One thing I am bound to say for Irene: she was eager to tell what she
knew. Chris did not wish her to tell. She insisted and got snaky with
him for trying to stop her.
She said that, on Monday night, she couldn’t sleep; so she got up—she
thought it was then about ten o’clock, though she was not certain—put
on her slippers and her wrapper, took a candle, and went downstairs to
the sitting room. She said she was going to read, and she was afraid a
light in the bedroom would disturb Chris. She said, also, that she was
cold, and she thought the fire might still be burning in the
sitting-room fireplace.
The fire was burning. She mended it, lighted the hanging lamp, and
finished reading her book. She thought that it was close around eleven
o’clock when she went upstairs again. The door to her room and Chris’s
was locked. She said that she and Chris had had a “trifling quarrel”
before Chris had gone to sleep. She thought, in consequence, that he
had misunderstood her reason for leaving the room and had locked her
out. (That gives a fair notion of her perceptions. She’d been married
to Chris for seven months, and yet she could fancy that he was capable
of a cad’s trick such as that. Chris is faulty, but he’s no mucker.)
She said that this made her very, very unhappy and a little bit angry.
She didn’t desire the family to know that Chris could do such a thing;
so without making a particle of noise, she tiptoed downstairs again
and made a bed for herself on the sofa, with the Indian blankets.
Her next move was to pull the bolts on the doors to the front and back
stairways. She did that because, she said, she felt sure Chris would
feel ashamed of himself before long and come down and try to make it
up with her. I guess she was pretty hot, all right, for she said she
thought the bolted doors would show him that two could play at that
lock-out game. Locked doors are a mania of hers, anyway. So is
insomnia, though she sleeps until noon often enough. This trick of
going downstairs to read was, as far as I know, a new one with her. I
fancy the trifling quarrel was responsible for that.
After she had locked the doors, she blew out the light, got into her
sofa bed, and settled for a long, comfortable weeping spell. Or, as
she explained it, she lay down and cried herself to sleep.
She was wakened by the sound of the shot upstairs. The room Father had
then—Chris’s old room—is right above the sitting room, you know. She
said she thought it was Chris shooting himself because she had been
unkind to him. (She is the sort of woman to whom such an action would
seem not merely reasonable but also admirable.) She jumped from the
sofa, got into her wrapper and slippers, lighted her candle, ran
through the rooms, unbolted the door to the front stairway, and ran
upstairs. All the noises had begun up there, she said, before she had
got the door unbolted. If anyone had been running through the upper
hall, or trying to come down the back stairway, there would have been
no chance of her having heard him.
She started straight down the hall for Chris’s and her room. She says
she is sure she did not get hold of the idea, then, that we were all
locked in our rooms. She said that she did hear Grandfather shout,
“Let me out of here!” but she was too badly frightened to make any
meanings at all.
She passed Olympe’s room and Grandfather’s room on her left, and Aunt
Gracia’s, and yours, and Lucy’s on her right before she came to
Father’s door. It was standing open. The light was burning, so she ran
in there. For the minute, and for the first time, too, she had
forgotten about the exchange of rooms.
She said that, when she saw Father lying there in bed, it took her a
minute to realize that he was not Christopher. Father was lying with
his head tipped back on his pillows, and with blood streaming out over
his nightshirt. She ran to him. She put her candle on the table there,
and sort of lifted him in her arms. That was when she got her wrapper
smeared with blood. She says he turned his eyes toward the open window
and murmured, “Got away.” At first, Irene was certain that Father had
said, “Got away.” But, when Aunt Gracia questioned her, she admitted
that Father spoke indistinctly and that he might have said, “Go away.”
But I know that her best impression is that Father said, “Got away.”
Then, she declares that Father said, quite distinctly, “Red mask.”
There was no shaking her certainty about that. She said that he used
his lips to say it, and that she was watching them, and that she would
swear that he said, “Red mask.”
It stands to reason, Judy, that Father did not say “Red mask.” Now
what could he have said that sounds like red mask? Repeat it over to
yourself. I have; but I can’t get it. “Dead” sounds something like
“red.” “Dead past.” That’s senseless, isn’t it? “May ask,” sounds like
“mask,” and takes the lip pressure that Irene insists he made. But
“may ask” is meaningless, isn’t it? I can’t get it. I am hoping that
Lucy may be able to, later. She is such a little word wizard.
