The Second Richard Deming Mystery MEGAPACK™: 23 Classic Mystery Stories

Errand Boy

Originally published in The Saint Mystery Magazine, March 1965.

“Do you have to go out again tonight?” Phyllis Stroud asked petulantly.

Barney Stroud tilted up her chin to give her an apologetic kiss on the nose. “Do you think I like leaving you alone, baby? You know I’m nuts about you.”

This wasn’t just husbandly flattery. Even after two years of marriage Barney was still astonished at having managed to snare a wife such as Phyllis. She was not only the most beautiful woman he had ever known, with a lovely, sensitive face surrounded by a halo of honey blonde hair, and possessing a figure which popped men’s eyes, but she had class. Though her parents were now broke because of some unwise investments by her father, Phyllis was a Caldwell, and in St. Vincent the name Caldwell was equivalent to Cabot or Lodge in Boston.

Phyllis was a Vassar graduate. Barney had grown up in the slums of St. Vincent and had quit school at sixteen. He not only loved his wife, he was deeply awed by her background.

A lot of people were. If they hadn’t been, Phyllis could hardly have lifted her racketeer husband into her own elite social set, but instead would have been summarily dropped from the social register for marrying so far beneath her. But in St. Vincent a Caldwell could do no wrong. Barney was quite aware that he was tolerated by St. Vincent high society solely because he was Phyllis’ husband.

The only thorn in his Garden of Eden was that he didn’t know how to handle his wife when she became condescending. Before he met and married Phyllis, Barney had always practiced the role of the dominant male. If one of his old flames from the south side had ever spoken to him half as belittlingly as Phyllis often did, he would have slapped her silly. But you can’t treat a goddess the same way you treat a tramp. Even when his wife sometimes informed him that the only reason she had married an unschooled racketeer was because he had money, it only made him miserable instead of angry. He wasn’t about to do anything which might cause Phyllis to walk out on him.

“What is it tonight?” she asked with a touch of ice. “More errand running for Johnny Nash?”

Barney had given up trying to explain to Phyllis that as third man from top in the Drennan-Nash combine he was considerably more than an errand boy. Because she disliked Johnny Nash, she seemed to have the peculiarly fixed idea that the man deliberately cut in on Barney’s evenings by dreaming up unnecessary chores for him to perform.

Oddly, she never made similar objections when he was called out at night by Nash’s partner, Mark Drennan. She seemed to like Drennan, or at least to accept him socially.

Of course Drennan had a veneer of breeding which put him at ease in Phyllis’ social set, while Johnny Nash looked and talked like what he was: a successful gangster. Furthermore Mark Drennan, who was a bachelor, never showed up at Phyllis’ social affairs with a feminine partner who didn’t fit in, whereas Johnny Nash always did on the rare occasions he was invited. He couldn’t avoid it, because his feminine partner was always his wife, a beautiful but ungrammatical woman who gave away her ex-stripper background every time she opened her mouth.

As one of her husband’s bosses, Johnny Nash and his wife had to be invited to at least some of Phyllis’ parties, but she hated to have either one in the house.

Barney said pacifically, “Johnny’s not even in town. I have to drop some tally sheets by Mark’s place.”

“Oh,” she said, mollified. “Will you be long?”

“Not more than an hour,” he assured her.

As he drove away from the house, Barney thought aggrievedly that he wasn’t as bad a catch as Phyllis liked to make out. Maybe he didn’t have the education and social grace of her friends, but he was more of a bargain physically than any of them. He stood six feet two, without an ounce of fat on him, and the girls on the south side had considered him about the handsomest guy around. Anyway, under Phyllis’ tutelage, he had managed to develop enough surface polish and to straighten out his grammar enough so that her friends seldom, any more, looked down their noses at him.

And he certainly had more money than most of her friends. Phyllis had a hundred-thousand-dollar home in which to entertain, she drove her own Lincoln convertible, wore Paris fashioned clothes, owned a couple of minks and nearly as much jewelry as Tiffany’s. Which wasn’t bad progress for a young man of twenty-six who had owned only one pair of pants ten years before.

