The Siamese Twin Mystery, page 11
Her hand was at her mouth. “Yes,” she said faintly. “Iscre. My maiden name. I am French. …”
“Sarah Isère Xavier,” said the Inspector grimly. He whipped his hand into his pocket and produced with a flourish a small sheet of delicately tinted personal stationery, monogrammed at the top with three capital letters. “I found this piece of writing-paper in your desk in the big bedroom upstairs, Mrs. Xavier. Do you admit it’s yours?”
She was on her feet, swaying. “Yes. Yes. But—”
He held the paper high, so that all their wide eyes could see it. The monogram read: SIX. The Inspector dropped the sheet and stepped forward. “Dr. Xavier in his last moment accused S I X of murdering him. I saw the light when I remembered that two of your initials were S X. Mrs. Xavier, consider yourself under arrest for the murder of your husband!”
For one horrible moment Francis’s merry laugh rang faintly in their ears from the kitchen. Mrs. Carreau was white as death, her right hand on her breast. Ann Forrest was trembling. Dr. Holmes was blinking at the tall woman swaying before them with disbelief, nausea, mounting rage. Mark Xavier was rigid in his chair, only the muscles of his jaw working. Bones stood like a mythological figure of vengeance, glaring with awful triumph at Mrs. Xavier.
The Inspector snapped: “You knew that on the death of your husband you would come into a pot of money, didn’t you?”
She took a small backward step, breathing thickly. “Yes—”
“You were jealous of Mrs. Carreau, weren’t you? Insanely jealous? You couldn’t stand seeing them together conducting what you thought was an affair right before your nose, could you?—when all the time they were just discussing Mrs. Carreau’s sons!” He advanced steadily, never taking his hard eyes from hers, a little gray nemesis.
“Yes, yes,” she gasped, retreating another step.
“When you followed Mrs. Carreau downstairs last night and saw her slip into your husband’s study and after a while slip out again, you were mad with jealous rage, weren’t you?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
“You went in, snatched the revolver from the drawer, shot him, killed him, murdered him; didn’t you, Mrs. Xavier? Didn’t you?”
The edge of the chair stopped her. She tottered and fell into the seat with a thud. Her mouth was working soundlessly, like the mouth of a fish seen through the glass window of an aquarium.
“Yes,” she whispered. “Yes.”
Her glazedly black eyes rolled over once; then she shuddered convulsively and fainted.
Chapter 10. LEFT AND RIGHT
It was a terrible afternoon. The sun was overpowering. It poured its fierce liquefying strength upon the house and the rocks and turned both into infernos. They wandered about the house like materialized ghosts, scarcely speaking, avoiding each other, physically wretched from the dampness of their clothing and the heaviness of their limbs, mentally sick and exhausted. Even the twins were subdued; they sat quietly by themselves on the terrace and watched their elders with round eyes.
The unconscious woman had been turned over to the mercies of Dr. Holmes and Miss Forrest; that surprising young woman, it developed, having had considerable professional experience as a nurse in the years preceding her employment by Mrs. Carreau. The men carried the heavy figure of Mrs. Xavier upstairs to the master—now masterless—bedroom.
“You’d better give her something to keep her asleep for a while, Doc,” said the Inspector thoughtfully as he gazed down upon the handsome recumbent figure. There was no triumph, only distaste in his eyes. “She’s the nervous type. They go off the handle at the least emotional disturbance. Might try to do away with herself when she comes to. Not that it wouldn’t be the best thing for her, poor devil. … Give her a hypo or something.”
Dr. Holmes nodded silently; he went down to the laboratory and returned with a filled hypodermic. Miss Forrest fiercely banished the men from the bedroom. She and the physician alternated at the sleeping woman’s bedside for the remainder of the afternoon.
Mrs. Wheary, informed of the culpability of her mistress, wept briefly and not convincingly; she had always known, she informed the Inspector through squeezed tears, that “it couldn’t turn out well; she was too jealous. And him such a kind, good, handsome man, poor lamb, who didn’t even look at other women! I was his housekeeper before his marriage, sir, and when she came to live with us she started right away. Jealous! She was just crazy.”
