“I see.” Bruno looked at Thumm; and Thumm glowered at Imperiale’s broad back.

  “I had already booked passage on this evening’s boat,” said the Swiss with a slight frown, “and ordered my luggage called for by the express people, when one of your gendarmes appeared out of nowhere at my host’s home and forbade me to leave!”

  “To leave Mr. DeWitt’s house, Mr. Imperiale?”

  Imperiale shook his head with the merest trace of impatience. “Oh no! To leave the country, he said. He would not allow my luggage to be removed. This is very disturbing, Mr. Bruno! I am a business man; my presence is urgently required by my firm in Berne. Why am I delayed in this way? Surely-”

  Bruno tapped his desk-top. “Now listen to me, Mr. Imperiale. I don’t know how they do things in your country, but you don’t seem to realize that you are involved in an American murder investigation. A murder investigation.”

  “Yes, I know, but-”

  “There are no buts, Mr. Imperiale.” Bruno rose. “I am sorry, naturally, but you will have to remain in this country until the murder of Harley Longstreet is cleared up, or at least an official decision reached. Of course, you may move from DeWitt’s house and go elsewhere - I can’t prevent you from doing that. But you’ll have to remain within call.”

  Imperiale rose and stiffly stretched to his full height; his face lost its pleasantness and became ugly. “But I tell you my business will suffer!”

  Bruno shrugged.

  “Very well!” Imperiale clapped his hat on his head; his face was as red as the flames of Mr. Drury Lane’s fire. “I shall immediately call upon my consul, Mr. Bruno, and demand satisfaction. Do you understand? I am a citizen of Switzerland and you have no right to detain me! Good day!” He bowed infinitesimally, stormed toward the door. Bruno smiled. “Nevertheless, I’d advise you to cancel your passage, Mr. Imperiale. No sense in losing all that money…” But Imperiale was gone.

  “Well,” said Bruno briskly, “that’s that. Sit down, Thumm, and take a look at this.” He produced the letter from his pocket and spread it before the Inspector. Thumm glanced at once at the bottom of the sheet - there was no signature. The letter was written in rusty black ink on cheap ruled stationery, in a plain undisguised hand. It was addressed to the District Attorney:

  I am one of the people on the street-car when the man Longstreet was murdered. I have found out something about who killed him. I am willing to give this information to you, Mr. District Attorney, but I am very much afraid that the murderer knows I know, and I think I am being watched.

  But if you will meet me, or send somebody to meet me Wednesday night at eleven o’clock, p.m., I will tell what I know. Mete me in the Weehawken ferry waiting-room at that time. You will know who I am.

  I will disclose myself. Please for my sake don’t make a holler, Mr. District Attorney. Don’t tell any outsiders about this letter, for the murderer may find out I have talked and I will be killed for doing my duty to the State.

  You will protect me, won’t you. When I see you Wednesday night you will be glad I met you. This is important. [Heavily underscored.]

  I am going to watch myself until that time. I don’t want to be seen talking to a cop in the daytime.

  Thumm handled the letter gingerly; he placed it on the desk and scanned the envelope. “Postmarked Weehawken, N. J., last night,” he muttered. “Full of fingerprints from dirty fingers. One of those Jerseyites on the car… Well, Bruno, I’ll be damned if I know what to think. Might be a crank letter and then again it mightn’t. That’s the hell of these things. What’s your idea?”

  “Hard to say.” Bruno stared at the ceiling. “It sounds as if it might be a lead. I’ll be there all right, just in case.” He swung to his feet, began to pace the room. “Thumm, have a hunch this is going to be good. The fact that this bird, whoever he is, didn’t sign his name to the letter rings true. He’s incoherent, puffed up high with his coming importance, and above all trembling in his boots about the possible consequences of his revelation. Then, too, the letter displays the usual elements - it’s voluminous, repetitious, nervous - witness the misspelling of ‘meet’ and the omission of the cross-bars on some of the t’s. No, the more I think about it the more I’m inclined to like it.”

  “Well… Inspector Thumm was dubious. Then he brightened. “This ought to knock Mr. Drury Lane off his pins, anyway. Maybe we won’t need his blasted advice after all.”

