"I see.... Now, Miss Raymond," Dundee pounced unexpectedly, so that the
red-haired girl went very white beneath her freckles, "you observed Mr.
Sprague toiling down the rutty road, hot and weary, but romantic in the
sunset?"
Mrs. Drake let out a nervous giggle, then clapped her hand over her
mouth.
"I--I wasn't looking that way," Janet Raymond stammered. "I--I just went
out on the porch for a breath of fresh air--"
"And you were _completely_ surprised when Mr. Sprague came walking up
the flagstone path?" Dundee persisted, for he knew she was lying, knew
that she had stationed herself there to watch for Sprague.
"I--yes, I was! He stopped and talked for a while, before we came in and
joined Tracey and Lois in the dining room, where Tracey was mixing
cocktails.... But," she flared suddenly, "I don't see why you have to
badger all of us, when it _must_ have been Lydia, the maid, who killed
Nita, because--"
"Oh, Janet! Shame on you!" Penny cried furiously.
"Where is the maid now, Captain Strawn?" Dundee asked. "I haven't seen
her yet--"
"Because she's in her room in the basement, Bonnie," Strawn answered.
"Sort of forgot about her, didn't you?" and he chuckled at the younger
man's discomfiture. "But _I_ got her story out of her, you bet! Nothing
to it, though. One of my boys--Collins, it was--found her in that short,
dark hall that runs between the Selim woman's bedroom and the kitchen.
Sicker'n a pup she was; it was a mess. Said she'd--"
"I'd better have her up and question her, if she's well enough," Dundee
interrupted, as tactfully as possible. "It seems that she had an
abscessed tooth out today, with gas and a local anesthetic.... Now, Miss
Raymond, will you tell me exactly what you meant by saying it must have
been Lydia who killed her mistress?"
"I certainly will!" the red-haired girl cried defiantly. "What I can't
see is why Tracey and Lois and Dex--Mr. Sprague--didn't think of it,
too. It's as plain as--"
"Yes, as the nose on my face," Dundee cut in grimly, but with a glance
at Strawn. "Just stick to the facts, however, Miss Raymond, and maybe we
can all agree with you."
"Well, when Mr. Sprague and I went into the dining room, there were Lois
and Tracey cutting up like a couple of children," Janet began,
determined to take her time. "When they saw us, Lois said: 'Good Lord,
Tracey! Get busy! Or your job as bartender will be taken away from you,'
and Tracey began to shake cocktails at the sideboard--"
"Guess I'd better tell it, Janet, for what it's worth," Lois cut in
impatiently. "It's nothing more nor less than that I had to ring twice
for poor Lydia before she came," she explained to Dundee. "Tracey is
full of original ideas about cocktails, and wanted some sort of bitters.
He was going to shout for Lydia, but I stepped on the button under the
dining table, and the poor thing--in the basement nursing her jaw,
probably--didn't hear. Tracey and I got to kidding, as Janet says, and
had scarcely noticed how long Lydia was in coming. I rang again, and she
came.... That's all!"
"That isn't all!" Janet denied angrily. "I was there when Lydia came
in, and she was looking white as a ghost--except for her swollen jaw.
What's more, she acted so dumb Tracey had to tell her twice what he
wanted.... And then she said Nita didn't have any of those bitters
anyway."
"An open-and-shut case against poor Lydia!" Penny Crain broke in
derisively. "Go pluck daisies, Janet! You'd be of a lot more help!"
"Here's your maid, Bonnie," Captain Strawn announced lazily, as one of
his plainclothesmen appeared in the arch between dining and living room,
dragging by the hand a woman who was resisting strangely, her apron
pressed to her face.
"You are Lydia?" Dundee asked, his voice kinder than it had been for
many minutes. "Oh, it's Lydia Carr, Captain Strawn? Thank you.... Don't
be afraid. And I'm sorry about the tooth.... Come along in. I'll not
keep you long."
The woman's knees seemed about to fail her, but with a sudden effort she
released the detective's grip on her wrist. Very tall she was, very bony
in her black cotton dress. Pathetic, too, with her thin, iron-grey hair,
and that apron concealing the left half of her face. It was odd, Dundee
thought, that it was not the swollen jaw she chose to cover.
Mrs. Dunlap sprang to her feet and hurried across the room.
"Don't mind, Lydia, please. You must not be so sensitive," she said
gently, and even more gently pulled down the concealing apron....
"Good God!" Dundee breathed, and Strawn nodded his understanding of the
younger man's horror.
For the left half of Lydia Carr's face was drawn and puckered and ridged
almost out of human semblance. Even the eye was ruined--a milky ball
which the puckered, hairless eyelid could never cover again.
