The Kid Clips a Coupon
Erie Stanley Gardner

I - The Clue of the Jam

Dan Seller lounged in the big chair and listened as Police Inspector Phil Brame recounted the circumstances of the crime for the edification of the small group of cronies who frequented the choice corner of the club.
“Just a plain case of murder,” Inspector Brame was saying, “and a bit of strawberry jam is going to send the guy to the chair.”
“I don’t think Dan Higgins intended to commit murder when he broke into the place. Mrs Morelay, paralyzed from the hips down, was in the living room, seated in her wheelchair, going over a bunch of account books. Higgins broke in to get some food. Mrs Morelay heard him moving around in the kitchen. There was a telephone attached to her wheelchair. She called police headquarters and reported someone in her kitchen, stealing food.
“Higgins heard her telephoning. It sent him into a furious rage. The man was a hungry. He dashed into the room and split the woman’s head open with a hatchet he had picked up in the kitchen. Then he helped himself to food. He spread some homemade strawberry jam on a slice of bread and ate it. He spilled some jam on his necktie without knowing it. He had gone less than a block from the place when the police radio car came along.
“Higgins looked like just the type who would be stealing food-a half-starved chap with clothes that were pretty much the worse for wear. Our men stopped and picked him up on suspicion and then went to the house and found that murder had been committed. Higgins denied he’d been near the house, and he’d evidently learned his lesson about fingerprints, because there were no fingerprints on any of the stuff in the kitchen. The police found a pair of dirty gloves in his pocket. Evidently he’d worn those while he was eating. But there was strawberry jam on his tie. The jam was analyzed. The amount of sugar it contained was carefully noted by the police-chemists, and then an analysis was made of the strawberry jam in the jar in the sink. The jam on the tie Higgins was wearing at the time of his arrest came from that jar of homemade jam.”
“Wasn’t there someone who saw him leaving the house?” Renfroe, the banker, asked.
“Yes,” Brame said. “Walter Stagg, the man who acts as manager for Mrs Morelay, drove up to the house in his automobile. He arrived there almost at the same time that the police did. He was just coming up the cement walk when the police car rounded the corner. He said that he had seen Higgins coming around the back of the house, as though he had either slipped out of a window, or had been snooping around the house. Stagg said he intended to unlock the front door-which was always kept on a night latch-and see if anything was wrong. If anything was missing, he was determined to jump into his car and follow the man until he could notify a policeman. Stagg was unarmed so he didn’t want to encounter an armed crook unless he had an officer handy.”
Bill Pope, the explorer, stared steadily at the curling smoke of a cigarette.
“It seems strange,” he said, “that a man would have gone ahead and eaten heartily after having committed a murder, particularly the murder of a helpless old woman who had done nothing to injure him.”
“She telephoned for the police,” Inspector Brame said. “Don’t forget that.”
“But,” Dan Seller pointed out, “if that was the motive for the crime and the man knew she had telephoned for the police, he’d have been doubly foolish to have murdered her and then gone on eating, knowing that the police were on their way in a radio car.”
Inspector Brame’s face flushed.
“More of your amateur detective stuff,” he said. “It’s an easy thing for you wealthy young coupon-clippers to construct theories proving that the police are always wrong. Doubtless, an attorney for the defence will try to bamboozle a jury into believing the police got the wrong man. But he won’t be able to-not with that strawberry jam on the man’s necktie.”
“Was there,” asked Bill Pope, “robbery as well?”
“Apparently not. Higgins had nothing in his possession when he was arrested. He might have taken something from the body and buried it somewhere in the vicinity. She was supposed to have a large sum of cash money which she always kept on hand, but there wasn’t any money found on her body.
“Higgins was wise. He didn’t leave a single fingerprint. We fingerprinted everything about the body, and didn’t find a thing. The books that were open in front of her didn’t have a single fingerprint on the page other than the prints of Walter Stagg, the manager, who kept all the books and submitted them to Mrs Morelay for examination.”
“Perhaps a draught of wind might have blown one of the pages,” Dan Seller said. “Did your men take prints on the other pages to see if that had happened?”
“As it happens, my bright young man,” the inspector said, “we did that very thing, although we didn’t need to, because when the woman’s skull was split open, blood spattered upon the pages of the open account book, and we had no difficulty in telling what page was in front of her at the time.”
“Very clever detective work, inspector,” Renfroe, the banker, said. “Undoubtedly the man will go to the chair on the strength of that strawberry jam.”
“Mrs Morelay was wealthy?”
“Quite wealthy. She leaves no will. The property goes to a niece, Tess Copley. She’s the only surviving relative.”
“Live here in the city?” Renfroe asked.
“Yes.”
“They found the weapon with which the crime was committed?” Bill Pope inquired.
“Oh, yes, of course. It was there in the room. There could be no question about it. A blood-stained hatchet that had been taken from the kitchen.”
Bill Pope’s clear eyes surveyed Inspector Brame.
“You should feel pretty happy, inspector,” he said, “but you seem to be down in the dumps.”
Inspector Brame sighed.
“It’s that damned Patent Leather Kid,” he said.
“What about him?” asked the explorer.
“He’s been meddling again. The man is a crook, a gangster, a public enemy. And yet, he appeals to the public. He tries to pull some of this Robin Hood stuff, and the people fall for it. Slowly but surely he’s becoming a public hero, and he’s making the police appear ridiculous.”
“Why don’t you catch him,” asked the banker, “and put him away?”
“Have you,” asked Bill Pope, “got anything definite on him? His methods are irregular, perhaps illegal, but can you get him on any specific felony and make it stick?”
Inspector Brame’s voice was ominous.
“Listen,” he said, “when we get that guy, we’ll make something stick. Don’t worry about that. I wouldn’t want to be quoted publicly on the thing, you understand, but that fellow has been a thorn in the side of the Police Department long enough. It wouldn’t take very much framing to pin a good murder case on him.”
“Don’t you think framing him for murder is pretty steep?” the explorer asked.
“Well, perhaps not for murder,” Inspector Brame said. “I was speaking impulsively. But I can promise you this, that if we ever get our fingers on The Patent Leather Kid, he’ll go away for a long, long time.”
Dan Seller arose, yawned, and took a cigarette from a hammered silver case.
“Referring to that murder case once more, inspector,” he said, “didn’t Walter Stagg agree to notify Tess Copley, and fail to do so?”
“Notify her of what?” the police inspector asked.
“Of her aunt’s death.”
“He promised to go and get her, but he had some trouble starting his car. His battery was weak, and in the end the police telephoned and had a messenger sent to her. Tess Copley was working in a place where the girls weren’t allowed to receive telephone calls.”
“Then,” Dan Seller said, “her aunt didn’t part with any money while she was alive.”
“I’ll say she didn’t,” Inspector Brame said. “She was as tight as the bark on a tree-one of those misers who salted money away in gold coin. She’d been collecting gold for some time.”
“And hadn’t turned it in?”
“No.”
“What was the amount of the money?”
“I don’t know exactly. No one does. She had been collecting it for years.”
Dan Seller lit his cigarette, nodded casually to the small group. “Well,” he said, “I’ll be seeing you later.”
Bill Pope, the explorer, followed Dan Seller with quizzical, speculative eyes, but said nothing.

