Murder in Black Letter

By Poul Anderson

This is a Cock Robin Mystery introducing Trygve Yamamura--judo expert, Samurai sword connoisseur and private detective--triple threat to San Francisco crime. These combined skills enable him to keep his own head attached while finding out who removed someone else's with honorable Japaneses weapon. This is a good old-fashioned detective story, a genuine whodunit, with a good deal of suspense thrown in.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Blackmore Dennett
• Release date: May 1, 2019
• ISBN: 9788834106365

Poul Anderson

Poul Anderson (1926–2001) grew up bilingual in a Danish American family. After discovering science fiction fandom and earning a physics degree at the University of Minnesota, he found writing science fiction more satisfactory. Admired for his “hard” science fiction, mysteries, historical novels, and “fantasy with rivets,” he also excelled in humor. He was the guest of honor at the 1959 World Science Fiction Convention and at many similar events, including the 1998 Contact Japan 3 and the 1999 Strannik Conference in Saint Petersburg, Russia. Besides winning the Hugo and Nebula Awards, he has received the Gandalf, Seiun, and Strannik, or “Wanderer,” Awards. A founder of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America, he became a Grand Master, and was inducted into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame. In 1952 he met Karen Kruse; they married in Berkeley, California, where their daughter, Astrid, was born, and they later lived in Orinda, California. Astrid and her husband, science fiction author Greg Bear, now live with their family outside Seattle.

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MURDER IN

BLACK LETTER

by Poul Anderson

Published 2019 by Blackmore Dennett

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

1

Steel talked between roses. Kintyre parried Yamamura's slash; his riposte thumped on the other man's arm.

Touché! exclaimed the detective. He took off his mask and wiped sweat from a long, high-cheeked face. Or is it you who's supposed to say that? Anyhow, enough for today.

You're not doing so badly, Trig, Kintyre told him. And I have some revenge due for all those times you've had me cartwheeling through the air, down at the dojo.

Trygve Yamamura clicked his tongue. He stood over six feet tall, lanky, the Oriental half of him showing mostly in narrow black eyes and smoked-amber skin. You would use sabers, wouldn't you? he said.

Robert Kintyre shrugged. A foil is for women and I'm not fast enough for an épée. Also, there's professional interest. A saber is a wee bit closer to the Renaissance weapon.

I think I'll stick to Japanese swords.

Kintyre nodded. He was a stocky man of medium height, with straight dark hair above a square, snub-nosed, sallow-complexioned face. His eyes were gray under level brows, and set unusually far apart; there was little else to mark him out physically, until you noticed his gait. To an only slightly lesser degree than Yamamura's, it had the indefinable compactness of a judo man.

They stood in a garden in Berkeley. Walls enclosed them: the main house, now vacant while its owner and family were on vacation; the three-room cottage to the rear which Kintyre rented; a board fence strewn with climbing blossoms on either side. Overhead lay a tall sky where the afternoon sun picked out the vapor trail of a jet sliding above San Francisco Bay.

I agree, Samurai swords make these look like pitchforks, said Kintyre. But you can't do much with them except collect them. Too damned effective!

Yamamura removed his padded coat and fished for his pipe. You off work now? he asked.

Yep. Last bloody paper corrected, last report in, term's over, and I'm not teaching again till fall. It's great, though impoverished, to be free.

You're making a pack trip into Kings Canyon, aren't you?

Uh-huh. Bruce Lombardi and I were supposed to leave tomorrow. Only what the devil has become of Bruce? Kintyre scowled. His girl called me last night, said he'd left the day before—Saturday—and hadn't come back yet. She was worried. I'm beginning to be.

Hm. Attentiveness flickered up in Yamamura. His agency, small and new, had no engagements at the moment. However, he spoke with no more than friendly concern. Is it like the kid to go tearing off that way? I don't know him especially well, he's just somebody I meet now and then at your place.

That's the point, said Kintyre. It is not like him. The department head inquired about it this morning. Bruce hasn't turned in the grades for two of his classes; and he's disgustingly reliable, normally. He paused. On the other hand, he's having his troubles these days and—anyhow, I hesitate to—

Footsteps sounded in the driveway. A trim quasi-military shape came around the house.

Officer Moffat, said Yamamura. He had belonged to the Berkeley force until he set up for himself. What's happened?

Hello, Trig, said the policeman. He turned to the other. Are you Professor Robert Kintyre?

Assistant professor only, no cobwebs yet. Why did he answer with a bad joke, he wondered—postponing something?

How do you do. I'm sorry to bother you, sir, but we're trying to identify a young man who was found dead this morning. I was told that someone of his description was a teaching assistant in the history department, and that you knew him best.

The voice was sympathetic, but Kintyre stood very quietly for a moment. Then: I know a lot of young men, but perhaps—Bruce Lombardi?

That's the name I was given, said Moffat. I'm told you were his faculty adviser.

