Why So Dead?

Ellery Queen

MYSTERIOUSPRESS.COM

1.

Chuck Baer was a special case. For instance, when he waved to Solly as he went by the desk, he got a cheery wave in reply. Baer had the run of headquarters, notwithstanding his private detective’s license. Centre Street is not notorious for its enthusiasm for private detectives, but Baer was a buddy of Tim Corrigan’s.

He was a big man in every way but height. He reminded people of a piece of machinery, with his big feet riveted to the floor and a spready sort of build that breathed power. Others thought of him as a bear, with a lumbering swiftness that could be terrifying. His skin was swarthy and thick, he had heavy features, a nose like Michelangelo’s, and a rather incongruous cap of red hair. During their Korean hitch Corrigan had once desperately described him to a prospective blind date as “not exactly ugly, only approximately.” It had been sheer poetry, built on sales resistance. Baer was ugly, period. But it was the kind of ugliness that many women found beautiful.

Baer got out of the elevator, shoved through the Main Office squad room, and made for the door with the frosted panel that said CAPT. TIM CORRIGAN. He opened the door without bothering to knock.

Corrigan looked up from the morning teletype he was scanning with his one eye. The left socket was covered by a patch, for esthetic reasons; he had left the eye in Korea. He was the only one-eyed man in the New York police department, and it had taken a great deal of winking by the top brass to reinstate him after he got back from his stint with the OSS. The deciding factor had been his previous record. As one of the brass had said, “Corrigan with one eye is still twice as good as anybody I can spit at who has the usual complement.” He was slim and about Chuck Baer’s height; if Baer looked like the image evoked by his name, Corrigan was a greyhound. One of the standard arguments around headquarters was which man was better in a fight. Everybody agreed that a brawl between Baer and Corrigan would constitute the battle of the century.

“Oh, it’s you,” Corrigan grunted. “What got you out of bed before noon?”

“I couldn’t resist this luxurious office of yours,” Baer said, lowering his bulk into the one other battered chair in the tiny room. “I dream about it.”

“Go to hell.”

“I’ve been there.” Baer took out one of his beloved panatelas and lit up. “Look, if you’re going to insult me, I won’t invite you to the party.”

“What party?” said Corrigan. “Where?”

“It’s at the D’Autremont, in the Grand Suite. Tonight.”

“The D’Autremont’s not my style. You have to keep your pinkie out of the cup. How do you rate?”

“Do you want to go or don’t you?”

Something in Baer’s tone made Corrigan sit back and stare at him. “What’s up, Chuck? Who’s giving this party?”

“A sultan.”

“A who?”

“A sultan. Abdul Raj, Roman numeral VI. Sultan of Morojaca. One of the world’s last surviving absolute monarchs.”

“Now I’ve heard everything,” Corrigan said. “You hobnobbing with royalty! I can just see you getting down on your knees and kissing the royal—”

“You don’t have to be vulgar,” Baer said with dignity. “It so happens that old Abdul is a client.”

“He hired you? What for?”

“To play nursie to his jewels. If you weren’t so ignorant, Tim, you’d know that Abdul Raj has a world-famous jewel collection. It’s going to be on display at the party tonight, and I’m commissioned to guard it. Hell, one of the things is the Akhoond.”

“The what?”

“A-k-h-o-o-n-d. It’s the jewel of the jewel collection. A fifty-two-carat Burma pigeon-blood ruby named after the Akhoond of Swat.”

“You’re putting me on,” said Corrigan. “Swat?”

“Look it up. Swat is a flypaper country between India and Pakistan. Its ruler was known as the Akhoond. Some hundreds of years back the Akhoond of Swat, in a ceremonial exchange of gifts, gave the ruby to one of Abdul VI’s ancestors. The damned thing is valued at between half a million and a million dollars.”

“Might be interesting, at that.”

“It gets better as it goes along. Five of Abdul’s sultanas are with him. At least three of them are knockouts. I’ve already cased ’em.”

A light glittered in Corrigan’s warm brown eye.

“Down, boy,” Baer said. “Moslems don’t practice Eskimo-type hospitality. Four of the sultanas are the old man’s wives—he’s got twenty-two, I understand, but I guess he figured he’d be too busy on this Stateside trip to need more than four. You won’t get past handshaking distance of them. Besides, none of them speak English.”

“I thought you said five sultanas.”

“The fifth isn’t a wife, she’s a daughter. His favorite. He’s got thirty-three daughters and, at last count, around forty sons. She’s called the Sultana Salome.”

“You’ve got to be kidding.”

“It’s an old Morojacan name. Comes from the ancient Hebrew, same root as shalom, meaning peace. Man, there wouldn’t be much peace around this babe. Salome’s around twenty-two, with a figure like Sophia Loren and a puss that starts the juices flowing. What’s more, she speaks understandable English.”

“You’re selling me,” Corrigan said. “How come wives and daughters are both called sultanas?”

“They just are,” said Baer. “Boy, you’re ignorant.”

“When did you learn it? Today?”

“Yesterday,” said Baer. “Well?”

“I’m in,” said Corrigan.

So that was the way it started, with simple curiosity about a famous gem and a beautiful Morojacan, not necessarily in that order. It ended rather differently.

Corrigan was to be grateful later for Chuck Baer’s briefing about the Grand Suite layout. The Hotel D’Autremont’s best consisted of seven rooms and four baths. Five of the rooms looked out over the hotel’s main marquee; the remaining two had an unglamorous view of an alleyway. All but one of the rooms led directly into the hotel corridor. The two discriminated-against rooms, which lay at right angles to the other five, were a kitchen and a room intended as servants’ quarters. The kitchen was the only room with no door to the public hall.

Four of the five splendid rooms were bedrooms, occupied by the Sultan and his wives and daughter. The fifth was a vast sitting room, almost a lounge, where the party was being held.

A uniformed patrolman was on duty at the main entrance to the suite, the door to the sitting room. Corrigan did not know him, but the man gave him a snappy salute. It was one of the disadvantages of his eye-patch; it identified Corrigan not only throughout the department, but in the underworld as well. It made him unavailable for undercover work; it also turned him into a rough-and-tumble cop. If he could not hide under anonymity, he could make himself feared. Corrigan’s ability to take out an armed hood with nothing but his empty hands was a legend in Manhattan’s sinks.

He knocked at the door. It was opened immediately by a slim, tall young man with a face the color of Morocco leather. He was wearing the latest in Madison Avenue suits, and a snowy white turban. A cropped black beard and a mustache and the glitter in his black eyes gave him a rather piratical look.

He said in perfect Oxonian English, “Ah, you must be Mr. Baer’s friend of the police, Captain Corrigan.”

“That’s me,” said Corrigan.

White teeth flashed in a smile. The dark man offered his hand. “Welcome, Captain Corrigan. I am Haidar Ghafur, His Highness’s secretary.”

The royal secretary closed the door behind Corrigan and raised his pleasant voice above the conversational buzzing in the lounge.

“Captain Corrigan.”

Nobody but Chuck Baer and the man standing beside him paid any attention. Baer hovered over a long velvet-covered table on which was set a glass case; from where he stood, Corrigan could make out an array of gems which gave off sparks in the display lights that had been set up. Baer threw him a grin of greeting. The man beside him, Lt. Murray Painter, a headquarters bureau detective, waved at Corrigan and began to thread his way across the room.

Corrigan was rather surprised at the sparsity of guests; he had expected a typical Manhattan cocktail party, which usually resembled a subway in the rush hour. But there were fewer than two dozen guests, solid-looking businessmen types and their wives, chiefly middle-aged, with the smell of money about them. He discovered later that almost all of them represented oil and banking interests.

Six of the guests he recognized; apparently the party was also intended to be a press conference. Corrigan smiled to himself. That was probably why nobody was in black tie; it was hard enough to get newsmen to show up in pressed suits, let alone dinner jackets. He knew them all casually; one of them, Arnie Keppel of The New York Times, he knew well. The stoop-shouldered Keppel, who was on the foreign desk, caught sight of him and raised his glass.

There was a bar set up in one corner, and almost everyone had a glass in his hand. Lieutenant Painter’s hands were empty, presumably because he was on duty.

“Hi, Tim. Here to case the jewelry or the sultanas?”

“A little of each-each,” Corrigan grinned. “Say, Murray, what’s the protocol? I never met a sultan before.”

“Don’t fret. You present yourself to him, and he’ll stand up and shake your hand. Very democratic—when he’s in the West. The old boy’ll introduce you to his wives and daughter, then he’ll sit down again, and that’s it.”

“What do I call him?”

“The Morojacan Ambassador to the U.S. calls him Your Highness. There’s a big shot here from the State Department who’s calling him Sir. The reporters are addressing him as plain Sultan. The Sultana Salome calls him Father. Take your pick.”

“How about sonofabitch?”

“Hell, no, he’s supposed to be a pretty nice old guy. You want me to present you?”

“Might as well get it over with.”

Painter led the way toward the Sultan and his entourage; they were seated at the side of the lounge opposite what Corrigan took to be the kitchen doorway. En route Corrigan spotted U.S. Senator Pruce and City Comptroller Evanston. Evanston was presumably there as official representative of the Mayor; Senator Pruce could only be present because there was a whiff of oil in the air. The Senator’s nose for oil—a large red nose—was one of the worst-kept secrets in Washington. Corrigan wondered if there had been a new oil strike in Morojaca.

He kept his eye open as he followed Lieutenant Painter across the room. The stocky, middle-aged Moslem in the dark business suit and severe turban he assumed to be the Morojacan Ambassador Painter had mentioned. One man, tall, gray-templed, and distinguished-looking, could only be the bigwig from the State Department; he had “diplomacy” written all over him. And there was a couple who looked entirely out of place. There was something tinselly about them, an air of contrivance, that spelled show business. The woman was a blonde who looked thirty and was probably forty; she had a fixed, almost glazed smile on her face, and roving eyes. The man with her was handsome and decaying, with a gardenia in his lapel; Corrigan detected the signs of heavy drinking in the puffs under his eyes and his generally bloated look. He wondered idly if they could have crashed the party.

The Sultan sat stiffly in a thronelike gilt chair, a pair of what Corrigan took to be his wives on either side of him. The luscious young woman seated on a silk hassock at Abdul VI’s feet was obviously the favorite daughter. The monarch’s suit was Western, and his turban sported a yellow diamond that Corrigan judged to be thirty carats.

When Lieutenant Painter said, “Sultan, may I present Captain Tim Corrigan?” Abdul glanced without curiosity at the eye-patch, and away.

Corrigan was used to double takes at sight of his patch. Some people tried too obviously to ignore it; others were either self-conscious or openly fascinated. Only a few accepted it and went on to other things. Score one for the old lech, he thought, and found himself rather taken with the Arabian Nights character.

Abdul VI looked sixty-five. He had a bone-thin body and a great axhead of a nose. His leathery skin had an all-over cracked look, as if it had baked in the sun for years. Only his black eyes were youthful. Deeply sunken in their sockets, they held a liquid, mischievous glint. His movements as he rose from the chair were agile, almost graceful, and his deep voice was full of vitality. Like his secretary, Haidar Ghafur, he spoke Oxonian English.

“Welcome, Captain Corrigan,” he said, offering his papery hand.

“Your Highness,” Corrigan found himself murmuring.

The handshake was surprisingly firm. There was still fire in the old boiler, Corrigan thought.

“Are you in your country’s military service, Captain?”

“No, sir,” Corrigan said. “I’m a police officer.”

“Ah. On duty here.”

“No, sir. I’m a friend of Mr. Baer’s. I’m afraid I’m here on no other invitation than his.”

“Mr. Baer? Ah, yes, the guard of the Akhoond. It is no matter, Captain Corrigan. When in Rome, you know. You are welcome nevertheless.” The Sultan indicated the women seated on his right. “The Sultanas Agri and Kona.” He nodded to his left. “The Sultanas Fatima and Adana. They understand no English, so it is unnecessary to speak to them.”

The four wives were all between twenty-five and thirty, with oily black hair drawn back in sleek buns and sequined scarves draped over their heads. It was impossible to judge their figures; they were concealed behind colorful robes that looked like Indian saris. Two of them were beautiful in a Semitic way; the other two were plain to Corrigan’s eye—they must have hidden charms, he thought. He was rather surprised that none of the women were veiled.

The women did not offer their hands. Corrigan bobbed his head to each of them—a sort of cross between a nod and a bow—and he was rewarded with four shy smiles, after which the sultanas lowered their eyes to their folded hands.

“And this,” the Sultan said, indicating the girl on the hassock, “is my daughter Salome.” His voice held a note of—what? Pride? Possessiveness? Corrigan could not decide.

The Sultana Salome’s complexion was lighter than those of the other Morojacans, but her hair was as richly black as a black panther’s hide; unlike the wives, she wore it in bangs over her forehead and loose to the shoulders, giving her a rather Hollywood look. Her features were more Western than Semitic, with a perky little nose, enormous gray eyes, and a wide, sensual mouth. A silver circlet with an inscription in what Corrigan took to be Arabic hung on the center of her forehead, suspended from a silver chain that veed from her temples. There’s an Englishwoman or an American in her woodpile somewhere, Corrigan thought; the old man must have taken a Westerner as one of his wives. Of course, Abdul would have left her back home in Morojaca; he was probably shrewd enough to realize that a Western wife in his entourage might compromise his goodwill tour of the United States.

There was nothing concealing about Salome’s garb. Her figure was plainly visible, and it was all that Chuck Baer had promised. Through the long-sleeved translucent silk blouse she wore, a sequined black halter was on frank display. Her ankle-length black angora skirt was split to the right thigh, revealing a long, shapely leg. She must have at least a thirty-nine-inch bust measurement, Corrigan thought; considering how much she was exposing to the admiring male eyes around her, under her potentate-father’s nose, she must be his favorite indeed, with privileges unknown to the other females in his household. She undoubtedly had a mind of her own and could wind the old man around her heavily jeweled fingers.

Salome was in the category of eye-patch-ignorers, like her father. Instead, her enormous eyes took in his whole face, with evident approval; she raised her right hand, palm down, and said in delightfully accented English, “Is pleasure, Captain Corrigan,” pronouncing it “Coreegan,” with the accent on the “ee.”

Corrigan wondered if he was supposed to kiss the hand. He settled for giving it a slight, polite squeeze. “The pleasure is all mine, Sultana, believe me.”

“What nice voice you have, Captain.”

“Thank you. I find your English charming.”

“But clumsy, no?” She made a pouty face, wrinkling her little nose. She glanced at the Sultan swiftly and withdrew her hand, as if at an unspoken command.

The Sultan reseated himself.

“You must examine my gem collection, Captain Corrigan. And you will find refreshment at the bar.”

Corrigan knew he was dismissed. He found himself bowing jerkily and half backing off, much to his annoyance. It seemed to him as he turned to head for Chuck Baer and the jewel display that the Sultana Salome was trying to conceal a smile.

2.

It was some time before he reached Baer. He was stopped en route by Comptroller Evanston, whom he knew well. The Comptroller introduced him to the squat, middle-aged Morojacan and the tall, distinguished-looking American.

As Corrigan had guessed, the Moslem was the Ambassador from Morojaca—Evanston gave his name as Ranjit Aziz—and the American was an Assistant Undersecretary of State, Alex Thorne. Corrigan gathered that Thorne and Ranjit Aziz had come up from Washington together to meet Abdul’s ship and welcome him officially to the United States.

“The Sultan has a thing against flying,” Senator Pruce said, joining the group. “Ships and camels are his speed. Right, Ranjit?”

The Morojacan Ambassador seemed offended. “His Highness’s life is far too valuable, Senator, to be risked on an aircraft.”

“Oh, sure, I understand,” said the Senator, and strolled back to the bar.

Ranjit Aziz spoke excellent English, but, unlike his ruler and the royal secretary, he had obviously not been educated at Oxford; his English was heavily accented. He seemed uneasy—his eyes kept glancing over at the gem collection. He soon excused himself and hurried over to the Sultan.

Corrigan was stopped again, this time by the Times man, Arnie Keppel.

“Andrea and Ronnie were wondering who you are, Tim,” Keppel said. He had the blonde woman and the gardenialapeled man in tow. “Miss Andrea Day, Mr. Ronald Parker—Captain Tim Corrigan. Andrea and Ronnie are co-starring in an off-Broadway play that’s opening next week, Tim: Happy Are the Dead.”

“I take it that means the living aren’t getting much out of life,” Corrigan said. “From what I see in my line of work, I’d be inclined to agree. But then I have a pretty limited view.”

“A literate fuzz,” Ronald Parker said. Corrigan could have bopped him.

“Did you lose your eye in line of duty, Captain?” the blonde actress demanded.

Corrigan grinned. The lay-it-on-the-line type. He didn’t mind. He liked her frankness.

“No,” he said. “Or rather, not in line of police duty. A little yellow man did it around the 38th Parallel.”

“Then how did you get on the force? I mean, aren’t there strict physical requirements?”

“That’s my Andrea,” said the newsman. “Open her mouth and you’ll find her foot in it.”

“It’s all right, Arnie,” Corrigan said. “No, Miss Day, I was on the force before Korea. They took me back into the PD out of just plain sentiment.”

“I think that’s cute.”

“How about another drink, Andy?” the actor said; he seemed annoyed at the attention Andrea Day was paying Corrigan. But before she could reply, the voice of Haidar Ghafur from the door sounded clearly above the hubbub.

“Mr. George Angel. Mr. Samuel Terry.”

The two actors turned so quickly toward the door that Parker actually stepped on Corrigan’s foot. Corrigan smiled to himself. Angel was one of the top producers in Hollywood. He had never met Angel, and he looked him over with interest. The producer was surprisingly young, no more than thirty-five; he was slim and sleek, dressed to the nines, and had the kind of smile on his lips that made Corrigan immediately want to wipe it off. The man with him, Samuel Terry, Corrigan had never heard of. Pushing fifty, with something ratty about him, and plenty of paunch hidden under a girdle. A character actor? Corrigan decided no. If he was show business, it was in some other branch. There was a cringing yet brassy something about Terry that no actor would have allowed to show in public.

Andrea Day and Ronald Parker left Corrigan and Keppel abruptly and slipped through the crowd toward where the Sultan was seated.

The newsman saw Corrigan’s amusement. “That’s so they’ll be first in line to greet George Angel when he’s being presented to Abdul.”

“Angling for a job in Hollywood, Arnie?”

“What else?”

“Who’s the character with him? Terry?”

“He’s a press agent.”

“Bingo,” said Corrigan, and he left Keppel and made his way finally to Chuck Baer’s corner.

“You’re not doing what I’d call a land-office business, Chuck,” Corrigan said. Nobody was viewing the collection.

“They’ve all had their gander,” Baer grinned. “The husbands had to wipe the drool off the wives’ kissers. I guess they want to stay out of temptation’s way. Dull, isn’t it?”

“Not these,” said Corrigan, and stooped over the museum-type display case.

There were only about twenty gems in the case. But what gems! Diamonds, rubies, emeralds, pearls of enormous size, the cut stones giving off light, almost heat, as if they were on fire, and all surrounding the pièce de résistance. It was a red rhombohedral stone with rounded bezels and a flat face. It lay in naked beauty in the exact center of the case, like a sun surrounded by planets.

“I had to memorize the vital statistics,” Baer said. “You want the full tour?”

“I’ll settle for a rundown on the Akhoond.”

“The Akhoond is what’s called a Burma, a pigeon-blood ruby. Or did I tell you that? No one knows for sure where it was mined—it was dug up hundreds of years ago—but experts guess Burma because the finest rubies come from there. It’s been a prized possession of the Morojacan royal house since 1523. It’s considered by some experts to be the finest big ruby in the world. It’s not the biggest. The Edith Haggin de Long ruby in the American Museum of Natural History weighs a hundred carats, and the Ahoond only goes fifty-two. But the de Long is a star ruby, and they tend to be milky. The Akhoond is supposed to have the finest color of any large ruby in existence.”

Corrigan studied it again and shook his head. It was a gorgeous hunk of precious stone, all right, but what good was it? It probably spent most of its time in a vault, and, on the rare occasions when it was on public display, it had to be guarded as if it were surrounded by enemies. Corrigan was not an avaricious man. Possessions were things to be shared, like good music or art; if you had to stand over something with a gun, the hell with it.

“It’s hard to believe that thing is valued at up to a million bucks,” he said.

Baer shrugged his massive shoulders. “That’s an academic appraisal. A unique stone like this is worth whatever the market will bring. Not that it’s for sale. It probably never will be.”

“How much is it insured for?”

“Half a million.”

Corrigan’s brown eye blinked. “Where’s the Sultan keeping it when it’s not on display?”

“The collection’s stashed in a bank vault during the Sultan’s visit. Brinks transports it back and forth. They met the ship when it docked and took the collection straight to the bank. I don’t know where it’s kept in Morojaca. Probably in a box under the old boy’s bed.”

Corrigan shook his head again, glancing around. “If it were mine, I’d put it under a hell of a lot more security than you represent.”

Baer showed his square teeth. “My pal. There’s the cop in the hall, and Murray Painter’s here, isn’t he? They’re supposed to be guarding the Sultan’s person, but I don’t imagine they’d take much time thinking about whether to pitch in if somebody made a grab for the baubles.” He nodded toward the bar in the corner. “Then there’s those two refugees from the cast of Lawrence of Arabia.”

Behind the bar, infested by newsmen, stood two robed and hooded men with dark faces and businesslike-looking builds.

“Who are they?” Corrigan asked Baer.

“Members of the palace guard. They’re both armed with Lugers. Haidar What’s-his-name told me they can drive a nail at fifty paces. Incidentally, they have permits for the hardware. It was arranged through the State Department. Then there’s Captain Corrigan. Why do you think I asked you up here, you lug?”

“Then you were a little worried about the security, too,” Corrigan grinned. “I might have known you had an ulterior motive.”

He moved over to the bar. One end was loaded with huge platters of hors d’oeuvres. They were the same tasteless-looking bite-sized nothings found at any hotel cocktail party. Corrigan was disappointed. He had looked forward to sampling exotic Oriental delicacies, like fried camel’s-hump.

He said to one of the Morojacans behind the bar, “You speak English?”

“Yezzir,” the man said. “Is each of us speak.” He had the same nasal, singsong accent as the Morojacan Ambassador. “Me Ali, he Orkhim.”

Corrigan pointed to a cut glass punch bowl, half full of a pink fluid, in the center of the bar. “What’s in that?”

“It’s nonalcoholic, Tim,” one of the newsmen said. “That’s for the Moslems. How do they stand it?”

Ali waved to the collection of bottles on the back bar. “Is Scotch, wheesky, gheen, voodka. Your pleasure, zir?”

Corrigan ordered a bourbon and soda. He moved back with it to the group clustered before the Sultan.

Andrea Day and Ronald Parker had edged themselves into position beside George Angel. The film producer was paying no attention to them. His interest, and the interest of the rat-faced Samuel Terry, was riveted on the Sultan’s daughter, who was lapping it up.

Arnie Keppel was in the group, too. Spotting Corrigan, he companionably took hold of Angel and Terry and hauled them around. The producer gave Corrigan’s hand a limp shake, glanced briefly at his eye-patch, then immediately returned his attention to Salome. Sam Terry shook Corrigan’s hand as if it were a life preserver.

“Captain Corrigan. Army or Navy?”

“Police,” Corrigan said patiently.

“A copper. Of all the luck! I’m in the most dishonest racket there is.”

The prelude to his stock joke, Corrigan thought. He asked dutifully, “What’s that?” as if he didn’t know.

“I’m a press agent. One of those operators responsible for remaking dese-dem actresses into art lovers and making dog flicks sound like epics.”

“I can’t be conned,” Corrigan told him. “I pick movies by the reviews.”

Terry looked pained. “Education is going to be the ruination of this country. People used to read the sports page and the comics, glance through the ads, and the rest of the paper they wrapped their garbage in. Now I meet suckers who even read editorials.”

Keppel said, “Sam’s the lad responsible for the Sultan’s being here.”

“Oh? How’s that, Arnie?”

“I met the old joker while I was with a film company on location in Baghdad,” the press agent answered for the newsman. “We got buddy-buddy, and I talked him into visiting the U.S. American oil interests are responsible for most of Morojaca’s gelt—they struck oil there only a few years ago—” (so I was right, Corrigan thought) “—but he’d never been here. I was really doing myself a favor. My contract with the studio was over with the completion of the film, and I saw a chance to latch onto another job. Temporary, but cushy.”

“Doing what?” Corrigan asked, as if he cared.

“I’m the Sultan’s official American guide for the tour,” Terry answered with a grin. “He’s planning to cover our fair land from coast to coast. He’s a born yokel.”

The press agent abruptly transferred his attention. He had caught something that Angel was saying to Salome, and he elbowed closer to catch her reply. The film producer had complimented the Morojacan girl. She was beautiful enough to be a movie star. Had she ever considered a film career?

The Sultana opened her wide gray eyes wider. “What woman have not dream of Hollywood, Mr. Angel? But I doubt my father permit such thing.”

The Sultan, on his improvised throne, smiled. Arnie Keppel said to him, “How would you feel about that, sir? Would you object to your daughter’s becoming an actress?” Corrigan could feel Andrea Day’s fury beside him. The look she was throwing at the voluptuous girl on the hassock bore no relationship to her frozen smile. But then Corrigan got a shock, and he forgot all about Andrea Day.

Abdul VI had glanced at his daughter. It was the briefest glance, but Corrigan was startled. He could have sworn that those deep-set black eyes in the cracked-leather face had bubbled with lust. For God’s sake, Corrigan thought, does the old lech have a yen for his own daughter? Maybe incest was a way of life in old Morojaca.

The moment passed. The black eyes turned from Salome to the Times man.

The Sultan said calmly, “It would depend upon the chaperonage, would it not? I have no objection per se to the profession of acting. It is a delightful art. In my country mimes are held in high regard.”

His daughter looked down, flushed with joy, and George Angel rose to the fly like a hungry trout. Corrigan read his mind. The producer was visualizing the box-office value of a genuine harem-raised sultana. She had the looks and the sex appeal; the fact that she had no training as an actress was no problem. It might require twice as many takes, but the motion picture camera could do marvelous tricks.

“Sir,” said Angel, “would you allow me to schedule a screen test for the Sultana?”

Salome said, “Is best I discuss with my father first. Yes, Father?”

The Sultan smiled again, and the girl gave the producer everything she had in one look.

“Our American guide, Mr. Sam Terry, will—how you say?—contact you, Mr. Angel.”

Angel looked at the press agent as if he smelled something bad.

“I guess I’m elected her manager,” Terry said, shrugging. “That wasn’t in the deal, but I don’t look gift horses under the tail.”

Andrea Day asked in a sexy voice, “Are you planning to schedule any more screen tests, Mr. Angel?”

Corrigan did not hear the producer’s reply; he was heading for Chuck Baer. En route he detoured to the bar long enough to drain his glass and set it down. When he reached Baer, he said, “You sure this character is really the Sultan of Morojaca?”

Baer looked surprised. “Don’t you ever stop making like a cop? There’s no question that Abdul VI is the honest-to-Pete Sultan.”

“Convince me.”

“Alex Thorne is an old friend of mine. As a matter of fact, I got this assignment through him. Will you accept my word that Thorne is an Assistant Undersecretary of State?”

“I’ll buy Thorne if you say so. How does that make Abdul the McCoy?”

“By deduction. Alex told me he was picked to come up from Washington with the Morojacan Ambassador because Ranjit Aziz is a personal friend. That makes Ranjit the real Ambassador from Morojaca, doesn’t it? And it would be impossible for Ranjit not to know who his own ruler is, right? What ever put such an idea in that thick Mick head of yours, anyway, Tim?”

“Leprechauns,” Corrigan said, and made his way back toward the crowd around Abdul VI.

3.

He passed Sam Terry leading George Angel over to the gem display. Terry was talking fast in Angel’s ear.

Corrigan was reasonably certain that the press agent had maneuvered the Hollywood producer into meeting the Sultan’s daughter. For one thing, Terry and Angel had come to the party together; they could hardly be buddies, and only business would have paired them off. It now seemed unlikely that either the Sultan or Salome was party to the scheme, in view of Baer’s explanation. Probably Terry had sold Angel a bill of goods, good for at least a look, knowing that if anything came of it Salome would naturally turn to him for representation. It had not taken divination to tag Terry as an operator; “deal” was written all over him.

