It was at that moment that a thought struck him.
Changing the tire on Beryl’s automobile might or might not stave off discovery, but there was one absolutely certain way by which George Quinlan could give his daughter complete immunity from what she had done.
Hardly realizing the full significance of what he was doing, Quinlan tore another sheet of paper from the notebook. Seemingly without orders from Quinlan’s mind, but working mechanically and with some volition of their own, his fingers shaped a new triangle, a triangle not quite so broad at the base, a little more pointed. He had only to walk into the district attorney’s office, hand that triangle to Martin Walworth and walk out, and Beryl’s connection with the murder at the Higbee homestead need never be known.
He started the car and drove directly to the courthouse.
The district attorney’s secretary was at her desk. “You may go in. They are expecting you,” she said.
Quinlan entered the private office. Martin Walworth had moved over to occupy the district attorney’s swivel chair. Edward Lyons, publisher of the Rockville Gazette, was seated at the other side of the desk, his 6B pencil sprawling huge notes on folded newsprint that Quinlan could read over Lyons’ shoulder.
Printed on top of one of the sheets of newsprint, apparently to be used as headlines, were the words, SHERIFF’S SLIPSHOD METHODS MAY RESULT IN MURDERER’S ESCAPE, DECLARES CRIMINOLOGIST.
Rush Medford, his face suffused with smiles, was standing behind Walworth, and Bertram Glasco, puffing contentedly on a cigar, was nodding his head as though not only agreeing with something the criminologist had said, but also signifying his continuing agreement with anything the man might be going to say.
John Farnham, sitting very erect in a chair to the right of the criminologist, was watching Walworth with fixed intensity. Leave it to Farnham not to approve entirely of anything or anyone, Quinlan thought. Farnham was a typical dour-faced crusader who would never be happy, never satisfied. A one-time cowboy, he still did a little horse-trading in addition to his real-estate business, and Quinlan couldn’t help thinking that while he was sanctimoniously honest in his real-estate transactions, his reputation as a horse-trader was such that the initiated seldom dealt with him. There had been a bay saddle-horse Farnham had sold Beckett a couple of months ago. Quinlan had seen it in the Higbee place. Farnham had said the horse was twelve, but Quinlan would bet a month’s salary it was at least...
“Do you have that piece of paper, George?” Medford asked.
Quinlan opened the notebook. There was, he noticed, just the slightest tremor as his fingers took out the triangular piece of paper which he handed to the district attorney, who in turn passed it across to Walworth.
“That the triangle?” Walworth asked Quinlan, and it seemed to Quinlan that the man’s eyes were unnecessarily intense in their boring scrutiny.
Quinlan nodded.
Walworth picked up the piece of paper. He turned it over to look at the other side and then said to Lyons, “Now, this is an excellent example of what I’ve been talking about. This piece of paper represents the outline of a piece of rubber that has been gouged out of a tire. There are no identification marks on the paper — none whatever. In the first place, the tire pattern should have been preserved with a plaster mold. But unsatisfactory as this paper method is, it’s rendered doubly so by the fact that there are no identifying marks on it. That triangle of paper should have been initialed by the sheriff and the undersheriff right on the ground so that there wouldn’t have been any possible chance of a mistake or... or of substitution. As it is, it’s quite possible the defense attorney will rip the case wide open by claiming anyone could have substituted another piece of paper in place of the original, and that this piece is one that was substituted.”
Glasco said hastily, “That’s all right, Walworth. The sheriff is slipping, but Quinlan here is all right. He’s going to be the next sheriff. We don’t want to have any criticism of him. Ain’t that right, Ed?”
Edward Lyons, scribbling rapidly with his pencil, nodded emphatically.
Walworth almost contemptuously jerked Rush Medford’s desk pen out of its well, handed it to Quinlan and said, “Write your name on the back of this piece of paper so you can identify it in court.”
Quinlan leaned over the desk. The tension of his nerves was such that the signature which came jerking from the point of the pen was an angular travesty on his usual handwriting
“Now then,” Walworth said, “we’ll print thousands of perfect facsimiles of this slip of paper and put a copy in the hands of every service station in the county. The original, Mr. Medford, will be carefully preserved where it can’t be tampered with.”
Quinlan said, “You won’t want me any more?”
“Better stick around, George,” Glasco told him amiably. “This is really good. Mr. Walworth is analyzing the crime, pointing out just where Bill slipped up on...”
“I’ve got to see a man,” Quinlan apologized. “I’d like to stay, but this visit I’ve got to make is important.”
“Go ahead,” Medford said somewhat impatiently. “But just don’t talk to anybody about the case, and — don’t say anything about this.”
Quinlan paused only briefly at the desk of the Palace Hotel. “You have a Roy Jasper here,” he said. “What room’s he in?”
“Two-o-five. But he’s out. He checked in, cleaned up and went right out again.”
“You knew him?” Quinlan asked.
“Sure. Talked with him. He’d been up all night, needed a bath and shave. Said he tried to sleep for a couple of hours, but he couldn’t make it — had too much on his mind.”
Quinlan phoned his house from the lobby. “Beryl,” he said when she answered the telephone, “I want to get in touch with Roy.”
“Yes, Dad, I know.”
“He isn’t there?”
“No, Dad.”
“If you hear from him, find out where he is and let me know. If he comes there, get a call through to me right away.”
Beryl said with dignity, “If he telephones or if I see him, Dad, I’ll tell him that you want to get in touch with him right away, and for him to call you.”
“That isn’t what I said,” Quinlan said angrily.
“Father, you can’t doubt Roy. You simply can’t do it. If I tell him to call you, I know he will.”
There was something in his daughter’s voice that left Quinlan feeling strangely helpless. He just didn’t know how to cope with this grown-up daughter, and he couldn’t bring himself to threaten her as he would have threatened any other recalcitrant citizen.
He heard Beryl hang up at the other end of the line, and he slowly dropped his own receiver into place.
9
The Rockville Gazette created a sensation when it hit the streets at five o’clock that evening. Headlines screamed across the top of the page: CONSULTING CRIMINOLOGIST CALLED IN BY DISTRICT ATTORNEY MEDFORD TO SOLVE BAFFLING CASE.
Quinlan noticed that Lyons had toned down his headlines on the interview he had had with Walworth so that now they read: SLIPSHOD METHODS OF LAW-ENFORCEMENT OFFICERS GIVE CRIMINALS GREATEST BREAK, SAYS WALWORTH.
Over the left was a silhouette, a photograph in actual size of the torn triangular piece of paper Quinlan had given to Walworth. Accompanying the photograph in bold letters was the caption: CAN THIS BE CUT IN TIRE OF KILLER’S CAR? A boxed-in notice in boldfaced type suggested that each reader of the paper cut out this triangle and watch for a car whose right front tire held a gouged-out place in the side of the tread corresponding with the shape of this piece of paper.