Ken Corning said: “Okey. Never mind the comedy. You stick around there until I call you again. And don’t disobey orders again. I’ll tie a can to you one of these days for taking liberties with instructions.”
“You’ve got to admit,” she said, “that it always works out for the best.”
He slammed the receiver back on its hook, left the telephone booth and had two rye whiskies, one right after the other, His eyes were cold and hard, and the black pupils seemed like bits of coal against lumps of ice.
The apartment house corridor was redolent with the odors of cooking. There were odors of fresh meals which seeped through the cracks of doors and transoms, and there were the stale odors of long dead meals that clung tenaciously to wall paper and carpet to give a musty smell of human occupancy.
Apartment 13 B was near the end of the corridor. Ken Corning raised his hand and knocked.
After a moment there was the rustle of motion from the interior of the apartment. The door opened and afternoon sunlight streamed through the window and into the corridor.
Althea Kent was the exact antithesis of Nell Blake.
Her figure was distinctively feminine. Her complexion was well cared for. Her eyes held a deliberately provocative expression. The lips were full and shapely. There was a vague something about her, as elusive as the perfume of a flower and yet as persistently suggestive, which spoke of a knowledge of her attractiveness to men.
“What do you want?” she asked,
Ken Corning said: “I want to ask you a few questions.”
“Come in,” she invited.
As the outer door closed behind him, she asked: “Are you a reporter?”
“No. I’m investigating it from another angle. I want to find out one or two things that don’t check up. The theory has been that Colton switched off the light and killed Ladue in the dark. Can you give me any reason why he should have done that?”
She shook her head. “Colton killed him. You’ll have to ask him for his reasons,” she said.
Corning nodded.
“The office was dark when you rushed in there?”
“Yes, except for the light that came from the outer office.”
“The switch is near the entrance to the private office?”
“Yes.”
“You turned it on when you went in?”
“Shortly afterwards.”
“All right. Now think. Did the lights go on when you turned the switch on?”
“No,” she said. “Not when I tried to turn it on the first time. I was excited. I didn’t punch the button clear in, I guess. I remember snapping at it, and I heard a click, but the lights didn’t go on. A little while later I tried it again and that time I snapped the switch on all right and the lights went on.”
Ken Corning heaved a big sigh.
“Okey,” he said. “Now tell me about Perkins. He was in the office when you went in there the first time, wasn’t he?”
At his question she stiffened. She seemed to be holding her breath. When she spoke her voice had lost its cooing note of affectation, and her eyes were cold and hard.
“What are you talking about?” she asked.
“Perkins,” said Ken Corning, without hesitation. “He was in the office when you looked m there to take some dictation a little while before Colton came. Was he there when Colton arrived?”
She said, in a cold monotone: “I don’t know what you’re talking about. And who are you? You haven’t told me that yet.”
“My name,” he said, “is Corning. I’m a lawyer.”
“Representing Colton, I suppose?”
“Yes.”
She got to her feet.
“I’ve told all I know of the case to the authorities and to the newspapers. I haven’t time to discuss it any more. I’m going out this evening and I want to get dressed. I’ll have to ask you to excuse me.”
She walked to the door. Gone was the suggestion of intimacy about her maimer. She held the folds of the silken gown tightly about her. Her head was up, the eyes cold and distant. She turned the knob of the door and held it open.
“Did you know when Perkins went into the inner office?” asked Ken Corning.
Wordlessly, she held open the door.
“Can you tell me what the nature of the business was between Ladue and Perkins?”
She continued to stand at the door, holding it open, silent, distant, hostile. Ken Corning whirled on her.
“All right, young lady. I gave you the opportunity to save yourself a lot of trouble. This is a murder case. There’s a life at stake, and if you think you can pull a line like that and make it stick you’re sure going to be surprised.”
She said two words, cold, crisp words.
“Get out!”
Ken Corning went into the corridor. The door slammed behind him. He heard the rasp of the key and the click of the lock.
He stood in the corridor, jaw protruding, eyes narrowed, lips clamped in a firm, straight line. Then he walked swiftly and purposefully towards the elevator.
The police had finished with the office of Harry Ladue.
The man who made maps and diagrams had taken measurements. The police photographer had taken various and sundry photographs of the arrangement of the offices, the sprawled body, the exact location of the various articles of furniture at the time the crime had been committed.
The corporation of which Ladue had been the guiding head had appointed a man to fill the vacancy caused by death. There had been some attempt to make the business carry on. The new man had familiarized himself with the important matters which were pending; and now the offices were closed for the night.
Out on the streets there was still a little afterglow of light from the sky. In the building all was dark, except that night lights glowed in the corridors. Through the windows on the front of the offices came the colored lights of electric signs, one second glowing a deep red, then shifting to green, then vanishing.
Ken Corning moved down the corridor like some sinister shadow.
He was fighting the political powers that controlled the city. Already there was a warrant out for his arrest — a warrant that would never have been issued save for the fact that he was on the wrong side of the political fence.
If he slipped up he could count upon no mercy. The powers that were in the saddle would have railroaded him to the penitentiary without an instant’s hesitation. The underworld which was dependent for its very existence upon a complacent toleration on the part of those political powers had already once tried to take Ken for a ride.
And Ken Corning was carrying on.
He prowled about the corridor, looking for the fuse box which controlled the lights in the various offices. He found the box, a little recessed receptacle built into the wall, covered with a metal door which swung out on hinges.
Ken Corning tried the door of the office marked Ladue Investment Corporation — Entrance. The door was locked. He slipped a ring of keys from his pocket and tried them patiently, one after the other. On the third try he found a skeleton key which would operate the lock.
He went in and switched all the lights on in both offices. Then he went to the fuse box and experimented with the round fuses which were screwed into their places.
He found one which controlled a segment of the wiring.
He unscrewed it, and the lights went off in the private office. He screwed it in, and the lights went on. He smiled grimly, closed the door of the box and again entered the offices.
The desk of the secretary was in a corner by the door which led to the private office. That desk was locked, but the lock was of a pattern which yielded readily. Ken Corning went through the desk. He found a shorthand notebook. It was filled with pothooks and dashes which meant nothing to him. He found another one. There was a pencil thrust in between the leaves of this book. There was also a handkerchief between the same pages.