Murder Up My Sleeve

1

Terry Clane sat waiting in the outer office of the district attorney, and had no idea why he was waiting, nor for what.

In the background of his immediate memory was the recollection of peremptory knuckles on his door, of men pushing past Yat T’oy, his Chinese servant, and into his bedroom, waiting while he dressed, of being hustled into a police car, which with screaming siren clearing its way through traffic, had rushed him to the district attorney’s office.

Against the background of these hectic and scrambled memories, the irksome waiting in the district attorney’s outer office was a period of nerve strain which made the clacking of the wall clock seem a veritable tattoo of accusation.

The blonde young woman at the information desk from time to time made a surreptitious study of Terry Clane’s profile.

Keeping his eyes averted, yet conscious of her scrutiny, Terry wondered whether the district attorney had perhaps instructed her to observe and report upon his demeanor, or if her interest were purely gratuitous.

It was shortly before ten o’clock. Lawyers bustled importantly from the side doors flanking the long corridor, pushed open the swinging gate and strode across the outer office. As they walked they flung words over their shoulders to the girl who sat at the desk marked “Information.”

Terry Clane watched them with detached interest.

“Department Five, People vs Taylor,” a red-headed man said, and hurried out. “Judge Belter, preliminary in the Jackson case,” a thin, nervous individual snapped as he, too, lunged towards the outer door. “Argument on Motion to Quash, People vs Heinz,” remarked a fleshy young man whose perspiring hand clung to his leather briefcase as though he were afraid someone might try to snatch it from his grasp.

The young woman at the information desk made notes on a long sheet of paper containing a typewritten list of names. She checked these names off one at a time. A clock chimed the hour of ten. The frenzied activity of the office ceased. There were no more banging doors, no more hurried steps in the corridor.

The slightly wistful eyes of the young woman glanced once more at Terry Clane.

Clane, swiftly shifting his own eyes, caught and held hers.

“Do you think,” he asked, “that such haste actually makes for efficiency?”

“Certainly,” she said; then after a moment added, “it’s the modern pace.”

Clane’s nod was deferential, but he said casually, “Exactly, going in circles.”

She frowned. “Did you say circles or cycles?”

“Which,” he asked, extracting a carved ivory cigarette case from his pocket, “would you say?” And, while she was wrestling with that, inquired so casually that he seemed merely making conversation, “What did the district attorney wish to see me about?”

Instinctively she grasped at the understandable question.

“I think it’s something about...” She caught herself in mid-sentence.

Far from showing disappointment at his failure to elicit information, Clane calmly pre-empted the conversational lead as she hesitated, making it seem almost as though he had interrupted her.

“The modern pace,” he said calmly, selecting a cigarette from the case, “defeats its own ends; the public demands that tomorrow’s newspapers be on the street to-night, and so misses the real morning news; that fruit be picked green and softened on the fruit stands; that the Christmas numbers of magazines be on the stands the first of November... Tell me, wouldn’t you like some tree-ripened fruit for a change?”

Her nod was a trifle vague.

“Am I supposed to be a witness to something?” Clane went on smoothly, in the same casual tone, “or have I committed some major crime — a murder, perhaps?”

The dazed young woman was groping for a reply when the buzzer on the switchboard sounded. Her agile fingers clicked keys into place. She said into the transmitter, “Yes, Mr. Dixon.” Her finger snapped a key. As she raised her eyes and spoke to Terry Clane, her voice showed relief. “The district attorney will see you now, Mr. Clane — right through that gate, straight down the corridor to the double doors at the end.”

Terry Clane smiled his thanks, walked down the long corridor and pushed open the swinging doors. A secretary who sat very rigid behind a desk nodded towards a door marked “Private” and said, “Right through that door, Mr. Clane, please.”

Terry opened the door.

Parker Dixon, seated in a massive leather swivel-chair, was signing correspondence. He glanced up, said, “Good morning, Mr. Clane. Take that chair, please.” His eyes were back on the letters before he had finished speaking. His pen scrawled a signature. A young woman with tired eyes mechanically blotted that signature while the district attorney was making another. When the correspondence had all been signed, she deposited it gently in a wire basket and tiptoed from the office as though she feared to intrude upon sacred thoughts.

The district attorney looked up.

He was in his early fifties. His lips smiled with the readiness of a veteran politician. His eyes were watchful and did not smile. So completely convincing was his facial cordiality that few persons bothered to notice the cool appraisal of those eyes.

