Murder On the Way!

by Theodore Roscoe

  “Dormie pa’foom! M’sieu Proudfootl” was Papa Leo’s benediction. Maître Tousellines crossed himself, and echoed the blessing. “Let the dead sleep sweetly — ”

  We got away from the hill just as the mules were hauling the six-ton angel into his sentry station atop the grave. The mourners scattered on separate paths; I don’t know how they reached the château. Picking our way through the dark, Pete and the old lawyer and I made the journey down the valley in dismal silence.

  It was two o’clock when I stood in that moldy upper room with Pete, and grabbed into my Gladstone for a quart of Scotch. “Sleep sweetly,” I had to comment. “Well, I must say your uncle fixed it so he’d be the only one after his funeral who could. Do you want yours straight or without ginger ale? I’m sitting up all night. Tomorrow we clear out of here.”

  Pete frowned. “Maybe it hasn’t occurred to you, Cart, — ”

  “What?”

  “I — I spent all my money coming down here. There wasn’t any return fare. And you heard uncle’s will. No chance — not that I’d want any part of it — of my inheriting the estate, but it looks as if I might have to stay the twenty-four hours anyway, and — Cart, where’s the painting? I must have left it with my things down in the hall. If anything happens to your canvas — ”

  She was gone before I could swallow; the door blowing shut behind her. I listened to her quick steps down the stairs; capped the bottle and tossed it aside; ran to the door. Dampness had warped the sills, and I had a moment’s tussle with the knob.

  Bam! Wham! In the night somewhere there were two jarring reports. I whirled, sped across the room, kicked open the blinds, stepped out on the upper verandah.

  And that was the third picture I was to remember of that night. The lawn below, eerie with moonlight. A man in a white linen suit reeling drunkenly across the turf, crossing the gravel drive, wavering to pat the iron coach dog, then turning half-buckled to fall face up on the grass. He drew up one knee, then lay still. It was Dr. Sevestre.

  And a man I had never seen before crashed out of the verandah below; raced headlong across the terrace. He was a brown man in a brown uniform, all buckles and Sam Browne belt. “I saw it,” he bawled in English. “I saw it, in the name of the Law. This is murder, and no man may leave the premises!” He waved a bright sabre and his cheeks pouted on a whistle. Boots ran on the gravel. Presto! the lawn was crowded with uniformed men.

  IV.

  Please Stand By!

  When I ducked back into the bedroom Pete was wide-eyed in the doorway, the rolled canvas under her arm, my case of oils in her hand. I wouldn’t have bothered with that painting, right then, if El Greco had painted it. Whistles were criss-crossing in the night, and boots seemed to be racing all over the château. Down the compound the drum family stubbornly continued its bolero, while a dead man watered the lawn under my window with mulatto blood.

  I pulled a determined face, simulating some calm. “Right here,” I told Pete, “is where we say good-by to Haiti.”

  “What’s happened? It sounded like shots!”

  “Somebody just got Dr. Sevestre.”

  “Got Dr. Sevestre?” Her lips trembled. “You seem terribly cold-blooded about it — ”

  My blood had cooled, all right. I grabbed up my Gladstone and hunted wildly for my hat. Pete dropped her bumdles on the bed, her eyes darkening excitedly.

  “Cart! Is he dead?”

  “I didn’t investigate. He’s lying on the terrace out there.”

  “This is awful! What are we going to do?”

  “Pack up and clear out fast,” I almost shouted, starting for the door. Then there was stamping in the outer hail, the door opened behind Pete, and a stalwart Negro in a brown canvas uniform, military broad-brim hat and leather gaiters was posed squarely in the frame. “Ou là! Allons!” He shifted a heavy army rifle menacingly, with a snap, and his eyes meant business. “You and ma’mselle come quick.”

  “Who says so?” I tried to make it tough.

  “Garde d’Haiti. You come with police. Allons donc!”

  I looked at the rifle and dropped my bag. Pete clung to my arm, and I walked out on the gallery, clumped down the mahogany staircase to the lower hall. A squad of black gendarmes were crowding the front door, cackling, tramping. Fantastic they might be in their deductions, but I could not help but respect the dispatch with which these black police had arrived on the spot. Their trim, biscuit-colored uniforms, broad-brims, leather leggings, gave them the aspect of Negro soldiers modeled from U.S. Marines. There was nothing at all comic about this dark-skinned constabulary, just then. Hip, hip, hip! They drilled down the hall. It was no fooling, and I was ready to clout somebody.

  That Pete and I were in this devil’s mess was more or less at my instigation. A midnight funeral as grim as Eli’s, followed by a homicide, was completely overdoing the thing.

  So was the scene prepared for us in the library. The funeral parlor had become an impromptu morgue. Dr. Sevestre was stretched on a wooden fireplace bench, his face covered by his linen coat. Cocoa-colored gendarmes were fetching the various members of Uncle Eli’s funeral party from different quarters of the house; and no mourner, it eventuated, had taken leave. The wake was reestablished.

