“Printer going home from work.” Bruno rocked on his heels. “All right, Havemeyer, did you see a man’s body fall from the upper deck as the ferry docked?”

  “Yes, sir. Yes, sir.”

  “Where were you at the time?”

  “I was sittin’ in that room on the ferry - that cabin - and I was sittin’ on the bench across from the windows,” said the German, licking his fat lips. “Just as the boat began to get into the piers between those - those big sticks…

  “The pilings?”

  “Yes, the pilings. Just then I saw something big and black, it looked like - I sort of got a look at a face but it was all blurry - come falling outside the windows opposite from upstairs somewheres. It - it crunched right away… Havemeyer wiped a bead of perspiration from his trembling upper lip. “It happened so sudden-”

  “And that’s all you saw?”

  “Yes, sir. I began to yell, ‘Man overboard!’ and it seems like other people saw it too because everybody began to yell…”

  “That’s all for you, Havemeyer.” The little man retreated in relief. “Now, folks, did everybody see the same thing?”

  There was a chorus of assent.

  “Anybody see anything else - maybe get a look at the face as it fell past?” No answer. They looked at each other doubtfully.

  “Very well. Jonas! Take their names, occupations, and addresses.” The detective stepped into the midst of the group and interrogated the six remaining passengers with bored rapidity. Havemeyer spoke first, furnished his address, and scuttled back into the main body of the crowd. The second was a dirty little Italian dressed in black shiny material, wearing a black official cap - Giuseppe Salvatore, ferry bootblack. He had been shining a man’s shoes, facing the windows, he said. The third was a worn bedraggled little old Irishwoman, Mrs. Martha Wilson, returning, she said, from her work as scrubwoman in a Times Square office-building; she had been seated next to Havemeyer and had seen exactly the same thing. The fourth was a large dapper man, Henry Nixon, dressed in a shrieking checked suit - he was an itinerant salesman of cheap jewelry, he said, and had been strolling forward through the cabin when the body hurtled past the window. The last two were young girls, May Cohen and Ruth Tobias, office-workers, returning to their New Jersey homes from Broadway where they had, they said, “seen a swell show”; they had just risen from their seats near Havemeyer and Mrs. Wilson when the body fell.

  None of the six passengers, Bruno discovered, had seen a man in conductor’s uniform - a man furthermore with red hair - during the trip. All clamorously claimed that they had taken the 11:30 boat from the New York side. All denied having visited the upper deck, Mrs. Wilson testifying that she never did - the trip was too short - and besides, she said, the weather was “that nasty.”

  Bruno had the six remaining passengers herded back to the main body of passengers across the room, following them to conduct a short examination of the others. He discovered nothing. No passenger had seen a conductor with red hair. No passenger had visited the top deck. All professed to have been on the boat for one trip only, having embarked at 11:30 from New York.

  BBB

  When Bruno, Lane, and DeWitt marched upstairs again to the station- master’s office, they found Inspector Thumm, flanked by his men, sitting in a chair and staring viciously down at the torn clay that had been Charles Wood. Thumm leaped to his feet as they came in, glared at DeWitt, opened his mouth to speak, clamped it shut again and began to prowl up and down before the outstretched corpse, hands clasped fiercely behind his back.

  “Bruno,” he said in a small voice, “I’d like to talk to you privately.” The District Attorney’s nostrils quivered; he stepped to Thumm’s side, and the two men conversed in whispers. Occasionally Bruno glanced up to search DeWitt’s face. In the end he nodded emphatically and strolled off to lean against the desk.

  Thumm clumped his feet solidly on the floor, screwed his ugly visage terrifyingly, and attacked DeWitt. “DeWitt, when did you get aboard the Mohawk tonight? What ferry did you take?”

  DeWitt drew himself up to his meager height; the hairs of his stiff mustache bristled. “Before I answer, Inspector Thumm, will you please tell me what right you have to question my movements?”

  “Please don’t make it too difficult for us, Mr. DeWitt,” said the District Attorney in an odd tone.

  DeWitt blinked; his eyes struggled to the face of Drury Lane. But the actor exhibited no sign, of encouragement or disapprobation. Shrugging, DeWitt faced Thumm again. “Very well, I took the 11:30 boat.”

  “The 11:30? And how did it happen that you were returning home so late?”

