Evening star., 1935-10-06
INSTALLMENT XVII.

mn SAT up, leaned little for
~ ward. You don't mean Carr,
n Bill IL, :,.3.,n,,, p" ,on,. ,,..n tn.
Senator" Bill replied, shortly. Run
brecker's as innocent as you are"
"Mollie doesn't think So"
"All right" said Bill I'll tell you
what know and you draw your own
conclusions" He pulled up a chair,
straddled it and began to hunt for
cigaret. I've probably done as much
nosing around on this mess as the
police have, and I've learned quite
lot. Not enough to convict anybody,
perhaps. but still-quite lot
He talked slowly, in that low drawl
Of his We'll go back to the begin
ning-the night you and Rita came
into this town of tears. 1t was that
same night. you remember, that Mollie
had the call saying Thurman had been
drowned
Ann nodded Bill reminded her that
Mollie had traced the call to Thomas
circle shop and had then called Carl,
whose apartment was near by, and
asked him to go there and see if any
one was hanging around the public
phone booth in the store.
Carl went, all right Bill said, be
cause I dropped into the shop soon
after and talked to the proprietor"
The proprietor remembered the occa-
sion very we'll, he told Bill. because
until the arrival of the Department of
Justice man no one had used the
public phone in his store for hours.
The Justice Department man never
theless searched the booth for finger
prints and called the telephone office
to have them recheck the call
so you see said Bill. Il had rea-
son to suspect Carl from the very
first
Ann frowned. I'm afraid I missed
the point"
Il did. too, at first" Bill nodded.
"But 1 got it pretty soon. Let's as
sumo that Carl, for reasons of his
own, decided to murder Thurman
Wells and to tell some one who, as
he thought, would tell Thurman He
knows that Thurman is to drop by
Mollie's Office that evening and get
the key to her apartment for Selma.
So he picks Mollie as the informant.
But he's wise enough to know that
Mollie is too good a newspaper wom-
an not to try to trace the call. Maybe
he plans to call Mollie-aS himself. of
course-immediately after the fake
call, in the hope that she will ask
him to do exactly what she did ask
him to do.
Anticipating all this. he goes to
the shop, asks the proprietor if he
can describe the last person who used
the phone booth and being told that
no one has used the booth for hours,
he insists on looking for fingerprints
and calling the exchange to recheck
the call. Actually he calls Mollie at
the Globe and, using that little con-
trivance Mollie picked up at Run
BROKERS. he tells her Thurman has
been drowned in the rejecting pool.
Then he hurries back to his room.
In the meantime Mollie is talking to
Fuhrman, so that by the time she
has an opportunity to trace the call
and telephone Carl, Carl is back at
his place"
Ann shook her head doubtfully.
} "Sounds pretty far-fetched to me,
Bill"
AS an isolated instance, yes" Bill
agreed. But still assuming Carl's the
guilty man, you'll find in that first
little episode good idea that might
help to explain some of the things
that happened later. Well come to
that. Now let's get on to the night
of the murder"
q Bill got up and hunted around for
an ash tray. When he had straddled
the chair again he said:
Selma says she planned the re-
fecting pool business as a Joke and
that she had no way of knowing Fuhr-
man would turn up and be murdered
under her eyes. When she told me
she had rigged up the dummy corpse
and carried it to the pool I asked
her if she had done it alone and
she insisted she had. Later the police
got it out of her that Deane had
done it"
He paused and Ann said, quickly,
II had a feeling Deane knew more
about the murder than we guessed"
'Deane was too much the coward
to kill a man, and 1 knew it," Bill
declared. But getting back to Selma
When I asked her if she put the
dummy in the pool alone, was trying
to find out if Carl had had anything
to do with it. Deane hadn't entered
my mind. And when l learned she
had lied to me 1 decided she had
probably lied to the police as we'll
inf ie
phasis, If Carl had a hand in plan
ming Selmas joke he was unques-
tionably responsible for Fuhrman's
turning up at the pool just Wnen he
did. BY what subterfuge he got Fuhr
man to come there I don't know, but
If he did he most certainly dropp I'd
the bomb that sent us all into the
water and then proceeded to strangIe
Fuhrman with the piece of wire . .
When I got to my feet and looked
around, Carl was standing where a
few minutes later I made out Fuhr-
mans dark form lying on the bottom
Remembering the semi-darkness and
our first excited confusion, Carl could
have done the job
Her expression was one of complete
bewilderment Ann said, Il wonder IL
you realize it was Carl who pulled
me up? I went in head first, y.u
know"
Bill nodded Yes. I know: but I
didn't want to remind you of it. Yol
landed within foot of where Carl
was standing"
Ann understood and was silent. If
Bill was right in his suspicious, Carl
had not been so eager to get her to
her feet as he had been to keep her
away from the pathetic object he was
holding under the water.
Now" said Bill, having said that
Carl killed Thurman, there's still
plenty to explain"
PLENTY is right" Ann said, Il was