Death-Watch (22 page)

“Ames walked past, but didn’t see the killer?”

“That,” said Dr. Fell, a long sniff rumbling in his nose, “is the point in the reconstruction I wanted you to see. It’s a question of light. Now this hall, as I think we’ve heard several times, was pitch dark. Question: how the devil could the murderer see to strike? Well, there’s only one way it could have been managed, and I tested it last night … Look downstairs; you’ll have to go down a little way. So. You see those narrow windows at either side of the front door? One of ’em is directly on a line with the banisters, and there’s a street lamp outside. A person coming up in the dark has his head and shoulders faintly but clearly silhouetted, whereas the murderer would be in shadow. As I say, I tested it last night. I asked Eleanor Carver to show me where she was standing when she first saw the body from the stairs, and it worked out.”

Hadley straightened up. “So you asked Eleanor Carver,” he repeated in a curious voice. “I want to talk to you about that … Let’s go and see that bolt on the trap-door; to the roof, maybe. Where we can have some private conversation.”

There was strain here, the strain between old friends. Hadley took one of the keys out of his pocket and unlocked the door at the head of the stairs. It opened inwards, and he groped on the left-hand wall inside for a light-switch. A dull electric bulb hanging without shade from the ceiling revealed a narrow passage, dark-panelled and stuffy, with a strip of ragged carpet on the floor and at the other end a steep flight of stairs like a stepladder. The ceiling was low, accounting for the box-room overhead in a sort of loft, and Melson found himself coughing in the dust that trembled round the light. Hadley let the lock click shut. Then he dropped his defences.

“Fell,” he said, abruptly, “what’s the matter with you?”

Dr. Fell peered at the stepladder, hesitated and then he chuckled. That chuckle, booming out in the musty confines of the passage, eased and then destroyed the strain; a deep and Gargantuan mirth that kept back the terrors of the case. Drawing out his gaudy bandanna, he mopped his forehead, and the twinkle returned to his eye.

“Nerves,” he admitted. “Didn’t know I could have ’em. It’s the result of going until noon without the strengthening influence of beer. And also because I’ve been through one of the worst interludes I ever hope to put in. Heh. And also—”

“You don’t believe that girl is guilty.”

“Eleanor Carver? I do not,” said the doctor, with a tremendous honking battle-cry as he blew his nose. “Haa, hum. No. But first suppose you look at that trapdoor and see what there is to be said for young Paull’s evidence.”

Hadley climbed the ladder until only the lower part of his legs showed. They heard his hands bumping, the sound of a match struck, and then an exclamation of satisfaction. Dusting off his hands, he descended and stuck his head under the loft.

“That settles it. That most definitely settles it. The murderer didn’t come down through here; and, what’s more, the murderer didn’t slip back up through that trap leaving it bolted on the inside behind him. It
is
bolted, my boy. Hard and fast, and it takes a good wrench to move it.”

Dr. Fell twirled the bandanna.

“And so,” he observed, musingly, “your star witness was drunk and seeing things?”

“Exactly. This proves that only El … Hold on! What the devil do you mean, my star witness?”

“Isn’t he? Didn’t he prove to you that Eleanor committed the murder? Now I am aware,” said the other, with relish, “of your concurrence with Emerson when he says that a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds. But in this matter I am going to shout for a little consistency. You damned well can’t have it both ways. When Paull produced a blood-stained glove which he says he picked up in a pitch-dark hall, you applaud his shrewd presence of mind. When he says he sees a comparatively harmless patch of moonlight— which in the dark is usually more noticeable than a black glove, anyway—then you go off the deep end and accuse him of delirium tremens. Tut, tut. You may believe or disbelieve his story; I don’t mind. But you can’t accept the part you like and yell scorn on the part that doesn’t happen to suit your theory. To my simple mind, there ought to be an equal falsehood or an equal truth.”

“I can,” returned Hadley, “if the facts happen to support me. The trap is bolted: he was mistaken about that. But on the other hand, here
is
the glove. I’ve got it in my pocket. You don’t doubt the glove, do you?”

