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diff --git a/75500-0.txt b/75500-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d94f607 --- /dev/null +++ b/75500-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7775 @@ + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75500 *** + + +Murder by the Clock + +by Rufus King + +Published by Doubleday, Doran & Company, Inc., 1929. +Copyright, 1928, 1929 by The Consolidated Magazine +Corporation (The Red Book Magazine). + + + +CONTENTS + + I. 8:37 p. m.—Spring 3100 + II. 9:24 p. m.—Hall Marks of Murder + III. 9:45 p. m.—Guards Are Stationed at the Doors + IV. 10:02 p. m.—Pale Flares the Darkness + V. 10:17 p. m.—Living or Dead? + VI. 10:32 p. m.—Pictures in Dust + VII. 11:01 p. m.—Banked Fires + VIII. 11:28 p. m.—Mrs. Endicott Screams + IX. 11:55 p. m.—Queer Deeps + X. 12:06 a. m.—The Stillness of a Grave + XI. 12:15 a. m.—To Watch by Night + XII. 12:30 a. m.—Madame Velasquez Stirs up Muck + XIII. 2:01 a. m.—Glittering Eyes + XIV. 2:01 a. m.—An Empty Sheath + XV. 2:13 a. m.—The Thin Steel Blade + XVI. 2:13 a. m.—Time _versus_ Death + XVII. 2:40 a. m.—The Angle of Death’s Path + XVIII. 3:00 a. m.—Thin Haze of Dread + XIX. 3:15 a. m.—The Properties of Horror + XX. 3:24 a. m.—On Private Heights + XXI. 3:51 a. m.—A Woman’s Slipper + XXII. 4:14 a. m.—Tap—Tap—Tap + XXIII. 4:29 a. m.—A Turn of the Screw + XXIV. 4:41 a. m.—As the Colours of Dawn + XXV. 5:01 a. m.—Lunatic Vistas + XXXVI. 5:25 a. m.—There Was a Sailor + XXVII. 5:46 a. m.—Mrs. Endicott Cannot Be Found + XXVIII. 6:00 a. m.—Mist Drifting Through Mist + XXIX. 6:30 a. m.—As Is Mirage + XXX. 7:11 a. m.—The Criminal and Weapon of the Crime + XXXI. 8:37 p. m.—Five Years Later + + + +CHAPTER I + +8:37 p. m.—Spring 3100 + +Mrs. Endicott thought for a moment of simply dialling the operator and +saying, “I want a policeman.” + +It was what the printed notices in the telephone directory urged one +to do in case of an emergency. But it wasn’t an emergency exactly, +nor—still exactly—was it a policeman she wanted. She wanted a +detective, or an inspector, or something; a man to whom she could +explain her worry about Herbert, and who could do something about it +if he agreed with her that Herbert was in danger. + +Mrs. Endicott had never had any personal contact with the police. +Whenever she thought about it at all she thought of the force as an +efficient piece of machinery, the active parts of which one observed +daily from one’s motor as healthy and generally good-looking young men +who controlled traffic. She knew that there was a patrolman whose beat +carried him past their door. Upon thinking suddenly about it she +realized that she had only seen this man twice or three times at most +during the past year. She knew that Herbert always left a ten-dollar +gold piece to be given him by one of the maids at Christmas, and a +check for twenty dollars as a subscription to some enterprise vaguely +designated as the “fund.” + +She wondered momentarily whether the police characters she had seen in +various plays, while at the theatre with Herbert, were true to life. +Most of the characters had been brutal, in spite of a pleasant +tender-heartedness reluctantly betrayed toward the final curtain, and +just at present she wanted quiet, competent understanding—not +brutality. + +It occurred to her that a private investigator might be better, but +she was uncertain as to the extent of their official powers. She +decided to rely on the police, because the police could do something +if they agreed with her that something ought to be done. + +Mrs. Endicott looked up the telephone number of police headquarters +and dialled Spring 3100. She grew nervous while waiting. + +“This is Mrs. Herbert Endicott speaking,” she said, when an undeniably +masculine voice answered. It was an impersonal, efficient voice with +no overtones about it. “Will you please connect me with your detective +department? . . . I beg your pardon? Oh.” She gave the number of her +house on East Sixty-third Street between Fifth and Madison avenues. + +“This is Mrs. Herbert Endicott speaking,” she began again, upon a +second voice’s saying, “Hello,” “and I am worried about Mr. Endicott. +I wonder whether you could send someone up to talk it over with +me. . . . No, he hasn’t disappeared. I know exactly where he has gone, +but I have reason to believe that something might happen to him. . . . +Yes, it’s the Mr. Endicott who has been in the papers recently in +connection with Wall Street. . . . Around in a few minutes? But I +thought police headquarters were down on Centre Street. . . . They +transferred the call to the precinct station? Really. . . . Oh, thank +you.” + +Mrs. Endicott replaced the receiver on its hook. She felt distinctly +impressed at the efficiency with which her request had been so +instantly transferred to the place where it could be handled +competently and with dispatch. + +The living room where she had been telephoning was on the second floor +of the house. She left it and went to her dressing room, which was +toward the rear of a corridor on the same floor. She gave her +appearance a preoccupied inspection before a pier glass. The soft and +uneven lines of the jade chiffon of her dress would offer a +satisfactory mask, she felt, for the nervous tenseness of her body. +She renewed the red on her upper lip where she had been biting it. She +returned to the living room, lighted a cigarette, and picked up a +novel which she did not read. + +She smoked three cigarettes. + +Her sense of aloneness became stifling. The conceit grew upon her +nervous condition that she had changed places with the furniture. She +had become inanimate and the furniture endowed with attributes of +life, as if her being were under the influence of some dispassionate +regard by something that had no eyes with which to see. It was +nonsense—nonsense. She never should have listened—at least not +attentively—to that wretched old woman. She could very well just have +given the appearance . . . one had to be polite . . . + +Mrs. Endicott moved restlessly to one of the draped windows and stared +down on the silent street. About her stretched the city of New York, +and yet her environment could not have been quieter in some cabin in +the woods. Not as quiet. Her memory swerved to that hellish week with +Herbert in the forests outside of Copenhagen . . . what on earth _was_ +the name of that little watering place . . . Trollhättan? . . . No, +that was in Sweden. Names never mattered. She looked up for a while at +a slender slice of night sky horizoned by cornices across the street. +It was heavy with stars that held her as if they were so many magic +mediums arranged in heaven for the express purpose of granting her +earthbound wishes. Wishes? She shrugged. She released the drapes, and +they settled into place. + +A maid opened the living-room door and came in. + +“A lieutenant from the precinct station, madam.” + +“All right, Jane. Ask him to come up here. Did he give his name?” + +“Lieutenant Valcour, madam, I think he said.” + +“Try and be more careful in the future about getting names.” + +“Yes, madam.” + +Mrs. Endicott lighted another cigarette. Her sense of having done the +proper thing began to desert her in a rush. The police had a habit of +finding things out—unexpected things, irrelevant to any matter on +hand. She was sure of it, and wondered on what she based the +knowledge: books, hearsay. She would have to be careful, but after +all, a person with intelligence—— He was standing in the doorway. + +“My maid,” she said, “wasn’t sure of your name. Is it Valcour?” She +noticed with a sense of relief that he was not in uniform and that he +had left his hat and overcoat downstairs. Mrs. Endicott had an +aversion to discussing things which fringed on possible intimacies +with people who were hatted and coated. He was a mild elderly man with +features that were homely but not undistinguished, well dressed in +tweed, and not smoking a cigar. He affected her with a quieting sense +of reassurance. + +“Valcour is correct, Mrs. Endicott. I happened to be leaving for home +when your call was put in, so I stopped in personally instead of +sending a detective as you suggested.” + +The faint trace of cultured precision in his speech made her suspect +foreign origin. She was sensitive to voices, and while not exactly +collecting them, they almost amounted with her to a hobby. They were +an essential part in the attraction she felt toward certain people, +and it would have been within the bounds of possibility for her to +have fallen in love with a voice. + +“You are of French origin, Lieutenant?” + +“French-Canadian, Mrs. Endicott. I became naturalized twenty years +ago.” + +She offered her hand. They sat down. Now that he was here she felt +that the necessity for hurry had vanished; his air of official +protection had erased it. She wondered how it would be best to begin: +just where to plunge into the foggy mass that composed her worry. + +Lieutenant Valcour accepted a cigarette and lighted it. He was +agreeably impressed with Mrs. Endicott and with the room. Both were +unusual, and the competent foundation in culture he had acquired at +McGill University in his youth enabled him to place them at a proper +evaluation. The furniture was low set in design and severely simple, +the general effect one of spaciousness and repose oddly marred by a +muted undernote of harshness. It was not bizarre. He suspected it, +correctly, of being modernistic. Mrs. Endicott herself had the +startlingly clear perfection of features one occasionally finds in +blondes. He decided that her age centred on twenty-five. Beneath her +authentic beauty—her face seemed planed in pale tones of pink +ice—there would be a definite substrata of metal. He noted that the +six cigarette butts crushed in the vermilion lacquered tray on a small +table beside her chair had not been smoked beyond a few puffs each. A +clock standing on the broad-shelved mantel of the fireplace struck +nine. + +“My husband,” Mrs. Endicott said abruptly, “has been gone now exactly +two hours.” + +Lieutenant Valcour smiled amiably and settled himself a little less +formally in his chair. His manner presented itself to her as a freshly +sponged slate upon which she could trace any markings that she might +choose. + +“He left here at seven o’clock this evening,” Mrs. Endicott said, “to +go to the apartment of a woman with whom he thinks he is in love. Her +name is Marge Myles, and her apartment is on the Drive.” + +Lieutenant Valcour’s smile seemed to offer both consolation and an +apology. + +“I’m afraid there isn’t very much we can do for you,” he said. “It’s +always private inquiry agents who handle work of that—well, of that +rather delicate character.” + +“No—I haven’t made myself plain.” Mrs. Endicott’s indeterminate +thoughts began to crystallize. “I’m not looking for evidence to secure +a divorce. This woman is nothing of any permanence, but I’m afraid of +her—of what she might do to Herbert.” Then she added, as if the simple +statement in itself would insure his comprehension, “You see, I’ve +seen her.” + +“With him?” + +“Yes. They were lunching at the St. Regis. Herbert always was a fool +about those things. She’s foreign-looking—the Latin type.” Mrs. +Endicott felt the need for being meticulously explicit. “Her eyes are +like the black holes you see in portraits of Spanish women. They’re +the entire face; everything else blurs into a nonessential whiteness. +This woman’s eyes are like that—like weapons. I know she’s the sort +who would kill if she got stirred up over something—got jealous or +something. People do get jealous enough to kill,” she ended. + +“Frequently.” Lieutenant Valcour stored away in his memory the broken +nail on the little finger of Mrs. Endicott’s left hand. The uniform +perfection of detail in the rest of her appearance made it stand out +jarringly. “This is all most unfortunate,” he said sympathetically, +“but I still doubt whether there is anything we could do. If there +were only something definite—say a threat, for example—we’d be very +glad to investigate it and to offer Mr. Endicott suitable protection.” + +Mrs. Endicott stood up. The abruptness of the movement spread the +folds of chiffon that streamed from a bow on her left shoulder, and +Lieutenant Valcour’s deceptively indifferent eyes lingered on bruise +marks that showed blue smears upon white skin before the chiffon fell +back into place. + +“Would you come with me to my husband’s room?” Mrs. Endicott said. + +“Certainly.” + +“There’s something there I’d like to show you—to ask you what you +think about it.” + +Lieutenant Valcour followed Mrs. Endicott along the corridor that led +past her dressing room. A door beyond this opened into her bedroom, +and directly across the corridor from it was the door to Endicott’s +room. The blank end of the corridor served as a wall for the bathroom, +which connected the two bedrooms and turned them into a suite which +ran the width of the rear of the house. + +Lieutenant Valcour sensed a difference in the furnishings of +Endicott’s bedroom that set it at sharp variance with the other parts +of the house that he had seen. It was done in heavy mahoganies that +were antiquated rather than antique, and methodically centred in each +panel of its gray-toned walls was a print of some painting by Maxfield +Parrish. After a comprehensive glance around he felt as if he had +already met Endicott. He had at least evolved a fairly accurate +portrait of the man’s sensibilities, if not of his physique. He +thought that Endicott would be difficult: a clearly divided +neighbouring of the physical and the ideal, assuredly conscious of the +fitness of things—which would be responsible for his acquiescence in +the tone of the rest of the house—but dominated by an inner +stubbornness which faced ridicule in the maintaining of his private +room at the level he had accepted as a standard years before. + +“That is his desk.” + +Mrs. Endicott indicated a flat-topped desk which was placed before one +of the rear windows. A lemon-jacketed book with crumpled pages was +lying on it as if it had been slammed there. Near the book was a scrap +of paper. Lieutenant Valcour leaned down and stared at the paper +without picking it up. On it was printed in pencil: + +[Illustration: Scrawled capital letters reading “BY THURSDAY OR—”.] + +He looked at Mrs. Endicott. She was evidently waiting for him to +speak. + +“To-day is Thursday,” he said. “Might it not be simply a memorandum?” + +“My husband doesn’t print his memorandums, nor is it likely he would +use a piece of paper torn from a paper bag.” She added, to clinch her +belief, “I can’t imagine Herbert ever having a paper bag.” + +“Perhaps he bought something at some haberdasher’s.” + +“The paper is too cheap. It’s more like the sort they use at grocers’ +or small stationers’.” + +“So it is.” + +“And there’s a crudeness about the printing. It’s almost an +intentional crudeness.” Mrs. Endicott stared fixedly at Lieutenant +Valcour. “It’s the sort of printing you’d expect to find in a threat,” +she said. + +“I have learned to find almost any sort of writing or material used +for purposes of conveying a threat,” Lieutenant Valcour said. “People +who threaten are invariably unbalanced emotionally, if not actually +mentally, and there is never any telling just what they will do. There +was a case that recently came to my attention where a woman received a +threat which had been engraved on excellent paper and enclosed in the +conventional inner envelope one uses for formal announcements or +invitations.” + +“Really.” + +“I’m not, by that, questioning your judgment in the matter of this +note, Mrs. Endicott. It might quite well be a threat, as you think.” + +“There is nothing else apparent that it could be.” + +“When did you find it, Mrs. Endicott?” + +“After my husband had left.” + +“Lying just about where it is now?” + +“Exactly where it is now.” + +“I see. You didn’t touch it then—just read it. I wonder why your +husband left it there.” + +She looked at him almost impatiently. “I don’t imagine he did leave it +there—that is, purposely. It probably fell out from between the leaves +when he slammed the book down.” + +“Has it occurred to you that we might call up this Marge Myles—but +that’s foolish. Of course you’d have thought of that.” + +He observed her obliquely as she answered. + +“He’d never forgive me.” Her gesture was faintly expressive of +helplessness. “I’m not supposed to know anything about it.” + +“Of course. This menace, Mrs. Endicott, this danger that you are +fearing, where do you think it lies?” + +She became consciously vague. “The streets—indoors—out——” + +“And you’re basing it entirely upon this note?” + +“Primarily. It’s something concrete, at any rate. I think that he +ought to have protection, and yet, if I did do anything about it, he’d +put it down as spying.” + +“Well, if this note is a threat there is rarely only one, you know. I +wonder whether we might find any others. I haven’t the remotest +justification for looking, but I’m willing to do so if you wish me +to.” + +Mrs. Endicott grew curiously detached. “His papers are in the upper +right-hand drawer,” she said. + +Lieutenant Valcour opened the drawer. Its contents were in a state of +considerable confusion. It was not the sort of confusion which is the +result of a cumulative addition of separate notes, letters, and sheets +of paper, but a kind that exists when a normally orderly collection of +papers has been milled around in suddenly. + +“There’s quite a mass of stuff here,” he said. “It might be simpler to +eliminate other possible places before tackling it. I must repeat +again that I’ll be exceeding any legal rights by doing so, but if you +earnestly believe your husband is in danger I’d like to go through the +pockets of his clothing.” + +“Pockets?” + +“It’s a much more usual place to find important things than you would +imagine.” + +“His clothes are in that cupboard.” + +Mrs. Endicott indicated a door. Lieutenant Valcour went over and +opened it. An electric light was automatically turned on in the +ceiling. The large hulk of a man crumpled into one corner of the +cupboard gave him a severe shock. The man was dead. He closed the door +and faced Mrs. Endicott. He nodded toward the desk, on which a +telephone was standing. + +“I’m going to use that telephone for a few minutes,” he said. “There’s +a message I want to put through. Also, please ring for your maid.” + +Mrs. Endicott’s eyes widened a little. “There’s something in the +cupboard,” she said. + +“Ring for your maid, please.” + +She went past him and toward the cupboard door. He shrugged. The value +of her reaction would offset the brutality of not stopping her. She +opened the door and looked in. Her grip tightened on the knob. + +“Then he didn’t go out at seven,” she said. + +“No, Mrs. Endicott. He didn’t go out at all.” + + + +CHAPTER II + +9:24 p. m.—Hall Marks of Murder + +Lieutenant Valcour felt that the utter stillness of the room would +overwhelm him. He—Mrs. Endicott—everything seemed to be taking its cue +from death. He reached past Mrs. Endicott and touched the body’s +cheek. It was quite cold. + +“Where is your room, Mrs. Endicott?” + +He carefully pried her fingers from the knob of the cupboard door and +then closed it. + +“But you can’t leave him in that cupboard.” + +Her voice held the toneless qualities of arrested emotion, as if the +functioning of her nerve centres had stopped. + +“We must leave him in there, Mrs. Endicott, until someone from the +medical examiner’s office has seen him. If you’ll tell me the name of +your family physician before you lie down——” + +“Lie down—I? Lie down?” + +“Yes, and rest. I’ll call the doctor up on the possible chance that +we’re mistaken, only I’m quite certain, Mrs. Endicott, that we +aren’t.” + +She stumbled verbally in her rush. “Worth—Dr. Sanford Worth—Calumet +876—it’s 876 something—I know it perfectly well. I—it’s in my +book—come with me.” + +She seemed mechanically vitalized, and her movements were those of a +nervous, jerky toy. She flung open a door adjacent to the cupboard. It +led into a bathroom, the fittings of which were of coral-coloured +porcelain. A door in the opposite wall led into her bedroom. She went +immediately to a leather reference book beside a telephone near her +bed. + +“It’s Calumet 8769,” she said. + +Her finger slipped in the dialling. Lieutenant Valcour gently took the +instrument from her hands and put through the call. + +“The office of Dr. Worth?” he said, when a woman’s voice answered him. +“This is the home of Mr. Herbert Endicott. I am Lieutenant Valcour of +the police department. Mr. Endicott is dead. I would appreciate it if +Dr. Worth would come here at once and consult with the medical +examiner, and also attend to Mrs. Endicott. Thank you.” He replaced +the receiver. + +“I haven’t the slightest intention of collapsing, Lieutenant.” + +“We will need Dr. Worth anyway, Mrs. Endicott.” + +Lieutenant Valcour dialled the Central Office and, in a suddenly most +efficient voice, gave the requisite information. He then called his +own precinct station and told the sergeant at the desk to send over a +detail of five men in uniform. + +“The chief of the Homicide Bureau, the medical examiner, and some of +my own men will be here presently,” he said to Mrs. Endicott. + +“And my husband has to stay in that cupboard until they come?” + +“Unless Dr. Worth arrives first and disagrees with me that Mr. +Endicott is dead.” + +“It’s inhuman.” + +“Very, but there’s a set routine for these cases that we have to +observe. Is this the button you ring for your maid?” + +He pressed a push button set in the wall at the head of the bed. + +“Yes, but I don’t want her.” + +“You may, and there’s no harm in her being with you. I’m going to +leave you in here for a little while, until the people we’ve +telephoned for come.” + +“You insist on my staying in this room?” + +“Heavens, no. Do anything you like, Mrs. Endicott, or that you feel +will help you. As long,” he added gently, “as you don’t leave the +house.” + +“Oh.” + +“You see we’ll have to talk such a lot of things over, just as soon as +the usual formalities are finished.” + +“It’s rather terrible, isn’t it?” + +“Pretty terrible, Mrs. Endicott.” + +“So”—she mentally groped for a satisfactory word—“so conclusive.” + +It seemed a peculiar choice. Lieutenant Valcour sensed that it wasn’t +just Endicott’s life alone which was concluded by death, but something +else as well—such as an argument, perhaps, or a secret and bitter +struggle. The precise significance was elusive, and he gave it up, or +rather checked it within his memory in that compartment which already +contained six barely smoked cigarette butts, a broken finger nail, +bruise marks, and a note which, in view of the body, might safely be +presumed to have been a threat. + +A maid knocked on the door and came in. She stared speculatively for a +curious second at Lieutenant Valcour. + +“Madam rang?” + +“No, Roberts. Lieutenant Valcour rang. Lieutenant Valcour is of the +police.” + +Any sudden announcing of the police is always shocking. It is a +prelude to so many unpleasant possibilities even in the lives of the +most blameless. They are in a class with telegrams. Lieutenant Valcour +noted that Roberts accepted his identity with nothing further than an +almost imperceptible catching of breath. Mrs. Endicott’s attitude +puzzled him. It wasn’t resentment, certainly, or any stretching at +rudeness; such emotions seemed so utterly inconsequential at this +moment when she must have been wrenched by a very severe shock. It +reminded him of the aimless play of lightning clowning before the +purposeful fury of a storm. + +“Mrs. Endicott will explain things to you,” he said. “Stay with her, +please.” + +There lingered, as he went into the bathroom, a picture of the two +women, separated by the distance of the room, standing quite still and +staring at each other: Mrs. Endicott, young, exquisitely lovely +looking—the other, older, quite implacable. The connection was absurd, +but the effect remained of two antagonists in a strange encounter who +are standing in their separate corners of a ring. He closed the +bathroom door and slipped the catch. He turned on all the lights. + +There was a single window. He parted muslin curtains and looked at a +glazed lemon-coloured shade, especially along its hemmed bottom. There +were some smudges at its centre that interested him. He believed that +they had been made by a dirty thumb. He raised the shade and the lower +sash of the window. + +The night was clear and cold and windless. A shallow stone balcony ran +the width of the rear of the house. It was for ornamentation rather +than use, as to get onto it one had to straddle the window sill. +Lieutenant Valcour did so, and stood looking down upon the dimly +defined outlines of what, in spring, would bloom into a formal garden. +He satisfied himself that there seemed no access to the balcony from +the ground unless one used a ladder or were endowed with those special +and fortunately rare qualities which transform an otherwise normal +person into a human fly. + +The house was five windows wide; the two on the right of the bathroom +belonged to Mrs. Endicott’s room, and the two on its left to her +husband’s. He flashed on his electric torch and examined all five +sills. None showed a trace of recent passage, and there was no very +good reason, he realized, why any of them should. They were clean, +windswept, and smooth. + +How pleasant it would be, he reflected, to come across the perfect +imprint of a shoe, or a rubber, or—what was it that was so popular at +the moment?—of course: the footprint of a gorilla. The case would then +be what was technically known as an open-and-shut one. He’d simply +take the train for California and arrest Lon Chaney, and—— But enough. + +And the floor itself on the balcony was smugly lacking in clues. He +relinquished the keen sharp air, the star-heavy night, and returned to +the bathroom by way of its window, which he closed, and again drew +down its lemon-coloured shade. + +A cake of soap in a container set in the wall above a basin attracted +his attention. It was so incredibly dirty. Someone with exceptionally +dirty hands had used it and either hadn’t bothered to rinse it off or +else hadn’t had the time to. The dirt had dried on it. + +He couldn’t vision such a condition of uncleanliness in connection +with the hands of either Mr. or Mrs. Endicott, unless there had been +some obscure reason. He preferred to think for the moment that the +hands had belonged, and presumably still did, to the murderer. That, +of course, eliminated the gorilla. What a pity it was, he reflected, +that he was so constantly obsessed with infernal absurdities. Even +though he tried to keep them under triple lock and key when working +with his associates on the force, they had a distressing habit at +times of cropping out into the open where they could be seen. Nor were +they of a humour especially in vogue among his contemporaries; there +rarely was an and-the-drummer-said-to-Mabel or an-Irishman-and-a-Jew +among them. Rarely? He shuddered. Never. As a result there were +occasions when he rested under the cloud of being considered mildly +lunatic. It was bad business. He had told himself so firmly again and +again. Success and humour formed bedfellows as agreeable as an +absent-minded dog would be _en négligé_ in the boudoir of a surprised +cat. + +With a beautiful access of gravity he lifted the lid of an enamelled +wicker hamper and peered in at the soiled linen it contained. There +were many towels. Towels were, he reflected, one of the few genuine +hall marks of the rich. The Endicotts, hence, must be very, very rich, +as it was obvious that they shed—or was it shedded?—towels as +profusely as the petals fall from a white flowering tree. + +There was a badly soiled and crumpled towel on the very top of the +pile. He picked it up and looked at it. It was very dirty and still +faintly damp. He folded it, set it on the floor beneath the basin, and +placed the cake of soap upon it. They were, he smiled faintly, +Exhibits B and C. The distinction of being classified as Exhibit A was +already reserved by the threatening note on the desk. As for the +smudges on the lemon-coloured shade, they would have to be definitely +determined as finger prints before they could have their niche in the +alphabet. The prosecuting attorney would be pleased. He was a man +whose flair for alphabeted exhibits amounted to a passion. Lieutenant +Valcour hoped that he could find a crushed rose. The prosecuting +attorney was at his best with crushed roses. For example, take that +knifing case in the Ghetto. Three petals were all the prosecuting +attorney had had there, but they had bloomed, via the jury, into +tears. Into tears, Lieutenant Valcour amended, and tripe. + +A pair of silver-backed brushes showed no finger marks upon their +shining surfaces, nor were there any on the silver rim that backed a +comb. One could infer, Lieutenant Valcour decided, and did, that +someone later than Mr. Endicott had used them, as Mr. Endicott would +never have wiped them off to remove his prints, and had he not done so +there certainly would have been some signs of usage. What a careful +murderer it was, he thought, to polish the evidence so very clean. And +what a grip the subject of finger prints maintained upon the criminal +mind, and upon the lay mind as well. It seemed to embrace their Alpha +and Omega in the scientific detection of crime. Lieutenant Valcour +offered to bet himself his last nickel that the murderer had +overlooked entirely the possibility of what might be found left within +the bristles of the brushes and between the teeth of the comb. He took +a clean hand towel from the rack and wrapped the brushes and the comb +up in it. He set the bundle on the floor beside the cake of soap and +the dirty towel. The alphabet, he reflected, had now been depleted +down to F. + +The bathroom could tell him nothing more. He reconstructed its segment +of the drama before leaving it: the murderer had entered, gone at once +to the window and pulled down its shade. There had been a washing of +hands and a brushing and combing of hair. The murderer had wiped the +silver clear of finger prints and had left. The whys and wherefors +must come later. The shell would remain unchanged until the moment +came to pour it full of motive and give it reason and life. + +He went into Endicott’s room and opened the cupboard door. The beam +from his electric torch, added to the ceiling light, brought out +sharply the waxy pallor of the face’s skin. Its good-looking, homely +ruggedness was marred by a slight cast of petulance, as inappropriate +as a pink bow on a lion. Cruelty showed, too, a little—and something +inscrutable that baffled analysis. Endicott weighed, Lieutenant +Valcour decided, close upon two hundred pounds and no fat, either; a +strong, powerfully muscled man, and about thirty-five years old. He +played the light upon Endicott’s right hand and exposed the wrist a +little by drawing up the sleeve. The wrist and hand were normally +clean, as he had expected. + +He gently inserted his fingers into such of Endicott’s pockets as he +could reach without disturbing the body. From the rumpled state of +their linings and their complete emptiness it was apparent that they +had been hastily turned inside out and replaced. + +Lieutenant Valcour began to sniff at a motive. Not robbery, exactly, +in the ordinary sense, as an expensive platinum wrist watch and a set +of black pearl shirt studs were untouched, but robbery in the +extraordinary sense—one that had been indulged in for a certain +definite purpose. He strongly began to suspect that there would be the +ubiquitous “fatal papers.” It might also develop that Endicott was the +secretive owner of some fabulous jewel of a sort usually referred to +as a Heart of Buddha, or perhaps some important slice of the Russian +crown jewels—the number of which now almost equalled, he reflected, +the thousands upon thousands of ancestors who came over to our shores +on the _Mayflower_. + +The top button was missing from Endicott’s overcoat. It would have +been torn away when the murderer had lifted his victim from the floor +in order to drag him into the cupboard. Otherwise there wasn’t +anything that hinted at a struggle. There wasn’t any blood, or any +wound, or sign of contusion visible on the head, and no trace of blood +around such parts of the cupboard that Lieutenant Valcour could see. + +He suddenly wondered where Endicott’s hat was. It wasn’t on Endicott’s +head, nor in the cupboard, nor in the bedroom, which struck him as +strange. He was a strong believer in the paraphrase that where the +coat is, there the hat lies, too. One could look for it more carefully +later. Just at present, of greater importance was Exhibit A. + +Lieutenant Valcour went to the desk, picked up the note and studied +it. The pencil used had been a thick leaded one, almost a crayon. And +there, right before his nose in a shallow tray that held an assortment +of office things, was a pencil with a very thick lead that was almost +a crayon. He copied the note with it on the back of an envelope he +took from his pocket. He compared the result with the printing on the +note. They were alike. + +One begins, he informed himself gently, to wonder. + + + +CHAPTER III + +9:45 p. m.—Guards Are Stationed at the Doors + +There are knocks, Lieutenant Valcour believed, and knocks. He ranged +them from gentle careless rappings, through sly sinister taps, to +imperative demands and, finally, thumps. He classified the ones at the +moment being bestowed upon the hall door as official whacks. He was +right. He put the scrap of paper and the crayon pencil in his pocket +and turned to greet five men from the station house who flooded into +the room on the heels of his “Come in.” + +They were intelligent-looking young men, well built, alert, and their +uniforms were immaculate—five competent blue jays outlined sharply +against gray walls. Lieutenant Valcour knew each one of them both by +reputation and by name. + +He nodded to the starchiest and youngest looking of them. “Cassidy,” +he said, “stay in here. O’Brian, stay by the front door, and keep +Hansen with you to carry messages. There’s a servants’ entrance at the +front, McGinnis. It’s yours. And you, Stump, watch the door from the +back of the house into the garden. If anyone wants to leave the house +send him to me first. You can let anyone in, with the exception of +reporters, and find out their business. Now in regard to the reporters +just be your natural genial selves and say that apart from the plain +statement that Mr. Herbert Endicott, the owner of this house, is dead +and that—” Lieutenant Valcour choked slightly—“foul play is suspected, +you can tell them nothing. The police, as usual, are actively on +the job, have the case well in hand, and there is every reason to +believe that in view of our customary efficiency the guilty parties +will soon be brilliantly apprehended etcetera and so forth Amen. +Excuse-it-please.” + +“Cuckoo,” confided O’Brian to Hansen as, with Stump and McGinnis, they +filed out. + +“Cuckoo as a fox,” agreed Hansen, who had worked under Lieutenant +Valcour on a case before. + +“Yeh?” + +“Yeah.” + +Lieutenant Valcour and young Cassidy were alone. + +“Tell me, Cassidy, how are the servants taking all this, if you bumped +into any of them?” + +“Sure, I only saw the girl at the front door, Lieutenant. She’s a +sorry piece, and was shivering worse than one of them new and indecent +dances.” + +“Did she say anything?” + +“She did not, beyond telling us to follow her upstairs. She took us to +that door across the hallway first, and some lady said you was in +here.” + +“How did that lady’s voice sound to you, Cassidy?” + +“Smooth, sir.” + +“Not nervous?” + +“Devil a bit.” + +“What are you looking for, Cassidy?” + +“The corpse, sir.” + +“It’s in that cupboard.” + +“Is it now?” said Cassidy, casually removing himself as far from the +cupboard door as he could. “It ain’t one of them Western hammer +murders, is it?” + +“I don’t know what kind of a homicide it is, Cassidy. There are no +marks on him that I can see.” + +“Will it be poison, then?” + +“Maybe.” + +“Well, let’s hope it’s one or the other. I hate them mystery cases +where the deceased got his go-by from a Chinese blow gun, or some +imported snake from Timbuctu, or parts adjacent.” + +“When did you ever work on such a case, Cassidy?” + +“Sure, Lieutenant, you can read about them every week in the +magazines. There’s one that’s in its fourth part now where some louse +of foreign extraction kills a dumb cluck of a Wall Street magnet with +a package of paper matches, the tips of which was so fixed that they +exploded when struck, instead of acting decent like, and shot dabs of +poison into the skin of his fingers. Can you imagine it? Just say the +word and I’ll bring it around to the station house and you can read it +for yourself.” + +“Thanks, Cassidy.” + +“It’ll be no trouble at all, Lieutenant.” + +An important knock on the door disclosed a stranger. Lieutenant +Valcour addressed him, correctly, as Dr. Worth. + +Dr. Sanforth Worth did not merely imagine that he cut a distinguished +figure; he was sure of it. A certain grayness clung impressively about +the temples of an intellectual brow, and he was probably one of the +few physicians left in New York who had both the audacity and ability +to wear a Vandyke. He was dressed in evening clothes and had not +bothered to remove his overcoat or to give up his hat. + +“Dr. Worth? I am Lieutenant Valcour, of the police. Mr. Endicott is in +here.” + +Dr. Worth bowed gravely, and with a sparklingly manicured hand stroked +his Vandyke once. “I have been afraid of something like this for quite +a while, Lieutenant,” he said. His voice, in company with everything +else about him, sounded expensive. + +Lieutenant Valcour raised his eyebrows. “It begins to seem, Doctor, as +if everybody except Mr. Endicott himself anticipated his murder.” + +“Murder?” + +It was Dr. Worth’s eyebrows’ turn. They raised. They fell. They +became, in conjunction with pursed lips, judicious. He removed his +overcoat and placed it, with his hat, upon a chair. + +“I believe you will find, Lieutenant, that it is just his heart. His—— +Dear God in heaven, man, what have you left him slumped down like this +for?” + +“You mustn’t touch him, Doctor, unless you think he isn’t dead.” + +Dr. Worth stiffened perceptibly. “Fancy that,” he said. “Well, one +would infer that he is dead, all right. Just the same, Lieutenant, is +there any legal objection to opening his coat and shirt bosom? I dare +say I could slit them, if you preferred. You see, it might be +advisable to test for any trace of heart action with the stethoscope.” + +“I had no intention of offending you, Doctor. Go right ahead and do +anything you think is absolutely essential to establish life or +death.” + +Dr. Worth melted conservatively. “You see, sir, I know his heart. He +had a nervous breakdown two years ago which left its action impaired.” +He loosened Endicott’s overcoat and the black pearl studs set in a +semi-soft shirt bosom. He listened for a moment, and then removed the +stethoscope. “No trace,” he said. “He’s dead. Shall I button up the +shirt front and the coat again?” + +“It isn’t necessary, Doctor.” + +The hall door opened abruptly. The homicide chief and the medical +examiner came in, followed by a squad of detectives. Lieutenant +Valcour was well acquainted with both officials. He introduced them to +Dr. Worth and placed at their disposal such information as he had +gained while waiting for them to arrive. + +The department’s experts automatically began to function at once. A +photographer was already arranging his apparatus to make pictures of +the body from as many angles as its position in the cupboard would +permit. A finger-print man went about his duties along the lines laid +down by established routine. The medical examiner and Dr. Worth +gravitated naturally together and plunged into a discussion of +Endicott’s medical history. + +The homicide chief, a well-built, alert-looking man of fifty, by the +name of Andrews, drew Lieutenant Valcour a little to one side. + +“What do you really make of it, Valcour?” he said. + +“Oh, it’s undoubtedly murder, Chief, but I doubt whether there’ll even +be an indictment unless we get a lucky break, establish a definite +motive, and get a confession.” + +“I feel that way about it, too. Any signs of an entry having been +forced?” + +“I haven’t looked. I’ve been in here all the time, and my men just +came.” + +“Well, Stevens and Larraby are making the rounds now. They’ll let us +know. If the autopsy doesn’t show poison or some wound it’ll be a +nuisance. If it’s a straight heart attack, as Dr. Worth claims, we +might just as well drop it. Can you imagine getting up before a jury +that’s been shown a picture by the defense of a big husky like +Endicott and saying, ‘This man was scared to his death?’ Suppose a +woman was the defendant. They’d laugh the case out of court.” + +“Maybe it won’t be as bad as all that, Chief. While you’re busy in +here I’ll wander around and try to scare up something. Would you mind +sending for me when the medical examiner reaches some decision as to +the manner of death?” + +“Sure thing, Valcour. I’ll see to it, too, that those brushes and comb +are looked into.” + +“I’ll probably be in Mrs. Endicott’s room. That’s the door just across +the corridor.” + +Andrews was aware of Lieutenant Valcour’s reputation in the department +for the painless extraction of useful information from people. “Go to +it,” he said. “And squeeze every drop that you can.” + + + +CHAPTER IV + +10:02 p. m.—Pale Flares the Darkness + +Lieutenant Valcour wondered concerning Mrs. Endicott as he walked +slowly across the corridor and knocked on the door of her room. A +curious, curious woman, with youth and beauty that almost passed +belief. He knew her instinctively as one of life’s misfits: complex to +a note far beyond the common tune; essentially an individualist; +essentially unhappy from an inevitable loneliness which is the lot of +all who are banished within the narrow confines of their own +complexity; a type he had seldom met, but of whose existence he was +well aware. + +Roberts opened the door. The woman’s face was butchered and her eyes +had the quality of glass. + +“Ask Mrs. Endicott, please, whether she feels strong enough to see me +for a moment.” + +Mrs. Endicott’s voice was definitely metallic. As it reached him in +the corridor, disembodied from any visual association with herself, it +seemed to hold a muted echo of brass bells. + +“Certainly, come in. I wish, Lieutenant, you would give up the +tiresome fiction that I am going to collapse. I’ll ring, Roberts, when +I want you.” + +“Yes, madam.” + +As Roberts passed him on her way to the door Lieutenant Valcour felt +an imperative awareness of an attempt at revelations—an attempt to +impart to him some special knowledge. Her eyes, as she glanced at him, +lost their cobwebs and grew sharply informative. It was entirely an +unconscious reaction on his part that forced from his lips the word +“Later.” The cobwebs reappeared. She left the room. + +Lieutenant Valcour drew a chair close to the _chaise longue_ upon +which Mrs. Endicott was nervously lying. Flung across her knees was a +robe of China silk, a black river bearing on its surface huge flowers +done in silver and slashed at its fringes with the jade chiffon of her +dress. He launched his campaign by first swinging, wordily, well wide +of its ultimate objective. His tone, from a deliberate casual +friendliness, was an anodyne to possible reservations, or fears. + +“It is the tragedy of a detective’s life,” he said pleasantly, “that +the sudden slender contact he has with a case affords such a useless +background for human behaviour. You can see what I mean, Mrs. +Endicott. Were I you, or some intimate friend either of yourself or of +your husband, I would already be in possession of the countless little +threads that have woven the pattern of Mr. Endicott’s life for the +past five or ten years. You’ll forgive me for outraging oratory? It’s +a nasty habit I’ve contracted in later years whenever dealing with the +abstract. I’m not making a speech, really. What I’m trying to express +is that in that background, that pattern of Mr. Endicott’s life, one +thread or series of interrelated threads would stand out pretty +plainly as the reason why someone should wish to kill him.” + +“I,” said Mrs. Endicott, “have several times wished to kill him.” + +Lieutenant Valcour nodded. “There is nothing left for me but the trite +things to say about marriage. And trite things, after all, are the +true things, don’t you think?” + +“If they’re just discovered. I mean by that, that to the person just +discovering their deadly aptness they’re true. Rather terribly so +sometimes.” + +“But the aptness wears off with usage?” + +Mrs. Endicott’s slender hand and arm were models of quietness in +motion as she reached for a cigarette. “Everything wears off with +usage,” she said. “Love quicker than anything else.” + +“But it doesn’t wear off completely, love doesn’t, ever.” + +Mrs. Endicott looked at him sharply. “Why are you a detective?” she +said. + +“The accident of birth—of environment. Only geniuses, you know, ever +quite escape those two fatalities. My parents emigrated from France to +Canada, where my father held a certain reputation in my present +profession. My parents died. There was enough money to secure an +education at McGill—one had contacts here in the States . . .” +Lieutenant Valcour smiled infectiously. “I reversed Cæsar in that I +came, was seen, was conquered.” + +Mrs. Endicott was amused. “How utterly conceited.” + +“Isn’t it?” + +The smile vanished from her face with the peculiar suddenness of some +conjuring trick. She veered abruptly. “What are they doing in my +husband’s room now?” she said. + +“Dr. Worth and the medical examiner are determining the cause of +death.” Lieutenant Valcour transferred his attention to a Sargent +water colour above the mantel. “Dr. Worth has already expressed the +opinion that it was heart failure,” he said. + +Mrs. Endicott offered no immediate comment. She withdrew, for a +moment, into some private chamber, and her voice was rather +expressionless when she spoke. “But that isn’t murder.” + +“It could be—if the disease itself were used as a weapon.” + +“I don’t believe that I understand.” + +“Why, if some person who knew that Mr. Endicott was subject to heart +attacks were deliberately to shock or scare him suddenly, or even give +him a not especially forceful blow over the heart, and he were to die +as a result of any one of those things, that would be murder. It would +have to be proved pretty conclusively, of course, that it had been +done deliberately.” + +Mrs. Endicott joined him in his continued inspection of the Sargent. +“It would indicate a rather circumscribed field for suspects, too, +don’t you think?” + +“Yes. One would confine one’s suspicions to those who were intimate +enough with him to know of his physical condition. But apart from all +that phase, there are those things we technically speak of as +‘attendant circumstances.’ They point to murder.” + +Their glances brushed for a second in passing and then parted. + +“Such as?” + +Lieutenant Valcour explained, with certain reservations. “The note you +showed me—the position of Mr. Endicott in the cupboard—the fact that +he is completely dressed for out of doors, but there is no trace of +his hat—oh, several little things that speak quite plainly.” He +focussed her directly. “Where did Mr. Endicott usually keep his hats?” + +“I’ve never noticed particularly. There’s a cupboard downstairs in the +entrance hall, and of course the one——” + +“Yes, I’ve looked for it up here. I wonder whether you’d care to tell +me what happened—what you did, I mean, and what you remember of Mr. +Endicott’s movements from the time, say, of his reaching home this +afternoon.” + +Mrs. Endicott’s face sought refuge in the very pith of candour. “Why, +nothing much—nothing unusual.” + +Lieutenant Valcour laughed pleasantly. “That is where I fail in my +background,” he said. “The things done were usual to both of you and +therefore of no importance. To me, however, they would prove +interesting because of their unfamiliarity. Did you talk at all?” + +“Elaborately.” + +“I beg your pardon?” + +“I said elaborately. Herbert makes a point of talking elaborately +whenever he’s lying.” + +“I see—he was lying, then, about Marge Myles.” + +“And unoriginally. But Herbert never was original, much, in his +emotions. He told me he was going to an impromptu reunion of some men +in his class at the Yale Club. These reunions have occurred with +astonishing regularity once a week for the past month, in spite of +their impromptu character. I detest having my intelligence insulted,” +she ended, not unfiercely, “more than anything else in the world.” + +“You will forgive me for becoming personal, but I doubt whether Mr. +Endicott understood you very well.” + +“He didn’t understand me at all.” + +“And you, him?” + +Mrs. Endicott momentarily disarranged the perfect arch of her +eyebrows. “I could see through him perfectly,” she said. “A child +could see through him. But understand him? I don’t think anyone could +understand Herbert. He made a fetish of reticence. He was,” she +concluded, “half animal.” + +“And the other half rather cloudily complex?” + +“A fog.” + +“And when he came home this afternoon at five?” + +“Five-thirty—nearer six, even.” + +“Toward six, he joined you in the living room and gave you the weekly +excuse.” + +“I didn’t say the living room. It was the top floor—you may have +noticed that this house has a peaked roof—in what would correspond in +the country to an attic——” She stopped sharply, and her defensive +veneer cracked for an instant, long enough to show that she was +definitely startled. “I——” + +“You feel that you shouldn’t have told me that. Perhaps you shouldn’t. +If the fact of your having met Mr. Endicott in the attic has nothing +to do with the case at all, it will cause us to snoop around among +your personal affairs unnecessarily.” + +“He didn’t ‘meet’ me there, as you say. He—I don’t know why he came up +there. I never will know why.” + +“You didn’t ask him?” + +Mrs. Endicott forced Lieutenant Valcour’s full attention by the almost +startling intentness of her eyes. “There has never been a direct +question put or answered between Herbert and me during the whole +period of our married or unmarried life,” she said. “My hold on him +was the static perfection of my features and a running, superficial +smartness in attitude and mind that passed for intellect. His hold on +me was that I loved him.” + +“Even when you wished to kill him?” + +“I suppose even then. Mind you, I never wished him _dead_—there’s a +difference.” + +“Oh, quite.” Lieutenant Valcour smiled engagingly. “You often felt +like killing him, but you wanted it to stop right there.” + +“You know, I wish you’d come to tea sometime——” Mrs. Endicott’s eyes +contracted sharply. Her voice became a definite apology, not to +Lieutenant Valcour, but as though its message were being sent along +obscure and private channels to some port where it would find her +husband. “There are moments,” she said, “when you make me forget.” + +“Forgetting isn’t a sin. That’s natural. It’s not loving—being +mentally hurtful—that’s a sin. There isn’t any word exactly for what I +mean. Did you both stay in the attic and go through the trunk +together, or whatever it was you were going through?” + +Mrs. Endicott smiled as if at some secret knowledge. “I wasn’t going +through a trunk,” she said. + +“No? I just mentioned it, as nine times out of ten that’s what people +do in attics.” + +“And the tenth customary thing,” said Mrs. Endicott, reaching for a +cigarette, “is suicide.” + + + +CHAPTER V + +10:17 p. m.—Living or Dead? + +Lieutenant Valcour’s eyes narrowed slightly. He had a habit of +dividing suicides into two classes—those who talked about killing +themselves, and those who did so. He knew that the two rarely +overlapped. He felt a shocking conviction that in Mrs. Endicott’s case +she might well have been the exception which proved the rule. “I +suppose an attic is the conventional place for suicide,” he said. “Or +at least to think about it.” + +Mrs. Endicott’s laugh was without humour. “One doesn’t need an attic +in order to think about it.” + +“That’s true. And so you went downstairs with him, then?” + +“He followed me in here. That is,” she corrected herself with +noticeable carelessness, “we went into the living room and he +wondered, while he kissed me, whether I’d mind very much being alone +for dinner. I doubt whether you’ve ever experienced, Lieutenant, the +rather perfect torture of a, well, an abstract kiss. Men don’t.” + +“We’re too self-centred, I’m afraid, or conceited or something, or +else our sensibilities aren’t refined enough to be hurt by it.” + +“But you could understand—if you could vision the background?” + +“Everybody knows what love is, Mrs. Endicott.” + +“That’s just it—it’s the comparison of what is with what has been. +It’s an indescribably vulgar subject—kissing—but it’s either very +wonderful or very painful. People who claim it can be a combination +talk nonsense. We can eliminate, of course——” + +“Of course—‘petting’ they call it, or did. You never know from one +minute to the next just what a thing is being called. And then he went +to his room to dress?” + +“Yes.” + +“Alone?” + +“Certainly.” + +“Has he a valet?” + +“Herbert? Heavens, no.” + +“And you dressed?” + +“Yes.” + +“Roberts helped you?” + +“Of course.” + +“Then when Mr. Endicott said good-bye?” + +“He called it through the closed door.” + +Lieutenant Valcour almost visibly showed his surprise. “He did say +good-bye?” + +“Herbert insists upon saying good-bye. He rapped on the door and +called in. If it would interest you to know his exact words,” she said +bitterly, “they were in the falsetto voice he uses when he thinks he’s +being especially funny and were, ‘Don’t be angry with Herbie-werbie, +sweetheart. Goodie-byskie.’” + +“They’re almost a motive in themselves,” said Lieutenant Valcour, +smiling. “Which door did he rap on, Mrs. Endicott?” + +“The hall door.” + +“I see. And you heard him going down the stairs?” + +“One can’t hear footsteps with the door closed.” + +“And that was at——?” + +“The clock over there on my mantel was striking seven.” + +“And after that there is nothing further you can tell me about Mr. +Endicott?” + +“Nothing.” + +“You dined. You went to his room. You found the note. You began to +worry, and then you called us up.” + +“That is it.” + +“Was it in this room here or up in the attic, Mrs. Endicott, that you +told him you were going to kill him?” + +“Here, after he—— That wasn’t exactly fair, was it?” + +“Heavens no, but awfully smart.” Lieutenant Valcour’s smile was the +essence of pleasantness. “I do wish you’d continue with the ‘after +he.’ After he did what? Or was it something he said?” + +“Did.” + +“Yes?” + +“I told you,” she blazed, “that he was half animal. You can hardly +expect me to become more explicit.” + +Lieutenant Valcour was genuinely upset. “I do beg your pardon, Mrs. +Endicott,” he said. “About this afternoon, were you in the house?” + +“Partly. I had tea at the Ritz, early, about four-thirty—with,” she +added defiantly, “a man.” + +“Ah.” + +“Exactly so. That will permit you to reverse another tradition and go +_cherchez l’homme_.” + +Lieutenant Valcour found instant good humour. “So you decided to fight +fire with fire,” he said. + +“If you care to call it that.” + +“Just who is Marge Myles, and what?” Lieutenant Valcour said suddenly. + +“There are several terms one might apply to her. They all mean the +same thing. I believe that recently, however,” Mrs. Endicott said very +distinctly, “she has lost her amateur standing.” + +“Recently?” + +“The past year or so.” + +“Mr. Endicott had known her as long as that?” + +“Until the past month or two my husband had not known her at all. He’d +heard of her, of course, and so had I.” + +“Then she is a woman who once had position?” + +“She was the wife of one of Herbert’s friends, a man who died two +years ago and left her penniless. They say, incidentally, that she +killed him.” + +“Killed him?” + +“It was just gossip, of course. They had a camp near some obscure lake +up in Maine. The canoe they were in one evening upset. Harry Myles +couldn’t swim.” + +“And Marge Myles?” + +“Marge Myles was famous for her swimming.” + +“Then the inference is that she, well, neglected to save her husband?” + +“That—and that she deliberately upset the canoe. I repeat it’s all +gossip. People dropped him, you see, after he married her. That’s a +commentary for you.” + +“You mean they still accepted him while he was—that is, before the +ceremony.” + +“Yes, while he was living with her. It’s thoroughly natural, of +course. People didn’t have to recognize her then; they could ignore +her. But you can’t ignore a man’s wife; you either have to recognize +her or not. The nots had it. If she had been a genuinely nice person, +or an amusing one, I doubt whether the fact of their having lived +together really would have mattered. But she wasn’t.” + +“What was she before her marriage?” + +“A member of that much-maligned group known as the chorus.” + +“And recently she had got in touch with your husband?” + +“She looked up all of Harry’s old friends. Don’t you see? As a widow +she again had a standing—a shade higher, but similar to the one she +held before Harry married her. I don’t know how many others she +landed, but she certainly landed Herbert.” + +“And you were afraid she would do something to him?” + +“Well, she killed Harry.” + +“Then you personally believe the gossip?” + +Mrs. Endicott did not bother to give a direct reply. She shrugged, and +twisted a little on the _chaise longue_. + +“And do you associate her in any way, Mrs. Endicott, with what has +happened here to-night?” + +She continued to evade further direct responsibility for an opinion. +“Who else?” she said. + +“But the actual mechanics of it, Mrs. Endicott—how could she have got +into the house?” + +“It could be done. Herbert himself might have let her in.” + +“That’s going a little far, isn’t it?” + +“Yes. It was rotten of me to suggest it. I never really thought it, +Lieutenant. I just said it.” + +“And after all, Mrs. Endicott, why should she want to kill your +husband? You weren’t trying to keep him from her.” + +“He might have been trying to keep himself from her.” + +“He might. It’s stretching it a little, though, to think she’d +deliberately kill him for that.” + +“She wouldn’t do it deliberately.” + +“I don’t know. When a woman starts out to kill she invariably chooses +some weapon, or a poison. Every case has proved it again and again. +But we’re only speculating, aren’t we? Who was it who took you to +tea?” + +“I haven’t any intention of telling you.” + +“Because it might involve him?” + +“He couldn’t possibly be involved. If I thought he were I’d tell you +in a minute.” + +Someone knocked on the door. + +“Just the same, Mrs. Endicott, I wish you would tell me who he was.” + +“No.” + +Lieutenant Valcour was able not only to recognize finality, he could +accept it. He considered Mrs. Endicott’s very definite refusal to +answer his question as of small consequence; there were so many more +ways than one for frying an eel. He stood up and crossed to the door. +He opened it and stepped into the corridor, closing the door behind +him. Even in the dimmish light young Cassidy’s normally ruddy face was +the colour of chalk. + +“What’s happened, Cassidy?” + +“Honest to God, Lieutenant, I’m scared stiff. They’re getting things +ready in there to bring that corpse back to life.” + + + +CHAPTER VI + +10:32 p. m.—Pictures in Dust + +Lieutenant Valcour stared for a puzzled instant at the white face. + +“What do you mean, Cassidy?” he said. + +“Honest to God, Lieutenant, I mean just what I say.” + +“But that’s impossible.” + +Cassidy went even further. “It’s sacrilege,” he said. + +“Nonsense,” Lieutenant Valcour said sharply. “You have simply +misunderstood Dr. Worth. It is possible that Mr. Endicott was not dead +at all but in some state of catalepsy. No one, Cassidy, can bring back +the dead.” + +“I’m glad to hear you say so, sir.” + +“Then let us go in.” + +“Must I go back in there, too?” + +“You must. Forget the fact that you’re a superstitious Irishman, +Cassidy, and remember that you’re a cop. Cops, as you’ve been told +more times than one, should be noble, firm, and perpetually cool, +calm, and collected.” + +“Sure now, you’re kidding.” + +“Tut, tut.” + +“Well, and I’ll try, Lieutenant—but cripes!” + +“But nothing,” advised Lieutenant Valcour as he opened the door to +Endicott’s room. + +The effect was shockingly garish. All shades had been removed from +their lamps, and the various details of the furnishing stood out in +the painful white light brightly clear. + +Andrews was alone. He stood near the bed upon which Endicott had been +placed, looking in rather shocked bewilderment at the body. Lieutenant +Valcour joined him. A blanket had been drawn up to Endicott’s chin, +and the face which remained exposed looked very waxlike—very +still—very much like a dead man’s indeed. + +“This is the damnedest thing, Valcour.” + +“What is, Chief?” + +“They say there’s a chance that this man isn’t dead. Worth is going to +operate.” + +“Operate? But Dr. Worth himself admitted that the heart had stopped +beating after testing with a stethoscope. What sort of an operation?” + +“Worth’s going to inject adrenaline into the cardiac muscles.” + +“I wonder just how much value there is in that stuff.” + +“Well, unless Endicott’s been poisoned, the medical examiner and Worth +both seem to think there’s a chance. They feel there’s no harm in +trying, anyway. It sounds silly to me, but they reminded me of that +recent case in Queens—you probably read about it—where a man had been +pronounced dead for six hours and was revived. Of course, they said he +wasn’t really dead, just as they now think that Endicott may not be +really dead. No one can bring back the dead.” + +Lieutenant Valcour threw a bland look to Cassidy, who was standing in +as convenient a position to the hall door as he could possibly get. + +“They say,” Andrews went on, “that adrenaline’s been used off and on +for years. Worth says they try it quite often when a baby is born +‘dead.’ Sometimes it starts the heart pumping and the baby lives.” + +Lieutenant Valcour shrugged. “It will make things pretty simple for us +if it works with Endicott,” he said. “He can make a statement and +prefer charges himself. Where is everybody?” + +“The medical examiner and Worth are downstairs telephoning and making +arrangements for the operation. My men have finished and have gone +back to headquarters. There wasn’t any sign of forcing an entry, so it +looks like an inside job, if there was any job. I tell you, Valcour, +if it wasn’t for your suggestion that robbery was a motive, or for +that note that might have been a threat, I’d drop the whole thing. +It’s a different matter if the adrenaline doesn’t work and an autopsy +proves poison or something. Find out much from Mrs. Endicott?” + +“Enough to be interested in learning more. Want the details?” + +“Later, if I have to get to work on the case. You want to keep on +handling it?” + +“Yes.” + +“Go ahead. Call for any outside stuff you want us to check up on for +you. I’ll send you a report on the brushes and comb as soon as they +finish with them downtown.” + +“You going, Chief?” + +“No use in my sticking around, Valcour. We haven’t a case yet, really, +that calls for any Central Office work. Hell, according to those two +six-syllable specialists downstairs, we haven’t even got a corpse. +Robbery there may have been, and it’s your precinct—so go to it. I’ll +find out from the medical examiner when he gets back how the operation +turned out, and if there’s going to be an autopsy. If poisoning is +proved and you haven’t pinned it on anyone by then, I’ll get on the +job again. I suppose you’ll see that the people in the house are given +the once-over?” + +“Certainly, Chief.” + +“I’ll run along then. Good luck, Valcour.” + +“Thank you, Chief.” + +Andrews left the room and closed the door. + +“I bet he’s got a date,” said Cassidy. + +“He’d stay here if he had twenty dates, if he thought it was +necessary,” said Lieutenant Valcour. + +“Well, I wish I had a date.” + +“You’ll have a whole vacation if you don’t brace up. I’m going to take +a look in that cupboard, now that Endicott’s no longer in it.” + +Even a cupboard seemed preferable to Cassidy to being in the room. +“Can’t I help you, sir?” he said with almost fervent politeness. + +“No, Cassidy, you can’t. You can stay just where you are.” + +“Oh, very well, sir.” + +Lieutenant Valcour picked up a straight-backed chair and took it into +the cupboard with him. He held a sincere respect for the Central +Office men, but at the same time felt that their work was too +methodically routine to permit their darting along interesting +tangents or wasting their time in strolls along bypaths that might +lead to fertile fields. There was no criticism in his mind at all. He +admired the system that had been established, and the expert +functioning of its units and departments. He knew very well that its +average of successes was greater than its average of failures. But it +was deficient in that elusive, time-taking, and sometimes expensive +thing known as the “personal equation.” It remained, at its best, a +machine. + +A certain amount of carelessness, too, ran in the general plan. In +many cases some things were slurred over, some missed entirely. This +again was not surprising when one considered that the personnel was +recruited largely from the more intelligent men in the ranks. +Intelligent, yes, but hardly specialists, nor could one in all +fairness expect them to be. + +When working on a case they functioned along two distinctly separate +but parallel lines. One department of specialists handled the +technical and chemical investigation of material things and clues +found on the scene of the crime—just as the brushes and comb were +shortly to be examined by the proper men down at Central Office. A +second department dealt with the human aspect—examining witnesses, +looking up all friends or connections of the victim; a large, +competent organization that would stretch feelers, no matter how many +were necessary, to every contact point of the victim’s life within the +city, and from whose findings some possible motive could be +established and some possible suspect or group of suspects be evolved. + +The two branches would then compare notes, and if a satisfactory +amount of evidence had been obtained by the technical department to +establish a case against one or several of the suspects, arrests would +be made or the suspects brought in for questioning. According to the +temperament and station of the suspects, one of the various forms that +go to make up the properly dreaded third degree would be employed and +a confession obtained. The work of the Central Office would then be +finished, and the case up to the prosecutor. + +Lieutenant Valcour was glad that in the present instance the homicide +chief had felt it useless to set in motion the machinery of the second +branch until more definite developments should occur. The case +interested him. Mrs. Endicott interested him—her astonishing beauty, +her mind, her contradictions—Roberts—Marge Myles—three women who +offered an assurance of satisfying an almost blatant curiosity he +possessed for discovering the source springs of human behaviour. This +talk about reviving Endicott and Endicott himself making a +statement—well, perhaps. But until it was accomplished he preferred to +think of Endicott as a corpse, the case a definite homicide, and of +possible suspects right in the house. + +Lieutenant Valcour concentrated his attention upon the cupboard. There +were shelves along the back of it, the lowest one being at the height +of a man’s head. Numerous suits of clothes were hanging from beneath +this lowest shelf. He stood on the chair and played his flashlight +along the top of it. There was nothing there but an accumulation of +dust. He felt a distinct and highly satisfactory thrill when he noted +that streaks showed where the dust had very recently been rubbed away, +as if somebody had deliberately wiped both his hands in it. It linked +with the dirty cake of soap. Andrews had said nothing about the +streaks. It was pretty obvious that the Central Office men had +overlooked them—had casually observed that the shelves were empty and +had let the matter go at that. + +Lieutenant Valcour began to feel quite pleasant and informed himself +gravely that a deduction was in order. For a happy moment he +considered the possibility of that curious and sinister Oriental +influence that crops up so perennially in the very finest of murder +cases—of Cassidy’s murder cases: that elusive figure swathed in gray, +whitely turbanned above coffee-coloured skin, who has a penchant +toward religious fanaticism the esoteric rites of which involve dust. +This breath-shocking villain would ultimately be trapped by the bright +detective through the wretch’s occult passion for this dust. Had one, +Lieutenant Valcour wanted to know, such an enigma to deal with here? +No, he informed himself sternly, one knew damned well one had not. But +in the place of such a handy and beautiful deduction—what? + +He stared at the dust and began to see pictures in it: a crouching +person tormented by hate or fear, or both, who knows that Endicott is +going to open the cupboard door. What, in the name of the lighter +humorists, to do? The person dreads recognition. Is there no disguise? +No, curse it—but yes—the dust! The person’s hands are smeared, and by +means of the hands, the face . . . + +“Ain’t there _nothing_ I can do for you, Lieutenant?” + +Lieutenant Valcour sighed and got down from the chair. + +“Yes, Cassidy,” he said. “You can take this chair and put it over by +the hall door. Then you can sit down.” + +“Very well, Lieutenant,” said Cassidy bitterly. “But when you’re in +that cupboard there ain’t nobody in the room with me but that live +corpse.” + +“Then sit where you can’t see it.” + +“Cripes, Lieutenant, I don’t _have_ to see it. I get the chills just +thinking about it.” + +“You’ll get the gate, Cassidy, if you don’t snap out of it.” + +“All right, sir, but if you come out and find me keeled over, don’t +blame me.” + +“I wouldn’t dream of it, Cassidy.” + +Lieutenant Valcour reëntered the cupboard. He examined the corner in +which Endicott had been slumped. The suits on the hangers had fallen +back a little into shape. He carefully went through their various +pockets. They were empty, and from the rumpled condition of their +linings he knew that they had been hastily gone through before. +Perhaps the Central Office men had done so, but he doubted it. They +would concern themselves pretty exclusively with the effects taken +from the clothes Endicott had been wearing at the time of the attack. + +It interested him to note that the suits against which Endicott’s body +had been slumped showed evidence of having been searched with the +rest. It confirmed his theory that that was what the attacker had been +doing when caught in the cupboard by Endicott’s sudden appearance in +the bedroom, and it also strengthened his theory of the ingenious use +of dust from the shelf top as a disguise. + +Shoes lined a low shelf along the bottom of one side, and hat boxes +occupied a corresponding shelf on the other. Lieutenant Valcour +dismissed the possibility that the particular hat he was searching +for—the one that Endicott was wearing or intended to get at the moment +of the attack—would be in a box. Perhaps it was in the cupboard Mrs. +Endicott spoke about downstairs in the entrance hall. The point kept +nagging at him irritatingly, and he considered it important enough to +go down and find out. + +Cassidy barely restrained himself from clutching Lieutenant Valcour’s +arm by the hall door. + +“Honest to God, you ain’t going to leave me in here alone, +Lieutenant?” + +“Honest to God, Cassidy, I am.” + +Lieutenant Valcour went out. Cassidy took one bleak look at his +charge, the living corpse, carefully crossed the fingers of both his +hands, and sat down. + +“I just knew,” he muttered truculently, “that this case was going to +be one of them printed damn things.” + + + +CHAPTER VII + +11:01 p. m.—Banked Fires + +The corridor was deserted. + +Lieutenant Valcour walked along it to the top of the stair well and +looked down into the entrance hall. He could see the broad athletic +back of Officer O’Brian on guard at the door. O’Brian’s snub nose was +pressed against the plate glass, and his eyes, one presumed, were +staring out through the door’s bronze grille upon the street. + +As Lieutenant Valcour went down he wondered at the complete stillness +of the house. There was no sound of any nature at all. There was a +waiting quality about the stillness: a definite waiting for something +that would shatter the hush into bedlam. + +“What are you pressing your nose against the glass for, O’Brian?” he +said. + +The young policeman turned and grinned at him broadly. + +“Sure, it’s them boys from the papers, sir,” he said. “They’re all +stirred up over what the medical examiner has just told them.” + +Lieutenant Valcour groaned faintly. “When was this, O’Brian?” + +“Not two whisks of a lamb’s tail ago, sir—out there in the vestibule.” + +“Did the medical examiner go out into the vestibule?” + +“He did that, Lieutenant, and the last mother’s son of them has just +beaten it off down the street like a jumping jack rabbit. They were +crazy after photographs, but he drew the line at that now.” + +“Really?” Lieutenant Valcour was politely astounded. + +“Sure and he did—with the exception of a flash or two he let them take +of himself.” + +“And were you the little birdie, O’Brian?” + +“Was I the which, Lieutenant?” + +“Did you say ‘peet-tweet’ over his left shoulder as the flashlights +went off?” + +“Ah, sure now, sir, and I did have the door open a wee bit. I was just +explaining to the boys that they couldn’t come in without your +permission nohow, and it was then that the medical examiner came along +and, hearing the talking, went outside to pacify them.” + +“A modern martyr throwing himself to the lions. Except for the tea +party, O’Brian, has anything happened down here?” + +“Not a thing, sir.” + +“Any of the servants been drifting around?” + +“Only one old dame in black, and seven foot tall if she’s one inch. +She came halfway down the stairs, took one dirty look at me, and then +stalked back up as stiff as a poker. Her bonnet was on her head.” + +“You don’t know who she was, I suppose?” + +“That and I don’t, sir. She looked like she might be a housekeeper.” + +“She probably was. By the way, O’Brian, just what was it the medical +examiner told the boys?” + +“Lieutenant, I could make neither the head nor the tail out of it. I’d +been telling them myself that the boss upstairs was dead and that foul +play was suspected, and they were hot after the medical examiner for a +further word, and I’m damned if he didn’t give it to them.” + +“What was the word, O’Brian?” + +“Indeed and it sounded like crinoline, sir—the stuff the missus do be +talking about in old dresses.” + +“Was that all he said?” + +“It was enough, sir. ‘Crinoline,’ said he, and looked very wise at +that. Then he added, ‘For the present, boys, no more,’ and off they +scampered like the devil in person was after them.” + +“All right, O’Brian. Just stick where you are.” + +Lieutenant Valcour wandered around the entrance hall but encountered, +beyond his own and the medical examiner’s, no hat. He knew that Dr. +Worth’s was still upstairs where the doctor had left it in Endicott’s +bedroom. He found the cupboard Mrs. Endicott had referred to. There +was no hat. The subject was becoming a fixed idea. It was growing +increasingly believable that the attacker had taken the hat and worn +it out of the house. But why should the attacker leave the house? And +what was the matter with the attacker’s own hat? Time, if not Endicott +himself, would have to tell. + +From a reception room opening off the entrance hall he caught the +murmur of Dr. Worth’s and the medical examiner’s voices in +consultation. He passed the door indifferently and went upstairs. + +. . . an old dame in black, seven foot tall if she was an inch. Her +bonnet was on her head. + +. . . and her bonnet, Lieutenant Valcour repeated softly to himself, +was on her head. + +He continued on up a second flight of stairs to the third floor. A +door toward the end of the hall was open, and light flooded out +through the doorway. He walked to it and looked in. + +A tall, thin woman sat on a chair before a grate in which some coals +burned bleakly. She was unbelievably gaunt—her silhouette a pencil, +rigidly supporting an austere face beneath a smooth inverted cup of +steel gray hair. Black taffeta sheathed her, tightly pressing against +flat narrow planes, and smoothly surfacing two pipelike arms that +ended in the tapering, sensitive hands of an emotional ascetic. + +Lieutenant Valcour rapped on the door jamb. + +The woman did not start. Her head alone turned and faced him, and her +eyes were a contradiction of nature—black planets glowing coldly in a +sky of white. + +“Pardon me, I am Lieutenant Valcour of the police. Are you, by any +chance, the housekeeper?” + +Her voice was of New England—low almost to huskiness, a trifle harsh, +and completely stripped of all nuances. + +“Yes, Lieutenant. I am Mrs. Siddons.” + +“May I come in? Thank you—please don’t get up. I’ll only stay a minute +or two, if you don’t mind.” + +He took a chair and placed it before the fireplace beside her own. He +sat down and did nothing beyond observing obliquely for a moment the +curiously artificial placidity of Mrs. Siddons’s clasped hands. + +“There is no use in questioning me, Lieutenant, because I have nothing +to say.” + +Her tone was the chill clear winds that sweep the rigorous mountains +of Vermont. + +Lieutenant Valcour warmed his hands before the lazy coals and smiled +amiably. “And I,” he said, “have absolutely nothing to ask.” + +“That is a lie.” + +There was nothing abusive in the remark. It was simply a statement of +fact, coldly, dispassionately pronounced by the remarkable pencil +dressed in black who spired beside him. Lieutenant Valcour was shocked +into a nervous laugh. He discarded his mask of indifference and stared +at Mrs. Siddons openly and with complete interest. Not planets, her +eyes—rather were they banked fires beneath whose ash hot coals +smouldered deeply. + +“I shouldn’t wonder,” he said, “but that your forbears came from +Salem.” + +A look of interest stirred sleepily in the coals. + +“Why so, sir?” + +“Because there’s a look of witch-burning in your eyes.” + +Mrs. Siddons gestured a slow negation. + +“I would never abrogate the rights of God.” + +“But you would approve, Mrs. Siddons.” + +“I would _rejoice_, sir, in the crushing out of any evil or”—her tone +became implacably stern—“of any evil thing.” + +“Or even of a human being?” + +Her look did not waver. + +“Yes, Lieutenant—or even of a human being.” She went on steadily and +unemotionally. Her words were fragments of stone chipped from some +elemental quarry of granitelike conviction and harsh purpose. “That is +why you find me dry-eyed, sir, in spite of the tragedy which has been +visited upon this house.” + +Lieutenant Valcour felt that there was a catch in it somewhere. If she +held Endicott’s condition in the light of a tragedy then she scarcely +regarded his death as an act of vengeance on the part of her +unquestionably inflexible god. + +“Tragedy?” he repeated softly. + +“A tragedy, sir, for blinded eyes.” + +He hoped that she wasn’t going to be allegorical. He endeavoured to +interpret. “It is hard on Mrs. Endicott,” he said. + +For a moment he thought she was going to melt. “That poor young +thing,” she said, and her voice fringed on unaccustomed softnesses. +“That sweet young child of beauty—what a bitter ending for the journey +of her tormented heart.” + +He stepped delicately out upon the fragile ice. “But she’s really +better off, don’t you think?” + +“She will never know to the full the fortune of her release.” Mrs. +Siddons’s incredibly thin body was suddenly shaken with passion as she +added, “From that hateful—that filthy beast.” + +“Oh, come, Mrs. Siddons—no man is quite as bad as all that.” + +Her eyes blazed with the heat of a strange malevolence. “You didn’t +know him, Lieutenant, as we did.” + +“‘We,’ Mrs. Siddons?” + +“Myself, sir, and the servants under my charge.” + +“You found him disagreeable—overbearing?” + +Mrs. Siddons stared fixedly at the coals, as if finding in their +vibrant reds some adequate illustration of her angered thoughts. “I +found him such a man, Lieutenant, that I am glad to know that he is +dead.” + +“But you see, Mrs. Siddons, he isn’t dead.” + +He thought for a minute that she was going to faint and instinctively +leaned forward to support her. She stood up unsteadily but refused the +offer of his hands. + +“If you will pardon me, sir, I believe I will lie down. There has +naturally been a certain strain—a——” + +She bowed and found her way to a door that led into an inner room. +Lieutenant Valcour listened for a moment at its panels after she had +closed it. + +He could not determine whether the muffled sound he heard was of +peculiar laughter or a sob. + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +11:28 p. m.