by Rufus King
“Well,” Dr. Johnson said, “it’s over. It’s done. I took the liberty of telephoning Miss Marlow that we were finished with the autopsy, Sergeant Hurlstone. She will join us down here.”
Estelle’s arrival was shortly followed by Washburn with the drinks. Marlow, Dr. Johnson said, had had his death hastened beyond the radioactive poisoning in a manner which the autopsy had clearly shown. Dr. Johnson tried obviously for Estelle’s sake and for Ann’s to gloss the more repellent features of the job which he and Dr. Bedmann had done.
He told them that pyrogallol was the agent that had accomplished the trick. A white and odorless crystalline powder. Its form was of leaflets or of needles that were very fine. He offered this strange sop of glossing in a distorted stab at beautifying the crystals’ vicious powers of death.
In Marlow’s case the pyrogallol had presented one of its rare performances of causing embolism, having degenerated Marlow’s erythrocytes, a term which Dr. Johnson himself degenerated into the more comprehensible one of red blood corpuscles. The reddish-brown blood coagula had put Dr. Bedmann and himself rapidly on the track.
The fatal dose for this beautiful but unhappily toxic crystalline could vary from 4.9 grams to 20 grams, and Marlow had been especially ripe for its evil results, in that age and disease had rendered his susceptibility to the poison most acute.
With Ann, he said, death would have been longer in coming. Possibly a few days. And the clinical picture would, among other unpleasant symptoms, have offered cyanosis and chills. Then death would have reached her by collapse.
Yes, the poison was the same. It had hurried off Marlow and it had been introduced into the water of Ann’s carafe.
Estelle was sitting beside Ann on the sofa. The slow, drawn, ghastly sound which her breath made was like nothing which Ann had ever heard before. Almost a death rattle, Ann supposed, could be like it. Estelle’s voice, when she spoke, had a choking moisture in it, a burbling sound as when water is drawn into the lungs.
“Why wasn’t I told? What is this, Ann?”
Dr. Johnson saved her from fainting. He soothed her, calmed her, and dosed her with a pill while the water-carafe business was explained to her. Estelle was convincingly superb about it, almost frighteningly so, and Ann handed it a mental Oscar as certainly being the best performance of the year. She did this with complete callousness and a hardening of her heart, Dr. Johnson’s calm portrayal of, among other unpleasant symptoms, cyanosis and chills and a death by collapse still being urgent with her. All in one swallow.
Dr. Johnson went on to say, after Estelle was breathing normally again, that pyrogallol was accessible to anyone on the place who cared to avail himself of the photography laboratory. Its use in photography was as a reducing agent. Harley Brown, who was in charge of the laboratory, had told them that pyrogallol was always kept in stock.
As for the long-range plan to efface Marlow through a radioactive substance, further unpleasantness faced them there. Dr. Johnson was sorry there could be no choice. He did not, he said, know what plans were in mind for the funeral, but whatever they were, the body would have to be cremated.
The post-mortem test for such radium poisoning required that the bone ash and the ash of certain organs which he did not enumerate be placed in a dark room on photographic film, wrapped and sealed in black opaque paper. This would have to be gone through with as an official gesture, in spite of the fact that Miss Ann Marlow’s chance catching of the silvery bones on her pictures of the ocelots left no doubts as to what the results would be.
Estelle’s dimpled hands were now lifeless on the rose velvet of the robe in which she was swathed. Although her breathing was quite under control she was apparently at a loss, for the first time in her life, for anything to say and certainly did not present her reputed portrait as one of the sights of Paris. She looked dumpy and middle-aged and tired to the point of being washed out.
She said at last: “Sergeant Hurlstone, we continue in your hands. You have been courteous and most kind. Your training and your intellect will rid Black Tor of its evil. We are at your disposal.”
Sergeant Hurlstone soothed a movement of the dark-haired cat. He suggested that Ludwig and Dr. Johnson and Dr. Bedmann must all be weary and might care to retire: a suggestion which carried the implication he would be pleased if Estelle and Ann were to remain. Both doctors took the nakedly virile hint with good grace and said their good nights. They left.
