“When was the room janitored?” asked Snowy Shane, interrupting.
“After the office closed.”
“Robb was having a night session?”
“So it seems.”
“No one else in the room?”
“No.”
“If we could show someone else had been in the room, then what?”
The lawyer heaved a sigh.
“Then we’d stand a chance,” he said.
“What you want me to do?”
“Give me some facts to work on. I want you to pull some of your fourth degree stuff and give our client a break.”
Snowy Shane grinned.
“All right,” he conceded, “let’s get started and see what we can do for our client.”
The attorney chuckled.
“Knew you’d come around,” he said.
Shane bristled.
“It was the fourth degree stuff that turned the trick for you,” he said.
And Frank Sheridane, criminal attorney, and, therefore, shrewd judge of human nature, suppressed a smile. With Snowy Shane on the job the battle was underway, and he had been saving that fourth degree comment for just the proper time.
The president’s private office of the Mutual Morehomes Building & Loan had ceased to be a private sanctorum and had become a chamber of death.
A uniformed officer guarded the door, admitted the lawyer only after careful scrutiny of his pass. The rugs were still rumpled back, the gruesome red splotches discolored the floor. A chalked outline showed where the body had lain. The room reeked of the smell of death and the acrid fumes of flashlight powder where police and newspaper photographers had taken pictures of what had been found in the office.
The outer offices housed hushed groups of wide-eyed women employees who discussed the case in whispers. A detective accompanied Sheridane and Snowy Shane into the death chamber a cigar tilted in his mouth, his eyes weary and watchful.
“Take a look-see,” he said, “but don’t touch nothin’.”
Snowy Shane planted himself in the middle of the room. His eyes went slithering about, steely cold, watchful, alert.
“Fingerprints, Joe?”
The detective shook his head. “Nope.”
“Find the knife?”
“Nope.”
“What kind of a sticker was it?”
“The surgeon says it was paper knife, or a thin stiletto, the kind a frail would pack.”
Snowy Shane grunted.
“Let’s go,” he said, after a while.
Sheridane followed him to the outer office. There Shane secured the names of the three members of the advisory committee — Arthur Sprang, the chairman; Ernest Bagley and Sidney Symmes. He also secured their addresses.
“Looks sort of gloomy,” said the attorney as they descended in the elevator. “I’ll go to my office. You let me know if—”
Shane shook his head.
“You’ll stay with me. I’m going to see these men. I may want a witness.”
The lawyer’s eyes lighted.
“Fourth degree?” he asked. “Some of your special kind?”
Shane tamped tobacco into the bowl of his pipe, thrust it into his mouth and gripped the stem with firm teeth.
“Yeah,” he remarked, “stick around.”
They drove to the home of Arthur Sprang first. That individual was paunchy, red-eyed, pasty-jowled. The shock had left him nervous. He consented to see the pair with the statement that the interview would be brief.
“What time did you get the letter?” asked Shane, his gray eyes gimleting the red-rimmed ones of the heavy man.
“About one o’clock.”
“Humph,” said Shane and filled his pipe.
The attorney produced a cigar, offered one to the man who let his eyes shift restlessly, from one to the other.
“Thanks,” said Sprang, “I have my own pet brand.”
He produced a case from his inside pocket, selected a cigar, bit off the end and spat it explosively on the floor. His hand shook slightly.
“Terrific shock,” he said.
Snowy Shane leaned forward, jabbed an impressive finger at the bosom of the chairman of the advisory committee.
“How was he lyin’ when you busted in the door?”
Sprang repressed a shudder with a visible effort.
“Sprawled out,” he said, and shook his shoulders.
“Head toward the door or away from it?”
“Away from it.”
Shane grinned triumphantly.
“That,” he remarked, crisply, “is exactly what I wanted to know. Come on, Frank.”
And he got to his feet, led the puzzled lawyer to the door.
“But you said you wanted to get some very vital information you thought I might have,” murmured Arthur Sprang.
“We’ve got it,” said Shane and slammed the door.
In the taxicab, the lawyer regarded him speculatively.
“Really, Snowy, I don’t see just what you gained.”
“Shut up,” said the detective. “I’m thinkin’.”
They journeyed in silence to the office of Ernest Bagley. That individual, thin, dour, very nervous, greeted them with a dry, husky voice, shook hands with big, bony fingers that were cold and dry. He was past middle age, abnormally long of arm, high of cheek bone, thick of lip, hollow of cheek.
“You wanted to ask about the murder, you said, over the telephone?”
“Yeah,” said Snowy Shane, plunging into the discussion without any polite preliminaries. “How long you known Robb?”
“Ten years.”
“Members of the same golf club and all that?”
“No. I don’t play golf. Neither did Robb.”
Snowy Shane produced his pipe from his pocket, tamped tobacco into the bowl, regarded it ruefully.
“Any pipe tobacco? Mine’s run out.”
Bagley shook his head.
“I use cigarettes, roll my own. I can give you some of my tobacco I use in them, though.”
Shane nodded. Bagley produced a cloth sack, handed it to the detective. Shane filled his pipe.
“Only had half enough for a smoke,” he said. “This’ll come in handy.”
He passed back the sack. Bagley took a packet of brown papers from a vest pocket, rolled a cigarette. His hand shook slightly.
“Ever have any mutual business interests with Robb?” asked Shane, abruptly.
The bony fingers stopped, midway in their task.
“A few,” admitted Ernest Bagley, and the cold caution of his guarded tone was apparent to both of his listeners, trained as they were in the subtleties of human prevarications.
“Profitable?” asked Shane.
Bagley looked up from his cigarette.
“That,” I think, “is hardly a proper question.”
Shane got to his feet.
“All right,” he said. “If you won’t cooperate with us, we’ll have to reach it some other way.”
The attorney followed him from the office, his eyes puzzled. Bagley watched them with a face that was utterly void of expression.
“A good poker player,” said the attorney, as they got into the taxicab once more.
“Yeah,” said Shane. “We’ll go see Symmes now.”
Sheridane studied the squat, powerful man with the steel-gray eyes and snowy hair.
“Shane, do you know what you’re doing, or are you just messing around in the dark?”
The detective regarded him with eyes that were wide with surprise. “Why, of course I know what I’m doing. You said you wanted facts, didn’t you? Something you could pin a defense to?”
“Yes,” said the attorney, “you give me a peg to hang a defense on, and that’s all I want. I’ll do the rest.”
The detective nodded.
“And you don’t see what I’m doing?”
“No. I’m hanged if I do. I presume it’s some of your fourth degree stuff, but I don’t see it.”
“Stick around then,” advised Snowy Shane, “and save me a cigar. I’m going to switch from a pipe, after a while.”