“And the person who killed Mrs. Conlin a few hours ago is still on the island.”
“Yep. Now, Billings, you could have killed Haywood for the twenty thousand dollars and chucked him out of the airplane over the ocean. You had plenty of reason to hate Conlin. You could have lured him to the Rapidan-Sears house and murdered him. You were in Nantucket the night the body was stolen. You knew the house was deserted and you could have parked him here.”
“But I couldn’t have impersonated him in New York, and I didn’t kill Mrs. Conlin. You know that.”
“Yes,” admitted O’Hara reluctantly. “But you could have had confederates.”
Billings laughed.
“You’ve got blond hair and it’s long in front. You could have combed your hair in the Smith house and left those hairs on the comb.”
“As a matter of fact, I did,” said Billings, smiling. “After introducing Haywood to the servants, I did comb my hair in that bedroom. I went over the bluff without a hat and my hair was disarranged.”
“I ought to pinch you on suspicion,” said O’Hara irresolutely.
“And permit the real killer to escape, eh?”
“That’s the trouble. I can’t make myself believe you did it.”
“Thanks, old man. I didn’t.”
They sat in silence for a few minutes and then a motor car came up the drive and Chief Plympton with two officers descended.
“What’s happened here?” demanded the chief. O’Hara put him in touch with events as briefly as possible.
“This fiend killed Mrs. Conlin while you were sitting in a room only a short distance away,” commented Amos. “I don’t call that very smart.”
“Never mind what you think,” replied O’Hara gruffly. “Put a couple of men on guard here so they can’t snitch this body again. Billings and I are going after the killer.”
Ollie Learns Plug Casting
by Harold de Polo
There was a red-headed crook Ollie should have been chasing, but Ollie had a date to go night casting for bass.
I
Ollie Bascomb, the sheriff of Derby, leaned back in his favorite chair in the lobby of the Derby House and examined the level-winding reel that the city fishermen had just given him.
“My soul an’ body, Mr. Murdock, thanks,” he said gratefully.
“Don’t mention it, Sheriff,” laughed the big, ruddy-faced man called Murdock, with the abashed air of one trying to make little of a very nice gift. “Had it in my tackle box a — yep, a good dozen years. I remember I bought it back in nineteen twenty before I went up to the Adirondacks for some bass fishing.”
“Gosh, you didn’t go wrong when you did buy it,” beamed Ollie. “It sure is a beaut’, all right. Cripes, looks most new. Twelve year in your kit, eh? Take good care o’ your tackle, you do.”
“Well, you take just as good care of your own, from what I’ve seen, Sheriff,” the other complimented. “There’s just one complaint I have to make against you, though,” he added with mock gravity.
“What’s that?” asked Ollie.
“You should have taken up plug casting for bass long ago. It’s the greatest fishing there is.”
“I reckon you can’t git Ollie to admit any kind o’ fishin’ comes nigh to wadin’ a stream an’ castin’ a fly for brook trout, Mr. Murdock,” an onlooker broke in with a chuckle. “Eh, Ollie?”
Ollie flushed. He was famous all over the county for his love of fishing and hunting, but his favorite sport of all was known to be casting for brook trout with a dry fly. Nevertheless, it was plain that he did not want to offend a man who had given him such a valued present.
“Gosh, Mr. Murdock, they’s suthin’ to be said for both them kinds o’ fishin’. Wadin’ a stream is one o’ the noblest ways to spend a day I come to know ’bout, an’ this plug castin’ for bass after dark is sure a grand way to spend your night hours. Yes, sir, they’s a lot to be said for both of ’em!”
“And I’m saying right now that even if I think bass casting is the greatest sport in the world, I think you’re going to make one of the best night casters in the business,” insisted Murdock. “I never in my life saw a beginner become an expert so quickly. I—”
“Sheriff, here’s something we should look into at once,” a crisp and youthful voice interrupted from the doorway. “A message about a crook from the Chief of Police of Portland!”
Ollie Bascomb did not always relish hearing the voice of Bert Wells, his deputy.
“What’s the trouble, Bert?” he drawled, turning around.
“We’re to be on the sharp lookout for a crook travelling around in a green Sunray roadster, robbing summer camps and cottages on lakes. He’s been robbing places that have been shut up for the winter — breaking in — before people come up for the summer. He just broke into Senator Brodhead’s place, on Sebago Lake, and stole a Landseer oil paint picture valued at about five thousand dollars.” Bert glanced at the paper in his hand.
“Hmmm,” said Ollie.
“But that’s just one of the things this report mentions,” went on the deputy. “He’s been covering a lot of territory, posing as a fisherman to get the lay of the land. Two places were broken into at Long Lake, after Sebago. Then the Rangeley section has had — oh, five or six camps there were stripped. And remember that we’ve got Saltash and Upper Saltash Lakes near here, Sheriff, and that it isn’t July yet. Some of the bigger camps, with maybe valuable stuff in them, are still closed up. It’s your job — our job — to watch out. That Merton place must have a lot of worth while things in it, and there’s Ellery Gansvoort with his coins. He—”
“He got up early this mornin’,” broke in Ollie. “Come ’bout four o’clock. Woke me up, durn him. Drove up alone, ’thout no servants. Hankered to show me some new specimens to his collection. Beauties, they were. Dummed if he didn’t have one alone wu’th three thousan’ dollar, he said. Whul’ collection’s wu’th close to a hundred thousan’. He—”
“Sounds to me as if you ought to fish Saltash Lake, Sheriff, and keep an eye on things,” said Murdock with a chuckle.
“My soul an’ body, that’s another argument in favor o’ your bass castin’. Patrol the lake an’ fish at the same time.”
“This report goes on to state,” said Bert, ignoring the laugh from the crowd in the lobby, “that this crook is big and blustery, about two inches over six feet, with red hair and moustache. He has a distinguishing scar running from his right temple to down under his cheekbone. I think that covers it, just as I think we should watch the lakes around this whole section. With your permission, I thought of taking Upper Saltash and—”
“Say, I’m telling you boys I’m mighty glad I’m not red-headed,” broke in Murdock genially. “Yes, sir, this is one time I’m thankful for my blond locks, all right. Otherwise you might think I was this fishing crook and slip me into the hoosegow, eh, Sheriff?”
“That’s true,” said Ollie gravely. “Was you red-headed a feller might think you was that crook, mebbe. You could ’a’ shaved off that moustache, o’ course.”
“Yes, Sheriff,” broke in Bert Wells, “and if Mr. Murdock had a scar, and if he wasn’t under six feet instead of over, and if he didn’t drive a black Oakley coupe instead of a green Sunray roadster, and if—”