GRAHAM IS NOT A FOOL
Left alone, except for a highly intrigued sergeant of police at the end
of the library, Landis and Bernard stared at each other with frowning
eyes.
“There’s something rotten in Denmark!” Bernard growled.
“Mother-in-law stuff?” hinted Landis. “Natural maternal jealousy? She
couldn’t possibly have shot him!” He had lowered his voice so that
Sergeant Forbes would not hear.
Bernard heaved about in his chair.
“Lord knows,” he sighed. “Well, let’s quiz the others, especially
‘Uncle Joel’! We may learn something and we can talk it over
afterwards.”
“Suppose we have a look around first,” Landis suggested. “We may find
something to ask them about.”
Bernard agreed and they walked to the end of the library. Armor,
bow and quiver were exactly as they had found them when they first
returned. They passed on through the lateral hall to the billiard-room,
where they found the door to the sunken garden unlocked. So was the
door at the end of the wing hall. They mounted the narrow stairs there
and emerged in the hall above, to be instantly challenged by a large
policeman. Having quieted him with some asperity, Landis led the way to
Miss Mount’s door. It was unlocked and the key was on the inside. Her
room seemed undisturbed. The door at the far side of the bathroom was
locked, the key on Miss Mount’s side.
The huge, ornate house, where death had once crashed the gate at
dinner time and had now tried to do so again, yielded no clue to the
man or woman who had guided his dark feet there. The case was tangled,
confusing and apparently meaningless. Their mutual sense of frustration
amounted to real alarm.
“Come on downstairs again and tackle that bunch,” Bernard growled as
they left Miss Mount’s room. “This business has got my goat! It’s the
first case I ever saw where nothing fits!”
“It will, though,” answered Landis with an attempt at cheerfulness. “Go
ahead. Lead the way.”
They returned to the library and one by one questioned Russell, Allen,
Isabelle and Anita in the order named. Bernard was angry. His whip-lash
questions left Russell frankly furious, Allen white about the mouth,
Isabelle in tears and Anita thoroughly cowed. But he learned nothing.
All four declared that they had been in their rooms from six-thirty
until seven-thirty when the gong rang and Susan screamed. There was
nothing to disprove their statements. Otherwise they had nothing to
tell except to verify what the detectives had learned from Graham and
Stimson.
Finally, with a courtesy that attempted amends for his companion’s
ferocity, Landis dismissed them all and, going to the reception-room,
asked Miss Mount to tell Mr. Joel Harrison that they would like to see
him at once in the library. He told Miss Mount to go to bed if she
liked.
She did not return. It was some time before Joel Harrison put in an
appearance. At length his long, clumsy figure, fully dressed and
unexpectedly neat, ambled into the doorway from the hall and Landis
invited him to be seated. He obeyed, peering at them as a child peers
up at a stranger of whose good-will he is not quite sure.
“Now, Mr. Harrison,” Landis began, “we want your help! You went to the
funeral this afternoon and came home about six?”
Joel’s face clouded, then suddenly darkened to anger.
“I did, sir! I went to it! I came home precisely at six and went
straight to my bed! I tell you frankly,” he went on, his voice
rising, “I was nauseated with the heavy odor of the flowers in that
closed room, instead of out in God’s open air where they are at home!
Ridiculous! Senseless!” he snorted. “Gentlemen, our civilization, as we
call it, has much to answer for!”
Landis hesitated, rather at a loss.
“The funeral of your brother--er--affected you, too, no doubt?”
Joel Harrison leaned forward and tapped his questioner on the knee,
lowering his voice confidentially.
“There you have it!” he murmured. “I didn’t like to say anything! Miss
Mount and Isabelle and little Mrs. Graham were crying! They seemed
quite sincere! What a mummery, young man! Between ourselves, I was
utterly disgusted! Yes, sir, disgusted!”
“A mummery?” exclaimed Landis. “You consider your brother’s funeral a
mummery?”
After one pitying glance, Joel shook his head.
