The Headless Lady

Chapter Eighteen Headless Man

Merlini’s face didn’t wear the dismayed look I half expected. Instead he said, “That’s fine. I’m glad to hear that there’s one detective in the immediate vicinity who doesn’t think that I’m the culprit. Now, let’s blow before we meet someone else we’ll have to lock up. We’ll hear your story on the way.”

“Okay,” O’Halloran agreed. “Can I have my gun now?”

“No. I’ll keep it for the moment just in case you should get the urge to revert to the side of law and order. I don’t want to see any more jails tonight. They slow me up. Come on.”

As we left the building O’Halloran said, “My car’s right here.”

“Our transportation,” Merlini replied, “is all arranged for. You can get your car later.” Rapidly he led us down the street to where a Ford sedan was inconspicuously parked a block away. There was a man at the wheel.

Merlini’s appearance as an officer of the law wouldn’t have won him any commendations at police inspection; too many extra inches of wrist and ankle projected from beneath his uniform’s inadequate coverage. But this unnatty appearance wasn’t greatly noticeable in the darkness; and, in any case, the bullying, officious voice he suddenly assumed more than made up for it.

“You can’t park here,” he said sternly to the figure in the car. “I’ll have to give you a ticket.”

Farmer’s voice answered, “Now listen, Officer—” Then at Merlini’s chuckle he stopped. “Oh, it’s you. What kept you so long? You must be slipping.”

“We were busy delaying the pursuit,” Merlini explained. “The showground, James.”

As we piled in, I said, “I’m beginning to get it now— or part of it. Case the can means ‘watch the jail,’ and I’ll light a rag, I suppose is ‘I’ll escape.’” (Light a rag actually means: to leave. Synonymous with cop a sneak, take a powder, lam.)

“Okay,” O’Halloran said. “Here’s where you find out who your Headless Lady was. I’d better go slow, start way back at the beginning and break it to you gradually. Three weeks back a couple of gorillas walked into Maxie Weissman’s country hide-out near Bridgeport and let a lot of daylight through him with Tommy guns. You know that. What wasn’t in the papers was the fact that Maxie’s pals, mainly his mouthpiece, Duke Miller, and Bo Lepkewitz started scrapping about who was going to take over. In the mixup, somebody with an ax to grind spilled a lot of first-class beans in the D.A.’s ear. He had himself a picnic. He had Judge Commager and Judge Parton busy issuing warrants in shifts. But they needed just a little more than what they had to really pin down the big shots. They figured that the right kind of pressure on the Duke would do the trick, but he got a tip-off and turned up missing just as they reached for him.

“The Crime Prevention Association and the Merchant’s Bureau put up rewards that added to ten grand. The agency business hasn’t been too hot lately, so I thought maybe I could, with luck, cut myself a piece of that. When the D.A. found the Duke had gotten off the hook, he got Inspector Gavigan assigned to special duty and they got busy. First thing they did was put tails on Paula Starr.”

I groaned. “So that’s it. Paula Starr, café society’s darling. El Algier’s acrobatic dancing sensation, Broadway’s cutest nudist. The Duke’s gal friend. And you’re going to tell us that she—”

“Is Pauline’s sister, Paulette Hannum; that she was the Headless Lady; that she’s not only the Duke’s girl friend — they’ve been married for five years; and that Duke Miller is the ex-circus legal adjuster, Andy Meyers, that she eloped with. You begin to see light?”

“The dawn came up like thunder,” I said. “But what—”

“Ross,” Merlini cut in impatiently, “shut up and let him talk. Gavigan’s men were tailing Paula, hoping that she’d contact the missing Duke. Then what?”

“Well,” O’Halloran went on, “I hung around her apartment some, too, looking for a break. Last Friday I got it. Paula left her apartment in the East Fifties and ankled into the classiest eating joint on Park for lunch. One of the city dicks, Mike Brady, followed her in, flashed his shield, and got a table in the corner and a glass of water. The cover charge alone in that place almost runs into three figures, and if he’d ordered anything more than water the mayor would have started an investigation. That was where I had the edge on him. I took a chance, pushed in enough blue chips to buy me meals for a week, greased the headwaiter with a fin, and got a table next to hers. So, when it happened, I was close enough to get something Mike missed. I caught her giving the wink to another dame a couple of tables away. What made me sit up and take notice was the fact that they looked a hell of a lot alike. The other gal wasn’t the 14K looker that Paula was, but she’d get by all right. The main thing was I had a hunch that kept getting stronger all the time that they were sisters. Then what happens but Paula gets up and heads for the nearest ladies’ can and a minute or so later the other gal does the same. It was a smart dodge — Paula knew Mike was tailing her, and she knew he couldn’t follow her in there, not unless he was carrying a disguise kit with a wig and a set of skirts in it, like these pulp-magazine dicks do.