Andrea Day and Ronald Parker seemed to have given up on Angel. They were now chatting with Senator Pruce and the City Comptroller; Pruce was preening himself like an old turkey-cock. Arnie Keppel and Lieutenant Painter were hovering over the Sultan. Corrigan edged into the group.

The bearded Haidar Ghafur at the door announced: “Mrs. Patricia Newcomb.”

The Broadway columnist barged in like a garbage scow in a new coat of paint. She had had her face lifted so many times that she looked like something put together with papier-mâché. She wielded great power in the theatrical world, and the blonde actress and her companion abruptly ditched Senator Pruce and Comptroller Evanston and headed for her. Corrigan watched with amusement. Mrs. Newcomb barely nodded to them, ignored Andrea Day’s clutch, frowned at Parker, and brushed by them to home in on Abdul VI. The actor and actresses were left standing there with glassy smiles. Corrigan felt almost sorry for them. What a way to have to live!

Guests continued to arrive until nine P.M., by which time about fifty people were present. Ali, one of the robed and hooded servants, periodically offered hors d’oeuvres to the Sultan and his women and kept them supplied with punch.

Shortly after nine, Corrigan saw one of the Morojacan servants carry the punch bowl, which by now was empty, toward the kitchen. At the same moment the royal secretary, Haidar, opened the suite door in answer to a knock. Corrigan caught a glimpse of a red-jacketed bellhop standing in the corridor with a package. Haidar stepped outside; the door closed behind him.

The servant with the punch bowl pushed through the swinging door into the kitchen.

Several minutes passed before the corridor door reopened and Haidar appeared with the package the bellhop had delivered. It was about six inches square, wrapped in white gift paper and bound in red ribbon. The secretary crossed the room and bowed before the Sultan, offering the package.

“A servant of the hotel just delivered this, Your Highness,” he said. “Compliments of the management, he said.”

The Sultan looked mildly interested; gifts could hardly be a source of excitement to him. He set the package on his lap and began plucking idly at the bow of the ribbon.

Haidar returned to his post at the suite door.

The Sultan stripped off the gift wrapping and handed it to one of his wives. The cubical box under the wrapping was covered with contact paper designed to look like leather.

Corrigan was standing several feet to one side of the Sultan’s chair, his right profile toward the kitchen door. As that was the side with the eye, he saw the kitchen door swing open and the robed and hooded servant carrying the refilled punch bowl emerge.

As the man approached the gem table and Chuck Baer, a curious tension in his bearing made Corrigan give him a closer look.

The face beneath the hood looked familiar. It was certainly not that of the servant who had gone into the kitchen with the punch bowl.

Then everything happened at once. Corrigan was about to spring toward Baer’s station when what seemed like a blockbuster went off behind him. He was deafened and staggered, but he managed to whirl around. The Sultan had evidently opened the lid of the gift box, and the box had exploded in his face. People were bowled over all around him, apparently from the concussion. What had been the Sultan’s face was now a spongy red mass; blood was spurting from it like a fountain. His jeweled turban had been blown off, disclosing a brown bald head spattered with blood. He had collapsed in the gilt chair and now lay half on the floor.

Tissue and blood had splattered in every direction; Salome and the two wives seated nearest the gilt chair were speckled, as if someone had flipped a full paintbrush at them. Mrs. Newcomb, who had been talking with the Sultan, seemed miraculously unhurt; she was glaring in horror at something white and red plastered to the bosom of her party gown. Corrigan later recalled foolishly thinking, as he saw a large red blob on his own left shoe, that Abdul VI’s last act in life had been to explode the old wives’ tale that royal blood was blue.

The floor was littered with bits of excelsior. The box, Corrigan’s trained eye saw in that horrifying instant, was still intact except for its lid, which had been blown across the room. At the explosion the box itself had jumped from the monarch’s lap and fallen to the floor at his feet. Through his shock Corrigan found himself wondering why it had not disintegrated in the blast.

Lieutenant Painter, who had been standing slightly to the rear and left of the Sultan, was staggering back, clutching his shoulder. As far as Corrigan could see in that century-long moment, no one else—it was incredible—seemed hurt.

The Morojacan servant who had been presiding at the bar was rushing forward with a Luger in his hand. Belatedly Corrigan remembered the other servant, the one who had come out of the kitchen with the refilled punch bowl—the impostor. He jerked his head around.

Chuck Baer was swiping at both eyes, as if he had been blinded. The glass top of the gem-display case was broken, and in the case lay the shattered remnants of the cut glass punch bowl, as if it had been used to batter in the case. Even from where he stood, Corrigan could see that the Akhoond ruby was gone.

He swung around and just caught a glimpse of a robed figure disappearing through the door to the kitchen. Corrigan launched himself in that direction.

Even as he made a dash for the swinging door, it registered on him that, instead of swinging outward from its own motion before settling in its proper position, the door had stopped abruptly when its edge reached the center of the jamb. There was evidently a bolt on the kitchen side, and the fleeing man had shot it home.

The thief’s strategy flashed into Corrigan’s head. The man planned to make his escape through the kitchen, from the kitchen into the servants’ bedroom, and out the bedroom door into the hotel corridor, figuring that pursuit would naturally come in his direct wake. The bolted kitchen door would hold the pursuers up and give the thief a few precious extra seconds.

In midstride Corrigan made an abrupt ninety-degree turn and headed for the main door of the suite. The Sultan’s secretary, Haidar, was still at the door, gaping toward what was left of his ruler. Behind him the door burst open, slamming Haidar aside, and the patrolman guarding the hall appeared with drawn gun.

Corrigan had no time for explanations. He spun the uniformed man out of the way with a body block and drew his own gun as he ran into the corridor.

No one was in sight. He made at a dead run for the turn in the corridor, hoping the policeman had recognized him. All the way down the hall he expected a bullet in his back.

He dashed around the corner. The door from the servants’ quarters was closed, and there was no one in that section of the corridor, either. Racing to the door, he tried to open it. It was locked.

He had hurled himself ineffectually against the door twice when the patrolman came running around the corner.

“Let me try it, Captain!”

The cop was six feet two and weighed a fat-free two hundred and twenty pounds. Corrigan gladly stepped aside. The man backed across the hall and crashed against the door like a pro lineman. The lock snapped; the big man tumbled to his hands and knees inside the bedroom.

Corrigan, gun leveled, was right behind him. No one was in the room. He threw one glance into the kitchen; the door to it from the bedroom stood open. Its sole occupant was the real servant, robeless, clad in a garment that resembled a suit of long, baggy underwear. A holstered Luger was strapped around his waist. He lay face down, peacefully out.

As the uniformed officer got to his feet, Corrigan’s eye flicked about the bedroom. One of the windows was open. He jumped over and saw a fire escape outside.

The Grand Suite was on the hotel’s third floor. Two stories below, the lowest section of the fire escape was swinging back upward. Corrigan could just see a robed figure fleeing along the alley toward the rear of the D’Autremont.

He was able to snap off one shot before the man darted around the rear corner of the building. He knew he was going to miss even as he squeezed the trigger. From a third-floor window it would have been difficult to hit a running target in dim light even if he had had time to aim.

He pulled his head inside and holstered the gun.

“What happened, for God’s sake?” the policeman asked.

“Somebody blew up the Sultan and snatched the Akhoond in the confusion.”

Corrigan strode into the kitchen, the officer trailing him. He spotted a telephone extension on the kitchen wall.

“See how badly he’s hurt.” He nodded toward the unconscious Moslem and went to the phone. He heard Arnie Keppel’s voice say, “Give me the city desk, quick.” The newsman was apparently using the bar extension.

“Get off the line, Arnie,” Corrigan said. “I need it bad.”

“Tim?” Keppel said. “Just a second, will you? I’m through to my paper.”

“Get off the goddamn line!”

The reporter said something impolite and hung up.

Corrigan jiggled the bar on the phone till the hotel switchboard answered, asked the operator to get the headquarters number, and a moment later was giving a sergeant a terse rundown. He described the jewel thief—a meager enough description—and ordered a thorough search of the area.

“Better send an ambulance, too,” he said. “A police officer caught a bomb fragment in the shoulder. I’ve also got an unconscious Morojacan on my hands.”

“Whatever that is,” the sergeant said. “We ought to have the area blanketed within five minutes, Captain. The ambulance should be there in ten.”

Corrigan hung up. “What’s with him?” he asked the patrolman.

“His breathing’s all right, pulse steady,” the officer said. “There’s a long, narrow lump on his right temple, but no discoloration. Must have been a leather sap, Captain. He’s going to be bye-bye for a while.”

Corrigan nodded. “He’ll keep for now. Get on back to your post and don’t let anyone leave the suite.”

The man saluted and left on the double.

As Corrigan had guessed, there was an inside bolt on the swinging door between the kitchen and the lounge, and it had been shot home. He pulled it open and hurried through to the scene of the carnage.

4.

No more than four minutes had passed since the explosion. The lounge was still in shock. The four blood-spattered sultanas sat huddled together in fright. Salome was on her feet, sobbing, while Sam Terry and George Angel made silly attempts to wipe the Sultan’s gore from her clothing with their handkerchiefs.

Someone had hauled Abdul VI from his chair, laid him on his back, and covered his ruined face with a napkin. The napkin was a uniform red. Blood was still oozing out from under it. Women were in hysterics all over the place, and the men looked pistachio-green. Someone had vomited in a corner, like a dog.

The Moslem servant who had rushed from behind the bar with the Luger was on his knees before the corpse, rocking back and forth in silence. Corrigan was not sure which one it was, Ali or Orkhim; Arabs all looked alike to him.

Senator Pruce and the Comptroller were pressing against Lieutenant Painter’s wounded shoulder, trying to get him to sit down. The detective was trying to get away from them. Corrigan pushed the Senator and Evanston out of the way and examined Painter’s wound. It didn’t look like much, but he ordered the lieutenant to sit down, anyway.

The patrolman reached into the suite and pulled the door shut. Corrigan turned his attention to Chuck Baer.

Baer was blotting his eyes with a handkerchief, cursing at the top of his considerable voice. When Corrigan got close, he smelled a powerful odor of whisky. The front of the private detective’s jacket was soaked in it.

“How are your eyes, Chuck?”

“Coming around,” Baer growled. “I caught the whole bowlful smack in the kisser. That was no Moslem punch—there was raw hooch in that bowl. The way it burned, for a minute there I thought it was lye. What happened to Ali?”

“It wasn’t Ali, Chuck. Ali’s out cold in the kitchen. It was a ringer, who knocked Ali out and snatched his robe, filled the punch bowl with whisky for your special benefit, let you have a faceful of it, smashed the case, and lammed it with the ruby. He made it down the fire escape from the servants’ quarters. The district is being covered now.”

“The ruby.” Baer glared down at the display case with bloodshot eyes. “Brother, when I goof I go whole hog, don’t I? I can imagine how much business I’m going to get after letting the Akhoond get away from me. Tim, I’m out of business.”

“Nobody can blame you. Not with this setup. You’re sure your eyes are okay?”

“I’m all right,” Baer said shortly. “What was that blast?”

It had not occurred to Corrigan that Baer was unaware of the Sultan’s assassination. He nodded toward the red-napkined corpse.

Baer blinked.

“My God!” he said.

They went over to it. After his exclamation the big man was speechless.

Corrigan raised his voice. “Will everyone please give me his attention?”

Everything stopped.

“I’m a police officer. No one is to leave this room. I don’t want anything touched, especially the remains of that bomb. Just stay where you are.”

Senator Pruce said, “Some people have already left, Captain.”

Corrigan glanced around. Every newsman who had been present, as well as Patricia Newcomb, the columnist, had disappeared. They must have ducked out before the patrolman had had time to get back to the door. It didn’t much matter. They would all be back soon enough to cover the follow-up.

He said, “All right. The rest of you stay put. There’s an officer at the door to make that order stick.”

He went over to look at the lethal box. He stooped, but did not touch it.

It had not disintegrated for sufficient reason. It was made of steel a quarter of an inch thick, so that the explosion had been funneled upward in a narrow expanding pattern, like a shotgun blast. The Sultan’s face would inevitably take its full force. That was why none of the bystanders except Lieutenant Painter had been hurt.

Corrigan glanced up. The ceiling above the gilt chair was jaggedly peppered with holes. He lowered his gaze and spotted a discolored metal shard on the floor near the chair. It resembled a grenade fragment.

It couldn’t have been a hand grenade, though, he thought. Even encased in quarter-inch steel, a grenade would have wiped out half the people in the room, because the box would have blown apart like cardboard.

Corrigan got to his feet and walked over to where the box lid lay. It was of steel, too. The remains of twin hinges were still attached to it.

The patrolman let in a plump, middle-aged man carrying a medical bag. Corrigan went over to him and showed his shield case.

“Corrigan of the Main Office Squad,” he said. “You the doctor for the hotel?”

The plump man nodded. “Dr. Oslow.” His glance strayed to the red napkin, not with joy. He probably hasn’t seen a messed-up corpse since his intern days, Corrigan thought.

“He only has half a head left, Doctor,” he said. “The back half. There’s nothing you can do for him. But there’s a man unconscious in the kitchen, and another officer here with a flesh wound that needs attention.”

To give him the lie, the kitchen door swung open and Ali appeared in his Morojacan underwear. He steadied himself against the nearest wall with one hand while he held his head with the other.

“My mistake,” said Corrigan. “The man in the kitchen’s come to all by himself. Better take a look at the wounded officer first, Dr. Oslow.” He jerked a thumb toward where Senator Pruce and Comptroller Evanston still hovered over the lieutenant. The doctor hurried over, opening his bag on the way.

Corrigan went to the dazed servant leaning against the wall. The man had his hand over his eyes; he had not yet seen his ruler’s body. The MOS man planted himself before the Morojacan to block his view.

“You’re Ali?” he said.

The man half opened his eyes. “Yezzir,” he said dully. “Ali Singh.”

“Got another robe in your room?”

Ali Singh glanced down at his underwear and lunged back into the kitchen, clutching himself. Corrigan followed him into the bedroom he shared with Orkhim and waited for him to put on another robe. The man collapsed on the edge of his bed, holding his head again.

“Can you tell me what happened?” Corrigan asked him.

“A man with red coat,” Ali said. “Servant of hotel. When he come from bedroom, I wonder, but he smile on me friendly. Then hand come out from pocket, something black in it. I feel big hit on head. Is all remember.”

“You ever see this man before?”

Ali looked helpless. “American, he all look same.”

There’s tit for your tat, Corrigan, Corrigan thought wryly.

“You stay right here, Ali. A doctor will be along shortly to look at your head.”

He went out the bedroom door and around to where the uniformed man stood before the suite entrance.

“What’s your name?” Corrigan asked him.

“Patrolman Rourke, sir.”

“Okay, Rourke. You were on this door when the bellhop delivered that package. Exactly what happened?”

“He come from around the same corner you just came from, Captain. The elevators are the other way, but I didn’t think about that at the time. He was carrying a white package tied with red ribbon. He walked right past me, rapped on the door to the suite, and that young guy with the black beard and turban opened it—the secretary. When the bellhop said he had a present for the Sultan from the management, the secretary stepped out in the hall. The bellhop handed him the package and then walked around the corner again, the way he’d come. The bearded guy watched till he was out of sight, then he said to me that Americans were funny people—he’d never heard of a hotel giving a guest a present before. I said it probably was because the guest was a sultan; the guy shrugged and went back inside. A couple of minutes later I heard the explosion.”

“Can you describe the bellhop, Rourke?”

“Thirty to thirty-five. About five eight, a hundred and forty pounds. Dark straight hair. Kind of a thin face, with a pointy nose.”

The same face he had seen under the hood. Corrigan asked, “Ever see him before?”

“It didn’t register, Captain. He was a new one to me.”

“Well, he wasn’t to me,” Corrigan said. “Only I haven’t fingered him yet. Okay, Rourke.”

“I hope I’m not in trouble, Captain,” the big patrolman said anxiously. “The guy was wearing a bellhop uniform. Naturally I thought—”

“Naturally. Don’t worry about it. A Homicide team and a lab crew ought to be along in a few minutes. Anybody else, Rourke, you check with me.”

“Yes, sir,” said Patrolman Rourke.

5.

There was less confusion in the lounge now. Chuck Baer had returned to his post by the table to stand glumly over the ruins of the gem collection. Lieutenant Painter was stripped to the waist; the house doctor was applying a compress bandage as the Senator and Evanston looked on. The Sultan’s widows were still clinging to one another. Salome was back on the hassock, crying more quietly. Sam Terry patted her shoulder. George Angel, flanked by Andrea Day and Ronald Parker, was looking longingly at the door. Orkhim still knelt beside the Sultan’s body, but he was no longer rocking. He was staring at the floor.

Corrigan went over to Dr. Oslow and his patient in time to hear the physician say, “There’s a piece of metal in there you ought to have removed at once, Lieutenant. I suggest you get to a hospital.”

“I have a car, Lieutenant,” the Comptroller said. “I’ll be glad to run you over.”

“That won’t be necessary,” Corrigan said. “An ambulance is on the way. How you feeling, Murray?”

“Okay, Tim.”

“You’ll find the man who was conked out in the bedroom beyond the kitchen, Doctor. He got rapped with a leather sap.”

Dr. Oslow nodded. On his way out of the room he glanced down at the corpse. When he saw the depression under the blood-soaked napkin, he proceeded toward the kitchen.

Corrigan looked around. Haidar Ghafur still maintained his post by the suite door. As Corrigan headed for the secretary, he passed within earshot of the Morojacan Ambassador and Assistant Undersecretary Thorne.

Ranjit Aziz was shaking his finger in the face of the State Department man and saying in his singsong voice, “Is this the way the American government protects visiting heads of state, sir? Why were not Secret Service men assigned? You think Morojaca is too unimportant to offer its ruler even minimum security?” The Ambassador’s face was the color of mahogany.

Corrigan paused to listen to Alex Thorne’s reply.

“You know we offered Secret Service protection, Ranjit. It was the Sultan himself who rejected it. He told us he preferred to rely on his own palace guard.”

Senator Pruce had drifted over to listen to the exchange. Ranjit Aziz was not mollified.

“The Sultan toured the Soviet Union last year in perfect safety,” he shouted. “My country will cancel all American oil contracts and sign new ones with Moscow!”

Senator Pruce frowned at Thorne. The State Department career man had gone pale. Although he could hardly be blamed for the murder, somebody’s head would roll if an oil-rich Arab state friendly to the West suddenly decamped to the Communists. Thorne apparently saw himself as the logical victim of the diplomatic guillotine.

Corrigan shook his head and moved on. The life of a cop seemed a sinecure by contrast.

“You have any ideas about this, Haidar?” he asked the bearded secretary.

The young Morojacan stared at him blankly, as if he were still in shock.

“This wasn’t a mere jewel theft, Haidar. If the idea was to create a diversion, the thief could have done it without murder. Somebody wanted your Sultan dead.”

Haidar licked his lips. “How could that be? Who would assassinate a man as kind and noble as His Highness?”

“I don’t know,” Corrigan said. “I was hoping you do.”

The royal secretary shook his head. “It is impossible. Sultan Abdul was nationally beloved. The bomb must have been meant primarily to cover the thief’s escape with the Akhoond.”

Corrigan did not budge. “It seems like a damned messy way to create a diversion. Can you describe the bellhop who delivered the package?”

Haidar Ghafur shrugged. “One does not really look at a page. He was simply a man in a red hotel uniform.”

Corrigan had his built-in sonar going. He already had a description of the fake bellhop from Patrolman Rourke; he had asked the secretary the question for another reason. The coup would have been impossible without inside help; on the theory that anyone might be involved, he was testing Haidar to see if the Morojacan would give a wrong or misleading description of the thief.

“He must have registered something on you, Haidar. Age, size, facial peculiarity, anything. Can’t you remember?”

The man drew his fine dark brows together. “I will try, Captain.… He was not a youth. Perhaps thirty to thirty-five?”

“I’m asking you.”

“Nor was he especially tall. Perhaps five feet eight inches or nine. He failed to impress me as either fat or thin, so he must have been of average weight for his size. I will hazard one hundred fifty to one hundred sixty pounds. These are only guesses, you understand.”

“Guess about his face.”

The secretary mused again. Then he shook his head. “I could no more describe it than I could describe the waiter who served my breakfast. I simply did not notice.”

Proving not much, Corrigan thought. Haidar’s description of the man was close enough to Rourke’s to take him off the hook, if he was an accomplice, without providing any hardcore information. There was a discrepancy in weight, but Corrigan knew how hard it was to judge weight, particularly under conditions of stress. Nor did it necessarily mean anything that Haidar was unable to describe the man’s face. Hardly anybody could describe the features of a waiter or taxi driver or bellhop.

Dr. Oslow appeared from the kitchen. Corrigan left Haidar and intercepted the hotel physician.

“He has a bad bump, that’s all,” Oslow said. “I gave him some aspirin and told him to lie down for a while. Any other patients?”

“The Sultan’s wives and daughter. May as well take a look at them. They’ve had a nasty jolt.”

Corrigan went to the bar phone and said to the switchboard operator, “This is Captain Corrigan of police headquarters, in the Grand Suite. Please send your captain, the bell captain, up right away.”

“Yes, sir,” the girl on the board said. “Is anything wrong up there, Captain Corrigan? Our house doctor was called for, and the house manager is worried. And there’s some silly rumor going around about an explosion—”

“I don’t want anyone up here from the hotel just now but the bell captain. Tell your manager he’ll be rung in on it in due time.”

Corrigan hung up and went over to Chuck Baer.

“How do you feel, Chuck?”

“Just yummy,” Baer said sourly. “Figure out yet how it was done?”

“The bellhop who delivered the bomb was the same one who tossed the whisky in your face. The cop on duty in the hall says he came from the direction of the servants’ quarters. I figure he either had a passkey or picked the lock in the bedroom door. He must have been standing in the kitchen, watching through the crack in the swinging door. There’s about a half-inch of clearance there. As soon as he saw Ali take away the empty punch bowl, he ran back through the bedroom, slowed to a walk when he got out in the hall, and delivered the package. He could have been back in the kitchen, where Ali was mixing a fresh batch of punch, within a minute.”

“Pretty fine timing,” Baer growled.

“Not too fine, Chuck. He could count on Ali’s taking a few minutes to prepare the punch. After he slugged Ali and put on his robe, he dumped out the punch Ali was mixing and poured a couple of quarts of raw whisky in the bowl. For the benefit of your beautiful eyes.”

Baer shook his massive head. “It’s too pat, Tim. How could he depend on one of the servants carrying an empty punch bowl into the kitchen? Suppose it had been an hors d’oeuvre tray?”

“The punch bowl must have been an improvisation. The guy probably intended to use the sap on you. When Ali came into the kitchen with the punch bowl, he decided to make use of that instead.”

Baer shook his head again. “How could he know the Sultan wouldn’t set the bomb off while he was still climbing into Ali’s robe in the kitchen? There’s something fishy here, Tim. The timing was too perfect.”

“Would it have made any difference if the bomb went off thirty seconds early? The place would still have been in an uproar. What bugs me, Chuck, is his detailed knowledge of the setup. He had to know that the kitchen was being used to replenish food and drink supplies instead of the stuff’s being sent up by room service. He had to know that the servants who would be going in and out of the kitchen both wore hooded robes. He had to know that this display table was so situated that he could walk past it presumably on the way to the bar. He even had to know that the kitchen’s swinging door had an inside bolt. Seems obvious it was a finger job, doesn’t it? He had to have had inside help.”

“One of the servants?”

“We’ll start with them, of course.”

He headed for Orkhim, who was still on his knees at the dead Sultan’s side.

He never got there. Patrolman Rourke had pushed open the suite door and was beckoning. Two men stood in the hallway behind him.

So Corrigan detoured around the kneeling Morojacan flunkey and went over to see who they were.

6.

The two men were dressed in neat business suits. The elder, about fifty-five, was of slight build, and he wore horn-rimmed glasses and a worried look. The other, fortyish, had a muscular body beginning to run to fat, and an unreadable face.

“This man says you sent for him, Captain.” Rourke nodded toward the younger arrival.

The man said, “I’m Gil Yates, sir. The bell captain.”

Corrigan stepped out into the hall and closed the door.

The man with the worried look said, “What’s going on in there, Captain?”

“Who are you?”

“Willard Forbes, assistant manager of the hotel.”

Corrigan was annoyed. “Didn’t you get my message, Mr. Forbes? I’m not ready for you yet.”

“Who are you, sir?” the man insisted.

Corrigan produced his shield. “Corrigan of the Main Office Squad.”

“See here, sir. If something’s happened up here, the hotel has a right—a duty—to know! The manager isn’t in just now, and the responsibility for the D’Autremont’s good name is mine. I demand to know what’s wrong.”

“There’s been a murder, Mr. Forbes. And a jewel theft,” Corrigan said, looking at him.

“My God! Not the Akhoond?”

Leave it to a hotel management to worry about a theft of property first, Corrigan thought. He waited for the man to get around to asking who was dead.

“A gem valued at over five hundred thousand dollars!” the man moaned. “A theft like that at the D’Autremont … the board of directors …” He said suddenly, “Did you say a murder, too, sir?”

“The Sultan.”

The assistant manager turned a lovely blue. But Corrigan was now watching the bell captain out of the corner of his eye. The man’s face told nothing. It took more than a murder to upset a hotel bell captain. Or a theft?

“What—how did it happen?” Forbes stuttered.

“I haven’t time to give you a run-down.” Corrigan turned to the bell captain. “Your name is Yates, you say?”

“Yes, sir.”

“A bellhop delivered a package to this suite about ten minutes past nine, Yates. It was cubical, about six inches each way, gift-wrapped in white paper and tied with red ribbon. He said it was a present for the Sultan with the compliments of the management. Know anything about it?”

The bell captain seemed puzzled. “I haven’t sent a bellboy to this suite all evening, sir.”

“The hotel management didn’t send the Sultan any gift,” Forbes said in a shrill voice. “I’d know if we did.”

Corrigan ignored him. “Yates, how would an outsider get hold of one of your bellhop jackets?”

“The employees’ locker room is in the basement, sir. There would be a dozen or more red jackets of off-duty bellboys hanging there. They’re supposed to keep their lockers locked, though.”

The type of lock found in the average locker room would hardly slow down a pro. Corrigan shook his head.

“Make a check of your men and find out if a jacket is missing. You can report back to whatever police officer is on duty here. It probably won’t be me. I’m covering until a Homicide or Robbery team arrives.”

“Yes, sir,” Yates said. “None of the off-duty men will be in till midnight, though, most of them not till eight A.M.”

“Just make sure the officer in charge gets the information.”

He nodded dismissal and went back inside. He cut off the assistant manager by closing the door.

The four wives and Salome were no longer in evidence. Dr. Oslow said he had administered sedatives to all five women and sent them to bed.

Burly Dave Bender of Homicide arrived. He was accompanied by his lanky partner, Marty Kinn.

“Tim,” Bender said. “I hear you’ve got a hot one for us.”

Corrigan led the detectives over to the Sultan’s body. Neither attempted to remove the blood-soaked napkin from the face. The way it dipped told its own story. Both men grimaced.

“How?” Bender asked.

Corrigan told him the story of the fake bellhop and the lethal gift “from the management.”

The Homicide men knelt to examine the steel box, partially covered with singed contact paper; it still lay on the floor where the blast had hurled it. Neither touched it.

They rose, and Bender said, “Designed to blow straight up. It’s lucky nobody else was hurt.”

“Nobody but Painter.” Corrigan thumbed Lieutenant Painter, in a chair, his jacket draped over his shoulders and his bloodstained shirt wadded in his lap. “Murray caught a piece of metal in his shoulder. There’s an ambulance on the way. Where the hell is it?”

“That ambulance doesn’t have to hurry for me,” the lieutenant said. “I’m not anxious to feel the probe. I’ve been over that route before.”

Kinn looked around the room. Most of the beleaguered guests were sitting about listlessly, but some of them were beginning to look angry. The Sultan was already a mere unpleasant memory.

“We’d better start cleaning up on the bystanders, Dave,” he said to his partner. “There’s going to be a riot here soon if we don’t. They look like VIPs.”

