Detective Fiction Weekly. Vol. 60, No. 1, July 4, 1931

Hugo Oakes borrows a stepladder to demonstrate why a man might chuckle when murdered.

I

Hugo Oakes, lawyer, walked along the corridor of the ground floor of the Spinner Apartments. Noting the shabby rug upon which he was trudging, and the niggardliness with which the hall was lighted, he concluded that the sign outside which read “Beautiful Singles, $37.50,” had been conceived by an optimist.

He stopped before number seven, which was the last apartment to the right, and tapped on the door.

Presently the door opened. A young woman, modestly pretty and modestly dressed, stared at him. Her brown eyes were hazy pools of trouble. She stared at Oakes as if she could scarcely believe what she saw.

“Well,” demanded Oakes, gruffly, “what’s the idea keeping me standing here?”

“Oh!” she gasped, and her eyes became wells of happiness. “Come in!”

Oakes followed her in and sank his short, fleshy ungainly form into a cheap overstuffed chair. The girl stood in front of him, her quick, nervous hands clasped.

“I... I’m so glad!” she said. “I thought you told me that you wouldn’t take the case, and I was feeling frightfully blue. I... I—”

“When I work,” Oakes grumbled, “I got to have money. You said you didn’t have any, didn’t you?”

“That’s right.” The worried look returned. “Really, I haven’t any—”

“Yeah. Well, after you left, I got to thinking. Mamie, my secretary, tells me I got four hundred and ninety-nine people on my books that owe me money. So I thought maybe I ought to make it an even five hundred.”

Oakes said it seriously enough, but the young lady laughed in relief.

“That’s what they told me,” she said. “Everybody says that you’re the last hope of penniless people in trouble—”

“Don’t remind me of it,” cut in Oakes, gloomily. “Your name’s Miss Sutter, ain’t it?”

“Yes, sir,” said the girl. “Mary Sutter.”

“All right, Mary. Your father, Jerry Sutter, was arrested last night and held in connection with the murder of John Spinner, huh?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You live in this apartment with your father?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And John Spinner owned the dump?”

“Yes. Mr. Spinner owned the apartment house. He lived in the apartment on the second floor, just above this one.”

“And your father worked here, too.”

The girl flushed slightly.

“Yes. My father lost all he had a couple of years ago. He is getting old. He... he did janitor work around the apartment house in exchange for an apartment. I am not trained to work, but sometimes I get a little office work, and manage to bring in enough money for groceries.”

“Uh huh,” said Oakes pessimistically. “That’s tough. Probably have to do something like that myself pretty soon, unless I can make some quick collections. Now, about this John Spinner, what kind of a guy was he?”

“I... I suppose I shouldn’t say it, Mr. Oakes. But I thought him mean and unkind.”

Oakes looked at her shrewdly.

“Mean, huh? I thought the papers said he died laughing?”

“Well, it looks as if he did. At any rate, he was heard laughing quite heartily, and he stopped in the middle of the laugh.”

“Yeah. Well, do mean guys laugh?”

“I don’t know, Mr. Oakes. But I do know that about the only time I ever heard Mr. Spinner laugh was when somebody else was in trouble.”

“Yeah?”

“Yes, sir. Dad, as I told you, was getting old. Sometimes he would make a mess of things. Then Mr. Spinner would laugh at him. That is, he would laugh unless it was costing him something, in which case he would become very angry. You... you understand about dad, do you, Mr. Oakes?”

“Oh, sure. That’s all right. Some of the best people on earth find it tough going when they get old — sometimes because they are so blame good. Sometimes looks like it’s all hooey about the survival of the fittest — more like the survival of the most ruthless.”

The girl nodded in agreement.

“And your father was fired?”

“Yes. Mr. Spinner had given us until the first to get out. That’s three days from now.”

“Sure. My friend Inspector Mallory will probably claim that as the motive.”

“He does,” said the girl.

“Uh huh. Well, we’ll fix that guy Mallory,” Oakes threatened. “Spinner was shot in the forehead, wasn’t he?”

“Yes.” The girl’s voice was steady, but her face was very pale. “They say that one shot did it, fired at about fifteen feet.”

“Fifteen feet!” Oakes repeated. “That ain’t so far, but it would take a pretty fair shot to drill a hole through a guy’s forehead, neat and clean, even at fifteen feet.”