  Toadstool and the Widow Gladys, routed from rooms somewhere in back.

  Ambrose brought out of the billiard room.

  The En-sign strolling in between two Gardes, his pipe fuming in a cheerful smile.

  Manfred flushed from a door down the hall with a Hasco bottle in his fist and his boots unsteady.

  Ti Pedro making dumb noises in his mouth and fingering the egg under his neck.

  Sir Duffin Wilburforce arriving indignant in a moth-holed undershirt with a bib tied under his chin, a shaving brush in his hand, one side of his jaw bearded with foamy lather.

  Marched into the library, they were ordered in line against the book shelves by a tall lamp-black darkey corporal whose voice goose-honked through a harelip, it occurred to me that those seven mourners made as evil a string of fish as any drag-net could hope to catch.

  As Pete and I were ranged into this scene, the Sam Browne officer with the cavalry sabre, that one I’d seen dart across the lawn, was gesticulating rapid French at Maître Tousellines.

  “I want everybody, you comprehend? Every last one. All of them!” He pantomimed a ripost with the sabre to indicate Pete and me. “Sacré farceur! who are these?”

  Maître Tousellines, greenish at the temples, introduced us, in turn presenting the officer. “This is Lieutenant Nemo Narcisse of the Garde d’Haiti, whom you would perhaps call Inspector-Chief in this arrondissement, this district.”

  Lieutenant Nemo Narcisse of the Garde d’Haiti, whom I would perhaps call Inspector-Chief in this district, glared at me and I glared at him. I don’t know what he saw in me, but I saw a pompous, short-legged man compounded of French and African blood, his skin the color of an Alexander [cocktail], a plump, important face set with quick black eyes, pomaded curls, a handkerchief up his cuff, his pouty bosom wearing more medals than the Emperor of Japan.

  He disliked me at once and with courtesy, making a very polite bow, showing very white teeth. I wondered if this were the policeman who had handed down the suicide verdict on Uncle Eli’s death with the reservation that he might have been killed by a zombie; and my heart sank for the third time. Politics in police departments are bad enough, but superstition could be worse. If the Law of Haiti believed in witchcraft, Justice might prove a ghostly affair.

  I started the old one about American citizens.

  The Garde officer was unimpressed. He thrust a hand in his bosom, Napoleon fashion, and nodded patronizly. “Ah, but I am the authority here, m’sieu. You and ma’mselle are in Haiti now, not so? And both, to speak it plainly, under suspicion of murder.”

  “Under suspicion of murder?” Pete gasped.

  Lieutenant Narcisse shrugged a shoulder at the body on the bench.

  “Miss Dale and I had nothing to do wit
h this!” I was outraged.

  “It is the Code Pénal,” he answered. “Unfortunately I am forced to hold that all suspects are guilty in this matter until proved innocent.”

  “You aren’t going to hold us anywhere. This lady is tired. It’s two o’clock in the morning.”

  He waved a hand to indicate that in Haiti there was always plenty of time, and his unguent air heated the skin under my collar. “I want to get in touch with the American consular service,” I commanded. “Right now.”

  “In due course, m’sieu. Meantime ma’mselle would like a chair?” He nodded at the leather-and-buttons armchair in which Uncle Eli had been found with a bullet in his cerebrum.

  “Thanks,” Pete declined. “I’ll stand.”

  “And now we’re all on deck,” the En-sign spoke out abruptly, “why not cut the comedy and tell us what it’s all about? I see somebody pinched out the saw-bones, but does it mean I gotta stay up all night? I ain’t cryin’, because I never liked Sevestre, myself.”

  “I will take that into account,” the officer noted softly, balancing himself on an arm of the leather chair and sending a cool glance up and down the line. “I will take into account that none of you liked Dr. Sevestre. His murder, I think, is not the only crime in this little household of Morne Noir. I am convinced, messieurs, that M’sieu Proudfoot himself was the victim of an assassin’s hand.”

  “What could that have to do with Mr. Cartershall or me?” Pete interrupted with spirit. “We weren’t in Haiti when that happened! If you will allow us to use the telephone — ”

  “Presently,” the lieutenant said and bowed. “May I remind ma’mselle — the innocent, do they have cause for alarm? But no. I shall also require their aid in this ugly affair. I came here tonight because I am most certain your uncle was the victim of murder. Was I so foolish as to believe M’sieu Proudfoot a suicide?” He bowed toward Tousellines. “Non! As for the zombie story, that was my own invention to place the real assassin off his guard. And now we know the good doctor has just been murdered, and 1 think he lies dead because he knew too much about M’sieu Proudfoot’s murder. The good doctor knew something. Now he is dead.”

  Sir Duffin Wilburforce spluttered. “Who did him up, then?”

  “That, blanc, is what I — Lieutenant Nemo Narcisse — am on hand to discover.” His glance ferreted at the Englishman. “Perhaps you were not aware that I, a police officer, was standing on the side verandah when those two shots were fired at the front of the house. My men were stationed across the compound. But then I was in that very hall tonight while the will was being read in this library. What is more, while the funeral party was at the burial on the hill, I was searching your rooms, here. It is possible I know more about you, my friends, than you would like to believe.”

