Silent Are the Dead (2 page)

“Nothing on Stanford Endicott, of course. That would be too much to expect.” Blaine sat up. “Unfortunately, I'm afraid our competitors will all carry pictures of Mr. Endicott in the morning. Don't you think we should have one too? If it's not too much trouble? Now? Today?”

Blaine hesitated, though he knew there would be no answer. He cocked an eye at Wade, who had cleaned up and now looked fairly presentable. “I won't bother you about it,” he continued. “I've got another assignment for you.” He glanced at a slip of paper on his desk. “The West Roxbury Little Theater Group is putting on a play tonight. That should be right up your alley.”

Wade opened his mouth, closed it with an effort. Blaine turned to Casey. “I still want a picture of Endicott,” he said. “Sometime before morning, if you don't mind— If you don't think you can handle it, I'll send Austin and O'Hearn with you.”

At the elevators they split, Wade deciding to go out for his dinner and Casey continuing down the stairs to the studio. He was still muttering when he entered, and he was so intent on his corrosive thoughts of Blaine that he reached the center of the room before he saw the girl.

She was sitting on a battered straight-backed chair along one wall, her feet flat on the floor, her hands in her lap, and a look of determination on her young face. She wore a loose-fitting suit of brown tweed and a felt hat cocked pertly on one side, and Casey got a quick impression of feminine attractiveness before he had a chance to notice all the details which contributed to the picture.

“Oh, hello,” he said for the want of something better, good-looking young women being as scarce in the studio as pearls in restaurant oysters. “Looking for someone?”

“How do you do,” she said. “Does a Mr. Austin work here?”

“Perry Austin? Yes.”

You—you re not—

“Un-uh,” Casey said. “He isn't in.”

“Oh.” He took her moment of indecision to note the fine-boned face, the hazel eyes, the chestnut hair with auburn lights in it; he saw too that her mouth was still somewhat tight and determined, and he decided she would be a lot prettier if only she would smile. “You don't know when he'll be back?” she added finally.

Casey said he didn't. It might be any time, and was there anything he could do?

“I'm afraid not.” She rose, smoothing out her suit, and her mouth relaxed a little. “Thank you just the same.”

He watched her move to the door, suggesting tentatively, “You wouldn't want to leave your name?”

“I don't believe so,” she said. “Perhaps I can see him later.”

It was after 8:00 when Casey got back to the studio. His earlier attempts to get in touch with Endicott had failed, so he had declared a truce while he went down the street and put away three old-fashioneds and a steak. Now, coming through the doorway to resume his pursuit of the lawyer, he saw Perry Austin sitting at his desk manicuring his fingernails. Casey sat down and reached for the telephone.

“There was a dame looking for you,” he said.

Austin glanced up. “What kind of a dame?”

“How do I know? I don't run around with dames— much.”

“Well, what did she look like?”

“Offhand,” Casey said, grinning, “I'd say she looked a little too good for you.” And he went on to describe the girl as best he could.

Austin could not seem to identify her. “Damned if I know who she is,” he said, frowning. “Funny she didn't want to leave her name— She didn't say what she wanted?”

Casey answered absently as he got busy on the telephone again, and after a few minutes he located Stanford Endicott, the houseboy at his apartment informing him that the lawyer had gone to his office.

“I thought you covered him this afternoon,” Austin said as the big photographer hung up.

“I did,” Casey said, and, in no mood to explain, added, “I have to get some more.”

Austin went back to his fingernails and Casey studied him a moment before reaching for his plate case. A symmetrically slender and regular-featured fellow in his late twenties, Austin had been dubbed the fashion plate of the
Express
because of his liking for society and night-club assignments and his penchant for sartorial splendor. He had come from somewhere in the West two years ago, and although Casey had never been particularly friendly with him, he recognized him as a competent man with a camera in spite of the wave in his hair and the small clipped mustache that did not entirely hide the suggestion of weakness about the mouth. Right now he was especially resplendent in a double-breasted dinner jacket, and as he lounged behind his desk he seemed out of place in the studio.

“What're you on?” Casey asked.

