American Gun Mystery (9 page)

“Really?” said Ellery unexpectedly.

Grant’s eyes were glowing with a joyful light. “I tell you,” he cried, “there ain’t a pea-shooter in my armory, Inspector! An’ not a boy or girl in my show totes one!”

“Pea-shooters, hey?” said the Inspector genially.

“That’s what they are—pea-shooters!”

“But,” continued the Inspector in a dry voice, “because your people don’t carry .22’s, Mr. Grant, as a usual thing, doesn’t say that one of ’em didn’t carry a .22 tonight. Wasn’t usual at all, tonight’s business. No, sir. Besides, you know as well as I do that there are a number of big models that use .22 ammunition.” He shook his head sadly. “And then the Lord knows how easy it is to buy a rod these days. No, Mr. Grant, I’m afraid we can’t clear the slate of your bunch just on
that
account. …That’s all, Dr. Hancock?”

“That’s all,” replied the physician in a small voice.

“Thanks. My own man, Doc Prouty, will be here soon. I don’t think we’ll need you any more, Dr. Hancock. Suppose you join that crew of—of. …Geronimo, is this New York or isn’t it?—of cowboys over there!”

Dr. Hancock humbly retreated, clutching his little bag, the earnest light still in his eyes.

The body, being cold and rapidly stiffening clay, was left where it was, to the mercy of twenty thousand pairs of resentful eyes. Of Tony Mars, standing by in utter quietude, masticating a cigar so shredded and pulpy that little bits of it stuck brownly and wetly to his thin lips, the Inspector demanded information.

“Where the devil can we go for a heart-to-heart talk, Tony? Time’s come to ask some questions, and I don’t feel like doing it in front of half the population of Brooklyn and Manhattan. Where’s the nearest cubbyhole?”

“I’ll show you,” said Mars tightly, and began to march off.

“Just a minute. Thomas! Where’s Thomas?”

Sergeant Velie, who had the uncanny faculty of seeming to be in two places at the same time, materialized at the Inspector’s side.

“Come along, Thomas. You guerrillas,” snapped the Inspector to his five stalwarts, “you stick around here. Mr. Grant, you join us. Piggott, get that angel-haired cowboy—Curly Grant—and Miss Horne from among that gang over there.”

Mars led the way to one of the small exits on the south wall of the oval; the Inspector clucked something, and the detective on duty opened the door. They emerged into a vast underground chamber with tiny rooms branching off, and it was to one of these that Mars went, the group at his heels. It proved to be a minor office, perhaps of a watchman or a time-keeper.

“Ellery, shut that door,” growled the Inspector. “Thomas, no one’s to get in here.” He appropriated one of the two chairs in the room, sat down, inhaled snuff, smoothed his neat gray trousers, and waved his hand at Kit Horne, who was clutching the back of a chair. She was not dazed now; some emetic Curly Grant had applied to her shock had brought it out of her; but she was extremely quiet and, it seemed to Ellery, watchful. “Sit down, sit down, Miss Horne,” said the Inspector in a kindly tone. “You must be tired.” She sat down. “Now, Mr. Grant, let’s get together,” went on the old man more crisply. “We’re alone, we’re all friends here, and you can speak your mind. Any suggestions?”

“No savvy,” said Grant tonelessly.

“Any idea who might have killed your friend?”

“No. Buck—” his voice trembled, “Buck was just a big kid, Inspect’r. Best-natured critter you ever saw. Didn’t have an enemy in the world, I’ll swear. Ev’ry-body knew him liked him—loved him.”

“How about Woody?” said Kit Horne in a low, dangerous tone. Her eyes remained unwaveringly on Grant’s florid face.

Something troubled came into the showman’s eyes. “Oh, Woody,” he said. “He—”

“Who’s Woody?” demanded the Inspector.

“My reg’lar top-rider. Star of the show until—until Buck joined the outfit, Inspect’r.”

“Jealousy, eh?” said the Inspector with a sparkle in his eye, as he glanced slyly at Kit. “Sorehead, I’ll bet. Well, what’s the story? Must be a story, or Miss Horne wouldn’t have said what she did.”

“Woody,” said Ellery thoughtfully. “That isn’t by an odd chance the chap with one arm?”

“Yeah,” said Grant. “Why?”

“No reason,” murmured Ellery. “I just didn’t know.”

“Well, there’s no story,” replied Grant wearily. “As you say, there might ’a’ been some peeve on Woody’s part, Inspect’r. Maybe some bad feelin’ between him an’ Buck. …Woody’s got only one arm, so he’s made capital of it. Doesn’t hinder him none from ridin’ an’ shootin’, an’ he’s sort o’ proud of himself. When Buck came along. …I tole Woody this was only temp’rary, this business of Buck’s bein’ with the show. Yeah, maybe he resented Buck’s buttin’ in, Inspect’r, but I’d swear he wouldn’t do nothin’ so damn foolish as murder.”

