Twenty minutes later Larry arrived at Luckman’s apartment. He had hoped to find Bradley, but the inspector was not there. However, the detective watching the apartment was waiting for Larry and admitted him.
Some of the angry energy had deserted Larry. He seemed reluctant to begin his examination of Luckman’s collection. It was in no sense as complicated a process as going over Adrian’s stock. Luckman had been a specialist, interested only in Newfoundland issues.
There were several cardboard letter files filled with stamps, some of them lying loose in the boxes, some carefully put away in envelopes and labelled. An inspection of these showed Larry that the loose stamps were damaged, mostly cancelled items. In such condition they had very little value. The ones in the envelopes were in better shape, but none of them, Larry saw, was first-rate. They were all saleable, however.
Luckman’s possession of these dubious items was presently explained when Larry took a large, morocco-bound album from the drawer of Luckman’s desk. This was the works, the real collection. Like so many enthusiasts Luckman had had this album specially prepared. There was a space in it for every known Newfoundland issue. Each space was carefully labelled, and each space contained a stamp—a faultless specimen of its type.
Larry had a feeling for this sort of thing, and his manner, as he handled the album, was almost reverent. Here were mint-condition items, unblemished in every respect. Where there were rarer colours of certain issues, Luckman had them. Evidently he had bought in the beginning simply to fill the book, but gradually he had replaced and replaced until the collection was flawless. Larry realized that all the stamps in the boxes and envelopes were duplicates of the perfect specimens which Luckman had laboriously acquired.
He finally turned to a page where a single prepared square was not filled. It was the only empty space in the book. Under the square was the printed label: “#10,1860 one shilling, orange, on laid paper.” This was the stamp which Adrian had sold to Paul Gregory without giving Luckman the chance to bid. Luckman’s fury was understandable. His collection was one of the finest Larry had ever seen. Larry sat staring at the vacant space for a long time. There was a little torn piece of a stamp hinge attached to the square, and Larry’s lingers fiddled with it. He looked at the detective who sat stolidly in the corner of the room, thumbing through a magazine.
“If he could have filled that square, I suspect he wouldn’t have minded dying,” Larry said.
“Huh?” The detective looked up.
“Perfection is a rare thing,” Larry said. “This is perfection, but for one missing stamp. You ought to look at it, Officer, because you may never see anything like it again.”
The detective got up and came across the room. He glanced over Larry’s shoulder, scratching his head. Larry sat still, his fingers playing idly with the torn piece of gummed hinge.
“How guys can spend the dough they do on them things is beyond me,” said the detective. “Have you got anywhere, Mr. Storm?”
Larry sighed. “That’s the hell of it, my friend. I haven’t. We expected big things from this collection, but I’m damned if I can see anything that helps us. I’m going through it all again.”
He did. Some one brought him lunch. He went carefully over the loose stuff in the boxes. There was nothing that gave him the slightest clue. In the end he came back to the leather-bound album. It was a thing of beauty; it would have thrilled any stamp enthusiast; but if it held a hint to the identity of a murderer, Larry could not see it.
It was about six when Larry gave up. He called police headquarters on Luckman’s phone, but Bradley was not there and no one seemed to know where he could be reached.
Larry left the apartment, picked up Rube in the hallway downstairs, and went home. Bones greeted him at the front door. The boy’s face looked white and drawn. Larry patted him on the back.
“Still feeling a little rocky, fella?”
Bones turned away quickly. “It isn’t that, Larry.” His voice shook, as if he were close to tears.
“Ellen!” Larry said, sharply. “Is something wrong with her, Bones?”
“No, no, Larry, she’s all right. She’s in the living room.”
Larry stepped past the boy into the room beyond. Ellen was stretched on the couch near the fire, a pale-blue quilt drawn up over her, Larry went to her, knelt beside the couch. He saw that she had been crying.
“Ellen, what on earth …”
She put her cheek against the lapel of his coat and for an instant her arm clung to him.
“I didn’t know what you meant this morning, Larry, when … when you said we might not like the way things have turned out. Oh, Larry, I can’t believe it. He was so … so real, so human. I—”
“Ellen, for God’s sake, what are you talking about?” He pushed her gently back against the cushions.
“Haven’t you been in touch with Bradley?” she asked.
“No, I haven’t seen him all day. What’s happened?”
Ellen turned her eyes away. “It’s Mr. Julius, Larry. Why didn’t you tell me that Bradley suspected him? It would have prepared me.”
“Tell me what’s happened!” Larry said.
“It’s all in the afternoon papers,” Ellen said. “Bradley put a man to watch Mr. Julius. This morning Mr. Julius went out. He went into a restaurant for a late breakfast. During breakfast he went into the washroom. He didn’t come out. The detective finally went in after him. Mr. Julius had gone, escaped through a window at the back. Bradley says it’s as good as a confession. They’ve got a general alarm out for him.”
