them and the strip of wall between them, an old pier glass, turned lengthwise over the desk, was tilted forward so that Doc Wernitz, sitting there, could glance up and see the whole room—the barred windows at the back end, the brown steel filing-cabinet and the open safe blocking the side windows.
“Anything missing, Swede?”
“No idea. You can say in the paper I’ve only given it a cursory glance, so far.”
The chair creaked wretchedly as Carlson leaned back in it. He watched Gus cross the room to read the framed license on the dun-papered wall by the door. It acknowledged receipt of $3,500 and $1 by the Commissioners of Smith County, in return for which they authorized Paul M. Wernitz, operating as The Smith County Recreation Company, Inc., to distribute and offer for rent or lease recreational devices as defined in and in strict accordance with Chapter 482 of the Acts of 1944 and all regulations and amendments thereof. Gus glanced at the official signature at the bottom. It was always a little amusing to him to see Nelson Cadwallader Syms’s cramped signature authorizing the distribution and operation of the machines that Aunt Mamie, Mrs. Nelson Cadwallader Syms, girding up her ample loins, was hell-bent on banishing and destroying forever—along with one of the county’s most lucrative sources of cash income.
There was nothing else in the room to look at except the brown linoleum on the floor, cracked in places and worn to the boards in front of the desk and safe, and two wooden armchairs. There was also a calendar topped with a seminude bit of November cheesecake and the compliments of the Smithville Consumers Coal Company. Gus stopped in front of it, studying it with concentrated interest. He was trying to figure out what Swede Carlson was sitting there watching him for. He knew Carlson was a shrewd cop, for all the slow-molasses and owl’s-grease technique, tough and canny, and honest within the pragmatic limits of his calling. At least he had never known him to be dishonest, and he had known him to go out of his way to help people when not doing it would have seemed the smarter tack. Like the Filipino boy waiting outside now—unless that was a little political warfare and Carlson was just seeing to it the county attorney wasn’t making the first arrest. Why, he wondered, was the Swede apparently so interested in him right now? He studied the lady on the calendar a moment longer and turned back.
“Think this is an out-of-county job, Swede? A mob killing?”
It had none of the marks of the two mob killings he’d covered in New York, nor any he’d ever heard about.
Chief Carlson brought the swivel chair creaking back into position. “Might be,” he said. “And again it mightn’t. I don’t know much about it, Gus. Just got here a little before you did—been down in the other end of the county all evenin’ talkin’ to a guy that knifed his wife. Least that’s the way it looks. Looks like a mighty lot of trouble for anybody else to go to.”
He got heavily to his feet. “Sort of looks the same way here. But I don’t know much about mob killin’s, ’cept what I see in the movies when I ain’t got my nose to the grindstone, or read about when I got my shoulder off the wheel. When I’m not carryin’ the ball, or keepin’ my eye on it, that is. Keeps a fella pretty busy, not bein’ an acrobat.”
Gus grinned at him. “Why does this look the same?”
Chief Carlson glanced bleakly off in the general direction of the kitchen. “Can’t say, Gus. Not considerin’ the people you’re runnin’ with here lately.”
“Miss Maynard?” Gus looked at him intently, surprised. “She works on the paper, Swede.”
“Sure she does.” Carlson agreed amiably. “Come to think of it, her old man owns it. Used to was, Gus, a fella could tell the Gazette somethin’ off the record and it was off the record. It’s different now. Tell the Gazette somethin’ and Miss Maynard hot-foots it home and
“Anything missing, Swede?”
“No idea. You can say in the paper I’ve only given it a cursory glance, so far.”
The chair creaked wretchedly as Carlson leaned back in it. He watched Gus cross the room to read the framed license on the dun-papered wall by the door. It acknowledged receipt of $3,500 and $1 by the Commissioners of Smith County, in return for which they authorized Paul M. Wernitz, operating as The Smith County Recreation Company, Inc., to distribute and offer for rent or lease recreational devices as defined in and in strict accordance with Chapter 482 of the Acts of 1944 and all regulations and amendments thereof. Gus glanced at the official signature at the bottom. It was always a little amusing to him to see Nelson Cadwallader Syms’s cramped signature authorizing the distribution and operation of the machines that Aunt Mamie, Mrs. Nelson Cadwallader Syms, girding up her ample loins, was hell-bent on banishing and destroying forever—along with one of the county’s most lucrative sources of cash income.
There was nothing else in the room to look at except the brown linoleum on the floor, cracked in places and worn to the boards in front of the desk and safe, and two wooden armchairs. There was also a calendar topped with a seminude bit of November cheesecake and the compliments of the Smithville Consumers Coal Company. Gus stopped in front of it, studying it with concentrated interest. He was trying to figure out what Swede Carlson was sitting there watching him for. He knew Carlson was a shrewd cop, for all the slow-molasses and owl’s-grease technique, tough and canny, and honest within the pragmatic limits of his calling. At least he had never known him to be dishonest, and he had known him to go out of his way to help people when not doing it would have seemed the smarter tack. Like the Filipino boy waiting outside now—unless that was a little political warfare and Carlson was just seeing to it the county attorney wasn’t making the first arrest. Why, he wondered, was the Swede apparently so interested in him right now? He studied the lady on the calendar a moment longer and turned back.
“Think this is an out-of-county job, Swede? A mob killing?”
It had none of the marks of the two mob killings he’d covered in New York, nor any he’d ever heard about.
Chief Carlson brought the swivel chair creaking back into position. “Might be,” he said. “And again it mightn’t. I don’t know much about it, Gus. Just got here a little before you did—been down in the other end of the county all evenin’ talkin’ to a guy that knifed his wife. Least that’s the way it looks. Looks like a mighty lot of trouble for anybody else to go to.”
He got heavily to his feet. “Sort of looks the same way here. But I don’t know much about mob killin’s, ’cept what I see in the movies when I ain’t got my nose to the grindstone, or read about when I got my shoulder off the wheel. When I’m not carryin’ the ball, or keepin’ my eye on it, that is. Keeps a fella pretty busy, not bein’ an acrobat.”
Gus grinned at him. “Why does this look the same?”
Chief Carlson glanced bleakly off in the general direction of the kitchen. “Can’t say, Gus. Not considerin’ the people you’re runnin’ with here lately.”
“Miss Maynard?” Gus looked at him intently, surprised. “She works on the paper, Swede.”
“Sure she does.” Carlson agreed amiably. “Come to think of it, her old man owns it. Used to was, Gus, a fella could tell the Gazette somethin’ off the record and it was off the record. It’s different now. Tell the Gazette somethin’ and Miss Maynard hot-foots it home and
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