Death Wears a Mask

by Thérèse Benson

  He finally crawled into bed with a sigh of relief, and slept until Sing brought his coffee in the morning.

  On the floor below, Miss Livingston was less fortunate. Harvey’s presence had required explanation, if secrecy was to be maintained, and before she had a chance to lock herself in her room, Eliza returned from the movies all a-twitter.

  “Just like you said maybe would happen, a terrible swell young man came and sat down right next to me. At least at first there was an empty seat between us, hut when that Sing comes along, he moved up one. Then he spoke to me like a perfect gentleman. ‘If he’s a friend of yours, lady, I’ll give him my place,’ was what he said; so, not wanting anyone think I was chummy with a Chink, I said: ‘Certainly not, sir. Merely a bowing acquaintance, entailing no further obligation.’” Her imitation of her mistress, wholly unconscious, was unmistakable. She continued:

  “And so, you see, the ice being broken as you might say, we passed a word now and then, and we come out of the theater side by side, walking together accidental like.” She paused.

  “Well?” was all Miss Livingston had to say to induce her to resume her recital.

  “Well, ma’am, he asked me some questions. Questions any gentleman might ask a lady. What did I do for my living and such. Nothing real personal, as you might say. And then he wanted to know about you. My mistress was a sort of social lady, wasn’t she? Entertained a lot. Some one had been staying with her lately, hadn’t there? And then I knew he was just the man you had been expecting; though, honest, I wouldn’t never have thought it of him, he had such kind blue eyes. ‘No,’ said I, ‘no one’s been staying. We’ve been unus’al quiet. Miss Livingston’s had this here grippe that’s been going ‘round.’ ‘Indeed!’ says he, awful sharp, ‘then how come the lights are lit in your spare room at night? Extravagant, I call it’...Now what do you think of that for impudence? I wasted no time in letting him know I considered it such, and explained, just like you told me, that I was sleeping there to be handy in case you needed anything at night. But he walked all the way home with me, and when we got here, although the blinds was down, you could see by a streak of light along the sides that the electrics was lit in the room and me down in the street looking at it.

  “‘I presoom you’re up there now getting ready for your innocent slumbers,’ says he, awful sneering. ‘No,’ I answered him back, giving as good as he gave, ‘I’m here with a chap that’s mislaid his manners, if he ever had any. And while it’s not my business any more’n it is his, I presoom that Miss Livingston’s at work on some of the files she keeps in that room.’ So then I tossed my head, like this, to show I didn’t care what he thought, and turned into the service entrance without so much as a good night. And the man had the nerve to call after me, ‘I think me an’ Detective McCurdy’ll be in in the morning to have a good look at those files.’”

  “Hm,” said Miss Livingston. “You’d better wake me early to get ready for them. You handled the creature extremely well, Eliza.”

  “I moved six files in there today, ma’am, just in case,” said Eliza, much gratified by such praise. “Awful exciting, I call it. Exactly like a movie, if you ask me.”

  Miss Livingston nodded her head. She was as tired as Sam, being quite unused to emotion such as she had been enduring uncomplainingly.

  “It’s too much like a movie for my taste,” she said.

  “It ain’t for mine,” Eliza returned, valiantly. “I think it’s grand. Ronald Colman could do the hero, and between us, ma’am, we’ll manage to save the innocent man and perhaps we’ll help convict the guilty.”

  “I’m afraid I’ll rest content if we succeed in doing the first,” Miss Livingston sighed wearily.

  “I won’t,” Eliza asserted. “Confidential, ma’am, I got my eye on the real criminal. In every other talkie I ever saw except the Charlie Chans, it’s the Chinaman who does the dreadful deed. And all the time there’s that Sing upstairs, looking as if butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth and nobody paying any attention to him at all, just because he’s the Police Commissioner’s chef. As if that was any alibi. If there was a detective worth his salt ‘round the place, he’d have been in jail long before this.”

  After exchanging good nights, the two women started on their several ways, but Miss Livingston called Eliza hack as various contingencies passed through her tired brain.