“You, too?” he whispered. “My dear young man, you don’t know my
brother! It’s all tomfoolishness! The whole proceeding was nonsense!
Mason is away somewhere! Why, don’t you realize that my brother is
far too selfish, far too accustomed to having his own way, to allow
anyone--_anyone_--to do away with him?” He leaned back in his
chair with the satisfaction of a man who has solved a difficult problem.
“I see your point,” replied Landis. “Perhaps it _was_ kinder to
say nothing to the others. But you had some dinner?”
“Naturally! It was served to me after I had gone to bed. Our cook takes
care of my modest wants.”
“That was before the gong rang? About seven, eh?”
“Possibly. It’s of no consequence.” Joel obviously was losing interest
in the conversation.
“After your dinner was brought up, did you happen to hear any sort of
commotion in the house, Mr. Harrison?”
Joel nodded.
“I was eating my dinner and reading when I heard someone screaming with
laughter. There seemed to be a good deal of moving about on the stairs
and down here. Naturally I paid no attention to it.”
“You didn’t come out to investigate, as you did on Saturday night, when
you thought Mrs. Graham or Anita had screamed?”
“Certainly not! That was all foolishness! My dear sir, between
ourselves, this entire household appears to have gone quite mad! Take
yourselves for example! Who invited you? Where do you come from? We’ve
never been introduced! I mean no offense, of course, but there you are!”
“You didn’t come out to investigate!” exclaimed Landis. “In that case,
it must have been before the commotion that you locked Miss Mount’s
door!”
Joel stared in amazement. His expression changed slowly to one of
haughty reproof.
“Is this _more_ nonsense?” he demanded. “I know nothing of Miss
Mount’s door! That goes without saying! Let me add, please, that if you
have anything of moment to communicate to me I shall be glad to give
you an appointment in the morning! Now I must ask you both to withdraw!”
“You locked Miss Mount’s door tonight!” thundered Bernard suddenly.
“Don’t try to deny it!”
Instantly Joel’s manner changed. He subsided in his chair like a
pricked balloon. His haughty expression vanished to be replaced by one
of harassed conciliation. The pathos beneath the humor of his muddled
intelligence and quaint changes of mood was nothing to the pathos of
this swift submission to a bullying tone. The elderly brother of the
strong-willed millionaire cringed like a child and like a child tried
to avert calamity by winning forgiveness.
“I apologise!” he exclaimed quickly. “I had no intention to offend.
Entirely an oversight--”
“Then you did lock Miss Mount’s door?” snapped Bernard.
“I’m afraid not, sir! If you had given me any idea that such a duty was
expected of me I should most certainly have seen to it! Perhaps if I
did so now--?” He started to rise.
Hunched down in his chair, Bernard stared up at the old fellow from
beneath penthouse brows for a moment, then shook his head slowly.
“If you didn’t lock it before dinner, it’s too late now. There’s
nothing to be done,” he explained in a quieter tone.
“Never mind,” said Landis. “We’ll get around _that_ all right. Now
you’d better go back to your bed and your book. We’re sorry that we
disturbed you. Good night, Mr. Harrison!”
With an air of intense but slightly puzzled relief, Joel bade them good
night and straggled loose-jointedly out of the room. They listened
until they heard his door close above.
“You don’t think he had anything to do with it?” asked Landis.
“I’m hanged if I know! Either he’s just crazy or he’s cunning and
crazy. Or maybe he’s cunning enough to seem crazy! He has the skill
and the motive and had the opportunity to kill his brother. He might
shoot Graham to draw suspicion from himself, just because he would have
no motive there. But that seems pretty far-fetched!”
“Let’s go up and see if Graham is asleep!” suggested Landis soothingly.
“If he’s not, we’ll ask him about his wife. He’ll tell us all he knows,
now, or I’m a billygoat.”
“Right you are,” agreed Bernard with a sigh.
Graham was very much awake and responded instantly to their gentle
knock. As soon as he heard who they were he assured them he could get
out of bed and in a moment unlocked and flung open the door. Landis
helped him into bed again.
