INTRODUCTION

THE MULTI-TALENTED Harry Kurnitz (1908-1968), who wrote several mysteries under the pen name Marco Page, packed a lot of life experience into his sixty years—newspaperman, novelist, Hollywood screenwriter, Broadway playwright, art collector, raconteur, cosmopolite. While doing research for this introduction, I was reminded of what the legendary polymath Isaac Asimov once told me when I asked about his own prodigious output in a wide variety of literary projects. “Nothing is wasted,” he replied simply, and tapped his prominent forehead. For Kurnitz, a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania who honed his reportorial skills as a book and music critic for the Philadelphia Record in the 1930s, everything was in play and grist for his creative mill.

Writing as Marco Page, Kurnitz set his first novel, Fast Company, among New York’s rare book community during the Great Depression, a hardscrabble world filled with characters forced to improvise “when the bottom fell out of the market,” as my tattered eleventh Pocket Book printing from November 1945 describes the situation beneath a banner panel that teases “Rare Books and Raw Murder Mix.”

Published originally in hardcover in 1938 by Dodd, Mead, the novel was a pioneering work that prefigured an international tradition of biblio-mysteries by such stalwarts that include John Dunning (Booked to Die, 1992), A.S. Byatt (Possession: A Romance, 1990), Arturo Pérez-Reverte (The Club Dumas, 1993), Bradford Morrow (The Forgers, 2014), and the Italian semiotician Umberto Eco, whose tour-de-force of medieval biblio-chicanery, The Name of the Rose, has sold more than 50 million copies worldwide since its release in 1980.

When Kurnitz began writing Fast Company in 1937, eight years had elapsed since the electrifying sale of the library of the famed Broadway composer Jerome Kern, an auction of 1,486 high spots of English and American literature that grossed more than $1.7 million at Anderson Galleries in New York in January 1929, with a per-lot average of $1,165 that remained an auction record for more than fifty years. It was a sensational sale by every metric and proved prescient on Kern’s part eight months later when the stock market collapsed and the value of rare books came tumbling down with it.

Just how dramatically values had tanked would be made tauntingly clear at the very time Kurnitz was writing Fast Company, with the sale of two prize acquisitions from the Kern collection to Lord Victor Rothschild in England. Financier Owen D. Young had paid $29,000 each for a six-volume first edition of Henry Fielding’s Tom Jones and an autograph manuscript of Alexander Pope’s Essay on Man—$58,000 total for two of the sale’s crown jewels. In 1937, Young, acting through the agency of the prominent Manhattan dealer Gabriel Wells, who had acquired the items on his behalf at the sale, sold both to Rothschild for a combined £3,500 (roughly $17,500), a calamitous loss of more than 70 percent.

As an ironic postscript, Rothschild would sue Wells and Young several years later, alleging that the Tom Jones contained skillfully inserted facsimile leaves and a restored binding—it was not, he asserted, the “rare uncut condition” and “sound original binding” the Kern catalogue had described, and therefore not worth the paltry sum he had already paid.

This was precisely the kind of sophisticated manipulation Kurnitz had depicted in Fast Company, and one of several possible reasons the principal victim of the plot, a much-despised high-end bookseller with shaky ethics named Abe Selig, is found bludgeoned to death in his office, the deed carried out with a marble bust of Dante from a nearby shelf.

Though the Kern sale is never explicitly mentioned in Fast Company, Kurnitz describes several “very large auctions in which most dealers, hoisted by their own enthusiasm, seriously overextended themselves, and in which a few million dollars’ worth of literary gems were unloaded at peak prices.”

When the market for “all boom-time luxuries” declined, he continues, the demand for first editions, presentation copies, manuscripts, letters and association copies “dwindled until it finally was invisible to the naked eye.” Dealers with the means to ride out the storm sat on their choicest inventory. “To keep the wolves from their inactive doors.” Others—most notably Joel Glass, who is at the center of the novel—“resorted to a variety of sidelines, including stamps, prints and etchings, with one dealer going so far south of the book business as to eke out a living as a notary public and process server.”

In the instance of Glass, a productive moonlighting gig comes in the form of amateur sleuthing in search of missing objects of value, the incentive for that having come “by pure chance” when he recovered a portfolio of Rembrandt etchings that had “vanished from a Newark Art Gallery,” earning for himself a $2,000 finder’s fee from a “grateful insurance company.” By combining an exacting eye for detail with a deep knowledge of precisely what he’s looking for, Glass is able to pay the rent for his fancy East Side office and maintain visibility in the antiquarian trade while navigating the realities of a severely stressed market.

Glass is ably assisted in this enterprise by his striking wife Garda, gorgeous, bright, and every bit his match in detection and repartee. The chemistry between them crackles beneath the constraints of 1930s publishing—a tacit, smoldering energy that infuses the novel alongside the banter, the whiskey, and clouds of cigarette smoke.

Garda is much more than a witty sidekick; she keeps Joel from overextending himself and maintains an even keel. Together, they form a partnership that is truly symbiotic. “You’re wonderful,” he tells her after an especially self-assured exchange of words in their apartment. “Come on, before you read my mind and then we’ll never get to dinner.”

Glass and Garda move in a world populated by “girls,” as they were known back then—attractive, often alluring women like the captivating Julia Thorne, Abe Selig’s secretary, whose presence generates enough ambiguous tension to keep readers wondering exactly where her interests and passions might lead.

When we first meet the odious Selig, it is in a verbal confrontation with Joel Glass and it is clear from the outset what people think of him and his underhanded tactics. “This afternoon I made up my mind that I would drive you out of New York and I’m going to do it,” Glass tells him. “You started out as a smut peddler in this business, Abe, and you should have stuck to it because you’ve got the soul of a smut-peddler. You’re a fat, rich louse.” When Glass learns later that night from a police detective that Selig has been murdered, he muses aloud that the unknown perpetrator should be awarded a Nobel Peace Prize.

Kurnitz is careful to stress in the novel that the “overwhelming majority” of booksellers “will buy nothing of real value unless satisfied as to the antecedence and character of the person offering it, but as in finance, medicine and every other profession, there is a scurvy, knavish fringe of the rare book trade, a little group of sharpers to whom a stolen book represents a real bargain to be bought cheap. With artful alteration such a volume may be passed out to an unsuspecting collector at a price which while it is less than par, nevertheless enables thief and dealer to profit handsomely.”

That, in a nutshell, sums up the clandestine activity of Abe Selig, and the type of dangerous and unscrupulous people he has surrounded himself with. As a consequence, there is no shortage of suspects.

Among those with motive is Ned Morgan, a former employee of Selig recently released from a two-year prison term for allegedly stealing a trove of valuable books—potentially worth several hundred thousand dollars—from his boss’s inventory. He admits going to Selig’s office that night intent on vengeance but insists he found him already dead. Glass is convinced that the most valuable books were never stolen at all, since they were never recovered, and that Morgan, despite his intentions, is innocent of the murder.

With the prospect of a substantial recovery fee from the insurance company and a chance to clear Morgan’s name, Glass launches his own investigation. What he doesn’t anticipate is how perilous that quest will prove to be.

Encouraged by the runaway success of a series of films based on Dashiell Hammett’s 1934 novel The Thin Man that featured an urbane husband-wife team of amateur detectives, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer moved quickly to acquire Fast Company. Shortly after the novel’s publication in February 1938, the studio brought Kurnitz to Hollywood to draft the screenplay, launching what MGM hoped would become a companion franchise.

Though the studio tinkered with different lead actors across three films released in quick succession— Fast Company in July 1938, followed by Fast and Loose and Fast and Furious, both in 1939—the series featuring Joel and Garda never achieved the cultural staying power of William Powell and Myrna Loy as Nick and Nora Charles in the Thin Man treatments. The irony is that Kurnitz had so thoroughly mastered the witty married-detectives dynamic that MGM eventually assigned him to write two actual Thin Man films, Shadow of the Thin Man (1941) and The Thin Man Goes Home (1945).

For Kurnitz, Hollywood remained his base of operations for the next fifteen years, during which he wrote more than forty screenplays. His credits ranged from Adventures of Don Juan for Errol Flynn to The Inspector General for Danny Kaye, demonstrating the versatility that had served him well as a Philadelphia journalist. He earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Screenplay for What Next, Corporal Hargrove? (1945). Among his most prestigious later assignments was co-writing the screenplay for Billy Wilder’s Witness for the Prosecution (1957), based on Agatha Christie’s courtroom thriller.

Wilder was known for his method of tinkering incessantly with scripts during production, but on Kurnitz’s insistence, they finished the screenplay before shooting began. According to a colleague, “Billy almost went nuts” having to cope with the break in his favored routine, but the film went on to earn six Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director.

Kurnitz also collaborated with William Faulkner on Land of the Pharaohs (1955)—though, as was often the case with the Nobel Prize-winning novelist’s forays into screenwriting, Kurnitz’s professional expertise proved essential to making Faulkner’s literary vision filmable.

During these years, fortified now with the means to do so, Kurnitz became a serious art collector, acquiring works by Picasso, Matisse, Rouault, and Derain, a hobby that would serve him well when he returned east to write for the stage.

“I’m a gambler,” he would tell an interviewer as the opening of one of plays approached. “There isn’t a bigger gamble in the world than the theater. There’s no such thing anymore as an in-between play. It’s either a smash hit or a crashing failure.”

His first play, Reclining Figure, had premiered at the Lyceum Theatre in 1954. It was a comedy that explored the same world of dealers, collectors, and chicanery that had animated Fast Company, only now set in the art world rather than rare books—and the anxiety surrounding that opening was just as intense.

Kurnitz told Gilbert Millstein of the New York Times that he was terrified on opening night for that play, so anxious about the response from a live audience and a corps of critics that he took a date to dinner at 21 instead of attending the premier. “Had one drink, ate one scallop and smoked one pack of cigarettes. It was like waiting for them to come in, shave your head and slit your pants. I mean, the electric chair.”

Deemed a success, the play ran for 116 performances and launched his Broadway career, which would include the hit comedy Once More, With Feeling (1958) and the musical The Girl Who Came to Supper (1963), written in collaboration with Noël Coward, earning for Kurnitz a Tony nomination for Best Author (Musical).

When the Opening Night vigil for that first play was finally over, Kurnitz told Millstein that he celebrated by drinking “everything in sight,” and “wound up playing gypsy violin solos in the Little Club at four o’clock in the morning.”

Celebrated as a stream-of-consciousness conversationalist, he elaborated on his choice of music for that stressful evening: “Sober, I think gypsy violin is the vilest manifestation of the creative instinct. Drunk, I beat my way toward it like a salmon going upstream to die. I play Hungarian, Rumanian and Russian gypsy music. Gypsy fiddle is best played drunk because then it doesn’t matter whether you play in time, in tune or whatnot. In Hollywood, your wife doesn’t even know your picture’s opening. Out there, you go to a preview in a big car with a mob. If the picture’s good, everybody knows you. If it’s a stinker, you come back alone and the chauffeur tries to slam the door on your hand.”

Harry Kurnitz certainly had a facility with words and a lively way of expressing them. Divorced in the 1940s, he never remarried and had no children. Constantly on the move, he led a nomadic existence, staying in luxury suites everywhere he went. A three-pack-a-day smoker and in declining health, he was reported to have been working on a detective story for Random House at the time of his death in 1968 after suffering a heart attack in his room at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel.

In a memorial tribute published in the The Observer, the English theater critic Kenneth Tynan wrote that “Kurnitz bought good paintings and listened to good concerts wherever his planes touched down. He was a civilized man with a plentitude of wit and charity. ‘What did Harry think?’ we used to ask, always knowing that there was only one Harry whose opinion counted in the higher reaches of show business. There won’t come such another.”

—NICHOLAS A. BASBANES

1

THE OPENING bid on Lot #248 was thirty-five dollars, offered by Joel Glass from his seat in the third row, and in five-dollar jumps the price progressed to seventy dollars, this being likewise Mr. Glass’s bid. At this point his wife nudged him sharply, saying, “Are you mad, Joel? What on earth will we do with it?”

“Quiet!” said Mr. Glass.

The auctioneer’s hammer hesitated in midair. “Seventy dollars… once! A very fine Emile Zola letter, gentlemen. Seventy dollars… twice! Is that all?” The hammer fell with a thump. “Sold to Mr. Glass.” The sale was over and the auctioneer and his assistant started to gather up their ledgers and paraphernalia.

“Nice work, Sire,” said Mrs. Glass. “Have we got a customer for such a monumentally unimportant letter, or are you going to start collecting authors whose names begin with a “Z.”

“That Zola letter was a great bargain,” said Joel, in a loud voice, to impress any dealers or collectors who might be listening. “Any dealer would give a hundred dollars for it.”

“Not this dealer,” said a voice behind them. Joel turned around to find Louis Petrie. “I wouldn’t give you seventy cents for it,” added Mr. Petrie.

“Ah,” said Joel. “Suppose I were to tell you that the letter was really written by William Shakespeare and that the great Elizabethan deliberately tried to make his handwriting look like that of Émile Zola.”

“Let me smell your breath,” said Petrie promptly.

“See what a reputation you’ve got,” said Garda Glass. She was adding the day’s purchases on the back of a catalogue and when these were totaled she took a checkbook and fountain pen from her purse. “It comes to five hundred and seventy-five dollars even,” she told her husband, as she wrote the check.

“A nice day’s work,” said Joel Glass. “A little celebration is indicated.”

Garda Glass looked up at him. “Are you going to get canned up again? Not without me you’re not.”

“Nice baby,” said Joel. “I don’t enjoy it without you.”

Garda stood up, waving the check around to dry it.

“Hold it up higher,” urged Joel. “Let the boys see that we still have a bank account. Climb up on a chair with it.”

Simon Clark, a well-known Philadelphia dealer, passed by. He raised his hat to Mrs. Glass and greeted Joel cordially. “Hello, sucker. I’ll give you a twenty-dollar profit on the Ainsworth you bought, Joel. What do you say? I’m trying to fill out a set.”

“Make it an even fifty.”

“Thirty,” said Mr. Clark. “Nobody buys Ainsworth any more.”

“Forty,” said Joel. “Maybe they’ll start up again.”

“All right,” said Clark. “You paid one hundred and sixty dollars. Send it to me for two hundred dollars even.”

“Mark it down,” said Joel to Garda, who did as she was told. “We’ll just drop this check off in the office and go down to the bar for a while.”

“Now tell me about the fight,” said Garda, as they moved toward the exit in the rear.

“What fight?”

“Oh, Joel!”

He grinned. “That was just a lover’s quarrel. The boys didn’t mean anything by it. I’ll tell you later. As for that Zola letter, my unimaginative spouse, Milton Parrish called me this morning and asked me to buy it for him. Not only do we make seven bucks commission, but it gives us an ‘in’ to Mr. Parrish which we did not formerly enjoy.”

“My humble apologies, Sire. I would gladly grovel a bit but it’s hard on the stockings.”

“Just remember for the future,” said Joel, “that my bid on a book is like sterling on silver. It means something.” He took the check in to the auctioneer, who promised delivery of their purchases by the following day, then went down the stairs with Garda to the street. The Warrington Hotel, only two doors away, had a cozy bar with a view of the Park, and this room was very popular with dealers and collectors on auction days. They had a table at the windows facing the Park and Joel ordered two drinks.

“If you shush me once more,” said Garda, “I won’t let you pay for my drinks. What were Mr. Selig and Doc Dolan fighting about?”

“Money,” said Joel. “I often think that if we were to abolish money men would live in peace with their neighbors, harmony would pervade the entire world and—Ouch!” He rubbed his shin vigorously.

“The fight,” Garda reminded him ominously.

“Oh, yes, the fight. Well, it seems that Doc had a good customer, a retired physician, who was giving him right nice prices for first editions of Shelley, Keats and assorted English poets. He was selling him Abe Selig’s books, mostly, and they were both making a fair profit. The sly Selig, scenting a chance to pull a fast one, had Doc followed to the customer’s lair, then brought up his heavy artillery. He dazzled the doctor with fancy books at low prices, and froze our friend Dolan right out of the picture.”

“The louse,” said Garda Glass. “I don’t blame Doc one bit now for swinging at him.”

“It’s time somebody with a better aim started swinging at Selig,” said Joel thoughtfully. “Doc missed him, unfortunately, and Selig will live to cheat another day. His case calls for the violent administration of a stiff dose of ethics.”

“You stay out of trouble,” warned Garda. “Selig never did anything to you, busybody.”

“Why wait? An ounce of prevention is better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick. If you want an eyewitness story, my dear, here comes Doc Dolan now.”

Garda turned around and waved to him, indicating the empty chair at their table. Dolan moved stolidly across the room, put his hat on the window sill and sat down without a word. When the waiter came he ordered a double whisky.

“That was a nice scrap,” said Joel. “You certainly dazzled him with your footwork.”

“Lay off,” said Dolan. The waiter brought the whisky; he drank it off and ordered another.

“I was just telling Joel,” said Garda, “that Abraham Selig was a double-barreled, thirty-third degree louse for taking your nice customer away from you.”

“Don’t needle me,” said Doc. He drank the second double order and thawed out a bit. “Did you see the way Selig dived into the elevator like a rabbit?”

“If the elevator hadn’t been there at the time it would have been even nicer.”

“I’m gonna fix that guy good,” said Dolan darkly. “If he thinks I’m gonna take a rooking like that… oh, what the hell’s the use.”

“Did you call him about it?” asked Joel. “What did he say?”

“He just cackled with glee and prattled about having to get up pretty early in the morning to get ahead of Abe Selig, my boy. That’s what made me so sore. Well, one of these days that heel just won’t get up at all in the morning and the book business will smell one hundred per cent sweeter.”

“I’ll drink to that,” said Joel. “Garda, why don’t you run along to the office and open up just in case a customer should wander in with money in his hand.”

“Our office?” said Garda incredulously. “I’ll do it if you say so, though.” She gathered up her bag and gloves, inspected her make-up and said, “I’m off. Don’t you dare shoot any craps, Joel Glass.”

“I just want to talk to some of the boys. Maybe make a few deals,” said Joel. “I’ll be around in an hour or two.”

When Garda was gone, he indicated her chair and Doc Dolan moved into it. “Well, Doc, did you see him?”

“I don’t think I did so good,” said Doc. “I went to the address you gave me and asked the landlady if Mr. Morgan was in. She told me to wait and, sure enough, Ned Morgan came down the stairs. He went white when he saw me and I thought for a minute he was all set to jump me right from the stairs. I said, ‘Hello, Ned, glad to see you,’ and I held out my hand, but he cursed me for a spy and a bastard and told me to get the hell out. I think he was a little tight.”

“That’s tough,” said Joel. “How did he look?”

“Not so bad for a guy that did a stretch like that. He’s gained a bit of weight but his color is bad. Boy, his face was meaner than a wildcat’s.”

Joel rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I thought he’d talk to you because you two were always pretty good friends.”

Doc said, “You know me, kid, and if you say do something I go and do it, but do you really believe that stuff about Selig stealing the books himself and hanging it on the boy.”

Joel nodded.

“But they caught him stealing.”

“Sure they did. They caught him with a Leigh Hunt first, a cheap copy of a John Drinkwater play, a ten-dollar Walter Scott item and a Thomas Hardy book worth every cent of three dollars. The whole package wouldn’t bring him in a cent more than twenty-five dollars and because they nabbed him with these they pinned on him the theft of books worth anywhere up to fifty grand. Let me ask you this, Doc: suppose you were a clerk making twenty-five or thirty dollars and were in love with the boss’s daughter, like Ned Morgan was in love with Leah Selig. You needed a few dollars extra to show her a good time, maybe rent a room with a bath. Would you steal a first edition of ‘Don Quixote’? Would you steal Charles Lamb first editions unknown outside of the British Museum and the Morgan Library?”

“It don’t make sense at that,” confessed Dolan. “It wouldn’t be no harder to sell Grant’s Tomb than a first edition of ‘Don Quixote.’ ”

“Right. And that goes for the Lambs, too. I can just picture what went on in Selig’s brain when he found out that Leah and Ned were in love. He’s a fox, Doc, and he’d know better than to rave and rant and play the heavy father, but he’d be seething inside and scheming away. When he learned that Ned Morgan was helping himself to some cheap firsts he saw a chance to put Morgan away, pocket a heavy slice of insurance, and break up the romance. He guessed right on two counts, but Leah knows what he did. She hasn’t spoken to him since the day he stood up in Court against Ned Morgan, and believe me, the old man is eating his rotten heart out over that.”

“It sounds great, the way you say it,” said Doc. “Why don’t you go to see the kid yourself.”

“He’s out of there by now. I only found out where he was by an accident.”

“Try Jake Durbin,” said Doc. “He was askin’ me today did I know where Ned Morgan was. Maybe he made a contact.”

“A good idea,” said Joel. He called for the check, paid it, and set out for Jacob Durbin’s store on the East Side.

The market for rare books is remarkably sensitive to the rise and fall of listed stocks, and follows the antics of the leading industrials with a precision which delighted bookdealers in the boom years, but which they found disheartening in the depression years. A stock-market crash at any time would have been bad enough, but that of 1929 came on the heels of two very large auctions in which most dealers, hoisted by their own enthusiasm, seriously overextended themselves, and in which a few million dollars’ worth of literary gems were unloaded at peak prices. When the brokerage muezzins began to call on the faithful for more margin, first editions went overboard with clandestine apartments, seagoing yachts, country places and prize dogs. The market for all boom-time luxuries declined generally, but for first editions, presentation copies, manuscripts, letters and association items, the demand dwindled until it was finally invisible to the naked eye. As in financial circles, the larger, wealthier firms sought to bolster prices by adding to their own already swollen inventories, but this emergency measure failed to halt the downward swoop of values. To keep the wolf from their inactive doors, dealers resorted to a variety of sidelines, including stamps, prints and etchings, with one dealer going so far south of the book business as to eke out a living as a notary public and process server.

Joel Glass was twenty-seven when the topheavy structure collapsed, a veteran of seven years in the business, though rare books had been a passionate hobby with him since the age of fifteen. He was settled in expensive offices in a new building, when the crash came, with good furniture, tasteful surroundings, and a stock worth just about a hundred thousand dollars. A nice clientele, too, but his customers now had more to worry about than first editions, and as the weeks rolled into months, and the clouds gathered ominously, it became apparent to Joel that his fine stock was devastatingly stationary. Things were black and getting blacker, when pure chance enabled him to play a leading part in the recovery of a portfolio of Rembrandt etchings which had vanished from a Newark Art Gallery. The grateful insurance company, until then glumly contemplating a twenty-thousand-dollar loss, handed Joel a check for two thousand dollars, and when the rent was paid, tradesmen appeased, a small note cleaned up and the celebration concluded, Joel made up his mind to look into such matters more carefully in the future. He had a wide acquaintance in the trade, as well as with libraries and collectors all over the country, and the insurance companies writing policies on books and pictures of value soon learned that he was a good man to notify when some rarity vanished.

The great majority of dealers, the overwhelming majority, in fact, will buy nothing of real value unless satisfied as to the antecedents and character of the person offering it, but as in finance, medicine and every other profession, there is a scurvy, knavish fringe of the rare-book trade, a little group of sharpers to whom a stolen book represents a real bargain to be bought cheap. With artful alterations such a volume may be passed out to an unsuspecting collector at a price which while it is less than par, nevertheless enables thief and dealer to profit handsomely. In his efforts to break up the traffic in stolen books, Joel had the enthusiastic support and approval of nearly all the dealers, nearly all of whom had been themselves, at one time or another, the victims of thieves, but a few in the business feared Joel Glass and watched his entry into the investigating field with trepidation. The sleuths of the Police Department, unfamiliar with the tricks of the bibliographical trade, presented no great menace, but a man of imagination and brains, together with an enormous knowledge of rare books and infinite contacts, had already taught some to their sorrow that he was dangerous to their existence.

The lot of books on which Abraham Selig had collected many thousands of dollars from his insurance company fascinated Joel Glass as had no previous theft in the book world. The stolen books were the last word in non-negotiable property, for each was a unique, extremely rare first edition and far from the type of book which a thief might take in the hope of immediate profit. Only the very most painstaking and expert alteration would make it possible for them to be resold, and under any circumstances, only when an interval of a few years had elapsed to cool the hunt for them. Ned Morgan had gone to jail stoutly denying any knowledge of them, although admitting a few minor thefts of cheap, readily sold first editions, and in the two years that had elapsed since they disappeared, no trace of them, nor clue to their whereabouts, had been found. Selig had long since been paid the full value of the books, the police had dropped the search and even the insurance company had no hope of their recovery. Only Joel Glass was still plugging along the thin, well-worn trail.

It was a nice day, and he walked slowly, turning east on 49th Street and along this thoroughfare until he was in the shade of the Third Avenue L. Jacob Durbin’s Book and Art Shop was apparently deserted, but Joel opened the door and walked in, to the clamor of an old-fashioned, loud bell overhead.

Jake Durbin appeared from the back room, carefully closing this behind him. He was a large, bulky individual, at present in his shirt sleeves, his thick, unkempt hair contributing a lot to the general picture of disorder. The store reflected his own untidiness accurately.

Joel said, “Hello, Jake. I was just in the neighborhood.”

“You can just get the hell out of it,” said Durbin. “What do you want?”

“I thought Ned Morgan might be around.”

“You thought wrong. Now beat it. We don’t need no police fairies around here.”

“One of these days,” said Joel, “I’ll wash your mouth with soap and water. Maybe I’ll wash you all over and you’ll die.” He turned to go. “If you see Ned Morgan tell him I left word that he shouldn’t be seen with crooks like you.”

“Just a minute.”

Joel turned to find Ned Morgan standing in the open doorway. Durbin, glowering, was trying to get him back in, but Morgan waved him aside. He wavered a little, and was obviously on the verge, if not already in the throes, of a good drunk. He had put on weight, as Doc Dolan reported, but the boyishness and geniality were out of his face entirely.

“What do you want with me, Glass? I told your stooge I didn’t want to be bothered.”

“He told me,” said Joel. “I thought I could do you some good.”

“Good, hell!” said Durbin. “He’d hang his father if it was worth something to an insurance company.”

“I’ll oblige you for nothing,” said Joel. He turned back to Morgan. “Do you remember coming to me once with some books that I spotted were Selig’s? I didn’t buy them and I tried to talk you out of snitching the boss’s books. But I didn’t step up at the trial to make it tougher for you. You keep hanging around with boys like Durbin and you’ll wind up in the can again.”

“Thanks,” said Morgan thickly. “What’s it to you?”

“It’s a bet,” said Joel. “I could help you square some accounts and maybe make a little something. On the level, too. You can spell out that word later for your little pal.” He turned away again. “You know where to get me, Ned; still at the old stand.”

“You can go to hell,” said Morgan. “You lousy, four-flushing copper’s rat. Before I’d call you on the ’phone I’d—”

Joel closed the door on the rest of his speech, and walked to the Third Avenue corner where a cab was waiting. He saw Durbin watching in the window as he drove away.

He left the taxi at 98th and Madison Avenue, only a few doors away from Leah Selig’s apartment. He crossed the street, though, to a drugstore and called the Security Mutual Insurance Company from a booth. The operator connected him with Mr. Langner, of the Claim and Investigation Department. “This is Joel Glass, Steve. I suppose you know that Ned Morgan is out. I just left him. I thought you might want to put a man on him. Why not? You’ve always believed he stole the books, why not put somebody on his tail to see where he goes. Might mean something. I left him in Jake Durbin’s store on East 49th Street. It may be some time before he comes out because he was hitting the bottle pretty hard. Okay, Steve.” He hung up and crossed the street again to Leah Selig’s apartment. He rang the bell in the lobby and, when the door clicked and let him enter, went up the stairs to the second floor. Leah Selig was waiting outside her door.

She said, “Oh, it’s you.”

Joel said, “Hello, Leah.” She was a dark-haired, fair-skinned beauty, the ravages of recent tears in her swollen eyes. “Can I come in?”

Leah held the door open for him and followed him into the living room. He sat down on a chair, without taking off his coat, and twisted the brim of his hat in his hands. “Seen Ned Morgan, Leah?”

She nodded.

“So did I. What’s wrong with the boy, Leah?”

“He’s bitter,” said Leah Selig. “Horribly, terribly bitter. I’m afraid, Joel.”

“I tried to talk to him,” said Joel, “but he was kind of short with me.”

“He hates you,” said Leah. “I don’t know why. I tried to explain that you offered to help him and tried to do everything you could.”

“He made his feelings pretty plain. He’s heading straight for trouble, Leah, and if you can do anything with him, for Christ’s sake do it now. I just left him in Jake Durbin’s back room, lapping up liquor and getting tight as a drum. I wouldn’t put it past Durbin to get the kid jammed up, one way or another, and in his present frame of mind he’s a sucker for a good suggestion.”

Leah Selig was crying softly. “Oh, Joel, I’m so unhappy. He’s changed so much.”

“Two years in the can,” said Joel, “is reputed to do it for anybody, especially a weak one like your Ned. And if you’re framed in you’ve got that much more to brood about. Seen your father lately, Leah?”

“No.”

“You should have stayed in the store,” said Joel. “With you on the premises, we’d—well, it doesn’t matter now, only I never could get very close to papa’s new secretary and I’m cut off from inside sources.”

Leah Selig looked up despairingly. “What are you trying to do, Joel?”

“Don’t worry. It doesn’t concern you and it doesn’t concern Ned, though he could help me if he wanted to. Frankly, Leah, I’m after those books. I never thought Ned Morgan stole them. Did you?” he added.

Leah shook her head. “No. What would he want with such valuable books? He only wanted a few extra dollars. He was a young boy, and weak, and not making a big salary, so he—” She began to sob, softly at first, then sank her head on her folded hands and let her tears have full sway.

Joel said, “I’m sorry, Leah. You’re having a hell of a time, I know.”

Leah didn’t look up, not even when he picked up his hat and left. He could hear her crying as he went down the stairs to the street again.

2

JOEL’S OFFICE was in the Carson Tower, an East Side triumph of modern design, erected just in time to catch the full force of the leasing blight in 1929. His own three rooms were twenty-eight floors from the ground, and consisted of a small outer office where Garda had her desk and where in more prosperous times an extra stenographer and office boy were also quartered. Off this room was the large paneled bookroom, where the stock was contained in inclosed and open cases, the rarer items being tucked away in a small vault. A door led from this room to Joel’s private office. Garda was sitting behind Joel’s desk when he came in, her feet up on a drawer pulled out for this purpose, and a large pile of catalogues on the floor at her right. She looked up as Joel came in, arched her eyebrows quizzically and said nothing. Joel looked approvingly at the pile of catalogues. “You’re a fine steady, industrious girl. Did you find anything?”

Garda ignored the question. “Where on earth have you been? It’s after five.”

“I know, dear. I had a lot to do and I knew you could handle everything here. Did you find that Christopher Morley first edition in any of those catalogues?”

“You must have dreamed it, Sire,” said Garda. “I’ve been through them all twice.”

“Maybe I did,” said Joel amiably. “How about the Paul Revere letter?”

“I found a beaut,” said Garda enthusiastically. “From Paul Revere to his horse, giving him the route from Lexington to Concord.”

Joel sighed. “How much was it?”

Garda beamed. “And that’s not all. Mr. Page came in, browsed around, told me it was a shame to keep such a pretty girl cooped up in a stuffy office, and when I showed signs of interest, he bought our copy of ‘Uncle Remus’ for eighty dollars. He made two passes, but I threw him out at first base both times.”

“You’re a wonderful girl,” said Joel, “and I’m a very lucky bookdealer to have such a sexy wife to sell my books.” He lifted her from his chair, sat down in it himself, and lowered her to his lap. “Go on, sell me a book.”

“Not you,” said Garda softly. “You’re my husband and you’ve got your rights. You don’t have to buy anything.”

“Very fair,” said Joel. “If you’ll hand over the eighty dollars now, Mrs. Glass, I’ll take you out to dinner.”

“In a minute,” said Garda. “Do you love me?”

“Madly.”

“And you’ll always love me—no matter what?”

“No matter what,” said Joel. “Hey, what’s the meaning of this in broad daylight, and you the woman who wouldn’t let me buy a couch for the office. Where’s that eighty dollars?”

“Well, after Mr. Page left I thought I would go down-stairs and have a soda so I walked around the block and there was the trickiest little dress in the window and I thought I would just go in and try it on.”

“Did it fit?” asked Joel politely but ominously.

“Beautifully. So I said to the girl, ‘How much is it,’ and she said, ‘Thirty-nine fifty,’ and I figured what—”

She landed heavily on the floor at this point and looked up reproachfully. “Monster! And I was going to let you take me out to dinner and show me off to all your stinking friends.”

“Very kind of you,” said Joel. “Where’s the rest of the loot?”

“In the drawer,” said Garda, rubbing herself ostentatiously. “Two twenty-dollar bills. I locked them in together in the hope that they would breed.”

Joel retrieved the money, examining it carefully.

“Are you mad at me?” asked Garda.

“You’re too cute,” said Joel. “Anyway, I knew all about your reckless extravagance before I married you.”

“And you’ll take me out to dinner?”

“If I let you get thin and scrawny,” said Joel philosophically, “you’ll be no good to me at all.”

“That’s fine,” said Garda, just as the buzzer sounded in the outer office. She looked at Joel. “Expecting somebody?”

“No,” said Joel, “but I do think we ought to see who it is.”

“I’ll go,” said Garda. She did and came back at once to report. “It’s Abe Selig, of all people. Shall I tell him you’re out?”

“Show him in,” said Joel.

Abe Selig was short, fat and bald. He wore plain dark suits invariably, neat haberdashery, and heavy, thick-lensed glasses gave him the air of a prosperous, well-fed scholar. His movements were very quick, and when working at his desk, his white, pudgy, carefully manicured hands darted among the papers like birds. He stood in the doorway now, answered Joel’s nod with one of his own, and moved quickly across the floor as the door closed behind him. He sat down in a leather chair near Joel’s desk and leaned back, a maneuver which brought his feet off the ground. He leaned forward then and rested his elbows on the desk.

“Well, Abe?”

“You’re Doc Dolan’s friend, Joel. I want you to give him this.” Abe Selig passed an envelope across the desk. It was sealed.

“Mind if I look?”

“Go ahead.”

Joel slit the envelope and took out two one-hundred-dollar bills. “Conscience money, Abe?”

“Business is business,” said Abe Selig unctuously, “but I just found out today that Doc needs the money bad.”

“You’re getting soft, Abe. Can’t you sleep nights any more when you pull a fast one?”

Selig shrugged his shoulders. “Give Doc the money and tell him to forget the whole thing. I have explained matters to Doc’s customer and told him that in the future he should buy only from Doc. What’s more, I will supply him with everything on a very low profit.”

Joel grinned. “Give it to him yourself, Abe.” He pushed the envelope across the desk. “Did you know Ned Morgan is out of jail?”

Selig picked up the envelope and put it in his coat pocket.

“Have you heard from Leah lately, Abe?”

“Sure. Why?”

“You’re a damned liar,” said Joel. “That’s why. I talked to Leah today and she said that if you ever came near her she’d spit in your face.”

Selig rose to his feet, trembling. His voice when he spoke was thick and hoarse. “She’ll be sorry! I’ll hound her till she comes back on her knees.”

“Lay off Leah,” said Joel, “or you’ll come back on a board. Ned Morgan would cut your heart out for a quarter and give you ten cents change. By the way, Abe, what did you ever do with those children’s books and the ‘Don Quixote’? If you’ve still got them you’re playing with dynamite.”

Selig had a good grip on himself now and looked down at Joel mockingly. “You’ll get too fresh with me, Joel, and I’ll make trouble for you.”

“I’ll take all you can make,” said Joel. “This afternoon I made up my mind that I would drive you out of New York and I’m going to do it. You started out as a smut-peddler in this business, Abe, and you should have stuck to it because you’ve got the soul of a smut-peddler. You’re a fat, rich louse, Abe, and if I were you I would patch up my trouble with Doc Dolan in a hurry or there’ll be more blood on your face than there is on your books.”

“Say, what did you do to Abe?” asked Garda, when the little man had gone.

“I gave him worms to eat,” said Joel, “and he choked on a few of them. Weren’t you listening at the keyhole?”

“Certainly not!”

“I threw some barbed shafts into Selig. I think some of them took, too. Honey, have you been in Selig’s store since he got his new secretary?”

“Male or female?” asked Garda suspiciously.

“Never mind,” said Joel. “It’s a girl and I want you to try and get friendly with her.”

“I’m a wife, secretary and procurer,” protested Garda. “Why?”

“If I told you it would spoil your act. I’ll think up a reason for you to go to Selig’s tomorrow and we’ll try to arrange it for a time when Selig is out. The girl’s name is Julia Thorne. She’s rather tall, a brunette, and damn pretty.”

“If I have to be a spy,” complained Garda, “couldn’t I make love to some dark, handsome foreigners with polished manners?”

“No. Put on your new dress, and we’ll go around to that new bar for a drink before dinner. Maybe we’ll meet some friends.”

Garda went to the closet in the corner. “There was a time when you just wanted to be alone with me,” she reminded him.

“There still is a time,” said Joel, “but right now, in my brutal, callous way, I’m hungry.”

She changed quickly, Joel helping with the buttons, then Garda put the finishing touches to the adjustment of her hat. She pulled the brim down, pushed it back up again, gave it a final pat or two, and surveyed herself in the mirror.

“Yes, sir, I’m a very pretty girl.”

“Sure you are.”

“Smart, too,” said Garda.

“All right, Mrs. Interlocutor, why are you a smart girl, too?”

Still looking in the mirror, Garda said, “I know why you hung around with Doc this afternoon instead of coming back to the office. I know why Abe Selig was here in such a lather. I know why you’re walking around for the past forty-eight hours, making mysterious noises.”

“Why?”

“Ned Morgan,” said Garda briefly. “He’s out. He’s sore. He’s—”

“You’re wonderful,” said Joel. “Come on, before you read my mind and then we’ll never get to dinner.”

As they waited for the elevator, Garda said, “I know you’ll tell me all about it in due time, and I shouldn’t pry, but I just don’t want you to think I’m a dope.”

“I knew you were a smart the minute I laid eyes on you. Do you remember what I first said to you?”

“Sure. You said, ‘For Christ’s sake, lady, can’t you come on time?’ ”

Joel winced. “After that?”

“Sure. You said, I’ll be back at four o’clock. The ladies’ room is right down the hall.’ ”

“All right,” said Joel. “Forget it.”

It was five-thirty by the clock in the lobby. The street lights were on, it was still pretty warm for early October, and the Avenue looked as if it had gotten its second wind after a heavy day. Traffic was extraordinarily light, there was room to walk leisurely, and they window-shopped all the way to the bar in 54th Street.

“Look,” said Garda, as Joel checked his hat. “Friends.”

“Let ’em advance and give the countersign.” Joel looked and saw Marge and Peter Brand, alone at a table for four. He yelled, “Hello, Pete,” in a voice that rattled all the glasses in the room.

Peter waved back, as did his wife, and pushed out the two empty chairs. When they were seated he called a waiter. “Better stick around,” he told him, “Mr. Glass is a well-known dipsomaniac and never leaves anything but twenty-dollar tips.”

“That’s right,” said Joel. “Bring us two Scotch highballs and give our friends a drink, being careful to see that it goes on their check.” He turned to Garda. “Don’t the Brands owe us a few? Haven’t they partaken frequently of our liquor with a promise to pay at some future date?”

“We’re cheap,” said Marge Brand cheerfully. “We never buy a drink.”

“Don’t brag,” said Garda. “It’s very bad taste.”

“That’s a cute hat. See what a cute hat Mrs. Glass has on, dear,” said Marge hopefully to her husband.

“Don’t bother me,” growled Peter. He turned to Joel rather ostentatiously. “Tell me, old man, what’s the market going to do?”

“In our opinion,” said Joel sagely, “the present is a good time either to buy or sell, depending on whether stocks are going up or down. I don’t mind you using it, Pete, because I know you need the money, but don’t tell anybody where you got it.”

“I won’t. How’s the book business?”

“It stinks.”

“It does not,” said Garda heatedly. “I sold a book today for eighty dollars.”

“She sexed it out of some old roué,” said Joel, “and spent half the money before I could get back to the office.”

“Nice work,” said Peter Brand. “Why don’t you and my wife see more of each other? Four years, four long years, and she hasn’t sexed me a single client.”

His wife sniffed. “Well, I’m sure it’s not because I couldn’t. Some women just have more character than others.”

“If this seventy-five-cent manicure weren’t brand new,” replied Garda Glass, “I would scratch your jealous eyes out. Tell me, honey, do you still get calls from sailors who don’t know you’re married?”

Vanquished, Mrs. Brand retreated ignominiously. “I have to powder my nose,” she said.

“Me, too,” chorused Garda.

The men rose and Peter Brand gave each of the girls a nickel. “Don’t spend that all in one place,” he warned them.

Joel, meanwhile, ordered fresh drinks. “I’m glad to have a moment alone with you, counselor,” he began respectfully. “Can I state a hypothetical case to you now?”

“Shoot.”

“Well, a couple of years ago a dealer caught one of his help stealing some books. There were other circumstances to make him hate this amateur thief violently and I’m pretty sure he exaggerated the theft by about fifty thousand dollars’ worth of books that were never stolen. He collected, of course, and the company on the policy prosecuted our hero up to here and got him a three-year sentence. He made it in about two years flat, but that’s beside the point. If these books turned up again now, would the company pay a reward?”

Peter Brand looked at Joel thoughtfully, then looked at his drink for a long moment.

“What’s the matter? Is it a hard one?”

Brand shook his head. “Easy, as these things go. The answer is, yes, the insurance company would probably pay their customary percentage.”

“What startled you?”

“The question,” said Brand. “I’ve heard if before.”

“What?”

Brand nodded. “I can’t tell you any more now.”

Joel said, “All right, forget it. Here come the girls, anyway.”

3

SELIG TORE through the lower floor of his establishment, went up the stairs to the rare-book room on the second floor, nodded to a man who was waiting, and vanished into his own office. The buzzer summoned his secretary, Miss Thorne, who came right in. “Any calls?”

“They’re on your desk.” While Selig busied himself with these memoranda, tossing them one by one into the basket, she said, “I told Mr. Bannerman that you would not be back but he insisted on waiting.”

Selig grunted. “I saw him. Don’t I pay you to get rid of people I don’t want to see?”

Miss Thorne flushed. “I couldn’t very well throw him out.”

“I told you I didn’t want to see him. That ought to be enough. You’re hired to use your head. Use it. Did Bernhart bring back my copy of ‘Tom Sawyer’?”

“No, sir. I ’phoned him twice.”

“Write him tonight registered and make it plain that we want the book or we’ll swear out a warrant.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I want you to go to the Lenox Library tonight. I left my Fourth Folio Shakespeare there with Mr. Stevens. I want an affidavit that it has been collated with their copy and that it checks.”

“But, Mr. Selig, we only sent the book up this morning.”

“He’ll do it for you,” said Selig. “I’ve seen the way he looks at you.”

Miss Thorne flushed again. “Yes, sir.”

“Send in Bannerman, write that letter, and then beat it up to the library. I need that affidavit in the morning for a customer.”

“Yes, sir.”

Elias Bannerman was quite tall, a good inch past the six-foot mark, broadly built. He had a heavy head, with thick, well-combed, iron-gray hair, and a hard mouth set in an uncompromising, grim line. His clothes were dark and sober, a shade less than smartly cut, and as he entered the room, he paused in the doorway to regard Abe Selig, slumped in his big swivel chair. The lines of his mouth relaxed in an unaccustomed, rare smile. “What’s the matter, Abe?”

Without looking up, Selig motioned to a chair at the left of his desk.

Bannerman moved across the floor and stood by the desk, laying his hat and gloves on a table nearby. “You can look up, Abe. I won’t hypnotize you.”

“I want more time,” said Selig bluntly, looking up into Bannerman’s steel-gray eyes. “I’m not equipped to take another lot of books right away.”

