“What do you want from me?”
“Whatever you can tell me about ice axes, who makes them, where you buy them, what they’re used for.”
Calvin Case looked at his wife. “Will you get my axes, hon? They’re in the hall closet.”
While she was gone the men didn’t speak. Case motioned toward a chair, but Delaney shook his head. Finally Mrs. Case came back, awkwardly clutching five axes. Two were under an arm; she held the handles of the other three in a clump.
“Dump ’em on the bed,” Case ordered, and she obediently let them slide onto the soiled sheet.
Delaney stood over them, inspected them swiftly, then grabbed. It was an all-steel implement, hatchet-length, the handle bound in leather. From the butt of the handle hung a thong loop. The head had a hammer on one side, a pick on the other. The pick was exactly like that described by Christopher Langley; about five inches long, it was square-shaped at the shaft, then tapered to a thinning triangle. As it tapered, the spike curved downward and ended in a sharp point. On the underside were four little saw teeth. The entire head was a bright red, the leather-covered handle a bright blue. Between was a naked shaft of polished steel. There was a stamping on the side of the head: a small inscription. Delaney put on his glasses to read it: “Made in West Germany.”
“This-” he began.
“That’s not an ice ax,” Calvin Case interrupted. “Technically, it’s an ice hammer. But most people call it an ice ax. They lump all these things together.”
“You bought it in West Germany?”
“No. Right here in New York. The best mountain gear is made in West Germany, Austria and Switzerland. But they export all over the world.”
“Where in New York did you buy it?”
“A place I used to work. I got an employees’ discount on it. It’s down on Spring Street, a place called ‘Outside Life.’ They sell gear for hunting, fishing, camping, safaris, mountaineering, back-packing-stuff like that.”
“May I use your phone?”
“Help yourself,”
He was so encouraged, so excited, that he couldn’t remember Christopher Langley’s phone number and had to look it up in his pocket notebook. But he would not put the short ice ax down; he held it along with the phone in one hand while he dialed. He finally got through.
“Mr. Langley? Delaney here.”
“Oh, Captain! I should have called, but I really have nothing to report. I’ve made a list of possible sources, and I’ve been visiting six or seven shops a day. But so far I-”
“Mr. Langley, do you have your list handy?”
“Why yes, Captain. Right here. I was just about to start out when you called.”
“Do you have a store named Outside Life on your list?”
“Outside Life? Just a minute…Yes, here it is. It’s on Spring Street.”
“That’s the one.”
“Yes, I have it. I’ve divided my list into neighborhoods, and I have that in the downtown section. I haven’t been there yet.”
“Mr. Langley. I have a lead they may have what we want. Could you get there today?”
“Of course. I’ll go directly.”
“Thank you. Please call me at once, whether you find it or not. I’ll either be home or at the hospital.”
He hung up, turned back to Calvin Case, still holding the ice ax. He didn’t want to let it go. He swung the tool in a chopping stroke. Then he raised it high and slashed down. “Nice balance,” he nodded.
“Sure,” Case agreed. “And plenty of weight. You could kill a man easily.”
“Tell me about ice axes.”
Calvin Case told him what he could. It wasn’t much. He thought the modern ice ax had evolved from the ancient Alpinestock, a staff as long as a shepherd’s crook. In fact, Case had seen several still in use in Switzerland. They were tipped with hand-hammered iron spikes, and used to probe the depth of snow, try the consistency of ice, test stone ledges and overhangs, probe crevasses.
“Then,” Case said, “the two-handed ice ax was developed.”
He leaned forward from the waist to pick up samples from the foot of his bed. Apparently he was naked under the sheet. His upper torso had once been thick and muscular. Now it had gone to flab: pale flesh matted with reddish hair, smelling rankly.
He showed the long ice axes to Delaney, explaining how the implement could be used as a cane, driven into ice as a rope support, the mattock side of the head used to chop foot and hand holds in ice as capable of load-bearing as granite. The butt end of the handle varied. It could be a plain spike for hiking on glaciers, or fitted with a small thonged wheel for walking on crusted snow, or simply supplied with a small knurled cap.
“Where did you get all these?” Delaney asked.
“These two in Austria. This one in West Germany. This one in Geneva.”
“You can buy them anywhere?”
“Anywhere in Europe, sure. Climbing is very big over there.”
“And here?”
“There must be a dozen stores in New York. Maybe more. And other places too, of course. The West Coast, for instance.”
“And this one?” Delaney had slipped the thong loop of the short ice ax over his wrist. “What’s this used for?”
“Like I told you, technically it’s an ice hammer. If you’re on stone, you can start a hole with the pick end. Then you try to hammer in a piton with the other side of the head. A piton is a steel peg. It has a loop on top, and you can attach a line to it or thread it through.”
Delaney drew two fingers across the head of the ax he held. Then he rubbed the tips of the two fingers with his thumb and grinned.
“You look happy,” Case said, pouring himself another whiskey.
“I am. Oiled.”
“What?”
“The ax head is oiled.”
“Oh…sure. Evelyn keeps all my stuff cleaned and oiled. She thinks I’m going to climb again some day. Don’t you, hon?”
Delaney turned to look at her. She nodded mutely, tried to smile. He smiled in return.
“What kind of oil do you use, Mrs. Case?”
“Oh…I don’t know. It’s regular oil. I buy it in a hardware store on Sixth Avenue.”
“A thin oil,” Calvin Case said. “Like sewing machine oil. Nothing special about it.”
“Do all climbers keep their tools cleaned and oiled?”
“The good ones do. And sharp.”
Delaney nodded. Regretfully he relinquished the short-handled ice ax, putting it back with the others on the foot of Case’s bed.
“You said you worked for Outside Life, where you bought this?”
“That’s right. For almost ten years. I was in charge of the mountaineering department. They gave me all the time off I wanted for climbs. It was good publicity for them.”
“Suppose I wanted to buy an ice ax like that. I just walk in and put down my money. Right?”
“Sure. That one cost about fifteen dollars. But that was five years ago.”
“Do I get a cash register receipt, or do they write out an itemized sales check?”
Case looked at him narrowly. Then his bearded face opened into a smile; he showed his stained teeth again.
“Mr. Detective,” he grinned. “Thinking every minute, aren’t you? Well, as far as Outside Life goes, you’re in luck. A sales slip is written out-or was, when I worked there. You got the customer’s name and address. This was because Sol Appel, who owns the place, does a big mail order business. He gets out a Summer and Winter catalogue, and he’s always anxious to add to his list. Then, on the slip, you wrote out the items purchased.”
“After the customer’s name and address were added to the mailing list, how long were the sales slips kept? Do you know?”
“Oh Jesus, years and years. The basement was full of them. But don’t get your balls in an uproar, Captain. Outside Life isn’t the only place in New York where you can buy an ice ax. And most of the other places just ring up the total purchase. There’s no record of the customer’s name, address, or what was bought. And, like I told you, most of these things are imported. You can buy an ice ax in London, Paris, Berlin, Vienna, Rome, Geneva, and points in between. And in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Boston, Portland, Seattle, Montreal, and a hundred other places. So where does that leave you?”