The girl hesitated a moment.

“Dad could have done it,” she said quietly. “He has been an excellent shot all his life. And he’s still good, even at sixty. He’s shaky on his legs, but his hand is steady.”

“Yeah?” Oakes complained. “Well, that ain’t going to do him no good. Everybody knows about him being a good shot, huh?”

“Yes, sir.” She paused thoughtfully. “But it was a rather funny thing about this place. There are, or were, several good shots here.”

“Yeah?” said Oakes, his small eyes gleaming with interest. “Who were these guys that could shoot good?”

“Mr. Spinner himself,” said the girl, “was an excellent revolver shot. Both he and his son, Frank. Then there is a man named Bill Nevvin, who has an apartment on the second floor — I think he originally got acquainted with the Spinners because of their mutual interest in revolver shooting.”

“They found the revolver in your father’s apartment here, huh?”

“Yes, sir. In a bureau drawer.”

“And you don’t know how it got there?”

“I haven’t any idea. I never saw it before, and neither did dad. It must have been planted.”

“Uh huh. Where were you, Mary, last evening, while Spinner was getting shot?”

“At a branch library, Mr. Oakes, about two blocks away.”

Oakes rubbed his hands.

“Uh huh. Your dad was a good shot. So was John Spinner, and his son, Frank. And another tenant by the name of Bill Nevvin. Any one else?”

“Well,” said Mary Sutter. “I am rather good at it myself.”

II

Oakes glared at her disagreeably.

“Yeah?” he said. “Well, I don’t want to know nothing about that. Let’s take a look at the place where Spinner was shot.”

“Very well,” said the girl. “That was on the second floor. I’ll take you up there.”

At the door Oakes stopped and carefully scrutinized the lock.

“Scratched!” he muttered.

“What’s that?” said the girl.

“Never mind,” said Oakes, “We’ll see about that later.”

She led him along the corridor toward the stairway.

“Only two floors, ain’t there?” queried Oakes.

“Yes. Just two floors.”

“Uh huh. Now that John Spinner is croaked, who is in charge of the house?”

“His son, Frank, I think,” the girl told him.

“Well, is he around? I think maybe we ought to take him along.”

“If he is,” Miss Sutter said, “he’ll probably be in number twelve. That’s upstairs, too.”

They mounted the stairs and walked along the second floor hall toward the rear. The hall widened at the end, and close to the window which opened on the back of the house were several chairs and a small table. It was a sort of miniature social hall.

The girl pointed to one of the chairs.

“It was a hot night last night,” she said, “and Mr. Spinner was sitting there where he could get some air—”

“Let’s get this young guy, Frank Spinner, first,” interrupted Oakes.

Number twelve was the back apartment on the right, within a few feet of the space in which the chairs were. Oakes rapped on the door and waited. Presently the door opened and a young man looked out inquiringly. He was dark, rather handsome, and well and expensively dressed.

Oakes introduced himself and stated his business.

“Certainly,” said young Frank Spinner. “Look around all you want to.”

“Yeah,” Oakes said dubiously. “But I’d like to have you along.”

Frank Spinner shrugged indifferently, closed the door of his apartment and joined them.

“That your apartment?” asked Oakes, indicating the door of number twelve.

“I suppose it is just now,” said the young man. “It wasn’t, though, until this morning. It was my father’s.”

“Uh huh,” said Oakes. “And which apartment was yours?”

“Why, I lived across the street, in the Albert Manor. It’s a much better place, you know. My things are still there. Now that father is gone, I’ll probably sell this place — it’s a shabby hole, anyway.”

“Well,” said Oakes, “I know a lot of folks who would be tickled to death to live here. But that’s your business. Now, where was your father sitting when he was shot?”

The young man pointed to the swivel chair that the girl had already indicated. The chair was facing down the hall, toward the front of the building, the back of the chair toward the window at the rear.

“Is the chair in the same position as when Mr. Spinner was found?” queried Oakes.

“Exactly,” said the young man.

“And the bullet entered the forehead, indicating that the shot had been fired from farther down the hall?”

“Obviously.”

Oakes grunted, walked to the window and stared out absently. Back of the building was a row of small garages the roofs of which were several feet beneath the window. About ten feet separated the garages from the building.

