He had scribbled out the note and was studying it.
“ ‘Con’ — I have a feeling that must be Connie, but I kept that from the Inspector — ‘plus Mad.’ If ‘Mad’ is a woman’s name, it would be what? Madeline — marvelous, Jones, you’re wasting your time at Harvard — Madeline who? I know no Madelines.” He scratched his head. “But if it was Connie and Maddy, why would he write that down? If a man was trying to make up his mind about two women, why in God’s name would he mark it important and write it out on a scratch pad? The man may have been queer, but not that queer. Forgetting for a minute that there are any women involved, what would Singer be apt to write on a pad. . . . Notes about his work, as the Inspector suggests? Very probably. What kind of work?” Suddenly he sat back in his chair and yelled. Sylvester dropped a glass. “Oh, my God!” Jupiter was laughing. “The boy detective at Harvard! Here I’ve been looking for women’s names and the thing is juvenile.”
Sylvester stuck his head in the door. “What is it, Mr. Jupiter?”
“It’s nothing, Sylvester; this murder has gone to my head. I’ve been looking for mysterious messages and I’ve found a reminder of Singer’s about his lecture for to-morrow. The plus sign fooled me. It’s nothing but a cross, just a plain cross — Singer’s own abbreviation for a Crucifixion, some painting he wanted to speak about. I might have known. I’ve seen it enough times. Of course ‘Mad’ stands for Madonna and ‘Con’ could mean a lot of things — Conversazione, Consecration, Condottiere. Hell, after that brain wave I need a drink. How do we stand?”
“There ain’ no more whiskey, but there’s a bottle of Sawturn.”
“Of what?”
“Sawturn.”
“Oh, Sauterne. Good God, no! Where did that come from?”
“Ah think you brung it home from a debutante party, Mr. Jones.”
“Impossible, Sylvester.” He vaguely remembered the party. “I haven’t been to a deb party for years, and besides I don’t steal liquor.”
“No, sir,” said Sylvester, unconvinced.
“If you’ve finished, you’d better go home. Come in early and bring all the papers.”
Sylvester departed happily. He was in twenty-three dollars.
Jupiter commenced his first step toward going to bed. He took off his coat, tie, and shirt. At this point he would usually read for a while, but to-night he was restless. He went through his liquor closet carefully, but without success.
While he was trying to convince himself that he didn’t need a drink at all someone knocked on the door.
“Come in,” he called, not getting up.
It was Peter Appleton. Jupiter would have been less surprised if it had been a green-faced man with flapping ears. Appleton was a sophomore and Jupiter was a graduate; furthermore Jupiter had told Peter on occasion what he thought of him and his little group of tea drinkers.
“Can I talk with you for a moment, Jones?” He seemed terrified.
“Certainly, little man. Did you come for fatherly advice or are you just lonely?”
Appleton came into the room, but he didn’t sit down.
“I want some help,” said Appleton.
“I’ll make him marry you,” said Jupiter. “Sit down — you make me nervous.”
He sat on the edge of a chair. “Can you get into Professor Singer’s room through the fire door?” Jupiter frowned. “Why?”
Appleton looked at the floor. “There are some things of mine I want to get before the police find them — if they haven’t already.”
“Things, Peter? Be explicit.”
“That’s none of your business. I’ll get them myself.”
“Oh, no,” said Jupiter. “I am working with the police — hand in glove. It would be cheating. Tell me your story.”
Appleton started to go. “It doesn’t matter. I knew I shouldn’t have come to see you.”
“Wait a minute. If I tell the police you were here trying to sneak into Singer’s room in the dead of night they’ll want to know all about it. What do you want?”
Peter stopped. “I might as well tell you, I suppose. You’ll find out anyway. He has some of my poems.”
He said it as if it were a major crime.
Jupiter snorted. “Poems! What are you babbling about?”
“I gave Professor Singer some of my poems and I don’t want a lot of unintelligent policemen reading them. . . . I — I dedicated them to him.”
Jupiter was stunned, but he saw the light. He smiled. “Well, well, well, if this isn’t just too cute! What is this, a girls’ school? Do we have a crush on teacher? However, I see your point.”
He got up, got a knife from his bedroom, and started to fix the lock on his side of the door.
He said, “Did you notice if there was anyone on duty outside guarding this room?”
Appleton shook his head.
“Well, there probably is. Snap out the light, so it won’t shine through when I open the door.”
Appleton turned off the light.
“I hope you realize I’m risking my already shaky reputation with the law by doing this for you,” said Jupiter.
He went into Singer’s room, and with the light from the street lamp and a couple of matches he found the poems in the bedroom bureau. He also remembered the quart of whiskey in the cabinet and brought that back with him. Appleton hadn’t gone into the room.
“I’m glad you came,” said Jupiter, holding up the bottle. “Have one?”
“No, I’ll go along. Thanks a lot, Jones.”
He reached for the poems.
“Oh, you can’t go yet, Peter.” He put the poems in his pocket and mixed himself a drink. “We will have an author’s reading. You know, it’s not every day that I get a chance to examine the work of a coming poet.”
He