—Mrs. Endicott Screams + +The tangents and the bypaths were beginning to increase. Lieutenant +Valcour tabulated them as he went thoughtfully down the stairs and +along the corridor toward Endicott’s room: Mrs. Endicott herself, and +the Spartan Mrs. Siddons—both had been partially explored; Roberts, +with her astonishing glance that had hinted so definitely at +revelations. Then what of Marge Myles? And what of the unknown man +with whom Mrs. Endicott, that afternoon, had taken tea? He opened the +door to Endicott’s room and went in. + +Preparations for the operation were practically complete. Dr. Worth +and the medical examiner were beside the bed, and hovering near them +were two trained nurses in uniform—middle-aged, competent women, +starched and abstract looking, moving a bit aloofly in their private +world which was so concisely separated from the sphere of laymen. + +Cassidy, who seemed bleaker than ever, still stiffly occupied the +chair near the doorway. He continued to inspect with an almost +feverish interest an unsullied expanse of white ceiling above his +head. + +Lieutenant Valcour seated himself on the corner of a long mahogany +chest that was placed before the window farthest from the bed and +gravely watched Dr. Worth. He began to feel a little sickish and hoped +that he wasn’t going to make an ass of himself and faint. He had +witnessed any number of accidents and stabbings, but had never been +present at an operation, and it worked on his nerves. Even if Endicott +weren’t dead, he certainly looked it. Suspended animation and +catalepsy were all right as figures of speech, but the human +illustration was rather ghastly. Lieutenant Valcour felt justified in +believing that he knew his corpses. He wondered why Dr. Worth was +delaying—hesitating—no, bending over now, and in his hand, ready to +give the injection of adrenaline into the cardiac muscles, was . . . + +The response was immediate. + +With the aid of the stethoscope Dr. Worth heard Endicott’s heart +throbbing again, growing steadily stronger. Quite noticeably beneath +the bright white lights a faint flush started to run through +Endicott’s skin. Lieutenant Valcour saw it, and he moistened with his +tongue the dry pressed surface of his lips. + +Dr. Worth straightened up and handed the stethoscope to the medical +examiner. “Endicott lives,” he said. + +No one had noticed Mrs. Endicott standing in the doorway. No one had +even noticed that the door was open. It was her terrific scream, her +dropping to the floor, that shocked everyone into instant awareness of +her presence. Dr. Worth nodded to one of the nurses. With her aid he +lifted Mrs. Endicott and carried her from the room. Everyone else +remained quite literally spellbound, still chained within the +influence of that extraordinary scream. It didn’t seem more than a +second or two before Dr. Worth returned. He went directly to +Lieutenant Valcour. + +“I have given Mrs. Endicott a narcotic that will keep her quiet for +the night,” he said. “It was outrageous—her being here. That guard at +the door should have seen to it that it was kept closed.” + +“Most outrageous, Dr. Worth. I believe all of us were hypnotized by +watching you.” + +“And I don’t care what the law is, she can’t be questioned or +disturbed in any way at all until I say so.” + +“But that _is_ the law, Doctor. You are quite within your rights to +dictate concerning your patient.” + +“I don’t want to dictate. I’m just as willing as anybody to have the +criminal side of this mess cleared up, if there is a criminal side.” + +“Endicott would hardly have crawled into a cupboard to have a stroke, +would he, Doctor?” + +“No.” Dr. Worth’s intelligent eyes stared speculatively at Lieutenant +Valcour for a minute. “Not unless he’d hidden in there to overhear +something, and did overhear something that gave him a stroke,” he +said. + +The cesspool, Lieutenant Valcour decided, was beginning to show +strange depths within its depth. The medical examiner came over and +joined them. He complimented Dr. Worth briefly on the success of his +operation, assured Lieutenant Valcour that the homicide chief would be +given a full report of Endicott’s recovery, and presumed that from now +on the case would be left in Lieutenant Valcour’s hands. Lieutenant +Valcour would deal with whatever charges of robbery or assault might +develop from it. He said good-bye and left the room, with the fullest +intention of going right straight home to bed; and so he promptly did, +as soon as he had made the promised report to Andrews. + +Dr. Worth pointedly raised his eyebrows. “Then there will be charges, +Lieutenant?” + +“That will depend largely upon Endicott, Doctor. As he is now revived +he will tell us himself who attacked him, or the nature of the +circumstance that gave him the shock.” + +“I trust so.” + +“There isn’t any doubt, is there?” + +Dr. Worth grew expansive. “Certainly there is a doubt,” he said. +“While it is true that Endicott has been revived, it is impossible to +state definitely that he will recover consciousness. And even granting +that he should recover consciousness, there is also a chance that he +might prefer not to make any statement at all. What would you do then, +Lieutenant?” + +“Fold my tents, Doctor, and fade away.” + +Dr. Worth looked down a long straight nose for a minute at tips +of low patent-leather shoes. “And if Endicott does not recover +consciousness,” he said softly, “what will you do then?” + +“You’ll be surprised at the number of things I will do then.” + +Dr. Worth’s eyes, surfeited with patent leather, snapped up sharply. +“I must impress on you that Mrs. Endicott is not to be disturbed,” he +said. + +“She won’t be, Doctor.” + +“Nurse Vickers, who helped me into her room with her, is going to stay +with Mrs. Endicott all night. Two day nurses will come in the morning: +one for her, if necessary, and surely one for Endicott. I need +scarcely impress upon you the seriousness of _his_ condition.” Dr. +Worth made a gesture of irritated bewilderment. “I wish I knew him +more intimately—who his friends are, I mean.” + +“He never talked with you about them?” + +“Never. He seems an unusually reticent man, with an almost abnormally +developed feeling for privacy concerning his intimate affairs.” Dr. +Worth’s manner grew definitely severe. Mentally, he wagged a finger +under Lieutenant Valcour’s nose. “He mustn’t have any further shock. +There must be nothing, absolutely nothing that will shock him when, +and if, he regains consciousness.” He directed his attention +momentarily to the nurse. “Get those shades back on the lamps, please, +Miss Murrow, and turn out the ceiling lights. And now, Lieutenant, to +continue about Endicott. As she is under the influence of the narcotic +I gave her, it is out of the question that his wife be here. I wish +she could be. I want the first person he sees to be someone he +knows—loves. His mind, you see, will pick up functioning at the +precise second where it left off—at least, such is my conclusion.” + +“And that was one of shock.” + +“Yes, Lieutenant, evidently one of shock or of great fear. We cannot +overestimate the importance of getting him past it safely. Personally, +I shall sleep here in the house to-night, and Nurse Murrow will call +me if Endicott shows any signs of coming to. That may not be before +morning. I hope so, in a way, as the effect of the narcotic will have +worn off by then, and Mrs. Endicott can be in here with him.” + +“One of the servants might know of some friend,” Lieutenant Valcour +suggested. “I take it you would like a friend to sit here with him +during the night?” + +Dr. Worth was emphatic. “It is almost a necessity that there should +be. The mental and nervous viewpoints, you see, predominate in the +case.” + +“There is just one thing that I would like to arrange, too, Doctor.” + +“Yes?” + +“I want to keep a couple of men posted all night in the bathroom. They +can sit on chairs just inside the doorway there, where they can watch +the bed, but where Endicott can’t see them. He need never know they +are there.” + +“What on earth would be the need for that?” + +“Why, it’s quite simple, Doctor. When Endicott comes to he will be in +a position to tell us who gave him the shock—a shock sufficient almost +to kill him—one which would have killed him if we hadn’t found him +to-night—and if,” he added thoughtfully, “Mrs. Endicott hadn’t had her +suspicions.” + +“But why the men in the bathroom?” + +“Because I don’t want to take any chances of there being a repetition +before Endicott makes his statement.” + +Dr. Worth pursed his lips and looked very wise indeed. “I see,” he +said. “I see. You are afraid that the same person might get at him +again and, well, silence him before he could talk.” + +“Something like that, Doctor.” Lieutenant Valcour became courteously +formal. “As the physician in charge of this case, sir, have you any +objection to my stationing the two men in the bathroom?” + +“Providing Endicott isn’t able to see them and won’t be disturbed by +them in any way at all.” + +“Then that’s settled. You’ll have a nurse in here all the time, I +suppose?” + +“Naturally.” + +“Then I’m going to ask her to keep this hall door locked on the +inside. She can open it if anyone knocks, and my men will keep their +eyes on whoever comes in.” + +“The precautions seem extraordinary, Lieutenant.” + +“And so does the case. I’ll go downstairs now and try to find out +something from the servants about his friends. I’ll tell them, if you +like, about your staying here, in case there is anything that has to +be got ready.” + +“Thank you, Lieutenant.” + +“Not at all, Doctor.” + +Lieutenant Valcour went outside. He found the maid Jane in the +hallway, seated on a chair near the stairs, trembling. A tray with an +empty glass was on the floor beside her. She saw him, picked up the +tray, and stood up. + +“I’m that upset, sir,” she said, “_that_ upset.” + +“Something has startled you?” + +“Startled! Glory be, sir—what with this bringing back of the dead and +the missus gone into a comma—if it wasn’t for them three cops at the +downstairs doors I’d be out of this house this minute, and so would +the rest of us, too.” + +“How many of the ‘rest of you’ are there?” + +“Sure and including the housekeeper there’s eight of us, sir.” + +The Endicotts, Lieutenant Valcour was now quite certain, must be +multimillionaires. + +“All women?” + +“Except for the houseman and chauffeur.” + +“And do they sleep in the house?” + +“The chauffeur does not, sir. He has an apartment for himself and his +wife and his three-year-old child, named Katie, over the garage in +East Sixty-sixth Street, sir.” + +“Have all of you been in service here a long time?” + +“Indeed and we haven’t, sir—except for Roberts and the housekeeper. +I’ve been here a month myself, and the rest of us not more than two or +three.” + +“And Roberts has been Mrs. Endicott’s maid for the past several years, +say?” + +“And sure and ever since she landed here from England, sir.” + +“Roberts is an Englishwoman?” + +“Hold your whisht, sir, and I’ll tell you that she’s of the +aristocracy, no less.” + +Lieutenant Valcour considered this gravely. It was not improbable. +Many English families were utterly wrecked financially by the war, and +the children had scattered whither they could, like sparrows, in +search of bread. “You’re sure of this?” he said. + +“And indeed it is common knowledge, sir. The housekeeper herself, it +was, who told me.” + +Lieutenant Valcour switched suddenly. “I wonder whether you could tell +me who Mr. Endicott’s intimate friends were,” he said. + +“Well, sir, there’s quite a few people have called on the madam off +and on, and a few on Mr. Endicott, too. I couldn’t say, though, as to +just how intimate.” + +“But didn’t he ever discuss his friends?” + +“Not before me, sir. I’m one of the downstairs girls. Perhaps Roberts +would know. She’s often in the room with the madam and Mr. Endicott +even when the pair of them is quarrelling that hard that—— Glory be +to——” + +“Tut, tut,” said Lieutenant Valcour gently. “Married couples are +always quarrelling together. There’s nothing unusual in that.” + +“Indeed and there ain’t.” + +“I wonder whether you’d ask Roberts to come out here and see me.” + +“I will, sir.” + +“Oh—and will you also tell whoever has to know about it that Dr. Worth +plans to stay here all night? And then let him know, please, where he +is to sleep.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +Jane went to the door of Mrs. Endicott’s room and knocked. Nurse +Vickers opened it and stepped halfway out, blocking the entrance. +Their voices were too low for Lieutenant Valcour to hear, but he saw +the nurse retreat into the room, caught an affirmative nod from Jane, +and presently Roberts came out and toward him. + +“You wished to see me, Lieutenant?” + +There was still that curious shielding in her eyes—a hinting at +definite information kept closely guarded behind twin gates. + +“I want you to tell me,” he said quietly, “why you compelled me a +while ago in Mrs. Endicott’s room to say ‘Later.’” + +“I don’t believe I quite understand.” + +“And I believe that you do.” + +Roberts became coolly detached. “One is justified in having one’s +beliefs.” + +“Just why do you hate Mrs. Endicott so?” + +She flinched as if he had struck her physically. + +“Is that why you sent for me?” she said. + +Lieutenant Valcour himself indulged in a veiling of eyes. “I wish,” he +said, “that you would sit down.” + + + +CHAPTER IX + +11:55 p. m.—Queer Deeps + +Roberts went indifferently to the chair that Jane had been using and +sat down. Lieutenant Valcour drew another up beside her. He began with +the usual distant skirmishing before launching the main body of his +attack. + +“I will explain why I wanted to see you,” he said. “It’s concerning +Mr. Endicott—concerning his condition.” He noted the sudden reflex +from tension on the part of her hands as he summed up concisely the +statement made to him by Dr. Worth. “I understand,” he concluded, +“that Mrs. Endicott is under the influence of a narcotic and will not +be available before to-morrow morning at the earliest. Dr. Worth +naturally wants to prevent all risk, and so we’ve turned to you.” + +He felt her staring through him, as if by some fourth-dimensional +process his being had been erased from her vision. + +“Mr. Endicott has very few friends,” she said. + +“You are taking the word at its literal meaning.” + +“Oh, quite. His acquaintances are numerous and transient.” She +focussed him into an entity again. “They are mostly women. I don’t +suppose one of them would do?” + +Lieutenant Valcour smiled slightly. “Not if their status is so +uncertain—their emotional status, I mean.” + +“Exactly.” The masked effect of her attitude remained unchanged as she +asked with almost perfunctory detachment, “Would a man do?” + +“Why not?” + +“Because there is one man of whom Mr. Endicott speaks quite frequently +as being his ‘best’ friend.” + +“Here in town?” + +“In a bachelor apartment on East Fifty-second Street.” + +“You have his exact address?” + +“It is in the memorandum book beside the telephone in Mrs. Endicott’s +room.” + +Lieutenant Valcour grew markedly casual. “A mutual friend, then?” + +“One couldn’t say.” + +“He is your only suggestion?” + +“He is the only man to whom I have heard Mr. Endicott refer in terms +of friendship and of intimacy.” + +“Then there really isn’t any choice.” + +Roberts’ smile signified nothing. “No choice.” + +“Have you ever seen this man?” + +“His name is Mr. Thomas Hollander. I have never seen him.” + +“Has anyone in the household ever seen him, to your knowledge?” + +“I dare say. I don’t know. One could inquire.” + +Lieutenant Valcour recognized the rising inflection at each period +mark, a habit so much in vogue among certain types of English people +when they wish to be mildly disagreeable. He felt a Gallic insistence +to retaliate even at the expense of chivalry. At the worst, he +thought, he would only be living up to the popular conception of the +men in his profession. And there _was_ some link of peculiar intimacy +between this woman and Endicott. . . . + +“If we cannot get hold of Mr. Hollander,” he said, “would you consider +it advisable for the post to be taken by yourself?” + +He repented instantly at the sight of her deadly whiteness. It seemed +impossible that blood could drain so swiftly from the skin. His own +face blazed like fire from the slap of her hand across his cheek. He +noticed, as he sat very still, the strange terror that hid beneath her +bitter, staring eyes: it wasn’t any terror of the law, the cheek of +which she had symbolically in his person just so vigorously slapped; +it wasn’t any terror of what he or the machine he represented could do +to her—what anyone or anything could do to her. . . . It was baffling; +baffling as the undiscoverable source of any intense emotional +reaction is baffling—something that drew its sustenance from roots +imbedded not in the immediate present but in the past. . . . + +“You will permit me to offer my apologies?” he said. + +She returned vividly to the moment, and her colour swept back in a +succession of bright waves. + +“I am not usually so unmannerly,” she said. + +“Nor usually subjected to insult. The fault was mine.” + +Her laugh was quite harsh. “On the contrary, Lieutenant, I am +accustomed to insult.” + +“Then why do you stay with Mrs. Endicott?” he said softly. + +“Because there are some people, Lieutenant, who can only find their +happiness in hell.” + +“Martyrs.” + +“Not martyrs, precisely.” + +“Just what, then, precisely?” + +“It’s a sharing, if you wish—sort of a sharing of torture.” + +Vague—vague. Lieutenant Valcour felt quite convinced that he would +shortly begin to gibber, if the mysteries of hearts, of minds that he +had dipped into during the past few hours, did not soon coalesce +within the mould of reason. He began to envy his sterner compatriots +on the force who confined their processes to the comfortable fields of +hard, cold facts—the “did you at five-forty-five this afternoon place +the silver teaspoon on the pantry shelf, or did you not?” sort of +facts. He conceded that their wholesome, plein-air tactics were quite +right, and that his own, in spite of their usually successful results, +were hopelessly wrong. They at least were never called liars, or +slapped in the face, or found themselves helplessly swirling in a sea +of metaphysics with a splendid chance of being thoroughly drowned. He +forced himself to concentrate. What was it that slash of pale lips had +been saying? A sharing of something . . . Of course, of torture. + +“You mean,” he said, “a sharing that is now going on?” + +“Perhaps—but especially in the past. Do you believe, Lieutenant, that +the dead remain in emotional touch with the living?” + +“And that, my poor fish,” he told himself severely, “is what your +interminable probing into people’s souls has got you into.” + +“I have never thought about it. But I should like to believe that it +is true. I should like to believe in anything that offers +corroborative proof of immortality.” + +“You are convinced of the finality of death?” + +“It is a dread, not a conviction.” + +Roberts nodded her head swiftly. “And with me—with me—if I could only +_know_.” + +“So that you would be quite certain that your sacrifice is not being +made in vain.” Lieutenant Valcour spoke very softly. He was +approaching, he felt, no matter how grandiloquently, that goal toward +which he had been aiming: the answer to the amazing look she had given +him in Mrs. Endicott’s room. + +The mood broke. She stood up abruptly. + +“You wished that address book?” she said. + +It was of no great matter. Moods, at least, did not die. They were +always there—somewhere—waiting to be recaptured. + +“If you will be so kind,” he said. + +She went to the door of Mrs. Endicott’s room, opened it, was swallowed +up. Lieutenant Valcour waited outside. The case was becoming mired in +evasions. That was the trouble with cases whose milieu rose beyond a +certain social and mental level. They invariably grew kaleidoscopic +with overtones. Crime in the lower strata was noteworthy for its +crudenesses rather than its subtleties: an intrigue among animals, +with the general patentness of some jackal filching its prey. But +breeding and intellect generally presupposed masks: the inbred +defensiveness of manner and social combativeness with the world which +offered barriers most difficult to pierce. Roberts opened the door and +handed him the small leather reference book Mrs. Endicott had used +when verifying the telephone number of Dr. Worth. + +“Thomas Hollander,” she said. “The names are listed alphabetically.” + +The door closed even in that short second which preceded his thanks. +It was a gesture of retreat from hinted intimacies. It wasn’t so much +the door of the room she had closed as it was the door guarding her +secrets. He felt that she wanted to show him she had already repented +of having gone so far—not that she _had_ gone any distance, really, +but there were beacons, faint pin points of light toward which he +would chart a course over the surface of her troubled seas. + +He took the reference book and sat down. He began with A and started +to go systematically through it. At H he fixed in his memory the +street and telephone number of Hollander’s house. He continued without +interest to turn the pages. + +At the end of the M’s he came, to his marked bewilderment, upon the +address and telephone number of Marge Myles. + + + +CHAPTER X + +12:06 a. m.—The Stillness of a Grave + +Lieutenant Valcour went to the head of the stairs. + +“O’Brian!” he called down. + +O’Brian looked up at him from below. + +“Yes, Lieutenant?” + +“Send Hansen up here, please.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +A painting on the wall held Lieutenant Valcour’s attention while he +waited. A Gauguin, he thought, and, going closer, confirmed it. His +eye drifted over the entire corridor. Everywhere were the details of +great wealth, and the young owner of it all not a happy child of kind +fortune, but a detested, a passionately hated, and a passionately +loved man. There flashed again before him in brief review Mrs. +Endicott, a storehouse of mountain storms in summer; Mrs. Siddons, +spiritual ash; Roberts, the shortest step this side of some fervour +bred in the swamps of lunacy; Hollander—Marge Myles—who knew? And +would one ever know? Suppose, as Dr. Worth had more than hinted, +Endicott should refuse to speak—if that strange reticence harped upon +so insistently both by his wife and his physician should resist . . . + +“Lieutenant, sir, Officer Hansen reporting.” + +Lieutenant Valcour dragged his eyes from the Gauguin unwillingly. + +“All right, Hansen,” he said. “Come with me.” + +They went down the corridor and stopped before the door to Endicott’s +room. + +“Do you know what’s gone on here to-night, Hansen?” + +“From what I’ve heard, sir, the man who was thought dead is now +alive.” + +“That is correct.” + +Lieutenant Valcour opened the door and beckoned to Cassidy. Cassidy +came out and joined them. + +“When you two men go back into that room,” Lieutenant Valcour said, “I +want you to get a couple of chairs and sit down just inside the +bathroom doorway. Put the chairs where you can watch the bed and this +hall door. If you talk, use a low voice that won’t disturb either the +patient or the nurse, and from the moment when she indicates that he’s +returning to consciousness, say nothing at all and sit still. The +shock of knowing that you were there might disturb his heart again. Is +that clear?” + +They assured him, in unison, that it was. + +“This hall door,” Lieutenant Valcour went on, “is going to be kept +locked on the inside by the nurse. Every time she opens it, watch +carefully. Keep your eye on anyone who comes into the room, especially +if they offer some excuse for wanting to be there—and when I say +‘anyone,’ I mean just that. For instance: the nurse might want some +coffee and ring for a servant. Watch that servant every second, until +she goes and the door is locked again. While on the subject of coffee, +you will drink none that may be offered you while you’re on watch.” + +“I never drink coffee, Lieutenant,” said Cassidy. “Now if it was a cup +of tea——” + +“If you get thirsty,” said Lieutenant Valcour severely, “take some +water from the tap. And eat nothing at all. I don’t want to have to +come back here and find you both groggy with knock-out drops and with +heaven-knows-what happened to Endicott. Mind you, I’m not suggesting +that anything like this will happen—but it might. Clear?” + +Again, in unison, they assured him it was all most clear. + +“Keep in mind,” Lieutenant Valcour went on, “that primarily you are in +a sick-room over which Dr. Worth has absolute charge. You are not to +interfere with anything he may do, or with any arrangements he may +make during the night. You are only to step in if you see that +Endicott’s life is threatened through the action of some person who +may approach him. Try to prevent this by physically overpowering the +attacker if you can, but if there is no time for that do not hesitate +to shoot.” + +“Even if it’s a woman, Lieutenant?” said Hansen quietly. + +Lieutenant Valcour shrugged. “There are no such things,” he said +evenly, “as sex or chivalry in murder.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +“I am painting, incidentally, the darkest prospect of the picture. In +all probability nothing will happen at all. You’ll spend a sleepless +and tiresome night, get cricks in your necks, and damn the day you +ever joined the force. Now, then, there is one thing more, and that +concerns a man by the name of Thomas Hollander. Dr. Worth believes it +advisable that an intimate friend of Endicott be near him and be the +first person whom Endicott sees when he recovers consciousness. Mr. +Hollander is that friend. I am going to try to get in touch with him +shortly, explain matters to him, and get him to come up here. Mr. +Hollander is naturally the exception to my previous instructions. Let +him alone. Don’t interfere with him, but—” Lieutenant Valcour’s pause +was significantly impressive “—watch him. Watch him, my good young +men, as two harmonious cats might watch a promenading and near-sighted +mouse. Shall I repeat?” + +“I get you, Lieutenant,” said Cassidy. And Hansen, he was assured, had +“got” him, too. + +“Then we will go in, and you will establish yourselves for the night +at once.” + +He opened the door, and they went inside. Dr. Worth’s arrangements +were complete, and he was ready to turn in. Nurse Murrow had received +her instructions and was to call Dr. Worth should Endicott show any +symptoms of returning consciousness. + +Dr. Worth joined Lieutenant Valcour at the door. + +“There is nothing further we can do for the present, Lieutenant, +except wait,” he said. + +“All right, Doctor. I’ve told my men how things stand.” He nodded +toward Cassidy and Hansen, who, on tiptoe, were vanishing into the +bathroom with two chairs. “I’ve told them you’re in charge here, and +that there’s not to be an unnecessary sound or move out of them.” + +Dr. Worth continued to remain politely incredulous. “Well, I dare say +you know what you are doing, but it still seems an extraordinary +precaution to me.” + +“And it probably is. I spoke to one of the maids about your staying +here, Doctor.” + +“Yes—thank you. They’ve told me where my room is. It’s the one +directly above this one.” + +“I’ve also lined up one of Endicott’s friends. I’m getting in touch +with him directly, and when he comes I’ll have him sent up to you. You +can tell him just what you want him to do, and then see that he gets +in here all right, if you will, please.” + +“By all means. Who is he, Lieutenant?” + +“A Mr. Thomas Hollander—lives on East Fifty-second Street.” + +“Never heard of him; but there’s no reason why I should have.” He sped +a parting look toward Endicott, faintly breathing on the bed. “The +most reticent man, Lieutenant, whom I have ever met.” + +They went outside and closed the door. + +Nurse Murrow went over and locked it. She felt, to put it mildly, not +a little atwitter. Her life had not conformed to the popular version +of a trained nurse’s. There had been no romantic patients in it whose +pallid, interesting brows she had smoothly divorced from fever by a +gentle pass or two with magnetic fingers. No grateful millionaire had +offered her his heart and name; nor had any motherly eyed old dowager +died and willed her a fortune. No. There had been, on the other hand, +a good many years of sloppy, disillusioning, grilling work, long hours +spent in pampering peevish patients, patients who were ugly with that +special ugliness which is inherent in the sick, snappish doctors, and +a perfect desert of romance. + +The present case loomed as a heaven-sent oasis. Who knew what might +not develop out of it? It awakened all the atrophied hunger of her +starved sentimentalism. And even if nothing _did_ result from +it—nothing practical, like marriage, or a good bonus—it would at least +leave her something to think about during those endless, tiresome, +tiring hours of the future. . . . + +She crossed to the bed and looked down at Endicott. She felt his pulse +and made a notation on her night chart. She lingered near the bathroom +doorway. + +“The strangest case,” she whispered, “that I’ve ever been on.” + +Cassidy looked up at her bleakly. + +Hansen said, “Yes, ma’am.” + +“I dare say,” she whispered on, “that it’s quite in the ordinary run +of things for you gentlemen.” + +“Yes, ma’am.” + +“There’s an atmosphere—a something sinister——” + +“Yes, ma’am.” + +Nurse Murrow’s broad shoulders jerked impatiently. There was a +talk-chilling quality in being so determinedly ma’am’d. She gave it +up, and settled herself starchily in an armchair. She adjusted a lamp +so that it shaded more efficiently her eyes. + +A floor board creaked upstairs—once. + +That would be Dr. Worth, she decided, going to bed. What a man! What a +shining light in his profession! A little bigoted, perhaps, in some +things, but so distinguished—admirable—a bachelor, too—— But what +nonsense! + +A complete stillness settled gently on the house. The stillness of a +grave. + +Yes, she thought, just exactly that—the stillness of a grave. . . . + + + +CHAPTER XI + +12:15 a. m.—To Watch by Night + +Lieutenant Valcour refreshed his memory from the leather reference +book and then dialled the number. + +“Mr. Thomas Hollander?” he said, when a man’s voice answered him. It +was a smooth, soft voice, and he suspected that further words beyond +the initial “hello” would reveal a Southern accent. + +“Who is calling, please?” went on the voice, making the expected +latitudinal revelation. + +“I have a message from the home of Mr. Herbert Endicott for Mr. Thomas +Hollander. Will you ask him to come to the ’phone, please?” + +“One moment.” + +“Certainly.” + +Lieutenant Valcour drew stars on a scratch pad while he waited. He +wondered idly what secret powers or hidden vices they would disclose +if examined by a trained graphologist. He made quite a good star and +drew exciting rays out from its points. That would undoubtedly show, +he told himself, that he was a nosey, mean-spirited, and cold-hearted +sleuth hound. What an infernal time it took to get Hollander to the +telephone! Had the line gone dead? Ah . . . + +“Yes?” It was a deeper voice, this time, and held no promise, or +threat, of Southern softnesses. + +“Mr. Thomas Hollander?” + +“Yes.” + +“This is the home of Mr. Herbert Endicott, Mr. Hollander.” + +“Yes?” + +“And I am Lieutenant Valcour talking—of the police.” + +The deadness of the wire became a pause of the first magnitude. Then: + +“Well, Lieutenant, what’s it all about?” + +“It is about Mr. Endicott, Mr. Hollander.” + +“Yes?” + +“Yes.” + +Another pause. + +“He’s dead?” + +“Dead? Why no, Hollander. Were you expecting him to be?” + +“What do you mean by ‘expecting him to be’? Certainly I wasn’t. Please +come down to facts, Lieutenant.” + +“I was about to. Mr. Endicott has suffered a heart attack brought on +by some sudden shock. His condition is serious, and Dr. Worth, who is +attending him, insists that some friend be at hand when Mr. Endicott +recovers consciousness.” + +“You mean”—the voice was speaking very carefully now—“in addition to +Mrs. Endicott?” + +“No, unfortunately Mrs. Endicott cannot be present.” + +Again a pause, and then: + +“Why not, Lieutenant? She isn’t—that is——” + +“I beg your pardon, Mr. Hollander?” + +“Damn it, is she arrested?” + +“Certainly not. What for?” + +“Well, what in hell are you cops in the house for if”—the voice ended +less belligerently—“there hasn’t been some crime?” + +Lieutenant Valcour remained splendidly detached. + +“We shan’t be certain that there either has or hasn’t been a crime, as +you infer, until Mr. Endicott recovers consciousness and lets us +know.” + +“He’s unconscious?” + +“Yes.” + +“Is his condition serious, Lieutenant?” + +“Most serious, Mr. Hollander.” + +“And Mrs. Endicott—why is it she can’t be with Herb?” + +“Dr. Worth has given her a narcotic. She’s sleeping. Her nerves are +unstrung.” + +This evidently took a minute to digest. + +“From what, Lieutenant?” + +“From her husband’s condition.” + +“Did Mrs. Endicott suggest that you call me up, Lieutenant?” + +“No. Roberts, her maid, said you were a friend—a mutual friend. +Roberts tells me that your name is the only one she has ever heard +spoken by Mr. Endicott in terms that would imply intimacy.” + +“That’s right.” + +“You and Mr. Endicott are intimate friends, are you not?” + +“Pretty thick, Lieutenant. What is it you want me to do?” + +“To sit with Mr. Endicott until he recovers consciousness. Dr. Worth +is afraid that his heart will go back on him again if there isn’t +someone he knows with him when he comes to. If you’ll be kind enough +to come up, Dr. Worth will explain the whole peculiar affair to you +much better than I can.” + +“Why, of course. Yes. When?” + +“As soon as convenient.” + +“In about an hour? There are some things——” + +“That will do perfectly. Thank you very much, Mr. Hollander. +Good-bye.” + +“Good-bye.” + +Lieutenant Valcour hung up the receiver of the hall telephone he was +using and walked to where he had left his coat and hat. He put them on +and buttonholed O’Brian by the front door. + +“O’Brian,” he said, “there’s a man coming here shortly by the name of +Thomas Hollander. Have him identify himself by a visiting card, or a +letter, or his driver’s licence, or initials on something or other. +Give him a pat, too, in passing to make certain that he hasn’t got a +gun. If it offends him, say that it is just a matter of routine. As a +matter of fact, in his case, it probably is. Then show him up to the +room that Dr. Worth is occupying for the night.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +“From Dr. Worth’s room he will be taken down to Mr. Endicott’s room +and will stay there until morning.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +“I want you to tip the men off on guard down here that I want it known +I am going home until to-morrow. Tell Mr. Hollander that if he asks to +see me. I am leaving the house now and may be gone for a couple of +hours, more or less. Then I’m coming back. I’ll rap on this door here, +and you let me in.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +“There’s probably a lounge or something in that room there just off +this hall. I’ll spend the night on it.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +“What is the name of the gentleman who is coming?” + +“Thomas Hollander, Lieutenant.” + +“Good.” + +Lieutenant Valcour went outside. The normal orderliness of life +returned comfortingly with the first deep breaths of cold night air. +He walked the short half block to Fifth Avenue and hailed a taxi. He +got in. He gave the driver, through the half-opened window in front, +the Riverside Drive address of Marge Myles. + + + +CHAPTER XII + +12:30 a. m.