Not so Ludwig.
“It will take a warrant to put me to bed, Sergeant.”
“Nobody wants you to go to bed, Mr. Appleby. I am suggesting that I prefer to speak with both Miss Marlows without your being here.”
“That I inferred.”
“Don’t be difficult, Ludwig,” Estelle said. “I think temperament would be the camel’s straw for me tonight.”
“Very well.”
Ludwig grew icily polite. His good nights were ceremonious to the point of insult.
“Sergeant Hurlstone,” Estelle said after Ludwig had left the room, “you are interested in how the poison was put into the carafe. I do not know what to say, Ann, except that I did not do it. I am not ignorant of chemistry. I know that pyrogallol belongs to the corrosives, and although it is odorless, it is said to have a bitter taste. I think you will find, Sergeant Hurlstone, that it was given Justin in his blackberry brandy. Perhaps you have tasted that concoction?”
“I have. I don’t like it.”
“Neither do I. Justin himself considered it a palatal affront, but he favored it as a simple for his stomach. My own opinion is that anything added to it, even a bitter tang, would cause pleasure rather than alarm. I can help you to this extent. The pyrogallol was added either during a short moment when I was with Ann in her dressing room, or it was put in after I had gone.”
“How long were you in the dressing room?”
“Several minutes, I believe. I suggested a sedative. We didn’t say much. Do you remember, Ann?”
“It was short, Estelle.”
“Yes, but it was long enough for someone to have slipped into the bedroom and put the poison in the carafe. The water was all right up until the time I went into the dressing room, because I had taken a drink of it. There was no bitter taste. That will help you, Sergeant Hurlstone, if you will believe that I am telling the truth. Otherwise you will decide that I put the poison in after having taken the drink.”
Estelle started to cry. She said, “Ann—Ann, my dear, don’t think this thing of me!” Her tears went beyond control.
Sergeant Hurlstone remained impassive. So did the cat, beyond opening its eyes to observe Estelle’s not inconsiderable commotion and then closing them again: a human nonsensicality quite out of its feline interests or province.
Ann did her best. She encircled Estelle’s plumpness and gave it a reassuring squeeze, even though thinking as she did so: This could be the wicked one, the monster who had selected apple cheeks and milk-soft skin for its disguise.
Right then it did not matter. The pressing business was to dam the flood. It subsided in time, and Estelle said, “It’s Justin who upsets me too. I was fond of Justin. He and I were the last of us, Ann. Except for you.”
One swallow, Ann thought, and you would have been the last of us, Estelle. With me dead, the Marlow fortune would have been yours. You intimated that when you told me about Marlow’s will. How much did the Germans take from you of your personal wealth? How much had you left when you came back here? How much, really, is that trust fund which Marlow left you? Enough? You claim it is. But is it?
That was all right for Marlow’s death and for Ann’s intended one, but why had Estelle killed Alice? Weren’t her riches enough even back in those days? Still, even with Alice and Fred out of the way, and with Marlow en route via his radioactive poisoning, there still, Ann considered, would remain Ann. Was that why Estelle had chosen to do Marlow in by long range? Did she hope that before the radium did the trick she could worm from Marlow the secret of Ann’s hidden whe
reabouts?
The pattern obtained. Marlow had told Estelle only recently of the Ledrick haven and guise. And then how pursuantly the pyrogallol had been employed for a dual ending to finish it all up. Leaving Estelle with her ocelots and emeralds and, of course, millions and millions to boot.
Sergeant Hurlstone was saying: “Why did you take that drink of water from the carafe, Miss Marlow?” Estelle dabbed at tears and looked stricken. She did not answer right away. When she did so her voice held a note of reserved dignity.
“Very well, Sergeant Hurlstone. You continue in doubt. You do not believe me. I had taken a sedative before leaving my room. The wafer capsules are large. The French have a habit of aggrandizement with some of their remedies. I suppose because it makes the purchaser think he is getting his money’s worth. An essential requisite in France. The cachet had left a sharp irritation in my throat which I relieved, when I reached Ann’s bedroom, by taking the drink of water.”
