Beaver’s eyes widened.
“What’s that got to do with it?”
Sergeant Ackley laughed.
“Plenty. They starve the birds and then take ’em out on their boats. They clamp a ring around their necks to keep ’em from swallowing. The bird sees a school of fish and flies over, swoops down and scoops up a whole beakful of ’em, an’ a pelican’s beak holds a lot. Then the bird tries to swallow ’em, but the ring keeps the fish right where they belong. The Jap pries the bird’s bill open, spills out the fish, and sends him away after more fish.
“Now this guy, Leith, has been lucky. I ain’t giving him credit for any great amount of brains, but for a lot o’ luck. He’s managed to dope out the solution of a few crimes from having the facts told to him, and he’s always thrown us off the trail by kidding us along with a lot o’ hooey.
“This time he ain’t going to kid nobody except himself. He’s got the hiding place of those diamonds figured out, and he’s going there to cop ’em off. Well, I’m going to just stick the ring around his neck, and let him cop. Then when he tries to swallow, he’ll find that we’ll just pry his jaw open an’ make ’m spill the goods.
“See? He’ll be just like the trained pelican. He’ll get the stuff for us, then we’ll shake him down and take all the credit for solving the case. After that we’ll cinch the stolen goods rap on this guy, Leith, and fry the murderer. And if we can’t find the murderer, we’ll just hang the whole works on Leith, frame him for the murder, and fry him.”
Beaver sighed.
“It sure sounds nice the way you tell it, Sarge, but I wish you’d find out what he’s goin’ to do with that there canary before we get into this thing too deep. Somehow or other I got a hunch that canary is goin’ to be the big thing in this case...”
Sergeant Ackley’s face turned red.
“That’ll do, Beaver. You go ahead and obey orders, and don’t ball things all up trying to get intellectual. You leave the thinkin’ to me. You do the leg work.
“That’s where you’ve always gummed the works before. You let this guy drag some red herring across the trail, and you go yapping off on that side trail while Leith gets his stuff across and ditches the swag.
“Now I don’t want to offend you, but I’m in charge of this case, and I’ll do the thinking. You beat it on back to Leith’s apartment, and telephone me whenever anything breaks. I’m going to play this hotel end of it my way.”
The undercover man started to say something, thought better of it.
“Yes, sir,” he said, saluted, turned on his heel and walked out.
Lester Leith stared around him at the hotel rooms.
There was nothing to indicate that one of these rooms had been the scene of a gruesome murder. Hotels have press agents who thrust forward certain favorable facts and keep others very much in the background when it becomes necessary.
The newspaper accounts of the Cogley murder had only mentioned the location of the crime as having been in a “downtown hotel.” They had been indefinite as to the name and location of this hotel and none of the accounts had so much as mentioned the floor on which the room had been situated, let alone the number of that room.
People have a superstitious dread of sleeping in a bed in which a murder has been committed, and some persons shun a hotel merely because a crime of violence has been committed under its roof.
The girl stared at Lester Leith with uncordial eyes.
“You’re leavin’ that connecting door unlocked?”
“Yes. I want to get into this room without going down the hallway. When you are in the room you can lock the door. But when you are absent I want to be free to come and go.”
“And you want me to do my stuff?” asked the girl.
“Meaning?” inquired Lester Leith.
“Copping watches and that sort of stuff?”
He nodded.
“But you don’t want me to do anything with ’em, hock ’em or anything like that?”
Lester Leith shook his head vigorously.
“No. I want you to give everything you take to me.”
The girl sighed.
“Hell,” she said, bitterly, “somebody’s always taking the joy outa life. Here it is!”
And she tossed a hard object to the hotel dresser, an object that rattled, rolled, and sent forth sparkles of scintillating fire.
Lester Leith stared at it.
“Where did that come from?”
“The hotel clerk’s necktie, of course,” she said. “You didn’t think I’d pass up anything like that, did you?”
Lester Leith stared at her in appreciative appraisal.
“Good work! Did you get anything else?”
She shook her head.
“I lifted the bellhop’s watch, but it was a threshing machine movement, so I slipped it back again.”
Lester Leith smiled, crossed the room to the telephone.
“Can you shed any tears?” he asked the young woman.
She shook her head.
“Never shed a sob in my life. I never regretted anything I did bad enough.”
“Can you look meek and regretful?”
“Maybe.”
“Okay. Get gloomy then, because I’m getting the clerk up here.” Lester Leith took down the telephone receiver.
“The room clerk,” he said.
There was a pause, then the click of a connection.
“A most unfortunate occurrence,” muttered Lester Leith apologetically into the transmitter. “Please come up right away to room 407. I’ll explain when you get here. Come at once.”
He hung up the telephone, turned to the girl.
“Pull out the handkerchief and droop the eyes,” he said.
She sat down on the edge of the bed, hung her head.
“Okay, but don’t put it on too thick, or I’ll giggle.”
There was a knock at the door.
The clerk, white-faced, wide-eyed, stood on the threshold. Back of him was a lantern-jawed individual with pig eyes. Out in the corridor two men were engaged in a casual conversation of greeting, exclaiming that it was a small world after all, shaking hands with a fervor that was too exclamatory to be entirely genuine.
The clerk stepped into the room.
“Meet Mr. Moss,” he said, nervously.
Lester Leith bowed.
“The house detective, I take it?”
The clerk cleared his throat nervously, but the big form of the man with the lantern jaw barged forward.
“Yeah,” he growled, “I’m the house dick, if that means anything.”
Lester Leith was suavely apologetic.
“So glad you came, so glad we can have this little conference. I’m sorry it all happened, but glad we can discuss it privately. You see, my niece is suffering from a nervous disorder. In short, gentlemen, she’s a kleptomaniac. Her hands simply will not let other people’s property alone. She’s particularly hard on department stores.”
The house detective glowered at the girl who sat on the edge of the bed, head hung in shame, her hands clenched.
“Klepto — hell!” he exclaimed. “What you mean is that she’s a shoplifter. I’ve heard of lots of these here cases of nervous troubles, but they’re all the same. Now, don’t you try to pull nothing in this hotel, because...”
“No, no!” exclaimed Lester Leith. “You don’t understand. The girl has everything she could wish for, everything that money can buy. She simply has an irresistible impulse to steal. Now what I wish to do is to assure you that if there is anything taken from any of the guests of the hotel I will be financially responsible. I will make good the loss.”
The house detective sneered.
“I had intended,” continued Leith, “to have my niece examined by the best brain specialist in the city. But unfortunate symptoms have developed which make me realize that an acute attack is developing, and I cannot reach the brain specialist. I think, perhaps, your house physician would be able to handle the situation until we could secure a specialist.”