Death on the Aisle Read online

  “Instead of eating more duck,” he added, as Mullins, after a hopeful look at Mr. North, passed his plate. Mullins said, “Listen, Loot!” Weigand added that, as a matter of fact, the times, so far as he had checked them, gave pretty much everybody an opportunity.

  “Unless, of course,” he said, “we take it as certain that Bolton was killed when Hubbard saw the cigarette go out.” He looked at the others. Mrs. North tapped her head.

  “Hubbard is the young actor who plays the brother,” Weigand reminded them. “The brother of the girl Alberta James plays. Alberta James is the girl with the long reddish hair—very pretty. Hubbard says he saw a cigarette fall when—”

  “All right,” Pam North said. “I remember now.” She thought a moment. “Of course,” she said, “maybe he did it himself and then just said he saw a cigarette fall then at—” she wriggled insistent fingers at Mullins who, sighing, laid down his fork and took up his notes. “About 1:18,” Mullins said, after consulting them. Pam resumed:

  “One-eighteen,” she said. “Because then he was on the stage himself along with—along with who …?”

  Mullins sighed more deeply and put down his fork again. It now had a piece of duck on it. He consulted his notes.

  “Ellen Grady,” he said. “This Driscoll guy—Percy. Paul Oliver. No, take that back. He’d just gone off. Grady, Driscoll, Hubbard. Three.”

  He put the notes down quickly, seized his fork and conveyed the duck to his mouth.

  “Got it that time,” he said, pleased. Pam said she was sorry.

  “But,” she said, “we’ve got to help Bill solve it, because he’s got other things to do.” She paused again in thought.

  “If it wasn’t Hubbard,” she said, “and he was right about the cigarette, it couldn’t have been Ellen Grady or Mr. Driscoll. Because they were on stage when it happened. But if it was Hubbard then the cigarette doesn’t mean anything and it could have been either of the others.”

  She paused to look bewildered and the others joined her, except for Mullins who ate rapidly.

  “I don’t know,” Pam said, frankly, “that that gets us anywhere, precisely. It sounds a little confused to me.”

  “Yes,” said Mr. North, gently. “It does sound a little confused, somehow.” He looked at Pam and nodded encouragingly. “Although,” he added, “how you ever came to notice it, darling, is—”

  “Jerry!” Pam said, decidedly. “Leave me out of it. We’ve got enough without me. How about Tilford? How about the producer? How about Mr. Kirk?” She paused. “How about everybody?” she said. “We ought to be able to work something out. Only now we’ll let Mr. Mullins eat.”

  “Thanks, Mrs. North,” Mullins said. He ate. The others ate. Then Mrs. North broke in again.

  “Motives?” she said.

  Weigand shrugged. He said it was early days yet. However—

  “Kirk may have been jealous of Bolton, because of Alberta James,” he said. “Assuming I’m right in thinking he’s fallen for her.”

  “You are,” Mrs. North said, with assurance.

  “Also,” Weigand added, “he’s not telling something he knows—maybe a lot he knows. That’s to be gone into.”

  “Ahlberg,” he went on, “possibly because of some financial hookup, which hinges on the fact that Bolton was threatening to pull out. Penfield Smith—that’s the author, Pam—because of the dirty trick Bolton did him.” Weigand paused. “I hope it isn’t,” he said, “because I’m afraid I’d sympathize. Miss Grady—no motive that I see.”

  “Well,” Mrs. North said, “maybe Bolton was going to put her out of the show and give her part to Alberta, if Bolton was chasing Alberta. Or maybe Bolton had scorned Miss Grady. Or maybe—maybe it’s something we haven’t found out yet.”

  That of course, applied to any of the others for whom no motive was evident. Like Tilford. Like Hubbard. Like Mary Fowler, the costume designer. Even like Christopher, the scenery man.

  Mrs. North shook her head over Christopher and said she wouldn’t pick him.

  “Too—” she said, and let it hang. Nobody required enlightenment.

  “How about Driscoll?” Dorian said. “Any reason for him?”

  Weigand shrugged, and said none they had come upon. Nor had they found any for Paul Oliver and Ruthmary Jones, colored, the other members of the cast.

  “It doesn’t seem to me,” Pam North said, accusingly, “as if you’d got very far. Probably you should have urged us to stay and help.”

