by Leslie Ford
“It’s quite false, of course, but I was so sure of him,” he said simply. “And I don’t know why, but I still am. What’s going on here, Colonel?”
Colonel Primrose did shake his head, this time, very thoughtfully. And I remembered what I’d come for, just as we were leaving. I suppose it’s because dignity and faith are fundamentally more important in human relations than murder is, really, that the whole business of Kurt Hofmann seemed an anti-climax when I finally told it. We’d gone outside and got into Colonel Primrose’s car, Sergeant Buck standing guard, and sat there in front of my house while I went through it. I don’t know whether Colonel Primrose thought it was an anti-climax, but he didn’t say anything for several moments. Then he said,
“Have you told anybody else?”
I shook my head.
“Then Buck can take you back to the hotel.”
“I’d better stick around there tonight, I guess, sir,” the Sergeant said. It was the only time I’d ever heard anything come out of the side of that lantern-jawed dead pan that made me think he’d care whether I lived or died. And then he said, “I wouldn’t want anything should happen to Miss Sherwood. She’s a mighty fine little girl.”
Nevertheless, it was my door he stayed outside of—or at least he was there in the morning when I opened it to get the papers. He handed me my mail, glacially as ever.
“Would you like some coffee, Sergeant?” I asked.
“No, thank you, ma’am,” he said, just as always.
I went back and ordered my breakfast. There was a letter from my younger son concerning a bargain in skis. Their owner had broken one leg and one arm and two ribs. They would count as a birthday present in July if I’d send the check that day special delivery, before the offer expired in favor of the boy’s roommate. I wrote the check and a letter about anatomical breakage and looked around for an envelope. There was none in the desk. Just as I was about to call the maid for some the phone rang. It was Sylvia.
“Can you come up here right away?” she said. Her voice was flat and lifeless. “I’ve got to see you.”
There’s no use saying all the things I thought as I got dressed and went out. I was on my own again, I noticed— Sergeant Buck was gone. I remembered the check as I started toward the elevator, went back and got it and my letter and went on up.
She was sitting at her typewriter, just finishing a letter. She pulled it out and put an envelope in without more than nodding, her eyes lost in deep circles in her white face.
“Be an angel,” I said. “Address that envelope for me to my son Scott, will you? Scott C. Latham.”
“He’s at St. Paul’s, isn’t he?”
I nodded. She typed it, pulled it out and handed it to me. The phone rang just as she’d started to speak. I was standing right by it and picked it up. She watched me almost desperate-eyed, I knew hoping against the bitterest possible hope that it was Pete. But it wasn’t. It was Colonel Primrose.
“It’s Grace Latham, Colonel,” I said.
“I’m glad, my dear. Hoped I could get you. I wanted to tell you that Kurt Hofmann is dead.”
I caught the back of the chair to steady myself. Sylvia started forward, catching something of what had happened from the look on my face. “It’s Kurt Hofmann,” I whispered quickly.
“Was it—suicide?” I said into the phone.
“No, my dear,” Colonel Primrose answered calmly. “He was shot by someone. Not suicide. I’ll be up in a few minutes. I want to see Sylvia.”
I put the phone down.
“He was shot,” I said. “Colonel Primrose will be up here in a few minutes. It wasn’t suicide.”
I took the letter with the check in it out of my pocket and put it in Sylvia’s envelope, hardly aware I was doing it. I moistened the flap, put it down on the table and moved the side of my closed hand across the face to keep from getting my hand sticky. Then I stopped, staring down at it in slowly dawning fright.
“Scott C. Latham,” it read.
As plainly as if he were in the room repeating it, I could hear Colonel Primrose saying, “The small ‘t’ and the capital ‘L’ are out of alignment and the tail of the small ‘a’ is very dim. The whole thing needs cleaning…”
I turned slowly and looked at Sylvia. Then my eyes moved gradually and came to rest on her typewriter.
19
As I stood there staring down at that typewriter, Sylvia got up suddenly, too absorbed in something else to pay attention to me, stood for a moment by the window and turned abruptly. How I’d ever thought her face was a mask to conceal anything I couldn’t imagine… or how it could have changed so, from that radiant instant she was in Pete Hamilton’s arms yesterday to what it was now.
