Leopold's Way (31 page)

He greeted them wearing a grease-stained shirt and pants, poking his head up from beneath a pickup truck that was belching smoke as the motor coughed. “Be with you in a minute,” he shouted over the motor's uncertain roar. If they had come expecting a crime king in a padded office, this was surely the wrong place.

When at last he emerged, passing a wrench to one of the other men, he proved to be a balding, middle-aged man with a turf of sandy-red hair over either ear. The hair, sticking out like twin horns, gave Leopold the fleeting impression that here indeed, in the flesh, was the Jersey Devil.

“What can I do for you men?” he asked, wiping the grease from his hands with a soiled cloth. It was hard to pinpoint his age or much else about him, but Leopold guessed him still to be under fifty. When he walked he threw his body to one side slightly, perhaps as a result of some old injury.

“Is there somewhere we could talk in private, Mr. Corflu?”

“My office. Up this way.” He led them up a worn wooden staircase to a floor of offices above the garage. Here a dozen or so girls were engaged in general office routine, and they hardly looked up as Benedict Corflu passed through.

His office, overlooking the truck service area, was small and functional, with open shelves holding stacks of papers and printed bulletins. Against one wall, behind his desk, was a large map of the metropolitan New York area, showing everything from Newburgh south to Trenton, and from the Pennsylvania state line east to New Haven.

“This is your operating area?” Leopold asked, motioning toward the map.

Benedict Corflu nodded. “Everything within 50 miles of Manhattan, and a bit farther than that in spots.” His face relaxed into a smile. “But you men don't want to talk about trucking.”

“That's quite right,” Leopold said. “How did you know?”

“The car you came in has Connecticut plates. It's also got a police radio in it.”

“I'm Captain Leopold, and this is Lieutenant Fletcher. We're investigating a murder and a robbery that might be connected with it. There's a possibility you could help our investigation.”

“Oh, I doubt that.”

Leopold just smiled and reached out, placing the Jersey Devil stamp, in its little glassine envelope, on the desk before him. “We want to talk about this.”

Benedict Corflu raised his eyes slowly, and the twin tufts of hair stood out more sharply than ever. “So?”

“We understand you operate a private postal service, in illegal competition with the United States Government.”

Leopold had expected almost any reaction to his words, ranging from outright denial to flustered confusion. He did not expect the reaction he got. Corflu leaned back in his chair and said, “Of course! That fact is known to a good many people in the government. During the great mail strike, restrictions were even lifted briefly to allow me to operate legally. The Post Office Department actually leased some of my trucks to haul mail out of New York City.”

“That may be, but I can hardly believe they could condone the issuance of private postage stamps like this one.”

Corflu waved a greasy hand in dismissal. “Rubbish! Stamps are only external symbols. I furnish a service, a needed service. Are you aware that mail—even first-class mail—can be seized and opened in this country of America? Are you aware that a sealed first-class letter can be held by authorities for more than a day, while a search warrant is obtained to open it? The Supreme Court has even ruled the practice to be constitutional! What protection is there anymore for the average citizen? What protection is there for pure and simple privacy?”

“Who needs it? The criminal element? Isn't that whom you serve with your mail system?”

“I serve anyone who still believes in the right to privacy. The government allows me to operate in violation of the law for the same reason it winks at numbered Swiss bank accounts and illegal distilleries. Our operations are a tiny percentage of the total volume, and putting us out of business might be more difficult than it appears. The specific operations I conduct are carefully planned and executed in a manner designed to challenge existing laws rather than openly break them. My arrest would open up a maze of legal problems, which I am prepared to exploit to the fullest.”

Leopold felt himself in a sort of wonderland, listening to a man who bragged of breaking the law and almost dared the law to arrest him. “I didn't come about your postal system,” he replied. “I came about a murder.”

“You said that. Who was murdered?”

“A stamp collector named Dexter Jones, last week in Connecticut. Another collector named Oscar Bailey had been robbed a few nights earlier. I think the crimes are somehow connected. One of the stamps stolen from Bailey was a Jersey Devil.”

