The Collection (107 page)

"There's a window in that other room," I said.
"Is it locked?"

"Yes," he answered. "He can't get in there
without breaking that window. Okay, turn out that light and sit tight."

I heard him move across the room to another corner. His
flashlight played briefly first on the door to the hallway, then swept across
to the window. Then it went out.

"Wouldn't the advantage be with us if we kept the
light on?" I asked.

"No. Listen, if he busts in the window, when you aim
your flash at it, hold it out from your body, out over the arm of your chair.
So if he shoots at the flash, he won't hit you. Our two lights should blind
him. We should be able to see him, but he shouldn't be able to see us."

"Okay," I said.

I don't know how many minutes went by. Then there was a
soft tapping at the window. I tensed in my chair and aimed the flashlight at
the window without turning it on.

The tapping came again. An irregular series:
tap--
tap--tap--tap.

"That's Wheeler," Jack whispered. "It's the
code tap. Cole couldn't possibly know it. Sit tight."

I could hear him moving across the room in the darkness. I
could see the streak of grayness as he cautiously lifted one side of the shade,
then peered through the crack between shade and window. As quietly as he could,
he raised up the shade and unlocked and raised the window.

It was turning slightly gray outside, and a little light
came from the street lamp a quarter of a block away. I could recognize the big
body of Wheeler coming through the window. Wheeler, and not Alister Cole.

I began breathing again. I got up out of the chair and went
over to them. Wheeler was whispering.

". . . So don't put down the windows," he was
saying. "I'll come in that way again."

"I'll
leave it up to Brian," Jack whispered back. "If he wants to take that
chance. Meanwhile, you watch that window."

He pulled me to one side then, away from the open window.
"Listen," he said. "Wheeler saw somebody moving in back. He'd
moved his car where he could watch part of the back yard. He got there in time
to see a window going down. Alister Cole's inside the building. Wheeler's got
an idea now, only it's got a risk to it. I'll leave it up to you. If you don't
like it, he'll go out again and get help, and we'll sit tight here, as we were
until help comes."

"What's the idea?" I asked. If it wasn't too
risky, I'd like it better than another vigil while Wheeler went for help.

"Wheeler," Jack said, "thinks he should walk
right out of the door into the hall and out the front door. He thinks Cole will
hear that, and will think I'm leaving you. Wheeler will circle around the house
and come in the window again. Cole should figure you're here alone and come in
that hallway door--and both Wheeler and I will be here to take him. You won't
be taking any risk unless by some chance he gets both of us. That isn't likely.
We're two to one, and we'll be ready for him"

I whispered back that it sounded good to me. He gripped my
arm.

"Go back to your chair then. That's as good a place as
any."

Groping my way back to the chair, I heard Jack and Wheeler
whispering as they went toward the hallway door. They were leaving the window open
and, since it was momentarily unguarded, I kept my eyes on it, ready to yell a
warning if a figure appeared there. But none did.

The hallway door opened and closed quickly, letting a momentary
shaft of light into the room. I heard Jack back away from the door and
Wheeler's footsteps going along the hallway. I heard the front door open and
close, Wheeler's steps cross the porch.

A moment later, there was the soft
tap--tap-tap--tap
on
the upper pane of the open window, and then Wheeler's bulk came through it.

Very, very quietly, he closed the window and locked it. He
pulled down the shade. Then I heard the shuffle of his footsteps as he moved
into position to the right of the door.

I haven't any idea how long we waited after that. Probably
five or ten minutes--but it seemed like hours. Then I heard, or thought I
heard, the very faintest imaginable sound. It might have been the scrape of
shoes on the carpet of the hall outside the door. But there wasn't any doubt
about the next sound. It was the soft turning of the knob of the door. It
turned and held. The door pushed open a crack, then a few inches. Light
streamed over a slowly widening area.

Then one thing Jack hadn't counted on happened. A hand
reached in, between the door and the jamb, and flicked on the light switch.
Dazzling light from the bulks in the ceiling almost blinded me. And it was in
that blinding second that the door swung back wide and Alister Cole, knife in
one hand and single-shot target pistol in the other, stood in the doorway. His
eyes flashed around the room, taking in all three of us. But then his eyes
centered on me and the target pistol lifted.

Jack stepped in from the side and a blackjack was in his upraised
hand. It swung down and there was a sound like someone makes thumping a melon.
He and Wheeler caught Alister Cole, one from each side, and eased his way down
to the carpet.

Wheeler bent over him and got the gun and the knife first,
then held his hand over Cole's heart.

"He'll be all right," he said.

He took a pair of handcuffs from his hip pocket, rolled
Cole over and cuffed his hands together behind him. Then he straightened,
picking up the gun he'd put down on the carpet while he worked on Cole.

I'd stood up, my knees still shaking a little. My forehead
felt as though it was beaded with cold sweat. The flashlight was gripped so
tightly in my right hand that my fingers ached.

I caught sight of Beautiful, again on the mantel, and she
was standing up, her tail bushy and straight up, her fur back of the ears and along
the back standing up in a ridge, her blue eyes blazing. "It's all right,
Beautiful," I said to her soothingly. "All the excitement's over, and
everything's--"

I was walking toward the mantel, raising my hand to pet
her, when Wheeler's excited voice stopped me.

"Watch out," he yelled. "That cat's going to
jump --"

And I saw the muzzle of his gun raising and pointing at the
Siamese cat.

My right hand swung up with the flashlight and I leaped at
Wheeler. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Jack stepping in as Wheeler ducked
back. The corner of my eye caught the swing of his blackjack. . . .