“I was damned sure now that the lunch money I’d risked was going to pay off, and when Paula left with the boys after her, I hung around and gave attention to sister. You know what happened then. It was Pauline, and she ends up at your shop and disappears on me. I still want to know what happened. Secret passageway you have built in, I suppose?”

“No,” Merlini replied. “She got a glimpse of you and left via the fire escape. Then you followed us, thinking we were Duke Miller in disguise, probably.”

“Well, I admit I didn’t know what the hell to think. If you were friends of the Duke’s you were new ones on me. But he had funny friends. And anyway, all I could do was check on you. I followed you downtown to the Square, and then I phoned one of my men and, when he took over, I went back to the office and started checking on sister. She’d made a stop at Billboard magazine before coming up to your place, so I phoned there and found out that she’d come in to pick up some mail, that her name was Pauline Hannum, and that she was with the Hannum Circus, which was showing in Bridgeport the next day. The first names, Paula and Pauline, clicked; and I knew damn well they were sisters and had had a conference in the ladies’ room and that something was on the fire. I figured this could be the contact with the Duke, and I decided to make tracks for the circus. And then that night, while you two were driving up from Albany, hell busted loose.”

“Your man was still tailing us?” Merlini asked.

“Yeah. He stayed on until Sunday when I called him off. He’d been sending in some of the dizziest reports about a convention of crackpots you were attending. What made him sure you were all fresh out of a loony house was when some guy who had been talking to you marched over and calmly cut off most of his necktie with a pair of scissors. Anyway, it didn’t sound much as if you were tied up with the Duke, so I called him off.”

“That joke,” Merlini said wryly, “seems to have turned and bitten me. If the O’Halloran Detective Agency had only decided I was a more sinister character, you’d have kept the man on, and Ross and I would have had a witness to the fact that we were in Albany when the Major was killed.”

“Teach you a lesson, maybe,” O’Halloran said. “And you owe me two bucks. My man put the cost of the tie on his swindle sheet. What the hell was the gag?”

“Swindle sheet is right,” Merlini replied. “The tie came off Gimbel’s dollar counter. I had just sold a customer a trick pair of scissors with only one blade. Magicians use them for a laugh, handing them to a spectator who’s assisting on stage and asking him to cut the rope the performer will later restore again. The scissors look all right and sound all right, but they don’t cut. I demonstrated them, and then, because my customer was a little tight and I suspected he’d go right to work with them, as a joke I secretly switched them for a good pair. And he cut the tie that was worn by the dick that worked for O’Halloran who called him off and left me without an alibi on account of which I landed in the jail that the Çhief built!”

“And now,” I objected, “you’re delaying the next installment. What happened while we were driving to Albany Friday night? You said hell broke loose.”

“Paula Starr,” O’Halloran explained, “dusted the D.A.’s men off her tail with a vanishing trick of her own. Those two gals should be billed as the Vanishing Twins. That half-dollar of yours doesn’t do any better. She popped in at the stage door of El Algiers a few minutes before her act was due on. Knowing she’d be busy giving the customers an eyeful for the next twenty minutes or so, the boys relaxed a bit. And Paula dolls herself up in an ermine wrap and a prop tiara, picks up Tommy Mannering at the bar for color, and slithers out the front door as if she was the current No. 1 glamour girl. She had her nose so high in the air even the news photographer out front who got a shot of them didn’t realize who it was until he’d developed his film. She led Mannering to the Crystal Club, knowing that the powder room there has two entrances. Powder rooms seem to be her specialty. Mannering hasn’t seen her since, except in the papers. Saturday morning every sheet in town had her publicity leg art all over the front pages — those they could run and still send the edition through the mails. Here”—O’Halloran pulled a clipping from his pocket—“this is a sample of the text that went with ’em.”

