Arrow Pointing Nowhere, page 11
“No, that’s a conservatory, complete with rubber plants and palms. There are horrid little ferns there, too, which Phillips nurses and puts into a legendary silver dish on the dinner table. Here’s a telephone, as you see, and the door on the right leads to the pantry. The one on the left belongs to the library, of course.”
“Of course.” Gamadge could almost see an eavesdropper creeping down the back stairs, listening to the conversation in the library, taking in (perhaps with some amusement) his own fatuous arrangements for keeping the conversation private. He followed Caroline up two steep flights to the top floor; on this landing a ladder rose to a blacked-out skylight.
Caroline opened the door to the main hall, glanced right and left, and beckoned. He again followed.
“You see there’s a glassed door at the end of this corridor, too,” she said, “and there’s one on the second floor. They belong to big bathrooms. The servants’ quarters and the trunk rooms and store closets are opposite and to our right. This room on our left—it’s above mine—is the only guest room left to us, and we didn’t even have it until Hilda Grove moved to Fenbrook!”
“It really has been something of an invasion.”
“It really has! The two front rooms are—Cousin Mott’s and Bill Craddock’s; his door is down that cross passage. Cousin Mott and Bill shared a communicating bath and a long clothes cupboard.”
Gamadge walked past the guest room and through the open doorway of a large, comfortable, shabby bachelor’s apartment. It had a threadbare Turkey carpet, ancient and huge mahogany furniture, ancient and faded group photographs in frames, a student lamp converted to electricity. The west and north windows, thickly curtained with dark madras, were now closed.
Caroline had remained on the threshold. She said: “He wouldn’t let us buy him new things or even give him a carpet; these were all his own, and most of them were with him when he was in college. He failed in business ever so long ago, and afterwards came and lived with us. Why not? Everybody can’t make money. We loved having him, and he did all kinds of things for Father. He stayed here in the summers while we were away, so we never had to close up the house; he hated travelling and country resorts. He always took me to the circus when I was little, and to funny plays afterwards. He was so nice.”
“And you were so nice.” Gamadge went to the tall window above the sitting-room bay, bent, and touched the sill. When he straightened he showed Caroline the powdery flakes on his fingers.
“I told you Nordhall wouldn’t overlook anything,” he said. “The professional as against the amateur—me.”
He put his fingers into the two brass slots in the window frame; it rose easily as high as his chin. He stood looking out at the dark side wall of the opposite house, and then down at the street. A man in a cap was clearing stained and trampled snow out of the space within the railing; somebody—Nordhall, perhaps—was getting into an official car. It drove off, and only a patrolman remained to deal with the thinning crowd.
Gamadge closed the window and turned. “You could have sent me out of that with a turn of the wrist,” he said, “and nobody the wiser, not even the policeman below. The street’s too dark.”
“We’ll have a fine new guest room,” said Caroline in a dry voice, “and Father will have guardrails put on all these windows.”
Gamadge walked through a long bathroom, through a passage lined with closet doors, and into Craddock’s not very cheerful retreat. It was rather untidy, with a portable typewriter on a chair and a kit bag under a table. Battered toilet articles were strewn on the plain cover of an outmoded bureau.
Caroline had come the other way, along the transverse hall. She stood at the door. “This was Father’s room when he was a boy,” she said, “and Uncle Cort had the other. It’s horrid now. Our footman had it before he was drafted.”
“Mr. Craddock is a bird of passage.” Gamadge looked at the kit bag. “You can see that he’s lived in his luggage for years.”
“Alden could have run into the guest room, or even down the back stairs, before Bill got through to Cousin Mott’s room.”
“Yes. Plenty of lines of retreat.”
“Alden’s room downstairs has a door into the hall. He could have crossed to the back stairs in two seconds.”
“We’ll go down.”
They went along the hall and descended the wide main stairway; halfway down Caroline leaned over the balustrade. “I’m afraid they’ve gone to bed; it’s dark.”
“We might see how much of the hall would have been in their line of vision.”
“Practically none, if they were where I left them—beside the fire. But it won’t make any difference—they’ll never admit that Alden was out of the room.”
They went into the sitting room, and Caroline turned on a lamp. Gamadge asked, looking at the closed door in the east wall: “Shall we disturb them?”
