“I notice there was nothing about that wager mentioned in your reports... Get busy, men. You have a search warrant. Look through these pillows and see if you can find one which has been cut, and the cut repaired with adhesive tape.”
Lester Leith said, in a slow drawl, “Of course, Captain, you know this is an inexcusable outrage. I should resent it, only I’m rather tired tonight, and being resentful consumes a lot of energy, don’t you think?”
Captain Carmichael said nothing.
Sergeant Ackley, who had popped into the bedroom, let out a whoop of delight. He returned to the living room, holding up a pillow in one end of which a small cut had been patched up with a piece of adhesive tape. “This is it!” he shouted. “This will convict him. This is all the evidence we need.”
Leith said, “That’s nonsense, Sergeant. I told you that white feather had caused me to wonder about Alcott. In the privacy of my own apartment I made an experiment to determine whether a small hole in a pillow could be plugged with adhesive tape taken from a bandage. I found that it could.”
Sergeant Ackley said gloatingly, “You’ll have a chance to tell that to the jury. This is the same pillow which was taken from Betcher’s hotel. I can swear to it. I’ve seen the pillows. I can identify them. Now then, you supercilious crook, laugh that off.”
One of the detectives who had entered Beaver’s bedroom came running into the living room, carrying a pillow. “I’ve found it, Captain,” he said.
There was grim silence while the detective peeled back the pillowcase to show a second pillow with a cut covered with adhesive tape.
“Any other pillows?” Captain Carmichael asked dryly.
The detective said, “Gosh, Captain, I didn’t look. I found this one. It was the first one I looked at, and—”
“Look at the others,” Captain Carmichael said.
The crestfallen Sergeant Ackley and the other detectives returned to their search. In the next five minutes they uncovered six pillows. Each one had been cut, and the cut patched with adhesive tape.
Lester Leith, who had been calmly smoking during the search, picked up his magazine and started to read.
Captain Carmichael, fighting back a twinkle which persisted in creeping into his frosty eyes, said, “What’s your explanation of these pillows, Leith?”
Leith looked up from the magazine. “Those?” he said. “Oh, just a psychological experiment, Captain. You know, I’m one of these confounded amateurs who likes to read about crime in the newspapers, and then try to work out some purely academic solution.”
Captain Carmichael said, “I’m afraid, Leith, that there’s enough evidence against you this time to arrest you, even if the evidence isn’t strong enough to convict.”
Leith said, “Oh, I don’t think so, Captain. If I were arrested, it seems to me the police would be placed in rather a peculiar position. In the first place, they’d have to admit that I, a rank outsider and an amateur, uncovered a theory which solved the Mandeville bribe case simply by looking at a perfectly obvious clue contained in a newspaper illustration, a clue which the police had in their fingers, a clue which was staring them right in the face. Furthermore, as a part of my defense, it would appear that I did what I did at the instigation of Sergeant Ackley, who made a surreptitious profit of twenty-five dollars on the transaction, and who, in order to get that twenty-five dollars, assured me in writing that it would be no crime to proceed with my plans.”
Lester Leith paused and shook his head sadly. “You couldn’t convict me,” he said, “and it would put the police force in a most unpleasant light. In short, Captain, they’d appear positively ludicrous.” Captain Carmichael’s eyes lost their twinkle as they fastened themselves on Sergeant Ackley. “The man’s right, Sergeant,” he said, “and you have yourself to thank for it.”
“But these pillows!”
“Which pillow is the one that came from Betcher’s hotel?” the Captain asked.
“Well, of course,” Sergeant Ackley said, looking at the pillows on the floor, “they’ve been pretty well mixed up now, and I—”
“Oh, but you identified one of them as having been the pillow,” Lester Leith said. “You were willing to swear to it, Sergeant. Come, come, Sergeant. Can’t you pick out the right pillow now?”
Sergeant Ackley’s facial expression showed only too plainly what was going on in his mind.
Captain Carmichael turned toward the door. “Come, Sergeant,” he said. “You’re not doing yourself or the Department any good by remaining here. If you ever had a case against Leith, it certainly has been botched up so that the less publicity that’s given it the better.”
As Captain Carmichael started to close the door, he turned to Lester Leith. “I wish we had your mind on the force,” he said. “It might increase our efficiency so far as catching criminals is concerned.”
Leith said very courteously, “Thank you, Captain, but it has always seemed to me that the best way to check crime is to deprive the criminals of their ill-gotten spoils.”
Captain Carmichael stared at him thoughtfully, and then said slowly, “And there’s a chance you may be right at that.”
The door closed behind him.
Lester Leith smiled at his valet. “Your loyalty, Scuttle, is touching,” he said. “I still don’t know how the devil you ever managed to persuade Sergeant Ackley to take over half of that bet and make that endorsement on the letter.”
The spy fidgeted uneasily. “Just a matter of tact, sir,” he said.
Leith nodded and yawned. “By the way, Scuttle,” he said, “I’ll have a deposit to make in one of my charitable trust funds tomorrow — a deposit of twenty-five thousand dollars, less the usual ten per cent covering costs of collection...”
The Exact Opposite
There was a glint of amusement in the eyes of Lester Leith as he lazily surveyed the valet, who was in reality no valet at all, but a police undercover operative sent by Sergeant Ackley to spy upon him.
“And so you don’t like fanatical East Indian priests, Scuttle?”
“No, sir,” he said. “I should hate to have them on my trail.”
Lester Leith took a cigarette from the humidor and flicked his lighter.
“Scuttle,” he said, “why the devil should Indian priests be on anyone’s trail?”
“If I were to tell you, sir, you’d think that I was trying to interest you in another crime. As a matter of fact, sir, it was a crime which caused me to voice that sentiment about East Indian priests.”
“Indeed?” said Lester Leith.
“Yes, sir,” he said. “I was thinking about the murder of George Navin.”
Lester Leith looked reproachfully at the spy.
“Scuttle,” he said, “is it possible that you are trying to interest me in that crime?”
“No, sir, not at all,” the spy made haste to reassure him. “Although if you were interested in the crime, sir, I am satisfied that this is a case made to order for you.”
Lester Leith shook his head.
“No, Scuttle,” he said. “Much as I like to dabble in crime problems, I don’t care to let myself go on them. You see, Scuttle, it’s a mental pastime with me. I like to read newspaper accounts of crimes and speculate on what might be a solution.”
“Yes, sir,” said the spy. “This is just the sort of a crime that you used to like to speculate about, sir.”
Lester Leith sighed. “No, Scuttle,” he said. “I really don’t dare to do it. You see, Scuttle, Sergeant Ackley learned about that fad of mine, and he insists that I am some sort of a super-criminal who goes about hijacking robbers out of their ill-gotten spoils. There’s nothing that I can do to convince the man that he is wrong. Therefore, I have found it necessary to give up my fad.”