Dark of the moon - Dr. Gideon Fell 22

by John Dickson Carr

  "I don't know him. I've heard Dr. Fell mention him."

  Captain Ashcroft shook a graying head.

  "Twenty years ago and more I was in the Army with Carlo Spinelli. You ought to hear him about Dr. Fell! Thinks the world of that blundering man-mountain, Spinny does; and now I've met the man I'll go along with it. Come on, Miss Bruce! You don't mind telling me, do you?"

  "I don't mind telling you, Captain Ashcroft. You're very easy to talk to, not like some people I could mention."

  "Now, now, ma'am!"

  "But I didn't think you were going to be like this at all." Camilla pushed back a lock of hair. "Rip Hillboro persuaded Mr. Maynard to get in touch with the police, which he didn't want to do. When Madge said there was a detective coming from Charleston. . ."

  "Scared you, did it?"

  "I was frightened to death; I wanted to run and hide. In the stories . . ."

  "I know, ma'am, I know! If we carried on like what they do in those detective stories we'd be in a heap of trouble every time we turned around. Lots of people seem to have it in for us: police always wrong, any old crook always right It's a hard job and a thankless job and it don't pay hardly anything, but we're not such a bad bunch in the long run; you hear?"

  "Captain Ashcroft," Camilla said gently, "may I ask you a question? You know Mr. Maynard fairly well, don't you?"

  Captain Ashcroft may have been a strong man; he was not a silent one.

  "I've known the Maynards," he answered, "almost since I can remember anything at all. They've been gentry for near on to three hundred years; I'm not that, exactly, though my great-granddaddy was chief gunnery-officer of the Palmetto when Henry's great-granddaddy commanded her."

  Here, with a motion of apology to Camilla, he bit off the end of a King Edward cigar and lighted it.

  "In the last generation there were only two of 'em, Richard and Henry. Richard, the older one, died unmarried a couple of months ago; he had inherited the property, and there was still plenty of property to inherit.

  "But Henry, who's eight or ten years older than I am, never had to worry. He was his mother's favorite; you know what that means. They sent him to a swell preparatory school up north, then to Williams or Amherst or one of those places; I wouldn't know. His mother left him so well fixed he could suit himself and live abroad, which he did almost until Hitler walked into France.

  "That's my part of the story, and I'm right happy to tell it. Early last Saturday afternoon, the 8th, we get a call at the office; there'd been a rumpus on James Island the night before. 'Joe,' the chief says to me—I don't let this get out usually; my first name's Joscphus for Jose-phus Daniels of North Carilina—'Joe,' he says, 'we can't tell what this is, probably nothing at all. Still, you know the folks. You're no Lord Chesterfield or Beau Brummell, but you won't throw soup in their faces or jump up in the air just to land on somebody's toes. You hike out and see.'

  "Now, little lady, it's your turn. You've got no call to be scared, anybody as sweet and pretty as you are. It happened 'most a week ago, didn't it, and you've already told it once this morning? I don't want to crowd you, believe me! But I agree with young Mr. Beale: something mighty damn funny goin' on over there, and I'd be grateful for any extra help you can give." "All right," Camilla agreed.

  She still fidgeted badly, the strain showing in her eyes. Alan had lit a cigarette for her when he lit his own, but she put it out at once. Camilla clasped her hands together. She looked out the window, as though intent on the rap of heels along the sidewalk; then she turned back.

  "Mr. Maynard," Camilla began, "was away in Richmond that night. Valerie Huret and Dr. Sheldon came to dinner, and Bob Crandall had arrived from Goliath. After dinner we had coffee in the back garden. When we went indoors about ten o'clock, we can all testify the scarecrow hadn't been touched."

  Now it was Josephus Ashcroft who displayed anguish.

  "Pardon my language, ma'am, but did you hear what I said about that God-damn scarecrow?"

  "It's the theft of the scarecrow you're investigating, isn't it?"

  "I don't know what I am investigating, ma'am. That's just the trouble. Go on."

  "Well, we went indoors about ten o'clock. Valerie Huret and Dr. Sheldon left together at that time. The rest of us, Madge and Yancey and Rip and Bob Crandall and I . . ."