“My doubts and my beliefs or disbeliefs form the basis of my stock in trade. They are impersonal. I would be of small service to you here without them.”
Estelle stood up.
“I should have realized so. With your permission I will retire, Sergeant Hurlstone.”
Sergeant Hurlstone managed expertly (because of the cat) to stand up too. He said that it was entirely agreeable to him if Estelle wanted to go to bed. He wished her sound sleep.
Estelle made a motion to kiss Ann good night and then drew back. You might, her manner said, not care to have me kiss you. Ann also had stood up. Impulsively she placed a warm kiss on Estelle’s pale cheek.
Tears sprang again into Estelle’s eyes, and it took a second or so for her to gain control of her voice.
“The storm is over, Ann. I saw from my window a break in the night sky. There are three stars quite clear in the west. That means the end of it. The planes are under your orders. You may leave the dangers of this unhappy house when you wish. There are standing arrangements with the authorities covering civilian flights to and from Black Tor. The formalities can be attended to within an hour.”
“I am staying here, Estelle.”
Estelle drew a quiet breath. She did not look at Ann.
“The planes are quite safe, my dear.”
“I did not mean that.”
“It is difficult, placed as I am, to know. Thank you, Ann, for kissing me. The day will come when I shall have your trust. We will be friends.”
Estelle left them then: an odd little bundle of rose velvet plumpness which was neither odd nor funny. There was too much of sound dignity in it.
“It’s getting on,” Sergeant Hurlstone said. “We’ll go up now, and you’ll get to bed.”
“I couldn’t sleep.”
“You will sleep perfectly well, Miss Marlow. I am spending the night in your living room.”
CHAPTER XXV
Some things you could not leave too long. Gaps, in time, became impossible to bridge. Bill definitely was laying off or he would have called by now. Ann had no knowledge of his phone number beyond the hotel in Washington where he had been staying. It seemed unlikely he would still be there. Surely barrack pallets were requisite hardeners for marines, not hostelries with inner springs and down. Plenty good for him, too, if he intended being tough about things.
Sergeant Hurlstone waited while she went into the small room and telephoned. The night clerk at the Washington hotel was sorry. Mr. Forrest had checked out late in the afternoon. There was a faint shock of affront in his voice at the thought that he would give a member of the armed forces’ forwarding address, even if he could.
Ann was not impressed. She doubted whether the war effort would collapse if she were told what barracks or camp Bill could be found in. Although even if she did know it she couldn’t call him in the middle of the night while surrounded by the frog chorus of his buddies. Not, that is, and live.
She called Fanny’s apartment. Glorious, Fanny’s colored maid, suggested the River Club, so she called the River Club, and after a while Fanny’s voice screamed at her: “Hello, darling, what now? You’re the talk of the town. Prince Oublevik wants to marry you. He’s that tall, thin thing with three saber slashes and those decayed-spaniel eyes. Do you want him, dear? He’s outside on the balcony eating borsch.”
“No, I’ll just put his name down, Fanny. I wanted to ask if you know how I can get in touch with Bill.”
“Oh.” There was a lull in the screaming. “So Bill hasn’t called you?”
“No.”
“He’s a louse. He called me around dinnertime.” The screaming gathered momentum again. “Take Oublevik. He’s lost his castles in Bavaria—I think it’s Bavaria—but he’s got stunning memories of them. Gobelins for slip covers, that sort of thing. You need some tag like Princess to go with all that money. Seriously, darling, I don’t know how you can reach Bill.”
“Did he say anything about me when he called you?”
“He asked if I thought you were all right, and I told him that your voice had sounded plushly virile, and then—oh, darling, he just said, ‘Thank you,’ and hung up. You may as well face it. I could almost hear his neck stiffening. You’ll never land him now.”
“Yes, I will.”
“Then you’re a better minx than I think you are. My God, you’re not going to refuse the Marlow gold pile, are you?”
“Of course not.”
“You had me worried. Look, darling, there’s that rum keg in Washington he used to toss pots in, and even the marines have their nights out. It’s name was Fricka’s—no, Freska’s. I give it to you for what it may be worth. He used it for crash dives.”
