"I'm part Airedale," he said, "on my father's side," and went behind her to help her out of her sealskin coat.
Smoothing her black dress, she went to the bed and sat on it.
He hung the coat on the back of a chair and stood-legs apart, hands in bathrobe-pockets-before her.
She studied him critically. "You don't look so bad," she said presently, "nor yet so good. How do you feel?"
"Swell. I'm only hanging around here on account of the nurses."
"That wouldn't surprise me much, neither," she told him. "But don't stand there ogling me like a Cheshire cat. You make me nervous. Sit down." She patted the bed beside her.
He sat down beside her.
She said: "Paul seems to think you did something very grand and noble by doing whatever it was you did, but you can't tell me that if you had behaved yourself you would ever have got into whatever scrape you got into at all."
"Aw, Mom," he began.
She cut him off. The gaze of her blue eyes that were young as her son's bored into Ned Beaumont's brown ones. "Look here, Ned, Paul didn't kill that whipper-snapper, did he?"
Surprise opened Ned Beaumont's eyes and mouth. "No."
"I didn't think so," the old woman said. "He's always been a good boy, but I've heard that there's some nasty hints going around and the Lord only knows what goes on in this politics. I'm sure I haven't any idea."
Amazement tinged with humor was in the eyes with which Ned Beaumont looked at her bony face.
She said: "Well, goggle at me, but I haven't got any way of knowing what you men are up to, or what you do without thinking anything of it. It was a long while before ever you were born that I gave up trying to find out."
He patted her shoulder. "You're a humdinger, Mom," he said admiringly.
She drew away from his hand and fixed him with severe penetrant eyes again. "Would you tell me if he had killed him?" she demanded.
He shook his head no.
"Then how do I know he didn't?"
He laughed. "Because," he explained, "if he had I'd still say, 'No,' but then, if you asked me if I'd tell you the truth if he had, I'd say, 'Yes.'" Merriment went out of his eyes and voice. "He didn't do it, Mom." He smiled at her. He smiled with his lips only and they were thin against his teeth. "It would be nice if somebody in town besides me thought he didn't do it and it would be especially nice if that other one was his mother."
Jack, letting cigarette-smoke come out with his words, said: "I think I've got something, though I don't know how you're going to like it."
Ned Beaumont looked thoughtfully at the sleek young man and smoothed the left side of his mustache with a forefinger. "If it's what I hired you to get I'll like it well enough." His voice was matter-of-fact as Jack's. "Sit down and tell me about it."
Jack sat down carefully, crossed his legs, put his hat on the floor, and looked from his cigarette to Ned Beaumont. He said: "It looks like those things were written by Madvig's daughter."
Ned Beaumont's eyes widened a little, but only for a moment. His face lost some of its color and his breathing became irregular. There was no change in his voice. "What makes it look like that?"
From an inner pocket Jack brought two sheets of paper similar in size and make, folded alike. He gave them to Ned Beaumont who, when he had unfolded them, saw that on each were three typewritten questions, the same three questions on each sheet.
"One of them's the one you gave me yesterday," Jack said. "Could you tell which?"
Ned Beaumont shook his head slowly from side to side.
"There's no difference," Jack said. "I wrote the other one on Charter Street where Taylor Henry had a room that Madvig's daughter used to come to-with a Corona typewriter that was there and on paper that was there. So far as anybody seems to know there were only two keys to the place. He had one and she had one. She's been back there at least a couple of times since he was killed."
Ned Beaumont, scowling now at the sheets of paper in his hands, nodded without looking up.
Jack lit a fresh cigarette from the one he had been smoking, rose and went to the table to mash the old cigarette in the ash-tray there, and returned to his seat. There was nothing in his face or manner to show that he had any interest in Ned Beaumont's reaction to their discovery.
After another minute of silence Ned Beaumont raised his head a little and asked: "How'd you get this?"
Jack put his cigarette in a corner of his mouth where it wagged with his words. "The Observer tip on the place this morning gave me the lead. That's where the police got theirs too, but they got there first. I got a pretty good break, though: the copper left in charge was a friend of mine-Fred Hurley-and for a ten-spot he let me do all the poking around I wanted."
