Murder in the Gunroom, H. Beam Piper [ebook reader color screen .txt] 📗

car and came across the road. “This is Gus Olsen, investigator for the D.A.’s office. Jeff Rand; Tri-State Agency,” he introduced.

“Hey!” Olsen yelled. “We been lookin’ for you! Where you been?”

Rand raised an eyebrow at McKenna.

“You just came from where we’re going,” the State Police sergeant surmised. “Was Gresham at home?”

“He was; he’s gone now,” Rand said. “He and another man are going to help me check up on what’s missing from the Fleming collection.”

“Hey!” Olsen exploded. “What I told you, now; he run ahead of us with a tip-off! Gresham’s skipped out, now!”

“What is all this?” Rand wanted to know. “What’s he screaming about, Mick?”

“Like he don’t know!” Olsen vociferated. “He tipped off Gresham so’s he could skip out; I’ll bet he’s in it with Gresham!”

“Pay no attention,” McKenna advised. “He doesn’t know what the score is; hell, he doesn’t even know what teams are playing.”

“Now you look here!” Olsen bawled. “We’ll see what Mr. Farnsworth has to say about this. You’re supposed to cooperate with us, not go fraternizin’ with a lot of suspects. Why, it’s plain as anything; him and Gresham’s in it together. I bet that was why he come around, the first thing in the morning, to find the body!”

Kavaalen, behind the wheel, turned around and began jabbering at Olsen, in the back seat, in something that sounded like Swedish. Most Finns can speak Swedish, and Rand was wishing he could understand it. The corporal’s remarks ran to about a paragraph, and must have been downright incendiary. At least, Olsen seemed to catch fire from them. He rose in his seat, waving his arms and howling back in the same language.

“Shut up, goddammit, shut up!” McKenna bellowed into his face. “Shut up before I sling your ass to hell out of this car! I’m talking, and I don’t want any goddam jaw from you, Olsen. You either,” he barked at Kavaalen, winking at him at the same time.

Silence fell with a heavy thump in the car.

“Well, now that the international crisis seems to have been averted, how’s about letting me in on it, too?” Rand asked. “For instance, what about Gresham? What’s he supposed to be a suspect for?”

“Ah, Olsen suspects him of chopping Rivers up,” McKenna replied wearily. “See, we questioned this Cecil Gillis, and he told us that last evening, as he was leaving Rivers’s, he saw Stephen Gresham drive up and go into the shop. I wanted to talk to him, myself; I thought he might account for the cigar-ashes, and the drink-fixings on that table. But when Farnsworth heard about the killing, he sent Olsen around, and when Olsen heard that Gresham had been there, he tried him and convicted him on the spot.”

“Oh, obscenity! Is that what it’s about?” Rand exclaimed in disgust. “Yes, Gresham told me about that. He didn’t have the drink, and he wasn’t smoking a cigar in the shop, and he left a little after nine. He got home at nine twenty-two. I can testify to that, myself; I was there at the time, and so were seven other people.” Rand named them. “They dribbled away at different times during the evening, but Philip Cabot and I stayed till around eleven.” He mentioned the approximate time at which the others had left. “What time was Rivers killed, or hasn’t the time been fixed?”

“The M.E. says around ten to two,” McKenna said.

“He could be wrong; them guys only guess, half the time,” Olsen argued. “And besides, Gresham had it in for Rivers. And that ain’t all, neither; he knew how to use a bayonet, too. I seen him, myself, during the war, showin’ the Home Guard how to do it, just the way Rivers was killed!” he produced triumphantly.

McKenna used a dirty word. “So what? Anybody who’s ever had infantry training knows that butt-stroke-and-lunge,” he retorted. “I learned it myself, when I was a kid, in ’24 and ’25, in C.M.T.C. Hell, anybody who’s ever seen a war-movie⁠ ⁠… If you hadn’t lammed out of Sweden when you were sixteen, to duck conscription, you’d of known it, too.”

“Well, maybe Olsen, or his boss, can explain why Gresham threw those record-cards in the fire,” Rand contributed. “You know why Olsen says Gresham had it in for Rivers? Rivers sold Gresham a fake antique, a flint lock navy pistol that had been worked over into something else. Gresham was going to subpoena those records, when he brought suit against Rivers,” Rand lied. “But I can explain why Cecil Gillis might have destroyed them, after killing Rivers, if he’d been cheating Rivers and Rivers caught him at it.”

“Yeah, and that might explain why Gillis was in such a hurry to sic us onto Gresham, too,” McKenna added. “I thought of something like that. And this high-brown girl that works for Rivers says that Gillis and Mrs. Rivers played all kinds of games together, when Rivers was away.”

“Well, who’s in charge of the investigation?” Rand wanted to know. “I heard, on the radio⁠ ⁠…”

“You’re liable to hear anything on the radio, including slanders on Bing Crosby’s horses. But for the record, I am in charge of this investigation. And don’t anybody forget it, either,” he added, in the direction of the rear seat.

“That’s what I thought. Well, Stephen Gresham has just retained me to make an independent investigation,” Rand said. “It is not that he lacks confidence in the State Police, or in you; he was afraid that other parties might get into the act and try to make political capital out of it. Which appears to have happened.”

“Well, if Gresham retained you, I’m satisfied,” McKenna said. “You can take care of that end of it. Glad you’re in with us.”

“Well, I ain’t satisfied!” Olsen began yelling, again. “And Mr. Farnsworth won’t be, neither. Why, this here private dick is like as not workin’ for the very man that killed Rivers!”

McKenna turned slowly in his seat, to face Olsen.

“One time, ten years ago,” he began, “Jeff Rand had a client who was guilty