Webb?—no.
Alice had every reason to hate Webb. If Webb had been in that room, if Webb had had anything to do with Mildred’s death (yet how could anyone have murdered her?), Alice would have told it at once.
Unless she were afraid of Webb.
Yet the only fear she could hold of Webb would have had to do with Jack’s murder and Alice could never again, in any circumstance, be charged with Jack’s murder.
Again, methodically, Myra went over the whole circle of conjecture, and again reached the only conclusion—none of her surmises had even attempted to explain away the sheer, bald facts of Mildred’s death. And all those simple clear facts still stood out in bold black letters on the safe side of the ledger and could not be erased.
For an instant, with a surrendering flare, the other side suggested some sort of chicanery (unknown by Alice, or its perpetrator protected by Alice) some sleight-of-hand trickery which had tricked and fooled Mildred—but it was a dim sort of suggestion, obviously blocked by facts. It had to be dismissed. It belonged to a realm of quicksand fancy, where there was no stratum of rock anywhere for a foothold.
With a feeling that a long time had elapsed, she looked at the clock and discovered that her whole expedition into the tortuous maze of speculation had taken exactly five minutes. It seemed much longer and she wished that Richard would return.
And her gaze went to the cupid. Nothing in all her journey through the dark and twisting jungle which included murder, had explained the gun or the cupid.
Yet neither the gun, nor the cupid, could have validity. And the warning of murder (Murder here, murder there: Look for me, I am near; I am within touch of your hand!)—all that was her own fancy, the trickery of her own nerves.
Someone knocked lightly at the French door.
Myra got to her feet. She backed around behind the chair. The terror her own thoughts had conjured up caught her so she could not speak. The knock was not repeated. The red curtains quivered and moved as the door opened. Webb Manders said, “Don’t scream …” and came in.
She couldn’t have screamed. He shut the door. His hat and coat were dripping. He said again, quickly, “Don’t scream. I am not going to hurt you.”
He did not take off his hat. Its wet sodden brim shaded his pale face. He shoved his hands in his pockets and eyed her for a moment from the shadow and, as she made some move toward the door, he said quickly again, “Stay there. I tell you I’m not going to hurt you.”
Miraculously, still in the grip of her self-induced terror, she achieved uneven, rapid words: “They’ve been trying to reach you by phone. Mildred Wilkinson confessed to having murdered your brother. She took poison and died. The police were here. They’ve gone now. …”
He did not move. His tall figure, his half-shadowed face, even his eyes did not seem to change, and all at once some quality in that changelessness seemed wrong. It was too still, too unmoved.
She cried with swift and utter conviction, “You already knew!”
He said coolly, “I was out walking along the road. I saw the police cars and followed them here.”
“Where have you been … ?”
“I did not know what had happened. I didn’t wish to be questioned. I thought it wiser to”—he shrugged—“to keep out of sight until they had gone.”
So Webb had been there’ all the time—hiding in the shadows of the hedges? Skulking behind the glossy, concealing banks of laurels? Watching? Waiting? For what?
He said coolly again, “Don’t look at me like that. I didn’t kill her! She committed suicide.”
“You knew that, too.”
“The terrace window was open. And then I saw them take her away.” He waited an instant and said, “She did commit suicide, didn’t she?”
“Y-yes.” Yes, certainly. But all those dim and vague and stubbornly persistent intimations of disaster, intimations of murder, came flooding back upon her. He said, “How?”
“She took poison.”
“I mean, how did she confess?”
“She wrote a letter. The police have it.”
“A letter saying she had killed my brother?”
“Yes.”
“Why did she kill him?”
“She said he was tired of her. She had been in love with him. …”
Again for a long moment Webb Manders stood, immovable in his long, black mackintosh, which glittered with rain, watching her with that cold, half-hidden look. Finally he said, “Why do the police want me?”
“To tell you what had happened. And to ask you what you knew of it.”
