I DROPPED my bombshell and sank back to await the explosion.
“Brushing his teeth!” Beton’s voice hit high G. “Are you crazy?”
“Nope. At least not violently.”
“Then what the hell do you mean?”
“Just what I said. Ned McGowan was brushing his teeth when he fell dead in the bathroom.”
“How do you know he was brushing his teeth?” Beton’s eyebrows were high.
“I was here. I saw the body. Toothpaste was caked on his mouth and gums. Look in the bathroom. The toothbrush is on the floor and there’s a broken water glass in the basin.”
Beton disappeared into the bathroom and came out a minute later with the toothbrush in his hand.
“Here it is! Just like she said.”
“I hope you know you’ve spoiled any fingerprints which may have been on that thing.” I looked at his big paw, wrapped around the handle of the brush.
He dropped it like a hot coal, then stooped and picked it up with a handkerchief.
“Oh well, the only prints on it must have been the doctor’s.”
“And perhaps one other person’s—and now yours are there.” I turned to Tommy. “What do you think now?”
“I think godammit! That’s what I think. And that this is the very hell of a ease!”
“So it is,” I agreed. “But just what is it?” I knew when to stop being too smart. Cops don’t like too smart reporters.
Tommy shook his head. “Damned if I know. If he was brushing his teeth it sure can’t be suicide. The door was double locked, so it can’t be murder, and the chemist says it can’t be an accident. So I don’t know what it is.”
Right then I threw caution to the winds.
“I do,” I said.
“Oh! You do!” Beton jeered. “Well, let us in on it. What is it?”
“Murder,” I said, much more calmly than I felt.
“Really? Well, where and how did he get the poison?”
I thought: Here we go—and let the bits fall where they may!
“That’s easy to figure,” I said. “He got it off the toothbrush.”
Jaws dropped as though let down on hinges.
“You’re nuts!” Beton shouted. “Just plain nuts!”
“I am not!” I denied, violently. “I’ve more sense than you have. At least I can see the nose on my face. Ned didn’t commit suicide. He didn’t get poisoned by accident. Then he was murdered. Killed with a toothbrush!”
Beton was disgusted. “Killed with a toothbrush! Who ever heard of such a thing?”
“Shut up, Les,” Tommy said mildly. “I remember reading a story once about a man killed that way. I suppose it could be done with several poisons. I don’t know about curare.”
“Et tu Brutus.” Beton turned an injured stare on Tommy. “The lad even knows Latin!” I said, nastily. “But he doesn’t know how to get out of the way when a brick building starts to fall.” I’d quite forgotten I’d needed a good jolt myself to see the obvious.
“Now you shut up, Margaret. Or, wait, don’t shut up. Let me hear how you figured the toothbrush angle?” Tommy was annoyed but interested.
“Miss Cheng had it figured for murder from the start,” I said, sullenly. “Only she hadn’t figured out how it was done—or had she? She spoke of how poison could be planted!”
“Planted?”
“Uh huh! She told me all about how she and Ned worked on experiments and how he let his friends in on the poison study. She said it was murder and she meant to prove it. And she went into long detail about how she and Ned always cleaned up after experiments so it couldn’t have been an accident. Her talk about tidying and cleaning up gave me an idea.”
“About what?” Tommy prodded.
“Well, it was the answer to something that puzzled me earlier.”
“What?”
“Well, you see, it’s like this—” I began cautiously but excitement gave caution a kick in the pants and I blurted, “It told me a woman had been up here when Ned undressed!”
“How can you say such a thing!” Beton sounded horrified.
“The act’s good, but you can skip it,” I said. “Tommy! I think I’ve got the whole thing in a bottle! Ned was killed by a woman, someone he knew and had no fear of—someone who was here with him when he came home last night!”
“But who?” He’d caught my excitement.
“How would I know? All I know is that Ned often spent the night at my house. Brett is almost too neat, and the contrast between his tidily hung clothes and McGowan’s things draped over the chairs and floor was strong enough to leave a mental impression. This room is too orderly, except for the dresser.”
“Maybe the maid hung his clothes in the closet,” Tommy suggested.
