“WALK INTO MY PARLOR”
The beds in the vacant guest-rooms were already made up. Stimson saw
to it that the detectives had towels, then went his final rounds with
quiet and melancholy dignity.
He left one large globe to light the main hall, a standard lamp
switched on in the library for the policeman on guard there and a
ceiling light at the head of the stairs. At the end of each hall in
the wing a single bulb burned all night as a guide to the fire-escape
staircase. Except for these and the bedrooms whose tenants had not
yet retired, Stimson left the house in darkness, mounting, somber and
noiseless as a shadow, to his own suite on the third floor.
When he had switched on his light and closed the door behind him he
went straight to his suit of day livery and felt in the pocket in which
Landis had discovered the bit of feather. Finding nothing, he withdrew
his hand slowly and stared down at his empty palm with thoughtful eyes.
Fifteen minutes later he had prepared for bed, propped up his pillows
and settled himself to read his usual chapter or two before turning out
the light.
It was close on midnight when the butler got into bed. Between twelve
and twelve-thirty the two policemen patrolling the grounds saw the
lights in the various bedrooms wink out, including the glow from
Stimson’s window. Indoors, the big house settled gradually to silence.
By a quarter to one the stillness was broken only by an occasional
movement from the policeman in the library and a rumble like distant
thunder from Bernard’s room.
Here on the ground floor, in the hall of the wing, a bedroom door began
to open very slowly, as though left unlatched and stirred mysteriously
by the night breeze. Wider and wider it swung, then ceased to move.
Into the dimly lighted hall a man’s head and shoulders cautiously
protruded. His body appeared. After a moment of hesitation he began
to steal along the hall, keeping close to the wall to avoid creaking
boards. The curtains that hid the darkened billiard-room parted and
closed behind him with a faint rustle. Minutes of cautious advance
brought him to the open billiard-room door and the lateral hall beyond,
now faintly discernible in the light that escaped through the open door
from the library.
He edged along the hall, reached the spot from which he could see the
side face and one shoulder of the drowsy policeman, passed on without
a sound. Suddenly he began to retrace his steps with even greater care
than before.
At the same moment another bedroom door opened in the lower wing hall
and another figure crept along the wall toward the billiard-room.
This second figure gained the curtains just as the first reëntered
the billiard-room from the other hall. There was a tense, motionless
silence, a sharply whispered word, then a murmured colloquy, too low to
be heard by the policeman nodding in the warmth of the library fire.
A moment later the first figure slipped again into the hall back of the
library, won past the peril of the library door and reached the swing
door into the servants’ hall. Inch by inch the door was pressed back.
The man stole through. Inch by cautious inch the door swung closed
again.
For another half hour the house stood mantled in a silence as profound
as that which now enshrouded its recent owner in the library. Then
the same swing door began to move once more. A figure, slimmer and
more delicate than the other, stole silently through into the hall and
paused there, listening and staring intently toward the library door.
From the direction of the butler’s pantry behind it came a faint, dull
thud. The figure in the lateral hall started violently, then in sudden
panic bolted for the door into the billiard-room, only to shrink back
with a gasp of dismay as the second figure from the wing blocked that
doorway.
In the library, the policeman leapt to his feet and raced for the door
at the end. The swing door from the servants’ hall was thrust violently
open. Then someone pressed the switch near it and the lateral hall was
flooded with light.
The rear door of the library framed the startled policeman. In the
billiard-room doorway stood Bernard, blinking in the glare and simply
attired in voluminous black and white pyjamas. Just inside the swing
door at the end of the hall stood Landis in a similar suit of pyjamas
much too large for him, his hand still on the switch. After a glance
at each other the men turned their attention upon the fourth person
strategically trapped between the three of them. Anita stood there,
shrinking a little and inarticulate with panic amazement, her slender
figure clad in a gossamer nightgown and a feather-trimmed negligee, her
feet in satin slippers.
Although two of the men were prepared and she was not, Anita was the
first to speak. She crossed her hands on her slim shoulders and turned
a sidelong glance on Landis.
“Oh, please put out the light, won’t you?”
His earlier talk with her and something in her tone now left Landis
unconvinced by this attack of maiden modesty. He left the lights on and
moved to the library door.
“Thanks,” he said to the policeman. “I’ll take care of this now. Go
back to your watch.”
The man reluctantly withdrew into the library, stealing one last glance
at Anita’s delectable figure.
“Now, Miss Harrison,” said Landis, “if you’ll step into the
billiard-room there, I’ll get you something to put round you. Then I
think we’ll have a talk!”