  “I spent the evening at my club, the Exchange Club, downtown. I told you as much before, when we met on the ferry.”

  “So you did, so you did.” Thumm jammed a cigarette into his mouth. “Were you on the upper passenger deck of the Mohawk during any part of that ten-minute ride across the river?”

  DeWitt bit his lip. “Suspicions again, Inspector? No.”

  “Did you see Conductor Charles Wood during the trip?”

  “No.”

  “If you had seen him, would you have recognized him?”

  “I think so. I’ve seen him on the Crosstown many times. Besides, the Longstreet investigation fixed him in my mind. But I assure you that I didn’t see him tonight.”

  Thumm produced a paper packet of matches, ripped one away, struck it and lit his cigarette most carefully. “In all the times you’ve seen Wood on his car, did you ever speak to him?”

  “My dear Inspector.” DeWitt seemed amused.

  “Yes or no?”

  “Of course not.”

  “So you knew him by sight, had never spoken to him, and didn’t see him tonight… All right, DeWitt. Now when I stepped on the ferry not long ago you were just leaving. You certainly knew an accident had occurred. Weren’t you curious enough to stay and find out what had happened?” The smile had faded from DeWitt’s lips. His face was tight and heckled. “No. I was tired, anxious to get home.”

  “Tired and anxious to get home,” said Thumm exasperatingly. “A good reason, by God… DeWitt, do you smoke?”

  DeWitt stared. “Smoke?” he repeated angrily. He turned to the District Attorney. “Mr. Bruno,” he cried, “this is infantile. Am I to submit to such a nonsensical inquisition?”

  Bruno said in a cold voice: “Please answer the question.” Again DeWitt glanced at Drury Lane, again DeWitt looked about helplessly.

  “Yes,” he said slowly - something terrified had crawled under his tired eye- lids - “yes.”

  “Cigarettes?”

  “No. Cigars.”

  “Have you any with you?”

  Silently DeWitt reached into the breast pocket of his coat, produced a rich leather cigar-case, neatly initialed in gold, and handed it to the Inspector. Thumm pulled the top away and, taking out one of the three cigars in the case, examined it minutely. On the cigar was a gilt band lettered /. O. DeW. “Private brand, DeWitt?”

  “Yes. They’re made up specially for me by Huengas of Havana.”

  “The bands, too?”

  “Of course.”

  “Huengas puts the bands on?” insisted Thumm.

  “Oh, piffle,” said DeWitt distinctly. “What is the purpose of this inane questioning? There’s something deep, dark, and foolish in your mind, Inspector. Yes, Huengas puts the bands on the cigars, boxes them, ships them to me by boat, and so on and so on. May I ask: What of it?”

  Without replying, Inspector Thumm restored the cigar to its case and stowed it away in one of his bottomless pockets. DeWitt’s face clouded at this wanton appropriation but, straightening his little body defiantly, he said nothing.

  “One question more, DeWitt,” resumed the Inspector in the most amiable way in the world. “Have you ever offered Conductor Wood one of these cigars - on the street-car or anywhere else?”

  “I - see,” said DeWitt in a deliberate voice. “I see now.” No one spoke.

  Thumm, whose cigarette drooping from his lips had gone out, was watching the broker with tigerish eyes. “I am finally,” went on DeWitt with restraint, “finally checkmated. Eh, Inspector? You play a clever game. No, I have never offered Conductor Wood one of these cigars, on the street-car or anywhere else.”

  “That’s fine, DeWitt, just dandy,” chortled Thumm. “Because I’ve found one of your special-brand, initial-banded cigars in the vest pocket of the dead man!”

  DeWitt nodded bitterly, as if he had quite foreseen this statement. He opened his mouth, closed it again, opened it and said in a dreary way: “1 gather, then, I’m to be arrested for the murder of this man?” Then he laughed - an old man’s broken, embarrassing cackle. “I’m not dreaming, I suppose? One of my cigars on the murdered man!” He sank into a nearby chair.

  Bruno said formally: “No one has suggested arrest, Mr. DeWitt…

  At this moment a party of men appeared at the door, led by a man in a police captain’s uniform. Bruno stopped speaking and questioned the officer with his eyes. The officer nodded and went away.

  “Come in, boys,” said Thumm in an agreeable voice.