“They’re VIPs, all right,” said Corrigan grimly.

“Did anybody leave?” Bender asked him.

“Six newsmen and Pat Newcomb, the columnist. They’ll be back as soon as they’ve phoned their stories in. Do you want their names, Dave?”

Bender nodded. “Better bring me up to date first.”

Corrigan described in detail what had occurred, adding his conclusions. “By the way, I’ve seen that jewel thief before somewhere. My guess is in the morning lineup. I don’t finger him yet, but I’ll drop by BCI tomorrow and go through the mug shots.” He reeled off the names of the newsmen who had decamped, Kinn taking notes, and said good-bye. As he turned away, the ambulance attendants arrived. They were carrying a stretcher, but Lieutenant Painter waved it off and left between the attendants under his own steam.

Corrigan went over to Chuck Baer, still at his post behind the shattered display case.

“You look as if you’d been caught in a defective time machine, Chuck. How long are you sticking around?”

“Till Brinks gets here for the ice,” the private detective said gloomily. “They’re not due till eleven.”

“Eleven o’clock and all’s fouled up.”

Baer gave him an unfriendly look. “Sometimes your sense of humor gives me a pain in the butt, Tim. I should have left you in that ditch in Korea.”

Corrigan grinned and departed.

Five men stepped off the elevator as Corrigan got there. Three he recognized as members of the lab crew; the other two were from the Robbery detail.

Poor old Chuck, he thought.

When Corrigan entered the MOS squad room the next morning, Detective Second Grade Meisenheimer was just coming out of the Inspector’s office, looking as if he had bitten into a sour apple.

Meisenheimer took the prop meerschaum out of his mouth and said sadly, “’Morning, Tim.”

“What happened to you?” Corrigan asked. “Reassigned to the night trick?”

Meisenheimer stabbed the stem of his pipe at the Inspector’s door. “Getting an earful as to why the Shelton case should have been cracked in three days instead of six. When the hell is the skipper getting out of the hospital?”

“Another week or so. Is the King riding high again?”

Inspector King was responsible for the tics and twinges that had invaded the nerves of the whole squad. With the chief of the Main Office Squad, Inspector Macelyn, hospitalized with a slipped disk, King had taken over as his temporary replacement. Near retirement, he had been shunted around the department for the past several years to fill in for division and squad chiefs on vacation, sick leave, or off duty for whatever reasons.

When a police officer with an inspector’s grade had no permanent assignment, it was an infallible sign of disfavor upstairs. He was a martinet, with no natural ability to command men, and it was known to everyone except King that the brass yearned for his retirement as eagerly as every last man in the department.

Corrigan logged in, checked his mailbox, and made for his so-called office. He was studying the morning teletype when the intercom ordered him to report to the Inspector’s office.

Corrigan knocked and, from bitter experience, waited for the command to come in. When it finally came, he stood at attention before the desk and awaited the invitation to sit down. Inspector King let him stand like that for thirty seconds. It was his idea of how to impress on his subordinates the importance of his rank.

“All right, Captain, sit down.”

Corrigan dutifully sat down and waited again. With King you did a lot of waiting. He wasted more time on nonessentials than any ranking officer Corrigan had ever had anything to do with.

King was a pale-faced man in his early sixties with eyes like aggies and a face that looked as if someone had whittled it out with a chisel. He always made Corrigan think of a Nazi SS officer.

“I got a call from the Deputy Commissioner,” Inspector King said. He had a voice that went with his face. “We’ve been assigned the Abdul VI case.”

Corrigan raised the brow over his brown eye. “In addition to Homicide and Robbery, sir?”

“Homicide and Robbery are out of it, except for such subordinate chores as we choose to assign them.” The Inspector’s tone became what he fancied was ironical. “With a foreign head of state murdered and a ruby worth maybe a million dollars missing, do you think they’d trust anyone but the Main Office Squad? We’re in complete charge. I hope we’re up to it, Captain.”

Even though he was temporarily its boss, King resented the brass’s special regard for the Main Office Squad. That this regard was based on past performance managed to escape him. The Inspector’s last assignment had been with Robbery, and the one before that with Homicide.

“I gather that the chronology of events was something like this,” King went on with a sneer. “About four this morning the Undersecretary of State phoned the Commissioner from Washington, demanding the immediate arrest of the Sultan’s murderer. It seems there will be all sorts of international hell raised if we don’t come up with a solution right away. The Commissioner got the Deputy Commissioner out of bed at five, and the Deputy Commissioner kindly waited till the day trick before he phoned me. It seems this wasn’t entirely because he didn’t want to disturb my sleep.”

“I don’t understand, Inspector.”

King’s eyes glittered with malice. “He wanted to consult Inspector Macelyn before talking to me, and he couldn’t disturb a hospital patient at five A.M. The assignments in this case, Corrigan, have been taken out of my hands. It’s enough to make a man throw up. I don’t know how you got your drag, but by orders from upstairs you’re to be in charge of the Moro—whatever it is!—case.”

In spite of his dislike for King, Corrigan felt a touch of sympathy. It seemed to him that the brass could have handled it more tactfully. He supposed that the pressure from Washington—and undoubtedly from City Hall, too—had left little room for maneuver. They didn’t trust King, and they’d had no time to save his face.

“If you’d rather somebody else was on the case, Inspector,” Corrigan said, “assign him, and I’ll work under him.”

“Thanks, but I don’t stick my neck out for anybody,” King said stiffly. “Orders are orders. Whether you want this hot potato or not, you’re stuck with it, Corrigan. You’re relieved of all other duty until you come up with a break.”

“What about the FBI?” The hell with you, Corrigan thought. The man had deliberately chosen to misunderstand him.

“They’re to be kept informed of all developments. Your contact will be Special Agent Toomey of the New York office. They won’t come into the case unless you fall on your face.”

Corrigan got the picture. If he didn’t crack the case quickly, the FBI would move in. That meant the whole department would suffer a black eye. Which would scarcely leave the brass overjoyed. No wonder King was taking the slap in the face so meekly. If Corrigan failed, it could not reflect on King, in view of his orders, but it could put a black mark on the records of a great many officers King disliked.

Corrigan rose. “If I’m to be the fall guy, I’d better get going.”

“I see you appreciate your position,” Inspector King said with relish. “Everybody from the State Department on down will be watching you. I’m not saying you’ll lose any rank if you fail, but I wouldn’t give you much chance of making inspector. The best of luck, Captain.”

Corrigan saluted—the final irony—and went out, thinking that he had been considerably premature in thanking his stars for being a cop instead of a diplomat. The Sultan’s assassination had put his career in as great jeopardy as Alex Thorne’s.

7.

The phone was ringing when Corrigan got back to his office. It was Chuck Baer.

“I’ve got another client,” Baer announced.

“Bully for you,” Corrigan said. “Who?”

“Well, it’s really the same one, only extended. Ranjit Aziz, the Morojacan Ambassador, acting in the name of his beloved country.” Baer sounded grim. “What Mr. Ambassador doesn’t know is that I’d have worked on the case for free. I don’t like people knocking off my clients.”

“What’s he think you can do that the department can’t?” Corrigan snapped. His teeth were still on edge from his interview with Inspector King.

Baer said dryly, “He doesn’t think the NYPD is very competent. With two cops assigned to guard the Sultan, plus a third present as a guest, he may have a point.”

“Did it occur to him that the private detective he hired to guard the Akhoond wasn’t a ball of fire, either?” Corrigan growled.

“He’s still too mad over his boss’s death to have thought of that,” Baer said. “Can you clear me to get the dope collected so far by Homicide and Robbery?”

“You won’t need their clearance,” Corrigan said shortly. “I’m in charge of the case.”

Baer’s tone changed. “They’re setting you up for the fall, Tim?”

“Looks like it.”

“Then we’d better get a move on.”

“Where are you—at your office?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll meet you at Homicide.”

They met fifteen minutes later in the Homicide squad room. Bender and Kinn were off duty, but the information Corrigan and Baer were after was in the case record. They went over it together, Corrigan handing each sheet to Baer as he finished it.

There was not a great deal they did not already know. The record consisted mainly of negative information. Bender and Kinn, backed up by the Robbery team—Sergeant Willobee and Detective Second Grade Gloff—had questioned everyone on the scene except the five sultanas, who had been under sedation by the time the detectives arrived. Concurring in Corrigan’s opinion that the thief must have had inside help, they had concentrated on those close to the Sultan.

The two servants they were inclined to clear. According to Haidar Ghafur, the royal secretary, both had been fanatically loyal to Abdul VI. And since neither had ever been in the United States before and neither had been away from the suite except in the company of the Sultan, it seemed hardly credible that either could have made contact with the jewel thief.

Bender, Kinn, Willobee, and Gloff agreed in the report that the most likely finger men were Ambassador Ranjit Aziz, Secretary Haidar Ghafur, and press agent Sam Terry. All three had rooms at the D’Autremont, had been in and out of the Grand Suite since the Sultan’s check-in. The trio had known well in advance what the party arrangements would be, including where the Sultan would be seated and where the jewel collection would be displayed. In fact, interrogation had revealed that each of the three men had had some part in the arrangements.

Furthermore, any of them could have made contact with a professional jewel thief. From Patrolman Rourke’s description and because of Corrigan’s statement that the thief’s face was familiar to him, it was likely that the thief was an American, which meant that original contact with him had probably been made in this country. Ranjit had been in Washington for three years. Sam Terry, although back in the States for only two days, could well have known the gem thief prior to his Baghdad film assignment and could have gotten in touch with him after landing with the Sultan’s entourage simply by picking up a phone. Haidar Ghafur had been in the United States six weeks before the Sultan’s arrival; he had been sent in advance to negotiate preliminary contracts with American oil men. Haidar had also made several previous trips on similar assignments.

Baer put the report down. “This Terry looks like our best bet.”

“How do you figure that, Chuck?”

Baer shrugged. “Motive. The Ambassador must pull down a pretty good salary, and Haidar’s job seems cushy. But Terry was going to be out of a job when the Sultan completed his tour of the U.S. Maybe a good hunk of what the Akhoond would bring was more than Terry could resist.”

Corrigan said slowly, “I’m not sure the Akhoond was the only motive. Maybe it was part of it, but my guess is somebody wanted the Sultan dead, too.”

Baer looked at him.

“The bomb made a beautiful diversion,” Corrigan said, “but a pretty drastic one, wasn’t it? You know as well as I that jewel thieves rarely go in for rough stuff. So it’s at least possible that the theft was an excuse to knock off the Sultan and let some iceman take the rap.”

“A political crime,” Baer said thoughtfully.

“Why not? We don’t know what the political situation is in Morojaca, or even who inherits the Sultan’s job, now that Abdul is dead. Maybe it was a coup, engineered by Ranjit Aziz. We don’t know a damn thing about him. Or about Haidar. It’s even possible it’s both politics and l’amour. Haidar’s young. Maybe he’s got a yen for one of the Sultan’s twenty-two widows. Or his daughter, and somebody like Ranjit conned him into knocking the old boy off for reasons of his own.”

They resumed reading. The hooded robe and the red jacket had been found in a trash can at the rear of the hotel. A bellhop who came on duty at midnight had reported the jacket missing from his locker, and he had identified the one found in the trash can as his. The assumption was that the thief had hidden his own coat in the trash can, had donned it in his escape after shedding the jacket and robe, then had continued along the rear of the hotel to the side street and had lost himself in the midtown crowds.

The only other information in the file was that the steel box and the recovered fragments of the bomb had been turned over to the lab, and the broken pieces of the cut glass punch bowl had been sent to Fingerprinting.

Corrigan used a phone in the Homicide squad room to call Fingerprinting. Iz Staith answered.

“Tim Corrigan, Izzy,” Corrigan said. “Find any prints on the punch bowl?”

“You on that?” Staith asked in surprise.

“I’m on it,” Corrigan said. “Well?”

“No luck, Tim. A few smears, nothing clear enough for comparison. A cut glass surface isn’t much good for leaving fingerprints under the best of conditions.”

“Okay, Iz.” He hung up and said to Baer, “Negative.”

“Maybe they had better luck with the bomb, Tim.”

“I was just going to call them.” Corrigan phoned the lab and asked for Chief Technician Yoder.

“We’re working on it now,” Yoder told him. “I’ll have a report on your desk by noon.”

“Can’t you give me anything now?” Corrigan growled. “I’ve been ordered to solve this thing the day before yesterday.”

“We’re still putting the fragments of the bomb together, Tim. The ones picked out of the Sultan’s head, and the piece from Murray Painter’s shoulder, just got here. I can give you a rundown on the steel box and the wrapping paper, but it won’t do you much good.”

“Let’s have it, anyway.”

“The wrapping paper and the ribbon could have been bought in any dime store. Ditto the contact paper on the box. The box itself is stainless steel sheeting, which is about as rare as grass in July. If you got me a sample from the mill it was made in, we could probably pinpoint its source. Then all you’d have to do is check the hundreds of jobbers the mill shipped to, and the thousands of retail outlets.”

“Thanks for nothing,” Corrigan said. “Don’t you have a thing for me on the affirmative side?”

“Well, the seams of the box were hand-welded and polished. It’s an adequate job, but not professional enough to have been commercially made. You can look for somebody with access to machine-shop equipment and just enough knowledge to use it. The hinges suggest the same thing. They’re wood hinges with holes for screws that were welded onto the lid and the back of the box. Again only adequately, not professionally.”

“Somebody with a hobby? Maybe a shop in his basement?”

“Could be. Or an engineer who has access to a company machine shop.”

“Was the stuff checked for fingerprints?”

“Naturally,” Yoder said. “The Sultan’s and this Haidar Ghafur’s prints were on the wrapping paper; that fake bellhop handled it damn carefully. The Sultan’s prints were on the contact paper.”

“Anything else?”

“That’s it so far, Tim. And the sooner you get off my back, the sooner you’ll have the full report on your desk.”

Corrigan hung up.

“What’s the story?” Baer demanded.

Corrigan told him.

“That kind of knocks out all three of our suspects. Terry hasn’t been back in the States long enough to have built the box, Haidar can hardly have a machine shop in his hotel room, and Ranjit just doesn’t seem the type to work with his hands.”

“It knocks out nothing,” Corrigan grunted. “The finger man didn’t necessarily build the box. Maybe when we catch up with the actual thief, we’ll find he has an amateur shop in his basement. Let’s get the hell over to BCI and start looking our eyes out at mug shots.”

“My eyes, your eye,” said Baer.

“My eye,” said Corrigan. “Get off your damn butt!”

8.

At the Bureau of Criminal Identification, Patrolman Rourke was just coming out the door.

“’Morning, Captain,” Rourke said, “Mr. Baer. You here for the mugs, too?”

Corrigan said they were.

“I hope you have better luck than I had. I looked at mugs till my eyes crossed, and I couldn’t spot him.”

It was not encouraging. Rourke had gotten a much better look at the thief in the bellhop jacket than Corrigan. The man’s face was indelibly printed in Corrigan’s memory, however, and he was more than ever certain that he had seen it somewhere before.

He and Chuck Baer spent the next hour studying shots of every man with a record who had ever been charged with or suspected of a gem theft. Baer, who had not had a chance to see the face of the man who had tossed the whisky in his eyes, was no help. When the mugs started to fuse, Corrigan sat back to rest his eye.

He frowned into space for some time. He had tossed half the night trying to recall where he had seen the foxy face under the hood. It kept slipping away just as he almost had it.

Suddenly a months-old recollection snapped into Corrigan’s head. The morning lineup in the fourth-floor ex-gymnasium of the headquarters building … The case Corrigan had been interested in was a kidnaping. As always, he had paid careful attention to each suspect as he came under the lights, committing faces and names to memory for future reference.

He remembered the jewel thief clearly now. The hangup was that the man had not been arrested in connection with jewels. He had been pulled in by the Safe and Loft Squad on suspicion of breaking and entering, and had later been released for lack of evidence. Name, name? Willie something. Corrigan started the think-tank going. He employed association of ideas to fix names in his mind.

Tinker, it had something to do with Tinker. Toy? No.… Baseball?

It slipped into place on greased skids. The classic baseball combination—Tinker to Evers to Chance.

Willie Evers.

He went over to the desk and asked the girl if she had a sheet on a Willie Evers. She had, and he was their man.

Corrigan read the record to Baer.

“Wilfred (Willie) Evers, born Chicago, April 17, 1933. That makes him thirty-three years old. Five feet seven and one half, hundred and forty-eight pounds. Single, no known relatives. Occupation locksmith, drill-press operator, lathe operator! How about that, Chuck?”

“It doesn’t make him a cutter and welder, but at least he’s used to machine tools,” said Baer. “And the locksmith part is interesting, Tim. It explains his getting past the locks on the bellhop’s locker and Ali and Orkhim’s bedroom.”

“No juvenile record,” Corrigan continued. “First arrest December 10, 1961, for attempted burglary. Suspended sentence and probation. May 28, 1962, suspected burglary, dismissed for lack of evidence. Hmmm … Then he got careful, Chuck. No further arrests until April ’66, when I saw him in the lineup on that suspected breaking and entering.”

“He doesn’t sound like a killer to me,” Baer said. “Or a top iceman, either. The guy who snatched the Akhoond has to be one of the best in the business.”

“You mean because he snatched it from you?” Corrigan said with a grin. He was feeling lots better.

“Go to hell,” Baer said amiably. “You sure he’s the one?”

Corrigan studied the front and profile shots again. “Certain. Let’s run up to CC.”

At the Communications Center on the top floor, Corrigan put out an APB on Willie Evers, including his last known address from the sheet. He had little hope that the address would pay off. Habitual criminals had a cute way of moving the moment they were released after a pickup.

While he was at Communications, Corrigan decided to wire an inquiry to the Los Angeles police, requesting a rundown on Sam Terry, if any.

These routine matters out of the way, Corrigan took Baer back to the MOS squad room and his dingy office. Baer took the only other chair in the cubicle, and Corrigan grabbed the phone.

A voice answered, “Federal Bureau of Investigation.”

“Special Agent Toomey, please,” Corrigan said. “Police Captain Corrigan calling.”

A moment later a man’s voice said, “Toomey speaking. What can I do for you, Captain?”

“I’m on the Sultan Abdul case, Mr. Toomey. I understand you’re my FBI contact.”

“Yes.”

“I’ve been instructed to keep you informed. We’ve just identified the man who snatched the Akhoond. He’s a break-in artist and burglar named Willie Evers. I put an APB out on him.”

“That’s fast work,” the FBI man said.

“We still have to collar him,” Corrigan said. “Meanwhile I need some information. You may have to go through the State Department to get it, or possibly the CIA.”

“What information?”

“Our working theory is that this was more than a jewel theft. We suspect the Sultan’s death wasn’t a mere adjunct to the theft, but murder for its own sake. It’s possible it may have been a political assassination. What I want is a rundown on the political situation in Morojaca, whether there was some faction challenging the Sultan’s rule—that kind of thing. I’m particularly interested in knowing if either Ambassador Ranjit Aziz or the Sultan’s secretary, Haidar Ghafur, was involved in such a movement.”

“It hardly seems likely either would have retained his job if he was working against the Sultan,” Toomey objected. “Morojaca is an absolute monarchy.”

“True, but maybe Abdul didn’t know he had a traitor close to him. I know it’s a large order, Mr. Toomey, but it would certainly take the heat off if we could establish that the Sultan was assassinated by his own people.”

“You have a point there, Captain. I’ll get in touch with the CIA. If they have anybody in Morojaca, I’ll try to talk them into sending a code cable for the specific information you want. Where do I reach you?”

Corrigan said he was with the Main Office Squad, and gave his extension number. The special agent said he would call back the moment he had anything, and hung up.

Chuck Baer grunted, “So far, Tim, I haven’t done a damn thing but sit on my tookus. You have any chores for me?”

“You’ll earn your fee,” Corrigan assured him. “I’ll split the interviewees with you. As a starter I want detailed statements from Ranjit Aziz, Haidar Ghafur, Sam Terry, and Salome, especially about any suspicions they may have about who might want the Sultan dead. Eventually we’ll have to question his widows through an interpreter, but let’s table that for the time being. I doubt if they’d be able to contribute anything, anyway. It doesn’t strike me that the Morojacan wives are privy to any secrets except about the new gal their lord and master had his royal eye on.”

“Whom do I tackle?”

“Ranjit. He’s your client. Drop by to make a progress report as an excuse. If you can do it without making him suspicious, sound him out about any political opposition to the Sultan. He certainly ought to know.”

Baer did not stir. “Who you taking?” he demanded.

“Salome, as a starter.”

“Naturally,” the big man said bitterly. “Why don’t you take Haidar and Terry, and I’ll have a go at Salome when I’m through with Ranjit?”

“Because I’m the one the heat’s on,” Corrigan said.

“You’re the one the heat’s in! I spotted that look when your eye lit on Salome.”

“You want the privileges of this department,” Corrigan said, “or don’t you?”

“I’m bigger than you. Let’s wrestle for her.”

“I couldn’t trust you with Salome. I know what a stacked babe does to you, Chuck. I can’t have you causing international complications. First thing I knew you’d have her on her back.”

Baer sighed. “Why the hell did I ever pick you for a buddy?”

“We may as well use my car, since the witnesses all live at the D’Autremont.”

“Thanks for nothing,” growled Baer.

Corrigan’s car, Car 40 NYPD, was a deliberately meaningless black Ford with a powerful Interceptor engine. He steered it through the lunacy of Manhattan’s traffic with the blend of hair-trigger alertness and ingrained fatalism common to all New Yorkers condemned to drive daily about their city. He was always surprised when he arrived at a destination without at least a dented fender.

The D’Autremont had its own parking lot. They left Car 40 there and parted in the lobby, agreeing to meet in the hotel bar later. Baer headed for Ranjit Aziz’s room, and Corrigan for the Grand Suite.

9.

The press agent answered Corrigan’s knock on the suite door. Although it was only eleven A.M., Terry already had a highball in his hand.

“Oh, good morning, Captain,” he said. “Come in.”

Corrigan found three other familiar faces there. Haidar Ghafur sat before a cocktail table, and one of the Morojacan servants was in the act of serving him tea. Salome perched on the hassock; she was in lounging pajamas of exotic design today, and wore the same open-toed sandals she had worn at the party. Her astonishing eyes lay deep in her head; she looked as if she had not closed them all night, Dr. Oslow’s sedative notwithstanding.

Salome barely nodded to Corrigan. The bearded and turbaned secretary rose and offered his hand. The servant straightened from his tea-pouring, and Corrigan saw that it was Ali.

“How’s your head this morning?” Corrigan asked.

“Is all right, zir.”

Haidar said something to Ali in Morojacan, the servant glanced inquiringly at Corrigan and then at Salome, and the girl looked back at Ali blankly.

“I’m sorry,” Haidar said to Corrigan. “I expected Ali to repeat my question in English. I told him to ask you and the Sultana if you wished tea or a drink.”

“Neither, thanks.”

“Not tea,” Salome said dully. “Is wine, Ali?”

“There’s nothing but hard liquor at the bar, Sultana,” said Sam Terry. “I ordered the liquor for the party myself. I’m sorry. Do you want me to send down for wine?”

Salome made a face and shook her head. With a bow, Ali made for the kitchen. Haidar resumed his seat and waved Corrigan to a chair. Terry took a sip of his highball; he remained standing. Figures he’s quicker on his feet, Corrigan said to himself.

He glanced around, in no hurry at all. The oversized gilt chair the Sultan had occupied had been removed from the lounge. The rug had been cleaned overnight; there was no sign of the Sultan’s blood. The only evidence of the tragedy remaining was in the ceiling; in fact, the holes were larger than they had been, because the bomb fragments had been dug out by the lab crew.

Corrigan said to Salome, “How are the other sultanas this morning?”

“They have accept my father’s death,” the girl said in her throbbing voice. “They rest in rooms. You wish to see?”

“I won’t disturb them now. Ali seems to have adjusted, too. How’s Orkhim taking it?”

“They both still mourn, though in silence. My father, he was their life. Orkhim, too, in his room. You want see?”

“As a matter of fact, Sultana, it was you I came to see. I planned to drop in on Haidar and Mr. Terry later, so it’s just as well you’re both here, gentlemen. It will save me some time.”

“Are you on the case?” Terry asked. “I thought Homicide and Robbery had it.”

“It’s been assigned to the Main Office Squad. What I’m principally here to find out is if any of you know who would want the Sultan dead.”

There was a silence. Haidar spoke first. “You asked me that last night, Captain, did you not? And I told you His Highness had no enemy. Surely you are not believing that the motive was anything but the theft of the Akhoond?”

“It may have been the motive of the jewel thief,” Corrigan said, “but it’s a cinch he had an accomplice. And it’s my hunch the accomplice’s motive was murder. If it hadn’t been, some less deadly method of creating a diversion would have been devised. A stink bomb, for instance. It would have caused just as much confusion, and it wouldn’t have killed anyone.”

There was another silence. Haidar took a thoughtful sip of his tea, and Sam Terry finished his highball.

This time it was the press agent who spoke up. “One of the guests was working with the thief?”

“It could hardly have been a guest, Mr. Terry. Or let me put it this way—the number of guests who could have been accomplices is pretty restricted. The jewel thief had too detailed a knowledge of the layout of this suite and the party arrangements not to have been briefed by somebody on the inside. Most of the people had never been in this suite until they got to the party. The only exceptions were Chuck Baer, who was guarding the gem collection; Ambassador Ranjit Aziz; and Assistant Undersecretary of State Alex Thorne.”

“Surely you cannot suspect any of those!” Salome exclaimed. “Unless … This Baer man. Do you suppose—”

“Absolutely no chance. We’re not restricted to those three, anyway. Quite a few close to the Sultan knew the layout and all the party arrangements.”

The bearded secretary frowned. “I think I should resent that, Captain.”

Corrigan drilled him with the sharpshooting eye. “I can’t worry about resentment, Haidar. The thief simply couldn’t have pulled this job off so smoothly without inside help.”

There was a longer silence this time, broken by Salome.

“If you accuse Ali or Orkhim, you make big mistake, Captain. They die gladly for my father.”

“That is a fact, Captain Corrigan,” Haidar Ghafur chimed in.

Corrigan did not comment. He had no intention of letting them know that the pair of servants had been eliminated as suspects. “The investigation is too young for accusations. But not too young for figuring on an accomplice, the source of the thief’s inside information. That’s the reason I have to know whether anyone close to Abdul VI had a reason to want him out of the way—any reason, political or personal.”

“What do you mean by political?” Haidar demanded.

“Does it have more than one meaning?” Corrigan said, showing his teeth. “Who’s the next sultan?”

The royal secretary looked startled. “It will he His Highness’s eldest son. He is also named Abdul, and he will become Abdul VII. At least I suppose it will be so.”

“What do you mean, you ‘suppose’?”

Haidar was uncomfortable. “I should not have spoken,” he muttered. “It is a matter of no importance.”

“In a murder investigation anything may be important. What’s the hangup about this eldest son?”

The bearded secretary squirmed. “I could be in serious trouble for telling this, Captain Corrigan. I would have to have your word that you will keep it in absolute confidence.”

“You have it,” Corrigan said, “unless it proves to have some direct bearing on the case.”

Haidar glanced from Terry to Salome.

Terry said, “I know when to keep my mouth shut, Haidar.”

Salome said oddly, “May my tongue be cut out.”

“All right.” Haidar faced Corrigan suddenly. “The Sultan has forty sons. Abdul, the eldest, is forty-two, and under Morojacan law he automatically succeeds to the throne—unless the Sultan has named one of his other sons by royal decree. Abdul has spent little time in Morojaca of recent years, preferring European night clubs. His Highness has expressed dissatisfaction with Abdul’s behavior, to the point of threatening to name his next son, Omar, heir to the throne. Actually, I do not believe the Sultan would have done this. He believed strongly in the dynasty passing through first sons. It was his way of wielding a parental club, I am convinced.”

“Did Abdul VII know it was a bluff?”

“He must have. He knew his father quite well.”

Salome said, “If you are thinking my brother could have plot my father’s death, it cannot be, Captain. He was love by all his children.”

Corrigan cocked his eye at Terry.

“You couldn’t prove it by me, Captain,” Terry said hastily. “I never met the son Abdul. He was vacationing on the Riviera when I stayed at the palace.”

