THE TRAGEDY
DINNER at Valhalla that night was a brilliant affair.
Anna’s name for the place had caught on, and Loft began to like it as
he heard it used by his guests.
Anna, as chaperon, graced the head of the table, and Curran sat at
her right hand. This left Pauline for Loft’s guest of honor, and as
she took her place beside him, he thought she had never looked more
beautiful. Her great dark eyes seemed brighter than usual and her
cheeks showed a flush that was quite obviously not rouge. She wore
black, her only ornament a long slender neck-chain of small bright
diamonds. She was in vivacious, almost perverse mood, quite unusual for
the calm, gracious Pauline.
Anna, tonight, was demure and coy. She set herself the task of
subjugating Hugh Curran, and so far as she could see she was putting it
over.
Yet the man was tricky, she could see that, and more than likely, she
thought, his devotion was insincere.
Though commonplace looking, Curran had an air of easy superiority that
made him almost distinguished. But his round red face and sparse sandy
hair precluded all pretension to good looks.
Countess Galaski was gorgeous. Robed in white satin, glittering
with jewels and autocratic of manner, she appropriated the best of
everything, was rude to everybody, and yet somehow charmed all by her
gay naïveté.
Stella wore especially long and diaphanous draperies, of pale green and
silver, and looked more than ever like the Blessed Damosel.
On the whole Loft had a right to feel proud of his guests, for aside
from their appearance they were a group of mentally alert and even
original talkers.
But when the Countess began to expatiate on her marvelous collection of
miniatures, Anna gayly called a halt.
“Countess, darling,” she said, “we beg of you to don’t. Mr. Curran is a
book collector and he’s crazy to talk Black Letters, or whatever they
are, with Angel Bob, who is an Old Book Fiend too. Val, of course,
collects everything, from books to old bandboxes, and I believe Mrs.
Meredith collects postcards. But they’ve all promised not to talk
Collect at the table. So, be goody-girl, Countess dear, and drop your
miniatures.”
“Oh, very well,” and the Countess smiled at Little Anna, “the loss is
yours not mine. But I have to talk. I’ll tell you about--”
“Wait a minute,” the incorrigible Roly dared to interrupt her, “since
we have Mr. Curran here, and Lord knows when I’ll ever get a chance at
him again, let’s talk Detective Stories. We all love ’em.”
“Not all of us,” Anna dissented; “but you may talk on that subject for
fifteen minutes, Roly. After that, I shall choose the theme.”
“To go back to a discussion we had the other day,” Angel Bob began,
“what do you think the best and finest method of murder, Mr. Curran?”
Mrs. Meredith gave a little gasp at this, and her husband looked
shocked.
But Curran took it as a matter of course.
“Each method has its advantages,” he began. “And too, much depends on
the criminal. If he has any surgical training, stabbing is indicated,
if he has a good aim, shooting is better. An athlete would, of course,
strangle.”
“And a woman would give poison,” said Pauline, slowly.
“Yes,” and Hugh Curran looked at her, “yes, a woman probably would.”
“If this conversation keeps up,” Mrs. Meredith spoke hysterically, “I
shall have to leave the table.”
“Don’t be a fool, Madame!” exclaimed the Countess. “If you would read
De Quincey’s essay on Murder As A Fine Art, you would learn that the
greatest minds are willing to discuss such matters. One does not have
to be a spook to discuss Spiritualism!”
“Spiritualism is a decent subject,” Mr. Meredith said; “whereas, murder
is, or should be, outside the pale of our thoughts.”
“Well, you have to be dead before you can be a spirit,” the Countess
returned, “and if one is unfortunate enough to be murdered, there’s no
reason why those still alive shouldn’t talk about it.”
“I’m for strangling,” Baldwin said; “then there’s no weapon,--no
‘feathers left around,’ you see. Also, granting one _wants_ to
kill a man, what a pleasure it must be to feel one’s fingers on his
throat,--tightening, closing in--tighter,--a gasp--”
Angel Bob, in mischievous mood, portrayed his speech in dumb show, with
such realism that Mrs. Meredith shrieked and rose from the table.
“Sit down” commanded the Countess, in ringing tones, and Mrs. Meredith
sat down.
“I’d shoot,” and Ned Knox, picking up the theme, acted the part of an
intruder, taking aim at an unsuspicious victim. He chose Loft for his
purpose, and aimed a fork carefully at his right temple.
“But I can see you,” Loft objected.
“Turn your head away, then,” Knox counselled.
“Shooting has disadvantages,” Curran said, musingly. “There’s the
noise.”