Yes. Kintyre pawed blindly after a cigarette, meeting only his jacket. How did he come to die?

If it is him. Do you think you could identify him for us? I warn you, it isn't pretty.

I've seen dead men before, said Kintyre. Come on. He started toward the street.

Your clothes, said Moffat gently.

Oh, yes. Yes. Thanks. Kintyre fumbled at his equipment. He threw it on the grass. Put this junk away for me, will you, Trig? His voice was uncertain. I'll call you later.

Sure, said Yamamura in a low tone. Call me anytime.

Kintyre followed Moffat to the police car. It nosed off the shabby-genteel residential street and into southbound traffic. Moffat, at the wheel, pointed to the cigarette lighter.

Kintyre put tobacco smoke into his lungs and insisted: What happened?

He seems to have been murdered. Moffat's eyes flickered sideways along his passenger's wide shoulders, down to the thick wrists and hands. We'll go to headquarters first, if you don't mind, and you can talk to Inspector Harries.

In the following time, at the office, Kintyre answered many questions. Inspector Harries seemed to have little doubt who his corpse was, but much uncertainty about everything else.

Bruce Lombardi. Age twenty-four, did you say? Five feet nine, slender build, brown eyes, curly brown hair—m-hm. Did he wear glasses?

Yes. He was nearsighted. Horn rims.

What kind of clothes did he ordinarily pick?

Anything he got his hands on. He was a sloppy dresser. I remember—no, never mind.

Please tell me, Dr. Kintyre. It may have some bearing.

Hardly. This was about five years ago. I was an assistant bucking for an instructorship, he was a freshman with a major in my department—history, did I tell you? There was some kind of scholastic tea or something—semiformal—you know. He showed up in a secondhand tweed jacket and an old pair of khaki wash pants. He honestly thought they were suitable for—Never mind. It seemed funny at the time.

Kintyre stubbed out his cigarette (the fifth, sixth, twentieth?) and took a deep breath. He was letting this run away with him, he thought. He was yattering like an old woman, shaken into brainlessness. It was not as if he had never encountered death before.

He groped toward the teaching of the dojo, the judo school. Judo is only in part a sport; it is also a philosophy, the Gentle Way, with many aspects, and the first thing to learn is to relax utterly. The passive man is prepared for anything, for he can himself become anything.

But it was an unreal attempt. Kintyre's interest in judo was a superficial growth of a few years; his roots lay in the West. He understood with sudden bleakness why Bruce's death had so clamped on him: once again someone he cared for was gone, and the horror he had borne for two decades stirred toward awakening.

Don't you feel well, Dr. Kintyre?

Harries leaned over the desk, politely concerned. I'm sorry to put you to a strain like this. If you want to rest a while—

No. Kintyre mustered a degree of steadiness. I was a bit shaken, but—Go ahead. If Bruce really was murdered, I certainly want to give you any help I can finding who did it.

The inspector regarded him thoughtfully. You and he were pretty close, weren't you?

In a way. He was almost eleven years younger than I, and had lived a—limited life. Not sheltered in the usual sense, his family being poor, but limited. And he was such a peaceful fellow, and his life since entering college had been mostly books. It made him seem even younger.

Kintyre sighed. We got to be about as friendly as one can get under such circumstances, he finished. Maybe I looked on him as a son. Not being married, I can't be sure of that.

Did he ever say anything which led you to believe that he might be in serious trouble?

No. Absolutely not. That is, I knew his older brother hung—hangs around with a dubious crowd over in San Francisco, and it distressed him, but he never implied anything really bad was involved.

Let's see. Harries looked at some notes. I gather he left his, uh, girl friend's place about six P.M. Saturday, telling her he had business over in the City and she shouldn't wait up. She got worried and checked with you Sunday evening. And he was found by a patrol car this morning, at daybreak, on the bank of the old frontage road, near the Ashby Avenue turnoff.

You've worked fast, said Kintyre. Or did I tell you all this? he wondered. There are a few minutes which I remember only hazily. I was so busy fighting myself.

What did you do over the weekend? asked Harries in a casual tone.

Oh, let's see—Saturday morning I puttered around down at the yacht harbor, doing some work on my boat. I went home in the afternoon, graded papers and so on, went out at night and had a few beers with a friend—Dr. Levinson of the physiology department. Sunday morning I took a sail on the Bay, and later finished my paperwork. Shortly after Miss Towne had called me, I was invited over to Gerald Clayton's suite at the Fairhill. We had some drinks and talked till quite late. This morning I turned in my last reports to the University, came home, and was horsing around with Trig Yamamura when your man arrived.

You seem pretty well alibied, smiled Harries. Not that we suspect anyone on this side of the Bay.

Why not?

Harries' mouth tightened. Dr. Kintyre, you'll undoubtedly be asked a great many more questions in the next several days. Get the worst over with now. Then go out with some friends and have a lot more drinks. That's my advice.