“Not if we speak quietly; the doors are soundproof. I ought to know—that was my mother’s suite; Aunt Belle has the front room now, and then there’s a bath, and Mrs. Grove has the little dressing room. Next her is Alden’s, with a door into the hall as I told you.”
“Where are you, and where is your father?”
“I’m just outside here, the first door on the right as you go out; I have my own bath. Father’s suite is beyond the back passage; two rooms and a bath, the whole southwest corner of the house.”
Gamadge turned to look at the half-open door of her room; then he walked to the embrasure of the bay. “The window’s closed, I see. Those ladies don’t seem to have heard the commotion after your cousin fell.”
“They needn’t have heard it; everything’s thick and solid and noiseproof in this house.”
The round table stood where it had stood that afternoon, and the wastebasket just below it was half full of colored snippings from the day’s needlework; but on top of the soft mass lay a crumpled paper ball. He had expected to see it there, his client had trusted him to come and find it. In his momentary triumph Mott Fenway’s death and Caroline’s quest faded from his mind.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Second Arrow
“WHAT IN THE WORLD, Mr. Gamadge,” asked Caroline, “are you digging out of the wastebasket?”
Gamadge straightened, glanced at the paper ball, and dropped it into his pocket. “A memorandum I threw away this afternoon by accident. Lucky to find it again.”
“If our footman hadn’t gone to the wars you wouldn’t have found it; the basket would have been emptied before dinner.”
A well-dressed man with an air of cool authority came out of Mrs. Fenway’s bedroom. He was carrying a black bag. “Well, Caroline!” He stopped to look at her, professionally enough, but also with a manner at once friendly and paternal. “Do you want some of the sedatives I stuffed into my bag, or can you manage without them?”
“I can manage, Doctor.”
“I thought you could.” He put the bag on the table, and looked at Gamadge.
“This is Mr. Gamadge, Dr. Thurley.”
Gamadge nodded in response to Thurley’s nod. He liked the look of the Fenways’ family doctor; a graying, ruddy, muscular man.
“Glad to meet you, Mr. Gamadge,” said Thurley. “Craddock tells me that if you hadn’t happened along Blake Fenway would probably still be putting ideas into the heads of the press. I’ve put my official seal on the accident theory; Mott Fenway would have lived a hundred years, if he’d been able to manage it, and enjoyed every day of them. Wish there were more like him; wish some of the rest of us understood leisure. I shall miss him. Caroline, your father’s talking funeral arrangements with old Bedlow in the library; they’ll be at it half the night if you don’t go down and interfere. My orders, and he’s to take those pills I gave him. If he doesn’t he’ll lie awake.”
“I’ll go, Doctor.” She looked at Gamadge, who answered the look by saying that he would get himself out of the house.
“Then—tomorrow?”
“Sometime in the afternoon.”
“Good night.”
“Good night, Miss Fenway.”
When she had gone he addressed Thurley, who was rearranging the contents of his bag. “I thought you might want a prescription filled, or something; I know what deliveries are now, especially at night.”
“Very thoughtful of you, but I had the presence of mind, as I told Caroline just now, to throw some old reliables into my bag before I rushed up here. I’ve dosed Belle Fenway, or at least I’ve left a dose to be taken. Mrs. Grove will get it down her if she’s restless.”
Gamadge walked across the room to the lamp, got the paper ball out of his pocket, and smoothed it out. It was another section of timetable, and there was another arrow in the margin; but this arrow pointed nowhere; away from Rockliffe Station into space.
He put the crumpled leaf in his pocket again. Thurley was talking:
“Shocking tragedy, and cruel hard on Blake Fenway. There’s bound to be a little publicity; dear old Mott was obscure personally, but he was a Fenway. The police are behaving very well; I saw Nordhall, competent man. He’ll have them make a routine examination of the body, and then he’ll give out a definite statement to the newspapers. Blake doesn’t understand these things, but he’s always willing to do what’s proper. The perfect citizen. Of course he’s badly shaken up; he feels responsible on account of those devilish windows. Do you know Belle Fenway?”
“I met her this afternoon.”