Wincing once or twice he settled himself on his back and looked at his
visitors with quizzical irritation. “Do you suppose,” he demanded,
“that I can get to sleep with a herd of elephants prowling outside my
door? You can’t tell me that one lone flat-footed cop could make all
that noise!”
With a remorseful chuckle, Landis swung one of Graham’s bedroom chairs
into the hall and requested the policeman to sit down on it instead of
tramping up and down. Pleased and slightly astonished, the cop sat down
at once. Landis returned to the side of Graham’s bed in time to catch
his answer to a question of Bernard’s.
“I know I’ve begged off answering twice. Your two questions involved
the same thing. But I’m in no mood now to keep anything to myself any
longer. I’ll only ask you to keep absolutely confidential what I’m
going to tell you. For I’m morally certain that it can’t affect the
case!” He glanced at Landis rather anxiously.
“You know we’ll do that if we can!”
Bernard nodded.
“Unless it does affect the case--and even then if we can!” he agreed.
“All right,” said Graham with a wry smile, “here goes! About five
months ago--early in May--Mr. Brent told me that Mr. Harrison had a
little highly confidential work he wanted done for him and that he,
Mr. Brent, had recommended me for it. Of course, I was delighted,
telephoned Mr. Harrison’s secretary, made an appointment and went to
see him at his office.
“Mr. Harrison beat about the bush a bit and finally told me that he
wanted me to go back to New York, drop everything else and find a young
girl named Ethel Cuddy.”
Both detectives nodded with no apparent quickening of interest, though
inwardly highly intrigued.
“I suggested a private detective agency,” continued Graham, “and
Harrison blew up at once, roaring at me that if he had wanted a private
detective he would not have sent for me.
“I kept quiet after that and he went on to say that the girl was the
daughter of an old friend who had died insolvent. He had arranged
with an old couple, a Mr. and Mrs. Cuddy, to bring her up as their
own child. She was three when her father died. He had paid them small
monthly sums for years for her education and her keep, as he put it.
Recently, by the merest chance, he had read a brief item about an
explosion of a still at the Cuddy home in which there was no mention of
a daughter. He had investigated on his own hook and discovered that the
girl had run away nearly three years before. Now he wanted her found.”
“Or his money back!” suggested Landis irrepressibly.
“He mentioned that,” laughed Graham. “He said he was going to make it
hot for the Cuddys one of these days. But the girl had to be found
first and he wanted me to find her.”
“Don’t see anything particularly confidential about that--from
Harrison’s point of view,” grumbled Bernard.
“He explained that, too! He told me that, so far as he knew, Ethel
Cuddy believed herself the daughter of the old couple she ran away
from. He didn’t want her undeceived on that point because it might put
ideas in her head if she learned that a millionaire was interested in
her. Oh, he was quite, quite frank about it.”
“Pleasant character, Harrison,” observed Landis.
“So I thought! Anyhow, he wanted me to find where she was and report
her circumstances to him. He did not want me to speak to her or get in
touch with her in any way. It was a large order to find one girl in New
York. But he offered me a thousand dollars and I undertook the job.”
Graham glanced up at this point to discover that his visitors were both
smiling. He stared from one to the other.
“Of course you believed every word of that?” asked Landis. “It’s all so
likely!”
“Wait a bit,” Graham frowned. “There’s something coming that’s a
million times less likely and quite true!”
“We’ll try to believe you,” Bernard rumbled.
Graham laughed.
“That’s all I ask! Anyhow, I looked and looked and always failed. In
the meantime, I’d met, at a friend’s studio, a girl named Ethel Craig.
I guess you both know what it’s like when a girl bowls you over. She
bowled me over clean! During this time she was trying to get on the
stage again, as she was out of a job. I helped her all I could and we
got to know each other well. She seemed to like me and one day, after
I had been telling her about myself as a fellow will, she confided to
me a little of her own early days. She told me that her parents were
old and cross, her home environment a sordid and miserable one. They
had made her do chores from morning till night and had never shown the
slightest affection for her. Instead, their attitude had always been
that she was a burden to them.”