II - Fingerprints and a Stalled Car

The process by which Dan Seller, the wealthy club man, became The Patent Leather Kid, spectacular figure of the city’s underworld, was tedious and complicated. However, it left no back trail, and when The Patent Leather Kid entered the apartment hotel where he maintained a penthouse, he might as well have appeared from thin air for all the trail he had left.
The manager greeted The Kid with deference.
Gertie, the telephone operator, flashed him a glance from eyes that were starry, as she reached for the switchboard to notify Bill Brakey that The Kid was on his way up.
The Kid’s private elevator whisked him directly to the roof. Bill Brakey, ensconced behind bullet-proof doors, made certain that The Kid was alone, and that there was no trap laid by police or gangster enemies before he opened the door.
Bill Brakey’s face never showed the slightest nervousness. Only his hands and his eyes betrayed the everlasting watchfulness, the readiness to explode into instant action.
“You made a short trip this time, Kid,” he said.
“Yes,” The Kid told him. “Let’s go in where we can have a drink and talk. I’ve got something on my mind.”
The Kid dropped into a chair, stretched out his feet and sighed.
“Seems good to be back, Bill,” he said.
Bill Brakey brought out a bottle of Scotch, drew the cork and poured out whiskey and ginger ale.
“What’s on your mind, Kid?”
Brakey’s eyes were not fastened upon The Patent Leather Kid, but were slithering about in a nervous survey of the windows and doors. It made no difference that he knew no one could get through the roof without a warning coming over the telephone, without an automatic alarm shrilling a strident warning should the only elevator which communicated with the penthouse start on its way without The Kid’s key having first unlocked an electrical contact.
Bill Brakey’s watchfulness was purely mechanical, purely a matter of long habit.
“I’m interested,” The Patent Leather Kid said, “in the murder of Mrs Fannie Morelay.”
“Inside stuff is,” Brakey said, “that Higgins is going to the chair because he had some strawberry jam spilled on his necktie. He didn’t leave any fingerprints, but it looks as though it was a dead open and shut case.”
“Except for one thing,” The Patent Leather Kid said, slowly.
“What’s that?” asked the bodyguard.
“This fellow, Stagg.”
“You mean the manager?”
“Yes.”
“He’s okay,” Bill Brakey said. “The police looked him up just to make sure. He’s got the highest references. He’s been with Mrs Morelay for years. He handled all of her business affairs. You see, she couldn’t get around at all by herself, and she had quite a bunch of business interests. She was worth over a million dollars. Nobody knows just how much more.”
“Stagg was just coming up to the house when the police came. He’d just driven up in his car, and saw Dan Higgins moving about as though he’d been prowling around the house.”
Bill Brakey flashed The Kid a sharp glance.
“Even if he was lying about that” he said, “the strawberry jam on Higgins’ necktie is enough to send him to the chair. Higgins says he wasn’t near the house. The chemists can absolutely identify that jam. No two batches of homemade jam are made according to the same actual recipe. There are minor variations of sugar content, and that sort of stuff, and-“
“That’s all right,” The Patent Leather Kid remarked, “but when Walter Stagg wanted to notify Tess Copley, the niece, of what had happened, his car didn’t start, the battery was weak.”
“Well,” said Brakey, “what about that?”
“If he had just driven up to the house,” The Kid said, “his car would have been warm. And, what’s more, the battery would have been freshly generated from a run. It would have turned over a warm motor. The fact that it didn’t turn over the motor indicates that the motor was cold. It’s more probable that Stagg had left the house and was running towards the car, trying to make a getaway, when he heard the police car coming, and, knowing that he couldn’t get away, turned and started back towards the house, pulling out his key to open the front door as he did so.”
There was an interval of silence. The Kid sipped his highball thoughtfully.
“Of course,” Brakey said, “that doesn’t prove anything. It’s a suspicious circumstance-that’s all.”
“That’s why I didn’t call it to the attention of the police,” The Kid said. “It’s something that we’ve got to run down.”
Bill Brakey nodded.
“When do you want to start, Kid?” he asked.
“Sometime tonight,” The Kid told him. Brakey’s poker face did not change.
“There’s a police guard at the place?”
“I presume so. I don’t know. I can find out.”
The Kid let smoke stream from his nostrils.
“Better slip out there this afternoon. Bill,” he said. “Look the ground over and make a report. I’ll get a little sleep and get caught up on some of my reading. As soon as you come back with the report, we’ll have dinner and then proceed to look the premises over.”
Bill Brakey nodded.
“I’ll have all the low-down on it,” he said.
“Another thing,” The Patent Leather Kid muttered, hesitatingly, “that doesn’t check, is the fingerprints on the book of accounts. They found the fingerprints of Walter Stagg on those books. No other print.”
“Higgins was wearing gloves,” Brakey said.
“I know,” The Kid said, “but if this woman had been checking over the books of account, it’s almost a cinch that her fingerprints would have been on the books somewhere.”
“That’s so,” Brakey agreed.
“Apparently they weren’t. Just Stagg’s prints.”
“What do you make of that, Kid?”
The Patent Leather Kid shrugged his shoulders so slightly that the action was all but imperceptible.
“That,” he said, “is something which remains to be determined.”
“They were the books she was working on, all right,” Brakey said, “because there were bloodstains on the leaves. They were the books she was working on when she was murdered, regardless of who did the murder.”
“Then why weren’t her fingerprints on the pages, Bill?” The Patent Leather Kid pointed out.
“Gosh, Kid, I don’t know,” Brakey confessed.
“That’s something we’re going to find out.”