“Of Mildred’s affair with Jack?” He seemed to consider for a moment and then said, almost casually, as if it had no importance just then, “I expect it was true enough. She had a lot of money. Jack was younger than I, ten years younger. He had his faults, but he kept his affairs to himself. Of course old Wilkinson wouldn’t have wanted Mildred to marry Jack. He’d have stopped any plan of theirs to marry if he had known about it. Probably Jack and Mildred both preferred to keep it a secret. And then—well, I don’t blame Jack if he decided that the money was all right, but he didn’t want Mildred. You can’t blame a man for changing his mind. I expect she killed him, all right. Probably he was the only man that ever had been interested in her and she was sore as hell. She was spoiled, too, with all that money. It’s a case of a ‘woman scorned,’ ” said Webb, and gave a dry whisper of a laugh.
“You didn’t see her!” cried Myra with a sharp stab of remembered pity. “Poor Mildred …”
“Poor Mildred!” The derisive, half-smile on his mouth changed to something like a snarl. “She shot my brother.”
How ready he was to accuse, thought Myra irresistibly. Too ready … He had accused Alice, and now Mildred.
In this case he was right. Yet she said angrily, all her vague dislike of the man suddenly crystallized, “You accused Alice, too.”
He was still very cool, casual, as if it was an idle conversation, none of it with significance. Actually it was as if some deep preoccupation held him so engrossed that he gave the things they were saying only a fraction of his attention. “Of course I accused Alice. I thought she shot him. I thought there was some sort of affair between Alice and Jack. That’s why I came here that night. I’d got home and Jack was gone and I came straight over here. I knew he’d been seeing a lot of her and if there was anything of the sort, I intended to find out and put a stop to it. She’d never have left Dick and his money for Jack. It only meant trouble for everybody. Jack was nobody’s saint but he met his match in Alice. At least that’s what I thought then. I never thought of Mildred.” He spoke abstractedly, looking all around the room. His cold, seeking eyes found the cupid, fixed themselves upon it for an instant and went on. He said, “The case is closed then?”
“Sam thinks so. The district attorney is on his way. He’s driving.”
His eyes jerked back to her. “The district attorney! Oh. Well. I just thought I’d ask you what, exactly, had happened. …”
A sudden, rather queer question came out of his words. She glanced at the curtain, drawn securely over the French window. He could not have seen her, sitting there by the fire, engaged in her own private struggle with fear. She said, “How did you know that I was here?”
“How …” He too glanced at the curtain. And then again, suddenly and mirthlessly grinned. “Oh, I took a chance.”
She said slowly, “You were on the terrace. You were watching. You saw me in the room where Mildred died. …”
“Yes,” said Webb. “I saw you searching the room.”
And all at once, imperceptibly yet certainly, his abstraction, his air of impersonal, almost uninterested conversation was gone. She knew it. And she knew that now, in the lifting of an eyelid, he had come to the heart of his intention.
She waited, her heart suddenly hammering in her ears. He moved toward the door, the mackintosh rattling and catching glittering highlights. He put his hand on the latch.
Surely he
would hear the pounding of her heart; surely he would sense her waiting, as an animal senses a trap.
He didn’t. At the door he turned and said the thing she knew he had come to say. “What about the gun?”
The gun. The center of his purpose in coming into the house. The core of his indirect questioning. He had been, she saw suddenly, trying to pump her for knowledge—not of Mildred’s suicide, not of the investigation, not of anything but the gun.
She said quickly, half-whispering, “What do you know of the gun?”
And he knew something; knowledge was in the surprised, deep flash in his eyes. It was in the air between them. Then he opened the door, and wind and rain swept in. He said, “I don’t know anything about the gun,” and left. One instant his tall figure in the glittering, wet, black mackintosh was there, the next instant it had gone and the door closed.
The rain muffled any sound of his departing footsteps.
Again the tick of the clock seemed to grow louder.
Mildred’s death automatically cleared Tim and Richard—and Webb. There was no question of that.
And if Webb had actually and secretly had some quarrel with Jack, if he had shot Jack and then accused Alice to clear himself—then he might have repeated a once-successful pattern, choosing Mildred this time instead of Alice for a scapegoat.
