"You say it's just coincidence the kids were carrying. 38 cannelured bullets and Bartlett got killed with the same kind?"
"If you'd just think about these things, that's all I ask-a little rudimentary logic. The kids had a homemade gun, and quite naturally it also has a smooth-bored barrel. Actually a piece of pipe. Anybody who knows anything at all about guns, and is stuck with a smooth-bore, is going to try to make up for the handicap by using cannelured bullets, which are grooved. Has the class any questions?"
"Yes, please, teacher. How does a slick con man-or in fact anybody we've heard of in this case so far-come to be such a Deadeye Dick with an old cannon like this?"
"Now there you do ask an awkward question," admitted Mendoza. "I don't know. But it's a fifty-fifty chance that it was just wild luck, you know. And I'll say this. We've been thinking that whoever fired those shots at Bartlett and Walsh did it in the dark-a dark rainy night, along a stretch of road lighted only by high arc lights. I went out there last night, before I waylaid Laidlaw, and roped Gonzales and Farber in on a little game. I'd got Walsh to tell me just where the squad car was sitting in relation to the light at the corner of Cameron and San Dominguez, and I placed Gonzales and Farber there and drove past a couple of times. And you know what? Just the way it had slipped my mind about patrolmen changing round at the wheel, another little thing slipped all our minds when we thought about this before. Go on now, be a detective and tell me what it was."
"My God," said Hackett. "The roof light."
"That's my boy, you get A-plus. Going on and off almost right over the driver's head, whenever the car's standing still. It's a nice straight road along there, and the shoulder where the squad car was sitting is unobstructed for a hundred yards each way. And thirty isn't really very fast, in relation to an object, say, fifteen feet to the side-you've got time to see it, coming up. I think it must have been a double take-that whoever it was spotted the car by its number, maybe when Bartlett and Walsh had stopped that car for speeding. So X speeded up and doubled back, to try his shot without that additional witness-and so, coming up on them, he knew it was the right car, he didn't have to spot the number and get in position to fire, all at once. It's just a question-I tried a dry run on it last night-of taking your right hand off the wheel, your eyes off the road, for about three seconds, and tiring at right angles out the driver's window."
"That's if there was only the driver-even saying it was whoever killed Twelvetrees, that there's any connection."
"Sure. If there were two, a lot easier. One to drive, one to shoot. But when you come to think, whoever killed Twelvetrees had quite a bit to do that night-"
"I still say there's nothing to show definitely it was that night."
" Pues mira, chico -look here-al1 right, but it was some night, because if it had been broad daylight Mrs. Bragg, or one of the housewives in the other apartments, would have seen someone arrive and leave. Going to Twelvetrees' place you'd have to walk or drive past all those other front doors. I refuse to believe that human nature has improved so much since I first began to notice it among the five women who're usually at home most of the day in that court, not one was curious enough about a good-looking bachelor to take at least casual note of his movements and visitors. You grant me that's likely? Then I say it's also likely that whatever happened happened that Friday night, when it was raining and overcast and people were staying inside ignoring the neighbors. And also because on the Saturday and Sunday nobody seems to recall seeing the Porsche in Twelvetrees' carport. True, they wouldn't be looking for it, he was probably out a good deal, and nobody would take special note of it one way or the other, there or not there, so that's negative evidence. But we haven't yet found anybody who remembers seeing him after the Kingmans saw him leave the Temple at four o'clock on Friday. The three or four restaurants he habitually used say he didn't come in that night. The garage where he took the Porsche hadn't seen him for three weeks. No gas station he might hit on his way home sold him any gas. His agents don't remember that he'd come in since several days before. The autopsy says he'd had, probably, beef stew, salad, and some kind of pie about two to six hours before he died. Not helpful unless we find the restaurant where he went, and they remember. All right. Nobody remembers either how long the Porsche had been standing where it was left. We've got no evidence, except negative evidence. But why didn't he show up anywhere on Saturday or Sunday?"
"We don't know he didn't," said Hackett. "Maybe somebody just hasn't come forward to say. Maybe this old flame of yours knew where he was those two days. Maybe, for that matter, he never did leave the Temple on Friday and the Kingmans just say he did. Maybe he was killed there and ferried out-"
" Caray, let's not make it any more complicated than it is! You're forgetting those suitcases-those carefully packed suitcases. What did we say when we looked at them? He was getting ready to clear out, of his own choice. Now maybe he was just moving to another apartment, maybe he was going to get married, maybe he'd just heard he'd inherited a million dollars and didn't have to stay in the racket any longer-but one of the possibilities is that for some reason his whole private racket was up, here, and he had to get out. Say he was going to clear. Then tell me what he'd have done too, just before he left."
"That's an easy one, he'd have taken some of the Kingmans' money along with him. But it depends on a lot of ifs."
"Well, I don't know that it does. There are a lot of fishy things about the Kingmans' behavior, but two things are a little fishier than the rest. In the first place, you'll never get me to believe-no matter whether all this about Twelvetrees' blackmailing them was so or not-that Mr. Martin Kingman is so unworldly and unbusinesslike that he didn't have a home address and a phone number for the treasurer of his Temple. Why didn't he give Woods that information right away, if he was so anxious to catch up with Twelvetrees? And second, he jumped the gun very damned quick, didn't he, on laying a charge? If, as I think we can almost take for granted, the Kingmans and Twelvetrees looked on this Mystic Truth business as nothing but a business, there wouldn't be anything very peculiar about dear Brooke missing their Sabbath ceremonies-it must have happened before, his taking a weekend off. He couldn't have gotten into the bank then before ten on Monday morning, either to deposit the month's receipts or close out the accounts. And, de paso, that in itself poses a funny little question, you know. If he was planning to run with a big handful of the profit-as much as he could persuade the bank to let him have-why was he packing up and getting ready to leave as early as Friday? It'd be Monday before he could-"
"So there you are, maybe it wasn't Friday."
"Reason it through," said Mendoza. "It wouldn't have been very sensible, if he intended to take off on Monday morning, to start packing on Saturday night. And we know it wasn't Sunday night, because Mrs. Bragg found the note on Sunday noon, he'd already gone by then. I wonder if that bank-yes, well, file that for thinking about… Kingman knew what time the bank opened, after all, and closed. When he saw Twelvetrees on Friday afternoon, the banks were still open-if he was afraid Twelvetrees was planning larceny, why didn't he contact the bank then? And bright and early Monday morning we find him ‘checking with the bank'-evidently because he's leaped to this conclusion over the Saturday when dear Brooke didn't show up-and at a quarter past ten he's up in Theft laying the charge. Which looks-" Mendoza stopped and interrupted himself reflectively, "Or, of course-"