III - Inside the Murder House

The Patent Leather Kid adjusted the black patent leather mask which covered the upper half of his features. He worked his hands into soft, pliable leather gloves, nodded to Bill Brakey.
“Ready, Bill,” he said.
Bill Brakey jimmied the window.
The Patent Leather Kid was the first one through. He paused for a tense moment while he listened, then muttered to Bill Brakey: “Okay, Bill, let’s go.”
Brakey slid noiselessly after him.
The place was musty, with a peculiar suggestion of death.
The Kid produced a flashlight.
“This the window he came through, Bill?” he asked.
“This is it.”
“And the murder took place in this next room?”
“Yes. On the other side of that swinging door.”
The men moved upon silent feet. The Kid pushed open the swinging door and gazed upon the room in which the crime had been committed.
Inasmuch as Tess Copley, the sole beneficiary of the estate, did not care to occupy the house, the police had left the room just as it had been found when the crime was discovered. All that had been removed was the corpse of the victim. For the rest the furniture remained undisturbed. The shades were drawn so as to shut out any light, and The Patent Leather Kid let his flashlight flicker around the room, taking in the various details.
“There’s a guard in front, Bill?” he asked.
“Yes. A harness bull that was taken off his beat. He doesn’t take it very seriously. He’s probably dozing off right now. For some reason, the district attorney wants to keep the room just as it was so that he can show it to the jury. In order to do that, he’ll have it appear that the place was guarded by an officer who will testify he was there to see nothing was disturbed.”
The flashlight centred upon a lacquered box.
“What’s the box, Bill?”
“That’s a lock-box they found in the room. There was nothing in it. There was a file of papers by the side of it that probably were taken from the box.”
The Kid knelt by the box. It was unlocked. He lifted back the lid and stared at the interior.
“Notice the way the enamel is chipped on the inside, Bill,” he said. “That wouldn’t have been done by papers.”
He pulled the lid of the box back and looked at the metal handle.
“Notice the bulge in the top of the box,” he said. “It looks as though it had been filled with something very heavy and lifted repeatedly.”
“Gold?” asked Bill Brakey.
“Looks like it.”
“Where was the manager’s office, Bill?” asked The Kid. “Did he have one here in the building?”
“Yes, he had one way in the front.”
“Let’s take a look.”
They traversed a corridor, went through a bedroom, and came to another room in the front of the house, which had evidently been designed as a bedroom, but which had been used as an office.
“Take it easy,” whispered Bill Brakey. “The cops are right outside there on the walk.”
“The curtains aren’t down here,” The Kid observed, in a whisper. “Why would they have the shades drawn in the rest of the house and not have them drawn here?”
“Looks as though the manager had been working here,” Brakey said.
“You’ve got a plan of Stagg’s house?”
“It ain’t a house. It’s a flat.”
“Has he got the lower or upper flat?” The Kid asked.
“Upper. It’s a three-story flat. He’s on the top floor.”
“An attic above him?”
“Probably. I haven’t been in the place. I was waiting for you.”
“Okay,” The Kid said, “I’ve seen enough here. Let’s go take a look at this man Stagg. I’d like to talk with him.”
“You’re the boss,” Bill Brakey said.
The men left the place as silently as they had entered it. They slipped through the window, oozed through the darkness to the alley, followed the alley to a side street, and there picked up their car.

Bill Brakey drove to a district given over largely to small apartment houses and flats. He parked the car by the kerb.
“That’s the place over there,” he said.
“Well,” The Kid said, “there’s a light on the upper floor. That means our friend will be up.”
“Do we bust in on him?” asked Bill Brakey.
“I think,” The Kid said, “we bust in on him, tie him up and make a search. Maybe we can throw a scare into him.”
“Just what do you expect to find?” Brakey asked.
“I don’t know,” The Kid told him. “Maybe we’ll let the police find it.”
“How do you mean?”
“Go in and pull out a few drawers, mess things up a little bit, tie him up, and then notify the police. They’ll start making a search to see what we took and to see whether we left any fingerprints.”
“He’s too clever for that,” Brakey said. “If there’s anything hidden there, it’ll be hidden where the police wouldn’t find it. The police may have made a search already. They’re not so dumb.”
“Inspector Brame is,” The Kid said. “His whole idea of handling a case is to make a quick arrest and then make sure of getting a conviction. After a man is once arrested for a crime, Brame never bothers about any clues that don’t point to the guilt of that man.”
Bill Brakey opened the car door.
“Well,” he said, “we might as well... That car, watch it.”
A big sedan purred smoothly along the road and slid gently to the opposite kerb. It was a car that had been designed with plenty of power under the hood. From it a big, well-nourished man stepped to the sidewalk. For all of his size, he moved with the lithe grace of a panther.
“’Pug’ Morrison, the prize-fighter who turned gangster,” Bill Brakey said in an undertone. “What the hell is he doing here?”
“Perhaps,” said The Kid, “he’s looking around the same way we are.”
“When that guy looks around,” Bill Brakey said, “he’s looking around on a hot scent.”
“Uses his noodle, does he?” asked The Kid.
“He uses his muscle,” Brakey said. “That bird is one of those cheerful guys that always wants to give the other fellow his cut provided his cut isn’t more than one and a half per cent. Pug figures that around ninety-eight or ninety-nine per cent is his fair share of the take.”
“Well,” The Kid said, “he’s going up.”
“Hell,” Brakey ejaculated, “going up! He’s ringing the bell.”
The door of the flat opened and the broad-shouldered form of Pug Morrison moved through the lighted oblong.
Bill Brakey slid out from behind the steering wheel. The Kid got to the ground on the other side. They had no need for words. They crossed the street with swift steps. Bill Brakey had his skeleton keys in his right hand while they were still six feet from the door. It took him less than ten seconds to find the right key and shoot back the spring latch. A long flight of stairs loomed before them-stairs which were broken by one landing.
Men’s voices were audible when they were still a dozen steps from the top. The voices came from the left, and sounded only as an undertone of booming sound, interspersed at intervals by a voice that was higher in pitch, less in volume, and which spoke with nervous rapidity.
A dimly lighted reception hall was at the front of the stairs. A door opened from it to what was evidently a corridor. The door on the left was closed. From under it shone a ribbon of bright light. Evidently the conference was taking place in a front room on the left hand side.
Once more the men exchanged glances. The Patent Leather Kid adjusted the distinctive black mask of patent leather from which he had derived his name. His shoes were of patent leather. His gloves were also black.
Bill Brakey wore no gloves. At times such as these, he needed to have his swift hands, with their long, delicate fingers, where they could whip guns from the shoulder holsters without the faintest suggestion of a fumble. It was an unspoken law between them that The Kid touched those things upon which fingerprints might be left; that Bill Brakey’s hands remained free to reach for and use weapons.
The Kid crossed the reception hall, twisted the knob on the door, disclosing the long corridor which stretched the length of the flat. He picked the first door on the left, twisted the knob, and entered a bedroom. He brought his flashlight into play, slid quietly across the bedroom to a bathroom which opened to his left, entered the bathroom, and crossed to a small dressing room. On the other side of this dressing room was a door through which came the mumble of voices.
The Kid worked with swift efficiency. He gripped the knob tightly with his gloved right hand, pulled the door as tightly against the jamb as he could force it, and then twisted the knob, moving it so slowly as to make the motion all but imperceptible. When the latch cleared its seat in the jamb, there was no faintest suggestion of a click. Slowly, The Kid pushed the door open-an inch,--two inches.