—Madame Velasquez Stirs up Muck + +The taxi ran north along Fifth Avenue for a few blocks and then bore +left into the leafless, frosty stretches of Central Park. It was +deserted of pedestrians. Occasional yellow lights showed the vacant +surface of benches and empty walks. + +The average worthlessness of any person’s reactions when suddenly +confronted by the police, Lieutenant Valcour reflected, was a curious +phenomenon. It was his belief that only rarely were such reactions the +result of the moment at hand. They were instead a subconscious +scurrying backward to some earlier time when something had been done +by that person, or known by that person, which might then have brought +him into the grip of the law. No one—he included himself in the +arraignment—led a blameless life. No, not even the saints, for they +had their periods of expiation, which in themselves presupposed +blemishes that required the act of expiation for their erasure. And so +it was with people when, even in the rôle of the most innocent of +bystanders, they were confronted by the police. Inevitably there +lurked a certain fear, an instinctive thrusting out of defenses as a +guard against the chance discovery of that early blemish. . . . + +Take Hollander, for instance. Every word of his telephone conversation +had been a negative defense, and yet one could not link it necessarily +with the attack on Endicott. No, not necessarily. It was perfectly +obvious that Hollander had _expected_ something to happen to Endicott, +and equally obvious that he was worried about the fact that Mrs. +Endicott might be involved in it, but one couldn’t say that he had +been involved in it himself. . . . + +The taxi stopped. Lieutenant Valcour got out, paid the driver, and +dismissed him. + +Riverside Drive seemed about ten degrees colder than the midtown +section of the city had been. Or was it fifteen or twenty degrees? A +northerly wind blew iced blasts from the Hudson River and at him +across the treetops of the terraced park. Marge Myles, Lieutenant +Valcour decided as he took in the façade of the building that housed +her apartment, did herself rather well. + +A sleepy and irritable Negro casually asked him “Wha’ floor—’n’ who, +suh?” as he entered the overheated lobby. The boy was smartly snapped +into full consciousness by the view offered him of Lieutenant +Valcour’s gold badge. + +The proper floor proved to be the fourteenth. + +As the hour was hovering about one in the morning, Lieutenant Valcour +was considerably surprised at the promptness with which the door swung +open in response to his ring, and considerably more surprised by the +querulous voice that emerged from beneath a wig, dimly seen in the +poor light of a foyer, and said, “Well, I must say you took your own +time in coming. Put your coat and hat on that table there, and then +come into the parlour.” + +Lieutenant Valcour complied. He followed a dimmish mass of jet bugles +into the more accurate light of a room heavily cluttered with +gold-leafed furniture and brocades. + +“I’m Madame Velasquez—Marge’s ma. I ain’t Spanish myself, but if there +ever was a Spaniard, my late husband Alvarez was.” + +The wig on Madame Velasquez’s head offered no anachronism to the +bugles of her low-cut dress. Its reddish russet strands were +pompadoured and puffed and showed at unexpected places little sprays +of determined curls. The face beneath it bore an odd resemblance to an +enamelled nut to which nature, in a moment of freakish humour, had +added features. + +“Now I want you to tell me at once, Mr. Endicott, what you have done +with my little Marge.” + +Lieutenant Valcour with curious eyes tried to probe a closed door at +the other end of the room. + +“I expected to find her here, Madame Velasquez,” he said quietly. +“Isn’t she?” + +“She ain’t. And what is furthermore, Mr. Herbert Endicott, you know +she ain’t.” Her voice had grown shrill, but without much volume. It +was rather the ineffective piping of some winded bird. + +“What makes you say that, Madame Velasquez?” + +The bunched strands of artificial jewellery that were recklessly +clasped about Madame Velasquez’s thin neck quivered defiantly. + +“And you never met her here at seven,” she said. “I suppose you’ll say +you _wasn’t_ to meet her here at seven. Well, I got this note to prove +it. There, now.” + +She handed Lieutenant Valcour a sheet of notepaper that reeked of some +high-powered scent. + + Make yourself at home, Ma [read the note]. Herb Endicott was to meet + me here at seven. He didn’t come although he was to take me to the + Colonial for dinner. I am going to the Colonial now and see if he is + there. Maybe I did not understand him right, Ma. I will be home soon + anyways. + + Marge. + +“And it is now,” said Madame Velasquez, “after 1 a. m.” + +“She knew you were going to pay her this visit, Madame Velasquez?” + +“I telegraphed her this afternoon. I’m here for a week. Where is she?” + +“I don’t know where she is, Madame Velasquez.” + +“Mr. Endicott, one more lie like that and I’ll call the police.” + +“That’s all right, Madame Velasquez. You see, I am the police.” + +The bugles, the jewels, the curls became still with shocking +abruptness, as a brake that without warning binds tightly. + +“You belong to the police?” + +“Yes, Madame Velasquez—Lieutenant Valcour.” + +He showed his badge. + +“Then you ain’t Mr. Endicott?” + +“No, Madame Velasquez.” + +“Then he—she—they’ve gone and done it, Lieutenant—they have run away.” +Madame Velasquez began to simper. + +“I’m sorry, Madame Velasquez, but they haven’t run away. Mr. Endicott, +you see, was attacked this evening. If he doesn’t live, whoever did it +will be charged with murder.” + +There was a complete absence of expression in Madame Velasquez’s tone. +“And you think Marge done it,” she said. + +“Not necessarily so at all. Your daughter may very well have met +somebody else at the Colonial—some other party of friends—and have +joined it when Mr. Endicott failed to show up. The Colonial is closed +by now, but perhaps she went on to some night club. I shouldn’t +worry.” + +“Why should she go on to some night club when she knew her ma was +waiting for her here?” + +Madame Velasquez’s thin hands, the fingers of which were loaded with +cheap rings, played nervously with any substance they chanced to +touch. + +“Something’s happened to her, Lieutenant,” she went on. “I always told +her as how it would. Marge—I told her a hundred times if I ever told +her once—there’s a limit to the number of suckers you can play at one +and the same time.” + +“You think that some man who was jealous perhaps attacked Endicott +first and then got after her?” + +“Man? Men, Lieutenant, men. That brat kept the opposite of a harem, if +you know what I mean.” + +“She isn’t your daughter, really, is she, Madame Velasquez?” + +“She was Alvarez’s only child by his first wife—some Spanish female +hussy from Seville. What made you guess?” + +“The way you talked about her. But do keep right on, Madame Velasquez. +What a remarkable pendant—it’s a rarity to see so perfect a ruby—may +I?” + +Madame Velasquez simpered audibly while Lieutenant Valcour leaned +forward and stared earnestly at the bit of paste. + +“My late husband, Lieutenant, used to say that nothing was too good +for pretty Miramar. That’s my name, Lieutenant—Miramar.” + +“Few people are so happily named, Madame Velasquez. Tell me—let me +rely upon your woman’s intuition—just what did Marge expect from +Endicott?” + +Madame Velasquez leaned forward confidentially. An atmosphere as of +frenzied heliotropes clung thickly about her. + +“Every last damn nickel she could get,” she said. + +Lieutenant Valcour assumed his most winning smile. “Scarcely an +_affaire du cœur_, Madame Velasquez.” If he had had a moustache, he +would have twirled it. “I suppose her early marriage embittered her, +rather hardened her against men?” + +“Well, if it did I ain’t noticed it none.” + +“Perhaps Endicott came under the heading of business rather than +pleasure?” + +“Well, yes, and then no.” + +“A happy combination?” + +“Just a combination. Not so damn happy.” + +“A little bickering now and then?” + +“A lot.” + +“Indeed? Marge was on the stage, wasn’t she?” + +“If you can call it the stage nowadays, Lieutenant.” + +“In the chorus, wasn’t she?” + +“Yes.” + +“And Harry Myles saw her and carried her off.” + +Madame Velasquez’s laugh was an art; unfortunately not a lost one. +“The millionaire marriage,” she gasped. “My dear”—her hand found a +resting place on one of Lieutenant Valcour’s knees—“he didn’t have a +cent.” + +“She felt disappointed, I suppose?” + +“Disappointed!” Madame Velasquez fairly screamed the word at him, like +an angry parrot. Her manner changed and became darkly mysterious. “I +know my little know,” she said. “You can believe me, Lieutenant, +little Miramar’s not the boob some parties I could mention, but won’t, +think she is.” Her voice grew harsh with the gritty quality of a file. +“I’ll learn her to leave me in the ditch like this.” + +“Then you think Marge purposely isn’t here to greet you?” + +It was a sweet little bunch of filth, taken all in all, thought +Lieutenant Valcour. It was perfectly plain: Madame Velasquez either +held definite knowledge that Marge had killed Harry Myles, or else had +convinced Marge that she knew. And then Madame Velasquez had simply +bled Marge of all the money she could get. + +“Is Marge frightened easily, Madame Velasquez?” + +“About some things.” + +The reddish, dusty-looking curls nodded vigorously. Lieutenant Valcour +looked at his watch. It was one-thirty. He stood up. + +“Thank you for receiving me, Madame Velasquez. If I leave you a +telephone number would you care to call me up when Marge comes in? Or +will you be in bed?” + +“Leave your number, Lieutenant.” The seamy enamelled face became more +nutlike than ever. “I got a thing or two to talk over with that female +Brigham Young.” She raised a be-ringed hand and held it unescapably +close to Lieutenant Valcour’s lips. + +He brushed them gently against a hardened coat of whiting, smiled his +pleasantest, and left, assisted doorward by what might at one time +have been called a sigh. + +He paused for a moment in the small foyer, after putting on his hat +and coat, and pencilled the Endicotts’ telephone number on one of his +cards. He started back to give it to Madame Velasquez. + +She wasn’t in the room where he had left her, and the room’s other +door stood ajar. He crossed to it softly and looked in. Madame +Velasquez—yes, he convinced himself, it _was_ Madame Velasquez—was +sitting before a dresser. Her wig was off, and her heavily enamelled +face peered into a mirror beneath thin knots of corn-gray hair. As the +lonely, weak old voice rose and fell, Lieutenant Valcour caught a word +or two of what Madame Velasquez was saying: + +“He didn’t know—if I went and told her once, I told her a thousand +times—he didn’t _know_.” There followed a short, dreadful noise that +passed as laughter. “But _I_ know—Miramar knows, darling—you little +lousy . . .” + +Lieutenant Valcour retreated softly. He left the card lying on a +table. He went outside and closed the door. He rang for the elevator +and shut his eyes while waiting for it to come up. There were times +when they grew a little weary from looking too intimately upon life. + +Down in the lobby he used the house telephone and called up the +Endicotts’. + +“Lieutenant Valcour talking,” he said. + +“O’Brian, sir.” + +“Everything quiet?” + +“Indeed and it is, sir.” + +“Mr. Hollander get there yet?” + +“He’s just this minute after arriving, sir. He’s upstairs with Dr. +Worth now.” + +“Did he identify himself all right?” + +“He did that, Lieutenant, with cards and a driver’s licence.” + +“Good. I’ll be along in about an hour now. Good-bye.” + +He was helped by the bitter wind as he walked east to Broadway. He +found a taxi and gave the driver Hollander’s address on East +Fifty-second Street. He settled back and closed his eyes. He went to +sleep. + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +2:01 a. m.—Glittering Eyes + +Nurse Murrow didn’t slumber, exactly; it was much too slender a lapse +from consciousness for that. But it was not until the second gentle +rapping that she stood up. + +Someone was rapping on the hall door. + +She glanced at her wrist watch as she crossed the room, and was glad +to note that it was just after two o’clock. Three or four hours, now, +and it would be dawn. She’d get some coffee, then, and her work for +the night would be almost over. + +As she turned the key in the lock she noticed with a sharp thrill of +interest that the two policemen, very quiet, very alert, but still +sitting on their chairs in the bathroom doorway, had each drawn a gun +from its holster and was holding it by his side. She opened the door. + +Dr. Worth, his dignity considerably muffled in camel’s hair, stood in +the corridor with a stranger. + +“Miss Murrow,” he said, “this is Mr. Thomas Hollander, the friend who +is going to sit up with Mr. Endicott. He understands everything about +the situation, and I have advised him just what to do.” + +“Yes, Doctor.” + +Dr. Worth failed futilely in suppressing a yawn. “Are there any +reports?” + +“No, Doctor.” + +“Then I’ll return to my room. Call me at the slightest indication.” + +“Yes, Doctor.” + +Hollander came inside. Miss Murrow closed the door and locked it +again. She stood watching Hollander as he went an uncertain step or +two toward the bed, with that natural hesitation with which one +approaches the very ill. He was a personable young man in his +thirties. He was more than personable, she decided. Not handsome, +exactly—heavens, no—she corrected herself rapidly. The features +weren’t moulded in the tiresome regularity of handsomeness. Engaging? +Perhaps. A body perfectly proportioned, with the broad shoulders and +slim hips of a fighter—of, yes, a prize fighter—an amateur sportsman. + +Hollander had finished with staring down at Endicott. His walk, as he +came over to where she was standing, caused Miss Murrow to change her +opinion as to his vocation. She put him down as a sailor, a yachtsman. +There was a buoyancy, a certain fluidity, in his movements, as if his +feet were accustomed to maintaining him with poise across the surfaces +of moving things. His eyes, except for one flashing glance, did not +meet her own directly. + +“Is it all right to smoke?” he said. + +Miss Murrow smiled apologetically. “I’m afraid not, Mr. Hollander. Mr. +Endicott’s lungs require as clear air as possible. I’ve even opened +that window a little to keep the atmosphere in the room quite fresh.” +She nodded toward the window above the large mahogany chest. The sash +was up about six or seven inches from the bottom. + +“Oh.” Hollander continued to stand before her, giving her still that +peculiar effect of movement. There was nothing perceptible about it. +His body was like a stolid field, motionless, beneath drifting shadows +of the clouds. “Will Dr. Worth be here when Herb comes to?” + +Nurse Murrow felt a professional stiffening. “I will inform Dr. Worth +at the first sign of returning consciousness.” + +“How?” + +“I beg your pardon?” + +“How’ll you inform him?” + +“By going up to his room, of course.” + +“Oh.” Hollander’s gaze wavered about at the line of her chin. “Then +I’ll just baby Herb along until you get back down here with the +doctor.” + +“The doctor and I will undoubtedly be back before Mr. Endicott +actually does come to.” + +“Uh-huh. Good kid, Herb.” + +She threw out a tentative feeler. + +“You and he are great friends, Mr. Hollander?” + +“Buddies. War buddies.” + +Miss Murrow’s thoughts fled back along old trails. “How splendid! So +few war friendships have really lasted, Mr. Hollander. I know it’s +been so in my case, and with so many, many others.” A faint flush +crept over her palish cheeks and made her look rather young again. +“There was a girl with me in hospital at Chaumont, and we just knew we +were going to be friends for life, but she lives out in Akron, Ohio.” + +“Uh-huh.” + +“We wrote quite regularly for a while after we got back from France—we +both sailed from Brest on the _Amerika_—but then it sort of dwindled. +Postal cards—picture postal cards at Christmas. Last year we didn’t +even send any. I wonder what she’d be like if I saw her again. Have +you ever wondered about people whom you’ve once been very fond of, +that way—about whether they change in time, I mean?” + +“Everything changes.” + +“Doesn’t it, though? Just like the seasons. Oh, I do think you can +draw so many happy comparisons between life and nature. They’re +interlinked, if you get what I mean. That’s why the weather is so +affecting. I just can’t _help_ feeling gloomy on a gloomy day, and +when it’s bright and cheerful and all sunshiny outside, why then I’m +that way, too.” + +“Cripes!” muttered Hollander softly. + +“What did you say, Mr. Hollander?” + +“I said that was nice.” + +“Now I suppose with you and Mr. Endicott you see each other quite +regularly.” + +“Now and then.” + +“I suppose whenever your business permits?” + +His look flicked her like a whip. + +“Where’ll I sit?” he said. + +Nurse Murrow vanished within her professional sphere. + +“Near the patient, please.” + +She wondered whether he had meant to snub her. It wasn’t a snub +exactly. Yes, it was, too. Well, what of it? He was attractive enough +to get away with it, and it probably was nothing but brusqueness, +after all. Many strong men were brusque—purposely so to hide a tender +interior. There was a man, and a millionaire at that . . . Hollander +was back again beside her. She wondered whether it was so—whether +people who didn’t look into your eyes were people whom it was unsafe +to trust. + +“Just what do you know about all this?” he said softly. + +“About all what, Mr. Hollander?” + +“About the police being in the house.” + +“Isn’t it just too thrilling?” + +“Uh-huh. Whom do they suspect?” + +Miss Murrow began to feel friendly again. He _was_ so good-looking. +She wished she had a whole lot of exciting and important information +to give him that would keep him standing there listening, so that she +could just stare at him and try to put her finger on the source of +that amazing effect of fluidity. + +“They haven’t said whom they suspect, really.” She lowered her voice +to an appropriate pitch. “But I know they think it’s somebody who is +in the house.” + +Hollander’s voice was a whisper. “You wouldn’t say it was Mrs. +Endicott whom they suspect, would you?” + +Miss Murrow appeared a trifle shocked. “Oh, it would be too dreadful +to think a wife would harm a husband. But it does happen.” Her mind +tabulated the news offered daily by the papers. “Why, it happens +almost every day. Oh, you don’t _think_——” + +“Certainly I don’t think she did it,” Hollander said fiercely. “It’s +what the police think that I’m trying to get at. What makes you so +sure they’re going to hang it onto somebody who’s in the house?” + +Miss Murrow nodded toward the bathroom door. “From the way they’re +guarding Mr. Endicott from being attacked again. From being attacked,” +she added, “before he can make a statement.” + +“Then they’re still just guessing?” + +“Just guessing.” + +It seemed to satisfy Hollander, and he managed to convey the +impression that the conversation, so far as he was concerned, had come +to an end. Miss Murrow went over to her chair in a corner of the room +and sat down. He was deep, she decided. Yes, a deep creature, with +deep impulses. . . . + +Cassidy and Hansen tilted back their chairs a bit and, with loosened +collars, settled for the last tiring watches of the night. They had +nodded briefly to Hollander, and he had nodded just as briefly in +return. He looked to them like a good scout. Like one of the boys. +Regular. Cassidy tried to remember what that last line of hooey was +that the lieutenant had shot at them about Hollander. Something about +cats. About two cats, that was it, watching a promenading and +near-sighted mouse. Nuts. + +Hollander took an armchair and pushed it close to the head of the bed. +It was an upholstered armchair, heavy, and with a tall solid back. He +placed it so that its back was to the bathroom door. The back also +obliquely obscured him from a full view on the part of Nurse Murrow. +He vanished into its overstuffed depths and settled down. His eyes +travelled slowly along the spread until they came to rest with a +curious fixity on the smooth, masklike face of his friend Endicott. + +Then the pupils of Hollander’s eyes contracted until they glittered +like the heads of two bright pins. + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +2:01 a. m.—An Empty Sheath + +It was just after two o’clock when Lieutenant Valcour stepped to the +pavement and paid his fare to the driver. The cab snorted away and +left silence hanging heavy on the street. The bachelor apartment house +where Hollander lived had an English basement entrance. He found +Hollander’s name among a row of five others and pressed the proper +button. After he had pressed it four times, a voice answered him +through the earpiece of the announcer. + +“Who and what is it?” said the voice. + +It was the Southern voice. + +“This is Lieutenant Valcour of the police department talking.” + +“Oh. Mr. Hollander has already left, Lieutenant.” + +“Thank you, I know that. I want to come upstairs.” + +“Fourth floor, Lieutenant—automatic lift.” + +“Thank you.” + +The release mechanism on the door was already clicking. Lieutenant +Valcour entered a smart little lobby and then an electric lift. He +pressed the button for the fourth floor. + +“Sorry to bother you like this,” he said, as he stepped out into a +private foyer, and stared curiously at the young man facing him. + +“No trouble at all, Lieutenant.” + +“That’s very kind of you, Mr.——” + +“Smith, Lieutenant—Jerry Smith.” + +“Since when?” asked Lieutenant Valcour gently, as he started to follow +Mr. Smith into an adjoining room. + +“Why, what do you mean, Lieutenant?” + +The man stopped, and his soft dark eyes stared earnestly at Lieutenant +Valcour from a ruddy, slightly dissipated-looking young face. + +Lieutenant Valcour removed his hat and placed it on a settee. “Nothing +much, Mr. Smith,” he said. “Certainly nothing beyond the fact that I +saw you one morning last month in the line-up down at headquarters. In +connection with some night-club business, I believe. The charge fell +through, I also believe, because the woman involved preferred the loss +of her emerald necklace to the loss of prestige she certainly would +have suffered during the publicity of a trial had she pressed the +case. That’s all I mean, Mr. Smith.” + +“I don’t suppose, sir, I could convince you of my innocence?” + +“No, I don’t suppose you could.” + +“It was my misfortune that the case never did come to trial, +Lieutenant. I could have cleared myself then.” + +“Nonsense. You could have brought counter charges—sued for damage for +false arrest.” + +Mr. Smith looked inexpressibly shocked. “We of the South, sir, do not +bring charges against a lady.” + +“Well, the ethical distinction between swiping a woman’s necklace and +bringing charges against her is a shade too delicate for my Northern +nerves to grasp.” Lieutenant Valcour crossed casually to a chair +placed before a secretary and sat down. “Sit down, Mr. Smith,” he +said, “and tell me something about your friend Thomas.” + +“The straightest, squarest gentleman who ever lived, sir. Why . . .” +Mr. Smith plunged into a panegyric that would have brought a blush +even to the toughened cheek of a Caligula. + +Lieutenant Valcour permitted him to plunge. While the flood poured +into his ears, his eyes were inconspicuously busied with such papers +as were on view in the secretary. + + Tom, darling [he read on the folded half of a sheet of notepaper]: + Let’s tea on Thursday at the Ritz. 4:30, as Herbert . . . + +Lieutenant Valcour did not consider it essential to reach out and turn +the page. His fingers absently busied themselves with the leather +sheath for, presumably, a metal paper cutter or, perhaps, a stiletto. + +“Yes, he is an honourable and an upright gentleman, sir, and if you +think there is anything wrong with him in the Endicott business”—Mr. +Smith temporarily moved north of the Mason and Dixon Line—“you’re all +wet.” + +Mr. Smith was through. + +“For how long has he known Endicott, Mr. Smith?” + +“As I’ve been telling you, Lieutenant, ever since that night he saved +Endicott’s life.” + +Lieutenant Valcour became almost embarrassing in the sudden focussing +of his attention. “Would it bother you very much, Mr. Smith, to tell +me of that occurrence again?” + +“Why, it’s just as I’ve been _saying_, Lieutenant, in the war—the +war.” + +“Oh, of course. Endicott and Hollander were in the same outfit, and +Hollander saved Endicott’s life.” + +“You can prove it, sir, if you wish. Just call up the Bronx armoury +and ask for the adjutant—in the morning, of course, as he wouldn’t be +there now. He’ll make it official.” + +“Oh, I believe it all right, Mr. Smith. It’s a very reasonable +explanation of why Endicott should be so intimate with one of your +friends.” + +“I swear you have me wrong, Lieutenant. I had no more to do with that +gilt-knuckles job than—” Mr. Smith sought desperately for a convincing +simile—“than a babe unborn.” + +“It isn’t any of my business anyway, Mr. Smith, even if you had,” said +Lieutenant Valcour soothingly. He tapped the leather sheath he was +holding against his fingers. “I suppose Hollander was even quite +prominent at the wedding, when Endicott was married?” + +“Prominent? He was the best man.” + +“Really. Well, well. Mrs. Endicott is indeed a very beautiful woman, +and from all that she has told me, a much misunderstood one.” + +Mr. Smith poised himself delicately upon the fence and remained +watchful. + +“It must have been rather a problem for Hollander,” Lieutenant Valcour +went on reflectively, “when she told him this afternoon during their +tea at the Ritz that she was faced with one of two things.” + +“What do you mean, Lieutenant?” + +“Didn’t he tell you?” + +“Tell me what, Lieutenant?” + +“That Mrs. Endicott told him she couldn’t stand it any longer: that +she either was going to kill her husband or else commit suicide.” + +Mr. Smith smothered a sharp intaking of breath. + +“Oh, you know how women talk, Lieutenant. It’s just talk.” + +“Then he wasn’t impressed, really?” + +“Why, of course not. No more so than you or I would have been.” + +“He got back here from the Ritz at six?” + +“About.” + +“And stayed here until I ’phoned him?” + +Mr. Smith looked a little baffled. “Well, not exactly, Lieutenant.” + +“Just how exactly, Mr. Smith?” + +“Why, you see, he left for dinner right after he came in.” + +“Just after six?” + +“Near six-thirty.” + +“And what time did he get back from dinner?” + +“I wasn’t here, Lieutenant. I had a date and didn’t get back here +myself until around midnight.” + +Lieutenant Valcour became very, very casual. + +“Did Hollander plan to marry Mrs. Endicott after she’d got the +divorce?” he said. + +“Golly, no. There wasn’t going to be any divorce. It was platonic—and +damned if I don’t believe it.” + +“It’s quite possible.” + +“I have never seen her—but to hear Tom rave!” + +“She is very beautiful.” + +“Lieutenant,” Mr. Smith’s exceedingly attractive dark eyes stared +solemnly into Lieutenant Valcour’s veiled ones, “he thinks she’s a +saint. I mean it.” + +“Dark and strange,” muttered Lieutenant Valcour. “Dark and strange.” + +“What’s dark and strange, Lieutenant?” + +“The rather terrible things that sometimes happen, Mr. Smith, under +the patronage of love.” + +“I’ll be damned if you talk like a cop,” said Mr. Smith, suddenly very +suspicious. + +“Then I’m afraid you are damned, Mr. Smith. What,” Lieutenant Valcour +asked suddenly, “was kept in this?” + +Mr. Smith, momentarily distracted from his suspicions by the abrupt +switch, stared at the leather sheath Lieutenant Valcour was holding +out at him. + +“Some sort of a sticker that Tom picked up on the other side,” he +said. “Damascus steel, he calls it. Uses it for a paper knife.” + +“I wonder why it isn’t in its sheath,” said Lieutenant Valcour mildly. + +“Search me.” + +Lieutenant Valcour poked around among the papers. + +“It isn’t here in this secretary, either.” + +“Well, I don’t know where it is, Lieutenant. It was there this +afternoon.” + +“I don’t know where it is either, Mr. Smith, but I’m going to find +out.” + +“Go ahead.” + +“Where was it you saw it this afternoon? On this secretary?” + +“Yes.” + +Lieutenant Valcour’s search of the secretary was swift and thorough. +The pigeonholes, the drawers yielded no stiletto of Damascus steel. +Hidden in one of the drawers was a copy of the _Oxford Book of English +Verse_. That interested him momentarily. He gave it sufficient +attention to note that the most used portion included the Sonnets of +Shakespeare. But there was no time now—no time. + +“I’m going through the rooms here,” he said, “and look for that +stiletto.” + +“You’ll be exceeding your authority if you do, Lieutenant.” + +“Have you any objections?” Lieutenant Valcour asked quietly. + +Mr. Smith grew almost fervent in his protestations that he had none. +Why should he? He had nothing to conceal, nor had Hollander. Of +course, there were a bottle or two of gin and a quart of Scotch, but +he didn’t imagine the lieutenant would be interested in anything along +that line. No, the lieutenant assured him, he wouldn’t be. Liquor was +not in his province. Then it would be all right to go ahead and +search? Lieutenant Valcour wanted to know. Oh, quite. + +In spite of his verbal acquiescence Mr. Smith followed Lieutenant +Valcour through the two other rooms of the apartment with a gradually +growing air of truculence. He stood near and a little behind him when, +after the search yielded nothing, Lieutenant Valcour went to a +telephone and dialled the Endicotts’ number. + +Lieutenant Valcour did not get the connection, because Mr. Smith drew +a pliable leather-bound slug of lead from his pocket and struck +Lieutenant Valcour with it on the head. + + + +CHAPTER XV + +2:13 a. m.—The Thin Steel Blade + +Miss Murrow began to feel fidgety. + +Even after the many, many years she had spent in nursing she had never +accustomed herself to spending a night quite comfortably in a chair. +She had always had her attacks of the fidgets, and would probably +continue to have them until she arrived at the port of destination for +all good nurses and married one of her patients or a doctor. Of the +two she really preferred a patient. + +She trained a speculative eye on her present one over there on the +bed. Not really speculative, as—she told herself firmly—he was already +married. Although heaven knew that that never mattered. Take the case +of that red-headed Gilford girl who had snapped old man Tomlinson +right up from under his wife’s nose—probably, at that, because of his +wife’s nose, which had been an unusually large one. Miss Murrow +giggled. That was almost witty enough to tell to Mr. Hollander. + +He must have _felt_ that she was thinking about him. What a curious +expression that was in his eyes. He had just turned them toward her, +and they seemed to glitter. Yes, that was the word exactly—“glitter.” + +It was a fancy of Miss Murrow’s to be meticulous in the matter of +words. “Really,” she thought, “I don’t see why I couldn’t be an +author.” She felt sure she had ever so much more knowledge of life +than one encountered in the average run of books. Tripe. Yes, “tripe” +was indeed the word. Of course, her books wouldn’t be average. Now +that little story of Delia Hackenpoole and the interne with those +shifty eyes . . . + +Eyes . . . + +Yes, Mr. Hollander’s eyes _were_ glittering—even in that second flash +she had just caught of them. But possibly he, too, had the fidgets. +He’d been sitting terribly quiet for the past ten minutes or so. Not a +budge out of him. A body would forget he was there, almost. + +Of course he was handsome. Especially in that soft, vague light from +the distant lamp which picked his pale features out obscurely. And +they _were_ pale, at that. Genuinely pale. She did hope he wasn’t +going to be ill or have a nervous breakdown and ruin this perfectly +marvellous case of the dear doctor’s. . . . + +Mrs. Sanford Worth. What a pleasant name it would be. _Distingué_. How +apt the French were! (She knew ten phrases.) + +Was that right hand of Mr. Hollander’s actually moving, or was it an +illusion of light and shade? It seemed to be slipping slowly from the +arm of the chair and would eventually end up in his lap. It was +moving—it wasn’t—quite creepy, really. Damn the fidgets! She shifted +her centre of balance and felt temporarily relieved. Overstuffed +chairs were really wretched for prolonged periods of sitting, when you +came right down to it, whereas a good old-fashioned horsehair sofa, +such as Aunt Helen had had at Sciota. . . . + +Why, the hand was gone! + +Positively gone—like a conjuring trick. + +It wasn’t on the arm of the chair, so it must be in Mr. Hollander’s +lap. Then it _had_ been moving after all, and she hadn’t been just +imagining it. Why, it was almost _sneaky_. . . . + +His profile was toward her. Not a snub nose, exactly, nor _retroussé_. +You couldn’t apply that term to anything about a man, and whatever +else he might be, Mr. Hollander certainly was a man. + +How interesting his life at sea must have been. (She had definitely +ticketed him as a sailor.) Lives at sea were always interesting. All +the best books were in accord with that. You never read of a Main +Street on the ocean. What with the girls in every port and the fights +and the smell of crisp salt air . . . What a wretched little twirp +that boy had been down at the beach last summer, with his absurd +remarks about the salt smell being a lot of decayed lobster pots and +dead fish. Of course the air at sea was salt. Sea and salt were +synonymous. + +Mr. Hollander _did_ have the fidgets. + +She couldn’t see exactly, because of the masking arm of the chair, but +he certainly was fiddling with something. She’d think he was twirling +his thumbs, if he looked like the sort of man who twirled thumbs, but +he didn’t, so it wasn’t that. + +She looked at her wrist watch and saw that the hands were approaching +the half hour. She’d have to examine her patient and note his pulse on +the chart. What a pity that the only time you really felt comfortable +in an overstuffed chair was at the moment when you had to get up. + +She stood up, smoothed starched surfaces, and sailed, a smart white +pinnace, toward the bed. She smiled engagingly at Mr. Hollander and +then started to take Endicott’s pulse. She gave a slight start and +concentrated her full attention upon Endicott. + +“I think there’s a change.” + +Hollander looked up at her alertly. “Change?” + +“I think he shows signs of coming to.” + +Miss Murrow wondered a moment at the tight little lines which suddenly +appeared on Hollander’s face, hardening and aging it rather +shockingly, and altering the features into a cast whose hidden +significance she could not define exactly. Strain, perhaps, better +than anything else, served as an explanation: an emotional strain. + +“How can you tell?” he said. + +Miss Murrow smiled a bit superiorly. “It becomes instinct, mostly.” + +“Will it be soon?” + +“Very soon now. Be careful, please, not to disturb him or make any +sudden noise or movement until I come back. I want Dr. Worth to be on +hand before the patient actually does regain consciousness.” + +“You going up to get him now?” + +“Yes.” She went over to the bathroom door and spoke to Cassidy. “You +gentlemen will be careful, won’t you, about being seen? I’d stay well +back within the doorway, as sometimes a patient is a little, well, +wild when he comes to like this, and if he started jerking around at +all he might see you.” She smiled engagingly. “What with the uniforms +and everything——” + +Miss Murrow left implications of the possible fatal consequences +hanging in air and returned to Endicott. She examined him critically +for another moment, checked his pulse again, and then started for the +door. She stopped just before she reached it, and said to Hollander: +“I suppose you had better lock the door after me. Lieutenant Valcour +placed great stress on the fact that it should be kept locked +constantly.” + +“I’ll lock it,” said Hollander. + +“It does seem kind of foolish, doesn’t it?” + +Hollander smiled grimly. “Most foolish.” + +He stood up and joined her at the door. She went outside. He closed +the door and locked it. He stared almost blankly for an instant at the +two policemen. They had drawn their chairs back a little within the +bathroom doorway. Hansen was impassively studying the ceiling above +his head. Cassidy, leaning forward a little, was looking with solemn +eyes at the outline of Endicott’s still figure beneath the bedclothes. + +Hollander stretched cramped muscles and then went back to his armchair +beside the bed. He sat down and was all but completely obscured from +the two guards by its high back. With imperceptible movements he drew +a thin steel blade from beneath the cuff of his left coat sleeve and +held it in such a fashion that it was masked in the palm of his right +hand, the hilt extending up a little beneath the shirt cuff. He leaned +forward and stared down upon Endicott’s quiet face. Not quiet, +exactly, for the lids were twitching—opening—and Endicott’s eyes, +bright and unseeing from fever, stared up. . . . + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +2:13 a. m.