"My name is Rand," he identified himself. "I am calling from Arnold Rivers's antique-arms shop on Route 19, about a mile and a half east of Rosemont. I am reporting a homicide."
"Yeah, go ahead—Hey! Did you say homicide?" the other voice asked sharply. "Who?"
"Rivers himself. I called at his shop a few minutes ago, found the front door open, and walked in. I found Rivers lying dead on the floor, just inside the door. He had been killed with a Mauser rifle—not shot; clubbed with the butt, and bayoneted. The body is cold, beginning to stiffen; a pool of blood on the floor is almost completely dried."
"That's a good report, mister," the corporal approved. "You stick around; we'll be right along. You haven't touched anything, have you?"
"Not around the body. How long will it take you to get here?"
"About ten minutes. I'll tell Sergeant McKenna right away."
Rand hung up and glanced at his watch. Ten twenty-two; he gave himself seven minutes and went around the room rapidly, looking only at pistols. He saw nothing that might have come from the Fleming collection. Finally, he opened the front door, just as a white State Police car was pulling up at the end of the walk.
Sergeant Ignatius Loyola McKenna—customarily known and addressed as Mick—piled out almost before it had stopped. The driver, a stocky, blue-eyed Finn with a corporal's chevrons, followed him, and two privates got out from behind, dragging after them a box about the size and shape of an Army footlocker. McKenna was halfway up the drive before he recognized Rand. Then he stopped short.
"Well, Jaysus-me-beads!" He turned suddenly to the corporal. "My God, Aarvo; you said his name was Grant!"
"That's what I thought he said." Rand recognized the singsong accent he had heard on the phone. "You know him?"