IV - A Playmate for The Kid

They listened to the mumbling noise of the conversation, conversation which became audible as the door opened. At the slightest break in the rhythmic flow of that conversation, The Kid would have flung the door open and crouched. Bill Brakey, a gun in either hand, would have stood in the doorway, commanding the situation.
But there was no break. The door was in a dark corner of the room; the illumination came from floor lamps. The men who occupied the room were far too engrossed in what they were saying to pay attention to the shadows of the room.
“...kidnapping is a serious business,” said the deep, booming voice of Pug Morrison. “I don’t go in for it.”
“You go in for making money, don’t you?” asked the higher-pitched, nervous voice of Walter Stagg.
“Sure I do, but I don’t go in for death penalties and life sentences.”
“Oh, bosh and nonsense,” Stagg said. “You go in for murder.”
“Who says so?” asked Morrison, with sudden menace in his voice.
“Don’t take offence,” Stagg said, “I’m telling you what everyone says. I’m not talking about any specific killing. I’m talking about the reputation you’ve got. Remember, I’m not trying to frame you with anything. I’m in this thing just as deep as you are.”
Pug Morrison laughed.
“The idea,” he said, “of a guy like you trying to frame me! I could tell you what’s on your mind right now. You’ve been manager for Mrs Morelay. She was murdered. It looks like a dead open and shut case against this guy Higgins, but I’m not so certain that you ain’t mixed up in it now. You’ve been handling all the gravy for the old woman and, now that she’s croaked there’s going to be an administrator appointed and you’ve got to make accounting. There’s probably a will some place that you’re holding out. It provides that the niece takes all the property, unless she should die first; and then it all goes to you. Something like that. Therefore, you want us to snatch the kid and bump her off. You’ll come into the big coin. You’d better get your cards on the table, buddy. If you’re playing around with the big coin, we want to know it. You can’t hold out on us anyway. We’d keep coming back and shaking you down from time to time until we got a fair split, so you’d better give us a break.”
Stagg’s voice lost much of its assurance, but maintained its nervous, almost hysterical, rapidity of articulation.
“Now, look here,” he said, “you know as well as I do, that if it’s just a matter of getting somebody bumped off, I can find lots of people who are willing to do it for a thousand dollars.”
Pug Morrison laughed, a laugh that contained no mirth, but plenty of scorn.
“Sucker,” he said. “You’d pay a grand to have a bump-off and you’d get bled white for the rest of your life. You deal with me and you’re going to pay and you’re going to pay plenty. But if you’re on the square, you’re going to pay once and that’s going to be all. You know that, and you know I can’t afford to get mixed into this thing any more than you can, so you figure we’re going to shoot square with each other. Now, go ahead and give me the lowdown.”
“Well,” Stagg said, “there was some cash in the estate. Not liquid cash, you understand, but cash in the bank. It’s stuff that I can’t touch without a court order, see?”
“No, I don’t see,” Pug told him. “Cash in the bank doesn’t mean anything to me. It’s cash in my right fist that talks music.”
“That’s just the point,” Stagg went on hurriedly. “I’ve got that kind of cash, too.”
“Oh, you have, have you?”
“That is, I know where I can put my hand on it.”
“Go ahead,” the gangster said, “and get to the point.”
“I figured that you could snatch this girl and make a demand on the estate for seventy thousand dollars’ ransom.”
Morrison’s tone showed sudden interest.
“Why seventy grand?” he asked.
“Because,” Stagg told him, “that’s the amount I could raise, and that’s about the amount on deposit in the bank.”
“Go ahead,” Morrison said, with a voice that had lost much of its mocking scorn, and was almost respectful.
“The snatching job,” Stagg said, “wouldn’t look like it was done by any professional gang, but it would look like it was done by a bunch of amateurs. You’d make it look that way in your ransom notes.”
“That’s old stuff,” Pug Morrison said. “That doesn’t fool anybody. All regular snatchers try to make their stuff look like the work of cranks and amateurs.”
“But, this would be different,” Stagg went on. “You’d be snatching a woman that you couldn’t get any money out of. In other words, you’d make a demand for seventy thousand dollars, the amount of money that Fannie Morelay left in the bank. Then, no matter how badly any executor of the estate wanted to pay it, he couldn’t pay it under the law. The girl would have the money coming to her, but only after the estate had gone through probate. So you’d really have snatched a girl who didn’t have any money or any opportunity of getting any immediate cash. There wouldn’t he any relative who could pay. The newspapers would play it up big. It would be the work of blundering amateurs.”
“Go ahead,” Morrison said. “Maybe you’ve got something in your bean after all.”
“Then, of course, having snatched the girl and not being able to get any money, you’d murder her. That would account for a motive. If I had the girl killed without having some other motive for the murder, someone might start suspecting me. It would look as though I might be in a position to profit by the killing.”
“I see,” Morrison said, musingly.
“Now, you get your letters ready. You take the girl. You get seventy thousand dollars, and you kill the girl.”
“Listen,” Morrison said, thoughtfully, “how do we know we ain’t going to double-cross one another?”
“You can’t double-cross me,” Stagg said, “because I’ve thought it all out in advance. I’m not going to double-cross you, but I’m going to show you how you can keep me from giving you anything that looks like a double-cross.”
“Go ahead,” Morrison said, “show me. I’m listening.”
“You take the girl,” Stagg said. “And when you take the girl, you take seventy thousand dollars at the same time. And at the same time you take the money, you deliver the letters demanding payment of a ransom.”
“You mean we get the cash at the same time we make the snatch?” asked the gangster.
“That’s right.”
“Well,” Morrison said, slowly, “that’s jake with me, but how about you. You said you’d done some figuring on your own account. Let’s have it.”
“I’m figuring this way,” Stagg said. “It’s got to be a genuine snatch. Therefore, as soon as you make the demand, you’re in the kidnapping racket. You don’t dare to turn the girl loose then because she could identify your men and you’d be on the dodge. You’ve got to kill her once she finds out what she’s up against.”
“How are we going to work this?” Morrison asked.
“I’m going to tell you where you can contact with the girl. She’s going to hire a detective.”
“The hell she is!” Morrison exclaimed.
“Yes, she’s going to go to the Victoria Hotel and register as Ethel Mason. She has an appointment for a detective to meet her there at eleven thirty tonight.”
“So what?” asked Morrison.
“So,” Stagg said, “you go there about an hour earlier-about ten thirty. The girl will be there. You tell her that you’re the detective, that you got rid of the case you were working on earlier than you had expected. And that you’re there to talk with her. She’s going to tell you some stuff about the killing of her aunt. She’s a little bit suspicious about it. You tell her you want to see the premises. You get her in your car and drive her out to the Morelay house. But don’t stop. Tell her you’re going on past. There’s a drug store about two blocks down the street. Tell her you’ve seen as much of the house as you want from the outside. Stop in front of the drug store and tell her that you want to see specimens of her aunt’s signature; that it’s important that you see them; that you would like to see some cancelled cheques.”
“Go on,” Morrison said.
“The only way she can get those is by telephoning me,” Stagg said. “She’ll telephone me and ask me to send her some cheques and documents that are specimens of her aunt’s signature. She’ll make some sort of an excuse. I’ll put seventy thousand dollars in currency in a black bag and send it by a messenger the girl knows. I’ll try and use a girl friend of hers. You take the bag, open it, look in it, find that there’s seventy thousand bucks there, and then give the messenger a note to open after she’s gone five blocks from the place. That note will be a demand for ransom.
“You get out of the car when you accept the bag, and you have a mask on your face. Do you get the sketch? If you aren’t wearing the mask, you don’t get the bag with the seventy grand. If you are wearing the mask and make the demand for ransom, you get the bag.
“The newspapers make a big hullabaloo about it, and then some wise guy finds out that the money couldn’t be paid, no matter how badly Tess Copley might want it paid. The snatching is branded as the work of amateurs. The newspapers give you the horse-laugh. You retaliate by bumping the kid off and dumping the body by the side of the road somewhere. That’s all there is to it.”
There was a moment of silence.
Pug Morrison’s voice was low and thoughtful.
“Buddy,” he said, “you’ve got a brain on your shoulders. We need you in our gang. You’ve got something that we need.”
“You can’t get it,” Stagg rasped. “I’m a business man. I’ve got affairs of my own to consider.”
The gangster’s voice was once more filled with respect.
“You made out a fake set of books,” he said. “You’d been waiting for an opportunity to substitute them. You heard the old woman telephoning for the cops when the guy got in the kitchen. You recognised that as your opportunity. You waited until the bird sneaked out of the window, and then you stuck the fake books in front of the woman, slammed the hatchet in her head, ducked out, and tried to make a getaway. But the cops came around the corner just as you were getting to your machine. So you pretended you were getting out of your automobile instead of getting in, and started up to the house as though nothing had happened.”
“Suppose I did,” said Stagg, “what of it?”
“Nothing,” said Morrison, “except that you used your noodle to make maybe a couple of million dollars for yourself, to say nothing of covering up any little shortages that might exist in your affairs.”
“What makes you think there are shortages?” asked Stagg.
Pug Morrison’s laugh was ironical.
“Seventy thousand bucks,” he said, slowly, “seventy thousand bucks that you can ‘put your hands on’. And don’t bother about all that elaborate program, because you ain’t going to cross me-not with a murder rap I can pin on you.
“You just send out the jane with the bag. Have seventy grand in the bag unless you want to go to the chair. We’ll make the snatch. You kick through with your end.”
The Patent Leather Kid turned to Bill Brakey, and nodded his head.
Brakey turned and tiptoed across the floor of the bathroom. The Patent Leather Kid was at his heels. As noiselessly as two shadows, they slipped to the back of the house, found a back door, opened it and flitted like silent shadows downstairs to a back yard which opened on an alley.
Pug Morrison was driving away as the pair reached the cross street.
“What a sweet little playmate that guy is!” Bill Brakey said.
“Playmate is right,” The Patent Leather Kid told him, “because we’re going to play with him.”

