“You picked up another deadie?”
“A couple. Came over here to the shop of this Lemwitz who does contract finishing for Rossman... and right away somebody blasts him out with a forty-five.”
The deputy cursed again. “How was he mixed up in the fire?”
“It was his rabbit coats that were on Rossman’s racks in place of thirty-five thousand bucks worth of genuine squirrels.”
“The old switch game!”
“Point is, somebody must have known that Lemwitz had these cheap rabbit coats and that they went out in his truck tonight. Because the truck driver had a knife stuck in his gizzard. Just found him packed away in the empty truck, here. The truck was over on West Thirty-eighth tonight, when it was supposed to be at Dablin’s store.”
Shaner grunted. “Seems Mr. Dablin might know a thing or two.”
“He might. I’m going up to give him the once-over, now.”
While Pedley waited for the radio patrol, he asked questions. He didn’t get many answers from Rossman or Boyne; none of them helped. The only thing that was clear in the Marshal’s mind was that probably the same individual who had stuck the blade into Pete’s back had also found it necessary to murder the contractor. Apparently Lemwitz had to be shut up before he discovered that his rabbit coats hadn’t been delivered to Dablin’s.
Well, this fur-store owner needed to be checked up. All Pedley knew about him was that the name Dablin was flashed nightly, via glowing neons, to thousands who used the crosstown artery of Fourteenth Street. And Dablin’s For Furs came nightly to the ears of millions, over the radio...
It was three o’clock in the morning before the red sedan parked in front of the West End Avenue apartment where Dablin lived.
It was an imposing building. But the tiny lobby was smart with chrome and glass. The self-service elevator took them up to the third.
Boyne was worried. “Dablin’s practically my best customer. Busting in here like this’ll put me in a hell of a bad spot.”
Pedley answered gruffly: “What you think you’re in, anyway — until we clear this up?”
The furrier was frightened. “I ain’t believing it’s Dick Dablin who stabs Pete and shoots Hymie. But maybe I’m wrong. So what’ll keep him from doing the same with us, I’m asking?”
The Marshal patted his left shoulder. “What you think I carry around with me? A cap pistol?” He pressed the pearl button beside the door of 3-B; had to ring twice more before it opened. The pajama-clad individual who flung it wide was brown with sun-tan; his smile showed strong white teeth. Dark, shaggy eyebrows lifted quizzically as he recognized Boyne and Rossman.
“Hiya, boys. C’min, Jack. What’s on your mind, Meyer?” He knotted the silk cord of his dressing gown around him, gestured an invitation. A very imposing figure of a man.
Pedley introduced himself, curtly. “You bought a bunch of squirrel coats from these men, Dablin?” He prodded the furrier and the salesman into the comfortably furnished living-room.
“Plead guilty to that. I’ll admit the price was a little low, but it never occurred to me it would be considered as a crime.” The store owner seemed ill at ease. “You’ve really been sticking your nose into my business, haven’t you?”
“It’s Fire Department business.” The Marshal was curt.
“So? Why?”
“Rossman’s building went up in smoke tonight. He was wiped out.”
Dablin frowned. “What happened to my coats, Meyer?”
“I couldn’t tell,” the manufacturer began. “Only—”
Pedley cut him short. “That’s what we’re trying to find out. After you bought the Beautifurs squirrel coats, you purchased another lot — cheap dyed rabbit — from a contractor named Lemwitz?”
The store-owner held up his hands so the dressing-gown fell back loosely from his wrists. “That’s right. Nothing up either sleeve, you see.”
The Marshal took out his pistol, fiddled with it. “Somebody’s hiding plenty. Those rabbit coats were supposed to have been delivered to your store last evening. Apparently they wound up on the rocks at Rossman’s — and were a total loss in the blaze.”
Dablin scratched his chin with a manicured fingernail. “Don’t get it. Am I supposed to?”
“Way I figure it,” Pedley watched him closely, “the cheap Lemwitz coats were switched for the expensive ones Rossman was supposed to ship you in the morning. So the insurance people would assume that it was the squirrels that had been burned up, and would pay off accordingly — when it was actually the rabbit imitations that were burned.”
Boyne burst out: “It must have been Lemwitz’ idea, Dick. Nobody else would have known where to lay hands on just the right number of imitation squirrels.”
“Natural, Hymie would know,” Rossman agreed. “He’s finishing that lot of squirrels for me, himself.”
Dablin fumbled in the pocket of his dressing room, produced a cigarette. “I must be dumb. I don’t see what Lemwitz would get out of a scheme like that.”
“Somebody,” Pedley said, “got thirty-five thousand bucks worth of genuine squirrel coats out of it. What Lemwitz got was a slug that sent him to the undertaker’s.”
Dablin froze, with the match at his cigarette-tip.
“Pete, his truck-driver,” the Marshal went on, “got a few inches of cold steel under his heart.”
The store-owner sat transfixed.
“The watchman at Rossman’s building got throttled to death.” Pedley stood up. “And the bookkeeper in Beautifurs was roasted alive.” He waggled the gun, casually. “That’s not the whole hall of yarn, either — because somebody else is going to die for this — and I mean burn!”
“Yow!” Dablin yelled, sharply. He flung the flaming stump of the match stick to the carpet, put his finger to his lips. He stared in horror from Boyne to Rossman... then at Marshal.
Chapter Seven
No Fur Coats In Hell!
The store owner made a tremendous effort to pull himself together, but his hand still shook when he finally managed to get the cigarette going. “This is terrible. Have you... any idea who—”
“Somebody who knew the ropes.” Pedley stood straddlelegged, balanced on his toes. “Knew them well enough to dope out that the only way to make the switch was by getting hold, somehow, of a truckful of imitation squirrel coats. After that, it wouldn’t be so tough to knock off the driver, run the truck around to Rossman’s building and, after putting the watchman and the bookkeeper out of the picture, get the cheap lot of coats up in the elevator... and the fancy lot down to the truck.”
Dablin seemed too stupefied to reply.
“The guy who ordered the imitation coats from Lemwitz would have to be in on it.” The Marshal stepped in, swiftly; grabbed the loose fold of the store-owner’s dressing gown and yanked him up on his feet. “You probably figured that because you’d actually bought the squirrel coats, nobody could connect you with stealing them.”
“No, no, no,” Dablin cried. “You’re making a horrible mistake.”
“The error was on your side, mister — if you though you were going to get away with anything like that!”
“I didn’t—” Dablin’s teeth chattered. “—I didn’t have anything to do with the murders.”
Pedley shoved him away; shoved him hard enough to send him catapulting into Jack Boyne. The salesman threw up his arm to protect himself. His hand caught Dablin on the side of the head.
The store man struck back, ferociously. But Boyne didn’t retaliate. He held out his hands, pleadingly.