in the nod he gave the three men.
The dark man, leaving the other side of the sedan, went toward the house. The fat man hurried to walk beside him.
A man came out of the house before they reached it. He was a middle-aged giant in baggy, worn clothes. His hair was gray, his eyes small, and he chewed gum. He said, “Howdy, Fern,” to the fat man and, looking steadily at the dark man, stood in the path confronting them squarely.
Fern said, “Hello, Nick,” and then told the dark man: “This is Sheriff Petersen.” He narrowed one eye shrewdly and addressed the sheriff again: “He came up to see Wynant.”
Sheriff Nick Petersen stopped chewing. “What’s the name?” he asked.
The dark man said: “John Guild.”
The sheriff said: “So. Now what were you wanting to see Wynant about?”
The man who had said his name was John Guild smiled. “Does it make any difference now he’s dead?”
The sheriff asked, “What?” with considerable force.
“Now that he’s dead,” Guild repeated patiently. He put a fresh cigarette between his lips.
“How do you know he’s dead?” The sheriff emphasized “you.”
Guild looked with curious blue eyes at the giant. “They told me in the village,” he said carelessly. He moved his cigarette an inch to indicate the fat man. “He told me.”
The sheriff frowned sceptically, but when he spoke it was to utter a vague “Oh.” He chewed his gum. “Well, what was it you were wanting to see him about?”
Guild said: “Look here: is he dead or isn’t he?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Fine,” Guild said, his eyes lighting up. “Where is he?”
“I’d like to know,” the sheriff replied gloomily. “Now what is it you want with him?”
“I’m from his bank. I want to see him on business.” Guild’s eyes became drowsy. “It’s confidential business.”
“So?” Sheriff Petersen’s frown seemed to hold more discomfort than annoyance. “Well, none of his business is confidential from me any more. I got a right to know anything and everything that anybody knows about him.”
Guild’s eyes narrowed a little. He blew smoke out.
“I have,” the sheriff insisted in a tone of complaint. “Listen, Guild, you haven’t got any right to hide any of his business from me. He’s a murderer and I’m responsible for law and order in this county.”
Guild pursed his lips. “Who’d he kill?”
“This here Columbia Forrest,” Petersen said, jerking a thumb at the house, “shot her stone dead and lit out for God only knows where.”
“Didn’t kill anybody else?”
“My God,” the sheriff asked peevishly, “ain’t that enough?”
“Enough for me, but down in the village they’ve got it all very plural.” Guild stared thoughtfully at the sheriff. “Got away clean?”
“So far,” Petersen grumbled, “but we’re phoning descriptions of him and his car around.” He sighed, moved his big shoulders uncomfortably. “Well, come on now, let’s have it. What’s your business with him?” But when Guild would have replied the giant said: “Wait a minute. We might as well go in and get hold of Boyer and Ray and get it over with at one crack.”
Leaving the fat man, Guild and the sheriff went indoors, into a pleasantly furnished tan room in the front of the house, where they were soon joined by two more men. One of these was nearly as tall as the sheriff, a raw- boned blond man in his early thirties, hard of jaw and mouth, sombre of eye. One was younger, shorter, with boyishly rosy cheeks, quick dark eyes, and smoothed dark hair. When the sheriff introduced them to Guild he said the taller one was Ray Callaghan, a deputy sheriff, the other District Attorney Bruce Boyer. He told them John Guild was a fellow who wanted to see Wynant.
The youthful district attorney, standing close to Guild, smiled ingratiatingly and asked: “What business are you in, Mr. Guild?”
“I came up to see Wynant about his bank account,” the dark man replied slowly.
“What bank?”
“Seaman’s National of San Francisco.”
“I see. Now what did you want to see him about? I mean, what was there about his account that you had to come up here to see him about?”
“Call it an overdraft,” Guild said with deliberate evasiveness.
The district attorney’s eyes became anxious.
Guild made a small gesture with the brown hand holding his cigarette. “Look here, Boyer,” he said, “if you want me to go all the way with you you ought to go all the way with me.”
Boyer looked at Petersen. The sheriff met his gaze with noncommittal eyes. Boyer turned back to Guild. “We’re not hiding anything from you,” he said earnestly. “We’ve nothing to hide.”
Guild nodded. “Swell. What happened here?”
“Wynant caught the Forrest girl getting ready to leave him and he shot her and jumped in his car and drove away,” he said quickly. “That’s all there is to it.”
“Who’s the Forrest girl?”
“His secretary.”
Guild pursed his lips, asked: “Only that?”
The raw-boned deputy sheriff said, “None of that, now!” in a strained croaking voice. His pale eyes were bloodshot and glaring.
The sheriff growled, “Take it easy there, Ray,” avoiding his deputy’s eyes.
The district attorney glanced impatiently at the deputy sheriff. Guild stared gravely, attentively at him.
The deputy sheriff’s face flushed a little and he shifted his feet. He spoke to the dark man again, in the same croaking voice: “She’s dead and you might just as well talk decently about her.”
Guild moved his shoulders a little. “I didn’t know her,” he said coldly. “I’m trying to find out what happened.” He stared for a moment longer at the raw-boned man and then shifted his gaze to Boyer. “What was she leaving him for?”
“To get married. She told him when he caught her packing after she came back from town and – and they had a fight and when she wouldn’t change her mind he shot her.”
Guild’s blue eyes moved sidewise to focus on the raw-boned deputy sheriff’s face. “She was living with Wynant, wasn’t she?” he asked bluntly.
“You son of a bitch!” the deputy sheriff cried hoarsely and struck with his right fist at Guild’s face.
Guild avoided the fist by stepping back with no appearance of haste. He had begun to step back before the fist started toward his face. His eyes gravely watched the fist go past his face.
Big Petersen lurched against his deputy, wrapping his arms around him. “Cut it out, Ray,” he grumbled. “Why don’t you behave yourself? This is no time to be losing your head.”
The deputy sheriff did not struggle against him.
“What’s the matter with him?” Guild asked the district attorney. There was no resentment in his manner. “In love with her or something?”
Boyer nodded furtively, then frowned and shook his head in a warning gesture.
“That’s all right,” Guild said. “Where’d you get your information about what happened?”
“From the Hopkinses. They look after the place for Wynant. They were in the kitchen and heard the whole fight. They ran upstairs when they heard the shots and he stood them off with the gun and told them he’d come back and kill them if they told anybody before he’d an hour’s start, but they phoned Ray as soon as he’d gone.”
Guild tossed the stub of his cigarette into the fireplace and lit a fresh one.
Then he took a card from a brown case brought from an inner pocket and gave the card to Boyer.
JOHN GUILD
ASSOCIATED DETECTIVE BUREAUS,
INC.
FROST BUILDING, SAN FRANCISCO
“Last week Wynant deposited a ten-thousand-dollar New York check in his account at the Seaman’s National