Irene knew that Father was dying. She thought that he had shot
himself. She did not try to question him. We can’t blame her for that.
She wanted to do something for him, but she didn’t know what to do.
She attempted to ease his position; to stop the flow of blood with the
sheets.
He said our names: “Neal. Judith. Lucy.” She started to leave him,
then, to bring Lucy and me to him. He said, more loudly than he had
spoken before: “Wait. Father.” She ran back to him, and he said,
slowly and plainly: “Bring Father. I must tell _him_.” He repeated,
“Must tell Father.” That was the end.
Irene declares that there can be no doubt about it: Father had
something that he wished to tell Grandfather and no one else. It seems
to me that can mean but one thing: Father knew who killed him. He was
willing to tell Grandfather, no one else, who that person was. This
would seem to preclude an outsider. Though there may be still some
events in Father’s past life of which we children have not been
informed.
That ends Irene’s story, in so far as Father is concerned. She left
him, then, and ran to the door and back again to get her candle before
going into the dark hall. On the table, beside her candle, and in the
light ring from Father’s lamp, she saw the keys lying scattered. Then,
she thinks, for the first time she made the connection of the noise in
the hall with the doors. That is reasonable enough—for Irene. She said
she could not get the keys picked up. She kept dropping them. At last
she put them in the pocket of her wrapper and, with her candle, came
into the hall. Lucy’s door is directly across the hall from Father’s
room, as you know. Irene poked one of the keys into the lock and
unlocked it.
I asked her how she had known which key to use. She said that she had
never thought of that. She took the keys from her pocket, one at a
time, and each one fitted the lock she put it in. That is straight.
The locks on the upstairs doors are all alike, and so are the keys.
Chris made me go with him Tuesday while he proved this to me.
When Irene had finished telling her story, Tuesday morning, Aunt
Gracia asked her why she had unlocked Lucy’s door first. She added
that Lucy was the one child in the household. It was stupid of Aunt
Gracia to ask that, because Irene had just told us how it had
happened. I didn’t blame Chris for getting hot.
He said Aunt Gracia was assuming that Irene ran out of Father’s door
in full possession of all her faculties; that Irene was in a condition
to stop and reason quietly about which door it would be wise to open
first, establishing orders of precedence, giving us all a rating as to
age and importance. There was tragedy, Chris said. There was a duty
for Irene to perform. She performed it, and she deserved high
admiration for her composure and courage. We might, or not, give her
that admiration, he said. But he would brook no word of criticism.
In a way, I agree with Chris. I wish Irene had got us out sooner; but
I can see her position. Father was dying. She felt as if she should do
something for him, right there, instead of rushing off and leaving
him. When she did start to leave him, he called her back to him—that
is, told her to wait. I don’t like Irene. But I guess she did about as
well as any of us younger ones would have done.
Aunt Gracia seemed to pay no attention to Chris’s speech. Her next
question was downright crumby. She asked Irene why she had thought
Christopher had shot himself, when she must have known that
Christopher had no gun.
Grandfather settled that in a hurry. He apologized for Aunt Gracia;
and then he explained to her that sudden fright, as she knew,
precluded rationalization, and that it was natural that Irene’s first
anxiety should be for her husband.
Aunt Gracia said, “You haven’t a gun, have you, Christopher?”
“Beginning already?” Chris was ugly about it. “No, Gracia, I have no
gun. Have you?”
Aunt Gracia said: “No, I haven’t. But that is an honest question, and
you had a right to ask it.”
“Irene,” Grandfather said, “Christopher and Gracia were both locked in
their rooms, were they not? You unlocked both their doors?”
“I did, Uncle Thaddeus,” Irene answered. “I swear that I released
every member of this family from a locked room.”
It seems to me like this, Judy. Either we have to believe Irene’s
story, all of it, or we have to disbelieve it. I am here. I know her.
I heard her tell it. I believe it, word for word.
Grandfather believes it, I know. In spite of her actions, I think that
Aunt Gracia believes it. Or, perhaps I should say, against her own
will, I think Aunt Gracia believes it. Chris must believe it. But here
is the crumby thing about Chris. Instead of saying flat, as I can say,
that he knows Irene’s story is true, he keeps trying to prove it.
