5 Detective Novels Magazine — page 104: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

104 quarter of a mile— Huh? No, I didn’t drive out from town; I walked. He wasn’t run down by acar, anyway. He— No, I don’t know who he is. Never saw him before. His throat— Huh? Sure, I'll wait here— No, I’m not going to leave town. I’ll ride back to town with you and make a complete statement.” I hung up. “You look kind of pale, Tommy,” Reeder said. “Have a glass of wine. Come on in the living room and I’ll have one with you. You, too, Jeff.” “Maybe I better stroll down the road and see who the dead man is,” Pogue said. “If he’s from around here, [’ll know him.” Reeder shook his head. “Sheriff’s started already, and he drives fast. He’ll be there before you could walk that far.” He went into the neatly furnished living room and took a decanter and glasses from the sideboard. I looked around. It was always difficult to be- lieve, in Reeder’s house, that he was a bachelor. He had a woman’s touch with furnishings and decoration. And neat- ness far surpassing that of the average housewife. He handed us glasses and lifted his own. “To—” He hesitated. “To the soul of the poor man back in the road.” It was an unexpected toast. Reeder looked a bit embarrassed at having given it. But we drank. “You started to say something about his throat,” Jeff Pogue said. “Was it cut? Was he murdered, I mean?” “It was a violent death. His throat was torn as by an animal. But—” “But what?” Pogue wanted to know. An animal or a human devil, I’d been thinking. A homicidal maniac, possibly. At any rate, if the thing I had seen in the cornfield had been the killer, then it hadn’t been an animal. “T didn’t examine the wound closely,” I hedged. “Let the boy alone,” Reeder told Pogue. “He’s jumpy now, and Ed is going to turn him inside out when he gets here. Uh— Tommy, Magnus never did like you, did he?” “It was mutual,” I told him. “Don’t let him get you down. Tommy. FIVE DETECTIVE NOVELS MAGAZINE His bark’s worse than his bite.” “His bark’s bad enough,” I said. should be peeled off him in strips.” “An animal,” Pogue said thought- fully. “Only a wolf or a dog kills that way. There aren’t any wolves around here. Nor any killer dogs.” “That police dog of your brother’s,” 66 It suggested Reeder. “He—’ : “No, not Emperor. He’s a_ good watch-dog, but not vicious. And he’s trained not to go off Karl’s place. You couldn’t tempt him off.” Reeder turned to me. “Back in Haverton to stay, Tommy ?” “Here on business,” I told him. “To see you, aS a matter of fact. I was on my way out here when— Listen, if you don’t mind, I’d rather wait until this other business is over with before I talk to you about it. Magnus’ll be here any minute and I’d just get started by the time he came. And he’ll probably want me to go back with him to make a state- ment—if I know Magnus.” “Okay, Tommy. I’ll be home any time you want to come out again, tomorrow or the next day. Stay for a meal with us, if you'll take pot luck. Find any changes in Haverton?” WE WERE on our second glass of wine when the car stopped out front. Magnus had brought his deputy, Tip Overholt, with him. He came in, when Reeder opened the door, like a bull charging into a china shop. He talked and acted like a bull. So help me, he even snorted once in a while; you wouldn’t have been surprised to see him paw the ground and charge. He went right past Reeder without even speaking to him, and stared at me, _“What’s he gag, Lederer?” “Gag?” I said. “Didn’t you find it? He was lying half in the road. You couldn’t miss seeing him, driving by.” “Come on—you show us. Wait! Want to ask you a few questions first. What you doing in Haverton?” No, Ed Magnus hadn’t changed a bit. He still had those little red-rimmed pig eyes, and if he took off his hat, he’d still have that short-cut, bristly carrot hair. Broad shoulders, too, and arms like a gorilla’s. “Here on business,” I told him. MICLOOOLK (C(O) (C