  "Whoa, ma'am; whoa there! Take it easy, and not so fast." Captain Ashcroft spoke with a certain excitement. "You're not saying . . . you can't be saying . . . ?"

  "Saying what?"

  "Mark Sheldon's got a wife of his own; they've been married for less than a year, and a very fine person she is. Blow me down! You're not suggesting there's something between Mrs. Huret and that young doctor?"

  Camilla was appalled. "Saying it? Suggesting it?"

  "Ma'am?"

  "I'm not even dreaming it. Neither is anybody else. They're casual acquaintances, that's all. They 'left together' because they live near each other, somewhere down around East Bay in Charleston. She'd be too old for him anyway, even though she doesn't look it. If Valerie's interested in anybody, Madge thinks, she's interested in Madge's father."

  "Or in Mr. Crandall, maybe? That'd be my own guess; I could be far wrong. Also, speaking of who's got a fancy for whom, Miss Maynard says that you . . ."

  His eye flickered briefly round the table. Camilla's color came up; she held herself rigidly.

  "Madge says—what?"

  "Nothing, ma'am, ab-so-lutely nothing! However! Since you're in the young lady's confidence and can probably guess . . ."

  "I'm not in Madge's confidence. Madge doesn't confide in anybody, really. She's a sweet girl, as you would put it But she has moods. You mustn't take her moods too seriously or regard her as an authority on anything relating to me."

  "I won't, ma'am. Still! Even if you did have a fancy, where would be the harm in it?"

  "Now listen, Mr. Jehoshaphat Ashcroft . . . !"

  "Josephus Ashcroft! Just 'Joe' will do."

  "Please!" Camilla begged, more than half docile again. "I don't know anything about policemen, especially policemen like you. But what are we doing, really? Are we discussing some rather frightening experiences last Friday night or are we just fishing for idle gossip?"

  "You'd be surprised, ma'am, how much real evidence can be buried in idle gossip. I don't say the funny business at Maynard Hall comes from somebody fooling with the wrong woman, or with any woman at all. But it's much more likely to be caused by that, now, isn't it, than by anything that happened many years ago?"

  "Well . . ."

  "We can discuss the frightening experiences, ma'am, if you'll just get on and tell 'em while I think."

  "I'm sorry, Captain Ashcroft! Where was I? Oh, yes!"

  Camilla put her hands flat on the tablecloth and drew a deep breath.

  "Madge and Yancey and Rip and Bob Crandall and I came indoors, then. It was warm during the day, but it had turned cool with twilight. A mist rose off the water, as they say it often does. The five of us went to the library, which is the big room to the left of the front door and down four steps, with the books behind wire gratings and early Victorian furniture padded in yellow satin. Then they started telling ghost stories." "Who told the ghost stories?"

  "Yancey and Rip. Yancey began on a dreadful one out of M. R. James; Rip countered with the severed hand that has a life of its own and crawls across things to strangle people. Ever since Monday, you see, Rip and Yancey had been trying to top each other's remarks and impress Madge; they're still doing it."

  "Not much love lost between those two, is there?"

  "No, none at all. But they both began by being heavily polite to each other, much too polite when you remember Rip's aggressiveness; and they've continued that too."

  "Both of 'em gone on the young lady, aren't they?"

  "Oh, yes. I'm betraying no secret when I say that Given the least opportunity, either will buttonhole you and explain at length."

  "Which one does she favor?"

  "I don't know
. I'm Madge's closest friend; she's been kept so much in cotton-wool that maybe I'm her only friend. But, as I told you a while ago, Madge doesn't confide things like that; she keeps her own counsel far better than—" Camilla stopped.

  "Anyway, on and on went the ghost stories! Bob Crandall tried to lighten the atmosphere by giving an account of life on a small-town newspaper in the old days before they had teletypes; a reporter at the typewriter would put on headphones and take dictation from what was known as a 'pony-call.' And he quoted some typographical errors that were real beauties, though I've no intention of repeating them.

  "It didn't matter. Whichever way we turned, whatever we started to talk about, back it came to something wickedly supernatural. Really, I ask you! Ghost stories in the space age! It was absolutely ridiculous, don't you think?"

