Read Online American Gun Mystery by Ellery Queen - Free Book Online Page B

and opened his mouth in anger. Then he shrugged and handed over his slim revolver. Neither Grant nor his son, it soon appeared, had a second weapon in his clothes. Then Kit Horne—
    Ellery said: “No.”
    The old man cocked an inquisitive eye at him. Ellery jerked his thumb slightly toward the girl and shook his head. The Inspector stared, then shrugged.
    “Uh—you, don’t bother Miss Horne now. We’ll attend to her later.”
    The two detectives nodded and marched off across the arena. Kit Horne did not move; she had not heard a word, but continued to study the zigzag design of the blanket in an expressionless absorption that was horrible.
    The Inspector sighed and rubbed his hands together briskly. “Grant!” he said. The old showman turned his head with precision. “You and your son—get Miss Horne off to the side there, will you? This isn’t going to be pleasant.”
    Grant drew a deep sobbing breath, his eyes fiery red, and touched Kit’s pale bare arm. “Kit,” he muttered. “Kit.”
    She looked at him in surprise.
    “Kit. Come off here a minute, Kit.”
    She looked down again at the blanket.
    Grant nudged his son. Curly rubbed his eyes for an instant, wearily, and then they lifted the girl bodily and swung her around. Terror gleamed there, the impulse to cry out; it drained swiftly away and she went limp. They half-carried her across the arena.
    The Inspector sighed. “Takes it hard, doesn’t she? Well, El, let’s get to work. I want a long look-see at that body.”
    He motioned to several detectives, and they came forward to form a solid wall of official flesh around the corpse. Ellery stood within the ring, and Inspector. Queen. The Inspector braced his spare little shoulders, took a last stimulative pinch of snuff, and then squatted on the tanbark. He removed the blanket with steady fingers.
    There was something ironic in that dusty, bloody, once gorgeous costume. The dead man was dressed in black, a shiny romantic black. But the gloss of romance had been destroyed by Horne’s descent to mortal earth, and it was now the rusty black of death. On his twisted, queerly dispersed legs were high-heeled boots of black leather which came well up to his knees, adorned with fancy stitching. Silvery spurs protruded from the boot-heels of the quiet feet. His tucked-in trousers were of black corduroy. Although his bandana was black, his shirt was of pure white sateen—a startling contrast. The shirt-sleeves were drawn in above the elbows and gripped tightly by black garters, while on his wrists he wore a pair of exquisitely fashioned black leather cuffs, embroidered in white stitching and studded with small silver ornaments, the much-coveted conchas of the cowboy-on-parade. Around his waist there was a snug-fitting black trouser belt; and swathing his torso and hips an ornate pistol belt, quite wide and looped for the insertion of cartridges. There were two holsters of beautiful black leather, one resting on the thigh below each hip. And both were empty.
    These were the routine items to be duly noted. The Queens looked at each other, and then returned their attention to the body in a search for more interesting details.
    Horne’s outfit, so resplendent and brave, had been torn and dirtied by the steel-shod hooves of the horses. Rents in the white shirt revealed gashed hoof-wounds on the skin beneath. Neat, small, clean as a marker, there was a bullethole in the left side, a trench which obviously had ploughed trough the heart. It had bled remarkably little, that wound; the satin edges of the hole were merely stuck to the skin beneath by pasty gore. The graunt old face was taut in death; the white head seemed curiously sunken on one side, behind the ear; and they noted with a sudden repulsion that some horse’s wildly flying hoof had kicked the entire side of the man’s head in. But the features were quite unmarked, except for dust and splatters of blood. The body lay in an impossible position—impossible,