  “Make your bed as soon as you’re up,” she warned the woman. “There will be no time to air it. Then bring your night things and slippers with you to leave in Mr. Thorne’s room. And, Eliza, you’ll have to undress in the dark. You can turn on your light a moment to hang up your coat and hat. That would be natural, but switch it off at once. I’m sure your new acquaintance will have an interest in your window, for all his kind blue eyes.”

  “I thought of that and it would be like his impudence, ma’am,” the woman rejoined. “Them detectives is up to all sorts of tricks, but I’ll be a match for him. You learn an awful lot in the movies, these days. Good night, ma’am.”

  “Good night, Eliza.”

  This time they really separated, and with Miss Livingston went the thought, to stay with her while she undressed and to haunt her after she at last was between her lavender-scented sheets: Could Eliza possibly be right? Was Sing a legitimate suspect? Mr. Mellon had said his man was out, but had anyone checked up on his movements? What provocation could have caused him to commit such a crime, if he had committed it?

  She had taken a dislike to the man when she had heard him demanding a commission from a small tradesman for work that was evidently done for his master.

  That she recognized as a personal prejudice, and she had read enough of the immemorial “squeeze” of China to know that a Chinese servant might look on it as his rightful perquisite. It by no means followed that he was ready to murder one of his master’s friends without thought of gain.

  Without thought of gain? Was that the key to the riddle? Had Consuela Thorne had something that had tempted the house man to commit the deed?

  Once Harvey was safely on his way to the Caribbean, she must remember to suggest this possibility to the Police Commissioner—who perhaps would not thank her for depriving him of an efficient servant.

  Over the crass selfishness implied in this last suggestion she balked.

  “I don’t know who the chap’s family are or where he came from, but at least he’s a friend to his friends,” she ruminated, “and he’ll want to find the murderer.”

  Chapter XIII

  The morning broke clear and cold. Sam would have welcomed fog or rain to make the task of spying more difficult. However, he followed his usual routine without haste and on finishing his breakfast tinned to Sing:

  “You were a little slow in answering that call just as I came in last night, Sing. Were there any other messages for me?”

  “I was asleep,” Sing said, his face falling into sullen lines at any hint of criticism. “There was only one call. A woman, a lady perhaps, she spoke well, wished to speak with you. She refused to leave a message.”

  “Probably it was my niece——”

  “It was not Mrs. Harris.”

  “Well, if it’s anything important, the lady will call again. And, Sing, buy a tablet and pencil and keep them beside the phone in the pantry. I wish every call you receive to be recorded.”

  “Sir, I never fail to give you your messages.”

  “Not often, perhaps. You did not tell me yesterday that Mrs. Harris wanted to speak to me particularly.”

  “If you are dissatisfied with me, sir——”

  Sing began, hotly.

  “When I am, I shall not hesitate to tell you,” Sam interrupted. “Meanwhile don’t forget that tablet and pencil.” He picked up his paper and looked at his watch. “Dinner at the usual time.”

  At nine o’clock precisely he was in the lower hall.

  A rather callow lad named John Scott was doorman in the daytime. The intense cold had driven him inside and Sam stopped to speak to him.


  “A little brisk out doom this morning, John?”

  “It’s bitter, C’missioner.” John was careful to give him his title. “I wisht the house would give us doormen swell big capes like a friend of mine has over at the Normandy. They look good and they’re grand to wrap up in on days like this. The wind is whistlin’ off the river somethin’ fierce.”

  “I’ll make a note of it,” Sam promised. Then he caught sight of Miss Livingston coming rather feebly across the hall from the elevator. “I’m afraid I’ll freeze. This ulster is supposed to be the warmest thing I have, but it’s homespun and it feels like tissue-paper on a windy day like this.” He especially wanted John to remark that ulster and he turned up the collar ostentatiously, pulled his muffler higher, and began to put on a new pair of pigskin gloves, just as the lady reached him.

  “Good morning, Mr. Mellon,” she said.

  Her morning had been full of excitement, yet so far she had come off victorious. She longed to tell Sam what had happened, but this was not the time for that.

