Sleuths by Bill Pronzini

Author:Bill Pronzini [Pronzini, Bill]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mystery & Crime
Publisher: Crossroad Press
Published: 2011-11-22T13:00:00+00:00

Sometime later, Steele, Ardis, Cedric, Jan, and I were sitting around the half-moon table waiting for Inspector Lupoff and Captain Dickensheet to return from questioning the murderer of Philip Boltan. The Cellar had been cleared of patrons and police, and we were alone in the large, dark room.

Steele occupied the seat of honor: an old wooden rocking chair in the dealer's spot in the center of the half-moon. He had said little since the finale of his special midnight show. All of us had wanted to ask him how he knew the identity of the killer, and exactly how the vanishing act had been worked, but we knew him well enough to realize that he wouldn't say anything until he had the proper audience. He just sat there smiling in his enigmatic way.

When the two officers finally came back, they looked disgruntled and morose. They sat down in the two empty chairs, and Dickensheet said grimly, "Well, we've just had an unpleasant talk with Spellman–or the man I knew as Spellman, anyway. He's made a full confession."

"The man you knew as Spellman?" I said.

"His real name is Granger. Robert Granger."

Cedric frowned, looking at Steele. "Isn't that the name of Boltan's former partner, the one you told us committed suicide?"

"It is," Steele told him. "I had an idea that might be who the young cadet was."

"You mean he killed Boltan because of what happened to his father?" I asked.

"Yes," Lupoff said. "He decided years ago that the perfect revenge was to kill Boltan on stage, in full view of an audience, and then disappear. He's been planning it ever since, mainly by studying and mastering the principles of magic."

"Then he intended from the beginning to murder Boltan in circumstances such as those tonight?"

"More or less," Dickensheet said. "He wanted to do the job during one of Boltan's regular performances, and the invitation to the Academy graduating class tonight convinced him that now was the time. It was only fitting, according to Granger, that Boltan die on stage under an aura of mystery."

Jan said bewilderedly, "But why would a potential murderer join the police force?"

"Spellman, or Granger, is mentally unstable. We try to weed them out, but every once in a while one slips by. He believes in meting out punishment to those who would 'do evil,' in his own words just now. God only knows what he might have done if he'd gotten away with this murder and gone on to become an officer in the field." Dickensheet shuddered at the possibility. "As if we don't have enough problems . . ."

"I don't understand how Granger could join the force under an assumed name," Cedric said. "I mean, if his real name is Granger and you knew him as Spellman–"

"Spellman is the name of the family who adopted him out of the orphanage he ended up in after his father died. As far as our people knew, that was his real name. I mean, you usually don't check back past a kid's sixth birthday.

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