Graham paused reminiscently.
“She had run away from home nearly three years before to seek her
fortune and had changed her name so that they could not find her and
drag her back!”
The two detectives sat forward in their chairs as though suddenly
enlightened.
“It was Ethel Cuddy!” cried Landis.
“You’ve stolen my thunder!” Graham complained. “Ethel Cuddy it was!
It seemed incredible of course. But with my search always in mind, it
leapt to the eye. I wanted to surprise her and tell her what her name
had been. But I had to stick to my bargain with Harrison. If I had
shown her that I knew, she would have asked a million questions. So I
just asked her what her name had been and she told me--Ethel Cuddy!”
“A thousand dollars for two words,” Landis commented. “What did you do
about Harrison?”
“I telephoned from New York and came out here to see him. I told him
the truth and that he need have no further anxiety about her as I
proposed to marry her!”
“What did he say to that?” inquired Bernard.
“At first he was furious. Then he got grim and ugly and told me that I
need have no expectations on her behalf just because he had expressed
curiosity to know what had become of her. Of course I got up on my
ear a bit and told him that such a question didn’t arise, although I
expected the sum he had promised me for finding her. He grumbled a bit
and gave me a check and that was that.”
“Did you--er--believe Harrison’s account as to her being the daughter
of an old friend?” asked Landis tactfully.
Graham frowned.
“I’d fallen in love with her, Landis! Do you suppose I gave or give a
damn who her parents were? I have no social aspirations, thank God!
Ethel’s breeding and character speak for themselves!”
“You bet they do!” rumbled Bernard.
“But did you guess,” Landis persisted, “that Harrison’s interest in her
might be, well, more than friendly?”
“What do you mean by that?” Graham snapped.
“Not what you mean! I mean, did you guess that she might be a--relative
of Harrison’s?”
The young lawyer stared at Landis for a moment with angry eyes.
Abruptly his expression lightened and he laughed.
“Look here, Mr. Landis, I’m not a fool! Of course I guessed it! That’s
why, without his asking it, I volunteered not to speak to her at
all of his interest. On the other hand I asked him for permission,
_after_ we were married, to bring her out to meet him as a friend
and a valued client.”
“What was the idea of that?”
Again Graham stared, this time suspiciously.
“It’s fairly obvious, I should think. You’ve seen Ethel. Nobody could
help liking her. Of course I wanted him to see her! Neither of us is
over-supplied with money, though I have enough for us both. _If_
Harrison was her--was a relation and grew fond of her, anything he
did for her of his own free will was so much the better! On the other
hand, in order to avoid even the suspicion of blackmail, I sought for
no link between them and stipulated that our visit be _after_ our
marriage, when it was up to me to support her anyway.”
“Entirely ethical and extremely considerate,” Landis smiled. “What did
he say to that?”
“He looked me up and down for quite a while and I think he saw clear
through me. Anyhow he finally nodded and said: ‘All right, come and
spend a week here if you like, _after_ you’re married! That’ll
save you the cost of a honeymoon!’ So I thanked him and got out!”
“Do you think he still had the idea that you might attempt to blackmail
him?” asked Landis.
Graham shook his head.
“I don’t believe so. You see, a lawyer is in a confidential position
toward his client anyway and such a thing would be out of the question.
Also, I think he was shrewd enough to guess that I wasn’t that sort.”
“Probably he was. We are!” smiled Landis.
Graham thanked him with a nod and a slow flush.
“Anyhow,” he continued hastily, “I didn’t go near him again until
Ethel and I were married. We were practically engaged when she told me
her real name. We sent him an announcement card and got in exchange
an invitation to stay here this week from Isabelle Harrison. I guess
you fellows believe that I would have married and did marry Ethel
regardless of any expectations or hopes I might have had from Harrison?”
