The Mammoth Book of Perfect Crimes & Impossible Mysteries (5 page)

Curtis was quick to agree. “Right. And even though Townsend had a motive for suicide, he couldn’t have stabbed himself in the back. Not even a well-trained contortionist could have done that. And even if he could have, he would have left prints on the ice pick handle. And there were no prints.”

All three sat silent, thinking. After a few moments, Stone said, “Look, either it’s murder or suicide. There’s no way we can call it an accident. Now, Townsend did have a compelling motive for suicide. He had a brain tumor and could have been suffering unbearable pain. But why would he want his suicide to look like murder?”

Curtis’s eyes widened with sudden understanding. “The insurance! His wife couldn’t collect if he took his own life.”

“Right. But why such a bizarre death?” Stone wanted to know. “He could have ‘accidentally’ stepped in front of a vehicle moving at high speed or driven his car into a telephone pole, and there would have been no question of suicide or murder.”

Lissner was right on it. “Townsend was a really nice, thoughtful guy. He never wanted to do anything to hurt anyone. He probably felt a car accident might involve others or that he might be horribly injured but not killed. I think he figured if he set up an impossible murder, no one could be charged with the crime, and his family would be certain to collect his insurance. He’d taken one of those pain-killing pills and put curare on the ice pick to make death quick and certain.”

Curtis put a damper on this theory. “Yeah, but how?”

Stone didn’t answer the question. “That’s what I want you two to think about. Go on home, get a good night’s rest, and we’ll talk it over in the morning.”

After Curtis and Lissner had left, Stone sat meditating. He let his mind replay the conversation with Sergeant Kendrick and suddenly it was clear to him why Kendrick’s logical explanation was not so logical. Stone decided it would be very wise to visit the scene of the crime once more.

Lew waved to him as he pulled into the station. It was nine p.m. – about the same time that Richard Townsend had died on the previous night.

“Hi, sergeant! What can I do for you?”

Stone nodded a greeting. “Mind keeping an eye on me the way you did on Townsend?” He walked over to the booth, stepped inside, closed the door, and performed a brief experiment. Then he went back to the pumps.

“Well, Mr Hall?”

Lew pushed back his cap and scratched his forehead. “Looked like you were reenacting the crime. You went through all the same motions the dead guy did, ’cept you didn’t fall down dead. How come?”

“It helps me immensely in solving crimes if I don’t fall down dead,” Stone retorted with a suggestion of a smile. “Now pretend I’m the telephone repairman. Tell me if what I do is about what you saw last night.”

Stone drove over to the booth. He got out of his car, entered the booth, closed the door, took the receiver off the hook, put it back, bent down, straightened up, then stepped outside to the back of the booth. He knelt for a moment, then moved slowly over to the air and water service island, returned to the booth, and drove his car to the island, where he checked the tires. He walked back to where Lew was standing.

“Pretty good show, sergeant,” Lew laughed. “Like I said this morning, I didn’t see him all the time, but I’d say he did pretty much what you just went through.”

“Thanks for your help, Mr Hall.” Stone extended his hand and got a firm return shake from the station operator.

“Don’t mention it. Think it’ll help you find the killer?”

“It wouldn’t surprise me at all,” Stone flung over his shoulder and he got into his car and drove off.

Harvey Curtis was already in the squad room when Stone arrived at eight the following morning. Lissner came swinging in moments later with that mile-wide grin across his face.

“Looks as if you have something to tell us,” Stone said.

“Would you believe I’ve solved this one? I knew my TV watching would pay off.”

“Well, don’t keep us in suspense,” Curtis said.

“You know how we were talking about Townsend being the only one with a motive but we couldn’t figure out how he could have got that ice pick in his back? Well, I can tell you, thanks to a movie I saw last night. It’s called
Rage in Heaven.
Stars Ingrid Bergman and Robert Montgomery. Both dead now, but they live on in the movies. Maybe you saw it?”

“Can’t say that I have,” Stone replied. “Well, get on with your story.”

