After breakfast the jailer came into the cell room and distributed a few letters. There were two for Quade. One from Charlie Boston, telling him that he was going to the city to get his lawyer-cousin, Paul, and not to worry about a thing. The other was an unsigned note, written the evening before. It said merely:
“That was a very detestable thing for you to do. I hope you stay in jail for keeps.”
Quade winced as he read the note. He had treated Lois Lanyard pretty shabbily, but still he couldn’t regret it. Given time to think things over, Lois couldn’t help but realize that she shouldn’t marry Freddie Bartlett. In innumerable ways she’d shown that she didn’t love him; she was going through with the marriage merely because it had been rather expected of her and because several people, including her family, had been opposed to it. Quade had taken a high-handed way of helping her out of her quandary and sooner or later, he believed, she would appreciate it.
The prisoners’ cells were unlocked a little while later and they were herded into the bull pen. The men crowded around Quade then, thanking him for the breakfasts and assuring him that he was the Number One man of the jail as far as they were concerned.
“That’s very fine of you, boys,” Quade thanked them. “But I’m expecting to get out of here today.”
One of the prisoners had not joined in the eulogy to Quade. He was a surly, dark man, who sneered when the others crowded around Quade, but a little later he came up alone.
“Here’s something for you,” he said.
His hand came out of his pocket and Quade threw himself backwards. The gleaming knife blade ripped his coat sleeve from elbow to shoulder.
The prisoners in the bull pen began yelling, but the knife wielder received the surprise of his life. Quade was totally unarmed, except for his quick wits and lean, strong body. But even with a knife the attacker was no match for him.
He side-stepped the man’s second rush and, snaking out a hand, imprisoned the knife wrist. He jerked swiftly on the wrist, then smashed the forearm across a raised knee. The knife clattered to the concrete floor and the prisoner yelped in agony.
Quade stepped back from the prisoner and brought up his right fist in an uppercut. The blow caught the man under the chin, lifted him from the floor and deposited him on his back on the concrete.
Quade scooped up the knife. The prisoners crowded around him.
“What the hell’s the matter with the Greek? He go nuts?” asked one.
“Greek, huh?” Quade rubbed his chin. “I think I know what’s wrong with him. He got a letter this morning, didn’t he?”
“Yeah,” replied one of the men. “He tore it up in little pieces and flushed it down the toilet.”
Quade filled a tin cup with water and sloshed it on the unconscious man’s face. The prisoner gasped and began moaning. In a moment he sat up.
“All right, partner,” Quade said. “Who told you to carve me up?”
“No one,” grouched the prisoner. “I just didn’t like your looks.”
Quade reached down, caught hold of the man’s shirt and yanked him to his feet. “Fella,” he said, glaring into the man’s face. “I asked you a question and I want a straight answer. Was it Bill Demetros?”
The prisoner looked at the fist that Quade shook in his face and said, “Yeah. He said you was getting in his hair.”
Quade threw the man away from him. “I ought to report you and you’d get a good deal more than you’re due to get now, but I can’t be bothered with small fry.”
The turnkey stormed into the bull pen. “Quade, Mister Quade, you’re wanted up front.”
Quade brushed off his new blue suit, frowned at the slashed sleeve, and followed the turnkey to the front part of the jail. Christopher Buck and the chief of police were both there and both looking serious.
“I guess we’ve got to let you go, Quade,” Costello said.
“You’re convinced that I didn’t kill Wesley Peters?”
“Yeah. Bob Lanyard confessed that he did it.”
“What? Why, he confessed that a couple of days ago. You don’t believe him this time, do you?”
“Got to,” grouched the chief. “He left a letter.”
Quade became rigid. “What do you mean, he left a letter?”
“He shot himself last night.”
Quade gasped. “Bob Lanyard shot himself? He’s dead?”
Both the chief and Buck nodded. Quade shook his head in bewilderment. “The letter — could I see it?”
Chief Costello pointed to a piece of paper lying on the desk before him. Quade looked down at it. It was just an ordinary sheet of white bond paper, crumpled, as if it had been clutched in a dead hand. There were two lines of typing on it. They read:
“I killed Wes Peters. He was annoying my wife. Forgive me, Jessie, for making this exit.
Bob.”
“When was he found?” Oliver Quade asked.
“About five-thirty this morning,” replied the chief. “The caretaker heard the dogs whining and howling and when he went to see what was the matter, there he was. The gun was in his hand.”
“He was found in the dog kennels?”
“Yeah, in the vacant stall where Miss Lanyard usually kept those woolly dogs she’s got at the show, now.”
Quade’s forehead wrinkled. Then suddenly smoothed. “Buck, you still interested in this?”
“I’ve lost my client,” growled the cadaverous detective. “But I haven’t been paid off yet. What do you want me to do?”
“Go out there and point out things to me.”
Buck looked at the chief, who nodded. “My men should be through by now. Let him look around.”
They rode out to the Lanyard home in the private detective’s expensive roadster. Quade looked at the drawn shades of the house and shook his head. Lois had been fond of her brother. And it would be a terrible shock to the parents, too.
The backyard was still swarming with newspapermen, but a couple of police were keeping them out of the dog kennels. Buck was known to them and they let him pass through with Quade.
The dog house was a long, low building, divided into three individual stalls. There was a door at each end of the building and connecting doors between the stalls. Quade had to stoop to enter and the tall detective had to walk bent almost double. Quade’s eyes were gleaming by the time they had entered by the small door into the wire runs.
They passed through the huskies’ kennel to where Bob Lanyard had been found in the vacant woolly kennel just beyond. The body had already been removed but the coagulated blood on the floor was mute proof of where the body had lain.
Quade’s eyes made a sweeping, searching tour of the sheep dog stall, then he nodded to Christopher Buck. “All right, let’s go.”
Buck looked at him with narrowed eyes. “That’s all?”
“Yes. I just wanted to make sure he didn’t commit suicide.”
“But he did,” protested Buck. “The gun was in his hand.”
“Placed there by the murderer. If Bob Lanyard wanted to kill himself, why would he come out here? He could have done it in his room just as well. Someone forced him in here, probably at the point of a gun. Didn’t want the people to hear the shot.”
“Quade,” Buck said thoughtfully, “there may be something in what you say. That confession note was typed, but not signed. Anyone could have written it. I’m going to check up on the typewriters around here.”
“That won’t prove anything. Almost all the people interested in this matter could have got to one of the Lanyard typewriters. You forgot they almost had a wedding yesterday and there were plenty of guests.”