“That remains to be seen. Anybody else got a suggestion? You—the curly lad.”

Curly said in a sort of despair: “Inspector, I wish to God I—we could help you. But this is just—hell, it ain’t human! None of the people in our wickiup could possibly’ve—”

“Hope not, son,” said the Inspector gloomily, in the tone of one who quaffs hope merely to quench despair. “You, Miss Horne?”

“Except for Woody,” she replied stonily, “I don’t know of a living soul who might have desired Buck’s death.”

“That’s hard lines on Woody, Kit,” began old Grant with a frown.

“It will be hard lines on whoever did it, Bill,” said Kit in a conversational tone. They all looked at her quickly; but her eyes stared at the floor. There was an uncomfortable pause.

“S’pose,” said the Inspector, clearing his throat, “s’pose you tell us how Buck Horne came to be with your show, Mr. Grant. We’ve got to start somewhere. What was he doin’ with a circus outfit?”

“Circus outfit?” repeated Grant. “I—Oh. Buck’s been out of the public eye fer nine-ten years. ’Ceptin’ fer a spell maybe three-four years back, when he made one pitcher in a come-back try. Pitcher flopped, an’ he took it passable hard. Went back to ’is ranch in Wyoming.”

“Took it hard?”

Grant cracked his big knuckles. “I tell ya he was heartbroken! He was gettin’ along in years, but he was a stubborn cuss an’ wouldn’t admit he was licked. Then the talkies came in an’ he perked up again. Tole me on one o’ my stopovers at the ranch that he was good as ever—wanted another crack at the movies. I tried to talk ’im out of it, but he says: ‘Bill,’ he says, ‘I’m goin’ loco out here, all alone. Kit, she’s busy in Hollywood. …’ Well, I says: ‘Right, Buck. I’ll pitch in, help much as I can.’ So I helped—helped kill ’im,” said Grant bitterly.

“And this stunt here, at the rodeo, was a build-up?”

“I had to do
somethin’.
”

“You mean there wasn’t much chance?”

Grant cracked his knuckles again. “At first I thought he didn’t stand a show. But this last week—I dunno. He caught on. Papers took ’im up—Grand Ole Man o’ the Movies business; that kind o’ bunk. …”

“I beg your pardon,” said Ellery, “for interrupting, but was this scheme for Horne’s re-entry into motion pictures based on an actual connection with a producer?”

“You mean was it more’n a pipe-dream?” muttered Grant. “Well—No producer—they wouldn’t touch him with a ten-foot pole. But—well, I was goin’ to help put up the ante. We’d form our own comp’ny. …”

“You alone?” demanded the Inspector.

Tony Mars said quietly: “I was considering it, too. And Hunter—Julian Hunter.”

“Oho!” said the Inspector. “Hunter, the night-club bird—this Gay woman’s husband we met tonight. Well, well.” His little eyes twinkled frostily. “And now will somebody please tell me how it happens that Horne’s best friend, and you, Tony, and Hunter were willing to put up the jack for Horne—and yet
his own daughter didn’t put up a cent?
”

Grant swallowed hard, and his face settled into dusty bench lines. Curly made an impatient little gesture, and instantly relaxed. Kit sat very straight had been sitting very straight for long minutes. There were tears in her eyes—not weak tears, but tears of pure rage and chagrin.

“Bill Grant,” she choked, “do you mean to stand there and say there
wasn’t
a producer? Why, you yourself told me—”

The Queens said nothing; the Inspector, having some experience in this business of letting unexpected little dramas play themselves out, watched with bright inquisitiveness.

Grant mumbled: “Kit, Kit, I’m awful sorry. But it wasn’t my fault; it was Buck himself made me say that. He didn’t want yore money risked; said to tell you there was a producer so you wouldn’t insist on puttin’ up the cash. Business proposition, it was to him; plain business. Said if he couldn’t int’rest hard-headed business men in his come-back he’d duck out altogether.”

“You might add, pop,” said Curly suddenly, “that Buck didn’t know
yore
mazuma was in it, either!”

“Here, here,” murmured the Inspector. “Regular fairytale, this is. We’re getting more tangled up every minute. What is this?”

Grant shot a hard look at his son. “You, Curly, keep yore damn mouth shut when yo’re not asked.” Curly blushed and muttered: “Yes, pop.” Grant waved his beefy right hand. “He’s spilled it. All right, Buck didn’t know my dough was in it. Wouldn’t hear of it. Just wanted me to be his manager. We even signed a contract. That’s why I had to go out an’ bluff—make a stab at gettin’ Mars here to come in with us. But on the sly I tole Mars I’d stand the whole business. That’s what I was meanin’ to do from the start, anyway.”