“The picture’s about this nutty millionaire who kills himself so it looks like murder, so the guy he thinks is his wife’s lover will get executed. The guy wedges a knife in the door jamb, then walks backwards into it. He falls on the floor and it looks like somebody has stabbed him in the back. That’s how Townsend did it. He wipes the handle of the ice pick clean, and holding it by the tip, puts it into the return coin slot, which held it at the right height and angle to penetrate his heart. Then all he had to do was to be sure someone was around to witness his murder and fall backward onto the blade. Sort of
hara-kiri
in reverse.”

Curtis slapped his thigh. “Hot damn, Fred, that’s it! Suicide made to look like murder. That’s the only solution. Well, Ray, it looks like we can toss this one in the closed file.”

“I don’t think so,” Stone said. “Townsend didn’t kill himself; he was murdered. A very clever murder, which was supposed to be termed suicide. Just as you two did.”

“Come again,” Lissner blurted.

“I don’t get it,” Curtis admitted.

Stone sighed. The two detectives were good investigative officers, but without much imagination. “The murder of Townsend was well planned and executed. Incidentally, Fred, I thought of the ice-pick-in-the-coin-slot ploy yesterday and nearly came to the same conclusion you did. I let you go through the suicide theory to see if you would agree it was the only solution, and you did. That’s the conclusion the killer wanted. He knew we’d sooner or later figure out how Townsend could have put the ice pick into his own back. Once we thought of that, we’d call it suicide and close the case. I’ll admit I was almost ready to do it. But a few things didn’t fit.”

“Such as?” queried Lissner.

“First, the telephone booth was supposedly out of order and had been fixed just before Townsend used it. Logically the repairman’s fingerprints should have been all over the phone, yet only Townsend’s were found. That told me that the repairman must have wiped the phone clean. No legitimate repairman would have done that. He might have cleaned the phone, but his prints should have been on it. Also a genuine company employee would have replaced the burnt-out light bulb and swept out the booth before putting it back into service. This one didn’t. That tells me he was a phony.”

“But,” Lissner interrupted, “the phone company told us he was a fake attempting to rifle the coin box. We know that.”

“We know nothing of the kind,” Stone said gently. “Sure, he could have been one of the gang. Stranger coincidences have happened. But a couple of things told me he wasn’t. If he had been attempting to break into the coin box, he wouldn’t have taken down the out-of-order sign before successfully looting it and putting everything back in order. If he hadn’t opened the box in a few minutes, he would have run. He certainly wouldn’t have waited around for a second chance.”

Both Curtis and Lissner were more than a little dubious. Lissner had come up with a perfectly good explanation of Townsend’s death, and they were reluctant to abandon it. However, they could see some logic to Stone’s reasoning. “What else?” Lissner asked.

“That piece of electrical tape found in the booth. We assumed that the phone company’s serviceman left it there. But remember the phone company hadn’t sent out anyone to fix the phone, so that little piece of tape set me thinking. It convinced me that the fake repairman murdered Townsend and then drove off in the stolen truck while Lew and the other witnesses were discovering the body.”

The two detectives looked at each other and shook their heads. Curtis spoke for both of them. “I can see how Townsend could have killed himself, Ray, but what you say is impossible. The booth was completely closed. How could anyone get the ice pick into the booth without breaking the glass?”

“Very simply,” Stone explained. “He put it into the booth before Townsend entered.”

Curtis seemed puzzled. “Okay, say the ice pick was in the booth when Townsend entered. Why didn’t he see it? How’d the fake repairman get it into his back when he was at least thirty feet away?”

Stone hesitated. In his mind he had already worked out the solution to how the crime was committed and he was positive he was correct. “The ice pick wasn’t in the coin return slot. The killer used compressed air to project the ice pick into Townsend.”

“Compressed air?” The puzzled look remained on Curtis’s face.

“You know that Lew’s station has water and air hoses situated at a distance from the gas pumps, so drivers using those facilities don’t hold up the gas lines. It’s the only place in town with a setup like that. That’s why the murder occurred there. That’s why Townsend was lured to that telephone booth. It had been converted into a death chamber. The mechanics of the thing are simple. Dr Wagner’s mentioning South American Indians hunting with the poison started me thinking. The hunters use poison darts and blowguns. The killer used the ice pick as his dart and had his own version of a blowgun.”

“Sounds complicated to me,” Lissner remarked.

