“What about Doc Kurzin? Going to bypass him again?” Kurzin’s the coroner, an ancient incubus who missed his forte as a meat-cutter for some supermarket.
“I’ll have to, if we’re going to get anywhere. Your standing as an expert in this county gives me that right, officially.”
“All right,” I said, a little reluctantly, because to be honest, it seemed that the boy must be guilty. After all, most murders are not subtle; they are chock full of blunders. When a man is keyed up to the point of killing, he’s not likely to be a cool planner. “I’ll do the P.M. as soon as you get the body here to the hospital. Then, if you want to bring the stick later, I’ll see if the blood and hair are really the victim’s. Meanwhile, do the usual and make me one of your fine lists of suspects. You know, descriptions, character analysis – the works. You’ve a knack for that.”
“There are plenty of possibles,” Ader said glumly. “Four other heirs in the house, and I don’t think the colonel ever won any popularity contests in the army or out of it.”
“How many of the other suspects fly? Because, believe me, it’ll take wings or teleportation to explain how the old man got killed without the murderer leaving tracks on the sand.”
“That’s why I can’t help thinking Larry did it. I don’t want to believe it, but the alternative, as you say, means a parachute jump, or something. And,” he added in a bitter voice, “a similar jump in reverse-upwards.”
“Larry is innocent,” Dana said firmly to me. “If you remember that, you’ll find the explanation. You’re our only hope, so please try very h-hard.”
“I should warn you of one thing,” I told them. “I’m not an advocate, remember; I can’t take sides. What if the facts of my investigation-” I was going to say,” – put another nail in the boy’s coffin?” but had the good sense to hunt a different metaphor – “make the case against Larry even worse? Maybe you should give the job to Kurzin at that. He’ll mess it up so that the jury might give the boy all the benefit of the doubt.”
“You won’t hurt his chances. He didn’t do it, and that’s what the evidence is bound to show finally,” Dana said, her voice still firm.
Ader shrugged in half humorous resignation.
“You heard her,” he said. “I’m inclined to agree that there’s nothing to lose, really. The worst D.A. in the business couldn’t fail to get a conviction right now, with no further investigation.” He led his niece gently towards the door. “I’ll have the body brought over immediately. And I’ll drop by myself with the stick later, unless I get tied up somewhere.” He patted the girl’s shoulder sympathetically, and they left.
Watching Dana leave, chin up, I thought that if Larry was smart enough to pick her, he wasn’t likely to bungle a murder so badly. Then I thought my logic was getting worse than hers, so I went back to my roundworms.
The body arrived about ninety minutes later, and things being slack at Pasteur, I was able to get right to work. Beginning, as usual, with the head, I had to agree with Ader that the crushed skull certainly explained the man’s death. In addition, it was also true that the old boy was remarkably healthy otherwise, and could have reached a hundred. There were laborious tissue and toxicological tests possible, but I felt them to be counter-indicated. I had no doubt he was killed by a blow on the head. I was just finishing up these gross tests, when Ader came in with the walking stick.
He studiously avoided looking at the remains, even though everything was back in place. In another minute I was through, and covered the body with a sheet. Then Ader came closer.
“Well?” he demanded.
“He was killed by a clout on the head, all right. Let’s see that stick.”
He gave it to me. There was a plastic bag over the heavy end of the stick; the stem was thin, tough ebony, thirty-eight inches long. There was little doubt that egg-shaped handle could account for the bone injury. Whether it had or not remained to be seen.
The blood test was fast and simple, a matter of typing the blood. The hair didn’t take long either, using a good comparison microscope. I shook my head ruefully at the results, and Ader’s face was bleak. He had his tail in a crack, so to speak. On the one hand, he had a dream of a case, with none of the usual rat-race of finding reluctant witnesses and other sorts of elusive evidence. On the other there was his niece, Dana, a favorite relation I inferred, about to lose her beloved to the gas chamber, or, if they were lucky, to a prison for thirty years or so. Either way, the lieutenant wasn’t going to be happy. Unless, of course, we found a new candidate for the big jump.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “This is no help. McCabe was killed by this stick. I’ll stake my professional reputation on that – and will have to so testify under oath.”
“I wasn’t expecting anything else,” he said listlessly. “For Dana’s sake, I was only hoping. Anyhow, here’s that complete run-down on the rest of the household. Read it over tomorrow, and maybe you’ll think of something. You’ve done it before on more hopeless cases.”
“This one out-hopelesses all the others,” I said. “And frankly, we don’t need suspects as much as we need ‘how was it done.’ One murder; one rather obvious killer – what’s the point in additional names?”
“I don’t know,” he said wearily. “But begin by assuming Larry is innocent, and then figure out how somebody else might have done it.”
“Very simple,” I replied. “All I need is another month and fifty per cent more brains. But I’ll try, Master.”
Ader left, looking desperately tired. He probably hadn’t slept much since the murder.
It was after eleven, but I didn’t feel pooped at all, so I sat down with the family dossier. Ader is very good at this sort of thing, and I could easily visualize the members of Colonel McCabe’s household.
There were five in the family itself, exclusive of the dead man. They were Larry, the nephew, a boy of twenty-four; two sons, Harry, aged thirty-two, and Wallace, thirty-nine; the colonel’s brother, Wayne, fifty-seven; and a cousin, Gordon Wheeler, twenty-eight. As for servants, an elderly couple kept the place clean and did the gardening. A middle-aged woman did the cooking.
When it came to motive, they all had it, except for the servants, who were provided for whether the colonel lived or died. For the family, it was a matter of money. McCabe was worth well over a million, his late wife having been the childless widow of a rich manufacturer. The colonel’s will was no secret. The two sons were down for $200,000 each; the brother, $150,000; Larry, $50,000; and the cousin, $30,000, all tax free. After a few small annuities to the servants, anything Uncle Sam left would go to the local museum, provided they kept McCabe’s arms collection, all of it, on permanent display.
For the old man fancied himself a military expert of high order. But instead of refighting the Civil War, and the one in 1914, he preferred to correct the errors of earlier generals. In short, he intended to rewrite Oman’s “The Art of War in the Middle Ages”.
One room of the house was devoted to a collection of medieval arms and armor. This was the responsibility of the cousin, Gordon, who catalogued the stuff, and kept it so polished and functional that McCabe could have left on a crusade at any moment, perfectly equipped with plate armor, sword, lance, dagger, and crossbow. Only a horse was lacking.
The late colonel was something of a bully at times, but not really a bad sort. There was no evidence that he interfered unduly with the members of his family, or that any of them had serious cause to hate him. It seemed to me, reading between Ader’s lines, that the only reasonable motive was money. For McCabe was possibly a bit stingy on handouts, although everybody had an allowance of sorts.
But, actually, motive wasn’t the basic problem here. My real job was just as I’d stated it to Ader: If Larry didn’t kill the colonel, how was it done? The “who” could wait, and would probably come from the method, I felt sure.