.”
“Boys—” burst out Mr. Wacker, but went no farther. He had been stopped by the muzzle of a Colt’s forty-five jammed against his stomach.
Said young Barrett in a voice of ice: “I can’t kill ’em all. But I can kill you. If one of ’em makes a move, I’ll do it.”
Half an hour later, Bill Wacker, being safely, and profanely, in jail, a thoughtful young prosecuting attorney again walked through the sleeping streets, alone.
As he drew near the cottage where slumbered the cool and sweet wife whose dreams that he was to go to Congress, or to be Governor, his night’s work may have wrecked, he was saying to himself: “There’ll be plenty of torpedoes, all right. But, damn the torpedoes, and go ahead.”
Yet, he was feeling very lonely.
III
During the first ten days that Bill Wacker was in jail, awaiting the meeting of the grand jury, Prosecuting Attorney Barrett resisted every one of the direct and indirect attempts which were made to get him to do what Bill Wacker’s intercessors — some of them accredited go-betweens, others volunteers — called “listen to reason.”
But, on the night of the tenth day, something happened that shook the foundations of the case he had built up against the prisoner. The stroke came out of a clear sky, for the tenth night was a cloudless night of stars — a night of such magical beauty that, under its spell of peace and loveliness, the much-tried and much-tempted and very tired young John Barrett relaxed, and, for the first time since he had begun to build the case, found comfort and encouragement in discussing it with his wife.
After she had washed the supper dishes and he had dried them and put them away, they sat down, side by side, on the upper step of the little front porch of their cottage. At first they sat in silence, the stilly evening, spangled with stars and fragrant with the perfumes of spring, seeming to lay invisible fingers on their lips.
But, when she had glimpsed a falling star, and having lightly kissed him, nestled her blond head against his shoulder, they began to talk in little, broken phrases about their future.
Insensibly, the talk came round to the Wacker case, and nothing since the first day of his investigation so soothed him as to hear her whisper: “You’re making a brave fight, my man, and I hope you win it.”
“Honey,” he found himself saying, “I can’t thank you enough for that. I get kind of tired sometimes. It’s just fine to know you’re with me.”
“I wasn’t, at first,” she told him, capturing his hand. “I was piggy enough to want you to let well enough alone. But now I’m glad you went ahead. With most of the whole county down on you, I’d be a great wife, wouldn’t I, if I didn’t stick?”
A flash of Knot-Headed Barrett’s fighting spirit was in his voice as he answered: “Most of the whole county will quit being down on me when I prove Bill Wacker’s guilty. Every one thinks he’s innocent. The people he’s been sending to me every day all insist he’s innocent. I know better.
“I know he planned that murder for more than a month — ever since Alvarado almost choked him to death while they were fighting over at Tucgoles. That was during the State Fair.
“The fight was over some girl. They’d had business troubles before, but this scrap over the girl was what made Wacker decide to get Alvarado out of the way for good. It seems the girl loved Alvarado.”
“And how do you know all this?” his wife asked. “And who is the girl?”
“Duke Emmett told me about the fight. Alvarado told him. They were great friends, even though Duke was turning the faro box for Bill Wacker. He doesn’t know who the girl is, but he does know he saw Bill Wacker kill him.
“Wacker doesn’t think anybody except that bartender he paid hush money to, and sent away the night of the murder, saw him do it. But Duke Emmett saw him. Duke’s my surprise witness. Wait till most of the county hear him—”
“Look, Jack, look!” she cut in, breathlessly. “Isn’t that a man standing in the shadow of the pepper tree over there?”
On his feet in a flash, revolver in hand, he placed himself in front of her.
“You, over there under the tree!” he challenged. “Come here — and come with your hands up!”
A figure disengaged itself from the shadow cast by a pepper tree, between the sidewalk and the street, and advanced toward them, hands in the air.
“Duke Emmet!” exclaimed the relieved prosecutor. “What in the world—”
“I didn’t see any light. I didn’t know you were home. I was going to wait till you came,” interrupted his star witness, the faro dealer, with what, for him, was unusual agitation of voice and manner. “You’d like to get your hands on that bartender Wacker shipped out of town, wouldn’t you?”
“Would I?” cried Barrett.
“Then come with me. He’s back. Right now, he’s sitting in a five-handed poker game in room No. 8 at the Bella Union.”
“And the grand jury meets to-morrow.” said Barrett, thinking aloud. “If I can get him to tell the truth to that jury they’ll simply have to vote a true bill. Without him, Wacker’s friends on the jury might say they preferred to believe Wacker’s story instead of yours. But, if he corroborates you, the jury’ll just have to indict.”
Impulsively, protectively, his wife slipped her arm around him. “But, but, can’t you send for him?” she queried. “Is it necessary for you to go to the Bella Union?”
The prosecuting attorney’s murmured reply was unintelligible, but not so the observation Duke Emmett volunteered. “No, it isn’t,” said he firmly. “To-night the Bella Union’s no Y. M. C. A. There’s a lot of hard drinking and a lot of hard talking going on down there, and some of those tough friends of Wacker’s from Tucgoles are used to shooting without waiting for the hat to drop.
“If any of them thought I was helping your husband, I’d have got mine before this. But they all think I’m body and soul with Wacker. This being my night off, they’ve been inviting me to sit in at their poker games. Wacker’s Man Friday, the town marshal, is in one of them now.