  According to plan, he addressed her:

  “John says it’s very cold. Ought you to be going out so soon when you’ve had a touch of the grippe?”

  “I can’t afford to baby myself,” she returned petulantly. “There’s the Schuyler dinner-dance list to be made up, and several other things no one else can attend to—and I’ve left my notes upstairs. That shows I’m not well yet. I never forget anything.” She turned to go up again, tottering a little as if from weakness, and Sam stopped her.

  “Sit down and take it easy. I’ll go fetch your notes. Surely your maid can get them for me.”

  Miss Livingston sat down as if relieved by this offer of help.

  “You’re very kind. Tell Eliza—Eliza’s my maid’s name—that she will find a small red-leather notebook in one of the files in the spare room. Remember, red. I don’t want the black one. It’s in the third or the fifth file from the right hand. I can’t be sure which. I think it’s the third, but she will have to look.”

  Sam started toward the elevator, then called: “Oh, John!”

  “Yes, sir?”

  He beckoned to the lad and whispered to him:

  “The old lady ought not to be going out. In just five minutes whistle for a taxi. I’ll persuade her to let me drop her at her office.”

  “Her own car is here, sir.”

  “I didn’t know she had a car. Well, have it at the door then in five minutes and I’ll help her into it so fast she won’t have time to feel chilled.” He stepped into the elevator and in less than a minute was in Harvey’s room, where he divested himself of coat, hat, muffler and gloves.

  “Get into these quickly,” he said. “No, wait a minute. Those evening clothes might give you away. We’ll have to change trousers at least. Miss Livingston’s a real sport. She noticed that we were the same height and build and had hair the same color. Now with this muffler and with your collar pulled up, I don’t think there’s a chance in the world of anyone guessing that it isn’t Sam Mellon. Off you go!”

  Eliza was in the foyer, holding out a red notebook.

  “Don’t forget this, sir,” she said, eager to help the plot along. “I just couldn’t bear it if you didn’t get away safe. Only I know you will.”

  Sam was standing, his eyes on his watch.

  “Time to be off, old man,” he said. Harvey wrung his hand silently and stepped into the elevator.

  “I wisht I dared look out of the window to see what happens,” Eliza hinted.

  “You mustn’t risk it,” Sam told her, and caught the woman staring at him as if fascinated.

  “Them trousers, sir,” she faltered. “We forgot all about them. Of course Mr. Thorne had them on underneath—You see, his tailor basted strips with his name into all of his clothes and we remembered to rip them out before the police came this morning——”

  “The police?” Sam interrupted, simply aghast.

  “Yes, sir. Awful early. About eight o’clock. Miss Livingston made a fuss about letting them into the spare room. But, to get rid of ‘em, she let ‘em in at last. It was airing, with my nightgown and slippers and all on a chair, and her files and papers in plain sight on top o’ the desk. I never in all my life see anyone so disappointed as that lad with the blue eyes.

  They went through the whole flat, poking into closets and under beds. When they found Mr. Thorne’s evening clothes, with the labels all ripped out, in the butler’s lavatory, they thought they had something for sure. But Miss Livingston was a treat.”

  “How did she explain them?”

  “The best she could. She said she had ‘em for the use of a butler when she gave dinner parties. She said she was particular what her attendants wore, and that’s no more than the truth. Then when they asked why the labels was all gone, she explained, very haughty, that she did not propose to risk some casual employee (those was her very words, sir) going off with clothing that had her nephew’s name in it.”

  “Is Mr. Thorne her nephew?” Sam asked, rather stupidly, for the question agitating his mind was where they had parked Harvey while this search was going on.

  “Bless you, no, sir! But Mr. Lucius Livingston is, and she called him out of bed last night to tell him he’d given her a set of dinner clothes that didn’t fit him and what tailor in London made ‘em. They were too new to be called old, you see.”

  “She thought of everything——”

  “Indeed she did, sir. She even changed his blotting-paper. She might have been going to the movies all her life. I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.”