Presently he returned to the others. He looked from the door of number twelve to the door of number thirteen, which was directly across the hall.

“These two apartments,” he asked Frank Spinner, “are the two back apartments?”

“Of course.”

“Who lives in number thirteen?”

“No one. It’s vacant just now.”

“Then, if your father was out in the hall here when he was shot, there was no one in either apartment at the time?”

“Correct,” smiled the young man. Oakes turned to the girl.

“And where was your dad when this happened?”

“Why, he was in the next apartment down the hall here, number eleven. That was vacant, too, and he was cleaning it up so that it could be shown to prospective tenants this morning.”

“Uh huh. And he heard no shot?”

“No, sir. No one heard it. The police say that a silencer was used.”

“Oh, sure. It was your dad who found Spinner dead, huh?”

“Yes. When he came out of number eleven, he noticed Mr. Spinner sitting there, facing toward him, slumped over. He spoke to him, and got no answer. Then, of course, he discovered what had been done.”

“Yeah. And it ain’t the first time the cops have tried to nail a guy because he was honest enough to report finding a stiff,” growled Oakes. “Another thing. Spinner, they say, died laughing. That is, he was heard to break off in the middle of a laugh. Did your dad hear him laugh?”

“No,” said the girl. “The door of number eleven, where he was working, was closed, of course. And dad’s hearing was quite poor.”

“Uh huh. Well, who did hear that laugh?”

“Oh,” put in Frank Spinner, “Bill Nevvin heard it. He says it was quite distinct.”

“Bill Nevvin heard it, did he? And where was he?”

“In his apartment. That’s number ten, right across from number eleven. Bill’s door was open a little at the time, and he was in his apartment, reading.”

III

Oakes waddled down the hall. It was just a few steps to where the doors of numbers ten and eleven faced each other. He looked at one door and then the other, then turned and looked back toward the swivel chair in which John Spinner had been sitting — and laughing — when he was shot.

Oakes walked slowly back to the others. He spoke to the young man.

“So Jerry Sutter was working in number eleven, and Bill Nevvin was reading in number ten, when Spinner got bumped off?”

“So it seems,” said Frank Spinner. “I know only what I’ve been told about that, of course.”

“Sure. And who is this guy Nevvin?”

Young Spinner smirked.

“It’s pretty well known around here,” he said, “so I guess it won’t hurt to tell you. Bill is a wholesale bootlegger.”

Oakes looked pleased.

“A bootlegger! That’s fine! Bill and your father were pretty thick, were they?”

“They were together a great deal.”

“Sure. When did they let you know about your father being shot?”

“A few minutes after Sutter found him. I was over in my apartment across the street, in the Albert Manor, and they phoned me.”

Considering that his father had been shot to death the night before, young Frank Spinner seemed very cool. Oakes apparently noted this.

“Your father didn’t seem to be very popular, huh?” he suggested.

“He didn’t deserve to be,” the young man said frankly. “He could be pretty mean at times.”

“Uh huh. And yet he died laughing.”

“Well, he laughed occasionally. The last time I saw him alive, which was early yesterday afternoon, he was laughing.”

“Yeah? What did he laugh at?”

“Well, Sutter was going down the stairs there. He slipped and fell. He really did look rather funny, and my father laughed then.”

Oakes glanced at the girl. Her lips were tightened and her face was flushed.

“Old man Sutter is a good guy,” Oakes said harshly. “But it’s interesting about that laugh. So Bill Nevvin heard it, huh? What do you think made him laugh — somebody tell him a funny story?”

“There was no one with him to tell him stories,” the young man pointed out. “At least, no one that we know of.”

“Yeah. Your father have lots of money, did he?”

“I believe so.”

“Do you get it now?”

“I don’t know,” said Frank Spinner, sourly. “He had a will leaving most everything to me, but he got angry with me a couple of days ago and said he was going to make a new will. I know he tore the old one up.”

“Uh huh. Who was his lawyer?”

“Harlan Mears.”

“I know Mears well,” said Oakes. He paused thoughtfully. “Now, most of these liquor dealers have lawyers, too. Do you happen to. know who Bill Nevvin had for a lawyer?”

“I certainly do,” said the young man. “He had the same lawyer — Mears.”

