Drury Lane’s Last Case (26 page)

It was evident at once that Maxwell's captor had been incredibly ruthless in the pursuit of whatever purpose had brought him to the lonely country house. The room had been devastated in the search. Not only had furniture been overturned and glass objects broken, but the panelled walls showed unmistakable evidence of having been attacked in places by some sharp instrument. The instrument was very quickly found by Chief Bolling. It was a small chopper and it lay on the floor near the fireplace.

“That's our axe,” said Maxwell, licking his lips again. “It comes from the tool-box in the kitchen. I used it for chopping wood for the fireplaces.”

“Is it the only axe on the premises?” asked Patience.

“Yes, miss.”

The woodwork and panelling had been viciously attacked: long splinters lay on the moulding at the base of the walls. Even the floor had been hacked in one place, where there had been a ring, according to Maxwell. The rug now lay crumpled in a corner, as if it had been violently hurled aside. An ornate grandfather clock of Victorian vintage which had stood in another corner now lay prone on the floor in a litter of glass. Examination showed that the wielder of the axe had deliberately smashed its case, torn away the brass pendulum, tipped the clock over, and then hacked away its back and sides, revealing its intricate gears and works. The hands stood at precisely twelve o'clock.

“Was this clock going last night?” asked Rowe sharply.

“Yes, sir. I was in here playing patience when—when the door-bell rang, so I know. It had a very loud tick. It was going, all right.”

“Then he attacked the clock at midnight,” murmured Patience. “That might be useful.”

“I don't see for what,” grunted Bolling. “We know he came at half-past eleven from Maxwell's story, don't we?”

Mr. Drury Lane, wrapped in a mantle of reverie, stood quietly to one side, watching. Only his eyes were alert—deeply sparkling.

Patience moved slowly about the room. She surveyed the desk, whose drawers had been pulled out and their contents scattered; on the top lay strewn playing-cards. Then she caught sight of something across the room and her eyes narrowed. It was a cheap tinny alarm-clock, and it stood on the oak mantel above the fireplace.

“What is it, Pat?” asked Rowe, noticing her preoccupation.

“That alarm-clock. Queer thing to be in a study,” and she walked over and picked it up. It was ticking away cheerfully.

“I brought that in here, miss,” said Maxwell apologetically; he seemed to have recovered from his shock and was watching the proceedings with curious eyes.

“You did? But why did you need the small clock when there was the big grandfather-clock in the room?” demanded Patience suspiciously.

“Oh, for the alarm,” Maxwell hastened to reply. “I had a slight cough the last few days, miss, and I'd got some cough medicine in Tarrytown on Saturday. The druggist told me to take a spoonful every four hours, you see. I'd taken one at eight last night but I'm sort of absent-minded, miss”—he smiled weakly—“and I thought maybe I'd forget to take it again before I went to sleep. So I brought the alarm in here while I was playing patience and set the alarm to ring at midnight to remind me to take the medicine, and then I was going to bed. But before I could——”

“I see,” said Patience; the story seemed innocent enough, for there was a small bottle of brown liquid on the mantelpiece near the clock, three-quarters full, and a sticky spoon. She looked over the clock and found, just as Maxwell had said, that its alarm was still set to go off at twelve o'clock; its little lever was pushed against the end of the slot marked
Alarm
. “I wonder now …” she murmured; and consulted her own tiny wrist-watch. It was 11.51. “What time have you, Gordon?”

“Just about eleven-fifty.”

“Have you the time, Mr. Bolling?”

“Eleven-fifty-two,” snapped Bolling. “What's all this——?”

“I was just wondering how correct this clock was, that's all,” said Patience with a faint smile; but her eyes were perturbed. “As you see, it's on the dot.” And indeed the hands of the cheap alarm-clock stood at 11.51.

“Ah—Patience,” murmured Lane, coming forward. “May I see that for a moment, please?” He examined it briefly, set it back on the mantel, and returned to his corner.

“What the deuce is that?” asked Rowe wonderingly; he had been wandering about among the wreckage, poking things. His head was thrown back and he was gazing at something high on one of the walls.

