The King is Dead

10

By written order of Abel Bendigo, the Queens were permitted that afternoon to inspect the Confidential Room. Colonel Spring himself, looking a wee bit flustered, unlocked the big steel door. The Colonel, the officer in charge of the household guards, and two armed guards went in with them and watched them as closely as if it were the bullion vault of Fort Knox.

It was a great empty-looking room painted hospital gray. There was only one door, the door through which they had entered. There were no windows at all, the walls themselves glowing with a constant, shadowless light. A frieze of solid-looking material ran around the walls near the high ceiling; this was a porous metal fabric invented by Bendigo engineers to take the place of conventional heating and air-conditioning vents and grilles. “It’s a metallic substance that actually breathes,” explained Colonel Spring, “and does away with openings.” The air in the room was mild, sweet, and fresh.

No pictures, hangings, or decorations of any kind broke the blankness of the walls. The floor was of some springy material, solidly inlaid, that deadened sound. The ceiling was soundproofed.

In the exact center of the Confidential Room stood a very large metal desk, with a leather swivel chair behind it. There was nothing on the desk but a telephone. A typewriter-desk, its electric typewriter exposed, faced the large desk; this one was equipped with an uncushioned metal chair. Solid banks of steel filing cases lined the walls to a height of five feet.

Above the door, and so in direct view of the occupant of the large desk, there was a functional clock. It consisted of two uncompromising gold hands and twelve unnumbered gold darts, and was embedded in the wall.

And there was nothing else in the room.

“Who besides the Bendigo family, Colonel, uses this room?” asked Inspector Queen.

“No one.”

Ellery said: “Does Judah Bendigo come in here often?”

Colonel Spring cocked a brow at the officer of the guard. The officer said: “Not often, sir. He may wander in for a few minutes sometimes, but he’s never here very long.”

“When was the last time Mr. Judah visited this room?”

“I’d have to consult the records, sir.”

“Consult them.”

The officer glanced at Colonel Spring. The Colonel nodded, and the officer went away. He returned shortly with a ledger.

“About six weeks ago was the last time, sir. And a week before that, and three weeks before that.”

“Would these records show if at those times he was in this room alone?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Was he?”

“No, sir. He never comes in here when the room is unoccupied. He can’t get in. No one can but Mr. King and Mr. Abel. They have the only two keys, aside from an emergency key kept in the guardroom in a wall safe. We have to open the room daily for the maids.”

“The maids, I take it, clean up under the eye of the guards?”

“And the officer on duty, sir.”

The Queens wandered about the Confidential Room for a few minutes. Ellery tried a number of filing cases, but most of them were locked. The few that were not locked were empty. In one of the unlocked drawers he found a bottle of Segonzac cognac, and he sighed.

Ellery examined the steel door. It was impregnable.

When they left the room, Colonel Spring tried the door with his own hands and gave the key to the captain of the guard. The officer saluted and took the key to the guardroom.

“Is there anything else I can do, gentlemen?” asked the Colonel rather plaintively, Ellery thought. “My orders are to put myself completely at your disposal.”

“Just the matter of the air-conditioning unit, Colonel,” the Inspector said.

“Oh, yes...”

Ellery left them and crossed the hall. He knocked on Judah Bendigo’s door. There was no answer. He knocked again. There was still no answer. So he went in.

Max’l was straddling a chair the wrong way, his chin on his hairy hands. Only his eyes moved, following like a watchdog’s the movements of Judah Bendigo’s hands. An empty bottle of Segonzac lolled on Judah’s desk. Judah was opening a fresh bottle. He had torn away the tax stamp and was just running the blade of a pocket-knife around the hard wax seal. He paid no attention to the troglodyte, and he did not look up when Ellery came in.

Ellery spent the rest of the day trying to save Judah Bendigo’s soul. But Judah was doomed. He did not resist salvation; he shrugged it down. He was looking more like a corpse than ever — a corpse who had died of violence, for his cheek-bone was bruised, swollen, and purple from its encounter with the dining-room wall, and a split lip gave his mouth a sneering grin such as Ellery frequently saw at the morgue.

“I’m not enjoying this, Ellery, really I’m not. I don’t care for the idea of killing my brother any more than you do. But someone has to do the dirty job, and I’m tired of waiting for the Almighty.”

“Once you shed his blood, how do you differ from King, Judah?”

“I’m an executioner. Executioners are among the most respectable of public servants.”

“Executioners do their work by sanction of law. Self-appointed executioners are simply murderers.”

