The Four of Hearts (15 page)

‘But how are you going to get away with whatever you're trying to get away with?' asked Ty with a faint smile.

‘Remember the Ohippi case? I had something to do with solving it, and this' – he opened his hand – ‘is a token of your
pueblo
's gratitude, up to and including Glücke, poor devil. Honorary Deputy Commissioner's badge. Look tough, you two, and keep your mouths shut.'

He walked down the corridor to a door with a pebbled glass front on which was daubed in unimposing black letters:

INTERNATIONAL MAILERS, INC.

T. H. LUCEY

Los Angeles Division

The office proved to be a box-like chamber with one streaky window, a scratched filing cabinet, a telephone, a littered desk, and a dusty chair. In the chair sat a depressed-looking man of forty-odd with thinning hair carefully plastered to his skull. He was sucking a lollipop morosely as he read a dog-eared copy of
True Murder Stories.

‘You Lucey?' growled Ellery, fists in his pockets.

The stick of the lollipop tilted belligerently as Mr. Lucey swung about. His fishy eyes examined the three faces.

‘Yeah. So what?'

Ellery withdrew his right hand from his pocket, opened his fist, permitted the mote-choked sun to touch the gold badge in his palm for a moment, and returned the badge to his pocket.

‘Headquarters,' he said gruffly. ‘Few questions we want to ask you.'

‘Dicks, huh.' The man took the lollipop out of his mouth. ‘Go peddle your eggs somewheres else. I ain't done nothin.'

‘Climb down, buddy. What kind of business do you run?'

‘Say, whadda ya think this is, Russia?' Mr. Lucey slammed the magazine down and rose, a vision of American indignation. ‘We run a legitimate racket, Mister, and you got no right to question me about it! Say,' he added suspiciously, ‘you from the Fed'ral gov'ment?'

Ellery, who had not anticipated this sturdy resistance, felt helpless. But when he heard Lew Bascom snicker his back stiffened. ‘You going to talk now or do we have to take you downtown?'

Mr. Lucey frowned judiciously. Then he stuck the lollipop back into his mouth. ‘Aw right,' he grumbled. ‘Though I don't see why you gotta bother me. I'm only the agent here for the company. Why don't you get in touch with the gen'ral manager? Our main office is in –'

‘Don't give a hoot. I asked you what kind of business you run here.'

‘We take orders from folk to mail letters, packages, greeting cards – any kind o' mailable matter – at specified dates from specified places.' He jerked his thumb towards a profusely curlicued bronze plaque on the wall. ‘There's our motto: “Any Time, Any Where”.'

‘In other words I could leave a dozen letters with you and you would mail one from Pasadena tomorrow, the next one next week from Washington, D. C., and so on, according to my instructions?'

‘That's the ticket. We got branch offices everywhere. But what's this Ogpu business? Congress pass another law?'

Ellery tossed an envelope on the man's desk. ‘Did you mail this envelope?'

The man looked at it, brows drawn in. Ellery watched him, trying hard to preserve the indifferent expression of the professional detective. He heard Lew and Ty breathing stertorously behind him.

‘Sure thing,' said Mr. Lucey at last. ‘Mailed it – let's see; Tuesday, I think it was. Tuesday late. So what?'

Ellery preened himself. His companions looked awed.

‘So what?' said Ellery sternly. ‘Take a look at the name and address, Lucey!'

Mr. Lucey's lollipop stick tilted again as he bridled; but he looked, and the stick dipped like the mast of a flag being struck, and his mouth opened, and the lollipop fell out.

‘B-Blythe Stuart!' he stuttered. His demeanour altered instantly to one of cringing apology. ‘Say, Officer, I didn't reco'nize – I didn't know –'

‘Then you mailed the others, too, didn't you?'

‘Yes, sir. Yes, sir, we did.' Mr. Lucey betrayed liquid signs of an inner warmth. ‘Why, even now, even just now when you showed it to me, I read the name, but it sort of didn't register … I mean I spotted it because it looked familiar. The name –'

‘Don't you read the names and addresses on mailable matter when you contract to take a job?'

‘We don't contract. I mean – no sir, I don't. I mean why should I? Get stuff to mail, and we mail ‘em. Look, Officer, did you ever have to do the same thing day in day out for years? Look, I don't know nothin' about these murders. I'm innocent. I got a wife and three kids. People just give us mail, see? Salesmen. People tryin' to put the dog on with their customers – as if they had branches in diff'rent cities, stuff like that –'

‘And husbands supposed to be in one city but actually being in another,' said Ellery. ‘Sure, I know. Well, keep your shirt on, Mr. Lucey; nobody's accused you of being mixed up in this thing. We just want your cooperation.'