—Time _versus_ Death + +O’Brian stirred a bit restlessly in his chair by the hall door and +yawned; then he looked at his watch. It was almost a quarter past two. +He began to enumerate the various things he would give for a good cup +of strong black coffee, and his shirt headed the list. Or, if not +coffee, some excitement to keep him awake. + +The telephone jangled. + +He stood up abruptly and went to the instrument. It would be, he +imagined, Lieutenant Valcour calling again to find out if everything +was all right. Well, everything was. + +O’Brian lifted the receiver and said, “Hello!” + +No one answered him, and there wasn’t any sound from the other end of +the line, unless you could call a sort of thumping noise and a faint +tinkle that might have been breaking glass a sound. + +“Hello!” O’Brian said again. + +The line wasn’t dead, because there wasn’t that peculiar burring one +hears when the connection is broken. The receiver of the ’phone at the +other end was certainly off the hook. O’Brian singled out one of the +patron saints of Ireland and wanted to know, most emphatically, just +what sort of fun and foustie was being made of him. + +“Hello!” He tried it again. + +There was a click. The burring sound started. The line was dead. +Whoever had been calling from the other end had hung up. + +O’Brian very thoughtfully did likewise. + +Then he began to wonder what he ought to do. It didn’t take him very +long to decide, especially as the thumping noise and tinkle of +breaking glass grew louder in retrospect the more he thought about +them. He didn’t have to go as far as Denmark; something was certainly +rotten right here in New York. + +He dialled the operator, identified himself as a member of the police +force, and stated that he wanted the call he had just received +instantly traced. + +“Oneminuteplease,” requested a voice with a macadamized smile. + +The minute stretched into two—ten—but eventually he was informed that +the call had come from the apartment of a Mr. Thomas Hollander, whose +’phone number and address were thereupon given. + +O’Brian jotted them down. He then dialled the telephone number of +Hollander who was, as he very well knew, right upstairs. Several +persistent diallings failed to awaken any response. + +The complexion of the work afoot grew dirtier. O’Brian felt certain +that it was connected with the terrain activities of Lieutenant +Valcour. If it had just been some occupant of Hollander’s apartment +who had wanted to call Hollander up about something, there would have +been an answer. + +And there wouldn’t have been that thumping noise, and the tinkle of +breaking glass. + +It seemed a matter that required investigation at once. O’Brian +telephoned his precinct station and reported the occurrence and his +beliefs about it to the sergeant in charge. He was assured that a +raiding squad would be dispatched within a matter of minutes to the +address he had given. + +One was. + +They found Lieutenant Valcour helplessly bound, very dazed, very weak, +lying on the floor beneath a table when the men crashed the door to +Hollander’s apartment and broke in. Cold water—a glass of whiskey from +a convenient decanter—and intelligence and strength began to return. +Lieutenant Valcour pushed away the hands that were supporting him and, +going to the telephone, called the Endicotts’. + +“O’Brian?” + +“Yes, Lieutenant—you all right, sir?” + +“Yes, yes—pay attention to every word I say and follow my instructions +to a letter. Endicott’s life depends upon it.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +“Go upstairs to Dr. Worth and wake him. Tell him I believe that +Hollander is armed with a knife and that he is probably just waiting +for a chance to use it when he won’t be observed by the nurse or +Cassidy and Hansen. Hollander is Endicott’s enemy, not friend. Tell +Dr. Worth to go down and knock on Endicott’s door. Tell him to go +right inside when it opens. Now get this.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +“Tell him to ask the nurse how the patient is—to act natural about it. +Tell him to start to go out and then, as a second thought, tell him to +beckon to Hollander as if he wanted to tell Hollander something. +Hollander will get up and go to him. Tell him to whisper to Hollander +that there’s something he wants to tell him privately, if Hollander +will step outside for a minute into the corridor. You be in the +corridor. When Hollander comes out, jump him. Put the cuffs on him and +keep him quiet until I get there. I’ll be right on up. O. K.?” + +“Yes, sir.” + +Lieutenant Valcour rang off. He turned to the sergeant in charge of +the detail. + +“Leave one man here, Sergeant,” he said. “The rest of you men can go +back to the station after you’ve dropped me at the Endicotts’.” + +“Anything you want the man who’s left here to do, Lieutenant?” + +“Not unless a dark-haired youngster comes back, which he won’t. But if +he should, just have him kept for me, please, on ice.” + +Down on the street, Lieutenant Valcour jumped in beside the driver of +the department car and said, “Step on it, Clancy. It’s only eleven +blocks up and three west.” + +The car shot forward, swept to the right at the corner, and lunged up +Lexington Avenue. There was little traffic, and what little there was +was so scattered that nothing impeded its way. + +“Something going to break on that Endicott business, Lieutenant?” + +“Either going to, or has.” + +“A homicide, ain’t it?” + +“Possibly—by now.” + + +Nurse Murrow smoothed the last wrinkles from her uniform while waiting +for Dr. Worth to open the door. It paid to look one’s best. Always, at +any time at all. One never could tell. + +“Oh, Doctor. I’m sorry to get you up again so soon, but Mr. Endicott +shows symptoms of coming to.” + +Dr. Worth, who was no longer the eager-eyed practitioner he once had +been, did his best to shake off the puffy chains of sleep. + +“I’ll come right down, Miss Murrow.” + +“I’ll wait, Doctor.” + +“Just want to dash some cold water on my face.” + +“No hurry, Doctor.” + +He vanished into the room again. Ah, dreamed Miss Murrow, _what_ a +man! And he’d never been snappy with her, either. So many were snappy. +Someone was coming up the stairs—quickly—two at a time—a policeman—— + +“Where’s the doctor, miss?” said O’Brian, a little winded. + +“He’s coming right out, Officer.” + +“I gotta see him at once.” + +O’Brian brushed her aside and opened the door. Dr. Worth met him, +astonished and glistening, on the threshold. + +“Say, lissen, Doctor, the lieutenant just called up, and he +said . . .” + +O’Brian thereupon repeated all that the lieutenant had said. + +“But, my dear man, this is the most extraordinary thing I have ever +heard in my life!” Dr. Worth’s slightly damp eyebrows indulged in a +series of gyrations. + +“Sure there ain’t no time for astonishments, Doctor,” said O’Brian. +“Let’s go—easy and quietlike, now. We’re not to put this bird +wise. . . .” + +With O’Brian leading, they started down the stairs. + + +“Hello, Herb,” Hollander said softly. + +Endicott’s voice was so weak that it scarcely carried to Hollander’s +ears. “Who is it?” he said. “What . . .” the voice dribbled off. + +“It’s your friend, Herb.” + +Sullen, petulant lines clung suddenly to Endicott’s mouth, making the +thickish lips look almost viciously weak. He made a curious noise that +might have been intended for a laugh. + +“Have no friend.” The voice was the ghost of dead whispers. + +“What happened to you, Herb?” + +“Happened?” Endicott’s eyes made a strong effort to get through the +fogs shrouding them. “Something did happen—I want the police—I’ll +teach that rotten—that——” + +There wasn’t any sound for a while. + +“You’ll teach whom, Herb?” + +Endicott was staring very fixedly up at Hollander now. And Hollander’s +right hand, the fingers of which were unnaturally rigid, was gently +moving to that spot on the spread which would lie above Endicott’s +heart. + +“Who is it you’re going to teach, Herb?” Hollander said again. + +The mists were clearing, and Endicott could see things almost plainly. +He fixed Hollander’s face into definite focus. “God damn you,” he +said, “for a——” + +“Now, now, Herb, that isn’t nice, and you don’t know what you’re +saying.” + +Hollander’s right hand had found the spot. It hung above it, +motionless, very rigid, and the fingers very stiff. + +“I’m going to call a policeman and——” + +Endicott’s voice was so weak as to be almost inaudible. His lips +seemed as motionless as the rest of his body, which was completely +inert. + +“No, you’re not, Herb,” whispered Hollander. “And you’re not going to +tell, either.” + +Endicott got tired of looking up at Hollander. His eyes travelled +fretfully along Hollander’s right arm. + +“Neither you nor all the devils in hell,” he whispered faintly, “can +stop me from telling.” + +And then he saw the knife. + +“Can’t I, Herb?” + +It was the slenderest knife Endicott had ever seen. He wondered where +on earth Hollander had got it. No hilt—or perhaps the hilt was cupped +in Hollander’s hand. A stiletto, that’s what it was, and its point was +pressing through the white spread at a point that lay just above his +heart. Why, if the pressure kept on, it would go right into his +heart. . . . + +_Crack_ . . . + +_Crack_ . . . _crack crack_ . . . _crack_ . . . _crack_ . . . + +A bullet from Cassidy’s gun shattered Hollander’s right wrist. +Hansen’s shot caught him in the right shoulder. Two bullets out of the +fusillade that followed lodged, one in his right hip, and the other +one farther down in the leg. Both officers, in spite of Nurse Murrow’s +orders, had moved into the room and were crouched on the floor where +they would still be concealed from Endicott’s line of vision, but +where they could better and more closely observe what had been the +faintly suspicious movements on the part of Hollander. + +They were within four or five feet of him and still crouched below him +as blood stained the white spread in a sickish smear when Hollander +dragged his mangled wrist across it to the floor. + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +2:40 a. m.—The Angle of Death’s Path + +The pounding on the door became hysterical, and Cassidy, who for two +cents would have become hysterical himself, went over and unlocked it. +He found Dr. Worth, backed by scandalously excited servants and +flanked by Nurse Murrow and O’Brian, pressing across the sill. + +“Is it Endicott?” Dr. Worth demanded breathlessly. + +“No, sir—it’s Hollander. We shot the knife from his hand before he +could stick it into Endicott, and then we shot him down.” + +“Close this door, Officer, and keep these people out. Come in with me, +Miss Murrow.” + +Dr. Worth came into the room with Nurse Murrow. Cassidy closed the +door, and the shrill clatter of excited whisperings ebbed like a tide. + +“Thank God, Officer, you saved Endicott. What a mess.” Dr. Worth +glanced critically at Hollander, huddled on the floor by the bed in a +blood-soaked heap. “You two men help Nurse Murrow. Stretch him out on +that chest over there by the window. Do what you can for him, Miss +Murrow, until I’ve taken care of Endicott.” + +Cassidy and Hansen lifted Hollander and carried him to the improvised +cot Miss Murrow arranged with blankets and a pillow on top of the +mahogany chest by the window. + +Nurse Murrow then became the acme, the pink of proficiency. She +dressed and bound Hollander’s wounds, and applied the proper +tourniquet above his shattered wrist. In her opinion, his condition +was not fatally serious, when one considered his obvious physique and +his probably excellent constitution—of iron—and, yes, he _was_ +distinctly handsome. What a pity they’d arrest him. Or perhaps he was +under arrest already, although she usually associated handcuffings +with arrests. But there surely wouldn’t be any handcuffs now. In spite +of her long familiarity with dreadful injuries she shuddered a little +at that shattered wrist. And they couldn’t be so soulless as to move +him to prison. Dr. Worth would never permit any patient of his to be +treated like that. And, after all, Hollander _was_ the doctor’s +patient. . . . + +Dr. Worth himself was standing beside her. There was a bewildered, +curiously grave look on his face. She sensed intuitively what had +happened. + +“Mr. Endicott, Doctor?” + +Dr. Worth shrugged helplessly. “He’s dead.” + +“But I swear that knife never went in, sir,” Cassidy said. “Hansen, +here, and me was watching Hollander like cats. Sure we saw the knife +even before it touched the bedclothes.” + +“Didn’t Hollander have a gun, too?” + +“No, sir. Why do you ask?” + +“Because Endicott was killed by a bullet.” + +Hansen’s Nordic young face grew very red and then very white. Cassidy +showed nothing of what he was thinking—certainly nothing of the +sickening, puzzled worry that clamped his chest—except that there was +a tight clenching of his hands. + +“Too bad,” Cassidy said. + +“Yes,” agreed Dr. Worth, “it is too bad.” + +“You’re sure, sir?” + +Dr. Worth grew icily formal. “Quite,” he said. He was also getting +good and mad. This was the sort of thing, he told himself angrily, +that taxpayers shelled out their money for. Protection! It was enough +to make anybody laugh. A lot of protection the police force of New +York City had been for Endicott. They’d shot him—that’s what. + +“But I don’t see how——” + +“Officer, there is no mistaking the difference between a bullet wound +and one made by a knife. In this case especially it is perfectly +obvious. I dare say the charge against you two men will be just +technical—accidental homicide in line of duty!” + +Dr. Worth did permit himself one short laugh. + +“I guess so, Doctor,” Cassidy said. + +“And is there anything that has to be done, Officer?” + +“In what way, sir?” + +“Why, a report made to the medical examiner?” Dr. Worth became almost +airy in his mounting anger. “This sort of starts the whole thing over +again, doesn’t it? I mean, won’t the medical examiner have to come +back up and investigate before we can move the body and—oh, well, you +know the line.” + +“Maybe so, sir.” Cassidy’s face was the colour of a red tile brick. +“Cripes, but I wish the lieutenant was here.” + +“I understand that he will be here any minute.” + +“You’ve heard from him, sir?” + +Dr. Worth felt that if he didn’t apply the brakes he would become +positively light-headed. “Oh, yes, yes, indeed, Officer. He called up +to warn me that my patient was going to be murdered and suggested that +I run downstairs and stop it. Murder? Fiddlesticks—it’s beginning to +graduate into a catastrophe.” + +“What has happened here?” + +Lieutenant Valcour, very pale, still very weak, and with an improvised +bandage around his head, had come unobserved into the room. + +“You can see,” Dr. Worth said with almost insulting distinctness, “for +yourself.” + +Dr. Worth then went on to expand. He related in detail his version of +the battle—he insisted that it was a battle—which had just taken +place. + +Entirely apart from the natural discomfiture of his head, Lieutenant +Valcour was feeling desperately glum. Under no light, no matter how +favourable, could his handling of the case be considered a success. He +had to his credit one slap on the face, a good crack on the head from +a lead slug, and now it seemed that the very man whom they had been +ordered to guard had been shot and killed by his own men. That, at +least, was the impression the angry bee talking to him was obviously +trying to give. Oh, it would be a _cause célèbre_ all right, but he +shuddered to think of just what it would be celebrated for. + +“This,” he said, “is nonsense.” + +Dr. Worth was by now thoroughly acid. + +“I am glad that you are able to find in the miserable situation some +element of humour, Lieutenant.” + +“Humour? Not humour, Doctor. I am just trying to say that the +probability of Endicott’s having been shot by one of my men is +nonsense.” + +“Would it convince you, sir, were I to remove the bullet and let it +speak for itself? Imperfections in the barrel leave their markings, +don’t they? You can then doubtless determine which one of these two +young men fired the unhappy shot.” + +“Please don’t get irritated, Doctor. I’m not trying to annoy you or to +be funny. It’s simply that I cannot see—just where is the wound +located, Doctor?” + +“In the chest.” + +“Cassidy, where were you and Hansen standing?” + +“We was crouched on the floor just inside the room, sir—not over five +feet off from Hollander,” Cassidy said. + +“Then consider your angles, Doctor. There’s Endicott—there’s about +where my men were crouched. It would take pretty wild shooting for +either of them to hit Endicott in the chest. In fact, one might almost +consider it impossible.” + +Dr. Worth still hovered around zero. “From the number of innocent +bystanders whom one reads about in the newspapers as having been shot +down by the police——” + +“That is an unfair comparison, Doctor. Those cases you refer to have +all involved a chase of some sort—rapid motion—streets cluttered up +with people. There was nothing like that here. I’m going to call up +Central Office and ask permission for you to remove the bullet and +determine the angle of its path.” + +“Permission, sir? And do you think it is my business or my pleasure to +go probing about for bullets and determining the angles of their +paths? I happen to be a specialist, sir——” + +“Yes, yes, Doctor. But right now it is your business to do just that. +We must have the information immediately.” + +“And why so, sir?” + +“Because if the calibre of the bullet that killed Endicott differs +from the ones in the guns of my men, or if the angle of its course +proves conclusively that it could not have been fired by one of them, +then the murderer is still loose about the house. He couldn’t have +escaped, you see, as the guards are still on duty down below.” + +. . . Then the murderer is still loose about the house . . . + +The chilling possibilities of the statement served a good deal to cool +Dr. Worth’s steaming indignation. He was getting tired with being +angry, anyway. + +“I’m sorry I have been impatient, Lieutenant. You may be quite right, +and I’ll be glad to help you in any way that I can.” + +“Thank you, Doctor. I’ll telephone Central Office from downstairs, as +I want to instruct the men on guard down there to be doubly careful. +If you’d care to start in probing it will be quite all right. I’ll +explain everything to the medical examiner. It’s something, you see, +that we must know. Cassidy, you and Hansen are not to leave this room. +Search both it and Hollander for a gun.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +Lieutenant Valcour went out, and Dr. Worth proceeded, with the aid of +Nurse Murrow, to probe. + +The room had an air about it of a shambles. Cassidy and Hansen, having +searched for a gun and found none, leaned dispiritedly against the +wall near the chest on which Hollander was lying. They felt a measured +sense of relief—had felt it, in fact, from the moment when Lieutenant +Valcour had come into the room. Each knew he could never have fired +that shot which had killed Endicott. And each was reasonably certain +that the other couldn’t have, either. + +They could determine nothing from Dr. Worth’s face as to how the +examination was going. Neither of them looked very closely at what he +was doing. Their wonderings ran along parallel lines: Hollander +couldn’t have had a gun or they’d have seen it or found it during +their recent search. None of their shots could have gone so hopelessly +wild as to have hit Endicott. But somebody did have a gun, and +Endicott had been shot by it. But there had been nobody in the room +with Endicott except themselves and Hollander. And Hollander couldn’t +have had a gun, or they’d have seen it . . . the perfect loop +continued on and on. Each made the circle in his thoughts and then +started in all over again. If Lieutenant Valcour hadn’t reëntered the +room, and if Dr. Worth hadn’t just then extracted the bullet, they +probably would have gone mildly mad. + +“Everything’s all right, Doctor,” Lieutenant Valcour said. “The +medical examiner was only too pleased at your kindness in helping him +out. He won’t be up again to-night unless I send for him. He asked me +to thank you.” + +“Not at all, Lieutenant.” Dr. Worth showed considerable excitement. +“You know, it’s surprising. I don’t know much about the calibre of +bullets, but I think you’re right about the angle. Here’s the bullet.” + +Lieutenant Valcour inspected a leaden pellet curiously and then +slipped it into a pocket. + +“It isn’t from one of our guns, Doctor,” he said. + +“I’m not surprised, Lieutenant—not surprised at all. Because the angle +it entered at—why, damn it, Lieutenant, it must have been fired from +some place over there.” + +Dr. Worth indicated a problematic area which included the corner where +Hollander was stretched out. Lieutenant Valcour looked just above +Hollander at the window. It was the window which had been opened about +six or seven inches from the bottom by Nurse Murrow so that the air +for her patient would be quite fresh and clear. + +It was still open. + +And outside of it, as Lieutenant Valcour very well knew, ran the +shallow balcony which offered not only adornment to the rear of the +house but a passageway to—and from—the windows of Mrs. Endicott’s +room. + +But Mrs. Endicott was under the influence of a narcotic, and a nurse +and a maid were both in the room with her. + +But were they? . . . + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +3:00 a. m.—Thin Haze of Dread + +Dr. Worth, too, was staring at the black, impenetrable rectangle left +by the opened window. It was a passageway for air, but infinitely more +so was it a passageway leading to obscure recesses of the night: +recesses that seemed to offer a maleficent sanctuary to hell-born +secrets of distorted souls. + +Who had crept along that balcony and fired that shot? + +The apparent improbability of anyone from Mrs. Endicott’s room having +done so transplanted the problem from clear fields of logic and of +simple facts into vague regions of absurd conjecturings which stared +wanly out at Lieutenant Valcour through baffling curtains of darkness +and of fog. + +He felt a definite sense of uncertainty, and—as one does when +confronted by a suggestion of the unknown—an impalpable dread. It was +nothing that he could put his finger on; it seemed, absurdly, some +emanation from the outer night creeping in through that rectangle of +black to hang in thin hazes about the room. + +“What would you suggest doing with Hollander, Doctor?” he said. + +Dr. Worth, whose own thoughts had been warily browsing in disagreeable +pastures, sought relief in professional preciseness. + +“He would be better off in a hospital, Lieutenant. I consider his +constitution to be more than sufficiently strong to obviate any danger +in moving him. Are you going to arrest him?” + +Lieutenant Valcour smiled faintly. “He is under arrest now, Doctor. I +should like to get a few things straightened out, though, before +booking him on any definite charge. Would it hurt him very much to +talk with me before he is taken to the hospital?” + +“Not if it weren’t for too long.” + +“Could you give him something to revive him—to brace him up?” + +“Certainly.” + +“Then I will have a man send for an ambulance, and I’ll just talk with +Hollander until it gets here.” + +“That will be all right.” + +“And if you don’t mind, Doctor, I should like to be alone with him. +Just he and I and—Endicott.” + +Dr. Worth was already busied with restoratives. “Certainly,” he said. +“Miss Murrow and I will be outside, if you want to call us.” + +“Cassidy,” Lieutenant Valcour said, “wait outside in the hall, and +you, Hansen, go downstairs and telephone for an ambulance. Let me know +as soon as it gets here.” + +And in a moment Lieutenant Valcour found himself alone in the room +with Endicott, with Hollander, and with those curious mists that +hinted at unnamed dreads. + +The restoratives were effective, and Hollander opened his eyes upon a +stranger who was sitting on a chair beside the mahogany chest. He +wondered idly who the stranger was. The drug which Dr. Worth had given +him made him feel rather alert and smart. Any sense of pain was +completely deadened. His eyes travelled leisurely about the room and +hesitated at a sheet-covered object on the bed. That would be his +friend called Endicott. His lids closed sharply as a reaction to some +wound that was not physical. + +Lieutenant Valcour stared thoughtfully down at Hollander’s pale face. + +“What did you do with Endicott’s hat?” he said. + +Hollander opened his eyes again in bewilderment. “I don’t know what +you’re talking about,” he said. “And who are you, anyhow?” + +“I’m Lieutenant Valcour, Mr. Hollander. We’ve talked together over the +telephone. The hat I’m referring to is the one that Endicott must have +been wearing, or carrying in his hand, or that was some place near him +when you attacked him shortly after seven this evening.” + +“I didn’t attack him, Lieutenant.” Hollander’s lips were +peaked-looking and didn’t move very much when he talked. “I wasn’t in +this house until a little after one-thirty this morning—after you had +called me up.” + +“Which did you think Mrs. Endicott would really do, Mr. Hollander?” + +Hollander tried painfully to concentrate. He felt the need of being +very careful of his footing: they were on dangerous ground. + +“Do?” + +“Yes—when she told you during tea at the Ritz that she had about +reached the end and was either going to kill Mr. Endicott or commit +suicide. Or didn’t you really believe either?” + +It seemed impossible that Hollander’s face could grow any paler. + +“You’re crazy, Lieutenant.” + +“All sorts of people tell me so lots of times, Mr. Hollander. Did you +have to wear Endicott’s hat when you went out because you had lost +your own?” + +Hollander sighed fretfully. “You must think I’m awfully dumb,” he +said. + +“Oh, not at all—well, in a few things, yes. Your choice of friends, +for example. And I don’t mean the Endicotts.” + +“Whom do you mean, Lieutenant?” + +“That dark-eyed child, for one—Mr. Smith. But perhaps you don’t know +that his name is not Smith. I imagine that when you left him in the +apartment he was still either Jack Perry or Larry Nevins. He shows +great versatility, really, in his adoption of names. I was just a +little surprised and disappointed at his present selection of Smith.” + +“You’ve been to my apartment, Lieutenant?” + +“Yes. I had quite an enlightening talk with the present Mr. Smith. +Where did you leave Endicott’s hat?” + +Hollander, after one peevish glare, shut his eyes. + +“I can tell you pretty well what happened, you see, except for that,” +Lieutenant Valcour went on. “You _did_ believe Mrs. Endicott this +afternoon when she told you her intention. That much is fact. And now +for a little fiction: either at the Ritz, or just as you were handing +her into her car, you stole her purse.” + +Hollander’s eyes snapped open and glared viciously. + +“Because,” Lieutenant Valcour continued, “you wanted her keys—the keys +to this house. You were a little hazy as to just what it was you +intended to do, but you did know that you were going to kill Endicott, +and that you were going to do it before his wife either committed +suicide or killed him herself. You went to your apartment and got the +stiletto. Then you came back here, let yourself in with Mrs. +Endicott’s keys, came up to this floor and into this room. You may +have been in several of the other rooms first: I don’t know. Nor do I +know just what you were searching for while you waited in here, +either. Mrs. Endicott herself will tell me all about that later. At +any rate, you were going through Endicott’s clothes in that cupboard +when you heard him coming. You closed the cupboard door. You were +naturally nervous and upset—everyone is when contemplating or +committing a crime. You were afraid there would be some slip, so you +disguised yourself with dust smeared on your face. Then, either +because you made some noise or else because he wanted to get something +Endicott opened the cupboard door and saw you. You must have had the +stiletto all ready in your hand and have looked pretty horrible +altogether, because the shock of seeing you stopped his heart and he +crumpled to the floor.” + +Hollander’s eyes began to look feverish. + +“His falling like that startled you,” went on Lieutenant Valcour. “You +felt his heart, and in pulling open his overcoat so that you could get +your hand inside you ripped off the top button. What did you do with +it?” + +Hollander grinned faintly. “Swallowed it,” he said. + +Lieutenant Valcour flushed a little. “You probably put it in your +pocket. You were satisfied that Endicott was dead—miraculously +dead—and that you hadn’t had to stab him. But he _was_ dead, and you +experienced the natural panic of all murderers. I don’t mean that you +went wild, or anything. But your mind didn’t function correctly. You +may have been quite calm, but it wasn’t a calmness based on +intelligence. You dragged Endicott into the cupboard and closed the +door. You washed the dirt from your hands and face in the bathroom, +combed and brushed your hair, wiped the silver clean, and then printed +that curious note which Mrs. Endicott found, and which contained no +significance other than to direct suspicion to some outside agency in +order to shield her from becoming a suspect herself. But why did you +take Endicott’s hat, and where did you put it?” + +“You’re talking bunk, Lieutenant.” + +“On the contrary, Mr. Hollander, those were the moves which were made +here to-night—whether you were the person who made them or not.” + +“Yes?” + +“Yes. And it is quite within the range of possibility that if you +didn’t make them, then Mrs. Endicott did.” + +Hollander looked very worried, very tired. + +“You’re bluffing, Lieutenant,” he said. + +“And you’re a very frightened man, Mr. Hollander.” + +“Are you going to arrest Mrs. Endicott?” + +“That depends.” + +“Because she didn’t do it.” + +“Why didn’t she, Mr. Hollander?” + +“Because she loved her husband.” + +“I wish you would explain to me how it is that she loved him so much +that she wanted either to commit suicide or else kill him.” + +“Pride, Lieutenant.” + +Lieutenant Valcour tested the possibility of that angle. It could not, +he felt, be ignored. As many outrages were yearly committed under the +goadings of pride as there were committed because of jealousy and +hate. + +“You believe, Mr. Hollander, that the other women whom her husband +played around with hurt her pride so keenly that her love became +coloured with hate?” + +“Why not?” A certain fierceness crept into Hollander’s voice. His eyes +were shining very brightly. “People don’t know her as I know her. +_Nobody_ knows her the way I know her.” + +Lieutenant Valcour shrugged. “She made you hate your friend—a man +you’d been through the war with—whose life you had saved.” + +“That’s the bunk, Lieutenant.” + +“But you did, didn’t you?” + +“Oh, sure, it’s all true enough, about it happening—but that stuff +doesn’t last.” + +“Friendship?” + +“Among men? Hell, no.” Hollander jerked his head fretfully. “Gratitude +gets damned tiresome, Lieutenant, not only to give it but to get it.” + +“Especially,” Lieutenant Valcour said gently, “if a woman comes +between.” + +“No—no—no.” + +There was a complete and very convincing finality in the three +negations. + +“But you do love Mrs. Endicott.” + +“I worship her.” + +“And she?” + +“I don’t know.” There was nothing obscure in Hollander’s expression +now, and his eyes were frankly, genuinely sincere. “Why should she? +I’m nothing. Herbert was everything.” + +Lieutenant Valcour almost regretted having to do so when he said, +“Then why, Mr. Hollander, does she address you in her notes as ‘Tom, +darling’?” + +Hollander didn’t answer for a minute. He considered the question quite +seriously. “I guess it’s just because she’s sorry for me,” he said. + +“And I, personally, think that that’s a pretty bum guess.” + +“No—listen here, Lieutenant . . .” + +Hollander’s voice began to wander. His sentences became +broken—meaningless. It was with a sense of relief that Lieutenant +Valcour saw the door open and two stretcher carriers come in followed +by Dr. Worth and the ambulance surgeon. Hollander, as they carried him +out, was unconscious again. + +Lieutenant Valcour detained Dr. Worth at the door. + +“There is something I should like to ask you,” he said. + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +3:15 a. m.—The Properties of Horror + +“Doctor,” Lieutenant Valcour said, “our immediate concern is to find +out who fired that shot. The principal reason is quite academic: we +want to catch and arrest the person who did it. A secondary reason is +that many people who reach the state of mental unbalance where they +are impelled to commit murder don’t stop with the crime. They’ve +tasted blood. They are in a state of abnormal acuteness, and are +driven by a new fear: that of discovery and capture. To prevent being +captured, they reason, why not kill again? There is nothing to be +lost. You see, they can only be electrocuted once. I am presupposing, +of course, that the criminal is an outsider—some person at present +hidden in the house, who will make some desperate effort at escape. It +is a supposition that must be entertained, even though it is not a +very good one. I believe that the facts will eventually prove the +criminal to be a legitimate inmate.” + +“That narrows the field, doesn’t it, Lieutenant, to whoever was in +Mrs. Endicott’s room?” + +“It does, unless somebody dropped a rope ladder from an upstairs +window and got onto the balcony in that way. But I don’t put much +stock in those tricks, Doctor, any more than I do in sliding panels +and trapdoors. Outside of the badger game I’ve never come across a +sliding panel in my life, and I don’t ever expect to, either.” + +Dr. Worth was inclined to take the idea more seriously. “But a rope +ladder—there might very well be one around the house for an emergency +fire escape.” + +“All right, who was in the room just above this one? You. Did you come +down a rope ladder and shoot Endicott?” + +“God’s truth—my dear man——” + +“Oh, be sensible, Doctor, of course you didn’t. And who had the room +across the hall from you, which also is above the balcony? Mrs. +Siddons, the housekeeper. If you saw her, you’d scarcely picture her +as hurrying up and down a rope ladder. No, Doctor, whoever was on that +balcony came from Mrs. Endicott’s room. We’re back to the same three +people: Mrs. Endicott, her maid, and her nurse.” + +“But Mrs. Endicott is out of the question, Lieutenant. She is still +under the influence of the narcotic I gave her.” + +“How about the nurse, Doctor? Have you known her long?” + +“Known her? Only for the several cases she has worked on with me. But +she comes from the most reputable agency in the city. How about the +maid?” + +“I don’t know.” + +“She is just as good a candidate for suspicion as Miss Vickers, isn’t +she? Why under the sun should Miss Vickers want to shoot Endicott?” + +“I’m not seriously considering Miss Vickers at all. It’s perfectly +obvious that whoever did shoot Endicott was either directly +responsible for the earlier attack during the evening or else involved +in it as an accomplice.” + +“That might still include the maid.” + +“It certainly might. I wonder if you’d mind asking Miss Vickers to +come in here. I’d like to question her first.” + +Dr. Worth nodded toward Endicott’s body, covered with a sheet on the +bed. “Miss Vickers, Lieutenant, being a nurse is naturally accustomed +to seeing the dead, but it will be rather gruesome for the maid if you +question her in here, too.” + +“Very gruesome, Doctor.” + +“Well, you know best. You’re liable to have a fine case of hysterics +on your hands.” + +“I’ll risk it.” + +Dr. Worth left and closed the door. There again swept over Lieutenant +Valcour, with the solitude, that indefinable feeling of some lurking +dread. There were voices crying out to him from the subconscious, +warning him of dangers that were very real, very close at hand—but the +messages were indecisive, as are all instinctive things which fall +beyond the charted seas of any human knowledge. + +Nurse Vickers came in without the formality of knocking. Her glance +toward the bed was professional and not coloured by any sign of +nervousness. + +“Thank you for coming, Miss Vickers. I’ll only bother you for a +minute.” + +“No bother at all, Lieutenant.” + +“There is just one thing I want to know: who was in the room with you +and your patient at the time of the shooting?” + +“Why, I couldn’t say, Lieutenant, exactly.” + +“Why not, Miss Vickers?” + +“Because I wasn’t there myself. I was down in the kitchen making some +coffee. I left Roberts with Mrs. Endicott. You see, there wasn’t +anything that had to be done except just to be there. I’m sure it was +quite all right.” + +“Of course it was. I’m not suggesting for a minute, Miss Vickers, that +I thought otherwise.” Lieutenant Valcour studied the woman for a +second and then said, “I just wanted to know if you could help me +check up on the number of shots that were fired.” + +“I didn’t hear any shots at all, Lieutenant, ’way down there in that +kitchen.” + +Lieutenant Valcour wondered at this. The sound of one shot might well +have been heard down in the kitchen: the shot which had killed +Endicott and which had been fired from the balcony. The sound would +surely have travelled clearly in the still night air and to the +kitchen from outside. And yet he believed Nurse Vickers implicitly in +her statement that she had heard no shot. There was no earthly reason +why she should lie about it. The fact convinced him that whoever had +fired had held the pistol inside of the window. He glanced at the sash +and realized that the opening afforded plenty of room for a hand +holding a gun to reach through. + +“No,” he said, “I suppose you couldn’t have heard anything at all. +Maybe Roberts can help me. She was in the room, wasn’t she, when you +came back?” + +“Oh, yes, Lieutenant, and terribly excited about the shooting. She +seemed so upset, in fact, that if there hadn’t been so many much more +important things for Dr. Worth to attend to, I’d have asked him to +give her something to quiet her.” + +“One can hardly blame Roberts,” Lieutenant Valcour said. “The +fusillade must have been quite a shock, you know. And then everyone’s +nerves are on edge to-night anyway. In just what fashion was she +upset, Miss Vickers? From your professional experience, I mean, you +probably could diagnose her actions. Was it fright—nervous shock?” + +“Oh, fright, of course, Lieutenant. I’ve seen lots of nervous and +hysterical people during my work but never one as badly off as she +was. I’m not exaggerating one bit when I say that she was gripped with +an hysterical sort of terror.” + +“Really. As bad as that?” + +“Why, I was almost afraid even to let her stay in the room with the +patient. The poor creature actually seemed to blame Mrs. Endicott in +some fashion for what had happened. Just imagine this, Lieutenant: +when I came in she was literally leaning over the bed and shaking her +fist at Mrs. Endicott.” + +“You are quite certain of this, Miss Vickers?” + +“I saw it with my own eyes, Lieutenant.” + +“And was Roberts saying anything?” + +“Just the jumble that people go in for when they’re hysterical.” + +“You couldn’t catch anything connected?” + +“I didn’t try, Lieutenant. I had to get her away from the bed and calm +her down.” + +“You were able to?” + +“I was. She calmed down quite suddenly and became perfectly normal +again. I persuaded her to run downstairs and make herself a good +bracing cup of tea.” + +“Possibly carrying the pistol with her,” Lieutenant Valcour thought +bitterly, “to hide it in some place where it might never be found.” + +“Did she come back into the room afterward?” he said. + +“Well, not really, Lieutenant. I know how particular you police +officers are about the littlest details. She just stopped at the door +to tell me she was feeling all right again. She said she was going +upstairs to her room to take a little rest.” + +“And you’re quite sure, Miss Vickers, that you can’t recall any of the +words that Roberts was saying when you found her leaning over the +bed?” + +“I would if I could, Lieutenant. It was just a jumble. Ice—something +about ‘ice and human hearts.’ Then she switched to ‘searing flames’ +and I don’t know what all else.” + +“Would it bother you very much to go up to her room and see whether +she’s in condition to come down here for a few minutes?” + +“Why, not at all. I’d be glad to.” + +“Thank you, Miss Vickers. You’ve helped me tremendously. Oh, there’s +just one thing, Miss Vickers.” + +Miss Vickers paused at the doorway. + +“Yes, Lieutenant?” + +“When you came back upstairs from the kitchen, did you notice anything +about the atmosphere of Mrs. Endicott’s room?” + +“Why—I don’t know—you mean a sense of tension or something?” + +“No, I don’t. I mean was it as warm as when you left it, or cooler, or +what?” + +“Yes, I do, too—it was cooler—_much_. Because I remember after I +quieted Roberts I went over to one of the radiators to see if the heat +was still turned on. I thought Roberts must have turned it off, +although I couldn’t for the life of me see why. But the radiator was +quite hot, so I realized it must have been just the change from the +kitchen. It’s a hot kitchen.” + +“That is probably just what it was. Would you send Roberts to me now, +please?” + +“I will, Lieutenant.” + +“Thank you.” + +Miss Vickers went out and closed the door. + +Lieutenant Valcour then did a rather horrible thing. He went over to +the bed and pulled down enough of the sheet so that Endicott’s face +was exposed. + +And then he sat down and waited for Roberts. + + + +CHAPTER XX + +3:24 a. m.—On Private Heights + +“You wanted to see me, Lieutenant?” + +She _had_ been under a strain, and a rather terrible one. There wasn’t +any doubt about that. It was emotion, after all, that brought age, not +years, thought Lieutenant Valcour as he glanced at the dark rings so +clearly visible beneath her tragic eyes. + +Roberts hadn’t looked toward the bed—yet—but then he hadn’t really +expected that she would. Perhaps she wouldn’t look for some time, but +eventually she would lose some portion of that really splendid +self-control that she was exerting and then, instead of the expanse of +white sheet she had been expecting, there would be Endicott’s +face. . . . + +“I wonder if you could tell me, Miss Roberts, the number of shots that +were fired during the shooting.” + +“I’m sure I couldn’t.” + +She was pointedly on guard, her eyes held at a level that included his +cravat but went no higher. + +“The question isn’t as silly a one as it seems,” Lieutenant Valcour +said. “I don’t suggest for a minute that you counted the shots as they +were being fired, actually, but it’s quite within possibility that +your subconscious mind really did that very thing, and that on +consciously thinking about it the number might come to you. It’s +something along the principle of visualizing sound.” + +“I’m sorry. I’m sure that no amount of thinking about it would clear +the rather terrible confusion of that moment.” + +“Won’t you sit down?” + +“I prefer to stand, thank you.” + +“Just as you wish. You were with Mrs. Endicott, weren’t you, when it +happened?” + +“Yes.” + +Lieutenant Valcour admired the accomplished ease with which the word +had so unhesitatingly been brought out; but then most women, in his +estimation, were natural-born liars. The art formed for him one of +their greatest charms. + +“You were sitting down beside the bed?” he went on. + +“Yes. Reading.” + +Splendid—splendid—she was a Bernhardt—a Duse. + +“And Miss Vickers?” + +“She was down in the kitchen making some coffee.” + +“Did the shooting upset you, Miss Roberts?” + +“I’m naturally nervous. The sound of firing has always disturbed me +terribly.” Then she flung at him abruptly, “My brother was killed in +the war.” + +Lieutenant Valcour both looked and felt genuinely consoling. He also +felt a selfish measure of irritation. The statement was such a perfect +period mark. When a young woman, no matter how great a criminal, +potentially, announces flatly that her brother has been killed during +the war, one can’t ride over the fact roughshod. + +“Was there anyone whom you loved killed in the war, Lieutenant?” + +She was determined to hammer at the point, it seemed. He wished that +she would stop. + +“There wasn’t, Miss Roberts.” + +“Then you don’t know much about soldiers.” + +“No, not much, really.” + +“I don’t mean soldiers—or the war itself, either. It’s a state of +being—a sort of lucid abnormality. It’s hard to tell you just what I +do mean. But it’s the thing,” she ended fiercely, “that made me +understand Mr. Endicott. He never quite recovered, you see, from being +a soldier.” + +“And perhaps it also made you understand why Mrs. Endicott +misunderstood him?” + +Things were going better now; the channel was broadening into useful +seas. + +“Of course it was,” Roberts said. “She, too, lost no one in the war.” + +The fog rolled in again. + +“I’m afraid I’m not following you very clearly.” + +“It’s quite useless, Lieutenant—simply that in Mr. Endicott I kept +seeing my brother. I suffered for him to the extent I would have +suffered for my brother had my brother been in similar circumstances.” + +“Suffered?” + +“Yes, suffered. From her damned superiority.” + +“You think that Mrs. Endicott overdid the mental?” + +He noted that Roberts was slowly losing control. There was a blazing +quality of anger creeping into her eyes. + +“Lieutenant, she regarded that man as her tame tiger. You realize how +strong he must have been physically.” + +“Very strong.” + +“It used to please her to control him—you know the way it’s commonly +expressed—with a ‘word.’” + +“I shouldn’t exactly say that she had succeeded.” + +“The other women?” + +“Yes.” + +“She didn’t care about that. If anything, it satisfied her sense of +power. She looked on them as a pack of shoddy substitutes that he +could fool with, kick around, and treat terribly, if he liked. But she +still remained the original—the unapproachable—the happy possessor of +a tame tiger. He was always _hers_, you see, no matter what it was he +had done. She’s had him crying.” + +“That’s a little hard to believe.” + +“It’s the truth. He took her in his hands one night and twisted +her—just like that! She didn’t say a thing to him. For a month +afterward he went around the house like a whipped cat. Then she said +something kind to him, and he cried. I wish she was in hell.” + +“Perhaps she is, Miss Roberts—just that.” + +“She won’t stay in it long. Her kind doesn’t.” + +Lieutenant Valcour held his eyes thoughtfully directed toward the bed. + +“Tell me, Miss Roberts, do you think that Mr. Endicott is happier +dead? Let me put it in this fashion: if Mr. Endicott had really been +your brother, would you rather have seen him dead than living in the +emotional hell you picture Mr. Endicott as having lived in?” + +His gaze retained its determined fixity. + +“No,” she said. “There is always a way out.” It was irresistible. She +found herself having to look, too. Against every advice of instinct +her eyes were drawn toward the bed in company with Lieutenant +Valcour’s . . . peace—there _was_ peace—greater than she had ever seen +when he had been living—peace to a tired heart—a plain, normal, happy +human heart that had been broken on the wheel of too much +complexity. . . . “Oh, I’m lying, Lieutenant! I would—I would—a +million times rather.” + +He worked very fast now, having captured the mood. “Were you thinking +of all that when you stood outside on the balcony and watched him +through the window?” + +Her eyes clung immovably to the cold closed lids, the mouth, carved in +gentle shadows; her very being seemed withdrawn on private heights. “I +wasn’t on the balcony.” + +“And I’d like to know what you did with the gun.” + +. . . Perhaps he was laughing at it all now, if people laugh in +heaven. He and her brother. They would have met and be laughing at it +all together. But they wouldn’t be laughing at her. . . . “There +wasn’t any need to use the gun, Lieutenant.” + +“Then what did you do with it?” + +“Put it back in the bottom of my trunk.” . . . He’d know, now, the +exact reason why she had done the things that she had done. People +know everything in heaven—sort of an enveloping awareness—like +lightning darting brilliantly to immediate comprehension at its +target—target—gun?—_gun_. Her face was bleak ivory. “What did you say, +Lieutenant?” + +“I had just asked you, Miss Roberts, what you did with the gun, and +you told me that you put it back again in the bottom of your trunk.” + +Her eyes, as she looked at him, were strangely devoid of fear. + +“Then if I told you that, you’ll find it there.” + +“It wasn’t the wisest place to put it, Miss Roberts.” + +“It doesn’t matter much.” + +“You mean you don’t care?” + +“Not just that. I’m speaking about the gun. I never fired it.” + +“Then why did you hide it?” + +“Because it’s illegal to have a gun.” + +“Then why did you have one, Miss Roberts?” + +“It’s one my brother gave me over twelve years ago. I’ve always kept +it with me.” + +“What calibre is it?” + +“A Colt .38.” + +The bullet in Lieutenant Valcour’s pocket had been fired from a +Colt .38. + +“And to-night you were going to use it to save Mr. Endicott by +shooting him.” + +“No, Lieutenant. I was going to use it to shoot Mrs. Endicott if she +attempted to get near him again.” + +“Again?” + +“Why, yes, Lieutenant. She went out of the room last night right after +he had knocked and said good-bye.” + +“Out into the hallway?” + +“Yes.” + +“When did she come back?” + +“She didn’t come back.” + +“Then when was the next time you saw her?” + +“When you rang for me—after you had found Mr. Endicott in the +cupboard.” + +“And you think it was Mrs. Endicott who put him there.” Lieutenant +Valcour thought for a moment of the broken finger nail of Mrs. +Endicott’s otherwise immaculate hand. “But why, Miss Roberts, should +she kill her—tiger?” + +“Perhaps Mr. Hollander could tell you that better than I.” + +“And why did you get a gun to prevent Mrs. Endicott from going again +to her husband, when you knew she was under the influence of a +narcotic, that she was unconscious, and couldn’t possibly move?” + +“Because, Lieutenant, she never drank the narcotic.” + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +3:51 a. m.—A Woman’s Slipper + +Lieutenant Valcour felt a distinct shock, and his eyes became +predatorily alert. If this astonishing thing was true and Mrs. +Endicott had not taken the narcotic prepared for her by Dr. Worth, +then the bypaths one might dart along were numerous and alarming +indeed. + +“How do you know, Miss Roberts?” he said. + +“Because when the nurse went downstairs to make that coffee I went +over to the bed. I wanted to take a close look at Mrs. Endicott. Have +you ever felt that desire to look closely at something that you hate +very much? It’s the curiosity of hate, I suppose. I put my hand on the +spread, at the edge, so that I could lean down. The spread was damp; +something had been poured on it. There wasn’t anything that could have +been poured on it except the narcotic. She’d recovered consciousness, +you see, when the nurse and Dr. Worth brought her in from here and put +her to bed.” + +“But wouldn’t he or the nurse have seen her pour it out?” + +“None of us saw it, Lieutenant, because she said, just after the +doctor had handed her the glass, ‘There’s blood on that dresser.’ We +all looked at the dresser, of course. Naturally there wasn’t any blood +on it. The doctor thought she was delirious. She was just finishing +drinking when we turned around.” + +“Didn’t you accuse her—when you felt the damp spot on the spread?” + +“What was the use? She never would have admitted it. I believe,” +Roberts said fiercely, “that I could have stuck pins in her and that +she’d have endured the pain rather than admit it. And suddenly I began +to feel afraid—not so much of her, as of what she might do to Mr. +Endicott. She was playing a trick and I didn’t know just what the +purpose of it was. I ran upstairs and got my gun, then came right +back.” + +“She was still in bed?” + +“Yes. But the shooting was over, and the room was cold. The room was +cold”—Roberts’s voice was very intense as she drove her points +home—“and her skin was cold, and her breathing was heavy from recent +exertion. I think I was going to kill her. I _would_ have killed her +if the nurse hadn’t come in just then.” + +“Why didn’t you tell someone of this at once, Miss Roberts?” + +“Would you have? Would anyone have?” + +“I don’t quite understand.” + +“There had just been that shooting—and I had a gun. I wanted to get +rid of it. By the time I had got rid of it, it was too late. I +couldn’t say anything then without practically accusing myself of a +murder I didn’t commit.” + +“You’ll stay here in the house, Miss Roberts?” + +“Naturally, since I’m to be accused of having killed Mr. Endicott.” + +“Not as yet, Miss Roberts.” + +“It won’t bother me.” She added bitterly, as she started for the door, +“You’ll find me a tractable prisoner.” + +“One minute please, Miss Roberts. How long were you gone from Mrs. +Endicott’s room when you went upstairs to get the gun?” + +“Just long enough to run up and back again. I have no idea, really.” + +“Where is your room?” + +“On the upper floor—the room to the left of the corridor in the front +of the house.” + +“And whereabouts did you keep the gun?” + +“In my trunk—where it is now.” + +“Was the trunk locked?” + +“Yes. I keep it locked.” + +“And the keys for it?” + +“In a purse. The purse was in a dresser drawer.” + +“Then that gives us a pretty good idea of the length of time you must +have been gone, doesn’t it?” + +“I suppose it does. Three or four minutes, probably.” + +“Nearer, I imagine, to five or six. But we don’t require the actual +number of minutes. The point we need is, rather, a comparison of two +different operations within the same time limit. While you were going +through the various movements you have described, would Mrs. Endicott +have had the time to get out of bed, supply herself with a revolver, +open a window, and, from the balcony, shoot Mr. Endicott, return to +her room, and be in bed again by the time you came down? I think so, +don’t you?” + +“There would have been plenty of time for that.” + +“You’ve been with Mrs. Endicott for quite a while. Have you ever +noticed whether or not she owns a pistol?” + +“I don’t think I have. No, I’m sure I’ve never seen one. That doesn’t +prove anything, though. There are any number of private places where +she may have kept it. It is also possible”—Roberts seemed desperately +earnest in her effort to strengthen each link in her accusation, for +she was accusing rather than simply offering a theory—“that someone +may recently have given her a revolver, isn’t it?” + +“Everything is possible.” + +“Mr. Hollander, for example?” + +“A very good example.” + +He said nothing further, and after a while the stillness became almost +physically oppressive. Roberts was finished with emotions. “Is that +all?” she said, and her voice was colourless. + +“I believe so, Miss Roberts—except that I wish you would tell me why, +in view of your recent insinuations concerning Mrs. Endicott and +Hollander, you ever suggested him as the proper friend to stay with +her husband to-night. It’s a little inconsistent, don’t you think?” + +“Very.” + +“Then why did you do it?” + +“I have nothing further to say.” + +Lieutenant Valcour went abruptly to the door and opened it. Cassidy +and Hansen were standing near by in the corridor. + +“Hansen,” he said, “go with Miss Roberts up to her room. There is a +gun in her trunk. She will give it to you. Keep it for me.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +Roberts went outside. + +“Am I to consider myself under arrest, Lieutenant?” + +“No, Miss Roberts. But, as I have explained, you are not to leave the +house. Cassidy, come inside here with me.” + +Cassidy came in and closed the door. He watched Lieutenant Valcour +draw the sheet up again over Endicott’s face. + +“What’s Dr. Worth doing, Cassidy?” + +“He has gone back to bed, sir. Shall I go get him?” Cassidy cast one +suspicious look toward the bed. + +“No, let him sleep. There’s nothing just this instant. I’ll want to +see him in about a quarter of an hour, though.” + +Lieutenant Valcour went into the bathroom, opened the window, and went +outside onto the balcony. The gray before dawning was in the sky, and +a rare clearness was vibrant in the fresh, sweet air. + +The outline of the garden down below was quite distinct. There were +other gardens belonging to the adjacent houses, too, and to the houses +backing them from the rear. It was a street of gardens which bloomed, +Lieutenant Valcour reflected, for the express benefit of caretakers in +summer, while their owners spent the season at fashionable resorts +either in the mountains or on the shore. + +Lieutenant Valcour went and carefully examined with his flashlight the +window to Endicott’s room that had been raised from the bottom when +the shot was fired. He played the light upon the surface of its glass. +It was quite clean. There was no trace of any pressing of noses or of +foreheads against its polished surface. Nor, on the stone sill, were +there any telltale threads of silk, or any of the various clues that +would serve to indicate a woman’s presence. + +He stared speculatively for a minute at the windows of the room above, +where the curiously vindictive Mrs. Siddons was now presumably +resting, or else indulging in her blank-eyed game of mental +maledictions. No, he couldn’t really visualize her as descending to +the balcony by a rope or any other kind of ladder. A hundred years +ago, perhaps, she might have gone so far as to shape a replica of Mr. +Endicott in wax and then, with appropriate incantations, proceed to +stick pins in such portions of it as would cabalistically do the most +good. But there was no such simple expedient left her in our modern +skeptic age. It would be necessary, of course, to interview her +further concerning those vague, bitter hints she had thrown out about +outrageous actions on the part of Endicott toward the maids. + +Even the city could not kill the fair fresh breezes of dawn. He stared +at the dimming stars and wondered whether Roberts’s extraordinary +statement was a lie. For after all it hinged upon nothing more +significant than a damp spot at the edge of a spread, and Roberts +could easily have spilled something there herself to offer as +corroborative evidence to her tale. Was she, he wondered, quite so +smart? And from all that he had been able to judge of her, he rather +thought that she was. + +He would have to consult with Dr. Worth, of course, before doing +anything drastic. And the doctor would probably raise a holler, +especially since he had just gone to bed and would have to be yanked +summarily out of it again. Well, bed-yankings were to be expected in +the lives of doctors and of the police; they were expected to be +perpetually on tap, like heat or water. + +He made his way slowly toward the windows of Mrs. Endicott’s room, +carefully inspecting the balcony and sills with his flashlight as he +went along. There were no smudges, no threads, no clues until he +reached the last window in the row. And there, on the balcony floor +just below its sash, something blazed in the circle of his torch a +bright jade green. + +It was a woman’s slipper. + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +4:14 a. m.—Tap—Tap—Tap + +Lieutenant Valcour picked the slipper up and sighed. It was a +distressingly leading and decisive clue, but it did not lead in a +direction he cared to follow, nor did it decide things as he thought +they ought to be decided. + +On the surface of it, the case seemed blatantly plain: Hollander had +come to the house at seven to save Mrs. Endicott from committing +murder or suicide and had shocked Endicott almost to death—and just a +short while ago Mrs. Endicott had shot her husband to prevent him from +making a statement that would convict Hollander. + +Rubbish! + +Lieutenant Valcour flatly refused to believe it. And yet one had to +believe that Hollander had certainly intended to stab Endicott with +that knife; the point was irrefutable. Furthermore, Hollander’s +motives remained clear enough and beautifully simple: he wanted to +protect Mrs. Endicott. + +But what about her motives? + +And Roberts’s? + +And as a kernel to the whole perplexing enigma, what had been the +object of the search through Endicott’s pockets and among the papers +in the left-hand upper drawer of his desk? + +There was nothing to be gained, however, by standing outside on the +balcony and admiring the flushing sky and breathing in with the manner +of a connoisseur the morning air. Lieutenant Valcour returned, via the +bathroom window, to Endicott’s room. + +“The night’s almost over, Lieutenant,” said Cassidy by way of +greeting. + +“Almost over, Cassidy.” + +“And it’s been a hell of a night, too, if you don’t mind my saying +it.” + +“I don’t mind your saying it.” + +“Especially for him.” + +Cassidy jerked a muscular thumb toward the bed. + +“Least of all for him, Cassidy.” + +“He may be well out of it at that.” + +“He is. There’s a lot of beautiful tripe written about how all people +kill the things they love. Metaphysically, perhaps. But with a bullet, +Cassidy? Not so.” + +“I don’t get you, Lieutenant.” + +“That isn’t strange, Cassidy. So far I don’t even get myself.” + +Lieutenant Valcour went to the door and opened it. Hansen was standing +outside, and in his hand was a gun wrapped in a clean handkerchief. + +“Roberts’s gun, Hansen?” + +“Yes, Lieutenant. It was just where you said it would be, in the +trunk. I wrapped it in a handkerchief to keep any prints you might +want on it.” + +“That’s right, Hansen. Go upstairs now and wake up Dr. Worth. Ask him +if he will please come down here at once.” + +“Yes, Lieutenant.” Hansen hesitated for a minute. + +“Well, what is it, Hansen?” + +“I understood you all right didn’t I, sir,” Hansen said uncomfortably, +“when you told me that maid wasn’t to be put under arrest?” + +“Yes. I don’t want to do anything about her as yet. Later on we may +book her on a violation of the Sullivan Law and again we may not.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +Lieutenant Valcour took the gun and went back into the room with it, +closing the door. He carefully unfolded enough of the handkerchief so +that the barrel was exposed. He sniffed this and decided that the gun +had neither been recently fired nor cleaned. There was just the +definite odourlessness which one finds with guns that have not been +used or taken care of for a very long time. So far, then, he was +inclined to believe that Roberts’s story was correct. + +“Is that the rod that done the trick, Lieutenant?” said Cassidy, who +had been keenly interested in the sniffings. + +“No, it isn’t, Cassidy. This gun hasn’t been fired for years, maybe.” + +“Well, I wish it was. I’d like to get out of this joint.” + +“Still nervous, Cassidy?” + +“No, I ain’t nervous, Lieutenant. I’m just uncomfortable. It’s like +there was something in this case that hasn’t broken yet. You know what +I mean? Something we ain’t so much as put a finger on.” + +Lieutenant Valcour knew very well just exactly what Cassidy meant. He, +too, felt that same indefinable effect of impending “somethings” that +were connected with obscure danger. It was an emotion, however, which +required official scowlings. After all, psychic patrolmen were not +considered as being to the best interests of the force. One shouldn’t +be allowed, really, to graduate into psychic realms anywhere below the +rank of lieutenant. + +“Discounting your weekly adventures between paper covers, this is your +first real murder case, isn’t it, Cassidy?” + +“I thank God it is, sir.” + +“Well, you’ll get used to them after a while. Before you’re called in +on your fourth or fifth you’ll be finished with having presentiments.” + +“Will they be likely to be like this one, sir?” + +“That will depend entirely, Cassidy, upon just how much publicity this +one is given in the papers, as well as on the supply at hand of +potential victims who have weak hearts. I dare say the method will +become fashionable for a while.” There was a peevish rap on the door. +“Ah, come in, Doctor.” + +Dr. Worth was just as peevish as his knock. The camel’s-hair dressing +gown in which he was still bundled hinted blurringly at indignant +muscles that quivered beneath its loose folds. His hair was +rumpled-looking and frowsy. + +“Really, Lieutenant,” he began, “this is getting to be beyond a joke.” + +“I’m sorry, Doctor, but I had to discuss Mrs. Endicott’s condition +with you most seriously and at once.” + +Dr. Worth paled a little at this. + +“Nothing’s happened to her, too, has there?” + +“No, Doctor, nothing has. And I don’t think that just now I could +stand another murder. It’s about her physical condition in general. Is +her heart all right?” + +Dr. Worth’s curiosity was beginning to get the upper hand over his +grouch. + +“Perfectly sound. Why do you ask?” + +“Because I want to try an experiment on her.” + +“You want to what, sir?” Dr. Worth almost shouted it. He was +thoroughly awake now. + +“Not so loud, please, Doctor. I want you to let me stay in the room +alone with your patient. You can open the connecting bathroom door a +little and watch me through its crack, but I want the nurse out of the +way. And I don’t want you to make any noise or comments while you’re +watching. I don’t want Mrs. Endicott to know that you’re there.” + +Dr. Worth looked at Lieutenant Valcour sharply. “This is nonsense. She +couldn’t possibly tell who was or who wasn’t there. She’s +unconscious.” + +“Perhaps she isn’t, Doctor. This is what her maid has just told me.” +Lieutenant Valcour offered Dr. Worth Roberts’s astonishing theory +concerning the poured-out narcotic, and Dr. Worth was quite properly +astonished. “So you see it’s a possibility, Doctor, and the fact of my +finding that slipper outside of the window makes it practically a +certainty.” + +“It’s the most astounding thing I’ve ever heard of in my life. If you +don’t intend to shock her, Lieutenant, I’ll agree to anything you +say.” + +“I shan’t do anything rough, Doctor, like discharging a gun off near +her ear, or pinching her, or slapping her, or any of the tricks which +are so popularly supposed to be kept up the sleeve of a policeman. You +can stop me at any minute if you object to anything I may be doing.” + +“Have you planned just what you will do?” + +“With a woman like Mrs. Endicott there wouldn’t be any use in planning +anything. All that I can do in advance is to create an atmosphere and +then do whatever occurs to me as being best when the proper time +comes. There won’t be anything complicated about it.” + +“Just what sort of an atmosphere, Lieutenant?” + +“Well, in the first place I’ll call the nurse outside into the +corridor and you can tell her not to go back in again until I say so. +You might suggest to her that she go down to the kitchen and make some +coffee—she seems a little dippy about coffee—or something. Then we’ll +leave Mrs. Endicott quite alone in her room for a minute or two. If +she’s really faking, she’ll begin to worry about what is going on. +Then the door will open again and, instead of the nurse, I’ll come in. +She’ll be pretty certain to suspect that I’ve found the slipper, but +will be all the more careful to keep up her pretence of being under +the influence of the narcotic. If she gets away with that, you know, +she can always claim that Roberts herself must have dropped the +slipper onto the balcony as a plant. The main thing is that Mrs. +Endicott won’t know just what’s up, and when a woman of her +temperament can’t figure a thing out mentally, it about drives her +crazy.” + +“Then I suppose, Lieutenant, that when you get her into this receptive +state you’ll speak to her?” + +Lieutenant Valcour laughed. “On the contrary, Doctor, I haven’t the +slightest intention of saying a single word. Shall we go now? After +you’ve arranged things with Nurse Vickers you can come back in here +again and start watching from the bathroom.” + +They went outside, and Lieutenant Valcour rapped softly on Mrs. +Endicott’s door. It opened a bit, and Nurse Vickers looked out. She +saw Dr. Worth and came outside, shutting the door behind her. + +“You wanted to see me, Doctor?” + +“Yes, Miss Vickers. How is Mrs. Endicott?” + +“Quite comfortable, Doctor. She’s breathing as peacefully as a child.” + +“There haven’t been any signs of restlessness?” + +“Oh, no, Doctor. She hasn’t budged since I’ve been watching her.” + +Dr. Worth mildly raised his eyebrows. “That in itself is rather +curious,” he said. + +“Curious, Doctor?” + +“Oh, nothing to be alarmed at, Miss Vickers. You look a little tired. +Run downstairs and drink some coffee. The lieutenant, here, will stay +with Mrs. Endicott, and you’re not to go back into her room again +until he says so.” + +“Help!” thought Lieutenant Valcour. As a detective Dr. Worth was a +darned fine doctor. Miss Vickers, as he had expected, was instantly +curious. + +“Something more wrong, Doctor?” + +“No Miss Vickers,” Lieutenant Valcour said coldly. “Please do as the +doctor instructed, and at once.” + +“Oh.” + +Nurse Vickers, feeling a little outraged, vanished toward the stairs. + +“Shall I go and stand by the bathroom door now?” said Dr. Worth. + +“If you wish. Don’t make the slightest sound when you’re opening it, +and don’t open it more than an inch at the most, please.” + +“I won’t, Lieutenant.” + +Dr. Worth, feeling very much like one of those fabulous characters he +had read about in Fenimore Cooper when a child, went back into +Endicott’s room. + +Lieutenant Valcour waited another full minute before he opened the +door and went inside. He did not look at Mrs. Endicott, but walked +softly over to a chair, lifted it, and placed it close beside the bed. +He drew the slipper from his pocket and sat down. + +There was an utter and complete hush. For three minutes—he timed +himself with his wrist watch—he sat motionless and stared at the +closed lids of Mrs. Endicott’s eyes. + +Then he began to tap the slipper quite softly, but quite persistently +and with a rhythmic regularity, upon an arm of the chair. + +Tap—tap—tap—tap—tap—— + +Mrs. Endicott’s face retained the smooth expressionlessness of +slumber. + +Tap—tap—tap—— + +Her breathing held the steady depths of sleep. + +Tap—tap—tap—tap—— + +“If you do that much longer,” she said quietly, “I shall go insane.” + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +4:29 a. m.—A Turn of the Screw + +“You needn’t say anything you don’t care to, Mrs. Endicott.” + +“I’m glad you didn’t use the stereotyped formula, Lieutenant. It would +have disappointed me if you had. Get me a cigarette, please; there are +some over there on the dresser.” + +Lieutenant Valcour stood up. He got the cigarettes and lighted one for +Mrs. Endicott and one for himself. + +“You shouldn’t have dropped your slipper outside of the window,” he +said. + +“You shouldn’t have found it.” + +Her eyes, now that they were opened, were admirably guarded, and her +fingers, as they held the cigarette, showed no trace of nervousness. + +“The slipper is of no great consequence, Mrs. Endicott. There are so +many other things, too, you see.” + +“Sort of a wholesale strewing of clues? I never imagined you as +bothering very much with clues. It’s people you’re more interested in: +reading their minds.” + +Her eyes offered an almost impudent invitation that he read hers. + +“Whom were you aiming at when you fired, Mrs. Endicott, at your +husband or at Mr. Hollander?” + +Mrs. Endicott blew smoke rings elaborately. + +“At neither, Lieutenant. I didn’t have a gun.” + +“Then it was just curiosity?” + +“What was?” + +“Your going out on the balcony.” + +“I didn’t go out on the balcony. I’ve never been on it in my life.” + +“I am not stupid, Mrs. Endicott.” + +“Nor very credulous, either.” + +“No, nor credulous.” + +“That’s the trouble with truth: it often sounds so silly.” + +“Surely you realize how things look against you, Mrs. Endicott.” + +“Black.” + +“The worst of all is your not having taken the narcotic, and then +having pretended to be in a state of unconsciousness.” + +Her eyes became stupefyingly innocent. “Is it illegal to decide not to +take medicine, Lieutenant?” + +His respect for her as an adversary began to mount by leaps and +bounds. “No, Mrs. Endicott. But in the present case it was +purposefully deceptive.” + +“Why, I simply disliked hurting Dr. Worth’s feelings; that was all.” + +Lieutenant Valcour pictured her maintaining that attitude—smartly +dressed in becomingly plain black, very innocent, very +beautiful-looking—before the twelve impressionable and normally dumb +people one finds on juries. He was grudgingly afraid she could get +away with it. + +“And it isn’t illegal, either,” she went on, “to go to sleep, is it?” + +Lieutenant Valcour decided that if anything was to be gained from the +interview he would have to give a turn to the screw. + +“No, Mrs. Endicott, sleeping isn’t illegal. Even,” he added +negligently, “if your husband has just been killed, and your—well, +whatever state of relationship exists between you and Mr. +Hollander—your friend, let us say, is wounded to the point of death.” + +The cigarette dropped from her fingers to the floor. Lieutenant +Valcour crushed it with the sole of his shoe. + +“I don’t believe you.” + +Her voice had the same pallid qualities as her skin. + +“You must have seen for yourself, Mrs. Endicott, that he was pretty +badly hurt when he slipped to the floor. There was blood enough +smeared around, goodness knows.” + +“You’re trying to trap me.” + +“Just stating facts, Mrs. Endicott. Of course you may have left the +instant after you fired and so not have seen Mr. Hollander shot down +by the police.” + +“You are being vulgarly brutal.” + +“You were certainly in a frantic enough hurry to have dropped your +slipper and not to have bothered to pick it up. Did you throw the gun +into the garden, Mrs. Endicott? We’re bound to find it, you know.” + +“Is Mr. Hollander still in the house?” + +“No.” + +“Where have they taken him?” + +“To the hospital.” + +“Please ring for my maid and leave the room. I must go to him +immediately.” + +“I’m sorry.” + +“Will you please leave this room?” + +“You don’t seem to realize, Mrs. Endicott, that you are under arrest.” + +The thought stunned her. Her head fell back among the pillows as if it +had been thrown there. + +“But that’s silly—silly, I tell you.” + +“You admitted yourself, Mrs. Endicott, that the truth is always +silly.” + +“You are actually charging me with the murder of my husband?” + +“‘Arrest’ was perhaps an injudicious word. I am holding you, Mrs. +Endicott, as a material witness, for the present.” + +Mrs. Endicott had recovered somewhat from the shock. + +“I shan’t be bromidic, Lieutenant, and attempt either tears or +bribery. I’m not stupid enough to think that either would affect you +in the slightest from the performance of duty. But I should like to +appeal to your reason.” + +“You will find me a sympathetic listener, Mrs. Endicott. My wretched +conceit forces me to add that I shall also be an intelligent one.” + +“You see, I knew pretty well what was going on from hearing the nurse +and Roberts talking about it. Lieutenant, just what do you want me to +admit?” + +“That you were on the balcony.” + +“But I wasn’t.” + +“Then how did your slipper get there?” + +“It fell from my foot.” + +Lieutenant Valcour stood up abruptly. “You will have to pardon me, +Mrs. Endicott,” he said, “while I search this room.” + +“You misunderstand me. I mean exactly what I say. I wasn’t on the +balcony, and the slipper did fall off my foot. If you must know it, I +was straddling the window sill.” + +“What stopped you from going out, Mrs. Endicott?” + +“The sound of the shooting. It unnerved me. I almost fell back into +the room and closed the window. I knew that I had dropped a slipper +outside, but the idea of doing anything further than hurrying back +into bed terrified me.” + +Lieutenant Valcour examined the slipper he still held in his hand. +“This is a slipper for the left foot,” he said. “And in that case, +when you were straddling the window it is the foot which must have +been on the outside. Isn’t that so?” + +“That’s rather elementary, isn’t it?” + +“Quite. But it serves to prove that at the moment when the shots were +fired you could look along the balcony toward the windows of your +husband’s room. Did you?” + +“I imagine so. I’m not quite certain, really. It was absolutely dark +out there.” + +“On the contrary, there was a glow cast on the balcony from the +farthest window, which was open a little, wasn’t there?” + +“Perhaps. Yes, I think there was.” + +“And did you see anybody standing at that window when the shots were +fired?” + +“You mean on the balcony?” + +“Yes.” + +“No.” + +“That is all, Mrs. Endicott.” + +“You don’t believe me.” + +“Frankly, I don’t.” + +Mrs. Endicott’s expression hardened perceptibly. Whether from +bitterness or from some sudden private determination it was difficult +to say. + +“Does being detained as a material witness prohibit me from getting +out of bed and dressing?” she said. + +“Not at all. In fact, it is essential that you do so. You see, we +detain our material witnesses in jail.” + +He heard again, as he had heard it earlier in the night, the muted +echo of brass bells in her voice. “If you will leave me then, please?” + +“Just as soon as I have searched the room.” + +“For what?” + +“For a revolver, Mrs. Endicott.” + +Mrs. Endicott closed her eyes. She turned on her side and faced the +wall. Lieutenant Valcour conducted his search with the thoroughness +and speed born of experience. In the room, in the room’s cupboard, in +the various drawers, beneath the different pieces of furniture, there +was no gun. He took a dressing gown and placed it on the bed. + +“Put this on, please, Mrs. Endicott, I want to search the bed.” + +She did so, without either comment or objection. She went to the +window and stared unseeingly at the breaking day. + +Lieutenant Valcour removed the spread, and with a pencil roughly +outlined the damp spot where the narcotic had been spilled. Then he +folded the spread and tucked it under one arm. The rest of the +bedclothes, the mattress, the pillows, concealed no gun. He walked to +the door. + +“I will send your maid to you, Mrs. Endicott, if you wish.” + +She continued to stare through the window and to present her back to +him. She said nothing. He tried to catch the suggestion in her pose. +It wasn’t a gesture of petty rudeness or angry spite; nor was it by +any means suggestive of despair or fear. He went outside and closed +the door. + +And as he crossed the corridor to Endicott’s room it occurred to him +with shocking clearness that, in spite of the idea’s seeming +absurdity, her pose had suggested a very definite mood of positive +exaltation. + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +4:41 a. m.