“So he ducked out on them?” Larry stood up, frowning. “Now why the hell would he do that? Bradley had no real evidence against him.”
“But you, Larry. He was afraid of what you’d find today. Was there … was there something to incriminate Mr. Julius at Luckman’s?”
“That’s the hell of it, Ellen. There wasn’t anything to convict any one. I … I think we must have gone wrong on our reasoning. Luckman had a beautiful collection, perfect except for that missing Number 10, but as far as a clue to the killer goes, there was—” He stopped short, staring at Ellen. “My God!” he said.
“Larry, what is it?” she asked, anxiously. “Was there something after all?”
He strode over to the sideboard and poured himself a drink. His eyes were suddenly bright. The neck of the scotch bottle rattled against the rim of the glass.
“I’ve got to think,” he said. “I’ve got to think it out, Ellen. There was something, right under my hand, and I didn’t see it at the time. But if I’m right—”
“Mr. Julius?”
“Not Mr. Julius! God knows why the old devil has given the police the run-around. There’s no case, Ellen. He was fond of Bones! He found Bones pretty easily! He has no alibi! I But they haven’t connected the gun with him. They haven’t explained why, if he was so soft-hearted about Bones, he would try to kill us. No, Ellen. I wouldn’t put murder past Julius, if he thought he was right. But I think he’d take his medicine if he were trapped, and not go around taking pot shots at people.” He drained half his glass at a gulp. “Great God, if I’m right …”
He walked up and down the room, puffing at his cigarette. Suddenly the phone rang and he walked over and picked it up.
“Hello? Yes, this is Storm. … What’s that? … I see. And who are you? … Very well, I’ll come at once.”
He put down the phone. He put down his glass. He turned to face Ellen, his eyes shining with excitement.
“It seems,” he said, slowly, “that some one’s broken into our office downtown. They want me to come and see whether anything of value’s been taken.”
“Gee, boss,” Bones cried. “That’s terrible! I got a lot of important stuff there, too. Can I come with you?”
“You’ll stay here with Ellen.” Larry’s voice sounded far away, yet tense.
“Who called you, Larry?” Ellen asked.
A faint smile flickered on Larry’s lips. “The night watchman in the building.”
Ellen looked at him, frowning. “But, Larry, there isn’t any night watchman in the building! That’s why we …”
“I know,” said Larry, softly. “There isn’t any night watchman.”
He walked slowly out into the foyer.
“Larry!” Ellen cried. “Larry, don’t be a fool! It’s some kind of a trap.”
Larry came back into the room buttoning up his coat. He stood beside the couch looking down into Ellen’s face. “Traps aren’t dangerous when you know about them ahead of time,” he said.
“Don’t be an ass,” Ellen said. “If somebody’s waiting there to get you, you haven’t a chance. Call Bradley. Let him handle it.”
“Bradley can’t be reached.”
“Then don’t go. You’re just playing into the murderer’s hands.”
“Listen, sweet, I’ve been pushed around long enough by this lug,” Larry said, suddenly angry. “I think I know who it is, and I can handle him. I’ve got a private debt to settle, and I’m not going to wait till it suits Bradley to show up. If Bradley chooses to chase around after Julius, then here’s where I beat him at his own business.”
“You damned idiot!” Ellen protested. “This man didn’t hesitate to try to get you once before, did he? How do you expect to handle him? You don’t even own a gun!”
“I think I can convince him that the game is up,” said Larry. “He isn’t going to polish me off till he finds out what I know and whom I’ve told. Take it easy. I’ll be back—soon.”
He left them. In the elevator, he spoke to the operator.
“Take me all the way down to the basement,” he said. He gave the boy a wink. “I don’t want that flatfoot in the lobby to know I’m going out.”
“You can count on me, Mr. Storm.”
* * *
Larry got out of a taxi about a block from his office and paid off the driver. He stood for a minute, looking up and down Nassau Street, almost deserted at this hour of the night. Offices had closed. A few lights showed that a handful of stragglers remained at their desks. A damp, cold wind whipped round his legs and flapped the tails of his overcoat. Then he walked slowly toward 64 ½.
The entryway was dark. George, the elevator man, had gone home. Larry began the long climb up the winding stairs, six flights of them. When he reached the seventh floor he paused. There was not a sound in the building. A distant automobile horn blared in the street below. That was all.
Slowly Larry walked along the corridor and turned down the passage that led to his office. There was no light burning behind the plate-glass door. It was so black that he felt his way along, one hand on the wall. Outside the door he stopped. Then he tried the knob. The door was unlocked, and he opened it. The office was pitch-dark. Larry’s gloved fingers crept along the wall till they touched the light switch. Again he hesitated, straining to hear some sound. Then it came to him— the faint creaking of shoe leather. Larry’s muscles tensed, but his voice was quiet and steady when he spoke.
“Don’t shoot, Mr. Hale,” he said. “I’m going to turn on the lights.”