Of course, as Phyllis liked to point out, he had come to a dead end. The only move upward left to make would be to take over top spot from the Drennan Nash partnership, and neither partner was likely to retire voluntarily for at least another twenty-five years.

At sixteen Barney Stroud had started running numbers for the Drennan-Nash combine, which at that time was just beginning to organize the city’s divergent rackets into a single centrally-controlled organization. Mark Drennan and Johnny Nash, respectively only twenty-four and twenty-five themselves, had moved in on existing rackets with a combination of brashness, muscle and organizing knowhow which left the combine in undisputed control of local rackets by the time Barney could vote.

He had moved right along with it, rising from runner to muscle man, then to district manager and, finally, to “thumb man” in charge of all collections and payoffs.

Barney was already third man from top when he met and married Phyllis. He had been pretty proud of that position until she began belittling him as an “errand boy.” But now he did considerable dreaming about eventually moving into top spot. His dreams weren’t inspired by ruthless ambition, for actually he was quite content with his lot. It was just that he envisioned commanding his wife’s respect if he was in a position to give orders instead of taking them.

It was only idle dreaming, though. Mark Drennan was now only thirty-four and Johnny Nash thirty-five. By the time either decided to retire, Barney would be in his mid-fifties himself.

Of course premature retirement could be effected with a gun, but this was impractical.

The dream had become persistent enough to make Barney think of resolving his problem with a gun, but he had discarded the idea almost as soon as he thought of it. This wasn’t the roaring twenties, when an ambitious young hood could blast his way to the top. Modern rackets were conducted as businesses, with a minimum of headline-making violence. The general public no longer stoically accepted gang killings, and the politicians, without whose protection rackets couldn’t exist, were leery of aroused public opinion. The local officials who accepted the combine’s payoff to prevent the police from interfering with its activities would never stand still for anything even remotely resembling old-fashioned gang warfare.

Barney knew that even if he managed to beat the raps legally, he couldn’t win by using his gun on Drennan and Nash. The finger would point straight at him, and the local administration wouldn’t require legal evidence to dump him. As nobody, regardless of the guns behind him, could take over without political backing, anything as crude as murder would bounce Barney right out of the picture altogether.

So Barney Stroud merely dreamed of how nice it would be to become top dog. He didn’t really plan to do anything about it.

It was about nine p.m. Barney parked in front of Mark Drennan’s house. Ordinarily he delivered tally sheets to Johnny Nash, as Nash handled the routine business end of the partnership, while the more suave Drennan was the contact man who lined up and paid off the necessary officials. But tonight Johnny Nash was out of town and Barney had instructions to deliver tallies to Drennan whenever Nash wasn’t available.

Although Mark Drennan was a bachelor, he maintained a seven room ranch style house on Shannon Drive in one of St. Vincent’s most exclusive sections. Barney supposed it was because he liked to entertain, though most of his parties were rumored to consist of only himself and some lone woman. Drennan had the reputation of being something of a Casanova.

The front of the house was dark when Barney came up the front walk, but he noted light streaming through some French doors at the side. As he knew the French doors gave onto a small play room where there was a bar, he guessed that Drennan was there and walked around to the side.

As he approached the French doors, he saw a man and woman standing in front of the bar clasped in each other’s arms. The man, tall, lean and darkly handsome, half faced the doors so that Barney could see he was Mark Drennan. As the woman’s back was to him, he could see only that she was a slim and shapely brunette.

Barney paused, not wishing to interrupt such an intimate scene. Then the woman disengaged herself from the embrace and picked up one of two drinks setting on the bar. The movement placed her profile to Barney.

With a sense of shock Barney recognized her as Nina Nash.

He stood still, momentarily appalled at Mark Drennan’s perfidy. Even though Drennan was a notorious woman chaser, it would never have occurred to Barney that he would poach on the domain of his own partner, who was also supposed to be his best friend.