“A man like you is always equipped, Abe. And what books! Half of them you don’t have to touch. Five Franklin imprints that you only need to rub up a little to make them look worn. You’ll get a thousand dollars for them by tomorrow night.”

“Sure,” said Selig dourly.

“And a Keats ‘Lamia,’ without a mark on it to prove where it came from; a ‘Departmental Ditties’ by Kipling, and two Shelley firsts that you can turn over at once without a fear in—” He stopped as Julia Thorne entered with the letter Selig was to sign. She laid it down in front of him, stood by while he scratched a few exclamation points and his signature, then picked it up again. “Good night, Mr. Selig.”

“Good night,” said Selig.

She nodded to Bannerman, who said, “Good night, Miss Thorne,” as she passed his chair. “That’s a fine girl you’ve got there, Abe,” he said, when the door had closed again.

“Dumb as they make them,” said Selig.

“Well, I’m not,” said Bannerman. He rested his heavy hands on the edge of Selig’s desk, the muscular fingers forming a strong cathedral as he leaned forward. “You’ve made a fortune out of what I’ve brought to you, Abe, and you can’t turn these down just because they may be a little too hot for you.”

“Why not?” demanded Selig hotly. “Who do you think you are? Do I have to squeeze myself for money just because that snotnose you pimp for can’t keep his hands in his pockets when he sees a rare book?”

“They’re big words,” said Bannerman evenly. “I don’t like them, Abe.”

“You don’t understand, Eli. Rare books ain’t moving, not even when they’ve got a pedigree. The kind of books Sidney Wheeler steals and you bring me I have to sit on for a couple of years. Even then I take a big chance.” He toyed with the one ornament on his desk, a small marble bust of the poet Dante on a bronze base. “No, Bannerman, I can’t do it. Not now.”

“I have already paid Sidney his half,” said Bannerman quietly. “I am not taking a loss like that just because you get a chicken heart all of a sudden. I want five thousand dollars from you, Abe. I want it tonight.”

“I haven’t got it.”

“Liar!”

“For Christ’s sake, Eli! I’ve been on this treadmill long enough. Leave me alone already. Sell them to somebody else.”

“They’re your books, Abe. Nobody else’s but yours.”

“And if I say no?”

“Don’t say it, Abe. You know me, and I say don’t say it.”

Selig returned his angry stare for a moment, then his eyes dropped. “All right. The last time, Eli. I mean it.”

“When?”

“Tonight,” said Selig. “Later. Bring them up about eight o’clock. I’ll be here.”

“Why so late? I can bring them over in fifteen minutes. They’re in my office.”

“Later,” said Selig briefly. “I have to get the money.”

Bannerman regarded him searchingly. “Eight o’clock then, Abe, but I swear to God, if you’re thinking of—”

“Don’t be a fool,” said Selig. “I tell you I still have to get the money. Come on, I’ll take you down and let you out. I still have work to do.”

They went downstairs together. Selig closed the door after him and went back upstairs again.

Elias Bannerman reached his law offices at six o’clock. The outer room, furnished in a businesslike way with three small desks and an assortment of filing cabinets, was in darkness, but the door to his private office was ajar and this was brightly lit. Behind Bannerman’s desk, with his feet up on the top, young Mr. Sidney Wheeler sat with a glass in his hand. He was about thirty, with a lean scholarly face, the features of which were pleasant in a weak way. He waved a cheery, nonchalant greeting to Bannerman as the attorney entered the office and closed the door.

“What’s the matter, Eli?… You look like bad news.”

“Do you have to sit with your feet on the furniture?” demanded Bannerman irritably.

Sidney took his feet off the desk.

Bannerman poured himself a drink from the decanter on the desk. Without being told, Sidney got up out of his chair and Bannerman sat down.

“What a time I had with Selig,” said Bannerman finally, while Sidney stood near the desk.

“Did he squawk?”

“Like a chicken.”

“But he’s paying?”

“Two thousand dollars.”

“What! For those books, Eli? No, sir!”

“I had a hell of a time getting him to take them at all,” said Bannerman briefly. “He’s got too much hot stuff already. I had to threaten him to get that much out of him.”

Sidney paced the floor, visibly agitated, his clothes flapping on his angular frame. “It’s crazy, Eli. A thousand dollars for the chances I took.”

“You talk like a child,” said Bannerman. “They’re nice books, true enough, Sidney, but they’re as hot as the seat of your pants while you were running away with them. Do you want retail prices, my boy?” he asked indulgently. “If you do, I can get books like these without a hue-and-cry behind them.”

“It’s not fair,” protested Sidney Wheeler. “I took chances. I didn’t just walk in and out with those books. It took me three weeks to get things set.”

“Go talk to him yourself. Don’t you see, he can’t unload the books for years to come.”

“But he gets plenty when he does sell them. Oh, what the hell. All right, give him the books.” He poured himself a stiff drink. “Want one?”

Bannerman, relieved that everything was going so well, unbent. “A short one,” he ordered, and when Sidney handed him the glass he proposed a graceful toast. “To the cleverest thief I know.”

Sidney inclined his head in recognition.

“It’s not such a bad night’s work,” said Bannerman, smacking his lips over the potion. “A thousand apiece—with no risk.”

“For you,” said Sidney pointedly. “I risk my liberty every time I go outside.”

“Nonsense,” said Bannerman. “Who knows you here? Maybe now you’ll appreciate why I’ve talked you out of small-time jobs around New York. The cops don’t know you, the librarians think you’re a student, and in the art galleries they respect you as a good, hard-working copyist. One of these days we’ll haul off and let them have it, but until then, you lay low. Follow my advice and you’ll never have trouble. The New York police don’t even know you’re alive and as long as you stay clear of the libraries and stores here you’re as safe as J. P. Morgan.

“Okay,” said Sidney. He got up and walked to the window. “Hey, it’s raining.”

“Let it rain.”

“I don’t like the rain,” said Sidney petulantly. “I got caught running away from a job I did when I was a kid because I fell on a wet street. I did an ace that time.”

“A what?”

“A year,” said Sidney. He was one of the most accomplished sneak thieves in the world, his bookish instincts had early in life indicated the path he was to follow and in the world of rare books, though few knew of him, he occupied the same place as the Japanese beetle in the hearts of the New Jersey truck gardener. He was a skillful artist, forger, and bookbinder, three specialties which enabled him on many occasions to make an issue of lesser value and importance look amazingly like an expensive rarity, and with a facsimile of some great book, could often trap an unsophisticated dealer or collector into a large cash payment. He was known by a variety of names west of the Mississippi, but comparatively obscure here in New York.

“We’ve got lots of time,” said Bannerman, “so stop walking up and down.”

Sidney poured another drink for himself. Bannerman still had most of his first. “Here’s to you,” said Sidney gallantly.

Bannerman sipped a little more of the whisky. “I’m only the brains,” he countered modestly, “but you’re the eyes and hands and legs.”

“And nose and throat,” said Sidney.

“Joking aside, my boy, if you stick with me you’ll make your fortune. Don’t lose your topcoat, whatever you do.”

Sidney had a loose raglan coat, so artfully fitted with hooks, slings and pockets that the works of Charles Dickens, on large paper, could nestle under it without showing a bulge. He was inordinately proud—too proud, Bannerman maintained—of explaining the workings of this garment to sympathetic friends, and on this occasion he warmed under Bannerman’s praise.

“I might come in handy,” he said. “Could you work off a Stradivarius, Eli?”

“You mean a violin?”

“Sure. The fellow who owns it carries fifty-grand insurance on it. I could get it like that.” He snapped his fingers.

“Too risky,” said Bannerman. “What the hell would we do with it?”

“You’ve got a swell front,” said Sidney, “and a reputation like Abraham Lincoln. You could sell it back to the insurance company, like that bastard, Joel Glass.”

“What’s he doing these days?” said Bannerman, apparently ignoring the rest of Sidney’s remark.

“Choking, I hope,” said Sidney. “I don’t like a guy who’s always sticking his nose in people’s business.”

“I’ll have to meet that young man,” said Bannerman. “About the fiddle, Sidney, it’s no go. It’s too big; you’d get caught, you’d squeal, and everything would go up in smoke.”

“Not me,” said Sidney.

“All right, not you. If you want to make yourself some change when you get back to the Coast, pick me up a nice ‘Leaves of Grass.’ I could use one.”

“For how much?”

“Oh, a couple of hundred.”

“Philanthropist,” said Sidney. “At those prices I don’t need you.” He drank a little more. “What time is it?”

“Don’t get nervous,” said Bannerman. “You know what I’m thinking, Sidney: when this is done with, it will be time to think of something very profitable and clever for your New York debut.”

“Sure.”

“I’m going to make you famous,” said Bannerman. “You’re going to be the one who steals Henry Lorraine’s original cipher in Bacon’s handwriting.”

“What are we going to do with it?” asked Sidney. “Paper a wall?”

“Sell it back to Mr. Lorraine,” said Bannerman.

“That’s rich,” said Sidney. “A book-naping.”

“Exactly. Henry Lorraine would just as soon lose his right eye, aside from the fact that it cost him a couple of hundred thousand. I’ll bet we could get fifty grand. The only thing that bothers me is it’s such a hell of a big thing.”

“Leave it to me,” said Sidney modestly. He poured the last three inches of the whisky into his glass and drank off most of it. He banged the glass down. “If I could get out of the Lenox Library with a Chaucer Second Folio, I guess I could—” Sidney stopped suddenly, pale as death, and looked around wildly. “No, Eli! Not a Chaucer! I made a mistake, I didn’t—”

Bannerman rose and glared down at Sidney, his fists clenched at his side. “You heel! You rat, you told me you didn’t have anything to do with that.” He raised his right fist and Sidney cowered in his chair, his hands held up before his face. “Eli! Don’t!”

“What did I tell you about getting the cops after you here in New York.”

“It was a cinch,” protested Sidney weakly. “Nobody laid eyes on me.” He got to his feet. “I got it while the guards were changing shifts and got out of the building without—” Bannerman’s right fist crashed against Sidney’s jaw and he watched grimly while Sidney’s legs buckled and he sank down on the carpeted floor in a heap. “You little louse! I lay awake nights figuring ways to keep us both clear of trouble and you go out and beg for it.” He kicked the prone figure brutally in the side. Sidney groaned and stirred. Bannerman reached for the siphon on the table near the desk and splashed a short squirt in Sidney’s face. He opened his eyes and groaned. “Oh, my side!”

“You fell against the desk,” said Bannerman. “Get up. You had it coming to you.”

Sidney got up silently.

“You’ll have to learn to follow my orders,” said Bannerman pleasantly, “or I’ll kill you, Sidney.”

Moving with difficulty, Sidney went to the washstand in the little closet and dressing room. While he was gone Bannerman opened a wall safe and from its roomy interior took out a number of books. He packed these into a large brief case, closed the safe and locked the bag just as Sidney came back, restored to his usual sartorial perfection. All but the lump on his jaw. He was limping a little. “You’ll do that someday, Bannerman, and you won’t like what happens to you one bit.”

“Shut your mouth,” said Bannerman. He handed Sidney two twenty-dollar bills, which were accepted sullenly. “On account,” said Bannerman. “Get yourself some dinner, go to a movie or show, and meet me at my apartment around ten o’clock.”

“All right,” said Sidney.

4

IN THE offices of the Security Mutual Insurance Company only the Investigation Department showed any signs of life and these were of a sort rarely associated with the insurance business. In one of the smaller offices two men sat over a checkerboard, with a bottle and glasses conveniently placed on a nearby desk. One of them made two triumphant moves, leaned back in his chair, and crowed, “Another buck.” He reached for the bottle and a glass, poured a drink, and said, “Come on, Steve, pay me.”

Steve Langner looked at his opponent with revulsion. “You stingy bastard!” He took three one-dollar bills from his pocket and tossed them on the board, then took the bottle from the desk and ostentatiously corked it. “This brandy is fifty cents a drink now.”

“It’s not worth it,” said Jack Donovan. “I’ll play you one more for the three bucks.”

“Nuts.”

“All right, crybaby.” Donovan put the pieces in a cardboard box, then stowed box and board away in the bottom drawer of another, smaller desk in the corner. “Can’t we close up yet and go home, Steve?”

“You can. I’m going to stick around until I get a call from Farley.”

“You mean on Ned Morgan?”

Langner nodded. “The front office is very much perturbed about those books.”

“And you think he’ll make a beeline for them in his first week out so he can go back in again. Not if he’s any smarter than an ox, Steve!”

“We don’t know that he is,” said Langner. “Anyway, this was Joel Glass’s idea.”

“Sure. He don’t have to hang around and wait for ’phone calls. He and that wife of his are out somewhere lappin’ it up while we run our tails off so he can collect rewards.”

“Go on home,” said Langner. “I don’t need you.” He walked to the window and stared down into the financial section of New York, spread out seventeen floors below. The lights of Park Row gleamed, and offices in City Hall were brightly lit. The streets were quiet, deserted, wet from the slight but steady rain which fell almost as spray. “It’s raining,” he said over his shoulder. “Where can we go, anyway?”

“Let it rain.” Donovan was putting on his topcoat. “Steve, do you really think this fellow is gonna take Farley right to the books?”

“If I thought so,” said Langner, “I’d be out there myself. It’s worth a shot, though. I remember once when I was working on a case where somebody—” The ’phone cut him off and he jumped to answer it. “Hello.… Yes, Farley.… Jesus Christ, man, how did you do a thing like that?… I know, but you should have better sense than to stand outside for ten minutes, even if you did think there was only one way to get out.… No, go on home.… Tell me about it in the morning.” He hung up and turned to Donovan dourly. “He lost him. He trailed him downtown, as unobtrusively probably as Sousa’s Band, to a hotel on 19th Street, near Gramercy Park. Morgan went in, Farley waited a while and went in after him. There was an exit on 20th Street, of course, and that’s the last of Mr. Morgan.”

“Swell,” said Donovan. “Let’s go home.”

“You’re dumber than he is.”

“Okay,” said Donovan. “Good night, Steve.”

When Donovan was gone, Langner took some reports from a file on his desk, snapped on the light over the typewriter and began filling them out. He typed painfully and laboriously, using the machine only because his handwriting was completely illegible, even to the company’s experts. He worked for nearly an hour, then clipped the papers together, put them in the outgoing basket near the door and got a raincoat and a battered felt hat from his locker. Then he put out the lights and left the office.

The thin cold rain was scooting up from Battery Park when he got to the street. Steve walked across Broadway and north to City Hall where he bought a paper and stood under a street lamp until he had scanned the headlines. Then he tucked it under his coat and went into a little cafeteria on the corner. He hung up his hat and coat, deposited his paper and a glass of water on a table, establishing a claim to the seat, and then went to the counter for a ham and egg sandwich and coffee. He came back to his seat with dishes, utensils and food to find somebody sitting in his seat, absorbed in his paper. It was a girl in a blue raincoat and a blue hat.

“Hey!”

The girl turned around and Langner said, “Oh. It’s you.”

“It’s me. I was coming to pay you a call and the night man said you had just left. So I put two and two together and came here. Is that your dinner?”

“No, I ate. Give me my paper.”

She passed it across to him. “What did you do?”

“Donovan and I sat around the office and played checkers. He beat me out of three bucks.”

“Losing your grip?”

“I let him win,” said Langner, through a mouthful of sandwich. “You know I’m the best damn checker player in these parts. I remember once in Toronto, when I was solving some jewel robberies, I was killing time with a girl who took tickets in a movie. My blandishments were to no avail in convincing this armor-plated ticket-snatcher and we finally decided we would play a game of checkers for it. Well, sir—” Langner snatched his fingers away just as the girl banked a heavy spoon down on the tiled table. “Hey, Helen!”

“Stop bragging. I’ll bet you won the checker game and woke up a few hours later with your money and your gun missing.”

“As a matter of fact,” said Langner complacently, “the little girl was broken-hearted and when I cleaned up the case and started for New York, she followed my train all the way down to Vermont in her bare feet, like Marlene Dietrich in ‘Morocco.’ ”

“Personally,” said Helen Scott, “I think more of my feet. By the way, did you catch your book-loving friend tonight?”

“He caught us,” said Langner sadly. “With our pants down. I sent a man to trail him. Operator 13, he turned out to be. He stood outside a hotel on 19th Street while subject walked out the door on 20th Street.”

“Nice work. I talked to our literary editor today. He knows a lot about rare books and he said it would be impossible to get rid of the books on that list. Said they were all extremely rare and subject to immediate suspicion.”

“I know,” said Langner.

“He also gave it as his opinion that Mr. Abraham Selig was a louse, both of whose parents must have been lice, as a louse like Mr. Selig is not created just out of thin air.”

“I know that, too. Maybe I could be a literary editor. But the fact remains that my firm is stuck for more than thirty thousand dollars and they could be Jack the Ripper’s books and I would still work my head off to get them back.”

“Good and faithful servant,” said Helen Scott. “Let’s go up to that hotel on 19th Street and wait. Maybe Morgan will come back.”

“I have to go to Police Headquarters. Are you through for the night?”

“All through.”

“Well, come on up to Headquarters with me. I’ll see Jim Flanner and then we’ll go have a drink.”

“What do you have to see Flanner about at this time of the night. Are you murdering anybody special tonight?”

“I’m mulling over a little sex murder. Just turning it over and over in my mind.”

“Keep it there,” warned Helen Scott. “Come on, then, we’ll go to see Flanner. Are you going to leave me out in the hall while you talk to him?”

Steve nodded. “Come on.” He paid the check, signaled a cab that was parked on the other corner, and when the driver swung around, he helped Helen in and got in after her. “What did you do all day?”

“I had a lovely time. I interviewed a movie star, with cocktails, and then I saw a scientist who claims that in three thousand years women will be extinct. No cocktails, but the guy was screwy enough without them.”

“Couldn’t he move the date up a little?”

“Gee, you’re real funny tonight. You should have been around while I was writing my story. Incidentally, wise guy, the Sunday Department gave me fifteen dollars extra for that story you made so much fun of and the new hat purchased therewith will probably enable me to pick up so many rich fellers that you’ll hardly ever see me again. When are we going to get married, by the way?”

“Soon,” said Langner. He put his arm around her and pulled her over to his side of the cab.

“Isn’t this a little risky so near Headquarters?” said Helen, but she didn’t mean it.

The driver pulled up with a screech on the wet pavement, and Langner got out to pay the fare. Then he and Helen Scott went up the stairs into the lobby, and up another flight to the Homicide Bureau. “Where’s Lieutenant Flanner?” asked Steve of a passing cop.

“In his office, I guess.” Unable to point because of a double armful of paper, the cop jerked his head down the hall.

“Thanks.” Steve went down the hall, but Helen Scott said, “Pick me up in the Press Room when you’re through.”

Steve opened the door marked HOMICIDE BUREAU and waved to the detective on duty in the outer room. “Hi, Paul. Where’s Lieutenant Flanner?”

“He went out,” said Paul. “I just came in but I seen him go out like a bat outa hell. Must be somethin’ doin’.”

“It’s a good night for it,” said Steve. “Well, thanks, anyway.”

“I could maybe find out where he went,” said the detective.

“Never mind. What I had to tell him can wait.”

“Okay.”

Steve went out into the corridor and banged into Helen Scott, tearing down the hall at a remarkable rate of speed. “Did Flanner tell you?”

“He’s out,” said Steve. “Did he tell me what?”

Helen Scott put her hands on her hips and regarded him pityingly. “Nothing that would interest you, Philo. Abe Selig was murdered in his shop. They found the body a half hour ago.”

At three-fifteen in the morning, a little after the closing hour for the New York night clubs, a taxi drew up before the apartment house in which Garda and Joel Glass made their home. The driver turned around and said, “Can you make it, lady?”

Garda said, “I’ll see. Come on, Joel. Up and out, my boy.”

Joel Glass lurched out of the cab, nearly performing the maneuver head first, and steadied himself on the pavement. Garda gave the driver a dollar, let him keep the change, and took her husband by the arm. “Come on, sot!”

“I don’t want to go to another night club,” said Joel in a loud voice. “Let’s go home.”

“Shut up, dummy; this is home.”

“Is it? Looks like a night club.” He clapped his hands. “Waiter!”

“Shut up. They’ll bust our lease.”

“I’ll bust their necks.” He clapped his hands again. “Bring on the dancing girls. What the hell kind of a night club is this, anyway?”

“Joel! Please, darling, let’s get upstairs. I’ll dance for you.” By artful pressure she steered him into the lobby and up to the elevator.

“Good evening, Mr. Glass,” said the elevator boy politely.

“It was terrific,” said Joel. “See for yourself.”

“Yeah,” said Garda. “See for yourself.” To the boy she said, “Give us an easy ride.”

“There were some people here asking for Mr. Glass,” said the elevator operator. “They was here a couple of times and I told them you were out.”

“Were we?” asked Joel.

“Shut up,” said Garda. “Did they leave any name or message?” she asked the boy.

“No, ma’am. They said they would be back.” He opened the elevator door and Joel veered out of it. Garda gave the boy a quarter. “If anybody comes back tonight tell them we’re still out.”

“Yes, ma’am. Shall I help you, ma’am?”

“No.” She took Joel by the arm again and they walked to the door of their apartment together. “I don’t know why I should be helping you,” she remonstrated. “I’m just about as drunk.”

“Drunker,” said Joel. “Making a scene right in front of our own home. It’s the last time I take you on a party.”

Garda had the door open. “Enter, Sire, and now if you want to fall on your nose, you may go right ahead. My responsibility is ended.”

“Fair-weather wife,” said Joel. He sat down in a chair, took off one shoe and threw it under the piano. “Remind me in the morning that my right shoe is under the piano, around the fifth octave.”

“Yes, sir. Wouldn’t you rather undress in the bedroom, my master, and then you’ll be able to find your clothes in the morning?”

“Conventional woman,” muttered Joel. He took off the other shoe, got up and in his stockinged feet walked across the room to the bookcase. He put the shoe in the case, over a set of Galsworthy, and came back to the chair. “Make a note of that,” he instructed Garda.

Garda said, “Make your own notes. I work an eight-hour day and if you get tough about it I’ll have John L. Lewis up here to tone you down a bit.” She went into the bedroom to undress and Joel got up and followed her in. She was squirming out of her dress and Joel stood in the doorway and offered valuable hints and suggestions. “You ought to get more left-to-right into that motion, honey.”

He ducked a shoe, which flew over his head into the living room, and chuckling, threw himself on the bed. “Hurry up and get undressed,” he ordered, “and then you can help me off with my pants. You can rifle them tonight, too, if you like, because I haven’t got a dime.”

“Did you spend forty dollars tonight?”

He nodded gravely. “And some odd.”

“In that event,” said Garda, “you can jolly well take off your own pants yourself, and if you never do, that will suit me just as well. I’ll set the alarm for seven-thirty, young man, and you can get up and hustle around to make some money.”

Joel put a pillow over his head. “No,” he said in muffled tones. “Not that. You wouldn’t do that, would you, Garda? Not seven-thirty?”

“Seven-thirty,” repeated Garda firmly. “It’s three-thirty now and four hours’ sleep is plenty for a growing boy like you. Personally, I shall stay in bed till noon and have breakfast sent up to me.”

“Me, too,” said Joel. “A husband’s place is in the bed.”

The telephone rang then and Garda started for it. “Shall I answer it? I wonder who it can be at this hour.”

“Let it ring,” said Joel.

Garda hesitated. She picked up the receiver, while Joel locked his hands under his head and stared up at the ceiling.

“Hello…” She listened and then put her hand over the mouthpiece. “It’s the police, Joel.” Joel sat up straight on the bed. “Some Lieutenant. I can’t get his name, and Steve Langner of the Security Mutual.”

“What’s up?” asked Joel.

“They want to talk to you.”

“Is that Langner on the ’phone?”

“Yes.”

Joel reached for the instrument. “Hello, Steve. What the hell is so important at this time of the night?… What! Jesus Christ!… Sure, Steve, come on up… 11D… the operator will show you.” He hung up and turned to Garda. “You’ll never guess what happened. Abe Selig was murdered tonight. About seven-thirty.”

Garda stared fixedly at him.

“Are you thinking the same thing I’m thinking?” asked Joel.

“Doc Dolan,” said Garda.

“That’s what I’m thinking,” said Joel, “but I don’t believe it—not for a minute.”

“Why do they want to see you at this hour?” asked Garda.

“Because, my pretty, they obviously know that Abe came to see me shortly before his timely end. They will mosey around and ask questions and stick their noses into all our affairs. By the way,” he added, as the buzzer sounded in the living room, “have we got any erotica in the office?”

“Not a scrap,” said Garda, pulling on a negligee.

“In that event you may open the door for the law. Show the gentlemen in and then make some coffee like a good wife.”

“Did you get that sober all of a sudden,” said Garda suspiciously, “or were you just putting on an act downstairs in the lobby?”

“A little of both. Sudden death sobers me. Open the door, honey.”

Garda went out to do as she was told, and Joel heard her talking to Steve Langner in the other room. Then she opened the bedroom door and said, “Here’s Mr. Langner and a friend, dear.”

Joel sat up and said, “Hello, Steve. Hello, Lieutenant. My wife coudn’t catch your name on the telephone.”

“Flanner,” said the Lieutenant. “Jim Flanner. I hate to bother you at this time of the night, Mr. Glass, and you, too, Mrs. Glass, but this is important. A man’s been killed.”

“So I heard,” said Joel. “Sit down, Lieutenant. Take off your raincoat. You, too, Steve.”

Lieutenant Flanner sat down but didn’t take off his raincoat. Neither did Steve Langner. “Joel Glass is a right guy, Jim, and I know that if he knows anything to help us he’ll tell us. Won’t you, Joel?”

“Sure,” said Joel. “What do you want to know?”

“Why did Selig come to see you around five o’clock today?”

“He was interested in some books I had to sell.”

“Selig’s help tells me that he didn’t like you one bit,” continued Flanner, “and vice versa. Did you two do much business together?”

“No,” said Joel. “None at all, as a matter of fact.”

“Then why do you suppose he called on you to buy some books today?”

“I can’t say,” said Joel. “I thought it was funny at the time.”

“Wouldn’t you rather tell me what he really did come to see you about?”

“No,” said Joel briefly. “Not right now, anyway.”

“Suit yourself. Do you know a man in the book business by the name of Francis Dolan? They call him Doc.”

Joel nodded. “Doc’s a good friend of mine.”

“Ever know him to threaten Selig?”

“No.”

“Were you at an auction sale in the Park Gallery today, Mr. Glass?”

“For a little while.”

“Did you see Dolan attack Selig near the elevators at the sale?”

“Why don’t you ask Doc Dolan some of these questions?” said Joel. “I’ll give you his address, if you like.”

“I’ve got his address,” said Flanner. “He’s not there.”

“Doc keeps funny hours,” said Joel. “might as well be frank with you, Lieutenant. Steve Langner will tell you that when it means something to me I am always on the side of law and order. I’ve helped him get back a few stolen books for his company and I’ve steered clear of trouble in my twelve years in this business. I regard the man, woman or child who killed Abe Selig as a benefactor to humanity who ought to get the Nobel Peace Prize. I don’t think it was Doc Dolan. Doc will be along in the morning and I’m sure he’ll be able to square himself without any trouble.”

“How about your own movements tonight, Mr. Glass?”

“Let me see. I left the office with my wife about five-fifteen, right after Selig left; we went to a bar on 54th Street and had some drinks with Peter and Marjorie Brand. Mr. Brand is a lawyer. Then we had dinner at the Metropolitan and went to some bars together. That took us up until about three o’clock. We were together all the time.”

“Did Selig have any enemies? Except Doc Dolan and you?”

Joel smiled. “That’s right; count me in. Practically everybody who ever did any business with Selig wound up an enemy. He was that kind of a guy. I suppose Langner told you about young Ned Morgan?”

Flanner nodded. “What about him?”

“Nothing. He was an enemy, that’s all.”

Flanner looked from Joel to Steve Langner and then back to Joel again. “Langner had one of his men tailing young Morgan tonight. Morgan gave him the slip about seven o’clock tonight on 19th Street. He didn’t come back to his rooming house after that.”

Joel whistled.

Garda came in and announced, “Coffee in the breakfast room, gentlemen.”

“Sounds good to me,” said Lieutenant Flanner. “Is the law invited?”

“Coffee for four,” said Garda. “Please check your guns.”

They followed her into the little room where a percolator, some toast and coffee cups were spread, and sat down. Flanner finally took off his raincoat and hung it over his chair.

“How was it done?” asked Joel.

“The old man was killed by one blow of a small marble statue he had on his desk. It was his good-luck piece, the employees told me. About seven-thirty tonight. There were no signs of a struggle and the blow was delivered from the rear while Selig sat in his chair. The body was found by Olin Roberts, Selig’s assistant. He had been to a moving picture with his wife and stopped by the store to pick up a package he had forgotten to take home with him. He went up to his locker on the second floor and noticed that the door to Selig’s office was open. He ’phoned the police at once. The vault where the valuable books were kept was open, too, but so far nothing seems to be missing. Roberts is down there now checking over the contents with the actual inventory.” He turned to Langner. “Maybe you can tell me why a place that carries seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars’ worth of insurance on its rare books doesn’t also carry a night watchman.”

“We suggested it a lot of times,” said Langner, “but the old man figured that the extra premium was cheaper. You see, Jim, nobody used to steal rare books very much. Except lately, that is. Until the last few years we hardly ever had a loss that amounted to anything.”

“How about Selig’s secretary?” asked Joel. “Can she tell you anything important?”

“Only that he went to see you this afternoon, all excited about something, and when he came back he was burning mad. Then he had a caller, an attorney who buys some books once in a while. She left then, right after she took the visitor in.”

“She’s a nice girl,” said Joel. “Pretty, too, don’t you think, Lieutenant?”

“Plenty,” said Flanner. “Is that all she was—a secretary?”

“The old man wasn’t much for the ladies,” said Joel. “She might have sold him the idea. She could sell me. Ouch!”

“Next time,” said Garda, “I’ll throw a knife.”

“I was just giving the Lieutenant a lead,” said Joel reproachfully.

“Excuse me if I seem to know my business,” said Flanner. “When I find a middle-aged man with his brains all over the floor, and a secretary who looks like this Julia Thorne, I don’t just forget about it and go on to something else. The girl’s got a good story, but we’ll know more about it tomorrow. She was up at the library, checking on a book that Selig wanted an affidavit on for the morning.”

“I thought you’d help us if you could,” said Langner. “I told Jim that on the way up.”

“I will,” said Joel. “I’ve got to think a while.”

Flanner stood up. “Thanks for the coffee, Mrs. Glass.” He turned to Joel. “Think right here in town.”

“Sure. I’ll be at my office in the morning. Steve knows where it is.”

When they were gone, and Garda was putting the dishes in the sink for the maid, Joel lit a cigarette, and said, “It’s a funny world.”

“And a bloody one,” said his wife.

“Imagine Selig leaving us so abruptly, passed into eternity by that bust of Dante on his desk. It was his luck piece. He adored it.”

“Joel.”

“What?”

“You don’t really think Doc Dolan killed him, do you?”

“He’s a hot-tempered Irishman.”

“But to kill a man? Over a couple of hundred dollars? Doc isn’t like that. He doesn’t care that much about money.”

“But he’s hot-tempered, and that’s just what this was. It just happened. Arguments, threats, and there you are.”

Garda shuddered. “Were you there?”

“Just reconstructing the crime for you, honey. Let’s go to sleep now for a few minutes. Better set the clock for seven-thirty after all.”

5

JOEL WENT to the office of Peter Brand first thing in the morning and found that worthy barrister pale and shaken from the night before. He groaned at Joel’s entrance. “God, how do you do it?”

“Do what?”

“Look like that after what we’ve been through.”

“Oh. I’m in good shape, that’s all. Lionel Strongfort will do as much for you in three weeks in the privacy of your own home.”

Brand shuddered. “What do you want here? Do I owe you money?”

Joel shook his head. “Seen the paper?”

“No.”

“Abe Selig was murdered last night.”

“Well, why not? Is it a closed season?”

“Apparently not. I want to know who, what and where about that hypothetical question you talked about at dinner last night. Remember, I asked you something about the reward on some books and you told me you had heard it before?”

“Well, for one thing, I never saw my client before or since. Even if I knew, I couldn’t tell you.”

“Describe him.”

“Her.”

“All right, her.”

“It’s not cricket,” said Brand. “I took a fee, gave advice, and the whole thing has to be locked tight in my breast.”

“I’ll cut it out of you,” said Joel impatiently. “I’m not going to the police, Pete, you know me. I’ve got to contact whoever it was that spoke to you about those books. I’ll keep you out of it.”

“She was young,” said Brand dreamily, “and, oh, so beautiful. If you get her into trouble, whoever she is, I’ll kill you,” he added vehemently. “She was quite tall, had lovely legs, and was very smartly dressed.”

“Blonde?”

“No, brunette. She had extremely graceful hands, she seemed a little agitated about something, and she said her name was Smith.”

“How did she get to you?”

“My name was mentioned somewhere,” said Brand proudly. “Proves I’m getting on in the profession.”

“Sure,” said Joel. “Well, thanks, I’ll have to be going.”

“Hey, not so fast! Who is she?”

“I haven’t the vaguest idea,” said Joel. “Miss Smith, I guess.”

From behind the desk Peter Brand glared at him with impotent rage. “Oh, what a chump I am when I’ve got a hangover. Listen, Joel, if you walk out of here without telling me who she is, I’ll—I’ll—”

“Well?”

“You can’t do it!”

“So long,” said Joel, closing the door. He stopped at the stenographer’s desk and told her to take some aspirin tablets in to Mr. Brand, then went downstairs and took a taxi to Abe Selig’s store. He dismissed the taxi at 58th Street and Madison Avenue, walking west to the store. There was quite a crowd around it, two uniformed policemen were keeping the spectators moving, and another cop was stationed just inside the front door. Joel pushed through the crowd to the front door, rapped on it sharply to attract the inside guard’s attention. The door was opened an inch.

“Is Lieutenant Flanner here?”

“Who wants him? You a reporter?”

“No. He wants to see me. Tell him Joel Glass is here.”

“He ain’t in,” said the cop. “Call his office.”

“I guess the big shots are taking charge now,” said Joel. The policeman closed the door, locked it, and waved Joel on with his nightstick. Joel pushed through the crowd again and was looking up and down the street for another cab, when he caught a glimpse of Julia Thorne, the murdered man’s secretary, walking quickly toward the store from Fifth Avenue. He hurried to meet her.

“Good morning, Miss Thorne.”

She said, “Good morning, Mr. Glass,” without even looking at him and walked on quickly.

“Before you go into the store,” said Joel, “you ought to talk to me.” Even on the run, Julia Thorne was a very beautiful girl, her pale, dead-white complexion heightened by the shadow of worry and fatigue around her eyes.

“If you don’t go away,” she said icily, “I’ll call the police.”

“You and I have a common interest,” said Joel. “We’re both interested in the reward on the books Ned Morgan stole.”

She slowed her quick walk. “Are you crazy or do you take dope?”

“Never before noon,” said Joel. “You ought to talk to me, Miss Thorne. I don’t know anything, can’t threaten you, and don’t want to, but in a murder case the police pry like beavers if they only have a hint of something screwy. I could help you avoid a lot of unpleasant bother.”

“Why?” she asked coldly.

“Don’t get me wrong. I’m not the Galahad type.” He took her by the elbow and she let herself be led out of the stream of sidewalk traffic into a store doorway. He looked her straight in the eye. “I think there’s money in it. You know something and I know you know something. That makes me an associate.”

She hesitated. Then she said, “Very well, I’ll come to your office.”

Joel gave her a card. “Come at noon, or thereabouts. I’ll be waiting for you. Try not to let Lieutenant Flanner’s police dogs see where you go.” He watched her walk the few yards down to Selig’s store, then walked to Madison Avenue again and up to 59th. Doc Dolan’s store was near Lexington Avenue, and while by no means a large or pretentious establishment, known to many collectors as a likely place in which to locate desirable private-press books and modern first editions at fair prices. He was an amiable Irishman as a rule, though with a red-hot temper when aroused, and in the field of modern literary rarities was regarded as a fully qualified expert, often consulted when such items were being catalogued for sale. He had excellent collections of the first editions of Christopher Morley, including a copy of this writer’s first book of verse, “The Eighth Sin,” of which only a handful are known to exist; the poetess Edna St. Vincent Millay, Edward Arlington Robinson, James Branch Cabell, Ernest Hemingway, and other writers of our own time whose first editions, association copies and manuscripts bring out the collector’s instinct in their admirers. Neither Doc’s appearance, nor that of his store, gave a hint to the uninitiate of the modern treasures scattered within, but twice a year he issued a small catalogue, little more than a short-title check list, which brought inquiries by mail and in person from far and wide.

There was a black touring car with a policeman at the wheel outside Doc’s store, and when Joel rang the bell it was Lieutenant James Flanner who poked his head out of the back room. Then Doc Dolan appeared—a worried, haggard bibliophile—who perked up noticeably when he saw Joel.

He opened the door. “Jesus, I’m glad you came. These dumb bastards think I killed Abe Selig.”

“What,” said Joel, “you mean to say you didn’t?”

Doc said, “Cut it out, wise guy,” as Flanner came out to join them.

Joel said, “Hello, Lieutenant.”

Flanner said, “Hello. We found your pal.”

“I noticed him. Where was he?”

“I was out drinkin’ with some friends,” said Dolan. “I’ve even told him who. They wanna know when did I see Selig? Why was I mad at him? Am I sure I didn’t go to his store last night? Well, the God-damn incompetents can just go and find out. I killed him, if you wanna know somethin’, Mister. I just waved a ten-dollar bill over his head and he broke his neck jumpin’ for it.”

“His mother fed him on Roman candles,” said Joel. “The chances are he’s telling the truth, though. When Selig came to see me yesterday he asked me to give Dolan two hundred dollars. Even handed it to me. Said he had called Doc’s customer and tried to square the injury he did him.”

“That doesn’t check with what either of you has told me about Selig,” said Flanner.

“Abe was worried,” said Joel. “For one thing he had an idea Doc would beat him up when they met again. For another, I’ve an idea now that Selig came up yesterday to ask for my help and that the money for Doc was to show me what a great guy he could be.”

“So what?”

“So I kicked him out,” said Joel. “We got mad at each other.”

“Hasn’t anybody in this business got a peaceful disposition?” asked Flanner. “Exactly what did he say?”

Joel told him. “I didn’t think of him coming to me for some help until this morning, but when I remembered how he looked, and how ingratiating he was at first, it seemed logical to me.”

“Why the hell didn’t it seem logical to you yesterday?” said Flanner bitterly. “I’ll check up on what you told me, Dolan, and you, too, Glass. I’ll be around to see you both.”

He went out, and Joel turned to Doc Dolan. “That ought to teach you not to swing on guys in public if you intend to kill them later in the day,” he said. “Have you got a good alibi?”

“What the hell,” said Dolan. “I was out drinkin’, like I told him. The people I told him about were on the level. They can’t get me on the Prohibition Law any more and my income taxes don’t worry me much. If they want to find the murderer, why don’t they ask Selig? If they offer a reward, he’ll talk—dead or alive.”

“You shouldn’t burn up the law like that,” said Joel. “They only do what they’re paid to do. They have to ask somebody questions or the taxpayers get dissatisfied and call for new dice. As long as the papers holler ‘Police Grill Suspects in Selig Murder’ everybody is happy and the right people draw salaries. If they even stopped asking questions and just went on shaking down whorehouses even the voters would scream like eagles.”

“That’s right,” said Doc, “but they make me so God-damn mad. Were they botherin’ you, too?”

“Worse,” said Joel. “They learned that Selig visited me yesterday—you heard me tell Flanner—and came back to his office sore as a wet hen. Only about three hours before the blessed event, too.”

“I don’t know why you let your feelings interfere with my two hundred bucks,” said Dolan bitterly. “The one time in his life Abe Selig tried to do something honest and you get sore and throw him out. And then you tell me I’ve got a temper.” He pulled on his coat nervously and said, “Let’s get a drink. I had one hell of a night.”

“It’s too early,” said Joel. “Anyway, I want to get back to the office.”

He walked to the taproom on the corner with Dolan and let him go in alone, then walked west again to his bank, near the office. He cashed a check there, stuffed the money loosely in his pocket and went on to the office where he found Garda talking on the telephone in the outer room. When she saw Joel, she said, “Wait a minute, here he comes now.” She handed Joel the telephone. “It’s Mr. Langner, Joel. Mr. Langner of the insurance company with all the dopes in its Investigating Department.”

“I heard that,” said Steve Langner on the ’phone when Joel picked it up.

Joel chuckled. “Personally, I wouldn’t hurt your feelings like my wife just did, but she and I agree that you didn’t cover yourselves with glory in trailing Ned Morgan.”

“That was a tough one,” admitted Langner. “I want to see you,” he continued. “What time and where?”

“Right here,” said Joel. “Three o’clock. I’ll be in all day from now on except maybe for lunch.”

“I’ll be up,” said Langner.

Joel hung up and turned to Garda. “I’m having company. Twelve o’clock. What time is it now?”

“Just eleven-thirty. What kind of company?”

“Wait till you see.” He made voluptuous motions with two hands. “The kind of secretary a man ought to have. She was Abe Selig’s until death did them part. Miss Julia Thorne, the dark lady of the rare books.”

“Did you see Doc Dolan?” asked Garda.

“Doc’s all right. When last seen he was cursing out the cops and apparently had a bullet-proof account of his doings to set before them.”

“Good. I was worried about Doc.”

“So was I. Honey, how would you like to go call on Leah Selig? If you can get to her, that is. I’d do it myself but Flanner would smell something right away.”

“Are you a detective on this case?” asked Garda. “First Julia Thorne for some reason, and now Leah Selig.”

“I’m going to make a piece of money,” said Joel. “I’ve got a feeling. Here I am, a reasonably smart, strong guy, with a mystery right in my own back yard. If there’s money in it, so am I. In the papers they say that Leah swears young Morgan didn’t do it. She says he told her yesterday afternoon that he was going away for a few days and that as soon as he hears about this he’ll turn right around and come back. For all I know it’s true, but you go on up and sympathize with her a while if you can.”

“All right,” said Garda, “but I don’t see why she should have me around, of all people.”

“She might,” said Joel. “I saw her yesterday and I think I made an impression.”

“You certainly managed to see all the right people yesterday. You didn’t sneak out last night and kill Abe Selig, did you?”

“On my word of honor as a Scout,” said Joel, “I did not kill Abe Selig. I did my good deed in the morning, before I came to work. Remember?”

“I’ll get out of here now,” said Garda. “How about a little something for expenses?”

“Here’s a buck,” said Joel. “What do you think this is—Scotland Yard?” he asked, when Garda held her hand still outstretched. He gave her another five. “Now don’t come back till you’ve solved something.”

Garda kissed him and went out.

Julia Thorne arrived at twelve-fifteen and Joel took her into his office, where he pulled up the most comfortable chair, put cigarettes and matches within easy reach, and settled himself behind the desk. “I can offer you some Scotch, but no soda.”

“Too early,” said Miss Thorne.

“I’ll have one,” said Joel, opening the bottom drawer of his desk and retrieving the bottle and a small glass. “You and I know it’s too early, but the liquor won’t.”

“Are you trying out a radio script?” asked Miss Thorne politely. “I’m pretty busy, you know.”

“Sorry.” Joel drank his Scotch. “I guess you know about my little hobby, don’t you?”

She nodded. “You find things.”

“And in the finding, often make a little money. Right now I’m looking for a very valuable package of books and I think you know more about them than I do.”

“Do I?” she asked coolly. “Very interesting.” She took a cigarette from the box and lit it. “Do I tell you all I know so you can make some more money?”

“A fair question. It doesn’t make sense, I know, but I’ve got a feeling that you’re going to tell me.”

“Please, Mr. Glass, you’re wasting my time.”

“I don’t think so. Why did you come here, Miss Thorne?”

She shrugged her shoulders.

