At One-Thirty - Isabel Ostrander (book reader for pc .txt) 📗

THERE was a moment of electrified silence, and then Mrs. Finlay Appleton arose majestically to her feet.

“Mr. Gaunt, do you mean to imply that my son committed suicide, and that someone else, coming upon his body hours afterward, attempted to conceal the evidence of his act, and to create a false impression of theft and murder? You go too far, sir! Such a deduction is that of a mind, to say the least, gone astray!”

“I imply nothing of the sort, Mrs. Appieton. I assert that your son was killed by some person, at present unknown, who did not enter by way of the window; and that the murderer, or someone else, coming by chance upon the body, sought to convey a false impression of the manner of your son’s death. That is the case as it stands now.”

“I cannot believe it! It is preposterous—unthinkable! Why should anyone do such a thing? What motive could there be? No one in my household could be capable of it! I trust my servants implicitly!” The dominant woman had forgotten for the moment that it was of her daughter-in-law’s house she spoke, her daughter-in-law’s servants.

“Good God!” Yates Appleton ejaculated in a low tone. He was wiping his forehead, and staring at the detective with something akin to horror in his eyes.

“Mr. Appleton,” Gaunt turned to him, “your mother tells me that you and she are planning to leave this house today; I should like a word in private with you before you go.”

“Y-yes, Mr. Gaunt. Perhaps you’ll come to my room? My man is packing there now; but I’ll dismiss him—”

“I’ll come presently, when I’ve had a word with the Coroner.”

The Judge had turned to Mrs. Appleton, and was saying softly:

“You are leaving this house—leaving Natalie in her grief?”

“Her grief is not overwhelming, my dear friend. There is no need of pretense to you. She’s merely hysterical now, and Barbara is taking care of her.”

“But, Catherine, is it wise? Is it—politic?”

“I don’t know. I know the house is horrible to me; that I could not spend another night in it!”

The Judge sighed.

“Could I speak to Natalie for a moment, do you think?”

“I’ll see.” Mrs. Appleton swept from the room as if glad to escape even momentarily from Gaunt’s presence, and the. Judge turned to where his daughter, with white, set face and staring eyes, crouched in the window-seat.

Meanwhile, the Coroner said in a low, excited tone:

“You’re sure of what you said, Mr. Gaunt? That was a pretty strong statement you made. After all, you know, you’ve the merest circumstantial evidence to go on.”

“Good heavens, man! Don’t the facts bear me out so far? And I made that statement as openly as I did, for a good and sufficient reason. Be sure you keep that revolver from being handled too much. You’ll need the powder-traces on it as evidence, lattt.”

“Judge Carhart, if you will come with me—” Mrs. Appleton’s voice came from just behind them, —“Natalie would like to see you for a moment.”

When the Judge had left the room, the Coroner, too, departed, and Gaunt crossed to where the slim, still figure was seated among the cushions.

“You—you’re blind aren’t you, Mr. Gaunt?” the girl asked curiously, but not unkindly. “How did you know where I was sitting?”

“By your perfume. Miss Carhart,” he replied, with a smile. “You know, we who are bereft of one sense must train the others to act for us in place of the one we have lost. That perfume is very strange, unusual.”

“Yes. My father has it sent from India. He used to get it for my mother. It has an unpronounceable name, meaning ‘The Rose in Death.’” She shivered a little at the last word, then went on hurriedly: “It is supposed to be very, very old. I believe it was first distilled for the queen in whose memory the Taj-Mahal was built…. But tell me, Mr. Gaunt, is it really true that Garret— that Mr. Appleton was—murdered? Even after hearing what you have all just said, I cannot believe it.”

“He is dead,” Gaunt answered, gently. “By whose hand we have yet to learn. Try to recall everything that happened last evening, every little, trivial incident, which may have slipped your memory. There was nothing—not a word or a look from anyone out of the ordinary?”

“I can’t think—you frighten me so, Mr. Gaunt! You make me feel as if you suspected every one of us! Surely, it was a burglar, was it not? Mr. Appleton’s money and jewelry are also gone, they say. Oh, what does it all mean? Who can have done it?”

“Try to calm yourself. Miss Carhart, and collect your dioughts, and tell me exactly what happened last evening—everything which you can remember.”

“Why, we dined—just a simple family dinner— you know, we’re all awfully old friends—Mrs. Appleton, and” my father, and Garret and his wife, and Miss Ellerslie, and Yates, and I. And then, afterward—let me see. Oh, yti^^ Miss Ellerslie went to a wedding with a party of friends, who called for her—”

“A wedding?”

“Yes. An old friend from the South, I believe. And Yates went out, too. Mrs. Appleton and father played double-dummy bridge, and Garret and his wife and I chatted for awhile. Then Garret’s wife said she wasn’t feeling very well, and excused herself and went upstairs, and Garret and I sat and talked until father and Mrs Appleton finished their game, and we went home. That is all.”