This wall differed from the others in that its built-in book-shelves ran almost to the ceiling whereas the others ran only half-way to the ceiling. A sliding ladder, such as is used in shoe shops and libraries, ran along a metal track at the foot of this wall, evidently put in by the original owner of the house to provide easy access to the uppermost shelves out of normal reach. Above the topmost shelf there was a series of walnut panels, like the panelling on the other three walls. They were narrow and carved in the ginger-bred style of a bygone generation. What had caught Gordon Rowe's eyes was one of these panels. It was swung away from the wall, quite as if it were a door.

“Looks like a secret compartment, by George,” chuckled the young man. “In another minute I'll expect the Count of Monte Cristo to pop out of the fireplace.” He ran lightly up the ladder, which stood directly below the opening in the panel near the ceiling.

“What the devil've we run into?” groaned Bolling. “Secret compartment! Sounds like one of these here detective stories.… Maxwell, did you know about this?”

The old man was staring upward open-mouthed. “N-no, sir! That's the first time I ever saw it. Why, it's a little door——”

“Empty,” announced Rowe grimly. “Swell hiding-place! It's about—let's see now—eight inches wide by two inches high by two inches deep.… Ales must have made it, and a clever job he did, too! It's of recent vintage; you can still see the fresh chisel-marks inside.” He squinted about, while they watched him intently. “Whoever demolished this place was unlucky. He didn't find the hole. See?” And he pointed to the narrow strip of panelling above the topmost shelf. Here and there the blade of the axe had bitten savagely into the wood; but when Rowe swung the little door shut they could see that it bore no marks of any kind. “Missed it clean! Clever, isn't it! Now how the devil do you get it open again?”

“Let me up there, young fellow,” said Bolling grimly.

Rowe reluctantly descended, and the police chief mounted with a heavy caution. The secret compartment, as Rowe had said, was ingeniously made. Now that the little door was swung to, there was no sign of its existence. The cracks had been so contrived that they came at the edge of the frame of carving and were thus undetectable. Bolling pushed and pulled until his red face became redder; but the door remained shut and the panel outwardly innocent, although it gave out a hollow sound when he rapped it with his knuckled. The frame of this panel, as uniformly of the others, was set with tiny wooden rosettes. Bolling panted: “Some trick to it,” and began to finger the rosettes. Then he exclaimed aloud. One of them had turned in his fingers. He revolved it once, and nothing happened. He revolved it again; and the door flew open with such coiled vigour that he almost fell off the ladder.… He took the door off and examined the interior. It contained a crude but clever mechanism of catch-and-spring.

“Well,” he said, descending to the floor, “no use worrying about that. Whatever was in it, if anything ever was, is gone. Mighty small space, hey? Let's take a look around upstairs.”

Dr. Ales's bedroom was as badly hacked as the study downstairs. The bed had been taken apart, mattress sliced open, furniture split, floor attacked—obviously the wielder of the axe, not having found what he was seeking downstairs, had mounted to Dr. Ales's bedroom to continue his search. There was a small gilt clock in the bedroom; and, oddly enough, this had been damaged also in the tornado which had swept the room, having fallen to the floor from the night-table, perhaps when the hacker had upset the table in his haste to get the bed apart. The hands had stopped at 12.24.

Patience's eyes sparkled. “Our friend's left almost a time-table of his activities,” she exclaimed. “This proves that he attacked the lower part of the house first.… Maxwell, do you know if this clock kept correct time?”

“Yes, miss. All the clocks were good ones, even if they were cheap, and I regulated them so that they corresponded all the time.”

“That's very fortunate,” murmured Lane. “How stupid this man was!”

“What?” asked Bolling sharply.

“Eh? Oh, nothing, Mr. Bolling. I was just commenting upon the essential imbecility of criminals.”

A bass voice rolled upstairs. “Hey, Chief! Look what I found!”

They tumbled down the stairs in their haste. One of the policemen was standing in the hall, focusing a flashlight on a dark and dirty corner. In the rays of the light they saw three pieces of glass, to one of which was attached a long loop of black silk ribbon, torn in one place.