Anita straightened, flung up her head, laughed softly and obeyed,
stepping past Bernard with a demure glance. She went swaying lightly
past the table and slipped into a chair before the dying fire. Landis
forebore to look at her but strode to his room for his overcoat. His
glimpse of Anita’s slender, curving outline, distinct through her
diaphanous clothing, had startled him as it had startled the policeman.
The fact irritated him to real anger, as, regrettably, it had not the
policeman.
He returned to find the girl where he had left her and Bernard pacing
beside the billiard table. The older man looked at him with grim humor.
“Thought you’d steal a march on me, didn’t you!” he demanded.
“I just wanted to let you rest!” Landis found his temper evaporating.
“But your idea of one of us at each bolt hole was better than my
attempt to catch her single-handed!”
Thus momentarily ignored, Anita turned her head.
“Well, now that you have caught me, what are you going to do about it?”
she inquired impudently. “I was only stealing a march on you both and
hunting for clues!”
Bernard turned on his heel and strode to the side of her chair. One
hand she had buried behind her, the other arm still hovered across her
chest. His big fingers followed the first arm down to the wrist. Here
they closed and raised her hidden hand aloft in spite of her little
squeal of protest. From her slim clenched fingers he took Isabelle’s
lace handkerchief, now a tiny damp ball.
“Found one, didn’t you!” he observed dryly. “And you had time to hide
it in the chair, too! Stand up!”
The last two words were delivered in a parade ground bark and the girl
found herself on her feet. Landis held out the overcoat and she slipped
into it obediently. She looked down at the long sleeves, recovered her
poise and sank into the chair again, crossing her bare legs.
The detectives sat down on either side and almost facing her, so that
they could watch her expression.
“Now, Miss Harrison,” said Landis quietly, “we want the entire truth
from you.”
Anita directed the battery of her eyes on him, knowing him,
instinctively, as the more impressionable of the two. “But I’ve told
you all I know! What more do you want?”
“This,” snapped Landis, his anger returning. “Why did you close the
library door before your father was murdered? Why did you rub out your
own finger-prints with Isabelle’s handkerchief? Why did you drop it?
Why did you come back for it? _Who killed your father?_”
“I don’t _know_ who killed him!” she flared.
“Say, young woman,” drawled Bernard, “you’ll tell us all you do know
and tell us now! We’ve no time to waste on you. You talk and talk fast
or we’ll run you in, see?”
“You wouldn’t dare!”
“Wouldn’t we? We’ve two separate witnesses who saw you come down the
back stairs this evening after six-thirty. You lied to us about that.
We find you after that handkerchief. It’s got chalk on it where you
rubbed out your finger-prints. You talk or you’re for it!” He glanced
at Landis.
“You bet you are!” the younger man confirmed.
The girl stared from one to the other, shivered and hunched down in the
big coat.
“I did come down the back stairs this evening,” she admitted. “I didn’t
tell you about it because I was afraid you’d think things!”
“What time was that?” asked Bernard.
“About five or ten minutes past seven.”
“See anything or anyone suspicious?”
“Of course not. I would have told you if I had!”
Anita began to swing her foot, so that her slipper dropped to dangle
from her toes.
“You closed the library door!”
“Yes, I did! I peeked in and saw that Dad was there so I pushed it
almost shut!”
“Why?”
“Because--because he was so nosey always!”
“I see. Where were you when you heard Susan scream?”
“I was--I was playing billiards, of course.”
“So you ran up the back stairs and down the front to get to the
library, eh? Better cover up your legs before you catch cold,” he added
dryly. “They don’t interest us.”
Anita sat up quivering, between fright and rage, flung the overcoat
across her knees and glared at him.
“You--you growly old beast!” she stammered.
“The truth from beginning to end!” demanded Bernard. “So far it’s been
mostly lies. You’ll tell the truth now or in court! You’ll get your
picture in the paper anyway. And you won’t like what they’ll do to you
in court! The truth!”
“I _am_ telling you the truth!”
Landis leaned wearily back in his chair.
“Look here, Miss Harrison,” he said, “you’re in a bad jam now and
getting in deeper every minute. You don’t seem to realize that we’re
investigating a murder. We’ve caught you in two lies already. If
you don’t tell us the truth now I’ll have you arrested tonight as a
material witness. I mean it!”
For the first time Anita began to look frightened.
“What d-do you want to know?” she stammered.
“Why did you close the library door?”
“Because I didn’t want Dad to see me.”
“You had a row with Isabelle tonight because you flirted this afternoon
with Russell. Were you going to his room when you closed the library
door?”
Anita hesitated, then nodded quickly.
“Were you still there when you heard Susan scream?”
Another nod.