He got me off and showed me, on Tuesday, that the fire had been mended
after we left it the night before. He showed me the oil in the hanging
lamp, nearly burned out. He has said, “Irene had no opportunity to get
rid of a revolver.” As if Irene could not have done all the things she
said she had done—built the fire, burned the oil, made the bed, and
then come upstairs later and fired the shot. She could have hidden the
gun in the front of her wrapper, and have got rid of it since. Nobody
searched her. The only important thing about any of Chris’s “proofs”
for Irene is that he thinks it necessary to hunt for them and use
them.
On the square, though he is starring himself in the rôle of sleuth,
Chris seems to me to be more off his screw than any of us. But,
perhaps, I haven’t any right to say that. Chris told me that I should
try to brace up, that Lucy, poor little kid, was worrying desperately
about me. Grandfather told me that we must be careful for Aunt Gracia;
that it seemed to him the tragedy was affecting her more seriously
than any of the rest of us. Aunt Gracia thinks that Grandfather is
harder hit than any of us. And, of course, Olympe is still flat in
bed.
It is queer about Olympe. She must have heard the shot and jumped out
of bed and fainted from fright. But she has no memory of having heard
it at all. That shows the sort of tricks one’s memory can play. When
we found she didn’t know what had happened, we didn’t tell her until
Dr. Joe got here yesterday, Wednesday morning. (I started this letter
on Wednesday; but I’ve written all night, so it is four o’clock
Thursday morning now.) Dr. Joe thought it better to break the news to
her gently than to have her keep on fussing and worrying and asking
questions. He told her. Leave it to Dr. Joe to take for himself, and
put right through, any old disagreeable job that we are all afraid of
attempting.
After our merry little breakfast on Tuesday morning, Chris rode to
Quilterville to spread the news, send the telegram to Dr. Joe, and to
send the crazy lying telegram, which he and Irene had composed
together, to you.
Gus Wildoch and Hank Buckerman (he’s coroner now) and a couple of
other guys came out to the ranch with Chris. Gus and Hank were as
decent as they could be, I guess, under the circumstances. The other
guys went about issuing invitations to have their faces punched in;
but again under the circumstances—how handy those clichés are—I let
them get away with it.
Grandfather took charge of Gus and Hank. Gus’s attitude seemed to be
that, if Grandfather would tell him what he wanted done, he’d do it.
They stayed around about an hour, holding their sombreros like
stomachers and shaking their heads, and then they left. Hank was much
embarrassed because there would have to be an inquest. He kept
apologizing to Grandfather about it. When Grandfather suggested that,
perhaps, the inquest could be discussed later, Hank said sure,
whenever we said, and, furthermore, it was nothing but a damn lot of
red tape anyway.
Gus and Hank came out again to the ranch when Dr. Joe came, early
Wednesday morning. Slim Hyde came, too, with his hearse. Dr. Joe had
brought him because he, Dr. Joe, wished to take Father’s body to
Quilterville for an autopsy. Hank was a trifle worried about the
inquest by this time, but Dr. Joe told him that the family would not
be able to be bothered with anything of the sort for several days. The
time was finally set for Friday morning. Queer, especially since old
Hank is coroner, how I dread that inquest. If I were dog guilty, I
couldn’t dread it much more than I do. Hank was decent as could be
about it. Insisted, again, that it was a mere formality, and advised
Grandfather not to try to attend. Furthermore, he said, that went for
any of us who weren’t feeling up to snuff on Friday morning. All he
needed, he declared, were one or two folks who could kind of tell a
little about how things had happened.
Hank himself, as I nearly forgot to tell you, deduced a theory almost
at once which satisfied him completely. Someone, he declared, had shot
Father through the open window. Since it did not matter at all to Hank
that there is not a tree of any sort near Father’s room, nor that,
unless the murderer had been equipped with wings, he should have had
to stand on the porch roof to fire, nobody bothered to quarrel with
Hank about it, nor about how the fellow had got the window open, nor
any of it.
Dr. Joe stayed here until shortly after noon. He had his hands pretty
full, what with attending the entire family, and interviewing and
dismissing the busybodies who had been streaming up since the day
before, like ants to a sugar bowl.
Chris and I could not see much reason for an autopsy. We knew that
Father had been shot; and had died from that shot. But Dr. Joe was as
stubborn as a mule about it; so we gave in. He and Slim took Father’s
body to Quilterville on Wednesday afternoon. It will stay there, now,
until after the inquest, and then be brought home for the funeral,
which, I believe, the folks have decided to have on Saturday.
I have kept at this all night, in order that you and I can start even.