“What time did you leave?”

“Oh, early—between eleven and halfpast, I think.”

“And on your arrival home?”

“Father went to his study for a last cigar, and I went right up to bed, and read for an hour or two before I fell asleep. We weren’t going on anywhere else. It’s too early in the season for dances and that sort of thing, you know.”

“I understand. Miss Carhart,” he bent forward suddenly, as if to look into her face through his sightless eyes, and shot the question at her, “at what hour during the evening, and with whom, were you in the den?”

She shrank from him, her breath coming in great gasps.

“The— den?” she faltered, through’dry lips.

“The room in which Garret Appleton was afterward murdered,” he persisted, inexorably.

“The—den!” she repeated. “Why, never—not once—not for an instant! I swear it!”

The detective drew back.

“Oh!” he muttered. “You said that you and young Mrs. Appleton and her husband sat chatting, while your father and the elder Mrs. Appleton played bridge. I thought perhaps you were in the den.”

Miss Carhart drew a deep breath.

“Oh, no!” she said, hastily. “We were in the library.”

He could feel her eyes upon him, deep and bright with suspicion.

“You say that young Mrs. Appleton was not well. Did she seem depressed, or unhappy?”

The sudden change of topic had the desired effect.

“How should I know?” the girl drew herself up coldly. “I did not norice her particularly. She seemed quite as usual.”

“I thought perhaps you would have noticed. I understood you were great friends.”

“I meant that my father and I were great friends of the Appleton family. I only know Garret’s wife and her sister casually, not inrimately.”

“Well, Miss Carhart, I must leave you. No doubt Mrs. Appleton will return almost immediately with your father, and I must interview the servants. Thank you for [replying to my questions.”

He turned gropingly, with outstretched hands, as if feeling for the door from which he had come to her with such unerring precision, and his hand came in contact with her head just where her hair billowed out from under her hat. He withdrew it at once, with a deprecatingly murmured apology, and, with an odd lack of his usual accuracy, fumbled for the door. On the sill, he paused, stopped, and picked up a iilmy square of lace, so tiny that it had lain unnoticed in the general excitement by those who had passed over it. He turned, and walked straight back to where the girl sat watching him, with curious, fascinated eyes.

“Your handkerchief, I believe?” he asked, smilingly presenting it. “You must have dropped it when you entered.”

Miss Carhart took it from his hand, glanced at it, and then swiftly back to his face, and her eyes were dark with apprehension.

“Thank you, it is mine,” she said quietly.’ “But — ^how did you know?”

“The perfume,” he explained, with courteous, but wearied, patience. “Wherever you are, whereever any personal article of yours lies, that individual, penetrating scent of yours would lead unmistakably to you. And then, too, if I am not mistaken, I felt the monogram D. C. in a comer of the handkerchief. Mrs. Appleton called you ‘ Doris.’ It is quite simple, you see. Good-morning, Miss Carhart.”

As he made his way slowly along the unfamiliar hall, he pondered. She had been in the den sometime the previous evening. The lingering, cloying perfume was unmistakable. Why had she denied it?

A man-servant passed through the hall, and, seeing him, approached deferentially.

“Mr. Gaunt, sir? Were you going to Mr% Appleton^s room? He expects you. I’m his man, sir. Shall I show you the way?”

“If you will, please. But where were you going just now?”

“To the kitchen, sir, with this tray.”

“Tray?”

“Yes, sir. Mr. Yates Appleton’s breakfast-tray.”

The man’s perceptible pause before the word “breakfast” was illuminating, but unnecessarily so to Gaunt.

“That is not a breakfast-tray, my man, unless your master partook of a most injudicious meal. He’d better not have anything more to drink today, if you can keep it away from him.”

“Drink, sir? How—how did you know?” the valet stammered, the shaking tray almost slipping from his hands.

“From the tinkle of ice in the glass, and that purring sound of gas in the siphon. If that tray had been more heavily laden—with dishes, for instance—I should have heard them clink together, also, as you came toward me down the hall. What is your name?”

“James, sir.”

“Well, James, at what hour did your master return home last night, or, rather, this morning?”

“At about three o’clock, sir.”

“How do you know? Did you wait up for him?”

“Yes, sir. I mostly do, sir. It—it isn’t often that he can get to bed by himself, sir.” The man spoke apologetically, but with eager frankness. Evidently, he stood much in awe of his inquisitor.

“I understand. And in what condition was your master when he returned this morning?”

“About as usual. Quite—quite under the weather, so to speak, but not what you might call bad, sir…. This is his door.”

James coughed discreetly, and knocked, and an irritable, highly strung voice bade him enter.

“Mr. Gaunt, sir,” announced James, and departed swiftly and noiselessly.

“Oh I” said Yates Appleton, with a noticeable change of tone. “Come in, Mr. Gaunt. What is it you