Corflu nodded. “I read about it. I remember, now that you mention it. The papers didn't mention the Jersey Devil, but they did say a valuable two-cent Hawaiian was still missing.”

“That's correct.”

“Worth how much?” he asked.

“Perhaps thirty or forty thousand dollars.”

“I fear my poor Jersey Devils will never bring a price like that, Captain.”

“We want the stamp back and we want the murderer of Dexter Jones, Mr. Corflu.”

“Why do you come to me?”

“Because the phone company records show that Jones placed a long-distance telephone call to you the day before he was murdered and the day after he told me about the Jersey Devil.”

Benedict Corflu was silent for a time, perhaps considering the possibilities as he formed his reply. Finally, he said, “Yes, that's correct. I'd never met Dexter Jones, but we did talk occasionally on the phone. I was sorry to learn of his death.”

“Why did he call you that day?”

“As a collector, he's been interested in the Jersey Devil stamp issue. He'd called me a couple of times before. This time he had two things on his mind. First, he wanted to warn me that a detective had been asking questions about the Devil stamps. I assume that was you.”

Leopold nodded. “What else did he say?”

“That he'd been approached by someone regarding the missing two-cent Hawaiian. There was no picture of it in the papers, and this person wanted to know exactly what it looked like.”

“Do you know if the person was a girl?”

“He didn't say. He only told me that he felt himself in the middle of things. Apparently he'd told this person he'd have to see the stamp to be certain, and he was undecided whether he should tip off Bailey. They were bitter rivals, you know, and I think he was almost pleased at the robbery. Still, he didn't want to get in too deep.”

“He asked you your advice?”

“In a sense, yes.” Corflu smiled slightly at the memory. “Jones was an honest man, but even honest men can be tempted at times. I really believe he was sounding me out on the availability of a market for the stolen stamp. I suppose it follows logically—a man who prints illegal stamps would be interested in buying stolen ones.”

“He put it to you like that?”

“No, no. But the implication was clear. He could get his hands on the stolen stamp if there was a buyer for it.”

“And you told him what?”

Benedict Corflu smiled once more. “I advised him to call Bailey or the police. I advised him not to get involved.”

“Spoken like a law-abiding citizen.”

“Which I am.”

“You heard nothing more from Jones?”

“Nothing. But you know that. You have a list of his calls.”

Leopold got to his feet. The arm beneath his cast was itching again, annoying him with the persistence of its presence. “We may have more questions, Mr. Corflu.”

“My door is always open.”

On the way back, along the Garden State Parkway, one of Corflu's trucks seemed to follow them for some distance. It made Fletcher nervous, and he rode with his .38 service revolver in his lap until the truck turned off at the state line. It was that sort of a day.

Nothing happened for a week.

Leopold had never had a case like it, and the feeling of absolute frustration grew with every passing day. There was no sign of the girl, no sign of the missing stamp, no further news of the Jersey Devil. Oscar Bailey continued to phone every day, and Jimmy Duke continued living alone in his apartment, awaiting trial.

It seemed obvious to Leopold that Dexter Jones had been killed—by either Bonnie Irish or Jimmy Duke—when he took Corflu's advice and told them he was going to call the police; but the obvious was not always the case, and at least one other possibility had inserted itself into Leopold's reasoning. They had only Corflu's word for the contents of that telephone conversation. Perhaps Jones had, indeed, obtained the two-cent Hawaiian from Bonnie Irish, and in turn delivered it to Corflu. A man like Corflu might well have killed him rather than pay him the stamp's value.

So Leopold continued to puzzle over the facts, or lack of them, and wait for the sort of break that always came sooner or later.

The break, when it did come, was from a most unexpected source: Benedict Corflu himself, on the phone from his Paterson office. “Leopold, this is Corflu. Remember me?”

“I remember.”

“Some news has reached me which might be of interest to you.”

“Oh?”

“Regarding a young lady named Bonnie Irish. Are you still looking for her?”

Leopold signaled Fletcher to pick up the extension phone. “We certainly are! Where is she?”