  The newcomers trooped into the room shyly. One was the Irish motorman, Patrick Guiness, who had driven the street-car in which Longstreet had been murdered. The second was a lean old man, attired shabbily and wearing a visored cap, who said he was Peter Hicks, ferryman on the New York side. The third was a wind-burned street-car inspector whose station, he said, was at the end of the Crosstown run, just outside the ferry terminal at the foot of Forty-Second Street.

  Behind them appeared several detectives, among them Lieutenant Peabody. Sergeant Duffy’s broad shoulders loomed behind Peabody. All eyes focused instinctively on the dead body lying on the canvas.

  Guiness glanced once at Wood’s remains, swallowed convulsively, and turned away with frightened eyes. He looked sick.

  “Guiness, will you formally identify this man?” asked Bruno.

  Guiness mumbled: “Christ, look at his head… It’s Charley Wood, all right.”

  “You’re sure?”

  Guiness directed a shaking finger at the left leg of the corpse. The trousers had been ripped and torn by concussion with the side of the ferry and the pilings. The left leg, except for shoe and sock, was nakedly exposed. Part of a long scar was visible on the calf, disappearing where the black sock covered it. The scar curled and twisted - a peculiar cicatrix now livid in death.

  “That scar,” said Guiness hoarsely. “I’ve seen it many a time. Charley showed it to me when he first came onto the car-line, even before we both got transferred to the Crosstown. He’d got it in an accident years and years ago, he told me.”

  Thumm stripped the sock away from the scar, revealing it in its gruesome entirety. It extended from the point immediately above the ankle to just below the knee, curving halfway around the calf. “You’re positive that’s the same scar you saw?” asked Thumm.

  “That’s the scar, all right,” said Guiness faintly.

  “Okay, Guiness.” Thumm rose, brushing his knees. “Now you, Hicks, got anything to offer about Wood’s movements tonight?”

  The wiry old ferryman nodded. “Sure thing, Cap. I knew Charley purty well - used the ferry near every night, gen’ally stopped and spoke to me. Tonight, around ha’past ten, Charley comes into the ferry terminal and as usual we got to talking. Looked a little nervous, now I come to think of it. We jest gabbled a spell.”

  “You’re sure of the time - 10:30?”

  “Sure I’m sure. I got to keep tabs on the time - them ferries run 011 schedule, Cap.”

  “What did you talk about?”

  “We-ell,” said Hicks, smacking his leathery lips, “we talked, and he was carryin’ his bag, and I asked him if he’d been in town the night before as per usual - y’see, sometimes he stayed over in the City and took some clean duds with him - but no, he says, it was jest a second-hand bag he’d bought on his off-time today; handle of the old one’d broke. And-”

  “What kind of a bag was it?” demanded Thumm.

  “What kind of a bag?” Hicks pursed his lips. “Hanged if there was anything special about it, Cap. Jest one 0’ these cheap black handbags you can buy for a buck anywhere. Square kind of.”

  Thumm motioned to Lieutenant Peabody. “See if any of the passengers in the waiting-room downstairs have bags like the one Hicks describes. And get a search started of the Mohawk for a bag of that description. Upper deck, pilot-house, and all. Top to bottom. Then have the boys on the police boat search the water - might have been thrown overboard, or maybe it fell overboard.”

  Peabody strolled out. Thumm turned again to Hicks. Before he could speak, Drury Lane said gently: “I beg your pardon, Inspector… Hicks, by any chance was Wood smoking a cigar while you chatted?”

  Hicks’ eyes widened at this apparitional inquisitor. But he replied, readily enough, “Sure was. Matter of fact, I asked Charley for one. Them Cremos he smoked sorta appealed to me. Anyway, he looks for one in his pockets-”

  “His vest pocket, too, I trust, Hicks?” said Lane.

  “Yep, vest pockets and all, and he says: ‘Nope, guess I’m all out, Pete. I’m smokin’ my last one.’ “

  “Smart question at that, Mr. Lane,” said Thumm grudgingly. “You’re certain it was a Cremo, Hicks, and he hadn’t another of any kind on him?” Hicks said in plaintive tones: “But I’ve jest told this gentleman, Cap…” DeWitt did not look up; he sat in his chair as if turned to stone. From his eyes, it was doubtful whether he had even heard the exchange of questions and answers. They were brimming and bloodshot.

  “Guiness,” said Thumm, “was Wood carrying this handbag when he completed his run tonight?”

