“Why—he had one set and I had the other.”
“Where do you keep yours?”
He had her interest now. A tiny frown worked at the bridge of her nose, and her hazel eyes were dry and intent.
“In a purse or a pocket—depending on what I was wearing—and in a bureau drawer when I didn’t need them.”
“Would you look?”
She rose at once, the frown widening. She stepped to the bureau, opened a drawer, and poked about for a second or two. When she glanced up her brows were high.
“They’re not here.” She came back to the chair, walking slowly, the bewilderment still in her face. “Why did you ask?” she said finally. “Because you knew they were gone?”
He shook his head and took his time putting out his cigarette. He did not want to tell her about Arthur Prentice yet, and his mind was busy wondering when Prentice had come to get those keys.
“Were you here in your room most of the afternoon?”
“Yes. After—after they told me about Gramp. I had something sent up around six and—”
“What time did Larkin come to tell you about the meeting downstairs?”
“Between twenty and twenty-five of eight.”
“Did you go right down?”
“Why, yes. Yes, I did. I was the first one in the drawing-room.”
Murdock leaned against the window frame and stared sightlessly out into the night, figuring the time element and knowing that Prentice had plenty of opportunity to come here and get the keys. Bureau drawers would be the first place one would search, and the rest of it would be simple.
“I guess you were pretty fond of John Caldwell. You called him Gramp.”
“Yes.” She sighed, and from the corner of his eye he saw that she had leaned back in the chair. “I was very fond of him. And why not? He practically took care of me ever since I was fourteen.”
“But he cut you out of his will.”
“Oh, that!” Her tone dismissed the matter. “That was just his way of showing disapproval. He knew I had a little money of my own but he didn’t know how else to discipline me. He probably would have made some other gift later on to make up for it.”
Murdock remembered that John Caldwell had wanted her to marry his grandson, and this was a wish Murdock could well understand. He liked this girl; he liked her very much. It was not that she was beautiful, for this seemed always a debatable matter, nor that she was young and smooth-skinned and vital-looking. It was something else, something that lay beneath the surface and was reflected in her eyes and her voice and the way she accepted life. There was a gentle honesty about her, an inbred dignity and refinement that was apparent to all who knew her; yet for all of this he had an idea that there was a full quota of courage and self-reliance which could be called on when needed.
Considering these things now, Murdock knew she was the sort of girl any grandfather would choose for his grandson, the sort a father would be proud to call his daughter-in-law no matter how high his opinion of his son. That she had chosen Nick Taylor rather than George Caldwell and his millions suggested that she knew what she wanted, but to one like Old John such a choice could only have come as a shock.
“That was because he liked you,” Murdock said. “And maybe admired your spunk. It wouldn’t be that way with everyone, would it? He must have been pretty severe with some of those he disliked.”
He turned from the window and found her watching him, her eyes wide and thoughtful. She moistened her lips; finally she nodded.
“Yes, I guess he would.” She hesitated again, and now her gaze grew quizzical. “But why—”
He cut her off with a crooked smile and a gesture. He took from his pocket the silver chain and the three keys he had found in Larkin’s office desk.
“Would these be yours?”
She reached for them, then stopped. She shook her head and looked up, her glance puzzled.
“No,” she said. “Those are Larkin’s. W-Where did you get them?”
He told her. He asked her if she knew any reason why anyone would want them and she said no. He did not suggest that someone had very likely taken them from the butler after he was dead, and he hoped the idea would not occur to her. He thanked her for her help, and now that he was ready to leave, he could see from the expression in her eyes that there would soon be other questions, some of which he might not want to answer. He went our before she put one into words.
Murdock telephoned his statement to the Courier-Herald a few minutes later from the upstairs study at the insistence of a recently arrived assistant district attorney, and under his supervision. A matter of form, was the way the official put it, so that each newspaper would get the identical statement. Murdock said he understood how it was. He gave Alger a sardonic grin and said he’d see him later. Then he went downstairs and, finding the main hall again deserted, walked back to the transverse corridor that led to the library and office.
This time the library door was closed, and when he entered and found the room dark, he stepped to the bookshelves and took the papers from their hiding-place. Then, seeing the outline of the desk as he moved back, he turned on the light that stood there and bent down to take another quick look at the reports.
Ordinarily Murdock’s intuitive equipment was the equal of most men’s, and in some respects it was superior. In this instance, however, it failed him completely. With his interest and attention centered on the typewritten words, he had no warning and was aware of no sound until he snapped off the light and straightened up. In that same instant it happened.
He felt rather than heard the rush of movement behind him, but now there was no time to think, and even as he turned and tried to swivel away he felt the reports being snatched from his grasp. He got one hand up, or thought he did. The sudden darkness confused him, and when he tried to duck, the movement was tardy, and in the wrong direction.
The fist slammed flush against the side of his jaw, too high for a knockout but solidly, with plenty of drive behind it, spinning him to one side and backward. He staggered, tried to get his balance; then his heel caught in the leg of a chair and he went down hard, landing on one shoulder.
