The Dutch Shoe Mystery
- Автор: Куин (Квин) Эллери
- Серия: Ellery Queen #3
- Год: 1931
- Язык: английский
- Год: Frederick A. Stokes
- Жанр: Классические детективы
Электронная книга - «The Dutch Shoe Mystery». Краткое содержание книги:
“Naturally. He’s gone to warn off Swanson.” The old man was morose now. “Ritter was caught in a jam around the terminal and by the time he got out and into the station Janney had disappeared. He recruited a squad of cops right away to watch the outgoing trains but it was useless. Like looking for a needle in a haystack.”
“Well,” muttered Ellery, frowning, “it’s practically certain that Janney went to warn Swanson, and that Swanson therefore lives somewhere in the suburbs.”
“Taken care of already. Thomas has a group working on the suburb angle...” The Inspector’s eyes brightened momentarily. “There’s one ray of light, though. Know what this Fuller lunatic has done?”
“Sarah Fuller!” The name leaped from Ellery’s lips. “What?”
“Slipped out of the Doorn house about an hour ago. Hesse was tailing her all day. He followed her to — the home of Dr. Dunning! What do you think of that?”
Ellery stared at his father. “Dr. Dunning, eh?” he said slowly. “Now, that is interesting. Anything else from Hesse?”
“Nothing much. The fact alone is enough. She remained in the house for a half-hour. When she came out she took a taxicab directly back to the Doorn place. Hesse reported by ’phone and is still there, working with another man on the job.”
“Sarah Fuller and Dr. Lucius Dunning,” murmured Ellery. He sat down at the table and, looking into the fire, drumming incessantly on the cloth. “Sarah Fuller and Lucius Dunning. There’s a combination for you...” He smiled at his father suddenly. “The prophetess and the healer. A classic non sequitur.”
“It’s funny, right enough,” said the Inspector. He drew his outer robe more closely about him. “We’ll have to follow that up in the morning.”
“Evidently,” said Ellery with a strange satisfaction, “on the Slavic assumption that ‘the morning is wiser than the evening.’ Well... we’ll see.”
The old man said nothing. Just as suddenly as it had appeared, the pleasure vanished from Ellery’s face. He rose quickly and went into his bedroom.
Chapter Eighteen
Condensation
The journalistic explosion which later was to reverberate through the press of the entire world did not achieve its full fury until the day after Abigail Doorn’s murder.
On Tuesday morning every newspaper in the United States carried blazing headlines, voluble front-page stories, and a pitiful handful of facts. The New York press in particular made up for the dearth of available data by devoting whole pages of stories to Abigail Doorn’s astonishing career, her outstanding financial transactions, her enormous list of charities, and the details of her romance with the long-deceased Charles Van der Donk. One syndicate began a hastily assembled series of feature articles titled The Life Story of Abigail Doorn.
With the early afternoon editions, peals of editorial thunder began to make themselves heard. Thinly veiled shafts of criticism were hurled at the Police Commissioner, at Inspector Queen, at the Police Department as a whole, and in one case, obviously as a political move, at the Mayor. “Twenty-four precious hours have slipped into eternity,” ran one indignant account, “and still not the tiniest shred of fact or clew has been unearthed which might lead to the identity of that foul murderer whose bloody hand yesterday sent the great soul of a great woman weeping into the hereafter, long long before her time.” “Is the redoubtable Inspector Queen about to fall down after so many years of successful man-hunting in this, his most important assignment?” queried another. A third stated categorically that the Police Department of the greatest city in the world, for years “notoriously incompetent” in its regulation of the morals of that vastly moral community, would now have the unexampled opportunity of displaying to the sneering world exactly how incompetent it was.
The only newspaper in New York which neither groaned nor flayed the police was the sheet, strangely enough, to which Pete Harper rendered reportorial service.
But it had not required the insinuations and accusations of a vitriolic press to rouse officialdom from its alleged lethargy. The political and social worlds were rocked to their foundations, and the tremors were recorded on the sensitive seismographs of Headquarters. Public figures in all walks of life showered the Mayor with telegraphed, telephoned and personal demands for swift justice. Wall Street, alarmed at the financial unrest and unable to stem the inevitable tide of falling quotations and growing panic, rose in its wrath. The Federal Government evinced an unusual interest in the case. A Senator in whose State Abigail Doorn owned huge properties made a flaming speech from the floor of Congress.
City Hall was a maelstrom of frenzied conferences. Centre Street buzzed like a gigantic bee-hive. Inspector Queen was nowhere to be found; Sergeant Velie flatly refused to talk to reporters. Rumors, feeding on the atmosphere of mystery and doubt, circulated magically all over the City, whispering that an unnamed and “protected” financier of great power had strangled Abigail Doorn with his own hands in revenge for a financial struggle which he had ignominiously lost to the dead woman. The rumor’s patent absurdity, it seemed, did not retard its circulation. Within two hours official cognizance was being taken of it...
Late Tuesday afternoon a solemn group gathered secretly in the innermost sanctum of the Mayor’s chambers. Seated around the conference table in the thick smoky air were the Mayor himself, the Police Commissioner, District Attorney Sampson and his aides, the Borough President of Manhattan, and a half-dozen secretaries. Inspector Queen was conspicuous by his absence.
Gloom hovered over them, leering. They had discussed the case from every conceivable angle while a mad, chattering horde of reporters besieged the outer offices for interviews. The Mayor held in his hand a great sheaf of reports, all signed by Inspector Queen, which gave in painstaking detail every fact, conversation and finding accumulated in the case up to Tuesday morning. Personalities had been weighed and judged: the Borough President had expressed himself as satisfied that the fine Irish hand of Big Mike Cudahy was somewhere mixed into the murder, possibly employed by a mysterious enemy of Abigail Doorn. Dr. Janney’s stubborn silence, the search for Swanson, were the subjects of fruitless debate.
The conference seemed doomed to failure. Nothing new had been discovered; not even a lead toward possible action. A private wire to Police Headquarters stood waiting at the Commissioner’s elbow; it rang incessantly, reporting failure in the investigation of the scant hoard of clews.
It was precisely at this critical moment that the Mayor’s personal secretary entered the room with a heavily sealed envelope addressed to the Police Commissioner.
He tore it open and eagerly scanned the top sheet of a number of typewritten pages.
“Special report from Inspector Queen,” he muttered.
“He says here a full report will come later. Let’s see...” He read in silence. Suddenly he handed the papers to a stenographer at his side. “Here, Jake, read these aloud.”
The clerk began to read rapidly in a clear flat voice.
“Report on Michael Cudahy
“At 10:15 A.M. Tuesday Cudahy was physically able, according to medical advice, to give testimony regarding possible connection with Doorn case. Questioned in Room 328 at Dutch Memorial Hospital where he was brought yesterday after operation for appendicitis. Weak, in great pain.
“Cudahy professes no knowledge of the murder. First quizzed in effort to confirm story of Dr. Byers and Grace Obermann, nurse, that masked and gowned figure of unknown passed through Anæsthesia Room and into Anteroom Monday morning while Cudahy was lying in Anæsthesia Room ready to be anæsthetized in preparation for appendectomy. Confirms seeing man in white gown, cap, surgical gag, etc., walk hurriedly through, as above, entering from South Corridor. Did not see him leave because ether-cone was adjusted almost at once and he was put to sleep. Cannot identify man. Seems to recall limp but is not sure. This however may be discounted; testimony of Dr. Byers and Miss Obermann sufficient to establish same.