The Leather Duke

Johnson looked at Johnny a moment, then swallowed hard.

“Just a minute,” he said, thickly.

He left Johnny at the head of the sorting benches and strode down the line to where Elliott Towner was working at his bench. Johnny saw Johnson ask young Towner a question. He didn’t hear Elliott’s reply, but saw Johnson stagger as if struck by an invisible fist. Towner, however, continued to talk and Johnson listened intently for a moment or two. Then he bobbed his head and came back toward Johnny.

As the foreman approached Johnny saw that his face was filmed with perspiration. “I’m fifty-two years old,” Johnson said when he came up. “I’ve worked for this company since I was thirteen — thirty-nine years. I’ve seen a lot of men come and go here, Fletcher. I’ve hired thousands of men and I’ve fired a few hundred. But, so help me, I’ve never had a man here like you...” He cleared his throat. “And I hired you!”

“You almost didn’t,” said Johnny. “Sam Cragg was your first choice. By the way, where is Sam?”

“Piling up barrels,” said Johnson. “Without Joe Genara — and without the elevator. Now, don’t tell me you’re going to pull him off that job.”

“How could I pull him off?” asked Johnny innocently. “You’re the foreman.”

“I am?”

“Of course.”

“I thought you were taking over!”

“Me? Whatever gave you that idea?”

“Elliott said that you—”

“Shh,” said Johnny. “I’m going to snoop around here, that’s all. A little undercover work, until I smoke out the man who killed Al Piper. But don’t pay any attention to me. I won’t interfere with the work.”

“Will the work interfere with you?”

Johnny chuckled. “Not if I don’t have to do any of it.”

About eight pairs of eyes down the line of benches were watching Johnny and the foreman, while the owners were pretending to be sorting counters.

Johnny clapped Johnson on the shoulder and at least six audible gasps went up along the benches. Johnny left the foreman at his high bookkeeper’s desk and headed for an aisle between two rows of barrels. He reached the washbasins at the rear, stopped to listen and heard the thump of a barrel on concrete. He headed to the left and saw Sam lifting a barrel of counters over his head.

“Johnny!” Sam cried. “I was just thinkin’ that you ran out on me...”

He eased the barrel on top of a stack of three, then turned happily to Johnny. “Where’d you get the two bucks you left for me? I sure had a swell lunch and I still got ninety cents.”

“I’ve got about four-ninety, myself,” said Johnny. “Four hundred and ninety.” He took the bills from his pocket and exhibited them to Sam.

Sam gasped. “Johnny, you didn’t rob...?”

“Now, Sam, you know I wouldn’t do a thing like that. Mr. Towner gave me the money — an advance.”

“You conned him out of it?” Then Sam grimaced. “It’ll take us about a year to earn that, Johnny.” Sam’s voice rose in agony. “You ain’t gonna make us work here that long, are you?”

“You can ease off now, Sam. We’re back in the chips.”

“And we’re quittin’?”

“Well, not exactly.” Johnny coughed gently. “I sold Mr. Towner on the idea of letting me find the murderer of Al Piper.”

“No, Johnny, you didn’t!”

“I’m afraid I did.”

“But you promised me you wouldn’t do any more detective stuff.”

“I made no such promise, Sam. As a matter of fact, we were already working on the job. Only we were doing it for nothing. Now, we’re doing it for pay.”

“But that cop was up here again this morning, Johnny. He was askin’ all sorts of questions. About you — and me...”

“I know. He tried a little joust with me just before lunch. He came off second-best.”

“Maybe, Johnny, maybe. But don’t forget they got rooms down at Headquarters where they make you sit under a big white light and ask you a lot of questions with rubber hoses and things. We wouldn’t come out so good on that, would we?”

“That isn’t going to happen to us, Sam. I’m way ahead of Lieutenant Lindstrom right now. While he’s making up his mind, I’ll grab the murderer.”

“Now?”

“Well, no. I don’t know who he is.”

“You got any idea, yet?”

“Uh-uh. Let’s see, it was over in the next aisle you found him. Let’s take a look.”

“Do we have to?”

“Cut it out, Sam. The man’s dead. His body was taken away yesterday morning.”

Sam frowned, but followed Johnny reluctantly into the next aisle. “Now, let’s go at this scientifically.” Johnny said. “There are ten stacks of barrels on each side—”

“Only nine on the right side,” Sam said. “The empty place is where, ah, Al Piper was...”

“That’s right.”

Johnny walked into the aisle. “Four stacks of barrels, then this empty spot, then five stacks — mmm.” Johnny stepped past the empty spot in the row of barrels where the body of Piper had been found and continued on to the end of the aisle.

A rack had been built here, running the entire length of the counter sorting department. Partly filled barrels were piled on the rack and under it, more or less screening the sorting department from the stacks. But by stooping, Johnny could see under the rack and over the top of the barrels set on the floor, into the sorting department.