Quietly he faded back toward the front of the house. After standing indecisively for a few moments, he mounted the porch and rang the front doorbell.

A couple of minutes passed before a light went on in the front room and the door opened. There was a frown on Mark Drennan’s handsome face when he peered out, but his expression cleared when he saw who his visitor was.

“Hi, Barney,” he said. “What’s up?”

Beyond Drennan, Barney could see that the doorway to the playroom had been left open, but the room was now dark. He said, “Just the week’s tally sheets. Johnny’s out of town, you know.” He held out the manila envelope containing the tally sheets.

“Oh, yeah,” Brennan said, accepting the envelope. “I’d forgotten that.”

Forgotten it, hell, Barney thought. He’d taken full advantage of it.

“Come in for a drink?” Brennan asked without moving aside. His tone was more polite than enthusiastic.

Barney was tempted, just to see what evasive action Nina Nash would take, but he decided against it.

“No thanks,” he said. “Phyllis is waiting for me at home.”

During the drive back home Barney brooded over what he had seen. And as the shock abated, it gradually dawned on him that he had stumbled onto something which might move him right into the top slot.

No one would suspect Barney if one of the partners was gunned and the other was convicted of the crime. The idea had tentatively occurred to him once before, but he had rejected it because he couldn’t think of any motive the police would swallow. The partners got along too amicably for the police to accept that either would gun the other merely to take over control of the combine alone.

But a love triangle offered a perfect motive for murder.

When he entered the house, Phyllis was in the bar off the front room working on the invitation list for her next party. Offering a cool cheek for his kiss of hello, she asked preoccupiedly. “How’s Mark?”

“Fine,” he said.

She added a name to the list, then glanced lip. “Do you think we can skip Johnny and Nina again this time?”

Walking over behind the bar to mix himself a drink, Barney said, “They’re going to start suspecting how you feel about them, hon. And, after all, I have to get along with Johnny.”

“Yes, I suppose an errand boy can’t afford to offend the boss,” she said, making a face. “I wish you didn’t have to take orders from that man. I would have more respect for you if you quit the whole setup and went into some honest business.”

He poured soda on top of whisky. “You knew what I was when you married me.”

“Not exactly, darling. I knew you were some kind of gangster, which held a certain fascination for me, because I’d never known an underworld character before. But I didn’t realize you took orders from such a crude boor as Johnny Nash. It’s not your profession I object to. It’s probably the only one in which you could make enough money to suit me. It’s just your status in the profession that turns my stomach.”

Barney stirred his drink and sampled it. Resting his elbows on the bar, he gazed at his wife’s profile.

“You wouldn’t fuss so much if I was top dog, huh?”

She was busy with her list again. Preoccupiedly she said, “I wouldn’t fuss at all.” Barney came to a decision. He was going to take advantage of what he had learned tonight.

He lay awake and thought about it long after Phyllis had gone to sleep. The first step, he decided, was to make sure the motive would come to light immediately after the murder, before the police had time to look in any other direction. And the surest way to accomplish that was to let the affair between Mark Drennan and Johnny Nash’s wife become known to the police in advance.

He could hardly just inform them. But there was a way to let information seep to the police naturally without leaving any trace of its source. A rumor planted in the underworld grapevine would eventually reach some informer, who in turn would relay it on to the police.

Of course if the rumor also reached either Drennan or Nina Nash, caution might cause them to break off the affair. But he was reasonably certain that none of the principals would hear the gossip, because those talked about are always last to hear.

The next morning Barney entered a pool hall on lower State Street. Singling out a tall, lanky man of about forty who was idly watching a snooker game, Barney called him aside.

“I’ve got a little private job for you, Bulletin,” he said. “Can you keep your mouth shut?”

Bulletin Willie Gloff nodded eagerly. “Sure, Barney. You know me.”

Barney did know him, which was the reason he had picked him. Bulletin Willie got his nickname from his chronic eagerness to be the first to pass on gossip. As he worked as a leg man for a half dozen of the combine’s bookies, he had daily contacts with a lot of people. No one could spread a rumor faster than Bulletin Willie Gloff.