“I’m sorry that it was necessary to bother you, Mr. Clane,” Parker Dixon began without other preliminary, “but a matter of great importance makes it necessary to ask certain questions.”

“Just what,” Clane asked, “is the nature of this matter? Should I feel flattered or frightened?”

The district attorney continued to smile, but his greenish eyes were as watchful as those of a cat studying a caged bird.

“Suppose,” he said, “you let me ask my questions first? If you don’t mind, we’ll dispense with preliminaries. You see, I’ve already acquired complete information about your life. Therefore, I only want to ask you about certain specific events which took place within the last few hours.”

Clane’s eyebrows showed courteous surprise. “You’ve collected complete information about my life?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“May I ask when your interest in me reached the information-seeking stage?”

The probing eyes caught the reflection of light from a window and seemed to glitter.

“Since about four-thirty this morning. Does that mean anything to you, Mr. Clane?”

“Only that your information would, under those circumstances, be woefully incomplete.”

The district attorney said, “I’m afraid you underestimate the facilities which are at my disposal.”

Somewhat after the manner of a magician producing a rabbit from a hat, he picked up several closely typewritten sheets of paper from his desk; and Terry Clane, realizing that he had played into the other’s hand by saying exactly that which he had been expected to say, schooled himself against repeating his blunder.

The district attorney began reading in a low monotone:

“Terrance Clane, age twenty-nine, hair dark, wavy, complexion smooth olive, eyes blue, height five feet eleven, weight one hundred and eighty-five, graduated from the University of California, took law course and was admitted to the California Bar; went to China and then entered the diplomatic service, showed himself an apt student of Chinese language, philosophy and psychology; abruptly resigned from service, disappeared and was reputed to have started for the interior, accompanied by an old Chinese.

“A Communist uprising took place in a district through which he traveled and it was surmised he had been murdered, since no ransom demands were made. Four months ago he appeared in Hong Kong, giving only a sketchy account of his wanderings. He shipped by the Dollar Line steamer President Hoover, disembarked in San Francisco, looked up a few of his closest friends, maintained a marked reticence about his Chinese adventures. Keeps a bank balance of something less than a thousand dollars in the main branch of the Bank of America at Number One Powell Street, but seems to be free from financial worries. Has a host of Chinese friends in the local district. At night sometimes goes to Chinatown, enters stores, disappears through back doors, and upon such occasions fails to return to his apartment until shortly before dawn.

“Is an adventurer, described by some of his intimates as a bit wild. Is noted in his circle of acquaintances for a scorn of conventions, yet lives a life which is for the most part above reproach.

“Investigation in China indicates that during the period he was missing he had entered a Chinese monastery, posing as a neophyte in order to gain access to ancient temple ruins where gold and gems had been stored. The teachers regarded him as an apt pupil. He is reported to have completed his training when some incident forced him to flee for the treaty ports.”

The district attorney turned the sheet, started to read from a second page, then checked himself and said,

“I think I have read enough to illustrate my point.”

“Sounds rather bizarre,” Terry commented.

“I have every reason to believe it’s absolutely accurate, Mr. Clane.”

Terry shook his head. His eyes showed quiet amusement.

“I never completed my training,” he said. “I remained a mere neophyte. Four and a half seconds of concentration was the best I was ever able to accomplish. The masters...”

“Four and a half seconds!” the district attorney exclaimed. “Surely you mean hours. Frequently, Mr. Clane, I myself become so absorbed in concentrating upon a legal problem I lose all track of time.”

Terry noticed the trace of irritation in the district attorney’s voice. It was quite evident that he wanted to get back to the matter in hand, equally evident that he prided himself upon his ability to concentrate. Resenting the fact that he had so easily given the district attorney the verbal opening which had enabled him to produce a typewritten report, read just enough from it to make him vaguely uneasy as to what might be in the balance of the document, Terry whipped a pencil from his pocket, held the point against the top of the desk.

“You thought you were concentrating,” Clane said. “As a matter of fact, you were bringing only a small portion of your mental powers into focus. For instance, concentrate on the point of that pencil for just two seconds.”

Dixon started to say something, then frowned and stared at the point of the pencil. “Now I presume,” he said, as Terry put the pencil back in his pocket, “you want me to describe the point of the pencil. Very well, the lead is somewhat softer than the ordinary grain of lead. There’s a small place near the point where...”