“And where is Nevvin now?” Oakes asked, with a chuckle.

“I rather think,” said Frank Spinner, “that he’s in his apartment right now. He’s usually in about this time. Would you like to see him?”

“You bet I would,” said Oakes vigorously.

“Very well. We’ll get him—”

“Wait a minute,” said Oakes. “First, I’m going to get a friend of mine down here from headquarters. Where’s your telephone?”

IV

Frank Spinner obligingly led Oakes into the apartment his father had occupied. Oakes, however, did not at once call headquarters. First he put in a call for his own office.

“Mamie,” he told his stenographer. “I want you to run over to the office of Harlan Mears — it’s right across the street.”

“Yes, sir,” Mamie’s voice came to him obediently.

“Mears is out of town,” Oakes went on. “But you can get around his stenographer somehow. Get her to show you any of his recent correspondence or records of interest to John Spinner, who was his client. Can you do that?”

“You bet!” said Mamie.

“Make a copy of anything you see, and bring it around to me at the Spinner Apartments right away.”

“I’m on the way right now,” said Mamie.

Oakes rang off, and soon had Inspector Mallory on the wire. There was a brief and rather bitter verbal tussle, at the conclusion of which Mallory agreed to join Oakes at the Spinner Apartments within a few minutes.

After all, Mallory’s experience with Oakes was such as to have encouraged him to treat the pudgy lawyer’s suggestions with greater respect than he was willing to admit outwardly.

Oakes, still accompanied by the young man, went back out to the hall, where Mary Sutter was waiting.

“This Bill Nevvin is a good revolver shot, too, ain’t he?” asked Oakes, apparently filling in the time with conversation.

“An excellent shot,” Frank Spinner agreed. “In fact, shooting was quite a popular topic of conversation in this house. Several good—”

“Yeah,” said Oakes. “So I’ve heard. By the way, who uses those garages back of the house here?”

“Oh, various tenants, of course.”

“Uh huh. And uses the one directly opposite that rear window?”

“Why, that’s Bill’s.”

“Bill Nevvin has his car in that garage?”

“Yes.” Young Spinner eyed Oakes curiously. “But surely that has nothing to do with the killing of my father. It’s quite certain, apparently, that the shot came from the opposite direction, judging by the position of the chair, which was facing down the hall, just as it is now.”

“Uh huh.” Oakes suddenly got up. “Me and Miss Sutter,” he said, “will go downstairs for a few minutes. Mallory will be along by the time we get back. You can wait in your apartment, young fellow.”

“Very well,” the young man smiled his cool, indifferent smile. “I’ll be here when you want me.”

“And don’t wise Bill Nevvin while I’m gone, either,” Oakes instructed gruffly.

He escorted the girl back down the stairs to her apartment.

“Mary,” he said kindly, “you can go rest in your own place. I don’t need you now. I’ll let you know when I want you.”

The girl smiled her thanks, and entered number seven.

Oakes proceeded the short distance to the rear door. Just inside the door he stopped and noted that at that point another door opened on some steps that led down to the basement.

He stared down into the gloom below, muttering to himself.

In a few minutes he swung about and walked out of the rear door. Here he was standing between the back of the house and the row of garages, just outside of the garage used by the bootlegger, Bill Nevvin.

Oakes casually examined the ground between the house and the garage, and was just about to open the door of the garage when he was hailed from the window immediately above. Frank Spinner’s smirking face was showing at the window.

“Inspector Mallory is here,” announced the young man.

“Tell the old scoundrel,” said Oakes, “that I’ll be right up.”

He trudged back into the house, along the hall, and back up the stairs. Mallory glowered at him grimly as he approached.

“What are you doing here?” grumbled Mallory.

“Just correcting another of your mistakes,” Oakes told him genially. “You ought to feel sorry for a good old guy like Jerry Sutter.”

“I can’t afford to feel sorry for nobody,” snapped Mallory. “What’s the dope, anyway?”

“Why,” said Oakes, “first, let’s go see this bootlegger guy, Bill Nevvin.”

Frank Spinner escorted them to the door of number ten, and knocked.

While they were waiting, Oakes nodded a greeting to a large man lounging at the top of the stairway. This was Mallory’s man, Carter.

“Who is it?” called a voice presently.

“It’s all right, Bill,” Frank assured him. “A couple of gentlemen to see you.”