“Then I’ll tell you why. You wanted to know how much I knew.”

She smiled. “About what?”

Joel changed the subject abruptly. “Have the police been botherin’ you?”

“Not much. There’s practically nothing I can tell them.”

“If they do,” persisted Joel, “and they might, I want to give you the name of a good lawyer. Peter Brand, in the Dexter Building. Only a stone’s throw from your office.”

She smiled again, betraying no surprise. “A coincidence,” she said. “I know Mr. Brand.”

“Not under your own name.” Joel got up and came around in front of his desk. “Look, Miss Thorne,” he said earnestly, “if you’ve been around the late Abraham Selig you probably have a pretty low opinion of me. I’m not like that. With all his curses, I think Abe Selig trusted me.”

“Yes,” said Julia Thorne thoughtfully, “I think he did.”

“Selig was a cagey old man. He knew I’d fight him with every weapon I could lay my hands on, but he also knew that I’d fight him fairly. Selig is dead now, and all the secrets of his business are going to come to light. You can be on the outside, looking in, or on the inside, cashing in. The way you’re situated you need somebody like myself.” He grinned. “I can show you letters from my Sunday-school teacher.”

“You’re a salesman,” said Julia Thorne, with admiration. She crushed her cigarette in the tray. “Where do we begin?”

“You know something about the books Selig claimed Ned Morgan stole from him. Just to begin with, where are they?”

“That’s more than I know,” said Julia Thorne. “About a week ago Mr. Selig had a caller—a young man named Carl Streicher. Do you know who he is?”

Joel nodded. “Carl Streicher is a very clever young man, learned in bibliography, and a capable man with a few simple tools. His specialty is altering books.”

“I didn’t know that, though he’s been in quite a bit. They were in Mr. Selig’s office together for about an hour, maybe a little more, and once, when I came in with some mail, I saw Mr. Selig quickly put some books into the deep drawer on the right side of his desk. They went out together and when I came in to straighten up his desk and lay out some papers to be signed, I picked up this.” She fumbled in her bag and produced a little slip of paper which she handed across the desk to Joel.

“That’s a list of the books,” said Joel. “The missing books.”

“I kept thinking about it all through my lunch hour,” said Miss Thorne. “Mr. Selig was always raving about how Ned Morgan ruined him by stealing those books, though I knew about the insurance collection, and every time somebody mentioned a book even remotely connected with something in the missing lot, the uproar began all over again. So I knew the titles pretty well, and the more I thought about it the more certain I felt that Selig still had the books. A girl I knew had once worked for Mr. Brand, and I knew he was in the neighborhood, so I consulted him about what I could do. I didn’t know I was walking straight into a competitor,” she added reproachfully.

“Too bad,” said Joel, smiling.

“Oh, I’m pretty pleased about it now.”

“Really?”

“Sure. You know all about things like this and if I can just give you a little help you’ll probably handle the whole thing very efficiently. I’d just gum it up if I tried it alone. Anyway—” and she said this thoughtfully—“what with my being Mr. Selig’s secretary, I don’t know that it would look so nice for me to be mixed up in it.”

“True. Do you think Streicher has the books now?”

“Most likely,” answered Miss Thorne.

“I think so, too. Selig sat on the books for a couple of years and he probably figured that it was time to ease them out. Well,” he added briskly, “we’ve got a start, and that’s not bad for a beginning.”

“Can you locate Carl Streicher?” asked Julia Thorne.

“I’ve got friends who can. Say, how’s the man hunt? Do they know where Morgan is?”

She shook her head. “The police seem to be worried.”

“The old dragnet isn’t dragging them in any more,” said Joel. “Are they sure it was Morgan?” He grinned broadly. “Did you know that the insurance company detectives were trailing him last night? He slipped away just in time to kill Selig—if he killed him.”

“What’s so funny?”

“I can’t get worked up about this passing somehow. I’ve a feeling that Selig got his reward, just the way he earned it.”

“Well, I can’t stand the way you talk about him.”

“Listen, I could tell you stories about Abe Selig that would make your hair stand on end. Yarns that make what he did to Ned Morgan look like bedtime stories. Do you know how Selig got his start in this business twenty-six years ago? He discovered a copy of ‘The Murders in the Rue Morgue’ and sold it for a small fortune. A man committed suicide over that, and it was the first rung in one of the lousiest, crookedest success stories of our time. Then there was the affair at the sale in London, when—”

The buzzer sounded in the outer office and Joel said, “Excuse me,” and started for the door. Before he got to it it was thrown open and Jake Durbin burst into the room, his huge fists doubled and rage in every blood vessel. He caught sight of Joel and nearly howled. “You son of a bitch, where’s my book?”

Joel tried to wave Julia Thorne out of her chair and behind the desk, watching Durbin warily. “What’s wrong, Jake? I haven’t got your book.”

“My place was broken into early this morning,” said Durbin, “and either you did it or you know who did.” He said all this doggedly. He noticed Julia Thorne then and relaxed slowly, still standing near the door.

“Why don’t you tell the police?” Joel sat down on the edge of his desk. “Maybe it was too hot for the police, eh, Jake?”

Durbin’s eyes narrowed. “I’ve wanted to slap you down for a long time, Glass.”

“Better start thinking up a good story about Morgan’s hanging out in your store,” said Joel. “I’m telling you that as a friend. They want Morgan enough to sweat anybody they think can tell them something. Did you hold his ears while Morgan slugged him?”

Durbin lunged across the room. His right fist missed Joel’s jaw by an eyelash, but Joel’s fist landed solidly in the pit of Jake Durbin’s good-sized stomach. He doubled up like a knife. Joel turned to his desk, grabbed a large elaborately bound quarto volume and as Durbin straightened up again, he brought this smashing down on his head. Durbin collapsed on the floor this time, out cold.

Joel tossed the book back on the desk, while Julia Thorne looked on silent and horrified. He knelt by the stricken man and began to go through his pockets swiftly, returning the meager contents to each as he finished with it. He looked swiftly through all the papers, grimaced, and brought some water in a glass. He threw this in Durbin’s face. “Wake up, Jake. You’ll be late for school.”

Durbin groaned. He stirred and began to get to his feet, rubbing his head and standing up with difficulty. “I’ll kill you, Glass!” he said thickly.

“You can go now, Jake,” said Joel. “I’m through with you.”

Durbin picked up his hat, swung it against his knee and put it on. “Don’t worry, Glass. I’ll get you.”

“See you in the District Attorney’s office, Jake.” He stood by the open door of the private office until he was sure Durbin was off the premises. Then he locked the door and turned to Julia Thorne. “The seamier side of the book business.”

“What on earth was all that?”

“It’s a funny world,” said Joel, with a sigh. “The way I reconstruct the incident, Jake Durbin stole a book, or had a book that somebody else had stolen. Along comes still another thief and steals Jake’s stolen book. Naturally, he’s worried. I feel rather flattered that he should think of me right away.”

“Lively place you have here,” said Miss Thorne. “What did you expect to find in his pockets?”

“Ah! Now that was different. He and Ned Morgan were pretty thick. I figured maybe he had some clue to Morgan’s whereabouts.”

“Did he have very much money?”

“Durbin?”

“Yes.”

“About fifteen dollars, I think.”

“I only mentioned it because Mr. Selig had about six thousand in cash on him last night. Did you know that?”

“No.”

“They found out this morning. It was gone, of course.” She stood up. “I hope you find some traces of those books, Mr. Glass.”

“So do I. Do you mind giving me your home ’phone number? I’d rather not call you at the store.”

She smiled. “Of course.” She wrote the number and the address on a blank card Joel tendered and smiled again when she handed it back to him. “I hope you’ll call me soon, Mr. Glass. From what little I’ve seen of your office and your friends, I believe you’d be a sure cure for boredom.”

“I hope so,” said Joel, as he walked to the door with her. He stood at the elevators until a car came along, shook hands again, and went back to his own quarters. He spent the next forty-five minutes making up a package of Browning first editions for a discriminating collector in South Bend, handling the books lovingly, carefully jotting down each title, facts of interest, the sale price and what it cost as he assembled the shipment. He hesitated over an immaculate copy of “The Enchantress,” a posthumous first edition, consulted catalogues and two issues of “Book Prices Current.” After much deliberation he marked the price up another five dollars, to twenty, wrapped it carefully, and placed it with the others. A presentation copy of the fourth issue of “Poems” he set aside as unworthy of the consignee and turned to contemplation of one of his choicest pieces, a first edition of “The Runaway Slave at Pilgrim’s Point.” Just then the buzzer summoned him to the outer office, where he found Sidney Wheeler, jaunty and debonair as ever.

“Hello, Joel.”

“Hi, Sidney. Sit out here a minute while I count the rooms.”

Sidney looked hurt. “What did you ever lose?”

“I’m making up an important order, and I haven’t got time to be polite to you, Sidney. I would as soon turn my back on a live rattlesnake. What do you want?”

“I know somebody who’s buying a lot of Stevenson and I also know that you’re stuck with a whole raft of that stuff.”

Joel laughed out loud. “Do you think I’m sucker enough to let you walk out of here with a bag of books, my boy? Guess again, Sidney.”

“Cut it out,” said Sidney sharply. “I want to bring this man up here and let him do business with you—cutting me in, of course, for a piece of your profit. I need the money like all hell, Joel. Honest!”

“Who is your customer?”

“A lawyer—stinking rich—Elias P. Bannerman. He’s a big collector. Buys from Selig and all the big shots.”

“Selig isn’t such a big shot today,” said Joel mildly. “I’ve seen Bannerman at sales, and I know about him, of course. He never bought any Stevenson that I know of, though. How do you come to him, Sidney?”

“I met him in a café,” said Sidney. “He likes me.”

“Wait till he looks for his watch.” Joel hesitated. “All right, Sidney, you can make your appointment for any time tomorrow that suits you. If I’m out leave word with my wife when you’re coming. I’ll cut you in for a small piece. Are you broke?”

Sidney shrugged his shoulders.

“Here’s ten. If this is a gag about Bannerman, I’ll deal harshly with you.”

“It’s no gag. He’s only just starting to buy Stevenson and he’s already paid Milton Ryall fancy prices for stuff that’s not half as good as yours.”

Sidney departed just as Garda came in. He tipped his hat politely, still with the ten-dollar note in his hand, and Garda stared after him incredulously. “Did you give Sidney that money?” she asked Joel.

“Ten bucks. It’s a gamble. Sidney has a prospect for some of my Stevenson and it sounds on the level to me. Another ten dollars in the pot won’t make much difference to my Stevenson collection.”

“You ought to chop Sidney’s hands off at the wrists,” said Garda, “if he’s to be around here to any extent. How does he stay out of jail, with all you’ve told me about him?”

“Out West,” said Joel, “they want him pretty badly. Here in the East, except for a few sophisticated collectors whom he’s flim-flammed, his record isn’t so bad.”

Garda hung her things behind the screen in Joel’s office. “Did you really think Leah would talk to me, Joel?”

“No. Did she?”

“No. What was the idea?”

“I thought Julia Thorne would be a little more comfortable if we were alone.” He grinned. “I had to feel her out, as we detectives say. She told me a lot. Say, were there cops in Leah’s apartment, or around it?”

“She wasn’t home when I got there but I remembered that I was a detective’s wife and I hung around. Cased the joint, I believe is the expression. Well, as I’m lurking there, disguised as a Checker Cab, up comes a black touring car and out comes Leah Selig. She was crying to beat the band and when I tried to talk to her she said, ‘Please, Mrs. Glass, go away.’ I went, too. I felt like a heel.”

“I’m sorry, honey.”

Garda kissed him. “I don’t care. In your mysterious way, did you do anything about the Browning order?”

“I did a lot. Come and help me finish.”

Garda extracted the customer’s original letter from the files, and together they checked off the items already assembled, while Joel made out the express tags. The last string was tied, the seals affixed and the insurance papers filled out at just about three o’clock. On time as always, just as Garda was ’phoning the express company to come and take it away, Stephen Langner appeared. With him was Helen Scott.

When the company was seated, Joel said, “I read your story in the paper this morning, Helen. It stunk.”

“Stank, dear,” corrected Garda. “Isn’t he sweet?”

“I don’t care,” said Helen cheerfully. “To hell with a career. I’m going to be a wife and mother one of these days, with six children—all detectives.”

“She daydreams,” said Langner. “What’s new with you, Joel? Did you see Flanner?”

“This morning. In Doc Dolan’s store. He started out to interview Doc and wound up on the wrong end of the third degree.”

“They’re not concerned with anybody but Morgan now,” said Langner briefly. “He was in Selig’s store last night just about when the coroner says the old man was slugged.”

“No!”

Langner nodded. “On the level.” He turned to Helen Scott. “Darling, why don’t you and Garda take a walk or go to lunch or just sit in the park for a half hour or so. I want to talk to Joel.”

“I can take a hint,” said Helen. She stood up, and tapped Garda on the shoulder. “Come along, Mrs. G.; we’re not welcome here any more.”

When the girls were gone, Langner said, “What’s new on those books?”

“Plenty. I think maybe I’ll have them back in a couple of days. Was anything stolen at Selig’s?”

“Apparently not, except for the five or six grand he had in his pocket. Did you know he pulled five thousand in cash out of the bank just before he came over here yesterday?”

Joel nodded. “Give me the whole story on the murder, Steve.”

“I’ll give you what I know.” Langner reached for the bottle, poured another drink and put his feet up on the desk. “He had no recent trouble, or worries, so far as anybody knows. Yesterday he went to the sale, where he had that run-in with Doc Dolan and then he went back to his office. Lunch was sent up to him and later in the afternoon he went out. He stopped at the bank, pulled out the dough, then came here. Returning to his office, Selig answered some mail, dismissed his secretary and was alone with his last caller, a lawyer and collector named Elias Bannerman.”

Joel said, “Well, I’ll be damned!”

Langner looked at him with interest. “Know anything about Bannerman?”

Joel shook his head. “It just struck me funny. Go on.”

“Well, Bannerman left, and Selig was all alone in the store. That’s all we know. This morning the police found a woman who lives across the street who is ready to positively identify Ned Morgan as the man who came up to Selig’s store last night, peered in at the windows for a few minutes, then let himself in, apparently with a key.”

“Good for her. Were there any prints, or clues on the inside to point to Morgan?”

“What do you want—a candid-camera picture of the old man being slugged?”

“You’ve got enough,” said Joel.

“Plenty,” said Langner. “It looks open and shut to me. If your theory about Selig having appropriated those books himself is true it looks even better. The boy goes to the can for a couple of years, a notoriously good place in which to brood. He comes out with a heart full of rancor and revenge, goes on a bat, and with a brain full of liquor he goes up to Selig’s. Maybe he learns that Selig is in the store. For all we know, maybe he knows about the money, too. After all, he was Leah Selig’s tootsie. So in he goes, with a key, I guess, and out goes Selig.”

“With a bust of Dante?” said Joel mildly. “If Morgan planned to kill the old man, why didn’t he use a gun, or a knife, or a length of pipe or anything a little less fantastic? Were there any prints on the statuary?”

“Plenty, but all Selig’s. Morgan was wearing gloves when our man lost him downtown. Get it?”

“I get it. Let me give you a recipe for an electrocution, pal: first, catch your murderer. From what you tell me, though, it does look like our Ned is going to be tapped for the first degree. Did Selig leave much money?”

“Barrels. Maybe two millions by the time they get it all counted.”

Joel whistled. “That much? Who gets it?”

“The will was made about four years ago and never disturbed. His darling daughter, Leah, gets it all except a few small bequests to relatives and five grand for Olin Roberts.”

“That’s nice for Roberts,” said Joel. “How about the help, Steve? Did they check up on everybody?”

“With a microscope,” said Langner. “All accounted for. It’s Morgan, all right.”

“How about Elias P. Bannerman, barrister?”

“He was back in his office, apparently, quite a while before the murder could have been committed, and he didn’t leave there until seven-forty-five. He went home then. Got in about eight-fifteen.”

“Here’s a lead,” said Joel. “Morgan spent a lot of time with Jake Durbin yesterday.”

“I told Flanner about that. That’s where our man picked up Morgan yesterday, after you ’phoned me.”

“Jake was up here a little while ago,” said Joel. “Raving mad about somebody ransacking his place and making off with a book I suspect was hotter than Fourth of July in the Congo. He thought I did it.”

“Did you?”

Joel grinned. “I was too busy. Incidentally, what’s your chum, Mr. Donovan, doing these days?”

“He’s working on a missing wrist watch this afternoon.”

“Take him off. Tell him to start prowling for Carl Streicher.”

“What for?”

“I’ll tell you when you find him.”

“He’s not in town, so far as I know,” said Langner. “Hasn’t been for over a year.”

“Wrong,” said Joel. “He was in town a few days ago. In Selig’s office, too.”

“Okay,” said Langner. “If you say so, Joel, we’ll do it, but you’ll let me know if it amounts to something?”

“I’m only after the books,” said Joel. “And my ten per cent, of course. You and Donovan can split the glory two ways.”

“A deal,” said Langner. He picked up the ’phone to call his office, left word for Mr. Donovan to check all sources for Carl Streicher, and was pouring himself a drink when the girls came back.

“All through?” asked Garda.

“We’re checking up on some suspects,” said Joel. “Where were you on the night of the murder?”

“In bed.”

“Very interesting. Can you describe this bed, madam?”

“Well, it’s big and roomy, the spring sags and the bedspread is usually covered with footprints because I’ve got a husband I can’t housebreak.”

“Come on,” said Langner to his girl. “The Glasses are ready to start clowning.”

“Go on,” grumbled Joel, “but you’re passing up some very valuable clues. Isn’t he, honey?”

“You bet. Some detectives, you two. There’s barely any Scotch left.”

“We trailed it to its lair,” said Joel, “and it was all over just like that.”

The telephone rang, Garda answered it, and passed the instrument to Steve Langner. “For you.”

When Langner received the brief message and hung up again he turned to Joel Glass, a trace of triumph in his aspect. “Well, wise guy, you certainly gave me a live lead. Donovan has been through our files and found that Carl Streicher is in jail in Indiana. For forging a check. Been in the can for nearly a year.”

Joel sighed. “Chicanery… deceit…”

“You and your clues,” said Langner.

“Sorry,” said Joel.

“Come on,” said Langner to Helen Scott, “before this guy has me digging up Sacco and Vanzetti.”

“Cut it out,” said Garda sternly. “A dope he may be, but he is my husband.”

“You can have him,” said Langner.

“Sire, you seem like a crestfallen man right now,” said Garda, when the visitors were gone and Joel was disconsolately pouring a drink.

“I am.”

“Is somebody making a monkey out of you?”

He nodded.

“Not Julia Thorne?”

“The same. What time is it?”

“Four-thirty.”

“I’m going uptown,” said Joel. “I may not be back for dinner. You don’t mind, do you?”

“Not especially,” said Garda. “I’d like to turn in early tonight. I’m dead.”

“I’m nearly dead myself,” said Joel, “but from acute stupidity.”

6

“HOOK, LINE and sinker,” crowed Sidney Wheeler, as he stood before Bannerman’s desk. He exhibited the ten dollars. “He even gave me this on account.”

Bannerman put down his newspaper, on a desk already littered with morning and afternoon editions. “Maybe you believe me now,” he said quietly. “Double-crosser, you hollered, when I didn’t have the money for you last night but you know why now.”

“Sure,” said Sidney. “What the hell, you have to take the good with the bad.”

“I rang the bell and I stood by that door with my heart in my mouth. I saw the light was on but nobody came to answer the door. I cursed Selig for a son-of-a-bitch and a bastard but deep in my heart I knew something was wrong. I felt it.”

“Forget it. We’ll dig up a fresh sucker. I did what you told me to with Joel Glass, and it did my heart good to see the way he bit for it.”

“Don’t be so sure of yourself,” said Bannerman dourly. “That Glass is nobody’s fool.” He drummed heavily on the top of his desk with nervous, muscular fingers, the vigorous tattoo sounding sharp and clear. “I’ve got to get to Glass somehow… find out what he’s doing… what he’s up to. The police don’t worry me. They’ll concentrate on finding that Morgan and when they find him they’ll be satisfied, but a wise guy like this Glass, with a finger in every pie in the book business, he could be poison to me.”

“Me, too,” chimed in Sidney Wheeler. “He knew all about me ten days after I came East. Too much.”

Bannerman regarded him with contempt. “Me, too,” he mocked. “Me, too. Yes, you, too, you cheap little sneak thief. All you have to do is take your extra shirt and beat it. Your worries are over. Well, I can’t. I’ve got a home, and office, prestige, a reputation. That’s what I’ve got to look out for. My whole life! Well, thank God, I don’t need you around me any more.”

While Sidney looked on with interest, Bannerman unbuttoned his jacket and took out a well-filled wallet. He counted out two hundred and fifty dollars, pushed it across the desk, and said, “This is Station E.P.B.—signing off. You get as far away on that as you can go. California, maybe. I hear people leave their front doors open when they go to sleep out there. I’ve got troubles enough without you. Get going.”

Sidney picked up the money and examined it closely.

“What’s the matter?”

“I was just wondering,” said Sidney, “if maybe some of these didn’t come from Selig’s pants pocket.”

Bannerman started from his chair. “You son-of-a-bitch!” He made for Sidney but a small, blunt automatic in Sidney’s right hand stopped him in his tracks.

“Sit down,” said Sidney pleasantly. “I made up my mind yesterday, when I was washing up after you slugged me, that you’d never do that again and live to kick me in the side while I was on the floor. Remember that, Eli? Boy, would I like to give it to you right in the gut! Sit down, Eli; rest yourself.”

Bannerman sat down.

With the desk between them, Sidney let the gun slump a bit. “You were the last one to see Selig alive, Eli. How do I know you didn’t kill him even before you came back here from his office? You told me you had trouble with him.”

“Look in the papers,” said Bannerman. “See what time Selig was killed. I was back here a few minutes past six. Anyway, would I go back there last night if I killed him? Stick my neck in the noose?”

“Maybe,” said Sidney. “Maybe you never went back there. I don’t care about that. The point is that you talked me into lifting those books at a hell of a risk. You promised me a couple of thousand, then cut me down to a grand, and now you give me two hundred and fifty dollars and expect me to do as you say—like a dog! Well, I only hope you get the rabies, Eli, because I’m going to take a bite out of you now. Hand over that wallet, Eli, and be very careful when you unbutton your coat.” The gun rose again until it was level with Bannerman’s middle.

Bannerman unbuttoned his coat, watching Sidney closely all the time, extracted his wallet and threw it on the desk.

“You’re a good sport,” said Sidney approvingly, as he reached for it with his left hand. He shook the money out on the desk, gathered it together again and tossed the empty wallet back. “I won’t count this now,” he explained, “because that takes two hands.” He stood up and without turning his back on Bannerman, edged toward the hatrack where his hat and coat were hanging. Bannerman tightened up in his chair, as if to jump, but when Sidney stopped and the gun stiffened, he relaxed. “A handy gadget,” said Sidney, waving the ugly automatic.

Bannerman said nothing.

“You can go to see Joel Glass in the morning,” said Sidney, while he reached behind him for his things, “and I only hope he gets enough on you to send you to the chair. I’ll come and spit in your face. Give Joel my love and tell him I had to leave town in a hurry.”

“Good-by, Sidney,” said Bannerman. He looked down at his manicured nails. “I’ll kill you for this when I catch up to you, but I guess you know that, don’t you?”

“Nuts! I know how to handle you now, Mr. Bannerman. You’re plenty tough when you’ve got sixty pounds and height and reach on somebody you want to slug; and you’re plenty brave when a guy is down and you’re close enough to kick him in the ribs, but when there’s a chance you might get hurt yourself you’re as yellow as they come.” He left then and for a long time Elias Bannerman sat still in his chair. Then he got to his feet slowly, took his hat, gloves and cane from the closet and left the room. He went down to the street, into a nearby bar, and had two neat brandies. He felt better then, but not much.

Joel took a cab uptown to 98th Street, near Madison Avenue, where Leah Selig lived, paid the driver and looked around the neighborhood a bit before he rang the bell. There seemed to be no signs of undue curiosity in the comings and goings of people who came and left the house, and after waiting and watching for a few minutes he rang the bell. The door clicked open, he went up the stairs and was met on the landing by a tall, sturdy woman, wearing an apron. She spoke a rather thick English. “What do you want?”

“I’m Joel Glass. I want to see Miss Selig.”

“She won’t see nobody.”

“Ask her if she’ll see Joel Glass.”

“She said not to bother her unless it was from the police or the store.”

“Go ask her,” said Joel. “You might be doing her a favor. Go ahead.”

The woman went, closing the door. Joel lit a cigarette and leaned against the stair railing until she came back again. “Come inside,” she said cordially. “Leah wants to see you.”

Joel took off his hat and followed her into the living room. Leah Selig, dressed in a somber black dress, was lying on a couch near the window. A handkerchief, damp and soggy with her tears, was clutched in her left hand and the other was thrown across her eyes. She was still crying, a pretty thoroughly prostrated young woman.

Joel said, “Hello, Leah,” very softly.

“Sit down.”

Joel sat. He said, “Your boy’s in a jam, Leah.”

Leah Selig took her hand away from her bloodshot, tired, haggard eyes. “He didn’t do it, Joel! I swear it! He didn’t do it! I know!”

The woman who had answered the door came over and said, “Don’t excite yourself, darling,” but Leah pushed her away. “Leave me alone, Aunt Rose.”

Aunt Rose shrugged her shoulders and left the room.

“I had to talk to somebody,” said Leah wildly. “That’s why I let you in. You’re his friend. You said so yesterday. You’ll help him, won’t you? You will, won’t you, Joel?”

“Sure I will.” Joel took her by the shoulders, gently but with authority. “You’ve got to pull yourself together, Leah. I know it’s hell for you, but you’ve got to be able to think straight.”

She nodded.

“Why did Ned go to the store last night?”

Leah clutched him by the sleeve. “He didn’t!”

Joel nodded. “He was seen.”

Leah groaned. She leaned back on the couch again and covered her eyes once more. “I don’t know. I didn’t even know he went there.” She sat up again suddenly. “That’s all they need! Now they’ll be sure he did it.”

“They are,” said Joel quietly. “Believe me, Leah, I wouldn’t tell you these things today just to hurt you, but it looks very bad for Ned if they catch him.”

“He’s innocent,” said Leah. “He was bitter and hot with anger but he wouldn’t do a thing like that.”

“You and I know that,” said Joel. “The thing is to convince outsiders. Even if the worst happens and Ned is caught and charged with the murder, Leah, we’ve got one chance. Those books your father claimed Ned stole from him. If we could prove that Ned didn’t steal them, and was framed, it would create a lot of sympathy for him. A smart lawyer could work wonders for him. Do you see what I mean?”

“He’s innocent,” said Leah hoarsely. “I know he is. I know my Ned. He wouldn’t do it! Oh, God!”

Joel shook his head. “That won’t do it, Leah. Tell me, did your father have any hiding place where a big package of books could be put away? An outside vault, or something like that?”

Leah shook her head. “I don’t know of any.”

“Any place up at his apartment?”

“I don’t know.”

“You’ve got to know, Leah. Damn it, you’re not doing him any good now, you know. This is a jam he may never get out of. You may think I’m in this only for the money, but don’t get the idea that I’d ever do anything to hurt your chances.”

“I know,” said Leah desperately. “I can’t think. I’m going mad!”

“I’m sorry,” said Joel. “Better get some rest. I’ll ’phone you in the morning, or I’ll stop around.”

“All these months in prison,” moaned Leah. “He’s only home a few days. Is this what I waited for?” She turned face down on the couch and her frame shook with huge sobs.

Joel got his hat and walked out into the hall. Aunt Rose was there to let him out, a grim look about her.

“Better get Leah a doctor,” said Joel. “She needs something.”

“You did her a lot of good,” said Aunt Rose, and slammed the door. He went downstairs and bought a paper on the corner. The Selig murder was all over the front page, with plenty of pictures, and the hunt for Morgan had spread through seven states. The papers had their best men on the case, because there was something appealing about the idea of bloody violence in a rare-book shop, associated in the public eye with spirited auctions, dignified publicity, and the generally sanctimonious air of a business which shows itself in public only when it is dealing in large sums. The man in the streets who asked himself what makes a book worth ten, twenty, thousand dollars, maybe even more, was reveling now in all kinds of juicy hints about Ned Morgan, Leah Selig, and the deceased’s beautiful secretary. “One of the Last to See Abraham Selig Alive—The Murdered Man’s Beautiful Secretary. Staff Photo.” He walked east toward Lexington Avenue and the subway this time, in no particular hurry to get downtown. He was anxious to talk to Julia Thorne, but not anxious enough to call her at the Selig store. It was bad enough that Flanner or his superiors in charge of the case might know of her visit to the store in the morning, maybe even about Jake Durbin’s interruption and subsequent fall. He turned south on Park Avenue, still deep in thought, and suddenly became aware of the fact that someone had walked up close behind him, silently, and was now at his side, in step. He knew at once, even before he looked up, that he was walking with Ned Morgan, and almost at once he experienced the unique sensations that might come to a man carrying a load of high explosives across a slack wire. He said, “Good God, are you crazy!”

“If you move suddenly you’ll get shot,” said Morgan ominously, though his voice quivered and he was obviously at the breaking point.

“You dumb bastard,” said Joel passionately. “Where can we go? Quick!”

“Take it easy,” said Morgan, obviously not taking it too easy himself. “Let’s turn west here.”

They turned. “Keep your coat collar buttoned up,” muttered Joel. He looked up at Morgan. Other than a harried look and the hollow eyes of a man who has been party of the first in a man hunt, he didn’t present a bad appearance. They passed a quiet, residential hotel, but with a bar for the quiet residents. “Put down your collar. We’ll take a chance and go in here.”

It was deserted, and Joel led the quaking Morgan to a table in the corner. “If they’re looking for you on Park Avenue,” he said softly, “then they’re smarter than I am.”

“How’s Leah?” said Morgan eagerly.

“Watch it.” Joel ordered two drinks and said, “Wait till we get them. Now this life-insurance policy I’m offering you is a dandy, Mr. Grant.” (This was for the waiter.) “A fine investment, and protection for your wife and family. That’ll be all.” The waiter withdrew and Morgan said again, “How’s Leah?”

“She’s fine,” said Joel. “Wonderful. The evidence is piling up on you faster than votes for Roosevelt. Do you know you were seen coming out, or going in, or going down through the chimney or however the hell you got in there last night?”

“I saw the paper,” said Morgan. “I don’t care. I didn’t do it.” He said this with the air of a man who didn’t expect to be believed.

“You fool,” said Joel, “you keep thinking of some place to hide the rest of your life. Why did you go to the store, if you didn’t kill him? Why did you slip away from the detective who was following you?”

“What detective?”

Joel looked at him incredulously. Then he recalled that this fact had not been given out to the papers, probably by request of the shame-faced insurance company. “On the level?”

“What detective?” repeated Morgan.

“That’s great. The insurance company was watching your every move. Do you remember going into a hotel near Gramercy Park?”

Morgan thought hard. “I went in there to ’phone.”

“Then why didn’t you come out the same way? You went out the other side, and the popular impression there is that you went straight from there to Selig’s.”

“I did,” said Ned Morgan quietly.

“Fine! Were you going to kill him, by any chance? Don’t forget to tell that to the District Attorney.”

“I had a gun,” said Morgan slowly, but in dead earnest. “I was going to kill him. When I went into that hotel I ’phoned the store. When Selig answered I put the receiver back on the hook and I knew the time had come.”

“Go on,” said Joel.

“I got to his store and I saw the light burning on the stairs. I didn’t know if he was alone, but I had to take the chance. I knew how careless Selig was about the burglar alarm, and if it was one, I would just have to run for it. Selig got my keys, naturally, when I—when I—when I left, but I had an extra one to the front door, and it worked. I crept up the stairs to the landing, through the anteroom, and opened the office door. The light was out, and I couldn’t figure why. I got my gun out and I switched on the light. Selig was lying near his desk, in a pool of blood, and the bust of Dante, all covered with blood, lying near his head. It was horrible and I guess I lost my nerve and was out of my mind for a minute because I don’t remember going downstairs. Suddenly I was out in the street and I started to run. I had a few dollars, but I didn’t try to leave town. I just walked.”

Joel rubbed his chin. “You didn’t happen to see five or six thousand dollars lying around the office, did you?”

Morgan said, “I know how it sounds. It’s the truth, though. I swear to God it is!”

The waiter was approaching their table again, to take away the empty glasses, and Joel stood up, motioning to Morgan to rise. He put a dollar and a tip on the table, pointed it out to the waiter as he hurried forward with the check, and followed Morgan out to the street. “Over to Park Avenue,” he said. They passed a policeman on the way, and while he paid no particular attention to either of them, Joel felt Ned Morgan stiffen like a ramrod. “You ought to cut out coffee, young fellow. You’re nervous.” They crossed Park Avenue on the green light and walked slowly east. “Have you got any money?” asked Joel.

“A little.”

“Here’s thirty dollars. Get rid of those clothes you’re wearing. Go up to the Bronx or somewhere out of the heart of town and get something that won’t sound a four-alarm wherever you go. Buy a pair of glasses, too, and fix up your face somehow. I’ll meet you tonight and meanwhile I’ll try to think up some way to get you out of town.”

“I didn’t do it, Joel. Shouldn’t I stay here and—”

“Don’t be crazy,” said Joel. “You haven’t got a chance. I’ll meet you tonight at midnight at 72nd Street and Riverside Drive. Any corner, but don’t hang around on the corner and wait. If you come early, or if I’m a few minutes late, take a walk around the neighborhood. Got that?”

Morgan nodded. “Okay.”

“Keep on walking east a while,” said Joel. “This is my station.” He waved as he started across the street, then turned back to Park Avenue. “Whew!” It was six o’clock now, and time for Julia Thorne to be home from work. He went into a drugstore and dialed the number she gave him. Then he heard her voice on the ’phone.

“This is Joel Glass, Miss Thorne. Things are popping fast. I’ve got to see you.”

She hesitated. Then, “Can you come up here about nine o’clock?”

“Sure.”

“I’ll be waiting,” said Julia Thorne. “Is it something very important?”

“It’ll keep till nine. I’ve found Carl Streicher.”

“Oh! Very well, then, I’ll see you at nine.”

Joel hung up, fumbled for another nickel, and just on the chance that Garda might be still in the office, he called there.

He heard her well-trained, secretarial voice. “Joel Glass & Co.”

“This is Joel Glass.”

“My wandering husband!” cried Garda, with obvious delight.

“I can make dinner now. Stay where you are. I’ll be right down.”

“You’ll have to get dressed and leave now,” he heard Garda say in a loud voice. “My husband is on his way. Don’t let him find you here. Did you hear that?” she asked.

“Perfectly. Lay out my hobnailed boots, Mrs. Glass.” He hung up, went outside and stepped into a waiting taxi. Traffic was thick, but he was at the office at six-thirty. Garda was making a drink as he entered. “I got ice and soda water from the drugstore and we can have a drink right here instead of spending good money in bars. Where’ve you been?”

Joel hung up his hat. “I went to see Leah Selig and that took time.”

“Did you get in?”

“Sure. Hurry up with that drink, honey. This sleuthing is hard on the head. I’m tired.”

“Up there,” said Garda, handing him his glass, “you tire easily. Mysteries are the joint property of husband and wife, says the New York law. Why leave me out of it?”

“This is a man’s mystery. Full of sexy women and dark doings—two things which seem to go hand in hand, if hand in hand is the term I want. You should complain. Sitting here in a nice office while I stand over a hot mystery all day.”

She smiled and sat on his lap. “You’re crazy, but in a nice way. I’m nuts about you, kid.”

“Gee, kid, and I’m nuts about you, too.” He kissed her. “What are we going to do about it?”

“I don’t know,” said Garda sadly. “We can’t get married because my parents would never allow me to marry a bookdealer. Their last words when I left home were, ‘Daughter, don’t hesitate to come home if you should go wrong, take up strip-tease, or marry a gypsy violinist, but don’t break our hearts by taking up with book-dealers.’ ”

“Did they really say that? Well, some people are just prejudiced against an honorable profession, that’s all. Watch out, you’ll spill my drink.”

“I’ll make you another. Do you love me in your nasty, cheap, bookdealer fashion?”

“To distraction. I never had a wife I loved so much.”

“Well, just don’t sit there, dummy!”

He finished his drink and put the glass on the floor.

“Now, Mrs. G., pay careful attention, if you please; this is the one that drove the Sultan mad.”

“That’s nice,” said Garda. “More.”

7

JULIA THORNE’S apartment was high up over Riverside Drive. It was a one-room suite, with dressing room, pantry and bath, but the one room was very large and set in a corner of the house. It was nicely, though modestly furnished, there were lots of books, a piano and a small phonograph. The bottom shelf of the bookcase had been built for record albums and there was a small but choice selection of music—on the piano in printed form and recorded specimens for the machine on the shelves. Joel looked at the books, as he automatically did in his first visit to everyone’s house, while Miss Thorne put away his hat and topcoat.

“Find any rarities?” she asked.

“Once a bookman,” murmured Joel, turning away from the shelves. “I can’t help doing that.”

“I find myself doing it,” said Julia Thorne. She was wearing a long, trailing housecoat and she looked stately and beautiful as she bent over the little serving wagon on which were bottles, soda and ice. “Scotch for you?”

Joel nodded.

“Soda and ice?”

“And a little truth,” said Joel.

Julia Thorne stopped short with her hand on the siphon. She looked up.

“Truth, I said.” Joel came a little closer and sat down on the studio couch near the mixing station. “You lied to me about Carl Streicher,” he said bluntly. “Do you blame me if I wonder why?”

“Lied to you?” She stirred the drink and handed it to him.

“Sure you did. You told me you saw Streicher and Abe Selig poring over those books a couple of days ago. Streicher hasn’t been in New York for nearly a year.”

Julia Thorne sat down on the edge of the couch. “That’s bad,” she said reflectively. “I hate to be caught in a lie—don’t you?”

“It’s bad,” said Joel. “Especially if the person who caught you in a lie knows that you’re just sparring for time to think up another one.”

Miss Thorne’s eyes opened wide. “Is that what you think I’m doing?”

Joel said, “Sure.”

She shook her head. “No. You’re much too smart. I’m not going to lie to you any more.”

“That will be dandy. What about those books now?”

“Well, I figured why should I include you in what was a private stroke of luck. I knew that the insurance company would pay a few thousand dollars to get the books back, and I was the only person who knew that Selig had them.”

“We shook hands,” Joel reminded her. “We were partners.”

“A lot of money was involved,” said Julia Thorne, as though Joel were a very naïve young man. “That always alters cases, I think. Now, of course, it’s different, because you caught me in my little lie and I’ll have to tell you the truth just to restore your faith in me. The books are in Selig’s apartment; I saw them there when I was working with him one night about a week ago.”

Joel looked incredulous. “Selig wouldn’t keep anything so hot as that in plain sight.”

“They weren’t exactly in plain sight,” said Julia Thorne. “Shall I make two more?” She asked as Joel put down his glass, empty. She didn’t wait for an answer but busied herself at the tray. “It all happened like this. Selig had a lot of Dickens firsts and association items on exhibition at a Library over in Jersey a couple of weeks ago. He brought them to his apartment when the show was over and he asked me to come up there with the inventory lists from the store and check everything with him. There were about fifty items, I guess. Do you know Selig’s apartment? Well, off the large living room there is a smaller room, a rather somber, paneled library which leads into Selig’s bedroom. On the wall to the left as you come in from the living room there is a large, framed Rembrandt etching and when this is removed you’ll see the dials of a wall safe. Selig had all the Dickens pieces in there and when I came up with the lists he opened it for me and handed them to me one by one. I checked the store numbers and the other details, while Selig went through them quickly for any signs of damages. Everything was all right, except that he couldn’t locate a very expensive item—a contract signed by Dickens with his publishers for a novel. He remembered putting this in his bedroom and went in there to look for it. He asked me to put the Dickens back in the safe while he was gone. I remember that I picked up the largest and heaviest item first, a ‘Pickwick Papers’ in parts, boxed in two heavy solander cases. I put this in the back of the safe and I must have touched a spring or a gadget because the rear wall flew up and there were some books there. I recognized them right away. Selig dinned those books into me and everyone else in the store from morning to night.”

“Did Selig see you?”

“No. When he came back into the room I pressed down the trick wall, which caught on a lock, I guess, and pretended to be fumbling with the top of the solander case.” She looked anxiously at Joel. “You do believe me, don’t you?”

“It has the ring of truth. The tough part is that what you told me this morning had the same ring of truth.”

“But you can find out about this right away.”

“That’s the nice part,” said Joel. “This one is easy.”

“So was the other, it seems,” she said lugubriously. “You’re smart. How did you find out about Streicher so soon?”

“He’s in jail. Been there for about a year. That brings up another question in my mind. I do believe you’ve told me the truth, but why?”

“What I really want,” said Julia Thorne, “is a drink, but if I make it now, you’ll think I’m stalling.” She made the drink, then looked him straight in the eyes, soberly and steadily. “You’re a practical man. I liked the way you handled Mr. Durbin in your office today. You’re hardheaded and tough. A girl could hook up with you in a scheme to make money and be sure you wouldn’t get soft or flighty in the middle of it.”

“That depends.”

“There’s a lot to be learned in a place like Selig’s,” said Julia Thorne softly. “I learned it.” She was sitting on the piano bench, her face framed softly in the gorgeous blue-black hair. “Yesterday you started to say something about Selig and the dirty tricks he had played on people you knew.”

“That’s where Jake Durbin came in,” said Joel, grinning.

“I never saw a copy of ‘The Murders in the Rue Morgue,’ ” said Miss Thorne. “Is it very valuable?”

“Up to here. Maybe thirty, forty thousand dollars now. Selig had one of the very few copies that ever turned up in my lifetime. Want to hear about it? It gives an interesting slant on the late bibliophile’s character.” He reached for the bottle and the siphon on the table near the couch.

“I’ll sit over here with you. It’s the only really comfortable spot in the room.”

Joel made room for her. “It goes back quite a long time. Selig was a young man, already fairly successful, and with a reputation for being a fast man in a trade or a swap. At just about this time there was a bookdealer over in Brooklyn—on the Heights, somewhere—who was friendly with Selig. This fellow was located near a school, did most of his business in second-hand textbooks, and didn’t know much about rarities. He just about managed to stay above the starvation level, had a wife and a kid and another one on the way when he brought a bunch of books over to Abe to ask his opinion on them. He used to do that frequently and sometimes Abe would take the books and give him a few dollars. This time he had bought a lot of books from an old home in Brooklyn, picked out what he thought might be worth rent money and left them with Abe. Abe snickered over them, chided the guy for wasting his time and gave him five or ten dollars. Doc Dolan was working for Abe Selig at that time and he told me the story. One of the books was an immaculate first edition of ‘The Murders in the Rue Morgue’ with an inscription in Poe’s handwriting. The finest copy ever known. Abe got around thirty thousand dollars for it from some utility king and a ream of publicity.”

“How about the dealer who sold it?”

“Not so good. He came running to Abe, of course, and he just quoted him proverbs and maxims about early birds, and so forth. Doc says Abe finally drew himself up grandly and counted out a hundred dollars for the man. Here’s a guy who was working and sweating and keeping late hours to try to make a living for himself and his family. He lets a fortune slip out of his fingers. He felt just badly enough to go right home and blow his brains out. His wife, on the point of having a baby, was shocked right into the hospital and in two weeks she was dead. Do you wonder why I can take Selig’s murder in my stride? Or why I wouldn’t lift a finger to catch the one who did it?”

“No,” said Julia Thorne. “I don’t wonder.”

“You make the drinks this time,” said Joel. “That speech parched me.”

She busied herself with the ingredients. “Here’s to us. Really partners this time.”

Joel took the highball. “No gags?”

She was hurt. “Certainly not.”

“I was just asking. Burnt child, you know, and all that.”

