Dutch Shoe Mystery (19 page)

“Oh, unquestionably,” said the Mayor. “Who’s on the list after that? Let’s have it, quickly!”

The stenographer continued:

“Further Report on Dr. Janney”

He paused as there was a distinct murmur from his intent audience. To a man, they hitched their chairs closer to the table. The clerk picked up the thread of the typewritten report:

“Further Report on Dr. Janney

“Dr. Janney returned Monday night to his residence, the Tareyton, at 9:07, emerging from a taxicab, according to the report of Operative Ritter, on the Janney assignment. Subsequent evidence of the taxicab driver, Morris Cohen (Amalgamated Taxi Corp., License No. 260954),
*
revealed that he picked up his fare outside Grand Central Terminal and was instructed to take him at once to the Tareyton. J. remained in his rooms for the rest of the evening. Telephone calls numerous, but from friends and professional acquaintances, all on subject of deceased. J. placed no calls.

“This morning (Tuesday, 11:45
A.M.)
was questioned about Swanson. J. self-contained, alert, wary; looks ill and harassed. Refused again to discuss Swanson or his whereabouts.
Q.
by Inspector Queen: ‘Dr. Janney, you deliberately disobeyed my order last night. I told you not to leave town. … What were you doing in Grand Central at 6
P.M.
yesterday?’
A.
by Dr. Janney: ‘I did not leave town. Went to the station to cancel my ticket for Chicago. I told you yesterday I was going and you said not to. So I decided the medical convention could get along without me.’
Q.
‘Ah, then you merely canceled your reservation? Didn’t take a train to any place?’
A.
‘I’ve told you. You can check up on me easily enough.’

“NOTE:
Immediate check-up at Grand Central Terminal revealed that Dr. Janney’s ticket and reservation were actually canceled at approximately the time he testifies they were. Impossible get description of man who canceled ticket—ticket-seller does not remember. Nor can verification be secured of J.’s statement that he did not buy a ticket for another destination.

“Q.
‘You left your hotel at 5:30, getting to the station at about 6:00. Yet you didn’t get back to your hotel until after 9:00. …You don’t mean to tell me that it took you three hours to cancel a railroad reservation which could have been done just as easily by telephone!’
A.
‘It took only a few minutes, naturally. I left Grand Central and took a long walk up Fifth Avenue and in Central Park. I was depressed. Needed air. Wanted to be alone.’
Q.
‘How is it then that you hailed a cab outside Grand Central to take you home, if you were in Central Park?’
A.
‘I walked back part of the way, but I felt too tired to continue on foot.’
Q.
‘In this walk of yours, Doctor, did you meet any one or stop to talk to any one who might verify your story?
A.
‘No.’

“Q.
by Mr. Ellery Queen: ‘You’re a man of intelligence, Doctor, now, aren’t you?’
A.
‘That’s my reputation.’
Q.
‘Well deserved, Dr. Janney, very well deserved. Now how does the following analysis strike this acute mentality of yours?—You are, let us say, impersonated in the Hospital for a brief period. In order to impersonate you it is essential for the impersonator to remove you temporarily from the scene. Lo and behold! a gentleman named Swanson comes to call on you about five minutes before the great impersonation is scheduled to begin, takes up your time for the entire period during which Abigail Doorn is being eased out of this world, and then releases you when the impersonator presumably has had a chance to escape. … I say, how does this strike your intelligence?’
A.
‘Purely coincidental! Can’t be anything more. I told you my visitor had nothing to do with this confounded business!’

“Janney, on being definitely warned that unless he discloses Swanson’s identity he will be held in large bail by the police as a material witness, remained silent. Exhibited facial indications of worry, however.

“
CONCLUSION
: There can be little question of the possibilities. Janney lied when he said he spent the time from 6:00 to 9:00 strolling about the streets. It is fairly certain that he did purchase a ticket to some unknown destination, probably near to New York (at the Lower Level of the station) and that he did entrain for this unknown destination. We are now working on all outgoing trains at approximately the correct hour in an effort to discover a conductor or passenger who can identify Dr. Janney as a traveler on the train during the significant hours. Nothing on this score as yet.