V - According to Schedule

Pug Morrison was too smart to make the contact himself. The Patent Leather Kid, lounging in the lobby of the Victoria Hotel, had left word with the telephone operator that he was to be signalled when a call was put through to the room of “Ethel Mason”. The flash of a detective’s badge and a five-dollar tip had been all that was necessary to secure her cooperation.
When The Kid got the signal, he carefully studied the man who was at the telephone desk over which appeared the sign, “TELEPHONES TO GUESTS’ ROOMS”.
The man was very smooth-shaven. His hands were well manicured. His clothes bore the stamp of expensive workmanship. His shoes fitted like gloves. There was an assurance about the manner in which he held his head, a quick restlessness about his hands that was reminiscent of Bill Brakey’s long, tapering hands.
The man hung up the telephone, moved with quick, nervous steps to the elevator, and was whisked up.
The Patent Leather Kid smoked in contemplative silence.
Twenty minutes elapsed before the man returned. This time there was a young woman at his side. She was wrapped in a heavy cloth coat with a wide fur collar. She wore a light-fitting black hat trimmed with white. Her eyes were large and black. Her lips had been carefully applied so that they were quite crimson. The Kid could not see too much of her figure because of the heavy coat, but he gathered that she was slim-waisted, and she carried her head with a little tilt to one side which indicated something of the vibrant individuality which seemed to radiate from her.
The Kid got to his feet, stretched, yawned, tossed away the end of his cigarette and nodded to Bill Brakey, who was standing near the door.
The man and the young woman left the hotel, went directly to a shining closed car which was drawn up in front of the kerb. Bill Brakey, getting The Kid’s signal, had placed himself in a position of vantage, where he could see the interior of the car. The Kid, standing in the doorway of the hotel, stretched and yawned, as though debating just how to spend the evening.
There was a moment while introductions were performed, and The Kid knew from the introductions that there was only one other man in the car. That man, of course, would be Pug Morrison himself. Morrison wouldn’t make a contact in a public hotel with a young woman who was subsequently to be murdered. On the other hand, he would not delegate the receipt of seventy thousand dollars in cash money to any of his subordinates.
The young woman entered the car. The door slammed. The car purred away, Tess Copley occupying the front seat with the driver, who, The Kid surmised, would be Pug Morrison. The contact man occupied the rear of the car.
The car purred into smooth motion and rounded the corner. The Patent Leather Kid nodded to Bill Brakey. Bill Brakey moved over to the place where The Kid’s high-powered machine was parked against the kerb. He slid in behind the wheel and had the motor started by the time The Kid jumped into the seat and said, “Step on it, Bill. I think they’re going to the Morelay house, but there’s no use taking chances. We’ll keep them in sight until we make sure that’s the way they’re heading.”
They swung around the corner. Bill Brakey snapped the car into high gear. They accelerated into swift speed, and within three blocks picked up the tail light of the big sedan.
“Okay,” The Kid said. “Let’s drop behind now.”
They followed for four blocks, and then The Kid nodded.
“They’re headed for the Morelay place. We can cut through on the side streets and get there a little before they do.”
The Kid sat back against the cushions while Bill Brakey piloted the car with deft skill. They passed the location of the grim tragedy where Mrs Morelay had been done to death, swung up a side street, and parked the car.
The Patent Leather Kid got out.
“Let’s look it over, Bill,” he said.
They moved as silently as shadows down the side street to the corner, waited until they heard the sound of a car, them peered out at the headlights that showed first as two gleaming eyes of white fire, then purred past, giving them a glimpse of the big sedan as it slid smoothly to a halt, exactly as Walter Stagg had planned.
The big sedan waited, the motor running. After a few minutes, the motor was shut off. A woman crossed to the drug store and returned.
The Kid nodded to Bill Brakey.
“Looks,” he said, “as though it’s going through according to schedule.”
A man emerged from the car as automobile headlights came in sight down the street. The man paused to adjust a mask about the upper part of his face. From the interior of the big sedan came the sound of a woman’s scream, a scream that was promptly suppressed.
The masked man moved to the rear of the car, flung a cloth over the rear licence plate. The man in the driver’s neat started the car. The purring sound of the running motor was audible to the waiting pair.
“Better start our car, Bill,” The Patent Leather Kid said.
Bill Brakey started the powerful motor, settled down behind the steering wheel, opened the door opposite him so that The Kid could jump in without the loss of a moment.
The headlights of the other car showed more plainly, then a taxicab rattled past. A girl sat in the rear of the cab. The cab slid to a stop by the side of the big sedan. The cab driver picked up a small suitcase from the floorboards, started to step from the cab. The young woman was fumbling with the door catch.
The masked man stepped forward, so that the headlights of the taxicab showed not only his mask, but the blued-steel
of the automatic which he held in his right hand. There was the sound of a scream from the girl. The taxicab driver slowly elevated his hands. The bag dropped to the street. The masked man shoved an envelope in through the partially opened window of the taxicab, motioned with his gun. The cab driver slid back to his place behind the wheel. The cab rattled into slow motion. The masked figure raised his gun and fired twice, deliberately shooting out both front and rear tyre on the right hand side. Then he scooped up the bag, turned and ran to the sedan. The sedan almost instantly glided into swift motion.