Except, this time, there was no chance of its going wrong. This time the victim could not return, exonerated and free.
Again the see-saw of fact and conjecture caught her. Mildred’s death could not be murder. But Webb’s whole intention had been to find out, from her, whether or not they were searching for the gun. And he had known something about it.
The danger that had focused like a sinister light upon the gun suddenly returned. It was so clear and strong that she was astounded at what amounted to her own disregard of that latent yet inextinguishable danger. It seemed now a fantastic negligence, an incredible procrastination.
Where was Richard?
Rain droned upon the terrace again like muffled footsteps. Then she realized that there actually were footsteps, but they were definite, nearer. Someone was coming along the hall, from the far end of it. It was Richard, she thought, and went to the door quickly. It was, instead, Tim, in pajamas, with a blue blanket flapping dismally over his shoulders. He saw her and, looking surprised, quickened his steps. “Hello,” he said. “You still up? I couldn’t sleep, either! Hell’s bells, how could anybody?”
“I didn’t hear you come down!” Had he heard her talk with Webb?
He hadn’t. “Oh, I came down the back stairs,” he said cheerfully. “Nearer my room.”
“Where is—have you seen Richard?”
He was reaching for a cigarette in the box on the table beside her. He shot a quick look at her. “No,” he said rather shortly. “Are you waiting for him?”
She nodded and Tim lighted the cigarette, and went to lean against the mantel. His hair was wispy and disheveled; he smoothed it absently and said, “Listen, Sis, I want to say something. About …” he hesitated. “Well, it’s about Dick. And—and you. You see, I don’t want you to be hurt. And I don’t want—well,” he swallowed, “Richard or—or Alice to be hurt.”
He waited a moment, his eyes were worried, his face uneasy. Suddenly he came to her and put his hand on her shoulder. She said, “Is it that easy to see?”
“No. I don’t think so. Not to other people. But you’re my sister.”
She put her cheek over against his hand. “I love him, Tim.”
“Yes.” He cleared his throat. “Yes, I know. But it’s no good, honey.”
“He loves me.”
There was a long pause. Then, in one of the quick and astonishing—and somehow sad—moments of wisdom and adulthood that were so far beyond his rightful years, Tim said, “Yes. That’s what he thinks. Or, rather, it’s what he thought before Alice came home.”
Fight for him, Aunt Cornelia had said. “How can I give him up, Tim?” cried Myra suddenly, despairing, wanting him, too, to say fight Alice.
But Tim did not speak for a long moment. Then he said, his voice very gentle, “Alice loves him and—well, she’s his wife. I’ll never forget how good she was to me, a callow, half-baked kid. She never forgot anything—Christmases, Easter, birthdays. She always had time for me. She never minded it when I showed pretty plainly how crazy I was about her. She’d laugh a little and—and I always knew she was like a—well, a sort of saint. That was when I was just a kid, you see. But I thought of her that way all through the war. I knew she couldn’t have shot Manders. If she did it was all right but I knew she hadn’t. And I used to—well, sort of see her—you know. We’d be coming back from a mission and I’d be cramped and damned cold and nervy. And I used to pretend that she’d be there, when I got back. Maybe it sounds silly. But sometimes I could almost see her face and that sort of childish, innocent look in her eyes.” He stopped and said abruptly, “I sound like a fool. I guess I was. But …” Again for an instant the premature age touched him, and he said slowly, “It’s not so bad for a fellow to have something like that to hold on to. In war …”
His mood had changed. He patted her shoulder briskly. “Well, I’ve spilled all over. But I wanted you to know that I’m with you—understand? I mean, well, hell, Myra, you’re young and pretty and you’ll meet some other guy. You’re licked here, honey. Come on and live with me.”
A million years ago—that afternoon, about twelve hours ago in fact—she had thought of that.
“Yes. Yes, I’d like to, Tim.”
He had expected her to oppose it. His face cleared instantly. “Good girl,” he said. “You’ve got sense.”