“The holding of Dr. Janney without definite evidence that he has lied (identification on the train would be such evidence) will accomplish nothing. In any event, even with identification the arrest of Janney would be useless unless it leads to the appearance of Swanson. It is not at all unlikely that this entire Swanson incident has assumed, due to Janney’s stubbornness and ‘principles,’ a greater importance than it actually deserves. We have nothing against Janney except his withholding a material witness.”

The clerk quietly laid the report on the table. The Mayor and the Police Commissioner regarded each other with deepening gloom. Finally the Mayor sighed and shrugged his shoulders.

“I’m inclined, for one,” he said, “to agree with that conclusion of the Inspector’s. Despite all this newspaper hullabaloo, I’d rather see you men go easy and make no mistakes than be hasty and pull a nasty boner. What do you think, Sampson?”

“Absolutely in accord.”

“I’d follow Queen’s advice,” remarked the Commissioner.

The clerk picked up another typewritten sheet and read aloud:

“Further Report on Sarah Fuller

“Most unsatisfactory. Refuses to disclose purpose of visit to Dr. Dunning’s house Monday night. Woman is half-insane. Replies obscurely and her talk bristles with Biblical references. Questioned in Doorn house at 2
P.M.
Tuesday.

“
CONCLUSION
: No question but that a conspiracy exists between Sarah Fuller and Dr. Dunning to withhold information that may be pertinent. How prove it? Woman under constant watch, as is Dunning.”

“Unbelievable, how little these people have revealed,” exclaimed the Borough President.

“I’ve never seen a more stubborn set of witnesses,” muttered the Commissioner. “Anything else there, Jake?” he snarled.

There was one report more. It was quite long and the attention of the conferees riveted immediately upon it. The clerk read:

“Report on Philip Morehouse

“Interesting development here. Contact through D.A.’s office brought word from Assistant District Attorney Rabkin that Probate Clerk revealed on query fact hitherto unknown. One of provisions of Abigail Doorn’s will, already filed by Attorney Morehouse for probate, authorized said Attorney to destroy certain secret and undescribed documents immediately upon the death of testator. Documents designated in will as being in custody of the Attorney.

“Inquiry immediately of Morehouse, found at Doorn house with Hulda Doorn at late hour this
P.M.,
discloses peculiar situation. Inspector Queen warned Morehouse at once not to destroy said documents, but to turn them over to the police as possibly containing information pertinent to the investigation of the crime. Morehouse replied coolly that he has already destroyed these papers!

“Q.
‘When?’
A.
‘Yesterday afternoon. It was one of my first acts after the death of my client.’

“Inspector Queen demanded information contained in documents. Morehouse disclaimed knowledge of their contents. Averred he followed instructions of will to the letter, destroying papers without breaking seals on the envelope. Claimed never to have known; that documents were in possession of Morehouse firm for years, even while elder Morehouse, now deceased, handled Doorn affairs; that, in taking over father’s clientele, he naturally inherited responsibilities and ethical duties of father’s high standing, etc., etc.

“Confronted with accusation that under the circumstances—a murder—he had no right to take such action without consulting police, let alone destroy possible evidence, Morehouse maintained he was within his legal right.”

“We’ll see about that,” shouted Sampson.

“Hulda Doorn, present and perturbed during this colloquy, questioned as to destroyed documents. Averred total ignorance of their contents or even their existence, although claims to have handled much of deceased’s private correspondence during the old woman’s latter years.

“CONCLUSION:
Recommend immediate inquiry by District Attorney Sampson’s office into legal rights of this matter. If Morehouse exceeded authority vested by State in him as servant of the law recommend further possibility of prosecution or, if prosecution cannot be secured, relegation of entire matter to Association of the Bar. Feeling prevalent, with few dissenters in Department, that these lost documents were in some way crucial to solution of the crime.”

“Old Q. is sore, sure enough,” said the District Attorney more calmly. “This is the first time since I’ve known him that he’s shown such a streak of vindictiveness. He must be hard hit by this case. I’d hate to be in poor Morehouse’s shoes.

The Mayor heaved himself wearily to his feet.