—As the Colours of Dawn + +“Well,” Lieutenant Valcour said, as he joined Dr. Worth in Endicott’s +room, “what do you think now?” + +Dr. Worth was finished with bewilderments. In spite of the +camel’s-hair robe swathing him, he had recaptured to an impressive +extent his air of dignity. + +“Lieutenant,” he said, “I think that my services are no longer +required in this house. With your permission, I shall dismiss the two +nurses and go home.” + +“Why, certainly, Doctor, if you wish. The prosecuting attorney will +probably require your testimony to secure an indictment and will want +you later on at the trial, but I’m sure he will bother you just as +little as possible. We realize how annoying any court work is to a +doctor.” + +“I shall be glad to testify whenever required.” + +“Will you also let me know where to keep in touch with the two nurses? +Their testimony will be needed, too.” + +Dr. Worth stated the name and address of the Nurses’ Home at which +Miss Vickers and Miss Murrow could always be reached, and Lieutenant +Valcour wrote them down in his notebook. + +“Would it bother you very much, Lieutenant, to let Mrs. Endicott know +that I have gone, when you see her?” + +“Not at all, Doctor.” + +“I doubt whether she will require my services again.” He paused for a +moment at the doorway. “That woman, sir, is of iron.” + +“I shouldn’t wonder, Doctor. At any rate, she is pretty thoroughly +encased in metal. I’ll send Cassidy along with you to pass you and the +nurses by O’Brian down at the door. No one can leave the house, you +see, without permission.” + +“Thank you, Lieutenant. Good-bye.” + +“Good-bye, Doctor, and thanks for all your assistance. Cassidy, come +back after you’ve seen the doctor out, and stay in the corridor. I’ll +call when I need you.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +The door closed, and Lieutenant Valcour was alone. With a persistence +that was becoming annoying, the same curious feeling of lurking danger +crept out at him from the room’s stillnesses. His nerves were usually +as steady as the quality reputed to be enjoyed by a rock, and the +strange little jumpings they were going in for were getting that +fabulous animal known as his goat. + +He went over to the chair before the flat-topped desk and sat down. +There was that drawer filled with disordered papers to be gone +through. He removed the drawer and emptied it of its contents by the +simple expedient of turning it upside down onto the top of the desk. + +There were, mixed up among bills and receipts, a surprising number of +letters from women. He read each one of them carefully and felt a +little sorrier, at the conclusion of each, for the future of the +race—not so much because of any danger to its morals as to its +mentality. + +He made a little group of each batch of notes from the same woman. One +pile topped the list with the number of ten. These were signed “Bebe” +and were addressed with deplorable monotony to “My cave man.” Endicott +must have been rather an ass, he decided, as well as a pretty low sort +of an animal. It was all very well for Roberts to rave on about +soldiers, and simple hearts, and war, and things. That’s just what it +amounted to: raving. What if Endicott and, presumably, her brother had +had simple hearts. So had guinea pigs. + +Lieutenant Valcour wondered whether everyone else connected with the +case was quite sane and he just a little mad. Roberts—Mrs. +Endicott—the housekeeper—Hollander—Madame Velasquez. They all seemed a +little touched, and that was a sign of madness when one considered +everyone else but one’s self insane. But no one was ever truly normal +under disagreeable and terrifying circumstances; at least, he had +never found anyone who was so. + +The letters were meaningless as possible clues to a motive; just a +sticky conglomeration of lust, greed, dullness, and execrable taste. +He shoved them aside. + +He watched the strengthening light of day as it came through the +window across the desk before him. Such sky as he saw was of rubbed +emerald, and the backs of the houses across the intervening gardens +were mauve and dark gray, with lines of lemon yellow running thinly +along their roofs. + +He thought of _Bohême_—dawn always made him think of _Bohême_—and +hummed a bar or two of it softly. Then he thought of Mrs. Endicott, +and his thoughts were pastelled in the colours of the dawn: a woman of +half-tones and overlapping lacquer shades. + +It became quite clear in his mind that she never would have killed her +husband. Or Hollander. That, in fact, she never would have killed +anybody at all. The belief became fixed, even in face of the sizeable +amount of evidence against her. + +He reviewed her case, in digest, as the prosecuting attorney might +present it to a jury: from the very start there was that contrary fact +of her having telephoned for the police. Why? On the slender ground of +a pencilled note that might or might not have been a threat, and an +instinctive premonition that her husband was in danger. The +prosecution would thereupon interpolate a smart crack or two on the +general subject of premonitions, fortune tellings, and the Ace of +Spades. They would point out that people who committed crimes which +were bound to be shortly discovered occasionally got in touch with the +police in order to use the gesture as a premise of their innocence. + +There were her definite admissions of intent to kill her husband—her +having left her bedroom immediately upon his having knocked and said +good-bye—and her recent most damaging actions in regard to the +narcotic and having been on the balcony. + +Motive? + +The prosecuting attorney could offer a thousand. The most prominent +ones would include a jealous rage at her husband’s easily proved +peccadillos with other women and her own rather significant attitude +toward Hollander. Yes, it would be only too possible for the +prosecuting attorney to get a conviction against Mrs. Endicott, and to +rope Hollander in as an accomplice. He’d want the weapon, though, to +make the case complete. Lieutenant Valcour had forgotten about the +weapon. He stood up, went to the door, and opened it. Hansen was +standing outside, having taken his post there until Cassidy should +come back from letting out Dr. Worth and the nurses. + +“Hansen,” Lieutenant Valcour said, “I want you to search the backyard +for a revolver that may have been thrown there from the balcony. If +you can’t find it, search the two adjoining backyards, and the three +in the rear as well. Don’t wake up the people in the other houses, +just get a stepladder and cross the party walls.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +“Report to me as soon as you’ve finished, or find anything.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +Lieutenant Valcour closed the door again. The revolver would clinch +the case: Mrs. Endicott the principal, and Hollander the accomplice. +What a sweet bunch of muck it would be, too. There were all sorts of +sob angles: Hollander and Endicott as Damon and Pythias, brothers in +arms during the war who were transformed through the vicious caprice +of a siren into Cain and Abel. Or would Mrs. Endicott spatter the +tabloids as a woman wronged who had by a reversal of the usual +position of the sexes taken her just revenge beneath the legendary +cloak of the unwritten law? If her lawyers were smart, she would. And +they would be smart, too. She’d probably have the most impressive +battery of legal guns that were procurable in the state lined up on +her side. + +It wasn’t the gun only that Lieutenant Valcour wanted. There was +something else. Endicott’s hat: that was it. How did the person who +had been caught in the cupboard fit in with Endicott’s hat? The answer +came to him with the sudden clearness that will enlighten a problem +that the subconscious mind has been working on for some time. The hat +was the final touch to the person’s disguise. And the fact would +pre-suppose a woman. A man’s hat would add immeasurably to any +disguise adopted by a woman. + +But which woman? + +And why had his hat been in the cupboard? + +And still there was no answer to the baffling question as to what had +been the object of the search through Endicott’s pockets and his +papers. There was, of course, a perfectly plain and logically possible +solution: the object or paper, whatever it was, had been found and had +been carried off by the thief along with Endicott’s hat and the top +button from his overcoat. And if such were the case, just what that +object or paper was might never be known. + +For the fourth time since he had been sitting at the desk Lieutenant +Valcour sniffed the air. There was a faint trace of scent—a curiously +reminiscent odour—all but intangible, but which he was quite certain +he had encountered in some different locality at some time during the +night. It was only apparent when he sat at the desk, and the deduction +was reached without too much mental labour that it must, hence, +emanate from something connected with the desk. Perhaps that aperture +from which he had pulled the drawer—— + +The telephone rang sharply. He drew the instrument to him across the +top of the desk, and took the receiver from the hook. + +The call came, he was informed, from Central Office. + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +5:01 a. m.—Lunatic Vistas + +The report from Central Office which Lieutenant Valcour received over +the telephone contained one definitely useful piece of information: +the person who had used the comb and brushes belonging to Endicott had +been a blonde and was either a man or a woman with bobbed hair. + +And Mrs. Endicott, Lieutenant Valcour reflected as he hung up the +receiver, had blonde shingled hair. And so, except for the shingling, +did Hollander. + +Roberts, on the other hand, had not. + +And where, he wanted to know, was his inspiring confidence in the +innocence of Mrs. Endicott now? Precisely where it had been before. +His mind began to gibber. What _was_ that curious scent, that trace of +an aroma? What about Hollander’s roommate: the young Southerner who +preyed upon wealthy women in night clubs? Had Endicott evidence that +Hollander was mixed up in similar jobs, and had Hollander come to +steal it, or silence Endicott? Rats! And what were Marge Myles’s +address and telephone number doing in Mrs. Endicott’s personal +directory? And why had Mrs. Endicott been such a stupid liar as to say +she had seen no one on the balcony at the time when the shots were +fired, when the only apparent place from which the shot that had +killed Endicott could have been fired was the balcony? . . . A +knock-knock. + +“Come in,” he said. + +Cassidy opened the door. + +“There’s an old dame downstairs, Lieutenant, who insisted on coming +in. She wants to see you.” + +“Did she say who she was, Cassidy?” + +“She did. And you can believe it or not, sir, but her name is +Molasses.” + +Lieutenant Valcour made a desperate clutch at his scattering reason. + +“By all means, Cassidy,” he said, “show Mrs. Molasses right up.” + +Madame Velasquez, in the penetrating light of early morning, was +beyond words. The intervening hours since Lieutenant Valcour had left +her, wigless and talking to herself in her stepdaughter’s apartment, +had unquestionably been ones of worry. As she came into the room +Lieutenant Valcour motioned to Cassidy to wait outside and close the +corridor door. + +Over her black sequinned dress she had thrown an evening cape of blue +satin edged with marabou, and on her wig rested a picture hat trimmed +with plumes. Her eyes ignored the details of Endicott’s room, of +Endicott’s body stretched beneath the sheet; ignored everything but +Lieutenant Valcour, the man whom she had come to see. + +“Marge is dead,” she said. + +Her voice still retained the curious qualities that made it suggest a +scream. + +Lieutenant Valcour wearily closed his eyes. One other murder would +truly prove to be the straw with himself in the rôle of the already +overladen camel. + +“Sit down, Madame Velasquez,” he said, “and tell me how it happened.” + +Madame Velasquez spread billows of blue satin and marabou into an +armchair. + +“I don’t know how it happened,” she said. + +“Did you find her body in the apartment?” + +“There ain’t no body.” Madame Velasquez then added, as her brittle +little eyes glittered with a strange sort of conviction, “He made away +with it.” + +“Who did, Madame Velasquez?” + +“Herbert Endicott,” she said. + +For a startled moment Lieutenant Valcour stared sharply down curious +vistas: _had_ Endicott killed Marge Myles, perhaps having called for +her just after she had written that note to her mother? He brought +himself up shortly. Utter nonsense! Endicott was in this very room at +the time when Marge Myles must have been writing that note and was +himself in the process of being killed. + +“That isn’t possible, Madame Velasquez,” he said quietly. “Endicott +was himself attacked right here at about the time your stepdaughter +must have been writing that note to you. That was at seven last +evening—at the very moment he was to call for her at her apartment—and +it must have been a little after seven when she wrote, as she states +in the note that he hadn’t come.” + +“No matter”—her beringed fingers fluttered extravagantly—“I feel +certain he did it, and I want him punished and caught.” + +“But Mr. Endicott is dead, Madame Velasquez.” + +“That’s what _you_ say,” she said. + +Was he really, Lieutenant Valcour wondered, going mad? There seemed +such terribly disturbing possibilities of fact in every absurd aspect +on the case the woman facing him opened up. Who, after all, _had_ +identified Endicott? His wife, and that only by implication; his +friend Hollander, again by implication; Roberts had seen the dead +man’s face, but she, in common with all the world, was mad; Dr. +Worth—what proof was there that Dr. Worth _was_ Dr. Worth, or that the +telephone number given him by Mrs. Endicott had been Dr. Worth’s? It +could all have been arranged by some clever mob. . . . + +“This is folly,” he said abruptly, really more to convince himself +than the nutlike face peering at him from the armchair. What he needed +was sleep—just a couple of hours of good sleep. “Madame Velasquez, +that body on the bed is Herbert Endicott. Now tell me as lucidly as +you can, please, just why you say that Marge is dead.” + +Her little eyes began to glitter with rage. “I believe she has killed +herself to spite me.” The knotted paste jewels on her thin fingers +quivered indignantly. “She did it to make me suffer,” she added, “to +_stint_ me.” + +“Just so she wouldn’t have to give you any more money,” he suggested. + +Madame Velasquez began to weep noisily. “What’ll I do, Lieutenant—oh, +what _will_ I do?” + +He continued to regard her through lazy eyes. + +“Can’t you find somebody else to take her place?” he said. “Somebody +else to blackmail?” + +“I ain’t young. It’s too _late_.” + +“Tut, tut, Madame Velasquez.” + +“No, I ain’t. And unless it’s a case like Marge’s was, such rackets +take looks.” + +“But surely such an intelligent and charming woman as you, Madame +Velasquez”—he unearthed a trowel and laid it on pretty thick—“a woman +of the world, surely you can think up other cases where the evidence +or proof can be faked. You know very well that you never had any real +or visible proof that Marge killed her husband in that canoe disaster, +now, don’t you?” + +“I did, too, Lieutenant.” + +“Nonsense. If you really did, you’d have it with you and would show it +to me.” + +She nibbled the bait slyly and refused it. + +“I wouldn’t, and I haven’t. And,” she said, “I want proof of that +trollop’s death. I’ll get it if I have to drag the river myself.” + +Madame Velasquez jumped up and ran nervously to the door. + +“Then you saw her drown herself, Madame Velasquez?” + +“I saw nothing, but I know—I know—what must have been . . .” + +She was out in the corridor and running for the stairs—a velvet virago +in blue. Lieutenant Valcour ran out after her, and saw that Cassidy +was blocking her way. + +“Ring up the wagon, Cassidy, and have her booked as a material +witness.” + +Madame Velasquez began to screech. “Don’t touch me. Keep your dirty +hands off me.” + +“Take her downstairs, Cassidy. After you’ve arranged for the wagon +leave her with O’Brian. Then go up to the housekeeper’s room and ask +Mrs. Siddons if she’ll come down. I’ll see her in Endicott’s room.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +Lieutenant Valcour slowly retraced his steps. When he was again in +Endicott’s room and the door shut, he felt a strong recurrence of that +annoying sense of some hovering danger. He even shivered a little as +if at some draught of cold air and glanced hastily at the windows. + +But both were closed. + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + +5:25 a. m.—There Was a Sailor + +Mrs. Siddons had not gone to bed at all. She remained the same amazing +pencil done in flat planes of black that had left him standing with +his ear pressed against the panels of her bedroom door. + +Lieutenant Valcour was acutely interested in her attitude toward +Endicott’s body. Her glance, the instant she entered the room, had +flown to it surely and accurately. There was no sorrow, no horror or +fear of the dead in that glance. It was wholly one of triumph, the +satisfied gazing of some revenge that was removed from petty +commonplaces. Mirrored in its satisfaction were avenging hell fires, +tormenting presumably the black and wicked soul of what had been a +very black and wicked Endicott. After that single initial glance she +did not look toward the bed again, but came over and sat with +extraordinary rigidity on the edge of a chair from where she could +stare out of the window at the clear morning light of the winter’s +day. + +“Several hours ago, Mrs. Siddons,” Lieutenant Valcour said abruptly, +“you spoke with considerable bitterness about Mr. Endicott’s attitude +toward the servants. I shan’t embarrass you by asking for any +information in detail. There are only one or two things that I want to +know—— Are you listening to me, please?” + +She dragged her eyes from the daylight, from the white misty air from +which she had been gathering in her thoughts the happy flowers of a +seed long bedded in hate. + +“I am listening,” she said. + +“Then the first thing I want to know is this: was there any one +particular instance in which Mr. Endicott’s actions toward one of the +servants were especially brutal or resented?” + +The coals began to glow faintly beneath the ash that dusted her eyes. + +“There was one very particular instance, Lieutenant.” + +“Recently, Mrs. Siddons?” + +“It occurred about a year ago, almost to a day.” + +“Did Mr. Endicott attack her?” + +“Yes.” + +“Here in the house?” + +“No, Lieutenant. It happened on her afternoon and evening out. Mr. +Endicott’s car was parked outside at the curb. He offered her a ride.” + +“Where is this girl now, Mrs. Siddons?” + +“She was committed last year to an institution for the insane.” + +The ash was completely gone now, and her eyes blazed with avenging +fires. + +“But surely she brought charges, Mrs. Siddons?” + +“She was insane when they found her, Lieutenant. She was trying to die +by throwing herself in front of a motor in Central Park. She has never +spoken lucidly since.” + +Lieutenant Valcour shrugged hopelessly. There it was again: that +wretched wave of hearsay showing its baffling crest above the placid +sea of established fact. Rumour had had it that Marge Myles had killed +her husband; rumour now would have it about all sorts of terrible +implications concerning Endicott, who was dead, and a girl who was +confined in an insane asylum. And neither, obviously, could give +direct testimony in accusation or defense. + +“What was Mr. Endicott’s story?” he said. + +“That he had driven her to Macy’s, where she wanted to buy something, +and had left her there.” + +And why not? Undoubtedly Endicott had been the blackest sort of a +sheep, but the case was valueless without a thousand illuminative +lights, without a whole medical history of the girl’s family, for +example. + +“Did you know this girl fairly well, Mrs. Siddons?” + +“Yes. It is my habit to know all of the girls in my charge here very +well. It is my duty, as I see it, to act not only as a housekeeper, +but as their religious mentor and guide.” + +“Then in the case of this girl, had she ever previously shown any +symptoms of being mentally unbalanced?” + +“There were times when I thought so, yes. Her family, you see, was not +free from the taint. Her grandmother, on her mother’s side, had been +insane. That is what made Mr. Endicott’s actions so peculiarly +detestable, sir. She might have continued to live a normal, useful, +happy life had he not shocked her so fatally.” + +And on the other hand, Lieutenant Valcour decided, Endicott need not +necessarily have done anything remotely of the sort. With such a +direct strain of insanity inherent in her blood no outside agency +whatever might have been needed to awaken it into activity. And then, +he reminded himself, the girl had been shopping. He often wondered why +more women didn’t go mad while shopping. + +“Had Mr. Endicott any alibi for the period between the time he left +her at Macy’s and came home?” + +“No, Lieutenant. He said he had driven out a ways on Long Island along +the Motor Parkway and then had come back.” + +“So nothing was done about the matter officially?” + +“There was nothing to do.” + +“Then the only substantiated fact in the story is that she was seen +getting into Mr. Endicott’s car in front of this house. I suppose +someone did see her?” + +“Yes.” + +“Who?” + +“Mrs. Endicott saw her, Lieutenant.” + +There was distinct food for thought in that. No matter how far flung +the tangents in the case appeared to be, they touched as a common +circumference the enveloping influence of Mrs. Endicott. + +“Is this girl still confined at the institution, Mrs. Siddons?” + +“I don’t know. There has been nothing said—no communication.” + +“What was the colour of her hair, Mrs. Siddons?” + +“Black—the deepest, prettiest black I ever saw. They say that +opposites are attracted to one another, and it was so in her case.” + +“What do you mean by that?” + +“Her husband was a blond.” + +Lieutenant Valcour caught his breath sharply. It fitted surprisingly +well—the motive—the crime—the fact that the girl might have retained +her key to the servants’ entrance and her husband have got hold of it. +And her husband would readily enough have believed the talk about his +wife and Endicott—husbands had a habit of doing just that. To the +man’s way of thinking, it wouldn’t have been anything so ephemeral as +a maternal grandmother who had driven his wife insane: it would have +been Endicott. + +Madame Velasquez’s innuendoes against the true identity of anybody +came back to Lieutenant Valcour with annoying force. What about +Hollander? Hollander was a blond, and obviously of a different level +in education and position than the Endicotts. And who had identified +Hollander? Nobody. Endicott and his wife were the only two in the +house who could, and Endicott was dead, and Mrs. Endicott had not seen +Hollander at all, if her unbelievable statement were true: that she +had not gone out onto the balcony and along it to the window from +where the shot had been fired. + +Suppose the man who had sat with Endicott had just been posing as +Hollander but had been, in reality, the husband of this unfortunate +girl. Suppose he had been waiting outside for an opportunity to +reënter the house, had waylaid Hollander and forced his errand from +him, had taken his driver’s licence and cards from him and had shown +them to O’Brian at the door to gain admittance. . . . + +No—there still arose that fundamental question: what had the attacker +been searching for among Endicott’s papers? This girl’s husband surely +would have nothing for which to search, unless it would be for +problematic evidence of his wife’s infidelity, and that theory was +pretty thin. . . . + +“What became of this girl’s husband, Mrs. Siddons?” + +“He is a sailor on merchant vessels.” Her gesture vaguely encompassed +the Seven Seas. “Where he is, or when, is as indeterminate as wind and +tide.” + +Lieutenant Valcour did not molest her extravagance. He refrained from +pointing out that few things were determined quite so accurately, +nowadays, as the tides or, for the matter of that, the winds +themselves. He stood up. + +“Thank you, Mrs. Siddons.” + +“Shall I go?” + +“If you will be so kind. Later, perhaps, we will go into greater +details concerning this poor girl’s husband.” + +Mrs. Siddons feasted her eyes for one parting, blinding instinct on +the bed. She stopped at the door and said, “You will never get them +from me, Lieutenant. And I am the only person who knows; who even +knows that she was married at all. She confided in me, and if it was +her husband who did this thing you will never drag his name from my +lips even if my silence should mean——” Her eyes became clouded and her +thoughts confused. She wanted to say something magnificent, something +splendidly fitting to the occasion which she interpreted quite +sincerely as a divine act on the part of God, with that poor, frail +little Maizie’s husband as His instrument on earth. Even if her +silence were to mean what? The words wouldn’t form. They rattled +around in her tired head meaninglessly: bar of justice—herself in the +dock—oh, it was cruel—life was cruel, and living was crueler still. +Only death was kind, sleep and peace beneath the shelter of His sweet +omnipotence. She stumbled a little as she crossed the threshold and +made her way, sobbing futilely, back upstairs. + + + +CHAPTER XXVII + +5:46 a. m.—Mrs. Endicott Cannot Be Found + +Lieutenant Valcour stepped across the corridor and rapped on the door +of Mrs. Endicott’s room. There was no response. He rapped again, and +still there was no response. He turned the knob and the door swung +inward. + +The room was empty. + +He closed the door and called to Cassidy, who was at the other end of +the corridor. + +“Sir?” said Cassidy, when he had joined him. + +“You’ve been out here all the while, haven’t you, Cassidy?” + +“Except when I went upstairs to get the housekeeper, sir.” + +“That’s right, you did. Come inside here for a minute with me. There +are some questions I want to ask you.” + +They went into Endicott’s room. + +“Sure, it’s good to see the daylight again, Lieutenant. Will we be +cleared up here soon?” + +“I have a feeling that we’ll be finished pretty soon now. Tell me, +Cassidy, was it you or Hansen fired first at Hollander?” + +“Lieutenant, Hansen and I have been disputing that very point. We all +but came to blows over it, we did.” + +“Why so?” + +“Because I claim it was him who fired the first shot, and he still has +the audacity to say it was me who not only shot first, but shot two +times before he so much as pulled the trigger.” + +“That,” said Lieutenant Valcour, “is exactly what I wanted to know. +You were both right and both wrong.” + +“Now, how can that be, Lieutenant?” + +“Neither of you fired the first shot, because it was fired by the +murderer over there at the window. You heard it, and thought Hansen +had fired. Hansen heard it, and then heard your following shot, and +thought that you had fired twice.” + +“That must have been it at that, Lieutenant.” + +“It was. The second thing I wanted to ask you about is Mrs. Endicott. +She isn’t in her room. Have you seen her about the corridor, or +anywhere else?” + +“No, sir.” + +“Then go and look her up. Ask the men downstairs if they’ve seen her, +and if they haven’t, look through the rooms on this floor and up +above. When you do come across her, ask her if she will please come in +here and see me.” + +“Yes, Lieutenant.” + +Cassidy went out and closed the door. + +Lieutenant Valcour was beginning to feel very, very tired. He yawned +elaborately, stared out of the window for a minute or two, and then +sat down again at the desk. There was something that he had intended +to do there when he had been interrupted by the arrival of Madame +Velasquez. + +What was it? + +It wasn’t connected with that wretched premonition of danger which was +nagging at him with increasing insistence. But it was something just +as intangible . . . + +Elusive as a shadow . . . + +Yes, that was it—the thing that he had forgotten: he had intended to +trace to its source that faint scent which was so curiously +reminiscent of some place—some thing. It had come, he remembered, from +the aperture from which he had taken the drawer. He shoved a hand +inside and felt around. Wedged far in the back was a crumpled letter +written on heavy notepaper. He pulled it out, and the scent became +more penetrating. + +It came back to him quite clearly now. It was the same perfume that +had drenched the note left by Marge for Madame Velasquez up at the +apartment. He took the letter from its envelope, smoothed it, and then +turned to the signature. Yes, it was signed “Marge.” + +A knock on the hall door interrupted him, and he placed the letter on +the desk. Hansen came in. + +“Yes, Hansen?” + +“I have searched all the yards you told me to, sir.” + +“Well?” + +“There wasn’t any gun, Lieutenant, that I could see.” + +“Did you look through all the shrubbery? There are some evergreens +down there that I noticed.” + +“Yes, sir, I looked through and beneath every one of them.” + +“All right, Hansen.” Lieutenant Valcour studied the young man facing +him for a curious moment. “You were at sea for a while, weren’t you?” + +“Yes, sir. I was with the navy during the war, and after that on +merchant ships for a year or two.” + +“Would it be possible for a sailor to climb up onto the balcony +outside this window from the garden?” + +“I couldn’t say offhand, Lieutenant. I didn’t notice much about the +balcony when I was down there.” + +“Then go down again and see what you think. Let me know whether it +would be an easy job, difficult, or impossible.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +Hansen went out, and Lieutenant Valcour had barely returned his +attention to the letter from Marge Myles when there was another +rapping on the door. This time it was Cassidy who came in. Lieutenant +Valcour dropped the letter back upon the desk and turned to him. + +“Did you find Mrs. Endicott all right, Cassidy?” + +“No, sir, I didn’t.” + +Lieutenant Valcour felt strangely disturbed. He had half expected +Cassidy to answer in just that way; the denial was nothing more than a +fulfilment of the curious premonitions he had been experiencing of +some subtle danger. + +“Did you look in all the rooms?” + +“Yes, sir.” + +“Question anybody?” + +“Everybody, Lieutenant. There’s no one has seen hide nor hair of her.” + +“How about the men at the doors?” + +“Each one was at his post, sir. She didn’t go out.” + +“Then in that case,” said Lieutenant Valcour, “she must still be in.” + +The thought was both a bromide and a consolation. Nowadays, Lieutenant +Valcour assured himself, people didn’t vanish into thin air; it just +wasn’t being done. While concentrating in his mind as to the possible +whereabouts of the unfindable Mrs. Endicott, his hands were +mechanically placing the piles of letters he had assorted back into +the empty drawer. He had shoved the letter from Marge Myles carefully +to one side. Any reading of it would have to come later, after he had +hit upon some logical explanation for this sudden move on the part of +Mrs. Endicott. + +“He must have been some stepper, Lieutenant,” Cassidy said, eyeing +with interest one disappearing pack of pink envelopes. + +“Quite a stepper, Cassidy.” . . . Where _could_ she hide? And why +should she? . . . + +“Each one of them piles from some dame?” + +“That’s right, Cassidy—each one from some dame.” . . . She wanted to +get out of the house, one could be pretty sure of that, and go to the +hospital to see Hollander. But how could she have got past the men at +the doors? She couldn’t. . . . + +“It certainly does beat hell what some guys can get away with, +Lieutenant.” + +“But it never does beat hell, Cassidy.” . . . And Hansen had been out +around the backyards, even supposing she had attempted anything so +unbelievable as to scale fences. That was absurd. . . . + +“It ain’t all a matter of looks, exactly—no, nor money, either.” +Cassidy’s glance toward the bed was but half complimentary. “I’ve run +with lads that was one step this side of being human monkeys, but +could they pick them? I’ll say. They had sex appeal. How about it, +Lieutenant?” + +“Undoubtedly, Cassidy.” . . . As for the roof, it was peaked and +offered no passage to the roofs of the adjoining houses. One couldn’t +picture her, in any case, scrambling over roofs any more than one +could believe that she would scramble over fences. . . . + +“And the worst of it is with these bimbos that have it, they ain’t +ever satisfied.” + +“No one is ever satisfied, Cassidy.” . . . There might be a way to the +roof at that, from the attic . . . attic . . . + +“Not ever with anything, Lieutenant?” + +“Not really ever with anything.” . . . Attic . . . and that curious +look that one had had to interpret as exaltation. It couldn’t be +possible, but still—— “Stay right here, Cassidy!” + +Cassidy gave a nervous jump. The words were sparks from flint striking +steel. Lieutenant Valcour’s sudden spurt of speed as he rushed toward +the door was surprising. + +A possible solution to Mrs. Endicott’s absence had just come to him +with rather horrible clearness. + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII + +6:00 a. m.—Mist Drifting Through Mist + +Lieutenant Valcour was out of the door in no time and racing along the +corridor up the stairs to the floor above. Somewhere—somewhere was the +entrance to the stairs leading farther up to the attic. Ah!—softly +now, quietly, not to disturb or shock. Thank God the treads were firm +and didn’t creak. . . . + +There was a window in the attic, at the garden end of its peak, not a +large window, but big enough to permit the cold white light of morning +to illumine the place grayly. + +Mrs. Endicott’s back was toward him, her face toward that window, and +the light from it blurred softly about her silhouette of darkness. She +had upended the trunk she was standing on, and it had placed her hands +within convenient reach of the rafter about which she had fastened one +end of a short rope. Its other end was coiled in a running noose about +her neck. + +Lieutenant Valcour measured the distance between where he stood at the +top of the stairs and the trunk. He could never make it. Some board +would creak. And yet, if he cried out, or spoke, if he failed in the +proper choice of a word—in fact, the least thing that startled her +would destroy her almost calm stance of fatalistic poise. + +He took a penknife from his pocket and, slitting the laces of his +shoes, removed them. Thank God her back was toward him, and the window +was there with its square of light cut clearly in muffled grays—its +light with which she seemed to be holding some private service of +communion—that inevitable farewell with earth indulged in by each +wretched soul before exchanging its conscious lonesomeness for the +obscure and problematic company of the damned. . . . + +He was very near her now, himself a mist drifting softly through +mist. . . . + +Whispering—whispering—he could hear her whispering—a thin flow of +meaning rather than of words, sent from the grayness to that light +beyond—sent through a little measured casement out into the +immeasurable brilliance of eternity. Her hands were resting easily by +her side; her body relaxed more and more peacefully in repose. + +“. . . and if you’re there, Tom darling, and Herbert, too . . .” + +He could leap forward now and catch her if it were necessary, but +better be safe, quite safe. + +“. . . it won’t be heaven, dear. They have no room for such as you and +me in heaven. But when you come——” + +His arms closed gently about her, and her body seemed to stiffen into +steel. She relaxed at once, and then stared down at him incuriously. +She removed the noose from about her neck as casually as she might +have taken off a hat. He lifted her to the floor. + +“There isn’t any hurry,” she said. + +He knew that she was hinting definitely at the future, when he and the +law were finished with her and she would be free to book her passage +for eternity again without supervision or restraint. + +“No hurry, Mrs. Endicott; nor any need, now.” + +The “now” dragged her sharply from the mists. She stared at him with +penetrating interest. + +“Mr. Hollander,” he said, “will undoubtedly recover.” + +“Yes?” + +The word was clipped from some inner store of ice. + +“Doesn’t that alter the surface of things, Mrs. Endicott—of your +intention?” + +“Why should it, Lieutenant?” + +“I am sorry that you choose to continue evasive.” + +“I’m not. It is you who see things, read things in people that are +never there.” + +“That isn’t true, Mrs. Endicott.” + +“What is there further that you wish to know?” + +There was no compromise, no yielding, and the hardness in her voice +was very definite. She looked almost extravagantly capable, too, in +the smart dark dress she had put on. She was, Lieutenant Valcour +reflected, one of those rare women who always “look their best” no +matter what the time is or the situation; who make a point of looking +so even when quite alone, and especially so, he added, when committing +suicide. But he was not deceived by her hardness. There were invisible +forces working within her, still stirred into turmoil by that +impressive emotional ladder she must have so recently climbed in order +to arrive at the decision to take her own life. If he were ever to +understand this complex woman he felt that he must do so now, while he +and she stood where they were in their private world—a tight little +sphere of shadows sifted with mists of sunlit dust—and before they +descended the attic stairs to the routined environment of daily +living. He decided to attempt to lead her by certain matter-of-fact +paths that would end in quicksands. + +“Why did you have the address of Marge Myles in your directory, Mrs. +Endicott?” + +She answered with the mechanical patience of an elder explaining some +academic problem to a child. + +“It was necessary to take her into account. As I have already told +you, she possessed a certain standing—enough of a one to differentiate +her from the other women whom my husband picked up promiscuously—and +the time might have come when I felt it advisable to get rid of her. +Not murder—you’re too intelligent to misunderstand me—there are +several ways one woman can get rid of another woman that are just as +effective.” + +“Which one did you employ, Mrs. Endicott?” + +“It wasn’t especially nice, but I wasn’t dealing with a nice woman. I +employed forgery.” + +This caught Lieutenant Valcour a little unprepared. + +“Forgery?” + +“Yes. I added a postscript to a letter Harry Myles had sent me before +he married Marge. Harry never dated his letters. This one was harmless +enough, but there was a reference in it to the camp he owned by that +lake up in Maine. The postscript that I added changed the whole +character of the letter. It made it apparent that Harry very +definitely feared Marge was planning to murder him. I gave that letter +to Herbert about a month ago, when it seemed that his interest in +Marge was becoming dangerously serious.” + +“Didn’t he ask you why you hadn’t produced it before?” + +“Yes. I explained that I had just come across it in an old letter file +that hadn’t been gone through for years. I asked him whether it was +too late to do anything about it—show the letter to some proper +authority, for instance. Of course I knew what he would say.” + +“That it was too