"Poor Lydia is ashamed of her scarred face," Lois Dunlap explained, her
arm still about the maid's shoulder. "She isn't quite used to it yet,
but none of _us_ mind--"
"You were burned recently, Lydia?" Dundee asked pityingly.
"That's my business!" the woman astounded him by retorting harshly.
"How did it happen, Lydia?" Dundee persisted, puzzled.
"I had an accident. It was my own fault."
Lois Dunlap's kind grey eyes caught and held Dundee's firmly. "I think,
if Nita could speak to you now, Mr. Dundee, that she would beg you not
to try to force Lydia's confidence on this subject. Nita was devoted to
Lydia--we can all testify to that!--and one of the sweetest things about
her was her constant effort to protect Lydia from questions and curious
glances. I, for one, know that Nita often begged Lydia to submit to a
skin-grafting operation, regardless of expense--"
When that kind voice choked on tears, Dundee abruptly abandoned his
intention to press the matter further.
"Lydia, your mistress had been married, or was still married, wasn't
she?"
The woman's single, slate-grey eye stared into his expressionlessly.
"She had 'Mrs.' in front of her name, to use when she felt like it.
That's all I know. I never saw her husband--if she had one. I only
worked for her about five years."
"You say she used her married name 'when she felt like it....' What do
you mean by that, Lydia?"
"I mean she was an actress, and used her stage name--Juanita
Leigh--pronounced like it was spelled plain 'Lee'; but she was mostly
called 'Nita Leigh'."
"An actress, you say?" Dundee repeated thoughtfully. "I had heard of her
only as director of the Forsyte School plays.... What shows was she in?"
"She was what they call a specialty dancer in musical comedy," Lydia
answered. "Sometimes she had a real part and sometimes she only danced.
She was a good hoofer and a good trouper," she added, the Broadway terms
falling strangely from those austere lips. "And when she wasn't in a
show she sometimes got a job in the pictures. She never had a real
chance in the movies, though, because they mostly wanted her to double
for the star in long shots, where dancing comes into the picture, or in
close-ups where they just show the legs, you know."
"I see," Dundee agreed gravely. "Where were you during the fifteen
minutes or so before your mistress was shot, Lydia?"
"I was down in my room in the basement," the woman answered. "Nita--I
mean Miss Nita was going to get Judge Marshall to build me a room on the
top floor. She hated for me to have to sleep in the basement, but I
didn't mind."
"You were not required to be on duty for the party?"
"No," she answered in her harsh, flat voice. "I'd fixed the sandwiches
and put out the liquors for the cocktails--set them all out on the
dining table and sideboard, and Miss Nita had told me to go and lie down
as soon as I was through. So I did. I had an abscessed tooth pulled this
morning, and I was feeling sick."
"Did you hear the kitchen bell at all?" Dundee went on.
"I dropped off to sleep--that fool dentist had shot me full of dope--but
I did hear the bell and I come up to answer it. Mrs. Dunlap said she'd
rung twice, and I said I was sorry--"
"Lydia, did you go into your mistress' bedroom before or after you
answered that bell?" Dundee asked with sudden sharpness.
"I did not! I didn't even know she was in her bedroom, until I saw her
sitting at her dressing-table--dead." The harsh voice hesitated over the
last word, but it did not break.
"And just when did you first see her--after she was dead?"
"I went into the kitchen, thinking something else might be needed. Then
I heard a scream. It sounded like it come from Nita's--Miss Nita's
bedroom, and I run along the back hall that leads from the kitchen to
her bedroom. I heard a lot of people running and yelling. Nobody paid
any attention to me."
"You came into the room?"
"No, sir, I did not. I stopped in the doorway. I heard Mr. Sprague say
she was dead. I was sick and dizzy anyway, and I couldn't move for a
minute. I sort of slipped down to the floor, and I guess I must have
passed out. And then I was sick to my stomach, and--I didn't seem to
care if I never moved again."
"Why, Lydia?" Dundee asked gently.
"Because she was the only friend I had in the world, and I couldn't have
loved her better if she'd been my own child," Lydia answered. And the
stern voice had broken at last. "I was still there in the back hall when
a cop come and asked me a lot of questions, and then that man--" she
pointed to Captain Strawn, "--said I could go and lay down. He helped me
down the basement stairs."
Dundee tapped his teeth with the long pencil he had kept so busy that
evening--tapped them long and thoughtfully. Then:
"Lydia, did you see anyone--_anyone at all!_--from your basement room
window before you answered Mrs. Dunlap's ring?"