The something substantial didn’t come from Sergeant Wilks, however. When he returned, Fellows was drinking coffee in the office and Wilks said, “I can tell how tough a case is, Fred, by the coffee you drink.”
“I didn’t have any lunch.”
“You should eat. You’ll make yourself sick.”
“Never mind about me. What’s your report?”
Wilks told him the bad news. He’d checked all the builders in Townsend and questioned everyone connected with them but no one would admit knowing anything about depositing a trunk at the station.
“Any of those guys look like the picture?”
“Not even one. Not even close.”
“And nobody’s left one of those places recently, nobody who might have used the name Campbell?”
“Give up, will you? Nobody’s left, period.”
CHAPTER XV
Monday, 7:30-9:00 P.M.
At seven-thirty that evening, while Chief Fellows was eating dinner, the phone rang. His oldest boy, Larry, answered and came back. “It’s for you, Dad.”
Fellows put down his napkin and went into the bedroom to the telephone table between the closet doors. “Fellows.”
“Chief? This is Harris.” The patrolman’s voice had timbre in it, a suppressed excitement Fellows could sense. “I’m in Stamford,” Harris went on. “I’ve been checking filling stations, trying to finish up now, so I won’t have to come back tomorrow. I found a guy who services a tan Ford with a bent rear fender. I showed him the picture. He thinks it might be the same man.”
“He know him?”
“He says his name is Clyde Burchard, lives at 62 West Hartford Street. I could go talk to him if you want. He’s home right now. Maybe you’ve got another idea.”
“No. Don’t do that.” Fellows picked up a pencil and scribbled the address. “Go to the Stamford police. Tell them what we’ve got. Tell them I’m coming down. Ask them to send somebody with you. Stake out the house, but don’t tip the guy off and don’t touch him unless he tries to leave.”
“Yes, sir.”
Fellows hung up and immediately dialed another number. “Sid? Fred. We may have a break. Call up that kid Andy, or Watly, or both. Tell them we want them to take a ride down to Stamford with us right away. I’ll be by for you in about eight minutes.” Wilks didn’t bother to ask for details. He said, “Right,” and hung up without waiting for a reply.
Fellows came back, crammed a quarter of a potato in his mouth, and picked up the rest of his chop. “I’ve got to go out,” he mumbled with his mouth full. “Want to get my coat, Larry?”
Larry hurried back with it. “Something to do with the murder?”
“Looks like it,” Fellows said, letting his son help him into it while he bit pieces of the chop.
“Can I go with you?”
“What do you ask a foolish question like that for?”
“What’s foolish about it?”
“You’ve got homework for one thing.”
“But I want to be a policeman. What’s homework compared with practical experience?”
“And I want you to get an education, so you won’t have to be a policeman.”
It was snowing harder than ever when the chief went out and the temperature had dropped way down. Fellows had trouble starting his car, but he got to Wilks’s house at twenty minutes of eight. Wilks opened the door and came down his snow-laden steps before Fellows had completely stopped. He climbed in and said, “Get your heater going, will you?”
“It’s on now. The engine hasn’t warmed up yet. What about the other two?”
“Both out.”
“You couldn’t get hold of them?”
“No. Just Andy’s mother and Watly’s wife.”
Fellows set the car in motion, plowing into the seething white flakes. “Oh, well, it may be a pipe-dream anyway.” He skidded, getting clear of the curb, and headed slowly out, keeping to the middle of the street.
The highway was pretty clear, but it still took them twenty-five minutes to get into Stamford. Fellows related the details on the way. “It sounds good,” he admitted, “but I’ve been a cop too long to go overboard.”
Sixty-two West Hartford Street was a large frame house, three stories high, split into separate apartments. It had a wide porch, an uncleared walk, and a globe of light gleaming from the porch roof in front of the doors. Owners of the other houses were out scraping their shovels into the thick carpet of snow, but the five inches that had fallen that day lay in front of 62, trampled, untouched, and freezing.
Fellows pulled up across the street from the house, behind two other cars, and from there could see the numbers 62 and 60 on either side of the door. When he shut off his motor and lights, three men got out of the car ahead and came to the chiefs window. One was Harris, wearing his patrolman’s uniform with the ear-flaps turned down from his cap, swirling clouds coming from his nose and mouth. He introduced the other two as Captain McGarrity and Detective Lieutenant Paulus of the Stamford police. “Burchard’s in there,” he said. “His car’s in the yard in back. Tan Ford, 1957, two doors, bent fender.”
Captain McGarrity said, “We’re backing you up, Chief. Whatever you want to do.”
“Good. I don’t know what we’ve got, but it sounds hot.”
Harris said, “His apartment is 2C. He doesn’t know he’s being watched.”
“All right. We’ll go in and talk to him. The five of us.” Fellows opened his door and got out into the deep snow, Wilks sliding after. Together they crossed the street and mounted the porch. The outer door was locked, but the name “Burchard” was under the top of three bells in the frame below the “62.” Fellows pressed the bell and waited.
He had to press it again and then, after a minute, a figure in dark trousers and shirt sleeves was visible through the inside curtains coming down the front staircase. The figure pulled open the inner door and stepped into the vestibule. A perplexed frown crossed his face at the sight of a policeman in uniform with four other men in coats, caps,