“Heroic creature, can face anything. I’ll have her on her feet in less than a year, I hope, but it will take time—time and surgery. She got no care on the trip home in 1940, impossible conditions. I’m only glad the experience didn’t drive young Alden out of the wits they built up for him in Europe. They did wonders for him, I’ll say that for the Frenchmen. I saw him regularly from the time he was born until he was four, and I never thought he could be maintained at a four-year level. Viborg was optimistic, if you can call it optimism, thought the boy would develop to five-year-old mentality. They did better in Fagon’s clinic. Have you seen Alden Fenway?”
“Yes.”
“Fagon said he could be kept at the seven-year level unless there should be disease of the brain and quick deterioration. The boy does very well; takes complete care of himself. Craddock’s the very man for him, and I’m only afraid they won’t be able to keep him frozen on the job.”
“What chances are there for further improvement in young Fenway? Or further development, let us say? Do the mental specialists commit themselves?”
“He’s had none since they came back to this country; Belle won’t face it. It seems that he’s always upset by tests, and it takes him a long time to get used to a new man. Viborg’s retired, and of course Alden wouldn’t remember him in any case. The boy was very shy with me at first, but now we’re great pals.”
Gamadge scribbled Work in Progress on an envelope, crumpled it, and crossed the room to toss it into the waste-basket. Then he scribbled on another, which he placed carefully in his wallet.
“Pretty lavish with good letter paper, aren’t you, young man?” Thurley snapped his bag.
“Damned wasteful. I never can remember to conserve it. How is Alden taking tonight’s tragedy, Doctor?”
Thurley, making for the door, stopped halfway. “Doesn’t know a thing about it. He’ll enquire after Mott once or twice, and then forget him. Well, I’ll be getting along. See you again, I hope, in more cheerful circumstances.” He hurried out, and down the stairs. Gamadge thought that the doctor was capable of making almost any circumstances cheerful.
They have to be like that, he thought; grow an extra skin. They’d never survive it all if they didn’t—be of no use to anybody.
He turned out the light and went into the hall; silence here, darkness except for one shaded bulb that did not reach the farther shadows. Psyche’s lamp was unlit, herself a wraith just visible in her little arched shrine: As he reached the landing in front of her the ghost of a sound made him look over his shoulder; Alden Fenway’s bedroom door opened, and the young man came out. He was in his shirt sleeves, with his collar unfastened and a comb in his hand; evidently on his way to the bathroom.
He stopped to look down at Gamadge. He seemed to tower in the dusky light, a little terrifying; like a giant walking doll with a fixed smile, whose mechanism was a mystery.
He asked: “Do you live here now?”
“Very sensible question; no.”
“Then come again soon.”
“Thanks, I will.”
Gamadge went on down the stairs, wondering what it would feel like if one of those big hands spread itself between his shoulder blades.
Rummaging in the closet beneath the stairs, he found his hat and coat. He let himself out into the vestibule, and came face to face with Craddock.
“Mr. Gamadge—you’re going?”
“Well, yes; at last.”
“It’s only half past ten.”
“I rather thought it must be the day after tomorrow.”
“Tired? I am myself. But if you’d just spare me a few minutes…”
Craddock looked more than tired; fatigue and strain had given him the wild expression of a man in physical misery. Gamadge said: “As many minutes as you like.”
“I thought—don’t want to disturb them in there. If you’d come down to the billiard room?”
Gamadge followed him down to the street, along to the gate in the railing, through it to the service door. Craddock unlocked this, and locked it behind him when they had entered a paved yard. Trees and shrubbery were on their right, and beyond opened the snowy expanse that would be grass some day. Craddock unlocked the kitchen door, and they went into a short entrance hall. There was a doorway to left and right; Craddock led the way through the right-hand one and turned a switch.
The big room was pretty well occupied by a billiard table, a Ping-Pong table, two bridge tables and several chairs. Divans ran the length of the south and west walls, and there was a fireplace opposite the long west window.
Craddock said: “It’s cold down here; I’ll light the fire.”
“Not for me; keep my coat on.”
“Well—all right.”
They sat on the divan nearest the doorway, their coats on and their hats pushed forward by the leather cushions against which they leaned; two exhausted-looking men. “Nice place,” said Gamadge. “Must be a great place in good weather, cool and pleasant with the garden outside.”
