Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 166: what you’re looking at

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

800 He stood directly in front of Freyne and Started to put on the gas mask. “ You know,” he said, “the more you Struggle and the harder you breathe, the more you'll inhale. Better take it easy. Watch it coming.” And he slipped the mask over his face. The light was getting dim. Lathrop drew a chair close to the window, and through the lenses of the mask, read the letter over to himself. Then he put it away and turned to stare at Freyne. Freyne was breathing with an effort that was almost a snore, but short and quick. The light faded till it was impossible to see a face, but Lathrop listened to the quick breaths. The children were called to their homes and the streets were quiet. Lights were lighted. Once the telephone rang, repeating, in- sistent. Probably an appointment that Freyne had failed to keep. Lathrop let it ring until, discouraged, it stopped. Once Lathrop rose and felt the pulse of the man in the chair, then sat down again. For an hour there was nothing to be seen in the room but the silhouette of a giant baboon, watching a man in a chair. No sound but the church bells outside, and within, a steady low hissing, as of gas escaping from a pipe. Lathrop rose and loosed the cord that held the man in the chair. Taking the body under the shoulders he dragged it across the room and laid it on the couch. The clothes line he rolled up and dropped in the bag with the necktie and the socks. At the door he listened a long time, then opened it, stepped quickly through, and closed it tight. The gas mask he stuffed in the bag, put on his hat, and passed out to the street where he turned west toward Park Avenue. Twenty-fours later Lathrop answered a ring at his door. ‘Are you Walter Lathrop?” (a4 Yes.”’ -“T’m Detective Lannen of the Homicide Squad. The inspector wants to see you at headquarters.” “What for?” “The Freyne murder. arrest, so—let’s go.” Youre under ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. When Cary Lee came in from his work on the morning edition of The Messenger, I was eager for details of the biggest ex- clusive story the paper had had in years. “As a matter of fact,” said Cary, “a newspaper is like a baseball team. Younever can tell when some rookie will crack ‘the ball into the bleachers. The fellow that dug that Freyne story and got Lathrop ar- rested, is a kid still going to night school. He works on the Sunday Magazine section. You’d never guess where. He does cross- word puzzles, number squares, you know, nut stuff that people go crazy over. ‘ What word of twelve letters indicating a chemical compound is indicated by a small crus- tacean of the West Indies using the dial telephone system?’ That kind of thing. “Well, here.” “You remember that farewell message Freyne was supposed to have left?” Cary unfolded a paper. “ Listen, ‘ Will-and last — testament e’er renouncing life and_ this horrible risk of punishment. Knowing I leave little estate devisable, my everything IT now confer on Louis, dear brother, last of our descendants.’ Darn fool kind of thing to write, isn’t it? It shouldn’t be ‘ will and last testament,’ it’s ‘last will and testa- ment.’ What does ‘last of our descend- ants’ mean? Nothing. It’s all phoney. Well, here’s the way the cross-word kid typed it out.” Cary gave me the paper. The initial letter of each word of Freyne’s message was printed on a line, the remaining letters vertically below. Read across the line, the initials spelled: “WALTER LATHROP KILLED ME IN COLD BLOOD.” T spelled out each word in amazement, “ Good Lord,” I said, “think of a-man knowing he was going to be killed, and figuring out a thing like that with the other fellow standing over him.” “ Yes,” said Cary, “ pretty quick think- ing. But what gets me is a man like Lath- rop doping out a gilt-edged scheme for killing Freyne, and then missing out on this childish trick. The trouble is with these nuts that plan all the fancy crimes, once — can think straight —~* FA = €omicbook Cary searched his pocket. | | at