He shoved it at me and I read it aloud. “Wilbur Wilton — On the Main Stem.”

“Cops and Robbers—We knew it would happen. The Dicktracys from the D.A.’s office are still holding the sack down at El Algiers, café society’s smartest hotspot. Duke (Ten Grand) Miller’s ever loving mamma, Paula Starr, the Nightspot Queen, topped her near nude dancing routine with the neatest trick yet when she turned her beauteous self inside out and disappeared as completely as vaudeville… Chief Inspector Gavigan invented some new cuss words (naughty naughty) and transferred two not so bright-eyed sleuths to the back side of Staten Island.

“The boys have been living in hopes our Paula would lead them to the missing Duke, the liquidated Maxie Weissman’s hotshot mouthpiece. She has been stripteasing the force for three weeks, and, just when they decided to pinch her (!) and find out what she was hiding, she does a fadeout… The D.A. had kittens all up and down Centre Street — the cutest things!

“Tommy Mannering, nitery addict and blonde fiend, was also stood up. Rumor has it that he is still waiting outside the powder room at the swank Crystal Club, and there is some talk of applying gilt and keeping him on as a permanent exhibit … Your correspondent also hears that the Duke was the finger man in the matter of his boss’s late demise via the Chicago typewriter route with Bo Lepkewitz cast as the trigger man.

“Things we won’t know until tomorrow: How does Paula hope to hide the phiz that launched a thousand champagne buckets? … Has she joined the Duke, and where? … What happened to Maxie’s do-re-mi, and why have two of Gavigan’s pet gumshoes been living at Bridgeport in the house where Maxie got it in the neck? … And will the D.A. recover?”

When I had finished, O’Halloran added, “Wilbur is still wondering how Paula expected to be able to hide out without being recognized. Her face has been on the cover of every picture magazine in town more than once, and a couple of years back she was in Hollywood. Her shape had so much oomph that it took the producers three pictures to find out she couldn’t act. But as soon as I hit the show I knew the answer. Somebody was using his head and she was minus hers. She was the Headless Lady. And when she was off duty and had a head, she wore blinders; and—”

“And,” Merlini interrupted, “she’d done a color change from brunette to blonde. She’d bleached her hair. Why, if you told Schafer this story, was he so upset when he discovered the corpse was a brunette?”

O’Halloran said, “I’m afraid I didn’t tell the Captain everything. I told him I was following a hunch of my own on the Duke. I told him I’d discovered he used to be with a circus, and I thought it was this one. Now I know where the Duke is; and, after all the spade work I’ve done, I don’t see why Schafer and Hooper should reach out and grab a fistful of that reward.”

“The Duke, then—” Merlini started.

“Now wait,” O’Halloran objected. “Let me get on with my story. I found Paula, and then I discovered that the show’s route had been juggled around, that nobody seemed to know why, and that they all thought it looked queer. Knowing what I did, I thought I saw some sense in it. The show has been heading in one hell of a hurry for Canada. By the quickest route; that explains the long jumps and the fact that they’ve been dating some towns that are way too small. It looked a hell of a lot as if the Duke might have gotten out of the country; and that Paula, with her Dad’s help, was on her way to join him. I decided to tag along, nab him when she connected, and collect the reward. But it didn’t pan out that way. Next thing I knew the Major dies in what everyone thinks is a car smash. Then you two guys show up and things really do begin to happen.”

“You didn’t suspect the accident was a phony?” Merlini asked.

“No. Why should I? I wasn’t interested in the Major particularly. I was busy keeping both eyes on the Headless Lady. But your arrival had me worried. I’d discovered that circus people practically never look at a newspaper and that Paula, with a little care getting to and from her trailer, could probably pull it off and reach the Duke in Canada before she was recognized. When you showed up I wasn’t so sure. I didn’t know that you two hadn’t read the papers either. And I was still wondering what Pauline had gone to your place for. I see now I should have figured it was the Headless Lady apparatus, but at the time I didn’t get it. So I gave you some attention, hoping you’d drop a hint that would give me a lead.

