The Four Johns by Ellery Queen Page A

stiffly. There would be conversation:
    P ROFESSOR B URTON : Mr. Gray, undoubtedly you know why I have asked you to drop by today.
    M ERVYN G RAY : I’ve got a strong suspicion.
    P ROFESSOR B URTON : We must face the crisis. It’s no use to pretend that it doesn’t exist. This wretched publicity is the poorest sort of thing for the department.
    M ERVYN G RAY : I realize this, Professor Burton. Unfortunately I can’t do anything about it.
    P ROFESSOR B URTON : Then—unfortunately, as you put it—I must. Blameless as you well may be, we simply can’t tolerate this sort of thing in connection with the university.
    M ERVYN G RAY : You mean that I’m fired?
    P ROFESSOR B URTON : I mean that you will not be rehired for the fall semester. For your own good I suggest that you resign. After this affair has been forgotten, there is no reason why you should not seek a similar post at another institution. If you choose to do this, you can look to me for references.
    M ERVYN G RAY : And if not?
    P ROFESSOR B URTON ( rising ): That aspect need not be considered. Surely you’ve thought the matter over.
    M ERVYN G RAY ( desperately ): Naturally, Dr. Burton. But my whole career is at stake. I’ve even been hoping for an assistant professorship—
    P ROFESSOR B URTON ( like steel ): That, I fear, is no longer remotely possible. The regents would be outraged at the mere suggestion, and rightly. These are the facts, Mr. Gray. May I have your resignation?
    So much was academically inevitable. But that could be by far the least of it. For what if the police refused to believe that he had no knowledge of how Mary’s body had come to be found by him in the Chevy trunk? That could be a matter not of his academic career but of his life.… He forced himself to think coolly.
    Mary Hazelwood had been murdered. And someone had stolen his car and stuffed her body into the trunk. This someone was almost certainly an acquaintance, because he knew all about the trick ignition switch. A sickening thought.… Well, now was the time to fish or cut bait.…
    Going to the police was out.
    Once he had made the decision, his next step was clear. And this was too exposed a spot to do it. Mervyn started the car and drove off.
    He turned at Ardly Avenue and then took Perkins Road to the Freeway, heading north.
    After a few miles he drove off into a side road, and presently left-turned into another.
    He stopped the car between a vineyard and a field barren except for a few sheds and farmhouses in the distance. The hot breeze sighed through the grapevines; grasshoppers sang.
    Mervyn got out. He was alone on the road.
    Steeling himself, he flung open the trunk. She was still there, in sky blue, stiff and curled. Poor Mary, thought Mervyn, poor innocent friendly Mary.
    He stooped. Her suitcase lay half under her body. Her right temple showed a great dent that had pushed her features askew. Apparently she had been killed by a blow from a heavy object. The area of contusion showed a pattern of secondary marks, grouped in a semicircle, where the skin had been broken. Mary’s bones were delicate; the blow might not have done such damage to a heavier skull.
    The muscles of his arm quivering, he reached behind the body and pulled out the suitcase. The body bumped to the floor of the trunk. The blazing sun, the vineyard smelling of hot leaves and sulphur, the dust-colored road, the car: in such a context the corpse seemed absurd as well as pitiful.
    Mervyn lugged the small suitcase around to the front seat and opened it. He was poking around when a faint clatter brought his head up and around sharply. Behind him at the crossroads a toy truck was growing larger. He hurried around to the rear of the car and slammed down the trunk lid, breathing hard. The toy became a noisy, dilapidated pickup. Three pairs of expressionless adult eyes swiveled to stare at him from the front seat as the pickup passed. In the rear crouched