“This is strictly confidential,” Barney said. “I don’t want you to mention it to a soul.”

Bulletin Willie raised his right hand. “I’m a clam, Barney.”

“Okay. This has to do with the good of the organization. I’m a little worried about Johnny.”

“Johnny Nash?”

“Nuh-huh. You know how nuts he is about his wife.”

“Sure. Something happen to Nina?”

“Not yet. And I want to make sure it doesn’t. I got wind that she’s doing a little drifting.”

The lanky man emitted a soundless whistle. “Johnny’ll knock her ears off. Who with?”

“That I didn’t hear. I want to make sure the scoop is right before I got off half-cocked by giving her the Dutch uncle bit. Johnny would blow his lid if I stuck my nose in and it turned out there was nothing to it.”

Bulletin Willie nodded sagely. “Yeah, I can see how it’d be a kind of delicate spot for you. You’d like to nip it, but you can’t just walk up to Nina and start accusing her. If she’s innocent, she’d run crying to Johnny and he’d come down on you with both feet.”

“You get the picture. I have to know for sure before I make a move. If it’s a bum steer, I’ll keep my trap shut, but if she is drifting, I want to know it. You follow me?”

“Sure. You want me to do some tailing.”

“I want you on her every night. Days don’t matter, because she won’t be playing footsie while the sun’s out, but you have her staked out by dusk every night. I want to know everywhere she goes and everybody she sees.”

“You can count on me, Barney. I’ll stick to her like a can tied to a cat’s tail.”

Barney took out his wallet and removed a fifty-dollar bill. “Here’s something for your trouble. Do a good job and I’ll match it.”

That took care of that, he thought as he left the pool hall. Even if the rumor was traced back to its source, which was unlikely, no one could say that Barney Stroud had ever mentioned Mark Drennan and Nina Nash in the same breath. All he had to do now was relax and let nature take its course.

Four nights later, on a Sunday, Bulletin Willie phoned him at home.

“Anybody listening?” he asked.

“Yes,” Barney said. Phyllis was seated not ten feet away.

“Then I’ll hold it until morning. About nine o’clock at the pool hall?”

“Okay,” Barney said, and hung up.

“Who was that?” Phyllis asked.

“Business,” he said, which killed her interest.

At nine Monday morning he found Bulletin Willie waiting for him at the pool hall. The lanky man was so bursting with news, he could hardly contain himself.

“You’re not going to believe this,” he said. “But it’s gospel truth. Saturday she spent the whole blame night at a guy’s place.”

“What guy?”

Bulletin Willie grinned, drawing it out in order to increase the suspense. “You’re never going to believe it.”

“Try me,” Barney said impatiently.

The lanky man let a pause build before saying with relish, “Mark Drennan.”

Barney let his eyes register shock, then narrow. After a moment of silence, he took out his wallet and gave the man another fifty-dollar bill.

Bulletin Willie pocketed the bill. “Johnny will kill him,” he commented.

“Not if he never finds out,” Barney said. “I’ll take it from here. Just keep your mouth shut.”

“Sure, Barney. I wouldn’t say anything.”

Except to your friends, in strict confidence, Barney thought. He gave the gossip three days to spread all over the grapevine.

His estimate was conservative. Within two days he had heard the news from three different sources that Mark Drennan was carrying-on an affair with Nina Nash.

The following Saturday was Phyllis’ party, and both the Nashes and Mark Drennan were there. In public Nina and Drennan were being very cautious, Barney noted. Except for one duty dance, Drennan didn’t go near the woman all evening.

Johnny Nash, big and wide-shouldered and somehow rumpled-looking despite his perfectly pressed two-hundred-dollar suit, as usual spent most of the evening at the bar. About midnight Barney drifted over next to him.

“Having fun?” he asked.

The big man shrugged. “You know me, Barney. These friends of yours ain’t exactly in my class. I come because Nina likes to rub shoulders with the aristocracy.”