“Silencer,” returned Knox.
“Not always practicable. Then, there’s the weapon.”
“Easy enough to dispose of,” Knox laughed, “except in fiction, where it
is needed as a clue,--if it has initials on it, or is one of a pair.”
“Righto!” and Curran laughed appreciatively. “I’m glad to learn how you
readers are on to our hackneyed tricks. Stabbing is a good way--”
“Yes,” Loft agreed; “with the library paper-cutter. Used to be an old
Italian dagger, and the victim many times said it ought not to be left
around, as it was a suggestion and a temptation to any murderous-minded
bystander.”
“Oh, Lord, you know all the tricks of the trade!” Curran sighed in mock
despair. “I confess it’s hard to get a novelty for a story nowadays.”
“But it’s easy to murder,” said Bob.
“It isn’t,” contended Loft; “it’s possible, but it’s a delicate and
difficult affair to put over artistically. I’m not talking of yeggs and
gunmen.”
“Except for them, it’s impossible.” Ned Knox averred. “I don’t propose
to try it for that reason. I know I’d fail.”
“Of course you would,” and Anna giggled. “If you could put it over,
you’d have tried it on me long ago. I’ve given you sufficient
provocation, I know. Anyway, time’s up,--No more murder talk. Now,
we’ll discuss Mr. Curran. How do you all like him?”
“Top hole!” cried Roly Mears. “But I want to know more about him. What
does he eat for breakfast? What--”
“Wait till morning and you’ll find that out,” Loft interrupted. “I want
to know his real name. No secret, is it, Mr. Curran?”
“Not a bit. I had another name, but I lost it, somehow. It’s my
besetting sin,--to lose things. I lost my wife, then I lost my
ambition. I found that again, though. But mostly I lose material
things. I can’t keep a pencil or a rubber or a sheet of paper, no
matter how many I buy. I’m just naturally untidy. My room always looks
like Broadway the day after Election night. My brushes just won’t stay
on my dresser; my clothes crawl out of their wardrobes and drawers. I
can’t help it,--are you like that, Miss Fuller?”
Apparently he addressed Pauline because she was looking at him
intently, seemingly interested in his tale of his personal derelictions.
“N--no,” she replied, looking startled at being thus spoken to. “I
don’t think so,--I--I never thought about it.”
“Goodness, Pauline,” said Anna, staring at her, “don’t take it so
seriously. I can vouch for your tidiness. I never knew a girl who kept
her top bureau drawer in order as well as you do.”
“That is a sure test,” declared the Countess. “I’ll bet Miss Lawrence’s
is a kaleidoscope of laces and ribbons, gloves and handkerchiefs.”
“It is!” said Stella, good-naturedly. “And I want it so--With my
temperament, I couldn’t be methodical or systematic or anything like
that. Fate rules me--”
“And you leave it to Fate to clear up your bureau drawers,” said Roly,
laughing. “Good idea, so do I.”
“I don’t,” said Mrs. Meredith primly, but no one seemed to care deeply.
The Merediths were out of place, but had been asked because of some
social obligation of Loft’s. They were shocked several times during
dinner, but perhaps Mrs. Meredith’s sensibilities were most greatly
jarred, when, leaving the dining room, she chanced to overhear Hugh
Curran ask the butler for a toothpick.
The capable Binns didn’t allow himself to be jarred, but he was
bothered, for the request caught him unprepared. However, he quickly
bethought himself of the tiny Japanese wooden toothpicks that the cook
used to pin rolled morsels and he soon supplied the distinguished guest.
Angel Bob noticed the incident and was more amused at Mrs. Meredith’s
disdain than at Curran’s unconventionality.
The party broke up into smaller groups.
Anna seized upon Curran, who went, nothing loath, with her to see the
moonlight from the upper terrace.
Loft and Pauline went for a stroll in the rose garden; Roly Mears set
himself to tease Stella and to please the Countess, succeeding well
with both.
As it neared bedtime, all gathered for good-nights in the library.
“Tomorrow,” said Curran, as he looked at the filled shelves, “I want to
spend the morning in here. You have wonderful treasures, Mr. Loft, and
I anticipate joyous hours with them.”
“I am clairvoyant, Mr. Curran,” Stella said, looking at him dreamily,
“and I can read your soul.”
“Good Heavens, don’t, Miss Lawrence! It’s not fit reading for a young
girl!”
“But I’m not like other girls,” Stella was determined to have her
innings, “I’m apart,--alone.”
“Yes?” said Curran, not thinking of anything better to say.
