"So what?"
"Our next step is the inquest. We can't appear there, of course, because if a jury finds out a dead man is insured they'll murder us. We can send an investigator or two, perhaps, to sit in there, but nothing more than that. But Jackson says he'll be glad to appear and tell what he knows, and there's a chance, just a chance, but still a chance, that we may get a suicide verdict anyway. If we do, we're in. If we don't, then we've got to consider what we do. However, one thing at a time. The inquest first, and you can't tell what the police may find out; we may win right in the first round."
Keyes mopped his head some more. He was so fat he really suffered in the heat. He lit a cigarette. He drooped down and looked away from Norton like it was some schoolboy and he didn't want to show his disgust. Then he spoke. "It was not suicide."
"What are you talking about. It's a clear case."
"It was not suicide."
He opened his bookcase and began throwing thick books on the table. "Mr. Norton, here's what the actuaries have to say about suicide. You study them, you might find out something about the insurance business."
"I was raised in the insurance business, Keyes."
"You were raised in private schools, Groton, and Harvard. While you were learning how to pull bow oars there, I was studying these tables. Take a look at them. Here's suicide by race, by color, by occupation, by sex, by locality, by seasons of the year, by time of day when committed. Here's suicide by method of accomplishment. Here's method of accomplishment subdivided by poisons, by firearms, by gas, by drowning, by leaps. Here's suicide by poisons subdivided by sex, by race, by age, by time of day. Here's suicide by poisons subdivided by cyanide, by mercury, by strychnine, by thirty-eight other poisons, sixteen of them no longer procurable at prescription pharmacies. And here-here, Mr. Norton-are leaps subdivided by leaps from high places, under wheels of moving trains, under wheels of trucks, under the feet of horses, from steamboats. But there's not one case here out of all these millions of cases of a leap from the rear end of a moving train. That's just one way they don't do it."
"They could."
"Could they? That train, at the point where the body was found, moves at a maximum of fifteen miles an hour. Could any man jump off it there with any real expectation of killing himself?"
"He might dive off. This man had a broken neck."
"Don't trifle with me. He wasn't an acrobat."
"Then what are you trying to tell me? That it was on the up-and-up?"
"Listen, Mr. Norton. When a man takes out an insurance policy, an insurance policy that's worth $50,000 if he's killed in a railroad accident, and then three months later he is killed in a railroad accident, it's not on the up-and-up. It can't be. If the train got wrecked it might be, but even then it would be a mighty suspicious coincidence. A mighty suspicious coincidence. No, it's not on the up-and-up. But it's not suicide."
"Then what do you mean?"
"You know what I mean."
"…Murder?"
"I mean murder."
"Well wait a minute, Keyes, wait a minute. Wait till I catch up with you. What have you got to go on?"
"Nothing."
"You must have something."
"I said nothing. Whoever did this did a perfect job. There's nothing to go on. Just the same, it's murder."
"Do you suspect anybody?"
"The beneficiary of such a policy, so far as I am concerned, is automatically under suspicion."
"You mean the wife?"
"I mean the wife."
"She wasn't even on the train."
"Then somebody else was."
"Have you any idea who?"
"None at all."
"And this is all you have to go on?"
"I told you, I have nothing to go on. Nothing but those tables and my own hunch, instinct, and experience. It's a slick job, but it's no accident, and it's no suicide."
"Then what are we going to do?"
"I don't know. Give me a minute to think."
He took a half hour to think. Norton and I, we sat there and smoked. After a while, Keyes began to bump the desk with the palm of his hand. He knew what he meant, you could see that.
"Mr. Norton."
"Yes, Keyes."
"There's only one thing for you to do. It's against practice, and in some other case I'd oppose it. But not in this. There's a couple of things about this that make me think that practice is one of the things they're going to count on, and take advantage of. Practice in a case like this is to wait, and make them come to you, isn't it? I advise against that. I advise jumping in there at once, tonight if possible, and if not tonight, then certainly on the day of that inquest, and filing a complaint against that woman. I advise filing an information of suspected murder against her, and smashing at her as hard and as quick as we can. I advise that we demand her arrest, and her detention too, for the full forty-eight hours incommunicado that the law allows in a case of this kind. I advise sweating her with everything the police have got. I particularly advise separating her from this accomplice, whoever he is, or she is, so we get the full value of surprise, and prevent their conferring on future plans. Do that, and mark my words you're going to find out things that'll amaze you."
"But-on what?"
"On nothing."
"But Keyes, we can't do a thing like that. Suppose we don't find out anything. Suppose we sweat her and get nothing. Suppose it is on the up-and-up. Look where that puts us. Holy smoke, she could murder us in a civil suit, and a jury would give her every nickel she asks for. I'm not sure they couldn't get us for criminal libel. And then look at the other side of it. We've got an advertising budget of $100,000 a year. We describe ourselves as the friend of the widow and orphan. We spend all that for goodwill, and then what? We lay ourselves open to the charge that we'd accuse a woman of murder even, rather than pay a just claim."
"It's not a just claim."
"It will be, unless we prove different."
"All right. What you say is true. I told you it's against practice. But let me tell you this, Mr. Norton, and tell you right now: Whoever pulled this was no punk. He, or she, or maybe the both of them, or the three of them or however many it took-knew what they were doing. They're not going to be caught just by your sitting around hoping for clues. They thought of clues. There aren't any. The only way you're going to catch them is to move against them. I don't care if it's a battle or a murder case, or whatever it is, surprise is a weapon that can work. I don't say it will work. But I say it can work. And I say nothing else is going to work."
"But Keyes, we can't do things like that."
"Why not?"
"Keyes, we've been over that a million times, every insurance company has been over it a million times. We have our practice, and you can't beat it. These things are a matter for the police. We can help the police, if we've got something to help with. If we discover information, we can turn it over to them. If we have our suspicions, we can communicate them to them. We can take any lawful, legitimate step-but as for this-"