“Oh, they’re not so bad when you get to know them,” Barney told him. “Buy you a drink?”

“Sure,” Nash said, draining his glass and setting it on the bar.

The white-coated bartender Phyllis had hired for the evening was snowed under. Barney walked behind the bar and personally mixed Nash a new drink, using a fresh glass.

As he handed it to Nash, he said, “Nina seems to be having a good time.”

Nash turned to look toward his wife, who was dancing with a portly stockbroker named Myron Wood. With a paper napkin protecting his fingers, Barney quickly lifted the used glass and set it in the waste receptacle beneath the bar. He dropped the napkin over it.

He hadn’t definitely devised a murder plan yet, but a glass with Johnny Nash’s fingerprints on it might come in handy.

Hours later, after everyone had gone home, he retrieved the glass and hid it behind some bottles in the liquor storage cabinet.

Before he was able to devise a workable plan, Barney had to postpone the whole thing. The syndicate which furnished the combine its turf news and form sheets announced a hike in price. The syndicate was headquartered in Kansas City and the local branch printery claimed it had no control over the decision. Mark Drennan sent Barney to Kansas City to register an objection and try to dicker the price back down. It took him three weeks to work out a compromise deal.

The evening he got back, he found Phyllis all dressed to leave the house.

“Where we going?” he asked. “I planned to spend tonight at home.”

“You are,” she told him. “Mother’s not feeling well. She asked me to spend the night with her.”

Phyllis’ father had died about six months before, and her mother wasn’t in very good health. With increasing frequency the old lady asked her only daughter to spend nights with her. Barney could hardly object, but he often wished Phyllis would be as conscientious about his welfare as she was about her mother’s.

His first night back he had to sleep alone.

The front for the combine’s business ventures was the Drennan-Nash Realty Company in downtown St. Vincent. Mark Drennan didn’t show up the next morning, and as operation costs was something in Drennan’s province instead of Nash’s, Barney phoned his home at noon. Drennan sounded as though he had been awakened from a sound sleep.

“I was in an all-night poker game,” he informed Barney. “Tell Johnny I won’t be in today. Want to drop by here tonight to make your report?”

“All right,” Barney said. “See you about nine.”

Phyllis didn’t make her usual objection to his going out at night when she learned his business was with Drennan instead of Nash. Barney arrived promptly at nine and found Mark Drennan at home alone.

“Come in,” Drennan said cordially, and led Barney back to the play room. “Drink?”

“A little bourbon and soda,” Barney said.

Drennan went behind the bar to mix two drinks, then rested his forearms on the bar.

“Any success?” he inquired.

“Some. They’re willing to split the difference. They claim rising printing costs.”

Mark Drennan pursed his lips. “Everything’s going up,” he conceded. “But how do we know they won’t hike the price again a month from now?”

“I got a two-year contract.”

Drennan’s expression cleared. “That’s pretty good work, Barney. I guess you were worth developing. I told Johnny when you first came to work for us that you were a sharp kid.”

Barney merely smiled modestly.

By the time he had explained the new contract in detail, their glasses were empty and Drennan mixed another drink. “Long as you’re here, Barney, want to do me a favor?”

“Sure, Mark. What?” Coming from behind the bar, Drennan disappeared into the other room. He returned carrying a German Borchardt-Luger. Drawing back the slide to lock it open, he checked to make sure it was empty and handed it to Barney.

“Just picked this up,” he said. “Isn’t it a beauty?”

After examining it, Barney clicked the slide shut. “Sure is.”

“Mind dropping by police headquarters and registering it for me tomorrow?” Drennan asked. “Have my permit switched over from my thirty-eight to this too.”

The combine was careful not to lay its members open to possible concealed weapons charges. With its political influence, it didn’t have to risk such minor infractions of the law. Every member of the combine who was authorized by Drennan and Nash to carry a gun had it registered and had a gun permit.

“Sure,” Barney said, dropping the gun in his pocket.