  “Listen, Pam,” Jerry said, but Weigand grinned at him, and then he found that Pam, also, was smiling her pleased recognition of a rise to bait. Jerry said, “Oh, all right,” and why didn’t they have coffee in the drawing room. They withdrew to the end of the living room, which became the drawing room for purposes of coffee, and had coffee and then turned on Mullins.

  “Times, please,” Pam said. “Wait, I’ll get us all some paper. Then we’ll figure out who would have had time to.”

  It took a while, with a good many erasures, but they came up with a list. It was not altogether satisfactory. Pam said she was a little disappointed in it, at first glance.

  “For one thing,” she said, “anybody could have killed him if he got back before the rehearsal started, as apparently he did. And, of course, if they got back, too. I mean if he got back, too. Or she. Whoever murdered. So up to twelve minutes after one, anybody who was in the theatre could have killed Bolton.” She shook her head over the fact. “It isn’t as neat as I’d hoped,” she said.

  With the exception of the time before the rehearsal began, when no one was accounted for, the list agreed upon went like this:

  Opportunity:

  Ellen Grady—From 1:48 to 1:51, when she was off the stage.

  (Pam: “Not much time.” Weigand: “Perhaps just enough.”)

  Percy Driscoll—From 1:28 to 1:51; 1:55 to discovery of the body at 1:58.

  Paul Oliver—any time after 1:15, when he left the stage.

  (Mullins: “Looks like he’s got an easy job, Loot.” Weigand: “Maybe he works harder in the other acts.”)

  Alberta James from 1:12 to 1:20; 1:22 to 1:42, although conferring with Mary Fowler for part of this time; 1:52 to 1:58.

  John Hubbard—1:12 to 1:17; 1:32 to 1:42; 1:52 to 1:58.

  Tilford—1:12 to 1:21; on stage from 1:21 to discovery of the body.

  Ruthmary Jones—any time except for the minute between 1:40 and 1:41.

  Mary Fowler—out of theatre until 1:22; 1:24 to about 1:45, conferring with Alberta James; 1:45 to 1:58 if she could slip unnoticed from her seat in the orchestra.

  Penfield Smith—prior to 1:25 (about) and thereafter if he left his seat unnoticed.

  Christopher—out of theatre until 1:25 (about); any time t.i.h.l.h.s.u. (Pam: “I’m not going to write it out every time, for anybody.”)

  Ahlberg—out of theatre until 1:21 (about): any time thereafter if unobserved.

  Kirk—almost any time, except during first few minutes of the run-through. (Mullins: “Although every time I looked for him, I saw him. Of course that don’t mean I could of earlier.” Weigand [automatically]: “Could have, Mullins.”)

  “And, of course, Evans could’ve any time,” Mrs. North pointed out. “Except when he was concussed, and we don’t know when that started. Maybe he just bumped his head against a wall to make an alibi.” She paused. “Only,” she said, “I don’t really think that.”

  Weigand took the tabulation from Mrs. North and looked at it thoughtfully.

  “It doesn’t,” he admitted, “tell us much. Not even as much as I’d hoped.” He drained his coffee cup and shook his head. “We’d better get back on it, Mullins,” he said. “Back to digging, Sergeant.”

  Mullins sighed and rose.

  “Wait,” Pam said, “is it still at the theatre?”

  Weigand nodded.

  “Then,” Pam said, “I don’t see why we don’t all go. When there is so much room.”

  Mr. North was doubtful for a moment.
But in the end they all went.

  IX

  TUESDAY—8:45 P.M. TO 9:20 P.M.

  Weigand explained carefully that the privacy of the Norths’ home was one thing and a formal police investigation something else; he explained that, although he couldn’t keep the Norths and Dorian out of the theatre, he would prefer to talk to his own men in reasonable and official privacy. So the Norths and Dorian could go away and play or, if they would keep out of trouble, go away and detect. He was no longer Bill Weigand; he was now Detective Lieutenant William Weigand.

  “And,” he said, still very grave and official, “I can’t have Pam confusing my men. Except Mullins.” He paused and looked at Mullins. “And it’s changing him,” Weigand said, with the mockery of gloom. “He’s softening.”

