“If my hypothesis is right, the killer was a pro. And that fits in with certain other facts. In the twenties and thirties, the Bluff Road area was a stamping ground for hoods. It was until quite recently, as a matter of fact. In those days it was a real hotbed. A lot of the liquor that kept San Francisco going during Prohibition came in by sea and was tunneled through Luna Bay. They brought in other things than liquor – drugs, for instance, and women from Mexico and Panama. You ever hear of the Red Horse Inn?”
“No.”
“It stood on the coast about a mile south of where we found the skeleton. They tore it down a couple of years ago, after we put the stopper on it. That was a place with a history. It used to be a resort hotel for well-heeled people from the City and the Peninsula. The rum-runners took it over in the twenties. They converted it into a three-way operation: liquor warehouse in the basement, bars and gaming on the first floor, women upstairs. The reason I know so much about it, I had my first drink there back about 1930. And my first woman.”
“You don’t look that old.”
“I was sixteen at the time. I think that’s one of the reasons I went into law enforcement. I wanted to put bastards like Lempi out of circulation. Lempi was the boss hood who ran the place in the twenties. I knew him personally, but the law got to him before I grew up to his size. They got him for income tax in 1932, he died on the Rock a few years later. Some of his guns were sent up at the same time.
“I knew those boys, see, and this is the point I’m coming to. I knew what they were capable of doing. They killed for pay, and they killed because they enjoyed it. They bragged in public that nobody could touch them. It took a federal indictment to cool Lempi. Meantime a number of people lost their lives. Our Mr. Bones could be one of them.”
“But you say Lempi and his boys were cleaned out in ’32. Our man was killed in ’36.”
“We don’t know that. We jumped to that conclusion on the basis of what Doc Dineen said, but we’ve got no concrete evidence to go on. The Doc himself admits that given the chemistry of that particular soil, he can’t pinpoint time of burial closer than five years either way. Mr. Bones could have been knocked off as early as 1931. I say could have.”
“Or as late as 1941?” I said.
“That’s right. You see how little we have to go on.”
“Do I get to take a look at what you have?”
“Why not?”
Mungan went into a back room and returned lugging a metal box about the size of a hope chest. He set it on top of his desk, unlocked it, lifted the lid. Its contents were jumbled like kindling. Only the vertebrae had been articulated with wire, and lay coiled on the heap like the skeleton of a snake. Mungan showed me where the neck bone had been severed by a cutting instrument.
The larger bones had been labeled: left femur, left fibula, and so on. Mungan picked out a heavy bone about a foot long; it was marked “right humerus.”
“This is the bone of the upper arm,” he said in a lecturer’s tone. “Come along on over to the window here. I want to show you something.”
He held the bone to the light. Close to one knobbed end, I made out a dun line filled and surrounded by deposits of calcium.
“A break?” I said.
“I hope in more senses than one. It’s a mended fracture, the only unusual thing in the entire skeleton. Dineen says it was probably set by a trained hand, a doctor. If we could find the doctor that set it, it would answer some of our questions. So if you’ve got any ideas…” Mungan let his voice trail off, but his eyes stayed hard on my face.
“I’ll do some telephoning.”
“You can use my phone.”
“A pay phone would suit me better.”
“If you say so. There’s one across the street, in the hotel.”
I found the telephone booth at the rear of the dingy hotel lobby, and placed a call to Santa Teresa. Sable’s secretary put him on the line.
“Archer speaking, the one-man dragnet,” I said. “I’m in Luna Bay.”
“You’re where?”
“Luna Bay. It’s a small town on the coast south of San Francisco. I have a couple of items for you: a dead man’s bones, and a live boy. Let’s start with the bones.”
“Bones?”
“Bones. They were dug up by accident about six months ago, and they’re in the sheriffs substation here. They’re unidentified, but the chances are better than even that they belong to the man I’m looking for. The chances are also better than even that he was murdered twenty-two years ago.”
The line was silent.
“Did you get that, Sable? He was probably murdered.”
“I heard you. But you say the remains haven’t been identified.”
“That’s where you can help me, if you will. You better write this down. There’s a fracture in the right humerus, close to the elbow. It was evidently set by a doctor. I want you to check on whether Tony Galton ever had a broken right arm. If so, who was the doctor that looked after it? It may have been Howell, in which case there’s no sweat. I’ll call you back in fifteen minutes.”
“Wait. You mentioned a boy. What’s he got to do with all this?”
“That remains to be seen. He thinks he’s the dead man’s son.”
“Tony’s son?”
“Yes, but he isn’t sure about it. He came here from Michigan in the hope of finding out who his father was.”
“Do you think he’s Tony’s son?”
“I wouldn’t bet my life savings on it. I wouldn’t bet against it, either. He bears a strong resemblance to Tony. On the other hand, his story is weak.”
“What story does he tell?”
“It’s pretty long and complicated for the telephone. He was brought up in an orphanage, he says, went to college under an assumed name, came out here a month ago to find out who he really is. I don’t say it couldn’t have happened the way he says, but it needs to be proved out.”
“What kind of a boy is he?”
“Intelligent, well spoken, fairly well mannered. If he’s a con artist, he’s smooth for his age.”
“How old is he?”
“Twenty-two.”
“You work very quickly,” he said.
“I was lucky. What about your end? Has Trask got anything on my car?”
“Yes. It was found abandoned in San Luis Obispo.”
“Wrecked?”
“Out of gas. It’s in perfectly good shape, I saw it myself. Trask has it impounded in the county garage.”
“What about the man who stole it?”
“Nothing definite. He probably took another car in San Luis. One disappeared late yesterday afternoon. Incidentally, Trask tells me that the Jaguar, the murder car, as he calls it, was another stolen car.”
“Who was the owner?”
“I have no idea. The Sheriff is having the engine number traced.”
I hung up, and spent the better part of fifteen minutes thinking about Marian Culligan Matheson and her respectable life in Redwood City which I was going to have to invade again. Then I called Sable back. The line was busy. I tried again in ten minutes, and got him.
“I’ve been talking to Dr. Howell,” he said. “Tony broke his right arm when he was in prep school. Howell didn’t set the break himself, but he knows the doctor who did. In any case, it was a fractured humerus.”
“See if they can turn up the X-ray, will you? They don’t usually keep X-ray pictures this long, but it’s worth trying. It’s the only means I can think of for making a positive identification.”