“Let’s wait for the women.” He drew all the shades down to the sills. Then he went back to the table and stood there.
The women came in chattering. But when Beck Pearl saw the old man’s face she stopped talking and sat down in a corner. Jessie took a chair near her and folded her hands in her lap.
Inspector Queen glanced over at his friend’s wife. “Is your girl in the house, Becky?”
“Florrie? No, she goes home nights.”
“Then we’re alone?”
“Yes,” Abe Pearl growled. “For the love of Mike, Dick, what’s this all about?”
“Abe, what would you say if I told you we’ve finally got the goods on Alton Humffrey?”
The Taugus policeman looked from him to the package.
“In that thing?”
“Yes.”
“So it’s back in my lap.” The big man came slowly to the table. “Let’s have a look.”
The Inspector undid the twine and removed the heavy wrappings with loving care.
Then he stepped back.
Abe Pearl said, “My God, Dick.”
The package contained two sheets of thick plate glass. Between them, spread flat but showing wrinkle marks, as if it had been found crumpled but had been smoothed out, lay a lace-edged pillowslip. The slip was of some dainty fabric; the lace was exquisite. By contrast the dirty imprint of a man’s hand, a trifle blurry but unmistakable, was an offense. The print lay just off-center, the impression of a right hand from which the tip of the little finger was missing to the first joint.
“Where did you find this?” Abe Pearl demanded.
“You like it, Abe?”
“Like it!” The chief bent over the glass, scrutinizing the pillowslip eagerly. “That missing fingertip alone—! Wait till Merrick sees this.”
“You owe Jessie an apology, Abe, don’t you?” Richard Queen said, smiling.
“I guess I do, Miss Sherwood! I can’t wait to see that iceberg’s face when he gets a squint at this,” Abe Pearl chortled. “But Dick, you haven’t told me where you got it.”
The old man said quietly, “We made it.”
The big man’s jaw dropped.
“It’s a forgery, Abe. And judging by your reaction, a successful one. That’s what I wanted to find out. If it’s fooled you, it’ll fool Humffrey.”
“A forgery...”
“We’ve been working on this for a week. Jessie went around from store to store in New York till she found a pillowcase exactly like the one that disappeared. What’s this lace called again, Jessie?”
“Honiton. The case itself is batiste.” Jessie glanced at the big policeman. “So of course, Mr. Pearl, I’ll let you take your apology back.”
He made an impatient gesture and turned away. But he turned back at once. “Tell me more, Dick.”
“One of the boys, Pete Angelo, went up to Boston. We figured because of Humffrey’s missing fingertip he’d likely have his gloves made to order, and we were right. Pete located his glovemaker, and got hold of a pair of gloves the old fellow’d made for Humffrey that Humffrey didn’t like. Then we enlisted Willy Kuntzman, who used to be one of the best men in the Bureau of Tech Services” — the old man grinned — “retired, of course — and Willy went to work on the right glove. He came up with a cast of Humffrey’s right hand in that plastic, or whatever it is, that looks and feels like flesh. Then, with Jessie describing the handprint she’d seen on the original pillowcase, Willy doctored the duplicate, and this is the result.”
“Isn’t this taking a hell of a chance?”
Richard Queen returned his friend’s look calmly. “I’m willing to take it, Abe. I was hoping you’d be, too.”
“You want me to pull this on Humffrey.”
“The preliminary work, yes.”
The big man was silent.
“Of course, Abe, it’s not absolutely necessary. I can do the whole thing. But it would have more of an effect if you set it up. The crime was committed in your jurisdiction. You’re the logical man to have found this.”
“Where?”
“You don’t tell him where. It won’t even occur to him to ask. The sight of this ought to throw him for a loop. If he should ask, toss it to me. I’ll be in on the kill.”
“Listen, Dick, you’ve got a rock in this,” the police chief said slowly. “All right, Humffrey left his right handprint on a pillowcase just like this, and disposed of it that night before we got there. How? It must have been burned up, we said. Or it was cut to pieces and flushed down a toilet. Humffrey knows how he disposed of it, doesn’t he? If he burned it, how could we produce it? If he cut it up, how come it’s whole again?” Abe Pearl shook his head. “It won’t work. He’ll know in a flash we’re trying to pull one.”
“I don’t think so, Abe.” The Inspector seemed unperturbed. “I didn’t agree with you and Merrick when you discussed it that night, although I didn’t want to put my two cents in with Merrick there. It’s highly unlikely that Humffrey’d have burned the pillowslip. It was a hot night in August. He’d hardly have risked making a fire that might have been seen or smelled by somebody in the house — Jessie here, a servant, Dr. Wicks, even his wife — and remembered later just because it was a hot night in August.
“As for cutting it to pieces, he didn’t have to, Abe. The material is so fine you can take this thing and crumple it into a small ball. He could have flushed it down a drain in one piece. A man who’s just taken the life of an infant and expects the police any minute — no matter what substitute for blood is flowing through his veins — isn’t going to go in for anything fancy. That only happens in my son’s books. Humffrey had only one thought in mind, to get rid of the pillowcase in the quickest and easiest way.
“Sure, Abe, I don’t deny the risk. But the way I see it, the odds are way over on our side.” He shrugged. “Of course, if you’d rather not have anything to do with it—”
“Don’t be a horse’s patoot, Dick. It’s not that.” Abe Pearl began to pull on his fleshy lower lip.
The old man waited.
“It is that, Abe.” It was Beck Pearl’s soft voice. “You’re thinking of me.”
“Now Becky,” her husband shouted, “don’t start in on me!”
“Or maybe I’m flattering myself. Maybe it’s yourself you’re thinking of. Your job.”
“Becky—” he thundered.
“The trouble is, dear, you’re going soft in Taugus. It’s a nice fat easy job, and you’ve gotten nice and fat and easy along with it.”
“Becky, will you stay out of this? Damn it all—!”
“How would you feel if that little boy had been Donny? Or darling little Lawrence?”
“You would throw my grandchildren up to me!” The big man hurled himself into the armchair with a crash that made the room shake. “All right, Dick! What’s your plan?”
The next morning two police cars shot across the Nair Island causeway, drove into the Humffrey grounds, and eight Taugus detectives and uniformed men, headed by Chief Pearl, jumped out.
Stallings, the caretaker-gardener, was on his knees in one of the flower beds, planting bulbs.
“Something wrong again, Chief?”
“Nothing that concerns you, Stallings,” Chief Pearl said gruffly. “Get on with your work. Borcher, you and Tinny take the house. You other men, fan out on the grounds — you know what we’re after. One of you go down to the beach and keep an eye on that dredger, in case they make the strike.”
“One minute,” Stallings said uneasily, as the officers began to scatter. “I’m responsible, Chief. What are you up to?”
“This is a search party,” the chief barked. “Out of my way.”
“But, Mr. Pearl, I got my instructions from Mr. Humffrey. He specially said I was to keep cops and reporters out.”