“You ducked out on me after we had seen Pauline and Joy do their tight-wire act, and so I trailed along in the background, keeping my eyes and ears open. I saw you meet Keith, overheard part of what he told you about his suspicions, and was right behind you when you broke into the Major’s trailer. When you found that broken windowpane you almost found me too, because I was just outside getting an earful. Then, when I heard you decide that the Major had been bumped off, I figured Paula for the rap, though I couldn’t see much motive unless maybe the old man had renigged on helping her and was going to turn her in. And when Pauline said that what she had to tell would hit the front pages of every paper in the country, I knew she was thinking of Paula and had picked the same horse. When she went out for her perch act and somebody cut the lights, it looked like Paula more than ever. Particularly since she had no alibi. She was apparently working in the Headless Lady apparatus, but there was no way of proving it was her and not someone doubling for her.”

“And you didn’t arrest Paula then because you were still hoping she’d lead you to the reward?” Merlini asked. “That makes you an accessory after the fact, doesn’t it? You concealed the fact that you had reasonable grounds to believe her guilty.”

“Yeah, it would, if I’d had any real evidence to back up my theory. I didn’t have, of course, because, as Paula’s own murder has proved, she wasn’t the guilty party after all. And then when she didn’t show up in Norwalk this morn—”

“Hold it,” I broke in. “You’re skipping. You eavesdropped at our door in the hotel last night too, didn’t you?”

“At the hotel? No, sorry. Did someone—”

“Someone got an earful,” Merlini said. “But go on. When Paula didn’t arrive on the lot this morning—”

“Well,” O’Halloran continued, “I began to think I’d pulled a bloomer, that she’d lammed and that I was out of luck all the way around. I was parked behind the side-show tent, chewing my nails and waiting for her to show, when you and Harte got there. I’d been worrying some about where you’d got to, too. I must have passed you on the road when you were finding the empty trailer. You pulled in and parked your car right alongside mine. I was on the floor by that time, and I overheard your talks with Joy and Keith. That didn’t make me any happier — but right there was when I got my break.”

“But I didn’t mention murder then,” Merlini said. “Only that we’d found her empty trailer.”

“I know, but the important thing was that I discovered somebody else listening in on your broadcast. I heard somebody sneak up on the off side of my car and squat on the running board. When he heard you say you’d found the empty trailer, he scrammed quietly. I edged my car door open a crack and got a look at his back. Then when you and Keith moved off I came out of hiding and went after him. He made a beeline for Pauline’s trailer. The Negro Mac had on guard was snoozing, and this guy ducked in.”

“Garner!” I said.

O’Halloran nodded as Farmer drove our car onto the circus lot.

One of the Chief’s men on duty at the entrance stopped us. Merlini put his head out enough so that the man got a quick glimpse of his uniform cap. “Special detail, New York Police,” he said gruffly. “When Chief Inspector Gavigan arrives tell him I’d like to see him in Miss Hannum’s trailer.”

The cop nodded and Farmer stepped on the gas. “Take us around by the cookhouse,” Merlini ordered. “And we’ll park there until we’ve heard the rest of O’Halloran’s yarn. There’ll be cops by the side-show top where we were before.” Then he asked O’Halloran, “A point of information: Was Garner wearing his tramp make-up when you caught him eavesdropping?”

“You’re catching wise, aren’t you?” O’Halloran said. “Yeah, he was. And since then I’ve done a little nosing around, and I’ve discovered he never did wash his face much. He wore his make-up around the lot much more than was necessary. While you were arguing with Mac about seeing Pauline, he was inside having a heart-to-heart chat with her, mostly in whispers, so I couldn’t get much of it. But I did hear him threaten Pauline. He said he’d kill her if she gave him away. He had a gun, and when you two and Mac barged in, he backed into the wardrobe. You know now why Miss Hannum wasn’t saying very much. He was right there with a heater all set to go. I began to have hunches fast along about then, and I started checking his alibis.”

