“Show him, Mokley,” he said to the butler.
The man nodded. “This way, sir.”
He was all that Captain Mahoney had described, a ferocious looking figure, massive, heavy-handed, his ear cauliflowered.
“Here is the room, sir. The gems were in a concealed cabinet back of the bookcase. Only a very few people knew of that bookcase.”
But Sidney Zoom did not even glance at the place of concealment. Instead he dropped to his hands and knees and started crawling painfully, laboriously, over the edges of the carpet, his fingers questing over every inch of the carpeted surface.
He remained in that position, searching patiently for some three or four minutes. If he found anything he gave no sign. As abruptly as he had assumed the position, he straightened to his full height, looked at the two men.
“The bedroom,” he said.
“This way, sir,” said the butler.
They trooped into the bedchamber. It was a dank, chilly place of slumber, suggestive of fitful sleep, disturbed by periods of worry, or restless thoughts, of selfish desires.
Zoom inspected the cheerless room.
“Where,” he asked of the butler, “did Raine keep his gun?”
The lawyer cleared his throat.
Zoom shot him a glance.
“I asked the butler,” he said.
The butler’s face was wooden.
“I haven’t seen him with a gun for some time, sir. He used to have one, a thirty-eight, Smith and Wesson, sir.”
Zoom strode to the dresser, started yanking open the drawers.
There were suits of heavy underwear, coarse socks, cheap shirts, a few frayed-edged, starched collars. In an upper drawer was a pasteboard box with a green label on the top. The sides were copper colored. Zoom pulled out the box, ripped open the cover, turned it upside down.
Upon the dresser there cascaded a glittering shower of brass cartridges, cartridges for a forty-five automatic.
The lawyer cleared his throat again. Then he shrugged his shoulders, walked away. Zoom stared fixedly at Captain Mahoney.
“I want to see the Chinese cook,” he said.
Captain Mahoney studied the level intensity of Zoom’s eyes for a moment, then motioned to the butler.
“Come with me and let’s find the cook.”
They left the room. The lawyer cleared his throat, turned, regarded Sidney Zoom.
“Going to say something?” asked Zoom.
“Yes,” said the attorney. “I was about to remark that it was a nice day.”
The door opened again and Captain Mahoney escorted the butler and the Chinese cook into the room. The cook was nervous, plainly so.
“Ah Kim,” said Captain Mahoney.
Zoom looked at the man. The slant eyes rotated slitheringly about in oily restlessness.
“Ah Kim,” snapped Zoom, “do you know much about guns?”
Ah Kim shifted his weight.
“Heap savvy,” he said.
Zoom indicated the pile of shells.
“What gun do these fit?”
“Alla samee fit Missa Raine gun. Him florty-five, automatic.”
Zoom turned on his heel, faced the lawyer.
“You made Raine’s will.”
It was a statement rather than a question. The pale eyes of the lawyer regarded Zoom unwaveringly.
“Yes,” he said “Of course I did.”
“Who were the beneficiaries?”
The lawyer pursed his lips.
“I would rather answer that later, and in private.”
Captain Mahoney glanced at Zoom, then fixed the attorney with his dark, thoughtful eyes.
“Answer it now,” he said.
The lawyer bowed.
“Very well. The property, what there is, and it’s considerable, is left share and share alike to the two servants, Ah Kim and Sam Mokley.”
Chapter VII
The Hidden Gun
The Chinese heard the news with a bland countenance that was utterly devoid of expression. Sam Mokley gave a gasp of surprise.
“What!” he said.
The lawyer bowed.
“I wasn’t going to tell you until the investigation was over, but Raine left his property to you two.”
“Did you share in it?” asked Captain Mahoney.
“No.”
“He didn’t leave any to Eva Raine?” asked Zoom.
“Naturally not,” said the lawyer, “One does not ordinarily bequeath property to one’s murderer. And the girl was utterly unscrupulous. She testified falsely in the lawsuit over the gems. She broke into the house and committed burglary.”
Sidney Zoom nodded careless acquiescence.
“Do you ever read the Bible, Mr. Gearhard?”
The white-haired man smiled.
“I have read it,” he said, dryly.
“It is an excellent passage,” commented Sidney Zoom, “which remarks that the one who is without sin may throw the first stone.”
The lawyer’s lips settled in a straight line.
“If you mean anything at all personal by that,” he snapped, “you had better watch your tongue. There is a law in this State against libel. Your attitude ever since you entered this place has been hostile.”
It was apparent that the grizzled veteran of many a court room battle was very much on the aggressive whenever his personal integrity was assailed.
Zoom bowed.
“You are mistaken,” he said. “My attitude is that of an investigator.”
He turned to Captain Mahoney.
“The murder,” he said, “is solved.”
Captain Mahoney stared at him.
“Who did it?”
Zoom smiled.
“Since there is a law against defamation of character, I will say nothing, but will refer you to absolute means of proof. A step at a time, we will uncover the matter.
“Rip, smell of the gentlemen.”
And Sidney Zoom waved his hand in a gesture, a swift flip of the wrist.
An animal trainer would have known that it was the gesture, more than the words which made the police dog do that which he did. But the effect was uncanny. The dog walked deliberately to each of the three men, smelled their clothing with bristling hostility, ruffling the hair on his back.
“Come, captain,” said Sidney Zoom.
And he turned, stalked from the room.
“We will leave the car parked here,” said Zoom as they gained the porch, leaving behind them three very puzzled individuals, “and start walking by the shortest route toward the apartment which the girl maintained.”
Captain Mahoney fell into step.
“Zoom,” he said, quietly, “have you any idea of just what you’re after?”
Zoom’s answer was a single explosive monosyllable.
“Yes.”
They strode forward, walking swiftly.
“Search,” said Zoom, and waved his arm.
The dog barked once, a short, swift bark, then started to swing out in a series of questing semicircles, ranging ahead and to either side of the walking men.
They walked rapidly and in silence. Captain Mahoney was put to it to keep the pace. From time to time, his anxious, speculative eyes turned upward to Zoom’s face. But the rigid profile was as though carved from solid rock.
It was not until they had approached the place where the body of the murdered man had been found that the dog suddenly barked three times, came running toward them, then back toward a vacant lot.
Here was a patch of brush, back of a signboard. The ground was littered with such odds and ends as invariably collect in vacant lots. There were two or three automobiles which would never run again, a few tin cans which had been surreptitiously deposited.
“I think,” said Zoom, “the dog has found something important.”
Captain Mahoney sprinted into speed, was the first to arrive at the patch of brush. He parted the leaves. The dog pawed excitedly, as though to help.