Corrigan said to the secretary, “What will be your position when Abdul VII takes the throne? Will you lose your job?”

“I do not think so,” Haidar replied stiffly. “His Highness’s eldest son has as high a regard for me as his father had. Omar would be another story. He—”

He stopped at the sudden alertness on Corrigan’s face. After a pause he shrugged. “I seem to have a penchant for unfortunate remarks today. It would be to my advantage for Abdul VII to ascend to the throne instead of Omar, I confess, but my security would be even stronger if Abdul VI were still alive.” He added suddenly, “I see you think I have a possible advantage in the Sultan’s death. Let me explain my relationship with His Highness.”

“Do that,” Corrigan said gently.

“I am not an aristocrat, Captain. My father was a peasant who was fortunately chosen to be a member of the palace guard. Because of his liking for my father, His Highness took an interest in me. I would be an illiterate farmer in Morojaca today if the Sultan had not had me instructed by palace tutors and later educated at Oxford. As it is, I hold a master’s degree in arts and a doctor’s degree in science. Although I was officially private secretary to the Sultan, my position entailed much more than that title might indicate. My duties could be more accurately likened to those of your chief Presidential assistant. I have been His Highness’s confidant and adviser in matters of state, his personal representative in dealing with foreign industrialists, and the supervisor of most of our government’s engineering projects—I happen to be a civil engineer. Can you think that I would deliberately harm the author of all this in any way? Next to my father, I loved my Sultan more than any other man in the world.”

Corrigan said nothing. His silence became a somehow ominous thing.

“I started to be an engineer,” Sam Terry blurted out, as if to lighten the air. “Mechanical engineering in my case. After two years of it I switched to advertising. I’ve regretted it ever since.”

Corrigan ignored him. He turned abruptly to Salome. “Is this your first visit to America, Sultana?”

She smiled sadly. “Is my first trip from Morojaca anywhere, Captain Corrigan. Until twenty-one I never out of palace, seldom even out of harem.”

“You speak English very well.”

She said with a speed that surprised Corrigan, “I am tutored.”

Something that had happened a few minutes before and had puzzled him popped into Corrigan’s head. He had a sudden hunch. He decided, however, that this was not the time to explore it. He resolved to return at the first opportunity for a solo talk with the girl.

At that moment someone knocked on the door, and Haidar went to see who it was.

It was a trim man in a wrinkled business suit. He was carrying a valise. Corrigan saw him hand Haidar Ghafur a card.

“I’m Morton Ball of the Featherstone Museum,” the newcomer said briskly. “Sorry I’m late, but I had to make an unexpected flight to Los Angeles yesterday, and I just flew back in. My plane was late, so I came here straight from the airport. The Sultan was expecting me at ten.”

Haidar stared at him. “Certainly you must know—”

“Know what?”

“Have you not heard, Mr. Ball?”

“Heard what?”

“It has been on the television, on the wireless, and in all the newspapers, sir. The Sultan is dead.”

“Dead!” The representative of the museum looked horrified. “Oh, no! I haven’t seen a paper.… If I’d taken the time to telephone the museum …” He clutched the handle of his valise and performed an awkward little bow. “Please forgive this untimely intrusion.”

“You are forgiven,” said Haidar distantly, and shut the door in the man’s face.

The secretary returned to his chair. Sam Terry said, “Poor slob. It’s my fault. With everything that’s happened, I forgot the Sultan was expecting him this morning.”

Corrigan said, “What was that all about?”

Haidar replied, “When the Sultan’s impending visit was first announced, together with the information that he was bringing the Akhoond with him, the Featherstone Museum asked Ambassador Ranjit if one of their representatives might see it. The arrangement was made by cable and the invitation extended two weeks before the Sultan’s arrival. It was not your fault, Mr. Terry, but mine. I should have telephoned the museum to cancel the appointment.”

Salome suddenly rose from her hassock. “I have not recover from my father’s death yet, Captain Corrigan. Is headache now. I retire to my room, yes?”

“Yes,” Corrigan said. He rose, too.

So did Sam Terry. But Haidar remained seated. In Morojaca, apparently, the rules about women were different.

“I’ll have to be running along myself,” Corrigan said as Salome disappeared. “If you gentlemen will excuse me?”

“Wait for me, Captain,” Terry said. “My room’s just beyond the elevators. I’ll walk you that far.”

The Secretary had the teacup to his lips. He lowered it. “I shall finish my tea.”

“Do that,” said Corrigan pleasantly, and he left.

10.

As they walked toward the elevators, the press agent said in a rueful voice, “The Sultan’s death knocked me out of a soft job. I’m hoping I can salvage something from the wreck.”

“How’s that?” Corrigan asked.

“If I can talk Salome into accepting George Angel’s offer, I ought to be able to get her to sign me on as her manager. She’d be a hell of a box-office draw merely on the strength of what’s happened to her royal father.”

Corrigan pressed the down button.

“How was the Sultan to work for, Mr. Terry? Was he as lovable as Haidar and Salome say?”

Terry shrugged. “He was easy enough to get along with. But he was a lusty old coot. Twenty-two wives, and he tried to talk every new woman he met into bed. He had a special yen for English and American girls—he was always inviting well-stacked femmes from Britain and the U.S. to stay at the palace. He had a lot of success, too, judging from the palace scuttlebutt. I guess a lot of the gals found it easy to forget he was a dried-up old man when he offered them strings of matched pearls or Arabian Nights bracelets in exchange for a roll in the royal hay.”

Corrigan remembered the expression he had thought he detected in the Sultan’s eyes the night before. “Was he lusty enough to go after his own daughter?”

The press agent stared at him. “Salome? What in hell gave you that idea?”

“I caught him looking at her last night. It wasn’t a fatherly look.”

The idea seemed to upset Terry. “I can’t believe he went in for incest. He bedded more women in his lifetime than the average man does the Frug with. Why would he want his own daughter?”

The elevator door opened, and the operator said, “Down, please.”

“I don’t know,” Corrigan said. “Why did he need other women when he had twenty-two wives?”

Sam Terry was still frowning at him when the elevator door closed.

Chuck Baer was waiting in the hotel bar, smoking a panatela and nursing a glass of beer. Corrigan took the next stool and shook his head at the bartender.

“How was Salome?” Baer grunted.

“Headachy. Haidar and Terry both happened to be with her, so all three are covered. Was Ranjit in?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Get anything out of him?”

The private detective blew smoke into Corrigan’s face. “Mainly nothing. According to Ranjit, it couldn’t have been a political assassination. It seems Abdul VI was a saint beloved by all in Morojaca, especially because of his social reforms. Instead of lining his pockets with the oil money, Ranjit said, Abdul spread it around among the lowly. Ranjit claims that before oil was discovered the peasants lived in abject poverty, and now the standard of living is almost up to ours, all of it the great Abdul’s doing. The Sultan’s oldest son, Abdul, has been educated to the same responsibilities, and Ranjit is sure he’ll continue his father’s policies.”

Corrigan said slowly, “That doesn’t jibe with what Haidar just told me.”

“Oh?”

“I promised to keep it in confidence, so don’t spread it around. If it got back to somebody like Ranjit, Haidar could be in trouble. According to Haidar, Abdul VII is a playboy. His father threatened to issue a royal decree naming his next son, Omar, heir to the throne if Abdul didn’t straighten out.”

Baer shook his big head. “Ranjit didn’t mention anything like that. He seemed to regard the son Abdul as highly as the father. Looks as if we’ve stumbled on something.”

“It suggests an interesting possibility, Chuck. If the CIA’s report to Agent Toomey verifies Haidar’s story, we can start wondering why the Morojacan Ambassador gave the son Abdul such a buildup. If Haidar’s right, the bomb made sure Abdul instead of Omar inherited the throne. It makes me wonder how Ranjit gets along with Omar. If it turns out Omar would have bounced him as Ambassador, we’ll have a good suspect.”

Baer said slowly, “Maybe better than you think. Ranjit has the necessary background to have built that bomb. Before he was appointed Ambassador to the United States, he was a general in the Morojacan army. He was chief of artillery and brags that he’s an expert in ballistics.”

Corrigan scowled. “Sorry to disillusion you, but that doesn’t narrow the field at all. Haidar Ghafur and Sam Terry could have the know-how, too. Haidar is a civil engineer, and Terry had two years of mechanical engineering before he switched to advertising.”

Baer stubbed out his cigar. “I might have known it wouldn’t be that easy.” He glanced at the clock over the bar. “It’s almost noon. What do you say to lunch?”

“Not here,” Corrigan said. “The prices don’t go with a cop’s salary. How about the Automat?”

As they re-entered the lobby, they spotted the turbaned Haidar Ghafur getting out of an elevator. The secretary hesitated, then got into another elevator.

“A little birdie tells me he’s heading for Ranjit’s room,” Chuck Baer said. “He seems to have a lot on his mind.”

“So have I.” Corrigan grinned to himself. The way was clear for his private confabulation with the beauteous Salome. “Say, Chuck, I think you’d better have lunch by yourself. I just remembered—I want to check something out. Phone me at my office later.”

“Hey, you’re my transportation,” Baer protested.

“Taxis are still running.”

“You’re going back to see Salome because you think she’s” alone,” Baer said accusingly. “How about that?”

“Right,” Corrigan said.

“Nuts to you, fuzz,” Baer said. “I’m tagging along.”

“The hell you are,” Corrigan said, and left the big man cursing.

This time Ali answered Corrigan’s knock. Corrigan stepped inside and glanced around. The lounge was empty.

“Tell the Sultana Salome I would like to see her.”

The servant looked doubtful. “She rest now, zir.”

“It’s important.”

“Yezzir.” Ali bowed and departed.

Several minutes passed before he returned with Salome. Corrigan was leaning against the bar when they came in. The young Sultana gave him a frigid look.

“Sorry to disturb you again,” Corrigan said cheerfully. “But there are some questions I have to ask the Sultan’s widows, and I’ll need an interpreter. Ali, get the other sultanas in here, will you?”

“Yezzir.” Ali disappeared again.

“Ali can be interpreter,” Salome said with a frown. “You no need me, Captain. I bad headache. Truly. You excuse now?”

“I’m sorry, Sultana, but I have to have you present.”

He watched her. It was a body blow, all right. She could have torn him to pieces. Headache or not, her gorgeous eyes were burning him to a crisp. She flounced over to a chair facing the bar and plumped herself down in it as if he weren’t there.

The four widows glided into the lounge, trailed by Ali. Today they were in Moslem mourning, swathed in their shroudlike costumes. The yashmaks below their eyes were the double-veil ones Moslem women wear in public; they were impenetrable, and it was hard to tell from their eyes alone under the scarves what they were thinking or feeling.

This is something I ought to look up, Corrigan thought. Was Moslem mourning for widows different from that of daughters? There was nothing about Salome’s costume to suggest mourning of any kind. And the yashmak she wore was of the private-apartment kind, gauzy and tantalizing.

The four women lined up before Corrigan submissively.

“You may go, Ali,” Corrigan said.

“No, no, stay,” Salome said to the servant. “I wish you to interpret. I feel fatigue.”

“I said you may go, Ali,” said Corrigan.

Ali looked doubtfully at the young sultana.

“You not know Moslem custom, Captain!” cried Salome. “Kin of deceased may not speak to widows during the first month’s mourning.”

Corrigan grinned. “You’re fast on your feet, Sultana.” He turned to the servant without the grin. “For the third and last time, Ali: Out.”

The servant rolled his eyes to Allah and left.

As the kitchen door swung shut, Corrigan turned back to the girl. Her face was the color of the cherry in a manhattan.

“We could toss the ball around for a while, Sultana—me asking you to translate English into Morojacan or whatever it is, and vice versa, with you exercising your busy little brain thinking up excuses,” Corrigan said mildly, “but, hell, we may as well cut the comedy. You can’t speak a word of these women’s language—or the Sultan’s.”

He could have sworn the girl’s complexion whitened under her dark makeup.

“You made your first mistake this morning when you asked for wine. Even an infidel like me knows that Moslems don’t drink alcoholic beverages—and you’re supposed never to have left the Sultan’s palace till you came on this trip to the U.S. It’s true that could make you a Moslem heretic. But you also don’t know the lingo. This morning, when I got here, you didn’t have the foggiest notion of what Haidar said to Ali in their native tongue. You’re about as much a Morojacan sultana as I am.”

11.

He thought she was going to faint. But he had to hand it to her—the girl had guts. She drew herself up, smiled at him, and turned to the four mute widows. At her shooing gesture they fled.

“All right,” she said to Corrigan in perfectly good New York American, “I’m a phony. But it was a pretty good act while it lasted, wasn’t it?”

“Damned near perfect,” Corrigan said admiringly. “You almost pulled it off. I assume Ali and Orkhim—and the women—know you’re a fraud, but how the devil did you manage to pass inspection with Haidar and Ranjit Aziz?”

“Haidar knows. The old goat had no secrets from him. And, of course, anything His Nibs told Haidar to do, he did, or else.”

“And Ranjit?”

“No problem. Morojacan women go practically unnoticed outside their households. Ranjit’s probably never seen most of the Sultan’s wives, let alone his daughters. And he’s a diplomat—out of Morojaca most of the time. On this trip I’ve been careful to stay out of his way. The only time he spoke to me in Morojacan was when the old boy introduced us, and I just gave him one of my shy smiles. I guess what he said was a greeting or something, because he didn’t seem to expect me to answer.”

Corrigan nodded. It could have been pulled off, with the wives, servants, and Haidar in the know. “You’re from New York, according to your Bronx accent. What’s your real handle?”

“Gladys Quinn. Does the Bronx show so much? I thought I had that one licked. I was born on the Grand Concourse, and I was an ash blonde before I dyed my hair.” The girl scowled at him. “I can just see George Angel offering me a screen test when you tell him I’m a fake. You’ve ruined my one big chance.”

“Sorry to louse you up,” Corrigan said, “but this is a murder investigation. How in God’s name did you—and, I suppose, Sam Terry—ever con the Sultan into going along with the gag?”

“Abdul had a real good sense of humor. He wasn’t a bad scout at all. Sam talked him into it.”

A good old scout with a yen for English and American women, Corrigan thought, remembering what Terry had told him. He looked Gladys Quinn over with a fresh eye. No question about it—she’d be a knockout in any language.

“I figured it was Terry’s brainchild,” he said. “What did he offer the Sultan—you and a bed?”

Gladys flushed. “You don’t have to make it sound so coarse! I don’t know what the Sultan had in mind—I can only tell you what happened. I was a script girl working on the same location as Sam, in Baghdad. Sam took up with me, and we ran into Abdul in a Baghdad night club; he loved night clubs. The old man went for me in a big way—a fatherly way,” she flared at Corrigan, “no matter what you think.”

I’ll bet, he thought. But he let her tell her story.

“He invited us to visit him in his palace in Morojaca when the picture was finished, and a couple of weeks later, when shooting was over, instead of going back to the States with the rest of the company, we took our transportation allowances in cash and went to Morojaca. Sam and I had been guests at the palace about a week when one night Abdul said something like he would like a daughter like me. Leave it to Sam to jump into an opening like that! Sam said that if I actually was a sultana, he could make a movie star out of me in nothing flat. The thing sort of developed from there. Next thing I knew, Sam and Abdul were planning how they would dye my hair and dress me up and give me an accent and then palm me off as the Sultan’s daughter over here. The old boy thought it was a marvelous joke. He was like a kid with a new toy.”

Not like a kid, Corrigan said to himself, although the toy idea rang the bell. Going along with the hoax could hardly have been a development of the old lecher’s sense of humor—not in light of that look he had seen in the Sultan’s eyes. Gladys Quinn had merely asked for a different form of payment from the Sultan’s usual pearls and bracelets.

“I don’t know what you wanted to go to all that trouble for, Miss Quinn,” Corrigan said. “I’m no expert, but it seems to me you’ve got everything Hollywood wants. Maybe even talent. Angel would be a sap to pass you up.”

The girl looked at him with sudden hope. She came over to him, close. Her proportions had given Corrigan a false idea of her size. Actually, she was small; the top of her head came barely to his nose.

“But it helps, Captain, it helps,” she said in something of her Salome voice. “Is it really necessary to let everyone know I’m not the Sultan’s daughter?”

“It has to come out, I’m afraid. I can hardly overlook the fact that one of the principals in a murder investigation is a phony.”

“I have something to show you that may change your mind.” She put her hand in his, like a little girl. “Would you come with me, Captain?”

Corrigan let her lead him down the corridor to one of the suite’s bedroom doors. She stopped at the first door, the one to the room she had apparently been occupying, opened it, and drew him inside. Then she shut the door and bolted it.

Uh-uh, Corrigan thought.

She came close to him again and looked up into his face. He noticed with amusement that during the walk down the corridor the two top buttons of her lounging pajamas had somehow come undone. He could see the swell of her breasts above a black bra. She was not wearing body makeup; they were very white.

“Are you married, Captain?” she murmured.

“No such luck.”

“Calling you Captain seems so formal. What’s your name?”

“Tim.”

“Tim. I like that. Are you engaged, Tim?”

“Not even threatened.”

She pressed closer. “You can’t be a woman hater. You’re too much of a man for that.”

“I’m man enough,” Corrigan said. “What did you have to show me?”

“Me.” She stepped back.

The pajama top slid to the floor before Corrigan could stop her. The brassiere was strapless, fastened in the front. With one quick movement she popped it loose, and it fell to the floor, too. He had scarcely time to appreciate the view when her arms twined around his neck and she was giving him the full treatment.

“Hey,” Corrigan tried to say. But it was smothered by her mouth. When he felt her tongue, he put his hands on her shoulders and pushed. It wasn’t easy. She clung like a jellyfish.

She came loose, panting.

“Oh, you’re so nice,” she moaned. “And that eye-patch … I fell for you the minute I saw you. Tim, Tim, do you have to tell?”

“It changes the whole picture, all right,” Corrigan said.

“Then you won’t?”

“Then I will.”

She stiffened. There was no love in her eyes now. “But you just said it changes the whole picture,” she said furiously.

“It does. It adds you to the list of suspects.”

“What?” she gasped.

“Abdul wouldn’t have gone to all this trouble just for a gag. You sold yourself to him to get him to go along with Sam Terry’s plans, and you’re trying to buy me with the same cash in hand. The way I see it, Gladys,” Corrigan said, “you figured that once you had George Angel hooked you didn’t need the Sultan any more. Angel isn’t going to lose interest just because the old man is dead. You could have arranged for that bomb so you wouldn’t have had to pay Abdul off.”

He didn’t believe the wild theory for a moment, but he wanted to see what she would do. What she did was to haul off and smack him across the face. Then she stepped back, her bare breasts heaving.

“You’re an idiot!” she cried. “God help law enforcement in this town if that’s a sample of police thinking. If you must know, damn it, he got paid in advance. If you don’t believe me, ask Sam. He practically stood and watched.”

“I’ll ask him,” Corrigan said.

She snatched up her bra and pajama coat and spat at him, “Get out of here! Get out of here or I’ll yell rape!”

“No, you won’t,” Corrigan said. “One peep out of you, and I’ll knock you cold.”

She was still standing there bare-torsoed, panting like a puma, when he gently closed the door behind him.

Corrigan glanced at his watch. It was a quarter past twelve. Probably Sam Terry was out for lunch, but he decided to check Terry’s room on the off-chance.

He knew the press agent’s room was on the same floor, somewhere beyond the elevators, but not which one. He was about to go back into the Grand Suite to phone the desk when Terry’s pudgy figure appeared from a room down the corridor.

Corrigan met him at the elevators. Terry seemed surprised to see him again.

“Let’s go into your room for a little conference,” Corrigan said.

“I was just on my way down to lunch,” Terry said. “We can talk in the dining room.”

“Let’s not and say we did,” Corrigan said. “I think you’ll prefer privacy.”

He took the man by the elbow and steered him in the direction of his room. Terry seemed reluctant to go. But the pressure on his arm was inexorable, and after a moment he stopped resisting. Corrigan let him unlock his door, then gave him a little shove in and shut the door and stood with his back against it. Terry went very pale.

Corrigan said, “This shouldn’t take long, Mr. Terry. I just came from a heart-to-heart talk with Gladys. And I mean heart-to-heart.”

Terry’s tongue came out and went in again. “Gladys?”

“Gladys Quinn,” Corrigan said.

A youthful red surged from the press agent’s collar to his hairline. “So the stupid little bitch had to talk! After we had it in the bag.”

“She didn’t talk until after I’d tumbled to the fraud,” Corrigan said. “She tried to buy me off with the usual offer.”

Terry snorted. “She would. Gladys thinks the solution to everything is to jump into bed. At that, it wasn’t a bad offer. Captain. I can testify from experience that she makes a mink look frigid. Why not try it?”

“I can get that sort of thing on my own time,” Corrigan said. “Right now I’m here for answers, not to listen to you pimp.”

“I don’t have to take that, Corrigan!”

“You’ll take whatever I dish out. I don’t like you, Terry. I don’t like what you tried to pull.”

The press agent sank onto his bed. “What do you want from me?” he asked sullenly. “You already know the whole story, I take it.”

“I’m not sure Gladys gave it to me whole. First she said the Sultan went along with the hoax because of his great sense of humor. Then she said she paid him off with her body, with you practically standing over them.”

“Gladys said that?” Terry laughed. “You must have gotten her good and sore, Captain. She was lying about going to bed with the old lech, or bragging—with her you never know. He was to get paid when the gag paid off, not before.”

“You made her hold out till she got a movie contract?”

“Of course. You don’t think old Abdul would have kept his part of the bargain if she’d given out in advance? She would have if I hadn’t been there to steer her. She’s been giving out on mere promises by producers and directors as long as I’ve known her. She never learns. How do you think I got her into bed? All I had to say was that I’d get her a part in DeWitt’s next production. DeWitt! I knew all the time that I was going to be canned as soon as he finished shooting in Baghdad.”

“Just what was Gladys’s deal with Abdul?”

“If he helped her get a movie contract, she’d go live in his harem for a month.”

“What assurance did he have that she wouldn’t back out after he did his part? She’s an American citizen. He could hardly have dragged her off to his harem if she welshed.”

Terry grinned. “He thought of that, too. So I pointed out to him that she couldn’t back out. All he’d have to do was reveal the hoax, and her movie career would go up in smoke. As soon as she had a contract in the bag, our plan was to have her return to Morojaca with the Sultan, with the cover story that he wouldn’t allow his daughter to go to Hollywood until proper chaperonage was arranged. She was to come home a month later with one of the Sultan’s older wives, who’d pose as her mother, plus a couple of palace guards. They would stick around till she had a picture in the can, then quietly fade out and go back to Morojaca.”

“Wouldn’t that have been dangerous? It could have made those columnists in Hollywood suspicious.”

“So what?” the press agent said with a shrug. “Once she hit it big, being exposed wouldn’t hurt her. It might even have helped her. Think of the added publicity! In fact, I was diddling around with the idea of exposing her myself at the right time. Of course, her exposure now ruins everything. No producer will touch her.”

“All this was your plan, I take it. And Gladys just went along, like a dog on a leash?”

“Sure. She didn’t have a damn thing to do with the deal. Abdul and I worked it out between us.”

Corrigan decided to bait him. It was not from mere dislike, although his contempt for the Terrys of this world was vast. There was something devious about the man that fitted in with crime. Just how, Corrigan did not know. But a crime was what he was investigating.

“Tell me, Terry,” he said. “How did the deal make you any different from what used to be called a white slaver?”

Terry did not bait easily. He smiled. “She was going to give in, anyway. If I hadn’t been there to handle the thing, she’d have come away with a rope of pearls or something. I got a possible movie career for her out of it.”

“I don’t care what the payoff is,” said Corrigan, “you still sold her.”

“I tell you she was selling herself. Look, Captain, I couldn’t have stopped her from jumping into bed with the Sultan. If I could have, I would have.”

Corrigan’s brow rose. “You?” he said.

Not only did Terry not bait easily, he apparently had the hide of a dinosaur. “I know it sounds like a gag. But the fact is, Captain, even though Gladys has round heels, I kind of like her. You might even say I’m fond of her. She’s got a kid kind of quality that gets you.” He saw Corrigan’s expression and shrugged again. “All right, not you. But it got me. So that makes me a sucker, right? I don’t understand it myself. But after we started cozying up in Baghdad, I sort of thought of her as my gal. We were getting along like a couple of honeymooners when we ran across Abdul in that night club. The truth is, I was sorer than hell when she accepted his invitation to visit him in Morojaca. I did my damnedest to talk her out of it. When I couldn’t change her mind, I came up with the idea of getting her a movie career out of the deal.”

Corrigan chuckled. “You mean you were jealous?”

His tone brought a flush to the press agent’s flabby cheeks for the first time. “I’m jealous of every stud she goes to bed with.”

“A few minutes ago you were practically inviting me to give her a roll. What are you trying to hand me, Terry?”

“In spite of what you think, I don’t make a practice of passing her around. I can still make a buck without pimping. I’d have hated your guts if you’d taken me up. I’ve learned to live with it because I know I can’t change her.”

“I’m ready to bust out crying,” Corrigan said. “Let me get this straight. The Sultan never touched her—”

“No.”

“If you’re telling the truth, Terry, you’ve just worked yourself into an interesting theory. Once George Angel was hooked, the Sultan wasn’t necessary to the plot—Angel wouldn’t lose interest just because the supposed Sultana’s supposed father had his face blown off; the exact opposite is true. So if I hadn’t found out that Salome is really Gladys Quinn of the Bronx, Abdul’s death would have been pretty convenient for you. Your beloved Gladys wouldn’t have to pay off, she’d still have her screen career, and you’d have Gladys and your twenty percent, too. Or was it to be fifty?”

He had finally penetrated Terry’s thick skin. The press agent bounced to his feet, little eyes blazing. “Just a minute, just a minute! You’re not pinning a murder rap on me!”

“Why not?”

“You’re out in left field! Nobody would believe a cockeyed story like that!”

“You’d be surprised how many cockeyed stories like that turn out to be true romances, Terry.”

“Well, I’m not taking that rap!”

“You are if you did it. What’s more, Gladys may be in on it, too. And if she is, she’ll face an accessory charge.”

“You think what you want about me. But leave Gladys out of it!”

“How much con is there in you, Terry? Do you think for one minute you can sell me on you being the deep-in-love boy scout who’ll do anything to keep the light of his life out of trouble? Try somebody else, bud. I say you’re in this up to your fat neck, maybe with Gladys’s help.”

The press agent was speechless. He stood there in a fury, licking his lips, making fists.

“And by the way,” Corrigan said, “have you heard from Willie yet?”

Terry was in the act of taking a step forward. He stopped dead. “Willie? Willie who?”

“Willie Evers.”

Terry continued to glare at him. After a moment he said, “Who’s Willie Evers?”

“Gladys says he’s a friend of yours.”

There was another silence. When Terry spoke again, it was in a thick voice. “You’re a liar, Corrigan. You’re trying to trap me.”

“When did you see or talk to Evers last?”

“I don’t know any Willie Evers.”

“Gladys says you do.”

“You lie!” the man screamed, and sprang.

The assault came too unexpectedly for Corrigan to avoid it entirely. He rolled with it. For all Terry’s flab, rage gave him power, and the blow might have floored Corrigan if it had, connected solidly. As it was, it sent a shock through Corrigan’s head as it brushed his chin.

The furious man was following through with a roundhouse right when Corrigan ducked under it, grabbed Terry’s wrist, spun around, and got his shoulder under Terry’s armpit. Corrigan stooped and yanked on the wrist. The press agent’s feet left the floor, and he went hurtling over Corrigan’s back to land on the floor with a crash, all the fight knocked out of him.

Corrigan jerked him erect and wrestled him backward. He pushed, and Terry fell over onto the bed.

He lay very still, staring up at Corrigan with hate-filled eyes.

“I ought to run you in for assaulting an officer,” Corrigan said, standing over him. “But I’m too busy right now. I have some advice for you, Terry. Don’t try changing your address unless you check with me first. Or I’ll slap you in jail so fast you’ll wonder where the yellow went. Understand?”

Terry said in a tight voice, “I didn’t rig that bomb, Captain. Or Gladys, either.”

“That,” said Corrigan, “remains to be seen.”

He let himself out of Terry’s room with great politeness.