“I only doubt its importance … See here, now. Do you honestly think the murderer used that glove? Can you picture Eleanor Carver, after stabbing poor old Ames, plucking off the glove and hurling it into the air in pure joyous abandon—for the police to find with her initials inside? It must have sailed some distance, by the way, if it travelled from the head of the stairs to Paull’s door. ‘The Mystery of the Flying Glove,’ a Scotland Yard Thriller, by David F. Hadley … Eyewash, my fathead. First-class, guaranteed-British eyewash. Put Paull into the box to tell that story, and a good counsel would laugh you out of court. But what do you do? You swallow that piece of evidence intact, and sternly deny the business of the trap-door! Hasn’t it occurred to you that the trap-door may have been open then, and bolted now, for the astounding reason that somebody later bolted it?”

Hadley studied him. His face wore a grim smile. He patted the pocket where he had put the glove.

“You’re good enough at ridicule. I’ve always admitted that …”

“But don’t you see any reason in it?”

The other hesitated. “Your own type of firework reasoning, maybe. But I don’t want any advocacy, and it strikes me you’re doing what’s known as whistling in a graveyard. You’ve made up your mind this girl isn’t guilty …”

“I know she isn’t. Look here, what do you mean to do?”

“Face her with the glove. If it really does belong to her … Now take it easy and look at the facts of the case. The evidence fits down to the smallest joint, even to her admitting herself that she had a habit of carrying a key in the finger of a glove—where we found the key in this one!

“We had decided that suspects in the department-store business narrowed down to Handreth and Carver. Handreth proved an alibi. The witnesses at Gamridge’s didn’t get a look at the girl’s face—but in everything else the description exactly fits Eleanor. She even admitted she was at the store at the time of the murder …”

“Now,” interrupted Dr. Fell, bitterly, “I will proceed to give you a piece of evidence which fits into your case and will please you no end. I had a talk with Carver—Johannus.
He
thinks she’s guilty, and apparently jumped to the conclusion after the Gamridge robbery and murder, to such an extent that he lied to us last night about remembering the reason, he said, ‘We had some difficulty with her as a child—’ changed his mind, and shut up. Kleptomania, my lad. Kleptomania, for a fiver.”

“Are you joking?”

“Nooo-o!” rumbled Dr. Fell. “Seize the bright objects; that’s it. Probably everybody knows about it. The only reason why La Steffins didn’t mention it last night was probably because her narrow imagination couldn’t connect anybody in her own house with murder. Seize the bright objects: bracelets, rings, watches … If the bright objects happen to belong to your guardian, the inhibitions strongly rooted from the past prevent you from pinching ’em except when they’re out of his care— in another person’s charge—or
sold to somebody else.
These inhibitions! The clock was sold to Sir Edwin Paull; one watch was sold to Boscombe, and Gamridge’s were financially responsible for good care of the other. Seize the bright objects; watches, rings—carving knives.”

Hadley was struggling with his notebook.

“Have you gone stark insane?” demanded the chief inspector. “You’re making out an unanswerable case against your own client! I’ve got—”

Dr. Fell drew a deep breath and quieted down.

“I’m telling you this,” he replied, “first, so that you can’t say that the defense hasn’t been fair; second, to make you see what I’ve been seeing looming up in one deadly mass on that girl from the first—and third, because I don’t believe one single damned word of it. Like some of your other fortuitous circumstances, Hadley, it’s much too good to be true … Shall I go on and pile up your case for you? There’s a good deal more of it.”

“What
is
the defence?”

Dr. Fell stumped up and down the passage, which seemed to stifle him.

“I don’t know,” he answered, dully. “I can’t make it—yet. Look here, shall we get out of this place? I’d much rather be overheard than suffocated … But if I tell you your case, and drive in all the good stout coffin nails, will you grant me a grace of time to pull ’em out again?”

Hadley walked ahead of him to the door. “You think you know who did commit the murder?”

“Yes. And, as usual, its the last person you might have suspected—No, I’m not going to tell you. Is it a go?”

Hadley fiddled with the spring-latch, clicking it back and forth. “The Carver girl is guilty. I’m almost sure of that. But I’m willing to admit your confounded positiveness has got me uneasy … Well, look here! In default of more evidence, I can hold my hand until I make certain of the glove and test all other possibilities; in the meantime, we’ll let her alo—”

With a decisive gesture he was opening the door, and stopped. He came face to face at the head of the stairs with Sergeant Preston, the swarthy-faced master of search.