“Yes. And in your soul I read a longing for all that is beautiful and
good--”
“I like them beautiful,--I’m not so insistent on the good,” and Curran
smiled. This line of talk always bored him.
“Things, I mean, not people. Oh, I can read you, Mr. Curran.”
“And I can read you, Miss Lawrence. I’m clairvoyant, myself.”
“Oh, are you?” cried the Countess. “Read us all, won’t you? I don’t
care for Stella’s foolishness,--you shut up, Stella.”
“Want a table?” asked Loft, “or any paraphernalia?”
“Oh, I’m not a parlor Magician,” Curran protested. “I don’t know
anything about legerdemain or hocus-pocus. But I have a natural gift of
reading minds.”
“Don’t do it!” exclaimed Roly Mears. “If these people know what I’m
thinking they’d never speak to me again!”
“You’re joking,” said Curran, “but there are some really quaking in
their shoes, lest I tell something they don’t want told.”
“I know!” said the Countess, “it’s Mrs. Meredith! I always suspected
she led a double life! Well, much as I want to know the truth about
it, I beg of you, Mr. Curran, don’t tell it all out in public.”
Mrs. Meredith blushed angrily, but said nothing. She had learned it was
better not to irritate Countess Galaski.
“Go on,” urged Anna. “Tell us something to prove your powers. I hate
people who say they can do things and then do nothing at all!”
“Yes,” said the Countess, “go on! Tell anything you like about me.”
“Very well,” said Curran, “you’re thinking that you wish you had worn
your old slippers after all, for the new ones are a bit tight and they
do pinch.”
“You’re perfectly right!” and the Countess joined in the general
merriment. “But that isn’t clairvoyance. I’ve had my face screwed up
with pain all the evening!”
“Well, how’s this, then? In the mind of one of you is a most
disquieting thought, which I may suggest by _Black Pansy_.”
“That’s me!” said Ned Knox, as Curran waited for some response. “I’ve a
lot of stock in that mine, and unless she picks up soon, I’ll probably
start ‘Over the hills to the poorhouse!’”
“How did you know it, though?” and Anna looked at Curran, incredulously.
“Clairvoyance,” replied Curran, not caring to say that he had seen a
newspaper thrown down, with a marked notice about the mine.
“Also,” he went on, “as I look around, I feel vibrations from others of
you.”
He glanced from one face to another, all breathlessly watching him.
“If I should say,” he spoke very slowly, “if I should say
_Rosalie_--would I reflect the word in anybody’s mind?”
A dead silence followed.
Removing their regard from Curran, one looked at another, but no one
spoke.
Nor did any one look especially self-conscious. Loft looked inquiring,
Angel looked bewildered. The women looked merely interested, except
Pauline, who seemed bored. She moved restlessly, and stared hard at
Curran.
“Right,” Curran said; “it’s better not to recognize the reference.” He
nodded his head as in satisfaction.
“Suppose I say, ‘_Mr. S._’” he went on. “Is he in any one’s
thoughts?”
Again the silence fell.
Anna, frankly curious, glanced quickly from one to another. From
the faces, as she read them, the reference might mean something to
Valentine Loft or to Bob Baldwin. On the other hand, they might look
disturbed, as they both did, merely from interest in the proceedings.
“Oh, well,” Curran resumed, “I see, the people who recognize my
allusions prefer not to say so. I don’t blame them. Now, Mrs. Knox,
shall I tell what’s in your mind? Shall I mention the name of--”
“No!” screamed Anna, “no! If you do, I’ll kill you!”
But she told her husband afterward that she only said this to make a
sensation.
“Then,” said Curran, “I’ll read Miss Lawrence’s mind. Last night Miss
Lawrence dreamed--”
“Stop!” Stella cried, her eyes staring; “if you dare divulge that
dream--”
Curran smiled. He had made a stab in the dark, feeling sure that the
psychic Stella, would always be dreaming and interpreting her dreams
according to Freud.
“Guess we’ve had enough of this sort of thing,” and Loft rose. “Don’t
trouble yourself, Mr. Curran, to read my mind, I can read it for
myself.”
“Nothing startling in it just now,” Curran said; “but there will
be soon. I’m slightly prophetic as well as clairvoyant, and I
prognosticate a lot of surprising, even tragic thoughts for your mind
soon.”
“All right, I’ll go to bed and sleep while the sleeping’s good, then,”
and Loft inaugurated good-nights, and the party dispersed.
By next morning Loft had forgotten the irritation he felt at Curran’s
strange speech, and after his breakfast he went to the library to await
the coming of his guest to talk books.