“Do you think Horne suspected your real intention?”

Grant muttered: “Hard to say. He’s always been a hard hombre to fool. These last couple o’ days, he’s acted kind o’ funny. Mebbe he caught on. All his life he shied away from anything that—well, smacked o’ charity, ’specially from his friends.”

Kit rose suddenly and went up to Grant, standing very close. They looked into each other’s eyes, and Kit said simply: “I’m sorry, Bill,” and returned to her chair. Nobody said anything for some time.

“All of which goes to prove,” said Ellery cheerfully in the silence, “that murder is the most effective cathartic for vocal indigestion. Miss Horne, whom will it be necessary to notify of your foster-father’s death?”

She murmured: “No one.”

Ellery’s head shot round, his eyes fastening on Grant. But Grant only nodded, heavily.

“You mean except for yourself he had no family?”

“Not a single living relative, Mr. Queen.”

Ellery frowned. “Well, perhaps you don’t know, Miss Horne. But you must know, Mr. Grant. Is that true?”

“Right as rain. Except fer Kit, Buck was alone in the world. Left an orphan at six—brought up by an uncle who owned the ranch next to my father’s in Wyoming. My ole man an’ Buck’s uncle used the same range fer their stock.” Grant’s voice was agony. “I—I never thought ole Buck’s cashin’ in his checks would get me this way. But hell. …His uncle kicked in, an’ that was the end. Buck was the last of the Homes—one o’ the oldest families in the Northwest.”

During this exposition Mr. Ellery Queen’s features might have been observed changing expression with the lightning facility of a chameleon changing color; why Grant’s explanation should have disturbed him was obscure. But disturbed he was, although after a moment he made an effort and erased all emotion from his face. The Inspector studied him with a faint puzzlement; the old man kept quite still now, content to see what esoteric idea might be buzzing about in his son’s brain, if indeed there was anything to be seen. But Ellery’s shoulders twitched, and a small grin lit on his lips.

“How many riders did you announce as following Horne on that last sad processional of his, Mr. Grant?” he murmured.

The showman started out of a reverie. “Hey? Riders? Forty.”

“But there were forty-one, you know.”

“Forty. I ought to know. I pay ’em.”

At this Inspector Queen’s eyes narrowed. “When you said forty in the arena a while ago,” he snapped, “you were speaking in round numbers, weren’t you?”

Grant flushed darkly. “Round numbers nothin’. What is this? I said forty, an’ I meant forty—not forty-one or thirty-nine or a hundred an’ sixty!”

The Queens regarded each other with sparkling eyes. Then the old man scowled. “You—uh—you couldn’t have made a mistake in counting, could you, son?”

“I was really an excellent mathematician in school,” said Ellery, “and I don’t think the problem of counting to forty-one would have taxed my numerative ability. On the other had,
est giebt Menschen die gar nicht inert) weil sie sich nichts Vemünftiges vorsetzen,
or words to that effect. However, since I’ve always posed as a rational animal. …Suppose we put this little problem to the test.”

He strode toward the door.

“Where you going?” demanded the Inspector, as the others stared.

“Like all martyrs—into the arena.”

“But what the dickens for?”

“To count the noses of the survivors.”

They trooped back, through the little door by which they had entered the subterranean chamber, into the full glare of the
Colosseum’s
tabernacle. There was a distinct quality of weariness in the mass noises now; detectives yawned all about; and the group of cowboys and cowgirls in the arena itself sprawled on the tanbark in varying attitudes of dejection and indifference.

“Now then,” said Ellery briskly as they trotted toward the group, “suppose you count ’em yourself, Mr. Grant. Perhaps
I’m
crazy.”

Grant growled something under his breath and, glaring at his costumed employees, strode about among them counting audibly. Most of them were sitting, heads sunken on their breasts; the old showman walked through a mushroom forest of large soft hats.

Then he came back, and all the amazement and bewilderment and pain which had struggled for mastery in his features since Buck Horne had crashed dead to the floor of the arena had vanished. His formidable jaw waved below grim lips like a banner. “I’ll be a double-distilled son of a horse-whippin’ so-an’-so if there ain’t forty-one, the way Mr. Queen said!” he bellowed to the Inspector.

“You count that ugly little runt, Boone?” asked the old man quickly.

“Dan’l? No. He wasn’t among ’em. There’s forty-one without Dan’l.” Brown faces had lifted now; they were staring at him curiously. He whirled about, and somehow without theatricalism his right arm perched on his right hip, holding his coat back and displaying his empty holster; he seemed himself to realize that the holster was empty, for he dropped his arm on the instant, scowling. Then he roared: “You mangy waddies! The gals too! Up on yer hin’ legs an’ let me get a good look at yore ugly maps!”