Chapter 18 Narcotics department black ledger

The Black Ledger case was one of the biggest cases Ellery has ever taken over, and this huge impact does not change because Ellery spent only a little effort.It simply required Ellery to do an errand to bring a ledger from New York City to Washington, D.C. Why is shipping ledgers from one city to another a thorn in the side of three dollars?Why was Ellery a courier instead of a federal agent?Why did he go out of his way to complete the task alone, without even a weapon?These concerns may have answers in appropriate places, but they will not be answered here.The story begins after these questions have been answered.

From the outside, this black ledger is unremarkable.The cover, frayed at the corners, with a faux-leather border, was six inches wide by eight and a half inches high; in it were fifty-two pages, thick and soft, lined in blue and red; Dirty.However, it remains the most notorious ledger in America's criminal library and is of great historical importance.Because on the blue horizontal line among these fifty-two pages, there are the names and addresses of drug dealers in all important areas of the United States, and the person who wrote the list is the leader of the circle. The list was urgently needed by federal authorities at a time when drug addiction was sweeping through forty-eight states.Leaving behind the black ledger is an extremely rash move, so its original owner, the dormant monster, will do whatever it takes to get it back.Two government agents paid with their lives to keep the ledger.At least for the time being, the black ledger is safely in New York.

It was here that Ellery joined the action. The places where the books are checked, the tasks are taken over and prepared for execution must be under the surveillance of the opponent.Criminal organizations operate across the continent, and their leaders are not just ordinary mafia bosses.He is a genius with no conscience, able to mobilize huge power, resources and relationships, and almost raise malicious crimes to a respectable enterprise scale.Ordinary methods are bound to fail. If you rely on force, it will definitely turn the scene into a bloody battlefield, resulting in the loss of innocent citizens' lives.So Ellery's plan was adopted.

He reserved a lounge on the Capital Express by phone.At the appointed time, Ellery started walking down the street. The autumn sky was gray and cloudy.Ellery slung a bamboo-handled umbrella over his left arm, wore a light, lined overcoat, and carried a bulging briefcase. What Ellery didn't seem to realize was that from the moment he stepped onto the sidewalk, his chances of saving his life plummeted to near zero.Calmly smoking his big briar pipe, he stepped onto the curb as if looking for a cab. Two things happened simultaneously.His arms were restrained from behind, and a seven-seater car sped to the side of the road, blocking his way.

In a second he was in the car.Four large men held him prisoner, their absolute silence more threatening than intimidating. Ellery wasn't surprised when the car dropped them off at Penn Station.Among the four silent detainees, three involuntarily pushed him to Door No. 3 and entered Lounge A of Car No. 5 of the Metropolitan Express, which was exactly the room he had reserved.Two tall men ushered him in, and another carefully bolted the lounge door. As Ellery had expected, the monster was waiting for him.The monster sat in the best armchair, a very well-dressed middle-aged man.His thin white hair was neatly parted in the middle, and his eyes were burning and painful.The monster was a millionaire, Ellery thought, a millionaire who made millions by destroying the hopes, health, and futures of countless fools.Many of these fools are children and teenagers.

Then Ellery said, "Of course, you tapped the phone." The drug lord didn't answer.He glanced at the stronger of the two big men, the one with the snub nose. "Nose" immediately said: "He didn't talk to anyone when he came out. No one approached him. He didn't touch anything, he didn't drop anything." The monster in the chair looked at the other big man, whose right eyelid was always twitching. "No one else came out from there to follow us." Twitch said, "Al is in the waiting room and has been using the train station phone."

Those eyes cast their animal torment on Ellery. "Do you want to live?" he said in a woman's soft voice. "Think like everybody else," Ellery said, his tongue nearly fighting with itself. "Then hand it over." Ellery swallowed and said, "Come on." Nose grinned, but the monster said to him, "No. Open his briefcase first." Nose dumped the contents of Ellery's briefcase on the ground.There was only one thing in it: a brand-new Manhattan phone book. "Anything else?" "There's nothing left." "Nose" threw the empty briefcase aside.He picked up the thick catalog and flipped through it twice.

