Halfway House by Ellery Queen Read Free Book Online Page A

expression, “but in the shed back there there’s another car.”
    Ellery said mercifully, “Another car? What do you mean?” Bill’s cheeks turned the color of dirty clay.
    “Lincoln sports roadster, latest model. Key in the ignition. But the motor’s dead cold, and there’s a swanky tarpaulin over the car. No owner’s license inside, but it’s going to be pie tracing the serial number, gents, just apple pie.” De Jong grinned at them. “That car must belong to this fawn-rug guy who’s been using the shack. Looks like a real live lead. Yes, sir … And there’s something more. Pinetti!”
    “Good Lord,” said Bill in a strangled voice, “what next?”
    One of the silent men behind De Jong stepped forward and handed his superior a small flattish suitcase. De Jong opened it. It was untidily packed with cards displaying cheap jewelry—necklaces, rings, bracelets, cuff-links, fraternal emblems. “That’s Joe’s.” Bill licked his lips. “Samples. Stock.”
    De Jong grunted. “Came from his Packard; that’s not what I meant. Pinetti, that other thing.”
    The detective produced a metal object. De Jong held it up, turning it over in his fingers with a false preoccupation. Then his cold eyes shot up to the level of Bill’s face.
    “Ever see this before, Angell?” He slammed it into Bill’s hand.
    It was very curious. As if De Jong’s question had been composed of oil, Bill’s manner altered, smoothing out to a blank and glassy stillness. Ellery was astonished, and De Jong’s eyes narrowed. They could actually see the metamorphosis as Bill’s bare fingers gripped the thing: features settling back into normal lines, the frown vanishing from the forehead, leaving it calm and inscrutable, eyes hardening into marbles.
    “Of course,” he smiled. “On hundreds of cars.” And he turned the object slowly over in his hands. It was part of the radiator-cap of an automobile—the rust-flecked figurine of a running naked woman, metal hair and arms streaming behind her. The figure had been broken off at the ankles, leaving two rusty jagged ends of metal where the tiny feet had been attached to the threaded plug.
    De Jong snorted and snatched the figurine away. “That’s a clue, gentlemen. It was found in the main driveway right in front of the house, half-buried where—Hannigan says—the Ford ran over it. I’m not saying it mightn’t have been lying there for a month. But then again,” his lips curled away from his mouth in a leer, “it mightn’t have. See what I mean?”
    Bill said coolly: “You’ve put your finger on the weak spot of that exhibit as evidence, De Jong. Your prosecutor would have a sweet time proving that that was broken off the cap of a car on the evening of June first, even if you found the car it came from.”
    “Oh, sure,” said De Jong. “I know you lawyers.”
    Ellery glanced absently from the little naked woman to Bill’s face, blinked, and walked around the table. He stooped over the dead man, his eyes riveted to Wilson’s fingers, caught by death as they clawed the rug… No rings. No rings. That, he thought, was good. He remained in his stooped position, unmoving except for his eyes, which went to Wilson’s chill face for the twentieth time that evening and with the same faint expression of annoyance. De Jong was saying with exultation, “So I’m getting after the car this came from right away, get me? And when I find it…”
    Ellery slowly straightened up. Across the body of Joseph Wilson he looked at his friend, and for an instant teetered on the thin edge of a mad impulse. Then he looked down at the dead man again, and this time both the uncertainty and annoyance were gone from his face, leaving wonder, conviction, and pity behind. “Excuse me,” he said in a flat voice. “I’m going out for a breath of air. This stuffy room…”
    De Jong, Bill stared at him. He smiled faintly and hastened out of the shack as if it had become intolerable to him. The sky