“Dane, pay attention. This could be important. You say you took a short walk, then returned to the penthouse - at least to her vestibule.

  Think now. How long were you gone? Can you tell me?”

  “I’m afraid not.”

  “No idea at all?”

  “If I had to guess, I’d say I was gone about fifteen minutes.”

  “Then it’s possible you were outside Sheila’s door at 10:23, the time she was shot.”

  “I suppose so.”

  “Level with me, Dane. If I’m to help you, I need straight answers. Did you hear a shot from inside the apartment?”

  “No. I’d remember if I did.”

  “I doubt if a shot could be heard, Mr. Queen,” the elder McKell said.

  “The apartments are solidly soundproofed.”

  Ellery murmured, “Dane stood outside that penthouse apartment just about the time Sheila was shot. Do you see what that means? In all likelihood, you were standing in that vestibule while the killer was inside. Didn’t you see or hear anything? How long did you stand there?” Dane shook his head. “A very short time. I couldn’t ring or knock, so I went away. I didn’t hear or see anything at all.”

  “You went away. Where?”

  “Walked some more.”

  “Did anyone see you leave? Did you meet anyone you knew, Dane?

  Say, in the building?”

  “I can’t remember anybody. I was in a fog. I do recall being in a movie theater -”

  “That’s something,” his father exclaimed. “Which movie theater, son?”

  “I don’t know. Some neighborhood house. Probably around Lexington or somewhere.”

  “What was the title of the picture?”

  “How should I know? I tell you I was half off my rocker!” Dane was growing angry. “I sat there watching a Western, I remember that, in color, all the fixings, but when the shooting started and the bodies began flying around I got up, sick to my stomach, and walked out. And back to the house and apartment. That’s all I can tell you, Dad.”

  “Do you have the ticket stub, son?”

  “I’ve looked for it in all my suits. I can’t find it. Must have thrown it away. Who holds on to movie theater ticket stubs?”

  “None of this matters in the least,” Ellery said, frowning. “The essential fact is that Dane was at the door of the penthouse just about the time the murder was committed. What difference does it make where he went afterward?”

  There was silence. Ellery began to pull at an invisible beard; his eyes went perceptibly far, far away. Dane, his father, Judy, sat uncomfortably still while he reflected. A truck backfired somewhere, startling them. A dressing cart clashed by in the corridor. Someone laughed. In the distance a police siren went off.

  After a long time Ellery returned from wherever he had been. “All right, that’s past,” he said slowly. “What’s the present situation? First, the blackmailer. His identity? Well, there have been two blackmailing letters of which we know, each demanding $2,000 down and $1,000 a month thereafter. Each has specified that the payments were to be in $20 bills.

  Each has been written in block capitals - yours was in pencil, too, Mr. McKell? - and each used the alias ‘Mr. I. M. Ecks,’ care of General Delivery, main post office. And so on. The similarities are too striking to be coincidence. I agree with you, Mr. McKell, both blackmail notes were written by the same person. So - we’re dealing with a single blackmailer.” A touch of color had invaded Ellery’s face, paled by several months of exile from the sun.

  “The obvious question is: Having a killer at large on the one hand, and a blackmailer at large on the other, what connection - if any - exists between the two?”

  “Why, that’s so, isn’t it?” said Judy thoughtfully. “I didn’t think of that.”

  “A connection very probably exists. The blackmailer’s hold on Dane is based on his possession of the original of the letter Sheila Grey wrote just before she was killed. How did the blackmailer get hold of the letter?

  Well, let’s see if we can reconstruct what must have happened on the night of the shooting.”

  They were sitting forward in their chairs now. Ellery went on deliberately.

  “Dane and Sheila had a bitter quarrel. He began to choke her, caught himself in time, ran out of the apartment. He left her alive. A very few minutes later you, Mr. McKell, arrived. You were there just about long enough for Miss Grey to ask you to leave, which you did. That was a few minutes past ten o’clock. It has not been challenged by anyone, through two trials, and we can accept it as a fact, that the shot the precinct officer heard over the phone was the shot that killed Sheila Grey; and the time of the shot, the officer noted officially, was 10:23 p.m. According to the medical examiner’s finding, she died instantly. The conclusion has to be that she wrote the letter about Dane, intended for the police, between a few minutes past ten - your departure, Mr. McKell - and 10:23.”