He heard the rush of footsteps across the rug as he rolled over, but when he came to his knees he had lost his sense of direction. He could not tell which way the man had fled, and by the time he regained his feet and felt the desk in front of him, there was no sound but his labored breathing.
He swore bitterly, softly. He found the lamp again and switched it on. Then, flexing his jaw and finding it unbroken, he heard the faint sound of whistling that grew steadily louder and was presently accompanied by the tap of footsteps.
Nick Taylor swung into the room still whistling, spotted Murdock, slowed down. He stopped whistling, and then, his gaze on Murdock’s face, he whistled again.
“My, my!” he said. “What happened to you, slugger?”
Murdock felt the side of his jaw, discovered a small cut there and wondered if it had been made by a ring. He glanced at Nick’s hands and saw the signet ring on the little finger of the left hand. He tried to think back, to visualize the punch, but when he realized he could not be sure whether it had been thrown by a right hand or a left, he improvised a story of what had happened.
“You didn’t see anyone in the hall?”
“No,” Nick said. “You didn’t either, huh? No ideas?”
Murdock patted the brasion with a handkerchief, saw there was no active bleeding. “Maybe it was your pal with the black suit and the scar on one eyebrow.”
“What were you hit with?”
“A fist.”
“Then it wasn’t Ross. A gun butt or a sap, or maybe a rock, and it might be him. And he’s no pal of mine,” Nick said. He slid his hands down the lapels of his Brooks suit and looked uneasy. He shifted his weight and said, “That row in your office this afternoon was a mistake. I had a thousand bucks in my pocket. Larkin told me to buy that picture back if I could, but”—he flipped one hand and put it back on his l
apel—“I didn’t get the chance to make an offer.”
“Murdock, remembering the progression of that incident, knew that this could well be true, and his interest now centered in the thug Nick had called Ross. He had, he realized, been waiting for a chance to find out more about the man and he said, “What does he do when he’s not slugging someone?”
“Ross? Oh, he’s sort of a guard. I never worked with him before, but he’s been around. An outside man, mostly.” He paused, and then continued when he saw that Murdock did not know what he meant.
“When you’re as famous as Caldwell—any one of them—and have as much money, you’re bound to be bothered now and then by cranks and crackpots. Not all of them are dangerous, but most of them are nuts. You’ve seen the gatehouse and the wall? Well, we still get prowlers around the wall, and once in a while some screwball climbs over for a look around. Ross is supposed to be handy in case anybody does get in. When that happens—and it does occasionally—he tosses them back over the wall or out the gate. The lacerations and contusions that go with the ejection are supplied by him free of charge.”
“Don’t you ever get sued?”
“Sometimes. But the kind of dopes that climb walls like these can be bought off cheap, or threatened with charges. Mostly they’ve had too much of Ross already and are glad to get away without losing an arm.”
Murdock got the general idea, and in some ways he did not think Nick exaggerated.
“A real tough guy, hunh?”
“In a nasty sort of way.”
Nick reached for a cigarette, his glance moving alertly about the room. His pale-blue eyes narrowed thoughtfully when they touched the office door, and in another moment he had stepped past Murdock, moving through the opening and snapping on the overhead light. He whistled again when he saw the disordered appearance of the desk drawers, most of which stood open.
Murdock moved past him to the desk light and found the reflector still warm. That told him that someone had been searching the place and had given up and was standing—or waiting—in the darkness of the library when he opened the door. He saw that Nick was watching him and looked back at him, dark eyes brooding.
“Why would anyone put the slug on you?” Nick asked.
“I don’t know,” Murdock said. “I guess they don’t like me around here. I guess maybe it was time I shoved off. Would you like to walk upstairs with me while I get my camera—to make sure I don’t lift some of the family silver?”
“Sure,” said Nick, and grinned.
The equipment case was still on the bed in the third-floor room, but it was not quite as Murdock had left it, and when he saw the rumpled condition of his topcoat he seemed to know that someone had gone through the pockets.
It took him but a moment to open the case, and he saw at once that while his camera seemed to be all right, there were no spare film holders, either in the case or in the back of the camera. He had brought perhaps a dozen altogether, and the two he had exposed in Larkin’s room and in the hall were still in his jacket pocket. Because these were safe he was more disgusted than angry when he turned to Nick.
“A fine thing!” he said. “You watch me to make sure I don’t run off with anything but nobody watches you and the rest of these characters.”
Nick warped a brow and ran his tongue around the inside of one cheek. “You think somebody searched it?”
“I know somebody did.”
“What’s missing?”
“About ten film holders.” Murdock closed the case and threw his coat over his arm. “I think I’ll make a complaint.”
“Yeah,” said Nick. “Why don’t you?”
They went along the hall and down to the second floor. George Caldwell was standing just outside the study door talking to his cousin.
Murdock and Nick walked up to them and Nick said, “Mr. Murdock has a complaint.”
George Caldwell looked older than his twenty-seven years. He had put on quite a bit of weight, in the face as well as the body, and this added size and the responsibilities of his work with the company had served to give the impression of maturity beyond his years. The tragedy and its complications had left their mark, sobering him beyond his naturally serious disposition, and he was a grave, impressive figure as he inspected Murdock and said, “What seems to be the trouble?”