“Law? On Bendigo Island?” Judah permitted his ragged mustache to lift. “Oh, I admit the circumstances are unusual. But that’s just the point. There are no sanctions I can evoke here except the decent opinions of mankind, as expressed in a handful of historic documents. The conscience of civilization has appointed me.”

At another time — toward dusk — Judah interrupted Ellery to say, simply, “You’re wasting your breath. My mind is made up.”

It was at this point that it occurred to Ellery that Judah Bendigo was talking like a man who expects to consummate his crime.

“Let me understand you, Judah. Granted the firmness of your resolve, hasn’t it sunk home that you’ve been detected in advance? You don’t think we’re sitting by and letting you execute your plan, whatever it is? Max’l alone in this room with you would be enough to thwart whatever you have in mind. There’s going to be no murder, Judah.” By this time Ellery was talking as if Judah were a child. “We simply can’t allow it, you know.”

Judah sipped some cognac and smiled. “There’s nothing you can do to stop me.”

“Oh, come. I’ll admit that a man bent on violence may sooner or later find an opening, no matter what precautions are taken. But we know the exact time and place—”

Judah waved a thin white hand. “It doesn’t matter.”

“What doesn’t matter?”

“That you know the time and place. If I cared whether you knew or not, I’d never have written the note.”

“You’ll do it in spite of the fact that we’re forewarned?”

“Oh, yes.”

“At that time? In that place?” exclaimed Ellery.

“Midnight tonight. The Confidential Room.”

Ellery looked at him. “So that’s it. You have another plan entirely. This was all a red herring to foul up the trail.”

Judah seemed offended. “Nothing of the sort! I give you my word. That would spoil it. Don’t you see that?”

“No.”

Judah shrugged and tipped his bottle again.

“Of course, none of this is really necessary,” Ellery said, “since you have my personal assurance you won’t leave this room tonight and your brother King won’t enter it. So I can afford to play games, Judah. Tell me this: You announced the time of the murder, we know the exact place — if you stick to your word about the time — so do you mind telling me by what means you intend to kill your brother?”

“Don’t mind at all,” said Judah. “I’m going to shoot him.”

“With what?”

“With one of my favorite guns.”

“Nonsense,” said Ellery irritably. “My father and I have searched these rooms twice today, and neither of us is exactly a novice at this sort of thing. Including, if you’ll recall, a very thorough body-search. There is no gun on these premises, and no ammunition of any kind.”

“Sorry. There’s a fully loaded gun right under your nose.”

“Here? Now?”

“It’s not six feet from where you’re standing.”

Ellery looked around rather wildly. But then he caught himself and grinned. “I must watch that trick of yours. It’s unsettling.”

“No trick. I mean it.”

Ellery stopped grinning. “I consider this downright nasty of you, Judah. Now, on the off-chance that you may be telling the truth, I’ve got to search the place all over again.”

“I’ll save you the trouble. I don’t mind telling you where the gun is. It won’t make any difference.”

It won’t make any difference... “Where is it, Judah?” Ellery asked in a kindly voice.

“In Max’l’s pocket, where I slipped it when you started searching.”

Max’l jerked erect. He began to paw at his coat pocket. Ellery ran over, flung his hand aside, and explored the pocket himself. It was crowded with pieces of candy, nuts, and other objects Ellery’s fingers could not identify; but among the sticky odds and ends there was a hard cold something. He drew it out.

Max’l glared at it.

It was a rather silly-looking automatic pistol. It was so snubnosed it could be concealed in a man’s hand, for the barrel was only about one inch long — the entire length of the weapon was scarcely four inches. It was a German Walther of .25 caliber. For all its womanish size, Ellery knew it for a deadly little weapon, and this one had a used look. The ivory inlays on the stock were rubbed and yellow with handling, and the right side of the grip was chipped — a triangular bit of the ivory was missing from the lower right corner.

Judah was gazing at it fondly. “Beauty, isn’t it?”

The automatic was fully loaded. Ellery emptied the magazine and chamber, dropped the little Walther into his pocket, and went to the door. By the time he had unlocked and opened it, Inspector Queen blocked the doorway.

“What’s the matter, Ellery?”

“I’ve extracted Judah’s teeth.” Ellery put the cartridges in his father’s hand. “Hold on to these for me.”

“Where the devil— Maybe he’s got more!”

“If he has, they’re not in there. But I’ll look again.”

Ellery relocked the door and regarded Judah thoughtfully. Why had he disclosed where the gun was? Was it a trick designed to head off still another search which would turn up a second gun — the gun Judah had intended to use from the beginning?