  “Yes, sir,” replied Guiness in a faint voice. “Just as Hicks said. He went off duty at half-past ten for the night. He’d had the bag stowed on the car all afternoon.”

  “Know where Wood lived?”

  “In a rooming-house in Weehawken here - 2075 Boulevard.”

  “Any relative?”

  “I don’t think so. Leastways, he wasn’t married and as far as I can remember he never said a word about kin.”

  “There’s another thing, Cap,” put in Hicks the ferryman. “While Charley and me were talkin’, all of a sudden Charley points to a little geezer that gets out of a cab all bundled up, sneaks into the ticket-office, buys a ferry- ticket and, droppin’ the ticket into the box, crosses into the waitin’-room and waits for the ferry like he didn’t want anyone to see him. Charley says to me, confidential, that the little guy was the broker, John DeWitt, the feller mixed up in the murder on Charley’s car.”

  “What!” roared Thumm. “And you say this was around 10:30?” He glared down at DeWitt, who had roused now and was sitting, forward, hands gripping the arms of the chair. “Go on, Hicks, go on!”

  “Weil,” drawled Hicks maddeningly, “Charley looked kinda nervous when he sees this DeWitt…

  “Did DeWitt see Wood?”

  “Reckon not. He stuck in a comer all the time, all by himself.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Well, I had to go ’bout my dooties jest as the ferry boat came in at 10:40. I did see this DeWitt go in through the gate, and Charley says good-bye and goes in too.”

  “You’re positive about the time, now - it was the ferry leaving at 10:45?”

  “Aw rats!” said Hicks in deep disgust. “I said that most a hundred times.”

  “Step aside, Hicks.” Thumm pushed by the ferryman and glowered down upon the broker, who was nervously picking at the fabric of his coat. “DeWitt! Look at me.” DeWitt raised his head slowly; the misery in his eyes startled even the Inspector. “Hicks, is this the man Wood pointed out to you?”

  Hicks stretched his attenuated neck, studying DeWitt’s face judiciously with fish-eyes. “Yep,” he said finally. “Yep, that’s the little guy. Ready to take my oath, Cap.”

  “Good enough. Hicks, Guiness, and this man here - car inspector? won’t need you now - go downstairs and wait for me.” The three men left the room with reluctant steps. Drury Lane unexpectedly sat down, leaning on his stick, surveying the taut features of the broker with melancholy eyes. Far, far in the crystal depths of those eyes there was a faint puzzlement - a suspension of judgment, a question.

  “Now then, Mr. John O. DeWitt,” growled Thumm, looming over the little man, “suppose you explain to us how it is you were seen boarding the 10:45 ferry, and yet a while ago you said you took the 11:30 ferry.”

  Bruno stirred slightly; his face was grave. “Before you answer, Mr. DeWitt, it is my duty to warn you that anything you may say may be used against you. T here is a stenographer here taking down every word. You needn’t answer if you don’t want to.”

  DeWitt swallowed hard, ran his thin finger under his collar, made a sorry attempt to smile. “The sad consequences,” he murmured, rearing his body, “of flirting with the truth…Yes, gentlemen, I did lie. I took the 10:45 boat.”

  “Got that, Jonas?” shouted Thumm. “Why’d you lie, DeWitt?”

  “That,” said DeWitt quietly, “I must refuse to explain. I had an appointment with someone on the 10:45 boat, but the matter was strictly personal and had nothing to do with this ghastly business.”

  “Well, if you had an appointment to meet someone on the 10:45 boat, why the hell did you stay on until 11:40?”

  “Please,” said DeWitt, “moderate your language, Inspector. I am not accustomed to being addressed in this manner; and if you persist, I shall absolutely refuse to say another word.”

  Thumm swallowed a curse, caught a quick glance from Bruno, inhaled deeply, and continued in a less belligerent tone: “All right. Why?”

  “That’s better,” said DeWitt. “Because the person I was waiting for did not show up at the appointed time. I remained on the boat for four trips, suspecting a delay. At 11:40 I gave up and decided to go home.”

  Thumm snickered. “You expect us to believe that? Who was this person you were waiting for?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  Bruno wagged his finger at DeWitt. “You understand, Mr. DeWitt, you are placing yourself in a most peculiar position. You must realize that your story is very, very thin - under the circumstances we can’t accept it without specific information.”