Avalon said thoughtfully, “Well, you know, there’s something to that.”
“Nothing much,” said Rubin, “unless Mario can tell us what Tar Heel, North Carolina means?”
“It could be an anagram.”
“Like what?”
Gonzalo said, “I’ve been working on one: ‘Al, the not real corn hair.’ ”
There was a sticky silence, then Trumbull brought his fist down on the table. “Damn it, Mario, what does that mean?”
“I don’t know. There could be other anagrams. Or it could be a cryptogram. Or there could be a book somewhere that has a list of word equivalents. Maybe it means, ‘Cheese it, the cops.’ I don’t know. But it means something.”
Rubin said, “That’s a big help, telling us it means something.”
Gonzalo said, in an aggrieved tone, “Then let’s do some thinking. It won’t hurt if we spend a few minutes trying to anagram it, or something, and maybe work out what it means.”
The minutes passed in a dead silence and finally Burry looked at his watch and sighed. He said, “I really must get down to the police station. I suppose the letter is really meaningless.”
“Well, now, Dan,” said Halsted, stroking his hair back from his receding hairline, “we can’t really say that till we’ve asked Henry.”
“The waiter?”
“Why, yes. He has an uncommon knack for seeing the obvious. Except that I don’t see him. Henry!”
Henry’s head appeared as he climbed the stairs with a rapidity quite different from his usual gentle flow. “I beg your pardon, Mr. Halsted,” he said, “I did not intend to be gone long. May I ask Mr. Burry a question?”
Burry had risen and was clearly on his way to the cloakroom. He said, “Well, yes, but nothing too complicated, I hope.”
“Unless you said something about it during the brief interval in which I was absent, sir, I believe you did not mention the actual place — the address — at which the student was apprehended.”
“No, I did not.”
“Do you know the place?”
Burry sucked his lower lip inward and bit at it thoughtfully, “It was mentioned. Yes. But I don’t think I remember it.”
Henry said, “Was it, by any chance, 283 West 92nd Street?”
Burry stared at Henry for a moment, then sat down. “Yes, it was, now that you mention it. That was precisely the address. How did you know?”
“It’s in the letter, sir.”
“Where?” said Avalon. “Show us where.”
Henry said, “Mr. Gonzalo’s reasoning seemed to me perfectly correct in every detail when he pointed out the irrelevance and, therefore, the importance of the town of Tar Heel, North Carolina. There seemed to be a general impression that it was a manufactured name, but it occurred to me that it might be a real one. There are very many peculiar names among the small towns in the United States; Tar Heel would be sedate and conservative, compared to some. And if it were real, it would have unmistakable significance. So I went down to look it up.”
Avalon said, “You mean there is a Tar Heel, North Carolina?”
“There is, Mr. Avalon.”
“And it’s listed in the gazetteer?”
“It may be, but I tried another source. The all-inclusive recording of all the inhabited places in the United States large enough to include a post office is in a zipcode directory, and we have one downstairs. Tar Heel, North Carolina is included and, of course, so is its zipcode. The directory is the book Mr. Gonzalo referred to when he spoke of a list of word equivalents.”
“I was thinking of phrases,” said Gonzalo.
“It is numbers, but that’s a mere detail. The number equivalent is, of course, unique. Tar Heel has a zipcode of 28392 and no other. And if the clearing house is on the upper west side, 283 West 92nd Street would seem the likely interpretation. Undoubtedly, there are ways of coding for the east side or west side, or if not all the numbers are used, as in 2 West 92nd, or if a named street such as Amsterdam Avenue is used. Still, the prevalence of numbered streets and avenues in Manhattan make a zipcode code, if I may use the phrase, particularly useful.”
Burry said blankly, “How could I miss that?”
Drake grunted. “We always ask ourselves that after Henry sees whatever there is to see.”
Burry said, “If I show this to the police, they’ll see that the correspondence between the zipcode and the address can’t be coincidence. And if they know that much, then they may learn more.”
“If they concentrate on the letter,” said Rubin, “they might learn something about the typewriter, the Xeroxing, and so on. And if you confront John with what you know and indicate that the gang will assume the information came from him, he might be willing to tell more. He can be in no worse trouble with them and he might improve his standing with the police.”
Burry had his coat and hat on. “Thank you, all of you. Thank you, Henry.” He whirled out.
Avalon said, “Happy ending.”
“Not for everyone,” said Henry.
“What do you mean?”
Henry said, “Mr. Gonzalo clearly had the answer, all but the trivial final step. In my opinion, Mr. Rubin owes him five dollars.”
Ellery Queen’s Mystery Newsletter
Grime Dossier
by Otto Penzler[11]
HOLMES MOVIES: Is it possible to overpraise a wonderful book? By whipping out every conceivable superlative and heaping it on a single volume, is credibility strained? There are times when the risk must be taken. The Films of Sherlock Holmes (Citadel, $14.95) by Chris Steinbrunner and Norman Michaels requires one simply to use those words which reviews ought generally to avoid: brilliant, distinguished, magnificent, etc. To fail to use the words would do this volume an injustice. Here is the opening sentence: “The place is a room in Baker Street, somewhere on the edge of eternity.” Can you doubt that you are in for a treat?
Meticulously researched and exquisitely, colorfully written by Steinbrunner, one of the country’s foremost film scholars, and enhanced by hundreds of both familiar and very rare photographs tracked down by Michaels, the book is one of the few indispensable Holmesian books of the past several years. And, although it is said that comparisons are odious (well, there are some who say it), it is only fair to point out that The Films of Sherlock Holmes is not the only book on the subject. Last year Bramwell House published Holmes of the Movies, and the very first chapter provides fair warning of what lurks ahead. Holmes’s address is given as 221 Baker Street (instead of 221B), Poe’s landmark story is given the title “Murder in the Rue Morgue” (instead of “The Murders”) and a character is described as “Edgar Allan Poe’s Arsene Lupin” (whereas Poe created the detective, C. Auguste Dupin, and Maurice Leblanc invented the thief, Arsene Lupin). Beware!
If you like Sherlock Holmes, or movies, or mysteries, or just good books which provide hours of intelligent and literate fun, The Films of Sherlock Holmes is recommended as the book of the year.
A DANGEROUS THING: For anyone fortunate enough to live in San Francisco’s Bay Area, several mystery courses are scheduled for the upcoming months. “Agatha Christie: Queen of Crime” will be taught at St. Mary’s College, Moraga, California, in two day-long sessions in March. “Divine Mysteries” will feature clergyman sleuths, in the winter session at the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley. And if you hurry you might still get into classes on “The International Detective” and “Women of Mvstery.” All courses are taught by the same femme fatale, Janet Rudolph, who can be reached at (415) 548-5799.