“Thanks, Fanny. I’ll try it.”
Ann said good-by. It was kind of Fanny not to ask things. Her life was a swelter of anxiety to get the news before it even was printed. This aptitude formed her bread and meat. Ann left it to long-distance to get her Freska’s, and the voice that eventually greeted her was something in the neighborhood, she thought, of impure Arabian.
“Will you find out, please,” Ann said, “if Mr. Bill Forrest is there?”
“Yes, yes, he is here. Very happy. All the time cry.”
“Ask him to come to the phone, please.”
A pause lengthened. He knows it’s I, Ann decided. He’s probably potted above the Plimsoll mark. Drowning his sorrows and starching the old Forrest sterling self-sufficiency.
“He says,” said the odd voice, “who you are and what do you want?”
“Tell him,” Ann said coldly, “I am a dying aunt.”
“You wait.”
“Hello, Ann,” Bill’s voice said shortly. (Stuffiest voice, Ann thought, I ever heard in my life.) “I called Fanny and she said you were all right.”
“So she just told me. And how are you, Bill?”
“I am A-1.”
“Don’t boast. I just wanted to check on our date for Friday. To let you know I’d be in town.”
“Oh. I’m sorry about that. The leave is off. They’re just giving me tomorrow to clear up some stuff at the office. Look, Ann, about that gag I pulled. You’ve probably forgotten it already. About our ordering the orange blossoms on Friday, I mean. You know how we used to kid?”
“Oh, stop being so damned desperate, Bill. I wouldn’t think of holding you to it.”
“Holding me to it?”
“Naturally you have to think of your Army career. Any blot on it—”
“What blot?”
“Oh, I know. I understand.” Ann sent (she hoped) a sigh along the wire. She pulled out the proper stop to give her voice, if not exactly treviolo, at least a wistful note. “And in any case I couldn’t bear the thought of your going Over There as a widower.”
“Widower? What in heaven’s name are you talking about?”
“They put poison in my drinking water two hours ago. Pyrogallol, to be exact. A swallow results in cyanosis and chills, then death from collapse. It was probably a leftover from the dose they used to kill Mr. Marlow.” Ann
shoved back tremolo and replaced it with chilled steel. “The next time they’ll cook up something fresh.”
“Ann! …Ann?”
It was Ann, this time, who let the telephone go bang. She rang the estate operator and asked that no calls originating in Washington be put through to her until morning. She joined Sergeant Hurlstone.
She said: “I’ve just been jilted.”
Sergeant Hurlstone’s rocklike face again warmed faintly under a smile as they went toward the lift.
“Is this new money of yours in the way?”
“It is. Temporarily.”
“I can see how he feels about it.”
“You men make me sick. All of you.”
“No, we don’t.”
“I think I’ll become a princess. Princess Oublevik. I can buy a tiara and serve melted pearls in the borsch.”
“You’ve got it bad all right.”
“Are you taking that cat up with you?”
“Yes.”
“What is this, anyhow?”
“I just like cats.”
“Just as you say, Sergeant Hurlstone.”
Sergeant Hurlstone pressed the button marked 3.
“Is he in the Army?”
“He is a freshly laid marine.”
“I’m getting in next month.”
“That leaves me nothing but to join the WAVEs.”
“What have you done so far?”
“Red Cross. USO. Whatever I could.”
“It won’t be so very long now before you can do plenty.”
They went into her living room.
The lights were on, and Estelle was seated near the coal fire which had been freshly arranged.
Estelle said, “I took the liberty of coming in, Ann. I felt that I couldn’t sleep without doing at least a little toward effacing such suspicions as you may have about me. I am glad, Sergeant Hurlstone, that you, also, are here. Do you mind, Ann dear?”
“I’m only too glad, Estelle.”
Sergeant Hurlstone waited until Ann sat down and then deposited himself and the dark-haired cat in an armchair. He remained courteously interested but completely removed, and his slate-colored eyes rested for an instant on Estelle and then slid past her toward the Adam desk.