“We were talking.”
“What was Russell doing when Susan screamed?”
“I--I don’t know. We were just talking.”
“While he was taking the leisurely bath he told us about, eh? He was
still in the tub when you went to his room.”
Anita jerked her head away.
“Oh, leave me alone!” she cried. “You’re both beasts!”
“Did you kill your father?” demanded Bernard.
“I did not!” she gasped.
“Where were you when you heard Susan scream?”
“I was talking to Hobart, I tell you!”
“What was he doing when you heard Susan scream?”
“He was--he was tying his tie! There!”
Landis rose and made his way through Bernard’s bedroom to Russell’s
bedroom, where he switched on the light.
Russell sat up in bed.
“What the hell do you want?”
“What were you doing when you heard Susan scream?” inquired Landis with
an inward chuckle.
“You mean you waked me up to ask me that, you and your misfit pyjamas?”
“I did,” said Landis pleasantly. “I’ll keep you awake all night if
necessary. What’s the answer?”
Russell measured him for a minute. Landis was entirely cool.
“It’s rather important,” he explained.
“My God, what a pair of detectives! Well, if you must know, I was
brushing my hair. Want to know any other little intimate details?”
“You were alone, of course?”
“Well, naturally! Say, what’s the big idea?”
“Good night,” said Landis and departed, chuckling.
He returned to the billiard-room. Anita looked nervously at his face as
he took his chair. She had drawn her feet under her and was curled in a
little pathetic ball.
“Now, Miss Harrison,” he said, “you weren’t in Russell’s room at
all when you heard Susan scream. I’ll give you one more chance. If
you don’t tell us the truth this time I’ll arrest you as a material
witness! Russell was alone and was brushing his hair when he heard
Susan scream.”
“He’d say that,” Anita ventured.
Landis shook his head and started for the door.
“I’ll phone for a patrol wagon,” he said to Bernard. “Better call Miss
Mount and have her see that Miss Harrison is dressed when it gets here.
Otherwise she’ll go in a blanket!”
“Wait!” cried Anita. As he turned slowly back to the fire she added,
sullenly: “I’ll tell you the truth.”
“You’ve wasted enough time about it! Go on, where were you when Susan
screamed?”
“I was in Fred’s room, talking to him.”
“Fred Allen?”
She nodded.
“All right,” said Landis. He turned back through the curtains, went
into his own room and the adjoining bathroom to Allen’s room beyond,
where he switched on the lights. Allen stared up at him drowsily.
“What’s the matter?”
“Want your help,” explained Landis cordially. “Want to know whether you
remember exactly where you were when you heard Susan scream tonight?”
“I told you, I think. I was in the bathroom.”
“I remember, now! And the door was open into your bedroom here. Don’t
remember exactly what you were doing, do you?”
Allen hesitated.
“I was dressing, I think.”
“Not your evening clothes--in the bathroom?”
“No. I was getting into some clean underwear.”
“Anita Harrison tells us that she was talking to you at the time. Was
she in the bedroom or the bathroom?”
Allen jumped out of bed.
“That’s a lie!”
“Step into the billiard-room and hear it from her lips then!
Incidentally, unless you want her indicted for murder you’d better
admit that she was here--if she was here.”
Allen hesitated, staring at Landis.
“She was here,” he said at last. “What does that prove?”
“Here in your bedroom?”
“Yes. We’re old pals, you know.”
“With you getting into your underwear in the bathroom and the door open
between? Very old pals, eh?”
Allen remained silent and motionless, staring at Landis, who sensed
that, for all his lesser bulk, the man was far more dangerous at this
moment than Russell would ever be.
“What do you mean by that?” asked Allen softly.
Landis turned his back.
“Follow me to the billiard-room, please!” He walked out but heard Allen
behind him.
By the time they reached the others Allen had recovered himself. He
nodded pleasantly to Bernard and smiled toward Anita, who frowned
sulkily in response.
“Now,” said Landis when they were seated, “I want you to advise Miss
Harrison to tell us the whole truth about what she did and where she
went tonight in the hour before her father was murdered. Otherwise
we’re going to lock her up, Allen.”
Allen smiled at Anita.
“I don’t know what the hell you’re doing down here in that rig,” he
said, “but you’d better ’fess up, old girl. Tell ’em everything.”
Anita flung him a mutinous glance. But she had a feeling that Landis
would keep his threat about the patrol wagon.
With a sudden change of front she leaned her head back and glanced from
Landis to Bernard under lowered lashes.
“All right,” she said lightly. “I don’t mind telling you in the least,
if you insist on prying!”
“Proceed,” encouraged Bernard dryly.