The phone rang and Drennan went into the front room to answer it.

At that moment the plan Barney had been seeking for took shape in all its details.

His tentative idea had been to gun Drennan and let Johnny Nash take the blame. But now he realized that the jealousy motive would fit just as well if Drennan was framed for Nash’s murder. And he had just been handed the means to frame the kill that way.

In the front room he could hear Drennan talking on the phone. Quickly rounding to behind the bar, he placed a fresh glass on it, took out his handkerchief to avoid leaving fingerprints and poured Drennan’s drink from the old glass into the new. Three steps took him to the French doors. Easing one side open, he slipped outside and set the glass containing Drennan’s fingerprints on the grass to one side of the doorway.

He was back inside again, leaning against the bar, when Drennan returned.

“Johnny Nash, giving me mild hell for goofing off today,” Drennan said with a grin.

When Barney finished his second drink, he said, “I’d better run along, Mark. I’ve hardly seen Phyllis yet since I got back. Thanks for the drinks.”

Outside he slipped around the side of the house, carefully staying close to the building so that he couldn’t be seen through the French doors, and retrieved the highball glass, again using his hand kerchief.

At home he concealed the glass in the same place as the one containing Nash’s fingerprints. He was pleased to note that the glasses were identical in size and shape.

The following morning Barney dropped by police headquarters, handed over the Luger so that the record clerk could copy off the serial number and had the gun registered in Mark Drennan’s name. He also had the carrying permit changed to the new gun.

When he left headquarters he drove to a sporting goods store and bought a Borchardt-Luger exactly like the one he had just registered. When he got to the Drennan-Nash Realty Company, he delivered the second Luger to Mark Drennan. The one which was registered was locked in the glove compartment of his car.

He had to wait two more weeks before the precise set of circumstances necessary to carrying out his plan developed. Two factors were necessary: Johnny Nash had to be home alone and Mark Drennan must have no alibi.

Both circumstances developed on a Friday. Johnny Nash announced that his wife’s mother in Chicago had died, and that Nina had flown to Chicago that morning. She planned to be gone a week, Johnny said. Hardly fifteen minutes later Mark Drennan told Barney he intended to spend the weekend at his cabin on Mud Lake.

“Alone?” Barney asked.

“Sure. I always fish alone. Every once in a while I need the solitude. You have the phone number up there in case you have to get in touch with me, haven’t you?”

Barney nodded. “Yeah, I have it. When do you leave?”

“Tomorrow morning.”

Things worked out even better than Barney could reasonably have expected. Saturday afternoon Phyllis announced that her mother was again ill and that she was spending the night with her. Barney didn’t figure he would need an alibi, but it was convenient not to have a witness who could testify that he was away from home at the time of the killing.

He said, “Okay, hon. I’m kind of bushed anyway. I’ll hit the sack early and get a decent night’s sleep for a change.”

The Nashes employed two servants, but neither lived in. To make sure they would be gone for the evening, he waited until ten p.m. before phoning the Nash home. Johnny Nash answered.

“You going to be home for a while?” Barney asked.

“I was planning to go to bed. Why?”

“A little business. I’ll stop over in about a half hour.”

“Okay,” Nash said. “I’ll wait up for you.”

Barney hung up and dialed station-to-station to Drennan’s Mud Lake cabin.

When Drennan’s voice said, “Hello,” Barney said, “I get you out of bed?”

“Oh, hello, Barney. Yeah, but I wasn’t asleep yet.”

“Anybody listening?”

“No. I’m all alone.” Barney’s sole motive in phoning was to make sure Drennan had no alibi witness, but he had to give some excuse for the call. He said, “Hank Brassard, who runs the book at Fourth and State has been holding out, I just found out. I planned to run over and lean on him a little, but I thought I’d better check first.”

“Couldn’t you have checked with Johnny?”

“He seems to be out.”

“Oh. Well, use your own judgment. You’re a big boy. You don’t have to check stuff like that with me.”

“Okay,” Barney said. “Hope you catch a fish.”