“Pardon me,” Terry interrupted, “but what did I do with my left hand while you were concentrating on the pencil held in my right?”

“You kept it in your left coat pocket,” Dixon said positively.

Terry smiled.

“In China,” he said gently, “one who concentrated upon the point of a pencil would be expected to focus all of his mental faculties on the point of the pencil. I can assure you, Mr. Dixon, that it isn’t easy to do.”

Dixon’s voice showed irritation.

“I didn’t send for you to discuss elemental psychology,” he snapped.

Terry seemed to be enjoying himself. Obviously, the interview wasn’t going just as Dixon had planned it.

“Perhaps,” he suggested, “since your report is so complete, you might like to add to it the real reason I was expelled from the monastery.”

The district attorney raised inquiring eyebrows.

“It was,” Clane said, “a matter of legs, or, if you are at all old-fashioned, limbs. I am personally very partial to good-looking... er...” He broke off to study the facial expression

of the district attorney and then, with a smile which just missed being patronizing, said, “I think, under the circumstances, ‘limbs’ would be the proper word.”

From the fleeting expression of annoyance which clouded the district attorney’s eyes, Clane knew that his shot had told, but he went urbanely on:

“This little Russian girl had drifted in from God knows where. She was a beauty; she was clever as the very devil, and she interfered with my studies. The estimable gentlemen who watched over my progress were quite right in assuming that one who permitted himself to be so easily distracted lacked the moral stamina to put the outer world completely from his thoughts. They suggested that I should return to my native land, or, at least, to the treaty ports. I may state, in passing, that subsequent events have convinced me that their judgment in this, as in other matters, was flawless.”

The unmistakable frown of annoyance on the district attorney’s face showed his irritation at Clane’s facetious manner.

“Had that statement been included in my report,” Dixon said, “I might then have agreed with you in your characterization of it as bizarre.”

“Not,” Clane pointed out, “if you’d known the Russian.”

Dixon ostentatiously dropped the typewritten sheets into a drawer of his desk, suddenly raised his eyes to stare at Terry Clane with what might have been intended as disconcerting steadiness. “I think, Mr. Clane,” he said, “we’ll dispense with these friendly informalities and remember that this interview is official.

“Last night you attended an informal dinner-dance at the home of B. Stanley Rayborne.” He waited only for Clane’s nod before going on: “Miss Alma Renton was also there. You were Miss Renton’s escort. You left the Rayborne residence about twelve-thirty A.M., did you not?”

“I can’t tell you the exact hour,” Clane said, his voice and manner stiffly formal.

The district attorney opened another drawer in his desk, took from it a small square of lace-bordered linen.

“Do you recognize this?” he asked.

“No,” Clane said promptly, almost before the question had left the district attorney’s lips.

Parker Dixon frowned. For a moment his lips were as hard as his eyes.

“No, no, don’t be in a hurry. Take it in your hands, smell the perfume, look at it.”

He leaned across the desk, handed the handkerchief to Clane, who examined it, smelled it, handed it back, and said casually, “Surely you don’t attach great importance to a handkerchief?”

“Why not?”

“Oh, I don’t know. It’s such a conventional thing. On the stage and in books, women are always leaving handkerchiefs behind. One would think that a person of ordinary intelligence who has attended no more than half a dozen mystery plays would certainly be above dropping a handkerchief, unless, of course, she were someone who wished to implicate the owner.”

“For one who doesn’t recognize a handkerchief,” Dixon said dryly, “you’re making rather an obvious effort to defend its owner, and, incidentally, I haven’t intimated this handkerchief was connected with any crime.”

Terry Clane sighed, a sigh which seemed but a degree removed from a yawn. “When a district attorney,” he observed, “has me routed from bed and whisked to his office to examine a handkerchief, I assume that his interest is official.”

Dixon smiled, not the automatic lip smile he customarily used to disguise the fact that his every move led towards some definite object, but rather the conciliatory smile of one conceding a point because it does not at the moment suit his convenience to argue over it.

“You will,” he said, “notice the initial ‘R’ embroidered on the handkerchief.”

“I noticed it.”

“Miss Renton is an artist?”

“I believe so, yes.”

“Quite successful?”

“You are referring to success from a monetary or an artistic standpoint?”

“From both.”

“I know nothing concerning her income.”

“Is that her handkerchief?”

“I’m sure I couldn’t say.”

“Did you go directly to Miss Renton’s apartment after you left the Rayborne residence?”