  "Well . . . now!" Captain Ashcroft said in his ruminating way. "I wouldn't just like to go as far as that, no. There's more things in the world than we know about, maybe. What do you tliink, Mr. Grantham? Agree with the lady?"

  "It's not the least bit of use asking Alan," Camilla said sweetly, "because he'll only disagree on principle. All he ever does is ignore me or sneer at me." Alan jumped to his feet

  "For God's sake, Camilla, when have I ever done that?"

  "When haven't you done it? What are you doing right now?"

  Alan studied her, mouth and eyes and figure.

  "If I told you what I'm thinking at this minute"—he sat down again—"you might feel still less cooperative than you already are. I won't do it, Camilla! Just go on with the story."

  Camilla fixed her attention on Captain Ashcroft.

  "Yes, it was ridiculous," she insisted. "But the atmosphere had been established too well. Start thinking of horrors, especially at a place like Maynard Hall when the time's close on midnight, and you'll have the horrors in spite of yourself.

  "It was affecting Madge badly. Yancey saw that and stopped talking; nothing could stop Rip. Towards twelve-thirty, when we were getting ready to go up to bed, Rip said, 'Madge, do you know about the thing that follows and leaves no trace? At the Library Association they say the story's found in only one book, called Sea-Island Ghosts.' Madge said, 'Rip, there's no such ghost' T know there isn't,' said Rip, 'but what if it tapped at one of our doors in the middle of the night?'

  "Yancey shouted, 'You shut your mouth,' and for a second I thought there would be trouble. But there wasn't Madge ran out of the room and up to bed; she told me later she took two sleeping-pills. Yancey said, 'God help me, I started this.' Then he turned around and almost ran out of the room; anyway, he went.

  "The rest of us followed more slowly. I was in as bad a state as Madge; I can't defend myself. In the upstairs hall on my way to my room I looked out of a window facing north over the beach. The mist had cleared; the moon was shining. But all I could think of was poor Commodore Maynard with his head battered in.

  "We'd had rather a lot of wine at dinner, and whisky in the library afterwards. I hoped it would put me to sleep, but of course it didn't. I was wide awake—and worse.

  "My room is on the south-western angle at the back of the house, above a weapons-and-trophy-room behind the library on the ground floor. When Mr. Maynard's elder brother partly rebuilt and modernized the Hall in the late nineteen-forties, he added a private bathroom to every bedroom, and put an air-conditioner in one window of every bedroom. That air-conditioner is necessary, or at night the mosquitoes would drive you crazy.

  "Yes, I was in a state. I had some sleeping-tablets of my own; not the heavy kind Madge uses but some lighter stuff, called Dormez-Vous, you can buy without a prescription at any drugstore.

  "I had locked the door. I took two pills; I got undressed; I paced the floor, smoking cigarettes. It would take about half an hour for the pills to work, if they worked at all. Meanwhile, every creak and crack of the woodwork brought fancies I oughtn't to have had. I picked up the bedside book; it was called Sea-Island Ghosts.

  "I threw that book across the room, and scared myself with the noise it made when it hit the wall. At about one o'clock I thought I might be feeling drowsy. My watch has a luminous dial." Camilla held up her left wrist to show the gold band. "I put it on the bedside table. I turned out the overhead light, crawled into bed, turned out the bedside lamp, and hoped for the best.

  "Well, the pills worked—after a fashion. I lost consciousness, at least. There were dreams of some kind. Then my eyes were open again.

  "This, it developed later, was at half-past three in the morning. I didn't turn on the light or look at my watch. My eyes were open, yes. But I was confused and only half conscious, with the fears pretty well dulled.

  "The moon had set. What drew me to the window it's impossible to say. That room has two windows above the back garden, with the air-conditioner blocking the lower part of the left-hand one. In bare feet and pajamas I blundered over to the right-hand window. I looked out and then down.

  "The weapons-room below has a big French window, two leaves to the window, opening on the garden. What I could just barely see in such a light made me push up the bedroom window; it slid smoothly and without noise. The leaves of the big French window, below me and to my left, had been pushed or drawn partway outward. There was somebody standing in the aperture between them."

  Captain Ashcroft shifted in his chair and struck two fingers on the edge of the table.