"It's so weird to run around with this," Twitch commented. "My favorite thing to do is to read the phone book on the train," Ellery said.He wanted so badly to ask them for a glass of water, but decided not to. "Not here," said Nose. "His coat and hat." Nose stripped his coat like corn, and Twitch inspected the hat. "It can't be here," he complained. "It's too big." "Nose" sneered: "If there is a cover, it will be very big. This is a smart man, he must have torn off the pages one by one, and then crumpled them into balls."

"But there are fifty-two pages." Twitch protested. The monster said nothing.His blood-red eyes fixed on the folded umbrella.They had returned it to Ellery, who was clutching it.Suddenly, he stretched out his hand to grab it, slowly removed the umbrella cover, and slowly opened the umbrella ribs.The umbrella is open.After a while, he threw the umbrella aside. "It's not in the coat," said Nose, and he threw the lining on the floor, pockets turned out, seams ripped open. "Strip him naked." Ellery felt his knuckles aching from the "nose." "Twitch" took off his clothes without mercy.The monster's tormented eyes, like those of a crocodile, watched him being stripped naked without blinking.

"At least keep the shorts!" Ellery said wildly. They left him with nothing, and he was as naked as a newborn.They allowed him to wrap up what remains of his overcoat and curl up in a chair to smoke his pipe.The tobacco tasted like brass smoke, but it comforted him nonetheless. As the Metro pulled out of Penn Station, he reached for the Manhattan phone book.He knew they had made contact with the conductor, and no one would bother him until he got to Washington—if he made it there alive. But he was wrong.A man entered the lounge when the train stopped in Newark. "Nose" called him doctor.The doctor was a fat little man with a triple chin, no hair, and a black bundle.He eyed Ellery briskly, expectantly like a professor approaching the mortuary trough in the autopsy room.

