Death From a Top Hat

Chapter 14 The Man Who Laughed

Van Ness Lane is a shrunken, lost little backwash of a street, its only connection with the outside world a dark arched opening, iron-grilled, squeezed uncomfortably in between two elderly apartment buildings. Several squad cars, an ambulance, and a small but growing crowd clustered about the entrance when we arrived.

Inspector Gavigan spoke briefly to an officer standing by one of the cars, and we went in, down several steps, to meet an India-ink blackness that was only accentuated by the thin artificial glow from Quinn’s torch. The yellow splash of the light moved before us and disclosed a pattern of dark splotches on the thin carpet of white, a hurried trail of footprints leading inward.

Fifty or sixty feet back the walls on either side fell away, and we emerged into the Lane proper. On our right a large lonely house slept behind the blank eyelessness of shade-drawn windows. Two smaller buildings were on the left, one a low brick carriage house and the other, No. 36, a three-story, red brick building in the obsolete Village style. The Lane ended in a high blank wall.

From the partly opened door of No. 36 a narrow oblong panel of light came hesitatingly forth and fell crookedly down across a flight of stone steps. At the left of the door, and on the same level, were a pair of large French windows opening out on to a narrow wrought-iron balcony. Two of the several sets of footprints continued on up the steps and in at the door, only to come out again and join with the others that made a confused track toward the windows. Below the balcony they stopped.

Burke leveled his light at the window. The right half was just slightly ajar, and near its center edge where the catch would be one pane had been smashed. A thin sliver of light streaked the opening, and the sound of voices came from behind heavy drawn curtains.

“I guess we go in by the window,” Gavigan said, “but keep clear of those prints.”

Inside the voices stopped, the window swung inward, and the black shape of a man stepped on to the balcony. “Don’t worry about those tracks,” he said, “they’re ours.”

“Oh, it’s you, Grimm,” Gavigan replied.

Leaning over, Grimm offered his arm to each of us in turn as we hoisted ourselves up and swung over the railing.

Merlini and I followed the Inspector into the room, stepping carefully past a small end table that lay overturned just inside. On the floor around it lay the shattered pieces of what had been a lamp with a pottery base. Light sparkled in the deep-piled rug from the bits of glass that had formed the bulb, and the parchment shade was crushed and torn.

Beyond a davenport that stood a few feet in from the window, back toward us, were four men, facing us. Three of them were uniformed officers from the squad cars, the fourth, a young ambulance intern. Gavigan started around the end of the sofa, stopped short, and stood looking down at something it concealed. I followed Merlini as he stepped forward.

At first I saw only the face; I couldn’t take my eyes away. It was dark with a deep tan, and horn rimmed glasses were wildly askew on a sharp nose. There was a small mustache, shiny black hair worn somewhat long, and that same horrible constriction of facial muscles that we had already seen on another face. The eyes bulged, and the mouth, with its swollen tongue protruding, gaped as if still gasping for that last agonizing breath of air. The lips, drawn far back, exposed the teeth in an ugly, inverted grin.

But what really brought us up short was the position of the body. Flat on its back on the floor, arms and legs spread wide, feet toward a fireplace, it lay in exactly the same position as had the body of Sabbat.

The man’s clothing was shabby, ill kept, and disordered, as if death had been accompanied by a struggle. There was a ragged tear in the trousers at the knee, and a battered black hat lay crushed on the floor, stepped on.

I pulled my eyes away, finally, trying hard to retain control over the uneasy roller-coaster feeling in my stomach.

Gavigan said, “Who found him?”

Grimm, from behind me, answered, “I did.”

“Who is it?”

“We don’t know. Haven’t looked at his pockets yet. Headquarters said you were on the way, and to hold everything.”

Gavigan looked at Merlini. “You know?” he asked.

Merlini still watched the body. For a moment he made no answer, then, at last, he shook his head in a slow negative and turned abruptly to frown at the debris on the floor.

I looked around at the rest of the room, and saw, suddenly, a sixth man sitting uncomfortably on the edge of a low divan beyond the fireplace. He was a small, furtive-looking individual with a pallid, washed-out face and a shock of wiry, sand-colored hair. He sat stiffly and gazed with a curious, frowning intensity at Merlini’s back.

Gavigan saw him too. “Who’s that?” he demanded, pointing as if the little man were something for sale.

“Says his name’s Jones,” Grimm replied.

Merlini swung around and returned the man’s stare with a surprised lift of his eyebrows. He seemed about to speak, but Grimm continued, “He was with me when we broke in.”

The Inspector dropped to one knee and began a closer examination of the body. I looked about the room. It was large, perhaps twenty by forty feet. Two tall glass cabinets stood at the far end of the room and had shelves that were filled with a strange array of metal and wooden shapes, locks, keys, handcuffs, leg irons. Against the black wall, between two windows, sat an exceptionally odd affair, the dummy, life-sized figure of a bearded man wearing the turban and native dress of a Turk. He sat, cross-legged, behind a desk-like cabinet in the front side of which were numerous doors. From under lowered lids he gazed solemnly down at the cabinet’s top which was laid out as a chessboard and on which chessmen stood. The fingers of his left hand were closed about a Bishop while the right hand held a clay pipe of extraordinary length.

Old playbills and faded, but still exciting, posters announcing the magical performances and listing the repertoires of famous conjurers lined the walls: Breslaw, Pinetti, Houdin, Anderson, Alexander, DeKolta, Herrman, Kellar, Houdini, Thurston. The largest poster, a three sheet in full color, hung above a radio on the mantelpiece. It depicted Duvallo and his Chinese Water Torture Cell Escape.

The Inspector got to his feet. “All right, Grimm, let’s have the story.”