The door opened. It was a flashily-dressed man of middle age who greeted them. Bill Nevvin, dark and roughly good-looking, had a naturally suspicious eye, and the suspicion in his eye was working overtime as he looked them over.

Oakes grinned at Nevvin, but it was Mallory’s grim insistence that prompted Nevvin to admit them. At a gesture from Oakes, however, young Spinner refrained from accompanying them into the apartment.

“About this killing last night,” Oakes said, when they were in the apartment. “You were in here at the time?”

“Sure,” said Nevvin, resentfully.

“Uh huh. And it was you who heard the old guy laugh, just as he was shot?”

“Sure. He laughed a minute before, see? I heard him plain. Then he laughed again, louder, but the laugh busted off right in the middle. It was funny—”

“It must have been,” said Oakes. “But you didn’t go out to see why he didn’t finish the laugh?”

“Hell, no,” said Bill Nevvin. “Why should I?”

“You’re supposed to answer questions, not me,” Oakes reproved him. “Now, how about your garage?”

Nevvin fixed him with a steady stare.

“Yeah, what about it? It’s right beneath the back window, ain’t it?”

“Sure. But I didn’t put it there.”

“No, but you use it. And the roof of that garage has needed fixing lately, ain’t it?”

“Sure. But who cares about that?”

Obviously, Bill Nevvin’s suspicion had not abated, and he was inclined to be defiant.

“Well,” said Oakes, placidly, “it’s a flat roof, and I noticed a little while ago that one or two, of them long boards in the roof seemed loose. You never made no kick about it, did you?”

“I sure did,” blurted Nevvin. “It let the rain leak in on my car. I told old man Spinner he’d have to have it fixed.”

“And did he say he’d attend to it?”

“Yeah. He told me yesterday he’d take care of it right away.”

“Uh huh. Now let’s go out to your hall door, Bill,” said Oaks familiarly.

He got up and led the way to the door, opened it. Followed by Nevvin and Mallory, he stepped into the hall. A few feet across the hall was the door of number ten.

“Inspector,” Oakes said to Mallory, “your idea is that poor old Jerry Sutter came out of number ten there, and plugged Spinner from the doorway.”

“Yeah,” said Mallory. “It’s about the right distance.”

“On the other hand,” Oakes pointed out, “it’s just the same distance from the door of number eleven, where Bill here lives, as it is from number ten. That is, the same distance to the chair where Spinner was sitting.”

“Yeah,” agreed Mallory dubiously.

Bill Nevvin swore vigorously.

“What’s the idea?” he shouted. “You two guys are trying to railroad me—”

“Aw, shut up, Bill,” Oakes soothed him. “It don’t make no difference, anyway.”

“Why not?” queried Mallory.

“Because,” said Oakes, “Spinner wasn’t shot from this direction at all.”

Mallory gazed at him in bewilderment.

“He wasn’t, huh?”

“Naw. The way I got it figured, Spinner was shot from the other direction, through the open window.”

“Through the window?” repeated Bill Nevvin, somewhat mollified. “But this is the second floor, not—”

“Uh huh,” said Oakes. “But he was shot from the roof of your garage, Bill.”

V

Nevvin spluttered angrily again. But Mallory was keeping a cold and watchful eye on him now.

“Wait a minute,” Oakes said suddenly. And he turned and walked toward Mallory’s man, Carter, who was resting on the top step of the stairway. Oakes spoke to him in an undertone, and Carter, with a pleased grin, got up and went downstairs.

Oakes rejoined the two men.

“Now there’s the chair he was sitting in. Let’s take a look at it,” he suggested, and they approached the chair.

Oakes bent close, and presently chuckled.

“Here’s luck,” he said enthusiastically.

“What’s luck?” grouched Mallory, who looked as if he really didn’t believe in luck.

“Well,” said Oakes, “the thing that had you fooled was that the chair was facing down the hall, so that old Spinner’s back was toward the window. And Spinner was shot in the forehead. Now if he was shot from the roof of the garage, he must have been facing the window at the time.”

“Sure,” said Mallory.

“And in that case,” Oakes went on, “the killer must have swung the chair around after he fired.”

“That’s hooey,” put in Nevvin. “He couldn’t reach across the roof. It’s all of fifteen feet from the roof to the chair.”