The Patent Leather Kid raised his arm in a beckoning gesture and gave a shrill whistle. Instantly, Bill Brakey shot the powerful car into motion. It slid to a stop beside The Kid. The Kid climbed the running board on the side near the wheel.
“It’s going to be a gun fight, Bill,” he said. “I’ll take the wheel.”
Bill Brakey slid over to the other seat and snapped the door closed. The Patent Leather Kid adjusted himself behind the wheel. His patent leather shoe pressed down on the throttle. The car shot ahead.
As The Kid sent the car into a turn at the corner, he snapped the band of the black patent leather mask about his forehead, adjusted the mask so that his eyes fitted the eye-holes. The car was continually accelerating its speed.
They passed the crippled taxicab and, as they passed, The Kid snapped the gearshift into the overdrive. His car swept ahead with the grace of a seagull swooping down to skim the surface of ocean waves. The big sedan rounded a corner. The Kid swung wide, skidded his car into a turn, stepped on the throttle.
“They know we’re on their tail, Bill,” he said. “They’re going to run for it.”
The sedan swung wide, swayed far over on two wheels as it took a corner. The Kid, grinning, swung his car at the same corner, keeping all four screaming wheels on the pavement. Bill Brakey slipped a heavy calibre gun from its shoulder holster, nestled it in his right hand.
“Don’t shoot until they do,” The Kid told him, shifting gears us he spoke.
The cars roared down a paved side street devoid of traffic, travelling at a mad pace. The Kid’s car gained.
The driver of the sedan tried one more turn, not realising that The Kid’s low-hung car was far less top-heavy. The driver lost control of the sedan. It ran on two wheels, came back to four wheels with a terrific jolt which swayed the big body on its springs.
A hand knocked out the rear window. A gun spatted viciously. A bullet struck the side of the windshield support on The Kid’s car and ricocheted off into the night. 
“Try for the driver, Bill,” said The Patent Leather Kid calmly, and swung his car wide so that Bill Brakey would have a clear shot around the side of the windshield.
Brakey’s gun crashed twice. The dark hulk of the driver’s body jerked and swayed. The big sedan screamed into a skid, whipped entirely around, crashed against a kerb, hung balanced for a moment, and then toppled to its side with a roar of breaking glass and the sound of grinding steel.
Bill Brakey flung open the door of the car, jumped to the ground. The Patent Leather Kid was out from behind the wheel and on the ground ahead of him. Together, they raced towards the big sedan.
“Look out!” yelled The Kid suddenly. “They’ve got a cover-car!”
Headlights came into view as a car skidded around the corner.
“Quick!” shouted The Patent Leather Kid. “I’ll get the girl and the bag. You hold the car.”
Hill Brakey dropped behind a fire hydrant. His gun crashed once. The headlights of the approaching car wobbled. The car screamed as the driver applied brakes and skidded in close to the kerb. Little flashes of gunfire spurted into the night. The Patent Leather Kid tugged at the jammed door of the sedan, finally wrenched it open.
A young woman stared at him from wide black eyes. As she caught sight of the black mask which covered the upper half of The Patent Leather Kid’s face, she screamed.
“It’s all right, Miss Copley,” The Kid said. “I came to get you.”
He leaned forward and pulled her through the doorway.
Pug Morrison was lying unconscious, his head badly gashed. The man who had been in the rear seat was making futile motions, clawing with his fingers at the upholstery on the back of the seat.
“Your friends will be here in a minute, buddy,” The Kid said. “In the meantime, fork over that bag. Walter Stagg said we’d find seventy grand in it.”
He caught sight of the bag, lurched towards it, and then grinned at the girl.
“We’ve got to make a run for it,” he said. “There’s a battle going on.”
The street echoed and re-echoed to the sound of shots. Men had jumped out of the cover-car, taken refuge behind such protection as they could find and were directing a cross-fire at Bill Brakey.
The Kid sprinted to the car. Someone shot at the pair, but the bullets were wide of the mark. The Kid flung the girl into the seat.
“Bend over low,” he said.
He jumped in behind the wheel and tooted the horn, signal to Bill Brakey.
Bill Brakey suddenly stood erect. His guns roared in a pealing crescendo of rapid fire, a fire of such scathing accuracy that it drove his enemies to cover, and in the moment when they were ducking to cover, Bill Brakey sprinted for the car.
The Kid had it in second gear. The car gave a terrific lurch and then snarled into speed.
Behind them came a burst of fire. The bullet-proof body in the rear of the car deflected half a dozen bullets that thudded into the steel.
“They’ll try the gasoline tank and the tyres,” Bill Brakey said, slipping a fresh clip of cartridges into his gun. “I’ll give them something to keep their minds occupied.”
He fired four or five well-directed shots, then slid in beside the girl.
“Here they come,” he said.
“We’ll make a run for it,” The Kid told him. The car by this time was in high gear. The Kid waited until it was going fifty-five miles an hour before he flung in the overdrive. The car swept into instant response, screaming down the pavement at better than sixty miles an hour, a sixty which soon became seventy, eighty-five. The speedometer needle quivered around ninety miles an hour.
A car came out of a side street.
There was a moment of tense silence, but The Kid swung his car in a deft skidding turn, so that he swept past the obstructing car, the driver of which had lost his head and left the car in such a position that it blocked the intersection.
The pursuing car tried a similar swerving turn. The driver was not skilled enough. The car went out of control, swung completely around in a circle, and then crashed into an ornamental lamp post.
“Okay, Kid,” said Bill Brakey, “slow down and let’s introduce ourselves to Miss Copley.”