They shook hands, feeling it was a somehow theatrical gesture, and thus being embarrassed without knowing how to avoid it. Moffat drove Kintyre through miles of city, down to that place in Oakland where the dead man was kept.

They entered a chill room. Kintyre took the lead, compulsively. He went to the sheeted thing and uncovered it.

After a while he turned around. Bruce Lombardi, he said. Yes.

I'm sorry you—Oh, hell. Moffat looked away. He was a sort of handsome young chap, wasn't he? Thin regular features and so on. I'll bet his parents were proud of him.

They paid his undergraduate expenses, mumbled Kintyre. Since then he went ahead on scholarships and assistantships, but those were four high-priced years for a poor family.

And now they'll see this. Hell. Moffat stood with fingers doubled together, talking fast. He himself was rather young, more shaken than his superiors would have wished. "Look at those burns—marks—He's like that all over. He was never unconscious once, unless he passed out now and then—no blackjack marks, no chloroform, just rope bruises. Then when he was dead, the murderers cut off his fingers and hacked his face some more, to make it harder for us to identify. Stuffed him into an old coat and pair of pants and left him half in the tidewater. Twenty-four years of age, did you say? This is what the old Lombardis have to show for their twenty-four years. Jesus Christ. I'll bet Ihave to take his father in here."

You think it was a sadist?

Oh, sure, I don't doubt at least one of the murderers got his kicks. It takes a cracked brain to do something like this—even for money. Yes, I feel pretty sure it was a professional job. Most of the torture was systematic, almost neat, for a definite purpose. You can see that. When they reached their purpose, when he talked or whatever it was, they cut his throat—neatly—then mutilated him for a good logical reason, to make it harder for us, and disposed of the body in regular gangland style. They shouldn't have dumped him in Berkeley. The Berkeley force sees so many University people we automatically thought a nice-looking young fellow like this might belong on the campus, and checked. But that was their only mistake. Mine was going in for a job where I'll have to show this to his father.

Must you?

It's the law. I wish it weren't.

Moffat moved to pull back the sheet, but Kintyre was there first. Covering Bruce's face made a kind of finality. Though the real closing curtain had fallen hours ago, he thought, when Bruce lifted hands torn, broken, and burned, to take death for his weariness. And afterward they cut his fingers off. Maybe the curtain had not been rung down yet.

2

By the time Kintyre got back, it was close to sunset. He entered a book-lined living room. There were a few good pictures, a small record player, his sabers hung on the wall by Trig, the furniture bought used or made out of old boxes—otherwise little. He did not believe in cluttering life with objects.

He poured himself a stiff drink. Glenlivet was his only expensive luxury. He sat down to savor it and perhaps think a little about Bruce. There was no solid reason why the boy should have made so large a niche in Kintyre's existence, but somehow he had. The emptiness hurt.

When the phone rang, Kintyre was there picking it up before consciousness of the noise registered. He was not surprised to hear Margery Towne's voice.

Bob? You know?

Yes. I'm sorry. I wish to hell I could tell you just how sorry.

I can guess. Her tone was flattened by the control she must be keeping on it. We both loved him, didn't we?

I think everybody did.

Somebody didn't, Bob.

I suppose you heard through the police?

"They were here a few minutes ago. Do they know everything?"

Probably I gave them your name. They came to me first, for the identification.

They were very nice about it and all that, but—

Silence whistled remotely over the wires.

Bob, could you come talk to me? Now?

Sure, pony. Give me half an hour.

Kintyre hung up one-handed, starting to undress with the other. He went through a shower and put on a suit in ten minutes.

Margery's apartment was catercorner from his, with the University between. He parked his battered '48 De Soto on the near side of the campus and walked across, hoping to hoof out some of the muscular tightness and set his thoughts in order.

Level yellow light came through eucalyptus groves to splash on a cropped greensward and pompous white buildings, almost bare of mankind in this pause between baccalaureate ceremonies and summer classes. Kintyre reflected vaguely that he would have to go through Bruce's desk, finish his work, yes, and complete his study of the Book of Witches.... His mind drifted off toward a worried practical consideration. What could he do about Margery?

He wanted to help her, if he could—double damnation, hadn't he tried before? At the same time he was not, repeat not, going to get himself involved. It would be unfair to both of them.

There were rules of the game, and so he had played it with her. You left wives and virgins alone: well, she was long divorced, and had slept around a bit since then. You neither gave to nor took from a woman. You made it perfectly clear you weren't interested in anything permanent. And when you broke it off, after a pleasant few months, you did it cleanly: he had the best excuse in the world, back in 1955, an academic grant that returned him to Italy for a year of research in his specialty, the Renaissance. (But she had been very quiet, the last few weeks; sometimes at night he had heard her trying not to cry.) Back home