He held up his hand and smiled.
"You needn't worry, Jerry," he said. "I know it's over--the minute anybody is smart enough to guess. And--well, I murdered a man all right, but I'm not the type to murder another to try to cover up, because I can see where that would lead. The man I did kill deserved it, and I gambled on--Well never mind all that."
"Who was he?" I asked.
"His name was Mark Leedom. He was my assistant four years ago. I was foolish at that time--I'd lost money speculating and I stole some zoo funds. They were supposed to be used for the purchase of--Never mind the details. Mark Leedom found out and got proof.
"He made me turn over most of the money to him, and he--retired, and moved out of town. But he's been coming back periodically to keep shaking me down. He was a rat, Jerry, a worse crook than I ever thought of being. This time I couldn't pay so I killed him."
"You were going to make it look like an accident on the Mill Road?" I said.
"You killed him here and took him--"
"Yes, I was going to have the car run over his head, so he wouldn't be identified. I missed by inches, but I couldn't try again because another car was coming, and I had to keep on driving away.
"Luckily, Doc Skibbine didn't know him. It was while Doc was in South America that Leedom worked for me. But there are lots of people around who did know him. Some curiosity seeker would have identified him in the week they hold an unidentified body and--well, once they knew who he was and traced things back, they'd have got to me eventually for the old business four years ago if not the fact that I killed him."
"So that's why you had to make him unidentifiable," I said. "I see. He looked familiar to Bill Drager, but Bill couldn't place him."
He nodded. "Bill was just a patrolman then. He probably had seen Leedom only a few times, but someone else--Well, Jerry, you go back and tell them about it.
Tell them I'll be here."
"Gee, Mr. Paton, I'm sorry I got to," I said. "Isn't there anything--"
"No. Go and get them. I won't run away, I promise you. And tell Doc he wouldn't have beat me that chess game tonight if I hadn't let him. With what I had to do, I wanted to get out of there early. Good night, Jerry."
He eased me out onto the porch again before I quite realized why he had never had a chance to tell Dr. Skibbine himself. Yes, he meant for them to find him here when they came, but not alive.
I almost turned to the door again, to break my way in and stop him. Then I realized that everything would be easier for him if he did it his way.
Yes, he was dead by the time they sent men out to bring him in. Even though I had expected it, I guess I had a case of the jitters when they phoned in the news, and I must have showed it, because Bill Drager threw an arm across my shoulders.
"Jerry," he said, "this has been the devil of a night for you. You need a drink.
Come on."
The drink made me feel better and so did the frank admiration in Drager's eyes. It was so completely different from what I had seen there back in the alley.
"Jerry," he told me, "you ought to get on the Force. Figuring out that--of all things--he had used an armadillo."
"But what else was possible? Look! All those ghoul legends trace back to beasts that are eaters of carrion. Like hyenas. A hyena could have done what was done back there in the morgue. But no one could have handled a hyena--pushed it through that ventilator hole with a rope on it to pull it up again.
"But an armadillo is an eater of corpses, too. It gets frightened when handled and curls up into a ball, like a bowling ball. It doesn't make any noise, and you could carry it in a bag like the one Hank described. It has an armored shell that would break the glass of the display case if Paton lowered it to within a few feet and let it drop the rest of the way. And of course he looked down with a flashlight to see--"
Bill Drager shuddered a little.
"Learning is a great thing if you like it," he said. "Studying origins of superstitions, I mean. But me, I want another drink. How about you?"
Homicide Sanitarium
Killer at Large
I put down the newspaper.
"It's about time," Kit said.
I stood up. "Right, honey. It is."
Her big brown eyes got bigger and browner.
"What do you mean, Eddie? I just meant you've been reading that blasted newspaper for hours and hours."
I glanced at the clock. "For eleven minutes."
I sat down again and motioned, and she came over and sat down on my lap. I almost weakened.
"It's been a nice honeymoon," I said. "But I am a working man. I thought you knew."
"You mean you're taking on another case?"
"Nope," I told her. "One of the same ones. Paul Verne."
"Who's Paul Verne?"
"The gentleman I came to Springfield to find."
She looked really shocked. "You came here to . . . Why, Eddie, we came here for our honeymoon! You don't mean you had an ulterior motive in choosing Springfield."
"Now, now," I now-nowed.
"But Eddie--"
"Shhh," I shhhed.
She cuddled down in my arms. "All right, Eddie. But tell me what you're going to do. Is it dangerous?"
"Get 'em young," I said, "treat 'em rough, tell 'em nothing."
"Eddie, is it dangerous?"
"The world," I told her, "is a dangerous place. One's lucky to get out of it alive."
"Oh darn it, I suppose you are going to do something danger-ous. I won't let you!"
I stood up, and she had to get off my lap or fall on the floor. I walked over to the bureau and picked a necktie off the mirror.
"What are you going to do, Eddie?"
"Answer an ad I just read in the paper."
"You mean an ad to go to work?"
I nodded, and started to put on the necktie.
In the mirror, I could see Kit studying me.
"The idea of a pint-size like you being a detective," she said.
"Napoleon wasn't so big," I said, over my shoulder.
"Napoleon wasn't a detective."
"Well how about Peter Lorre? He's no bigger than I am."
"Peter Lorre was shot in the last two pictures I saw him in," Kit said.
She picked up the newspaper I'd put down and started scanning the want ads, while I was putting on my coat.
"Is this the ad?" she said. " "Wanted: Man with some knowledge of psychiatry, for confidential work'?"
"What makes you think that's it?" I countered.
"I know that's it, Eddie. All the other ads are routine sensible ones for salesmen or dishwashers or something. But why get dressed up to answer it? It just gives a phone number, and there's a phone right on the table there."
"That reminds me," I said. "Use that phone to call Information, will you, and get the listing on that phone number. You'll find it's the Stanley Sanitarium, I think.
But I might as well make sure."
She made the call.
"You're right, Eddie. Stanley Sanitarium." She looked at me with respect.
"How did you know?"
"Hunch. There's an article on Page Three telling about a new sanitarium for mental cases being started here. A doc by the name of Philemon Stanley runs it."
"But why can't you phone from here about the job?"
"From a hotel? Nix. I've got to give myself a local background and a local address. I go rent myself a room, and then use the landlady's phone. That way, if he's going to phone me back or write me a letter, I can give him an address that won't sound phony."
"What's phony about the New World Hotel?"