12.

Corrigan mulled over Sam Terry’s outburst of violence as he walked toward the elevator. Had it really been in defense of Gladys Quinn, or was it because he had mentioned Willie Evers’s name?

Bringing up Evers had been a hunch of the moment. Now that he had time to think things out, he decided it might be a good idea to spring the name on Gladys Quinn, too.

There was no time like the present—before Terry could get to her. Unless Terry had her on the house phone already.

He raced past the elevator and on down the corridor to the Grand Suite. This time he did not knock. He burst into the lounge. And there was the fake Sultan’s daughter, lapping up a highball. She was all dressed again.

She was a good twenty feet from the bar and the phone, So Terry had not had time to alert her.

Her nostrils flared when she saw him. “You again. What do you want now?”

“Sam Terry just told me about Willie Evers.”

If Gladys was startled, she concealed it. Maybe she was an actress, at that.

“Who the hell is Willie Evers?”

“Come off it, Gladys. I know all about it.” It often worked.

But not this time.

“I never heard the name in my life,” the girl said, and turned her back on him.

Corrigan left.

It had not proved anything either way, he thought on his way back to the elevators. She might be a good actress, and she had already proved that she could think on her feet. Her fast comeback that Moslem custom decreed against relatives speaking to widows during the mourning period had been a masterpiece of ad-libbing.

He stopped for lunch, so it was one-thirty before Corrigan got back to his office. There was a note on his desk: Chuck Baer had phoned. Corrigan dialed Baer’s office number and got his answering service.

No message had been left for Captain Corrigan.

There was also a manila envelope on his desk. It contained the report from the police laboratory.

He scanned the first paragraphs of the report, devoted to the wrapping paper, ribbon, excelsior, and the steel box. Since he was already familiar with these findings from his telephone conversation with Ray Yoder, he skipped to the section on the bomb itself:

The explosive device was an American-made practice hand grenade of the type used by the military services in recruit training. This type of grenade ordinarily has a ten-second fuse, but it is believed from the testimony of eyewitnesses that it had been modified for a considerably shorter fuse, perhaps for as little as three seconds. For safety reasons a practice grenade contains a reduced charge of explosive, sufficient to fragmentize the casing, but considerably reducing its lethal range. This accounts for the fact that the force of the explosion was insufficient to burst apart the steel box in which it was encased.

The grenade was probably imbedded in the excelsior, and a wire was welded to the underside of the box lid to connect with the grenade’s pin. Lifting the lid automatically drew the pin and started the fuse.

While the device was extremely simple, the modification of the fuse suggests that whoever rigged it had considerable knowledge of explosive devices; an amateur could have blown himself up attempting to adjust the fuse.

It also seems likely that the one who prepared the device had some knowledge of physics or ballistics. The tensile strength of the steel sheeting from which the box was constructed was well within the tolerance to keep it from fragmentizing along with the bomb, yet not appreciably thicker than it had to be. A person without such knowledge would probably have built a box so heavy as to be unwieldy. This further suggests that murder was intended and that the device was not a mere means of creating a diversion. Anyone with enough know-how to shorten the fuse and build the container to such exact specifications must have known that a practice grenade would be lethal and selective at close range.

Corrigan stared into space for a few minutes, picking at a sliver of memory. There had been something in the morning teletype a week or two before about practice grenades.

The morning teletype went to every precinct, bureau, and squad leader in the city, detailing each crime and arrest since the previous afternoon. It was primarily concerned with crimes occurring within the five New York City boroughs, but crimes committed elsewhere were reported when it was possible the perpetrators were either from the city or had fled from it. Corrigan had not paid too much attention to the item he was trying to recall, because he was sure it had fallen into the latter category.

It had come in on the same day as the $100,000 Manhattan Loan Company holdup, he suddenly remembered. And the holdup had occurred a week ago Thursday.

He dug the pertinent teletype out of the file. The item was near the end of the report. The military authorities at Fort Dix, New Jersey, had reported a break-in of an arms storeroom. Inventory check had disclosed only one missing item: a case of practice hand grenades!

That might well have been the source of the bomb, Corrigan thought. Not that it helped him any in the Sultan murder case. Unless the thief of the grenades had been caught in the interim, it was a dead end.

He put in a call to the provost marshal at Fort Dix. Whoever had stolen the grenades was still at large. There were no clues to the thief. None of the grenades had turned up anywhere.

Except, Corrigan thought, in Abdul VI’s face.

13.

When Corrigan left Chuck Baer standing in the lobby of the D’Autremont, Baer walked over to the Automat, had lunch, then caught a taxi to police headquarters. He picked up his car there and drove to his office.

His answering service reported that there had been one call. A number had been left, with instructions to ask for Whisky.

That would be Whisky Gates, an underworld informer Baer sometimes used.

When he rang the number, a gravelly voice answered, “Seaman’s Rest. What do you want?”

“Whisky there?” Baer asked.

“Hold on.”

There was a wait. Then a hoarse voice said, “Yeah?”

“Chuck Baer.”

“Got you.” The voice became a guarded whisper. “I see by the papers you was nursing that red bead when it was snatched.”

“That’s right.”

“You like to know who maybe snatched it?”

“I know who snatched it, Whisky. What I’m interested in is where to find him.”

Whisky seemed surprised. He cleared his throat. “So who was it?”

“It’s no secret. There’s an all-points bulletin out on him. Willie Evers.”

The informer cursed. “It’s gotten so the cops are finding out things before me!”

“Things are tough all over,” Chuck Baer said. “Look, Whisky. It’s worth a few bucks to me if you can steer me to Willie.”

“I don’t know where he’s holed up, but I could give you a lead.”

“Okay, shoot.”

“You know my motto, Mr. Baer—cash in advance. You want to meet me here?”

“At the Seaman’s Rest? What is it, a flophouse?”

“It’s a bar on the waterfront,” Whisky Gates said with dignity. “I don’t live in no flophouse, you know that. I got my own pad.”

“Sorry I wounded your sensibilities, old buddy. What’s the address?”

Baer was writing it down when a man entered the office. Baer waved him to a chair and continued scribbling.

“Okay,” he said into the phone. “See you in maybe forty-five minutes.” He hung up and examined his visitor. The man was dapper and small, about fifty, with a continental look. He was certainly not an American.

“You are Mr. Baer?” the man said. He had a strong French accent.

“I’m Mr. Baer. Who are you?”

The man produced a card.

“M. François DuBois,” the private detective read. “Société d’Assurance Internationale de Paris. What can I do for you, Mr. DuBois?”

“I arrive here by jet from Paris since two hours, Mr. Baer. Mr. Ranjit Aziz refers me to you. I miss you at his hotel by minutes only. You had just left when I arrive.”

Baer smiled and nodded. “I can guess your business. Your company has the Akhoond insured, right?”

The Frenchman did not smile as he nodded back. “I arrange for a jet flight as soon as I hear the deplorable news. Because of the six-hour difference, it is on our six A.M. wireless report, only three hours after the assassination and theft. One of our early-rising agents hears it and immediately telephones me. I am at the airport by eight A.M., Paris time, and on a jet flight a half hour later. It is a matter of urgency to my company, Mr. Baer.”

“Don’t you have any agents in the United States?”

“Unfortunately, no. Which places us at a grand disadvantage in this matter. It is told to me that you have been engaged by the Morojacan government to investigate the Sultan’s death. Would you consider also representing my company in recovering the Akhoond?”

“Mr. DuBois,” Baer said warmly, “it would be—” He almost said “a windfall.” He changed it at the last second to “a pleasure.”

“What would your fee be?” Baer told him, and DuBois nodded. “That will be satisfactory. Do you foretell any hope of recovery?”

“I foretell nothing, Mr. DuBois. No guarantees go with a job like this. But we have a head start. We know who the jewel thief was.”

“Ah.”

“Of course, we’ll catch up with him. That doesn’t necessarily mean we’ll get the Akhoond back.”

“We?”

“I’m working tandem with the New York City police officer in charge of the case.”

“C’est bien! But why do you say the ruby may not be recovered when the thief is apprehended?”

“Because he’s almost a sure thing to have made arrangements with a fence in advance. He’s likely disposed of the ruby by this time. And by the time we get to the fence—if we do—we may find the Akhoond already cut up. That’s the usual M.O. with gems as identifiable as the Akhoond. It could hardly be offered for sale in its original form, except to a nut collector.”

The Frenchman paled. “Time is of the essence, then. Do you have the underworld connections, Mr. Baer?”

“Yes,” the redhead said. “Why?”

“Get word of our offer to the proper persons at once, and it may prevent the cutting up of the gem.”

“What offer?”

“The Société d’Assurance Internationale will pay one hundred thousand dollars, one-fifth of its insured value, for the return of the Akhoond, and we shall ask no questions.”

Baer nodded. “That ought to get some action.”

“I hope so devoutly. Do you think it may succeed, our offer?”

“There’s a good chance if the right people get the word, Mr. DuBois. By the time it’s cut into smaller stones, the fence couldn’t hope to realize any more than that.” Baer glanced at his watch. “It so happens I have an appointment with an underworld informer—I was talking to him when you walked in. I’ll start your offer along the grapevine right away. Whoever has the Akhoond ought to hear it in a matter of hours. After that it’s a question of whether he’ll be willing to deal.”

The little Frenchman rose. “I shall not delay you, Mr. Baer. Bill us for your services at the address on my card. If you should recover the Akhoond without payment of the ransom, of course, there will be a formidable bonus.”

“Where do I reach you?”

“I am staying at the D’Autremont, naturellement.”

Baer dropped the Frenchman’s card into his pocket. “I’ll keep you informed.”

The Seaman’s Rest proved to be a malodorous bar a block from the waterfront. Baer found Gates seated in a dark rear booth. The informer was an emaciated man of about sixty. He was dressed in dirty slacks, a jacket two sizes too big for him, and a once-white shirt. He wore no necktie.

There was an empty shot glass before him. Baer picked up the glass, took it to the bar, had it refilled, and brought it back to the booth. He seated himself facing the informer.

“Cheers, Whisky.”

Gates downed the liquor in one gulp.

“You bring the bread?” he asked in his hoarse whine.

“You get it when I hear what you’ve got, Whisky. You know I won’t stiff you.”

“This should be worth at least a yard, Mr. Baer.”

The private detective growled, “You haven’t come up with a yard’s worth of information in the five years I’ve known you. Speak up, or I’ll take my business elsewhere.”

Gates was not the most reliable stoolie in town. An ex-burglar, forced into retirement by arthritis, he scrounged a living as a runner for bookies and numbers operators. He also steered marijuana and heroin customers to pushers, and sometimes acted as lookout for floating crap games. He seldom had the inside dope on big capers. His main value to Baer lay in getting word to the underworld.

Baer said, “How did you know Willie Evers pulled the Akhoond job?”

“Willie’s been bragging around about the big-time caper he had in the works. He never dropped just what, but that’s the only big-time job in the news lately except for the Manhattan Loan knockover. And the fuzz got the guys who pulled that.”

Baer grunted. “If you dragged me down here to brag about your powers of deduction, I’ll squeeze that drink back out of you.”

Whisky held up a crippled hand. “Don’t get bugged, Mr. Baer. I told you I have a lead on Willie.”

“What lead?”

“I know his girl friend’s name, where she lives.”

“What is it?”

Whisky looked stubborn. “For how much?”

“Come off it,” Baer said impatiently. “I’m not buying the Holland Tunnel. Give me the dope, and then convince me she’s Willie’s girl friend.”

“She is,” Whisky insisted. He lowered his voice, looking around. “Her name’s Penny Randall, and she lives in a walkup on Sterling Place over in Brooklyn. Willie ain’t been seen around with any other babe for weeks. Fact, it was in front of her he done most of his bragging about this job he had lined up. He was promising to take her to Rio soon as he pulled it off.”

“All right. What’s this Penny Randall’s address?”

“I don’t know the house number, but I seen her and Willie come out of the place one night when I had to pick up a bet over in Brooklyn for Benny Cowl. The bookie.”

“I know who Cowl is,” Baer rumbled. “Get on with it!”

“It was the second or third apartment house on the north side of Sterling Place, east of Flatbush Avenue. Her name would be on the mailbox, because I heard her tell another girl one night that she lives alone. You know where Sterling Place is?”

Baer shook his head. “I know Flatbush Avenue.”

“Well, Sterling Place crosses Flatbush just north of Prospect Park. There’s a Sterling Street, too, so watch out you get the right one.”

“I’ll find it,” Baer said. “Now listen carefully, Whisky. The Akhoond is insured by a French company named the Société d’Assurance Internationale de Paris. Here, I’ll write that down for you.”

He took a notebook from his pocket, tore out a sheet, and wrote down the company name.

Gates puzzled over it. “What do I do with this, Mr. Baer?”

“The insurance company is willing to buy back the ruby, no questions asked. I want you to get that on the grapevine.”

“I ain’t sure I can pronounce this.” He tried, with results that made Baer wince. “What they putting out?”

“A hundred grand.”

Whisky looked covetous. “That ought to spread damn fast.”

“Pass the word that any takers can contact me. I’m representing the company.”

“I’ll have it all over town by tonight. Now how about that bread?”

Baer rose and dropped a twenty-dollar bill on the table. Gates automatically looked indignant, but his claws flashed out, and it disappeared.

“If Penny Randall pans out, I’ll add the same,” Baer said. “If it’s a bum steer, Whisky, I’ll be back for that one. Better not drink it up till you hear which.”

There was a phone booth in the rear. Baer called Corrigan’s office. Corrigan was not there. Baer left word that he had called and would call back later.

14.

To Prospect Park in Brooklyn it would have been a twenty-minute subway ride. As it was, it took him fifty minutes to drive there. It was quarter past two when Chuck Baer parked just east of Flatbush Avenue on Sterling Place.

The street was stacked with identical three-story apartment buildings of more or less honorable vintage. Baer tried the second house on the north side and hit it on the nose. A Penny Randall was tabbed for a second-floor flat.

He pushed the bell button under the mail slot, and pushed again, and on the third try the buzzer released the inner door of the vestibule.

He climbed to the second floor and found a synthetic blonde of twenty-eight or -nine waiting for him in a doorway near the top of the stairs. Her elaborate hairdo was ragged, as though she had been sleeping on it.

“Miss Randall?” Baer removed his hat. Floozies appreciated it.

She looked disappointed. “Oh, it was you who buzzed? I was hoping it was somebody else. What do you want?”

“My name’s Chuck. Baer,” he said. “I’d like a few words with you, Miss Randall.”

She looked him up and down as if she had had a lot of practice estimating men. Baer returned her examination just as frankly. She had a hard face with a cute turned-up nose under the platinumed hair. She was tall, on the willowy side, but not thin. Her long legs were sheathed in jade Capris. A green pullover sweater stretched skintight across a cooch dancer’s stomach and breasts like footballs. Her feet were bare; her toenails were painted mother-of-pearl.

She smiled suddenly at the appreciation in his eyes.

“Whatever you’re selling, you must be a whiz at it,” she said. “But I’m not in the market, Chuck. I’m fresh out of a job.”

“I’m not a salesman,” Baer smiled back. “It’s about Willie.”

The girl’s smile vanished. “What about Willie? You got a message for me from him?”

He shook his head. “I’m trying to locate him. May I come in, Miss Randall?”

“Who isn’t?” she asked bitterly. She looked him up and down again. “Okay,” she said, and stepped back.

She led him into a tiny room. It was a railroad flat, its three rooms strung along like cars on a track.

“Rest the body.” Penny Randall nodded at an easy chair covered with faded brocade. “Excuse me while I make repairs. I was taking a nap, and I must look like the wrath. I didn’t get a wink last night.”

“You look fine to me.” Man, was she stacked! What was the matter with Willie?

“I’ll bet. You tell sweet lies, though. I’ll only be a minute.”

She went into the hall. Baer parked in the easy chair and dropped his hat on an end table.

About five minutes passed. Baer spent the time considering his best approach. He usually introduced himself in an investigation by presenting his business card. It was largely a matter of professional ethics; in Baer’s book, a private investigator was bound by the same rules as a police officer.

The rules did not necessarily apply in this case, however. He was dealing with the girl friend of a wanted criminal. And apparently Penny Randall had jumped to the conclusion that he was a friend or associate of the vanished Evers.

He decided to play it by ear.

When the girl reappeared, her hair was freshly done up and her makeup refurbished. She had been attractive even in her mussed state, but now she was almost beautiful in her hard way.

Baer promptly got to his feet.

She laughed. “You must be a lousy poker player, Chuck. Your eyes give you away. If I were a lady, I’d slap your face.”

“I’d deserve it.” He grinned back at her. This was going to be apple pie.

She plopped herself on a plastic-covered sofa and tucked her bare feet under her. Baer sat down again.

“You’re a friend of Willie’s, I suppose.”

“More like an acquaintance.”

She nodded wisely. “He owes you money, huh?”

Baer took a chance. “Doesn’t he owe everybody?”

“You’re no acquaintance,” she said with a hard smile. “You know him but good. What are you, a bookie?”

He shook his head. “A sucker.”

“Join the club, Chuck. Your chances of collecting are about as long as mine to win the title Miss Virgin of the Year. If you ever catch up with him, I hope you take out whatever he owes you in blood. You look man enough to do it.”

“He took you, too?”

“The deadbeat cleaned me out, and he loused up my career on top of it,” the girl said in that granite voice. “Temporary loans till his big deal went through, he said. Man, what a slob a fast-talking rat can make of a dame!”

“He ran out on you?”

“The minute his deal went through! I’ve been packed and waiting for the sonofabitch to pick me up since two this morning. I spent all night worrying about the louse till it registered. When I finally called his rooming house this morning and found out he’d packed up and moved out in the middle of the night without even saying good-bye to his landlady, I got the picture. The bastard took off without me.”

Baer made a sympathetic noise.

“I even quit my job,” the blonde said in an aggrieved voice. “For years I pound my arches flat in a chorus line and put up with greasy fingers like my last boss, who sneaks feels backstage. Then, when I finally get spotted by a producer and snag a speaking part in a real honest-to-God play, I throw it over in the middle of rehearsals for Willie! ‘We’ll live it up like sultans,’” she mimicked. “‘All the furs and ice you want. Days on the beach, nights in the high-class clubs.’ You’re looking at the prize cluck of the world, Chuckie.”

It was going beautifully. “Can’t you get your job back?” Baer asked earnestly.

She laughed. “Not me. Me, I couldn’t just politely give notice—I have to smart off. I told that bitch Andrea Day what I thought of her, spit in her face, and walked out.”

Andrea Day! The actress who had been at the Sultan’s party, the brittle blonde with the phony smile. What was the name of the off-Broadway production she was scheduled to star in?

“Happy Are the Dead,” he said, remembering. “She’s in that. Too bad you told her off.”

“I fixed myself so I’ll probably be blackballed by every producer in town. Goddamn, you’d think after all the lines I’ve been handed I’d recognize a snow job when I got one. But I’m the kind of dumb blonde who always thinks the new john is different. You’d think I’d know by this time that they’re all alike! Sweet-talk you, make big promises till you let your pants down, then blow town and leave you spoiling your manicure.”

“You figure Willie took off for Rio by himself, Penny?”

He had pulled a boner. She looked at him with narrowed eyes. “How did you know it was Rio he promised to take me to?”

Baer said carelessly, “He’s been sounding off about Rio for a couple of weeks. I never heard him mention taking anybody along, though.”

It worked. “That figures,” the girl said. “He mentioned it in front of me enough! When I wasn’t around, he told the truth.”

“Tough. Willie’s a louse, all right. By the way, how do I get to his rooming house?”

The eyes narrowed again. “You loaned him money and you don’t even know where he lived?”

“I know the address,” Baer said. “I just don’t know how to get there. Brooklyn is Podunk to me.”

“Oh, you from out of town?”

“Manhattan,” he said with a grin. “Take me out of Times Square and I’m lost.”

“And that’s a fact,” she nodded, relaxing. “Only reason I live in Brooklyn is a girl friend handed me this dump. You know where Atlantic Avenue is?”

“I think so.”

“From here you drive east on Atlantic. Are you driving?”

Baer nodded.

“Rochester is the first street east of Utica. You turn right, and it’s the third house on the left. But what do you want to waste your time for? I told you he skipped out in the middle of the night.”

“Maybe his landlady can give me a lead.”

“I’ll give you the lead. A hell of a lot of good it’ll do you. He took the four A.M. jet to Miami, and hopped from there to Rio.”

Baer shrugged. “I guess I can save myself the trouble at that. But how’d you find out, Penny?”

“Because his deal went through. I saw him ten o’clock last night.”

“You did? Where?”

“In front of his rooming house,” Penny said bitterly. “He’d told me he figured the deal would jell somewhere around nine, and he’d get home around ten. His business was in Manhattan, see, and he didn’t take his car, because the subway is faster. He planned to come back to Brooklyn to pick up his car, then he had to go somewhere for the payoff. He said he’d phone me from his rooming house to let me know everything was okay before he went to collect. I got ants in my pants and took a cab over there about nine-thirty. I was standing in front of his rooming house when he showed up.”

“I wish I’d been there—I’d have shaken my dough out of the rat’s jeans. And he told you the deal had gone through?”

“That’s right. He didn’t seem happy, though. If I’d had any sense, I’d have realized that what he wasn’t happy about was finding me there. He said to go home and pack and he’d pick me up at two A.M. The plane reservations were supposed to be for four at Kennedy—to hear him tell it. That’s the last I saw of him.”

“Dirty trick,” Baer said. “I’m sorry, kid, I really am.”

“I’m glad somebody’s sorry.” She was looking at him tenderly.

“I wonder what this big deal was. Think it was on the level?”

“It was legit, all right. But I wasn’t asking any questions—not of Willie. The less I knew, the less trouble I’d be in. You can bet your father’s mustache it was something crooked. Willie wouldn’t have been in such a rush to skip if it was on the up-and-up.”

“He didn’t drop any hint at all what kind of job it was?”

Penny shook her head. “The only thing he mentioned was the guy he was collecting from. When he goosed me home, he said he was in a hurry because ‘Bix’ would be waiting with the money.” Her eyes flashed like polished steel. “Seventy-five grand he was supposed to get. In cold cash! And he runs out on me.”

Bingo, Baer thought exultantly. The only underworld figure nicknamed Bix who dealt in that kind of money was Maddox.

15.

Bix Maddox’s front was a prosperous undertaking business in Brooklyn. The police and certain insiders had been aware for some time that he was running an underworld bank. The authorities could do nothing about it because Maddox kept himself carefully clear of direct involvement in crime. His function in the organization was to finance rackets and other criminal operations in return for a share of the profits. As a sideline he disposed of hot money and made loans at usurious rates to criminals on the run.

Chuck Baer had never heard of the mortician’s going in for fencing. In this case, however, Maddox may have wanted the Akhoond for the pleasure of personal possession. He was known to be a fanatical jewel collector. One of the vagaries of his mania was supposed to be a collection of copies of the world’s most famous gems. These he was said to delight in showing off to cronies.

Baer rose from the easy chair. He had gotten all the information he was going to get from Penny Randall. As a parting shot he said, “I’ll bet I can guess what Willie’s deal was. The Akhoond ruby.”

“That bombing last night?” The girl’s eyes went wide. “Hey, no. Willie may be a rat, but he’s no killer.”

“What other caper that was pulled off last night would bring that much bread? Seventy-five grand is just about what a fence would pay for the Akhoond. I hear it’s insured for half a million.”

“My God!” She sat staring up at him. But then she shook her head. “I don’t believe it. Willie never hurt anybody. It’s my guess he knocked over a fur warehouse or something, and it hasn’t hit the papers yet because they haven’t discovered the loss.”

“You may be right, Penny, at that.” Baer picked up his hat. “Well, thanks. I’ve got to be running along.”

“What’s your hurry, Chuck? I’ve got nothing to do. And there’s beer in the fridge.”

“I wish to hell I could stay,” he said ruefully. And that’s a fact, he thought. “But I just can’t.”

She swung her feet out from under her and got gracefully off the sofa. Somehow she was at the door before he was. She leaned against it and looked up into his face.

“What do you do besides lend money to deadbeats, Chuckie?”

“You might say I’m in business.”

“A racket, huh? Never mind spelling it out, Chuck. I don’t want to know. You married or anything?”

He shook his head. “Not even anything.”

There was no hardness in her smile now. “And I’m fresh out of a boy friend. Also out of a job, and broke. How successful is your business?”

“I manage eating money and a few luxuries.”

“Umm.” She ran her eyes over his substantial frame. “You gussy up like money in the bank, Chuck. Come on, stick around for a beer. No telling what might develop.”

With her body plastered against the door, he could not open it without pushing her aside. “Any other time I’d play like mad, Penny. Can’t I take a rain check?”

“You can, if you don’t wait too long before cashing it in.” She stepped forward and slipped her arms around his neck. “Here’s a little batting practice.”

Pulling his head down, she planted her parted lips on his mouth. Her body moved closer. It began a slow grinding movement.

Baer found himself responding. Damn! If he could only spare a half hour. But with Willie Evers probably winging toward Rio, it was no time to let himself be sidetracked, even by this.

He had never spoken more honestly in his life than when he disentangled himself gently and said, “Penny, I’ve got to go, I really do. But, baby, I’ll be back. You can count on it.”

“Make it soon,” Penny Randall said in a husky voice.

From the nearest drugstore Baer phoned Corrigan’s office. This time Corrigan was in.

“I’m onto some hot leads,” Baer said rapidly. “Most of it will keep until I get to your office, Tim, but one won’t. I located a girl friend of Willie Evers’s—just came from her place. She thinks Willie’s on his way to Rio. She was supposed to go with him, but he stood her up. According to her—her name is Penny Randall—he caught the four A.M. jet from Kennedy to Miami. If he did, he hit Miami long ago. But there’s a chance he might have run into a layover before he could get a flight to Rio.”

“I’ll check it out right away,” Corrigan said. “Where are you?”

“Brooklyn. I have to make one more stop, then I’ll head for your office. I should get there about four.”

Baer hung up and headed for Atlantic Avenue.

The rooming house on Rochester Avenue was a three-story brownstone with “Vacancy” in the window to the right of the street door. A fat woman with dirty gray hair and a mustache answered his ring.

He handed her his agency card and asked if she was the landlady.

“Sure am,” she said, reading the card. “Name of Mrs. Guthridge. Then you ain’t here about the vacant room?”

“No, I’m looking for a man named Willie Evers.”

Mrs. Guthridge’s mouth snapped like a trap. “You won’t find him here, mister. He stiffed me out of two weeks’ rent and pulled out in the middle of last night. You working for some collection agency? Usually it’s them looking for Mr. Evers.”

“I’m no bill collector,” Baer said. “Look, Mrs. Guthridge, I’m in a hurry. Have you any idea where Evers went?”

“With him owing me rent? Wish I did. I’d have the cops on him.”

“When exactly did he skip out?”

“It had to be past midnight. I keep my door open till then, and I can see everybody who comes in or out, because my front room looks right into the hall. He was out and hadn’t gotten back when I shut my door at midnight and went to bed. I found out he’d skipped when some woman phoned this morning asking for him.”

“I understand he owned a car,” Baer said. “Did he drive off in that?”

She shrugged. “It’s gone from out front, so I guess so.”

“What kind of car was it?”

“An old wreck. A 1950 Plymouth sedan.”

That should be easy to spot, Baer thought; there couldn’t be many 1950 Plymouths still running around. “What color is it?”

“Kind of faded maroon.”

“Happen to know the license number?”

The landlady shook her head.

“Would you mind if I take a look at his room?”

“Nothing to see, mister. I cleaned it up to rent again. He didn’t leave a scrap in it, anyways. No papers, nothing. I even checked the wastebasket, hoping I’d find a note or something with his new address on it.”

“Well,” Baer said, “thanks for your time. If you hear from him or get any information about him, will you phone the number listed on my card?”

“Why should I? I got first call on him.”

“The State of New York has first call on him, Mrs. Guthridge.”

“What d’ye mean?”

“He’s wanted for robbery and murder. You’d better get in touch with me fast. He might decide to slit your throat.”

That ought to insure her cooperation, he thought with a grin. She was still standing in her doorway, gaping, when he pulled away from the curb.

