The Philo Vance Megapack. S.S. Van Dine
further proof pointing to her being at Benson’s. My man learned, at the woman’s apartment house, that actually she did not get home until shortly after one. Moreover, she was without gloves and handbag and had to be let in to her rooms with a passkey, because, as she explained, she had lost hers. As you remember, we found the key in her bag. And—to clinch the whole matter—the smoked cigarettes in the grate corresponded to the one you found in her case.”
Markham paused to relight his cigar.
“So much for that particular evening,” he resumed. “As soon as I learned the woman’s identity this morning, I put two more men to work on her private life. Just as I was leaving the office this noon the men phoned in their reports. They had learned that the woman has a fiancé, a chap named Leacock, who was a captain in the army, and who would be likely to own just such a gun as Benson was killed with. Furthermore, this Captain Leacock lunched with the woman the day of the murder and also called on her at her apartment the morning after.”
Markham leaned slightly forward, and his next words were emphasized by the tapping of his fingers on the arm of the chair.
“As you see, we have the motive, the opportunity, and the means.… Perhaps you will tell me now that I possess no incriminating evidence.”
“My dear Markham,” Vance affirmed calmly, “you haven’t brought out a single point which could not easily be explained away by any bright schoolboy.” He shook his head lugubriously. “And on such evidence people are deprived of their life and liberty! ’Pon my word, you alarm me. I tremble for my personal safety.”
Markham was nettled.
“Would you be so good as to point out, from your dizzy pinnacle of sapience, the errors in my reasoning?”
“As far as I can see,” returned Vance evenly, “your particularization concerning the lady is innocent of reasoning. You’ve simply taken several unaffined facts and jumped to a false conclusion. I happen to know the conclusion is false because all the psychological indications of the crime contradict it—that is to say, the only real evidence in the case points unmistakably in another direction.”
He made a gesture of emphasis, and his tone assumed an unwonted gravity.
“And if you arrest any woman for killing Alvin Benson, you will simply be adding another crime—a crime of delib’rate and unpardonable stupidity—to the one already committed. And between shooting a bounder like Benson and ruining an innocent woman’s reputation, I’m inclined to regard the latter as the more reprehensible.”
I could see a flash of resentment leap into Markham’s eyes; but he did not take offense. Remember: these two men were close friends; and, for all their divergency of nature, they understood and respected each other. Their frankness—severe and even mordant at times—was, indeed, a result of that respect.
There was a moment’s silence; then Markham forced a smile. “You fill me with misgivings,” he averred mockingly; but, despite the lightness of his tone, I felt that he was half in earnest. “However, I hadn’t exactly planned to arrest the lady just yet.”
“You reveal commendable restraint,” Vance complimented him. “But I’m sure you’ve already arranged to ballyrag the lady and perhaps trick her into one or two of those contradictions so dear to every lawyer’s heart—just as if any nervous or high-strung person could help indulging in apparent contradictions while being cross-questioned as a suspect in a crime they had nothing to do with.… To ‘put ’em on the grill’—a most accurate designation. So reminiscent of burning people at the stake, what?”
“Well, I’m most certainly going to question her,” replied Markham firmly, glancing at his watch. “And one of my men is escorting her to the office in half an hour; so I must break up this most delightful and edifying chat.”
“You really expect to learn something incriminating by interrogating her?” asked Vance. “Y’ know, I’d jolly well like to witness your humiliation. But I presume your heckling of suspects is a part of the legal arcana.”
Markham had risen and turned toward the door, but at Vance’s words he paused and appeared to deliberate. “I can’t see any particular objection to your being present,” he said, “if you really care to come.”
I think he had an idea that the humiliation of which the other had spoken would prove to be Vance’s own; and soon we were in a taxicab headed for the Criminal Courts Building.
CHAPTER 7
REPORTS AND AN INTERVIEW
(Saturday, June 15; 3 P.M.)
We entered the ancient building, with its discolored marble pillars and balustrades and its old-fashioned iron scrollwork, by the Franklin Street door and went directly to the district attorney’s office on the fourth floor. The office, like the building, breathed an air of former days. Its high ceilings, its massive golden-oak woodwork, its elaborate low-hung chandelier of bronze and china, its dingy bay walls of painted plaster, and its four high narrow windows to the south—all bespoke a departed era in architecture and decoration.
On the floor was a large velvet carpet-rug of dingy brown; and the windows were hung with velour draperies of the same color. Several large, comfortable chairs stood about the walls and before the long oak table in front of the district attorney’s desk. This desk, directly under the windows and facing the room, was broad and flat, with carved uprights and two rows of drawers extending to the floor. To the right of the high-backed swivel desk-chair, was another table of carved oak. There were also several filing cabinets in the room and a large safe. In the center of the east wall a leather-covered door, decorated with large brass nailheads, led into a long narrow room, between the office and the waiting room, where the district attorney’s secretary and several clerks had their desks. Opposite to this door was another one opening into the district attorney’s inner sanctum; and still another door, facing the windows, gave on the main corridor.
Vance glanced over the room casually.
“So this is the matrix of municipal justice—eh, what?” He walked to one of the windows and looked out upon the gray circular tower of the Tombs opposite. “And there, I take it, are the oubliettes where the victims of our law are incarc’rated so as to reduce the competition of criminal activity among the remaining citizenry. A most distressin’ sight, Markham.”
The district attorney had sat down at his desk and was glancing at several notations on his blotter.
“There are a couple of my men waiting to see me,” he remarked, without looking up; “so, if you’ll be good enough to take a chair over here, I’ll proceed with my humble efforts to undermine society still further.”
He pressed a button under the edge of his desk, and an alert young man with thick-lensed glasses appeared at the door.
“Swacker, tell Phelps to come in,” Markham ordered. “And also tell Springer, if he’s back from lunch, that I want to see him in a few minutes.”
The secretary disappeared, and a moment later a tall, hawk-faced man, with stoop shoulders and an awkward, angular gait, entered.
“What news?” asked Markham.
“Well, Chief,” the detective replied in a low, grating voice, “I just found out something I thought you could use right away. After I reported this noon, I ambled around to this Captain Leacock’s house, thinking I might learn something from the houseboys, and ran into the captain coming out. I tailed along; and he went straight up to the lady’s house on the Drive and stayed there over an hour. Then he went back home, looking worried.”
Markham considered a moment.
“It may mean nothing at all, but I’m glad to know it anyway. St. Clair’ll be here in a few minutes, and I’ll find out what she has to say. There’s nothing else for today.… Tell Swacker to send Tracy in.”
Tracy was the antithesis of Phelps. He was short, a trifle stout, and exuded an atmosphere of studied suavity. His face was rotund and genial; he wore a pince