10-Story Detective Magazine, April 1946 — page 18: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

16-—___—_—_————_- 10-STORY DETECTIVE — alone. He told me how dreadfully he’d been abused by the owner of the Yellow Bottle Café, Mr. Brace Useman, Useman, he said, had beaten him. He showed me many deep bruises to prove it. We talked, and finally he offered me one thousand dollars if I’d get even with Useman for him. If I’d poison Useman.” “Tricks. All tricks,” said the detective. “There were no bruises. It was certain kinds of pigment, worked into the skin. There were no dangling—” He stopped, took a sup of his coffee that had grown flat and cold, then said, “Go ahead. Tell me all of it.” “He gave me the poison,” Rodney con- tinued, his voice a throttled mumble, “and told me how Useman always drank a closing-up drink with any customers in the café, It’s a custom of Useman’s to do that, and the drinks are on the house. He told me if I'd slip the poison into Useman’s glass, that he’d arrange to have the café lights turned out at the right moment. I was to poison Useman’s beer in the dark.” “Did you agree?” The detective tasted his ceffee again. “Yes. I was sick. I scarcely knew what I was doing, I’d already written the letter to mother telling her I intended com- mitting suicide. Afterwards I added a jittle more to it. I took his money and went home, “J put the money and my letter in mother’s purse the next night before I left for Useman’s. She found them sooner than I expetced. I saw her talking with you at the bus stop right after I left the house. It was right after the man with the dangling arms called on her, “T guess the reason he came was to make sure of my whereabouts. A news- paper with your picture on the front page was lying on a stand. He saw it and made some remark about you, letting mother know he knew you.” “Tell me what happened at Useman’s?” said Slawter. “When I got there Georgie Stawse and -Useman were alone in the café. It was a little before midnight. We three sat down to drink together, but I didn’t put any poison in Useman’s glass. I kept the stuff, intending to take it myself later.” Slawter believed him. There was a solid certainty within him that told him that Pell was telling the truth. “Th. lights went out,” Rodney con- tinued, “and in a minute came on again. A short time after that Stawse said he felt sick, terribly sick. That was after we’d finished our beers. He got up and went out. I left then.” ‘“‘Why did your mother falsely identify the body at the morgue?” the detective asked. “To protect me, She thought if she said the body was mine, Merryway and the others would lay off me.” | “What did you say in the letter to your mother?” “The same things I’ve told you, sven that about going to Useman’s.” Slawter understood now why Pell did- n’t want the letter to fall into Jake Romine’s hands, He said, “All you’ve told me doesn’t go an inch toward proving that Jake Romine didn’t try to poison a customer, and that Georgie Stawse didn’t come into his café and eat some of the soup. Unless you did attempt to poison Useman, and Stawse got hold of the poisoned beer.” “TI didn’t try to poison anybody,” Pell | said, After that they were silent, thinking things over. Finally Slawter said, “Sam Ownmond and Brace Useman are friends, Useman could have poisoned Stawse. If you put poison in Useman’s glass he could have been prepared for it—your friend of the dangling arms could have fixed that—and switched glasses with Stawse. That way you'd pan out as Stawse’s killer.” “But I didn’t put any poison in any- body’s drink,” insisted Pell. “I didn’t, but—” He stopped speaking and stared at the detective like a man suddenly gone daft, “Say—say—” he said, licking his lips slowly, a great enlightment flashing upon his handsome face. “You’ve got it,” said Tommy Slawter, giving with a bleak grin, “Simple, isn’t i¢?” Then he excused himself, left them gaping after him, as he went to free himself of a worry that had come into the lunchroom with him. He went into a phone booth and dialed his apartment. He was going to make sure that Vale was okay, then he meant to get hold of Sergeant Treckess and watch the making’ | of some very satisfying arrests. The voice that finally responded to Slawter’s efforts to phone his apartment was not his wife’s, It was the operator’s. COMME IO© KS (c@®