The Inspector grunted and became practical. None of them had had a mouthful of food since the previous night. Could Mrs. Wheary so compose herself as to scrape together a passable luncheon? He personally was on the verge of starvation.
Mrs. Wheary sighed, wiped away the last arid tear, and turned back to her kitchen-cabinet.
“Though I will say,” she moaned as the Inspector turned to go, “that there isn’t any too much food in the house, sir, begging your pardon.”
“What’s that?” said the Inspector sharply, halting.
“You see,” sniffed Mrs. Wheary, “we’ve got some canned goods and things, sir, but the more perishable vittles—milk and eggs and butter and meats and fowl—we’ve about run out of ‘em, sir. The grocer at Osquewa delivers once a week, sir; terrible long trip it is on these blessed mountain roads. He was due yesterday, but with this awful fire and all—”
“Well, do the best you can,” said the old gentleman mildly, and went away. In the gloom of the corridor, where he was unobserved, his mouth drooped. Things looked far from promising, despite the solution of the case. He bethought himself of the telephone and trotted with rising hope to the living-room.
He put the instrument down after a while, his shoulders sagging. The line was dead. The inevitable had occurred; the fire had reached the telephone poles and brought the wires down. They were completely cut off from the outside world.
No use getting the others in more of a state than they were, he thought, stepping out onto the terrace and smiling mechanically at the twins. He cursed the fate that had induced him to take his vacation. As for Ellery …
He came to with a start just as Mrs. Wheary plodded out of the foyer to announce luncheon.
Where was Ellery? thought the Inspector. He had disappeared not long after they had taken Mrs. Xavier upstairs.
He went to the edge of the porch and squinted over the tumbled rocks in the devastating sunlight. The place was as barren and ugly and grim as the surface of another and lifeless planet. Then he caught a glimpse of white beneath the nearest tree off the left side of the house.
Ellery was sprawled full-length in the shade of an oak, hands behind his head, staring intently up at the green leaves above him.
“Lunch!” yelled the Inspector, cupping his hands.
Ellery started. Then he wearily picked himself up, brushed off his clothes, and trudged toward the house.
* * *
It was a dismal meal, eaten for the most part in silence. The fare was poor and wonderfully diversified, but it seemed to make little difference, for they all munched away without appetite, scarcely noticing what they were putting into their mouths. Dr. Holmes was missing; still upstairs with Mrs. Xavier. When Ann Forrest finished, she rose quietly and went away. A few moments later the young physician appeared, sat down, and began to eat. No one said anything.
After luncheon they dispersed. Mr. Smith, who could be called a ghost only by the most generous stretch of the imagination, nevertheless contrived to look like one. He had not joined the others in the dining-room, having already been fed by Mrs. Wheary. He kept strictly to himself and no one ventured near him. He spent most of the afternoon tramping heavily about the terrace chewing a damp cigar as gorilla-like as himself.
“What’s eating you?” demanded the Inspector when he and Ellery retired to their room after luncheon for a shower and fresh clothing. “You’ll crack your jaw pulling that long face!”
“Oh, nothing,” muttered Ellery, flinging himself on the bed. “I just feel annoyed.”
“Annoyed! At what?”
“At myself.”
Hie Inspector grinned. “For not spotting that sheet of stationery? Well, you can’t have the luck all the time.”
“Oh, not that. That was very clever, and you needn’t be so modest about it. It’s something else.”
“What?”
“That,” said Ellery, “is what annoys me. I don’t know.” He sat up nervously, rubbing his cheek. “Call it intuition—it’s a convenient word. But something is trying to crawl past my conscious defenses and make contact. The merest wraith of a something. And what it is I’m blessed if I know.”
“Take a shower,” said the Inspector sympathetically. “Maybe it’s just a headache.”
When they had redressed Ellery went to the rear window and scowled out over the abyss. The Inspector moved about, hanging his clothes on hooks in the wardrobe.