VI - A $70,000 Coupon

Walter Stagg was nervously pacing the floor, cracking the knuckles of his right hand against the extended palm of his left hand. From time to time he glanced nervously at the clock on the wall.
The doorbell rang. Stagg did not wait to work the electric buzzer, but dashed madly down the stairs to open the door. A white-faced young woman staggered in through the opening and handed him an envelope.
“Tess!” she screamed. “She’s been kidnapped!” Walter Stagg ripped open the envelope with trembling fingers and stared at the demand for ransom.
“What happened?” he asked. “Tell me about it.”
“I took the papers out in a cab,” the young woman said. “A man was waiting. He had a mask. He drew a gun on us and took the papers. Then he gave us this demand and told us we’d never see Tess alive again unless we did just as we were instructed.”
Walter Stagg heaved a great sigh of relief. “Take this to the police at once,” he said.
“But they were going to kill her if we went to the police.”
“Don’t be a fool!” he said. “We’ve got no money. The money is all tied up in the estate. We couldn’t pay any ransom. We’ve got to go to the police. Did you get a description of the man?”
“He was masked,” she said. “He was a big man with a black suit-I saw that much.”
“Take this letter,” Walter Stagg said, “and go to the police.”
She hesitated a moment, looking at him in white-faced anguish.
“Tess was with them,” she said, “in the car-and-“
“Go to the police,” Walter Stagg told her, “otherwise you’ll be compounding a felony. It’s up to the police to handle the case. We can give publicity to it. The newspaper can feature the fact that none of the money can be paid out except on an order of the court, and a court can’t order moneys paid from an estate.”
The girl took the envelope, turned and ran to a taxicab which was waiting with the motor running. Walter Stagg stood in the doorway for a moment, watching her, then slammed and bolted the door. He walked back up two flights of stairs, and a smile of serene satisfaction twisted his lips.
He entered the living room on the front of the flat, turned and locked the door behind him, then suddenly gave a convulsive start.
A man was stooping over the wall safe, and, as Stagg looked, the lock clicked and the man pulled the door of the safe open.
Walter Stagg’s hand shot to his hip. The gun at which he tugged caught for a moment in the lining of his hip pocket. Then, as he freed it, he became conscious of another figure which was seated comfortably in one of the overstuffed chairs, holding a blued-steel gun levelled steadily at him.
“Better drop it,” said the voice of Bill Brakey.

