Read Murder on the Blackboard for Free Online

Sergeant complained.
    “I’ll show you,” she said. They had come at last to the end of the hall, where the solitary window opened out beside the narrow door that led to the old-fashioned fire escape.
    Miss Withers tugged at the sash. “Remember my saying that I doubted very much if the murderer got away via this fire escape? You were skeptical.”
    “I wasn’t exactly skeptical, but I had a hunch you were screwy,” Taylor admitted.
    “Well,” went on Miss Withers, as she finally raised the sash, “McTeague didn’t take my word for it, either. He’s tried it for himself, and therefore the ungodly din. Because whenever the fire alarm is rung in this building, it automatically opens this door. Vice versa, when the door is forced, the alarm goes off.”
    Sergeant Taylor heaved a sigh of relief. “You had me scared for a minute, ma’am. So it’s only good old McTeague, huh? He’s always letting his bump of curiosity lead him astray.”
    Miss Withers peered out into the darkness of the playground. There was only a faint glow from a distant street light, and for a moment she could see nothing.
    “Call to him and tell him how to get back here,” she advised. “There’s no connection between the playground and the building—he’ll have to go north around the teeter-totters and through the gate to the street, and then come back through the main entrance. The playground has a fifteen-foot wire fence around it to keep the children from getting out into the street and being run over.”
    The siren was dying down. Sergeant Taylor put his head out of the window.
    “McTeague! Hey, McTeague!” There was no answer.
    The Sergeant turned to Miss Withers. “Say, he couldn’t be hurt, could he? Strike his thick head against a rock or something like that as he slid out of the chute?”
    “I don’t see how,” Miss Withers retorted. “The children slide down it every week and I’ve never had a casualty yet. Wait—isn’t that he there?”
    She pointed into the darkness. A blurred figure was disappearing toward the gate, around the teeter-totter.
    “McTeague!” shouted the Sergeant again. Then, to Miss Withers—“I guess he’s wise to the way out. Hey, McTeague!”
    There was the shuffle of footsteps behind them, and Miss Withers whirled around to stare into the placid countenance of—McTeague!
    “Here I am,” said the big Irish copper. “Who wants me?”
    Miss Withers and the Sergeant both turned to the window again, but the blurred figure was gone. They looked at each other in silence.
    Then Miss Withers whirled on the hapless McTeague. “Say, didn’t the Sergeant tell you to patrol the stairway and this upper hall? Where were you? You went off duty and let somebody sneak through here….”
    McTeague blinked. “But I heard a suspicious noise, ma’am. A sort of knocking….”
    “Yes? Where was it?”
    “Well …” McTeague removed his uniform cap and scratched his head. “It wasn’t no place. I mean it was every place. It was in the radiators, ma’am. Just steam.”
    “Just steam, eh? Well, we heard that, too, Taylor. Steam rattling in the radiators.”
    Miss Withers looked around, quickly. There was a large radiator of the flat type hung on the ceiling over their heads, well out of the way.
    “Will one of you jump up and touch that?”
    McTeague willingly boosted himself up the wall and brought a large red palm in contact with the metal. He withdrew it, redder than it was before, and used a word not common in polite society.
    “I beg your pardon, ma’am,” he added. “But that’s hotter than hell.”
    Miss Withers nodded slowly and wearily. Her face was drawn, and the excitement of the chase was gone.
    “None of us thought it was unusual for a schoolhouse to have steam coming on at this hour of the day,” she said slowly. “The weather has been so warm that there’s only been a small fire in the morning, to take the chill off the place. I suppose you and those stupid men of yours who