Beagle Scented Murder

21

The sun was disappearing behind the mountains on the west side of the valley, but there was still plenty of light as Peel sent the convertible rolling along a narrow desert road that was almost as smooth as pavement.

After a while, Dunning pointed to a rambling red adobe ranchhouse on the left. “Mine. We’ll stop on the way back and I’ll give you the money… There’s Holt’s place…”

It was a very neat desert layout, a Mexican-type ranchhouse with a red tile roof, stables, a corral and a green patch of pasture, green because of irrigation.

A car was standing in the ward as Peel drove up. Marcy Holt himself was seated on the veranda of the ranchhouse, enjoying a cigar. He got up as Peel stopped the convertible some fifty feet away.

“Watch it,” Dunning said to Peel. “I don’t see Wade.”

Peel slipped his empty revolver from his hip pocket to his side coat pocket. He got out of the car and dropped his hand into his pocket. Dunning got out of the car on the other side.

“Hello, Marcy!” he called to the man on the veranda.

Marcy Holt looked at Joe Peel. “You’re smarter than I figured.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” said Dunning.

Peel turned to look at Dunning… and saw the.45 pointed at his stomach.

“Take the hand out of the pocket,” Dunning ordered. “But be awfully careful.”

“Sucker!” said Peel bitterly. He brought his hand cautiously out of his coat pocket.

A hundred feet away, Johnny Wade appeared in the open doorway of the stables. A gun was in his hand. He came forward.

“That’s all?” Peel asked.

Dunning looked at him narrowly. “Who else do you expect?”

“How about a fellow named Bill Gray?”

“You mean Johnny Wade. He isn’t Bill Gray any more.”

Johnny Wade came up and slapped Peel’s coat pockets. He located the revolver and extracted it. He broke it and looked sharply at Peel. “Empty!”

“Yeah. People get hurt with loaded guns.”

“You couldn’t take a hint yesterday, could you?”

Peel touched the still sore bruises on his face. “I’d like to give you a massage the next time you come into Ole’s Swedish Baths.”

“Maybe there won’t be any next time for you.”

Which reminded Peel of something. “Uh, how’s Otis Beagle?”

Johnny Wade looked at Marcy Holt. The latter nodded. “Might as well stable them together. But if anybody else comes we’re going to be a little crowded.”

Wade struck Peel on the shoulder with his fist. “Come on.” He pointed to the barn.

“Watch out for him, Johnny,” Dunning cautioned. “He’s a sharp one.”

Johnny Wade grunted contemptuously. “I can handle him.”

Peel struck out for the barn, Wade following closely behind him.

The barn was a long narrow one, consisting entirely of enclosed horse stalls and an aisle. Bags of feed, harness, bridles and other horse equipment hung from the walls and stalls. The place, Peel noted, was equipped with electricity.

Before he stepped into the barn, Peel sent a glance over his shoulder and saw Dunning and Marcy Holt going into the ranchhouse.

“All right,” said Johnny Wade, “the third stall.”

The door was fastened on the inside with an iron pin which fitted into a steel hasp. As Peel reach for the iron pin he was startled by a sudden hoarse yell inside the stall.

“Help!” cried the voice.

“Jeez!” gasped Peel. “Otis…”

“Joe!…” cried the voice inside the stall. “It isn’t… you…?”

Peel took out the steel pin and swung open the door. He faced Otis Beagle. The big detective agency proprietor groaned when he saw Peel.

“And I was counting on you!”

“Get in,” Johnny Wade said, behind Peel.

Peel surveyed the stall with considerable distaste. The straw on the floor was clean, but still — it was a stable. It smelled very strongly of horse.

He stepped into the stall and Wade slammed the door shut on him. It was almost dark inside with the door closed, but Beagle pawed the air and finding a dangling string pulled on it. An overhead electric light bulb went on.

Peel surveyed Beagle. “You look like hell.”

“You stay in here ten-twelve hours and see how you look. Not even a chair.”

“And not even your cane,” Peel jeered.

Beagle scowled. “They took it away… Where’d they get you?”

“They didn’t exactly get me, Otis. I walked into this myself. I came all the way out here under my own power.”

“How’d you find out about it?”

“I picked up a piece of paper in Wilma Huston’s kitchen. Somebody’d tried to bum it. I made out enough to see that it was part of the printed return address from a printing company in 13 Palms. That brought me down to 13 Palms. From thereon the blundering was all my own.”

“And I was hoping you’d get me out of this.” Beagle looked toward the door and dropped his voice. “They’re counterfeiters. There’s a printing press in the next stall. They were running it this morning.” He shook his head. “I should have known… that thousand dollar bill.”

“That reminds me,” said Peel. “That check you gave Charlie… it bounced…”

“The damn crooks; if I get out of this I’ll have Pinky Devol shut them up.”

“I don’t think he’ll do it. It was Pinky who called to tell me about the check.”