“Yes. Mott Fenway liked it down here. I can see him knocking the balls around of an evening, played a good game. Played everything well. Took on any of us at Ping-Pong, even. I liked him, even if he didn’t think much of us.”
“Us?”
“The other crowd; Mrs. Fenway’s.”
“Oh.”
“I didn’t blame him entirely, we do fill the house up. But it was tough on Mrs. Fenway. He thought a lot of you; he talked about you yesterday, after we all heard you were coming, and again today at lunch. Mr. Gamadge—did he ask you to come back here tonight?”
Gamadge was lighting a cigarette. “What makes you think so?”
Craddock pulled a standing ash receiver towards them with his foot. He said: “You didn’t happen along by accident; and he had a chance to talk to you alone this afternoon, when he took you downstairs.”
“So did Mr. Blake Fenway have a chance to talk to me alone.”
“He’s out of it.”
“Why should Mr. Mott Fenway ask me to come back here tonight?”
Craddock got out his own cigarettes. He said, choosing one, “I don’t know where I stand. We’ll have to settle that before I say anything, if it can be settled. Mrs. Grove knew my people, and she got me this job at a time when I couldn’t have held down another to save my life; but Mrs. Fenway’s paying me, Alden’s my patient—you might call him that, I suppose—and I’m under Blake Fenway’s roof. And Blake Fenway treats me like a king.”
“Am I to tell you whom you’re to be loyal to?” Gamadge turned his head to look at the young man. Craddock, however, did not look at him. He went on:
“I shouldn’t say a word to you or anybody if I hadn’t a personal motive for talking—Hilda Grove. I haven’t an atom of proof to back anything I say. I thought you might be willing to advise me, and then forget about it. I wouldn’t suggest this if I had evidence, but as I remarked before, there’s none.”
“You’ll have to trust my discretion.”
Craddock looked at Gamadge, his black eyes burning as if there might indeed be fever in his blood. He said: “At least I’m pretty sure you’re not the kind of reforming busybody that finally gets had up for slander.”
“No,” replied Gamadge, smiling; “I’m not that.”
“I ought to tell you frankly that I’m not actuated by any higher motive myself than personal affection. Hilda’s parents were killed in a plane crash; Mrs. Grove showed up and put her in that Swiss school, and then sheered off again. I made it my business to look in on young Hilda whenever I was within a thousand miles, more or less, of Geneva. I knew her when she was a baby; she’s one still, in some ways—doesn’t question motives, doesn’t look for slights, has no vanity. I wish you’d met her; you’d get some idea of how I feel.”
“I’ll try to exercise my imagination.”
“The point is that she can’t fight her own battles, and that she has nobody to look after her but Mrs. Grove—a dry stick if ever I saw one. I stayed on this job instead of going west because I thought she ought to have one friend in the offing. Blake Fenway is a king, but he lets Caroline keep Hilda marooned up there at Fenbrook with two rather stupid old servants. Mrs. Fenway’s no use, has no authority and can’t walk. Now I get the idea that there’s something definitely wrong about Mrs. Grove. I never liked her much, but I thought she was a high-principled kind of type. Lately I’m not sure about it.”
“How lately?”
“Since that nuisance of a book got into the house; that book of views. It brought things to a head, somehow, but I think the trouble goes back farther than that, much farther. I know Mott Fenway thought Alden had torn the picture out; I heard him asking the poor guy questions about it. Alden didn’t know what it was all about; he’s a nice fellow, would have been a great guy if he’d ever had a chance. I’m fond of him; he has a great disposition, he’s never sulky or troublesome. Perhaps he did tear the picture out; but I think Mott Fenway had stumbled on something else—overheard the two women talking, or found some letter. He wanted to get rid of the whole bunch of us, and I don’t think he would have stuck at much to do Caroline Fenway a favor. She hates the sight of us all.” Craddock leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. “My idea is that Mrs. Grove has something on Mrs. Fenway—something about Alden. They’ve been in Europe for years, probably met often. It’s possible that Alden may have been tagged by the psychiatrists over there—got into trouble of some kind, and Mrs. Grove knows it and is cashing in.”