“We’re partners,” said Julia Thorne decisively. “Since this morning I’ve been thinking over a lot of things that happened while I was working at Selig’s and I’ve come to the conclusion that you’re the man to help me figure them out. The reason I fibbed to you about Carl Streicher this morning was just because I was bewildered and I didn’t know if I could trust you. Now it’s different. I’m sorry I was so standoffish every time you spoke to me in the store or at a sale.”

“So am I. Say, who plays the piano?”

“I do—a little. Shall I play for you?”

“Sure.”

She arose eagerly, draining her highball.

“Watch how you handle that,” cautioned Joel. “It might turn out to be loaded.”

She smiled and sat down again on the piano bench. “What do you like?”

“ ’Most everything. Turn out some of the lights.”

From the lower shelf on the bookcase, where the records and books of music were stacked, Julia Thorne produced two stubby candlesticks of dull silver, in which were partly consumed candles. She set these at both sides of the music rack, lit them, watched the wicks flare up, then walked to the door and snapped off the lights. “How’s that—better?”

“Much better. You set a nice stage.”

“So you won’t notice my mistakes. I’m all out of practice.” She adjusted the trailing garment she wore in graceful folds around her slim legs, and raised her really beautiful hands over the keyboard, which gleamed dimly in the soft light. Heavy, crashing chords filled the room and as the reverberations gradually died away, a curiously tender and lilting melody emerged. When it was finished, she turned to him. “That was Debussy.”

“You’re very beautiful,” said Joel.

“You weren’t listening.”

“With my ears and my eyes,” said Joel. “I’ve always liked Debussy but I never liked the fat men in full-dress suits who played his music. That was perfect.”

“How about Bach?” she asked, turning back to the piano.

“A man I’ve always admired,” said Joel promptly, “but largely because he had some twenty-eight children of varying degrees of legitimacy. Tell me, is it true that they had to poison him to get him to stop writing fugues?”

“They put handcuffs on him. I’ll play something modern.” The piano seemed to come alive under her flying fingers and odd, contorted shapes paraded in the intricate measures of the martial theme. The harmonies, while weird, did not fall unpleasantly on the ear, and the music progressed in intensity until it came to a sudden, crashing, dissonant halt. “Prokofieff,” announced the artiste, turning back to her guest. “Like it?”

“It was great.”

She let her hands fall in her lap. “It’s so full of sound and fury I couldn’t help thinking about what you might do to me if those books weren’t in Selig’s safe when you go to look. Before me is a vision of Mr. Durbin going down in a heap. You wouldn’t hit me with a book that big, would you?”

“You’re making fun of me.”

The liquor had flushed Julia Thorne’s normally pale complexion and her aloofness had given way to a vibrance and eagerness which rather took Joel by surprise. “When I first learned that you had found out about me from that lawyer, Mr. Brand, I was annoyed and worried but I can see now that he only gives out information about me to the right people.”

“Thanks,” said Joel. “If I thought he had more clients like you I’d haunt his place from morning to night.”

“For shame, Mr. Glass. And you a married man.”

“That’s true,” said Joel, a little as if it were news to him.

“Did you tell her you had a date tonight?”

“I lied,” confessed Joel. “First lie I ever told her—about you,” he added. “I told her business, as a matter of fact. Half a truth is better than none.” He looked at his watch and found that it was twenty minutes to twelve. He realized that it might not be a good thing to leave Ned Morgan lying around on an open corner. Some cop might arrest him for throwing scrap paper on the sidewalk and the jig would be up. “I’ve got to go,” he said aloud.

“Oh, stay a while. Is there something wrong with the Scotch?”

“Everything is perfect,” said Joel. “If I didn’t have to be at a certain place at a certain time tonight you couldn’t drag me out of here with wild horses—not if they were frantic.”

“Well, have one more drink.”

“Lady, this is important.”

“Oh, all right. The next time we have a date I’ll disconnect the ’phone and double-lock the doors.”

“Every prospect pleases. Give me a rain check tonight.”

She smiled at him. “Sure.” She brought his hat and topcoat from the closet. “I think these are yours.”

He put them on. “They fit, anyway.”

“We carry a pretty complete stock.”

“By the way, I’ve a chance to acquire a customer who did a pretty big business with Selig. At least, I’ve always thought so. It’s Elias Bannerman, an attorney.”

“I know him.”

“Did he buy much Stevenson?”

“None at all. Not from Selig, anyway,” she added quickly. “He probably bought his Stevensons somewhere else.”

“Probably. Does he pay his bills?”

“Promptly.”

She took him to the door and Joel promised to let her know about everything as quickly as it happened. “One thing more,” she said. “Handle this matter as if you were in it alone. I want to stay on at the store as long as I can. It might prove uncomfortable.”

“I thought of that. You’re quite right.”

He had time enough to walk to 72nd Street, along the windy west side of the Drive, and he walked warily in the last block, watching for some sign that Morgan might have been already picked up. That would be bad enough, but to get mixed up in it himself for aiding and abetting a murderer’s escape—that would be something really hard to explain even for an experienced explainer. He had taken reasonable precautions against being followed from the hotel where he had dined with Garda to Julia Thorne’s apartment, and he was doubly certain that he had not been followed away from there. There were no signs of Ned Morgan on the designated corner, though Joel looked around carefully and stood under a street light rather ostentatiously to let Morgan see him if he was hiding in a doorway. He waited ten minutes, moving around from corner to corner, looking carefully at all the shadowy spots in the vicinity, then walked slowly toward Broadway. He walked slowly because if Ned Morgan were hiding somewhere, as he had hidden near Leah’s apartment earlier in the day, he might fall in with him somewhere along the street, but he reached Broadway alone. He was going down the stairs to the downtown subway trains when everything became crystal clear. A newsboy was crying an extra.

“Extra! Selig Slayer Caught on Train! Extra! Ned Morgan Caught on Train!”

Joel experienced a sinking sensation. He fumbled for a nickel, bought a paper, and spread it out to read the headlines as he continued on down the stairs. “The God-damned fool!” he said aloud.

8

BY THE time the sunrise editions of the morning papers hit the street, it was easy to see that all concerned with law and order were industriously measuring Ned Morgan for the chair. The City Chemist was able to report that the stain on Morgan’s trousers, just above the knee, was human blood, as was the stain found at just about that height on the door of Mr. Selig’s office, and this put the finishing touches to a perfect picture. Morgan’s own story, that he had gone to see Selig, let himself in and found the old man dead, was greeted with polite surprise by the District Attorney and the county detectives who were questioning him, and when he came to the part about everything going blank as he stood in the doorway, their surprise turned to amazement. The District Attorney had his coat, vest, and tie off, the room was littered with cigarette butts (all smoked by the law; Morgan couldn’t have any) and all those surrounding the man in the chair under the light wore the frustrated, harried faces of men who were being asked over and over again to believe a completely unbelievable yarn. After twelve hours of this, at eight A.M., Ned Morgan slid off the chair in a dead faint. The District Attorney, dark with fatigue, said, “Take him away, boys. He’s charged with murder.” Then he went to his private office, shaved for the photographers, and prepared a statement which was an admirable blend of outraged civic virtue, even-handed Mosaic justice, and a mere hint that the type of man who could speedily bring murderers to justice was not a bad type to install in the executive mansion next year. Ned Morgan, meanwhile, was lucky enough to stay unconscious for a full half hour, during which he had no troubles whatsoever, and when he came to in a cell, stripped of everything on his person with which a guilty man might commit suicide, he sat on the cot with his head in his hands, rocked silently, and after a while he began to groan.

Leah Selig, of course, was frantic. Unable to see Ned Morgan, to find out what had happened, or just to talk to him, she waited at Police Headquarters all that night, and when she got the news, from a reporter, that the State was charging Ned with murder, she also fainted. When she had been resuscitated and the photographers were reluctantly leaving such a swell shot, she sat huddled on a bench for a few minutes. Then her protective instincts came to the surface and she went uptown to see about a lawyer for Ned.

“And, boy, he needs one,” said a reporter for an evening tabloid to his photographer. “Juicy-looking dame, ain’t she?”

“And all those bucks. Yum-yum! Hey, do you think that shot I got when she was fallin’ will get me somethin’ extra?”

“Not a chance.”

“Imagine a dame standin’ up for the guy that conked her old man.”

“That’s a dame for you. Come on inside and get a shot of those broads they caught in a raid. We oughta get some of this stuff back to the office. Nobody can’t see it in that box of yours.”

Joel Glass was having breakfast with his wife, refreshed by a good night’s sleep. There was a heap of morning papers around his chair.

“Does it look very bad for Morgan?”

“Try to get a policy on his life this morning. There’s quite a stink in the papers.”

“Do you think he did it, Joel?”

“Right now, I’m a lot more worried about his telling the police that I saw him yesterday and gave him thirty dollars. The money he bought that damn ticket with.”

“Joel! You didn’t!”

“He followed me away from Leah’s yesterday, before dinner, and hailed me on Park Avenue. We walked all over town together, bowing to the police.”

“You’re mad! You’ll go to jail!”

“I hope not. I’m all washed up with this business after today. Maybe we’ll close up the place and take a little trip. Come on downtown, baby, and tend store for me while I put the finishing touches to a sleuth.”

“The reason I married you,” said Garda disconsolately, “was because I thought we would get to see something of each other that way.” She got up and began to remove the breakfast dishes.

“Leave them for the maid,” urged Joel. “Go get dressed, dear.”

“Don’t you like me any more when I’m not dressed?”

“Get some clothes on,” said Joel, “before I drag you naked down to the subway station. Yes, on a white horse.”

Garda disappeared into the bedroom. Joel picked up the papers again and was studying the accounts of the crime, the chase, the capture and the attitude of the police. Garda came back in fifteen minutes, fully clothed this time, and they left the apartment together. “We’ll crowd our luck,” said Joel, “and take a cab. Maybe I’ll make some money today.”

“Joel, are you after those books?”

“On top of them.”

“Do you think that will be so good for Ned Morgan?”

“Why?”

“I can’t help thinking of how Leah Selig looked when I saw her yesterday.”

“I won’t hurt Ned’s chances. Suppose I do give the police the motive. It’s a cinch for any lawyer to prove that Selig needed killing about as much as any man alive. Maybe they’ll give him a year and a day just to discourage that sort of thing.”

“Stay out of it,” urged Garda. “This isn’t your kind of a show. Too bloody, too hateful.”

“And a matter of six thousand dollars. I wonder what happened to that money.”

“None of your business,” said Garda sharply. “What’s the girl like, by the way? Did I ask that casually?” she asked anxiously.

“You’re cute. And so,” he added thoughtfully, “is Julia Thorne. Not cute, exactly, but very interesting. You’ve never seen her, have you? She’s tall, taller than you by about an inch, and her hair is thick and sort of blue-black. Her eyes are all colors—gray, green, and slate—she drinks like a fish and plays Bach and modern music with a lot of style. She’s clever, and quick, and colder than dry ice—on the surface.”

“I don’t like that ‘on the surface.’ ”

Joel laughed. “You asked me, remember? You’re my girl, though, and if this taxi hadn’t just pulled up at our office, I would show you that I mean what I say.” He helped her out and gave the driver money for the fare. “You go on upstairs, and if Mr. Bannerman ’phones, remember that we’re still in the book business. Make an appointment for me. ’Phone me at Selig’s store. If I’m not there, you can leave a message. I’ll be with Mr. Langner.”

In the second-floor office at Abraham Selig & Co., Steve Langner was sitting at the murdered man’s own desk, checking the contents of the vault with the aid of Mr. Selig’s assistant, Olin Roberts. Langner’s assistant, whom he had acquired reluctantly, was Helen Scott. She sat on the edge of the desk, smoking a cigarette, and delivering a harangue. Mr. Langner wore a pained look. This was obviously distasteful to him.

“You should have seen the look the City Editor gave me. He said, ‘I understand from some of the boys, Miss Scott, that you’re engaged to a man who is way inside on this Selig story. Bring us something, Miss Scott. A reporter is only as good as his contacts. Use them.’ ”

“Go ahead,” said Langner. “Use them. What was that again, Mr. Roberts?”

“A presentation copy of Kipling’s ‘Barrack-Room Ballads,’ carried at twelve hundred dollars, is not in stock at the moment, but I know that it is in the hands of a customer.”

“Check it off,” said Langner.

“But, Steve,” protested Helen Scott, “it wouldn’t hurt just to—”

“Isn’t there a sergeant-at-arms, or something, around here?” asked Steve wearily. “God damn it, Helen—” He looked up as Jack Donovan entered the office. “Mr. Glass is here. That nosy Mr. Glass,” said Donovan.

“Send him up.”

Donovan went down to the front door, where Joel was standing. There was a uniformed policeman on duty at the door and the shades were drawn. “You can go up, Mr. Glass,” he said politely. “Don’t hesitate to fall down and break a leg, Mr. Glass.”

Joel went up the stairs, passed by Julia Thorne with a wave of the hand, and went through the open door to the office. “Hello, Steve. Where can we talk?” He saw Roberts coming from the vault with an armful of books. “Hello, Roberts.”

“What’s up?” asked Langner.

Joel noticed Helen Scott now, who had retired to a chair against the wall. “The press, too, eh?”

“We never sleep. Steve’s been trying to kick me out for the last few minutes.”

“I’ll finish the job. Wait downstairs, will you, Helen? I’ve got to talk to Steve.”

“Okay.”

Roberts turned to leave, too, but Joel stopped him. “You can hear it. Steve, I want you to get a couple of cops, a safe man, and permission to go through the box in Selig’s apartment.”

“We’ve been through it.”

“This is special. There’s a compartment in it. Abe Selig kept some very private property in that safe, property you paid him for once if I’m not mistaken.”

“You’re nuts.”

“I don’t think so. Would I stick my neck out like this if I didn’t know something?”

“No,” said Langner thoughtfully, “you wouldn’t. How do you know?”

“I just know.”

“I couldn’t do it on my own responsibility. I’d have to talk to Flanner, and maybe the District Attorney.”

“There’s the ’phone,” said Joel.

Langner reached for it. “I hope you’re smarter today than when you had me hunting Carl Streicher. You were pretty sure about that, too.” He dialed the number, and it took a little while to locate Lieutenant Flanner, then still longer to convince him. Langner hung up, finally, and said, “He’s going to talk to the D.A. He’ll call back.”

“Good.” Joel looked around the ornately furnished, luxurious office. “So this is where the noted bibliophile met his end. Where’s the bust of Dante?”

“That’s exhibit A.”

“Don’t tell me you found Ned Morgan’s fingerprints on it. That’s all they need now.”

“They don’t even need that. I’m afraid your favorite murderer is going to the chair, or maybe up the river for life. The only prints on the bust were Selig’s, but we know that Morgan wore gloves when our man lost him downtown.”

“How about the dough? The six grand?”

“Buried it somewhere.”

“That’s what you said two years ago about the books.”

“We haven’t found them yet,” said Langner. “I’ve no reason to believe I was wrong two years ago. Frankly, I don’t give a damn, and if the boy gets off, more power to him.”

“Doesn’t it make your blood run cold to think of a man who might be innocent facing a trial for his life?”

“No. What’s more, neither does yours. What makes you so sentimental about Ned Morgan?”

“I’m his illegitimate son,” said Joel. “Want to see my strawberry mark?”

The ’phone rang and Langner answered it. He listened, said, “Okay, we’ll be right here,” and hung up. “That was Flanner. He’s on his way up with a safe expert and a man from the District Attorney’s office. It’s your baby now.”

Langner and Olin Roberts went back to work on the contents of the safe while Joel browsed around the office, listening idly while Roberts called off fabulous items from the store’s inventory lists. He made mental notes of items he might want to buy if the store’s contents were sold at auction, then edged around to the open door where Julia Thorne was working at her desk. “We’re going uptown to see about the safe,” he whispered.

She put her finger to her lips. “Not here.”

“See you later,” whispered Joel, withdrawing to the office once more. He busied himself with a row of sporting books, sumptuously bound to catch the eye of some wealthy, drawing-room Nimrod, and spent an interesting twenty minutes thus, while his estimation of the late Abe Selig’s fortune went higher and higher. There were heavy footsteps on the stairs then, and he turned to Langner. “Hark! The police!”

Flanner came in unannounced, followed by a small, portly man with a heavy bag which he put down gratefully by the door, and a taller, younger man, rather collegiate in dress, with a stubby pipe in his mouth. Flanner made the perfunctory introductions. The younger man was from the District Attorney’s office, Mr. Victor Byers, and the safe man was Mr. Joe Lambert.

“Pleased to meetcha,” said Mr. Lambert.

Mr. Byers didn’t acknowledge the introduction at all, being busy with his pipe, and when he had it lit, he said, “See here, Mr. Glass, the District Attorney’s office would like to know where you got your information in this matter.”

“I’ve got a Ouija board,” said Joel.

“We want to know exactly how—”

Joel turned to Flanner and said, “We’re wasting a lot of time down here, Lieutenant, when we might be uptown ‘tending to business.”

Mr. Byers put his hand on Joel’s shoulder. “See here, Mr. Glass, your attitude is—”

“Take your hands off me,” said Joel.

Flanner broke in. “He’s a hothead, Byers. It seems that everybody in this business walks around with a chip on his shoulder. Come on, we’ll go uptown and later on you can take him back to the office and beat the truth out of him with your bare hands.”

“We’ll let him talk to the Chief,” said Byers, not content without this parting shot. Then they all got their hats and coats and filed down the stairs to Flanner’s car. Joel said, “Good-by, Miss Thorne,” as they passed the desk in the hall and they all tipped their hats. Flanner’s was a big touring car, with a uniformed man at the wheel, and Mr. Lambert sat up front. The rest of them crammed into the rear seats. The ride didn’t take long, and in about fifteen minutes they were way up on Fifth Avenue, near the museum. Right off the Avenue, in a very upper-class house, Mr. Selig occupied half a good-sized floor. There was a policeman on duty near the elevator, and he saluted when he saw Flanner. “Nothin’ to report, Lieutenant.”

“Open up,” said Flanner, “and turn on some lights.”

“What kind of a box is this?” asked the safe man, the first words he had spoken.

“Never saw it in my life,” said Joel cheerfully. “You don’t have to worry about opening it, that is if Lieutenant Flanner brought the combination. There ought to be some kind of a trick back to it.”

“That might be tough.”

They were in the library now, the policeman turned on the lights and Flanner sent him back to his post. There was a large, framed Rembrandt etching. It was Landscape with a Cottage, and Joel recognized it as one which had brought some seven hundred dollars at a sale two years ago. He took it down himself, from the center of the left wall, behind which was Selig’s bedroom. The safe man whistled when he saw the gleaming door. “It’s a good thing you’ve got the numbers. That baby would be tough to get into without the numbers.”

Flanner put his hat on a table and approached with a slip of paper in his hand. Mr. Byers stood close by, while he twirled the dials, and Joel Glass, a few feet away, looked around the comfortable surroundings in which the deceased had spent so many happy hours trimming somebody. It was all quiet, tasteful, expensive stuff, designed to get collectors into a responsive frame of mind. Joel heard a muttered “Damn!” and turned to see Flanner spinning the dials angrily for a new start. “Use your specs, Lieutenant,” Joel advised him. This next try did it. Flanner worked his way laboriously through the combination, his lips moving silently, till the lock clicked and he stepped aside triumphantly.

To Mr. Byers fell the honor of opening the strongbox. There were two or three small, steel boxes, a number of books, some wrapped packages which were obviously more books. It was a good-sized cabinet, fairly deep, and the lower level quite a bit below the level of the door. Joel watched while the contents were stacked on a small table, and he walked around to look at the titles. They were valuable, interesting books, but held no special charm for Joel just then. Mr. Lambert had removed his jacket, and in his vest was standing by the safe with a flashlight in his hand. He focused this first on the area adjoining the door, pressing evenly on the smooth surface with fingers which now seemed curiously well adapted to their work. Their movements were deft, with a practiced, expert look about them. The brightly polished, gleaming, bare interior of the steel box made Mr. Lambert uneasy, and he frowned when he reached behind him for a hammer and a small chisel from his bag.

“Are you going to bust it?” asked Lieutenant Flanner anxiously. “If you damage the box and there’s nothing there, we’ll have hell to pay down at Headquarters.”

Mr. Lambert seemed a little hurt at this implication of crudity in his methods. “Nah, I ain’t gonna bust it. If there’s a gimmick in this box it’s right here in the joints. There’s a couple places right here that feel like they might give a little.” There was a prolonged, fruitless, metallic rapping as his head and shoulders disappeared again into the safe, then he changed to the other side of the rear wall of the box and began all over again. Joel was watching over his shoulder, shrinking from what Flanner and Langner might say if his lead was wrong, when suddenly the back wall of the safe flew up with such force that it knocked the chisel from the expert’s grip. “There you are, gents,” he said triumphantly, stepping aside. Langner reached eagerly into the hidden compartment, half as large as the safe itself, and began pulling out the books stacked there. He piled them on a nearby table, quickly shaking them free of their protective coverings. Then he looked up at Flanner and said, “These are what we want, Jim.”

Flanner looked suspiciously at Joel Glass. “All right,” he said. “Gather them up and we’ll all go downtown.”

The little safe-buster gathered up his tools, an air of quiet satisfaction about his movements. “I’d of had it a lot sooner only I think the gimmick is rusty. Been a long time since anybody was back here.”

Joel was still staring at the pile of books. “The dirty old dog,” he said softly.

“I guess he was at that,” said Langner. “Come on.”

In the Finance Building a large collection of floor space on the fifteenth floor was occupied by the law offices of Arnold Stamper, and to the building attachés this section was known as “Murderers’ Row.” In his twenty years at the bar, Mr. Stamper had defended a great many murderers of first, second and third degree, and while his clients were sometimes charged with manslaughter and assault with a deadly weapon, these latter cases were run-of-the-mill jobs, usually turned over to an assistant. Mr. Stamper had been uniformly, consistently successful in his work, and while some of his murderers of both sexes were doing time in various New York prisons, not one of them, no matter how premeditated and aggravated a homicide was involved, had ever been electrocuted. It was not unnatural, therefore, that he should be the first choice for counsel whenever homicidal men and women could afford his services, and it was well known that while Arnold Stamper came high, he was very well worth it. He was a medium-sized, wiry individual, a chain smoker of Turkish cigarettes, and well-dressed on all occasions. In court he put on what he himself admitted was a very good act. He could rave and rant, plead and exhort, shout and declaim with all the fervency of a Southern Fourth-of-July orator; bitingly sarcastic when cross-examining a State witness, tender and considerate when one of his own was on the stand. He had a tremendous flair for needling both prosecutor and Judge into flagrant violation of his client’s Constitutional rights, very handy if the verdict went against him and the case was thrown into the higher courts. On reading of Ned Morgan’s capture in the morning papers, and of the mounting pile of evidence against him, he remarked to his wife at the breakfast table, “I’ll have that Morgan case before I close up today.”

“Have they called you?”

“The girl’s got millions,” said Mr. Stamper reflectively.

“And just think how she got them,” said Mrs. Stamper, all for law and order.

“You think how she got them. I want to think how much to charge her.”

When he got to his office that morning at nine-forty-five, Mr. Stamper summoned his middle-aged secretary, Miss Laird, known to him and to the wealthier criminals of New York City as “Franny.”

“We may get that Morgan case today,” he told her, “and I want to be ready for it. Now if that Selig girl comes in here, let her wait a few minutes but not too long. When she’s been in with me for about five minutes, you come in and tell me that Boyle is ready with a report on the Ned Morgan case. Make believe you don’t see her.”

Franny did not move a muscle. “All right, sir.”

His confidence in his reputation was eminently justified at eleven-thirty that morning, when he was dictating some letters and Franny came in to announce that Miss Leah Selig was waiting.

Stamper spread some lawbooks around his desk, went out to the reception room to greet Miss Selig personally, and in his most fatherly manner brought her back to his office, settled her in a large, comfortable chair, put cigarettes and an ashtray within easy reach, and sat down behind the desk. “I suppose you’ve come about that unfortunate affair at your father’s store, Miss Selig.”

“Yes,” faltered Leah. “It’s Ned—Mr. Morgan—I’m so worried and my friends said that you—”

She got no further. Mr. Stamper smote his desk with a mighty blow of his right fist. “A frame-up!” he roared. “I’ve read the papers carefully and this is what they call Justice in New York City.” He snorted. “They’re railroading an innocent boy, or my name is not Arnold Stamper!” A few minutes later he had the intense satisfaction of watching Leah Selig write a check, and while she was trembling, he rather thought it would pass the tellers. He tossed the check rather casually into the middle drawer of his desk. “This five thousand dollars,” he said gently, “is what you might call for my office expenses. Unfortunately, it costs a great deal to prepare a case like this. Before we come to trial we may need another such sum and in court, of course, my fee will be one thousand dollars a day.” He watched her closely to get her reaction to these charges.

“Anything,” said Leah, almost moaning the word. “Anything at all, Mr. Stamper, but please don’t let them—”

Stamper cut her off with an eloquent practiced gesture. “From now on it is Arnold Stamper who will do all the work, all the worrying.”

When Leah was gone, Stamper rang for his secretary. “Here’s the retainer in People v. Morgan. Better take it around to the bank yourself and get it cashed.” He scribbled an endorsement on the back, then turned it over and looked at the figures lovingly. “I wonder where she got that kind of money?”

“As if you cared! Are we counsel?”

“Up to here,” said Stamper. “I’m going downtown now and you’ll be able to reach me in the District Attorney’s office. You get all the papers for the last couple of days and start Conway and Boyle checking up on every single solitary soul who is mentioned in the Selig case. Everybody, understand me. God knows there isn’t much to go on. I’ll see how hot they are at Headquarters.” Franny helped him into a form-fitting, fly-front gray topcoat, with velvet lapels, and handed him a jaunty gray hat with a feather in the band. He appraised himself in the mirror, grinning over his shoulder at the secretary, who wore a wry smile. “Go on, Franny, laugh—but I can still pull in the checks. A grand a day in court, too.”

“Who’s laughing?” said Franny dourly.

A taxicab whirled Mr. Stamper to the District Attorney’s office and he progressed through the halls and offices with a chorus of “Good afternoon, Counselor” echoing behind him from the doorman on. “I’m counsel for Ned Morgan,” he told the District Attorney’s private secretary. “Whom do I see?”

“Just a moment, Mr. Stamper.” She consulted a schedule on her desk. “Mr. Murray is preparing the indictment, but the D.A. will handle the case personally.”

“Why? He’ll never get a conviction.”

The girl smiled. “I guess he just wants to keep his hand in.”

“I’ll talk to Murray.”

“Right this way.”

Mr. Edward Murray, Third Assistant District Attorney (sixty-five hundred dollars), was a tall, thin, nervous young man, with a heavy shock of hair, hornrimmed glasses, and clothes which flapped rather than hung on his angular frame. He was slumped in a big chair now, studying some papers, a lot of books were lying on his littered desk, and his right hand was running nervously through his hair. He greeted Mr. Stamper cordially. “Hello, Arnold, what can we do for you today?”

“I came for some justice,” said Stamper, getting out of his coat, which he put with his hat on the window sill. “About a dime’s worth in a paper bag.”

Murray took off his glasses, which he held in his left hand. “You want our special white, well-to-do justice, or just the kind we hand out to niggers and strikers?”

“The best, and between you and me that’s none too good for the case I got this time. I’m counsel for Ned Morgan. The kid that killed his sweetie’s papa.”

“The hell you say. Does he know it?”

“Leah Selig just retained me. I guess it’ll be all right with my client. From what I read in the papers it don’t look like he’s got so much to lose.”

“And that’s a fact. Want to talk to him? I’ll be glad to give you an order.”

“He’ll keep. I want to talk to you. Is it a first-degree rap from where you sit?”

Murray shrugged his shoulders. “You know, of course, that the boy did time for stealing some books from Selig. At the time he maintained that he didn’t steal the stuff he was charged with stealing at all, just a few cheap books for spending money. Well, it seems that Selig did frame Morgan because the books he claimed were stolen were just found in back of a safe in his apartment. A dealer named Joel Glass tipped off the insurance company. I’ll give you his name and address.”

“What’s my client got to say?”

“He seems a little shell-shocked. He didn’t do it, naturally. He went to Selig’s store with a gun in his pocket, but that was for self-defense, I guess, in case the old man threw a book at him. When he got there Selig was dead.”

“So how did he get blood on his pants?”

“Hey! I’m the District Attorney.”

Stamper shook his head sadly. “Don’t I get the dirty cases, though?” He got into his topcoat, adjusted the little feather in the band of his hat, and said, “Give me that order, and the name and address of the bookdealer who tipped off the company. What is he, a ten-percenter?”

“I guess so.” Murray scribbled on a sheet of notepaper. “Now, for Christ’s sake don’t start a holler about the unmerciful third degree your client was subjected to. Nobody laid a hand on the guy.”

“I’m not so sure of that,” said Stamper darkly. “While I’m here, Eddie boy, how about a plea for Louis Rudnick? I’ll tell you what I’ll do, and only because I’m so busy with the Morgan case: I’ll plead him to plain, old-fashioned manslaughter and it’s a quick way out for everybody.”

Murray shook his head. “Not a chance. Dirty Louie is headed for the second degree and at least twenty to forty years.”

“But I promised him it would be manslaughter.”

“Get the hell out of here, before I book you on some kind of a charge yourself. You promised him! Why didn’t you promise him a job on the District Attorney’s staff while you were promising?”

“He wouldn’t take it,” said Stamper sadly. “It don’t pay enough. Say, why did Selig have it in for my client?”

“His daughter,” said Murray. “She was in love with Morgan and they figured to get married. The old man had other plans for her.”

“Sweet guy.” Stamper started for the door. “Thanks a lot, Eddie.”

“Don’t mention it, and don’t call me Eddie. Come again sometime. Oh, Justice, when banished from other habitations, make this thy dwelling place.”

“I’ll remember,” promised Stamper.

9

IN THE office of the District Attorney of New York, the Honorable J. Foster MacMillan, the books retrieved from Selig’s safe were stacked on the D.A.’s desk, and around this were ranged the characters who had figured so prominently in their recovery. Steve Langner had a seat in the rear of the room. Lieutenant Flanner, hat in hand, was standing near the desk and Joel Glass was seated at the District Attorney’s left. Mr. Byers, sucking disconsolately at his empty pipe, stood behind the District Attorney’s chair.

“Now, Mr. Glass,” said J. Foster MacMillan, not unkindly, “I must say that the stand you take amazes me.”

“I don’t see why it should.”

The District Attorney smiled indulgently. “Naturally, Mr. Glass, you wouldn’t, but if you were schooled in the law you would realize that in a murder case every single thing that might yield even a scrap of information must be minutely scrutinized, and investigated with the utmost care. Now suppose you begin at the beginning and tell us the whole story.” He leaned back in his chair, expectantly.

“I was born right here in New York City,” began Joel, “and after taking it easy for a few years, entered Public School Number 132, in the Bronx, at the age of five and a half. In the first grade I had—”

“You see, Chief,” said Victor Byers excitedly, “he’s deliberately—”

J. Foster MacMillan raised his right hand for silence. “Am I to understand then, Mr. Glass, that you are determined not to give this office any information?”

“Here’s a man from the insurance company,” said Joel, indicating Steve Langner, “who will bear me out when I say that I make some money now and then by engineering the return of property which has been lost, mislaid or stolen. I don’t have to tell you that the only reason I can do this is because I’ve got contacts. To keep those contacts I’ve got to keep my mouth shut. Anyway, I don’t see that the recovery of these books has anything to do with the murder of Abe Selig and it’s too late to try him for defrauding the insurance company.”

“We know who murdered Mr. Selig,” said MacMillan, “and as a citizen, Mr. Glass, it is your duty to give us every bit of information you have. I could hold you as a material witness, you know. Keep you right here in the Tombs until we come to trial and that won’t be for a few weeks yet.”

Joel was so relieved that nobody had mentioned his encounter with Morgan the day before that he laughed out loud. “Do that,” he invited cordially, then stood up. “You can always reach me at my office, Mr. MacMillan. I’ve lived here all my life and I promise not to leave town now.” He waved to Lieutenant Flanner. “If you get lost on the way, Lieutenant, just send up some flares.”

Flanner said, “On your way, wise guy.”

When he reached his office at nine o’clock the next morning, Elias Bannerman’s mind was made up. He tarried in his suite only long enough to scan the mail and load a blunt, ugly automatic, and with this weapon in his coat pocket, he went out on the trail. With fifteen hundred dollars in his pockets, Sidney Wheeler was sure to get drunk and, as Bannerman knew, liquor and conversation were inseparable to Sidney. Granted that he was scared to death and went far away, sooner or later he would be in a jam and squeal like a pig. Either of these was a definitely unpleasant prospect to Elias Bannerman. His first call was at Jacob Durbin’s store, where the proprietor was just opening up, but he discontinued his work when he saw Bannerman and invited him cordially into the back room.

“This place is hot right now,” he warned Bannerman, “but I guess it’s all right.”

“Why?” asked Bannerman.

“That son-of-a-bitch Joel Glass,” said Durbin. “Ned Morgan was here all day just before he rubbed out old Selig, and sure enough Glass told the police. They been all over my place, crawling up the walls, the dirty dogs.”

“That’s tough,” said Bannerman. “You know, Jake, sooner or later we might have to do something about Glass. I’m thinking about it right now.”

“So am I.”

“What were you doing with Morgan?” asked Bannerman curiously.

“Just priming him,” said Durbin, with a wolfish grin. “I figured he still knew how to get in and out of Selig’s store, and he was so hot against the old man, I thought maybe we could get him to knock off the store for a little haul. Instead of that he goes up there and runs wild, kills the old man, grabs the cash and runs. Now he’ll fry. The chump!”

Bannerman nodded. “That was a bad thing all around. About that Glass, Jake, you don’t like him much, do you?”

Durbin’s heavy mouth tightened. “No, not much.”

“What could you do about it?”

“Plenty. With pleasure.”

“And not stick your neck out too far doing it?”

“I swear to God, Eli, I wouldn’t care if I did.”

Bannerman shook his head. “That’s no good. I don’t like him much myself, but I wouldn’t want you to be reckless about it.”

“I could do it,” said Durbin eagerly. “I could do it so they wouldn’t even miss him for a week. Leave it to me, Eli.”

“How?”

“It’s a cinch. It would cost, all told, maybe half a grand. For expenses, you know, and for my partner.”

“That’s out,” said Bannerman firmly.

“He wouldn’t know even who Joel Glass was, let alone who was interested in him.”

“No,” said Bannerman.

Jake Durbin shrugged his shoulders. “Okay, Eli. Forget it. Anyway, I’m glad you dropped in because I’ve got a couple of beautiful Whistler etchings.”

“Not today,” said Bannerman. “It’s a little too hot these days for etchings. I’ll talk to you about them later on. By the way, Jake, have you seen Sidney Wheeler?”

“Last night,” said Jake Durbin. “I saw him down in Brodsky’s on Fourth Avenue about ten o’clock or so. He was drunk as a monkey. You need him?”

“Not particularly,” said Bannerman. “I know where he lives, anyway. So long, Jake.”

“So long,” said Durbin. “You sure you won’t take a look at those Whistlers, Eli? Beautiful stuff, and not the ones that could be spotted easily.”

“I’ll let you know,” said Bannerman. He left the store and took a taxi to 12th Street and Fourth Avenue, where Jascha Brodsky had a bookstore near the corner on the side street. He knew Brodsky, having bought a few minor books from time to time, and browsed around the shelves with the profuse permission of the proprietor to do so to his heart’s content. He found a Prideaux bibliography of Robert Louis Stevenson’s writings, and remembering that he was to be a Stevenson enthusiast later in the day, tucked this under his arm. He knew enough about this author to disarm most dealers, but it might come in handy, and he was glad to pay five dollars for it. “I’ll take it with me,” he told Brodsky, while the grateful dealer wrapped his purchase.

“You’re interested in Stevenson?” asked Brodsky hopefully. “I got right now a copy of ‘Underwoods’ which it was the personal property of Stevenson himself.”

“Not today, Brodsky. Say, by the way, do you know a young fellow named Sidney Wheeler?”

Brodsky looked at him and shrugged his shoulders. “I wish I didn’t. Why?”

“Have you seen him around?”

“He was here yesterday,” replied Brodsky. “Late last night, about eleven o’clock, when I was closing up. He was drunk and had a lot of money. Did he steal something from you, Mr. Bannerman?”

Bannerman laughed. “No. Is he a thief?”

“Is Sidney Wheeler a thief? Believe me, Mr. Bannerman, that gonif would steal the nickels off of a dead man’s eyes.”

“Pennies,” laughed Bannerman.

“Pennies, dimes, quarters, Sidney would steal them all.”

“Did he say where he was going?”

“Uptown, to do some more drinking. If I’m not mistaken, Sidney lives at the Mannering Hotel, right near here on Washington Square.”

“Did he say he was leaving town?”

“He didn’t say.”

Bannerman went to the Mannering Hotel, a little annoyed with himself for having overlooked such an obvious move since he knew where Sidney was living. The desk reported, not to his surprise, that Mr. Wheeler had checked out early the night before. “That boy over there, Number Eight, handled his baggage. Maybe he can tell you where Mr. Wheeler went.”

Bannerman accosted Number Eight with a ten-dollar bill in his hand, at the sight of which the bellhop’s eyes glistened. “I’m looking for Mr. Wheeler—Mr. Sidney Wheeler.”

“He left here last night, Mister,” said the boy eagerly, “but he didn’t say where he was going.”

“What did you do with his baggage?”

“He took a cab.”

“Out front?”

“Yeah.”

“Do you know which one?” The bill in Bannerman’s hand waved provocatively under the boy’s nose. He made for the front entrance, with Bannerman close behind, and ran up and down before the line of four cabs. His face fell. “He ain’t here now, Mister.”

“That’s too bad,” said Bannerman, folding the bill.

“Hey, Jerry,” the boy called out to one of the drivers. “Where’s the guy that hacks with the big black Caddy?”

“On a job,” replied Jerry. “Here he comes now around the Square.”

“Go ask him,” said Bannerman, as the cab pulled into line, and the bellboy ran off. He was back in a minute or two, his face glowing in anticipation of the reward. “He says he took Mr. Wheeler to the Penn Station, he checked his grips there, and then he took him uptown to Carmichael’s, on 53rd Street.”

“That’s not what I wanted to know,” said Bannerman. He gave the boy a dollar.

“But, Mister, I—”

“Beat it,” said Bannerman, and there was a look in his eye. The boy went off, grumbling.

Bannerman walked through the Square to the bus station, trying to recall if he had ever heard Sidney mention Carmichael’s, on 53rd Street. If Sidney checked his bags at seven P.M., went to Carmichael’s, then was seen downtown again drunk, the chances were that he was still in town. After a night’s drinking he would hardly wake up for an early train. Bannerman smiled as he walked along, and his right hand sought out the pocket of his topcoat where he had the gun. He had a plan, and jumped on a bus, went upstairs to the top deck, and relaxed in the strong sunshine.

“I’m not the District Attorney,” said Garda Glass, “so you can tell me what happened.”

“In a minute. Did Mr. Bannerman call?”

“He’ll be here at two o’clock. It’s only one-fifteen now, so we can talk.”

“It all turned out just like the gypsy told me. We went to Selig’s apartment, the safe yielded to a little pressure, and there were the books, tucked away in a compartment worthy of E. Phillips Oppenheim at his secretive best.”

“So you thought and thought, and then did it anyway.”

“Don’t be mad. Then we went to the District Attorney’s office and I refused to tell how I knew about the books.”

“Why?”

“I promised.”

“Did they like that?”

“Not much. Threatened to clap me in the cooler, as a matter of fact, but wiser heads prevailed and they just warned me not to leave town. What’s the matter, honey?”

“I don’t like the whole thing, that’s all.”

Joel went to the cabinet, brought out a bottle of Scotch and two glasses. He poured a drink for himself, offered one to Garda, and when she turned it down, he corked the bottle and put it away. “I don’t think I did Ned Morgan any harm today. On the contrary, but even that is incidental. The main thing is that I’m pretty sure that Selig was the top man in a little syndicate. With his contacts here and in Europe he could unload books and pictures that would be sudden death to any other fence, or that another man might have to sit on for centuries. Now that he’s dead this intricate structure is ripe for a push that will topple the whole thing over and that brings us to Julia Thorne. She’s on the inside, she knows what’s what. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could make about fifteen or twenty grand, close up shop and go away? Just the two of us?”

“You and Julia?”

“What I do,” said Joel, “I do for you. We kid around, but you know there’s nothing on earth could get me away from you. And about this job I’m doing, I’d drop it in a minute if I wasn’t so sure that I’m doing the right thing. Above all, I’ve got to do the right thing—especially if that’s how I can make the money.”

“Maybe I don’t understand,” sighed Garda. “You know, Joel, sometimes I think you and I get too much fun out of being in love; maybe we’re too flip with our happiness. I’d lay down and die if something happened to you.”

“Lie down,” corrected Joel.

“See, that’s what I mean. We could have become real tender there.”

“A place for everything,” said Joel, “and everything in its place. When things look blackest, my dear, remember that a good man loves you with all his heart and soul. And if I’m not mistaken, somebody just came in. Is the buzzer off?”

“I had the door open. I’ll go and see.”

She returned to hand Joel a card. “If you need a lawyer,” she said, “there’s a good one out there.”

“Arnold Stamper, eh? They hired a nimble brain.”

“With Bannerman due at any moment,” said Garda, “this is a bad time for your underworld activities to start popping.”

“Show him in,” said Joel. “Chances are he won’t be long.”

Arnold Stamper wore a big, broad smile as he approached the desk, and he pressed Joel’s hand warmly. Joel said, “Take off your coat. Pull up a chair.”

Stamper did all this. “Mr. Glass, I represent Ned Morgan. It’s just like that with me, no frills. I hope you’ll meet me on the same basis.”

“Nothing up either sleeve,” said Joel.

“I’ve just left Morgan and he said you were a man who could be trusted. He even told me about your kindness to him yesterday.”

“I was afraid he would.”

“Only the three of us know, Mr. Glass.”

“Yesterday it was only two of us.”

“As far as this case is concerned, you may regard Morgan and myself as one individual. All that you would do for him, I must ask you to do for me.”

“What happens if he goes to the chair? Will you subdivide then?”

“You can dismiss that notion,” said Stamper firmly.

“I hope so.”

“You took care of that today,” beamed Stamper. “My friends at Headquarters are inclined to regard it only as a stroke of luck for them, establishing the perfect motive for the crime—my client’s resentment at being charged with a crime he didn’t commit. But they don’t know juries like I know them. A man capable of a thing like that has got so much meanness in his life that it ought to be a cinch to convince any jury in the world that his removal was a noble act, bravely done. I don’t say that my client may not go to jail, but to the chair he certainly won’t get!”

“Do you think he did it?”

“Positively not,” said Stamper, “but it would be a hell of a job to prove him innocent and from what I’ve seen so far, impossible to prove anybody else guilty. One or the other must be done, and I don’t mind telling you that I prefer to do neither.”

“I get what you mean,” said Joel. “You don’t need your professional ethics with me, Mr. Stamper. I don’t like Ned Morgan any less because he killed Selig.”

“Have it your way. When I learned about those books today, through my own confidential sources of information, incidentally, I said to myself, this case is rooted deep down in the rare-book business. What it needs is somebody who knows that business. This Mr. Glass, I said to myself, would seem to know a lot about the rare-book business.”

“He does,” said Joel modestly. “Furthermore, I don’t mind telling you that just a minute ago I said to myself, ‘If that Lawyer Stamper is a smart man he’ll have every book in Selig’s store checked and double-checked.’ ”

“Why?”

“Because I’ve come to the conclusion that Selig was a fence. For the last five years more and more rare books have been stolen from libraries, exhibitions, dealers, auctions, etc. It suddenly became very profitable to steal books, and for the first time since the insurance companies began writing the stuff. It costs more to insure a book today than it did five years ago, and if I’m not mistaken the reason for this was Abe Selig. Behind that palatial front were some very shady doings. There’s an idea right in line with your campaign.”

