Voyage Into Violence by Lockridge Frances & Lockridge Richard

Author:Lockridge, Frances & Lockridge, Richard [Lockridge, Frances & Lockridge, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mystery
ISBN: 9780671473297
Google: ubcvmgEACAAJ
Goodreads: 3225124
Publisher: Pocket Books
Published: 1956-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

8

APPARENTLY Mr. Jules Barren had assumed his summons was to another party. He did not say so. But, finding only Captain Cunningham and Weigand in the captain’s quarters, he permitted dark eyebrows to rise in polite enquiry. He was told by Captain Cunningham that it was good of him to come. Cunningham then looked at Weigand and waited.

‘We have a problem, Mr. Barren,’ Bill said. ‘We think you may be able to help us.’

‘Me?’ Barren said, and then added that he doubted it, but that, of course, anything he could do.

‘Right,’ Bill said. ‘The problem we have concerns a murder. A man named Marsh has been killed.’

This time Barren’s eyebrows indicated astonishment.

‘On the boat?’ he asked, and Cunningham winced slightly and Bill said, ‘Right, Mr. Barren. Mr, Marsh was a private detective.’ To this, Jules Barren, who was gaily arrayed, said he didn’t get it. He looked from one to another, and repeated that he didn’t get it. ‘Why me?’ he asked, amplifying.

‘The photographs of jewellery,’ Bill said. ‘The ones we were looking at earlier. Mr. Marsh had them in his possession when he was killed.’

Then Barren’s eyes narrowed just perceptibly.

‘Your wife’s great-aunt,’ he said to Captain Cunningham. ‘So that was a lot of baloney. You know, it sounded like baloney.’

He looked at Weigand then.

‘So,’ he said, ‘what’s it got to do with me?’

But his eyes were wary, and it was evident he could guess. He sat down.

‘I think,’ Bill told him, ‘you had seen those photographs before, Mr. Barron. Or—the things themselves. You were anxious to get your hands on them. And when you did, all you needed was a quick glance.’

‘All right,’ Barren said. ‘That’s what you think. So that’s what you think.’

‘It isn’t true?’

Weigand was damn right, it wasn’t true. The varnish came off Barren’s speech. Cops could make mistakes. It wouldn’t be the first time—He stopped.

‘No,’ Bill said. ‘Not the first time, is it?’

‘Oh, I get it,’ Barren said. ‘I get it all right. Because there was this little mix-up about an old dame who couldn’t remember where she put her pretties—’ He broke off again, with a rather elaborate shrug. ‘Nobody charged me with anything. They wanted a fall-guy and tried me for size. And I didn’t fit. So they said, “Sorry, please”—only they didn’t, you can bet on that. All they said was “Scram!” So now you come along.’

He stood up. He displayed indignation, presumably righteous. He spoke to Captain Cunningham, and got some of the varnish on again. He said that if that was all it was -

‘No,’ Bill said. ‘Sit down, Mr. Barren.’

‘You,’ Barren said, ‘are off your beat, aren’t you?’

He looked hard at Bill Weigand, then at the captain. He was looked back at, harder.

‘You can take it, Mr. Barren,’ Cunningham said, ‘that Captain Weigand has got himself a new beat. As he said, sit down.’

And Jules Barron sat down, which came as rather a surprise to Captain Cunningham and interested Bill Weigand not a little, since he was off his

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