  Pam said that she thought Mr. Mullins was getting sweeter. “If anything,” she added. Mullins said, “Listen, Mrs. North,” and everybody smiled at him with affection. Then the Norths and Dorian wandered off into the darkened auditorium and down toward the stage, on the edge of which Humphrey Kirk stood and pulled at his forelock and said: “No! No!” Mr. Kirk advanced with a long stride and took Alberta James’ shoulders and moved her to the left. “There,” he said. “Now say it and turn!”

  “It isn’t that we do want you to be—” Alberta said obediently, in the voice of Sally Bingham. She turned down-stage. “Is that what you mean, Humpty?” she said.

  “Beautiful, darling,” Humpty said. “And now you cross to the door and then you say: ‘But Joyce, and so on and so on and so on.’”

  Alberta crossed to the door.

  “But Joyce,” she said, “and so on and so on.”

  “All right,” Humphrey Kirk said, “now we’ll take it over from where she says: ‘You can’t call it wheelchair snatching.’”

  “Isn’t it wonderful?” Mrs. North said to Jerry in a whisper. “You’d never think there’d been one.”

  Mr. North agreed that you wouldn’t.

  Weigand and Mullins sat in the theatre office off the mezzanine and absorbed routine. Edward Evans was still unconscious at the hospital. There was no fracture and the concussion was not severe. But it probably would be hours before he could be questioned. Precinct men were dutifully, but without much hope, canvassing hardware stores, and cut-rate “bargain” stores and five-and-ten-cent stores in the hope that somebody might remember somebody who had bought an ordinary ice-pick that day or the day before or at any time within the last few days.

  “For ‘ice-pick’ read ‘needle,’” Weigand commented. “But it’s the way we earn our money. We are very thorough, Sergeant.”

  Mullins said, “Yeh.”

  “It ’ud be nice if somebody went in and said, ‘I want an ice-pick to kill a heel named Bolton,’ only nobody would of,” he said. “People ain’t considerate.”

  They weren’t, Weigand agreed. And so the precinct men were probably wasting time—probably, but not certainly. “Always remember the Fogerty trunk, Mullins,” he said. “It should be an example.”

  Mullins remembered the Fogerty trunk which had, when it showed up on the platform of a receiving station of the Railway Express Agency, contained Mr. Fogerty. Mr. Fogerty was newly dead; discovery came because Mr. Fogerty had seeped. Somebody vaguely remembered that a taxi had driven up an hour or so before and that two men, one of them the driver, had lifted the trunk to the platform. Then, presumably, the taxi had driven away. It was a puzzling case, because Mr. Fogerty, while all of a piece, was entirely naked. And the police broke the case within a little more than an hour, because Mr. Fogerty’s room-mate, when he purchased a trunk from a luggage dealer on Sixth Avenue, had neglected to notice a half-erased chalk mark on the bottom.

  That chalk mark, described to half a dozen detectives and by them to fifty-odd luggage dealers, had led to Mr. Fogerty’s roommate, who was about to leave for the West and had been surprised and disappointed. The case, Mullins agreed, showed what routine would do.

  “Only,” he said, “was there a chalk mark on the ice-pick?”

  Weigand admitted that there was not, and that that was the rub. However—routine was good practice; it turned up that hundredth chance. They continued it.

  Ahlberg had been, as he said, at the Astor, where many had seen him. He was not with Bolton. It was impossible to trace the visit of Alberta James and Dr. Bolton to the Automat. But Kirk had had, as he said, a sandwich at a nearby counter. And Mary Fowler had lunched at the Tavern in Forty-eighth Street.

  “And,” said Detective Stein, reporting on such matters, “she did try to get in in front; tapped on the door, like she said. A man from Traffic saw her. He’s outside, with his horse.”

  He came inside, without his horse—Mounted Patrolman Callahan of Traffic A. Early in the afternoon he had broken up a traffic jam in West Forty-fifth Street and admonished the driver of the impeding truck. He had been sitting on his horse, looking around, when he saw a woman trying to get into the West Forty-fifth Street Theatre, which he knew was closed. He described her, and with her Mary Fowler.

  It was none of his business, of course, but after watching her for a moment he called across and told her the theatre was closed, adding that the stage entrance might be open. She had knocked once or twice again and turned away, shaking her head and frowning. But she hadn’t seemed very mad, Patrolman Callahan reported.