Ellery said to Max’l, “Watch him,” which was quite unnecessary, and searched Judah’s two rooms and bath again. Judah kept drinking with every appearance of indifference. He made no protest when Ellery insisted on another body search. Afterwards, he redressed and reached for the bottle again.

There was no other gun, not a single cartridge.

Ellery sat down facing the thin little figure and looked it over searchingly. The man was either insane or so fogged with alcohol that he could no longer distinguish between fancy and reality. For practical purposes it really did not matter which. If the German automatic was the weapon he had meant to use, its teeth were drawn; Judah would not and could not leave the room; and it had been arranged between the Queens, with Abel Bendigo’s unqualified consent, that King Bendigo would be prevented by force, if necessary, from crossing the threshold of Judah’s quarters.

There was simply no way for the dedicated assassin to kill the tyrant. And if Judah’s antics masked a plan whereby some bribed or hired killer was to attempt the murder, that was taken care of, too.

At exactly eleven o’clock that night King and Karla Bendigo appeared in the corridor. Six guards surrounded them. Karla was pale, but her husband was smiling.

“Well, well,” he said to the Inspector. And are you gentlemen enjoying yourselves?”

“Don’t joke about it, Kane,” begged Karla. “Nothing is going to happen, but... don’t joke about it.”

He squeezed her shoulder affectionately and produced a key from a tiny gold case attached to his trousers by a gold chain. Inspector Queen glanced about: two guards were at Judah Bendigo’s door across the corridor, one of them with his hand on the doorknob, gripping it tightly. On the other side of that door, the Inspector knew, Judah was guarded by Max’l and Ellery. Even so, he was taking no chances.

“One minute, Mr. Bendigo.” King had unlocked the massive door and Karla was about to precede him into the Confidential Room. “I have to ask you to let me search this room before you step inside.”

The Inspector was already in the doorway, barring the way.

King stared. “I was told you searched it this afternoon.”

“That was this afternoon, Mr. Bendigo.” The Inspector did not move.

“All right!” King stepped back peevishly. Three guards managed to slip between him and the doorway. They stood there shoulder to shoulder. Something about the maneuver restored the magnate’s good humor. “What’s he had you men doing today, rehearsing? You did that like a line of chorus girls!”

The room was exactly as the Inspector had left it during the afternoon. Nevertheless he prowled about, glancing everywhere — at the filing cases, the desks, the chairs, the floor, the walls, the ceiling.

“Mr. Bendigo, I want your permission to look in these desks and filing cases.”

“Denied,” came the brusque answer.

“I’ve got to insist, Mr. Bendigo.”

“Insist?”

“Mr. Bendigo.” The Inspector came to the doorway. “I’ve been given a serious responsibility by your brother, Abel. If you refuse to let me handle this as I think it ought to be handled, I have your brother’s permission to keep you from entering this room — by force, if necessary. Mr. Abel wanted your consent to my searching those drawers and cases, but he recognizes the necessity for it. Do you want to see his personal authorization?”

The black eyes engulfed him. “Abel knows that no one outside my family — no one! — is allowed to see the contents of those drawers.”

“I promise not to read a single paper, Mr. Bendigo. What I’m looking for is a possible booby trap or time bomb. A glance in a drawer will tell me that.”

King Bendigo did not reply for several moments.

“Kane. Do whatever they say. Please.” Karla’s voice sounded as if her tongue were stiff.

He shrugged and unhooked the little gold case from the end of his chain. “This key unlocks the file drawers. This one the drawers of my desk. The drawers of the small desk are not locked.”

The Inspector took the two keys. “Would you permit me to shut this door while I search?”

“Certainly not!”

“Then I must ask you and Mrs. Bendigo to step aside, out of range of the doorway. These three guards,” the Inspector added with a certain bitterness, “can keep watching me.”

He searched thoroughly.

When he came out into the corridor he said, “One thing more, Mr. Bendigo. Is there a concealed compartment of any kind in that room, or a concealed door, or a panel, or a passageway, or anything of that sort? Anything of that sort whatsoever?”

“No.” The big man was fuming at the delay.

The Inspector handed him the two keys. “Then it’s all right for you to go in.”

When the master of the Bendigo empire had entered the Confidential Room followed by his wife, and the great door had swung shut, Inspector Queen tried the door. But it had locked automatically; he could not budge it.