Carrying a briefcase, he arrived at the west-side mansion where Johnny Nash lived at ten thirty. Nash, wearing a robe and slippers, admitted him and led him into the huge front room.

“Drink?” he asked.

“No thanks,” Barney said. “Anybody here?”

When Nash shook his head, Barney opened the briefcase and took out the Luger, now equipped with a silencer. Johnny Nash’s eyes were just beginning to widen when the bullet crashed into his heart.

Without haste Barney detached the silencer, replaced it in the briefcase and wiped the gun clean. Dropping it on the floor, he lifted Nash’s body to a seated position on the sofa. Positioning a chair on the opposite side of a low cocktail table from the sofa, he wrapped his handkerchief around his hand and removed two highball glasses from the briefcase one at a time, setting them side-by-side on the cocktail table.

Going behind the bar, he carried a bottle of whisky and a seltzer siphon over to the cocktail table. After dribbling a little whisky into each glass, he squirted an ounce of seltzer on top of it. He carefully wiped off the bottles before replacing them where he had found them.

The glasses behind the bar were not the same type as the ones he had brought, he noted. It was a good thing he had come equipped with two, as different sized glasses might have struck the police as odd. He felt a touch of uneasiness that no other glasses on the backbar matched the ones on the cocktail table, then decided that probably no one would notice, since the two on the table matched.

He left the front-room lights on and opened the front window drapes before letting himself out. He drove directly home and phoned the police.

“I was just driving by a house when I heard a shot from inside it,” he said. “It’s at twelve twenty-four Urban Drive in the Chensworth district.”

“Who are you?”

“A neighbor from up the street.”

The murder occurred too late to make the Sunday morning papers, but it was on the air. The announcer said that as the result of an anonymous phone call reporting gunfire at Nash’s home, police had visited the place. When there was no answer to their ring, an officer had peered through a window into the lighted front room, had spotted Nash’s body and the police had then broken in.

Beyond these bare details, the police had as yet issued no statement, but the news commentator surmised that inasmuch as Johnny Nash had been a known racketeer, it had been a gang killing.

At three p.m. Barney got the first of a series of phone calls from combine personnel wondering if he had heard the news. Pretending that he hadn’t, he phoned police headquarters for details.

As the combine had pretty good relations with the police, the desk man was cooperative enough, but he didn’t have much information to pass out. He told Barney that they had the murder weapon and were running a check on it and that they also had the killer’s fingerprints, but a make hadn’t as yet come back from the R. and I. bureau. He also informed him that a wire had been sent off to Nash’s wife in Chicago.

Phyllis came home at four p.m., completely unaware of what had happened. She exhibited more surprise than shock at the news, and her first reaction was eminently practical.

“How will this affect you?” she asked.

“It won’t. Mark will just start running things by himself. He’s hardly likely to elevate me to partnership.”

“Well, at least the police can’t look your way then. My first thought was that maybe you had gotten ambitious.”

Barney felt a tingle move along his spine. “What kind of a crack is that?”

“I was just searching for a motive. Somebody obviously had one. But since you don’t stand to gain anything, you shouldn’t fall under suspicion. Has Nina been informed?”

“The cops sent her a wire,” he said shortly.

Monday morning Barney and Phyllis were at breakfast when the district attorney’s secretary phoned. She asked Barney to come down to the office and bring his wife with him.

“Why my wife?” he inquired.

“Mr. Eland didn’t say, but he wants you both.”

When Barney informed Phyllis of the call, she frowned. “I suppose it’s about Johnny Nash, but why do they want me?”

“Eland’s secretary didn’t know, but she was pretty definite about it.”

When they arrived at the district attorney’s office, they were escorted right into Maurice Eland’s private office. Mark Drennan was already there. He smiled at both Barney and Phyllis as though he didn’t have a care in the world.