  "I've asked you before, ma'am . . . !"

  "I know you have; they all have. But what can I say?"

  "Description, ma'am?"

  "It was a man, or at least I suppose it was: who else can it have been? He stood sideways, facing to the left away from me. I have an idea, rightly or wrongly, there was some kind of stocking-mask over his head and face. He didn't move; I couldn't tell whether he was going out or coming in. That's all the description I can give."

  "Did you think it was a ghost or a burglar?"

  "I didn't stop to think; I wasn't that coherent. All the fears rushed back, and I panicked. I grabbed up robe and slippers, turning on every light I could reach. Then I ran down the hall and hammered at Madge's door.

  "Possibly I should have gone to one of the men first. It wasn't a reasoned thing; it was instinctive. Madge's heavier sleeping-pills hadn't served any better than mine; if you're used to them, she says, they won't keep you under for more than a few hours. Out she came in her pajamas. We must have talked loudly, almost shouted; in a short time we'd waked up the other three.

  "We didn't rouse the servants, who sleep on the top floor at the back. The men were all for burglars: Yancey and Rip stalked downstairs with their fists clenched, and Madge clinging to Yancey's arm. I followed with Mr. Crandall, who'd turned grumpy at that hour of the morning. You know what we found.

  "There was no burglar in the house, and nothing had been stolen from it. The French window in the weapons-room was now closed, but not locked; no window there is ever locked. To me it was beginning to seem weird."

  "Weird, ma'am?"

  "That was the word. Whoever had been at the French window, it couldn't have been somebody from inside the house going out; we were all there. And it couldn't have been somebody from outside the house coming in; where was he? But to the others, after we'd searched until daylight without any result, it wasn't weird in the least. Yancey just patted me on the back and said, 'Honey, you were dreaming.'"

  Camilla clenched her hands.

  'That's what they all thought and still think, though they won't always come out flat with it. Good old Camilla! Too much impressed by the ghost stories, she took sleeping-pills on top of alcohol and had only been hysterical!

  "It's true that Rip Hillboro, hunting through the garden when it got light enough to see, found the scarecrow was gone. But that didn't help much.

  "And it didn't help at all when Mr. Maynard arrived back Saturday morning, on an early flight from Richmond that got him home in time for lunch. He'd gone away moody and depressed (I think I wrote this to Alan), but he came back as cheerful
as all getout. It's even changed his habits a little. He still sits on the terrace in the afternoon and in his study during the evening, but he doesn't always seem to be calculating something. We'd been supposed to leave at the weekend, all of us; he begged us to stay on; and he's got a way with him. He hadn't any trouble persuading the others, and I stayed because . . . well, I stayed. May I have another cigarette, please?"

  Alan lit one for her. Acknowledging the favor with a slight nod, Camilla expelled smoke hard.

  "Mr. Maynard thought I was dreaming. The only one even partway inclined to be serious was the hard-headed Rip. When Mr. Maynard pooh-poohed the idea of phoning the police about anything, Rip said: 'Probably the poor girl was hysterical, sir. The scarecrow was taken by a sneak-thief, as you think, and has nothing to do with this. Still! Suppose she wasn't dreaming; just suppose it! In case something or somebody should pay us a visit we don't want, why not be on the safe side and let the cops know?' Am I making myself clear this time, Captain Ash-croft?"

  "Can't complain about the clearness, ma'am; not a bit! It's just that . . ."

  "You don't believe me?" "I didn't say that either."

  "You yourself, Captain, won't hear a word about the scarecrow. But Rip Hillboro's no fool. With your permission, please, I should like to use an argument Rip used to Mr. Maynard. Supposing me to be an undeceived witness, which / know I am, can you really think the scarecrow and the prowler aren't in any way related? Isn't it far too much of a coincidence that the night the scarecrow was stolen was the night I saw somebody going in or out of the house?"

  "Now, now, ma'am!"

  "Yes?"

  "The argument works both ways, don't it?" asked Captain Ashcroft, grinding out his cigar in an ashtray. "Anyway, why so much hoo-ha? If your prowler wanted something in the house, why swipe the scarecrow? If he just wanted to swipe the scarecrow, why bother to go anywhere near the house?"