He set his back against the door and said to one of the guards, “Do you have a cigarette?” Ellery’s father resorted to cigarettes only in times of great stress. For the first time it had occurred to the Inspector that he had just risked being blown into his component parts to save the life of a man whose death under other circumstances would have caused him no more, perhaps, than a mild humanitarian regret.

Judah was well into his current bottle of Segonzac, and by 11.20 p.m. it was almost empty and he had settled down to serious drinking. He had politely inquired if he might play some music, and when Ellery, before consenting, re-examined the record-player, Judah shook his head dolefully as if in sorrow at the suspicious nature of man.

“Don’t go near those albums,” said Ellery. “I’ll get what you want.”

“Do you suspect my music?” exclaimed Judah.

“You can’t have a weapon concealed in those albums,” retorted Ellery, “but there might be a cartridge tucked away in one of them that I somehow missed. You sit just where you are, impaled by Max’l’s glittering eye. I’ll handle your music. What would you like to hear?”

“You would suspect Mozart. Mozart!”

“In a situation like this, Judah, I’d suspect Orpheus. Mozart?” “The Finale of the C Major symphony — there, the Forty-first. There’s nothing as grand in human expression except parts of Shakespeare and the most inspired flights of Bach.”

“Window dressing,” muttered Ellery, perhaps unjustly; and for a few minutes he listened with grudging pleasure to l’Orchestre de la Suisse Romande under the baton of Ansermet. Judah grudged nothing. He sprawled in the chair behind his desk, a snifter between his palms, eyes wide and shining.

Mozart was in full swing when Ellery glanced at his watch and saw it was 11.32. He nodded at Max’l, who was as impervious to the counterpoint as a Gila monster, went quietly to the door, and unlocked it. Before pulling it open, he glanced back at Judah. Judah was smiling.

At the sound of the door the Inspector came quickly across the corridor. He blocked the opening with his back, still watching the door of the Confidential Room.

“Everything all right, Dad?”

“Yes.”

“King and Karla still in there?”

“The door hasn’t been open since they went in.”

Ellery nodded. He was not surprised to see Abel Bendigo across the hall, standing among the guards before the locked room. Abel glanced at Ellery anxiously and came over to join them.

“I couldn’t work. It’s ridiculous, but I couldn’t. How has Judah been, Mr. Queen?”

“He’s hard to figure out. Tell me, Mr. Bendigo — does your brother Judah have any history of mental disturbance?”

Abel said: “Because he’s threatened to kill King?”

“No. Because even though he knows we’re aware of his intentions, he still talks as if he’s going to do it.”

“He can’t, can he?” Abel said it quickly.

“Impossible. But it’s a word he apparently doesn’t recognize.”

“Judah has always been a little peculiar. Of course, his drinking...”

“How far back does his alcoholism go?”

“A good many years. Do you think I ought to talk to him, Mr. Queen?”

“No.”

Abel nodded. He went back across the hall.

“He didn’t answer the question,” remarked the Inspector.

Ellery shrugged and shut the door. He turned the key and put it back in his pocket.

When the symphony was over, Ellery put the records away. He turned from the album shelves to find Judah regarding his empty glass. The would-be fratricide picked up the cognac bottle and tilted it. Nothing came out. He grasped both arms of his chair, raising himself.

“Where are you going?” asked Ellery.

“Get another bottle.”

“Stay there. I’ll get it for you.”

Ellery went behind the Bechstein and took a new bottle of Segonzac from the case on top of the pile. Judah was fumbling in his pockets. Finally he produced his pocket-knife.

“I’ll open it for you.”

Ellery took the knife from him, slit the tax stamp, and scraped the hardened seal off the bottle’s mouth. The knife had a corkscrew attachment; with it Ellery drew the cork. He placed the bottle on the desk beside the empty glass.

“I think,” he murmured, “I’ll borrow this, Judah.”

Judah followed his knife in its course to Ellery’s trouser pocket. Then he picked up the bottle.

Ellery glanced at his watch.

11.46.

At 11.53 Ellery said to Max’l: “Get in front of him. I’ll be right back.”

Max’l got up and went to the desk, facing Judah seated behind it. The great back blocked Judah out.

Ellery unlocked the door, slipped outside, relocked the door from the corridor.

His father, Abel Bendigo, and the guards had not changed position.

“Still in there?”

“Still in there, son.”

“The door hasn’t been opened at all?”

“No.”

“Let’s check.”

Ellery rapped.

“But Judah...” Abel glanced across the corridor.

“Max is standing over him, the door’s locked, and the key’s in my pocket. Mr. Bendigo!” Ellery rapped again.