“There were no maids on duty when he got home and undressed. The things were put away then.”
“You mean—?”
“Exactly!” I anticipated him. “The woman who was here had to be one Ned was intimate enough with to disrobe before her. She hung up his clothes—that’s strictly a woman’s trick. No man would think of doing it.”
“But the curare, Margaret? I told you taking it by mouth wouldn’t kill. That washes out the toothbrush theory.”
“On the contrary. It clinches it!”
“How?”
“That woman knew he’d been to a dentist and had a tooth pulled!”
“Who told you that?” He looked his amazement.
“Miss Cheng. Dr. McGowan had a tooth pulled from the lower jaw, an impacted tooth that called for a lot of gum cutting. The cavity provided the open wound through which the poison entered the blood!”
“That ties it!” Tommy snapped his fingers excitedly. “Maggie! You’ve hit the jackpot this time!”
“It’s the first one I’ve ever hit—and don’t call me Maggie.”
“Oops! Sorry!” He grinned at me. “Well, Margaret, it looks like you’ve drawn the picture. All we need do is find out who knew he’d had that tooth pulled.”
“That search should give you quite a few suspects,” I said drily. “No doubt everyone he spoke to after it was out heard the whole story.”
His face fell. “Yeah. Guess you’re right. But,” he brightened, “after all, he couldn’t have seen so very many people in just two days.”
“Not more than fifty, including patients,” I deflated him. His face dropped again. “Hell!”
“Cheer up, darling. It may not be as tough as it sounds. Let’s try a little reconstructing, with me as the woman who did the job. How about it?”
“Okay by me.” He grinned widely. “Let’s see what kind of a poisoner you’d make.”
“Poison being a woman’s weapon, I’d probably do all right at it. But seriously, we must figure I’d be someone to whom he’d taught toxicology. I’d have to know he had curare and where it was and about his tooth being pulled. I’d have to be someone in love with him, someone jealous and filled with a sense of having been done wrong.”
“How about his fiancee?”
“She’s out. In that case he wouldn’t have admitted the engagement. There wouldn’t have been any to admit.”
“Then it must have been some woman he’d been stringing along,” he observed brightly.
I gave him a look. “For a smart guy you say the dumbest things at times! Well, say I came up here with him or followed him up and went off on a long tirade of abuse and recriminations about his treatment of me. While I raved on he found my message and called me.”
“How could he call you if you were here with him?”
“Are you being funny?” I shot him a look, then realizing how strange the remark must have sounded I laughed. “Oh! That’s right. He couldn’t very well do that. Well, put it that he found a message to call a reporter he knew and did so. I listened to him make the call, heard him say he was going to marry Olivette, and wild with jealousy decided to kill him. Assuming I hadn’t already decided on it before I got here. How’m I doing?”
“Damn good, so far. Now how did you manage to get the poison on his toothbrush? You had to have it or get it somewhere.”
“Of course. Well, he undressed while the woman—I mean while I—was here. He emptied his pockets and put his stuff on the dresser. I took his clothes and hung them in the closet. I saw the keys on the dresser and I knew which ones fitted the cabinet.”
“You couldn’t get in there while he was in the room,” Tommy objected.
“No, but I could when he went to the bathroom.”
“How do you know he went to the bathroom?”
“If you’re going to be smart, I’ll stop right now,” I threatened.
“Don’t get sore, Margaret. I was just kidding. Go ahead.”
“All right then. I’d take the poison out, put it in my purse or my pocket, relock the case, and put the keys back. I’d choose the curare because I knew how it worked, and knowing about his cut gum, I’d figure it would be almost impossible to trace murder to me.
“After some more argument, I’d go to the bathroom and put the poison on his toothbrush, knowing he would use it either that night or the next morning. Then I’d come out, argue a while longer to make it look good, and leave.
“Ned let me out, put the latch on—that explains away the locked door—and sometime later used the toothbrush and rang down the final curtain. How is that for a picture of what could have happened?”
“Very pretty. Very pretty!” It was Beton. “Very—pretty—indeed!” He dragged the words out. “In fact it could be just what happened and how else would you know so damn much about the method and means?”