“You must be a very busy man,” said Stamper, as if he hoped it weren’t true.

“Terrifically,” said Joel. “Why?”

“Of course, I wouldn’t expect you to work for nothing.”

“What work?”

“I thought you’d be the very man to check the stock. Of course there are certain ways a man like yourself could make money on a job like this. Any property you recovered, insured stuff, I mean, would naturally—”

“Don’t say another word, Mr. Stamper.”

“I like you, Mr. Glass,” said Stamper. “Suppose we say fifty dollars a day for expert services.”

“Keep it. I hope to make this job worth real money. Better arrange with Leah Selig to have the people at the store, especially Mr. Roberts, notified that I’ll be down tomorrow.”

“I’ll do it,” said Stamper, just as Garda entered with a folded note. She left this, and exited.

“Guess who’s waiting,” said Joel. “The last man to see Abe Selig alive.”

“You mean Eli Bannerman? I know him. I thought of calling him in to give me some inside dope if you turned me down. He’s also a collector.”

“I hope to sell him some books. Did the police go all over his story?”

“Why should they? They’ve got my client and they’re all busy sewing him up in a sack. As it happens, I know Bannerman. He’s got a quiet, respectable practice. There’s nothing shady about him.” He stood up. “I’ll let you tend to your business, Mr. Glass. Call me from Selig’s store whenever you like tomorrow, let me know how things are going.”

“Just one question. What do you suppose happened to the five or six thousand dollars Selig had in his pants pocket?”

“I don’t believe he ever had it,” said Stamper. “Not when he was killed, I mean.”

“Maybe. All right, Mr. Stamper. You can count on me to do my best.” He heard Stamper and Bannerman greet each other, while Garda held the door open and blew him a kiss, then the outer door closed and Elias Bannerman came in. Joel stood up to greet him and to shake hands.

“I’ve heard about you, Mr. Glass,” he said after the perfunctories. “Only a few weeks ago Lawrence Hill showed me the beautiful copy of ‘The Cenci’ you sold him.”

“That’s been a year now,” said Joel. “Mr. Hill was pleased with that book, I know, and I think he got a bargain.”

“He told me what he paid,” said Bannerman, “and I agree with you.” He was seated now, his coat across his knees, his hat and gloves on the desk.

“Let me hang up your coat,” said Joel. But Mr. Bannerman preferred to lay it across the back of the heavy chair in which he sat.

“Is Stevenson a new interest with you, sir?”

“Fairly recent,” said Bannerman. “When young Mr. Wheeler told me about your Stevenson collection, I made up my mind that we must finally meet.”

“I’m certainly glad of that. I felt the same way when Sidney told me about you.”

“A nice young man, that Mr. Wheeler,” said Bannerman heartily. “I believe he’s in the utility business on the West Coast.”

“I thought it was railroads,” said Joel.

“It may have been railroads,” conceded Bannerman. “I’m very anxious to see your books, Mr. Glass, and as I don’t have a great deal of time, why—”

“Excuse me,” said Joel. “I’ll call my wife. She knows the location of everything better than I do.”

For a man who had not particularly cared about Stevenson until recently, Joel had to admit that Elias Bannerman knew a lot about that author’s first editions, manuscripts and association copies. He knew what to look for in books, had simple but good taste, and he was soon in ardent discussion of values, trends, points and disputed ideas about certain issues.

The more attractive items, including Stevenson’s own copy of a minor work, a unique letter mentioning a forthcoming novel, and copies of the three privately printed plays, Bannerman set aside for closer scrutiny.

“Those plays,” counseled Joel, “are rare in any state. In this superb condition, with such interesting presentation inscriptions, they are definitely unique. At a thousand dollars for the lot they are a real bargain.”

“If you’ll give me the prices on these six items I’ve set aside,” said Bannerman, “I’ll let you know in a day or two. I generally take a little time to make up my mind. But I don’t mind saying that I like your things very much.”

Joel jotted the titles and prices on a slip of his note paper. “If you call on the ’phone, sir, you can reach me best at Abraham Selig & Co.”

Bannerman looked up in surprise.

“That was the attorney for young Ned Morgan,” said Joel. “He’s retained me, as you legal gentlemen say, to check the contents of the store.”

“For a loss?”

“Presumably.”

“That was a dreadful tragedy,” he said, shaking his head. “A terrible thing.”

“He was in here the same afternoon,” said Garda artlessly. “Sat in that very chair.”

“How awful,” said Bannerman. “And now he’s gone. Poor Selig.” He reached for his coat on the back of the chair, put it over his arm and shook hands with Joel. “I’ll let you know in a day or two, Mr. Glass. I’ve enjoyed our talk immensely, and it’s been a pleasure to meet you, too, Mrs. Glass.”

When he was gone, Garda said, “I got your note. I chewed it up and swallowed it just like in the spy pictures.”

Joel said, “Well?”

“I made two cursory passes at his topcoat. There was something in there that felt a lot like a gun. What’s behind all this?”

“I thought so,” said Joel.

10

SHORTLY AFTER Arnold Stamper’s visit to the District Attorney’s office, an elderly man sought out Frances Laird, Stamper’s secretary, in her own cubicle, delivered a package of papers clipped together, and received a reward. Franny then summoned the two men-of-all-work maintained by the office to do independent snooping, prying into the private lives of jurors and witnesses, and the thousand and one other chores which criminal lawyers may find distasteful, if they are sensitive, keenly moral men, but which are, nevertheless, frequently necessary. Mr. Raymond Conway, a ponderous Irishman, was especially good at servants—female servants—and his partner, Mr. Jack Boyle, a small, agile Irishman, a picture-snatcher par excellence, a legal second-story man of unquestioned talent, and Arnold Stamper’s all-around trouble-shooter.

“Did you want us?” asked Mr. Boyle, speaking for the ensemble.

“Yes. Mr. Stamper is working on the Selig case. He’s counsel for Ned Morgan.”

“The kid what killed his old boss?”

“Don’t let Mr. Stamper hear you say that.” She handed Conway those of the reports which pertained to his present assignment. “Those are digests of the stories told by Selig’s employees and others about their doings. Mr. Stamper wants them all run down thoroughly.” She turned to Boyle. “You’re to go down into the neighborhood of Selig’s store and question everybody who might have been within sight of the store at the time of the murder. Look around for lunchrooms that might be open evenings, building superintendents, cab drivers, and if you find somebody who saw Morgan slug the old man, don’t go running to the police with the good news.”

“I getcha,” said Mr. Boyle. “How about expenses?”

“What expenses?”

“I dunno. Maybe like maybe buyin’ somebody a drink.”

“I’ll okay a nickel beer,” said Franny.

“Very often,” said Mr. Boyle, in hurt, dejected tones, “if you’re maybe pumpin’ a guy and you buy him a drink, very often it kinda makes him talk more.”

“Sure. It makes you talk more, too. Beat it.”

The investigators left, Mr. Conway’s lips moving silently as he studied his papers on the way out to the elevators. “This Julia Thorne,” he said to Mr. Boyle, tapping the top sheet. “I seen a picture of her in the papers. What would a dame like that be doin’ in a public library?”

“Readin’,” said Mr. Boyle.

“That’s what it says here.” Mr. Conway shrugged his shoulders. “If I had a dame like that, damn if she’d have time to do any readin’.”

“Sez you.”

“Sez me. You ever been in the public library?”

“Sure.”

“You think I’ll have any trouble?”

“Nah, they like to answer questions. That’s what they get paid for in a public library.”

They were down at the street now. Mr. Conway turned south to 42nd Street, and Mr. Boyle headed for the subway station.

At the bar in Carmichael’s, at nine o’clock that night, Sidney Wheeler was sitting with a very pretty, young girl. They were both drunk, which was not surprising, as Sidney still had a great deal of money and it was a well-known fact that he would never stop drinking while the price of still another shot remained in his pants.

“You sure can lap it up,” said the girl admiringly.

Sidney grinned, a little wolfishly. “You’re not so bad yourself.”

“I can’t take it like you can take it,” conceded the girl. “You been here all day?”

“Most of the time. I like it here,” said Sidney. “I like you, too. Have a drink.”

“Don’t mind if I do. Do you really like me?”

“Sure I do. You’re cute.”

“I can’t take it like you can take it,” repeated the girl admiringly, as Sidney poured two of Primo Camera’s fingers into a glass and drank it off.

“It’s a gift,” said Sidney.

“How about payin’ up for some of this, buddy?” asked the bartender.

“Sure.” Sidney dug down in his pants. “How much?”

“Well, I’ll charge it to you by the bottle; it’ll be cheaper that way, and the little lady’s had seven.” His lips moved as he counted. “Say twelve bucks all told.”

Sidney drew out a large roll of bills, hunted through it until he found a ten and a five, threw them on the bar, and said, “Keep the change.”

The bartender said, “Thanks, buddy,” and the girl’s eyes glistened at the sight of the outer layer of hundreds. “Have one on me,” invited the bartender, rinsing the glasses.

They had one on the bartender.

“What’s your name?” asked Sidney.

“Mildred. Mildred Lane.”

“Mine’s Sidney. Sidney Wh—Sidney White.”

“Hiya, Sidney.”

Sidney extended his hand gravely. “You my girl, Mildred?”

“Sure thing, big boy.” Mildred shook hands. “You’re cute.”

“How about let’s get out of here?” said Sidney.

“Sure. Where’ll we go?”

“What time is it?”

“Six-thirty.”

“We’ll go out where there’s lights and music and girls and—”

“Hey, you gotta girl.”

“Sure I have. What’s your name?”

“Jesus Christ! I just told you. Hey, you think you’ll be all right when that fresh air hits you?”

“Sure I will. You just wait till I go in the men’s room and then we’ll go out on a tear.” Sidney got up, walked slowly, with the infinite care of the very drunk, to the appropriately marked retiring room, and the door closed behind him.

“If I tell Red Carmichael you took a good customer out of here,” said the bartender darkly, “he’ll kick you humpbacked.”

“Go button your nose,” said Mildred pertly.

“The guy’s gotta roll.”

“All right,” said Mildred. “I’ll cut you in.”

Bannerman paid the driver of his taxi and regarded Carmichael’s, an unimposing brownstone front, its imperfections and dinginess high-lighted by a blazing neon sign hanging from the second story. He went upstairs, where the door was opened by a red-headed checkroom girl and went into the bar, ignoring the girl’s outstretched hands. He stepped into the bar just as Sidney Wheeler stepped out of the retiring room. Sidney saw him, paled and dived back among the stationary plumbing. He waited, trembling for a few moments, while the colored attendant watched him curiously, then opened the door a tiny bit and heaved a sigh of relief when he saw that Bannerman had disappeared. He came back to the bar, slipped into his seat, and said thickly, “Come on, let’s get out of here.”

“What’s the matter, honey? Were you sick? You’re awful pale.”

“Come on,” said Sidney.

“Lemme finish my drink, can’t you? Honest to God, honey, you look just like you just seen a ghost.”

“Hurry up,” said Sidney.

“Take your time,” said a steady, familiar voice in Sidney’s ear. He whirled around on the stool to confront Elias Bannerman, just as Bannerman, his right hand in his coat pocket, jammed the point of a gun in Sidney’s left side. “Don’t make a move, Sidney,” whispered Bannerman.

Sidney sat still.

“Hey, you,” said Mildred. “Beat it. This is a private party.”

“I’m a friend of his,” said Bannerman, the gun prodding Sidney even harder. “Get up and go out, Sidney. Mr. Wheeler is leaving,” said Bannerman politely to the girl.

“I thought you said your name was White?” said Mildred, who was resigned to having her boy friends snatched away, though rarely at the point of a gun. “What is this—a pinch?”

“Yeah, what is this?” chimed in the bartender.

Bannerman let the gun relax, at which Sidney heaved an audible sigh. “He doesn’t have to go if he doesn’t want to,” he said evenly.

Sidney stood up, as did Bannerman. “What does my friend owe you?” asked Bannerman.

“He’s paid,” said the bartender dourly.

Sidney turned around, walked to the door, with Bannerman following, but when they reached the street he turned and said, “Eli, please, don’t—I’ve got all the money—I’ll give it back to you, Eli—please, don’t do—”

“Shut your mouth,” said Bannerman. “I don’t care about the money.” He slapped Sidney’s hips and breast pockets as they walked along, made sure no armaments were concealed. “You damn fool, why didn’t you get out of town at least? Now you’re in a jam!” He shrugged his shoulders. “I guess I’m just as much of a fool for looking after you. Do you think I followed you all over town like a bloodhound just to get back a miserable fifteen hundred dollars? You’re in trouble, even if you don’t know it. I may be hard and unreasonable, Sidney, but may I drop dead if I ever desert a friend when he’s in trouble.”

“I know, Eli,” said Sidney, clutching at a straw.

“Here’s a quiet place, we can go in here and have a drink.”

Reassured at being where he could not easily be killed, Sidney gladly went into the dimly lit Bar & Grille, sitting down in the booth at the back which Bannerman indicated. Bannerman ordered a double Scotch for Sidney and some brandy for himself. “Do you know what Joel Glass is trying to do, Sidney? He’s trying to pin Abe Selig’s murder on you.”

“On me?” Sidney shook his head in dazed, bewildered fashion. “But I wasn’t near the place, Eli, and anyway, they got that Morgan guy.”

“You were near the place,” said Bannerman. “You went there with me. This Glass found a taxi driver who described you as hanging around on the corner near Selig’s store at just about the time of the murder. You know what that means, with your reputation in the book business.”

“But this Morgan guy,” protested Sidney.

“His girl’s got millions,” said Bannerman. “Did you ever hear of a man with millions to spend standing trial for murder? No. The minute Morgan was arrested they got busy and hired the best criminal lawyer in the city—Arnold Stamper. They’re probably paying him thousands to clear Morgan and along comes this Glass with a perfect set-up for them! It’s you, Sidney, and believe me you’re in plenty of trouble! Up to here! They’re already checking up on you on the West Coast, and you, you fool, had to brag to all the dealers in town about all the money you had on you. They figure that was Selig’s money you were blowing in. The five thousand he had in his pockets!” Bannerman sat back to let this sink in.

“Oh, my God! They’ll railroad me, Eli!”

“No, they won’t,” said Bannerman quietly. “Not if you’ve got any guts.” He looked at Sidney appraisingly, rather glad of the man’s resemblance to a cornered rat at that moment. “Waiter. Another double Scotch.”

Garda Glass put down another large platter of hamburgers, took off her apron, and tossed it in a corner. “That’s the last of it, and from now on it’s the cook’s night off. If any of you are still hungry when that’s gone, we’ll just have to barbecue a lawyer.”

“Not this lawyer,” said Peter Brand. “For one thing, my wife wouldn’t let you.”

“Try it,” urged Mrs. Brand cordially, “and see.”

“Stop bickering,” advised Joel, “and eat. Eat and drink, for that matter. This is on the insurance company.”

“Don’t count your checks,” advised Garda.

“Mr. Langner will bear me out. Mr. Langner, everybody.”

“He gets it,” said Langner dourly. “The boss okayed it.”

“Hear, hear!”

“And what do you get?” demanded Helen Scott. “Joel gets a few thousand dollars, his wife gets some new clothes, and even I got a scoop out of it, but what do you get, you nincompoop?”

“Hamburger,” said Langner, with his mouth full. “It’s good.” He chewed thoughtfully. “I view with alarm the zeal with which men and women pursue money.” He waggled his fork in midair. “You’re sick people, all of you. Sick with the lust for dough.”

“That’s fine. What are you sick with?” asked Garda.

“He’s got a bad case of acute frugality,” said Helen Scott.

“With all that money, Joel,” said Peter Brand anxiously, “don’t you want to sue somebody, make a will, or find something for legal hands to do?”

“Who, me? Associate counsel in the Morgan defense?”

Peter Brand looked skeptical, but Steve Langner looked up from his plate with genuine interest.

“Retained as an expert,” said Joel proudly.

“That finishes Morgan,” said Brand conclusively.

“Your honor, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the defense will now prove to you that this poor, innocent boy, the defendant, had nothing whatsoever to do with the crime, and that the whole thing is a plot on the part of certain international bankers to overthrow the government of the United States and make Sally Rand President. We will prove, moreover, that the late Abraham Selig lured this poor, innocent boy, the defendant, to his store and then and there, with malice aforethought, beat out his own brains with a bust of Dante so as to discredit this poor, innocent boy, the defendant, and thus keep him from winning a merit badge in his Boy Scout Troop. A monstrous crime, my friends!”

“On the level,” asked Langner, “are you working for Stamper?”

“Sure.”

“Why?”

“I put a bug in his ear and he hired me to take it out.”

“He’s going to poke around in this mess until he winds up behind bars himself,” predicted Garda.

“With a few thousand dollars,” offered Brand, “you’ve nothing to worry about. I’ll defend you personally.”

Joel shuddered. “From now on, let’s all think beautiful thoughts. The depression is over for Mr. and Mrs. Joel Glass and I don’t mind making a round of drinks for our friends on such an occasion.” He went into the pantry to make good on his promise, and Steve Langner said, “I’ll help, too.”

When the swinging door closed, Steve said, “Well, pal, what’s up?”

“I need a list,” said Joel, “and you’re the man to get it for me. A list of all the important book losses to libraries, collectors and stores over the last four or five years. Can it be had?”

“Not without a lot of trouble,” grumbled Langner. “Are you going to get them all back?”

“Enough of them to make it pay.”

“Well, I’ll give you all the dope I can get here in New York, but I’ll have to wire out of town for a lot of stuff from other companies.”

“Do it,” said Joel. He turned to the bottles and the ice ranged on the table before him just as Garda put her head in the pantry door. “Telephone for you, Mr. Head Conspirator.”

Joel went out into the hall, where there was an extension, leaving Langner and Garda to tend to the drinks.

“This is the District Attorney’s office, Mr. Glass. Can you come down here right away?” It was a familiar voice. Joel thought it was Mr. Byers.

“I’m having a party; can’t it keep?”

“It’s very important, Mr. Glass. It would be much better all around if you came down here right away.”

“All right. Tell His Honor to think up some sensible questions meanwhile.” He hung up to find Garda at his elbow. “Eavesdropping?”

“Not me. Do you have to go out, dear?”

“Just for an hour,” said Joel, putting his arm around her. “You have fun with the company and I’ll come back just as soon as I can.” He took his hat and coat from the closet in the hall, kissed his wife, and went down to the street. The doorman was off duty, but there was an empty cab a few doors up the street and, as Joel signaled, the driver started up and crawled the few feet to the door. The driver reached out to open the door, and Joel had one foot on the running board, when a shot rang out in the quiet street and the glass in the door of the cab shattered in his face. Joel fell sideways to the curb just as a second shot and a woman’s scream were simultaneously heard. He felt a searing pain in his shoulder, heard a shrill whistle, and tried to crawl under the cab without raising his body to provide a better target. Windows were flying up all around, he heard the sound of running feet, and prayed with all his heart and soul that nobody would shoot at that part of him which was reluctantly exposed now.

When they were back in Sidney Wheeler’s six-dollars-a-day hideout in the Mannering Hotel, Elias Bannerman permitted himself a slight blow-off. “You God-damned jittery fool! There he was like a target in a shooting gallery and you were right on top of him!”

Sidney poured another stiff drink with trembling fingers. The strain was beginning to tell on him and he was not far from collapse. Bannerman eyed him with pity and disgust.

“I couldn’t help it, Eli! I guess I was nervous.”

“You’ll be plenty nervous if they throw you in a cell with a murder charge for company.”

Sidney stirred himself at this. “They can’t, Eli. I’m an innocent man. I wasn’t there. I can prove it. I was with you.”

“You can’t prove anything by me,” said Bannerman coldly.

“But they got this Morgan. They saw him going in the store and they caught him with blood on his pants!”

“He could have blood on his nose. They’re spending a fortune. I heard they gave the District Attorney fifty thousand dollars and right down the line like that. No, Sidney, it’s all fixed and you’re it.”

Sidney’s head sank down on his folded arms. “Oh, my God!” he muttered thickly. Bannerman crossed the room to his side. He pulled Sidney’s head up, holding him by the collar, and looked coldly down into Sidney’s imploring eyes. “I’m not going to throw you down, Sidney. We’re all in this together, don’t think I don’t realize that. I’m going to get you out of town.”

Sidney nodded. His eyes were beginning to take on a glazed look. He had consumed nearly a quart of whisky in forty-five minutes.

“If you go near a railroad station, especially with a good case of the jitters like you’ve got now, you haven’t got a chance of getting out of town alive. Luckily, I’ve got my car not far from here and we can drive out to Long Island or over to Jersey and work it somehow from there. Is your hotel bill paid?”

Sidney nodded. “I paid for one night in advance.”

“Good! Got any baggage?”

“Not here.”

“Fine. Put your topcoat on and keep your hat down over your face. The important thing is not to be seen by anybody who might remember you and give the police a lead to trace you.” He poured another drink for Sidney, who lifted it in trembling hands, and held his elbow steady while Sidney poured the fiery liquor down his throat. It seemed to give him a little more backbone. “Eli, maybe it’s not as bad as you think it is. Maybe I ought to stay here. I can prove I’m innocent!”

“Do you want me to walk out of here and leave you flat?” demanded Bannerman sharply. “I’m a lawyer, I know these things. You haven’t got a chance.”

Sidney stood up and let Bannerman help him into his topcoat. He took the hat he handed him, jammed it down over his eyes, as per instructions, and with the lawyer supporting him at one elbow, went down the hall to the elevators. He had a fine case of the alcoholic tremors, aggravated no doubt by the strain of his attempted murder, and Bannerman watched him closely as they went downstairs. He got through the lobby in good shape, though, and on the sidewalk Bannerman hailed a cab. “Publix Garage, on 49th Street.”

Bannerman had a large, roomy sedan, powerful and fast. He headed east, making good time through streets devoid of heavy traffic and purred over the bridge to Long Island. “There’s a pint in that pocket by your right arm,” he told Sidney, who needed no second urging.

The pint was nearly gone when Bannerman swung off the Long Island Motor Parkway, down a dimly lit road which led to the Sound. “There’s a railroad station right down here a little way, and there ought to be a train any minute.”

“Where to?” asked Sidney, but he asked the question in a flat, dull, hopeless tone.

“We’ll buy you a ticket for the Penn Station, and you can get through to a train from the Long Island side without being nabbed at the gates. Once you’re on a train out of town, you can lay low in a berth and swing off at the first good stop. Maybe Princeton, or Trenton, and in the morning you buy some new clothes, fix up your face a little and head for the Coast. I’ll meet you out there.” The wheel seemed to wobble in his hands. “Damn! I think I’ve got a flat.” The car stopped in a dark, deserted stretch of road, and Bannerman opened the door and stepped out. He walked around to Sidney’s side, peered at the tires, then opened the door on that side, too, and said, “Better get out and let me get at the tools.”

Sidney stumbled out and bent over to look at the tire, too. He straightened up when he felt something hard jab him, then slumped to the ground as the gun barked twice. Bannerman bent over him, went through his pockets quickly and removed everything, including Sidney’s handkerchiefs. He worked quietly and swiftly, throwing everything back into the front seat of the car, then dragged the lifeless body into the underbrush by the side of the road. In five minutes he was back at the car, pushed some dirt over a stain near the front tire, then got behind the wheel and headed the car back toward town. He reached with his right hand for the roll of bills on the seat beside him, salvaged from Sidney’s pockets, and was pleased to see that only about a hundred dollars had been spent.

11

JOEL’S WOUND was a slight one. It was cleaned and dressed by an apathetic interne at the Uptown Hospital while Lieutenant James Flanner, who had rushed uptown when he got the news, sat on a nearby chair and asked questions.

“You can’t place the voice that called you out?”

“No. I thought at first it was that guy Byers who was with us today.”

“It wasn’t him,” said Flanner.

“I know that now.”

“Anybody you been fighting with lately who might take a shot at you?”

“Only my wife. Hey, Doc! That hurts!”

“It’s all right now,” said the interne. “You’d better take it easy for a few days and don’t move it too much.”

“What kind of a slug do you say it was, Doc?” asked Flanner.

“I don’t. Chances are it was a big one. Went through his shoulder clean as a whistle.”

“Come on,” said Joel. Flanner and the interne draped his jacket and topcoat over the bandaged shoulder and Joel shook off Flanner’s helping hand. “I can walk. Want to scare the hell out of my wife?”

Garda was sitting in the hall, pale and drawn. She jumped up when she saw Joel. “Are you all right? Oh, darling, you damn fool, you scared me to death!”

“Good as new,” said Joel. He put his good arm around her and they walked out to the street together. “Was the driver hurt?”

“Just cut a little by the glass.”

Flanner had a police car outside the hospital and drove them back to the apartment. “I’ve got to go up there and see if my boys found the bullet. If you were a little heavier,” he said critically, “you would have stopped it and saved us all a lot of trouble.”

“I’ll put on some weight right away.”

“You’re going right out of the target business,” said Mrs. Glass vehemently.

“Where did the shots come from?” asked Joel.

“Hotel next door. From the second floor. The guy just leaned out the front window and let you have it. We found an open window there and it’s just about right, judging from the way he got you. There was a dance up there tonight, and a lot of people coming and going all the time. This front room is a reception room. It wasn’t being used but the door was open.”

“Perfect,” said Joel.

“It was a good set-up,” admitted Flanner. “I bet they feel like chumps when they find out they only winged you.”

“Imagine their embarrassment.”

The car stopped a little way up the street, because there was quite a crowd around the taxi with the shattered glass. “Want me to put a man in your apartment?”

Joel shook his head.

The elevator boy regarded Joel with mingled curiosity, admiration and awe, almost as a latter-day James Cagney, and the Glasses were silent until they were alone in their home. “Where’s everybody?” asked Joel.

“All gone. Now, Mr. Glass, do you remember my telling you that this business was dynamite?”

“What the hell, honey, it’s only a little flesh wound. No worse than a bad cold.”

“I keep thinking suppose it was a little higher or a little lower and killed you.”

“It wasn’t,” said Joel.

“It might have been. Lift up, so I can get your pants off.”

Joel lifted. “This is the life. I intend to get myself shot every night. In various places.”

“Don’t say a thing like that!” said Garda sharply. She helped him into his pajamas and pushed him gently back on the pillows. “Take it easy, soldier.”

“I’m in love, I’m in love, with a beautiful nurse,” sang Joel. “Come on to bed. I was only shot in the shoulder, after all.”

“No excitement,” said Garda firmly. “Doctor’s orders.”

“Oh, Doctor!”

“Quiet!”

Joel woke up to find Garda, dressed for the street, pinning a note to the other pillow. “Are you leaving me, honey? Read it to me.”

She bent over and kissed him. “Go on back to sleep. I was just telling you that I had gone to the office and would be back this afternoon. Doc Dolan is here to watch over you.”

Joel sat up. He worked his shoulder carefully. “Feels pretty good. Have you seen the papers? What kind of a write-up did I get?”

“Exhibitionist! They buried you with the classified ads.”

“Where’s Doc?”

Dolan appeared in the doorway. “Well, bust my truss, if it isn’t Joel Glass, alive and well. I was in here while you were sleeping, and I said to myself, I said, ‘Don’t my old pal, Joel Glass, look mighty natural?’ Yes, sir, mighty natural.”

Joel grinned. “Hi, Doc.”

Garda leaned over the bed and kissed him once more, while Doc Dolan smacked his lips. “Now be a good baby,” she said, “and stay in bed all day.”

“Oh, Doctor, kill my pain,” sighed Dolan.

“Don’t worry, honey.”

“Doc Dolan, you take good care of my husband or I’ll tear your ears off.”

Doc saluted. “Just like you’re saying, Mrs. Glass.”

The ’phone rang just as Garda was going out and she picked it up in the hall. They could hear her plainly. “Everything is fine, Steve.… Joel had an eight pound, bouncing, baby boy.…”

Joel groaned, “I’ll never live it down.”

“You may not live at all,” said Dolan thoughtfully. “Who plugged you, kid?”

“Don’t know. Do you?”

Doc shook his head. “It wasn’t me, but that’s as far as I can go. Still, you’re always pokin’ around in somebody else’s business, and getting shot once in a while is one of the risks.”

“See if my wife is off the premises, Doc?”

Doc toured the apartment and reported that Mrs. Glass had gone. “What do you want—a drink?”

“No. Help me on with my clothes.”

“Hell, no. You’ll get me murdered.”

“That’s one of the risks,” said Joel. “Come on.”

Reluctantly, with the air of a man who is running a considerable risk, Doc Dolan gathered Joel’s clothes from the closet, helped him get dressed, then stood back to survey the final effect. “Not bad, considering we had quite a bulge to work with.”

“Fine. Squeeze some oranges while I make a few ’phone calls.”

Joel left the apartment fifteen minutes later, leaving Doc Dolan behind to cover up for a while should Garda ’phone, and took a taxi to Selig’s store. Olin Roberts opened the door for him.

“We’re glad to see you this morning, sir. Miss Selig ’phoned me yesterday afternoon that you were coming in.”

“I just about made it. Is Miss Thorne upstairs?”

“She is, Mr. Glass. Mr. Bannerman came in about a half hour ago and he’s been upstairs, talking to Miss Thorne about some books he saw here before—Mr. Selig—that is—”

“I’ll go right up,” said Joel. “I’ll call you when I want the safe opened. Did Miss Selig tell you I was going over the stock?”

“She did, Mr. Glass. Just call when you want me.”

The alarm clock on the night table near Elias Bannerman’s bed rang three times the next morning before the barrister stretched a powerful, muscular arm from under the covers, found the clock and switched off the bell. He lay in bed for a few minutes, staring up at the ceiling, then jumped out, cast off his pajamas and performed a few setting-up exercises on the rug. He was in excellent condition, and as he squatted, stooped, stretched his arms and legs, and touched his toes in regular rhythmic bends, the muscles of his huge body rippled and rolled. He walked naked into his bathroom, and emerged in twenty minutes showered and shaved. He dressed himself then, went down to the street and bought two morning papers from his favorite newsboy.

“Nice day,” said the lad, making change.

“Beautiful,” replied Bannerman. He walked to the corner and his regular breakfast spot, the headwaiter ushered him to his favorite table near the big window facing the street, and he ate a hearty breakfast while he scanned the morning papers. There was no news of Sidney Wheeler, he was pleased to see, nor would there be, he believed, for a few days yet. He reached his office at a few minutes before eight, to the surprise of the elevator starter and operator, and he worked methodically in his deserted suite until nearly eight-thirty. By that time he had quite a large quantity of papers and correspondence stacked up on his desk, and these he burned a few at a time in the metal wastebasket, stamping the ashes down thoroughly after each incineration. He opened the safe in his private office, removed a number of objects, mostly books, which he packed into a large leather kit bag with a combination lock, and leaving the office once more, he took a taxi to Grand Central Station. He checked the bag, bought a plain envelope at the news counter, and mailed the check to Joseph Breslin, General Delivery, New York, N. Y. With this bridge burned neatly behind him, he walked leisurely north on Madison Avenue to Abe Selig’s store, which he reached at nine-thirty. The door was locked but when he rapped sharply on the glass, Olin Roberts came to the door. He greeted Mr. Bannerman cordially and respectfully, they exchanged remarks about the tragedy, mention of which saddened Roberts, and then Bannerman said, “There were some books I wanted to purchase just before the—the—the tragedy, and I thought Miss Thorne could tell me now when they might be available.”

“On Miss Selig’s orders,” said Roberts sadly, “we’re not to do any business whatsoever. You may talk to Miss Thorne, of course, and possibly she can take it up with Miss Selig in a few days. Miss Thorne is at her desk upstairs.”

Julia Thorne was typing at her desk, following her copy very closely. She did not hear Bannerman coming up the carpeted stairs, and her surprise at his entrance was obviously genuine. “Eli! For God’s sake!”

He waved a reassuring hand and smiled. “It’s all right. I told a good story.” He removed his gloves and put them on the desk with his hat. “I’m still welcome here, I hope?”

“Sit down.”

He pulled a chair up close to the desk. “Now about this Joel Glass, Julia—what happened there?”

She shrugged her shoulders. “You shouldn’t have come here. Can’t we talk about this later on?”

“No. You threw me down, Julia.”

“I did my best. I’m no Svengali. I can’t hypnotize him, Eli.”

He smiled, but coldly. “You’ve your own special brand of hypnosis, my dear, and I’ve seen it work too well and too often to doubt your ability to do it again. I took your advice in this situation, because I believed you when you said that Glass merely wanted to unearth the books Selig stole from himself. Well, he did, and made a few thousands doing it.” He pounded his large right fist into the palm of his left hand. “Now he’s been retained by Ned Morgan’s lawyers to come in here and check the stock from hell to breakfast.”

“That’s bad,” said Julia Thorne thoughtfully.

“Plenty bad. I’m supposed to be a big customer here, but when Glass goes through the books he’ll find that I never bought so much as a Christmas card.”

“Or sold anything,” said the girl mildly. “What’s wrong with you, Eli—losing your nerve?”

“I’ll admit I’m worried.”

“You’ve got a front like the Bank of England,” she said scornfully. “You ought to be worrying about turning what’s happened to our advantage.”

“I’ll be content if I get out. A front like mine is a funny thing, darling. You build it up piece by piece through the years and all the time you’re sitting pretty. Then one little slip and the whole thing comes down around your ears. When that bastard walloped Abe Selig with the statue, he not only wrecked a flourishing business combination, but he also lit the hot water for us.”

“Funny, I’m not worried. I guess I’ve got a lot of confidence in you, Eli.”

“Misplaced this time, Julia. I only see one way out—we’ve got to grab and run.”

“Run!” she repeated incredulously.

He leaned forward. “Why not? This is all washed up now. I’ve got plenty of money, Julia. What do you say?”

“Do as you please,” she said coldly. “I’m staying. I never thought you’d let an amateur sleuth drive you out of town.”

Bannerman leaned back in his chair and regarded her closely. “He’s a handsome, stalwart fellow, if you happen to care for the type, Julia. I thought you were a smart girl.”

“Go on, run. Don’t bother me.”

“He’s hard as nails. Crazy about his wife, too. You’ll wake up and find yourself in bed with a kick in the pants, Julia.”

“Don’t worry about me, Eli. It’s nice of you, though.”

“I covered you up right down the line,” said Bannerman slowly. “In every deal we worked I schemed and figured the best way to keep you clean so you’d never be under a cloud. No matter what happened to me, I wanted to be sure that you would never have anything to worry about.”

“Stop it,” she said, “before I laugh out loud. You’re not cut out for hearts and flowers, Eli. What do you want?”

Bannerman lit a cigarette, blew a cloud of smoke up at the ceiling, and leaned forward in his chair once more. “I’m going away,” he said earnestly.

“As far as you like,” said Julia Thorne cordially. “With the new low rates of but two cents a mile, it is—”

“God damn you!” said Bannerman. “If you and that Glass are up to something I’ll—” He brought himself under control, looked around toward the stairs, then turned to Julia Thorne again. She was watching him warily, her chair pushed back from the desk.

“It’s all right,” he said. “You know what I want, Julia. Give me that letter.”

She shook her lovely head decisively, her mouth set in a firm line. “No, sir. That letter is my insurance policy. I’m safe from sudden accidents while I have that.”

“You’re being a little fool.”

“It’s a very comfortable feeling. You know perfectly well, Eli, that you’re safe from me. I want to be able to feel the same way about you.”

“Why should you want protection from me? I keep asking myself that question. Is it because you and Joel Glass are planning to make a killing in here and toss me to the dogs because you know I can’t drag you in while you’ve got that letter?

“I never meant to kill Ferris that night in Chicago,” said Bannerman. He licked his lips nervously. “I lost my temper and before I knew what— It doesn’t matter. I can’t go away without that letter. I must have—”

There was a hail from downstairs. “Miss Thorne.”

She jumped up. “Yes, Mr. Roberts.”

“A package has come for you. They want you to sign for it.”

“Coming, sir,” she said, and started for the stairs. Before she was halfway down, Bannerman was out of his chair and at her desk. He opened the bottom drawer, found Julia Thorne’s black suede purse, and opened this. He went through the contents quickly, ignoring everything but the key ring, a small silver disk to which were attached a half dozen keys. He worked quickly with this, removed one key, closed the purse and restored it to the drawers just as footsteps sounded on the steps. When Julia Thorne came in with her package, she found Bannerman in his chair, staring glumly at a print on the wall. She sat down at her desk again, putting the package behind her.

“Well, Eli, have you decided to act grown up?”

“It’s a tough spot,” he said. “It’s hard enough to go away, leaving my career, my position, everything that I’ve worked so hard to build up. To go away and leave that letter behind is agonizing to me, Julia. Well, I guess I’ll have to trust you a while longer.” He smiled at her, completely self-possessed now. “You know, darling, Arnold Stamper has his own men working on this case. Smart men, too. Suppose one of them gets a line on you—on us, rather.”

“I see what you mean, Eli, but I don’t see how they can accuse me of anything worse than being your mistress for a few years.” She smiled across the desk at him. “Those happy, tender, carefree days when you were teaching me blackmail, thievery, the badger game and how to be thoroughly rotten in ten easy lessons.”

“You were a wonderful pupil,” said Bannerman gallantly. “Anyway, you had a natural gift for that kind of work. Tell me, darling, how did it happen that a man as rich as Selig could be around you for two whole years and not find the way to your studio couch—or did he?”

Her eyes narrowed. “You’ll get yourself in trouble talking like that, Eli. The police know you were here that night. They don’t know anything else, fortunately. What really did happen, Eli? Did he make you mad? Did you lose your temper? He had a few thousand dollars on him, you know.”

“I wouldn’t hurt a fly. You know that, Julia.”

“Unless the fly had money.”

“I can see you’ve got a bad opinion of me,” said Bannerman. He sighed. “I’ve learned, through the years, that when you start needling me it means you’ve found another man to make you happy in the wee small hours.” He stood up and took his hat and gloves from the desk, then smiled and extended his hand. “Will you shake hands, Julia? For good-by.”

She put out her hand and Bannerman gripped it in his own, slowly putting pressure on until her face contorted in agony and she bit her lip to keep from screaming. He regarded her stolidly for a moment, then dropped her hand and watched her fall back weakly against the wall.

“You son-of-a-bitch!” she said hoarsely.

“You got off easy,” said Bannerman, smiling again. He turned to the stairs and started down just as Joel Glass came up. Bannerman stopped, expressed his regret at the shooting, solicitously inquired about the shoulder, and explained that he had come in to inquire about some books Mr. Selig had shown him a few days ago. Then he went down to the street while Joel went up to the landing where Julia Thorne was waiting for him.

“I heard you talking to Mr. Bannerman. I don’t know when I’ve been so glad to hear a man’s voice before. Are you all right?”

“I’m fine. Don’t make me feel like a heel by telling me you worried about it. It was only a scratch.”

“But who—how—what happened?”

“I don’t know. Maybe it’s the class struggle beginning. Somebody probably heard about the money we made. I wouldn’t go too close to Union Square for a few days.” He sat down, reached in his pocket for cigarettes, and awkwardly shook one out on the desk with his good hand. Julia Thorne struck a light for him, and he leaned across the desk to get it. “Thanks. I’ve missed you, partner. When do I hear some more music?”

“Whenever you like,” said Julia, smiling. “How was my tip?”

“Pure eighteen-carat gold, as you no doubt read in the public prints.”

“I did. Now I understand you’re in charge of the rare books here. You won’t need me any more.”

“Don’t say that. I need you more than ever. Anyway, come win or lose or draw, we’re partners. How do you summon Mr. Roberts? We ought to get to work.”

Julia reached under her desk, buzzed downstairs, and in a few minutes Mr. Roberts came up, the keys in his hand. “Will you open the vault?” asked Joel.

Roberts walked into the inner office, carefully avoiding any glances at his late employer’s desk, and spread apart the heavy oak panels which concealed the large safe. He twirled the dials through the combination, and when they clicked, he stepped aside. “Will there be anything else, sir?”

“The inventory lists. Were the more valuable books enumerated in the insurance policies?”

“Schedules were attached, yes, sir.”

“I’ll have those, too, in that event.”

“Yes, sir. I’ll send them up from the office.” Roberts went downstairs again while Joel opened the steel doors with one hand and let Miss Thorne snap on the light in what was really a small room, rather than a large safe. Books, books, books. In cases, mostly, the rich leathers gleaming in the sharp light. Large, flat protective cases shielded precious manuscripts and letters, and a few of the titles on display made Joel draw in his breath sharply.

“Impressed?”

“Immeasurably.” He bent to examine the backs of not one, but three First Folio editions of William Shakespeare’s plays, each worth upwards of thirty thousand dollars. “I’ve been hoping some day to have one of these.”

“We have another one now on exhibition,” said Miss Thorne. “Mr. Selig always said that Shakespeare was a good, reliable author; always in demand.”

“Mr. Selig was right. How thoroughly did Mr. Langner, the insurance man, check all these the other day?”

“Just ran through the titles,” said Julia. “There’s something here I want to show you.” She scanned the titles on the shelves and brought down a large box containing the first edition of “Knickerbocker’s History of New York.”

“This came in by express a few weeks ago, with no bill, or bill of sale, so far as I know, and I doubt if it appears on the insurance lists for just that reason.”

Joel pulled open the slipcase in which the work was contained, opened quickly to the tide page, then examined both the front and back covers, especially the end papers. Then he turned to the picturesque maps which formed the frontispiece for the first edition. “The end papers might have been deliberately stained, and the maps were certainly trimmed. I seem to remember that a library in Cleveland lost a copy of this about a year ago. We’ll put it aside, just for the time being, as certainly worthy of our most earnest, microscopic examination when we have more time. Anything else?”.

“Byron’s ‘Poems,’ 1807,” said Miss Thorne, reaching down the volume from an upper shelf. “Not a fabulously expensive or rare book, but it bears out what I mean. We had a copy of this, also mysteriously acquired, in the original binding. Then Mr. Selig took it out with him, I happened to notice, and a few weeks later we had this copy, rebound and rubbed up a bit. Why should the value of a book be cut in half by rebinding it?”

“I know that one,” said Joel. “The original binding goes on another copy, and this one, possibly stolen, is submerged in this phony leather creation.”

“You’re smart,” said Julia Thorne. “It took me months to think of that.”

12

IN HIS office downtown, Steve Langner was performing the executive portion of his duties, cleaning up some accumulated reports on losses and thefts. Helen Scott was perched on the other side of the desk, watching him. He went through each folder quickly, initialing it properly if he approved, laying it aside if it called for further investigation. “This is rich,” he said, chuckling.

“Tell me,” said Helen. “I need a laugh.”

“One of our brokers represents a rich dame uptown, Mrs. Roger Carstairs. She carries a hundred thousand dollars’ worth of policy on her jewelry and furs, full coverage, which means that she collects for anything and everything. Well, she had this full coverage, which costs good money, for about eight years and never had a single loss. Naturally, she hollered murder over the premium so about six months ago the agent switched her to one hundred dollars deductible insurance. That way she doesn’t collect at all on any loss under a hundred, and the company only pays that portion which is more than a hundred on any claim. The first day the new policy went into effect she lost a charm that cost one hundred and five dollars and we sent her a nice, new five dollar bill. A few weeks later her maid stole a ninety dollar clock, then she dropped a gold bag worth seventy-five dollars and yesterday she lost a gold clip worth exactly ninety-seven dollars and fifty cents. I’ll bet the broker is walking around with a firecracker in his pants. I know Mrs. Carstairs.” He pushed a button on his desk and Donovan came in from the other room. “Mrs. Carstairs,” said Langner, “has dropped something. We’re not liable, but let’s try to save a client a little money. It’s a gold clip, and I want you to beat it right up there. The butler will have the information for you. Try to act like you’re used to wearing shoes.”

“Aye, aye, sir. What shall I do if I find it?”

“Hide it somewhere. What shall he do if he finds it? Beat it to Europe, of course, and I’ll join you there to live off the proceeds. What shall he do if he finds it?”