“That depends on what you mean by ‘directly’.”

“Did you take the shortest road?”

“No.”

“Where did you go?”

“Is that important?”

“I consider it is.”

“We drove around a bit.”

“Did your drive take you along Grant Avenue in Chinatown?”

“Yes.”

“May I ask why?”

“We were talking about the subconscious grouping of colors in the Oriental mind. I drove through Chinatown to illustrate a point I had made.”

“Rather an odd hour to make such an illustration, wasn’t it?”

“An artist doesn’t exactly keep office hours.”

“Did Miss Renton seem to have anything on her mind?”

“A young woman of Miss Renton’s intelligence always has something on her mind.”

“That isn’t what I meant. Was she worried? Was she nervous?”

“I didn’t think so.”

“Did she mention that she was in any particular trouble?”

“No.”

“Did she intimate that some person was forcing her to do something against her will?”

“No.”

“Miss Renton uses her maiden name in her profession, but she is in fact a widow, is she not?”

“So I understand.”

“She was married some seven years ago to a Robert Helford?”

“Yes.”

“Where were you when her husband died?”

“In China.”

“You knew her before her marriage?”

“No. I met her afterwards.”

“Through Helford?”

“Yes.”

“In other words, Helford was a close friend. After he married, you naturally visited his house on numerous occasions and became acquainted with his wife. Is that right?”

“Yes.”

“How long after Helford’s marriage did you start for China?”

“About six weeks.”

“You left rather suddenly?”

“Yes.”

“Can you fix the exact time you left Miss Renton last night?”

“No.”

“Can you approximate it?”

“Only vaguely. After all, in calling upon an adult woman who is responsible to no one for her actions, one doesn’t sound a curfew.”

“I quite understand that,” Dixon said. “Nevertheless, I have encountered cases, Mr. Clane, in which men were able to fix the time of their departure quite accurately.”

“Indeed,” Clane muttered, as though the statement were most surprising.

“It must have been after one o’clock,” Dixon said.

Clane’s tone implied that he was delighted to find some point upon which he could agree with his interrogator. “I’m quite certain it must have been,” he admitted.

“Was it before two o’clock?”

Clane pursed his lips thoughtfully and said, “It’s so hard to be accurate in these matters, Mr. Dixon.”

There was something ominous in the district attorney’s voice as he said, “I’m giving you an hour’s leeway, Mr. Clane. I think I’m entitled to an answer to that question, and I think I should warn you that the answer may be important — to you.”

“I couldn’t say definitely,” Clane said.

“But it was before three o’clock in the morning?” Dixon persisted.

“I would say so, yes. In fact, I would place it generally as some time between one and two.”

The district attorney’s manner relaxed somewhat.

“You know a George Levering?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Do you know much about him?”

“I know that he married one of the Renton girls, a sister who died.”

“Know anything else about him?”

“Nothing that I consider important.”

Parker Dixon’s smile was frosty. “Do you know anything about him which I might consider important?”

“As to that, I couldn’t say.”

“Is it true that Cynthia Renton, Alma’s sister, has nothing to do with him, but that he imposes upon Alma to the extent of securing substantial ‘loans’? Is his life of social idler, polo player, and general society hanger-on largely, if not entirely, supported by these ‘loans’?”

“Unfortunately,” Terry said with dignity, “Miss Renton has never seen fit to confide in me concerning her more intimate financial affairs. Strange as it may seem, she prefers to keep these exclusively in her own hands.”

“That will do,” the district attorney said coldly. “There’s no call for sarcasm, Mr. Clane.”

Terry’s calm silence threatened to become an eloquent contradiction.

The district attorney’s forefinger slid surreptitiously across the desk, came to rest casually upon a mother-of-pearl button. His eyes remained fastened on Clane’s face. Terry’s consciousness was focused, not upon the district attorney’s face, but upon that which he observed from the corner of his eye: the all but imperceptible raising of the wrist as Dixon pressed the button, two long and two short signals to someone somewhere.

The district attorney opened the drawer of his desk which held the typewritten report and dropped the handkerchief in on top of the papers. He closed the drawer with an air of finality.

“I had hoped you would be more willing to co-operate,” he said.

“I am answering your questions,” Clane pointed out. “Cooperation implies a definite mutual objective.”

The district attorney hesitated a moment, then switched abruptly to another attack.

“You know Jacob Mandra, the bail-bond broker?” he asked.

“I have met him.”