“Not really. This is the way I think it happened. The murderer, posing as a telephone repairman, arrives in the stolen truck ostensibly to fix the phone. Earlier he had put an out-of-order sign on the booth to keep it free for his use. He then attaches his blowgun – a light-weight cylinder of some kind, probably cardboard or plastic, and about five inches long – to the underside of the telephone book shelf with some electrical tape, so that it hangs just slightly below the shelf and points to a predetermined spot which he is sure will coincide with the victim’s heart. The shelf is just slightly lower than the shoulder blade of a man of Townsend’s height. The killer inserts the ice pick into the tube, which is just a fraction wider than the diameter of the handle. Hanging phone books effectively conceal the device from anyone entering or standing in the booth.”

Stone paused to see if Curtis or Lissner wanted to make a comment. Neither did.

“Attached to the closed end of the cylinder is a length of transparent flexible tubing – probably plastic – which the killer runs through the rear ventilation opening at the bottom of the booth. He uses a couple of short pieces of electrical tape to hold the thin hose against the framework, where it is virtually invisible. Then he goes over to the air and water island, connects his tubing to an air hose, and pretends to be checking his tires. A few seconds later Townsend enters the death chamber. The killer uses the free compressed air supplied by Lew to blow his ‘dart’ into Townsend’s back. He gives a hard tug on the tubing; the cylinder comes loose from the shelf and drops to the floor. The killer pulls it and the tubing over to his truck and drives off just as Lew and the other witnesses are rushing to the booth. Unfortunately for the murderer, one small piece of his tape remains in the booth. Any questions?”

Lissner was dubious and blunt. “Well, it’s a helluva lot more complicated than my suicide theory, but I’ll have to admit, it does account for all those bothersome little details.”

Curtis went further. “Okay, suppose we agree that the phony repairman is the killer. How do we find out who he is? He wasn’t recognized and left no fingerprints.”

The reaction of the two officers to his splendid deductions was not as enthusiastic as Stone would have liked. To give them time to appreciate his mental efforts, he got up and walked to the window. The view wasn’t good – the police parking lot with a couple of billboards thrown in for good measure. He turned to face his subordinates.

“I know,” he teased. “Don’t you?”

Both shook their heads.

“I take it we agree that Townsend was murdered. Okay, then we have to accept as fact that the murder was conceived to lead the police to label it suicide, just as you did, Fred. The murderer has to be someone who knew Townsend might have a reason to kill himself and make it appear to be murder.”

Jumping to conclusions was one of Curtis’s weaknesses. “Dr Wagner! He was the only one who knew Townsend had a tumor. And he had possession of the poison. He could easily have faked that robbery. He could get his hands on the insurance money by marrying the widow.”

“Wagner knew Townsend was going to die,” Stone said, “but I don’t believe he knew about the insurance, since he was aware Townsend was not insurable. And even if he did know about it, he had no motive to kill Townsend, since the man was going to die in a few months. Now, we know that Townsend didn’t tell his family about his illness, and Wagner says he told no one. I believe him. But Townsend himself may have told another person, and I’m certain he did.”

Curtis and Lissner sat there with open mouths.

“Fred, get a warrant and search for rubber or plastic tubing, red paint, and electrical tape. Also check the area where the telephone truck was abandoned. The blowgun device may have been discarded near there. I’d sure like to get a look at that thing. Harve, you bring in the suspect for questioning.”

“Who?” both detectives asked.

“Hall Harris.”

By five in the afternoon proof that Stone’s deductions were amazingly accurate started coming in. A search of Harris’s garage yielded some plastic tubing, a can of paint that matched that on the ice pick handle, and a roll of tape like the piece found in the booth. Detective Lissner even managed to come up with the death device Harris had put together. It was found by neighborhood youngsters in a trash dumpster a few blocks from where the phone truck had been abandoned. Lissner had enlisted the kids in the search and it had paid off for both the detective and the children. It had cost him twenty dollars in rewards, but it was well worth the money, for Harris’s fingerprints were all over the gimmick. The device looked almost exactly as Stone had envisioned it – a five-inch piece of PVC sprinkler pipe on one end of a forty foot length of quarter-inch plastic tubing and a connecting tire valve on the other. The files at Harris’s office contained a copy of the medical report supposedly signed by Dr Wagner. It was an obvious forgery.