Oakes beamed at him.

“Bill,” he said, “you ought to ask Mallory for a job on the force — you’ve got a cop’s mentality. But the killer could reach across with one of those loose roof boards, couldn’t he?”

Mallory nodded. Bill Nevvin was silent.

“And there are scratches showing,” Oakes went on, “in the varnish on the arm of the chair. At the end of the arm, where the killer would naturally have pushed against it with the board.”

Mallory inspected the scratches Oakes indicated with a stubby forefinger. Then he looked out of the window, and wagged his head as he apparently noted that a man standing on the garage roof would have fired about on a level with old John Spinner’s head.

Suddenly, as if an unexpected thought had struck him, Oakes joined him at the window, bent down and examined the window sill.

“The paint on the window sill is scratched, too,” he remarked.

“Yeah,” said Mallory. “But I still claim that old Jerry Sutter could have—”

“Sure he could have,” interrupted Oakes. “But he’s a grand old man, and even if he did it I’d still be for him. Now let’s get hold of young Spinner and go downstairs.”

As they turned and made for the stairway, Frank Spinner came up.

“Just looking for you,” Oakes told him. “We need you to tell us where things are around here.”

“Certainly,” said the young man, and went back downstairs with them.

At the door of number seven Oakes stopped.

“Here’s where Jerry Sutter lives with his daughter Mary,” he remarked. “It is also where the revolver was found.”

“I know that,” said Mallory.

“Uh huh.” He advanced a few steps. “And here is a door leading down into the basement, inspector. You’ll observe it’s just inside the door leading out to the garages.”

“Yeah,” said Mallory sarcastically. “These apartment houses do have basements.”

Oakes grinned, and turned to Frank Spinner.

“By the way,” he said. “I suppose there’s a stepladder down in the basement?”

“Of course,” said the young man.

“Get it for us, will you?” asked Oakes. “We’ll need it to look at the garage roof.”

Frank Spinner trotted down the steps to the basement, and quickly returned with a stepladder. Oakes thanked him, and they all moved out to the walk between the house and the garages.

Young Spinner leaned the stepladder against the back of the house.

Oakes pointed down at the dirt walk close to the garage.

“Four indentations in the dirt there, inspector,” he noted. “Made not long ago. Look like they were made by the legs of the ladder—”

Oakes stopped abruptly as the rear door opened again. A young lady in short dress, smiling impishly, came out.

“Hello, Mamie,” said Oakes. “What you got?”

She handed him a typewritten slip of paper. Oakes glanced at it and stuffed it into his pocket.

“All right, Mamie,” he said. “You can stick around, if you want to.”

Evidently Mamie wanted to.

“Now,” Oakes went on, “my idea is that the killer got the stepladder out of the basement, used it to climb on to the roof, and when he got up there, he plugged old man Spinner from there.”

“Hooey!” commented bootlegger Bill Nevvin.

“Shut up!” Mallory told Nevvin.

“Then,” Oakes continued, disregarding interruptions, “he could easy climb down again, put the ladder back in the basement, stop at number seven and ditch the revolver in Jerry Sutter’s apartment, and beat it.”

“Of course he could,” agreed young Frank Spinner. “But could it be proved?”

“Sure,” snarled Bill Nevvin. “Go ahead and prove it.”

“Well,” said Oakes. “There’s one thing that might help us.”

“What’s that?” asked Mallory.

“The fact,” explained Oakes, “that the old man died laughing!”

The others were silent for a little while. It was apparent that they couldn’t quite see the significance of the laughing death.

“I suppose,” Frank Spinner said presently, “that you’re trying to prove that it was Bill who—”

“Naw,” cut in Oakes. “Not Bill. It was old man Spinner’s son, Frank, that plugged him.”

VI

Young Frank Spinner sucked in his breath and stared at Oakes. Then he laughed nervously.

“Ridiculous!” he said.

“Yeah?” Oakes grinned good-naturedly. “Well, the way I got it figured, the reason you bumped your old man—”

Again the rear door opened. It was Mallory’s man, Carter, this time. Carter winked at Oakes slowly. The wink seemed to hold some special meaning for Oakes.

“Glad you got here, Carter,” Oakes said. “Got a little job for you. Want you to climb the stepladder here on to the garage roof and see what you can find. Guess you know what to look for.”