Ned Beaumont rattled the papers in his hand. "Do the police know this?" he asked.
Jack shrugged. "I didn't tell them. I pumped Hurley, but he didn't know anything-just put there to watch things till they decide what they're going to do. Maybe they know, maybe they don't." He shook cigarette-ash on the floor. "I could find out."
"Never mind that. What else did you turn up?"
"I didn't look for anything else."
Ned Beaumont, after a quick glance at the dark young man's inscrutable face, looked down at the sheets of paper again. "What kind of dump is it?"
"Thirteen twenty-four. They had a room and bath under the name of French. The woman that runs the place claims she didn't know who they really were till the police came today. Maybe she didn't. It's the kind of joint where not much is asked. She says they used to be there a lot, mostly in the afternoons, and that the girl's been back a couple of times in the last week or so that she knows of, though she could pop in and out without being seen easily enough."
"Sure it's her?"
Jack made a noncommittal gesture with one hand. "The description's right." He paused, then added carelessly as he exhaled smoke: "She's the only one the woman saw since he was killed."
Ned Beaumont raised his head again. His eyes were hard. "Taylor had others coming there?" he asked.
Jack made the noncommittal gesture once more. "The woman wouldn't say so. She said she didn't know, but from the way she said it I'd say it was a safe bet she was lying."
"Couldn't tell by what's in the place?"
Jack shook his head. "No. There's not much woman stuff there-just a kimono and toilet things and pajamas and stuff like that."
"Much of his stuff there?"
"Oh, a suit and a pair of shoes and some underwear and pajamas and socks and so on."
"Any hats?"
Jack smiled. "No hats," he said.
Ned Beaumont got up and went to the window. Outside darkness was almost complete. A dozen raindrops clung to the glass and as many more struck it lightly while Ned Beaumont stood there. He turned to face Jack again. "Thanks a lot, Jack," he said slowly. His eves were focused on Jack's face in a dully absent-minded stare. "I think maybe I'll have another job for you soon-maybe tonight. I'll give you a ring."
Jack said, "Right," and rose and went out.
Ned Beaumont went to the closet for his clothes, carried them into the bathroom, and put them on. When he came out a nurse was in his room, a tall full-bodied woman with a shiny pale face.
"Why, you're dressed!" she exclaimed.
"Yes, I've got to go out."
Alarm joined astonishment in her mien. "But you can't, Mr. Beaumont," she protested. "It's night and it's beginning to rain and Doctor Tait would-"
"I know, I know," he said impatiently, and went around her to the door.
1
"The taxi didn't leak," he said, but his grin lacked virility. "Paul in?"
"He went out not more than half an hour ago, I think to the Club. But come in, come in."
"Opal home?" he asked as he shut the door and followed her down the hall.
"No. She's been off somewhere since morning."
Ned Beaumont halted in the living-room doorway. "I can't stay," he said. "I'll run on down to the Club and see Paul there." His voice was not quite steady.
The old woman turned quickly towards him. "You'll do no such thing," she said in a scolding voice. "Look at you, you're just about to have a chill. You'll sit right down there by the fire and let me get von something hot to drink."
"Can't, Mom," he told her. "I've got to go places."
Her blue eyes wherein age did not show became bright and keen. "When did you leave the hospital?" she demanded.
"Just now."
She put her lips together hard, then opened them a little to say accusingly: "You walked out." A shadow disturbed the clear blueness of her eves. She came close to Ned Beaumont and held her face close to his: she was nearly as tall as he. Her voice was harsh now as if coming from a parched throat. "Is it something about Paul?" The shadow in her eyes became recognizable as fear. "And Opal?"
His voice was barely audible. "It's something I've got to see them about."
She touched one of his cheeks somewhat timidly with bony fingers. "You're a good boy, Ned," she said.
He put an arm around her. "Don't worry, Mom. None of it's bad as it could be. Only-if Opal comes home make her stay-if you can."
"Is it anything you can tell me, Ned?" she asked.
"Not now and-well-it might be just as well not to let either of them know you think anything's wrong."