“Did you know him before you went to China?”

Terry sought to maintain an unyielding formality as a barrier through which the district attorney might not break.

“No. I looked him up after my return in order to verify an opinion I had previously formed.”

“Why?”

“He wrote, asking me to pick up a certain object for him, and offering very substantial remuneration.”

“What was this object?”

“I’d prefer to have you ask Mr. Mandra.”

“Unfortunately, that is impossible.”

“ ‘Impossible’ is a very definite word.”

The district attorney ignored the comment. “By any chance, Mr. Clane, was that object a sleeve gun?”

Terry hesitated for almost three seconds, then said, “Yes, it was a sleeve gun.”

“Precisely what is a sleeve gun?”

“It’s a tube of hollow bamboo, containing a powerful spring and a catch which is released by pressure. A metal-tipped dart can be inserted in the bamboo and pushed back against the tension of the spring until it’s engaged by the catch, which holds it in position. The device is some nine inches long. It can readily be inserted up the rather copious sleeve of a Chinese gentleman, or, for that matter, a woman. By resting the forearm on a table or other hard object, the catch is depressed and the dart is released.”

“It’s a deadly weapon?”

“Very deadly.”

“By deadly, I mean it can kill a man?”

“That’s the purpose for which it is primarily intended.”

“Did you procure such a weapon for Mr. Mandra?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“In the first place, they’re rather rare, being curios of another phase of Chinese life. In the second place, I was not in China to purchase curios.”

“You have seen Jacob Mandra since your return from the Orient?”

“Yes.”

“When?”

“About a week after I returned. I had tea with him at his flat on Stockton Street.”

“I believe you said you wished to verify certain impressions?”

“Yes.”

“What were those impressions?”

“I’m sorry,” Clane observed, “but I cannot see the necessity of such questions.”

“I feel they are very necessary, Mr. Clane.”

Clane sighed.

“I had a sleeve gun of my own,” he said. “If the impressions I had received from Mr. Mandra’s correspondence had proved incorrect, I intended to present him with that sleeve gun as a gift.”

“Did you present him with it?”

“No.”

“By that you mean that the impressions you had drawn from his correspondence were correct?”

“I saw no reason to present him with a sleeve gun.”

“What were those impressions?”

“I was not entirely certain,” Clane said, “that the man wanted the article as a curio.”

“You thought he might have wanted it as a weapon?”

“I wouldn’t go so far as to say that.”

“But you didn’t give him the sleeve gun?”

“No.”

“What was your impression of Mr. Mandra’s character?”

Clane raised his eyebrows.

“I can assure you,” Dixon said, “I have a reason for asking the question.”

“Frankly, the man interested me as well as repelled me. He undoubtedly has a keen mentality, but I doubt if the uses to which he puts his mind are... shall we say ‘ethical’?”

“Did he say why he wanted the sleeve gun?”

“Merely as a collector. He said a sleeve gun would make a very welcome addition to his collection of death-dealing nick-nacks.”

“Did you form any opinion as to Mandra’s nationality?”

“Not a definite opinion,” Clane said. “I’ll admit his nationality puzzled me. He has many definitely Oriental characteristics, both physical and mental, yet I don’t think he’s of Chinese or Japanese extraction.”

“Can you tell me some more about the opinion you formed of his character?”

“He’s a strange mixture,” Clane answered, “having a ruthless cunning as well as a tragic realization of what he’s lost by misapplying his rather remarkable natural talents. I consider the nature of the lethal weapons he has collected in his little museum indicates a very definite and sinister trait of character.”

“In what way?” Dixon asked, his interest shown by the way in which he snapped out the question.

“I noted,” Clane said, “that, while the weapons were all death-dealing, very few of them were weapons of open antagonism. They were, if I might use the word, surreptitious weapons, things which made no noise, daggers which could be concealed in the hem of a garment, blowguns which shot poisoned darts, silken cords of stranglers, and things of that sort.”

“You’ll understand, of course,” Terry went on, “that I’m acting on the assumption you consider my impressions of Jacob Mandra’s character sufficiently important to make my answers in a way obligatory.”

The district attorney nodded. “You didn’t see Jacob Mandra last night?” he asked.

“No.”

“At any time yesterday?”

“No.”

“Do you know whether Miss Renton knew him?”

“I have no idea.”

“Do you know whether Miss Cynthia Renton knew Mandra?”

“No.”

“Did either of the sisters ever mention a portrait of Mandra?”

