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"What did you think he might have concealed?"
Duncan said lamely, "I don't know. It might have been a gun."
"Perhaps," Mason suggested, "Duncan picked up something in the i
"That's a lie," Duncan yelled, "and you know it's a lie. You were still in the room when I pressed the buzzer for Ma
The sergeant interrupted, "That'll do. Now, just how long was it, Ma
"I don't think it was over four seconds, at the outside," Ma
Mason said, "It took us six or eight seconds to walk down that corridor. That gave Duncan ten or twelve seconds."
The sergeant ignored Mason's comment, but kept his eyes on Ma
"Duncan asked me to help him look around. He told me what had happened. I looked through the door into the other room, but Duncan kept on looking around through chairs in this room, and I came over and helped him."
"Did he say what he wanted you to search for?"
"No, he didn't say."
"Did you enter the i
"Just stood in the doorway," Ma
"One other thing," Duncan interrupted, "speaking about locking up the place reminds me:-are you going to want the vault opened?"
The sergeant said, "Of course we're going to want the vault opened."
"Well," Duncan said, "when you do that, I've got something to say about the way things are handled."
"Just what do you mean?" the sergeant asked.
"I came out here with a deputy marshal and an order to show cause why a receiver shouldn't be appointed, and I was going to make Grieb take a physical inventory in the presence of the deputy. Now, I'm sorry Sammy's dead; but that doesn't alter the fact that he tried to play me for a sucker. He's short in his accounts, and I know he's short, and that's why he…"
"Why he what?" Mason asked coldly, as Duncan paused.
"Why he didn't want to face me," Duncan finished lamely.
"What makes you think he didn't want to face you?" Mason asked.
Duncan turned pleadingly to the sergeant and said, "For God's sake, make this guy keep his trap shut while I'm trying to explain things."
The sergeant said tonelessly, "Shut up, Mason. What were you trying to say, Duncan?"
"Grieb left heirs somewhere," Duncan said. "I don't know just who they are, but they'll be snooping around and making trouble, claiming half of the business. With Sam alive, I could have had a show-down in court and put a receiver in charge. Now that Sam's dead, I've got to go through a lot of red tape with administrators and stuff, and if there's any shortage, in place of my being able to show that Sam lifted the stuff, they'll claim I got away with it after Sam died. So I want you fellows to make a complete inventory of every single thing in that vault and in the coin safe."
The sergeant frowned. "You mean you think something's missing?"
"I know damn well something's missing."
"Making an inventory is out of our line," the sergeant pointed out. "It'll take more time than I can spare right now."
"Well then, how about sealing the vault up?"
"We'll want to look inside of it."
"The minute that vault's opened," Duncan said obstinately, "there's going to be an inventory made."
The sergeant hesitated a moment, then said, "All right, Duncan, we'll make an inventory. Perhaps, after all, we might find something that'll throw light on the motive for the murder."
"Before you open that vault," Ma
The sergeant stiffened to attention. "Throw a gun overboard!" he exclaimed.
Ma
"Well, why the devil didn't you say so?"
"I tried to," Ma
"That'll do," the sergeant interrupted, and said to the young man who was staring with apprehensive eyes, "what's your name?"
The man swallowed twice and said, "Bert Custer."
"Where do you work?"
"In a service station at Seventy-ninth and Main."
"What were you doing out here?"
"I took my girl… I mean Marilyn Smith here, out to the ship."
"You were going to do some gambling?"
Custer lowered his eyes, gri
"Then what did you come out here for?"
"For di
"And do a little necking?" the sergeant interrupted, gri
Custer stiffened and said indignantly, "We were talking."
It was the girl who answered the question. "Sure we were necking," she said. "What'd you think we came out here for?"
"No offense," the sergeant said, laughing. "Now, you were out on deck?"
"Yes," Custer said.
"Where?"
"Amidships… Come to think of it we must have been right above this office."
"And what did you see?"
"A woman with a silver dress and white hair came out of the cabin where they have the gambling, and she acted awfully fu
"Go on," the sergeant said.
"Well, she stood there for a minute and then another woman came out, and this woman in the silver dress ducked back in the shadows and then Marilyn grabbed my arm and whispered, 'Look!' and I looked just in time to see a gun that this woman in the silver dress had thrown overboard."
"What sort of a gun?" the sergeant asked.
"Well, it was an automatic, but I couldn't tell what make it was nor what caliber. It was a gun. That's about all I can tell."
"You know the difference between an automatic and a revolver?"
"Yes, sure. An automatic is more at right angles, and a revolver has sort of a curve. They're built different. I can't describe them exactly, but I know all about 'em. I sold guns once."
"And this woman in the silver dress threw it overboard?"
"Yes."
"Then what did she do?"
"She stuck around on the deck for quite a while until after the other woman had gone away. And then she walked back down the deck. She was about fifty, I should judge."
"About fifty-five," the girl interrupted. "She had a silver lame dress, as nearly as I could tell, silver slippers, and a string of pearls."
"Just a moment," Mason said; "it sounds strange to me that the woman would have thrown away the gun under those circumstances. As I understand it, you two saw the gun go over the side. Now, isn't it possible that it was thrown by the other woman who had just come out of the casino?"
"That'll do," the sergeant said. "You're not here to pull any cross-examination of witnesses, Mr. Mason. I'll ask the questions."
"But we owe it to all concerned to get this thing straight," Mason asserted.