‘Cooperation? That's me, that's me, Officer.'

‘Tell me about this transaction. You must have records.'

The man swabbed his damp face. ‘Yes, sir,' he said humbly. ‘Just a minute while I look it up.'

The three men exchanged glances as Lucey stooped over his filing cabinet. Then they stared expectantly at the man.

‘Who put this particular order through, Mr. Lucey?' asked Ellery casually. ‘What was the name of this customer?'

‘I think,' said Lucey, red-faced as he struggled with the file, ‘I think … it was … somebody named Smith.'

‘Oh,' said Ellery; and he heard Ty curse under his breath. ‘What did this fellow Smith look like?'

‘Dunno,' said Lucey, panting. ‘He didn't come here in person, as I remember; sent the batch of letters in a package, with a note inside and a five-dollar bill. Here it is.'

He straightened up, triumphant, waving a large manila envelope bearing a handwritten legend ‘Egbert L. Smith'.

Ellery seized the envelope, took one swift look at its contents, closed it, and tucked it under his arm.

‘But it's still in our “Open” file,' protested Lucey. ‘There's still one letter in there to be mailed.'

‘Blythe Stuart won't need it any more. Did you have any further correspondence with this man Smith?'

‘No, sir.'

‘Did he ever call up, or show up in person?'

‘No, sir.'

‘Well, Lucey, you've been a great help. Keep your mouth shut about this. Understand?'

‘Yes,
sir
,' said Mr. Lucey eagerly.

‘And if this Smith ever should write, or call up, you can get me at this number.' Ellery scribbled his name and telephone number on the man's magazine. ‘Come on, boys.'

The last thing he saw as he closed the door was Mr. Lucey stooping, dazed, to pick up his fallen lollipop.

CHAPTER 13

MR. QUEEN, LOGICIAN

They dodged guiltily around the corner and hurried down Vine Street. When they were safely hidden in a private booth at the Brown Derby they all looked relieved.

Lew was fat with laughter. ‘I'd like to see Glücke's face when he hears about this,' he choked, wiping his eyes dry. ‘That deadpan won't talk – much. He'll tell his wife and his cuties and his pals. Say, I'll bet he's on the phone right now!'

‘I'll have to make it up to Glücke some way,' said Ellery contritely. ‘He doesn't even know these letters exist.'

‘For God's sake, Queen,' said Ty, ‘what's in that envelope?'

Ellery took from the manila envelope a letter,
sans
envelope; a typewritten schedule on a letterhead of International Mailers, Inc.; and a single envelope, sealed, addressed to Blythe Stuart in the scratchy, pale blue-ink block letters of the previous messages. Attached to this envelope by a steel clip was a slip of memorandum paper bearing a typed date.

‘Mr. Egbert L. Smith's letter,' said Ellery, scanning it slowly. Then he passed it over to Ty.

Ty read it eagerly, Lew squinting over his shoulder. The letter had been typewritten on a sheet of white ‘second' paper of the flimsiest, cheapest grade. It was dated the twenty-seventh of the previous month.

International Mailers, Inc.

Hollywood Blvd & Vine St

Hollywood, Calif.

GENTLEMEN
,

I have seen your ad in today's paper saying you run a mailing service and wish to avail myself of this service.

I have certain letters which must be mailed to a customer of mine on certain dates, but I find I have to leave town for an indefinite period and may not be in a position to keep up my correspondence, so I am enclosing the letters in the package with a five-dollar bill, not knowing what your rates are and not having time to make inquiries. I am sure the five dollars will more than take care of stamps and your charge.

You will find the envelopes bound by an elastic. I wish them mailed in Hollywood
in the order in which they are stacked
, the top one first, the one under the top one second, and so on. This is very important. Here is a schedule of dates for mailing:

(1) Monday 11th (next month)

(2) Thursday 14th (,,)

(3) Saturday 16th (,,) –
special delivery

(4) Tuesday 19th (,,)

(5) Thursday 28th (,,)

Thanking you in advance, I am,

Very truly yours,

E
GBERT
L. S
MITH

P.S. –
Please note letter No. 3 is to be mailed special delivery. This is to ensure its arriving on Sunday the 17th, when there is no regular mail.

E. L. S.

‘Damned Borgia didn't even
sign
his phony name,' muttered Ty.