Murdock told him, seeing the frown spread across the man’s face and the look of uncertainty cloud his gaze.
“Why should anyone do that?” he asked when he’d heard the story.
Murdock had an answer for that, too, but he held back part of it. For some reason he could not explain he did not want to mention the picture he had taken blindly in the hall—until he had a chance to print it.
“I took a couple of pictures in Larkin’s room,” he said. “The killer knew about one of them,” he added, and went on to explain the circumstances. “It looks to me as if he wanted to make sure that picture was destroyed.”
George glanced at his cousin and Larry Alderson scowled back at him. “This guy’s going to think we’re all a bunch of thugs,” he said disgustedly. “First thing you know he’s going to get sore, and then where’ll we be?” He turned the scowl on Murdock. “Do you know any reason why the murderer would want that picture?”
Murdock said no, and finally George Caldwell sighed and said he was sorry it happened. “I don’t know what we can do about it now,” he said, “except to offer to pay for your loss. If you’ll have the Courier-Herald send me a bill I’ll see that it’s taken care of.”
Larry Alderson had been watching Murdock, his gaze more cynical than usual. “Things happen to you, don’t they, Murdock?” he said. “You’re a pretty enterprising guy.”
Murdock eyed him curiously and waited, wondering what came next. So, apparently, did Nick and George Caldwell.
Larry bunched his lips, straightened them, pushed one brow up a quarter of an inch. “We could use a photographer like you in the advertising business. You might call me up if you ever want to make a change.”
Murdock gave him a lopsided grin. “Maybe I’ll call you up before that, Mr. Alderson.” He nodded to Nick, and together they moved round the railing and started down the stairs.
10
IT WAS ELEVEN-THIRTY when Kent Murdock got back to his office, and when he had slipped out of his coat he took the two film holders from his pocket. One of these, he knew, had been exposed in Larkin’s room while the murderer had watched from the closet; the other contained the negative he had exposed in the hall in his blind effort to get a picture of the killer, and the one he had taken after that in Larkin’s room.
Eddie Kelsey, his chair propped in the corner, was on the last pages of his adventure magazine. He was off duty at midnight, and now Murdock called him over and gave him the two holders with instructions to develop the films and let him know when they were dry.
Eddie said okay and went into the darkened corridor and Murdock began again to think about the pictures he had taken. He had no false hopes as to what they might reveal, for he had an idea that the picture taken in the hall would show nothing but that hall, and as for those taken in Larkin’s room, he doubted if they would picture anything that he had not already seen. Still, there was always a chance that a camera might pick up some detail unnoticed by the human eye, and he realized, too, that the murderer could never be sure just what the films contained until, like Murdock, he had a chance to see them. That the guilty one had some such idea in mind was a logical guess, since he had gone to the trouble of searching the equipment case and removing all the spare film holders. Murdock, putting himself in the killer’s place, was in the process of admitting that he would have done the same thing when Phil Doane, the demon reporter, breezed in and demanded an accounting of the last few hours.
“I should’ve known it,” he wailed. “I should’ve stuck right with you. I would have only the desk sent me over to Cambridge to cover a protest meeting of the Tax Payer’s Association. And what happens?” He spread his arms a
nd let them drop down, his hands slapping against his thighs in a gesture reminiscent of Jimmy Durante. “Somebody shoots the Caldwell butler, that’s all.”
He held a bulldog edition carrying the statement Murdock had telephoned in along with an older picture of Caldwell Manor.
“Do yon know yet whether it was murder or suicide?”
“No,” Murdock said.
“But you’ve got an idea.” Doane leaned over the desk, excited lights in his eyes. “You’re holding out,” he accused.
“Go away,” said Murdock.
“Are you going to follow up the case?”
“No.”
And it occurred to Murdock now that with this answer he was telling the truth. He did not know who had killed John Caldwell and Larkin. He had a story that he more than likely would never be able to release, and he had made a lot of trouble for himself and the Caldwells, and he had had enough. The fact that Larkin had been killed so soon after he had gone back there left him deeply concerned and if he had had any sound ideas that he thought might help, he would have offered them to the police. As it was, he knew very little more now than when he started, and certainly not enough to warrant any activity on his part—unless, of course, the pictures Kelsey was developing disclosed something important.
“No,” he said again, not even listening to Doane’s last question, and before he could continue, Kelsey appeared in the doorway to say the negatives were dry.
Doane was a hard man to satisfy. “I still think you’re holding out,” he said.
“That’s only your opinion. Consider yourself outvoted.”
“Did you get any pictures?”
Murdock stood up and took the reporter by the arm. He led him into the hall and gave him a gentle push. “Beat it!” he said, good-naturedly but with an undertone of firmness. “You bother me,” he said. “I’ll see you later. I might even buy you a drink.”
Doane looked hurt but he went. Murdock joined Kelsey in the printing-room. He inspected the three negatives but they were too small to give him more than a general idea of what they would eventually reveal, and he was about to make his first print when the telephone rang in the anteroom.
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