“Getting set for a long stay, I see,” murmured Ellery, without however turning.
The Inspector stared. “Well, it gives me something to do,” he grunted at last. “I have a hunch we won’t be so damn’ idle in a few days.”
“Meaning?”
The old man did not reply.
After a while Ellery said: “We may as well be thoroughly technical about this affair. Did you lock that study downstairs?”
“The study?” The Inspector blinked. “Why, no. What the deuce for?”
Ellery shrugged. “You never can tell. Let’s amble down there; I’ve a yen anyway to soak in a little of the gory atmosphere. Maybe that wraith will materialize.”
They went downstairs through an empty house. Except for Smith on the terrace no one was about.
They found the scene of the crime as they had left it; Ellery, obsessed by the vaguest twinges of alarm, went over the room thoroughly. But the desk with the cards on it, the swivel-chair, the cabinet, the murder-weapon, the cartridges—evervthing was untouched.
“You’re an old lady,” said the Inspector jovially. “Although it was dumb to leave that gun around. And the cartridges. I think I’ll get ‘em in a safer place.”
Ellery was regarding the top of the desk gloomily. “You might put those cards away, too. After all, they’re evidence. This is the craziest case. Corpse has to be stuffed into a refrigerator, evidence held for the proper officials, nice little blaze toasting—figuratively—our toes. … Pah!”
He shoved the cards together, went through them to get all their faces turned the same way, stacked them together and handed them to his father. The torn piece of card with the six of spades showing, and the crumpled remainder, he tucked after a moment of hesitation into his own pocket.
The Inspector found a Yale key sticking into the lock on the laboratory side of one study door, closed the doors and locked them from the study, locked the library door with an ordinary steel key of the skeleton type from his own key-ring, and used the key again on the outside of the cross-hall door.
“Where are you going to cache the evidence?” murmured Ellery as they began to mount the stairs.
“Don’t know. Have to get a fairly safe place.”
“Why didn’t you leave it in the study? You took plenty of trouble to lock the three doors.”
The Inspector grimaced. “Doors from the hall and library any kid could open. I locked ‘em just for effect. … What’s this?”
A little knot of people was crowded about the open door of the master bedroom. Even Mrs. Wheary and Bones were there.
They pushed their way through to find Dr. Holmes and Mark Xavier bending over the bed.
“What’s the trouble?” snapped the Inspector.
“She’s come out of it,” panted Dr. Holmes, “and I’m afraid she’s a bit violent. Hold her, Xavier, will you! Miss Forrest—get my hypo. …”
The woman was struggling desperately in the men’s grip, her arms and legs threshing like flails. Her eyes were glaring at the ceiling, wide open and blind.
“Here,” muttered the Inspector. He leaned over the bed and said in a crackling clear voice: “Mrs. Xavier!”
The threshing ceased and sense crept back into her eyes. She brought her chin down and looked about her rather dazedly.
“You’re acting very foolishly, Mrs. Xavier,” the Inspector went on in the same sharp tone. “It won’t get you anywhere, you know. Snap out of it!”
She shuddered and closed her eyes. Then she opened them and began very softly to weep.
The men straightened up with deep sighs of relief, Mark Xavier wiping his damp brow and Dr. Holmes turning away with dejected, drooping shoulders.
“She’ll be all right now,” said the Inspector quietly. “But I shouldn’t leave her alone, Doctor. As long as she’s tractable, you understand. If she gets fractious again, put her to sleep.”
He was startled to hear the woman’s voice, husky but controlled, from the bed. “I shall not make any more trouble,” she said.
“That’s fine, Mrs. Xavier, that’s fine,” said the Inspector heartily. “By the way, Dr. Holmes, you’d probably know. Is there any place in the house here where I can put something for safekeeping?”
“Why, the safe in this room, I should think,” replied the physician indifferently.
“Well … no. It’s the—evidence, y’see.”
“Evidence?” growled Xavier.
“Those cards from the doctor’s desk in the study.”
“Oh.”
“There’s an empty steel cabinet in the living-room, sir,” ventured Mrs.