“A friend of mine in New York has been contacted by her. She has some stamps for sale.”

“I'll bet! The two-cent Hawaiian, for instance?”

“That one was not specifically mentioned, but others from the Bailey robbery were. There's no doubt this is the girl you want.”

“Where is she now?”

Corflu sighed into the telephone. “That I cannot tell you. But the day after tomorrow she is to be in New York City, meeting with my friend.”

“He's willing to cooperate with the police?”

“When I told him there was murder involved, he thought it would be best. He wants me to be there, too, when he meets the girl.”

“Tell us where and when,” Leopold said. For the first time in weeks he actually forgot his broken arm.

The mid-Manhattan offices of Royal Stamp Sales were located on a dim side street off Sixth Avenue, behind shop windows cluttered with faded and probably worthless stamps from all parts of the world. It was not a place any passerby would be likely even to notice, but on this particular morning there was a great deal of activity. Corflu's friend, pleading a bad heart, had allowed himself to be replaced behind the counter by Corflu himself, free of grease and dressed surprisingly in a conservative shirt and tie. Two New York City detectives were also on the scene, working as clerks behind the counter with Corflu. They would make the actual arrest if one were to be made.

Leopold had been relegated to the sidelines, given an observation post in a hotel lobby across the street, but Fletcher was to play a key role in the stake-out. Dressed as a mailman, with peaked cap and leather mailbag, he would enter the stamp shop immediately after the girl, blocking her escape route.

“I feel foolish in this outfit,” Fletcher complained, standing with Leopold in the lobby of the shabby hotel.

“But you can follow her in without alarming her. Remember what Chesterton wrote in one of his Father Brown detective stories? ‘Nobody ever notices postmen somehow.' It's just as true now, except when they're out on strike.” He reached out with his good hand to grip Fletcher's arm. “Could that be her?”

A girl in her early twenties, who certainly had a dancer's body, was walking down the opposite side of the street, studying the numbers on the shop doors. Fletcher adjusted his cap and moved out of the lobby door. When she reached the entrance of Royal Stamp Sales, the girl paused a moment, seemed to brace her shoulders, and then entered. Fletcher was only a few steps behind her.

Leopold waited impatiently, running his right hand over the hard plaster of his cast. It must have been less than a minute, but to him it seemed like five. He cursed softly to himself, then moved out. Traffic was heavy on the side street, and it took him a moment to get across. He couldn't see through the dusty windows of the stamp store, but just as he reached the front of it the door was flung open and the girl came running out, holding a small pistol in one hand.

She saw Leopold and started to raise the gun, but he swung his cast and knocked it out of her hand, feeling the arrows of pain shoot up his arm at the force of the impact. Her face twisted in alarm and she turned to run, but now Fletcher was out of the door behind her, mailbag and all, grabbing her in a bear hug that knocked the remaining fight from her.

“She got the drop on us, Captain,” Fletcher explained. “I didn't figure her having a gun that handy.”

Leopold grunted as he stooped to recover the gun. “Miss Bonnie Irish, I presume?”

She twisted in Fletcher's grip and spat, “Go to hell!”

Inside, Benedict Corflu and the two New York detectives were sorting through the little pile of glassine envelopes she'd left on the counter. “Is that everything?” Leopold asked.

“Everything but the two-cent Hawaiian,” Corflu replied. “It's not here.”

Leopold swore and looked down at the gun in his hand. “Well, we've got Bonnie Irish, but that's about all. This gun is a .22 caliber, and Dexter Jones was killed with a .32.”

The case went into another of its periodic slumbers, only this time it seemed that nothing would awaken it. Bonnie Irish denied any knowledge of the Jones killing, and they could hold her only for her part in the Bailey robbery. The two-cent Hawaiian was still missing, and Oscar Bailey was still demanding its recovery. Benedict Corflu went back to his trucking business, and apparently to the Jersey Devil postal system as well.

Finally, one sunny day in April, Fletcher asked, “You think we're going to have to give up on that Jones killing, Captain?”