“You going to get some sleep today?”
“Afraid I’ll have to keep going today. I—”
The telephone rang.
The sheriff went to the phone. He heard a woman’s voice say, “Long-distance call from San Rodolpho,” and then the voice of Everett Gilmer, the chief of police in San Rodolpho. “Hello, Bill. Think I’ve got your party located. The Acme Cleaners has a record of cleaning the jacket. The girl’s name is Elizabeth Dow. Does that mean anything to you?”
“Not a thing. She live there?”
“Apparently. We have an address in an apartment house. She’s moved from there, but we’re tracing her. The description fits. Want to come down?”
The sheriff hesitated a moment, then said, “Okay, I’ll be down. See what you can find out and have it ready for me by the time I get there. I’ll stop by the courthouse and pick up some photographs.”
The sheriff hung up the telephone and glanced over at the table. Seeing the alert angle at which the head of his sister-in-law was cocked, he said suddenly, “I’ve got to rush out. I’ll be back this evening.”
“Where are you going?” Doris demanded so eagerly that the words all ran together into one continuous rattle of sound.
“Out,” the sheriff said.
Everett K. Gilmer, chief of police of San Rodolpho, was a big bluff man whose twinkling eyes radiated cordiality to brother officers, but could assume an ominous hardness when scrutinizing prisoners. He said to Bill Eldon, “Well, Sheriff, I’ve got a line on her. If you’ve got some photos we might just check with someone who can make an identification.”
“Who you got?”
“Woman who runs the apartment house where she had an apartment for a while. When she moved she left a forwarding address. But I thought we’d better check up first with someone who can make an absolute identification. If she’s the one I’ve got quite a lot on her. And I think she’s the one.”
“Let’s go,” the sheriff agreed.
They drove to a frame house that had at one time been an example of three-storied prosperity, but with the spread of the business area it had now been turned into an apartment house.
The heavy-set woman who ran the place promptly identified the photographs which Sheriff Eldon produced.
“That’s the girl. That’s Elizabeth, all right. What’s happened to her?”
“She was killed.”
“How?”
“Stabbed.”
“Good heavens! And such a nice girl, too!”
“Any idea who might have done it? Enemies or anything of that sort?”
“No. While she was here she was just as quiet and well-behaved as anyone could ask.”
“Know anything about her friends or relatives?”
“No, I don’t. I took over the place just before she moved out and—”
“We got some more recent stuff lined up, Bill,” Gilmer interposed. “Just wanted to make sure she was the party before I started following the other trails.”
“Her mother had died just before she moved out,” the apartment manager voluateered, “somewhere in — now, let me see. I think it was somewhere in Colorado. I remember she got a wire saying her mother was very low and she flew out, and then wrote me that her mother had passed away and that she’d stay for the funeral and move to another apartment when she got back, and she sent me two weeks’ rent and asked if that would be all right.”
“Know where that letter is?”
“I burned it.”
“About when was this?”
“Five or six months ago. I can look up the date when she left if you want.”
“I already have that,” Gilmer said to the sheriff. “It was in August.”
“That’s right,” the woman said. “I think it was August.”
Bill Eldon nodded to Gilmer. “Let’s go, Everett.”
They went to the telegraph office and wired the Denver police to consult statistical records and rush any information concerning a woman by the name of Dow who had died in Colorado within the last few months.
Then Chief Gilmer and Bill Eldon spent a couple of hours plodding along in the dull monotony of routine legwork, tracing Elizabeth Dow from one lodging house to another, finding where she had been employed and locating friends who had known her.
From this scattered pattern of information the sheriff and Gilmer pieced together a mosaic showing a clear picture of a young woman, vivacious, intelligent, alert, a steady, dependable worker, a loyal friend filled with the joy of life, yet respecting herself and commanding the respect of her friends. There had been one or two boy friends, but for the most part she had preferred a group of intimates to the more intimate companionship of boy friends. She had been employed as a cashier in a cafeteria. Her nimble fingers, quick eyes, and winning personality had made for adept efficiency as well as for popularity with customers.
The day before had been her day off, and about ten o’clock she had been seen with a young man who was strange to the girl’s set, although he had been seen with her off and on during the past week. The couple had sat for half an hour talking earnestly at a table in the cafeteria. And then Elizabeth Dow had got a cardboard container and put up a lunch — roast beef sandwiches, deviled eggs, crisp lettuce, and pie. Then she and the young man, a tall dark chap in Army uniform, had left the cafeteria. That had been around eleven. Neither one had been seen since.
At this point in the investigation a wire came in from the Denver police:
ELVIRA DOW AGED FIFTY-SIX DIED CORONARY THROMBOSIS AUGUST 23RD, BURIED HERE. FUNERAL ARRANGEMENTS MADE BY DAUGHTER ELIZABETH WHO REGISTERED HOTEL GIVING ADDRESS YOUR CITY.
“Well,” Gilmer said, “that’s all there is to it. Find the man who was with her and you’ve got the murderer. You say there was waxed paper on the table in that old house?”
“That’s right.”
“Find this chap in uniform. That’ll be all there is to it.”
The sheriff reached for his battered sombrero and put it on. He started for the door, and then paused to regard the chief of police with thought-puckered eyes. “You know, Everett,” he said, “it may not be that simple. When you’ve been in office as long as I have you get so you pay more attention to people and less to clues.”
Rush Medford, the district attorney, stepped out from his private office to receive George Quinlan.
“Hello, George. I asked you to come up here because I wanted to talk with you — confidentially.”
Quinlan glanced significantly at the unlocked door of the reception office, then at the closed door of Medford’s private office. Medford, lowering his voice, went on hastily, “I have a man waiting in there, George. I want you to meet him. I want you to give him every bit of help you can. His name’s Walworth — Martin Walworth. Ever hear of him?”
Quinlan shook his head.
“Famous all over the state as a criminologist. He—”
“Oh, yes! I’ve heard of him. I place him now.”
The district attorney said confidentially, “I’m calling him in, George, at the suggestion of some very, very influential citizens. They feel that there’s a soft spot in the County administration. You know, old Bill prides himself on paying more attention to people’s reactions than to material evidence. Some whimsical eccentricity on his part that’s going to get us all into trouble one of these days. You know how it is when word gets around that the crowd in the courthouse has been in office too long. There’s always a tendency to make a clean sweep. And that takes in all of us.”
“What do you expect Walworth to do?” Quinlan asked.
The district attorney smiled. “I expect him to solve this mystery very quickly and very competently, demonstrating to the voters of this County the fact that the old hit-or-miss methods of investigating a crime are as obsolete as the horse and buggy. The modern criminologist uses scientific equipment and streamlined efficiency.”