Wheary timidly from the group in the corridor. “It’s a sort of safe, but the doctor never kept anything in it.”
“Who knows the combination?”
“No combination, sir. It’s got some kind of funny locks and things, with just one funny key. Key’s in the big table-drawer.”
“Fine. The very thing. Thanks, Mrs. Wheary. Come along, El.” And the Inspector strode out of the bedroom followed by a battery of eyes. Ellery sauntered after, frowning. When they were on the stairs descending to the ground floor he glanced at his father with a quizzical eyebrow.
“That,” he murmured, “was a mistake.”
“Hey?”
“Mistake, mistake,” repeated Ellery patiently. “Not that it makes a particle of difference. I’ve got the important evidence right here in my pocket.” He tapped the pocket which held the halves of playing-card. “At that it may be interesting. Sort of baited trap. Is that what you had in mind?”
The Inspector looked sheepish. “Well … not exactly. Hadn’t thought of it that way. Maybe you’re right.”
They went into the deserted living-room and sought out the cabinet. It was imbedded in one of the walls near the fireplace, its face painted to match the wooden paneling of the wall, but frankly a hiding-place. Ellery found the key in the top drawer of the big table; he regarded it for a moment, shrugged, and tossed it to his father.
The Inspector caught the key, hefted it with a frown, and then unlocked the cabinet. The mechanism worked with a convincing series of complex clicks. The deep recess inside was empty. He took the loose pack of cards from his pocket, regarded it for a moment, sighed, and then slapped it down on the floor of the recess.
Ellery swung on his heel at a slight sound from the terrace. The gross figure of Mr. Smith appeared beyond a French window, bulbous nose flattened against the glass, frankly spying upon them. He started guiltily at Ellery’s movement, jerked upright, and disappeared. Ellery heard his elephantine step resound on the wooden flooring of the terrace.
The Inspector took the murder-weapon from his pocket and the box of cartridges. He hesitated, then returned them to his pocket. “No,” he muttered. “That’s too chancy. I’ll keep ‘em on me. Have to find out if this is the only key to the cabinet. Well, here goes,” and he slammed the door shut and locked it. The key he put on his own key-ring.
* * *
Ellery was increasingly silent as the afternoon wore on. The Inspector, yawning, left him to his own devices and trudged upstairs to their room for a nap. As he passed the door of Mrs. Xavier’s bedroom he saw Dr. Holmes standing at one of the front windows, hands clasped behind his back, and the woman lying wide-eyed and quiet in bed. The others had disappeared.
The Inspector sighed and went on.
When he emerged an hour later, feeling distinctly refreshed, the bedroom door was closed. He opened it softly and peered in. Mrs. Xavier lay as he had last seen her. Dr. Holmes had apparently not stirred from his position by the window. But Miss Forrest now had made her appearance; she lay in a chaise-longue near the bed, eyes closed.
The Inspector closed the door and went downstairs.
Mrs. Carreau, Mark Xavier, the twins, and Mr. Smith were on the terrace. Mrs. Carreau was making a pretense of reading a magazine; but her eyes were cloudy and her head did not move from side to side. Mr. Smith was still patrolling the terrace chewing the ragged end of his cigar. The twins were engrossed in a game of chess, which they were playing on a magnetized pocket-board with metal pieces. Mark Xavier half-lay on a chair, head on his breast, apparently asleep.
“Have you seen my son around?” asked the Inspector of the world at large.
Francis Carreau looked up. “Hullo there, Inspector!” he said cheerfully. “Mr. Queen? I think I saw him go down there under the trees about an hour ago.”
“He was carrying a pack of cards,” added Julian. “Come on, Fran, it’s your move. I think you’re going to be licked.”
“Not,” retorted Francis, “when I can give you a bishop and take your queen, I won’t! How d’ye like that?”
“Shucks,” said Julian disgustedly. “I give up. Let’s have another.”
Mrs. Carreau looked up, smiling faintly. The Inspector smiled back at her, looked up at the sky, and then descended the stone steps to the gravel path.