“Sure,” said Carter. He placed the ladder, mounted it, reached the roof.

Oakes turned his attention to Frank Spinner.

“As I was saying, I figure that you croaked your old man because you liked to fly high, and the old man had lots of cash that he hung on to pretty tight. This here place wasn’t good enough for you to live in — you had to live in a classy dump like the Albert Manor.”

The young man laughed derisively.

“Why,” he said, “my father had disowned me, only a day or two ago—”

“You mean,” Oakes retorted, “he destroyed the will making you his heir. But he hadn’t made another one yet. And as long as no new will was made, you would inherit the estate.”

Mallory grunted, and shifted his position closer to young Spinner.

“My secretary,” Oakes proceeded, “was just over to the office of your father’s lawyer, Harlan Mears, and she brought me a copy of a letter which Mears wrote your father two days ago. This letter says that Mears was to be out of town for a few days, but that as soon as he returned he would call and fix up a new will. Doubtless you saw the original of that letter, young man, and—”

“Of course I saw it,” broke in Frank Spinner, suddenly savage. “My father was mean, cold—”

“Yeah,” said Oakes. “And his son ain’t much different. Selfish and coldblooded.”

Carter appeared at the edge of the garage roof. He was just pocketing a magnifying glass. Carefully he descended the ladder.

“Find anything?” queried Oakes.

“Yes, sir,” said Carter. “Traces of-varnish on the end of one of them long boards—”

“From the arm of the chair,” put in Oakes.

“And some paint,” Carter went on, “along the bottom of the board, where it rubbed against the window sill, I guess.”

“You guess right,” said Oakes. “Anything else?”

“Sure,” Carter grinned happily — he was always happy when given an opportunity to demonstrate what a good eye he had. “Shreds of glove — some processed material — on the board, too. Also some shreds of cloth — gray — caught on a nail on the roof.”

“Uh-huh. Know where the cloth came from?”

“Sure. From a pair of pants belonging to this young man.” And he pointed at Frank Spinner.

The young man indicated suddenly sat down on the door step, and his face dropped into his shaking hands. Cool enough in the commission of a crime, his nerves were speedily shattered when he was caught.

“Inspector,” Oakes explained, “I took the liberty of sending Carter across the street to the Albert Manor, where young Spinner lives, a little while ago. And I believe Carter discovered something.”

“Yes, sir,” said Carter. “I expected to get into the young fellow’s apartment to see if I could find the gloves and pants, like Mr. Oakes said. But when I got over there I spotted him coming out of the side entrance and going around the back of the building. I waited until he came back and crossed the street. Then I went back there and batted around until I had a hunch to look in the old waste barrel. Buried under a lot of stuff in the barrel was a newspaper package, and in it was a pair of gray pants and a pair of gloves — I’ve got ’em inside.”

Carter finished his recital breathlessly, pride fully. For a moment there was silence, except for a moan from young Mr. Spinner.

“The pants, sir,” Carter added presently, “were torn near the knee.” Mallory stood over the young man.

“So you croaked your own father?” he demanded sternly.

“He deserved it!” the young man cried, a little hysterically. “He had money, lots of it, but he was hard with me! Why, he even had me doing janitor work around the building sometimes!”

“Tough!” murmured Oakes, not very sympathetically.

“That was what gave me the idea,” Frank Spinner went on. “He told me that I was to fix that garage roof. I would do it at night, anyway, so that no one would see me — the light from the window and the alley lamp was sufficient for the job. I knew that old Jerry Sutter would be working in number eleven. I knew that Miss Sutter was down at the library. I knew that there would be no one in the two back apartments, so that I would be unobserved—”

“But you did not know,” Oakes supplemented, “that your father was going to laugh.”

“Yes,” said the young man bitterly, staring up at Oakes, “he laughed!”

“He laughed!” said Oakes, “when you slipped on the roof — and tore your pants on a nail?”

“Yes,” lamented Frank Spinner. “He always laughed when anything like that happened — to some one else!”

“I thought it was something like that,” Oakes said, “that made the old man die laughing.”

“Well,” said Mallory to the young man, heavily, “you’ll be dying yourself before long.”

“But not laughing,” concluded Hugo Oakes.