  “Suits me, Thumm. We can stand a quick prosecution.” Bruno rubbed his hands together contentedly. “Tell you what. Get in touch with District Attorney Rennells of Hudson County over the river and make the necessary arrangements to have Jersey police watch the Weehawken terminal. Damn this constant fuss about jurisdiction, anyway! No uniformed men, Thumm - all plainclothes. You’ll be there?”

  “Try and stop me,” said Inspector Thumm with grim inelegance.

  As Thumm slammed the door, District Attorney Bruno picked up one of the telephone instruments on his desk and put in a call for The Hamlet. He waited peacefully, almost happily, until his buzzer sounded. “Hello! The Hamlet? Mr. Drury Lane… District Attorney Bruno calling… Hello! Who is this?”

  A shrill quavering voice answered: “This is Quacey, Mr. Bruno. Mr. Lane is right here by my side.”

  “Oh yes. I forgot - he can’t hear.” Bruno’s voice expanded. “Well, tell Mr. Lane that I have news for him.”

  He heard Quacey’s old voice repeating the message word for word.

  “He says ‘Indeed!’ “ came Quacey’s squeak. “And, sir?”

  “Tell him that he’s not the only one who knows who killed Longstreet,” said Bruno triumphantly.

  He listened intently while Quacey repeated this to Lane, and heard, startlingly clear, Lane’s remark: “Tell Mr. Bruno that is news, quite literally. Has he had a confession?”

  Bruno explained to Quacey the contents of the anonymous letter. Silence from the other end of the wire, then Lane’s voice, unhurried and unperturbed.

  “Tell Mr. Bruno I am so sorry not to be able to converse with him directly. Ask him if I may be present tonight at this meeting.”

  “Oh, by all means,” said Bruno to Quacey. “Er - Quacey, did Mr. Lane seem at all surprised?”

  Bruno heard the oddest chuckle over the wire - the well-fed ghost of a chuckle. Then Quacey’s quaking voice, brimming with sly fun: “No, sir, he seems quite pleased with the turn of events. He has often said that he always expects the unexpected. He-”

  But District Attorney Bruno with a short “Good-bye!” had replaced the receiver on its hook.

  Scene 2

  THE WEEHAWKEN FERRY

  WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 11:40 P.M.

  The lights OF midtown New York, on clear nights a pattern of bright stitches against black sky, on Wednesday night had almost completely blurred away in a blanket of fog which had persisted throughout the day and into the dark. From the ferry piers on the New Jersey shore nothing could be seen across the river except an occasional smeared point of electric light and a gray wall of forbidding mist over the water. Ferry boats loomed suddenly out of nowhere, ablaze on lower decks from stem to stern; ghostly small vessels felt their way up and down the river. Foghorns blared warning on all sides to cautious river traffic; but even these sounds were smothered by the fog.

  In the vast barnlike structure, the waiting-room behind the Weehawken ferries, a dozen men were grouped, for the most part silent and watchful. In the midst of the group stood the stock Napoleonic figure of District Attorney Bruno, nervously consulting his watch at ten-second intervals, pacing the hollow floor like a maniac. Inspector Thumm prowled about the big room, looking sharply at the doors and the infrequent newcomers. The room was almost empty.

  Quite alone, apart from the group of detectives, sat Mr. Drury Lane, at whose quaint figure waiting ferry and railroad passengers sent wondering, sometimes amused glances. He sat with utter placidity, two white hands clasping their long digits about the knob of a thick, murderous-looking blackthorn stick between his knees. He wore a long black Inverness coat, cape falling free about his shoulders. On his thick hair was a straight-brimmed, black felt hat. Inspector Thumm, looking his way from time to time, thought he had never seen a man so superficially oldish, from his dress and hair, and yet, from his face and figure, so surprisingly young. The still features, chiseled and strong, might have been those of a man of thirty-five. His self-possession was stimulating and arresting; it was not that he ignored the curiosity of passersby - he was serenely unconscious of it.

  His bright eyes were fixed on District Attorney Bruno’s lips.

  Bruno came over and sat down restlessly. “Forty-five minutes late already,” he complained. “It looks as if we’ve invited you on a wild-goose chase. Of course, we’ll have to see it through if it takes all night. To tell the truth, I’m beginning to feel a wee bit foolish.”

  “You should be feeling a wee bit worried, Mr. Bruno,” said Lane in his precise musical way. “You would have more cause for that.”

