At Harper's Ferry by Paul Westwood

  *

  After returning to the office, Jack opened the cheap tin box at his desk and pulled out the money and paper. He counted the money quickly. He looked over at his partner and said, “There’s just over two hundred dollars here,” he said, surprised by the amount.

  Ezra shook his head. “How could a two-bit operator save up this kind of money?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” Jack replied. “Let’s look through these papers.”

  The receipts were for buying liquor and the other necessities of keeping a bar running. But the small book held some further interesting information. Several columns of numbers could be seen next to a list of written names. Some were for small amounts, while other entries were for larger amounts of money.

  Jack studied the receipt book some more before speaking. “I can see our dead friend was making some kind of money on the side, but I’m not sure exactly what he was doing.” He flipped to the end of the book and looked at the last page. “There is an entry here - it looks like he received one hundred dollars from Stevenson.”

  Ezra raised his eyebrows as he turned the book towards himself and looked at the entries. “Stevenson, he’s that rough customer working for Abbott. What he would be doing with Tinen?”

  Jack thought for a moment about Stevenson and the type of man he was rumored to be. “There has to be a connection between my attack, and Tinen’s death. Since I couldn’t be silenced, Stevenson must have returned to the bartender and stretched his neck. Tinen must have known something about the disappearance of Lawrence and they didn’t trust him enough to keep it quiet.”

  The black man leaned back in his chair. “We don’t have any proof yet, but it sounds plausible.”

  “Well, I’m afraid I’ll have to turn in for the day. I still don’t feel right.”

  “I don’t blame you,” Ezra said sympathetically. “Get some rest and we can look further into this tomorrow.”