  “But,” Sam at last got out the question he was eager to have answered, “where was Mr. Thorne all this time?”

  Eliza took a long breath and emitted an excited giggle. This was the climax of her tale.

  “Miss Livingston told me that a long time ago there was a man who wrote books. Sort of detective stories, and he invented the very best way of hiding something, and that was not to hide it at all. So yesterday I got the loan of a pair of old overalls and an old coat from my brother, who’s a plumber but very obliging, and while the detectives was pokin’ ‘round into my room and every place that was no business of theirs, Mr. Thorne was working in the dining-room with all the curtains pinned up out of the road, polishing the windows, and the whole place smelling so strong of ammonia, that reelly no one could suspicion him.”

  “Why in the world didn’t Miss Livingston tell me that she suspected that the police were going to search her apartment?”

  “Oh, sir,” said Eliza, righteously, “Miss Livingston and me, we didn’t think it would be quite the thing for the Police Commissioner to be mixed up in making fools of the police. We didn’t think it would look well, sir.”

  “Perhaps you were right, Eliza,” Sam said, suppressing his amusement. “And since I may possibly be treated to a similar visitation, I shall bring these trousers back to you, once I’ve changed.”

  “Shall I go up and fetch you something else to wear, sir?”

  “No,” said Sam. “The best thing for you to do is to make sure when Sing has gone out. Then I’ll run up and change, but not before.”

  “Perhaps that’s just as well, sir.” Eliza paused, but went on, portentously: “Maybe I shouldn’t say it about another person in service, but I don’t like that Sing. He’s got such a funny taste in pictures. Not refined, if you see what I mean, sir. He went out last night long before the last picture was done, and it was perfectly lovely. It brought tears to my eyes. Two sweet little children-”

  “Some other time, Eliza,” Sam interrupted. “It sounds like just the sort of picture I adore, only now I’ve work to do. Will you run back and let me know the minute Sing goes out?”

  “Yes, sir, I will.” Eliza started out hut could not resist saying over her shoulder: “It’s moving to the Lexington and’ll be there the rest of the week, Mr. Mellon. It’s called ‘The Love of His Youth.’”

  “The Love of His Youth!” Poor, poor Connie. Sam
was plunged in an unprofitable revery when Eliza returned.

  “He’s gone, sir. I called him on the telephone and asked him to send me a Camembert when he did his shopping, to save me having to go out in the cold, me suffering with a troublesome tooth, and he stopped at the door for the money. I saw him go down.”

  “Good girl,” Sam said approvingly, and took his departure.

  He chose another suit and dressed hurriedly, but just as he was about to leave, wondering how he was to explain this second apparition to John, the doorman, his telephone rang. Impatient at being delayed, he thought of ignoring the call, but the imperious demand of the ringing overcame his resistance.

  It was Louise’s voice that came to him, pleasantly conversational, evidently ready for a long chat.

  “Hurry with anything of importance you have to say, Lou. I’ve a lot to do and am in the devil of a rush.”

  “O.K.,” said Louise, “Aimée says——”

  “In French,” Sam hinted. His French was far from fluent, but he had bethought him suddenly of the possible tapping of his line. Louise, a little startled, rose to the occasion:

  “In French, of course. Ette m’a dit que l’emeraude carrée de madame est perdue.”

  “O.K.,” said Sam. “I mean, trés bien,” and hung up.

  Thereupon, wasting no more time, he took the tell-tale trousers to Eliza, who at once began an intensive search for tailor’s labels.

  Connie’s square emerald gone? What did that mean? The police would have returned everything on the body, yet that ring was the one ornament Connie never appeared without. The rest of her jewelry might be changed to harmonize with her clothes. That square emerald, supported in its platinum setting by two smaller triangular diamonds, she always wore. It must have been taken from her dead hand.

  “I like it,” was her usual response when twitted with the fact that it accorded ill with her dress. Alone with him and in a more expansive mood, she had said: “To me, it’s a sign of victory. Incidentally, it’s one of the few things I possess that cost me nothing—absolutely nothing—not even a qualm of conscience.”