  “You think-” began Bruno with a frown - and stopped, stiffening, as did Inspector Thumm across the room, at the confused sounds of a raucous commotion emanating from the ferries outside.

  “What is the trouble, Mr. Bruno?” asked Lane mildly.

  Bruno’s head and ears strained forward. “You couldn’t hear that, of course… Mr. Lane, that was a cry of ‘Man overboard I’ “

  Drury Lane was on his feet in one feline movement. Inspector Thumm thundered up. “Trouble on the pier,” he roared. “I’m going out!”

  Bruno had also risen, indecisively. “Thumm, I’ll stay here with some of the boys. Might be a decoy of some kind. Our man may come yet.”

  Thumm was already pounding toward the door. Quickly, Drury Lane followed. A half-dozen detectives ran after them.

  They crossed the splintered wooden flooring outside, paused to determine the direction of the cries. At the farthest end of the roofed pier a ferry boat had come in and was grinding against the side pilings, maneuvering for the iron-shod curved landing-edge. A small number of scattered figures had already leaped the intervening space as Thumm, Lane, and the detectives reached the landing, while others were hurrying out of the terminal. The gold-leaf on the boat’s pilot-house above the upper deck read: Mohawk. On the north side of the lower deck passengers milled wildly about leaning over the rail along the bow, peering out of the windows of the starboard cabin- wall into the misty blackness below.

  Three ferrymen were shoving their way through the crowd, endeavoring to reach the side. Drury Lane, following in Thumm’s wake, suddenly looked at his gold watch. The time was 11:40.

  Inspector Thumm sprang to the boat-deck, collaring a thin gnarled old ferryman. “Police!” he roared. “What’s happened?”

  The ferryman looked scared. “Man overboard, Cap. They say he fell from the top deck just as the Mohawk was sliding into the pier.”

  “Who is he - anybody know?”

  “Naw.”

  “Come on, Mr. Lane,” growled the Inspector. “The ferry people will fish him out. Let’s see from where he fell.”

  They began to push through the press at the bow, going toward the door of the cabin. Thumm stopped short with an exclamation, extending his arm. At the south side of the lower deck a slight frail figure was stepping off to the dock.

  “Hey there, DeWitt! Just a minute!”

  The frail figure, bundled in a topcoat, looked up, hesitated, then retraced his steps. His face was white; he was panting a little. “Inspector Thumm!” he said slowly. “What are you doing here?”

  “Little assignment,” drawled Thumm, but his eyes were shining with excitement. “And you?”

  DeWitt plunged his hand into the left pocket of his coat and shivered. “I’m on my way home,” he said. “What’s going on here?”

  “Might have stayed to find out,” said Thumm amiably. “Come along with us. By the way, meet Mr. Drury Lane. Helping out. Lane the actor. Famous man. Mr. Lane, this is Mr. DeWitt, Longstreet’s partner.” Drury Lane nodded pleasantly; DeWitt’s eyes, wandering before, fixed themselves suddenly on the actor’s face and recognition leaped into them, something of deference. “This is an honor, sir.” Thumm was frowning; the men at his heels waited patiently. He craned about, seeming to search for someone, swearing beneath his breath.

  Then he shrugged his shoulders. “Come along,” he said sharply, and burrowed forward with his great bulk as the prod.

  The interior of the cabin was in a state of panic. Thumm lunged up the brass-tipped stairs amidships, the others following. They ascended into the oval upper cabin, crossed to one of the northern doors, and emerged on the dark upper deck. The detectives, by the strong local illumination of flashlights, examined the deck. Roughly between the center of the boat and the bow, a few feet behind the cleared space at the tip of the boat, and well to the rear of the pilot-house above, Thumm found long, scratchlike, uneven marks. The detectives riveted their lights on the spot; the scratches ran from the criss-crossed iron railing back across the deck to a cubicle, or alcove, at the northwest outer comer of the cabin. This cubicle’s western and southern walls were the outside of the cabin; the northern wall was a thin board; there was no eastern wall. The lights were trained inside; the marks on the deck emanated from the interior. There was a tool chest, locked and fixed to one wall, a few life-preservers, a broom, a pail, and other small articles. A chain extended across the middle of the open side.

  “Go through it. Get some keys and open that box. Might be something there.” Two detectives vanished. “And Jim. Go downstairs and hold everybody on the boat.”