The overhead light was bright in my eyes when I opened
them. I was lying flat on the bed and the first thing I saw was Beautiful, curled
up on my chest looking at me. She was all right now, her fur sleek and her
curled tail back to normal. Whatever else had happened, she was all right.

I turned my head, and it hurt to turn it, but I saw that
Jack was sitting beside the bed. The door was closed and Wheeler and Cole were
gone.

"What happened?" I asked.

"You tried to kill Wheeler," Jack said. There was
something peculiar about his voice, but his eyes met mine levelly.

"Don't be silly," I said. "I was going to
knock his arm down before he could shoot. He was crazy. He must have a phobia
against cats."

Jack shook his head. "You were going to kill
him," he said. "You were going to kill him whether he shot or
not."

"Don't be silly." I tried to move my hands and
found they were fastened behind me. I looked at Jack angrily. "What's
wrong with you?"

"Not with me, Brian," he said. "With you. I
know--now--that it was really you who killed Dr. Roth tonight. Yes, I know
you've got an alibi. But you did it just the same. You used Alister Cole as
your instrument. My guess would be waking hypnosis."

"I suppose I got him to try to kill me, too!" I
said.

"You told him he'd shoot
over your head,
and
then run away. It was a compulsion so strong he tried it again tonight, even
after he saw Wheeler and me ready to slug him if he tried. And he was aiming
high again. How long have you been working on him?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"You do, Brian. You don't know it all, but you know
this part of it. You found out that Cole had schizophrenic tendencies. You
found out, probably while playing chess with him, that you could put him under
waking hypnosis without his knowing it. And you worked on him. What kind of a
fantasy did you build in him? What kind of a conspiracy, did you plant in his
mind, Dr. Roth was leading against him?"

"You're crazy."

"No,
you
are, Brian. Crazy, but clever. And you
know that what I've just told you just now is right. You also know I'll never
be able to prove it. I admit that. But there's something else you don't know. I
don't have to prove it."

For the first time I felt a touch of fear. "What do
you mean?" I asked.

"You gave Cole his fantasies, but you don't know your
own. You don't know that--under the pressure, possibly, of working too hard and
studying too hard--your own mind cracked. You don't know that your
million-dollar rat-killer is
your
fantasy. You don't believe me, now
that I'm telling you that it is a fantasy. You'll never believe it. The
paranoiac builds up an air-tight system of excuses and rationalization to support
his insane delusions. You'll never believe me."

I tried to sit up and couldn't. I realized then that it
wasn't a matter of my arms being tied. Jack had put the strait jacket on me.
"You're part of it, then," I said. "You're one of those in the
plot against me."

"Sure, sure. You know, Brian. I can guess what started
it. Or rather what set it off, probably only a few days ago. It was when Dr.
Roth killed your cat. That dream you told me about tonight-- the cat killing
Dr. Roth. Your mind wouldn't accept the truth. Even your subconscious mind
reversed the facts for the dream. I wonder what really happened. Possibly your
cat killed a rat that was an important part of an experiment and, in anger, Dr.
Roth--"

"You're crazy," I shouted. "Crazy!"

"And ever since, Brian, you've been talking to a cat
that wasn't there. I thought you were kidding, at first. When I figured out the
truth, I told Wheeler what I figured. When you gave us a clue where the cat was
supposed to be, on the mantel, he raised his gun and pretended--"

"Jack!" I begged him, to break off the silly
things he was saying. "If you're going to help them railroad me, even if
you're in on the plot--please get them to let me take Beautiful with me. Don't
take her away too. Please!"

Cars were driving up outside. I could feel the comforting
weight and warmth of the cat sleeping on my chest.

"Don't worry, Brian," Jack said quietly.
"That cat'll go wherever you go. Nobody can take it away from you.
Nobody."

When the phone rang, Tim McCracken grabbed for it. Then he
pulled back his hand and made himself count up to ten, slowly, before he lifted
the receiver. Just because it was the first time the darned thing had let out a
peep in a week, he didn't want whoever was calling to think he'd been sitting
there waiting for the call.

Sure, business was bad, but a guy had to bluff. Or did he?
While he was counting to ten, McCracken let his eyes run around the
well-furnished office that constituted his bluff. He wondered again if he
hadn't been foolish to sink the profits from his first three cases into that
layout.

But those cases had come so easily and so quickly after
he'd quit his job with the police department, and gone out on his own. They'd
all come, though, when his office was a secondhand desk in a ramshackle
building. And since then--

Eight, nine, ten. He picked up the phone, and said:

"Timothy   McCracken   Detective   Agency.   
McCracken speaking."

"About that rent, McCracken," came a gruff voice.
"When you going to pay up?"

"I explained about that yesterday, Mr.--Say, who is
this? You're not Mr. Rogers."

There was a baritone chuckle at the other end of the line.

"Mack, you ought to be a detective, the way you catch
on to things. This is Cap Zehnder. How're tricks? Never mind, you just told
me."

McCracken grunted disgustedly. "Cap, if I didn't used
to work for you, I'd come over and slap your big ears down for that gag."

"Keep your scanties on, Mack," said Zehnder.
"That ain't why I called you. If you still think you're a private
detective, I got a client for you. He asked for you by name, even. I didn't
have to recommend you. Now what do you say?"

"My God!" said McCracken. "Give quick! Where
is he?"

"In the jug, right here. Suspicion of murder. It says
it heard of you and wants you to help it beat the rap."

"It? What do you mean, it? You started out with a
'he.' "

"Did I?" The captain chuckled. "My error.
It's a mocking bird. And it crochets."