“If I could only get hold of Gordon Lacey,” she said, with a kind of quiet desperate intentness. “He must be somewhere—he can’t have dropped off the earth completely!”
If I looked blank it wasn’t for the reason she thought, because she said, “Don’t you see, Grace! Don’t you remember what Corliss said about him that night! Corliss must have found out—something—through him! He must be the person who knows about this!”
I couldn’t say a word. It had come into my mind how odd it was for me to be sitting there with two opposite interpretations of what she was saying in my consciousness at the same time. For if she herself did write that wretched newsletter—perhaps even had murdered Corliss Marshall to keep him from telling not on Pete but on hex self—then that would explain her almost frantic anxiety to get hold of Gordon Lacey, just as easily as it was explained if she didn’t write it, and truly believed Pete didn’t, and thought that finding Lacey would prove who did.
“I don’t understand this, Grace,” she said more calmly, and with a definite effort to be calm, as if she realized how important it was that she should be. “Corliss is killed because he knew who wrote the thing. Colonel Primrose insists on that. And Alicia Wrenn’s killed. But she couldn’t have known who wrote it—she didn’t know anything about it. And I’m sure she didn’t know who killed Corliss. And now Hofmann’s killed.”
She turned away, her hands thrust into the pockets of her yellow wool dress, trying to control herself.
“There must be some other reason. Colonel Primrose must be wrong.”
“Pete,” I said quietly, “told Colonel Primrose and Bliss Thatcher last night that he writes ‘Truth Not Fiction.’ ”
I hadn’t meant to say it. It didn’t really follow, the way I said it, what she’d said. When I did, I don’t know what I expected exactly—whether I had a remote idea that she’d do something dramatic and confess then and there, or what. She didn’t, at any rate. She just looked at me, her face going blank, the way I used to see it, and her body becoming suddenly quiet.
“Oh,” she said. She didn’t speak for some time. Then she said, “It is true, then, isn’t it?”
“That… he writes it?” I asked steadily.
She flared up like a box of matches thrown into the fire.
“No! That it’s his stuff they use. That’s what I’ve been afraid of, and that’s what I haven’t had the courage to say to him! He loved it so, he was so proud of it. I couldn’t say ‘Pete, it’s too dangerous.’ He was so sure nobody else could read it. And now it’s happened—and that’s why I’ve got to find Gordon Lacey. Don’t you remember what Pete said? He’s the only other one who could read it—it must be coming through him!”
“—The only other one, Sylvia?” I asked.
The words got out of my mouth before I really knew what I was saying. I shouldn’t have said them in any case—and here, apart from everything else, I was certainly breaking a solemn promise.
She just looked at me. So slowly that I wasn’t sure I wasn’t imagining it, the blood drained out of her face, and her eyes that had flared up so passionately went as blank as an empty sheet of paper.
“Grace,” she whispered. “Does he think… Oh, how awful, how horrible! Oh, he couldn’t think I—”
She cl
osed her eyes.
“Oh, Grace, how he must hate me!”
Then she just stood there, the color seeping slowly back into her lips and cheeks. When she spoke next I didn’t think I could believe my ears.
“—I’m not sure I don’t hate him too,” she said softly.
I couldn’t say anything. In a moment she was just like she used to be, blank-eyed and expressionless, very young-looking, with only a deeper pallor than usual to show that she’d been different.
I got my voice. “Don’t be a fool, Sylvia,” I said sharply. “If Pete does think that, just think what he’s going through! It’s because he’s so much in love with you—”
She shook her head slowly.
“If he loved me, he’d come and ask me—he wouldn’t just take it for granted I’d… I’d betrayed him. I see it now. I thought last night the reason he didn’t come and didn’t call me was that he was just too upset. Oh, well. If that’s what he thinks of me, the sooner I know it the better.”
