Read Online Day of Doom: The Complete Battles of Gordon Manning & The Griffin, Volume 2 by J. Allan Dunn - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: J. Allan Dunn
Tags: Detective/Hard-Boiled
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case.”
If Henley was puzzled it meant something a long way out of the ordinary. The old lure of adventure, of the mysterious, came back to Manning. He was not as fagged as he had fancied after all. He was still underweight, there were still lines of strain in his hawklike features, but suddenly he was no longer tired.
“I’ll come,” he said. “Give me the address.”
He set it down with pencil and pad, touched a buzzer for Yamata, his Japanese body servant and butler.
“Good man,” Melleny replied, and the commissioner’s voice showed relief.
Twenty minutes later, having showered and breakfasted, Manning was driving his powerful roadster into the city.
II
The precinct captain had turned over the police end of it to the Central Office detectives. The three office men had made their maps and pictures, sprayed for prints. But the two detectives of the homicide squad were waiting, and so was Dr. Henley, chief medical examiner. They greeted Manning with eagerness.
It was a modern apartment house, thirty stories high, built in towering setbacks, exclusive and expensive. The woman had been found dead in her suite on the twentieth floor. The man, a well known portrait painter, was discovered on the demi-terrace at the top of the structure below a penthouse. He did not live there, but had his studio on the floor below. There seemed no reason at present why he should have been on the roof at such an early hour. Both deaths, according to Henley, had occurred about four o’clock. Rigor mortis had not set in, but there had been terrible changes in the bodies after death.
“You’ll want to look at them before the wagon comes,” said Henley. “There will be autopsies, but I’m doubtful about what even they will uncover.”
The chief medical examiner was a man well over fifty, experienced in surgery, an expert on criminal matters, whose findings and theories were respected on the Continent as well as in America. He and Manning had worked together before and they appreciated each other’s abilities.
They went first in the elevator to the roof, one Central Office man, Sergeant Doherty, with them, the other, Eddy Hanlon, first-grade detective, remaining behind. The husband of the woman who was dead and their maid were being held.
Pelota, the dead Italian artist, whose canvases of society women had created a furor, lay underneath a blanket. Henley removed it.
Though the sight he uncovered was ghastly it left Henley, used to the dissecting room, and Manning, used to war horrors, unmoved.
The artist’s olive skin was the color of old putty. He was clad in pyjamas of an intricate pattern, crimson and gold and purple. The top was open at the throat. Over the pyjamas he wore a sleeveless robe striped in vivid colors, an Arabian aba.
The lips had writhed back, showing his teeth. The eyes stared horribly upward. The face was a hideous mask that seemed to register terror. It evidently affected Sergeant Doherty, though Henley and Manning both knew that post-mortem expressions are not to be considered as registrations of mental impression in the fleeting moment of sudden death. They were muscular contractions attributable to other physical causes.
Pelota’s whole face was shrunken. So was his body. It was too small for the clothing. The flesh showed waxen and colorless. He had affected a small mustache and imperial, and these stood out from the chin and lip in a strained bristle.
“In life the man weighed about a hundred and fifty pounds,” said Henley. “The body has been drained of blood.”
Manning agreed with him.
“How?” he asked.
Beneath the collar bone Henley showed two tiny purple punctures. They were so close together as almost to merge.
“They go deep and straight in,” said Henley. “That is the only mark upon him, unless I find others in the autopsy. And, believe me, Manning, that is going to be thorough.”
Manning looked around. The terrace had a parapet three feet high. It was a platform some
If Henley was puzzled it meant something a long way out of the ordinary. The old lure of adventure, of the mysterious, came back to Manning. He was not as fagged as he had fancied after all. He was still underweight, there were still lines of strain in his hawklike features, but suddenly he was no longer tired.
“I’ll come,” he said. “Give me the address.”
He set it down with pencil and pad, touched a buzzer for Yamata, his Japanese body servant and butler.
“Good man,” Melleny replied, and the commissioner’s voice showed relief.
Twenty minutes later, having showered and breakfasted, Manning was driving his powerful roadster into the city.
II
The precinct captain had turned over the police end of it to the Central Office detectives. The three office men had made their maps and pictures, sprayed for prints. But the two detectives of the homicide squad were waiting, and so was Dr. Henley, chief medical examiner. They greeted Manning with eagerness.
It was a modern apartment house, thirty stories high, built in towering setbacks, exclusive and expensive. The woman had been found dead in her suite on the twentieth floor. The man, a well known portrait painter, was discovered on the demi-terrace at the top of the structure below a penthouse. He did not live there, but had his studio on the floor below. There seemed no reason at present why he should have been on the roof at such an early hour. Both deaths, according to Henley, had occurred about four o’clock. Rigor mortis had not set in, but there had been terrible changes in the bodies after death.
“You’ll want to look at them before the wagon comes,” said Henley. “There will be autopsies, but I’m doubtful about what even they will uncover.”
The chief medical examiner was a man well over fifty, experienced in surgery, an expert on criminal matters, whose findings and theories were respected on the Continent as well as in America. He and Manning had worked together before and they appreciated each other’s abilities.
They went first in the elevator to the roof, one Central Office man, Sergeant Doherty, with them, the other, Eddy Hanlon, first-grade detective, remaining behind. The husband of the woman who was dead and their maid were being held.
Pelota, the dead Italian artist, whose canvases of society women had created a furor, lay underneath a blanket. Henley removed it.
Though the sight he uncovered was ghastly it left Henley, used to the dissecting room, and Manning, used to war horrors, unmoved.
The artist’s olive skin was the color of old putty. He was clad in pyjamas of an intricate pattern, crimson and gold and purple. The top was open at the throat. Over the pyjamas he wore a sleeveless robe striped in vivid colors, an Arabian aba.
The lips had writhed back, showing his teeth. The eyes stared horribly upward. The face was a hideous mask that seemed to register terror. It evidently affected Sergeant Doherty, though Henley and Manning both knew that post-mortem expressions are not to be considered as registrations of mental impression in the fleeting moment of sudden death. They were muscular contractions attributable to other physical causes.
Pelota’s whole face was shrunken. So was his body. It was too small for the clothing. The flesh showed waxen and colorless. He had affected a small mustache and imperial, and these stood out from the chin and lip in a strained bristle.
“In life the man weighed about a hundred and fifty pounds,” said Henley. “The body has been drained of blood.”
Manning agreed with him.
“How?” he asked.
Beneath the collar bone Henley showed two tiny purple punctures. They were so close together as almost to merge.
“They go deep and straight in,” said Henley. “That is the only mark upon him, unless I find others in the autopsy. And, believe me, Manning, that is going to be thorough.”
Manning looked around. The terrace had a parapet three feet high. It was a platform some
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