He called another number and asked for Mr. Rumsen. A moment later he was saying: "'Lo, Jack, this is Ned Beaumont. Busy?… Fine. Here it is. I want to know if the girl we were talking about went to see Mathews of the Observer today and what she did afterwards, if she did.
That's right, Hal Mathews. I tried to get him by phone, there and home, but no luck… Well, on the quiet if you can, but get it and get it quick… No, I'm out of the hospital. I'll be home waiting. You know my number… Yes, Jack. Fine, thanks, and ring me as often as you can… 'By."
He went out to the waiting taxicab, got into it, and gave the driver his address, but after half a dozen blocks he tapped the front window with his fingers and gave the driver another address.
Presently the taxicab came to rest in front of a squat greyish house set in the center of a steeply sloping smooth lawn. "Wait," he told the driver as he got out.
The greyish house's front door was opened to his ring by a red-haired maid.
"Mr. Farr in?" he asked her.
"I'll see. Who shall I tell him?"
"Mr. Beaumont."
The District Attorney came into the reception-hall with both hands out. His florid pugnacious face was all smiling. "Well, well, Beaumont, this is a real pleasure," he said as he rushed up to his visitor. "Here, give me your coat and hat."
Ned Beaumont smiled and shook his head. "I can't stay," he said. "I just dropped in for a second on my way home from the hospital."
"All shipshape again? Splendid!"
"Feeling pretty good," Ned Beaumont said. "Anything new?"
"Nothing very important. The birds who manhandled you are still loose-in hiding somewhere-but we'll get them."
Ned Beaumont made a depreciatory mouth. "I didn't die and they weren't trying to kill me: you could only stick them with an assault-charge." He looked somewhat drowsily at Farr. "Had any more of those three-question epistles?"
The District Attorney cleared his throat. "Uh-yes, come to think of it, there were one or two more of them."
"How many?" Ned Beaumont asked. His voice was politely casual. The ends of his lips were raised a little in an idle smile. Amusement glinted in his eyes, but his eyes held Farr's.
The District Attorney cleared his throat. "Three," he said reluctantly. Then his eyes brightened. "Did you hear about the splendid meeting we had at-?"
Ned Beaumont interrupted him. "All along the same line?" he asked. "Uh-more or less." The District Attorney licked his lips and a pleading expression began to enter his eyes.
"How much more-or less?"
Farr's eyes slid their gaze down from Ned Beaumont's eyes to his necktie and sidewise to his left shoulder. He moved his lips vaguely, but did not utter a sound.
Ned Beaumont's smile was openly malicious now. "All saying Paul killed Taylor Henry?" he asked in a sugary voice.
Farr jumped, his face faded to a light orange, and in his excitement he let his startled eyes focus on Ned Beaumont's eyes again. "Christ, Ned!" he gasped.
Ned Beaumont laughed. "You're getting nerves, Farr," he said, still sugary of voice. "Better watch yourself or you'll be going to pieces." He made his face grave. "Has Paul said anything to you about it? About your nerves, I mean."
"N-no."
Ned Beaumont smiled again. "Maybe he hasn't noticed it-yet." He raised an arm, glanced at his wrist-watch, then at Farr. "Found out who wrote them yet?" he asked sharply.
The District Attorney stammered: "Look here, Ned, I don't-you know-it's not-" floundered and stopped.
Ned Beaumont asked: "Well?"
The District Attorney gulped and said desperately: "We've got something, Ned, but it's too soon to say. Maybe there's nothing to it. You know how these things are."
Ned Beaumont nodded. There was nothing but friendliness in his face now. His voice was level and cool without chilliness saying: "You've learned where they were written and you've found the machine they were written on, but that's all you've got so far. You haven't got enough to even guess who wrote them."
"That's right, Ned," Farr blurted out with a great air of relief.
Ned Beaumont took Farr's hand and shook it cordially. "That's the stuff," he said. "Well, I've got to run along. You can't go wrong taking things slowly, being sure you're right before you go ahead. You can take my word for that."
The District Attorney's face and voice were warm with emotion. "Thanks, Ned, thanks!"