Grimm began, talking rapidly, with a matter-of-fact assurance that was flatly contradicted by the puzzled look in his eyes. He spoke as if sure of what he had seen, but as if he couldn’t quite believe it.

“You had headquarters send a car here looking for Duvallo. They reported no one home. I was sent along from the Charles Street Station, with orders to stick around in case he showed up. It began to snow just as I got here, at ten o’clock. Regular blizzard. Everything was quiet until just a couple of minutes before ten-thirty when this guy,” he indicated Jones, “came into the Lane. I waited until he had gone up the steps and was putting his key in the lock. I said, ‘Just a minute, Mr. Duvallo,’ and followed him up the steps. He said, ‘Sorry, it doesn’t look as if Mr. Duvallo is in. You’d better stop back later.’ He stepped inside, snapped on the hall light, and tried to close the door in my face; but I eased in after him and flashed my shield. He started to get on his high horse, said it wasn’t his house, he couldn’t let me in and would I go away. I told him, ‘Sorry, I’m already in, and, if you’re not Duvallo, how come you’re letting yourself in with a key, this time of night?’ Before he could think up a good answer to that—”

“Inspector,” Jones blurted angrily, “I don’t have to stand for that. I can explain. You see—”

“Take it easy, Jones,” Gavigan said. “We’ll get to that.”

Jones shut up, but the look he threw at Grimm had poison in it.

“Before he could think up a good comeback to that,” Grimm repeated doggedly, “we heard voices in this room. Looked as if someone had been in there, quiet like a mouse, all the time I had been waiting out front. I motioned Jones to keep his lip buttoned and plastered my ear against the door. The door is plenty thick, and I couldn’t make out much, except that there seemed to be two persons arguing about something, both plenty mad.

“Jones didn’t like my snooping, so he sings out ‘Duvallo!’ a couple of times. It didn’t get any reply. The argument inside was going strong, and they kept right at it as though they hadn’t heard or didn’t give a damn. Then one of them laughed — Inspector, you remember Hatcher, the screwball who killed because it made him feel good? — well, it was a laugh like his.”

The look on Grimm’s face seemed to add that he would just as soon not hear it again.

Gavigan nodded silently, his eyes on the body, and Grimm went on. “Just then I caught a few words clear. The man who laughed stopped suddenly and said, ‘And the police will never know!’ I didn’t wait for any more. I pounded on the door and told ’em to open up. I didn’t have any better luck than Jones did. The argument just got hotter. Someone screamed. I shouted that I was coming in, and one voice yelled something I couldn’t get, but it didn’t sound reassuring by a hell of a ways. There was a crash — then dead silence. I threw myself at the door and found out how solid it is. I took a chance of hitting somebody and put a couple of shots into the lock. But that only jammed it, and so, figuring the window would be a lot quicker—”

Merlini broke in, “Wait. You mean that lock’s jammed so the door can’t be opened at all?”

Grimm nodded. “Exactly. It won’t budge. I’ve tried it from both sides.”

Merlini looked at Gavigan, smiled grimly and said, “That locked door’s here again! Go on, Grimm.”

Grimm did, looking even more bewildered. “I took those front steps three at a time. Jones trailed along, and when I climbed on to the balcony I pulled him up after me so’s he couldn’t lam. I smashed a pane, pushed the catch over, and came in. That light was on — I hadn’t seen it before because the curtains had been drawn tight. At first I thought the joint was empty. Then I saw the body. It couldn’t have been a full minute since I’d been listening to two people, and now all I find is one guy — and he’s dead! I made for that rear door — it was open — and went in with my gun handy, expecting a scrap.… ”

Grimm came to a full stop. Gavigan said, “Well?”

There was an odd expression on Grimm’s face, and he spoke slowly and with emphasis. “That door leads to a study — and something screwy. It’s the queerest damn setup I ever — it doesn’t make any sense at all.” He started toward the door. “Come, take a look for yourself.”

We followed. It was then that I became more fully aware of something I had before noted only subconsciously. The temperature of these rooms was no higher than that outdoors. And the reason was that a steady stream of cold air came in through the open door of the study.

It was a comfortable little study. There was one window, a large flat-topped desk, two chairs, steel filing cabinets, and, hanging on the walls, more lock collection. Great wooden Chinese pin-locks; ornate, intricately worked Spanish ones; crude cumbersome affairs from the Middle Ages; and small, delicately wrought animal locks from Egypt. In one corner, standing on end, was a large box that was like a brightly painted coffin.

The Inspector glanced at it suspiciously, and Merlini said, “That’s a Spanish Iron Maiden. Lined on the inside with sharp spikes. Duvallo used to escape from it.”

The inner machinery of what appeared to be the time lock of a large safe lay scattered on the green blotter covering the desk top. The further edge of the blotter was dark with damp, where snow had blown in through the open window. Gavigan leaned over the desk and put his head out.

“Let’s have the torch,” he said. “There’s a ladder out here.”

Grimm handed over the light. “Yeah,” he grumbled. “A ladder. And it goes all the way down to the ground. But if the murderer left by it, then… ”

The Inspector pulled in his head. There was an angry, determined twist to his mouth.

“Look at that Merlini,” he said.

As Merlini peered out, I edged over and got a glimpse. Fifteen feet below (the ground level was lower here than in front of the house) was a garden surrounded by a high stone wall, and at its far end, fifty feet from the window, stood a lone ailanthus tree. What annoyed Grimm and Gavigan was the fact that the garden was covered and the foot of the ladder completely surrounded by snow. Snow that was entirely innocent of footprints, as white and unmarked as a new sheet of paper.

“Shades of D. D. Home and Apollonius of Tyana!” Merlini said softly, his eyes bright. Then he finished Grimm’s sentence.

“… if the murderer went this way, then he must have been able to float in midair!”