He was heading for the Brooklyn Bridge when he had an afterthought. He stopped at the next drugstore he saw, went inside, and checked the Brooklyn telephone directory. There was a Penny Randall listed.

“Hello?” She had answered the first ring. Probably jumped for it, Baer thought.

“Chuck Baer again,” he said.

“Chuck!” She was excited. “Your business done already?”

“No, damn it, I’ll be tied up all day. Penny, I just thought of something I should have asked you.”

She sounded terribly disappointed. “Oh. Well, go ahead and ask.”

“Do you remember the license-plate number on Willie’s car?”

“Is that all? Who ever looks at a license number? Anyway, what good would it do? He sure didn’t drive to Rio.”

“It was just a thought.” He had not had much hope, but thoroughness was part of his job. “Thanks anyway, Penny. I’ll be seeing you.”

“When?” That voice flowed over the wire like oil.

“As soon as possible,” Baer said fervently.

16.

It was four-fifteen by the time he got to police headquarters. Tim Corrigan knew who it was even before the door opened. Baer never knocked; he just barged in.

The private detective took the rickety chair, popped a panatela into his mouth, and lit up.

“Man, have I had a day,” Baer said. “Picked up another client, dropped twenty bucks in a waterfront dive, drove over to Brooklyn, and had to fight off a sexy broad who couldn’t resist my manly beauty.”

“This Penny Randall?” Corrigan said, hiking his right eyebrow. “What’s the matter with her? She blind?”

“Very funny. I plan to go back. You check out that flight to Miami, Tim?”

“It landed at seven A.M., and there was a flight out for Rio at nine. So he’s long gone if he was on it. There’s a pretty good indication that he wasn’t.”

“How’s that?”

“A pair of reservations for the Miami flight were never picked up. No descriptions, because they were made by phone, but they sound like reservations Willie made for himself and his girl friend.”

“What did you consult—a crystal ball?”

“His stupidity. They were in the names of Mr. and Mrs. William Evans.”

Baer knocked ash toward a desk tray and missed. “No wonder criminals spend so much time in jail.”

“Just in case it was coincidence, I have the Airport Squad checking all other flights to Miami. The bus and railroad stations are being checked, too.”

Baer stuck the cigar back in his mouth and grinned. “Poor Penny. If it turns out Willie was just held up and he eventually shows to take her to Rio, she’s going to hate herself for singing about him to a stranger.”

“Penny is Willie’s girl friend, you say?”

“A luscious platinum blonde who rates better than a thief. Somebody like a private detective, for instance.”

“How much did you get out of her?”

“Everything she knew, including Willie’s last address. He took off from there in the middle of the night, clothes and all. He runs a car, incidentally. A maroon 1950 Plymouth sedan. I couldn’t find out the license number, but it just might be registered under his own name.”

“I’ll check with DMV under both names.”

Corrigan phoned the Department of Motor Vehicles, gave a description of the car, the names Willie or Wilfred Evers and William Evans, and Evers’s Brooklyn address. The clerk took his extension number and promised to call back.

“If Willie did catch the four A.M. flight,” Baer commented, “he probably left the Plymouth in the airport parking lot. It wouldn’t be worth trying to sell.”

“I’ll have the Airport Squad check it out,” Corrigan said. “May as well wait until DVM calls back; maybe I can give them the license number. What else have you got?”

The private detective gave a detailed account of everything he had learned. Corrigan’s eye sparkled when Baer mentioned the possibility that Brooklyn mortician Bradley (Bix) Maddox might have been the receiver of the Akhoond. He made a note of it instantly.

When Baer finished, Corrigan brought him up to date on his own activities. (The redhead choked on his cigar smoke when he learned that Salome was a natural blonde named Gladys Quinn, from the Bronx.) “Here’s something else, Chuck.”

He handed Baer the report from the police lab.

“Doesn’t seem to eliminate any of the suspects,” Baer grunted. “The question is, which one of them had access to practice grenades?”

“That’s answered already. A sneak thief swiped a case of them from Fort Dix about ten days ago. A case of practice grenades, nothing else, although the storeroom was full of all kinds of stuff, including combat grenades. My guess is the thief was Willie Evers, acting under instructions from the finger man.”

“Leaving,” Baer said glumly, “another dead end.” He tossed the report back and chomped on his cigar. “What do we do about Bix Maddox?”

Before Corrigan could answer, the phone rang. He picked it up.

“Corrigan.”

“Betty Gray of DMV, Captain,” the clerk’s voice said. “I have the information on that Plymouth you inquired about.”

“Shoot, Miss Gray.”

“It’s registered to a Wilfred Evers, but the address isn’t the one you gave me. He must have moved without informing the Department of Motor Vehicles.” She read off an address on Fulton Street, Brooklyn. It was the one listed on Willie Evers’s police record.

Corrigan did not bother to write it down. “What’s the license number?”

“IUL-053.”

Corrigan noted it, thanked her, hung up, and immediately called the Communications Center to put out a supplementary APB on Willie Evers, including the description and license number of the Plymouth. Then he phoned the Airport Squad, passed on the same information, and asked that all airport parking lots be searched for the car.

He hung up at last and said to Baer, “Where were we, Chuck?”

“What do we do about Bix Maddox?”

“Pull him in, and hit his place with a search warrant while he’s under wraps.”

“He’s too smart to leave the Akhoond lying around where a raiding party could find it,” Baer objected. “Let’s use finesse.”

“Such as?”

“Maddox is allergic to cops, but he might deal with a private detective. He has his hooks into so many underworld projects that by tonight he’s bound to have heard about the insurance company offer and that I’m dealing for the company. If I dropped in with the story that I’d been steered to him as a possible contact with the jewel thief, he might buy it.”

Corrigan looked unimpressed. “If your guess is right that he wanted the Akhoond for his private collection, that won’t get you anywhere even if he does buy your story. He’d probably rather keep the Akhoond to admire in private than take a quick twenty-five grand profit. He’s loaded.”

“It would get me in,” Baer insisted. “I’ll play it by ear from there.”

Corrigan considered, then nodded. “All right, Chuck. But I’ll cover you, in case something goes wrong. He has two ‘assistants’ living at his funeral home, and they’re both hoods. We keep close tabs on Maddox, so I know their records. They make Willie Evers look like a scoutmaster.”

“Who are they?”

“One of them is Hops Emmit. Maddox sent him to embalming school as an excuse to keep him around in his real capacity, which is muscle. From what I hear, Emmit enjoys the work—I mean the embalming. Before Hops became an embalmer, he took two busts for assault and one for ADW. He’s been in the can a total of four years. He’s still breaking heads, but most of the victims refuse to talk. When a rare one does, Bix’s lawyer is right there with a writ of habeas corpus and a couple of witnesses that Emmit was a hundred miles away at the time of the assault.”

“Who’s the other one?”

“Mark Spear. Spear takes care of the grounds and fills in as an usher at funerals. He used to strong-arm for the Biscetti mob before Maddox offered him a better deal. We suspect Spear of at least four homicides, but we could never make any of them stick.”

“Nice types to have around a funeral parlor,” Baer said with a grin. “If business gets slow, they can always create some.”

“Let’s hope they don’t decide you’re a likely customer,” Corrigan retorted. “Walk easy when you call on Maddox, Chuck. If you get in a jam, yell. I’ll be in the bushes outside.”

The Maddox Funeral Home in Brooklyn was surrounded by spacious grounds. Near Maspeth Creek, convenient to Calvary Cemetery, New Calvary Cemetery, and Mount Zion Cemetery, it stood on a square acre and was surrounded by an eight-foot ivied wall. The building itself was an old two-story brownstone mansion with a white-pillared veranda.

There was a parking lot to the right, but Corrigan decided not to use it. He left Car 40 half a block up the street, and he and Baer made the approach on foot.

A check of the obituary section of the Times had told them that a funeral was scheduled from the mortuary tomorrow, which meant that at least one occupied casket was on display tonight. Since nine P.M. was the usual closing hour for mourners, Corrigan and Baer timed their arrival for ten.

They slipped between the concrete posts marking the entrance to the grounds and stole along a curving driveway toward the building. Light streamed from several downstairs windows, and a couple of street lamps threw their glow over the wall, but there were dense shadows under the old elm trees to the left of the building. They approached from shadow to shadow.

They got to the building. Through the broad front windows at the veranda level they saw a man seated on a sofa, in a parlor. He was a grossly fat man, and his fat lips were moving; he was talking to someone in a leather-covered chair whose back was to them. The leather chair back was so tall that they could not see the occupant’s head.

Corrigan had never seen Maddox in the flesh, but the description in the files made the man easy to identify. He whispered to Baer, “The fatty on the sofa is Bix.”

“Let’s hope I can get him to talk to me in there,” Baer whispered back. “If he drags me off to some other room, you may not be able to see.”

“We’ll have to chance it, Chuck. I ought to be able to look in through those side windows under the elms. I’ll stake out there.”

“Check,” Baer said. “And let’s also hope I won’t need you.”

“The more I see of this setup,” Corrigan muttered, “the less I like it.”

“Oh, stop being an old lady, Tim.”

“All right, here goes.”

Baer waited until Corrigan crossed the lawn and had disappeared in the shadows under the elms. Then he stole over to the walk, stood up like a man, mounted the veranda steps, and boldly rang the bell.

17.

A man of about forty answered the door. He was six feet four, with heavyweight shoulders, a barrel chest, and the beginnings of a paunch. He was dressed in a conservative gray suit, and he wore the solemn expression characteristic of morticians, but his heavy features failed to go with the expression. His face displayed too many dents and lumps, which could only have come from contact with fists and blunt instruments.

“Yes, sir?” the man said. He had a voice that went with his face.

“Mr. Bradley Maddox in?”

The giant stepped back, and Baer went in. From the foyer a staircase rose to the upper floor; there were two doorways off each side. Immediately to his right he saw an open door into a chapel; a single light shone down on a walnut casket covered with lilies. Beyond that he saw a closed door; the lettering on it said OFFICE. Against the right-hand wall, between the two doors, a taboret held a guest register and a pen stand.

To his left Baer saw the open door into the parlor where he and Corrigan had spotted Bix Maddox. Beyond it, to one side of the staircase, was another door, closed.

The giant shut the front door behind Baer. “Is it about funeral arrangements, sir?”

“No,” Baer said. Well, here goes, he thought. The guy was a big one, all right—plenty tough-looking. He wondered how he would make out with the man at close quarters, and decided he would rather not try. It was either Emmit or Spear, probably Emmit.

He handed over one of his business cards.

He watched the prizefighter face. It did not change expression as Emmit studied the card, but a pair of mean little eyes gave him a lightning once-over. “Just a minute, sir,” the man said. He went through the door to the left, into the parlor.

There was a clothes tree in the foyer. Baer hung his hat on it.

The giant was gone less than thirty seconds. He said politely, “This way, Mr. Baer.”

The redhead followed his formidable guide into the parlor. It was an enormous room, perhaps forty by twenty-five, with a walk-in fireplace in the wall opposite the doorway. The room was obviously used as a living room after business hours; it was undoubtedly put to use for overflow mourners from the chapel during services; it resembled a hotel lounge. Four sofas stood back-to-back in pairs in the middle of the room; leather chairs with accompanying ash stands rimmed the walls.

As he approached the fat man on the sofa, Baer wondered what sort of man he could be who chose to live in a funeral home. He supposed there were private quarters upstairs to which the funerary atmosphere only seeped, but still … He had had his fill of corpses in Korea, along with Corrigan. What must it be like to live in a house always occupied by the dead?

For this reason, as well as more pertinent ones, he studied Bix Maddox with care. The man’s grossness seemed to go with the function of the place; he looked like a cadaver on a battlefield, blown up by gases out of all resemblance to the living. His belly stuck out over his lap like a front porch, and his eyes were buried in fat. The expression, unlike his flunkey’s, was smiling. There was no smile in the pinpoint eyes, however.

The occupant of the high-backed chair was a woman. She was middle-aged, like Maddox, and she was as thin as he was obese. Her gray hair was swept tightly back in a bun. She sat in a half crouch, which Baer thought must be habitual; it was as if she went through life ready to dodge a blow.

“How do you do, Mr. Baer,” said the fat man, with emphasis on the first “do.” He made no attempt to rise; it would take a derrick, Baer thought. He noticed a swelling on the right side of Maddox’s jaw. It was covered by pancake makeup, expertly applied; the slight difference in texture from the rest of his face would have been apparent only to someone trained to observe.

Somebody belted him one, Baer thought. He said, “Mr. Maddox?”

Maddox offered a hand. Chuck Baer had big hands, but he felt himself enveloped in goo. It was as if he had put his hand into a pot of liquefied chicken fat. He almost reached for his handkerchief.

The woman did not stir. She had her head slightly cocked, as if she were too tired to hold it erect.

Baer salvaged his hand. The impulse to wipe it off was overpowering.

“I’ve been reading about you in the papers, Mr. Baer,” Maddox said.

“About having the Akhoond ruby snatched from under my nose?” Baer said. “I could do without that kind of publicity.”

“I don’t see how you could help it, the way the job was pulled off,” the fat man said in a friendly voice. “It must have been done by a professional. Expertly planned. Oh.” His massive head turned toward the tall armchair. “My wife. Mr. Baer.”

“Mrs. Maddox,” Baer said. Mr. and Mrs. Jack Spratt in reverse.

“I’m glad to meet you, Mr. Baer.” Her voice surprised him. It was lovely, womanly. He gave her another look and decided that she must have been a beauty as a girl. Twenty-five years with Bix Maddox had turned her into a zombie.

“That’s all, Hops,” Maddox said to the giant in gray.

So he had been right. It was Emmit, the embalmer with two convictions for assault and one for assault with a deadly weapon. What does he need deadly weapons for? Baer wondered. His fists ought to be deadly enough.

And where was the other muscle, Mark Spear?

Emmit silently left. Maddox said to his wife, still smiling, “Mr. Baer and I want to talk, Martha. Go upstairs.”

He might have been addressing a servant. The woman rose instantly.

“It was nice meeting you, Mrs. Maddox,” Baer said.

She did not reply. She scuttled from the room like a mouse.

“Now, Mr. Baer,” the fat man said. “Sit down.”

Baer took the chair vacated by Mrs. Maddox.

Maddox fingered Baer’s agency card, still smiling. “I can’t imagine what a private detective would want with me. Unless you’re here for personal reasons? A loved one unfortunately in need of my services?”

“No, I’m here for professional reasons, Mr. Maddox.”

“Scaring up a little business, eh? I suppose most of your work, when you’re not guarding property, is chasing two-timers. I assure you my domestic life is impeccable.”

He likes fancy words, Baer thought, and he thinks he’s playing with me. It was almost a certainty that Maddox had already heard through the grapevine of the insurance company’s offer and of Baer’s authorization. Otherwise he would not have cleared the room.

“It’s about the Akhoond,” Baer said.

“Oh?” The smile seemed permanent, like the fat.

“I understand you’re interested in jewels, Mr. Maddox. Ever seen the Akhoond?”

“There was no way I could get myself invited to the Sultan’s party. I wanted to be there very much. I was particularly interested in the ruby because I happen to have a copy of it.”

“You don’t say,” said Baer. “I heard that you’ve got a collection of copies of world-famous gems.”

“Perhaps you’d like to see it later. I’ll be happy to show it to you. Meanwhile, why do you come to see me about the theft?”

“The Akhoond is insured for half a million dollars by the Société d’Assurance Internationale de Paris, Mr. Maddox. I’ve been commissioned by the company to try to recover it before somebody cuts it up. I’m authorized to offer a hundred thousand dollars for its return, no questions asked.”

The fat man raised his curiously feminine eyebrows. “An interesting offer. But considering that murder was also committed, how can there be no questions asked? Assuming you’re successful, the police are certainly going to want to know who your contacts were. As a matter of fact, you’d probably find yourself in jail as a material witness unless you talked.”

“Any information I might have would be privileged.”

The smile on Maddox’s vast face turned amused. “Come now, Mr. Baer. You know as well as I that the principle of privilege applies to lawyers, priests, and doctors, not to private detectives. Particularly where knowledge of a felony is concerned.”

Baer smiled back. “I’ll be frank with you, Mr. Maddox. The police are not going to find out who acted as the insurance company’s agent. All they’re ever going to learn is that the insurance company recovered the Akhoond. They’re welcome to subpoena executives of the company to try to find out how. But since they’re all French nationals, I wouldn’t bet on their success.”

“I see,” the fat man said. “However, Mr. Baer, I still don’t understand why you come to me about this.”

Baer leaned forward. Would Maddox buy it? He took the plunge.

“Like many private detectives, Mr. Maddox, I have a few underworld contacts. I don’t engage in any hanky-panky, you understand. I run an honest agency. But I’m sometimes called on to perform a service that a client can’t go to the police about. Like this one. I find my contacts invaluable in reaching the right people on such occasions. They trust me because I’ve never violated their confidence.”

Maddox said nothing, and his face told nothing.

“My contacts steered me to you. They suggested you might be able to get word of my offer to the right people.”

The funeral director frowned; it was the first break in his smile. “Who referred you to me?”

Baer looked shocked. “That would be violating their confidence, Mr. Maddox. You wouldn’t want me to tell anyone I had dealings with you, would you?”

“I’m hardly in the same class,” the fat man said, and something in the way he said it made Chuck Baer happy that Corrigan was lurking outside. “Anyway, it wouldn’t matter if you did, because our dealings, as you put it, Mr. Baer, aren’t going to involve anything that couldn’t be printed in a church letter. I never knew a jewel thief in my life. But I am curious. Why would anyone think I might be able to steer you to whoever stole the Akhoond? I confess, Mr. Baer, that your information distresses me.”

Apparently the chicken fat didn’t extend to the fat man’s wits. If Maddox were as innocent of underworld connections as he pretended, the suggestion should have made him have Baer booted from the premises. He obviously was not offended, and he was equally obviously not interested in the insurance company’s offer. Tim Corrigan’s guess must be right, Baer thought. Maddox, the gem nut, preferred keeping the Akhoond for his own enjoyment to grabbing off a quick twenty-five-thousand-dollar profit.

Pressing the matter further would accomplish nothing but some broken bones. Baer said ruefully, “I guess I got a bum steer, Mr. Maddox. Sorry to have taken up your time.”

“Think nothing of it.” The fat man struggled to his feet. “It needn’t be an entirely wasted visit for you, though, Mr. Baer. Would you like to see my facsimile gem collection?”

Baer was already out of the chair. “Say! That would be a real thrill. Thanks, I sure would.”

The fat man waddled toward a door beside the fireplace. “I have a collection of genuine gems, too. Nothing fabulous, I’m afraid—I’m not wealthy enough for that. Unfortunately, I can’t show them to you. They’re in my bank vault.”

He opened the door and switched on a light. It was a library, with book-lined walls, a reading desk, a table holding a world globe and an oversized dictionary, and a larger table before a window. The big table held a display case about five feet long by three feet wide. Maddox turned on a lamp over the case.

“The glass is to prevent dust, not theft,” the fat man said. “These would hardly be worth stealing—none of them has any value to speak of. Here, you can see them better without the glass in the way.”

He raised the lid.

The case was lined with black velvet. Arranged on this background were cut stones of varying colors, ranging from a pseudo-diamond nearly the size of a baseball to an emerald-green oblong no more than a quarter of an inch long. A card before each gave the name, statistics, and history of the stone it was a copy of.

Baer’s eyes jumped to the largest of the red stones in the collection. It was identical in shape to the Akhoond and, to Baer, seemed to sparkle with the same fire. It looked so real that he caught his breath.

Could Maddox be using the example of Poe’s “The Purloined Letter”? he wondered. Openly displaying the gem as part of a collection of fakes, on the principle that no one would suspect it was the real thing?

18.

Baer’s breathing became normal. All the stones in the case looked real to him. And they couldn’t be, of course. If they had been, their combined value would have run into the tens of millions of dollars. What was more, the names on some of the display cards were widely enough known so that even someone as ignorant of lapidary lore as he was recognized them.

The originals of these copies were scattered in museums and private collections throughout the world.

The fat man was enjoying Baer’s interest.

“This is a considerably better facsimile collection than the average museum can boast, Mr. Baer. They’re not paste or glass, most of them. Some are artificial stones of the same chemical composition as the originals. Others are made of substances that closely resemble the real gem material. The smaller diamonds are zircons, for instance. But I’ll take them in order and explain as I go along. We’ll start with the diamonds.”

The “diamonds” were aligned on the left side of the case, graduated according to size.

The frankfurter-finger pointed to the first stone in the collection, a crystal-clear piece too large to be worn as an ornament. “This is a copy of the Star of Africa, Mr. Baer, the largest cut diamond in existence. It weighs 530.2 carats, or nearly three and a half ounces troy. There aren’t any zircons that big, so I had this model made from a grade of leaded glass with a high refractive index, then coated with a special glass lacquer of my own invention to give it that diamond glitter. Doesn’t it look real?”

“I thought it was.”

The fat man laughed. “I wish it were. By the way, the measurements of all facets are within one-thousandth of an inch of those of the real stone. All my copies are exact.”

He moved on to the next “diamond,” a copy of the Jubilee, weighing 245.3 carats, then on to the others in descending order of weight. He had fakes of the Tiffany, the Star of the South, the Stewart, and the Koh-i-noor. The Hope Diamond, which Baer in his ignorance had always thought ranked as one of the largest in the world, was well down the list. Maddox said that it weighed in at a mere 44.5 carats.

By the time he reached the “emeralds,” the fat man had warmed to his subject. Chuck Baer found his attention skittering. He could not keep his eyes off the copy of the Akhoond ruby. The more he stared at it, the more genuine it looked.

Eventually Maddox reached the big red stone. He took it from the case and handed it to Baer.

“I suppose by this time you know the statistics and history on this one as well as I do, Mr. Baer. Looks real, doesn’t it?”

As he turned it under the light, the ruby’s fire started him breathing hard again. “It certainly does.”

Maddox chuckled. “It should, because it is.”

Baer glared at him.

“Oh, I don’t mean it’s the Akhoond,” the fat man said. “I mean it’s a real ruby. Artificially produced, but nevertheless real. It’s pure corundum, just like any other ruby.”

“I don’t think I understand,” Baer managed to say.

“It was made by the Verneuil process. That’s a method of forming artificial ruby from purified ammonia-alum and chrome alum. A small amount of chromic oxide, I would guess about two and a half percent in this case, is added to give the pigeon-blood color. The finely powdered material is dropped into an oxyhydrogen flame, where it fuses into corundum and can be built up into a boule, or matrix, weighing as much as 200 carats. It takes a boule of about that size to end up with a cut stone the size of the Akhoond; about three-fourths of the weight is lost in the cutting process. Well, not lost exactly. Many of the fragments can be cut into smaller stones.”

“You mean this thing has the same chemical composition as the Akhoond, the same color, the same size and shape?”

“It has.”

“Then it must be just as valuable!”

Bix Maddox laughed, his belly jiggling. “Hardly, Mr. Baer. No one’s ever discovered how to prevent microscopic bubbles and what we call striae from forming during the Verneuil process. An expert can tell it’s not genuine with one glance through a glass.”

He waddled over to the reading desk and returned with a large magnifier. “See for yourself.”

Baer held the red stone under the glass. Its interior was speckled with hundreds of minute spherical bubbles and curved lines undetectable by the naked eye.

He shook his head. “It’s still a beautiful thing. Isn’t even an artificial ruby like this worth a lot?”

“With the Verneuil process, Mr. Baer, it costs only a few cents a carat to produce. Of course, the cutting of an artificial ruby requires the same skill as a real one; that’s what comes high. I would guess the original cost of making this came to a mere hundred dollars or so. I really don’t know—I didn’t have it made. I bought it from someone.”

Martha Maddox appeared in the doorway. Her husband frowned. He seemed about to be sharp with her when she said in her cowering voice, “Emmit says to tell you that Mark Spear wants to see you in the office, Bradley. He says it’s important.”

Maddox said swiftly, “Excuse me a moment, Mr. Baer.”

His wife had come through the big lounge room. The fat man left by a door leading directly into the foyer. He shut it carefully behind him.

The woman turned to withdraw. Baer played a hunch. He stopped her by saying, “I’ve just been examining your husband’s collection of gem copies, Mrs. Maddox. They’re really something.”

She looked back at him, hesitating. Then, seeing the artificial ruby in his hand, she came into the library.

“That must be a new one,” she said shyly. “I don’t recall seeing it before.”

“Really?” Baer said.

He replaced the stone in the case and put the magnifying glass on the reading table. Martha Maddox went to the case. Baer ambled over to her.

“Your husband said he bought it from someone,” he said. “He didn’t mention from whom. Would you know, Mrs. Maddox? I’m fascinated by these things.”

“Bradley never discusses his hobby with me. As a matter of fact …” She flushed and went on rather hurriedly. “I wouldn’t have any idea where he got it, Mr. Baer.”

“Of course, it may have been here a long time,” Baer said carelessly. “Unless you look at the collection often?”

“Not very. I think the last time was a few days ago. No, it was yesterday morning, come to think of it. I was dusting in here.”

He gave her his most boyish smile. “You probably just didn’t notice it. Not that it matters, of course. But it’s a beautiful thing, all right.”

“Oh, I’d have noticed it,” Mrs. Maddox said, “in cleaning the top of the case. It is beautiful, isn’t it?” She stared down at it with a sort of hunger.

Interesting, Baer thought. Could this possibly be the real Akhoond, and Maddox’s yarn about a “Verneuil process,” or whatever it was, just double-talk to put him off the track? For all he knew, genuine rubies had bubbles and striae in them, too.

Baer decided that he was being idiotic. Not even the boldest, most cynical man would attempt anything as dangerous as openly displaying the hottest jewel in town—and to a private detective, at that. The thing had to be artificial.

Still, it kept bothering him that Bix Maddox had apparently acquired the copy around the same time as the theft of the original.

He looked around for Maddox’s wife and saw her mousing out of the room. “Oh, I’m sorry, Mrs. Maddox. I didn’t mean to ignore you—”

“I have to leave, Mr. Baer,” the woman said. “Bradley won’t like it if he finds me still here when he gets back.”

“I understand,” Baer said. What he understood was that the funeral director-underworld banker was a Svengali; looking at the poor woman who had the misfortune to be his wife, Baer felt a vast pity.

“Good night, Mrs. Maddox,” he said. “I enjoyed our little talk.”

She seemed thunderstruck. “You did? Well, I did, too, Mr. Baer. It was lovely meeting you. Good night.”

She left in a half trot that made him want to get his hands on Maddox’s fat neck.

Baer turned back to the Akhoond copy. What was keeping Maddox? What was the business his boy Spear suddenly had to talk to him about?

He was beginning to feel uneasy.

He heard the door from the foyer open quickly behind him. Baer turned around.

“Up.”

He very carefully raised his arms, high.

It was the giant plug-ugly, Hops Emmit, and Emmit was pointing a .45 straight at his belly.

19.

The draperies of the windows into the big room were drawn far back, Corrigan saw, as he took his stake-out position in the shadows of the elms. He could make out the occupants of the room clearly. The fat man, Maddox, on a sofa, faced the windows. The occupant of the high-backed leather chair, in profile from his vantage point, was a very thin gray-haired woman.

A minute or so later a giant of a man, whom Corrigan recognized from mug shots he had seen as Maddox’s combined embalmer and muscle, Emmit, came in. He handed a small white card to the fat man.

Maddox glanced at the card with a frown, pursed his blubber lips, then nodded and said something to the giant.

Emmit left the room. A moment later he was back with Chuck Baer in tow.

Maddox and Baer shook hands, the funeral director introduced the woman—she must be his wife, Corrigan thought—and soon both Emmit and the woman went out, leaving the fat man and Baer alone.

The two conversed for some time. Corrigan wished he could lip-read; he could make out every movement of their lips. Then Baer leaned forward and spoke for some time in a confidential way.

When Baer’s expression turned rueful, Corrigan knew that the fat man had refused to bite. Nevertheless, they still seemed on amiable terms. When Maddox got ponderously to his feet, his gesture was certainly not one of dismissal. Apparently he was inviting the redhead to accompany him elsewhere.

Baer got up, too, and followed the fat man into another room.

Light sprang up from a window near the rear of the building a moment after the two men disappeared from Corrigan’s view. The window was too far away for Corrigan to see into from his position. What was worse, there were no concealing shadows to fade into if he moved to where he could see.

