The Madman Theory (21 page)
Authors: Ellery Queen
Buck crouched on the seat. He looked for all the world like a trussed-up wolf.
“Yes, Buck, my boy,” said Collins, “we've got you cold. If you turn your head you'll catch a last glimpse of Copper Creek Trail. Take a good look. You can remember it as you sit in that chair in the gas chamber.”
16
On his return to Fresno, Collins telephoned the Gennemans in San Jose. The houseboy answered, and Collins asked to speak to Mrs. Genneman.
“This is Inspector Collins, Mrs. Genneman. I have some news for you. It's not pleasant.”
“You've caught the murderer of my husband.” She was holding herself in tightly.
“Yes. Mr. James.”
“Oh,
no
,” said Mrs. Genneman. “Not Buck. Not
Buck
. Are you sure? Really sure?”
“There's no doubt about it.”
She was silent. Then she said, “Where is he now?”
“In jail.”
“How can I tell Jean? Her world revolves around Buck. He's been practically a member of the family ⦠I don't know what I'll say to Jean.”
“If you like, have her telephone me. I'll break the news to her.”
“Thank you, Inspector. But I'll manageâsome way.”
At four o'clock Mrs. Genneman and Jean, with Kershaw and Retwig, appeared at the sheriff's office and asked to speak to Collins. He greeted them with gravity and took them into a waiting room. Mrs. Genneman had been crying; Jean seemed to be ready to blow up.
“Can we see Buck?” demanded Jean. “I want to hear what he has to say. I refuse to believe this ridiculous charge!”
“Miss Genneman, he was caught in the act of retrieving the shotgun. You remember the meeting we had the other evening?”
“Of course I do. And it was inane. You admitted you were all at seaânow this!”
Myron Retwig gave his head a small shake.
Collins said, “The purpose of that meeting was to alarm Buck, make him commit himself. He did. He drove to Cedar Grove, hiked to where your father was killed, climbed down the mountainside, recovered the shotgun, and very carefully buried it. We have the entire thing on film.”
“He was doing it to protect someone else,” stormed Jean. “It's obvious!”
“Whom was he trying to protect, Miss Genneman?”
Jean bit her lip.
Opal Genneman asked in a wondering voice, “But why should Buck want to kill Earl? It's senseless. Earl was his
benefactor
, his future father-in-law ⦔
“Your husband was too much of a benefactor, Mrs. Genneman. You'll have to face it. Buck James was and is completely ruthless. He attached himself to Jean because of Mr. Genneman's wealth, he worked hard to be a good salesman because that was the best way to butter his bread. Unfortunately, Mr. Genneman liked him. He wanted to expand Westco Pharmaceuticals, and Buck James was going to manage the new outlet. His first idea was to start a new branch in Portland, and Buck accepted the post with pleasure. Then Mr. Genneman had an opportunity to buy the Midland Drug Company in Madison, Wisconsin, where Buck James had lived and gone to school. That changed everything for James. First he tried to edge out of the managership of the new outlet. Mr. Genneman wouldn't listen. As far as he was concerned the set-up was idealâhis future son-in-law working a territory he knew intimately. Then Buck broke off his engagement with your daughter. Why? What was behind his strange behavior? The answer lies in a letter from the Madison Chief of Police. Buck James is already married to a girl in Madison. Furthermore, he worked for her father, at Wisconsin Mill Products Company, and it's believed that he embezzled a considerable sum of money. On top of that, his wife is a devout Catholic, so divorce is out.
“Buck found himself in an impossible situation. If he refused the Madison managership pointblank, Mr. Genneman's suspicions would surely be aroused. I understand that once Mr. Genneman got suspicious, he was singleminded to the point of fanaticism.”
“I'll vouch for that,” said Kershaw.
“He was a bundle of contradictions,” said Retwig. “Completely generous, absolutely relentless. It was a strain to work for himâtoo much of a strain.”
Jean Genneman sat glaring at Collins.
“Here we have Buck all set to marry Jean and the Genneman money. Then comes the Westco-Wisconsin dilemma. If he accepts and goes to Madison, his goose is cooked. If he refuses, Earl Genneman will make inquiries to find out why, and Buck's goose is cooked again. The one way to get what he wanted was to kill Mr. Genneman. After which he can marry Jean, and the new Madison outlet can be quietly fobbed off.
“He decides to kill Mr. Genneman on the back-pack trip. In such a way as to give him a built-in alibi.
“Then Steve Ricks got into the act. On the night of Saturday, June 6, Mr. Kershaw here got drunk at the Down Home Cabaret in Ricks' company. About one in the morning Ricks phoned the Genneman house.
“I suspect,” Collins said to Earl Junior, “that you were the one who answered the phone. You told Ricks there was no one home, and you gave him the phone number of James. You seem to get some sort of kicks out of defying authority, Earlâis that why you hate the police and withheld the information from us? You don't realise by what a thread your life hung. Buck asked you not to say anything about the call, didn't he? If you'd shown a moment's hesitation, it's my opinion he'd have killed you, too.”
Earl Junior, said nothing. But his sneer was a little pallid.
“As for Molly Wilkerson, Buck James killed her for precisely the same reason: to prevent the discovery of a link between himself and Ricks, a discovery that would have focused attention on him. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
“Buck and Steve brought Mr. Kershaw home. Buck probably had been toying with the idea of a mystery man following the camping party, and Ricks seemed a good man for the job, just sufficiently shy of the police to want to avoid involvement. If the police were looking for a mystery man suspected of having shot Earl Genneman, Steve Ricks wasn't going to claim to be that man.”
Collins rose. “That's about it. We have all kinds of evidence. As soon as we find where Buck rented the white Ford, we'll have even more.”
Jean's face sagged. “How could he have fooled me like that?” she cried, and turned on Collins with a look of sheer loathing. Then she marched from the room, followed by her mother and Myron Retwig. Red Kershaw turned to Collins. “I'm still in shock, Inspector. Think of it! Buck! Walking right behind me up that trail!”
“You're lucky he didn't consider you a threat.”
“Me?” Kershaw raised his brows in astonishment. “Why me?”
“Toward the end, when things started to fall apart, he was ready to kill at the drop of a hat, and it was through you that he met Ricks.”
Kershaw said wonderingly, “One man helps another man carry a drunk out of a bar. If you call that a âmeeting,' I guess that's how Buck James met Steve Ricks.”
“That's how they met, all right. Molly Wilkerson was a witness. First she tried to blackmail you, then she tried it on James. She'd have been safer spitting in a rattlesnake's face.”
“I still can't believe it. Buck's always seemed so levelheaded ⦠Three murders! That's the work of a madman.”
And Inspector Collins nodded back just as soberly. “Every murderer,” he said, “is a little mad.”
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1966 by Ellery Queen
Copyright renewed by Ellery Queen
Cover design by Kat Lee
ISBN: 978-1-5040-1915-6
This 2015 edition published by
MysteriousPress.com
/Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
345 Hudson Street
New York, NY 10014
EBOOKS BY ELLERY QUEEN
FROM
MYSTERIOUSPRESS.COM
AND OPEN ROAD MEDIA
