The Madman Theory by Ellery Queen

yourself.”
    â€œI guess I can do that. I’ll keep my eyes open. What was your name again?”
    Collins supplied his name and phone number and departed.
    He drove back to headquarters in a gloomy mood. The murder of Earl Genneman was fading rapidly into murk.
    In a macabre way, the news he received on his return to headquarters gave him satisfaction.
    Sergeant Easley greeted him with, “This Steve Ricks we’ve been looking for?”
    â€œWhat about him?”
    â€œWe’re not going to find him. Alive that is.”
    Collins waited.
    â€œAll the way to Tucson,” said Rod Easley. “Aboard the Santa Fe. The railroad police found him in a boxcar. He was in bad shape: head busted in, teeth knocked out, hands cut off. Somebody didn’t want him identified.”
    â€œHow was he identified?”
    â€œHe had money in his shoe. A hundred dollar bill and a check for thirty-two bucks. The check was on a Fresno bank. They called to find if we had a missing Steve Ricks.”
    â€œSure enough we did,” said Collins. He actually rubbed his hands.

6
    Steve Ricks had been dead approximately two days, according to the Tucson police doctor—since sometime between 6 p.m. and midnight Tuesday. Railroad records indicated that the boxcar carrying his body had left the Fresno yard at 10:20 that night.
    Ricks had been killed by blows of a hammer or similar implement. His hands had been crudely hacked off, possibly by an axe or hatchet. The murderer had emptied Ricks’ pockets and broken his teeth further to prevent identification. But he had not thought to remove Ricks’ shoes, and his grisly attempt had gone for naught. The check from the shoe instructed the Bank of America at Fresno to pay $32 to the order of Steve Ricks. It was signed “J. K. Mansfield,” a name not to be found in the local telephone directory.
    The murder having been committed within the jurisdiction of the Fresno police, Tucson was returning the body to Fresno. Tucson and Fresno would share the freight cost. The Atcheson, Topeka and Santa Fé Railroad would bear alone whatever expense it had incurred in transporting the body to Tucson.
    Collins returned at once to 982A Mulberry Street with a photographer and a fingerprint man. He inspected Ricks’ effects but found very little: a handful of photographs portraying Ricks in navy blues, Ricks playing guitar with a country band identified as Pete Silliman and His Arkansas Stompers, Ricks with his arm around a ferret-faced blond woman, and others of a similar nature. The photos showed him to have been a man of average height, overweight, with a cheerful face, a snub nose, and sandy hair combed in sweeps and waves. Collins estimated his age at thirty. There were several letters from a Mrs. Beulah Ricks in Bledsoe, Texas, apparently the man’s mother, containing nothing which seemed pertinent.
    Of one thing Collins was certain: the deaths of Earl Genneman and Steve Ricks were connected. To believe otherwise would be to stretch coincidence. Both killings were characterised by savagery, a ruthless lack of squeamishness.
    A thought startled Collins, and he cursed himself for the oversight—even Captain Bigelow would have seen it. A stroke of luck that he had remembered in time, rather than try to explain the lapse to Bigelow later! Steven Ricks’ shoes. Collins already had glanced through the scanty wardrobe: a cheap blue suit, a pair of tan slacks and a brown plaid sports jacket, five or six sports shirts, some neckties, some underwear and socks, two pairs or cowboy boots, a pair of pointed black dress shoes, a pair of tan suede loafers, and heavy work-boots. With care Collins wrapped the boots in newspaper and took them out to his car.
    The Sunset Nursery was a sprawling emporium selling everything from potted orchids to garden tractors, firewood, flagstones and cement. Collins talked first to the owner, then to a man named Sam Delucci, the