Corrigan glanced around. No one was in sight. He decided to risk it. The illumination from the windows and the street lamps made the grounds dimly visible to him; he doubted that he would be seen by anyone looking out into semidarkness.

He slipped across the lawn to a spot that was even with the rearmost window, and about fifteen feet away. The drapes were drawn back here, too. He saw a display case just beyond the window, its top folded back. Maddox and Baer stood before the case. The fat man was talking with considerable animation.

He’s showing off his gem collection to Chuck, Corrigan thought—no, more likely his collection of copies. The real stuff would hardly be displayed so close to a ground-floor window.

It looked as if Maddox’s guided tour would go on for some time. Since Baer seemed to be in no danger, Corrigan decided to return to the security of the elm trees.

He never got there. Something cold, round, and hard jabbed into the back of his neck.

“Freeze,” a metallic voice said in his ear. “Hands behind your neck.”

Corrigan raised his hands carefully and linked them behind his neck.

An oddly feminine man’s hand reached around and slapped him under each armpit. The hand went to Corrigan’s waist, felt the bulge of his .38 Detective Special, and darted beneath his jacket to yank it out of his belt holster.

“Okay,” the voice said. “March around front. Keep your hands where they are.”

Corrigan moved toward the entrance of the building. His captor crowded him, every few steps prodding him in the back with his gun muzzle to let Corrigan know he was still covered. Corrigan mounted the veranda steps and halted before the front door.

“You can use your right hand to open the door,” the man’s voice said. “It’s not locked. Then get it back behind your neck.”

He obeyed instructions. From his glimpse of the man’s hand, he decided he must be Mark Spear—Hops Emmit’s hands were like ham hocks. And Spear was a killer, not a crippler. There was never any point in trying to jump a killer with his gun in your back, unless you wanted to commit suicide. You waited for an opening. Spear had given him none.

He found himself in a thickly carpeted foyer, with a staircase straight ahead and two doors off each side. He recognized Chuck Baer’s Tyrolean-type hat hanging on a clothes tree near the front door.

Corrigan made a face. He was supposed to have been covering Baer. He could imagine what Baer was going to say.

The door slammed behind him, and at the same moment the towering figure of Emmit appeared from the nearest doorway to the right. Behind Emmit Corrigan could see a flower-covered casket bathed in funereal light.

“What the hell,” Emmit said. “Who’s this, Mark?”

“I caught the joker making goo-goo eyes at the boss through the window,” Spear said from behind Corrigan. “He had a heater.”

Corrigan risked a glance over his shoulder. Spear was a ferret-like man, slim as a wire, with dead eyes. Like Emmit, he was in a conservative suit. The gun in his hand was a .38 revolver with a standard-length barrel, unlike Corrigan’s, which had a snub nose.

Emmit growled, “Let’s get him out of sight fast. Bix has a visitor in there.”

A door snicked upstairs, and Corrigan saw a pair of feminine feet appear. The edge of the stairwell cut off an upper view of the woman. From the sensible shoes, he supposed the feet belonged to the fat man’s middle-aged wife.

Emmit made a violent gesture toward the chapel where the casket stood on display. Spear’s gun stabbed into Corrigan’s back. Corrigan did not resist. He went quickly into the chapel.

Spear prodded him over against a wall near the doorway, face to the wall. “One squawk and I blast, buddy.” He spoke in a whisper.

So Mrs. Maddox wasn’t in on her husband’s underworld business. Corrigan filed the fact away in his head for future reference. If he had a future.

Apparently Emmie had moved to meet the woman at the bottom of the stairs; his voice came from farther away. “If you’re going in to see Mr. Maddox, Mrs. Maddox, will you give him a message?”

“I wasn’t,” the woman’s timid voice replied. “I’m just looking for my reading glasses. I think I left them in the chapel.”

The giant said, “I’ll get your glasses. Tell your husband that Mark wants to see him in the office right away. It’s important.”

“All right,” Mrs. Maddox said.

There was a stretch of silence. Suddenly Emmit appeared in the doorway. For all his bulk, he moved like a cat. “Get him in the office, Mark. Where are her damn glasses?”

“Forget it,” Spear said. “Let her find them herself.” To Corrigan he said, “You. Move.”

Corrigan was hurried into the foyer toward a closed door near the stairs with the word OFFICE on it, Emmit preceding them. The big man opened the door noiselessly and switched on the lights. Spear herded Corrigan in.

“I’ll wait outside for Bix,” Emmit said. “Keep this monkey quiet.”

He went out and closed the door, still without a sound.

“You can turn around now,” Spear said to Corrigan. “Keep your hands where they are.”

Corrigan turned around. The office was simple and small; it held only a desk and swivel chair, a filing cabinet, a stand with a typewriter on it, and two cushiony leather chairs before the desk. The floor was of polished vinyl, in a brick design. The walls were done in pale, soft green; there were some flower prints on them, just a few.

“What’s with your eye?” Spear asked in his metallic voice suddenly. “You dressed for a firemen’s ball? Say, don’t I know you?”

“Your friend said to keep quiet,” Corrigan said.

“Oh, a wise guy, too. Okay, button up. You’ll have your chance to talk in a minute.”

“Can’t I take my hands down? My arms are getting tired.”

“I’m busting out crying. Keep ’em where they are!”

Corrigan shrugged. Several minutes passed. Then he heard Emmit’s bass in the foyer, in guarded tones. A moment later the door opened and the fat man came in, followed by Emmit. Emmit shut the door as soundlessly as before.

Bradley Maddox blinked at Corrigan’s eye-patch. He seemed puzzled, as by a fugitive memory. “Who is he?” he demanded of Spear.

“Search me, boss. I caught him watching you through the library window. He was heeled.”

“You, with the patch,” Maddox said. “Who sent you?”

“My mama,” Corrigan said.

“We got a comic,” Emmit growled. “You want I should soften him up, Bix?”

The fat man ignored him. “What’s your name?”

“Corrigan.”

“Corrigan?” Corrigan could see him chewing it, as if trying to identify its flavor. “Mark. Give me his wallet.”

Spear said, “Turn around, punk.”

Corrigan turned around. He felt the feminine hand dip into his hip pocket.

“Okay.”

“You may face me again,” Maddox said. “Keep him covered, Mark. You never know how stupid these characters can be.”

When Corrigan faced them again, the fat man was examining his I.D. The blubbery lips compressed.

“This man is a cop,” he said. “Captain Corrigan, of the Main Office Squad. Mark, are you sure there aren’t any others out there?”

“Not inside the grounds,” the killer said. “I was just finishing my rounds when I spotted him.”

Maddox tossed the wallet on the desk. His moon face looked worried. “We’ll have to check the whole neighborhood. Why are you spying on me, Captain Corrigan?”

Corrigan had been doing some fast thinking. Before long it was going to occur to Maddox that Chuck Baer and he were working together.

“I wasn’t,” he said. “I was tailing that crooked private eye. He led me here.”

The fat man’s buried eyes glinted. “Do you take me for a moron, Corrigan? Main Office Squad captains don’t pull stake-out duty. The only reason you would tell me that is to protect Baer. The two of you are working together.”

Corrigan thought, I’d have done better to keep my mouth shut. There was a razor brain sunk in that fat.

“Hops, bring Baer here,” the fat man said. “At gunpoint. He’s undoubtedly armed, so relieve him of his gun first. And make sure Mrs. Maddox has gone back upstairs before you start waving your heater around.”

“Sure, Bix,” Emmit said. “Don’t worry about a thing.”

He drew a .45 automatic from under his arm, checked it to make sure a shell was in the chamber, reset the safety, and stowed the .45 away. He went out and again shut the door behind him.

The oversized hood might not find his orders so easy to carry out, Corrigan thought. For all his breadth, Chuck Baer was as fast as Billy the Kid was supposed to have been and probably wasn’t. Emmit might find himself outgunned even if he walked in on Chuck with a drawn gun.

Corrigan waited for a shot. If it came, the report would sufficiently startle Spear to make him glance in the direction of the source. Corrigan set himself to whirl and chop down on the gunman’s wrist.

The door reopened and Baer clumped in with his hands behind his neck. Emmit was prodding him from behind. So much for dreams.

Baer looked at Corrigan accusingly. “I got caught with my pants down,” he growled. “What’s your excuse?”

“Carelessness,” Corrigan said. “I’m sorry, Chuck.”

“You ought to be! You were supposed to be covering me.”

“I’m sorry,” Corrigan said again.

“Where do we go from here, Mr. Maddox?” Baer said.

“Stand over by the captain, for openers.”

Baer obeyed instantly.

“The next order of business,” the fat man said, “is to see if we’re surrounded by boys in blue. Mark, check the grounds again. And up and down the street. Emmit, you will keep them both covered until Mark gets back. You may take your hands down, gentlemen. I don’t believe you’re going anywhere.”

20.

In his swivel chair, Maddox clasped his balloon hands over his paunch and regarded Baer and Corrigan, still smiling. The smile comforted neither man. “While we’re waiting, gentlemen, would you care to explain what you’re after?”

“I already told you,” Chuck Baer said. “The Akhoond.”

“You didn’t mention that you were working with the police, Mr. Baer,” Maddox said gently. “In fact, you gave me the distinct impression that you’re lone-wolfing.”

“You can’t hardly trust anybody these days,” Baer complained. “Tim, Maddox has a brand-new copy of the Akhoond in his collection. According to Mrs. Maddox, it wasn’t there yesterday morning. What do you make of them apples?”

“You’re sure it isn’t the real thing, Chuck?”

They were conversing as if they were alone. The fat man listened silently.

“Maddox claims it’s an artificial ruby made by something called the Verneuil process and isn’t worth much over a hundred bucks. He let me look at it through a magnifying glass. It’s full of bubbles and stuff, which he says is how you tell artificial rubies from the McCoy. I don’t know anything about precious stones, but I got the feeling he was leveling. It would take a nut to display the Akhoond in an unlocked case next to a ground-floor window, and Fat Boy, whatever else he is, has all his marbles.”

The fat man said softly, “I’m quite willing to let an expert examine my copy. I have nothing to conceal. You gentlemen are being held at gunpoint because you’re trespassers, not because you can connect me with a crime. You, Captain—carrying a shield gives you no right to invade private premises without a warrant. In fact, I may call Centre Street and lodge a complaint against you.”

Corrigan laughed. “In a pig’s eye—or yours, Maddox, whichever matches better. If you’re so lily-white and pure-o, why do you want to make sure first that the joint isn’t surrounded?”

“Maybe,” remarked Baer, “he’s worrying about how to explain where he got the imitation Akhoond.”

The fat smile became wintry. Suddenly Corrigan knew where the imitation ruby had come from.

“Chuck,” he said, “didn’t Willie’s landlady tell you she didn’t actually see him move out?”

“That’s right. She was in bed sleeping, she said.”

“I just had a flash. Suppose it wasn’t Willie who left with Willie’s belongings? Suppose somebody else did it in order to make it look as though Willie had taken it on the lam?”

Baer seemed interested. “Why?”

“If Willie disappeared leaving his personal possessions behind, it would be an MP case. That would mean a police check. Suppose he’s dead? His killer wouldn’t want an investigation if it could be avoided. So it was made to look as if he’d taken a powder in the middle of the night. In that case, who besides the landlady would give a damn?”

Baer looked thoughtful. “You may have something there, Tim. They’d have to dispose of the body …”

“Act your age, Chuck. It was probably weighted and tossed into the river.”

Maddox seemed to be struggling with his better sense. He lost. “What are you two talking about?” he demanded.

“Willie Evers,” Corrigan said. “Or are you going to pretend you never heard of him, Maddox? Incidentally, I just figured out where you got that fake ruby. Like to hear?”

The fat man’s lips pursed. “Very much.”

“Willie brought it to you some time after ten last night. Arrangements had all been made in advance, and you had seventy-five grand waiting to pay him off. Naturally, before you paid, you examined the stone, and you found it was a fake. Right so far?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Maddox said coldly.

“Since Willie wouldn’t have been stupid enough to try to palm a fake off on you,” Corrigan said, “it follows that he didn’t know it was fake.” He laughed again. “All that risk, plus murder, just to snatch a hunk of glass.”

“It isn’t glass, Tim,” Baer said. “It’s a manufactured ruby. You mean to say all the time what I was guarding was that thing in Maddox’s display case?”

“Yes. The Sultan wasn’t taking any chances. Lots of people have their jewels copied for public display and keep the real ice in a vault. It wouldn’t surprise me if the Sultan’s whole collection is fake, with the real ones back in the palace in Morojaca.”

Baer shook his head. “It ought to make me feel better about having it snatched from under my nose, but somehow it doesn’t.”

Corrigan said to Maddox, “You probably guessed what had happened the minute you examined the stone. And you realized you’d involved yourself for a hunk of nothing. You must have known when the job was planned for, so you’d have been listening for news reports. Since six reporters and a columnist were at the party, special news bulletins were on the air long before Willie got here. So you knew it wasn’t just grand theft you had let yourself in for—it was also conspiracy to commit murder. You couldn’t afford to let Willie live after that. He’d sure as hell have fingered you as the brains behind the job, once we got our hands on him.”

Mark Spear returned.

“Well?” the fat man demanded.

“Nothing,” Spear said. “There’s an unmarked police car parked about half a block away. I’d have missed it if I hadn’t looked inside and seen the dash mike. No sign of fuzz anywhere in the neighborhood.”

Maddox sucked on his lower lip. Corrigan could see the sweat on his scalp. Corrigan felt himself tense.

The fat man looked up. There was death in his eyes.

“Mark,” he said. “You and Hops are to dispose of these men. Not here. Somewhere where they can’t be found. And get rid of that undercover car, too. I don’t want it turning up within fifty miles of here.”

“You’re a hell of an undertaker,” Chuck Baer said, and from the way he said it Corrigan knew that Baer, too, had been preparing himself. “Throwing business away like that.” He knew Baer had every muscle primed, too. “Anyway, I thought you were going to charge us with trespassing.”

“That was before your friend the policeman here decided to imitate Sherlock Holmes out loud,” the fat man said. “Actually, he has what happened a little twisted. As far as I know, Willie Evers is still very much alive. But Captain Corrigan hit it too close for comfort. I’m sorry, gentlemen, but we’re used to sudden death around here.”

Baer gave Corrigan a pained look. “You and your big mouth. Well, nichevo. I’m sorry about you, Tim. It doesn’t make much difference to me, with this bum ticker of mine.” He laughed. “It would be a hell of a joke, Maddox, if I had a heart attack before your muscle can send me out the hard way. I’m not supposed to have any excitement.”

“You won’t have after tonight, Mr. Baer,” Maddox said pleasantly. “Well, gentlemen, I wish I could say adieu, or adios, or aufwiedersehen, but I’m afraid it will have to be good-bye.” He hauled himself out of the swivel chair and said abruptly to Emmit, “I’ll probably be in bed by the time you and Mark get back. If I am, awaken me. I’ll want to know that the job’s done, and done right. And it had better be.”

He waddled across the office and went out without a backward glance.

Spear said to the giant, “We’d better tie their hands behind them before we toss them in the car. I’ll get some rope from the embalming room.”

“Get with it, Mark,” Emmit said. “It’s past eleven now. I don’t want to be up the whole goddamn night.”

Spear left unhurriedly.

Corrigan braced himself. From Baer’s remark about his heart, he knew he was planning a break—the big man’s heart was as sound as the U.S. Treasury. With only one gun on them at the moment, it was the obvious time for Baer to make his move. The trouble was, the odds looked impossible. Emmit was standing a careful six feet away, .45 pointed between them, ready to shift instantly either way.

What was holding Chuck up? Make your move, Corrigan urged silently. If we have to go out, at least we’ll have tried. And if Emmit shot them, the explosions might—just might—bring a prowl car on the jump. That is, if a prowl car was in the neighborhood.

A lot of ifs, he thought.

They had been in jams just as bad before. Especially in Korea, when they had teamed up in the OSS. If only Chuck would move. Corrigan had no fear that he would misunderstand what was expected of him. They had developed a teamwork pattern that was almost an instinct.

But the opportunity passed. He heard Spear coming back. Why had Chuck waited?

Here it was.

Baer said in an unsteady voice, “I’m getting dizzy. This pain in my left arm, my chest … Emmit, I—think—I’m having—an attack. Is it all right if I—sit down?”

“The hell you say,” Emmit said. “Go ahead and have your attack, joker. It’ll save us a bullet.”

Spear came in with a coil of clothesline. Emmit glanced at him for the briefest instant. And Baer made his move.

He swayed, grunted, and began to topple.

Even as he reacted, Corrigan realized why Baer had timed his break for this moment. With his attention momentarily turned to Spear entering the room, then suddenly brought back to the toppling Baer, for the wink of an eye Emmit forgot Corrigan.

It was all Corrigan needed. He took a dancer’s step forward and swung his right foot up as if he were punting a football. His instep kicked the .45 out of the giant’s fist. The gun sailed across the room, caromed off the wall, and slid under Maddox’s desk.

Baer’s body had hit the floor inches from Emmit’s feet. Both hands flashed out, clamped around a beefy ankle, and yanked. The giant went over backward like a falling redwood, to land with a room-shaking crash on a hip and an elbow.

Corrigan jumped Baer’s body to get at Spear.

The gunman had dropped the coil of rope and was clawing at his armpit. His gun came out just as Corrigan got there. Spear had no time to fire. Corrigan’s left hand shot out and seized the cylinder, preventing it from rotating, freezing the trigger. The edge of his right hand came down in a blur across Spear’s gun wrist.

The weapon came away in his hand just as a left hook caught him on the jaw. Even though Spear was falling back and failed to connect solidly, the blow drove Corrigan into the wall. The gun was jarred loose and clattered to the floor.

Out of the corner of his eye Corrigan saw that both Baer and Emmit had scrambled to their feet. He was too busy with his own opponent to pay further attention to them, but he just made out the giant throwing a haymaker to Baer’s jaw.

He barely heard Baer’s roar of rage. Then he was fending off Spear.

The gunman was coming at him in the queerest way. Everything was alive in Spear’s face but his eyes. It was like being attacked by a reanimated corpse. Suddenly Corrigan knew what Spear was. He was a death machine, once he was set to kill. Parts of him would go on trying to kill even after the rest of him was dead. Corrigan had seen a few men like that in combat. They could not be stopped by ordinary means; they never gave up. Spear would not be taken alive unless his killing mechanism was put out of commission.

Spear sprang.

His abdomen was wide open. Corrigan put everything he had into the punch. His fist sank to the wrist into the man’s solar plexus. Spear’s mouth opened and let out a “Whoof!” as he doubled up and his eyes rolled over. Corrigan linked his hands. As Spear tumbled toward him, he brought the linked hands down in a deadly ax-chop on the nape of Spear’s neck. Spear collapsed at his feet, fingers twitching as if still trying to get at him. Then he lay still, on his face.

Corrigan swung around. He had concentrated so hard on Spear that he had been deaf and blind to the other struggle. He expected to find Chuck Baer out cold from Emmit’s haymaker, or the giant chopping the redhead to mincemeat. To his astonishment, Baer was still on his feet. What was more, he had that look on his ugly face, the look Corrigan had seen twice in Korea, under extraordinary circumstances. Each occasion had resulted in slaughter. Corrigan stepped back; Baer needed no help.

He was not surprised now to see Baer slip under the giant’s lunge, get one hand on the back of the man’s tree-trunk neck and the other in his crotch. Emmit bellowed with agony. Baer heaved. The giant came up in the air, over Baer’s head, facing the ceiling. The private detective held him there for a good ten seconds; then he launched Emmit like a javelin. The giant’s head struck the upper panel of the door, there was a lightning crash of splintering wood, and Emmit sailed through the door to land on his head in the foyer. He did not even twitch. For all Corrigan knew, he had a broken neck.

Corrigan stooped to recover his snub-nosed Detective Special from Spear’s pocket. Holstering it, he picked up Spear’s .38 and thrust it under his belt. Then, on hands and knees, he recovered Emmit’s .45 from under the desk.

Chuck Baer had opened the shattered door and gone into the foyer. Corrigan heard him say, “Hold it right there, Fatty.”

The redhead was kneeling beside the quiet giant. He had recovered his own gun and was pointing it at the stairs.

Corrigan joined him and saw the fat man on the bottom step, balloon face faintly green, hands raised high. He was wearing a purple dressing gown over green pajamas and had pomponned bedroom slippers on his feet.

Mrs. Maddox, in an old bathrobe, was peering down from the top of the staircase.

“I’m a police officer, ma’am,” Corrigan said. “Will you come down, please?”

She came down with a peculiar look on her dried-out face. Her robe was a plain white terry cloth; the hem of a cotton nightgown showed beneath it. Her bedroom slippers were of felt and looked years old.

The woman said quietly to her husband, “So they’ve caught you at last.”

Maddox glared at her.

Baer rose, still covering the fat man. He walked over, patted the pockets of Maddox’s dressing gown, and put his gun away.

“I won’t need a rod to handle you,” he said. “Put your hands down.”

Maddox lowered them cautiously.

“He still alive?” Corrigan nodded toward the motionless giant.

Baer nodded back. “He must have a head like Gibraltar.”

He took a pair of cuffs from his belt, leaned over the unconscious man, and linked the unresisting wrists behind the vast back.

“Let’s go into your office, Mr. Maddox,” Corrigan said politely.

21.

In the office Corrigan ordered Maddox and his wife to sit down. Spear began to moan. Corrigan handcuffed his wrists behind him, yanked him to his feet, and shoved him into the third chair. Spear looked around uncomprehendingly. He was still doubled over.

There was a groan from the foyer. Chuck Baer went out and returned with Emmit. The giant lurched as if he were drunk. At the sight of Spear he began to curse.

“You goddamn fool! If you’d used these guys’ cuffs instead of going after rope, we wouldn’t be in this jam.”

Spear’s dead eyes stayed dead.

Corrigan picked up the phone on the desk. He called the nearest precinct house and ordered a van.

When he hung up, he said, “You’re cooked, Maddox. We have you cold for conspiracy to murder, and I think we’ll be able to tie you to the Akhoond job. You made an interesting remark a while back, though. You said that as far as you knew Willie Evers was still alive. Want to put in a good word for yourself while we’re waiting?”

The fat man’s face was still green. “I have nothing to say until I see my lawyer.” He glanced at his henchmen. “You boys keep your mouths shut until we can get hold of Max.”

Corrigan shrugged. He looked at the fat man’s wife.

“Do you have anything to say, Mrs. Maddox?”

The woman said quietly, “I’d like to see you in private.”

Her husband’s bulk quivered. “You’re not to say anything either, Martha,” he said quickly.

She neither answered nor looked at him. She rose, and Corrigan followed her from the room.

“Martha, come back here!” Maddox screamed. “Captain Corrigan, I demand that my wife not be questioned without legal advice!”

She ignored him and led the way to the library.

The lid of the display case was still folded back. Corrigan stooped and took out the copy of the Akhoond. He dropped it into his pocket.

“Possible evidence,” he said to the woman.

“It’s all right, Captain. Take whatever you need.”

She stood looking at him. Corrigan waited. Suddenly she pointed up to a ceiling register.

“This is an old house, Captain; some of its original equipment is still in use. A few upstairs rooms are still warmed by the heat rising from downstairs through the registers. They carry sound as well as heat. My sewing room is immediately above this one. Bradley doesn’t know it, but I often sit up there and listen to what goes on down here.”

“Did you listen last night, Mrs. Maddox?”

“About ten-thirty he had a visitor he called Willie. The man asked if he had the money, and Bradley said it was in the safe. He obviously meant this safe.”

She went over to a bookshelf and swung aside a section of false books. There was a wall safe behind it.

“Bradley told this man he wanted to ‘examine the goods’ before paying. There was no talk for a while after that. Then I heard my husband say, ‘What are you trying to pull? This is an artificial stone.’ The man said it couldn’t be. An argument broke out. This Willie seemed to think that Bradley was pretending whatever item the man had brought was a fake, in order to avoid paying the agreed price. Finally I heard the sound of a blow and a thud, as if something heavy had hit the floor. I learned later that ‘Willie’ had struck my husband and knocked him unconscious.”

“How did you learn that, Mrs. Maddox?”

“From what my husband said later to Mark Spear and Hops Emmit. After my husband dropped to the floor, I heard nothing for several minutes. Then the library door opened and closed, after which there was again silence for perhaps ten minutes. Finally Bradley came to and began screaming for Spear and Emmit. When they came in, he told them what had happened and demanded to know why they had allowed this Willie to get away.”

“Why had they?”

“They said they didn’t know there had been trouble, that when Bradley took this Willie into the library, they had seemed on the best of terms. Bradley calmed down. Apparently he checked the safe, because I heard him say that at least Willie hadn’t walked out with the money. The man must have been unable or didn’t have time to open it—it’s a combination safe.”

Corrigan could guess what had happened during the period of silence immediately following the fight. Willie Evers had examined the stone through the magnifying glass and discovered that Maddox was telling the truth; it was not a genuine ruby. Unable to get at the payoff money, and wanting no part of a nearly worthless imitation which could tie him to a murder, he had simply walked out. Probably his flight from the rooming house in the middle of the night had been out of fear of reprisal by Maddox’s muscle men for assaulting the underworld banker.

“Did you overhear any more, Mrs. Maddox?” Corrigan asked.

She shook her head. “They left the library. But this morning Bradley had a bad bruise on his jaw. He covered it with some of the makeup he uses in preparing the dead. Are you wondering why I’ve told you all this, Captain?”

“I imagine,” Corrigan said, “that your husband isn’t the easiest man in the world to love.”

She looked down. “My life with him has been beastly, beastly. He took my youth, my spirit, everything that made me a person.… I’m not a vicious woman, Captain, or a malevolent one. But even the worm turns. Tonight I couldn’t stand it any more. And maybe now I can free myself of him.”

“I understand, Mrs. Maddox, believe me,” Corrigan said, and went to answer the front door. It was the men with the precinct van.

It was past midnight before Corrigan and Chuck Baer got away from the station house. Maddox, Emmit, and Spear had been booked for conspiracy to commit murder, and Maddox was also charged with “Investigation, conspiracy to commit grand theft and murder.” At the time Corrigan and Baer left, “Max” had still not made his legal appearance. The fat man was frothing at the mouth.

Corrigan left instructions for the transfer of the prisoners to the Tombs the next morning; he rather doubted that they would get there. Maddox’s lawyer would undoubtedly appear with writs and bail bonds before morning. It would be too difficult to tie Maddox in to the Akhoond job in a preliminary hearing at this point, so the district attorney’s office would probably settle for the time being on the conspiracy charge. Conspiracy was a charge for which bond could be set.

Back at headquarters, Corrigan dropped Chuck Baer, but he had a last chore for the night. Now that it seemed likely that Willie Evers was still in town, Corrigan wanted a stakeout on Penny Randall’s flat.

He went up to his office, arranged the stake-out, and locked the imitation Akhoond in one of his desk drawers.

Only then did he head for home and bed.

Just as he was leaving for downtown the next morning, Corrigan got a phone call from the D.A.’s office to report there before he checked in at headquarters. He found Bix Maddox, his two goons, and a lawyer named Max Ellis closeted with the district attorney. As he had anticipated, the three men were free on bond on the lesser charge, and the more serious charge against Maddox was shelved until the D.A. could build a case.

The purpose of the conference was to get the fat man and his muscle men to talk. It was a waste of time. On advice of Ellis all three refused to answer anything, and the lawyer implied that he would have nothing to say in their behalf until they appeared in a courtroom. The D.A. finally sent them packing in disgust.

When Corrigan got to his office, he found Chuck Baer waiting for him.

“Oversleep?” the redhead asked cheerfully. He looked as rested as a baby.

“I’ve been on the merry-go-round with the Maddox crew and Maddox’s lawyer at the D.A.’s office,” Corrigan grunted. “They’re all clamming. And all out on bail.”

“Figures,” Baer said. “I’ve been thinking, Tim, we ought to have an expert look at that stone. We only have Maddox’s word that it’s an imitation.”

“I’ve been thinking the same thing. If I find out I left the real Akhoond in my desk overnight …” He unlocked the drawer and laid the glowing stone on the desk. “Sure looks real,” he muttered.

