The closet... The Sergeant pulled open the door, rasped his horny palms together, and sprang forward at the clothing. Suit after suit turned shapeless under his pressing, squeezing, slapping hands. Nothing... He squatted and tackled the shoes.
When he rose, there was something pained about his expression; and he glanced at Ellery once with the faintest perturbation. That gentleman continued to polish his glasses, but his eyes were noticeably sharper and he edged the slightest bit closer to Grant.
Sergeant Velie groped about the shelf. His hand encountered a large round white box. He pulled it down and ripped off the lid. A wide-brimmed, dun-colored Stetson, apparently brand-new, lay majestically revealed. He picked up the Stetson... and started.
Then he came slowly out of the closet, carrying the box, and laid it on the table before the Inspector. He glanced briefly and queerly at Ellery.
Lying peacefully in the box, on the bottom beneath where the Stetson had rested, there was a flat, dull, tiny weapon — a .25 calibre automatic pistol.
Grant’s body quivered, and the color drained from his rocky face, leaving it the hue and consistency of earth-stained marble. Kit uttered a choking little cry, and then pressed her hand quickly to her mouth, her eyes fixed with horror on the old Westerner. Curly sat turned to stone, unbelieving, stupefied.
The Inspector stared at the weapon for a split-second, then snatched it out of the box, dropped it into his pocket, and with remarkable swiftness reached into his hip-pocket and brought out a .38 Colt police revolver. This he permitted to droop negligently from his fingers.
“Well,” he said calmly. “What have you got to say for yourself, Grant?”
Grant stared unseeing at the revolver. “What— My God, man, I—” He braced himself and drew a deep unsteady breath. His eyes were the eyes of a dead man.
“Didn’t you tell me,” said the Inspector softly, “that you don’t own a .25 automatic, Grant?”
“I don’t,” said Grant in a slow, confused way.
“Oh, you deny that this little feller,” the Inspector tapped his pocket, “is yours?”
“Ain’t mine,” said Grant lifelessly. “I never saw it before.”
Curly got uncertainly to his feet, eyes fixed on his father; and he swayed a little from side to side. Sergeant Velie quietly pushed him back into his chair, and stood over him.
Before any of them realized what was happening, Kit uttered a strangled cry, as appalling as the snarl of a tigress, and sprang from her chair directly at Grant. Her fingers clawed for his throat. He did not move, made no effort to defend himself. Ellery leaped between them and cried: “Miss Horne! For heaven’s sake, none of that!”
She retreated, drawn up stiffly, a look of unspeakable loathing on her brown face.
And she said: “I’ll kill you if it’s the last thing I do, you two-faced Judas,” very quietly.
Grant quivered again.
“Thomas,” said the Inspector with a little crackle in his tone, “I’ll take care of these people. Take that bean-shooter out of my pocket and beat it down to h.q. Get Knowles. Have him test it. We’re waiting here... None of you,” he said sharply, as Sergeant Velie obeyed, “make one funny move. Grant, sit down. Miss Horne, you too. And you, young feller, stay where you are.” The muzzle of the police revolver described a tiny arc.
Ellery sighed.
After a century the telephone bell rang in the room. Both Grants and Kit started convulsively.
“Sit still, all of you,” said the Inspector gently. “Ellery, take that call. Must be from Knowles, or Thomas.”
Ellery went to the telephone. He listened blankly for several moments, and then hung up.
“Well?” demanded the Inspector without taking his eyes from Grant’s hands.’
Grant did not move a muscle. Almost in agony his eyes were fixed on Ellery’s lips. It was quite like the scene in a courtroom, when the jury has filed in and the prisoner sits staring at the lips of the foreman for the verdict which will mean life or death.
Ellery muttered: “The Sergeant reports it’s the same automatic that killed Horne and Woody.”
Kit shuddered. Her eyes were wild with a feral emotion, and confused too, like the eyes of an animal blinded by sudden light and taut with the consciousness of danger.
“Put out your hands, Grant,” said the Inspector sharply. “I arrest you for the murder of Buck Horne and One-Arm Woody. And it’s my duty to warn you that anything you say may be used against you...”
27: The Heel of Achilles
Ellery Queen, Gent., was never an enthusiastic patron of the journalistic art. He read newspapers as infrequently as possible; the conservative ones bored him, he liked to say, and the lurid ones sickened him.
Nevertheless Monday morning found him on the sidewalk before Police Headquarters purchasing copies of four different morning sheets from a newsboy who accepted his coins with suspicious fingers.
But since there was no necessity for explaining this sudden change of habit to the newsboy, Ellery merely nodded and hurried into the big gray building.
He found Inspector Queen shouting in his battery of telephones. To this accompaniment he read the journals he had bought. The story of the capture of Wild Bill Grant was, of course this morning’s piece de resistance. The showman’s lined features stared at him from the front pages of the two tabloids, and less generously from the front pages of the two full-size papers. The banners variously described Grant as “fiend,” “pal-killer,” “Western bad man,” and “rodeo promoter.”
Curiously enough, Ellery read nothing beyond the headlines and prefatory paragraphs. Then he flung the papers aside, folded his hands pacifically, and regarded his father.
“Well, what’s happened this morning?” he asked cheerfully.
“Plenty. Grant’s mum — won’t talk, won’t say yes or no,” snapped the Inspector. “But we’ll break that down. The point is, we’ve got the gat. Knowles says there’s no question about the automatic from Grant’s room having been used in the two murders.” The Inspector paused, and something thoughtful came into his sharp eyes. “Funny,” he said slowly, “but it seemed to me Knowles was keepin’ something back. Knowles!” He shrugged. “Must be my imagination. The man’s a jewel. When do I get some explanations, darn you? The Commissioner’s been camping on my wire all morning.”
“Don’t tell me that gentleman’s interested in reasons,” murmured Ellery. “He’s been howling for results, hasn’t he? Well, you’ve given him results, haven’t you? You’ve delivered a murderer, F.O.B. New York, evidence clear — haven’t you? What more does he want?”
“Still,” said the Inspector, “he’s human enough to want to know how and why. And, come to think of it,” he added, eying Ellery suspiciously, “I’m a little curious myself. How’s it happen Grant leaves that gat lyin’ around loose that way? Pretty dumb for a slick killer, seems to me. Especially after the way he smuggled it out of the Colosseum twice under our noses. I think—”
“Don’t,” said Ellery. “Has Curly been around?”
“Hart at the Tombs called me up three times. The boy’s been making a pest of himself. Seems old man Grant won’t even see a lawyer — absolutely refuses. Can’t figure it. The boy’s frantic. And Kit—”
“Yes, what about Kit?” asked Ellery with sudden gravity.
The Inspector shrugged. “She’s been here to see me already this morning. Wants Grant prosecuted to the limit.”
“Very natural,” murmured Ellery, and seemed to find something distasteful in his cigaret.
Ellery hung about Police Headquarters all day. He wore an air of expectancy, and looked quickly up at the door every time a member of the Homicide Squad appeared to report to the Inspector. He smoked innumerable cigarets, and several times made telephone calls from a public booth in the main lobby downstairs.