He smoked thoughtfully for a moment and said, “Now the case is closed I keep thinking about it. All sorts of things.”
“Such as what?”
“Well, for one thing—you’re going to think I’m out of my mind—I always thought that Sam knew something about that gun.”
She sat upright. “Sam!”
“As a matter of fact, there was even a time when I thought Sam had killed Jack.”
“Why?”
His look was quickly disapproving. “Now don’t get all worked up. I shouldn’t have told you.”
“But Tim …”
He said hastily, “I’m going back to bed.”
“Why did you say that Sam … ?”
“Don’t get any ideas. Sam didn’t kill anybody. Mildred did it. I only thought of Sam because—well, for one thing he got here so fast that night. He was staying at the club and somebody phoned and didn’t talk to Sam but left a message for him. I guess he must have got it right away and driven over here like a bat out of hell. He would, of course. But he got here so darned quick! And also because he thinks a lot of Alice. I mean, well, Sam would do anything for Alice. But he didn’t. I was half out of my mind then. I suspected everybody. It makes no sense now, and never did! Forget it. Go to bed. Tomorrow’s another day.” He glanced around. And saw the cupid. “What’s that?”
“It’s—Alice’s cupid. Someone broke it.”
“Gee,” said Tim calmly, “too bad!”
This thing at least she could speak aloud. She said, “Tim, I’m frightened.”
“Huh!” He gave her a sharp look. “What about?”
“I don’t know. There’s something—in the room. In the house …”
“What on earth do you mean? There’s nothing in the room to be afraid of!”
It was like trying to convince him of a ghost which only she could see. She said inadequately, “There’s the cupid. Alice loved the cupid. It is as if somebody who hated her did that!”
“Nobody hates Alice! You’ve got an attack of nerves. Forget it. That was an accident. Coming upstairs?”
How could she explain the inexplicable? “No. I’ll wait for Richard.”
He did not insist. He said briskly, “Well, I’m going back and get some sleep. See you later,” and went away, the blanket trailing behind him.
Ric
hard must return soon.
The gun—the cupid. Webb. After awhile she went slowly to the stairway again. She lifted the carved pineapple top. The space below was still empty. She had known it would be. Mildred could not have returned the gun.
And the gun was safe. It was a swift, unexpected thought, corning from nowhere. The gun was safe because it was not loaded.
She came back into the library.
Suppose Webb had the gun.
The silence in the room was again charged with knowledge. The memories within it seemed to stir, as if about to come to life again.
She would not wait for Richard, she decided swiftly.
But she lingered, nevertheless, staring at the shattered rosy pieces of the cupid, which could never come to life again.
She kneeled. She began to pick up the little pieces.
Alice said quietly behind her, “What have you done to my cupid?”
CHAPTER 19
MYRA TURNED SWIFTLY, ON her knees, a jagged piece of the cupid in her hand. Alice had changed to her soft, pink-satin negligee. Her golden hair was smooth and shining as a golden cap, but her face was very white with that stony, pulseless look of a small and perfect statue. She said, “You broke the cupid.”
“No.”
“You broke it because it was mine.”
A sharp impatience came to Myra’s aid. “I did nothing of the kind!”
“Then what are you doing?”
Myra glanced at the shattered little heap of porcelain, the bit of blue sash, the slivered, tiny pink fingers. She got to her feet. “I was picking up the pieces.”
“Why?”
“Oh, Alice, I know nothing about it or how it happened! This is absurd. …”
“Why are you picking up the pieces?” Alice’s soft lips were touched with a light rose lipstick. Her perfect, straight little nose and chin, the lovely curves of her cheekbones were so beautiful in their heart-stopping perfection that they might have been done in marble by an inspired sculptor.
“I don’t know why!” said Myra. “Somebody had to pick them up!”
Alice’s eyes were gentle as she said softly, “I expect you’ve got into a habit of seeing to things. Taking my place, giving orders, seeing to the servants and the flowers. But it is not your house yet, Myra.”
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