“Darned,” exclaimed her husband, “if you aren’t getting to sound more like Masters every minute!”
“That,” said Nancy, “is because I’m beginning to think like him.”
12
There were several things that Lieutenant Masters had to do at headquarters the next morning, the foremost of which was to convince his chief that further investigation of the Connor case was justified. More, that it was mandatory; and Masters said so as clearly as he could.
“Are you sure, Gus?” the chief said. “By God, you’d better be.”
“I’m sure,” Masters said. “I’d be tickled to death to drop the case if I weren’t.”
“But you have to have something to base it on. And don’t bother to tell me again about the air-conditioners and the key that’s missing. Accentuate the positive.”
“Well, there’s something I got onto yesterday. It almost got past me, it was so obvious.”
“Well, well?”
“It’s evidence that Lila Connor was murdered by someone not her husband, who probably murdered her husband, too.”
“There you go again! Damn it, if ever there was a case that seemed closed as soon as it opened, this was it! All right, Gus. What’s this evidence you’re talking about?”
“Yesterday afternoon I was sitting here wondering whether to go on or give the case up, and all of a sudden I remembered something I’d seen in Connor’s office. I remembered seeing him lying on the sofa there, his right arm dangling over the side. He was in his shirt sleeves, and on his wrist below the edge of the cuff was a watch. On his right wrist. It’s not incontrovertible, but it strongly indicated that Larry Connor must have been left-handed. So I called his secretary, Ruth Benton, for verification, and I was right. Connor was left-handed.”
“So what?”
“The fingerprint report established that Larry Connor’s prints — and his only — were on the handle of the murder weapon. The prints of his right hand. But he was left-handed! Don’t you see what that means?” In his enthusiasm Masters poked the chief’s collarbone with his forefinger, which was as horny as a dragon’s claw, and the chief recoiled. “It means, Chief, that those prints of Connor’s were planted on that letter-opener by someone who hadn’t noticed or didn’t know or simply forgot that Connor was left-handed! Which logically means that they were planted after Connor died, in his office! Which means the murder weapon was only then taken to the Connor house to kill Lila Connor with! Which means the husband couldn’t have murdered her! And if he didn’t murder her, why would he commit suicide?”
“Wait, wait,” the thief groaned, holding his head. “Can you prove the letter-opener was taken from the office to the house?”
“It follows, Chief.”
“So does my dog a bitch in heat,” said the chief coarsely, “but it doesn’t mean he gets it.”
“Chief,” said Masters. “Ruth Benton, Connor’s secretary, will settle this — she’s coming in this morning to look at the letter-opener. She says it sounds like the one Connor kept on his office desk, but she’ll be able to say definitely when she sees it.”
The chief, rocking like an old lady, cursed softly. He obviously foresaw bad times.
“You win, Gus. Go ahead with it. But I’m not authorizing any three-month la-de-da. How long do you figure you need?”
Masters thought rapidly. He figured it would take a week. “Ten days,” he said.
“I’ll give you a week. Any idea who’s getting the nose-ring?”
“Not yet.”
“You’re lying. All right, go to it.” As Masters turned to leave, the chief said, “When you do pull the pinch, you better be sure.”
“Sure, Chief.”
“Damn sure,” the chief said grimly.
The detective went back to his office. On the way he noted that the clock in the hall stood at a few minutes past nine. Ruth Benton had agreed to come in at nine-thirty.
In the meantime there were a few other items on his agenda. Lila Connor’s second husband, he recalled, was said to have been a suicide. If so, there would be a police record; and Masters called Kansas City headquarters and asked for it and any other information pertinent. The police report alone, however, wasn’t likely to contain the kind of material he was after. He put through a second call, to a private K.C. agency, and commissioned a quick investigation, supplying as many leads as he could in order to expedite matters. Whereupon Masters sat back to wait for Ruth Benton, with fifteen minutes to go. Only three of them had passed when his phone rang. He recognized the voice at the first word. What a voice!
“This is Nancy Howell speaking,” the voice said. Temple bells, pure temple bells.
“Oh, hello, Mrs. Howell. I didn’t expect to hear from you again.”
“Because of yesterday, you mean?”
“Yes. I definitely got the impression that I was off your calling list.”
“Well, something’s come up that changes things. Would you like to hear what it is?”
“Very much. Why don’t you come downtown and tell me?”
“It would be better if you came up here. There’s something I want to do that I need your help for. It’s a — well, an experiment.”
“Can you be a little more definite?”
“I’d rather not. All I will say now is that we must get into the Connor house to do it.”
“The Connor house? You bet, Mrs. Howell! See you soon.”
He had just hung up when Ruth Benton, a few minutes early, arrived. Masters saw at once that Ruth Benton had been having a bad time. A secretary did not develop such bags under her eyes through sorrow over a mere kindly employer.
“Thank you for coming in, Miss Benton,” Masters said. “This will only take a minute. As I told you over the phone, I want you to look at the weapon used to kill Mrs. Connor.”
He had the lethal letter-opener in a paper-lined box on his desk. He removed the lid, revealing the blood-caked weapon. Ruth Benton closed her eyes, then opened them again.
“Yes,” she said. “That’s Larry’s letter-opener. He always kept it on his office desk.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
“Would you be willing to testify under oath to that effect?”
“I suppose so, but why? Does it mean that Larry didn’t kill his wife, or that he did?”
“It may prove that he didn’t.”
“Then who did?”
Masters rose. “Thanks for coming in, Miss Benton.”
The girl rose, too, accepting her dismissal with a shrug. “If Larry was guilty, I don’t blame him. If he was innocent, I’ll do anything I can to help prove it.”
In Shady Acres, Masters parked before the Howell house and went around to the back door. He found Nancy Howell, adorable in a crisp lavender housedress, pulling the stems from strawberries, which gave her hands the rather startling illusion that she had been dipping them in fresh blood. He entered, hat in hand, humbly, to be invited to sit at her kitchen table. Her offer of coffee thrilled him to the bone. It meant that he had been paroled, if not pardoned outright.
“Sorry I was held up, Mrs. Howell — oh, thank you,” said Masters, accepting the coffee. “I hope I didn’t keep you waiting?”
“That’s all right, Lieutenant,” said Nancy, “there’s no rush. Actually, I’ve decided I owe you an apology. One never feels in any particular hurry to apologize to someone, does one?”
“As far as I am concerned, Mrs. Howell, go no further. You owe me nothing. Certainly no apology.”