“Ah, sir!” said Preston, with a grin. “I’ve been looking all over the house for you. I wanted to tell you that it’s all up. Ho-ho!”

“All up?”

“Yes, sir. We’ve found the stuff—hidden very neatly in her room, but we found it.”

Melson felt a constriction in his throat, and he heard Dr. Fell mutter something as Hadley asked the obvious question …

“Why, the young lady’s room, sir,” said Preston. “Miss Eleanor Carver’s. Will you come downstairs and see?”

H
ADLEY DID NOT LOOK AT DR. FELL
while they tramped downstairs. Possibly the sergeant also sensed the tension; for, after a curious glance at the chief inspector, he was silent. Melson found himself thinking with something of a shock that the thing had become definite: no mere accusation, but as real as death and thin rope. Before him floated Eleanor Carver’s face—the long bobbed hair, the heavy-lidded blue eyes, the eager, voluptuous mouth moving in silent speech … She was out walking with Hastings; or had she returned? They gave them short shrift in England. Three clear Sundays after sentence, and then the walk at dawn. In the lower hall Hadley turned to Preston.

“Sewn up in a mattress, I suppose?” he asked, sharply, “or hidden behind loose bricks? We only made a cursory search last night.”

“Small wonder you didn’t find the stuff, sir. No. It’s cleverer than that. I should have found it eventually, of course—I was just getting round there. But an accident helped. See for yourself.”

Eleanor’s room was at the rear of the house. And before the door, which was closed, Mrs. Steffins stood back in the shadow of the staircase. She had an air of shaken anticipation, as though a rumour without voice had gone through the house. They saw the whites of her eyes in the gloom.

“Something’s going on in there,” she said, shrilly. “I heard them talking. They’ve been too long in that room, and they won’t let me in. I have a
right
to go in there … this is my house …
Johannus
!”

Hadley’s frayed temper broke.

“Get out of the way,” he snapped. “Get out of the way and keep quiet, or it will be the worse for all of you. Betts!” The door to Eleanor’s room opened a little, and Sergeant Betts glanced out. “Come out here and stand guard. If this woman won’t keep quiet, lock her in her room. Now, Preston …”

They went inside, and shut away the noise of shrill cryings. It was a small but high room, evidently once part of a larger one partitioned off. Two high small-paned windows looked out on the desolation of a brick-paved back yard, but the projection of the wooden scullery cut off even that view. The walls were of the same fine white panelling as most of the other rooms; aside from that, the whole room looked pinched and meagre. There was a white marble mantelpiece, its top ornamented with a Krazy Kat doll and two or three photographs of motion-picture stars in flimsy imitation-silver frames. Somehow that expressed everything else. For the rest: a wooden bedstead, wash-handstand, wardrobe—open, to show disarranged dresses on hangers—a dressing-table with a large mirror and a china lamp shaped like an eighteenth-century marquise, and on the floor a small woven rug. Over against the mantelpiece stood Mrs. Gorson, a startled expression in her protruding brown eyes, and the handle of a carpet-sweeper loose in her fingers. They heard her breathing … “Well?” demanded Hadley, peering round. “I still don’t see anything. What did you find, and where is it?”

“Ah! That’s the cleverness of it, sir,” nodded Preston. “I thought I’d let you see.” He crossed to the wall between the two windows. Between them hung a bad picture in blurry colours of a knight in armour straining to his shoulder-plates a scantily clad girl with long yellow hair. Preston’s footfalls creaked on the boards. He pulled the picture to one side.

I was just beginning on this wall, sir, and Betts with me.
That
lady,” he nodded towards Mrs. Gorson, “insisted she had to do some cleaning, and we let her go ahead. She was using a mop, and when she turned round the handle of the mop struck against this panel … Well, it was all up then. It took me longer to find the spring. But watch.”

He ran his finger along the top. Exactly as had happened in Carver’s room, a vertical line appeared at the side of the panel, this one, however, being only about two feet long. Preston hooked his fingers inside and pushed the slide into the wall.

“Like the old man’s” Hadley muttered, and smote his hands together. “The architect of this house seems to have …” He hurried forward, and they followed him.

“Looks like she’ll hang; eh, sir?” enquired Preston, complacently. “I remember when we dug up the cache of that fellow Brixley, the Cromwell Road murderer; you remember, sir; him that had his wife’s arm wrapped up in a bit of—”