“You’ve got a popular song there,” said Helen, “if you’ll just keep saying it I’ll get the rhythm. What I came to find out—so long, Jack—what I came to find out was, what’s doing in rare books these days? The kind looks my city editor gave me for one whole day when I brought in that story are beginning to turn to those ‘there’s-thirty-dollars-every-week-to-be-saved-right-there’ looks. Not good English, but it’s what I mean.”

“The Selig case is dead and buried.”

“Why not revive it? Like the Hall-Mills case. Did Selig have a wife?”

“No, and she didn’t sing in the choir. Why don’t you go pester Joel Glass? If he lives till you get up there.”

“That was funny, about somebody taking a shot at him. Do you think it was a case of mistaken identity?”

“Pardon me, are you the man I’m supposed to shoot? No, I think it’s one of those rare-book feuds. Maybe some bookdealer Joel tried to send to the can. He’s rummaging around in Selig’s store, though, working for the lawyers. Maybe they’re going to prove that Selig was crazy—though that’s not grounds for murder any more, what with Hitler and those babies alive and well.”

“I like you when you talk like an editorial writer. Anyway, that Mr. Glass has a nose for money. I can spot it in a man.”

“Spot some in me.”

Helen lit a cigarette. “Seriously, what does he expect to find there?”

“Search me. All the books that have been stolen since the first crusade, I guess. I’m getting some information together for him right now.”

“Sounds like fun,” said Helen mildly. “I think I’ll go give Mr. Glass that pestering. Is he at the store now?”

“He was supposed to be. He called from there a little while ago.”

“I’m on my way. I’ll call you later about dinner.”

Langner waved, and went back to his work.

Helen Scott went uptown to see Joel Glass. She gave her name to one of the clerks at Selig’s store, who asked her to wait downstairs and rather pessimistically hinted that Mr. Glass would be unable to grant her an interview.

“He’ll see me,” said Helen cheerfully, but in a few minutes the messenger was back with bad news. “Mr. Glass says he will have a statement for the press on St. Swithin’s Day. He said to tell you that won’t be for a few months yet.”

“Wise guy,” said Helen Scott. “I’ll tell his wife.”

She found Garda alone in the office, sitting by the ’phone with a worried look. “What’s the matter?” she asked. “Lose something?”

“I can’t get the apartment on the ’phone. Joel’s up there, in bed, with Doc Dolan, but for some reason they don’t answer.”

“If I was in bed with Doc Dolan,” said Helen, “I’d be only too glad to answer the ’phone. As a matter of fact, I just left your husband in Selig’s store. Not exactly left him, because he wouldn’t see me, but left him all the same.”

“The lug!” said Garda heatedly. “He promised me he wouldn’t go out today.”

“Men are like that, dearie. Why don’t you divorce him? I’d like a try at him myself.”

“If there’s anything left of him. Was he all right?”

“Nasty.”

“Then he’s all right. The trouble I have with that man! Take my advice, Helen, and get thee to a nunnery.”

“I’d rather let men drive me to drink. Which is to say, have you got a drink?”

“In the closet.” She sighed. “Better bring the bottle.”

Helen brought the bottle. “What’s so hot at the store, Garda? I thought everybody concerned was conceding Mr. Morgan to the electrician and going on to something else.”

“Don’t let it go any further than us two, Helen, but I don’t know.”

“If you come across what we call a tip, I’ll be much obliged to you.”

“Right now,” said Garda, “I want to know why somebody took a shot at Joel outside the house last night. He told me all about the taxi-drivers and how they’re always shooting at each other, but it sounds like good, old-fashioned poppycock to me. Somebody tried to kill him.” She reached for the ’phone. “At least you’re marrying a professional detective who knows enough to keep his nose out of the line of fire.”

“Is that so? You should hear about the cases where Steve has to go out without his rubbers, stand around in drafts, and take the most frightful chances.”

Garda had dialed the number, and while it was ringing, she said, “Duck, Mr. Glass, here I come. Hello. I want to talk to Mr. Glass, please. This is Mrs. Glass, his wife…. They’ll see if Mr. Glass is in,” she told Helen.

“Damned white of them. Ask them if they can do anything for me.”

“Hello, Joel. Look here, you nerve-wracking idiot, if you think—” She listened for a moment. “But, darling, you promised. Why take chances when the doctor distinctly told you— That’s a terrible thing to say about a doctor. How’s your shoulder? Good. Oh, Joel, you don’t have to work tonight, of all nights, when you shouldn’t even have been out of bed at all. It’s crazy.” She covered the ’phone with her free hand. “He has to work,” she said to Helen, and heaved a sigh. “Oh, all right, Mr. Glass. I’ll deal with you at home. Don’t drink anything, or not much, anyway. Of course I love you, but don’t think that I don’t know what a chump I am for doing it.” She hung up and turned to Helen. “Stick around and help a lonely wife get plastered.”

“That guy is up to something,” said Helen thoughtfully.

“Such as?”

“I don’t know, but I’ll bet it would make a good story.”

“News hawk!”

“News hawk, my eye. It pays thirty a week and it’s lots better than filing and typing and jumping over a couch every time the buzzer sounds.”

“It’s the Selig case, that’s certain,” mused Garda. “I don’t know just what, though. The way it’s told to me they don’t expect to prove that Morgan was innocent, but they want so much dirt about Selig that the jury will just stand up and give him a vote of thanks—Morgan, I mean.”

“Very plausible. My biggest scoop to date was your husband’s discovery of those books in Selig’s vault at home. Our night city editor bought me a drink and told me that if I didn’t have a baby or fall in a composing machine, I’d be a reporter yet. Speaking of having a baby, why don’t I call Steve on the ’phone and try to put the clip on him for dinner—the three of us.” She reached for the ’phone, dialed the number, was quickly connected with Mr. Langner, and just as quickly disillusioned. “We dine alone,” she told Garda sadly.

By five o’clock the combined efforts of Julia Thorne and Joel Glass had resulted in a fairly thoroughgoing investigation of the contents of Selig’s vault, and books to the value of nearly two hundred thousand dollars were ranged now on Selig’s desk, while Joel regarded them with distinct satisfaction. “Comes tomorrow,” he said to his assistant, “and I get my lists from Mr. Langner, we’ll know better about these. This Caxton,” he said, putting his hand on a large, folio first edition of an expensive landmark in the art of printing, “is so hot it gives off a temperature right this minute. The Arthur Lord copy, with alterations, but it seems to me I can detect where they lifted his bookplate.”

“It’s worth a lot of money, isn’t it?”

“A great deal. Let’s forget about them for the night, but not until we put them in a safe place, like the safe.” She helped him carry the books to the vault and placed them, at his direction, on an empty lower shelf. Then he snapped off the light, closed the steel doors, and whirled the dial. He tried the handle, then pushed shut the heavy wooden doors. “Where do I wash up after my labors?” he asked.

“Straight back to the dressing room.”

Joel took off his coat and vest, hung them on a chair, and went straight back to the dressing room. He turned on the faucets in the washstand, then turned to the door and opened it a fraction of an inch. He was not surprised to see Julia Thorne extract the envelope which had been delivered by Arnold Stamper’s messenger, glance quickly through the typed pages, then fold them again and restore them to their proper place. He closed the door, really washed his hands this time, and emerged in a few minutes humming “My Wife’s Gone to the Country, Hurray, Hurray.” Julia Thorne was standing near Selig’s desk, a compact in her hand, regarding herself critically in the mirror. “Mirror, mirror, in my hand, who’s the fairest in the land?”

“Not me,” said Julia Thorne. “Not with these smudges and those wrinkles.”

“Don’t fool yourself. Having explained matters to my wife, there is no reason now why we should not dine together.”

“I feel like a beast, when she’s probably worried about you, but if you’re sure it’s all right.”

“It’s perfect.”

“Let’s go somewhere where they sell provisions,” suggested Julia, “and then we can go to my place and I’ll cook them for you.”

“Swell. I’ll help. I can build a fire with two matches, also administer elementary first aid.”

“And you’ll help with the dishes?”

“On my word of honor.”

“Come along, then.”

They went to a market uptown, where Julia bought a large steak, suitable for two, the ingredients of a salad, and other component parts of a meal. They emerged loaded down with packages, including two bottles of wine, put everything in one corner of the back seat of a taxi, and filled the remaining space comfortably. “I practiced before I came to work today,” said Julia Thorne, “just in case I had another chance to play for you.”

“Good. Do you know ‘Chopsticks’? One of my favorite pieces, and a sadly neglected composition in these times.”

“It’s one of my favorites, too. Do you like ‘Farmer in the Dell’?”

“I adore it. How about ‘It Was Xmas in the Harem’ or ‘Christopher Colombo’?” He looked at her searchingly. “I believe you do know them, you’re blushing.”

“I had a normal childhood,” said Julia Thorne, “and learned most of the nasty songs you boys teach us girls.”

The cab was pulling over to the curb at her apartment house now, and Joel began to gather up the bundles.

“I’ll pay the driver,” said Julia Thorne, which she did, and then they went up to the house together. “Wait till you taste the dinner. I’m going to make the salad for you that won first prize at the Royal Academy.”

“I like the kind they have in tearooms,” said Joel. “Lettuce, chopped nuts, horseradish and whipped cream.”

She opened the door of the automatic lift, let Joel go in with the bundles, then stepped in after him and closed the door. “I’ve lost my maid, my part-time maid, so if there’s a little disorder in the apartment, just overlook it. There may be a stocking or two around the room.”

“I’ll grab one for my memory book.” The lift stopped and Joel said, “See if this is the right floor. I don’t trust these things.”

“It’s right.” She led him up to the apartment door, opened her bag and brought out the keyring. Then she looked up, puzzled. “That’s strange, I don’t seem to have my key to the door.”

“Termites,” suggested Joel.

“I’m sure I had it this morning. Maybe it fell off.” She looked through the contents of her bag, fruitlessly, while Joel said, “That’s nice. I buy the groceries for the dinner and have to cool my heels in the hall.” He leaned backwards against the door of the apartment, while Julia continued to search her bag, and had to straighten up fast to keep himself from toppling over because the door suddenly opened inward. He saw the horrified look on Julia Thorne’s face, as she stared past him into the apartment, and turned around to find a scene of incredible disorder. The drawers of the desk and table had been pulled out and their contents emptied on the floor.

The upholstery had been slashed, even the cupboards’ contents emptied on the floor, and books and records were lying in a heap. Julia stared at the wreckage, transfixed, while Joel emitted a long whistle. “Don’t look now,” he said slowly, “but you’ve had a caller.”

Julia didn’t hear him. She was ashen. “Oh, my God!”

“Better ’phone the police,” suggested Joel.

“What?” She asked this in dazed, befuddled fashion.

“I think you ought to get the police up here right away.”

She walked into the room, kicking at objects on the floor in mechanical fashion. She bit her lip nervously. “No,” she said finally. “That is, not right away. I ought to look around first and see what’s missing.” She was pulling herself together now and turned to him with a wry smile. “I told you there might be a little disorder.”

“Prophet of doom,” said Joel.

“I’m afraid our dinner is off,” said Julia. “Do you mind terribly?”

“Of course not. Isn’t there anything I can do to help?”

“No,” said Julia. “I’ll look around here, check over my few valuables, if any of them are left, and then get the police. I’m awfully sorry.”

“Don’t be silly,” said Joel. “I’m sorry there’s nothing I can do.” He put down the packages in the hall. “You can ’phone me at home if you need me.”

“I will,” promised Julia.

He left her standing in the middle of the room, staring around at the wreckage, and as the lift door closed and he was lowered to the street, he saw her run to the dressing room.

Joel went no further than the entrance to the apartment house next door, idling there for about fifteen minutes. “I’m waiting for someone,” he explained to the doorman, who seemed to want an explanation. He watched the entrance to Julia Thorne’s apartment dwelling closely, and his vigil was rewarded in another few minutes when she appeared, dressed as he had seen her dressed in the apartment, a cigarette in her right hand. She looked around nervously for a taxi, while Joel withdrew behind a pillar, and spying a row of them before a hotel in the next block, ran toward it, her high heels clicking on the pavement. Joel came out of his hiding place as her cab pulled away from the curb, grateful for the red light which temporarily halted traffic on the Drive. He reached a taxi just as the lights changed, and jumped in.

“Ouch!” He had forgotten his shoulder. “Follow that green and white cab in front. Don’t lose it.”

“Leave it to me,” said the driver. He was a good man at that sort of thing, and it seemed to Joel that the occupant of the car ahead could hardly be aware of his presence on the trail. They turned east at 72nd Street, across town to Park Avenue, then south on Park to the Sixties. When the light halted their movements, the cab he was following was a block away, but his driver pulled over to the curb side to keep it in view. Instead of going ahead on the Avenue, Julia Thorne’s taxi edged left when the light broke, and made the turn into the side street. Joel’s driver roared up to the corner in second, and as they also turned left, Joel saw Julia Thorne on the pavement before a remodeled private house with an austere gray-stone front, giving the driver his fare.

“Go on past,” cried Joel. “Turn the corner.”

He paid his own driver off on Third Avenue, adding a dollar for nice driving, then walked around the corner. Julia and taxi were gone, but he took no chances, crossed the street, and sauntered up to the opposite side from the house where he had last seen her. The entrance was deserted, and Joel crossed the street swiftly, walked down the three steps to the sunken entrance, and in the little entrance hall, he peered at the row of bells and mailboxes. He itched to push the one marked “Elias P. Bannerman” but good judgment restrained him.

There was a taproom on the Third Avenue corner of the block which Joel made his headquarters for the next little while, thankful that it afforded a clear view of the Bannerman residence. He ordered a drink, and while it was being served he went into the telephone booth at the rear, then came back to his seat, looked out for signs of life, and sat back to wait. If everybody left before Flanner came, he was just out of luck, and if Flanner came first, he might still be far from lucky. He regretted being so short with the Lieutenant in their few meetings, and hoped that Flanner wouldn’t hold it against him. He looked out the window when he finished his drink, just in time to see Julia Thorne emerge and walk swiftly to Park Avenue. Joel didn’t budge. He ordered another drink, watching the entrance closely now, and was mightily relieved when he saw a black touring car pull up on Third Avenue, and Flanner emerged. There was a driver at the wheel of the car, and in the back seat another man, but Flanner came into the taproom alone.

“Well, pal, what’s on your mind?”

“I’ve an idea that Elias Bannerman is going to leave town.”

“Who?”

“The lawyer—the last man who saw Selig before the murder.”

“Oh, him. Why shouldn’t he leave town?”

“Because I think he knows plenty about this case. Isn’t he a material witness, or something? If he tries to scram, couldn’t you stop him?”

“Sure I could,” said Flanner, “but I won’t. I’d be massaging my corns on the pavements of Staten Island, and lucky to be on the force altogether. Jesus, Glass, you can’t just walk around and arrest respectable lawyers on hunches. You’ve got to have proof of something.”

“Suppose I were to swear out a warrant for him?”

“On what charge?”

“Shooting at me last night.”

“Did he?”

“I don’t know that I could prove it,” said Joel, “but it would be my neck that would be sticking out. You’d run no risk if you just served a warrant and took him downtown, would you?”

Flanner considered this. “No, it’s no good. Have you really got something on him? If you have, say it. If you haven’t, forget it. I ain’t asking for any trouble.”

“Don’t be a chump,” said Joel. “If this thing worked out the way I think it will you’d wind up a captain, at least, maybe a general. Think how proud of you Mrs. Flanner would be!”

“I’m single.”

“Listen, if I had Bannerman arrested and he proved himself out of the charge, he could take my store, my bank account, my pants and my extra shirt.”

“That’s right,” said Flanner. “He could sue you from hell to breakfast.”

“If I’m running all those risks, don’t you suppose I know something? If I get the warrant, all you have to do is your sworn duty—serve it on him. I can see the whole thing now—the Commissioner pinning a badge on you, the Mayor kissing you on both cheeks, maybe a purse made up by grateful citizens. And I take all the chances.”

“Yeah,” said Flanner. “It’s too good to be true. You’re no baby in the woods, Glass. What’s in it for you?”

“Books. More books. Hot books.”

Flanner’s head was creased with doubt and worry. Finally he said, “What do you want me to do?”

“Well, we couldn’t do it without a warrant, could we?”

“Positively not.”

“Okay. Leave your man here to keep an eye on Bannerman, in case he scrams while we’re downtown. You and I will proceed to the nearest warrant foundry and pick out a nice, juicy one to slap on our suspect.”

“Come on,” said Flanner.

They went out to the car together, Flanner motioned to his aide to step out, Joel indicated the house and gave him a description, and Flanner gave the man his instructions. “Stay with him, no matter where he goes. If I come back here and find you gone, I’ll go back to the office and wait for you to get in touch with me.”

13

WHEN THE doorbell rang an hour after he returned to his apartment, Elias Bannerman answered it promptly, clicking the button to open the street door with his left hand, while with his right he slid back the safety catch of the gun in the pocket of his dressing gown. He heard quick, light footsteps as his caller scorned the lift and ran up the stairs, and was not surprised to find that it was Julia Thorne. He stepped aside to let her enter the apartment, bowed low as she swept past him, and then closed the door.

She wasted no words. “I want that letter and my money,” she said in a tense, hoarse, excited voice. As Bannerman ignored this and reached for a cigarette box, she struck it out of his hand. “God damn you, Eli, do you hear me?”

“I hear you,” said Bannerman quietly, “but I don’t understand you.”

She moved around to face him. “You stole my keys and rifled my apartment. You stole that letter and my money.”

“What money? Love is sapping your brain, Julia. I came directly here from my visit to you, and as you can see, I’ve been packing and completing my arrangements to leave town.”

“You’re not leaving,” said Julia Thorne. “No, sir. I had fifteen thousand dollars in my apartment and you stole it.”

“If you’re short of money,” said Bannerman, “I can let you have a hundred or two.”

“You dirty crook,” said Julia Thorne, her poise disappearing entirely. “I’ll kill you… I swear it… give me my money.”

Bannerman shook his head sadly. “If you’ve really lost all that money, Julia, I must say I’m sorry for you.”

“Yes, you’re sorry!” As Bannerman dropped into a chair she moved toward him suddenly, and he smiled and shook his head. “Don’t do it, Julia, my dear. A couple of times in the past you lost your temper with me and each time I found it regrettably necessary to use my superior strength to teach you a lesson. Remember, darling?”

She seemed to remember all too well, for she came no closer. “Then you won’t give it back?” she demanded thickly.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said with finality.

“All right. Don’t think you’re done with me.”

Bannerman stood up. “I think you’d better take your cock-and-bull story and get out of here, Julia. Come back when you’re calmer.” He took her by the elbow. “You’re nervous. I can feel that you’re trembling.” She said nothing as he led her to the door, opened this and stood aside. She hesitated then.

“Better go,” said Bannerman. “Come back later on—when I’ve left town.”

“Eli, please, I’m sorry about the letter, but that money—it doesn’t belong to me—I have to have it.”

“Sorry, dear.” He pushed her gently out and slammed the door.

He worked quickly when he was alone in the apartment, gathering up first a large quantity of correspondence which he methodically burned in the large fireplace, piece by piece, overlooking nothing. He stamped the ashes into a powder, scattered it all over the bricked surface, and then packed two large suitcases with clothing suitable for every climate, though he cast longing looks at the row of suits and coats which remained in his closet when the suitcases were full. He locked these, putting the keys carefully in his vest pocket, then changed into one of the remaining suits and fresh linen. Now that he had the letter he felt better about leaving New York, originally such a gloomy prospect, and he could not help a fleeting smile at Julia Thorne’s naïveté in leaving so valuable a paper and such a large sum in cash hidden in her own four walls. He wondered if she, too, had been planning a quick getaway. He was quite cheerful as he reached for the ’phone and called Newark Airport, booking passage on the sleeper plane in the name of Breslin. With Selig and Sidney Wheeler both dead and only Joel Glass alive to mar the sweetness of the moment, he put the grips near the door and patted the money belt around his waist fondly. He was in his topcoat, his hat in hand, and reaching for the light switch when there was a knock on the door.

“Who’s there?”

“It’s Joel Glass, Mr. Bannerman.”

Bannerman hesitated, puzzled, then turned the key in the lock and opened the door. Joel Glass entered, followed by Lieutenant Flanner and another detective. Bannerman stepped back from the door to give them plenty of room and spread his hands in amazement. “Gentlemen!”

“Sorry, Mr. Bannerman,” said Flanner, “but I’ve a warrant here for your arrest.”

“A what?”

“Sworn to by Mr. Glass here,” said Flanner briefly. “I’ll have to ask you to come with me.”

Bannerman looked at Joel, who smiled engagingly. “It’s true.”

“On what charge?” demanded Bannerman.

“Show Mr. Bannerman the certificate,” said Joel.

Flanner handed him the folded paper.

Bannerman looked through it, his practiced eye detecting no flaws. “But, Mr. Glass, this is absurd. The most hellish nonsense.”

“Confidentially,” said Joel, “everybody seems to agree with you—everybody but me, that is, and it’s my warrant so I’ll have to ask Lieutenant Flanner to do his duty. You really shouldn’t have shot at me just because you didn’t like the Stevenson items I showed you,” he chided.

“This man is mad,” said Bannerman. “I can account for all my movements last night. Surely you’re not going to arrest a man on a trumped-up charge like—”

“It’ll be just too bad for Mr. Glass,” said Flanner ominously, “if you can. He has made a charge, however, and I’ll have to take you downtown until we can establish your answer. You’ll have a hearing in the morning, and you can go over the whole thing then.”

Bannerman sighed. “Of course, Lieutenant, I can see that this is no fault of yours. It’s a rotten state of affairs if we are to be at the mercy of every madman who wants to walk into court and swear out a ridiculous warrant.”

“Run for Congress,” said Joel, “I’ll vote for you myself. I think you’re one of the smartest guys I’ve seen in a long time.”

“This your coat?” asked Flanner.

Bannerman nodded and Flanner held it for him while he got into it. He picked up his hat from the table, and shook his head when he noticed the grip near the door. “Let’s hurry,” he said. “I was making a short business trip, and this will seriously inconvenience me.”

“Sorry,” said Flanner. “Come on, let’s go!”

On the sidewalk, while his assistant made Mr. Bannerman comfortable in the back seat, Flanner held a whispered conference with Joel Glass. “Well, pal, you’re in the bucket with both feet. I’ll take him downtown, book him on the charge, and see that he’s held overnight. He can’t get a hearing on the charge any more tonight, but you better be at Headquarters in the morning with something substantial in the way of evidence.”

“I’ll be there,” said Joel, with a great show of conviction. He watched the car move off toward Third Avenue and turn right in the general direction of Police Headquarters, then he walked to the taproom on the corner where Stephen Langner was sitting at a table with a drink of Scotch and a short beer.

“Well, he’s on his way downtown,” said Joel, ordering a drink for himself.

“Better get Flanner to make you a reservation,” said Langner. “False arrest is a tough rap in this town. Especially when it involves a man like Bannerman.”

“Maybe they’ll get us both for breaking and entering. That would be nice. Insurance sleuth turns burglar. Make a nice story for your girl.”

Langner shuddered. “How I ever let you talk me into doing anything as deranged as this, I frankly don’t know. Have you been reading Dale Carnegie lately?”

“With a friend like you,” said Joel grandly, “I don’t need any more friends. What do the Scriptures say? Greater love than this—”

“It also says to stay the hell out of trouble,” said Langner dourly. “I’m not licensed to go around busting into people’s homes on no more evidence than the figments of a bookdealer’s diseased mind, you know. I could ride right the hell out of my job.”

“Think of me. A married man, with a home and a business, risking everything just to get you a promotion and a raise. We stand on the Rubicon, my friend.”

“Come on,” said Langner.

They left the taproom and crossed the street.

“How do we get into the house?” asked Langner. “Break the glass in the front door?”

Joel smiled. “On my way out I pressed the gadget that switches the lock so it can be opened from the outside. I’m no dummy, Mr. Langner.”

“You’ll wish you were.”

As predicted, the door opened from the outside, and they went up the stairs, scorning the automatic lift, to the second floor. “This is it—2-C,” said Joel. “Go to work.”

Langner took a bunch of keys, rods and wires from his topcoat pocket and began trying them, one after another, in the lock on Bannerman’s door. He worked quietly, and with a furrowed forehead, until he found one that went in smoothly and turned the lock with ease. With the door open, he put the keys back in his coat and pulled on his gloves. “Keep your mittens on,” he cautioned Joel. “We’ll have trouble enough without leaving fingerprints all over the place.”

Joel switched on the lights, and looked around the living room. “All in very good taste.” He walked over to the fireplace and stared disconsolately at the ashes there. “I’m afraid Flanner waited too long. Mr. Bannerman’s been burning things.”

“Maybe he just wanted to toast a marshmallow.”

“Maybe, but I doubt if a guy who was packing for a trip out of town would go to the trouble of making a fire. Especially with all this nice steam heat.” He looked through the ashes for some trace of unburned paper, but could find nothing. “The evidence has been dispersed, my friend, but as long as we’re in, let’s have a good look around. I’ll take the bedroom.”

It took only thirty minutes to convince both Langner and Joel Glass that short of tearing out the walls of Elias Bannerman’s apartment, they had gone over everything without learning anything.

“It looks like a bust,” said Langner. “We ought to get out of here before we get caught with our pants down. You know, Bannerman might get some Judge on the ’phone and have him issue a writ. He might be popping back in here any minute and he could put a slug in each of us.”

“He’d like that,” said Joel. “Jesus, Steve, I’m in a jam!”

“Up to here,” said Langner. “Whatever you do, don’t get me mixed up in it.”

“Don’t worry. I’d better start thinking up a good story to tell in the morning.”

They went downstairs again, without being seen, and out the front door. “I’m going home,” said Joel. “Wait until my wife finds out what I’ve been up to today.”

Joel got home at eleven o’clock and found his wife in pajamas, waiting up with a book. She discarded her original notion of heaving the book at his head the minute he stuck it in the door, and when she heard the key in the lock, ran forward eagerly. “Oh, you dear, damn fool.”

Joel embraced her, using both hands. “The shoulder is fine, honey; you shouldn’t have worried.” He put all his strength into a giant hug. “You see, good as new.”

“I love it,” said Garda. She led him to the couch by one hand. “Now, mister, suppose you tell me something about your movements all this day. You didn’t stay in bed, you know.”

“Didn’t I? Look again. Make sure. Get me a drink, darling, and we’ll sit right here and talk the whole thing out.”

Garda brought a tray with a bottle, seltzer and some ice. She put this down on the coffee table, poured for Joel, splashed in some seltzer and stirred the drink vigorously. “Helen and I had a private bender. I’ll have some coffee later.”

Joel took the drink.

“And the story, Mr. Glass?”

“I love you, Mrs. Glass.”

“Rat!”

“My heart of hearts is what you are, Mrs. Glass.”

“Dog!”

“While I was out there today, in the battle of life, I was saying to myself that a man like me doesn’t deserve to have a wonderful little wife to come home to. In pajamas, too, as if she knew what I was thinking.”

“Not on your life,” said Garda. “You’re in the doghouse, my boy, and only a very good story will open the door for you. Now begin at the beginning.”

“I guess I never really lived until you came into my life,” said Joel dreamily. “I existed, I guess, in an offhand way, but not like—”

“Joel!”

“Too much depends on my story for me to tell you the dull, unvarnished truth,” said Joel. “I need time to think up something that will get me out of the doghouse.”

“I’m going to bed,” said Garda stiffly, “and if you hear a click, that will be the door closing on the inside. And I won’t care if you howl like a wolf or break the china. It stays closed.”

“I know when I’m licked,” said Joel. “I went down to Selig’s store, and spent the whole day there checking the books. Yes, yes, with Mr. Selig’s secretary, the cute one, but all I checked was books.”

“Go on, dummy.”

“Then I took Miss Thorne back to her apartment, but I didn’t go in.”

“Pretty dull so far,” said Garda critically.

“It gets better. As a matter of fact, I need another drink to brace me for this next part.”

Garda made the drink. “Go on.”

“Well, then I went downtown, swore out a warrant, turned it over to Lieutenant Flanner and the two of us went uptown and arrested Elias Bannerman.”

“What!”

“What did I tell you? I knew that part would get you. Yes, darling, we arrested Elias Bannerman, and he is at this moment cooling his heels in the cooler.”

“Oh, my God!” This was a groan. “A customer, too. What else?”

“What else? she asks me! Isn’t that enough? Oh, yes, then I went uptown, set fire to the Metropolitan Museum and threw a bomb into J. P. Morgan’s living room.”

“You mean that you had him arrested and you can’t make it stick? Is that what you’re driving at?”

“Exactly.”

“That’s bad,” said Garda. “Why did you do it?”

“One of my hunches.” Joel got up, still holding his drink, and paced the floor for a few minutes while Garda sat on the couch, her knees up under her chin, watching him. “I’m in a jam, honey,” said Joel finally, out of this nervous reverie. “I’ve got to do a lot of talking in the morning because my hunch was pure lemon juice, nothing more. I still think I’m right, but I don’t know how the hell to prove it. And the District Attorney’s office just loves me to pieces, even without going around locking up respectable attorneys on hunches. It’s a good thing I got to know Arnold Stamper.”

The ’phone rang, and Joel picked it up. “Hello. Yes, Flanner.” Joel’s face was wreathed in smiles as he listened, and he blew kisses to Garda with his right hand. “Sure, I’ll see you first thing in the morning.” He put down the ’phone. “What do you know about that? When they took Mr. Bannerman to the jail, they took the reasonable precaution of searching him. In a money belt around his middle they found nearly a hundred thousand dollars in big bills and five thousand of it, all in hundreds, was the money Abe Selig drew out of the bank. New bills, and the police had the numbers.” He drained his drink. “Let Bannerman think up a good story now!”

The Honorable J. Foster MacMillan was annoyed. “Who the hell is this Joel Glass? Don’t we have any detectives of our own? There’s going to be a shake-up in this office, I can promise you that. A payroll like the war debt for detectives and investigators and the only breaks we get in this case we get through Glass.”

“He’s willing to stay out of it,” said Flanner mildly. “He suggested on the ’phone that maybe we could just bury his warrant and hold Bannerman as a material witness until we get something out of him. We could do that, couldn’t we?”

The District Attorney turned to Mr. Byers. “What do you think?”

“Well, Chief, in my opinion this—”

The D.A. snorted. “Cut out the crap, if you please, Byers, you’re not on the witness stand. I want to know how the hell to hold Bannerman and keep our record clean.”

“We can do what Lieutenant Flanner mentioned,” said Byers, a little abashed. “He was leaving town, obviously for a long stay, and he had been told not to. After all, he was the last one to see Selig alive. And he had previously denied knowing anything about the money.”

“How about his alibi?” He turned to Flanner. “Are you double-checking everything?”

“Yes, sir. Got seven men working on it, and I’ll bet Arnold Stamper is doing the same thing.”

“To hell with Arnold Stamper. If he finds out anything we won’t know it till we’re in court. I swear that if Stamper makes a monkey out of this office in this case, like he did in the Nora Drake case, I’ll blow the whole God-damn office apart. That’s final. What I want to know is, did Ned Morgan kill Selig, and can we hang it on him tight?”

“Positively,” said Flanner. “This business about Bannerman is screwy, and he knows a lot more than he’s telling, but if he killed old man Selig he killed him by remote control. I’ve run down too many alibis in my time not to know one that’s foolproof. I don’t see how he could have done it.”

“Joel Glass will show you,” said the District Attorney bitterly. “Where is he, by the way? Wasn’t he to pay our humble quarters a visit today?”

“He should be here any minute,” said Flanner. As an afterthought, he added, “Don’t let Mr. Byers get him sore.”

“What the hell is he, some kind of a prima donna?”

“No, sir, it’s only that he’s a hothead and Mr. Byers makes him sore.”

“Fine,” said Mr. MacMillan sullenly. “I’ll line up all my staff and he can fire anybody he doesn’t like.” He spread the protecting wings of his office around Mr. Byers. “Byers, you stay right here where you God damn are, and if Mr. Glass doesn’t like it, why, we’ll put him in alongside Mr. Bannerman.” He ran his fingers through his thick gray hair, and glared at Flanner. “What time did you tell him to be here?”

“Nine-thirty,” said Flanner.

“It’s nine-thirty now. If he thinks he can disregard this office completely, we’ll just get a warrant out for the young man.”

The D.A.’s secretary entered and announced that Mr. Stamper was waiting, and at the request of Mr. MacMillan ushered the gentleman in. Stamper was his debonair, well-dressed self, greeted the District Attorney warmly, shook hands with Lieutenant Flanner, whom he called “Jim,” and nodded to Mr. Byers. “I expected to meet my friend, Mr. Glass, here this morning.”

“So did I,” said Mr. MacMillan.

“He’ll be along,” said Stamper brightly, divesting himself of his topcoat and gloves. “Well, Mac, what’s the good word? The Morgan case is rather scrambled up this morning, isn’t it?”

“Why?” asked MacMillan hotly. “If you think this changes the District Attorney’s office’s attitude one iota, you’re very much mistaken.”

Stamper smiled. “Sure I am.”

“And another thing,” said MacMillan. “Your friend, your Mr. Glass, swore out a warrant for Bannerman’s arrest. I don’t think he’s got enough on Bannerman to keep him in a paper bag, let alone a jail.”

“Just some evidence that Bannerman sought to take his life,” said Stamper easily. “A witness who bumped into Bannerman, running like hell away from the scene of the shooting.”

Flanner looked up with genuine interest.

“What witness?” asked MacMillan.

Stamper hesitated. “A man of unimpeachable integrity, a well-known merchant whose word is beyond doubt.”

“Who?”

“A bookdealer,” said Stamper, smiling. “A man they call Doc Dolan.”

Flanner snorted, and Stamper turned to him. “Did you say something, Lieutenant?”

“No, but I could. They’ve been pals for years. Dolan and Glass, I mean. In the business they call Dolan Joel Glass’s stooge. He’d swear that Bannerman shot Abraham Lincoln if Joel Glass asked him to.”

“Very touching,” said the D.A. sarcastically. “Greater love hath no man, and all that stuff.”

“I’ll take my chances at a hearing,” said Stamper mildly. “It’s good enough for me, anyway. Let’s wait till Mr. Glass arrives and we can go over the whole thing thoroughly.”

They waited until ten-thirty, with the District Attorney’s annoyance increasing with each tick of the clock, and Mr. Stamper’s embarrassment mounting in proportion. At that time, Mr. Stamper ’phoned Joel’s home, and receiving no answer to his ringing, tried the office. Garda Glass answered the ’phone there, and assured him that Joel had left the apartment at nine o’clock, bound directly for the District Attorney’s office. She was worried when Stamper told her that he had not arrived, as was the lawyer himself, but the Honorable J. Foster MacMillan took it as a personal affront to his dignity and that of his office.

After telling Doc Dolan what was expected of him, Joel dressed for the inquiry. “I guess black is suitable on these occasions,” he said to Garda, who was helping him.

“What the well-dressed witness will wear,” said Garda, looking at him searchingly. “You look just like you did the day we were married. Who should know you were going to turn out to be a detective?”

Joel grinned. “Don’t tell my mother. This is all open and shut from now on. I’ll be back in the book business before you can say Jack Rosenbach.”

“You can save the gags for the District Attorney,” said Garda pointedly.

He kissed her. “That’s for being so patient with me.” He did it again. “And one to grow on.”

They walked to the door together, Joel’s arm around her waist. “Now don’t get too tough with the officers, honey, and if any of them ask you any difficult or embarrassing questions, you just tell them you can’t answer till you talk to your wife.”

“You’re a valiant little woman.” He went downstairs, where a cab was drawn up about four doors down the block, and walked to it as the driver jumped out and opened the door for him. “Centre Street,” said Joel, as he stopped to get in. The driver, a short, swarthy Italian, looked up and down the street, then raised his hand, in which he held a blunt jackhandle, and dealt Joel a terrific blow across the back of the head, sideways so that he toppled head first into the cab with a crash. The driver slammed the door shut, jumped into the front seat, and shot out from the curb. It was neatly done, and nobody in the street noticed anything.

The mighty wallop from the jackhandle kept Joel quiet for an hour, and by that time he was lying in a corner, on a bare floor, his hands securely lashed behind his back. As he recovered consciousness, only dimly aware of his predicament, someone leaned over him and a voice said, “Here, pal, drink this.”

His head was lifted and Joel drained the contents of the glass eagerly. Then the Samaritan dropped his head heavily to the floor again, turned to his companion, and said, “He’s good for another six hours now.”

“O.K.” Danny Scola, still wearing the uniform cap he had used in the taxi, poured a drink from the bottle of whisky on the table. “In six hours maybe we’ll give him something to sleep good.”

His companion, Paul Terelli, came over to the table and poured a drink. “I don’t like it, Danny. It’d been a damn sight quicker out in the street.”

“He ain’t goin’ no place,” said Danny.

“I know, but I’m afraid of a snatch. What the hell, you gotta hold on to the guy and you gotta collect the dough. Look at all them guys that got rubbed out tryin’ it.”

“Mugs,” said Danny Scola contemptuously.

“I dunno.” Terelli finished his drink. “They got some pretty good mugs.”

“There’s dough in it,” said Scola, as if that settled it.

“But somebody’s gotta collect it. You walk into a noseful of slugs that way.”

“Nobody’s askin’ you,” said Scola. “I ain’t sayin’ what we’ll do. All you gotta do is see that guy stays right here till we want to move him.”

“We oughta move him for good,” said Terelli, eying the unconscious heap in the corner. “What the hell? We got paid for our work. You shoulda given it to him right in the street.”

“Nah, this is better. That guy may be worth a piece of money to us, even if we don’t give him back. I’ll bet his wife wants him real bad. I saw her when I was watchin’ the place and, believe me, she looks like maybe in a couple of days she’d want him real bad. Some dame! A guy with a dame like that is got dough somewhere. That’s what gave me the idea.”

“I don’t like it,” said Terelli. He was younger than Scola, in his late twenties, a flashy dresser, even though he was sitting in his vest, and he had a lean, crafty face with shrewd narrow eyes. “I gotta sit here, like a target for the Federal men, and you’re on the outside makin’ deals.”

“Shut your face,” said Scola harshly. “What the hell do you mean? I got six hundred, didn’t I? Didn’t I give you three? What the hell do you want?”

“Nothin’,” said Terelli. “You said we’d do a job and now you change it. How do I know what we’re up against? Smarter guys than us been pumped full of slugs by them Federals. Look what happened to your brother Nick.”

“Shut up, God damn you,” said Scola passionately.

Terelli poured a drink and finished it in silence. “Okay,” he said glumly. “Work it to suit yourself.”

“Attaboy,” said Scola, his crooked features contorted in an ugly smile. “You’re wearin’ eighty-dollar suits since you met me. You’re eatin’ like a man and you got the best-lookin’ broads in New York. I like you, Terelli, and you’re goin’ places with me. Why the hell should we do hundred-dollar jobs when we got a guy right in our mitt is worth maybe ten, fifteen grand on a plate?” He stood up and put on his double-breasted blue overcoat. “I’ll take the car with me and I’ll be back maybe around the time that guy’s comin’ to. Watch him, Terelli. I’m countin’ on that guy. You, too.”

“Don’t worry. Hey, Danny, how about the guy hired you? Does he know you’re holdin’ onto the monkey?”

Scola shook his head. “I’m goin’ to tell him now. I’ll bet he don’t like it none. I’ll bet maybe he pays a little extra for a fast job. You know the idea I’ve had all the time? I think maybe there’s another guy in it yet. Somebody I don’t know.” He crossed to the corner where Joel Glass lay, breathing heavily in his stupor, and stirred the unconscious figure with his toe. “Sleep it off, sweetheart.” He turned to Terelli, watching him, and for the second time, an ugly smile wreathed his face. “He’s our million-dollar baby, Paul. Give him his bottle on time.”

“Okay,” said Terelli. “For Christ’s sake, don’t leave me here all night. Ain’t even nothin’ to eat in the joint.”

14

AT TWO o’clock that afternoon, as Joel Glass slid into the fourth hour of his stupor, the scene in his office could scarcely be described as lively or happy. Garda was sitting at his desk, her head on her arms, the ashtray before her piled high with partially smoked cigarettes. The telephone book was open before her, though she was through with it now, having called every conceivable number—twice. Steve Langner was sitting by the window, staring disconsolately out over the skyline, and Helen Scott was sitting near the desk, nervously leafing through some catalogues. The one person who showed signs of life was Doc Dolan, and it was limited in him to brisk pacing across the floor, with unhappy looks at Garda every time he turned around.

“No use kidding ourselves,” said Langner. “It looks bad right now.”

Helen Scott put a warning finger to her lips but Steve shook his head. “No use kidding ourselves,” he repeated.

“We’ve got to do something,” said Garda, looking up at him.

“Stamper says to sit tight.”

Garda bit her lip. “That’s easy for him.”

“He’s right. Flanner and the District Attorney have got a dozen men checking every possible place on the way downtown. They’re in touch with every hospital and police station. If anything breaks, he’ll ’phone here right away.”

“Call him now,” said Garda.

Langner came over to the desk and picked up the ’phone. They all heard his conversation with Lieutenant Flanner and it was not necessary for him to report that there was nothing new. He replaced the ’phone, lit a cigarette, and sat down.

“We’ve got to do something,” said Garda again. “I can’t just sit here and wait and wait and wait.”

Langner shrugged his shoulders. “Jesus, kid, I know how you feel. Go on out, if you want to. I’ll be here.”

The ’phone rang and Garda snatched it up eagerly. Then her face fell. “No, we haven’t heard a thing, Leah. I know. I’ll call you right away. Thanks, Leah.” Garda lit a cigarette. “Those are the kind of calls I get.” She turned to Doc, still walking up and down. It was the first time she had ever seen the giant Irishman distressed visibly and with all her worries and grief she managed to be sorry for him. “Sit down, Doc; you’ll walk yourself to death.”

“I’m thinkin’,” said Dolan. “The trouble is I can’t think of a damn thing.”

“Like the rest of us,” said Helen Scott.

“There’s Jake Durbin,” said Doc. “The only thing is Jake is a yellow-bellied rat. He wouldn’t have the guts to do anything to Joel.”

Langner looked at him with interest. “Say, they had trouble the other day.”

“What trouble?” asked Garda.

“Something about a book. Jake Durbin was in here raving mad about something and Joel threw him out.”

“He’s done that to half the people in the book business,” said Garda.

“Yeah, that’s the trouble,” chimed in Dolan. “Still, it wouldn’t hurt to tell Flanner about it.”

Langner reached for the ’phone but Garda stopped him. “I’ll tell him myself,” she said. “I’m going down to Headquarters. If they find anything, I’ll know about it sooner down there. Anyway, I’ll be where they’re looking, and I’ll feel better.”

“Go ahead,” said Langner.

“Want me to go with you?” asked Helen Scott.

Garda shook her head, as she got her hat and coat and gloves from the closet. “I’ll grab a cab and go down alone. I’ll ’phone here in a half hour and you can wait in case some word comes through.” She went downstairs, bought a paper at the corner, and read in the one-o’clock extras that Bannerman had been released in twenty-five thousand dollars bail for appearance in court. The papers had not yet had time to get excited about Joel Glass’s disappearance, though they mentioned that a charge brought against the lawyer by Joel had collapsed when he failed to appear. The bail had been fixed for his appearance as a material witness in the Morgan case, over the violent protests of Arnold Stamper and the District Attorney. Garda walked east, which is not the way to Police Headquarters, and turned south on Park Avenue to 49th Street. What good it might do, she didn’t really know, but Doc Dolan’s and Steve Langner’s remarks about Jake Durbin had crystallized her own vague thoughts in that direction. In the half-world of thieves, confidence men, erotica peddlers and fences that existed on the fringe of the book business, Joel had numerous enemies, but none more vehement, at least verbally, than Jacob Durbin. She was turning east again to Durbin’s store, when she saw the proprietor’s fat, bulky figure coming up toward her. She crossed the street and waited just around the corner till she saw Durbin turn into Park Avenue and head north. She let him have a lead of more than a block and followed.