After a moment the lock turned over. The guards stiffened. The door opened and King Bendigo towered there. He was in his shirt sleeves. At the secretarial desk, Karla twisted about, looking toward the door a little blankly.

“Well?” snapped the big man.

“Just making sure everything’s all right, Mr. Bendigo.”

“I’m still here.” He noticed Abel. “Abel? Finish with those people so early?”

“I’ll wind it up in the morning.” Abel was tight-lipped. “Go in, King. Go back in.”

“Oh—!” The disgusted exclamation was lost in the slam of the door. The Inspector tried it. Locked.

Ellery looked at his watch again.

11.56.30.

“He’s not to open that door again until well after midnight,” he said. He ran across the hall.

When Ellery relocked Judah’s door from inside, Max’l backed away from the desk and padded to the door to set his shoulders against it.

“What did he do, Max?”

Max’l grinned.

“I drank cognac,” said Judah dreamily. He raised the snifter.

Ellery went around the desk and stood over him.

11.57.20.

“Time’s a-ticking, Judah,” he murmured. He wondered how Judah was going to handle the moment of supreme reality, when he was face to face at last with the stroke of midnight.

He kept looking down at the slight figure in the chair. In spite of himself, Ellery felt his muscles tighten.

Two minutes to midnight.

Judah glanced at the watch on his thin wrist and set the empty glass down.

And turned in his chair, looking up at Ellery.

“Will you please be good enough,” he said, “to give me my Walther?

“This?” Ellery took the little automatic out of his pocket. “I’m afraid there isn’t much you can do with it, Judah.”

Judah presented his upturned palm.

There was nothing to be read in his eyes. The light Ellery saw in them might be mockery, but he was more inclined to ascribe it to cognac. Unless...

Because he was what he was, Ellery examined the Walther, which had not left his pocket since he had removed its ammunition.

The automatic, of course, was empty. Nevertheless, Ellery examined it even more closely than before. It might be a trick gun. It might, somehow, conceal a bullet, and a pressure somewhere might discharge it. Ellery had never heard of a gun like that, but it was possible.

Not in this case, however. This was an orthodox German Walther. Ellery had handled dozens of them. It was an orthodox German Walther and it was not loaded.

He dropped the little automatic into Judah’s hand.

He could not help feeling an embarrassed pity as Judah transferred the empty gun to his right hand and took a firm grip on the stock, his forefinger curled at the trigger. Judah was intent now, making small economical movements, as if what he was about to do was of the greatest importance and required the utmost in concentration.

He pushed downward with his left hand on the desk top and got to his feet.

Ellery’s glance never left those hands.

Now Judah raised his left forearm. He stared down at the second hand of his wristwatch.

Thirty seconds.

His right hand, with the empty gun, was in plain view. There was nothing he could do with it, no sleight-of-hand, not a trick, not a bluff, not an anything. And if he could? If, by an unreasonable miracle, he could materialize a cartridge and load the gun with it with Ellery at his elbow, what could he do with it? Shoot Ellery? Hypnotize Max’l? And if he got out into the corridor, what then? A locked door of safe steel. A hallful of armed, alert men. And even then, no key.

Fifteen seconds.

What was he waiting for?

Judah raised the Walther.

Max’l moved convulsively, and Ellery almost sprang. He had to check his own reflex. Max’l uttered a growly chuckle, rather horrible to hear, and relaxed against the door again.

It was too stupid. There was nothing Judah could do with that empty little gun, nothing. Too an obscure curiosity stayed Ellery. There was nothing Judah could do, and yet he was preparing to do something. What?

Seven seconds.

Judah’s right arm came up until it was straight out before him. He was apparently taking aim at something, getting his sight set for a shot he couldn’t possibly fire. A shot he couldn’t possibly fire at a wall he couldn’t possibly penetrate.

Five seconds.

A theoretical extension of Judah’s right arm with the Walther at the end of it would make a line through the wall of his study, across the corridor, through the wall of the Confidential Room, into the approximate center of that room and — perhaps — the torso of a seated man.

Three seconds.

Judah was “aiming” at his brother King.

He was mad.

Two seconds.

Judah watched his upheld wrist.

One second.

And now, Judah?

At the tick of midnight, Judah’s finger squeezed the trigger.

Had the little Walther flamed and bucked at that instant Ellery could not have been so astounded. A gun that went off in spite of the impossibility of a gun’s going off would at the least have made reasonable the unreasonable play that went before. It would have been a physical miracle, but it would have given Judah’s actions the dignity of logic.