‘An irritating but wise precaution,' said Ellery drily. ‘No handwriting, no clue. And no address. Note, too, the carefully innocuous phraseology. Neither illiterate nor erudite. With a distinct business-man flavour, as if Mr. Egbert L. Smith were exactly what he was pretending to be.'

‘Say, this letter was typed on Jack Royle's machine!' exclaimed Lew. ‘If what you said yesterday was true, Queen. Look at the broken serifs on those h's and r's. I think we ought to turn this over to Glücke pronto.'

Ellery nodded, picking up the sheet of the company stationery. ‘This is just Lucey's schedule, copied verbatim from the list in Smith's letter. Of course, the name is fictitious. And I imagine the paper will be found to be sterile of fingerprints.'

A waiter came to hover over them, and Ty said absently: ‘Brandy.'

Lew said: ‘Greetings, Gene.'

‘Double drinks, Mr. Bascom?'

‘Bring a bottle, for gossake. Can't you see I got a sucker? The fifteen-year Monnet.'

The waiter grinned and padded away.

‘Let's see,' murmured Ellery, ‘what the last letter in Mr. Smith's kitbag had to say. The one that hadn't yet been mailed.'

He ripped off one end of the sealed envelope and squeezed. A blue-backed playing-card dropped out.

The card was the ace of spades.

It was unnecessary to refer to the code sheet Ellery had found in John Royle's dressing-room.

All the world and his wife and children knew the cartomantic significance of the ace of spades.

‘Death,' said Ty nervously. ‘That's … But it came – I mean it was scheduled to come – She was killed
before
it came.'

‘Exactly the point,' said Ellery, fingering the card.

‘You and your points,' snorted Lew. ‘How about tipping your mitt for a change?'

Ellery sat gazing at the card, and the envelope, and the memorandum slip attached to the envelope.

‘One thing is sure,' said Ty, his face screwed up. ‘It's the baldest kind of frame-up. Somebody had it in for Blythe and framed dad for the crime. Dad's feud with Blythe furnished an ideal background for a frame-up, gave him a motive. And anybody could have got to that typewriter of dad's.'

‘Eh?' said Ellery absently.

‘It's true the date on this “Smith's” note – twenty-seventh of last month – ought to give us a clue to where the note was typed; I mean as between the dressing-room on the lot and our house. But, damn it, dad was always lugging the machine from one place to the other. I can't remember in which place it was before the twenty-seventh.'

‘Why did he have a typewriter, Ty?'

‘To answer fan mail. He despised secretaries and liked to correspond personally with the writers of the more interesting letters he received. Hobby of his. He wouldn't let the studio handle it at all. As a matter of fact, I do the same thing.'

‘You say anyone could have used his machine?'

‘The whole population of Hollywood,' groaned Ty. ‘You know what our house was like, Lew, when dad was alive – a club for every hooch-hound in town.'

‘Am I supposed to take that personally?' chuckled Lew.

‘And dad's dressing-room was a hangout for everybody on the lot. He was framed, all right – by someone who got hold of the typewriter either in the house or on the lot.' He scowled. ‘Somebody? It could have been anybody!'

‘But what I can't understand,' said Lew, ‘is why this palooka Smith planned for two letters to be mailed to Blythe
after
she died. That in itself would screw up a frame against Jack, because Jack was knocked off, too; and dead men send no mail. And if Jack was meant to be framed, why was he murdered? It don't make sense.'

‘That,' said Ty between his teeth, ‘is what I'd like to know.'

‘I believe,' murmured Ellery, ‘we'll get along better if we take this problem scientifically. That alternate inference I mentioned this morning, by the way, was arrived at by mere common sense. On the assumption that the writer of those addresses was sane, not a crank, it was evident that the only sane reason ascribable to the fact that a letter was mailed to Blythe
after
Blythe's death was … that
the writer had no control over the source of mailing.
'

‘I see,' said Ty slowly. ‘That's what made you think of a mailing service.'

‘Precisely. I stopped in at the post-office on the off-chance that the writer may have arranged to have the letters mailed directly by the postmaster. But of course that was a far-fetched possibility. The only other one was an organization which made a business of mailing letters for people.'

‘But if Smith murdered Blythe and dad, why didn't he try to get the last two letters back from the outfit around the corner before they were mailed? Lucey said himself there's been no such attempt.'

‘And lay himself wide open to future identification?' jeered Lew. ‘Act your age, younker.'

The waiter arrived bearing a bottle of brandy, a siphon, and three glasses. Lew rubbed his hands and seized the bottle.

‘Of course,' said Ellery, ‘that's perfectly true.'