“The minute I heard you were in a jam, and why,” said Durbin, “I got busy right away. Get me?”

Bannerman looked around the little restaurant suspiciously. “Christ, what a risk!”

“Sure, but I had to talk to you.”

“There was somebody tailing me,” said Bannerman, “but I threw him off. How about you?”

“Don’t worry. I could lose a copy in a telephone booth.”

Bannerman leaned across the table. “How about Glass?”

“He didn’t bother you, did he?”

“I want to know.”

“Well, remember the guy I told you about?”

Bannerman frowned. “Well?”

“Just like that. He never got ten feet away from his house. It’s all done.”

“Dead?”

Durbin nodded. “What I wanted to see you about was the dough.”

“How do I know you’re telling me the truth?”

“You just know it,” said Durbin, with an evil smile. “You just have to know it.”

“How much?”

“A grand and a half. I throw my end in free. It was a pleasure.”

Bannerman hesitated. “I’m not saying that it wasn’t the thing to do, Jake, but how do I know?”

“Stop the monkey business,” said Durbin sharply. “You were in a jam. Suppose Glass had come down there this morning and gone all over the place shootin’ off his mouth about you. That guy spent a full day in Selig’s store. He knows plenty about you by now.”

Bannerman had his hand in his pocket, fingering a roll of bills there. He had brought his money neatly arranged so that he could pull off bills of any desired denomination without exposing the size of the roll. He withdrew his hand, looked down at the wad of money there, and put it in the side pocket of his topcoat.

“Well?” asked Durbin.

“Not here. It’s ready for you.”

“Okay. I’m on my way now to see the guy who did it for me. Find out the details.”

Bannerman looked around the room, saw no reason to delay further, and passed the wad of bills under the table. He felt Durbin’s hand, pressed the money into it, and whispered, “Don’t count it here. It’s right.”

Durbin straightened up and smiled. “You got a real buy, Bannerman. A job like that, in the nick of time, and when I come back I’ll tell you just what they did with the remains.”

“Stay the hell away from me,” said Bannerman. “No matter what happens, stay away from me. It won’t be healthy. Not for either of us.”

“Okay.”

“Let me go out first,” said Bannerman. “Don’t you come out for at least fifteen minutes.”

“Sure,” said Durbin. “Waiter. One more rye.” He watched Bannerman pull on his gloves, while he eyed the door nervously. “Okay, pal. I’ll stay here and have another drink.”

Durbin waited the required fifteen minutes, then paid for his drinks and went out into the street. He sauntered away, casually, stopped to look in a window, whereupon Garda Glass dived into a convenient doorway, then headed south once more to 49th Street. With mingled skill, instinct and desperation, Garda managed to anticipate every chance he took to reassure himself that he was not being followed away from the restaurant, and when he reached his store, and went inside, she was still across the street, watching from behind a high stoop which permitted her a clear view of Durbin’s store but concealed her from anyone who might be peeping in the window.

“Any calls, Louie?” asked Durbin, as he hung up his hat and coat.

Louie jerked his dirty thumb toward the back door. “Guy in there.”

“Scola?”

Louie nodded and Durbin disappeared into the back room, carefully closing the door behind him. “Jesus, Danny, you want to get us both fried?”

Danny had taken for himself a pint of whisky on the table and he was pouring a drink as Durbin entered. “Whatsa matter, pal?”

“I was just on the way up to see you,” said Durbin. “It’s taking a chance, dropping in here. The cops.”

Scola made an obscene noise with his narrow, cruel mouth. “That’s for the cops. Reason I came down here was to tell you I sort of changed the whole set-up. I got the guy tucked away.”

Durbin started. “Alive?”

“He ain’t alive and he ain’t dead. Kind of in between. I gave him somethin’.”

“Now look here, God damn it, Danny, I gave you the dough to do a job.”

“Not enough dough,” said Scola shortly. “I didn’t know the guy was so important.”

“Important?”

“Read the papers. Just a guy you wanted to get rid of, eh? Just a small-time chiseler, who was in your way. Well, you fat, double-crossing bastard, read the papers. A guy with close to a hundred grand right in his kick was let out of the can because this Glass couldn’t come downtown today. And you gave me a lousy six hundred bucks. I oughta take you by the ears and kick the—but you know me, Jake, I ain’t a guy to have hard feelin’s. Sit down. Have a drink.”

Jake sat down.

“Did this lawyer pay you to get Glass out of the way?”

“No. That is, he paid me what I paid you.”

“You work too cheap,” said Scola. “Not me. I got this guy and he’s worth plenty, I can see that now.”

Durbin looked at him with genuine interest. “I never thought of that,” he admitted slowly.

“Either way, maybe both ways, this guy is worth a fortune. He got any dough?”

“You mean Glass? He ain’t no millionaire, but he’s got dough.”

“Good. That wife of his, I’ll bet she’s plenty crazy about him.”

Durbin nodded. “Yeah, but, Danny, I don’t—”

“Shut up! I see our play now. Okay, get your hat and coat.”

Durbin stood up. “Where we going?”

“Up to my place. Come on. You know how to reach this Bannerman?”

“I know how. I’ll tell you how. I couldn’t do it myself. He’d kill me. Make it look as if I ain’t in on it.”

“Sure,” said Danny. “Come on.”

Joel Glass was sitting up in a chair now, his hands still tied securely behind his back, shaking his head to get the cobwebs out of it. He had a fuzzy, dry taste in his mouth, like the ashes of a four-day drunk.

Paul Terelli regarded him coldly. “How you feelin’?”

“Great,” said Joel. “Who’re you?”

Terelli disregarded this. “Want a drink?”

“Water,” said Joel. “Jesus, these ropes are tight!”

“You’re a strong guy,” said Terelli. He went into the other room, leaving the door open, and came back with a chipped dirty glass in which was water. He held it to Joel’s lips, while he drank eagerly. “Thanks. What happened to my head?”

“You got slugged.”

“What’s the idea?”

“You’ll find out.” Terelli started to go, but Joel said, “Hey, what about these ropes? My arms are dropping off.”

Terelli passed behind his chair and yanked at the cords. “They’ll do,” he said.

“How about another drink?” asked Joel. “My mouth feels dry. I’ll get it myself if it’s too much trouble for you.”

Terelli grinned. “I’ll get it. You’re a nervy guy.” He took the glass and brought it back with water in it. He lifted it to Joel’s lips and held it while he drank.

“Is this a snatch?” asked Joel.

Terelli didn’t answer.

“The only soul I’ve got in the world is my wife,” persisted Joel, “and she wouldn’t give eight cents for me, dead or alive.”

“I hear different,” said Terelli. “You wouldn’t kid me, would you, mister?”

“No, I wouldn’t. Is that a bottle out on the table?”

“Hard stuff.”

“A little of that now,” said Joel, “and I’ll be ready to go places.”

Terelli grinned. He took the dirty, chipped glass and went into the other room. He brought it back with a large drink of whisky and held it to Joel’s lips. “Ain’t I the best God-damn valet you ever had?”

Joel leaned away from the glass, his mouth twisted and puckered. “Do you drink that stuff regularly?”

Terelli tossed off what was left in the glass. “I like it.” He sat down on a chair about six feet away from Joel’s. He saw Joel’s eyes roving around the room, hesitating at the curtained window, where the green shade was drawn to the sill. “Nobody could hear you,” he said, “and you yell only but once.” His double-breasted jacket hung open, away from his left breast, and as Joel’s eyes returned to him his right hand flicked upward and a large automatic pistol seemed to fly into it.

“Clever,” said Joel. “Could you teach me to do that?”

Terelli laughed out loud. “Damn, if you ain’t a nervy guy. Sure I could teach you. I could lend you the gun, too, and untie your hands.”

“I didn’t mean right now,” said Joel modestly. “Later on, when I haven’t got so much on my mind.”

Terelli teetered backward on the rickety chair, his legs outstretched before him. “If I was you,” he said pointedly, “I would get a guy to teach me how to play a harp.”

“Like that, eh?”

“I ain’t the boss,” said Terelli. He went out into the other room and came back with a tumbler half full of whisky. He offered the glass to Joel, in a kindly gesture, but Joel shook his head and he sat down in his chair again. He took a long drink. “No, I ain’t the boss. If I was, mister, you’d be layin’ out in a ditch somewhere. Nothin’ personal,” he hastened to add. “You don’t seem like a bad guy.”

“I’m not,” said Joel.

“You ain’t very popular.”

“So you don’t like the snatch business?” said Joel. “I don’t blame you. Too many guys get killed in it or sent up on the Rock.” He saw the flicker of emotion in Terelli’s face. “What time is it?”

Terelli pushed back his left cuff. “Four o’clock.”

“I was out a long time from just a sock on the head.”

“That only lasted about an hour,” said Terelli cordially. “I gave you some drops. What the hell? You might as well sleep.”

“Thanks. If you’d like to take a nap,” said Joel, with elaborate politeness, “go right ahead. I’ll watch things.”

Terelli snickered. “You’re a funny guy, all right. Say, what are you—a dick?”

“Just a sportsman.”

“A what?”

“Skip it. How about some more water?”

“Sure, pal.” Terelli took the glass and went into the other room. Joel had a minute in which to try his muscles against the ropes binding his arms, but they were impregnable. Terelli came back and held the glass against his lips while Joel drank. “Thanks. Say, where’s the boss? If it’s just a question of some dough, maybe I can raise some myself. Wouldn’t that suit you boys just as well?”

“I dunno,” said Terelli. He was looking at his wrist watch every few minutes, peering anxiously at the door in the other room whenever there was the sound of an automobile, while Joel strained against his bonds without loosening them one bit. “No use workin’ on them ropes,” said Terelli casually. “They’re tight.”

“You’re telling me,” said Joel, and Terelli laughed again. “Damn, if you ain’t a nervy guy. You know, maybe when Danny—” he caught himself—“when the boss comes, maybe you can square the whole thing with him. I dunno much about it, but you seem like a kind of a right guy.”

“I am,” said Joel fervently.

“Seems to me like I hear somebody now,” said Terelli. He went out into the other room with his right hand over his heart, like Napoleon, then carefully closed the door so that Joel was alone in his untidy little prison. He heard low voices in the other room, then the door opened and Terelli entered, followed by Jake Durbin. “Here’s the pigeon,” said Terelli.

“Hello, Jake.”

Durbin walked across the few feet of floor to the side of Joel’s chair. “Well, Glass, how do you like the detective business?”

“You don’t meet a very nice class of people,” said Joel. “You’ll look cute with a rope around your neck, Jake.”

Durbin drew back his right fist but Paul Terelli stepped in front of him. “None of that. I’m lookin’ after this guy. If he gets tough or tries to get away, you can rough him up a little, but nobody’s gonna slug him just like that.”

“Thanks,” said Joel.

“Why, this heel is one of the dirtiest rats in New York,” said Durbin heatedly. “I ought to kick his insides out for some of the things he’s pulled.”

“Cut it out,” said Terelli. “When the boss comes we’ll know what to do with him.”

Joel winced.

“I hear somebody,” said Durbin, and Terelli’s right hand flew up toward his heart again. He followed Durbin into the other room, closing the door once more, and Joel heard another voice this time, an excited voice. Then the door opened and Danny Scola came in with the others, all three of them talking at once.

“There he is,” said Terelli. “Safe and sound.”

“I see ’im,” said Scola glumly. “You dumb bastard,” he said to Jake Durbin, “couldn’t you make sure nobody tailed you away from your place?”

“You were with me,” said Durbin.

“Shut up. Now we gotta stay right here because the roads is liable to be too hot right now, but we gotta be up on our toes. I stopped them all right, but they might have the State Troopers out an’ we couldn’t take a chance and try to move this guy.”

“I like it here,” ventured Joel.

“Shut your trap,” said Scola, moving closer to him, “or I’ll shut it up for you good.”

“We can’t use that car any more,” said Durbin. “They must have the number.”

“We’ll give it a new number,” said Scola. “Jake, you’re comin’ with me. We’ll go down to a store near here and you can make a telephone call. Get me?”

Durbin nodded.

Scola turned to Terelli. “Paul, you stay here. We’ll be leavin’ here soon.”

“Jesus, Danny,” said Terelli passionately, “why don’t we finish the job and the three of us beat it out of here before it gets too hot to move?”

“My pal,” said Joel, but nobody heard him.

Scola tapped himself on the chest with a stubby, dirty finger. “I’m runnin’ the show. You heard what I told you outside. We gotta chance to make a real pull for ourselves.”

“Okay,” said Terelli.

Scola and Durbin left the room, the latter a little reluctantly, and then the outer door closed. Joel heard a key turn in the lock.

“Looks like we’re both in together,” he said.

Terelli sat down in his favorite chair, tilted it back against the wall, and regarded Joel with interest.

“Can I ask you just one question? Is it my wife you’re holding up for the money?”

Terelli considered this question while he teetered to and fro on the chair. “I don’t see that it makes much difference to you,” he said finally, “so I don’t mind tellin’ you. It’s that lawyer—the one that got out of stir today because you didn’t show up. We figure maybe a fellow like that would lay plenty on the line if you didn’t show up at all—no place, no time.”

“I didn’t know he got out,” said Joel thoughtfully. “That’s bad.”

“Not for us, it ain’t.”

“You never can tell,” said Joel. Though his arms were lashed behind his back, he had found in the last few minutes that he could reach the knots by bending his hands back, and he picked and scratched at the cords now with new hope.

15

UNLESS SHE sent up smoke signals, or flashed a message with her little mirror, Garda Glass was faced with the necessity of reaching a telephone. It meant that she must leave the shelter of the high step and possibly be seen from Durbin’s store. It meant also that in her momentary absence, Durbin might depart and go elsewhere. She decided to risk it and began to edge away from the step toward Third Avenue where there was a drugstore across the street. She stayed close to the building line, with her head turned away, and was nearing the corner when she looked back and saw a small black coupé just coming to a stop before Jake Durbin’s shop. A short, slender man in a black overcoat left the car and went up to the front door. Garda crossed to the drugstore, glad of the fact that Durbin had a visitor, for this would surely keep him inside for the few minutes she needed to make the call. The fact that these enemies, Durbin and Bannerman, had met and talked together, was all she needed for proof that they might lead her to Joel. She dialed the number of her office in the booth and Steve Langner answered the ’phone. “Any word, Steve?”

“Not yet, Garda. We’re waiting.”

“Get this and get it fast. I saw Jake Durbin about an hour ago, and he picked up Elias Bannerman while I was following him. They went into a restaurant together, then Durbin came back here to his store alone. I’ve been watching the place and a fellow just drove up in a small, black coupé, New Jersey plates, number H-23895. Got it? I’m in a drugstore on the corner and going back now to watch the store. Come up from the Third Avenue side and don’t come too close.”

“Right,” said Langner.

“Better ’phone Flanner,” said Garda, and hung up.

She left the drugstore and went back across the street. The coupé was still out front, and there were no signs of life around the door to Durbin’s bookstore. She watched both the entrance and the Third Avenue corner now, wondering what to do if they should leave, singly or together, before Langner arrived.

Langner made good time, considering traffic, and she saw him sauntering casually past the Third Avenue corner about twenty minutes after she ’phoned. She left the sheltering step once more, crossed the street and fell into step alongside. “What do you think, Steve?”

“I think you’ve got something,” he said quietly. “Who was the man who drove up?”

“Never saw him before. They may have noticed me, Steve. You look out and see if anybody’s moving.”

Langner edged a little way past the corner. “No, not yet. I’ve got a car here, and Flanner is on his way up. If he gets here before they start moving, we’ll let him decide what’s best to do. If they leave before he arrives, we’ll follow. I gave him the number of the car.”

“Oh, Steve, I’m so frightfully, terribly worried.”

He nodded. “Take it easy.” Langner edged past the corner once more, then darted back. “They’re coming out, Durbin and another. Come on, they’re getting in the car.”

They crossed the street to Langner’s company car, a large sedan, and Garda got into the front seat with him. Steve let the coupé ahead pull away from the curb and into the stream of traffic, then started his car and crawled east. Traffic was stopped by the light at Park Avenue and while there were five or six cars between them, Langner pulled out to the left so that he had a glimpse of the car he was following.

They turned into Park Avenue, when the light changed, and though the small coupé ahead darted in and out of traffic like a bug, averaging fourteen blocks to each green light, Langner hung on tenaciously but inconspicuously. “They’re not trying to throw us off,” he said, when they went over the bridge and headed ostensibly for the Grand Concourse, “so the chances are they don’t know we’re here. If they did, it wouldn’t be quite so easy. They could lose us here in a minute.” They drove in silence for quite a way, the coupé ahead always in sight, but as they neared the streets leading to the George Washington Bridge, Langner shook his head.

“What’s the matter, Steve?”

“If they go over the bridge it won’t be quite so easy to follow them.”

“Hang on,” said Garda.

“Sure.”

It was indeed the George Washington Bridge they made for, and when they were halfway across the structure, Langner said, “Well, I guess they know they’ve got company now. The driver’s been looking back at us.”

In the small coupé ahead, Scola, who was driving, turned to his passenger. “Well, Jake, somebody tailed us away from the store. I didn’t think so, but now it looks like we got company.”

“Oh, Jesus!”

“Don’t get sick an’ throw up,” said Scola. “I’ll shake ’em.”

“How? My God, Danny, maybe it’s the cops.”

“Nah. Some guy an’ a broad.” Scola turned off the bridge at the Jersey end, onto U. S. No. I, and watched in the rear-vision mirror to see if the sedan followed him. “Yep, somebody wants to know where we’re goin’.” He grinned. “Can you drive a car, Jake?”

Durbin nodded.

“Got a license?”

“Sure. Why?”

“I’ll show you. Could you find the house from here? If nobody was to follow you?”

“Easy. What are you going to do?”

“Step on it. Get a little lead and then I’ll swing off on one of these roads. You can cut back on the highway when I lose ’em for you. The minute I get out of the car, you jump in the seat and go off like a bat outa hell. Don’t worry about me, I’ll meet you at the house. I ain’t so sure about lettin’ you out of my sight, Jake, but if you pull anything, don’t forget that I’ll get you if it takes a hundred years.”

“I’ll be all right,” said Durbin.

“Okay.” Scola pressed hard on the accelerator, the speedometer shot up to forty-five, to fifty, to fifty-five and hovered near the sixty mark. At this speed, with the brakes screaming, he made a hard, short turn into a less open road, then jammed on the emergency and jumped out of the car into the underbrush by the side of the road. Durbin moved over and the coupé started up again, picking up speed quickly. Scola, kneeling behind protective shrubbery, reached into a shoulder holster for his gun, a heavy automatic, and got to one knee. He heard the other car approaching, and the sound of its brakes as it slowed for the turn. Up ahead, Durban had a lead of about a quarter mile, and as the sedan turned in and passed him, Scola raised the gun. His first shot, when the car was about sixty yards away, got the right rear tire of the pursuing vehicle, and he watched, content with his marksmanship, while the sedan swayed and shook to a stop, its front wheels hovering over the ditch at the left of the road. Jake Durbin, in the coupé, was nearly out of sight, and Scola replaced the gun in its holster and crawled toward the main highway.

Garda and Steve Langner, after staring ruefully at the remains of the tire, pushed the car down the road to where it could be parked off the path of traffic, then walked to the main highway. “The State Police is our best bet now,” said Langner decisively. “We know the number of the car, and the general direction it was going in. Those State Troopers are smart as whips,” he said, to comfort Garda mostly, “even if their uniforms look like something out of a Shubert second act. Flanner is probably working on it, too. Call home,” he told her, “and leave word that you and Joel will be in for dinner.”

Garda began to cry.

After ten minutes of frantic picking at the ropes on his wrists, Joel felt the cords give slightly. It had been agonizing work and he relaxed now to gather his strength for the final effort. At best, he figured, he had another fifteen minutes before Scola returned to move him or finish him off. He eyed the window desperately and wished that he knew whether the room was on the first, second, fourth or tenth floor. While Terelli teetered comfortably to and fro in the chair, his hat brim pulled down over his eyes and his coat hanging ominously open, Joel went back to his bonds. It was easier to reach the knot now, since the cords had given slightly, and circulation was partially restored since the pressure had eased. In five minutes more he felt the knot slip loose entirely and he was bound now only by the cords gathered loosely around his wrists. He remembered Terelli’s lightning draw now, and it was a small comfort to realize that he had nothing to lose. Unable to massage his wrists, he alternately clenched and opened his fists to hasten the circulation in his hands.

“Hey, Paul.”

The legs of the chair came down on the floor with a thump. “What is it, pal?”

“Don’t the condemned man get one hearty meal around here? What kind of a can is this?”

“Sorry, pal, but there ain’t a drop of nothin’ to eat or I’d of fixed it for you long ago. I’m hungry myself.”

“How about a drink?” asked Joel.

“Sure thing. I’ll have one, too.”

Joel’s heart skipped a beat, for above everything else in the world just then, he wanted Terelli to come back into the room with both hands full. While the gunman was in the other room he worked his hands free of the loose cords, being careful to push them under him so that Terelli might not notice them lying on the floor, and with his hands clenched behind his back, he sat with his head bowed down, the picture of despair. Terelli came back into the room with a glass in each hand. He said, “Cheer up, pal. Here’s a good drink for you.”

Joel raised his head slowly and opened his mouth as Terelli held the glass to his lips, and when it was but an inch away, and Paul was standing in close, he drove his right fist, with a prayer behind it, into Terelli’s abdomen, starting up from the chair at the same time, as Terelli fell back, doubled up. Instinctively, Terelli’s right hand went for the holster, but Joel grabbed it in his left and shot his right to the jaw. It was a terrific blow and he felt bone give under the impact of the crash. Terelli went down and Joel went down on top of him, tearing frantically at the holster. He got the gun and, holding it by the barrel, with his left hand at the gangster’s throat, brought the butt smashing down on his temple. That finished Terelli.

Joel stood up and ran to the window. He threw up the shade in one jerk. There was still enough daylight for him to see that he was on the second floor of a house set back about thirty yards from a road. He turned around to see if Terelli had moved, but the stricken man lay still as death itself, and Joel gave all his attention to the window. He smashed out the glass with the gun, anxious now to make as much noise as possible, and hesitated as he heard the sound of a car in the road. It might be help and it might be Scola. If it was Danny, coming back to finish the job, he might come off only second best in a gun fight with the thug. He heard the car stop and waited. When he heard the front door of the house bang, he waited no longer but clambered over the sill, with the gun in his hand, fired two shots in the air which rang out like thunder in the still countryside, and dropped to the ground. He landed on his feet in a patch of soft ground, miraculously without breaking a leg or an ankle, and then scrambled back close to the wall with his eyes on the window and the gun in readiness. There was a water barrel a few yards down, also in close to the house, and he edged toward this. He got down behind it just as Scola appeared in the window above, a gun in his right hand. With a prayer, Joel aimed and fired, but his aim was bad and he ducked down behind the barrel just as an answering shot ripped through the water spout where his head had been an instant before. Another shot thudded into the barrel, and a third whistled over his head. He heard the sound of another car in the road behind him but was afraid to turn around to look. He was just edging up to try another shot at Scola, when there was a louder report from the road, and he looked up to see Danny fall limply across the sill. He turned around now and saw a long, black touring car, a uniformed man in the front seat with a rifle resting on the door, and troopers coming toward the house from the road. Joel straightened and looked up again to the window, from which Scola was dangling lifelessly. A trooper came up with a rifle and Joel said, “I’m Joel Glass. These men kidnaped me.”

The trooper grinned. “That was close. Are you all right?”

“Fine,” said Joel. “There’s another of them upstairs on the floor. I think maybe I killed him. And there ought to be a big, fat guy around somewhere—maybe with a gun.”

“The place is covered all around,” said the trooper. “Half the cops in the world are out looking for you,” he told Joel.

“Honest? What’s the charge?”

“Worrying your wife. She’s over at our barracks now, with an insurance-company detective from New York. It seems she trailed these fellows”—he jerked his thumb back toward the window from which Danny Scola was flying like a flag—“over here, gave the State Police Headquarters the license number of that coupé out front, and we picked it up down the road. That’s how we got here in time to save your neck.”

“She’s a wonderful little woman,” said Joel. They went upstairs, pausing at the foot of the steps to allow free passage to a trooper who was leading a manacled Jake Durbin out to the car. Joel waved to him and went upstairs. One man was bending over the body of Paul Terelli and another was trying to hoist all that was mortal of Danny Scola back into the room.

“What did you do to him?” asked the man who was working on Terelli.

“Socked him,” said Joel. “In the head, with the butt of his gun. I socked him pretty hard, I guess, but I had to keep him still.”

“Looks to me like you socked him right out of the world.” He called to the one who was lifting Scola out of the window. “Hey, Joe, gimme a hand with this guy’s feet. No use bothering with that one, but this one shows a sign of life.”

Joel went downstairs again. “How about a ride to the barracks?” he asked the driver of the car, who was watching Jake Durbin.

“Sure. You might have to hang on the running board if we have some freight to go back, but we’ll get you there.”

“It was a cinch,” said Joel, as he and Garda and Steve Langner were being driven home by the ever-obliging Lieutenant Flanner. “The seven of them came rushing at me, with guns and knives. I grabbed two of them—any two—knocked their heads together and threw them in the faces of two others. That left three. West bid one no trump, South passed and I doubled.”

“I see you’ve got your nerve back,” said Flanner. “One of the troopers told me he had to lend you a pair of pants you were so scared.”

“A lie,” said Joel hotly.

Garda was holding his right hand, gently massaging his wrist, rubbed raw by his effort to extricate his arms from the ropes. “I thought at first it was a love nest you had there, and you just called in the troops to make it look on the level.”

“I was in a bad way,” said Joel softly. “You saved my life, Mrs. Glass.”

“When I get you home you might be sorry I didn’t leave you with those gangsters.”

“Where did they grab you?” asked Flanner.

“Right outside the house. I was on my way to the District Attorney’s office to meet Stamper and walked up the street to where this taxi was parked. I was just getting into the hack when something slugged me and I knew nothing till I woke up on the floor.”

“That’s what I figured. I had a dozen men out but nobody could pick up a trace of you.”

“What about Bannerman?” asked Joel. “How does he rate with the forces of law and order now?”

“Not so good. We want Mr. Bannerman worse than ever now. Did you ever hear of anybody named Sidney Wheeler?”

“Eli Bannerman’s pal,” said Joel promptly. “He’s the one who introduced me to the eminent attorney.”

“Maybe that’s why Bannerman killed him. I’d like to kill the guy that introduced me to you, too.”

“What?” Joel looked across at Steve Langner, who nodded his head briefly. “Like a doornail, they found him, lying face down in the mud over in the Long Island marshes. Two slugs in his belly and not a cent in his pockets.”

“Sounds like Bannerman,” said Joel, “especially the last part. It certainly sounds great for law and order. Here’s a lad who was the last person to see Abe Selig alive. He’s picked up later on with the murdered man’s five thousand dollars in his pockets, and the police apologize and let him go. When was Sidney killed?”

“A couple of days ago,” said Flanner, “near as we can make out at this late date. A small loss, from what we’ve learned about him. Out West he’s got a record longer than my arm. The way the story goes he was registered in a hotel uptown under the name of Sidney White and left there with somebody who looked a lot like Elias Bannerman. He’d been drinking hard, the coroner said, and there was muddy water in his lungs, which means that he wasn’t killed by the shots, but drowned out there, face down in the mud.”

Garda shuddered. “You’re through playing detective, my boy. If I can’t make it interesting enough for you without chasing these cold-blooded hellions and risking your fat neck, I’ll jolly well divorce you.”

“Later, darling,” said Joel. “So the good old dragnet is out for Bannerman, eh? Well, boys, I handed him to you once, but you saw fit to open the door and bow him out.”

“Wise guy,” said Flanner scornfully. “Bannerman had an alibi tighter than a Scotch auditor. You couldn’t crack that story with dynamite.”

“You’d rather send up Ned Morgan,” said Joel, “and wash your hands of the whole business. Well, I still think the barrister knows plenty, and if you ever get your hands on him again, I’d keep him around a while.”

“Thanks for the tip,” said Flanner. “Here’s your stop, brave boy. Do you think you can get all the way upstairs without getting yourself killed?”

“My wife’s with me,” said Joel fondly. “I’ll be safe.” They said good night to Langner and Flanner, went into the lobby of the house, and Garda groaned out loud when she saw Arnold Stamper waiting there, hat in hand. “Hold onto your hats, kids; here we go again,” she said in a low voice to Joel. “Here’s the Lord High Executioner.”

Joel shushed her.

“I’m certainly glad to see you,” said Stamper, pumping Joel’s right hand hard. “Any damage?”

“Just a few slight bruises. I want you to meet my wife, Mr. Stamper. She’s one of your admirers.”

“Your husband is a wonderful man, Mrs. Glass,” said Arnold Stamper. “Such bravery and courage are rare in these—”

“Especially when they’re your chestnuts,” said Garda. “Oh, well, let’s all go upstairs and have some coffee.”

Of the opposition, only Elias Bannerman was alive and at large the next morning. Danny Scola’s remains were being readied for obscure burial, Paul Terelli lay in the hospital under police guard and Jake Durbin heard a committing magistrate hold him for the Grand Jury in bail so high as to be inaccessible. Joel went to Selig’s, after the hearing, his entrance being a marked sensation in the dignified establishment, still closed to the public. The clerks stared openly and frankly, Olin Roberts wrung his hand with profuse expressions of joy and thanksgiving, and Julia Thorne, looking down from the second-floor landing, said not a word, watching silently as he came up the stairs to her. She was wearing a dark, high-necked dress, with a touch of white at the throat. “I’m so happy,” she said, when he stood on the landing with her. “When I heard about what happened I nearly died and when I read the papers and knew that you were safe, I went limp… I wept.”

“Let’s go inside,” said Joel. He opened the door of the private office, switched on the lights and led the way to Selig’s desk where he sir down in the large swivel chair. Julia Thorne stood by the desk, looking down at him, her eyes moist with tears. He smiled up at her. “A touching, if not altogether convincing demonstration, Julia. Those tears—are they springing up because I managed to get out alive?”

She looked at him steadily, a puzzled, hurt look now in her eyes. “What do you mean?”

“Where’s your little friend, Elias Bannerman, the butcher?”

After a long moment, her steady gaze wavered. “I don’t know.”

“Are you sure he’s not in your bed, Julia?”

“Please!” She turned away.

Joel got up and walked around the other side of the desk to face her. She put her hands behind her and leaned back against the huge desk. “Please, my eye! God, what a chump I’ve been. You told me all the little lies that popped into your head and I believed them, every last damn one of them. Well, I’m going to hear the facts for a change. You’re going to start talking now, Julia, and you’re going to talk very earnestly. If I suspect that you are so much as clipping the edges of the plate with a fast one I’ll ’phone the District Attorney’s office and you can think the whole thing out in a nice, quiet cell.”

“What do you want to know?” asked Julia Thorne weakly.

“Everything. All about you and Bannerman and Selig and Sidney Wheeler. All about the racket you were running here. Why did Bannerman kill Sidney Wheeler? Oh, yes, he did. You know damn well he did. The bullets in Sidney came from the gun they found on Bannerman.”

“I didn’t know. I swear it.”

“That doesn’t matter much. I want to know everything about this pretty little business.”

“I’ll tell you. You don’t know how it’s tortured me these last few days; you don’t know what a load I’ve carried.”

“Stick to the story, milady.”

“You’ve got to believe me now,” said Julia Thorne earnestly. “I’m going to tell you what I should have told you in the beginning, I guess, but I didn’t have the nerve. I was going to help you; truly, I was, but everything began to—” She caught the warning signal in the impatient way Joel crushed his cigarette in the ashtray. “All right. I’ve known Bannerman for about five years. I met him in Chicago when I was working in a club there. This part of it is a pretty old story, I guess. He was rich; I was poor. He had things; I wanted things. He showed me how to get them. He dealt in stolen goods then, just as he did now, but when I met him it was jewelry, bonds and stocks. I know how dirty it sounds, but I was tired of being poor and he was leading the kind of life I wanted to lead.”

“You were the decoy for the syndicate?”

She nodded. “Rich men, mostly. The rest of it was up to Bannerman and the people who worked with him.”

“When did you go into the book business?”

“He was always interested in things like that, and always friendly with Abe Selig. He met Sidney Wheeler here in New York right after Sidney had stolen some Poe first editions at an exhibition. He was holding on to them, afraid to try to sell them, and Bannerman took them off his hands. He sold them to Selig for about five times what he gave Sidney Wheeler and Selig got rid of them in Europe. That was the beginning and Bannerman began to send Sidney all over the country, steering clear of New York and the East, but all the stuff came back here and was passed out through Selig’s store. Then about two years after they began to work together came the time when Selig sent Morgan to jail. I knew a lot about books by that time, and Selig didn’t know that Bannerman and I were—I guess you know—we were—”

“Don’t be coy,” said Joel harshly.

“Well, Bannerman helped me fake a lot of references and I got the job here. He wanted me here on the inside where I could be most valuable.”

“I can see that. How long ago did you find out that Selig had those books in his safe at the apartment?”

“That was the truth,” she said earnestly. “I found out just a few days before—”

“You’re a liar,” said Joel calmly. “When we broke into the compartment the safe-man told us it must have been a year since anybody was at it.”

She bit her lip.

“Why did you keep it a secret all that time, with Ned Morgan eating his heart out in jail? Were you blackmailing Selig?”

“No.”

He grabbed her by the wrist. “Don’t lie to me. You were shaking down Selig for money on the side, weren’t you?”

“No! Honest to God! I didn’t say anything about it because I felt that it was an ace in the hole to have something like that on Selig. In case he ever tried to do anything. If I was blackmailing him about that he wouldn’t have left them in the safe all that time.”

“What do you mean, blackmailing him about that? Was there anything else?”

She shook her head. “I’m telling you the truth.”

“All right. Why did you go to Peter Brand that day? You knew one lawyer well enough to ask him a legal question. Why didn’t you ask Bannerman about those books and the reward?”

“I didn’t want him to know.”

“A little double-crossing, eh? Who killed Selig? Was it Bannerman?”

She shook her head. “Sidney Wheeler killed him.”

“What?”

“Sidney killed him,” she said. “That’s where Bannerman got the five thousand dollars of Selig’s money. He took it out of Sidney’s pocket when he murdered him. Selig was trying to back out of taking the books Sidney brought in but he finally consented to pay for them. That’s why he took the money out of the bank. He was afraid of Bannerman, and in too deep to back out. Bannerman was supposed to come back that night with the books but Sidney got here first and he and Selig had a dreadful row. Sidney lost his temper when the old man called him some pretty harsh names and smashed him with the marble bust.”

“How do you know?”

“Sidney told me.”

“Were you here that night?”

“No. I wanted to stay because I was afraid Bannerman had been lying to me about what he got from Selig, but I was sent up to the library to get an affidavit on the collection of a Shakespeare folio.” She licked her lips nervously. “Please, may I have a cigarette?”

He gave her a cigarette and struck a match. “Who ransacked your apartment that day? Was it Bannerman?”

She nodded. “I had a letter hidden there, implicating Bannerman in a murder in Chicago. I wouldn’t give it to him because I knew that nothing would happen to me while I had that letter. I was afraid of him.”

“Tell me about it.”

“In Chicago we had a man working with us named Dick Ferris. He was a clerk in a wholesale jewelry house and Bannerman cheated him out of some of the money we made on his tips. We were drinking one night in a hotel out there and they had a fearful argument. Bannerman stabbed him.”

Joel shook his head admiringly. “And you and he came to New York and you went right on sleeping with him. Did he get his letter?”

“You saw the apartment. He came to me that same afternoon and asked me to give it to him—told me he was leaving town, but I refused. He stole the keys out of my bag while I was downstairs signing for a package.” She walked slowly to a chair near the desk and sat down. She buried her face in her hands.

Joel paced up and down the floor, then came over to her and took her chin in his right hand, lifting it up. She stared into his eyes. “I told you the truth,” she said slowly. “Every word of it was true.”

“I believe you,” said Joel. “You know what books were stolen, what happened to them, and how they were altered, don’t you?”

She nodded eagerly.

“All right. I’m going to give you a chance to be on the level with a man for once in your life. I want you to get to work on a list. Everything that went through here from the time Bannerman and Selig began to do business together. If you go through with this on the square, I’ll cover you up and we’ll play the game the way we began it.”

“You’re the only decent man I ever met,” said Julia Thorne slowly, “I’d go to hell for you. Try to believe me. It’s hard, I know, with what I’ve told you today, but I was only a kid when I met Bannerman and before I knew it I was in too deep to do anything but get in deeper.”

“It’s hell to be poor,” said Joel. “Just give me a square deal now. I’ll be back here at five o’clock. Have that list ready for me.”

“Before this day is done,” said Joel to Arnold Stamper, as the lawyer leaned back in his chair and lit a fresh cigarette, “I’ll have Abe Selig as discredited as Hitler on the lower East Side. My word of honor.”

“Be careful,” said Stamper. “I’ve known a few killers in my time and they’re a vindictive bunch of people. Don’t walk outside where Mr. Bannerman might find you and sock it into you.”

“How’s the man hunt, by the way? Or don’t you care?”

Stamper smiled broadly. “To say that I like you, Mr. Glass, is to put it mildly—mildly indeed. With your help, a case that looked open and shut a few days ago is so completely stirred up now that I doubt if the District Attorney’s office knows whether it’s coming or going. Don’t be surprised if the murder of Abe Selig is definitely pinned on Elias Bannerman before Ned Morgan goes to trial.”

“Suits me,” said Joel. “First catch your rabbit,” he added.

“I don’t care if this rabbit never shows up at all. Right now he looks every bit as guilty as my client and the longer he stays away the guiltier he looks. Was that your idea, when you hinted that Morgan might be cleared?”

“Just a hunch,” said Joel modestly. “Any normal, right-living American boy, with Grape Nuts for breakfast every morning, could have done what I’ve done. There always seemed to be a lot that was screwy about Ned Morgan in the role of murderer—this particular murderer.”

“I’m listening.”

“All right. Number one, the bust of Dante. Now, I ask you, counselor, what the hell kind of a murder weapon is a statue of an Italian poet? Ned Morgan went to the store that night to kill the old man—he admits as much—with a gun in his pocket to facilitate matters. It was planned and premeditated with him, he’d been thinking about it for two years and he set out to do it the way he’d planned it. But he waited too long.”

“Go on.”

“Well, let us consider Bannerman. He was alone with Selig in the office—both of them jumpy and on edge. Bannerman wanted to sell some hot books, but Selig he no want to buy. He felt that Bannerman was squeezing him, overloading him, and he was sore. Got it? Big money, harsh words, hot anger. Bop!”

“It’s beautiful,” said Stamper reverently, as though he were standing before a masterpiece. “What a clear, lucid, beautiful mind you have, Mr. Glass.”

“Try this,” said Joel, with a grin. “Everybody talks about Sidney Wheeler but nobody ever does anything about Sidney Wheeler.”

“Bannerman did something about him.”

“But why?”

“Tell me.”

“Probably because he knew too much. Sidney was a drunkard and a fool; notoriously big-mouthed in his cups. Exceedingly dangerous to a man like Bannerman, but unbeknownst to the respected attorney, Sidney might have done away with Abraham Selig.”

Stamper frowned. “I don’t get it.”

“Well, Bannerman really left the store that night shortly after six o’clock. We know that because he reached his own office at six-fifteen beyond the shadow of a doubt, too, if you can believe the elevator operator, the starter and the clerk at the cigar stand. All he did up to then was arrange a time and place for future delivery of the books and collection of the money. Sidney may not have liked the terms or the price and gone around to do a little investigating. Selig didn’t like him much. Use your own imagination.”

Stamper smiled. “The way I see it now, practically anybody but Morgan might have killed the old man.”

“Right. All you need now is one reliable juror.”

“What a notion.” The lawyer chuckled. “I’d try this case for nothing—if it was necessary, that is,” he added hastily—“just for the look on the District Attorney’s face every time the case sags a little under him. The night they caught Morgan you would have thought they solved the Wall Street explosion, the Charlie Ross kidnaping and the sinking of the ‘Lusitania.’ By the way, did that lead I gave you on Selig’s secretary do you any good?”

“A great deal,” said Joel.

“Is that your own particular part of the investigation?” asked Stamper, smiling broadly. “I was hoping you’d mention it.”

“She’s a nice girl,” said Joel.

“Yum-yum,” said the renowned criminal attorney crudely, but expressively. “I don’t mind if you keep her to yourself, my boy, but I think it’s only fair that you let me in on what you find out about her.”

“She’s a nice girl,” said Joel. “She got mixed up in bad company when she wasn’t old enough to know what she was doing, that’s all.”

“Bannerman’s girl,” said Stamper. “What are you holding out on me, Mr. Glass?”

“I don’t want her bothered,” said Joel. “It means a lot of money to me.”

“One beautiful girl like that thrown into this case and I could put on a show in the courtroom that would be worth four dollars and forty cents at the box office.”

“You’re a ghoul,” said Joel Glass. “Another thing—you can tell your bloodhounds, those two Irish clowns, not to run themselves ragged in the corridors of the Public Library. Your own reports show that Julia Thorne was safe and sound in the rare-book room until they closed up at nine o’clock. You can’t just shuffle inconspicuously in and out of that room, either. Plenty of attendants to watch what you’re doing, and registry cards for everybody, with the time given in hours, minutes and seconds.”

“Don’t get mad,” said the lawyer. “What is this girl to you?”

“My mother,” said Joel, hanging his head. “It’s a long story, and a dull one.”

“Have it your way. What’s new with Selig’s books? Have you checked them all?”

“Not yet. I expect to have big news for you tomorrow.” He looked at his watch. “I’ve work to do now.”

Stamper walked to the door with him. “Watch where you go, and don’t go more than you have to. Elias Bannerman might seize the opportunity to try again.”

“He’s far from here by now. A year from now, if you hear that somebody stole the Taj Mahal or the Louvre, you’ll probably find Bannerman around. I’m sorry I never got to know him better. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

“Do that,” said Stamper cordially.

Joel walked back to Selig’s and found Julia Thorne hard at work, typing a list from shorthand notes on her desk. He looked over her shoulder at the items listed there. “Is this on the level?”

She took the paper out of the machine and handed it to him with two other sheets already finished. “Every word of it. Does it help you?”

“If it’s true.”

She flushed. “I swear it’s true.”

He patted her shoulder. “I’m sorry I have to be suspicious of you.”

“I know, but you needn’t be now.”

“I’m not.”

“I only hope,” she said fervently, “that they catch Bannerman and the whole thing is finished. I don’t care what happens to me.”

“You’ve nothing to worry about,” said Joel.

“Nothing? You mean it?”

“Sure.”

“I’ll never forget you. You’re the first man who ever had an ounce of fair play in him; the only man who ever gave me a break.”

“Cut it out,” said Joel. “You’re doing something for me and you’ll get your share.”

“I couldn’t touch it,” she said promptly. “I don’t want anything to do with that kind of life any more.”

“Good girl.” Joel patted his coat pocket, where he had the list. “It’s a shame tomorrow is Sunday, but first thing Monday morning I’ll be out cracking the book business wide open with this.”

He went downstairs, the pages of the list in his hand, studying it as he went slowly down the steps and through the main floor to the street. His forehead was puckered and furrowed in deep thought. He put the list in his pocket again and signaled to a passing taxi. He ordered the driver to take him to the library.

The Glass family slept until noon, the Sunday respite from business being nearly universally observed in the rare-book industry, and by twelve-thirty Joel was out of the bathroom. Garda was in the kitchenette, busy with breakfast. “Can I help?” asked Joel.

“Hello, slug-a-bed.” She kissed him. “No, you can’t help.”

“I’d like to wash the dishes,” said Joel.

“After breakfast.”