The Patent Leather Kid did not even look up as Walter Stagg’s hands shot into the air and the gun slipped from his nerveless fingers and thudded to the floor.
The Patent Leather Kid pulled out some papers, looked through them and chuckled.
“Here’s the will, Bill,” he said. “Stagg was suppressing it.”
“Who the devil are you?” screamed Stagg.
The Patent Leather Kid looked up. His enigmatical eyes glittered through the eye-holes in the patent leather mask.
“They sometimes call me,” he said, “The Patent Leather Kid.”
He turned back to the safe.
“Good heavens!” he said, “here are the original books! The damn fool hadn’t destroyed them as yet.”
Stagg took two quick steps forward, stopped only when he heard Bill Brakey’s voice, low with ominous menace.
“One more step,” said Brakey, “and I’ll shoot your legs out from under you.”
Stagg stopped, his face working with fury.
“Damn you!” he said. “You’ll pay for this-both of you! The police will have you for this. The Patent Leather Kid, huh? Well, this once they’ve got you where they want you.”
“I neglected to tell you,” said The Patent Leather Kid calmly, “that as soon as Pug Morrison had delivered the ransom note to the taxi driver, we rescued the girl and, incidentally, picked up the seventy thousand dollars. I inadvertently dropped a remark which makes him think we were working for you.”
There was a moment of silence while the full force of The Kid’s words struck home to Stagg.
“Think you’re working for me?” he screamed.
“Yes,” The Kid said, “he sort of thought you had double-crossed him. What makes it bad is that there was a cover-car following along behind. It had some of Morrison’s men in it. He didn’t trust you all the way. I’m afraid there’ll be trouble.”
Stagg’s upstretched hands slowly dropped. There was not enough strength in his arms to hold them up.
“Good God!” he exclaimed. “You...”
Bill Brakey nodded towards the door.
“We got you into it,” he said. “We’ll give you a chance to get out. You can beat it if you want to.”
“But it’s a death sentence,” Stagg said. “They’ll gun me out. They’ll...”
“Better get started,” Bill Brakey told him.
Stagg turned, ran to the door, struggled with the lock with futile, nerveless fingers which simply wouldn’t coordinate. Bill Brakey opened the door for him, saw him into the corridor, listened to the wild beat of his steps as Stagg dashed down the staircase and wrenched open the front door. A moment later he heard the ker-flop, ker-flop., ker-flop, ker-flop of his running steps on the cement sidewalk.

Bill Pope, the explorer, regarded Inspector Brame with twinkling eyes.
“At least, inspector,” he said, “you’ve got to admit that The Patent Leather Kid did a good job this time.”
Inspector Brame’s face slowly flushed to a dark shade that was almost a purple.
“The damned outlaw!” he said. “He wounded one man and almost killed another in one car, and killed a gangster outright in another. He had bullets flying around the street like hail. It was the most lawless demonstration of gangster warfare that has ever been staged in the city.”
Bill Pope chuckled.
“Nevertheless,” he said, “the public has got a great kick out of it.”
“It was murder, just the same,” Inspector Brame said, “and when we get him, we’ll-“
“Oh, no, it wasn’t murder,” Bill Pope said. “You forget that the girl testifies she was being kidnapped; that there’s a letter to prove her claims. Also, a girl friend who is a witness. All The Patent Leather Kid did was to rescue the girl from the hands of her kidnappers.”
“The police don’t need to accept help at the hands of a crook,” Inspector Brame said, with dignity.
“Where were the police at the time, inspector?”
“That’s neither here nor there,” Inspector Brame stormed.
“Neither were the police,” chuckled the explorer.
Renfroe, the banker, clucked his tongue sympathetically against the roof of his mouth.
“I quite agree with you, inspector. It’s a pretty pass when crooks have to come to the rescue of people who are being kidnapped. It’s an insult to the police efficiency.”
Dan Seller yawned, stifled the yawn with four polite forefingers and spoke suavely.
“Wasn’t there another murder, inspector?” he asked. “Seems to me I heard something about it over the radio.”
“Walter Stagg,” said Inspector Brame grimly. “He was shot down by machine guns. Someone took him for a ride.”
“Rather looks as though he’d been mixed up with the gangsters, doesn’t it?” asked the explorer.
“Yes,” Inspector Brame said, “we’ve got plenty on Walter Stagg. It’s too bad they killed him. We could have sent him to the chair.”
“What for?” asked Renfroe.
“For the murder of Mrs Morelay.”
“But I thought you said some tramp killed her.”
“That,” Inspector Brame said, “was merely a stall we were making in order to trap the real criminal. When we went to Walter Stagg’s flat, we found unmistakable evidence that he had doctored certain books of account and had prepared a duplicate set ready to be substituted at the proper moment. He found his opportunity when Mrs Morelay telephoned the police that a tramp was in her kitchen. He split her head open with a hatchet, substituted the duplicated book of accounts, and took the real one with him.”
“You have evidence of that?” asked Dan Seller, almost moodily.
“I’ll say we have. We searched his apartment and found the original books. They still had blood stains on them, and what’s more, we found Mrs Morelay’s fingerprints all over them, showing that those were the books she had been examining at the time she was killed.”
Dan Seller once more stifled a yawn.
“All this talk of shooting and violence,” he said, “bores me dreadfully.”
Inspector Brame snorted.
“That’s the worst of you young coupon-clippers,” he said, “you live a life of idle ease and luxury, and don’t know anything at all about what goes on out on the firing line. You should have the job I have for a while-only you wouldn’t last forty-eight hours. You wouldn’t have the faintest idea about how to go after a crook.”
Dan Seller nodded placid agreement.
“Doubtless you’re right, old top,” he said, “every man to his trade, you know.”
Inspector Brame’s grunted comment was inaudible, but Bill Pope, the explorer, surveyed Dan Seller with watchful, appraising eyes, in which there was just the suggestion of a twinkle.
“You look tired, Seller,” he said, “as though you had been through something of a strain.”
Dan Seller nodded.
“Yes,” he said, “I clipped a coupon-a seventy-thousand-dollar coupon.”
Renfroe, the banker, stared with wide eyes.
“What kind of a coupon would that be?” he asked.
“Oh, kind of a grab bag affair,” said Dan Seller, casually.
Bill Pope, the explorer, was suddenly seized with a fit of coughing.