Tenth Commandment

Stilton looked at me, puzzled.

'So?' he asked.

'That's what gave me the idea of how Knurr killed Sol Kipper. I was already inside the apartment.'

He had started to take a gulp of beer, but suddenly put his full glass back on the bar and sat there, staring straight ahead.

'Yeah,' he breathed. 'That sucker! That's how he did it.

Let me tell you: He was in the house all the time. Probably hiding in one of those empty rooms. Only Tippi knew he was there. She leaves her husband, comes downstairs.

Knurr goes up to the master bedroom on the fifth floor and wastes Sol Kipper. Maybe with one of those karate chops of his or with the famous blunt instrument — who knows? Then he carries — '

'No,' I said, 'that's no good. Sol Kipper wasn't a heavy man, but it would have been a difficult task to carry him up that narrow rear staircase to the sixth floor. I think Knurr rang for the elevator and took Kipper's body up that way.'

'Right,' Stilton said decisively. 'The first blues on the scene found the elevator on the sixth floor. All right, he gets Sol up on the terrace and throws him over. I mean literally throws him. That's why the body was so far from the base of the wall.'

'Then Knurr goes down — How does he go down?'

'He takes the stairs. Because the elevator door on the main floor can be seen from the kitchen. And also, the elevator was found on the sixth floor by the first officers to arrive.'

'Tippi fainted,' I reminded him, 'or pretended to.'

'Sure. To give Knurr time to get downstairs. Then he goes out the front door, turns right around, rings the bell, and waits for the butler to let him in.'

'Yes,' I said, nodding, 'I think so. You can't see the front door from the kitchen, so even if they were inside when he exited, he was safe. Perce, I think he stayed in the house overnight. The butler keeps a house diary of visitors, deliveries, and so forth. He has a record of the Reverend Godfrey Knurr arriving on Tuesday the 23rd, the day before Kipper died.'

'Oh wow,' Percy said, 'that's beautiful. I hate to admit it, but I got to admire him for that. The balls!'

'Then you think that's how it was done?' I said eagerly.

'Got to be,' Perce said. ' Got to! Everything fits. It was just a matter of planning and timing. That guy is one cool cat. When we take him, I'm bringing a regiment of marines. But what about the suicide note?'

'I can't explain it,' I confessed. 'Right now I can't. But I'm going to give it some thought.'

'You do that,' he said, patting my arm. 'Give it some thought. I'm beginning to think Roscoe Dollworth knew exactly what he was doing when he got you the job. Chief Investigator? You better believe it! Josh, I think now I got enough to ask my loot to reopen the Kipper case. I'll lay out the whole shmeer for him, how it ties into the Stonehouse disappearance, and how — '

'Perce,' I said, 'could you hold off for just a day or two?'

'Well. . sure, but why?'

'I'm trying to set up a conference with Mr Tabatchnick 321

and Mr Teitelbaum. Teitelbaum's the senior partner who represents the Stonehouse family. I want to tell the two of them everything we've discovered and suggest how the two cases are connected. I want them to let me devote all my time to the investigation and stick to it no matter how long it takes. I'd like you to be there at the conference. They have some clout, don't they? Political clout?'

'I guess they do.'

'Well, if we get them on our side first, won't it help you to get the Kipper case reopened and maybe be assigned to it full time?'

'Maybe it would,' he said slowly. 'Maybe it would at that.' He ruffled my hair with his fingertips. 'You're a brainy little runt,' he said.

I didn't resent it at all.

We were back on the sidewalk, about ready to part, when Stilton snapped his fingers.

'Oh Jesus!' he said. 'I forgot to tell you. There was nothing in Records on Knurr, which was why I pulled that scam at the church office. Just to get some background on the guy. But Tippi Kipper — she's another story. She's got a sheet. It goes back almost twenty years — but it's there.'

'She's done time?' I said unbelievingly.

'Oh no,' the detective said. 'Just charged. No record of trial or disposition.'

'Charged?' I said. 'With what?'

'Loitering,' he said, 'for the purpose of prostitution.'

4

Before I left for work early Wednesday morning, I slid a note under Cleo's door: 'Mr Joshua Bigg respectfully requests the pleasure of Miss Cleo Hufnagel's company at dinner in Mr Bigg's apartment tonight, Wednesday, at 8.00 p.m. Dress optional. RSVP.'

I went off to work planning the menu.

I found a memo on my desk from Ada Mondora stating that Mr Teitelbaum and Mr Tabatchnick would meet with me in the library at 2.00 p.m. I called Percy, but he wasn't in. I left a message asking him to call back as soon as possible. I then started to type notes on our meeting with Bishop Harley Oxman for the Kipper file.

I was interrupted by a nervous call from Mrs Gertrude Kletz. She had broken a tooth and the dentist could only take her at eleven o'clock. Would it be acceptable if she came in from twelve to four? I told her that would be fine.

A cabdriver called who claimed to have picked up Professor Stonehouse on the night of January 10th. He described his passenger as being short, in his middle 40s, with a noticeable limp.

'Sorry,' I said, 'that's not the man.'

'No harm in trying,' he said cheerfully and hung up.

The next call was from Percy Stilton. I told him about the meeting with Teitelbaum and Tabatchnick at 2.00

p. m., and he said he'd do his best to make it. Then he told me that he had visited Glynis Stonehouse's former employer, Atlantic Medical Research, that morning.

'They stock enough poison to waste half of Manhattan,'

Stilton reported. 'And they've got a very lax control system. The poison cabinet has a dimestore lock that could be opened with a heavy breath. The supervisor is the only one with a key, but he keeps it in plain view, hanging on a board on his wall, labelled. He's in and out of his office a hundred times a day. Anyone who works in the place could lift the key, use it, and replace it without being noticed.

Every time a researcher takes some poison he's supposed to sign a register kept in the poison locker stating how 323

much he took, the date, and his name. So I had the supervisor run a total on the arsenic trioxide withdrawn and check it against the amount they started with and how much was there this morning. Over two ounces is unaccounted for. He couldn't understand how that could happen.'

'I can,' I said. 'Two ounces! She took enough to kill the old man ten times.'

'Sounds like,' Stilton agreed, 'but no way to prove it.

Now they're going to tighten up their poison control procedure. By the way, Glynis Stonehouse wasn't fired; she left voluntarily. Cleaned out her desk one Friday and called on Monday to say she wasn't coming in. Didn't even give them a reason or excuse; just quit cold. Well, I've got to run, Josh. I'm going to try to get over to the 79th Street boat basin around noon. And if possible, I'll see you at two o'clock.'

I finished typing up my notes on the Bishop Oxman interview and began trying to compose a rough agenda for the meeting that afternoon with the two senior partners. I knew I would make a better impression if my presentation was organized, brief, succinct.

I was scribbling notes when the phone rang again. It was another cabdriver and the conversation followed the usual pattern:

'How much is the reward?' he asked in a gargling voice.