Ellery clutched the Manhattan phone book, cheering himself up. The Capital Express zipped through New Brunswick.While the doctor was busy, he jokingly called himself the Minister of the Interior with all his viscera.By the time the train pulled into Trenton Station, the doctor had run out of strength to joke; he was sweating profusely. He closed the bag and spoke to the man in the armchair in a nervous voice. nothing. The man in the armchair said to Twitch, "Tell Al to call Fili. I want Jiger to come over with the tools." Then he looked at Ellery, showing him his nightmarish smile for the first time and dentures in the mouth. "Maybe it's ciphertext." He said softly, "Just in case." Giger gets on the bus in North Philadelphia.At Wilmington, "Nose" reported the situation, and Jiger completed further inspections.Giger was a tall, thin, sloppy-shouldered man with a misshapen leg. The black ledger, or part of it, was not in Ellery's suit, and the remains of his trousers and light coat had been checked, and there was nothing, either.His oxford shirt, tie, underwear, shorts and socks had been meticulously destroyed.His shoe had been knocked, punctured, cut open, and nearly turned over.Even his humble leather belt was cut in half. Everything he owns is clear at a glance.Keys and coins are solid.The wallet contained ninety-seven dollars, a money order stub, a New York business license, an expired receipt from the Mystery Writers of America, five business cards, and seven notes on the inspiration for the story.His checkbook was turned page by page, including stubs.His tobacco pouch contained pipe tobacco, and his unopened cigarette case contained cigarettes.There was a letter from the publisher asking him to return a proof copy of the novel, three weeks overdue; and a letter signed by Josephine McCarty threatening to kill Ellery unless he would save the writer Freedom from an invisible enemy. Giger rubbed his Adam's apple and said there was no secret text in anything the man brought or wore or at all.This includes all smooth surfaces, including his cuticle.Giger used the word "skin." At this time, they were approaching Elkton, Maryland. The monster bit its lower lip quietly. "Maybe," said Nose in the silence, "maybe he's got the names all... eh?" "Yes!" "Twitch" seemed relieved, "The ledger may still be in New York, he put all the contents in his mind." The man in the chair looked up. "Twenty-eight names on one page, fifty-two pages in all—almost fifteen hundred names. You think he's Einstein?" he said suddenly. "You picked up that phone book again. .Interesting?" Ellery added fresh tobacco to his pipe, to give his fingers something to do. "Some people can relax with detective novels, I can't - I write detective novels. So I relax with the phone book." "Of course." The pained eyes flashed. "Jig, check that book!" Nose snatched it from Ellery. "But I've tested it, and there's no ciphertext," Giger said. "Never mind the ciphertext, what we're looking for is a string of names. In the New York phone book, you'll find all the names! Look for marks left next to the names—pinholes, pencil dots, fingernail prints— -whatever!" "Could some gentleman lend me a light?" said Ellery plaintively. The train was pulling into Washington Station when Giger returned from the cubicle he had been using as a makeshift laboratory. "No marks," he grumbled. "Nothing. The book is exactly as it was printed." "There's no one else trying to leave at that junction in New York." Twitch grumbled under his breath. "Al's calling from Baltimore." The man in the chair said slowly, "Then he is indeed the bait. They think he can distract us, and the others can escape at this time. But they will still be intercepted by us. Real Boy Scouts sooner or later." Gonna sneak out of that building. 'Twitch', tell Al to call New York and tell Mano that if anyone else comes out of there, he can start slitting his throat...well, you." He looked at Al Lerry, "Put on your clothes." The Capital Express stops at Washington Station.Ellery looked more like a bum than a respectable author-sleuth.He picked up the umbrella and said casually, "Will I be shot in the back when I leave, or is everything settled?" "Wait," said the monster. "What's wrong?" Ellery said, clutching his umbrella nervously. "Where are you going with this umbrella?" "Umbrella?" Ellery looked down at it blankly. "Oh, you checked it yourself—" "Indeed it is." Now the womanly voice grew ferocious, "I did check—the wrong part! It's in the handle. You roll up the inside pages of the ledger and stuff it into the hollow umbrella It's in the handle! Grab the umbrella!" Convulsed by Twitch, Ellery watched mesmerized as Nose destroyed the umbrella handle. After it was completely destroyed, there was nothing on the floor of the rest room except bamboo fragments. The monster stood up, eyes that seemed to be smoking in pain. "Get him out," he said hoarsely, "get him out of here!" Twenty-six minutes later, Ellery was escorted to a very important building in Washington.He came to a very important government office and entered the private offices of very important officials. "I'm a courier from New York," said Ellery. "I've brought you the black ledger." In federal court, Ellery saw the monster again.They ran into each other in the hallway during recess.Marshals, lawyers and journalists surround the drug lord, who looks like a criminal who knows he's in trouble.However, the moment he saw Ellery, his expression immediately brightened.He tugged at Ellery's arm to pull him aside. "Keep these monkeys off for a while!" he yelled, and then said pitifully, "Quinn, you really saved my life. These guys are driving me nuts. You were the one on that damn train." , I keep asking myself how did you do it. Not on you, not in your body, not in the phone book or in the umbrella. Where the hell? Can you tell me, please?" "I don't give a damn," Ellery said coldly. "I don't give a shit about people like you. Of course I'll tell you. Phone books and umbrellas are distractions. I'll let you be smart about your time." Spent it all. I have always had the ledger.” "What did you say?" the monster howled. "You're just juggling the size and content of the ledger. You don't spend time thinking about it. The volume and content can be reduced." "Ok?" "Microfilm," Ellery said, "is used by the government in wartime to reduce the size of each letter in troop correspondence to a quarter of an inch square. Even a ton of regular mail—eighty-five thousand letters Letters—it weighs only twenty pounds when turned into microfilm. I just need to photograph those fifty-two sheets of six-by-eight-inch paper and turn them into microfilm. The result is thirteen feet long, less than Half an inch wide. If rolled tightly..." "But you said it was in your hand." Takamono said confusedly, "I bet a million dollars that you didn't hide anything in your hand..." "I wouldn't make such a foolish bet," Ellery said. "No, the film was hidden in something—in two things, in fact. I've been lighting it with matches from New York to Washington. " "Match! Did you light it?" "Pretty good, isn't it? Oh, it's in a fireproof container, an old good-sized cartridge case, and it clamps down tight. The container stuck to the bottom of my pipe--that's what I carry The only one in there you haven't searched. The smoke smells like brass," Ellery said, "but as soon as I think of the kids who learned to smoke your marijuana, and the ones who inject your heroin Boy, I think it's all worth it. What do you think?"