“He won’t talk,” said Johnny, “but I’ve got him worried.”
“You’re not worried?”
“Why should I be?”
“Apparently someone suspects you so strongly that they’re paying money to a private detective agency to have you shadowed.”
“Of course,” said Johnny, “we don’t know for sure that I’m the one who’s being shadowed.”
Linda inhaled sharply. “You think — me?”
“Have you been behaving yourself lately?”
Linda looked thoughtfully at Johnny. “You’re not really joking. You think I—”
“No.”
“You do!”
Johnny sighed lightly. “At this stage of the game, I suspect everybody. You say you weren’t at the plant yesterday, but your father owns the place, your brother works there and you’ve probably been in and out of it a thousand times. You may or may not be aware of people in the factory. Let’s say you’re not, but there isn’t one of those five hundred odd workers, male and female, who doesn’t know about you. It’s an old company. I know of two employees who have been with the company for thirty-nine years. They know the day you were born; you may never have talked to them but they know you and everything about you...”
“But I don’t see how that could involve me in a brutal murder.”
“You know about your father being called The Duke?”
She nodded. “Yes. The newspapers have always called him The Leather Duke.”
“And the employees, in talking about him, refer to him as The Duke. They speak of you as The Duchess. The Towner Leather Company is an island in the city, an independent principality. The workers are its citizens. Some of them love the rulers, some of them hate them. But all fear them...”
“Why should they fear us?”
“Everybody fears his employer. Any workman can be fired, lose his security. A word of praise for one of the rulers, or a word of hate, can be resented by another employee. The reason for a quarrel does not determine the degree of hate that is engendered. A blow is struck and...” Johnny shrugged.
“You make it sound very devious,” Linda said soberly.
“The reasons for murder are usually devious. You take Al Piper; from all I’ve heard about him he was a pretty decent sort, a married man with two children. A pretty steady worker, as witness his long employment at the Towner factory. He had only one really bad habit; he was a periodic drinker. Twice a year he went on binges...”
“But you don’t know what he did during those drinking periods? I understand he had just come off one a couple of days ago.”
“True, but I want to call attention to the fact that he wasn’t killed while he was on one of those binges. It was only after he had sobered up and returned to work. I think therefore that his death can be traced to something that happened at the plant. It points the finger at a Towner man — or woman.”
“Of whom there are five hundred.”
“My job is to eliminate and keep on eliminating until only one person is left — the murderer.”
Chapter Thirteen
The man from the Wiggins Detective Agency followed Johnny and Linda Towner back to the leather factory.
“Now,” Johnny said, “we’ll see whether he’s following you or me. I’ll go in and you drive off.”
“But I wanted to see Dad,” protested Linda.
“He won’t be back yet from his director’s meeting,” said Johnny, “and me, I’ve got to get to work.”
Linda hesitated, then nodded agreement. “All right, I’ll see you later.”
She stayed in her car and Johnny went into the plant. He stopped inside the door, however, and peered out through the glass. Linda started up the Cadillac convertible and drove off.
The man in the black Chevrolet continued to loll back in his seat. Johnny nodded thoughtfully. “Well, that settles that. He’s watching me.”
He climbed up to the office floor and was so wrapped in thought that he did not see Nancy Miller. She started to speak to him, then thought better of the idea. Johnny rang for the elevator, then saw Nancy.
He hurried back to her. “Eight o’clock this evening,” he said.
“Eight o’clock, what?”
“That’s when I’ll pick you up. Oh, I haven’t got your address.”
“Aren’t you taking a lot for granted?” Nancy Miller asked, coolly.
“Why, no, you said you’d go out with me if I weren’t a laborer and I’m no longer toiling with my hands.”
“Then why’re you going upstairs?”
“I’ll tell you about that this evening. Here’s the elevator. The address...?”
She hesitated, then suddenly smiled. “635 Armitage.”
“Eight o’clock — your best dress!”
He stepped into the elevator and rode up to the counter floor. He walked through to the sorting department and noted that it was ten minutes after two.
Hal Johnson was leaning against his desk. He looked up at the clock and then at Johnny.
“Hiyah, Hal,” Johnny greeted him cheerfully.
Johnson grunted. “Go out to lunch with Mr. Towner?” he asked, sarcastically.
“No, his daughter.”
Johnson blinked. “All right,” he said. “I’m only the foreman here. Maybe I’m not supposed to know what’s going on. I hired you for a counter sorter yesterday, and today the boss calls you down to his office and you have lunch with his daughter.”
“The office send up the John B. Croft order yet?”
“What Croft order?”
“The one I got just before lunch. Twenty barrels.”
“You got an order for counters from the Croft Shoe Company?”
“Yes, Mr. Towner wanted to find out if I was a good salesman.” Johnny shrugged. “So I ran over and got the order.”
Johnson groaned. “Now, I’ve heard everything.”
Johnny leaned toward the counter foreman. “Harry offered me the sales manager’s job.”
“Oh, no!” cried Johnson.
“Don’t worry, Hal,” Johnny said easily, “I turned it down.”
Johnson looked at Johnny a moment, then swallowed hard.
“Just a minute,” he said, thickly.
He left Johnny at the head of the sorting benches and strode down the line to where Elliott Towner was working at his bench. Johnny saw Johnson ask young Towner a question. He didn’t hear Elliott’s reply, but saw Johnson stagger as if struck by an invisible fist. Towner, however, continued to talk and Johnson listened intently for a moment or two. Then he bobbed his head and came back toward Johnny.
As the foreman approached Johnny saw that his face was filmed with perspiration. “I’m fifty-two years old,” Johnson said when he came up. “I’ve worked for this company since I was thirteen — thirty-nine years. I’ve seen a lot of men come and go here, Fletcher. I’ve hired thousands of men and I’ve fired a few hundred. But, so help me, I’ve never had a man here like you...” He cleared his throat. “And I hired you!”
“You almost didn’t,” said Johnny. “Sam Cragg was your first choice. By the way, where is Sam?”
“Piling up barrels,” said Johnson. “Without Joe Genara — and without the elevator. Now, don’t tell me you’re going to pull him off that job.”
“How could I pull him off?” asked Johnny innocently. “You’re the foreman.”
“I am?”
“Of course.”
“I thought you were taking over!”
“Me? Whatever gave you that idea?”
“Elliott said that you—”
“Shh,” said Johnny. “I’m going to snoop around here, that’s all. A little undercover work, until I smoke out the man who killed Al Piper. But don’t pay any attention to me. I won’t interfere with the work.”