“The whole world washes dishes after breakfast. Why can’t we be unique?”

“We are,” said Garda. “We’re unique because I go right on living with you and loving you.”

“I’m not so bad,” said Joel modestly. “Didn’t you read what it said in the papers about my heroism and courage in the face of great danger?” He noticed that the table in the dining alcove was set for four. “Do I get three breakfasts?”

“Helen and Steve are eating with us—if they come in time, that is.”

“Fine. I want to talk to Steve. Let’s have oysters for breakfast. We don’t have to go to the office today.”

“Leave the room,” said Garda, lifting a heavy wooden spoon ominously. “You ought to have your mind washed out with soap and water.”

“Make it Scotch and soda,” said Joel, but he left. He went out to the living room and was just settling down with the weight of the Sunday “Times” on him when the buzzer buzzed and he went to the door to receive Mr. Langner and Miss Scott.

“Come in, good friends,” he said cordially, with a low bow. “What, no package of groceries?”

“We came to have breakfast with you,” said Helen pointedly. “Your wife asked us.”

“Oh, all right then,” said Joel. “She’s always picking up strays.” The visitors took off their coats, which Joel hung up in the closet. “Helen, why don’t you go out in the kitchen and help Mrs. Glass?” he said.

“I’ll stay right here,” said Helen. “Don’t mind me.”

“Helen,” said Steve Langner, “why don’t you go out in the kitchen and help Mrs. Glass?”

“It makes her nervous when people watch her cooking,” explained Helen. “Anyway, I’d rather—”

“Helen,” said Joel, “why the hell don’t you go out in the kitchen and—”

“I’m on my way,” said Helen, suiting the action to the word. “I can take a hint. I know when I’m not wanted.”

Joel went into the bedroom, where his pants were neatly folded over the back of a chair, and took from this garment the list Julia Thorne had prepared for him. He brought this back to the living room and handed it to Steve. “Read this. It goes back about four years.”

Steve unfolded the papers and read through the first few items listed there, with their explanations. “Interesting, if true,” he said. “Is it?”

“Both,” said Joel. “Go on, read a ways.”

When Langner was finished he handed the papers back to Joel. “Who gave you this?”

“It was brought to me by carrier pigeon. What do you think?”

“I think you can stand the book business right on its ear.”

“To hell with that. I mean, is there money in it?”.

“The books described in those papers add up to about a million dollars,” said Steve. “To me, that’s money. There’s stuff there my own company paid off on. The Shakespeare First Folio stolen from the Chatham Library, notably. According to that memorandum, Selig held it a year, altered it, trimmed the pages and put it up at auction in London.”

“I remember the sale,” said Joel. “I tried to get a buyer for it myself.” He put the list in the pocket of his robe and patted the spot affectionately. “Here I go, right into the upper brackets.”

Garda appeared from the kitchenette and regarded them both suspiciously. “If I thought you boys had been talking business out here… Steve, is he up to something?”

“He’s got an active little mind,” said Langner. “Where’s that breakfast?”

“On the table,” said Garda, stepping hastily out of the way as two large, masculine bodies hurtled themselves simultaneously at the doorway.

The large platter of scrambled eggs disappeared as though the locusts had temporarily deserted Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and come over for breakfast, and the toast vanished like a magician’s Ace of Spades. “My, ain’t they the hearty eaters!” marveled Helen Scott. “Just like lumberjacks.”

“They behave like lumberjacks,” said Garda. She reached for Joel’s cup and refilled it. “We’ll have to run a pipeline up from Brazil.”

“A good idea,” said Joel. “We ought to run one in from the bortsch mines of Eastern Siberia, too. The low quality of the bortsch we get here is an insult to a self-respecting Russian.”

“I ate too much,” said Langner, pushing back his chair. “I’m bortsching.”

There were threatening gestures from the others, but the atmosphere cleared when the telephone rang. Joel went out to answer it, and came back in a few minutes. He stood at the head of the table, his eyes lowered, his hands spread in a pontifical gesture. “My friends, I ask you to join me in two minutes of silence. While we sat here at peace with the world, oblivious to all but food and Class “C” jokes, the long arm of the law, personified by a cafeteria attendant in Jersey City, New Jersey, reached out to enfold the fleeing form of Elias P. Bannerman, Esquire. Weep with me for this titan, my friends, who fooled the world but was snagged by a bus boy. What infinite humiliation! What soul-searing shame!” He sat down as Helen Scott got up and went swiftly to the ’phone to call her office.

“Who ’phones?” asked Langner.

“Lieutenant Flanner. Isn’t it rich, Steve? Fleeing killer stops to eat. This teaches us that we should not make a god out of our stomach.”

“I’m glad,” said Garda earnestly. “I was worried.”

“It’s a pity it happened so early in the day,” said Joel. “We ought to have a drink on it. On the other hand, in certain parts of the globe it is late afternoon right now.”

“Very true,” said Langner.

Joel went to get things ready, just as Helen Scott came back with a glum look. “Hell! They knew about it.”

16

WHEN JOEL got out of the lift he saw the door of Julia Thorne’s apartment standing open. He walked in, took off his hat and looked around.

“Mr. Glass?” It was her voice, coming from the dressing room.

“Joel,” he said. “Mr. Glass couldn’t come.”

He heard her effortless, cheery laughter. “Well, whichever of you it is, I’m fresh from the tub and dressing furiously. Do you come to see all your girls on such short notice?”

“Some I just bust in on. Do I make my own drink or wait till I’m asked?”

“You wait,” she said sternly, but then the door opened and she came out, her hand outstretched. She was wearing the long, trailing housecoat he had seen on another visit, her hair looked damp and fluffy.

“It was worth waiting for,” said Joel.

She led him to the couch, took his hat and coat, then busied herself at the serving wagon. “I felt that if it was a question of preparing myself or the drinks, the drinks ought to get the best of it. I got all this ready. That’s why I’m late.”

“Thanks,” said Joel, taking the glass she handed him. She put her own on a bound volume of Chopin on the piano, and sat down facing him on the bench. “What made you come? I’m awfully glad of it, because I was settling down to just the Sunday papers and the radio.”

“I had Steve Langner up at the house for breakfast. I showed him that list—your list.”

“What did he think?”

“He whistled. Like this. He was impressed.”

“Are you?”

“I think it’s the biggest thing since the invention of movable type. Yes, sir, Joel Glass Gutenberg.” He put his glass down and leaned forward. “They found Elias Bannerman this morning.”

She gasped, and the color drained out of her face. “Found him?”

“Don’t be scared. Alive and well, right across the river. He stayed pretty close to town for a man who was badly wanted.”

“I wasn’t scared,” she said. Her fingers stopped winding and unwinding. “I’m glad. It’s over now.”

Joel picked up his drink and finished it. “No, don’t make another right away for me. I had some before I came. Was he a good lawyer, Julia?”

She was toying with the loose thread of the housecoat. “I guess so.”

“The practice of law probably bored him, especially the respectable type of work he did. Arnold Stamper tells me he never touched criminal work, shuddered if it was suggested to him.”

“I know,” she said, her voice sounding dry and tight. “He knew a lot about criminal law. He used to read reports of cases in the papers and tell me what he thought the attorneys ought to be doing.”

“What a man,” said Joel. “A handy fellow with a knife, too. I looked up the Chicago papers. That young Ferris seemed like a nice-looking lad, with a wife and kid, too.”

“I never knew that,” said Julia. “Not until afterward. He came in with us to make money.”

“He certainly made it fast. How did Bannerman make it look so much like suicide?”

“Joel… do we have to talk about it?”

“I’m not asking a lot of questions, considering everything,” said Joel mildly.

“That’s how it really happened,” said Julia. “Oh, I don’t mean suicide. The night they had this fight, Bannerman went at him with a knife, but he got it away from him. They fought for it, and it was rammed into his heart while he had his hand on it.”

“They’re a hefty pair of hands,” said Joel.

She shuddered. “I know. Joel, will he be convicted? Are you sure he won’t get out of it somehow?”

“Not a chance. The killing of Sidney Wheeler is custom-tailored for him. Not a wrinkle. They might hang the Selig murder on him, too.”

She looked up, startled.

“Oh, I suggested Sidney Wheeler for the part but nobody seemed to think he could play it.”

“Sidney told me himself.”

“Sidney talked too much. It cost him dearly.”

She got up to get a drink and Joel held out his glass. She refilled both, managing to get a better grip on herself, and when she came back to him with the glass she was re-establishing the mood of their first few minutes. “How about some music—the only thing I can do for you that doesn’t arouse suspicion?”

He laughed. “Go ahead.”

She sat down at the piano and threw up the cover, striking a few chords just for the hell of it. “What’s your favorite piece?”

“I never gave it that much thought. Play yours.”

“Mine has a kind of a forbidding title, but it’s not like that at all. Are you sure you don’t mind on Sunday afternoon?”

“Go on, play it. I’ll holler if I can’t stand it.”

“Well, it’s called ‘Come, Sweet Death.’ ” Her long, slender fingers poised themselves, hovering over the keys. “It’s by Bach. I used to think about it when I was playing in a honky-tonk in Chicago, beating out time for tap-dancers.”

“That’s tough,” said Joel, “but with music like that inside of you, it’s tougher. Go on, play it.”

It was a low-keyed melody, like a prayer; declamative, deliberate and with great intensity. She played it with her head thrown back, her eyes closed, evoking the beautiful sounds with what seemed uncontrolled, mechanical fingers. When the last note had died away, she sighed and turned to Joel, who was leaning forward, elbows on his knees, the drink at his feet. He looked up at her and said, “That could be my favorite piece, too.”

“I’m glad you like it. What were you thinking just then? I hated to call you back to earth.”

“I’m glad you mentioned it. I was going to get to it, anyway. I was thinking the whole thing over and wondering how—”

The telephone rang. “Damn!” said Julia Thorne, and got up to answer it.

She turned back to him, a puzzled look in her eyes. “It’s for you.”

“Oh.” Joel got up to take the call as if he had been expecting it. He said, “Hello,” then listened briefly to the other party, and said, “All right, come on up.” He gave the address and apartment number. Then he turned to Julia Thorne, at his elbow during the conversation.

“You don’t have to go away again, do you?” she asked.

“No. In a way, though, maybe. That was Lieutenant Flanner.”

“He’s coming up here? To pick you up?”

“Not me.” Joel walked back to the studio couch, picked up his glass and finished the drink. “Do you remember what I was saying when the ’phone rang? About my thoughts when you finished playing the piano?”

She was still standing at the secretary-desk where the telephone was, leaning back against it, her eyes now cold and hard.

“I was thinking,” said Joel, “that it was damned inconsistent to be able to play beautiful, glowing, tender music as if you really believed in that sort of thing, and on another occasion to be able to smash Selig’s skull with one blow of that marble bust.”

She put her hands behind her back, leaning against the desk as if she suddenly needed the support. Her face was ghastly white. “You don’t—you can’t believe that!”

“That first night up here, in the candlelight, with the beautiful music, it suddenly occurred to me that only a woman would be really likely to have her gloves on when she picked up that bust in a moment of fiery, red-hot anger. Only somebody Selig knew pretty well could have gotten close enough to him to crash that statue down on his head.”

She was staring at him wide-eyed and open-mouthed. “You’re mad!” she breathed, the words barely audible.

“Not mad enough. One thing you told me was true, Julia. Bannerman would never wear Selig’s five thousand dollars in a money belt around his waist, like an abdominal death warrant, if he knew where it came from. But he didn’t, and the reason was that he found it in this room. I saw your face when you left the house that day, and it wasn’t pretty at all—it was murderous. And that stuff about Sidney Wheeler was just because you guessed what I might be thinking about the five thousand dollars. What the hell, Julia? Sidney Wheeler couldn’t get past Selig’s front door in broad daylight, let alone getting himself closeted with the old man in the still of night.”

She was standing up straight now, looking at him with pity and contempt. “I’m sorry about your little joke, but I was at the library and I can prove it.”

“No, my pretty thug. Mr. Stevens would gladly lie his head off for you, but you made a mistake when you listed those books for me. The other day I spotted an item in Selig’s vault that I recognized at once: The Free Library’s copy of the first edition of ‘Tom Jones.’ A six-volume set, too bulky to be overlooked, but you left it out of the list you gave me yesterday. I wondered about that, Julia, so I went up the library and asked to see it. Stevens told me that he had sent it out to have a case made. I called Ben Whitman who does all the work for the library and he told me he had never seen it. That’s how I knew Stevens was in with you, and that’s why he was arrested at his home this morning. Now, shall I tell you how you got in and out of the library smoothly enough to fool the homicide squad detectives?”

“Go on,” said Julia Thorne. “Rave and rant to your heart’s content.”

“Okay. You came in the front entrance, made sure the guard recognized you, and went upstairs to the rare-book department. Stevens gave you his employee’s pass and you came down through the staff exit and back to the store. Then into the library again through the employees’ entrance, and up to the rare books again, with Selig dead on the floor by that time.”

Her cold, scornful smile faded as he was talking. “It’s a lie! You can’t make anybody believe a story like that! I didn’t kill him! I tell you I didn’t kill him!”

“You had to kill him,” continued Joel remorselessly. “When you told me that Selig didn’t know of your connection with Bannerman, I guessed at once that you must have been blackmailing him. You wouldn’t pass up a chance like that—not you, Julia. But you were afraid Selig would tell Bannerman and you knew what you’d get if your friend Eli found out about the double-crossing you were giving him. That’s why you held tight to that precious letter, Julia—you were scared.” He drew his finger across his throat in a quick motion. “Zip. So you came back to the store, sneaking in with your key, and Selig caught you, after which he soared off into bibliographic Valhalla. I only asked one question about you at the store, Julia: what kind of clothes you wore the day Selig was killed? What did you do with that smartly cut, mannish blue coat? Show me that. You had blood on that coat, just about knee-high, and it rubbed off on the door as you went out so that Ned Morgan got it on him when he stood in the doorway that night in—” He jerked suddenly to one side as something gleamed in her right hand, flashed by him, and buried itself in the wall with a thud. He turned to see a thin, stiletto-like paper knife quivering there, while Julia Thorne leaned back against the desk, her face ashen, the hand that had thrown the knife trembling now.

“What a temper!” said Joel. “Was that for me?”

She came toward him wringing her hands. “You can’t do this, Joel. Not to me! Please!”

“I won’t let Ned Morgan take the rap,” he said quietly. “For one thing, you’re not worth it.”

“He doesn’t have to,” she said quickly. “You said yourself they could pin it on Eli.”

“You’re a regular honey. A real pal. Bannerman never gave out a peep about where he got that money. He covered you up in the worst jam of his life.”

“It doesn’t matter to him,” said Julia. “He’s a killer; he’s sure to be convicted anyway. Look, I’ll help you. We’ll fix it up before Flanner comes.” She saw the look on him and backed away. “You’d let them send me to the chair?”

“Not to the chair, Julia. If things come to the very worst, a few years where you can’t play with knives might not be bad for you. I can’t help you now. I don’t trust you enough. You double-crossed Bannerman by blackmailing Selig, then tried to double-cross them both by turning up the books in Selig’s safe. Now you’d let Bannerman stand trial for a murder you did with your own talented, pretty hands. Suppose I helped you—how long would it be before you tried to slip the hooks into me?”

“I swear it! There’s still time. Give me a chance, anyway! Let me get away before Flanner comes. That wouldn’t mean anything to you. Please!”

“Give me credit for at least enough instinct to preserve my own health, Julia. If I let you go out of this room you’d be laying for me with a gun or a knife in half an hour.” He jerked his thumb at the knife in the wall. “From Julia Thorne to Joel Glass, with love, eh?” There were footsteps in the hall, and Joel stood up as there was a loud knocking on the door. With his hand on the knob, before opening it to admit Flanner, Joel said, “You’ll find Arnold Stamper waiting for you at Police Headquarters. Don’t talk to anybody till you’ve talked to him. He’s all steamed up about defending you, and you don’t have to worry about the fee. This round is on me.”

“You double-crossing, dirty dog!”

Joel opened the door, and Flanner came in, alone. He took off his hat, rather ill at ease. “I’ve got a warrant for your arrest, Miss Thorne,” he said quietly. “I’ll have to ask you to come with me.”

She gave Joel one pleading look, while Flanner stood by, but he shook his head, sadly but with conviction. “You filthy sneak!” she said bitterly.

Joel grinned. “We’ve had a lovers’ quarrel.” He pointed to the knife in the woodwork, at which Flanner whistled. “Better get dressed, Julia. You’ve got to face it.”

She drew herself up erect, and with her hands in the pockets of the housecoat, sneered at him. “You smalltime, wise-cracking fool. You didn’t have nerve enough to go after Bannerman—no, you pick the women. Eli Bannerman would break you in half if he ever got close enough to you.” She spat at him. “Don’t you ever come near me—I warn you.”

Joel walked to the closet, while Flanner stepped up and took Julia Thorne by the elbow. “I’ll leave you two together,” said Joel politely, with his hat on and his coat over his arm. He turned to Flanner. “She’s yours, Lieutenant. Get her dressed and out of here. And whatever you do, don’t let her coax you into showing her your great, big gun.”

“If you want to be really sentimental about somebody,” said Joel, “why not give a thought to Ned Morgan, blissfully in the hay somewhere with his girl, instead of on a cold, hard pallet in a prison cell. Turn out the light and forget about it. I made a down payment on the tickets this afternoon. In six weeks we’ll be on our way.”

“All right, Inspector Glass, but you’ve had your last case—just like Sherlock Holmes.”

“Quick, Watson,” said Joel, “turn out the light.”

“You forgot to open the window. Didn’t you honestly feel a twinge about turning Julia Thorne over to the police?”

“She counted on me to cover her up,” said Joel. “The minute she felt that she was in danger, her busy little mind would have schemed to do away with me. Forget about it.”

“You forgot to open the window,” said Garda pointedly.

Joel sat up in bed and leered at her. “I’ll get putty and seal up all the whole place like the Black Hole of Calcutta. Anyway, that floor is like ice.”

“Well, you can’t sleep with the window shut. It’s not sanitary.” She turned over. “Deduce something from that. Ouch!”

“You forgot how tough I was,” said Joel calmly. “Read the papers, Mrs. Glass.”

Garda turned around. “Are we going on a nice boat? Did you tell the man we have to have a private swimming pool and special meals for our pedigreed dogs?”

“I figured we would just take the children and a few servants. Anyway, if we—”

The telephone began to ring, though it was past one A.M. and they looked at each other. “You see,” said Garda, “it’s like being in bed with Scotland Yard.”

“Sorry,” said Joel, and reached out for the ’phone, but Garda put both her arms around him.

“Don’t answer it.”

The ’phone rang for only about two minutes and then it was quiet.

THE END

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

Did any aspects of the plot date the story? If so, which?

Would the story be different if it were set in the present day? If so, how?

Did the social context of the time play a role in the narrative? If so, how?

If you were one of the main characters, would you have acted differently at any point in the story?

Did you identify with any of the characters? If so, which?

Have you read any other bibliomysteries? If so, how did this compare?

Do you think the rare book world makes a good setting for a mystery novel? Why or why not?

Did this book remind you of any present day authors? If so, which?

OTTO PENZLER PRESENTS

AMERICAN MYSTERY CLASSICS

All titles are available in hardcover and in trade paperback.

Order from your favorite bookstore or from The Mysterious Bookshop, 58 Warren Street, New York, N.Y. 10007

(www.mysteriousbookshop.com).

Charlotte Armstrong, The Chocolate Cobweb. When Amanda Garth was born, a mix-up caused the hospital to briefly hand her over to the prestigious Garrison family instead of to her birth parents. The error was quickly fixed, Amanda was never told, and the secret was forgotten for twenty-three years… until her aunt revealed it in casual conversation. But what if the initial switch never actually occurred? Introduction by A. J. Finn.

Charlotte Armstrong, The Unsuspected. First published in 1946, this suspenseful novel opens with a young woman who has ostensibly hanged herself, leaving a suicide note. Her friend doesn’t believe it and begins an investigation that puts her own life in jeopardy. It was filmed in 1947 by Warner Brothers, starring Claude Rains and Joan Caulfield. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Anthony Boucher, The Case of the Baker Street Irregulars. When a studio announces a new hard-boiled Sherlock Holmes film, the Baker Street Irregulars begin a campaign to discredit it. Attempting to mollify them, the producers invite members to the set, where threats are received, each referring to one of the original Holmes tales, followed by murder. Fortunately, the amateur sleuths use Holmesian lessons to solve the crime. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Anthony Boucher, Rocket to the Morgue. Hilary Foulkes has made so many enemies that it is difficult to speculate who was responsible for stabbing him nearly to death in a room with only one door through which no one was seen entering or leaving. This classic locked room mystery is populated by such thinly disguised science fiction legends as Robert Heinlein, L. Ron Hubbard, and John W. Campbell. Introduction by F. Paul Wilson.

Fredric Brown, The Fabulous Clipjoint. Brown’s outstanding mystery won an Edgar as the best first novel of the year (1947). When Wallace Hunter is found dead in an alley after a long night of drinking, the police don’t really care. But his teenage son Ed and his uncle Am, the carnival worker, are convinced that some things don’t add up and the crime isn’t what it seems to be. Introduction by Lawrence Block.

John Dickson Carr, The Crooked Hinge. Selected by a group of mystery experts as one of the 15 best impossible crime novels ever written, this is one of Gideon Fell’s greatest challenges. Estranged from his family for 25 years, Sir John Farnleigh returns to England from America to claim his inheritance but another person turns up claiming that he can prove he is the real Sir John. Inevitably, one of them is murdered. Introduction by Charles Todd.

John Dickson Carr, The Eight of Swords. When Gideon Fell arrives at a crime scene, it appears to be straightforward enough. A man has been shot to death in an unlocked room and the likely perpetrator was a recent visitor. But Fell discovers inconsistencies and his investigations are complicated by an apparent poltergeist, some American gangsters, and two meddling amateur sleuths. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

John Dickson Carr, The Mad Hatter Mystery. A prankster has been stealing top hats all around London. Gideon Fell suspects that the same person may be responsible for the theft of a manuscript of a long-lost story by Edgar Allan Poe. The hats reappear in unexpected but conspicuous places but, when one is found on the head of a corpse by the Tower of London, it is evident that the thefts are more than pranks. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

John Dickson Carr, The Plague Court Murders. When murder occurs in a locked hut on Plague Court, an estate haunted by the ghost of a hangman’s assistant who died a victim of the black death, Sir Henry Merrivale seeks a logical solution to a ghostly crime. A spiritual medium employed to rid the house of his spirit is found stabbed to death in a locked stone hut on the grounds, surrounded by an untouched circle of mud. Introduction by Michael Dirda.

John Dickson Carr, The Red Widow Murders. In a “haunted” mansion, the room known as the Red Widow’s Chamber proves lethal to all who spend the night. Eight people investigate and the one who draws the ace of spades must sleep in it. The room is locked from the inside and watched all night by the others. When the door is unlocked, the victim has been poisoned. Enter Sir Henry Merrivale to solve the crime. Introduction by Tom Mead.

Frances Crane, The Turquoise Shop. In an arty little New Mexico town, Mona Brandon has arrived from the East and becomes the subject of gossip about her money, her influence, and the corpse in the nearby desert who may be her husband. Pat Holly, who runs the local gift shop, is as interested as anyone in the goings on—but even more in Pat Abbott, the detective investigating the possible murder. Introduction by Anne Hillerman.

Todd Downing, Vultures in the Sky. There is no end to the series of terrifying events that befall a luxury train bound for Mexico. First, a man dies when the train passes through a dark tunnel, then it comes to an abrupt stop in the middle of the desert. More deaths occur when night falls and the passengers panic when they realize they are trapped with a murderer on the loose. Introduction by James Sallis.

Mignon G. Eberhart, Murder by an Aristocrat. Nurse Keate is called to help a man who has been “accidentally” shot in the shoulder. When he is murdered while convalescing, it is clear that there was no accident. Although a killer is loose in the mansion, the family seems more concerned that news of the murder will leave their circle. The New Yorker wrote than “Eberhart can weave an almost flawless mystery.” Introduction by Nancy Pickard.

Erle Stanley Gardner, The Case of the Baited Hook. Perry Mason gets a phone call in the middle of the night and his potential client says it’s urgent, that he has two one-thousand-dollar bills that he will give him as a retainer, with an additional ten-thousand whenever he is called on to represent him. When Mason takes the case, it is not for the caller but for a beautiful woman whose identity is hidden behind a mask. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Erle Stanley Gardner, The Case of the Borrowed Brunette. A mysterious man named Mr. Hines has advertised a job for a woman who has to fulfill very specific physical requirements. Eva Martell, pretty but struggling in her career as a model, takes the job but her aunt smells a rat and hires Perry Mason to investigate. Her fears are realized when Hines turns up in the apartment with a bullet hole in his head. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Erle Stanley Gardner, The Case of the Careless Kitten. Helen Kendal receives a mysterious phone call from her vanished uncle Franklin, long presumed dead, who urges her to contact Perry Mason. Soon, she finds herself the main suspect in the murder of an unfamiliar man. Her kitten has just survived a poisoning attempt—as has her aunt Matilda. What is the connection between Franklin’s return and the murder attempts? Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Erle Stanley Gardner, The Case of the Rolling Bones. One of Gardner’s most successful Perry Mason novels opens with a clear case of blackmail, though the person being blackmailed claims he isn’t. It is not long before the police are searching for someone wanted for killing the same man in two different states—thirty-three years apart. The confounding puzzle of what happened to the dead man’s toes is a challenge. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Erle Stanley Gardner, The Case of the Shoplifter’s Shoe. Most cases for Perry Mason involve murder but here he is hired because a young woman fears her aunt is a kleptomaniac. Sarah may not have been precisely the best guardian for a collection of valuable diamonds and, sure enough, they go missing. When the jeweler is found shot dead, Sarah is spotted leaving the murder scene with a bundle of gems stuffed in her purse. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Erle Stanley Gardner, The Bigger They Come. Gardner’s first novel using the pseudonym A.A. Fair starts off a series featuring the large and loud Bertha Cool and her employee, the small and meek Donald Lam. Given the job of delivering divorce papers to an evident crook, Lam can’t find him—but neither can the police. The Los Angeles Times called this book: “Breathlessly dramatic… an original.” Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Frances Noyes Hart, The Bellamy Trial. Inspired by the real-life Hall-Mills case, the most sensational trial of its day, this is the story of Stephen Bellamy and Susan Ives, accused of murdering Bellamy’s wife Madeleine. Eight days of dynamic testimony, some true, some not, make headlines for an enthralled public. Rex Stout called this historic courtroom thriller one of the ten best mysteries of all time. Introduction by Hank Phillippi Ryan.

H.F. Heard, A Taste for Honey. The elderly Mr. Mycroft quietly keeps bees in Sussex, where he is approached by the reclusive and somewhat misanthropic Mr. Silchester, whose honey supplier was found dead, stung to death by her bees. Mycroft, who shares many traits with Sherlock Holmes, sets out to find the vicious killer. Rex Stout described it as “sinister… a tale well and truly told.” Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Dolores Hitchens, The Alarm of the Black Cat. Detective fiction aficionado Rachel Murdock has a peculiar meeting with a little girl and a dead toad, sparking her curiosity about a love triangle that has sparked anger. When the girl’s great grandmother is found dead, Rachel and her cat Samantha work with a friend in the Los Angeles Police Department to get to the bottom of things. Introduction by David Handler.

Dolores Hitchens, The Cat Saw Murder. Miss Rachel Murdock, the highly intelligent 70-year-old amateur sleuth, is not entirely heartbroken when her slovenly, unattractive, bridge-cheating niece is murdered. Miss Rachel is happy to help the socially maladroit and somewhat bumbling Detective Lieutenant Stephen Mayhew, retaining her composure when a second brutal murder occurs. Introduction by Joyce Carol Oates.

Dorothy B. Hughes, Dread Journey. A big-shot Hollywood producer has worked on his magnum opus for years, hiring and firing one beautiful starlet after another. But Kitten Agnew’s contract won’t allow her to be fired, so she fears she might be terminated more permanently. Together with the producer on a train journey from Hollywood to Chicago, Kitten becomes more terrified with each passing mile. Introduction by Sarah Weinman.

Dorothy B. Hughes, Ride the Pink Horse. When Sailor met Willis Douglass, he was just a poor kid who Douglass groomed to work as a confidential secretary. As the senator became increasingly corrupt, he knew he could count on Sailor to clean up his messes. No longer a senator, Douglass flees Chicago for Santa Fe, leaving behind a murder rap and Sailor as the prime suspect. Seeking vengeance, Sailor follows. Introduction by Sara Paretsky.

Dorothy B. Hughes, The So Blue Marble. Set in the glamorous world of New York high society, this novel became a suspense classic as twins from Europe try to steal a rare and beautiful gem owned by an aristocrat whose sister is an even more menacing presence. The New Yorker called it “Extraordinary… [Hughes’] brilliant descriptive powers make and unmake reality.” Introduction by Otto Penzler.

W. Bolingbroke Johnson, The Widening Stain. After a cocktail party, the attractive Lucie Coindreau, a “black-eyed, black-haired Frenchwoman” visits the rare books wing of the library and apparently takes a head-first fall from an upper gallery. Dismissed as a horrible accident, it seems dubious when Professor Hyett is strangled while reading a priceless 12th-century manuscript, which has gone missing. Introduction by Nicholas A. Basbanes

Baynard Kendrick, Blind Man’s Bluff. Blinded in World War II, Duncan Maclain forms a successful private detective agency, aided by his two dogs. Here, he is called on to solve the case of a blind man who plummets from the top of an eight-story building, apparently with no one present except his dead-drunk son. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Baynard Kendrick, The Odor of Violets. Duncan Maclain, a blind former intelligence officer, is asked to investigate the murder of an actor in his Greenwich Village apartment. This would cause a stir at any time but, when the actor possesses secret government plans that then go missing, it’s enough to interest the local police as well as the American government and Maclain, who suspects a German spy plot. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

C. Daly King, Obelists at Sea. On a cruise ship traveling from New York to Paris, the lights of the smoking room briefly go out, a gunshot crashes through the night, and a man is dead. Two detectives are on board but so are four psychiatrists who believe their professional knowledge can solve the case by understanding the psyche of the killer—each with a different theory. Introduction by Martin Edwards.

Jonathan Latimer, Headed for a Hearse. Featuring Bill Crane, the booze-soaked Chicago private detective, this humorous hard-boiled novel was filmed as The Westland Case in 1937 starring Preston Foster. Robert Westland has been framed for the grisly murder of his wife in a room with doors and windows locked from the inside. As the day of his execution nears, he relies on Crane to find the real murderer. Introduction by Max Allan Collins

Lange Lewis, The Birthday Murder. Victoria is a successful novelist and screenwriter and her husband is a movie director so their marriage seems almost too good to be true. Then, on her birthday, her happy new life comes crashing down when her husband is murdered using a method of poisoning that was described in one of her books. She quickly becomes the leading suspect. Introduction by Randal S. Brandt.

Frances and Richard Lockridge, Death on the Aisle. In one of the most beloved books to feature Mr. and Mrs. North, the body of a wealthy backer of a play is found dead in a seat of the 45th Street Theater. Pam is thrilled to engage in her favorite pastime—playing amateur sleuth—much to the annoyance of Jerry, her publisher husband. The Norths inspired a stage play, a film, and long-running radio and TV series. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

John P. Marquand, Your Turn, Mr. Moto. The first novel about Mr. Moto, originally titled No Hero, is the story of a World War I hero pilot who finds himself jobless during the Depression. In Tokyo for a big opportunity that falls apart, he meets a Japanese agent and his Russian colleague and the pilot suddenly finds himself caught in a web of intrigue. Peter Lorre played Mr. Moto in a series of popular films. Introduction by Lawrence Block.

Stuart Palmer, The Penguin Pool Murder. The first adventure of schoolteacher and dedicated amateur sleuth Hildegarde Withers occurs at the New York Aquarium when she and her young students notice a corpse in one of the tanks. It was published in 1931 and filmed the next year, starring Edna May Oliver as the American Miss Marple—though much funnier than her English counterpart. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Stuart Palmer, The Puzzle of the Happy Hooligan. New York City schoolteacher Hildegarde Withers cannot resist “assisting” homicide detective Oliver Piper. In this novel, she is on vacation in Hollywood and on the set of a movie about Lizzie Borden when the screenwriter is found dead. Six comic films about Withers appeared in the 1930s, most successfully starring Edna May Oliver. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Otto Penzler, ed., Golden Age Bibliomysteries. Stories of murder, theft, and suspense occur with alarming regularity in the unlikely world of books and bibliophiles, including bookshops, libraries, and private rare book collections, written by such giants of the mystery genre as Ellery Queen, Cornell Woolrich, Lawrence G. Blochman, Vincent Starrett, and Anthony Boucher. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Otto Penzler, ed., Golden Age Detective Stories. The history of American mystery fiction has its pantheon of authors who have influenced and entertained readers for nearly a century, reaching its peak during the Golden Age, and this collection pays homage to the work of the most acclaimed: Cornell Woolrich, Erle Stanley Gardner, Craig Rice, Ellery Queen, Dorothy B. Hughes, Mary Roberts Rinehart, and more. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Otto Penzler, ed., Golden Age Locked Room Mysteries. The so-called impossible crime category reached its zenith during the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, and this volume includes the greatest of the great authors who mastered the form: John Dickson Carr, Ellery Queen, C. Daly King, Clayton Rawson, and Erle Stanley Gardner. Like great magicians, these literary conjurors will baffle and delight readers. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Ellery Queen, The Adventures of Ellery Queen. These stories are the earliest short works to feature Queen as a detective and are among the best of the author’s fair-play mysteries. So many of the elements that comprise the gestalt of Queen may be found in these tales: alternate solutions, the dying clue, a bizarre crime, and the author’s ability to find fresh variations of works by other authors. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Ellery Queen, The American Gun Mystery. A rodeo comes to New York City at the Colosseum. The headliner is Buck Horne, the once popular film cowboy who opens the show leading a charge of forty whooping cowboys until they pull out their guns and fire into the air. Buck falls to the ground, shot dead. The police instantly lock the doors to search everyone but the offending weapon has completely vanished. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Ellery Queen, The Chinese Orange Mystery. The offices of publisher Donald Kirk have seen strange events but nothing like this. A strange man is found dead with two long spears alongside his back. And, though no one was seen entering or leaving the room, everything has been turned backwards or upside down: pictures face the wall, the victim’s clothes are worn backwards, the rug upside down. Why in the world? Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Ellery Queen, The Dutch Shoe Mystery. Millionaire philanthropist Abagail Doorn falls into a coma and she is rushed to the hospital she funds for an emergency operation by one of the leading surgeons on the East Coast. When she is wheeled into the operating theater, the sheet covering her body is pulled back to reveal her garroted corpse—the first of a series of murders Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Ellery Queen, The Egyptian Cross Mystery. A small-town schoolteacher is found dead, headed, and tied to a T-shaped cross on December 25th, inspiring such sensational headlines as “Crucifixion on Christmas Day.” Amateur sleuth Ellery Queen is so intrigued he travels to Virginia but fails to solve the crime. Then a similar murder takes place on New York’s Long Island—and then another. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Ellery Queen, The Siamese Twin Mystery. When Ellery and his father encounter a raging forest fire on a mountain, their only hope is to drive up to an isolated hillside manor owned by a secretive surgeon and his strange guests. While playing solitaire in the middle of the night, the doctor is shot. The only clue is a torn playing card. Suspects include a society beauty, a valet, and conjoined twins. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Ellery Queen, The Spanish Cape Mystery. Amateur detective Ellery Queen arrives in the resort town of Spanish Cape soon after a young woman and her uncle are abducted by a gun-toting, one-eyed giant. The next day, the woman’s somewhat dicey boyfriend is found murdered—totally naked under a black fedora and opera cloak. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Patrick Quentin, A Puzzle for Fools. Broadway producer Peter Duluth takes to the bottle when his wife dies but enters a sanitarium to dry out. Malevolent events plague the hospital, including when Peter hears his own voice intone, “There will be murder.” And there is. He investigates, aided by a young woman who is also a patient. This is the first of nine mysteries featuring Peter and Iris Duluth. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Clayton Rawson, Death from a Top Hat. When the New York City Police Department is baffled by an apparently impossible crime, they call on The Great Merlini, a retired stage magician who now runs a Times Square magic shop. In his first case, two occultists have been murdered in a room locked from the inside, their bodies positioned to form a pentagram. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Craig Rice, Eight Faces at Three. Gin-soaked John J. Malone, defender of the guilty, is notorious for getting his culpable clients off. It’s the innocent ones who are problems. Like Holly Inglehart, accused of piercing the black heart of her well-heeled aunt Alexandria with a lovely Florentine paper cutter. No one who knew the old battle-ax liked her, but Holly’s prints were found on the murder weapon. Introduction by Lisa Lutz.

Craig Rice, Home Sweet Homicide. Known as the Dorothy Parker of mystery fiction for her memorable wit, Craig Rice was the first detective writer to appear on the cover of Time magazine. This comic mystery features two kids who are trying to find a husband for their widowed mother while she’s engaged in sleuthing. Filmed with the same title in 1946 with Peggy Ann Garner and Randolph Scott. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Mary Roberts Rinehart, The Album. Crescent Place is a quiet enclave of wealthy people in which nothing ever happens—until a bedridden old woman is attacked by an intruder with an ax. The New York Times stated: “All Mary Roberts Rinehart mystery stories are good, but this one is better.” Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Mary Roberts Rinehart, The Haunted Lady. The arsenic in her sugar bowl was wealthy widow Eliza Fairbanks’ first clue that somebody wanted her dead. Nightly visits of bats, birds, and rats, obviously aimed at scaring the dowager to death, was the second. Eliza calls the police, who send nurse Hilda Adams, the amateur sleuth they refer to as “Miss Pinkerton,” to work undercover to discover the culprit. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Mary Roberts Rinehart, Miss Pinkerton. Hilda Adams is a nurse, not a detective, but she is observant and smart and so it is common for Inspector Patton to call on her for help. Her success results in his calling her “Miss Pinkerton.” The New Republic wrote: “From thousands of hearts and homes the cry will go up: Thank God for Mary Roberts Rinehart.” Introduction by Carolyn Hart.

Mary Roberts Rinehart, The Red Lamp. Professor William Porter refuses to believe that the seaside manor he’s just inherited is haunted but he has to convince his wife to move in. However, he soon sees evidence of the occult phenomena of which the townspeople speak. Whether it is a spirit or a human being, Porter accepts that there is a connection to the rash of murders that have terrorized the countryside. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Mary Roberts Rinehart, The Wall. For two decades, Mary Roberts Rinehart was the second-best-selling author in America (only Sinclair Lewis outsold her) and was beloved for her tales of suspense. In a magnificent mansion, the ex-wife of one of the owners turns up making demands and is found dead the next day. And there are more dark secrets lying behind the walls of the estate. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Joel Townsley Rogers, The Red Right Hand. This extraordinary whodunnit that is as puzzling as it is terrifying was identified by crime fiction scholar Jack Adrian as “one of the dozen or so finest mystery novels of the 20th century.” A deranged killer sends a doctor on a quest for the truth—deep into the recesses of his own mind—when he and his bride-to-be elope but pick up a terrifying sharp-toothed hitch-hiker. Introduction by Joe R. Lansdale.

Roger Scarlett, Cat’s Paw. The family of the wealthy old bachelor Martin Greenough cares far more about his money than they do about him. For his birthday, he invites all his potential heirs to his mansion to tell them what they hope to hear. Before he can disburse funds, however, he is murdered, and the Boston Police Department’s big problem is that there are too many suspects. Introduction by Curtis Evans

Vincent Starrett, Dead Man Inside. 1930s Chicago is a tough town but some crimes are more bizarre than others. Customers arrive at a haberdasher to find a corpse in the window and a sign on the door: Dead Man Inside! I am Dead. The store will not open today. This is just one of a series of odd murders that terrorizes the city. Reluctant detective Walter Ghost leaps into action to learn what is behind the plague. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

Vincent Starrett, The Great Hotel Murder. Theater critic and amateur sleuth Riley Blackwood investigates a murder in a Chicago hotel where the dead man had changed rooms with a stranger who had registered under a fake name. The New York Times described it as “an ingenious plot with enough complications to keep the reader guessing.” Introduction by Lyndsay Faye.

Vincent Starrett, Murder on ‘B’ Deck. Walter Ghost, a psychologist, scientist, explorer, and former intelligence officer, is on a cruise ship and his friend novelist Dunsten Mollock, a Nigel Bruce-like Watson whose role is to offer occasional comic relief, accommodates when he fails to leave the ship before it takes off. Although they make mistakes along the way, the amateur sleuths solve the shipboard murders. Introduction by Ray Betzner.

Phoebe Atwood Taylor, The Cape Cod Mystery. Vacationers have flocked to Cape Cod to avoid the heat wave that hit the Northeast and find their holiday unpleasant when the area is flooded with police trying to find the murderer of a muckraking journalist who took a cottage for the season. Finding a solution falls to Asey Mayo, “the Cape Cod Sherlock,” known for his worldly wisdom, folksy humor, and common sense. Introduction by Otto Penzler.

S. S. Van Dine, The Benson Murder Case. The first of 12 novels to feature Philo Vance, the most popular and influential detective character of the early part of the 20th century. When wealthy stockbroker Alvin Benson is found shot to death in a locked room in his mansion, the police are baffled until the erudite flaneur and art collector arrives on the scene. Paramount filmed it in 1930 with William Powell as Vance. Introduction by Ragnar Jónasson.

Cornell Woolrich, The Bride Wore Black. The first suspense novel by one of the greatest of all noir authors opens with a bride and her new husband walking out of the church. A car speeds by, shots ring out, and he falls dead at her feet. Determined to avenge his death, she tracks down everyone in the car, concluding with a shocking surprise. It was filmed by Francois Truffaut in 1968, starring Jeanne Moreau. Introduction by Eddie Muller.

Cornell Woolrich, Deadline at Dawn. Quinn is overcome with guilt about having robbed a stranger’s home. He meets Bricky, a dime-a-dance girl, and they fall for each other. When they return to the crime scene, they discover a dead body. Knowing Quinn will be accused of the crime, they race to find the true killer before he’s arrested. A 1946 film starring Susan Hayward was loosely based on the plot. Introduction by David Gordon.

Cornell Woolrich, Waltz into Darkness. A New Orleans businessman successfully courts a woman through the mail but he is shocked to find when she arrives that she is not the plain brunette whose picture he’d received but a radiant blond beauty. She soon absconds with his fortune. Wracked with disappointment and loneliness, he vows to track her down. When he finds her, the real nightmare begins. Introduction by Wallace Stroby.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

MARCO PAGE (1908–1968) was the mystery pseudonym of novelist, playwright, and screenwriter Harry Kurnitz. His first book, Fast Company, won the Dodd, Mead Red Badge Prize for Best First Mystery Novel. He wrote only a few more novels but is credited with over forty screenplays, including Witness for the Prosecution, several Thin Man pictures, and William Wyler’s How to Steal a Million.

NICHOLAS A. BASBANES is the author of cultural history, with a particular emphasis on various aspects of books, book history, and book culture. In addition to his books, Basbanes has written for numerous newspapers, magazines, and journals, including The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and Washington Post, and lectures widely on a variety of cultural subjects. Among his most well-known titles are A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes, and the Eternal Passion for Books and On Paper: The Everything of Its Two Thousand Year History.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Published in 2026 by Penzler Publishers

58 Warren Street, New York, NY 10007

penzlerpublishers.com

Distributed by Simon & Schuster

Copyright © 1938 by Harry Kurnitz.

Introduction copyright © 2026 by Nicholas A. Basbanes.

All rights reserved.

Cover image: Andy Ross

Cover design: Mauricio Diaz

Paperback ISBN 978-1-61316-832-5

Hardcover ISBN 978-1-61316-831-8

eBook ISBN 978-1-61316-833-2

Library of Congress Control Number: 2026935012