“Because I planted him up here myself!” Striker ground out exasperatedly. “It was a set-up! I picked him up, outfitted him, staked him, and brought him in here. He ran away to sea at twelve, never even learned his alphabet. I tested him and found out he was telling the truth. He couldn’t write a word, not even his own name! Now do you understand? Are you gonna stand here all night or are you going to do something about it?”

Courlander snatched up the phone, called his precinct house. “Courlander. Send over a detail, quick! St. Anselm. That suicide reported from here has the earmarks of a murder.”

“Earmarks!” scoffed Striker. “It’s murder from head to foot, with a capital M!” He took the phone in turn. “Pardon me if I try to lock the stable door after the nag’s been stolen. . . . H’lo, Maxon? Anyone left the building since this broke, anyone at all? Sure of that? Well, see that no one does. Call in that cop that’s looking after the body. Lock up the secondary exit through the coffee shop. No one’s to leave, no one at all, understand?” He threw the phone back at Courlander. “Confirm that for me, will you? Cops don’t take orders from me. We’ve got them! They’re still in the building some place! There’s no way to get down from the roof. It’s seven stories higher than any of the others around it.”

But Courlander wasn’t taking to cooperation very easily. “All this is based on your say-so that the guy couldn’t write and had a certain amount of money on him when he came up here. So far so good. But something a little more definite than that better turn up. Did you mark the bills you gave him?”

“No, I didn’t,” Striker had to admit. “I wasn’t figuring on robbery being the motive. I still don’t think it’s the primary one, I think it’s only incidental. I don’t think there is any consistent motive. I think we’re up against a maniac.”

“If they weren’t marked, how do you expect us to trace them? Everyone in this place must have a good deal more than just forty-five dollars to their name! If you did plant somebody, why didn’t you back him up, why didn’t you look after him right? How did you expect to be able to help him if you stayed all the way downstairs, nine floors below?”

“I couldn’t very well hang around outside the room. That would’ve been tipping my hand. I warned him, put him on his guard. He was to knock the phone over. That’s all he had to do. Whatever it was, was too quick even for that.”

Two members of the Homicide Squad appeared. “What’s all the fuss and feathers? Where’re the earmarks you spoke of, Courlander? The body’s slated for an autopsy, but the examiner already says it don’t look like anything but just the fall killed him.”