“So Paula did lead you to the Duke after all?” Merlini said. “Garner is the Duke. He came from a circus originally and, when he wanted to hide out, he came back to one. His manner of concealing himself is identical with Paula’s, perhaps because he thought of them both. A man wearing the heavy, grotesque grease paint of a clown is hiding behind the best disguise in the world. He might just as well not have a head at all. So we have a headless man as well as a headless lady. And his alibis—”

“Aren’t any of them worth a continental damn,” O’Halloran said. “When Major Hannum’s ‘accident’ occurred, Garner was supposed to be working in the Wild West show. Any one of the other clowns could have taken his place, and his own mother wouldn’t have caught it. Same thing when Pauline fell and the evidence was stolen from the trailer. Someone else subbing for him in the tramp get-up. I questioned the other clowns this afternoon, and I couldn’t find anyone who’ll swear positively he was in that clown car when it made the trip over this morning. Most of them were asleep, and the others didn’t notice. The Duke is the guy you’ve been hunting who is so smart about not leaving any decent clues — a hotshot mouthpiece like him knew enough to try to make his killings look like accidents. And he came within inches of getting away with it. He’s your murderer. But I’m going to be the one to pick him up. I’ll give him to Hooper, and you two will be in the clear.”

“Why, for God’s sake,” I asked, “didn’t you spill that when Schafer and Hooper arrested us?”

O’Halloran grinned. “Couple of reasons. First, I had to take time out to do some heavy thinking. There was so damned much evidence in that car of yours I began to wonder for a minute if maybe I wasn’t slipping some. I wasn’t completely sure that maybe you two hadn’t done it after all. And besides, the Captain had a whale of a lot more evidence for his theory than I did for mine. If I’d a popped with my dope on the Duke, they’d have arrested you just the same, picked up the Duke because he was wanted, and grabbed off the reward. Maybe I’d get a piece, maybe not.”

“O’Halloran,” Merlini said quietly, “I’ll have to admit that you’ve solved the case. You’ve supplied the one bit of information I’ve been wanting desperately ever since Monday night. But there’s one small error in your theory that you should fix.”

“What’s that?” O’Halloran looked at him apprehensively.

“The murderer’s identity,” Merlini said. “You’ve put your money on the wrong horse. The Duke is not the murderer.”

“The Duke isn’t—” O’Halloran’s voice was flat and empty like a busted balloon. He stared at Merlini. “You got a better guess?”

“I think I will have,” Merlini said. “Some of the most surprising ideas are beginning to occur to me.”

O’Halloran gave him a hard, incisive stare. “I don’t know what bee is buzzing in your bonnet, but I’m still betting on the Duke. And I’m picking him up right now.”

“I don’t think—” I began, got an admonishing poke in the ribs from Merlini’s elbow, and changed the ending to read: “—that he’ll like that much.” What I had intended to say was, “I don’t think that’s going to be as easy as you think. Last we knew Garner had disappeared.”

“I know he won’t like it,” O’Halloran said. “And he’s got a gun. Before I tackle him I’d like mine back.”

Merlini produced it and gave it to him. “Yes. I guess you had better have it.”

O’Halloran said, “I want to hear those surprising ideas of yours, but I’ll just attend to this first. Even if he shouldn’t be the murderer, there’s that ten grand.” He left on a run.

Merlini turned to Farmer, who had been quietly taking it all in. “Let him find out for himself that the Duke-Garner is A.W.O.L. We’ve got O’Halloran’s story, and I’d rather not have him around for the next few minutes. He’s too set in his ideas. But you might mosey along after him, Farmer, and report on what happens. I don’t know where the Duke is, and if he should still be around, O’Halloran might find him.”

Farmer said, “Okay. What about letting me have one of those ‘Forty-some-odds’ just in case?”[5]

“He’s asking for one of your guns, Ross,” Merlini translated. “You come with me. We’re going to see Pauline Hannum.”

I gave Farmer a gun, and we separated. Merlini and I made for the back yard. The performance in the big top was nearly over. I could hear the raucous amplified voice of the announcer saying, “Ladeez and gen-tul-men, please remain in your seats until the show is all out and all over! The arena track must be clear for our final presentation. The Chariot Races! The first event — a thrilling exhibition of dare-devil equestrianism, the Five-Horse Roman Standing … ”

Merlini’s hand was closing around the doorknob of Pauline’s trailer when the door suddenly opened. Mac Wiley ducked and came out. He was closely followed by a figure whose square shoulders, determined chin, and bright blue eyes were all too familiar, as were the perturbed scowl and the sharp bite his words held.

“Merlini,” he barked. “What the everlasting, blazing, blue hell are you and Ross doing in those uniforms?”

It was Chief Inspector Homer Gavigan.