Lane picked up the pieces and took them into the parlour. He fitted the three pieces together; they made a perfect circle of glass.

“A monocle,” he said quietly.

“Good Lord,” muttered Rowe.

“A monocle?” Maxwell blinked. “That's funny, sir. Dr. Ales didn't wear any, and I've never seen one about the house. And of course I——”

“Dr. Sedlar,” said Patience gloomily.

23

A Matter of Symbolism

There was nothing more to be done on the scene. Maxwell was advised to forget his employer and return to Tarrytown to resume the sadly broken thread of his hitherto peaceful life. Bolling, an energetic if plodding executive, placed the house under guard, leaving his two men to watch both the lane leading to the house and the rear, although the rear was inaccessible unless one ploughed through a tangle of underbrush and treacherous leaf-mould. Of one point young Rowe, who had been progressively more silent with the discovery of the secret compartment in the study, made certain: Maxwell had stated that due to his being alone at night in the country he had on the previous night, as always, locked all doors and windows. Rowe then personally toured the house; he found that with the exception of the front door all doors and windows were locked from the inside. As for the cellar, it was not necessary to examine it, since there was no entrance to it except through the staircase near the kitchen inside the house.… The bell contrivance on the front door jangled derisively after them as they left the house.

On the old gentleman's invitation—Boiling took Maxwell into Tarrytown in the police car—Patience and Rowe followed Dromio's limousine bound for The Hamlet. The young people retired gratefully to rooms assigned them by the Falstaffian little major-domo of the household, scrubbed themselves clean, and came down to a late luncheon refreshed in body if not in spirit. The three ate alone in the more intimate atmosphere of Lane's private quarters. There was little said during the repast; Patience was fretfully quiet, Rowe thoughtful, and Lane devoted himself to mild conversation and a complete silence on the events of the morning. After luncheon he placed them in the hands of Quacey, excused himself, and retired to his study.

Patience and Rowe wandered idly about the vast acreage of The Hamlet. When they came to a lovely little garden, they flung themselves by tacit consent full length on the grass. Quacey peered at them, chuckling, and then vanished.

Birds sang, and the grass smelled hot and sweet. Neither spoke. Rowe twisted about to study the face of his companion. She was flushed a little with the warmth of the sun and her exertions; her slim body lay outstretched, healthily curved. To Rowe, watching her with a curious eagerness, she seemed at once enticing and remote. For her eyes were closed and there was a faint white line between her straight brows that did not invite either badinage or love-making.

Rowe sighed. “What do you make of it, Pat? For heaven's sake, don't frown that way! I like my women vapid.”

“Am I frowning?” she murmured; and she opened her eyes and smiled at him. “You're such a child, Gordon. I've been thinking——”

“I supposed I'll have to get resigned to a brainy wife,” said the young man dryly. “The point is, so have I—so that makes two.”

“Wife? That's
not
funny, young man! I've been thinking that Dr. Ales's house last night was invaded not by one person but by
two
.”

“Ah,” said Rowe; and he lay back suddenly and plucked a blade.

She sat up, her eyes warm. “So you saw it, too, Gordon? One was the wielder of the axe. The condition of the house clearly shows that he was searching for something; he didn't know where it was and wanted desperately to find it—witness his systematic demolition of furniture and things with the axe. The important point is that the man
wasn't
Dr. Ales.”

Rowe yawned. “Naturally not. If he'd been Ales he would have known exactly where to find something that he himself—surely it was Ales who made that little compartment in the wall—had hidden there.” Rowe yawned again. “And the other?”

“Don't act so disinterested,” laughed Patience. “You know you're thinking furiously.… I don't know. You're right about the reason. The hacker is one of our unknowns; Dr. Ales wouldn't have had to chop the place to kindling wood—he would have
known
where to find whatever the hacker was looking for. On the other hand, the thing the hacker sought
was actually found
: witness the secret compartment which we found open, and which therefore was
left
open by some one.”

“And that makes you think two people were in the house last night? Why couldn't the hacker—confound that clumsy word!—have found the compartment himself, after he'd done the dirty work with the axe?”