“What difference does that make?” demanded Bernard. “Let your
conscience be your guide! Personally, knowing you and Mrs. Graham, I
don’t doubt it for a minute!”
“Nor I,” said Landis warmly.
“Thanks! Now, I want to remind you that Ethel knows absolutely nothing
about all this. There’s no proof of course. If there should be
anything in our guess, I naturally want to save Ethel any pain or--or
mortification--”
“Was that why you wouldn’t tell us about her past?”
“Of course! It had nothing to do with the murder, as I told you! But I
don’t feel like keeping _anything_ dark after this crack somebody
took at killing me. I can only trust to your kindness--”
“To which you _can_ trust!” retorted Landis shortly. “What I want
to know is this. Did her meeting Harrison accomplish what you hoped?”
“Of course it did! Or rather,” Graham added with a regretful laugh,
“it did and it didn’t. Mr. Harrison was very cool to her when we first
came, a week ago Saturday. But on Sunday morning Mr. Brent went off
to shoot with Joel Harrison and Ethel, of her own innocent volition,
drifted into a long, teasing conversation with Mr. Harrison. You see,
she’s been on the stage and she’s learned how to amuse men of his type
without losing any of her own dignity. In the afternoon he took her for
a drive and a sail and Sunday night he called me into the library.”
“That was when Anita came in and had her row with him, wasn’t it?”
Landis asked.
“Yes. She interrupted our talk in the middle. I found Mr. Harrison
smoking and apparently in a good humor. He told me to sit down,
presented me with a cigar and then said in his blunt way that he liked
my attitude and liked my wife. He added that his girls had and would
have plenty of money to make fools of themselves. He wound up by
telling me that he was going to change his will and make a provision
for Ethel in the future as he had provided for her in the past. He
proposed to go into town on Monday and take me with him for lunch at
the Bankers’ Club. And I gathered that he intended to see Mr. Brent
and change his will.”
“But he didn’t do it!” exclaimed Landis.
“I supposed he had, though I didn’t ask him. My senior partner would be
apt to say nothing to me about it and I supposed that there was plenty
of time anyway. Nobody knew then that he would be dead on Saturday!”
“So he didn’t change it at all, eh? That’s tough.”
“He left me ten thousand dollars. I suppose he postponed doing anything
for Ethel. Oh, well,” Graham shrugged, “I’ve enough for us both and
now I won’t spend the rest of my life trying to head off her questions
as to why he left her some money! But I didn’t want to tell you that
conversation in the library either. It would have meant telling you the
whole story and involving Ethel’s problematical past.”
“His offer, though, confirmed your natural assumption as to the reason
for his interest in your wife!”
“I suppose it did.”
“The chances are,” said Bernard, “that she’ll never have to know if
you keep her away from the Cuddys. By the way, to be frank about this
thing, did your guess that Harrison might be Mrs. Graham’s father ever
afford you an inkling as to who her mother might have been?”
“Good Lord, no! Why should it? Ethel went to the Cuddys, according to
Mr. Harrison, when she was only three years old. Her mother might have
been anybody. Probably she’s dead. That’s all shrouded in the mists of
eighteen years. Ethel is twenty-one now. Some poor little stenographer,
probably. Mr. Harrison was hardly a pleasant character.”
Bernard got up. Landis followed suit.
“Well,” said Bernard, “thanks for telling us all about it. Don’t
worry. We’ll keep it dark. And don’t worry about this business tonight,
either. We’ll see there’s no second attempt on you! Good night.”
“Good night,” said Landis. “Get some sleep now.”
Graham was staring after them. A rather startled expression had crept
into his eyes.
“Good night,” he said absently. “Switch out the light, will you? Never
mind locking the door unless you think it’s necessary.”
“Not at all, now,” Landis assured him.
They went out quietly, closed the door, nodded to the stiffly seated
policeman and descended to the first floor again. Their talk with
Graham explained his earlier reticence. It afforded them no direct clue
to the solution of the double mystery.