  Thumm and Lane, with DeWitt trailing along, walked to the rail. Beyond the rail, the floor of the deck extended two and a half feet to the edge of the boat’s side. Thumm, flashlight in hand, was scrutinizing the marks on the deck. He looked up at Lane. “Something rummy here, hey Mr. Lane? Heel- scrapings. A heavy object was dragged across the deck. A body, by God, and the heels of the shoes made the scratches. Might be murder.”

  Drury Lane was intently studying Thumm’s face in the faint light which reached them from the flash; he nodded.

  They leaned over the rail, straining to catch the frenzied scene below. Thumm out of the comer of his eye watched DeWitt. The little broker was calm now, somehow resigned.

  A police boat had moored to the pierhead; scurrying figures of police clambered to the slippery tops of the pilings, making fast. Two powerful searchlights suddenly switched on, illuminating the ferry brilliantly; and the pier stood out in bold relief despite the fog. The upper deck too was now quite bright. Lights swept below the lower deck, delineating every feature of the scene. The floor of the lower deck bellied outward, ground against the loose slimy pilings of the side piers. Nothing was visible below this wooden rampart. Ferry officials and workmen were standing and kneeling atop the pilings, shouting directions to the dim pilot-house above. There was an instant clanking and groaning in the interior of the ferry; it sidled out, edging away from the north pier toward the south pier. Two men in the pilothouse, the captain and pilot, were working furiously to clear away from the watery spot where the body evidently floated.

  “Must have been crushed to a pulp,” said Thumm in a matter-of-fact voice. “Fell from here just as the ferry ground against the piling; probably was smashed right between the boat and the piling, then as the boat moved on it slipped beneath that jutting floor. They’re going to have a job… Hullo! There’s the water, by God!”

  Oily scummed water, black and wicked-looking, appeared as the boat groaned sideways. The surface was churned and yeasty. A grappling-iron appeared from nowhere out of the darkness at the top of the pilings; police and ferrymen began to fish for the unseen body.

  DeWitt, standing between Thumm and Lane, was absorbed in the grisly operations below. A detective appeared by Thumm’s side. “Well?” growled Thumm.

  “Nothin’ in the chest, Chief. Nor in the alcove at all.”

  “All right. Just don’t step all over these heel-marks on the deck.” But his eyes were abstracted; they rested with curiosity on DeWitt. The frail little man was grasping the clammy rail with his left hand; he held his right hand rigidly before him, crooked elbow resting on the rail.

  “What’s the matter, DeWitt? Hurt your hand?”

  The little broker turned slowly and looked down at his right hand with an absent smile. Then he straightened and offered the hand for Thumm’s inspection. Lane leaned forward. On the forefinger, extending from the first joint vertically, was a fresh scar an inch and a half long. A thin scab had healed over the wound. “I cut my finger this evening on some apparatus in the Club gymnasium. Before dinner.”

  “Oh.”

  “Dr. Morris at the Club fixed me up. Told me to be careful with it. It does pain a little.”

  DeWitt and Thumm wheeled and leaned over the railing as a long triumphant yell reached their ears from below. Drury Lane blinked, and followed suit. “We’ve got him!”

  “Easy there!” A rope snaked down the pilings as the grappling-irons caught on something solid beneath the black surface of the water.

  Three minutes later a dripping, limp bundle emerged from the river. Screams came at once from the lower deck - a meaningless murmur and confused shouting.

  “Downstairs!” cried Inspector Thumm. As one, the three men turned and made for the door. DeWitt hurried forward across the deck. As he grasped the handle of the door he exclaimed in pain and annoyance. “What’s the matter?” asked Thumm hurriedly. DeWitt was frowning over his right hand; Thumm and Lane saw that the wound was bleeding freely. The scar hung loose, torn in several places.

  “Shouldn’t have used my right hand on the door,” groaned the little man. “Cut’s opened after all, as Morris told me it would if I wasn’t careful.”

  “Well, you won’t die,” growled Thumm and brushed by DeWitt, beginning to descend the stairs. He looked back. DeWitt had taken a handkerchief from his breast-pocket and was wrapping his right hand loosely. Drury Lane, muffled to the chin in his cloak, his eyes in shadow, said something pleasant, and the two men followed as Thumm clattered on down the stairs.