“I guess that’s all for to-day, gentlemen,” he said. “About all we can do is hope for the best and see what developments to-morrow will bring. … I’m satisfied from these reports that Inspector Queen is conducting the inquiry to the best of his ability—which seems to be considerable. I shall issue a statement to that effect at once for the benefit of these newshounds and to reassure the Governor.” He turned to the head of New York’s police system. “Is that agreeable to you, Commissioner?”

The Commissioner, wiping his neck heavily with a large damp handkerchief, nodded with a sort of baffled resignation and slouched out of the room. As the Mayor pressed a button on his desk, the District Attorney and his aides followed in depressed silence.

*
It must be borne in mind that the period during which the Doorn investigation took place preceded the current Police Department regulation which makes it obligatory for taxicabs to bear a special police-license number.—The Editor

“Have you ever watched a log-jam? You may see them in the swirling rivers of the forests high on the flanks of the Kjolen. … A great mass of freshly cut logs shoots down the river. At broken water one strikes a snag. The mass struggles but cannot go on. It halts, it churns, it crashes. And soon there is a mountain of logs, crushing each other, building with magical rapidity a broken rampart of wood.

“Then the lumberman seeks to discover the log which is causing the jam—the log which is stemming the wooden tide—in a word, the key-log. Aha! he has found it! A tug, a twist, a pull—it snaps out, upends, darts away. And as if Merlin’s wand had waved above the spot, the wall of wood collapses and makes a mad rush down the river. …

“The investigation of a complex crime, my young friends, is much like a log-jam at times. Our logs—our clews—are racing toward a solution. Suddenly—a jam. To our bewilderment the stubborn clews keep tangling, piling up
.

“Then the lumberjacking sleuth finds the key-log and, lo! The recalcitrant clews tumble down, range themselves in swiftly moving rows, open and intelligible, and make for the distant saw-mill—the solution.”

—from an address to the recruits of the Stockholm Police Academy on November 2, 1920, by the Swedish criminologist. …

DR. GUSTAF GOETEBORG

I
NSPECTOR QUEEN WAS AT
his desk in Police Headquarters at a rare hour Wednesday morning. Propped before him was a morning newspaper—announcing in blatant Gothic headlines the reported impending arrest of Dr. Francis Janney, noted surgeon, on “suspicion of homicide”—a delicate phrase intending to convey the meaning that the surgeon was to be held, charged with the strangling of Abigail Doorn.

The Inspector did not seem too satisfied with himself. His bright little eyes glimmered with worry, and he gnawed his mustache to shreds as he read and reread the story written by Pete Harper. Telephone-bells jangled incessantly in the next room; but the instrument on the old man’s desk preserved a discreet silence; he was officially “out” to every one but the Department.

Reporters had camped in the vicinity of the big police building all night. Say, Cap, is it true about Janney being collared for the old lady’s killing? No one knew, it seemed; at least no one would discuss the matter.

The Police Commissioner and the Mayor, apprised by the Inspector late Tuesday night of his plan, in their turn refused to talk with the press. In lieu of official confirmation, other sheets picked up Harper’s story. At the offices of Harper’s newspaper itself overpowering ignorance was expressed by all parties in authority concerning the source of the trouble-making story.

At 9:00 o’clock a special telephone-call from Dr. Janney was reported to Inspector Queen. The surgeon had demanded to be connected with the Inspector and had been switched to the desk Lieutenant instead. He was informed blandly that the Inspector was in conference and could not be disturbed. Janney exploded into curses. He had been pestered all morning, he roared, by reporters seeking to interview him.

“You tell me one thing,” he snarled over the telephone. “Is that newspaper report true?”

The Lieutenant was abysmally sorry, to judge from, his tone, but he really didn’t know. Janney vowed audibly that he would retire to his private office at the Hospital and see no one; he was so angry his voice was blurred and indistinct. The sound of his receiver being replaced on the hook crashed into the Lieutenant’s ear.

This conversation was relayed to the Inspector, who smiled grimly and issued orders through Sergeant Velie that no reporters were to be allowed within the walls of the Dutch Memorial Hospital.