  “We’ve been all through that,” said Dane impatiently.

  “We may have to go through it a great many more times before you’re out of the woods, Dane,” Ellery said dryly. “Now, then. The first officers on the scene, the radio car men, arrived at the penthouse within minutes of the fatal shot. From their arrival forward, the police were in charge of the premises. Yet, in spite of the police search, which we have a right to assume was thorough, especially in view of the sensational nature of Sheila’s letter, the letter was not found. Conclusion: the letter was no longer there. Further conclusion: it had been taken from the premises before the arrival of the police. Still further conclusion: since we know it came into possession of the blackmailer, the weight of the evidence is on the side of the blackmailer’s having found it. He found it, he photographed it, he still has it.

  “How did the blackmailer come to find it?”

  Ellery shrugged. “Who was the one person we know was in the penthouse between the time Sheila finished writing the letter and the time the police got there? Her murderer. Unless we are willing to credit the theory that between the departure of the murderer - which could not have been before 10:23 - and the arrival of the police a mere handful of minutes later, still another person - the blackmailer - came on the scene, searched it, found the Grey letter, and left without being detected by anyone, including the police… unless, as I say, we are willing to credit a theory so far-fetched, only one conclusion is permissible: the murderer of Sheila and the finder of the letter - that is, the blackmailer - are one and the same.

  “If we can lay our hands on this mysterious blackmailer, then, Mr.

  Ecks,” Ellery said softly, “we’ll have caught the killer of Sheila Grey. That job is too much for amateurs. We’ll need professional help, and that means my father.”

  “You can’t do that, Mr. Queen!” cried Judy.

  “I agree with Judy. It would mean revealing the contents of Sheila’s letter.” Ashton McKell shook his head. “And that would plunge my son deep into the case, Mr. Queen.”

  “All I intend to tell my father,” Ellery said, “is that Dane is being blackmailed, not the basis for it. Leave Inspector Richard Queen to an expert, won’t you? I know how to handle him; I’ve had enough practice!

  Agreed? Dane?”

  Dane was quiet. Then he threw up his hands. “I’m ready to be guided by whatever you say, Mr. Queen.”

  * * *

  Judy Walsh came away from the hospital meeting in a sweet euphoria.

  How poor Dane must have suffered! How unreasonably, blindly female she had been! But from now on… ah, things would be different between them. She was so very sure her love, her compassion, her active assistance, would help him overcome the frightening problem of his rages. If necessary, she would get him to seek psychiatric help. And then, with the homicidal blackmailer caught and eliminated from their lives, the case would be closed forever, Sheila Grey would become an ebbing if always unpleasant memory, they would find peace, would carve out new lives for themselves… in short, they would live happily ever after.

  * * *

  “So Dane McKell is being blackmailed,” said Inspector Queen, “and I’m not to ask any questions about it. Is that it, Ellery?”

  “That’s it,” and his son beamed.

  “Well, you just forget it. I don’t buy blind pigs in pokes, or whatever the blasted saying is. Even from you.”

  “Dad, have I ever steered you wrong?”

  “Thousands of times,” the Inspector replied, “thousands.”

  “Name one.”

  “Sure. There was the time -”

  “Never mind,” Ellery said. “Dad, listen to me this once, will you? If I weren’t laid up I wouldn’t even bother you with it. It’s merely a case of laying a trap for a blackmailer.”

  “What’s Dane being blackmailed about?” demanded the old gentleman.

  “I can’t tell you now.”

  “It’s in connection with the Grey case, of course.”

  “I tell you I can’t. You’ll know the whole story later. Don’t you trust me any longer?”

  “I don’t trust myself these days,” the Inspector said with gloom. “The D.A. and I have practically stopped talking to each other. I’ve never seen such a case.”