It took me a full minute to realize what he was implying.
“Why you poor dumb flatfoot!” I blazed at him. “Haven’t you been on the force long enough to learn about reconstructing a crime? That’s what I was doing, you ass!”
“Oh is it? Well, if you ask me you know a hell of a lot about how the guy was poisoned.”
“No one asked you,” I retorted. “You’re certainly screwy if you suspect me! That’s why the police department in this town stinks—guys like you give it a smell that rises to high heaven!” Then I realized I was being silly. “Oh, nuts to you, my fine feathered friend,” I said disgustedly.
He turned to Tommy. “It might be a damn good idea to check on what Miss Slone was doing when this murder took place. How do we know she didn’t make a date with him when he called her last night? How do we know she didn’t do the job herself? She had the opportunity and she sure seems to know just how it happened. Why can’t she figure as the jealous woman in the case?”
“You imbecile! Of all the damn fool things I’ve ever heard of this wins the dough!” I was in a tearing rage. “I help to drop a nice murder in your lap and you have the brass to accuse me of committing it! You make me sick!”
Beton ignored me. “Funny how come she pulled that poison angle on the coroner so fast.” He half-mused. “Sounds to me like she was just wanting to show off how smart she’d been.”
“Now listen, you pluperfect jackass—” I started to rise but Tommy waved me back into the chair.
“Shut up, Margaret. And you too, Les. This is so stupid it isn’t funny. We have a murder on our hands, a very clever murder—and you two are standing here spitting at each other like a couple of alley cats. We’ll never get anywhere if you keep clawing at each other. Margaret was only theorizing. She didn’t kill McGowan.”
“Yeah? How do we know that? Can she prove she went right home to bed when she left work?” He leveled a finger at me. “Can you prove it?”
“Aw, can the melodrama,” I sneered. “I told you I got in my car at 2:15. I stopped for nothing but traffic lights until I got home. I went upstairs, stopped by Brett’s room, saw he was out, and went to bed. So there!”
He tucked his thumbs in his trouser belt and said smugly, “That proves exactly nothing to me. Who saw you come in? Did you talk to anyone when you got there? Who can back your story for an alibi?”
“Why you—” I stopped abruptly. No one could back me up! There wasn’t a way in the world I could prove what time I got in! I knew it—of course—but proving it was something else. I couldn’t!
Six pairs of eyes were fastened on me, six pairs of ears were waiting for me to offer some proof r d told the truth. I laughed—but even to my own ears the sound was forced and unnatural.
“This beats me,” I said and turned to Tommy appealingly. “I can’t really prove what time I got home. No one saw me come in. I don’t think anyone even heard me.” I laughed again, this time more naturally. “You’ll just have to take my word for it.”
He patted my shoulder. “Of course I’ll take your word for it. You’re not the killer type, Margaret. Although it’s hard to say just what the killer type is at times. It depends on circumstances and motive.”
I looked at him sharply. Was it my imagination or was there a rather speculative gleam in his eyes? I told myself: Some day you’ll learn to keep your big mouth shut, Margaret Slone. You’re always talking when you should be listening.
I shrugged my shoulders, as if to throw off the tenseness I felt in the air. “All this stupidity is getting us exactly nowhere,” I opined. “I thought we were trying to catch a murderer.”
’Well, if you ask me—” Beton began, but Tommy cut him short.
“No one asked you. And it might be a good idea if you waited until someone did.”
Beton looked ugly, but he shut up.
I looked at my watch; 3:15 and deadline in fifteen minutes. I picked up the phone to call and Morrow looked at his own watch and hightailed for the door. LeFevre followed him. Herrot came and sat by me.
“I’ll get my dope from you.” He grinned.
I nodded and spoke to Dennis. “Well, McCarthy! I’ve really got a tale for you,” I said.
“You’d better have a good one!” he snapped. “What in hell has got into you, waiting until dealine to phone in? Don’t you know a deadline when you meet one?”
“I know a heel when I meet one!” I retorted. “And this time I don’t mean you. I mean Les Beton.” I glared at the offending cop.
“What’s Beton done to you?”
“Practically accused me of murdering McGowan,” I said bitterly.