The phone on the table by her buzzed. She picked it up. I could see her body go taut. She didn’t speak for a moment, and I could hear the operator talking again. Then she said quietly, “Tell Mr. Hamilton I’m awfully sorry. I’m very busy just now. I don’t know when I’ll have time to see him.”
“Oh, Sylvia,” I cried, “—don’t! Please don’t! Don’t be such a stupid fool!”
She put the phone down, stood with one hand out for a moment, and then broke away and ran blindly across the room. Her bedroom door slammed. I heard her throw herself down on her bed, and a heartbreaking sob before she buried her face in the pillows. There was nothing after that.
I sat there unhappily. I was thinking about Bliss Thatcher and Colonel Primrose. Both of them refused to believe that Pete wrote ‘Truth Not Fiction’; and yet Pete could believe Sylvia did, and Sylvia could believe it—or something—about him. I suppose the truth is that if two people are in love with each other, they’re more instantly ready to doubt and mistrust each other than anybody else ever is.
Gradually, as I sat there, I became aware of the typewriter again. I’d got up and started over to look at it more closely when there was a rap on the door. My pulse quickened instantly. It was just the sort of thing I’d expect Pete to do. I ran to the door and opened it, and said “Oh.”
“Who did you expect it to be, my dear?”
The flicker in Colonel Primrose’s eyes was gone instantly. He was sober-faced and serious.
“Where is Sylvia?”
“I’ll call her,” I said. “Come in. She’s dressing, I think.”
I knocked on the bedroom door. “Sylvia—Colonel Primrose is here.”
I turned back to him to say she’d be out in a minute, and my heart sank. He was looking thoughtfully over at her typewriter. I thought he was going to it, but he didn’t. He went to the window, and came back and sat down.
“This affair’s getting rather interesting,” he remarked, a trifle grimly. “Lamb and I thought we’d wait till this morning to see Hofmann. The servant’s showing signs of recovery. Lamb wanted to be sure just what he was doing. When he didn’t answer the phone the manager let us in. There was a ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign on his door. He was sprawled on the floor between the beds, shot through the head. No gun in the room. The couple next door hadn’t heard a shot, and the heads of their beds are just through the wall. There was some fairly loud talking about ten-thirty, when they went to bed. They complained to the desk, and the desk called Hofmann. It was quieter after that and they went to sleep. Which, of course, means a silencer, unless they just don’t want to be bothered giving evidence.”
He looked up as Sylvia came in. She wasn’t quite herself, but I don’t think even Colonel Primrose could have guessed the storm she’d been through.
“Good morning, Colonel,” she said coolly. “I hope you don’t think I murdered Hofmann too.”
Colonel Primrose frowned. I thought he was a little irritated, which he rarely is. He spoke placidly enough.
“Hofmann came to see you last night,” he said. “A few minutes after ten. The elevator boy saw him knock at your door. He stayed about ten minutes. What did he want?”
“You’d be surprised, Colonel,” Sylvia said. Her voice was direct and matter-of-fact. “He wanted me to tell Mr. Hamilton that if worst came to worst he thought he had a friend who’d give him a job. I told him I understood Mr. Hamilton had a job, and if he didn’t he could probably get one for himself.”
“What kind of a job?”
“I don’t know. I suppose he could do most anything. He couldn’t drive a taxi, because he hasn’t ever learned about red lights.”
“I’m referring to the job Hofmann’s friend had, Sylvia,” Colonel Primrose said politely.
“He didn’t say, and I didn’t ask him.”
She got up at a tap on the door. “Excuse me.” She went across the room.
“Oh—good morning, Senor Delvalle. Do come in. Colonel Primrose is just telling us about poor Mr. Hofmann.”
Colonel Primrose got up and nodded politely. Senor Delvalle stopped just inside the room, or did stop until he saw me. Then he came over, bowed and kissed my hand.
“Good morning, Mrs. Latham,” he said. “You have not told me whether I’m to have the pleasure of taking you to lunch.”
“She can’t,” Colonel Primrose said calmly. “She’s in protective custody, as they call it.”
I looked at him blankly. It was the first I’d ever heard of it.