late?” + +“Yes.” + +“But didn’t he also ask you why you hadn’t said something about the +letter at the time of Harry Myles’s death?” + +“I pointed out that we were in Europe at that time and didn’t hear the +news until many months later, when we got back. By then the letter had +escaped my mind.” + +“And did your action influence your husband’s feeling toward Marge +Myles?” + +“It was beginning to. Things like that work slowly; they keep breeding +in the mind until they become effective.” + +She had missed, he decided, her century. When the Medicis were in +flower she, too, would have bloomed her best. + +“Mrs. Endicott, what was your real reason for sending for the police +last night?” + +“I can explain that better by accounting for my movements between the +time that Herbert knocked on the door to say good-bye and you arrived. +Will that satisfy you?” + +“I hope so, Mrs. Endicott.” + +“I shan’t lie to you, Lieutenant. I shall tell you the exact truth. +Roberts was in the room with me, fixing some disorder in my dress. I +left the room shortly after and started down the corridor for the +sitting room. Mrs. Siddons, my housekeeper—I don’t know whether you’ve +met her or not?” + +“Yes, Mrs. Endicott.” + +“She was standing at the foot of the stairs leading to the floor +above. She said she had something to tell me, and we went into the +sitting room.” + +“That was just after seven o’clock?” + +“Five minutes—ten—yes. Mrs. Siddons brought up the subject of a +particularly despicable affair that my husband was involved in with +one of our maids over a year ago. Shall I go into it?” + +“It isn’t necessary, Mrs. Endicott.” + +“The maid was married. Her husband was a sailor.” Mrs. Endicott paused +for a moment, and seemed to be sorting in her mind which facts she +cared to present and which, in spite of her recent avowal of candour, +she preferred to hold in reserve. “You have probably noticed, +Lieutenant, that Mrs. Siddons is an abnormal woman. She is the most +striking example of the religious-fanatic type that I have ever met. +Her life is literally built upon the composite foundation of faith and +duty which she believes all mankind owes to God. Her belief in direct +punishment visited by God on earthly sinners is a fixed idea. And last +night in my sitting room she told me that God was going to strike my +husband and that His instrument would be the husband of that maid whom +Herbert had injured.” + +“But if that was an act which she so obviously desired to see +consummated, Mrs. Endicott, why did she warn you—anybody—about it in +advance?” + +“Religious fanatics, Lieutenant, scorn the idea that human agency can +interfere with the workings of any divine plan. Things, for them, are +ordained and are supposed to happen just exactly as they are +ordained.” + +“But why did she warn you?” + +“She came to tell me about it, she said, in order that I might be +prepared for the shock. She has always sympathized inordinately with +me over what she terms Herbert’s ungodly actions. I asked her, +naturally, to be more explicit, and I finally forced the admission +from her that she had seen, or else believed that she had seen, the +maid’s husband that afternoon loitering about the street in front of +the house. She went upstairs, then, to her own quarters. It seemed +absurd.” + +“Then it began to prey upon you?” + +“Indirectly.” + +“How?” + +“In its possible relation to something else.” + +Lieutenant Valcour became intuitive. + +“You are wondering now,” he said, “whether or not you ought to tell me +all about the tea.” + +“How did you establish the connection?” + +“Between your having tea with Mr. Hollander yesterday afternoon and +Mrs. Siddons’s story?” + +“Yes.” + +“It’s rather simple, isn’t it?” + +“Is it?” + +“Yes, Mrs. Endicott, I think it is. You won’t deny, will you, that you +very definitely impressed on Mr. Hollander that your determination to +‘end it all’ either by committing suicide or killing your husband was +sincere? Mr. Hollander _was_ the confidant for your secret confusions, +sort of a proving ground for reactions. I’ve already substantiated +that theory, both through Mr. Hollander himself and his friend.” + +“No, I won’t deny it.” + +“And you believed that he would do something to prevent you from +accomplishing your purpose.” + +“I suppose I did.” + +“And in your naturally upset state of mind last evening Mrs. Siddons’s +curious prophecy concerning the maid’s husband taking his revenge made +more of a genuine impression upon you than you cared to admit. You +were subconsciously afraid that something _would_ happen—that the +sailor might really injure or kill your husband, and that Mr. +Hollander, when the police investigated, would somehow become +involved. There was even a possibility that worshipping you as he +does, when he heard of your husband’s murder he might give himself up +to the police and offer a false confession in order to shield you. It +has often been done, you know.” + +“You are right, Lieutenant. I did think exactly that. The muddle of +the whole thing began to drive me crazy during dinner. I went down at +seven-thirty and ate nothing. I don’t think I stayed at the table for +more than five minutes. I went upstairs and into Herbert’s room, +looking for something. I really don’t know what—unless it was for some +sort of physical confirmation of his aliveness by the things he owned. +Then I saw that note on his desk. I hadn’t the shred of a nerve left +by then, and the note genuinely worried me. It was such a direct +confirmation of Mrs. Siddons’s story. I wasn’t exactly panicky, but I +felt as if things had got out of hand. I tried to reach Mr. Hollander +by telephone, but he wasn’t in his apartment. I began to picture +converging forces: himself—the maid’s husband—and Herbert as a focal +point. I felt that something had to be done. Well, I telephoned the +police.” + +“Why didn’t you tell me about the maid and her husband when I came, +Mrs. Endicott?” + +“It isn’t the sort of thing one would plunge into directly.” + +“You would have told me in time, then?” + +“Certainly.” + +“And why,” he asked quietly, “did you try to direct my suspicions +against Marge Myles when, in view of your special knowledge, that +maid’s husband was the logical suspect? That’s a little inconsistent, +isn’t it?” + +She looked at him evenly. + +“Do you always do precisely the proper thing at the proper moment?” + +“Rarely ever, Mrs. Endicott.” + +“Well, neither do I. I don’t think anybody does.” + +She adopted again that patient, explanatory precision of the teacher. +“A person’s actions or statements during any moment of great strain +are dominated by that moment itself, rather than being any sane +reflection of logical and contributory causes. At such times one +clings to straws.” + +“Marge Myles was a straw?” + +Mrs. Endicott shrugged. “Herbert had gone, as I supposed, to see her. +I believed that whatever happened to him would occur between this +house and her apartment, or at some moment during the evening while +they were together. I’m not claiming that there was any sense to my +beliefs. I wasn’t feeling exactly sensible just then.” + +“And you would have been quite willing to have Marge Myles blamed for +anything that happened rather than either the sailor or Mr. +Hollander?” + +“Oh, quite.” + +It was very convincing—her willingness, that is. As for her +credibility, Lieutenant Valcour retained reservations. He started +along another divergence. + +“Why have you kept Roberts so long in your employ, Mrs. Endicott, when +you must have known how deeply she hates you?” + +Mrs. Endicott smiled with frank amusement. + +“You’ve never kept a maid, have you, Lieutenant?” + +“Hardly.” + +“Then you can’t appreciate fully what I mean when I say that Roberts +is a good maid. What earthly difference does it make whether she hates +or loves me? I’m hiring her services, not her emotions, and her +services are excellent. I’ve frequently wished that someone in my +successive chain of cooks would develop a similar passion. There’s +something so binding about it.” + +He felt that she was escaping him again, that her armour was swiftly +undergoing repair. In the brightening light her face shone clearer. +She didn’t seem quite such an enigma, after all. Nothing ever was, he +reflected, truly enigmatic in daytime. It was just a tired face, +wearied by any number of things other than the lack of sleep. + +“I wish you would trust me, Mrs. Endicott,” he said. “I’m not a bad +sort, really, and I’m not trying to trap you into admissions that +would prove injurious to yourself. There are still confusions that +have to be straightened out. I have been assured by Mr. Hollander that +you were devoted to your husband. You personally imply that your +interest in Mr. Hollander is purely that of a friend, and yet you +address him in your notes as ‘Tom, darling.’ And there isn’t any +question but that he worships you. The situation doesn’t fall under +the heading of the eternal triangle. It’s a hub, rather, from which +radiate several broken and uneven spokes.” + +“Broken spokes.” The phrase appealed to her in a tragic sense +inordinately out of keeping with its flavour of triteness. But then—he +had said so to her before, ages ago—the trite things were the true +things. And that’s just what Tom and Herbert and herself were. And the +hub? Passion, she supposed, or perhaps a composite illusion of all the +various derivatives of love. + +“It’s hard to resolve human feelings into the simplicity of A B C’s,” +she said. “I can’t just say I loved Herbert because I was married to +him and because he was the first person I ever loved, or that no +matter how many other people there may be later in my life I will +always return to him in my heart, just because he _was_ the first +person whom I loved, and expect you to understand.” She brushed with +elementary strokes through fog in her effort to be explicit. “I love +Tom Hollander, too, just as much as I loved Herbert. It isn’t nice, +but it’s the truth. Love isn’t a unit, a single emotion tightly +wrapped up in one word. It’s a hundred feelings and desires and any +number of little human hurts that are longing to be made well again.” +A certain bitterness crept into her manner: a bitterness of revolt. +“The whole wretched business is too stylized. It’s quite all right to +love your father and your mother equally; in fact, it’s held wrong not +to—exactly fifty per cent. of your parental love must go to each. +Brotherly love must also be reduced to proportionate fractions. The +love for one’s neighbours is presumably scattered into legion. But if +a woman announced that this otherwise divisible quality is spent upon +more than one single man——” + +Her laughter wasn’t very pleasant to hear. Lieutenant Valcour felt a +little upset; there was something disturbingly reasonable in her +attitude. Was it pure sophistry? Not really. There was a strong +element of fact and truth running through it all. It was useless to +parade before her the different _clichés_ of what any universal +acceptance of her implied philosophy would do to society. He imagined +rather accurately the treatment she would hand out to them. And like +most people who had got what they wanted, he didn’t know even faintly +what to do with it. He couldn’t come out flatly and ask her if she was +planning to marry Hollander, and apart from the insight it gave him +into her character there hadn’t been any special advancement toward a +definite solution of the problem of who _did_ kill her husband, and +for what motive. Lieutenant Valcour began to feel that it was he who +had landed in the quicksands rather than herself. + +“You have been very patient with me, Mrs. Endicott, and very kind. To +an extent I am beginning to understand you. We have arrived again, but +perhaps with a surer footing this time, at our stumbling block. Before +we attack it, I wonder if you cannot think of any reason why your +husband should have joined you up here in the attic when he found you +here yesterday afternoon.” + +Mrs. Endicott was still too drugged with abstracts to attend very +kindly to the mechanics of detailed fact. + +“Well,” she said, “it wasn’t to commit suicide. That leaves your other +nine tenths, doesn’t it?” + +“You mean that he must have been just looking for something?” + +“There’s hardly any other plausible explanation.” + +“But does he keep things up here?” + +“He may have. This is his trunk.” + +She moved off toward the window, disinterested in anything further +that he might care to do. A complete lassitude drenched her, and she +sunned it negligently in the light sifting down through dusty panes. + +Lieutenant Valcour righted the upended trunk and raised its lid. There +were some papers lying loosely in its upper tray. He studied them +curiously until he came across a certain one that caused him to draw +his breath in sharply. He folded the paper and put it in his pocket. +Then he closed the trunk. His manner, as he approached Mrs. Endicott, +was implacably stern. + +“I want you to tell me,” he said, “just where about this house you +have hidden Marge Myles.” + + + +CHAPTER XXIX + +6:30 a. m.—As Is Mirage + +Mrs. Endicott stared sharply at Lieutenant Valcour. She was suddenly +tensely alert. + +“I think,” she said, “that you have gone mad.” + +“Do you still maintain the pretence that when you were on the sill of +your window and looking toward your husband’s room you saw nobody on +the balcony?” + +“There is no reason why I should alter the truth.” + +“I shall be as patient with you, Mrs. Endicott, as you have just been +with me. Listen carefully to me, please, and I will tell you why it is +I believe Marge Myles killed your husband, and why I think you have +given her sanctuary after the crime by concealing her some place +within this house.” + +“I’ve no alternative but to listen, Lieutenant. But you are +wrong—absurdly wrong.” + +“We will start with the initial premise, Mrs. Endicott, that Marge +_did_ murder Harry Myles in that canoe episode on the lake. I know +that she has been paying blackmail to her stepmother, Madame +Velasquez, for a long while, probably since the time of the crime +itself. Well, a woman of her type doesn’t pay hush money easily; she +makes very certain, first, that the blackmailer really has the goods +on her. Which made it simple for your husband.” + +“Herbert? Are you suggesting the fantastic idea that Herbert was +trying to blackmail her?” + +“People are blackmailed into giving up more things than money, Mrs. +Endicott. I’m not suggesting that your husband was after money, but I +do suggest that to further some abortive purpose Mr. Endicott held the +postscript forgery that you made over Marge Myles’s head as a threat. +I have just found that letter in his trunk, and it is now in my +pocket.” + +“Abortive purpose—— Don’t go on just for a moment, please—I’m trying +to make it fit.” + +“It’s something along the lines of cruelty that I’m suggesting—some +special cruelty.” + +“Perhaps. Herbert liked to see things squirm. He was subconsciously +sadistic.” + +“He probably drove her pretty far, because she made up her mind to get +that letter—he undoubtedly greatly magnified its importance as +evidence to her—no matter at what risk to herself. I don’t really +believe that when she came here last night she had any intention at +all of actually killing your husband. What she wanted was that letter. +Did you let her into the house, Mrs. Endicott?” + +Mrs. Endicott smiled a bit acidly and kept her lips tightly +compressed. + +“Because if you didn’t,” Lieutenant Valcour went on, “she must have +stolen a key from your husband. At any rate, she was in the house here +and searching for the letter in Mr. Endicott’s room sometime around +seven last night. Mr. Endicott should have been miles away up at her +apartment, according to appointment, and leaving her a clear field. +She had planned the whole thing out pretty carefully, because she left +a note for Madame Velasquez, who was due to arrive at the apartment +for a visit last night. Marge implied in the note that it had been +written after seven when, as a matter of fact, it must have been +written considerably earlier and planted in the apartment either as an +alibi or as an explanation to Mr. Endicott of her absence. It would +certainly have sent him hurrying off to the Colonial in search of her. +It wasn’t successful, of course, as he was undoubtedly delayed because +of the quarrel he had with you, and was here in the house instead of +up at her apartment as she had expected he would be. Don’t you see +that it rather all fits in?” + +“Quite. But I still fail to understand what possible connection it can +have with me.” + +“It has every connection with you, Mrs. Endicott, because unless we +can prove that Marge Myles fired the shot this morning that killed +your husband it will be unpleasantly necessary to establish the charge +against yourself.” + +“I am probably very stupid, Lieutenant, but it is incomprehensible to +me why I should shoot my husband around two or three o’clock this +morning because Marge Myles was searching for a letter in his room at +seven last night.” + +“Consider the problem, please, as two separate crimes and follow it +through on that basis. At seven o’clock last night we have Marge Myles +searching the pockets of your husband’s clothes in his cupboard. He +comes into the room, and she finds herself trapped in the cupboard. He +opens the door, and the sudden terrifying sight of her gives him a +heart attack. She believes him dead and drags him into the cupboard so +that his body will not be found until she has had a chance to escape. +She hasn’t returned to her apartment, you know, all night, so it’s +quite possible she has either taken flight or is in hiding some place +in the city.” + +“Then I can’t, as you have suggested, be hiding her in the house.” + +It was Lieutenant Valcour who now assumed the rôle of teacher, with +Mrs. Endicott as his young pupil. + +“Not under that supposition. But if she did escape from the house at +that time, what have we left? You found the scrap of paper on which +she herself wrote a hinted threat in an effort to divert suspicion, +and the writing of which was inspired by the distraught mental +condition she must have been in. You called the police, and we found +Mr. Endicott. Your suspicions jumped unerringly to the man who was +uppermost in your thoughts: Mr. Hollander. He, you said to yourself, +had done this thing to save you. Consequently, when you learned that +Mr. Endicott had been revived and was expected to make a statement, +you shot him to prevent his accusing Mr. Hollander, and you arranged +your alibi with considerable ingenuity by only pretending to have +taken the narcotic.” + +“It makes quite a case, doesn’t it?” + +“Yes, Mrs. Endicott, quite a case.” + +“And the alternative? You did suggest that there was an alternative.” + +“That Marge Myles has never left the house at all. That she is still +here. And this is what the prosecuting attorney will offer to the +jury: that with your knowledge she got onto the balcony through one of +the windows in your room, shot Mr. Endicott, returned to your room, +and was hidden by you some place around this house.” + +“All of which is unfortunately negatived, Lieutenant, by the fact that +it was my slipper you found outside the window, and not hers.” + +“The prosecuting attorney can alter the action of the scene to suit +that, Mrs. Endicott. After Marge Myles got onto the balcony you were +terrified at the thought of what you had become a party to. You made +an effort to recall her, when the shots were fired and threw you into +a panic. You dropped your slipper and got back into the room.” +Lieutenant Valcour became quietly persuasive. “Which of my two +theories shall I believe? I can make you no promises, Mrs. Endicott, +because any confession that has been given under an understanding that +there will be an amelioration of punishment loses value in court. But +I can suggest to you that if you choose to make things easier for +justice the act may prove beneficial for yourself. There are more +unwritten laws than the common one so generally known.” + +Mrs. Endicott looked at him queerly. + +“You don’t worry me,” she said, “at all. Any course that I might take +can have but a common, a desired ending. The method of achievement is +utterly inconsequential to me, as long as the ultimate result remains +the same.” + +She was mounted again, Lieutenant Valcour decided, upon her hobby +which carried her along indifferent trails to death. The apparent +strength of her obsession rendered any further efforts on his part +futile. In the attic there was, for him, no longer anything of mystery +or the beauty of shrouded things. It was an ugly, littered room +peopled by a smartly turned out beauty who, like a petulant and +spoiled child reaching for the moon, sought further mysteries in that +life which beckons from beyond life, and by a tired, oldish fellow +standing stupidly in his stockinged feet away from his shoes. + +“Come downstairs with me, Mrs. Endicott,” he said. “As soon as my men +have thoroughly searched this house you will be formally charged.” + + + +CHAPTER XXX + +7:11 a. m.—The Criminal and Weapon of the Crime + +Lieutenant Valcour was once more in his shoes. Even in their laceless +condition they restored his confidence in the relative fitness of +things. + +Mrs. Endicott preceded him down two flights of stairs and to the door +of her husband’s room, which Lieutenant Valcour opened. He looked +inside and saw Cassidy sound asleep, seated on the large mahogany +chest by the window. And he did not blame Cassidy so much as he envied +him. + +“Cassidy.” + +Cassidy’s sharp return to consciousness would have reflected credit +upon the hero of any Western drama. + +“Sir?” + +“Put your gun back, Cassidy.” + +“Yes, Lieutenant. I must have dropped off for a cat nap.” + +“We can discuss that later. I want you to take Mrs. Endicott down to +the entrance hall with you and leave her there in charge of O’Brian. +She is under arrest.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +“After that, warn the men on the servants’ entrance and garden door to +keep on their toes. If anyone tries to get past them on any pretext +whatever they are to stop him. Look up Hansen—he may still be in the +backyard—and then both of you come back here. We will then search the +house.” + +“Yes, sir.” + +Lieutenant Valcour went into Endicott’s room and closed the door. It +was getting to be a mechanical action with him that caused him to go +to the desk and sit down. The perfumed sheet of notepaper, which he +had twice been prevented through interruptions from reading, caught +his attention at once. He read the letter through. + + I don’t believe you [it began, without any preliminaries], and right + from the start I tell you I think you are a liar and a louse. Harry + never wrote your wife no such thing, and even if he did it proves + nothing anyway. Nobody can prove a _thing_. You think it is funny to + scare me and if you do it any more I am going to show you just how + damn funny it is. I am through with you just the same way that your + wife is through with you and you are a nasty rat. + + Marge. + +Not really, Lieutenant Valcour decided, an essentially nice person. He +folded the letter and put it in his pocket to keep company with the +postscript forged by Mrs. Endicott. It would serve ably in +establishing a motive and help the prosecuting attorney to clinch the +case. Just as soon, he added unhappily, as he had unearthed the +criminal and the weapon of the crime. That criminal, he repeated +softly to himself, who with her weapon was still at large about the +house, unless his theory of the case was basically wrong. + +And therein lay the danger, the source of that curious presentiment of +impending menace which had gripped him at odd intervals throughout the +night. Strange that it should possess him most strongly in this silent +room. But wasn’t that just the association of ideas? Endicott, dead on +the bed over there, and the path of that death-dealing bullet cutting +through that corner over by the other window. He sought relief from a +return of it by a mental mopping up. It didn’t do to linger on +presentiments. . . . + +There were those few little side issues to think about; issues that +had puzzled him, but which did not bear any direct reference to the +main theme. He felt that they were explainable without any further +personal investigation. + +It seemed obvious to him, for example, that the reason why Mrs. +Siddons had gone downstairs with her bonnet on, when the sight of +O’Brian by the front door had turned her back, was a desire on her +part to get in touch with Maizie’s sailor husband and warn him that +the crime she thought he had committed had been discovered and that +the police were in the house. She had told Mrs. Endicott that she +believed that she had seen him loitering about the street during the +afternoon. And Mrs. Siddons would never have questioned her own +ability to walk right out and find him because, if it so desired, +Providence would have prearranged a suitable rendezvous. + +. . . They came from that corner, really: those definitely significant +waves of warning, as insistent as the scent that had led him to +find the letter from Marge Myles in the desk. But they weren’t a +scent, nor were they anything so definite as a letter. They were +(the astonishing thought thrilled him disagreeably) _Marge Myles_—her +personality—herself—inimical. . . . Nonsense, nonsense—the room was +empty. . . . + +He forced himself to think of the two little bewilderments that had +troubled him in connection with the thoroughly bewildering Roberts. +That pregnant look she had given him—what had it really meant, more or +less, than an intense urge on her part to erase any spell of +fascination which Mrs. Endicott might have cast upon him, and to plant +in its place the seeds of suspicion of Roberts’s own sowing. It had +been nothing more, really, than that. + +Now of greater inconsistency had been Roberts’s suggestion of +Hollander as the proper friend to stay with Endicott; for Roberts +assuredly had held a fantastic passion for Endicott—fantastic in that +there was this abnormal interrelationship of his personality with that +of her war-killed brother—and she had just as assuredly been convinced +that a liaison existed between Hollander and Endicott’s wife. There +was but one solution: Roberts had never observed Hollander and Mrs. +Endicott together, and she had hoped, should morning bring a meeting, +that under the natural dramatic effect of the setting there might be +some betrayal. A look, perhaps, was all she wanted to confirm her +suspicions. And there could have been in her mind no thought of any +real danger to Endicott from Hollander, for had there not been a nurse +and two policemen close by on guard? Then later, when Endicott was +well again, Roberts could have told him the thing which she had seen. + +. . . Mental fingers, that’s what they were, plucking at his nerves +and forming dissonances that chilled him queerly. He _wasn’t_ +alone—but he must be—the room was empty. . . . + +He would think of that Mr. “Smith” who lived with Hollander. Did he +fit in—beyond one solid thump on the head? Only as one of the myriad +side issues that cling like parasites to the trunk of each major +crime. One could suppose (with reasonable assurance that the +supposition would later prove to be fact) that Hollander was in some +genteelly illicit profession such as bootlegging, and that Mr. Smith +drummed up Hollander’s customers for him among the night +clubs—incidentally relieving some of the more foolish of them of their +jewels. Mr. Smith might well have believed, at that moment when +Lieutenant Valcour went to the telephone in their apartment, that if +Hollander’s goose was cooked his own might be cooked, too, and a +blackjack had then seemed the simplest expedient that would insure his +fading swiftly out of the picture. + +. . . The room was empty—the room was empty. . . . + +As for the emotional jungle of warped and sunless growths through +which Endicott, his wife, Marge Myles, and Hollander had all +groped their illusion-drugged way to this unhappy end—that lay +beyond the punishment or acquittal of earthbound law. The proper +tribunal for that must be found seated within their separate souls. +Lies—evasions—fetid depths . . . + +But _had_ she lied? + +Had there truly been no one on the balcony, as Mrs. Endicott had said? + +The shot had assuredly been fired from the direction of that window +above the large mahogany chest. + +Above? + +Presentiments were banished before the lash of fact. The lid of that +chest was _not quite closed_. And the object that was holding it open, +for the space of perhaps a half of an inch, was the small black muzzle +of a gun. + +Lieutenant Valcour’s hand moved indolently toward the upper left +pocket of his vest, in which there rested a flat, efficient little +automatic of small calibre. He knew what had happened—that owing to +his stillness for the last five minutes the murderer had thought the +room was empty and was attempting to escape. His hand moved more +quickly, but not quickly enough. The lid opened wider—eyes—a face—a +little shock of alarm, of terror—all ever so much more quickly +accomplished than told. The lid slammed up. + +“Quit it, Lieutenant, and put your hands down flat on the top of that +desk.” + +“You’re Marge Myles, of course,” he said. + +He flattened his hands on the desk’s mahogany surface and stared +curiously at her sultry beauty as she sat on the rim of the open +chest. Flamboyant, that’s what she was, and terribly bizarre from the +effect of a shingled ripple of bleached blonde hair above her Spanish +night-filled eyes. + +“You have put yourself in my way, Lieutenant”—her voice was as +disagreeable as the clash of dishes in a cheap restaurant—“and I am +going to kill you and escape.” + +“I see,” Lieutenant Valcour said politely, “that you believe in +threes.” + +“How?” + +“Your husband, Mrs. Endicott’s husband, and now myself. One—two—three. +For the sake of symmetry it is a pity that I am a bachelor.” + +She enjoyed for a full moment of silence—luxuriated in it, really—the +sense of power which she held over this man. She had always enjoyed +the power exerted by her body, and it was refreshing to drink quietly +for a while of this different sort of power, which, through the medium +of the pistol held unwaveringly in her hand, controlled the services +of life and death. She would shoot him soon. . . . + +Lieutenant Valcour hoped that Hansen would not blunder. + +He could see Hansen quite clearly now, all but pressed against the +outside of the window just behind Marge Myles. So Hansen, he +reflected, had found that there _was_ a way to climb up onto the +balcony from the garden down below. What a handy thing it was, at +times, to have been a sailor. Lieutenant Valcour fervently hoped +that—the usefulness of the rule having been accomplished—Hansen would +promptly stop being a sailor and become a policeman. He couldn’t, and +didn’t, expect that Hansen would shoot a woman down in cold blood, nor +would Hansen dare to startle her by throwing open the window or +crashing through its glass. Could Hansen shoot through the glass and +knock the pistol from her hand? Maybe once, Lieutenant Valcour thought +unhappily, out of every twenty times. And she certainly wouldn’t +refrain from pulling the trigger while Hansen practised twenty times. + +“Tell me,” he said, “how you ever managed to breathe inside of that +chest.” + +“The back of it is broken.” The casualness of the question had +startled her into an answer. + +“Your own back must be pretty well broken, too.” Was Hansen, the +idiot, going to smash the glass after all with the butt of his gun? +Hansen was staring very intently at him, seeking advice. He all but +imperceptibly shook his head in negation. “And what did you have in +the paper bag you carried when you came here and from which you tore +that scrap of paper upon which you wrote the misleading note?” + +“This gun.” + +“You carried the gun in a paper bag?” + +“I was smart, was I not? Who would think that in a cheap paper bag +there was a gun?” + +“Not even a disciple of the fourth dimension.” Hansen was aiming now +at her wrist. It was absurd—he faintly shook his head again. No—no! +“How did it happen that Mr. Endicott had his overcoat on but you had +his hat?” + +“I wear it for a better disguise. I have the dust on my face—there is +the hat—it fits well over my cloche. The effect is astonishing.” + +“I see, and so when Endicott came back into the room to get it he +couldn’t find it and thought he must have left it in the cupboard?” + +“Yes—yes—you are a smart man, too.” + +“And you entered the house with a duplicate key which you had had made +from one of Endicott’s?” + +“Dear heaven, yes—how else?” + +It did not please her that her climax should come at a commonplace +moment, when inconsequential questions were being asked and equally +inconsequential answers being given. It was not bravura: the man was +genuinely unafraid. And she wanted him to be afraid. One shouldn’t +just dribble from the world: there should be a blaze, a scene. + +Then Hansen rapped, quite gently, upon the panes. + +Inspiration? Genius? Perhaps. Lieutenant Valcour’s Gallic blood swept +back to the nation of its source and he could have kissed that dear, +that brilliant Hansen upon both of his ruddy, his intelligent, his +Nordic cheeks. + +She whirled as if something had flicked her. Blue serge—brass +buttons—a glinting shield. She pulled the trigger. + +But the muzzle of the gun was in her mouth. + + + +CHAPTER XXXI + +8:37 p. m.—Five Years Later + +Mrs. Hollander thought for a moment of simply dialling the operator +and saying, “I want a policeman.” + +It was what the printed notices in the telephone directory urged one +to do in case of an emergency. But it wasn’t an emergency exactly, +nor—still exactly—was it a policeman she wanted. She wanted a +detective, or an inspector, or something; a man to whom she could +explain her worry about Thomas, and who could do something about it if +he agreed with her that Thomas was in danger. + +Mrs. Hollander wanted most of all a man like Lieutenant Valcour, who +had so ably handled that wretched affair five years ago when she had +been married to Herbert and Herbert had been shot. She wondered +whether Lieutenant Valcour was still on the force, and decided to find +out. She dialled Spring 3100. She grew nervous while waiting. + +“This is Mrs. Thomas Hollander speaking,” she said, when the same type +of impersonal, efficient voice answered her as had been the one five +years before. “I am ’phoning to inquire whether a Lieutenant Valcour +is still connected with the police force. . . . I beg your pardon? +Oh.” She gave the address of her apartment house on Park Avenue. + +“This is Mrs. Thomas Hollander speaking,” she began again upon a +second voice saying, “Hello!” “and I am trying to get in touch with a +Lieutenant Valcour who—— I beg your pardon? . . . You _are_ Lieutenant +Valcour—Inspector, is it? But how perfectly efficient! I am worried, +Inspector, about Mr. Hollander, and I wonder whether it would be +possible for you to come up and talk it over with me. . . . No, he +hasn’t disappeared. I know exactly where he has gone, but I have +reason to believe that something might happen to him. . . . Yes, I am +the Mrs. Hollander who was formerly Mrs. Herbert Endicott. . . . Yes, +that dreadful affair. . . . Oh, you will? Thank you so much.” + +Inspector Valcour smiled a curiously satisfied little smile all to +himself as he sat in a department limousine, chauffeured by a +department driver, and sped smoothly north along Lafayette Street on +the way to Mrs. Hollander’s address on Park Avenue. + +And he thought of many things. + +He thought of Marge Myles and of Herbert Endicott, who were dead; and +of Madame Velasquez who, too, had died. + +He thought of Mrs. Siddons, returned to her native New England hills, +sinking her body and her being into their granite harshnesses and +drawing amazing sustenance from them, as a flower will that grows in +the imperceptible fissure of some solid rock. + +He thought of Roberts whom he had never seen again and of whom he had +never again heard, after the violation of the Sullivan Law had been +charged against her, and her sentence suspended. She had gone back to +England, probably, to lapse into a proper background for her neurotic +broodings. + +And that partner of Hollander’s—the Southernistic Mr. Smith. He had +faded entirely, never to return; nor was the fact of any consequence +at all. He had been at best a side issue too unimportant for further +bother. + +But most of all he thought of Mrs. Endicott, who was now Mrs. +Hollander. + +The annals of history and the annals of crime were fringed with women +just like her: beautiful, astonishing women, who revolved with their +uncertainties like satellites about the world of normal beings, +trailing their baleful, striking brilliance like an impalpable +poisonous gas across the surface of every person whom they plucked and +tortured within the intricate enigma of their hearts. The law never +could touch her—nor could a person, either. She would escape. She +would always escape, with the subtlety of mercury slipping between +impotent fingers. + +For she _had_ escaped. + +There wasn’t any doubt in his mind about that. She had been the focal +point five years ago in that Endicott case, no matter what the law or +men might say. Her forgery of that postscript had had a deeper, a more +deliberate intention than the mere breaking up of any affair between +her husband and Marge Myles: it was to have been a breaking up of all +of his affairs. Of him. + +She was the true murderer of her husband, and not Marge Myles. She had +simply spread the powder train to a suitably lethal explosive and had +then applied the match. The movements of the others had been nothing +more than gyrations performed by stringed puppets. And she had held +the strings. Some of her puppets had died, committed suicide, and been +killed. And it didn’t matter in the least. The world was ageless, she +herself was ageless, and plenty of puppets grew perennially every +spring. + +Inspector Valcour wondered, as he descended to the curb and prepared +to enter the lift to her apartment, whether Thomas had become a +puppet, too. + + + The End + + + +TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE + +This transcription is made from the text of the 1929 edition published +by Doubleday, Doran & Company, Inc. However, the following errors have +been corrected from the original text: + + * “stubborness” was changed to “stubbornness” (Chapter I). + * “It’s contents” was changed to “Its contents” (Chapter I). + * “pressent” was changed to “present” (Chapter IX). + * “telehone” was changed to “telephone” (Chapter XI). + * “occasionallly” was changed to “occasionally” (Chapter XXIV). + * “Endicoott” was changed to “Endicott” (Chapter XXVI). + * “and than had” was changed to “and then had” (Chapter XXVI). + * “chauffered” was changed to “chauffeured” (Chapter XXXI). + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75500 *** |