Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 128, No. 6. Whole No. 784, December 2006
- Автор: Пикард Нэнси, Пронзини Билл
- Год: 2006
- Язык: английский
- Год: Dell Magazines
- ISBN: 0013-6328
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 128, No. 6. Whole No. 784, December 2006». Краткое содержание книги:
“When he told me he meant to bind his unruly country together by increasing the army three-fold, I recalled the words of the British staff officer in Constantinople when I described my surveying trip. The Brit said they couldn’t guarantee my safety. But if the Bedouins did capture me, he promised to send out planes and bomb the beggars until they let me go.
“I heard myself suggesting that the Shah might do the same job with an air force and at a fraction of the cost. How better to put down tribal revolts and maintain order in remote corners of the country? With warplanes a glut on the market he could buy all he needed for next to nothing. And there were plenty of aviators who’d jump at the chance to fly them.
“The Shah said he’d study the idea,” said Jerome. “But I could tell he liked it. Now for the long and short of it. A month ago I received his letter authorizing me to put together a Persian air force. Needless to say, there’ll be a tidy commission for yours truly when I do. So here I am, looking over what the Prentiss-Jenkins people have in the way of aircraft and interviewing pilots. My old friend Wing Commander Timmons is here representing a British team. Not to mention our old nemesis Baron Waldteufel on behalf of his German flyers. Even the Soviets are interested.” Jerome looked at his wrist watch. “An hour ago the Shah’s man General Massoudi arrived in San Sebastiano by British flying boat from Alexandria to see what I’ve put together.”
As he spoke, an old open touring car turned in at the retreat-house gate. It made a complete circle of the parking lot as though Father Carlus, the driver, who was done up in motorcycle goggles and a white duster, was reluctant to end the journey. Three visitors and their baggage sat behind him fresh from San Sebastiano’s old port where Imperial Airways had a quay-side hangar for their giant amphibious aircraft.
“That’s Massoudi, the one in the military uniform,” said Jerome. “The other two are my old Cairo to Cathay employers, Major Ibrahim and Mr. Wang.” He indicated the tall man in a white suit, with a long jaw and a red tarboosh, carrying a horsehair fly whisk, and an Oriental gentleman who seemed uncomfortable pent up in western dress. “They’re here to discuss fresh financing for their railroad with Miss Khalila Assad.” With a nod toward the blue car, Jerome went to greet the passengers.
Waving to Father Carlus, who had stopped to admire the Terrapin, Ganelon continued on his way to the back of the retreat house where a flagstone walk and a dozen sturdy willow trees circled a good-sized pond. Centuries before, a stream on the property had been dammed up, creating the pond and a millrace to drive the mill’s waterwheel, long since fallen to ruin. The unharnessed overflow still found its way down to the sea, where its brown water vanished like chimney smoke into the sky-blue Mediterranean.
It was Friday. Two young monks were out on the pond in a rowboat trying to net carp for dinner. Ganelon recalled Father Boniface’s complaint, “English monks always chose salmon rivers when they built their cathedrals. We must do with carp.”
Suddenly a monk gave a shout and jumped into the water. His companion followed. Wading across to a large willow, they struggled, trying to extricate something from the submerged tangle of the tree’s roots. As Ganelon reached them they were dragging the body of a man in a dark suit up onto the grass. One monk hurried off to fetch Father Boniface.
Ganelon knelt to examine the body, noting the wound from a heavy blow to the back of the head. The other monk said they’d seen the dead man’s heels floating beneath the willow branches. The detective found that the most interesting thing, the torso and head floating below the feet, so deep in the water.
“It’s Mr. Elmer Shypoke, the missing guest,” said a woman’s voice.
Ganelon looked up. The beautiful driver of the blue roadster was standing there. He was sorry he’d surrendered his Hrosco. The cockeyed grin it gave him charmed the ladies.
“Strange the way he was floating,” she added, pushing her black hair out of an alert and intelligent face.
“You’ve a good eye,” said Ganelon.
A male voice with an English accent said, “A shoulder money belt filled with gold guineas will do that to you.” The speaker was a tall, fair-haired man wearing a blazer and a Royal Flying Corps tie. He had a twisted chin and an indentation like a deep thumbprint low on one cheek. A casse-gueule, as the French called those who brought face wounds out of the War. The man introduced himself. “Timmons,” he said.
Ganelon opened the dead man’s jacket to reveal the bulging shoulder money belt. Well, the killer’s motive hadn’t been robbery. “You the one who led Jerome around in the hospital when he couldn’t see?” he asked Timmons. Jerome had been caught on the ground during one of Baron Waldteufel’s aerial gas attacks. Temporarily blinded, he’d been led away in a crocodile of like-injured. During his long recuperation in a San Sebastiano hospital, Jerome and Timmons had become fast friends.
“My jaw was all wired up,” said Timmons. “It was the dumb leading the blind. Have you met Miss Khalila Assad?”
“So you are the famous private detective,” said the young woman. “Please call me Khalila. May I help you in your investigation? I am not without experience in such matters.”
Ganelon remembered something from one of the magazines he subscribed to — was it P.I. Tidbits? — about a Levantine religious youth group solving crimes in the city of Nancy. “Better leave this to the police,” he said. He could tell she was disappointed. But he had his reasons.
Jerome and Father Boniface came hurrying down the path. While the priest knelt to pray beside the body, Khalila told Jerome, “Mr. Ganelon says this is a police matter. That’s fine with me. I don’t work well with men who talk to trees.”
“You were driving fast,” protested Ganelon. “This old man came out of the orchard to help me change a tire.”
Khalila frowned at him, put her arm in Jerome’s arm, and led him away. As he went the pilot shot Ganelon a puzzled look over his shoulder.
Ganelon watched the woman go. “Something of a coquette,” he said to Timmons.
“Don’t ask me,” replied the Englishman.
“The money belt, how come you knew about it?”
“We flew over from Croydon to Paris together, Shypoke, Baron Waldteufel, and I. Shypoke bragged about the gold and showed off what he called his shooting iron to keep it safe.”
Then he added, “If you ask me, Standard Oil sent the man to fish in troubled waters. Anglo-Persian Oil’s agreement is with a local warlord. The Shah could invalidate it.”
“I hear the country’s oil production could one day equal that of the U. S.,” said Ganelon.
“So they say,” said Timmons. “Perhaps Shypoke thought the gold might help him with the Shah’s man Massoudi. Shypoke’s arrival certainly spooked the Anglo-Persian people. Instead of waiting for Massoudi, they left this morning for Teheran to deal with the Shah directly.”
“And Waldteufel was on your Paris flight, you say?”
“Yes, our plane was a tri-engine Prentiss-Jenkins Gladiator, the ‘box kite,’ as they call them. A noon takeoff followed by a leisurely lunch on a wide table in a spacious cabin made it a very popular flight. Waldteufel was on board, but just barely. We were powering up when a chauffeured Daimler drove out onto the field to deliver him and his baggage.”
“The Daimler driver, did he have a club foot?” asked Ganelon, describing Eustace, Dorian Fong-Smythe’s chauffeur. Timmons hesitated. “I didn’t notice,” he said.