‘As a matter of fact, why those last two letters at all?'

Ellery leaned back, clutching the glass Lew had filled. ‘An important question, with an important answer. Have you noticed the date, you two, on which our friend Smith intended this last letter to be mailed – the envelope bearing the unfriendly ace of spades?'

Lew looked over his glass. Ty merely looked. The date typed on the memorandum slip clipped to the envelope containing the ace of spades was ‘Thursday the 28th'.

‘I don't see the point,' said Ty, frowning.

‘Simple enough. What were the two cards mailed in one envelope to Blythe on Thursday the fourteenth – the envelope that arrived on Friday the fifteenth, two days before the murder?'

‘I don't recall.'

‘The ten of spades and the deuce of clubs, meaning together: “Great trouble in two days or two weeks.” The fact that the murders did actually occur two days after the receipt of that message was a mere coincidence. For what do we find now?' He tapped the card and envelope before him. ‘The ace of spades in this unmailed envelope meaning “Death”, is clearly marked for mailing on Thursday the twenty-eighth, for receipt by Blythe on Friday the twenty-ninth. So the murder of Blythe was obviously planned to occur not earlier than the twenty-ninth; or in other words she was scheduled to die, not two days, but two
weeks
after the Friday-the-fifteenth warning of “Great trouble”.'

‘A week from today,' growled Ty. ‘If he hadn't changed his plans, Blythe would still be alive. And dad, too.'

‘Exactly the point. For what was the murderer's original plan? To murder Blythe –
Blythe alone.
Corroboration? The fact that the playing-cards were sent only to Blythe, that the ace of spades was meant to go, as you can see by the address on the envelope, only to Blythe. Also the plan included a frame-up of Jack for the murder of Blythe when it should occur – witness the use of Jack's typewriter in the typing of the code-sheet, the planting of the code-sheet in his dressing-room.'

‘Well?'

‘But what actually happened? Blythe was murdered, all right – but
NOT
alone. Jack was murdered, too. What made the murderer change his plans? What made him murder not only Blythe, as originally planned, but Jack as well the very man scheduled to take the rap for that murder?'

They were both silent, frowning back at him.

‘That, as I see it, is the most significant question arising out of the whole chain of events. Answer that question and I believe you'll be well on the road to an answer to everything.'

‘Yeah, answer it,' muttered Lew into his brandy. ‘I still say it's baloney.'

‘But what I don't understand,' protested Ty, ‘is why the date was advanced. Why did Smith hurry up his crime? It seems to me he could have waited until the ace of spades was delivered and then murdered the two of them. But he didn't. He abandoned his own time-schedule, the whole elaborate machinery of the letters which he had set up. Why?'

‘Opportunity,' said Ellery succinctly. ‘It's more difficult, you know, to contrive the killing of two people than of one. And the honeymoon jaunt in your plane gave Smith an opportunity to kill
both
Blythe and jack which he simply couldn't pass up.'

‘As the situation stands, then, the frame-up against dad is a flop and the murderer knows it.'

‘But there's nothing he can do about that except make an effort to get back the letters and the code list, and particularly his own tell-tale note in the files of the mailing company. As Lew suggested, he probably figured the relative risks involved and chose not to make the attempt.'

‘At least we've got enough to convince Bonnie of the absurdity of her suspicions against dad. What you've just said proves dad was another victim, that's all. Queen, would you –'

‘Would I what?' Ellery emerged from a cavernous reverie.

‘Would you tell that to Bonnie? Clear dad for me?'

Ellery rubbed his jaw. ‘And you, I take it?'

‘Well … yes.'

‘Now don't worry about anything, Ty,' said Ellery with a sudden briskness. ‘Forget this mess. Go out and get some exercise. Or go on a bat for a couple of weeks. Why not take a vacation?'

‘Leave Hollywood now?' Ty looked grim. ‘Not a chance.'

‘Don't be idiotic. You're only in the way here.'

‘Queen's right,' said Lew. ‘The picture's out, and I know Butch'll give you a vacation. After all, he's engaged to the girl.' He giggled.

Ty smiled and got to his feet. ‘Coming?'

‘I think I'll sit here and cogitate for a while.' Ellery surreptitiously glanced at his wrist-watch. ‘Think it over, Ty. Here, never mind the check! I'll take care of it.'

Lew clutched the bottle to his bosom, reaching with his free hand for his hat. ‘My pal.'

Ty waved wearily and plodded off, followed a little erratically by Lew.

And Mr. Queen sat and cogitated with an unusually perturbed expression in his usually expressionless eyes.