“I'm going down to the Club Berkely. They're having the finals in that ‘Most Popular Model Contest.'”

“How's chances for a lift?”

“Now?”

Austin put away his nail file and shrugged. “All right,” he said finally. “I'm a little early but—”

Casey put some extra flash bulbs and fresh film holders in his case, slipped into his balmacaan. He watched Austin shift the red carnation from the dinner jacket to the buttonhole of his Chesterfield.

“Sometimes,” he said dryly, “I wonder if you aren't wasting your time.”

“How?” Austin frowned.

“Instead of takin' pictures maybe you ought to pose for 'em.”

“Just because a fellow's a photographer—” Austin began.

“Is no sign he can't be smartly dressed,” Casey finished. “You told me that before— Well, let's get started.”

The building where Stanford Endicott had his offices was a small but neatly modern structure in beige brick and limestone, one of the growing row that had forced the neighboring ancient red-brick fronts to masquerade with false façades in a desperate attempt to recapture some semblance of smartness.

Austin parked his coupé beyond the entrance and as Casey was opening the door, he saw the man come through the arched doorway. The light from the foyer was behind him and Casey did not see the face until the fellow passed the window of a dress shop next door. By that time Casey was on the sidewalk, and as he stood there the man glanced over his shoulder. For just an instant their eyes met; then the fellow had disappeared in the shadows and Casey knew who he was: Nat Garrison, a onetime welterweight who had been sent to Charlestown some years previous for assault with a dangerous weapon.

So he's out,
Casey thought, and as Austin came round the car, he tried to think back, to recall whether Endicott had been the lawyer who defended Garrison, or whether Endicott had at that time been the prosecutor.

“I might as well go up as wait out here,” Austin said.

Casey said he might as well and they went along the foyer to the single automatic elevator. “Of course we're liable to get thrown out,” he added. “I haven't got an appointment, you know.”

“I'd rather get thrown out with you than anybody I know,” Austin said, and pushed the button marked 3. “Remember that Bund meeting?”

“Yeah,” Casey said, and thinking about it helped to re-establish Austin in his estimation. The guy was a smoothy and went for the night life and soft assignments, but when the chips were down he could handle himself. They'd both got their lumps at that Bund meeting, but they were battling back to back at the finish. “We had fun that day, huh?”

There were six doors opening on the third-floor hall and the three that made up the left-hand side were given over to Stanford Endicott, the rear two being of plain wood and the first bearing a frosted-glass panel which said,
Stanford Endicott-
—
Enter Here.

Casey found this door unlocked. He opened it and went in. There was no direct light here, but he saw it was a large room and sufficient illumination came through the glass panel of the connecting door to make the layout discernible. There was a railed-in space to make a waiting-room of sorts, a settee, and some chairs; the balance of the floor was given over to desks and chairs and typewriters and filing cabinets.

Austin shut the door. Casey pushed past the gate ill the rail, crossed to the glass-paneled door and opened it. He took one more step; then stopped short, still holding to the knob, feeling Austin bump against his back, but not moving.

This room was smaller than the first, but not small. There were two room-high windows at one side, a leather divan, two leather chairs to match, a massive and expensive-looking desk in one corner, behind which was a high-backed chair that probably cost as much as the desk. The pile in the over-all, sand-colored rug was long enough to trip over, and almost in the center of it was Stanford Endicott.

He was on his back, one arm outflung, his knees straight and ankles crossed, as though he had done it on purpose. Casey didn't think he had; Casey thought he was dead.

Behind him Perry Austin made a quick, sucking sound and began to curse with a curious, hushed intensity that seemed, in all that stillness, shockingly loud. When he tried to crowd past, Casey moved out of the way, stepping quickly to the lawyer's side, seeing then the slowly widening puddle of blood inching from under the back of the coat. He dropped to one knee and picked up a limp wrist.

It was warm, as warm as life itself. But there was no pulse. He didn't put his hand inside the vest to feel for a heart beat because just about where the heart should be were two tiny frayed holes in the gray fabric. Austin spoke softly behind him.

“Dead?”

“Very dead,” said Casey, his face somber.

