Boy's Cinema (1939-40)

libelling his father as the coroner," he stated significantly, "but as long as you've found some real evidence " " You bet we have. Chief !" cried Howard hastily. "And Steves going to show it to you, eh, Steve?" Steve murmured a very half-hearted "Sure," but Howard had liecome reckless, and he asked P<'ter to tell about tlie " awful cuts and bruises " on Herkimer's face. Peter tried to escape with a plea tluit he had an appointment, but the Chief of Police held on to him. "Were tliey bad?"' he asked eagerly. "Like boin' hit with a blunt instrument, maybe?" Peter was not pre|mred to imperil liimself as a doctor by endorsing wild exaggerations. "Well, lie liad a little bump on his fore- head—just a little bump." Howard surreptitiously scribbled a note on the back of a telegraph form. "How about tlic cuts?" asked Samuel hope- fully. . "Nothing much," Peter replied. "Just scratches." "Oh, shucks '." Howard handed Steve the telegraph form. "Did you see this one, Steve? Well, folks, I've got to run along, I've got an appointment with a client." " Wliat client?" ridiculed Peter, but he received a poke in the ribs as Howard vaulted the mahogany rail. "Sorry, doc," apologised the poker. "Mind if I use our car, Steve?" "Oh, no, no—not at all," said Steve, who had read the note on the telegraph form. "Go ahead." Howard went ahead in a literal sense. Samuel wanted to set out for the farm forth- with, Init Steve insisted upon being given a statement first, not only for the " R«'e- Clarion." but also for the papers of the big cities. Samuel could not resist such an oppor- tunity. "Well, I gue.ss them clues won't run away," he said. " Xow wliat'Il I say?" Mary Lou was ready with notebook and pencil, and Steve was perfectly ready with a statement. He dictated : " ' Wlule I cannot disclose everything to the public' said Fanesville's Chief of Police, Samuel Q. Lawson, ' I may safely state that I have uncovered sensational evidence, and that I will leave no stone unturned in my efforts to appreliend the fiend who murdered our respected fellow-citizen.' " "You took tlje words right out of my mouth," declared the deliglited Chief of Police. Samuel's office was situated at police head- quarters, next door to the court-house, and Samuel's official car was kept in a garage that opened on to a concreted alley at the side of (he court-house. The two loungers on the steps of Obadiah Wickens' slorc saw Samuel proceed up the street with Steve and Pete, watched them turn into the alley, and became (|uite • thrilled when a black car containing the three was backed out info- the street and spetl off in a westerly direction. Obadiah was on his doorstep wheti Matthew Brown, the elder of the two loungers, inter- pret(-d this departure. "Say, Sam Lawson's headin' for the Herkimer place !" he exclaimed. " S'pose wo oughta go along?" asked his companion. "Reckon wo should." Obadiah was so surprised fo witness activity on the part of the two ancients that ho asked questions. The news spread, and soon ho and a score of other townspeople were OTi Ihoi" way fo the farm. Dr. Ebeneezer Tyler and his son Tucker were approaching tlieir residence—a house on the corner of Lincoln Drive and the West Hoad—when the number of pedestrians all hea<led in one direction aroused their curiosity. Tuck<M- gripped the arm of a boy who had joined tfie piocession. "Young man," he said sharply, "what's all the excitement?" " It's a posse," was the shrill and inaccurate reply. "Herkimei's place, ("hief Lawson's got the guys that killed the old man 1 Leinme go!" Tfee boy was released. January' 20tfi, IMO. BOY'S CINEMA "Father," said Tucker, in high concern, "we'd better get out there!" The black car arrived at the farm some while before those who followed it on foot. Samuel alighted heavily in the yard, Steve jumped down beside him. and Peter, who had been brought against his will, was the last one to alight. "Now where are all them clues?" boomed Samuel. Steve asked Peter which they should show him first. "What?" Peter withdrew his gaze from a familiar two-seater that w-as parked partly behind a shed in the yard. "Oh, let's start with the ones you found." "Yes," said Samuel. "Where are they?" "In the barn." It was Howard who sup- plied the answer. He had come hurrying towards them from the two-seater. "Hallo, boys." "I thought you had an appointment with.a client?" challenged Peter. "I had," Howard shamelessly replied, "but he wasn't in. so I came out here to meet you fellows. Well, shall we inspect the evidence?" "Lead me to it!" boomed Samuel. The barn was a ramshackle affair, built mainly of wood. There was a little straw scattered about its uneven earth floor, but Howard found something else upon the floor— an axe he had planted there. "There you are. Chief," he pointed, "just as we found it." "Well, I'll be doggoned !" Samuel picked up the axe by its handle, regardless of finger- prints. "There's blood on this axel" "The murder weapon," suggested Steve. "It could be, Steve—it could be !" Howard drew attention to confused foot- prints, and in stooping to examine them Samuel found a cuff-link. "Must've come off diuin' the fight," he rejoiced, his fat face beaming. "Do you really think so?" asked Steve. "Yes, I do. That's what must've happened." Into the barn