The little Walther, however, neither flamed nor bucked. It merely went click! and was quiet again. No roar reverberated through the room, no hole appeared in the wall, no voice cried out.

Ellery squinted at the man.

He was incredible, this Judah. He was not acting like a man who had just pulled the trigger of a gun that could not and did not go off. He was acting like a man who had seen the flame and felt the buck and heard the roar and the cry. He was acting like a man who had successfully fired a shot.

Judah lowered the Walther slowly and with great care put it down on his desk.

The he sank into the chair and reached for the bottle of Segonzac. He uncorked it slowly, slowly poured several ounces of cognac, slowly and steadily drank, the bottle still gripped in his left hand. Then he flung bottle and glass aside and, as they crashed to the floor, he put his face down on the desk and wept.

Ellery found himself going over the facts indignantly. No bullet in the gun. A wall, a corridor, then another wall two feet thick made of reinforced concrete. And a man safely beyond it. Safely. Unless... unless...

Impossible. Impossible.

Ellery heard a harsh voice, hardly recognizable as his own. “You act as if you shot your brother.”

“I did.”

The words were sobby. Thick with grief.

As if you really killed him, I mean.”

He didn’t understand. He couldn’t have said — “I did.”

So he had said it. Ellery passed his hand over his mouth. The man was insane.

“You did what, Judah?”

“King is dead.”

“Did you hear what he said?” Ellery glanced bitterly across at Max’l.

Max’l tapped his temple, grinning.

Ellery took hold of Judah’s shoulder in a burst of annoyance and pulled him upright, holding him against the back of the chair.

Crying, all right.

He let go. Judah stopped crying to bite his lower lip with his uneven, stained teeth. He fumbled for something in his back pocket. His hand reappeared with a handkerchief. He blew his nose into it and relaxed, sighing.

“They can do what they want with me,” he said in a high monotone. “But I had to do it. You don’t know what he was. What he was planning. I had to stop him. I had to.”

Ellery picked up the Walther. Glared at it.

He tossed it back on the desk and strode across the room. He said stridently to Max’l, “Get out of my way.”

He unlocked the door.

The corridor was at peace. The Inspector and Abel Bendigo were leaning against the door of the Confidential Room, talking in lively voices. The guards lounged in visible relief.

“Oh, Ellery.” The Inspector looked around. “Well, that’s that. — What’s the matter? You’re pale as a ghost.”

“Is Judah all right?” asked Abel quickly.

“Yes.” Ellery gripped his father’s arm. “Did... anything happen?”

“Happen? Not a thing, son.”

“You didn’t hear... anything?”

“What?”

“Well... a shot.”

“Of course not.”

“Nobody’s gone in or out of the Room?”

“No.”

“The door’s remained shut — locked?”

“Certainly.” His father stared at him.

Abel, the guards...

Ellery felt like a fool. He was furious with Judah Bendigo. Not merely a lunatic — a malicious lunatic. Still...

He stepped up to the big steel door, looked at it.

The men around him watched him, puzzled.

Ellery knocked.

After a moment he knocked again, harder.

Nothing happened.

“There’s no use standing there waiting,” said a tired voice.

Ellery whirled. Judah had come out into the corridor. Max’l had both of Judah’s arms locked behind his back. Max’l was grinning.

“What does he mean?” asked the Inspector, nettled.

Ellery began to pound on the steel door with both fists. “Mr. Bendigo! Are you all right?”

There was no answer. Ellery tried to turn the knob. It remained immovable.

“Mr. Bendigo!” shouted Ellery. “Unlock this door!”

Abel Bendigo was cracking his knuckles and muttering. “He would go into his high-and-mighty act. But why doesn’t Karla...?”

“Get me a key, somebody!”

“Key?” Abel started. “Here. Here, Mr. Queen. Oh, why doesn’t he—? He’ll roar, but... Here!”

Ellery snatched the gold case from Abel. It was a duplicate of King’s. He jabbed the key in the lock, twisted, jerked, heaved...

Karla was lying on the floor beside her husband’s desk. Her eyes were shut.

King Bendigo was seated in the leather swivel chair behind his desk, and his eyes were open.

But the way he sat and the way he looked made Ellery’s blood stop running.

Bendigo was slumped in the chair off the perpendicular, one shirt-sleeved arm between his knees and the other dangling over-side.

His head lolled back on his shoulder and his mouth was open, too.

The white silk of his shirt, on the left breast, showed a stain roughly circular in shape, and in color bright red.

In the center of the red circle there was a small, black, bullet hole.