Beagle stared at Peel. “You’re kidding!”

“I think Pinky’s behind the joint.”

Beagle groaned. “You can’t trust anyone any more.”

“Ain’t it the truth?”

“They all right?” asked Dunning’s voice outside the stall.

“For now,” replied the voice of Johnny Wade, “but if you think I’m gonna sit out here in the barn all night, you got another guess coming.”

“Oh we can take ’em into the house,” said Dunning. “There’s no chance of anyone coming around after dark.”

“That’s damn decent of you,” exclaimed Joe Peel.

Dunning chuckled. “Still chipper, eh?” He pulled open the stall door and looked in. “Too bad we haven’t got a pool table out here. I’d play you a game.”

“I never play with welshers.”

The smile faded from Dunning’s face. “I had to get you out here, didn’t I?” He reached into his pocket and brought out a roll of bills. “Here’s your money — if it’ll do you any good.” he peeled off a twenty and a ten and handed the bills to Peel.

“Give them back to him, Joe,” said Beagle. “They’re counterfeit…”

“Are you crazy?” Dunning snapped at Beagle.

“I’ve got ears,” Beagle retorted. “I heard your printing press. And I got a sample of your work from Holt, yesterday… a thousand dollar bill.”

“I’ll be damned!” said Dunning. He looked at Joe Peel. “So that’s what you think we do…”

Peel shook his head. “That’s Otis’ idea. I know what you do.”

“What?”

“Oh, you’re a counterfeiter all right; but not money. Dime novels.”

Dunning seemed pleased. “Like to see how it’s done?”

“Why not?”

Dunning stepped back from the doorway and permitted Peel and Beagle to come out. Then the three went to the next stall. Johnny Wade remained aloof — but vigilant.

Dunning switched on a light. This stall, unlike the adjoining one, had a concrete floor. And a very neat layout of machinery including a printing press.

On a bench was a stack of several hundred little booklets. Peel walked over to them and picked up a handful. He riffled them out and whistled, “Malaeska.”

“The first dime novel,” chuckled Dunning, “printed by Beadle & Adams in the year 1860… with slight improvements by Dunning & Holt, 1946.”

“How do you age them?” Peel asked.

“That’s the secret,” Dunning replied, “that and the paper. Holt’s awfully good with the paper. That was his business back east.” He pointed to a tub filled with a pulpy mass. “He makes the paper himself — by hand. There’s a little cave back here, with a bit of a spring in it — keeps the air nice and moist. Ages paper 86 years in thirty days.”

Beagle came over to Peel and took one of the books from his hand. He glanced at it and snorted. “This looks just like that cheap pulp magazine you had in your room at the hotel…”

“Ah,” said Dunning, “so you had it.” He exhaled. “Too bad.”

“You mean Helen Gray?” Peel asked, softly.

Dunning nodded. “I had a bit of an accident on our second printing. A capital ‘M’ broke and a few sheets got bound and distributed before I discovered the accident. Wilbur Jolliffe happened to get one of them. Mr. Jolliffe was a very suspicious soul. He took his copy of Malaeska to the Huntingdon Library and checked it with a copy they have there…”

Beagle snorted. “A helluva note, killing a man over a cheap dime novel.”

“Not I,” Dunning said, “I’m only the printer.”

“This little book,” Peel said gently. “The genuine article — is worth three hundred dollars.” He looked curiously at Dunning. “How many have you shoved out?”

“More than a hundred,” Dunning replied. “We did it quite judiciously and sometimes get as high as four hundred for a copy.”

Otis Beagle did some rapid mental arithmetic. Then he exclaimed, “You mean there are that many suckers in this country?”

“A copy of Murders in the Rue Morgue which is a little book no bigger than this one, sold last year for forty thousand dollars.”

Beagle’s eyes narrowed. “Then, as long as you were printing, why didn’t you print up this Murders in the Rue Morgue?”

“Because the book is too well known to experts. Nobody would suspect a dime novel…”

“Nobody except Wilbur Jolliffe,” Peel corrected.

There was a step in the door and Marcy Holt entered. Beagle frowned at him. “That thousand dollar bill you gave me, Holt…”

“I want that back. You had no right to keep it…”

“What I want to know,” said Beagle, firmly, “is it genuine or is it—” he gestured to the books, “—counterfeit?”

Holt’s eyes widened. “Do you think I’d counterfeit money?”

For some strange reason, Peel laughed.

Dunning looked questioningly at Holt. The latter nodded, almost imperceptibly.

“It’s getting dark outside,” Dunning said. “Shall we go to the house?”

Holt hesitated. “Don’t you think they’d better stay out here…”

Johnny Wade came to the doorway. “I just got through telling Dunning I’m not staying out here all night.”

“It’ll only be a couple of hours, Johnny…”

“That’s what you said this morning.”

Holt sighed. “Very well, bring them along.”