surged the forerunners of the crowd, and the forerunners clamoured for information. "Quiet! Quiet!" commanded the Chief of Police authoritatively. " Now clear out of here before you destroy some important evidence." "Evidence?" echoed Obadiah Wickens. "You mean you found some real clues. Chief?" "Some? I've practically got the killer in my hands right now !" Howard chose that moment to discover a fragment of cloth attached to a nail in a door- post. Samuel acquired it. "This may be the key to the whole case!" he declared, addressing the audience he had ordered fo depart, but which had swollen in mmibers instead. Tucker Tyler thrust his way through the crowd with his father. "What's going on here?" he demanded. "I've just got the Herkimer killin' solved," Samuel proclaimed. " That was no killing." snarled Dr. Tyler. "He died of too much booze!" Someone ronuirked that he didn't believe tliere was too nuich booze in the world for Tad Herkimer. "I suppose." snorted Tucker, "our sensa- tion-loving yoiuig editor told you it was a killing?" "I don't need anyone to tell me!" retorted Samuel indignantly. " I can figger out clues when I see '(>m. Take a look at that axe—all them footprints—this cuff-link—that piece of cloth. 'J'akc a good look at 'em, Mr. Deputy County Pi'osecufir, and tell me that Tad Heikimcr died of anginy pecked-horses !" Having exhibited the clues in turn, he waved the blood-stained axe at the invaders. "Now cl(>ar out. boys, clear out—all of you," he said, "and give the doc and T'ucker room to change their minds. Come on, get out !" The axe was handed to Tucker, and Tucker and his father were left in possession of the barn. Outside it the ciowd lingered, and one of its members asked Samuel how ho put the clues together. Samuel, who was in his element, replied Every ruesaay that toe and heel prints, all over the place, meant that there had been a struggle. He contended that Herkimer and the killer had a terrific fight, during which the cufflink had dropped to the floor; that Herkimer was struck witli the axe and fell dead, and that the killer, in making his escp.pe, caught his coat on the nail. "Now all I gotta do," he wound up, "is find the coat that fits the cloth, and I've got the killer." "I'm not sure I like this," Peter growled to Steve. "Nobody's getting hurt," said Howard. "And we're making news," said Steve. A man named Kendall urged Samuel to swear in as deputies all the men present so tliat they could examine every coat in town. "That's just what I was a-goin' fo do," lied Ranuiel, and the men were all lined up, with their right hands raised, ■ when Tucker Tyler and his father strode out from the barn. "Sorry to spoil your fun, gentlemen," said Tucker, looking anything but sorry, "but you might as well all go home." Right hands were dropped, but protestations were raised. "What about, those clues?" shouted a voice. "The cuff-link "was one of Herkimer's," Tucker stated. "I've seen him wear it many a time," confirmed his father. "The cloth," said Tucker, producing a shabby old coat from behind his back, "came from this coat." He fitted the fragment of cloth to a "tear in the coat, and Dr."Tyler stated triumphanfly that it was Tad Herkimer's own coat. "I found it vinder the manger," Tucker asserted. "And the footprints were all made by the same pair of shoes—probably Herkimer's." Samuel was crestfallen, but one of the men cried out: "What about the blood on the axe?" That question seemed to please Tucker and his father. The axe was held out for inspec- tion, and Tucker said: "If any of you gentlemen care to take a close look, you'll find a few feathers mixed in with the blood—chicken feathers." "Yes," trumpeted Dr. Tyler, with a wither- ing glare for Steve and for Samuel and for Peter, "chicken feathers!" "So I'm very much afraid, gentlemen," con- cluded Tucker, "that the killer was Mr. Herkimer—and the victim was one of his liens!" The laughter that followed drove Steve and Peter and Howard away to their own fwo-^ seafer, and it still rang in their ears as they shot out from the yard into the highway and turned towards the town. THE CONFESSION THAT evening, Steve was packing some of his personal belongings in a suitcase when Mary Lou entered the office part of the printing works from the street, opened the door in the partition, and saw what he was doing. She sped to him, a cardboard box under one arm, a horrified expression in her grey- grceii eyes. "Are you running away?" she faltered. "Walking," Steve replied bitterly. "I haven't enough ambition left fo rim." "I'll see if you've forgotten anything else," said Pi Kelly, who was standing nearby, enveloped in gloom. "Tell him he's makin' a great mistake.'' Mary Lou held out the cardboard box. "Have you any room in yoin- suitcase for this?" she asked in a very strained voice. "It's some doughnuts mother baked. I thought you might like some before you went to bed." "Thank you." Steve took the Jiox and set it down besido a pair of shoes. "It isn't run- ning away," he explained. "I've just come ta niy senses. I shouldn't have fried fo make a go of this mofh-eafcn newspaper in the first place. And I shoitld never have talked Howard and Peter into coming here with me. That's the part that gripes me—the fact that I talked them into throwing away a year apiece." i