Short, plump District Attorney Maurice Eland was plainly uncomfortable, which didn’t surprise Barney. Since the man was on the payroll of the combine, there were two factors in this affair to upset him. He wouldn’t like the headlines about Johnny Nash’s death being a gang killing, and he wouldn’t be enthusiastic about having to prosecute one of the men who lined his pockets. He bustled about nervously placing chairs before his desk for his trio of visitors before seating himself behind the desk.

“We have a pretty embarrassing situation here,” he announced. “I’m hoping you can straighten it out, Barney.”

Barney hiked his eyebrows, but remained silent.

Mark Drennan said offhandedly, “They’re trying to pin Johnny’s kill on me, Barney. Seems my gun was found at the scene and checked out as the murder weapon. There was also a highball glass with my fingerprints on it.”

Phyllis emitted a little gasp. “Mark! You didn’t!”

Drennan gave her a reassuring smile. “Hardly. When I was picked up, I was carrying a gun exactly like the murder weapon, but it seems it wasn’t registered to me. Somewhere along the line there was a switch.”

Maurice Eland cleared his throat. “If Mark did commit this crime, he seems to have been incredibly sloppy about it. Which inclines me to give credence to his claim that it’s a frame. That’s why you’re here, Barney.”

“What do I know about it?”

“Time of death has been pretty definitely established as around ten thirty Saturday night,” the D.A. said. “The body was discovered only an hour later, so they were able to cut it pretty close. Mark has advanced an alibi, and if it stands up, he’ll be in the clear despite the circumstantial evidence against him. He says you’re his alibi, Barney.”

Barney put a puzzled expression on his face. “At ten thirty Saturday night I was home in bed.”

“Mark claims he got a phone call from you at his Mud Lake cabin at ten Saturday night. If you can verify that, he obviously couldn’t have been in St. Vincent a half hour later. It’s a good hundred mile drive.”

Barney looked at Drennan, who had a waiting expression on his face. Barney let his own expression become dubious.

“Well?” Drennan asked. “What are you waiting for?”

Barney slowly shook his head. “Sorry, Mark. I’d do a lot for you, but not perjury.”

Mark Drennan seemed more regretful than disturbed. He said quietly, “You’re denying you phoned me. Barney?”

“I have to, because I didn’t.”

Drennan shrugged. “Then I guess I’ll have to spring my other alibi witness. I was hoping I wouldn’t. Tell Mr. Eland, honey.”

Barney’s gaze swung to his wife. Her sudden flush sent a shock wave through him.

When Phyllis remained silent, her eyes avoiding everyone in the room, Drennan said gently, “You have to talk, honey. Barney set this up, because he was the only one in a position to switch guns on me. The frame will work if you don’t talk.”

Phyllis’ flush deepened. After one quick glance at Barney, her eyes moved straight ahead to the space between Barney and Drennan. In a metallic voice she said, “I was at the cabin when my husband phoned. I had been there about an hour. I was still there until twelve noon on Sunday. Mark wasn’t out of my sight the whole time.”

Barney gaped back and forth from his wife to Drennan in stunned disbelief. “But — but Nina was the one—”

His voice trailed off.

“Not since your trip to Kansas City,” Drennan said calmly. “You haven’t any kick. All I stole was your wife. You tried to steal my life.”

Maurice Eland said with distaste, “It does seem pretty obvious that you tried to frame Mark, Barney. Which makes it equally obvious that you killed Johnny Nash.”

Barney pulled himself together enough to throw Phyllis a murderous glance. “Try to prove it,” he spat.

“Oh, I doubt that we could. I was just interested in seeing Mark cleared. What happens now is up to him.”

Mark Drennan came lazily erect, took Phyllis’ hand and drew her to her feet. Ignoring Barney, he said, “Shall we go, baby? I think we’re finished here.”

The chill didn’t begin to hit Barney until the door closed behind them.

Then he said huskily, “What do you mean, what happens now is up to Mark?”

“You ought to know that,” Eland said. “Johnny was his best friend.”

There were twenty-two members of the combine with gun permits, Barney thought. He was staggering slightly when he rose from his chair and left the office...