“Who you going to get to look at it?”

“Man named Morton Ball, if I can locate him.”

He checked the telephone book and dialed. A girl’s voice answered, “Featherstone Museum.”

“Is Mr. Morton Ball in?”

“One moment, sir.”

There was an extension buzz, then a male voice said, “Crystallography Section. Ball speaking.”

“This is Captain Corrigan of the Main Office Squad, Police Headquarters, Mr. Ball. I was present yesterday when you called at Sultan Abdul’s suite to examine the Akhoond. Are you a jewel expert?”

“Well, I’m really a geologist, Captain, but I’ve specialized in crystallography. Yes, I suppose I qualify.”

“I would like you to look at a ruby.”

“I’d be glad to be of service.”

“Fine. I’ll be over at the museum right away.”

“That won’t be necessary, Captain Corrigan. Police Headquarters is only a few blocks from here. Expect me in ten minutes.”

Ball made it in eight. When he spotted the red stone lying on Corrigan’s desk, his eyes widened.

“You’ve recovered the Akhoond!”

Corrigan said, “Maybe,” and waved him to the chair Chuck Baer had hastily vacated. “By the way, meet Mr. Baer.”

“How do you do,” the crystallographer said, not turning around. “Captain, may I pick it up?”

“Be my guest.”

Ball seized it. He turned it over in his fingers, looking puzzled. Then he took a jeweler’s loupe out of his pocket and applied it to his right eye. He peered through the loupe and looked up immediately.

“I’m sorry, Captain, but you haven’t recovered the Akhoond. This is an artificial ruby.”

Corrigan nodded. “We’d already been told that. I wanted expert verification. Could you spare an hour or so, Mr. Ball, to look at a few more pieces?”

“I’m entirely at your disposal.”

Corrigan said, “One moment,” and phoned the Hotel D’Autremont. He asked for Haidar Ghafur. The Sultan’s secretary answered. Corrigan asked him at which bank the Sultan’s jewel collection was being held.

“Traders National,” Haidar said. “Why, Captain Corrigan?”

“Could you arrange with the bank for it to be examined? I have a jewel expert here.”

“But what is the purpose?”

“It’s part of the investigation of the Sultan’s death,” Corrigan said patiently. “How soon can you set it up?”

“It won’t require any setting up, Captain. I was commissioned by His Highness to rent the vault, so my signature is the one on the signature-comparison card. I can meet you at the bank in half an hour.”

“We’ll be there.”

22.

When Corrigan, Baer, and Ball got to the bank, they found Haidar Ghafur waiting with Ambassador Ranjit Aziz.

Haidar frowned when he saw Ball. “You’re the man from the Featherstone Museum. What is this all about, Captain?”

“I’ll explain after Mr. Ball examines the collection.”

The curtained alcoves proved too small to hold five people. A small office was turned over to them by the bank manager.

Ball sat down at the desk; the others looked over his shoulder. The expert began to examine the stones through his loupe. He worked in silence; his face told nothing.

When he had laid the last gem aside, Corrigan demanded, “Well?”

“All genuine stones, Captain. Some remarkable pieces. It was a pleasure to be given the opportunity to examine them.”

Ranjit Aziz looked puzzled. “Of course they’re genuine! What did you expect, Captain?”

“Fakes.” Corrigan produced the imitation ruby. “This is what was stolen at the party the other night. It isn’t the Akhoond. It’s an artificial product cut to the same specifications and worth a hundred dollars or so. I assumed that the Sultan was one of those people who keep their real gems in a vault and display only copies in public. Apparently it isn’t that simple. Why would His Highness have brought only one artificial stone from Morojaca when the rest of the collection is genuine?”

The two Morojacans were glaring at the imitation ruby. Haidar looked up. “Are you suggesting that the real Akhoond, Captain, was not on display the other night?”

“I’m not suggesting it, I’m stating it as fact. This imitation was the one stolen.”

“But that’s ridiculous!” Ranjit Aziz expostulated. “His Highness would not dream of perpetrating such a hoax! He owned no artificial gems, so far as I know.” He glanced at Haidar. “Did he, Haidar?”

The bearded secretary shook his head. “I was probably closer to the Sultan day by day than anyone else in Morojaca. I would surely have known if His Highness had commissioned an imitation of the Akhoond. If that stone in your hand is artificial, Captain, you have recovered the wrong gem.”

Corrigan pocketed it. Something that had not previously occurred to him now seemed so obvious that he wondered why he had not thought of it before.

Abdul VI himself had not been aware that his fabled Akhoond was an artificially produced stone.

Corrigan waited until he and Baer were alone before he mentioned his sudden thought.

Baer looked astonished. “You mean to say there’s never been a real Akhoond? That it’s been an artificial ruby all along?”

“Possible, but not likely,” Corrigan frowned. “If I remember that historical spiel you gave me, the stone came into possession of one of the Sultan’s ancestors back in the sixteenth century. Did they know how to make artificial rubies that far back?”

“Search me, Tim. You should have asked Ball. I’d better look up my French client and let him wrestle with all this. It presents a unique insurance problem.”

“I’ll drop you at your car.”

When Corrigan got back to his office, he found an air-mail special on his desk. It was the reply from Los Angeles to his inquiry about press agent Terry.

The report read:

Name of Subject: Samuel R. Terry.

Last Known Address: Beverly-Mitford Hotel, Beverly Hills, Calif.

Occupation: Hollywood press agent.

Criminal Record: 1956, convicted possession of marijuana. Six months’ probation. 1959, arrested on bad-check charge, dismissed when reimbursement made and victim (a tavern owner) dropped charges. 1962, questioned in connection with theft of actress Dolores Ruiz’s diamond bracelet from her hotel suite. Nothing proved, bracelet never recovered. No further record.

Current Status: Subject was last employed by DeWitt Productions, Inc., as press agent for a film shot in Baghdad. Subject remained abroad when film company returned to States, reason and future plans unknown. Company spokesman states subject’s employment was terminated because of unsatisfactory performance. Present whereabouts and/or employment unknown.

Advise if further information required.

Corrigan sat musing over the report. Sam Terry had shaped up as an angle-shooter all along. It was interesting that he had once been suspected of a jewel theft.

Of Corrigan’s three ripe suspects, the press agent seemed to have had the juiciest motives for arranging the crime. With the Sultan dead, Gladys Quinn, Terry’s pash, wouldn’t have to pay for the old rip’s cooperation in getting her a screen test. And Terry’s record indicated that he was not above making an illegal buck.

Whoever the finger man had been, Corrigan thought with grim amusement, he hadn’t been destined to make a profit from the crime. Everything pointed to Willie Evers’s intention to skip the country with both shares of the payoff the moment he collected them.

It was the middle of the afternoon when Corrigan got a call from Dave Bender. The Homicide detective was phoning from Bellevue Hospital.

“I thought you were on nights, Dave,” Corrigan said.

“Kinn and I started the day trick today,” Bender said. “We just caught up with Willie Evers, Tim, but he’s not in much shape to question. He’s in here with a bullet in his gut.”

“No kidding! What’s the story?”

“He was holed up in some rooming house on the Lower East Side. A couple of hours ago the landlady heard a shot. By the time she got to the second floor, whoever had plugged Willie had made it down a back stairway and out through the alley. Nobody else was in the joint, because all the roomers are working people. So nobody saw the killer.”

“Killer?” Corrigan said. “Is Evers dead?”

“Not yet, but the medics say he’s on his way out. He was in a coma when he was brought in, snapped out of it long enough to ask for some dame, then relapsed. The doc in charge says he might wake up long enough to give a dying statement, but not to count on it. You want to listen in, you better get on your horse.”

“I’m on my way!”

Corrigan phoned Chuck Baer, rapidly explained the situation, then headed for the hospital.

He got there before Baer. In the corridor outside the emergency room he found Bender and his partner, Marty Kinn. A tall, almost beautiful platinum blonde dressed in white Capris, matching skintight sweater, and thong sandals leaned against the wall beside them. She had breasts like footballs.

“Any change?” Corrigan asked Bender, looking at the girl.

The Homicide man shook his head. “The doc said he’d let us know the minute Evers comes to.” He nodded in the direction of the blonde. “This is the woman he asked for. Penny Randall.”

Corrigan examined Willie Evers’s girl friend with care. She did not look particularly grief-stricken.

He walked over to her and said, “I’m Captain Corrigan. You know anything about this shooting, Miss Randall?”

She stared at his eye-patch frankly. “I told the officers there. The first I knew what happened was when the hospital phoned. I didn’t even know Willie was in town. I thought he’d taken off for—”

“Rio?”

She seemed startled. Before she could say anything, Baer showed up.

“Why, hi-i, Chuckie!”

“Hi, Penny.” Baer looked her up and down with the pride of possession. “Any change, Tim?”

“Not yet.”

Baer exchanged greetings with Bender and Kinn.

The blonde frowned at his obvious familiarity with the three officers.

“Say,” she said suddenly, “you a cop, too?”

“Private cop,” Baer said indulgently.

“You heel!” she squealed. “You were just using me!”

“Yes,” Baer said. “But if you think I didn’t plan to come back for that social visit, Penny, you don’t know your own assets.”

“Well, don’t waste your time!” And Penny Randall marched down the corridor to take a new position holding up the wall, turning her back on them all.

“You should have scored when you were hot, Chuck,” Corrigan said with a grin.

“I’m playing the wrong part,” Baer mourned. “Penny only goes for the bad guys.”

“And you were so close,” Corrigan mourned with him. “If you’d kept your trap shut, you wouldn’t even have needed any makeup. With that ugly puss of yours, it’s type-casting. How did you make out with your French client?”

“DuBois is frothing. If his company’s been insuring a phony ruby for half a million bucks, he’s all set to fire whoever wrote the policy. If it turns out the real Akhoond was stolen and it isn’t recovered, I think he’ll slice his throat. Incidentally, Tim, the ruby the Akhoond of Swat gave Abdul I in 1523 couldn’t have been artificial. I looked it up. The process wasn’t invented till the nineteenth century.”

A nurse stuck her head out of the emergency room. “He’s coming to, and the doctor says you’d better come in.”

Corrigan jumped and got there first, Chuck Baer a half step behind. The two Homicide detectives followed. When nobody seemed to mind, Penny Randall slipped in after them.

23.

A young intern said to Corrigan, “He isn’t altogether conscious, but he can’t last long, so I thought you’d better see him. Don’t worry about tiring him; he hasn’t a chance. I don’t give him more than minutes.”

Corrigan went quickly to the bedside. Baer moved over beside him, and the Homicide officers hurried to the other side of the bed. Penny Randall hung back, but when she saw that no one was paying any attention to her, she slipped over to the foot of the bed. She stared at the dying thief with wet eyes.

Willie Evers’s sharp-featured face was deathly white. A sheet was drawn up to his chest, covering his bandages; both arms were outside. The left sleeve of his hospital gown was rolled back, and a needle was taped to the arm. A tube led from the needle to a suspended pint of plasma. His glassed-over eyes were staring straight up. He was making little muttering noises.

“My name is Corrigan, and I’m a police officer,” Corrigan said, stooping over him. “Can you understand me, Willie?”

The glassy eyes rolled toward Corrigan, trying to focus. “Said he’d bring me money,” he said in a gurgly whisper. “When I phoned him it was a fake … and I needed lam money … he said he’d take care of me. Took care of me … all right.”

The eyes rolled back to examine the ceiling again. He began muttering. Corrigan stooped lower.

“Didn’t know it would kill anybody … told me it would only make smoke … get ’em all panicked … What do I know about practice grenades? Why they call ’em … practice … if they can kill somebody?”

The mutter stopped.

Corrigan said distinctly, “Willie. Who shot you?”

Evers’s lips moved without sound. His breathing became noisy. The intern said, “He’s going.”

“Willie!” Corrigan said. “Who shot you?”

By some miracle the muttering began again. “Told me … how to … make the box. Supposed to … keep the heat … from burning anybody. Made it … like he said … Didn’t know … never wanted … kill …”

The eyes suddenly cleared. They were fixed on the figure of the girl standing at the foot of the bed, silently crying.

“Penny,” Evers said in a perfectly normal voice. “I didn’t mean to stand you up. I had to find a hole. I was going to call you when the heat was off.”

“It’s all right, Willie,” Penny Randall said. “It’s all right.”

But Willie Evers never heard her absolution.

His eyes remained open, but they seemed to be looking at something a long distance away.

Corrigan became aware that the noisy breathing had stopped.

The intern shoved in between him and Chuck Baer and leaned over the bed with his stethoscope. After a moment he put it into the pocket of his white coat and slid Willie Evers’s eyelids down with his thumb and straightened up.

“He’s gone,” he said. “Please clear the room.”

In the corridor Bender said, “We’ll keep you posted, Tim. The lab crew was going over his room when we left. Maybe they’ll come up with something.”

“And maybe they won’t,” Corrigan said. He was furious. It happened this way more often than not. They couldn’t hear you. Their ears were functioning, but they always listened to something nobody else could hear.

Penny Randall was wiping her eyes. Still, Corrigan did not get the feeling that she was overwhelmed with grief. It was just that she was a woman.

She put the handkerchief back in her bag and started to walk away.

“Just a minute, Penny,” Chuck Baer said.

The girl stopped and turned half around. Baer went up to her, and Corrigan trailed along. The intern came out of the emergency room at that moment, and Bender and Kinn turned their attention to him.

Baer said, “I’m sorry, kid.”

“You don’t have to be,” Penny said. “It’s better than being stuck away in a cell for life. We wouldn’t have gotten together, anyway. I’ve enough troubles without hiding out a killer.”

“I mean I’m sorry about lying to you,” Baer said. “In my business you sometimes have to lie.”

“You trying to get more information out of me?”

“Yes,” Baer said. “But on the level this time. You’d like to see Willie’s murderer caught, wouldn’t you?”

“What difference does it make? It won’t bring Willie back, and even if it did, I wouldn’t want him now.”

Baer growled, “You’re sore at me because I’m not a hood. What is it with you? Can’t you get a yen for an honest man?”

The girl looked startled. She started to say something, then stopped. Her eyes softened. “I guess I’m upset, Chuck. I suppose you were only doing your job. What is it you want to know?”

“Do you have any idea who burned Willie?”

She shook her head.

“When he was bragging about his big deal, did he mention a finger man?”

“The only name he ever mentioned was Bix. I told you about that.”

“Okay,” Baer said. “I’m through.”

But the blonde was not. “Do you make much of a living as a private detective, Chuck?” she asked thoughtfully.

“I told you I eat.”

“I’m not really mad at you. I’m out of a job, out of money, and out of a boy friend. If that makes me sound like a gold-digger, I’m not. I don’t take men. I just want to be sure my next has enough so he won’t try to take me. Can we make up?”

“The pleasure,” Baer said, “would be all mine.”

She smiled at him. “Call me soon, Chuckie,” she said softly, and walked away.

Corrigan waited until the girl was out of earshot.

“Chuckie,” Corrigan said gravely. “What does she call you in private—Chuckie-Wuckie?”

The redhead glanced up and down the corridor.

“Remember what happened to Emmit?” he said. “You call me that in public, old buddy, and I’ll find a solid oak door to toss you through.”

“All right, Chuckie-Wuckie.”

“The trouble with you,” said Baer, “your tongue is hanging out. Just because I’ve got it made with that gorgeous hunk of female beef.”

Corrigan caught up with him at the end of the corridor. Corrigan was still laughing.

“Truce,” he said. “For a steak dinner I’ll forget it.”

Baer examined him. “Blackmailer! All right, but wait till I get something on you. When?”

“When the case is cracked. You’ll be collecting two fees, so you can afford it.”

“Deal,” Baer said. “You can even pick the place.”

They parted on the hospital steps, Baer to cab back to his office, Corrigan to drive to headquarters.

There was a note on Corrigan’s desk that Special Agent Toomey had phoned. He called the FBI man.

“Oh, yes, Captain,” Toomey said. “How’s the Akhoond case coming?”

Corrigan told him of the arrest of Bix Maddox, the death of Willie Evers, and Maddox’s artificial ruby.

“With Willie dead, we may have trouble tying Bix in unless we can prove the imitation was what Willie actually stole,” he said. “Things aren’t as sweet as they sound.”

“It’s still good progress,” the special agent said. “But what you have so far isn’t going to get the State Department off the hook. Are you any closer to the finger man?”

“Not really,” Corrigan grunted. “We still have three prime suspects. I received a report from L.A. today that one of them was once a suspect in a jewel robbery, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. With Willie dead and Maddox refusing to talk, we may never be able to pinpoint the finger man. Bix may not even know who he was. His dealings were probably only through Willie, and Willie may never have told him. What did you call me about, Toomey?”

“I’ve had a report from the CIA.”

“Anything interesting?”

“I’m afraid not. No evidence of a revolutionary faction in Morojaca which might have wanted to blow up the Sultan. As a matter of fact, Abdul seems to have been revered by the people and well liked by the aristocrats. His eldest son takes over the throne as Abdul VII. Apparently he’s a chip off the old block. He’s as highly regarded in Morojaca as his old man was.”

Corrigan was silent. Then he said, “The CIA didn’t pick up any rumors that Omar was in the running for the throne, too?”

“Who?”

“Omar, Abdul VI’s second son. My information, from a source close to the Sultan, is that Abdul VII is a playboy. The Sultan is said to have threatened to disinherit him and put Omar next in line for the succession if the younger Abdul didn’t straighten out.”

“I don’t know where you got that, Captain. The CIA evaluation of Abdul VII is that he’s the serious, scholarly type. He has only three wives, which is practically celibacy in Morojaca. He has a master’s from Oxford and several graduate degrees from European universities. At the time of his father’s death he was in New Delhi doing research on Oriental philosophy. He’s writing a book on it.”

Corrigan was silent again. Finally he said, “I guess my source isn’t very reliable. Thanks, Toomey.”

Corrigan hung up and composed an overseas cable to the central office of Interpol. Then he buzzed the Communications Center and dictated what he had written.

There was nothing to do now but wait for a reply.

24.

The cable from Interpol arrived the following afternoon. Corrigan immediately phoned Chuck Baer.

“I have the last piece, Chuck. I know who the finger man was.”

“Who?” Baer asked eagerly.

“It’s a complicated story which I don’t want to have to repeat half a dozen times. Let’s get everybody concerned together, and I’ll only have to explain it once.”

“Who’s everybody?”

“You call your two clients, and I’ll contact the rest. We’ll meet in the Grand Suite.”

“All right,” Baer said. “But why are you making a production out of it? Why don’t you just arrest him?”

“I said I knew who he was, not that I could prove it. I’m hoping that if I drop the bomb in his lap in a roomful of people, there’ll be some reaction. Maybe he’ll make a break or confess. If he does make a break, incidentally, we’ll let him. I don’t want you beating him to the draw, because I have other plans. Understand, Chuck?”

“You’re the director,” Baer growled. “It’s almost three now. I’ll have Dubois and Ranjit at the Grand Suite in an hour.”

Corrigan broke the connection, called the Hotel D’Autremont, and asked for Haidar Ghafur. The royal secretary was not in his room, and Corrigan had him paged. He was located in the coffee shop.

When Haidar got on the phone, Corrigan said, “I’m arranging a conference in the Grand Suite for four o’clock. I wonder if you’d mind notifying some of those who live at the hotel.”

“Of course not, Captain. Whom do you want?”

“I’ve already arranged for Baer to contact Ranjit Aziz and the representative of the company which insured the Akhoond. I also want you, Sam Terry, and Salome to be present.”

“Salome?” Haidar said; he sounded amused. “It was my understanding that you had learned her real name.”

“All right, Gladys Quinn.”

“I’ll see that they’re present. Captain, what is this about?”

“I’d rather explain it to everyone at once.”

“Very well. I shall see you at four.”

Corrigan timed his arrival at the Grand Suite so that he was ten minutes late. He posted two uniformed men at the door and gave them explicit instructions. Then he went in.

He found them all assembled, waiting for him. Chuck Baer had already introduced DuBois to the people the Frenchman had not previously met—the insurance man, seated on a sofa between them, was amiably conversing with Terry and Gladys Quinn.

Apparently the girl had decided that there was no point in carrying on her masquerade. She wore a tight red dress with the prevailing short skirt, nylon stockings, and high heels. Her hair was still dyed black, but she had done it up in the current fashion, and she had abandoned the silver disk she had been wearing on her forehead.

Both she and Terry had highballs in their hands. The Frenchman sipped a cognac.

Gladys Quinn withered Corrigan with a glance. Terry glowered at him. The girl wasn’t going to forgive him for that bedroom scene, Corrigan thought, and the press agent hadn’t forgotten how he had been flipped on his back.

The sofa on which the trio sat faced the bar. Orkhim was behind the bar, and Ali Singh stood before it, ready to serve. Haidar Ghafur and Ranjit Aziz occupied easy chairs at right angles to the sofa, also facing the bar. The Ambassador was sipping what looked like ginger ale. Haidar was without a glass.

Chuck Baer was leaning against the bar. He was not drinking, either. He came forward immediately and introduced DuBois, whom Corrigan had never met. The two men shook hands, and Corrigan took up a position before the bar beside Baer.

There was an expectant silence.

“I’ve called this meeting to wind up the case,” Corrigan began. “As you all must know by now from the papers, the man who actually stole what he thought was the Akhoond, Willie Evers, is dead. We’ve known from the beginning that Evers had inside help, and we know this accomplice is the one who murdered him.”

Haidar asked, “How did you learn that, Captain Corrigan?”

“I’ll get to it in its proper place. The motive for this crime is what threw us. It seemed likely that at least part of the motive was the assassination of the Sultan, because otherwise some less lethal diversion for the theft than a bomb would have been used. We also assumed that financial gain was involved. However, we now know that the finger man was quite aware that the ruby supposed to be the Akhoond was an almost worthless imitation.”

“Do you mean, Captain,” demanded DuBois, “that the Société d’Assurance Internationale has all along been insuring an artificial ruby?”

“Not all along, just for the past two or three years, Mr. DuBois. I sent a cablegram to Interpol yesterday. For the benefit of those of you who may not know, Interpol is an international police agency which acts as a clearing center for criminal investigations that cross national boundaries. I asked for any information Interpol might have about a possible previous theft of the Akhoond. Here is the reply I got, less than two hours ago.”

He took a cablegram from his pocket and read its text aloud:

“Re your inquiry, rumors came to our attention that Maharaja of Japata came into illegal possession of Akhoond January 1964. Subject known as fanatical jewel collector, suspected receiver several other famous stolen gems. Discreet inquiry of Abdul VI of Morojaca elicited reply Akhoond still in his possession. No further action taken.”

As Corrigan put the cablegram back in his pocket, DuBois said, “I do not understand.”

“It’s quite simple,” Corrigan said. “Some time prior to January, 1964, our finger man substituted an artificial copy for the Akhoond and peddled the genuine stone to the Maharaja of Japata. What he got for the Akhoond is probably deposited in a numbered Swiss bank account. It must have seemed a safe substitution to the thief. The imitation was actually corundum, identical in color and cut with the Akhoond. Even a jewel expert couldn’t tell it was an artificial ruby without examining it under magnification. And since whenever it was on public display it was in a locked display case, it was highly unlikely the substitution would ever be discovered. Unfortunately for our finger man, the Sultan decided to bring the Akhoond with him to the States. Even more unfortunately, a crystallographer from an American museum arranged through the Morojacan Embassy for a private examination of the ruby. Our finger man knew that if the expert ever got a good look at the fake, he was through. So he arranged for it to be stolen before the expert could see it.”

Corrigan glanced around deliberately. He could see no change on any face.

Sam Terry said, “Why did he have to kill the Sultan?”

“That stumped me,” Corrigan confessed. “But look at it this way. He was in partnership with a professional criminal. What was likely to be Willie Evers’s reaction when he found out that, instead of a ruby he could fence for seventy-five thousand dollars, he had risked a prison term for a fake worth practically nothing?”

The press agent nodded slowly. “I guess he’d be sore enough to get tough.”

“Yes. At the very least, Willie would demand a payoff, threatening to expose the finger man to the Sultan if he didn’t get it. At worst, Willie might decide in revenge to call the Sultan anonymously, telling him the Akhoond was a fake and naming his accomplice. This would have started the Sultan thinking about the mysterious inquiry he had received from Interpol a few years back. Abdul VI was no fool. It wouldn’t have taken him long to figure out what had happened. He might never have been able to prove it, but Morojaca is an absolute monarchy. If his suspicions became strong enough, he could have had the culprit’s head.” He glanced from Ranjit Aziz to Haidar Ghafur. “Right, gentlemen?”

The stocky Ambassador licked his lips. Haidar said slowly, “His Highness was a compassionate man. But it is true that he might have ordered a death sentence for the violator of such a trust.”

Corrigan smiled. “I think the finger man was sure of it. His solution probably wouldn’t have occurred to an American criminal, but if the Morojacans present will pardon me, the Arab mind works differently from the Western. The finger man was close to the Sultan and, I believe, quite fond of him. But he was in a real bind. He finally concluded that the only way to make sure Abdul wouldn’t receive the damning information about him was to kill his sovereign. At the same time, Willie Evers, who had thought he was involving Himself only in a theft, would find himself wanted for murder. I suspect our finger man hoped this would frighten Willie into running for cover. It did frighten him, but not enough. Willie phoned the finger man for money to finance his getaway. Our finger man decided to remove all risk to himself by disposing of Willie. He promised to bring him money, but instead paid off with a bullet.”

“You can sure talk,” Gladys Quinn snapped. “Who is this finger man, anyway?”

“We narrowed it down to three possibilities almost from the beginning,” Corrigan told her. “It jumped to four when I learned you weren’t really the Sultana Salome. But now we can eliminate you and Terry, Miss Quinn. Neither of you knew the Sultan at the time the Akhoond originally disappeared.”

The girl tossed her head. The press agent took out a handkerchief and wiped his forehead.

“That narrows it down to you, Haidar, and you, Ranjit,” Corrigan said conversationally. “Both of you had the run of the palace, and either of you could have had access to the Akhoond.”

The two Morojacans glowered at him.

“It was not I,” said Haidar quickly.

“It was not I,” said Ranjit Aziz, only a breath behind.

Corrigan ignored them. “The finger man made two mistakes,” he said. “Early in the investigation I suggested that the Sultan’s death might have been a political assassination. The finger man jumped at this chance to put me on the wrong track. He made up a cock-and-bull story about Abdul VII’s being a playboy, and that the Sultan had threatened to disinherit him in favor of the second son, Omar, if the eldest son didn’t mend his ways.”

The turbaned Ambassador stared at Corrigan in astonishment. “I never made any such ridiculous statement, Captain Corrigan!”

“You certainly did not, sir,” Corrigan said, and he turned his one eye on the bearded royal secretary.

Haidar Ghafur’s nostrils flared, the only sign that he might be concerned. He said calmly, as if they were talking of someone else, “You mentioned two mistakes, Captain Corrigan. What was the second?”

“Not making sure Willie Evers was dead. Haven’t you read the papers? Evers lived for two and a half hours before he died. He named you as his killer.”

Corrigan had carefully worked up to this statement; everything depended on it. With Willie Evers dead, there was not a single piece of legal evidence against Haidar.

He waited, smiling. Beside him, Baer got ready; Corrigan could feel it.

Haidar casually rose. He, too, was smiling. His hand went to his pocket like a snake.

Corrigan grabbed Baer’s arm; with Baer you could never tell. Haidar’s hand streaked out of the pocket with a gun. His eyes on Corrigan and Baer, nostrils dilated, he. began to back toward the door of the suite … and the two officers on guard outside.

But in the end what balked Corrigan and provided the unexpected denouement reached back to Morojaca and a tribal loyalty.

Haidar Ghafur groped behind him for the doorknob, and two explosions erupted so close to each other that they sounded like one. The bearded man slammed back against the door, gun falling out of his hand. A red fountain came out of the middle of his forehead, just above his eyes, and another spurted from his chest, just above his heart.

He slid to the floor and sat there, dead before he hit it.

Corrigan whirled around.

Ali Singh and Orkhim each held a smoking Luger.

The Sultan’s guards had avenged their monarch’s death.

All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 1966 by Ellery Queen

Copyright renewed by Ellery Queen

Cover design by Kat Lee

ISBN: 978-1-5040-1996-5

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