Chapter Three:
CLOSE-UP OF A CORPSE

F
OR A LONG MINUTE
Casey and Austin stared silently at the inert figure. The long, plain-looking face was heavy in death, and Casey found himself thinking about how Endicott had looked that afternoon coming out of the courtroom. He could, in imagination, see the smiling, confident face again, hear the booming voice. He found himself looking at the bald streak which was no longer pink, but white and shiny and naked.

“You're going to get a picture all right,” Austin said. “But not the one Blaine figured on.”

“Yeah.” Casey opened the camera and reached for a flash bulb.

“He hasn't been dead long either.”

“Minutes. He's still warm.” And as Casey screwed the flash bulb in the synchronized holder he thought again of Nat Garrison. How long ago had he seen him come out on the sidewalk? Three minutes? Four? No longer. Then Garrison was the killer. Either that or—

It was then that Casey heard the faint metallic sound. He looked at Austin, thinking he had made it, and saw Austin look at him with round, surprised eyes and knew he hadn't. He knew, too, that the sound had not come from this room, but from the one beyond.

He glanced at the connecting door and what he did then was the result of one of those spur-of-the-moment decisions that showed better than anything else could why Casey was rated the best camera in town. He didn't stop to worry about what might happen to him then; he wasn't even sure just what he was going to do; all he knew was that the noise he heard sounded peculiarly like a door closing. Someone had been in that other room. If that someone was the killer, if he was sneaking out—

Austin stood motionless, looking first at Casey and then at the door. Casey put his finger to his lips and stepped quickly past him. “Keep talking,” he whispered, and with the tension winding up inside him, crossed swiftly to the door and palmed it.

“Maybe it's lucky for us we didn't come up here sooner,” Austin said loudly.

He said other things but Casey didn't hear him as he twisted the knob silently and pushed on the door. Light followed him in, disclosing another room that seemed more sumptuous than the one he had just left. There were three doors here and Casey moved to the one giving on the hall, opening it as quietly as he could.

A growing stiffness slid along his joints as he peered out; then, still hearing vaguely Austin's continuing monologue, he stepped into the hall. The elevator stood as they had left it, flooding light into the corridor. At his elbow the rear stairs wound narrowly down into darkness. He tiptoed to the stair well and listened.

He heard it then, the soft, hurried tapping. Below him. Growing rapidly less distinct, telling him he could not delay. He slipped off his oxfords, tucked them into his coat pockets, and started down, his stockinged feet making no sound as they sped over the stairs.

At the second-floor landing he paused to listen. There was no longer any tapping sound; for an instant there was no sound at all. Then a cold breeze spiraled up the stairs and slid along his ankles, and even as he felt it, he heard the solid click of a heavy door closing.

Casey ran the rest of the way. He groped in the darkness for the doorknob, found it, pushed against the steel door, and stepped outside. The door had a patent closing-device and he caught it just in time, a little angry that he should be so careless. He eased it shut and then, thinking of what might have happened, felt his first thrust of fear. Suddenly, with the blackness of the night all about him, he was cold and wondered about it until he realized he was sweating, that his nerves were tight and jumpy. It was so damned dark. He didn't know which way to turn and waited, breathless, half expecting a gun to start blazing at him.

When he heard no sound but the pounding of his heart, he stepped out, feeling the cobblestones under his feet, looking first one way and then the other until, presently, the street light at one end of the alley made an abrupt silhouette of some moving figure.

Instantly he felt all right again, and started along the alley, his confidence regained. The silhouette had become an overcoated figure now, a slightly bent and hurrying figure that moved out on the sidewalk and turned diagonally left. Not knowing yet whether it was a man or a woman, he loped after it.

He was still in the alley when he heard a car door slam. He was nearly to the sidewalk when he heard the motor start and he reached the street just as a small sedan angled swiftly from the curb diagonally across from him. After that he did not think but acted automatically, throwing his camera to his shoulder, seeing tile blue-white explosion of light as the flash bulb went off, catching a fleeting glimpse of the driver's face as he turned to look back; that was all, for the car, moving swiftly and with lights out, had disappeared around the corner.