  “Sort of peeved and smiling at the same time,” he said. “And when she came up to me, she patted Henry’s nose and sort of smiled. She said, ‘He’s in there, but he pretends he can’t hear me.’ She rubbed Henry’s nose and said, half under her breath. ‘The old fool!’ Then she went down the passageway leading to the stage entrance.”

  Yes, Patrolman Callahan knew about what time it was; he made a point of knowing about what time everything was. “I gotta sense of time, Lieutenant,” he said. Weigand said that was fine. And what time, about, was it that the woman had tried to get into the theatre?

  “I’d make it about 1:20, a minute or so either way,” Patrolman Callahan reported. “It couldn’t have been much earlier, because it was 1:15 when I rode down from Broadway and it took me a few minutes to break up the jam. Some guy thought it would be bright to double park.”

  Weigand said “right” and waved the patrolman on his way. But when Callahan reached the door there was another question for him.

  “By the way,” he said, “could you see into the lobby? Did you see anybody?”

  Callahan shook his head. Not from where he was sitting, he couldn’t. But he supposed the woman had seen old man Evans in there puttering around, and that it was Evans who had refused to let her in.

  “He’s a funny old guy,” Callahan said. “He’d think it was fun to let her knock. By the way, I hear he got hurt?”

  Weigand told him, briefly, about Evans. Callahan nodded.

  “Somebody pushed him, all right,” Callahan said, with conviction. “He’s got a lot of people around here sore on him. I know half a dozen kids who’d be glad to give him a shove, only they’d rather do it off the Empire State.” Callahan paused. “Not that he ain’t all right when you get to know him,” he said. “He just don’t like kids.”

  “Right,” Weigand said. “Thanks, Callahan.”

  Weigand and Mullins continued with the routine. They looked for discrepancies in stories, for people seen at wrong times.

  And there was a point at which Weigand’s drumming fingers were quiet for a moment on the desk, and then picked up their beat at a slightly faster tempo. Weigand stared at the wall for a moment and then said:

  “Well, that’s interesting.”

  Mullins involuntarily looked at the wall and then, hurriedly, back at Weigand, who hadn’t noticed. Mullins waited, hoping for clarification, but Weigand merely stared a moment longer at the wall.

  “Something, Loot?” Mullins said. Weigand abandoned the wall and looked at Mullins instead. After a moment he apparently saw Mullins and after a moment longer he nodded slowly.

  “Something that doesn
’t match,” he said. “You heard it, Sergeant. Only—” He stopped and stared at Mullins again.

  “You know, Mullins,” he said. “Things aren’t neat. Why didn’t Evans have a watch to break and stop when he fell downstairs? Everybody who is going to fall downstairs and knock himself out ought to have a watch. For the police force to go by.”

  Mullins thought this over and grinned at Weigand.

  “Maybe he had to hock it, Loot,” Mullins said. “You can’t be too hard on a guy.” Then Mullins, remembering with a pang that there was thought to be engaged in, sobered. “Is there something screwy in the stories, Loot?” he asked, hopefully. “Something that don’t fit?”

  Mullins waited hopefully. But after a moment the Lieutenant shook his head, as Mullins had been afraid he would.

  “We’ve got to keep you in training, Sergeant,” Weigand told him. “Think it over, Mullins.”

  Mullins obediently, but without much hope, wrinkled his forehead and made a start.

  Weigand watched him a moment, smiling slightly. Then he interrupted.

  “And,” he said, “here’s something else for you, Sergeant.

  Weigand opened an envelope and spilled its contents on the desk. Its contents was burned paper matches. Mullins stared at them and then at Weigand.

  “Stein,” Weigand said. “I’ve had him collecting them. Borrowing here, borrowing there. Giving himself nicotine poisoning, probably. And remembering where each match came from, and not throwing the match away after he used it.” Weigand spread the matches out on the desk top.

  “Looking,” he said, “for this baby.”

  The baby was wider than the other matches; wide enough to carry printing down its face. “The Pipe and Bottle,” the printing said. Looking at it, Mullins began to nod.

  “The bottle-shaped one,” he said. “Like you found on the floor behind the stiff.”

  “Right,” Weigand said. “Stein got it on his fourth cigarette. The one he lighted with a match he borrowed from Mr. Humphrey Kirk.”

  “Well,” Mullins said. “Think of that.”

  They finished the second scene of the first act for the third time and Humpty Kirk uncoiled himself from a seat near the center of the fourth row.