The women breakfasted in their rooms, the men dropping into the
breakfast room whenever they pleased.
Loft was down first, but was soon joined by Angel and Ned Knox, both of
whom wanted to hear Curran discourse on the subject of rare books.
“Keep your ears open, Bob, and find out what he wants,” advised Loft.
“You ought to be able to make a sale or two.”
“Hope so,” Bob assented. “He wants only Incunabula, though, and that’s
not so easy come by just now.”
But the hours passed, and no sign of Hugh Curran.
At last, Loft, looking at the clock, said, “I’m annoyed. I have to go
over to the Club before luncheon, and the time is growing short. I’ve a
notion to send for Curran. I don’t believe he’s still asleep.”
The butler was despatched to learn as to this, and was directed to be
discreet.
Discretion itself, Binns returned to say that he could hear no sound
from Mr. Curran’s room and that though he had softly tried the door, it
was locked.
They waited another half hour, and then Loft said, nervously, “You
don’t suppose anything has happened, do you? Maybe the man is ill.”
“Nonsense,” said Knox, “Men don’t get ill overnight. He looked a
healthy chap.”
“All the same, I’m going up myself,” and Loft went out to the hall.
He soon returned, saying, “There must be something the matter. I
knocked and even pounded on his door, but got no response. I even
listened at the keyhole, and I couldn’t hear any breathing. Do you
suppose he left in the night?”
“Through the window?” asked Angel.
“Well, it’s queer. If we can’t get anything from him, I’m going to
break in.”
“Oh, don’t do that!” cried Knox. “Send Binns up outside--to the
windows, you know.”
“Can’t,--it’s so high.”
“Ladder?”
“Yes,--but--oh, I suppose it’s all right.”
But after another hour, Loft declared he was going to get into that
room.
“I’m responsible for him,” he said; “he’s my guest, and if he’s merely
sound asleep, he can’t do more than curse me for my intrusion.”
No response being made to continued knockings, and no sound heard by
any of them listening, Loft ordered Binns to get a ladder and climb up
to the window.
The butler did so, and returned to say that he could see Mr. Curran,
fully dressed, sitting in an arm chair. The window was fastened.
“Should he break in?”
“Yes, by the door,” said Loft, suddenly determined. “That man must have
had a stroke or something, if he’s still dressed. In his evening togs,
Binns?”
“Yes, sir.”
“To work, then. You and I, together.”
Loft and the butler put their shoulders to the bedroom door, and after
one or two efforts burst through.
Hugh Curran sat in an arm chair, slightly relaxed in posture and as
they immediately discovered, stone dead. The body was cold, proving he
had died some hours previous.
The four men looked at him and at each other.
“Method?” asked Ned Knox, grimly.
Loft looked about him.
“I don’t see any weapon,” he said, shuddering, “but we can’t think
about that now. There’s too much to do. Binns, call up Doctor Gilvray.”
“What earthly good can a doctor do?” asked Angel, his blue eyes staring
at the dead man.
“We have to have him,” returned Loft, positively.
“Yes,” agreed Knox, “he can tell whether it’s natural death, accident,
suicide or murder.”
Angel looked at him curiously as he glibly rolled off these
possibilities.
“Then,” Loft went on, “we must call the police--”
“Not unless the doctor says so,” put in Angel. “If he says it’s a
stroke--”
“That’s so, we’ll wait for his report. Now, the worst is, telling the
women. Ned, you tell Anna and let her tell the others. No, she’s too
emotional. Here’s a better plan. Angel, you ask the maids to get the
Countess to give you an interview. Then you tell her about it, and let
her tell Stella and the Merediths. I’ll tell Pauline, myself.”
“Are the girls up?”
“They’d better get up. The housekeeper can tell them to do so, but let
them hear of the--this--from one of us.”
“I suppose there’ll be fainting and hysterics,” said Bob,
apprehensively, as he started on his unhappy errand.
“Maybe,--from Stella. Not the others,” said Knox. “I won’t let Anna
make a scene,--not outside our rooms, anyway.”
The two men went away, and Binns having gone to telephone, Valentine
Loft was left alone with his dead guest.
He looked about the room. It was clear that Curran had not begun to get
ready for bed. He had not even removed tie or collar.
Yet the room was in disorder. Near the dead man’s chair were two books
on the floor, several newspapers, a few scattered cigar ashes, some
bits of torn paper, two lead pencils,--
Loft’s mental cataloguing of these articles was interrupted by the
arrival of the doctor.