I want you to know, when you have read this letter, as much as I knew
when I wrote it. I’ll skip through it now and see whether I have left
out any points. If not, I’ll ride into Quilterville, as soon as Chris
gets up at six, and mail this on number Twenty-two.
I find several points I have not made in connection with Irene’s
story. As soon as she had heard the shot, she came through the
downstairs rooms and up the front stairway. The door was locked, until
she unlocked it. No one could have come downstairs the front way then,
or she would have met him. The door to the back stairs was also
locked, on the sitting-room side. Someone could have run down the hall
and have hidden on the back stairway, or in the bathroom, which was
unlocked. Someone could have gone to the attic. The door to the attic
was unlocked. Then, while we were all in Father’s room, just at the
first there, he might have managed to sneak through the hall, which
was dark, and past Father’s door in spite of the fact that it was
open, and get to some hiding place without any of us seeing him.
Whatever his previous plans had been, they had not included one member
of the family, not locked in a room, who could unlock the other doors.
Nor, of course, had his plans included the circumstance of his being
locked upstairs by means of the bolted stairway doors.
I know how this will be bound to seem to you: the problem was one of
discovering some fellow hiding in the house. It would seem so to me, I
am sure, if I were not right here. Judy, you’ll have to take my word
for it. No one was hiding in this house on Monday night or Tuesday
morning. A human being, even a child, takes a good-sized space to hide
in. There was not a foot of space, from cellar to attic, which we had
not gone over with idiotic thoroughness before it was light on Tuesday
morning.
I can see you sitting there and thinking of places where we did not
look. It won’t go, dear. Yes, we looked in the old furnace and poked
into it, though Lucy could not have crawled into the fire box. Yes, we
have looked in the broom closets and the fruit closets. We have looked
in the flour and sugar bins, and the wash boilers, and the churns, and
the bureau drawers. We have looked as if we were hunting for a collar
button instead of a man. And, remember, Aunt Gracia at the time, and
since, has been over every square inch of the house. You know that she
can always find any missing thing in this house more easily than we
can find a word in the dictionary. Irene, I think it was—it sounds
like her—who suggested secret passages and sliding panels. They would
be convenient, wouldn’t they?
The ground is still covered with snow. Except for the paths from the
front and back doors, and the necessary paths to the barns and
outhouses, and the tracks the dogs have made, the snow, as far as we
can see, is clean and unbroken. That would mean, wouldn’t it, that
anyone who had left the house since Monday night had left it through
the front or the back door? No one has stepped on the side porch, and
the snow from that door to the yard is still unbroken. We could not
keep the paths from getting beaten—people coming and going, all that.
We have kept the outside doors locked, and Chris has the keys in his
pocket. Nobody could pick those locks with a hairpin or a glove
buttoner. We have kept Whatof chained by the front door and Keeper
chained by the back door. You know, when those dogs have been told to
watch, what they would do to some sneaking stranger.
After this, it hardly seems worth while to bother about telling you
what Chris discovered when he was looking under Father’s bed that
night. But here it is. The bed had been moved three or four inches at
the foot—pulled along over the carpet, I mean, as if some fairly hefty
weight had been tugging on it. Chris keeps declaring that this must be
of importance. How can it be important? Remember, the rope was covered
with snow. The snow on the window sill and on the porch roof was
unbroken. The snow makes it a certainty that no one had got out of
that window during the past hour, let alone the past twenty minutes.
Chris maunders about the rope having been used for some purpose before
the snowstorm began. Irene suggested that the fellow might have come
in that way. Lassoed the leg of the bed, first, I suppose, and then
climbed right up.
I think that finishes it all then, except this. The folks here, for
some reason, seem to be getting comfort from keeping you and Greg in
the dark. Rather often somebody pauses to thank goodness that you two
don’t have to know the truth. I am not asking you to lie for me; but,
on the level, I wish you would. Things are bad enough around here as
it is, without having the folks all sore at me. In time, they will
have to tell you the truth. If you could, until they get ready to do
so, receive whatever hanky-panky they write to you, and not let them
know that you are on, it would help me a lot.
I’ll write you the truth every night—I’m night herding in the house at
present. You can write what you please to me, of course. As I have
said, I need the benefit of your thinking. Too, and again of course,
you can do as you please about giving me away. Perhaps I would better
say, you can do what you have to do. It doesn’t matter, really. What
does?
Your loving brother,
Neal.