And at the morgue a very little while later, we learned that we were correct. The dead man was John Boyd.
“He was dead when Ledwich brought him out of the house,” Bob said.
I nodded.
“He was! He was a little man, and it wouldn’t have been much of a stunt for a big bruiser like Ledwich to have dragged him along with one arm the short distance from the door to the curb, pretending to be holding him up, like you do with a drunk. Let’s go over to the Hall of Justice and see what the police have got on it—if anything.”
At the detective bureau we hunted up O’Gar, the detective-sergeant in charge of the Homicide Detail, and a good man to work with.
“This dead man found in the park,” I asked, “know anything about him?”
O’Gar pushed back his village constable’s hat—a big black hat with a floppy brim that belongs in vaudeville—scratched his bullet-head, and scowled at me as if he thought I had a joke up my sleeve.
“Not a damned thing except that he’s dead!” he said at last.
“How’d you like to know who he was last seen with?”
“It wouldn’t hinder me any in finding out who bumped him of, and that’s a fact.”
“How do you like the sound of this?” I asked. “His name was John Boyd and he was living at a hotel down in the next block. The last person he was seen with was a guy who is tied up with Dr. Estep’s first wife. You know—the Dr. Estep whose second wife is the woman you people are trying to prove a murder on. Does that sound interesting?”