“You see, Delvalle, I can’t let anything happen to her. Under the circumstances I’ll be happier if she’s where I can keep an eye on her.”
“I can understand that perfectly, Colonel,” Senor Delvalle said. Colonel Primrose himself was not more urbane. “Except that it was my own happiness I was considering. However, I am sure the Army takes precedence.”
He bowed to me again, a deprecating smile on his dark mobile face. He turned to Sylvia.
“What I came up for, Miss Peele, is to tell you that your friend Lacey has been found. In fact, he has been found, and poured—is that what you say?—into a plane. His property has been labelled and arrangements made to explain to him, when he can understand. He will be put off here in Washington, and he arrives here at half-past six tomorrow morning. I shall meet him for you if you like. I can recognize him, I take it?”
“Quite easily,” Sylvia said. “Thank you so much! It’s very kind of you.”
“It has been a pleasure, Miss Peele. Goodbye.”
She closed the door and stood holding it for a moment, her eyes closed. I thought she was going to come out of the mummy case she’d closed herself up in, but she didn’t. She came coolly back and stood as if the sooner both the Colonel and I left the better she’d like it—politely, of course, but unmistakably.
Colonel Primrose sat down.
“Will you tell me why you’re so anxious to get hold of Gordon Lacey, Sylvia?” he asked.
“I’m not anxious at all. I thought it might clear up all this nonsense about ‘Truth Not Fiction.’ This holocaust just can’t have any connection with it. Lady Alicia and her six of clubs, for instance. I think you’re being frightfully farfetched.”
Colonel Primrose nodded, to my surprise.
“I would have been if I’d ever thought of that. I happen to know who killed Lady Alicia. And you’re quite right about that part of it. It had nothing to do with ‘Truth Not Fiction.’ ”
“Who did it?” she asked evenly.
“Kurt Hofmann—in a sense,” Colonel Primrose said.
“How do you know he did it? And what do you mean by—”
“I know because the servant he thought he’d killed too is a very dour and tough Scotswoman. She’s conscious this morning, and very lucid. She says he came after you and the Whartons had come and gone. She tried to keep him from seeing her mistress.”
“Why?” I demanded.
He shrugged.
“She believes in the cards. Her story is that the minute s
he saw him she knew there was something wrong about him. Of course—she usual—she’s reading her present knowledge back into those things.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“It’s quite simple. Lady Alicia was killed because she knew—or had known—Kurt Hofmann. She was the only person here who did. You remember Hofmann rocketed into fame on one book. Up to then, nobody here had ever heard of him. Nobody but Lady Alicia.”
“But just that—”
“ ‘Just that,’ ” Colonel Primrose said, “was what made killing her imperative. That and the fact that she had three letters in his handwriting. The point being, you see, that the quite dead man downstairs is not Kurt Hofmann.”
I started to speak, and couldn’t. Sylvia said, “Then who is he?”
“It doesn’t matter in the least,” Colonel Primrose said, very placidly. “The important thing is that he was passing himself off as a distinguished anti-Totalitarian exile.”
She nodded slowly. “No wonder, then. You remember, Grace—he said that after he got her letter the little man in Chartres was arrested, or dead, and then they’d got on to the underground railway and no more prisoners escaped?”
I nodded, looking back on all sorts of things. His oddness about the old love affair, which of course he didn’t know anything about; his demanding of Ruth Sherwood over the phone, “Why did you have that woman there?”—I stopped abruptly, wondering what this meant in terms of Ruth Sherwood. The whole thing seethed dismally around inside me as Colonel Primrose went on.
“That’s the F. B. I.’s job. Ours is to find out who killed the fellow calling himself Hofmann—and who killed Corliss Marshall. That’s where ‘Truth Not Fiction’ comes in, Sylvia.”
“—I don’t believe it. I can’t.”
I couldn’t help wondering, with a little chill, why on earth she’d come out of her lacquered shell to say that unless she really knew.
He looked at her inquiringly. “If you have any information, you’d be doing yourself and Pete a great service by telling me about it.”
“I haven’t. I haven’t any at all.—You’re absolutely sure about Hofmann?”