“Wh-a-a-t! Are you crazy? Why should he do that?”
“I may be a little nuts but even I don’t know why he should pull that,” I answered. “But here’s your story and it’s a murder story, Dennis. No doubt about it.”
“So you managed to make it murder?”
“It managed to be murder!” I said tartly.
“All right. Start talking.” I could imagine him settling to business. Dennis could always tell when I wasn’t in the mood for ribbing.
“The poison he got was curare, a product of a strychnine plant. What? No, it wasn’t strychnine, it was curare, c-u-r-a-r-e.”
“How did he get it?”
“I’m coming to that, if you’ll just give me time,” I said impatiently.
“All right, but don’t take all day.”
“Curare kills only when it enters the bloodstream. It’s not rare but neither is it used very often in murder. The Indians in South America smear their arrow and dart tips with it when they hunt. As soon as the animal’s skin is punctured with the poisoned weapon it drops dead.”
“Indians! Arrows! Animals! I thought we were talking about a murder, not a big game hunt!”
“We are!” I snapped. “Keep your Irish down. In McGowan’s murder the poison was used by someone who knew their toxicology. NOT a South American Indian! It was planted. McGowan was quite an expert in poisons, it seems. He even wrote articles on the subject and he liked to teach his girl friends all about it. Which wasn’t very smart of him.”
“How was the poison planted?”
“Well, when he died he was brushing his teeth. The poison was either in the paste or on the toothbrush—most likely the latter. The suspicion is that the poison was put there so he’d get it when he was alone. Whoever did it figured he’d use the brush either that night or in the morning.”
“Have they tested the brush yet?”
“They can’t while it sits in Beton’s pocket!” I said, throwing Les a dirty look. “I don’t know what he expects to do with it, but no doubt he’ll get around to sending it to the chemist eventually.”
Beton’s reaction, a hasty departure for the door, gave me a moment’s pleasure.
“The brush is now on its way to the lab,” I told Dennis. “Whoever did this clever job knew Ned had been to the dentist and had a tooth pulled. Curare won’t kill unless it goes in the bloodstream; it only makes you sick to swallow it. The open gum provided entry for the poison.”
“Suppose he had stomach ulcers?”
“Now look, smart guy, this is no time for your low humor.”
“Well, after all, Maggie, if he had stomach ulcers couldn’t the curare kill him?”
“Maybe it could. I don’t know. But it didn’t because Ned had no ulcers. He got it through that torn gum.”
“Okay. Now that you’ve settled that point, who have they arrested for the murder? You?”
“You’d love that, wouldn’t you?” I jeered. “But just because Les Beton is a crack-brained idiot who can’t see past his nose doesn’t mean I’m going to be arrested. Why should I?”
’I don’t know, I’m sure. But he did accuse you, didn’t he? You said so.”
“I said he ‘practically accused me.’ There’s a difference.”
“What brought that on? Your big mouth?”
“Mind your own mouth!” I snapped. “We just had an argument, that’s all. Anyhow, no one has been arrested. We only figured it for murder a short while ago. We don’t even have a real suspect yet.”
“We!” He accented the word heavily. “Say, look, do you work for this paper or for the police force? Reporters who set themselves up as dicks give me a pain in the—”
“Now wait, McCarthy!” I cut in hastily. “Don’t get on your ear. It just happened I knew a few things about Ned and certain things I knew didn’t fit it with suicide or a natural death. The nurse was against accident and it worked into murder.”
“Hell of a case, I’d say. No suspects, no definite evidence. What about the inquest? When will they hold that?”
“Inquest? Oh! The inquest! Just a minute, I’ll ask Tommy.”
“Blat, blat, blat,” went the phone—much as it had earlier. I beckoned frantically to Tommy.
“The inquest, when is it?”
“Tomorrow morning. Around 10:00.”
I spoke to the blatting phone. “It’s at 10:00 tomorrow morning, dear.”
“Don’t give me that slushy talk. I’m not your dear. Okay, I’ll get this much set and please try to call back—”
“I will! I swear it!” I interrupted the old story.
“See that you do.” The phone clicked in my ear.