The Affair of the Bottled Deuce. Harry Stephen Keeler
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Название: The Affair of the Bottled Deuce
Автор: Harry Stephen Keeler
Издательство: Ingram
Жанр: Юмористическая фантастика
isbn: 9781479436644
isbn:
“I think it isn’t. Oh, I know, Butterball, you’re the famous 1-second observer—and that you’ve been in here all this time and haven’t made such observation as I, and—”
“Listen, Lousy,” said Butterball, with some acerbity, “if that hand is hanging any lighter than it should hang—listen, what the hell do you mean, anyway?—why should it hang down for any reason other than that’s what it’s supposed to? Its weight? A—”
“Plus the gun!”
“Plus the gun, yeah. Well, if it isn’t hanging as heavy as it could—might hang, I—I give you this case—I mean, I appoint you as source of observation around here, and—”
“Will you add superintendent of operations, too?”
“Hell, yes! I have reason in that respect for wishing you were. Because—well, because the less I have to do in this case from now, or a few hours from now, the more—”
“All right, Butterball. I’ll check. By lifting the arm a tiny bit—”
“Don’t tell me,” grimaced Butterball, “you can tell how much a dead arm—should weigh?”
“I can’t tell you what I can tell you. I don’t even exactly know myself. I—”
Lou strode forward. Lifted the pendant arm lightly, so as not to dislodge the gun in its hand. But shook his head as he did. For though reasonably heavy, the crook in the elbow wasn’t as straight as it seemingly should have been.
Now he let the arm down, and lifted just the hand itself. Perhaps an eighth of an inch or so, no more. Again shook his head. Now he reached about in his back pocket. Withdrew his white silk handkerchief. Shook it open. And with it detached the gun gently from the hanging hand. Opening his eyes wide as he did so, so light, so amazingly weightless was that gun.
He stood erect with it. Using the handkerchief to keep his fingerprints off it, he pressed its two ends in such a way as to put stress across its middle. The “gun” broke squarely, easily, into two halves, Revealing it wasn’t metal, wasn’t wood. Wasn’t anything—but black wax!
“See what I mean, Butterball?” he said quietly. “Black wax!”
Butterball could only stare with open eyes and open mouth.
“Ever heard, Butterball,” said Lou kindly, “of a man killing himself with a wax gun? Butterball, this is a staged ‘suicide’—not a genuine one. It’s staged. For what reason, I can’t remotely guess. But it’s staged. It’s—”
“Meaning—meaning,” said Butterball, “that it’s—”
“Meaning,” pointed out Lou calmly, “that you will now have to go out—or downstairs to Mr. Marchesi’s—and call the particular squad from the Detective Bureau that covers the specific thing this is. And which is Homicide, Butterball. Yeah, Homicide, commencing with H as in—in Hah-Hah!”
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