Lester Leith, enjoying the luxury of a lazy evening at home, looked up from the magazine he was reading as the buzzer sounded an imperative signal. “Better see who it is, Scuttle,” he said.
The spy opened the door. Sergeant Ackley, accompanied by Captain Carmichael and two detectives, pushed their way through the door.
Carmichael said, “All right, Sergeant. You do the talking.”
Sergeant Ackley pounded his way across the room.
Lester Leith arched his eyebrows in mild surprise. “Why, good evening, gentlemen,” he said. “What brings you here, and why the officious manner, Sergeant?”
Sergeant Ackley said, “You know very well what I’m after, Leith.”
Leith shook his head. “I’m not much of a mind-reader, Sergeant,” he said.
Ackley said, “We’ve been working on Rodney Alcott. He broke down and confessed the whole deal.”
“Indeed,” Leith said. “What did he say?”
“He’s a chiseler and an opportunist,” Sergeant Ackley said. “He thought there was an opportunity to shake down Frank Boyen for twenty-five thousand dollars. By capitalizing on a family connection Alcott had been able to be seen in public once or twice with Judge Mandeville. He took occasion to see that Frank Boyen, the president of the Click-Fast Shutter Company, knew of his contact with Judge Mandeville. Then he approached Boyen and tried to get twenty-five thousand dollars which he supposedly was going to pass on to Judge Mandeville.
“Boyen smelled a rat and called in Betcher, the private detective. Betcher also smelled a rat. They intended to give Alcott the money and find out what he did with it. If he went south with it, they were going to arrest him. If he passed it over to Judge Mandeville, they were going to arrest both of them.”
Leith said, “I have read the papers, Sergeant, and am familiar with the superficial facts. Do I understand that you have called on me this evening to ask me to collaborate with you?”
Sergeant Ackley gave an impatient exclamation. “You know why I’ve called,” he said. “You doped it all out.”
“Doped what all out?”
“What happened,” Sergeant Ackley said.
“Indeed, no,” Leith observed. “I’d be interested to know what did happen.”
“As though you didn’t know,” Ackley said. “I tell you Alcott has confessed. They took him into Betcher’s suite in the hotel. He was given the twenty-five one-thousand-dollar bills there, and he knew, of course, they’d keep him under surveillance until he had gone to Judge Mandeville’s chambers. But Alcott’s pretty slick. He managed to get one of the pieces of adhesive tape off of the bandage on his head. He was sitting on the bed in Betcher’s suite at the time. He got his knife out of his pocket. While they were checking and listing the numbers on the bills, he pushed back the end of the pillowcase and cut a small slit in the end of the pillow. When they handed him the twenty-five one-thousand-dollar bills, he took them with his right hand, folded them, and then surreptitiously slipped them into his left hand. He had already planted twenty-five one-dollar bills in his left coat sleeve. He managed to substitute those bills and then put them ostentatiously in his pocket. He shoved the twenty-five one-thousand-dollar bills into the opening in the pillow, put the piece of adhesive tape over the cut in the pillow, and pulled back the pillowslip. He intended to watch his opportunity, return, and pick up the twenty-five thousand dollars.
“The thing that betrayed him was a white feather from the inside of the pillow. In pulling the adhesive tape from his bandage, he got some of the adhesive stuck to his fingers. That caused one of the white feathers from the inside of the pillow to stick to his fingers and get folded in with the one-dollar bills. Later on, when the one-dollar bills were found in his wallet, the white feather was among them. He knew that he had to think fast and explain away that feather. Otherwise, it would furnish a clue to the entire business. So he handed out a cock-and-bull story about it being a lucky piece that he had carried for some time.”
Leith’s eyes showed interest.
“That’s very interesting, Sergeant,” he said. “Now, would you mind telling me how it concerns me?”
“You know how it concerns you. You went to a lot of trouble to set the stage for a nice little act which you staged in Betcher’s apartment this afternoon. You went up there with a pillow under your clothes. You arranged things so that you had a few minutes alone in Betcher’s room. Those few minutes were sufficient for you to identify the pillow that had the twenty-five thousand dollars in it. You couldn’t take the time there to search around in the feathers and find the roll of bills, so you simply switched pillows! You took the one which you had used as padding and placed it on Betcher’s bed, took the one on Betcher’s bed which was sealed up with a piece of adhesive tape and put it inside of your clothes as padding, and then went down the hall to terminate your ‘employment’ of Betcher. You did the whole thing so elaborately no one suspected that your real purpose was to have a few minutes alone in Betcher’s room in the hotel.”
Lester Leith nodded. “Sergeant,” he said, “I admire much of your deductive reasoning. As it happens, this time you’re a lot closer to the true facts of the case than is ordinarily the case. To be frank with you, Sergeant, I noticed the discrepancy between the condition of that feather and Alcott’s story as soon as I saw his picture in the paper. Then when I saw the picture taken after he was booked and noticed that one of the strips of adhesive tape was missing, I thought that it was quite possible that he had concealed the money in a pillow somewhere, and that the white feather had stuck to his fingers when he pulled it out.
“However, Sergeant, my interest in crime is only academic. It’s that of a student. The practical application of my theories to a solution of the crime has no particular charm for me.
“However, it did occur to me that Betcher might perhaps be a crook, and I suggested the matter to Scuttle, my valet. He thought that Betcher was quite honest. The thing got to a point where we laid a wager on it, and I believe that you—”
“That’s enough,” Sergeant Ackley interrupted. “We’re not interested in anything about that. We have a search warrant. We’re going to search your apartment, and if we find a pillow with adhesive tape on it—”
“Just a moment, Sergeant,” Captain Carmichael said. “I think Mr. Leith’s comments constitute damaging admissions. I think we should hear him out. Do you admit, Mr. Leith, that you posed as Mr. Randerman, and that you and Mrs. Randerman went to all that elaborate buildup for the purpose of making contact with Betcher?”
“Certainly,” Leith said.
Captain Carmichael frowned. “I’m afraid,” he said, “you’re going to have some difficulty explaining that.”
“Oh, not at all,” Leith said. “It’s simply the result of a wager. Sergeant Ackley knows all about it. In fact, he’s a party to the wager.”
Sergeant Ackley said, “I can explain it all, Captain. But this isn’t the time.”
“In fact,” Leith said, “I have already paid the wager to my valet, and I have reason to believe that he’s passed Sergeant Ackley’s share on to him.”
Captain Carmichael frowned. “Is that true, Sergeant?” he asked.
“Well,” Sergeant Ackley said, “it was a private matter, and—”
“Private matter!” Captain Carmichael roared. “It would make the department the laughing-stock of the newspapers, and why the devil didn’t you report it?”
“I didn’t think it was—”
“I know why you didn’t report it,” Captain Carmichael said. “You wanted to chisel twenty-five dollars.”
“At the time,” Sergeant Ackley said, “I thought it was best. I—”