American Sherlocks Nick Rennison (best big ereader txt) 📖

pointed to one that opened at the rear corner of the rathskeller, apparently on a side street. ‘He was so drunk he couldn’t hardly walk, and he almost fell into the seat. I was goin’ to put him out, we closed in half an hour, an’ I didn’t want to have to throw no drunks in the street. But he wanted a whisky and –’ The waiter flushed and stopped.

‘Go on,’ prodded Colton.

The waiter looked at the proprietor and gulped nervously. ‘He gave me a five-spot, an’ told me to keep the change. I was bringin’ the drink when the other two came in. I got theirs, and went up front to figger my checks. Then I heard the shot. When I thought of the drunk again he was gone. But he couldn’t ’a’ done nothin’. He had a horrible bun, an’ we seen the gun layin’ in front of this guy.’ He indicated Rogers. ‘Me an’ the bartender figgered we wouldn’t say nothin’ about him. If we did the police’d put us in the detention till they found him. His gettin’ out like that would ’a’ looked suspicious to them if it didn’t to nobody else. He was scared sober an’ beat it quick. That’s my idear.’

‘Probably he’d had an experience in the house of detention, too,’ declared the blind man dryly; then: ‘You never saw him before?’

‘No, sir.’

‘That’s all. Let’s go, chief. There’s a detail I want to clear up at the theatre. I’ve got to prove that girl’s murder.’ Again there was the ominous ring in the problemist’s voice.

The chief glowered at the waiter. ‘You stay right here till I want you,’ he warned. ‘If you try to beat it you go up the river.’ He turned to Colton. ‘Wait a minute, until I call up headquarters. I’ll give ’em the description of that drunk, and have every man in the city on his trail.’

‘And spend a week following up clues,’ snapped the blind man impatiently. ‘I’ll show you where he is in less than an hour!’

He paid no further attention to the gaping chief of detectives, but made his way out of the place, the silent Sydney Thames at his elbow, the latter’s coat sleeve lightly touching that of Thornley Colton. And the chief followed meekly.

The blind man climbed into the front seat with the driver, and Sydney realized that he wanted to avoid interrogation; to figure out the last steps alone. But in the tonneau the men could not resist voicing the questions that filled their minds. Who had killed Miss Reynolds, and what could have been the object of the murder? What connection could a drunken man have with the murder of Cartwright; with a pistol that had been fired without the aid of human hands?

They were at the theatre. The box-office had just been opened for the day, and the manager took them into the darkened house. The big interior, dim and tomblike, sent a shudder through Sydney Thames. Last night there had been brilliant lights, happy men, laughing women – and the girl of the violin. Today the great stage gaped before them, huge, untenanted; the seats were covered with their white dust cloths; voices sounded eerie in the barnlike emptiness. The velvet hangings at the rear of the box, which had looked so striking with their sleek blackness the night before, now appeared worn and dusty. The overturned chairs had been righted, the blood-stained carpet had been replaced.

Thornley Colton’s thin stick located the chairs. His right hand groped along the wall, so that the velvet moved under it. He thrust his slim cane under his arm, and the wonderful fingers went over the velvet inch by inch, sometimes so strongly that the thick stuff moved under them, then the pressure was so light that not a quiver of the loose velvet betrayed their presence. Inch by inch the feeling fingers made their way, as the men watched breathlessly.

Rogers could stand it no longer.

‘Was the murderer concealed behind those hangings?’ he asked excitedly.

‘No,’ Colton answered him, without moving. ‘The pistol flash came from this side of the velvet.’

Silence came again. The slow-moving fingers stopped. The blind man looked up; then his doubly keen ears caught the sound of hurrying footsteps coming toward them down the aisle.

‘A telephone message for me?’ he asked, as the attaché stopped.

‘Mr Colton?’

‘Yes.’ He turned to the others. ‘Come! I think this is the last detail.’

They were at his heels as he entered the boxlike office. Tense, expectant, though they knew not for what, they listened to the one-sided conversation.

‘Yes. Good. Did you see him? No, that’s all right. Stay there until we come.’ He spoke an aside to the ticket-seller: ‘Will you please take this address for me?’ The man picked up his pencil and drew a small pad toward him. ‘Nine hundred and ninety-seven West Forty-fourth.’ The blind man hung up the receiver.

‘What is it?’ The question was chorused by the excited men.

‘The address of the man who murdered Cartwright and Miss Reynolds!’

IV

Before the gasps of amazement, the ejaculations of incredulity could become coherent questions, Thornley Colton had turned and made his way from the office, light stick dangling idly from his fingers. Dazedly they followed him from the theatre and into the waiting automobile. He had located the murderer of Cartwright and the girl! They were dumb with the wonder of it. Swiftly, unerringly, the blind man had found the murderer whose very being they had not suspected a short time before. To the men who had followed every step of the problemist, who had seen things that he could not see, the finding seemed magic comparable only to the magic of the pistol that had apparently flown from the air to deal its death. There was a new expression on the face of the chief of detectives now. The scowl was gone; the sarcastic curve of lips had vanished. In their place had come wonder, tinged with awe toward the man who had builded