  “You want to settle it?”

  “Of course I want to settle it!”

  “Then do it my way, Dad.”

  “You’re blackmailing me!”

  “Right,” Ellery said cheerfully. “Then it’s a deal? You post your men at the main post office, have them watch the General Delivery window.

  The postal authorities will cooperate. They’ll give your men the tip-off when the fellow shows up -”

  “And suppose they make a mistake?” the old man asked sourly. “And suppose the city is sued for false arrest, with me in the middle of it? How’ do I defend myself for ordering an arrest without having seen the evidence that a crime may have been committed? What do I do, refer them to you?

  Nothing doing, Ellery.”

  But Ellery had an answer for everything this morning. A security guard from the McKell organization, one of the scores employed to watch the McKell warehouses, docks, factories, and other buildings, could be assigned to watch the post office along with the regular police. When the trap was sprung, this privately employed guard would make a citizen’s arrest, with the police staying out of it. If the arrest were resisted, the police could then step in, restrain and compel - their duty at any time - with impunity.

  Inspector Queen listened in silence. He was sorely, sorely tempted.

  The Grey case had been his headache since the discovery of the body; it was turning into a migraine. If it was true, as Ellery had hinted, that the blackmailer in question might turn out to be the slayer of Sheila Grey, one Richard Queen was off the hook. He might even get a departmental citation out of it.

  In the end the old man yielded, as Ellery had known he would.

  So on the next day the lobby of the great post office behind Pennsylvania Station was sprinkled with plainclothesmen and detectives from Inspector Queen’s command, along with Ashton McKell’s private guard. The postal authorities had agreed to cooperate. The package containing $2,000 in $20 bills (instructions of “Mr. I. M. Ecks,” to the contrary notwithstanding, not unmarked) had been made up, mailed, had arrived, was waiting to be picked up.

  The trap was baited and laid.

  It was never sprung.

  No one showed up to claim the package.

  Whether the blackmailer had spotted the police waiting to arrest him, or he had been scared away by his own guilty imaginings, there was no way of telling; the fact was, the bait lay beyond the General Delivery window, unnibbled.

  So passed December 28th.

  On the morning of December 29th…

  The real fireworks had occurred late the night before, in the hospital room of one Ellery Queen. The Inspector had barged in long after visiting hours, angrily flushed, triumphant, and loaded for bear.

  “I don’t care a curse what your rules are,” he had assured the indignant night nurse, flourishing his inspector’s shield under her nose. “And don’t any of you Florence Nightingales dare interrupt us even if you hear me strangling your patient, which he bloody well deserves!” And he secured the door with the back of a chair.

  Ellery was reading in bed.

  “Dad?” He peered into the gloom. “You got him?”

  “Listen, sonny-boy,” Inspector Queen said, hauling a chair over and snatching the book out of Ellery’s hand, “I’ll tell you what I’ve got. I’ve got heartburn and a bellyful, mostly of you. You can’t tell me the basis of the blackmail, hey? The hell you can’t! You don’t have to. I’m wise to the whole smelly business now. You ought to be ashamed of yourself, keeping a thing like that from your own father -”

  “What,” asked Ellery in an injured tone, “is this remarkable performance all about?”

  “I’ll tell you what it’s about!”

  “Keep your voice down, Dad. This is a hospital.”

  “It’s about your precious Dane McKell! You know what happened this evening?”

  “That’s what I’ve been trying, unsuccessfully so far, to find out.”

  “What happened is that we received a Special Delivery envelope at headquarters is what happened. Full of interesting stuff, yes, sir. All kinds of reference material. Most fascinating of the bunch was a letter addressed to the police, in Sheila Grey’s handwriting, that she wrote the night she was knocked off. How do you like those apples?”

  “Oh,” said his son.

  “And ooh and ah! You knew all about it, didn’t you? But not a word about it to me. Your own father. In charge of the damn case. Not a word. I have to find out about it from an anonymous donor.”

  “Dad,” said his son.