“A portrait?”

“Yes.”

“No,” Terry said positively.

“Did you ever discuss Mandra with either of the Renton sisters?”

“No.”

“You left Miss Alma at her apartment last night?”

“It was early this morning,” Clane corrected, “between one and two, or between one and two-thirty. She invited me in for a cup of tea.”

“Do you know whether she saw Jacob Mandra yesterday night or early this morning?”

“I’m sure I couldn’t answer that question.”

“Which means you won’t?”

“Not exactly... I couldn’t tell what she did when I wasn’t with her — naturally. And I’m certain she didn’t see him when I was with her.”

Dixon stared steadily at Terry Clane with thoughtful eyes. There was no trace of a smile on his lips. “It might interest you to know,” he said slowly, his voice low, his words evenly spaced, “that Jacob Mandra was murdered some time shortly before three o’clock this morning. The cause of death was a steel-tipped dart which had been shot into his heart by some force which made no noise and which caught him completely by surprise. In short, Mr. Clane, death was probably brought about by the use of a sleeve gun such as you have just described.”

Terry Clane met the district attorney’s eyes. His own eyes did not change their expression. His face did not move a muscle. “No,” he said, “the information does not interest me.”

“I have reason to believe,” the district attorney went on, “that a young and beautiful Chinese girl called on Mandra in his apartment some time after midnight.”

“Indeed,” Terry muttered politely.

“You know many of the better-class Chinese in San Francisco, do you not?”

“Yes.”

“Among them, do you know of some young woman who might have called on Mandra?”

“Your question,” Terry pointed out in a tone which was almost a rebuke, “contains its own answer. No high-class Chinese girl would have called on Mandra at such an hour.”

“I am afraid,” Dixon said, watching Terry narrowly, “that you aren’t taking a very active interest in the matter, Mr. Clane.”

“I have answered all your questions.”

“Your attitude, however, has been rather... shall we say ‘aloof’?”

“I believe you were the one,” Clane reminded him with unbending formality, “who suggested that, inasmuch as the interview was official, we could dispense with friendly informalities.” Dixon’s expression showed that the shot went home. He was evidently finding Terry’s cold formality as disconcerting as the demonstration of what Terry had meant by concentration. “You seem highly unconcerned over a very mysterious murder,” he charged.

“Frankly, I can’t see that it concerns me in the least.”

“It perhaps concerns Miss Renton.”

“Why don’t you ask your questions of Miss Renton then?”

“Because, unfortunately, she can’t be found. Her bed wasn’t slept in last night, and she isn’t in her apartment this morning. Nor can any of her friends tell me anything about her.”

“Perhaps, then,” Terry said, “I can clarify the situation somewhat by asking you a few questions. Is there any reason to suspect that Miss Renton is mixed up in the Mandra murder?”

Dixon said, “I don’t care to answer that question right now.”

“Have you any reason to believe that she called on Mandra last night?”

“That, also, is something I prefer not to answer.”

“Why did you think I could give you any information of value?”

“Because of your correspondence with Mandra about the sleeve gun.”

“And the fact that I was with Miss Renton yesterday evening and early this morning had nothing to do with it?”

“I wouldn’t say that,” the district attorney said slowly and significantly.

Terry sat back in his chair, regarding the official with the polite interest of one who has nothing further to offer save courteous attention.

Parker Dixon spread his hands in a gesture of dismissal. “That is all,” he said. “I had hoped you would be willing to give us more co-operation.”

Clane got to his feet. “I take it that where information is concerned you act on the assumption it’s more blessed to receive than to give.”

This time the smile of District Attorney Dixon’s lips was reflected in his eyes, as the sparkle of sunlight on Arctic waters is reflected from the side of an iceberg.

“It is,” he agreed, “the motto of the office. We had hardly hoped to find in you so apt a pupil, Mr. Clane.”

Terry suddenly grinned, the cautious formality of his manner seemed to drop from him, as a cloak slipping to the floor. “Well,” he said, “if the catechism is ended, let me suggest that you add that bit about the Russian girl to your report. Have you ever tried to concentrate upon an abstract philosophy, when a wanton little devil with a figure so supple it seemed as though her bones would melt under your touch... No, no, don’t bother to answer. I can see by your eyes that you haven’t.”

And Terry Clane, managing to make his exit something of a gesture, stepped into the corridor leaving behind him a somewhat baffled and very exasperated district attorney.