The Fifth Key by George Harmon Coxe

Author:George Harmon Coxe
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Head of Zeus Ltd

13

MURDOCK DID NOT BOTHER to go to the door. He moved round the desk and eased himself into the chair. He removed his hat and explored the slight swelling behind his ear, thankful now that the felt had deadened the blow and that the skin was not broken. He got out a cigarette, found a single match in a folder, used it, and then began to roll the folder absently as he reviewed what had happened.

His resentment still smoldered but it was controllable now and did not obscure his recognition of certain facts, the most important being that the loss of the report could make no great difference since he knew what it contained. Once he was sure who Wortman was it would be a simple matter to have Devlin check with the San Francisco police.

The trouble was he could not go to Devlin. He was being forced by circumstances into doing the one thing he had always hated to do. He had to be a detective. He had to hold out on the police and work alone, not knowing whom he could trust but knowing that if and when Devlin did catch up with him, he could expect no favors.

He brooded about this, remembering other times when he had worked with Lieutenant Bacon in Boston. It had been bad enough then, just being mixed up in a homicide and having the police on your side. Now—

He threw the rolled-up match folder aside and stood up. He glanced about the room, thought about searching the desk but could think of no good reason for doing so. Then, his eye stopping on the doorway to the adjacent room, he got up and moved over to it.

He found a switch just inside the doorway and flipped it on, finding himself in a windowless cubicle perhaps six by eight feet and fitted out as a darkroom. There was a long sink and composition trays and cabinets holding paper and supplies. There was a drying-rack, an enlarger and easel, another cabinet holding boxes of negatives and prints.

With no expectation of finding the negatives he wanted, he nevertheless spent twenty minutes making sure. Then he turned off the light and moved into the office, crossing to the door and then stopping when he caught sight of his reflection in the medicine-cabinet mirror over the washbasin.

He looked at himself sourly until he realized he was looking sour, and then his sense of humor came to his aid and a grudging grin formed at the corner of his mouth. He thought about Harry, remembering how swell it felt to throw that hook and how neatly effective it had been.

He glanced at his knuckles, finding two of them tender but unmarked. He flexed them and then, on impulse, he reached out and pulled open the mirrored cabinet door.

One look wiped the smile away. He grunted softly, hardly noticing the empty pint bottle and the can of bicarbonate of soda and the dirty glasses and the jar of Bromo-Seltzer.

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