  “Don’t Dad me! All right, I know what you’re going to say. This stuff came from the blackmailer -”

  “And how,” Ellery asked placatingly, “did he get it?”

  “How should I know? I don’t care! The point is, he got it, and he sent it to us, and now I’ve got it, and those McKells are going to rue the day!

  Especially that - that Hamlet-pussed pal of yours, Dane!”

  “Whoa, slow down,” the son said. “You’re not as young as you used to be. Give this to me in something like intelligible sequence, will you, Inspector?”

  “Glad to oblige,” chortled his father. “Here’s the way we dope it. First of all this blackmailer, who calls himself I. M. Ecks, doesn’t show - probably spotted the trap. He knows he can’t hope to collect a penny any more. So he sends the blackmail material to us - out of revenge, disappointment, malice; it doesn’t matter why. It’s no good to him. But it’s just what the doctor ordered for us.

  “So. We now shift gears in the Grey case, and for the first time - armed with real evidence - we’re on the right track. We were wrong about the parents, but there’s no mistake this time. This Dane is it. The third McKell turns out to be the right one. And there’ll be no acquittal in his trial.”

  “You’re still not telling me anything,” Ellery said fretfully. “What have you got besides the Grey letter? You realize that all the letter does is establish that Sheila Grey was still alive when Dane left her -”

  “Oh, it establishes a lot more than that, my son. But let’s not pick over picayunes. Let’s tackle this scientifically. You want science?”

  “I want science.”

  “I’ll give you science. How’s this? We’ve got a witness, a reliable witness, who saw your Dane come back to the penthouse.” Ellery was quiet.

  “No reaction?” chomped the old man. “That tells me you knew about that, too. Thank God I raised you to be a rotten liar. Ellery, I don’t understand. Withholding information like that! How did you find out?”

  “I didn’t say I found out anything.”

  “Come on, son.”

  “All right,” Ellery said suddenly. “Dane told me. Himself. Would he have done that if he had anything to be afraid of?”

  “Sure he would,” said the Inspector. “If he was very smart. If he figured it would come out sooner or later anyway. Well, if you know that, you know he took the elevator right up there. Want to know what time?

  Or do you know it? Don’t bother. It was 10:19, my son, when he stepped into that elevator - 10:19 p.m. - and going up - four minutes before she stopped that bullet, Dane McKell was zooming up to the penthouse! My witness watched the elevator dial swing right up there from the lobby, no stops.”

  “I suppose it was the doorman.”

  “You suppose correctly. We had a tough time prying the truth out of John Leslie tonight, but we cracked him. For some reason that escapes me he feels loyalty to the McKells. Well, we knocked it out of him. I’m not taking anybody’s crud in this case any more. I’ve had it.”

  “Did he tell you anything else?”

  “Yes, he told us something else. He told us that Dane McKell’s been visiting that penthouse with great regularity. That’s one your friend almost slipped over on us. With his old man involved with Sheila, we never pictured the son was, too. We did a quick check tonight, enough to tell us he’d been running around with her in a way that means only one thing. So there’s the motive. He was having an affair with her, but this lady’s affairs seem to have been jumpy transactions - the man was here today and gone tomorrow. She must have given your friend Dane the old gate and he wouldn’t or couldn’t take it. So blam! first he starts to strangle her, has second thoughts, leaves, then comes back in about a half hour and lets her have it with the gun his mother thoughtfully loaded with live ammo.”

  “And the blackmailer?” Ellery asked, not strongly.

  “I know all about the blackmailer. You’ll say he had to have been on the premises about the same time in order to have got his mitts on the letter. Right. I agree. How about at the same time?”

  “What do you mean?” Ellery asked, puzzled.

  “I mean Dane McKell hooked that letter after he whopped Sheila with the blaster. That this whole business of blackmail is so much happy dust he’s flung into our eyes!”

  “No,” Ellery said. “No, that would have been pure idiocy. That would mean he sent you the original of the letter. To accomplish what? His own arrest for murder, when before that you didn’t even suspect him? You’ll have to do better than that, Dad.”