City for Ransom

investigation agency in Europe, and Tewes smelled like an alias even to them—as a Dr. Francois Tewes was reported as having died while imprisoned on charges of having killed a man in a brawl.

Likely enough, Chicago’s Dr. Tewes was in his late twenties or early thirties; he with his full head of hair below the bowler, his small ears, dimpled chin, thin nose. This man was ambitiously working to build a reputation. What would solving a mystery do for his dubious practice?

“A garrote killer in New York left six victims in water—dumping their bodies in rivers, lakes,” Tewes calmly maintained.

24

ROBERT W. WALKER

“Our Chicago fellow seems more interested in fire than in water,” Ransom replied.

“He used a garrote?” asked Griffin, who’d rejoined them.

“Like our madman here? Double-tiered?”

Ransom shot a wilting look at Griffin that telegraphed his disappointment in Drimmer’s gullibility. “The good doctor here has something on Kohler, Griffin. That’s obvious with his letter of recommendation. Kohler informed him. That’s all there is to it.” “It’s no letter of recommendation, Inspector,” countered Tewes. “Read it. It’s a direct order made to you.”

Griffin tugged at Ransom’s sleeve. “You can’t afford any more trouble.”

“Double wires,” said Tewes mysteriously, “that crisscrossed in front to create a small diamond incision at or near the voice box in the females, and now the boy’s Adam’s apple. The deadly thing is likely a piano wire connected to two sturdy sticks, which he twists round the neck, making an immediate incision at once three hundred and sixty degrees.

The tighter he winds it, the deeper the cut.”

Ransom now knew for certain that Dr. Tewes had something on Kohler; only blackmail could’ve gotten the scoundrel this far. “I want the two-wire diamond aspect of this murder weapon kept under wraps, Tewes. Do you understand? We must not let the newshounds have it. We must hold some information in abeyance toward the day we pinch this maniac—to identify the killer with absolute—” “I can be cooperative, Inspector.”

“Don’t think that you can blackmail me, Doctor.”

“Why, Inspector, you give me far too much credit for guile!”

“If you mean skill in cunning and deceit and a cleverness in trickery, yes, perhaps I do.”

“Look, I’ve seen the coroner’s notes, true. But I first saw all this happening while laying on of hands to the cranium of a dying woman—”

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“A dead woman now. Whooo . . . dying woman . . . how very mysterious,” countered Ransom.

“A pauper buried in your Potter’s Field a few months ago.”

“It remains an incredible assertion.”

“I read heads. It’s what a phrenologist does.”

“And you receive visions in the process.”

“Perceptions . . . not visions, sir, and only sometimes, yes.”

Griffin now stared at Tewes as if he were a magician. Ransom saw this and grew angry at his partner’s wide-eyed response. “Nothing you’ve told us is new, Dr. Tewes. You may just as well have gotten your information from Kohler or some easily fooled police clerk.” “Yes, I suppose I might’ve. I certainly understand your skepticism. After all, you’re paid to be cynical! But look here, I’m telling the truth about New York. And there’s something else.”

“What?” asked Griffin, eager to hear more.

“The instrument of death he wields.”

“Yes?” asked Griff.

“The killer fashioned it himself. Made it with his own hands.”

“However can you possibly know that?” asked Griffin, playing into Tewes’s hand.

“The unique nature of the instrument. I’ve studied garroting devices. None that I have seen utilize two strands crossed into a diamond shape of this nature. X’s yes—but using two strands, this is unique to our killer.” “And why the fire?” asked Griffin. “I mean if the victims are already dead . . . why then set the bodies aflame?”

“Usual purpose to set a dead man aflame is to obscure any chance at easy identification. Identification often leads to a killer, but this . . .” began Tewes.

Ransom cut Tewes short, saying, “Seems the fire was clumsily set, mainly to the torso. Features can still be made out, so whoever did this was not interested in throwing us off identification.”

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ROBERT W. WALKER

Tewes nodded. “I am surprised. He is brazen, this killer.

As he was in New York.”

“How can you be sure it’s the same man?” asked Griffin, bursting to hear more.

“He follows the same patterns. In his patterns, his ritual, he leaves a distinctive mark of himself.”

“Dr. Tewes has read some police manuals, I warrant,” said Ransom.

“On that we can surely agree, Inspector Ransom.”

“Perhaps we ought to be looking at anyone recently emigrated from New York to here, Alastair?” Griffin looked to Ransom, but Alastair held Tewes in his steely gray gaze.

“Only if you buy into this snake-oil salesman’s ideas, Griff. Isn’t that right, Dr. Tewes?”

Tewes frowned and said, “Please, just allow me a moment with the body, before it is too late.”

Ransom did not like it when a man failed to answer a direct question. Something a man could not get away with in the U.S. Navy or aboard a whaler—two occupations Alastair had tried on as a young man.

“You may’s well give in to me, Inspector,” Tewes said, getting close enough to breathe on Ransom. “Nathan Kohler is on his way here this minute. He’ll want an accounting if I am not allowed to read the victim’s cranium.” Ransom ran his free hand through his bushy hair. A big man with powerful hands, Alastair went to the corpse. He then placed his cane under his arm to free up both hands. He next grabbed on to the corpse’s blackened, singed hairless head at forehead and base of neck. He easily cranked the cranium from side to side, then front to back. With a sickening squish, the garroted neck released its tenuous hold, the head coming off in Ransom’s now sooty, grimy hands to the chorus of gasping reporters who’d pushed the police line to the top of the stairs. Onlookers, cops, and medical personnel who’d rushed to the murder scene joined in a collective gasp, adding to the groans of seasoned crime reporters.

Photographer Keane flashed his pan and a fiery black CITY FOR RANSOM

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plume appeared with the odor of gunpowder all in a single whoosh, getting a shot of Inspector Ransom holding the dead man’s head in his hands.

“Ransom!” shouted Griff in awe, expecting an oozing gruel to come rushing out of the huge cavity. However, the fire had dehydrated all bodily fluids; nothing but soot lifting and flying off the now completely severed head dirtied Tewes’s white suit. Tewes’s gritted teeth spoke volumes.

Still, the doctor accepted and couched the severed head in the cradle of his arms.

Tewes’s chin quivered like a girl about to burst into tears, his watch fob shivering, as Ransom said, “You wanna read the boy’s skull, Dr. Tewes? Be my guest!”

Under Ransom’s steady glare, the slight doctor refused to show another moment’s emotion, holding his ground, earning more respect from Inspector Ransom than Griffin thought possible.

“I—I’ll take it to the stationmaster’s office,” Tewes shakily said, “place it on a desk . . . for—for stability. You really . . . really should’ve left it intact, Inspector.”

“Yes, find a square foot of privacy. . . . Good idea.” Ransom’s eyes scanned the reporters. “Or have you invited the press as well, Doctor?”

Dr. Tewes stiffly marched off with his dubious prize. Ransom tried to think of something clever to shout after