  His speech sent a little flurry down the line-up; and I was beginning to think the Haitian police weren’t the comic opera their black faces might indicate. The lieutenant went on in his liquid, creole accent.

  “Accordingly, I was on that side verandah to see all of you return from the burial and enter the house. Ambrose, there, came first, then the others, followed last by m’sieu the American and the girl. Dr. Sevestre remained outside and walked alone. He passed me where I was concealed, then retraced his steps to the terrace in front, and just as he moved beyond my sight I heard the two shots. I did not see the gunfire” — Lieutenant Narcisse patted his curls with a dramatic gesture— ”but I know it came from inside the house. Voilà! A child’s problem! Some one of you fired those shots!”

  “That lets me out,” Ambrose stepped out of line to shrill. “I was in the billiard room practicin’ massé shots when I hear the gun let go. What you lookin’ at me for? Why’d I want to croak this medico, anyhow?”

  “Is it that he knew too much about the death of M’sieu Proudfoot, then?”

  “I’m telling you I was in the billiard room.”

  “And who was with you in the billiard room?”

  “Nobody. I was takin’ massé — say, what the hell are you — ” The boy started forward, his colorless eyelids fanning, his white head sunk turtle-neck in his jersey collar, face inflamed. “What the hell are you tryin’ to pin on me, Narcisse? I didn’t knock off the Doc. I ain’t got a rod and never carry one, see?”

  Lieutenant Narcisse blinked blandly, arranging his sabre across a plump knee. “Tell me how you were employed at Morne Noir? In what capacity did you serve M’sieu Proudfoot?”

  “Pilot,” the youth sniveled. “Run his launch over at Mole St. Nick. That’s where I was three days ago when I hear the boss has croaked and this Lemonade lawyer sends word I’m to be at the funeral, same as he sent word to the rest of these mugs. That’s why I’m here, and you ain’t got nothing on me.”

  “And you,” asked Lieutenant Narcisse, swerving on Sir Duffin, “you were overseer at Morne Noir, oui? Also it appears by the will that you are first in line to inherit the estate. Where were you a little while ago when the doctor was shot?”

  “My dear fella, where does it look as if I was?” The Briton ran a hand across his jaw, scooped a palmful of soap-froth, slung it at the floor. “Naturally, I was in my boudoir. Shaving. My ears being filled with lather at the time, don’t y’know, I failed to hear the shooting. Ergo, I cannot imagine its origin.” His triangular eyes watered with perplexity and amusement. “You notice, also, I am quite unarmed. At least, my only weapon at hand was a razor, and since the worthy healer’s throat was not cut — ”

  “I notice,” the officer interrupted, “only that your room is near the front door.”

  “But of course I was in the throes of a shave, what?”

  “It would appear you choose an odd hour of the night to make this toilet.”

  “The funeral of my revered benefactor and employer had fatigued me, Leftenant, and I wished to be refreshed after sorrow.”

  “Permit me likewise to refresh your memory,” said Lieutenant Narcissce, producing a notebook from a tunic pocket. “The day of your employer’s death I consulted by telephone the British agents at Port-au-Prince, asking information about you. I am advised you came to Haiti nine years ago from England. More explicitly, you came from that English prison, Dartmoor, where you had served a twenty-year sentence for murder.”

  There was a moment’s silence in the library; then Sir Duffin Wilburforce blew up. The man’s fury was extraordinary. His forehead bulged. His eyes dwindled. Shaving soap bubbled with apoplectic foam on his lips.

  “Well, what of it?” he screeched. “Suppose I was, you blasted mulatto fool! What would that prove?”

  “Only that murder is no stranger to you, mon vieux. Only that you possess already a criminal record. Only that you might have to provide for yourself a handy alibi to mask another design.”

  “That’s a lie!”

  “It will be a pity for you if it is not. However, you are not the sole criminal before me, non. This Ti Pedro. This tongueless scoundrel from San Domingo — ” Turning from the exploding Englishman, the Haitian officer poked his sabre at the Dominican. “You cannot speak, I am told, but you can hear. Hear, then, that I know you shot and killed a captain, a few years ago, in your Dominican army. Is it not so?”

  Ti Pedro’s eyes were expressionless as lumps of dried glue.

  “Is not your room next to this Englishman’s? Answer me!”

  The dumb one nodded sullenly.

  “Also you are second in line for this Morne Noir inheritance! Ha! You killed the doctor, I think. You sneaked down the hall, fired through those front doors, fled back to your room on those wonderful bare feet.”

  Ti Pedro shook his head.

  “You know the murderer, then?”

  Ti Pedro blinked his eyes.

  “Comedian!” the officer raged. “If you had the tongue in your mouth I would start you talking like a parrot, I promise you. I am not finished with you yet.” He made an angry flash with the sabre and twisted around at the Toadstool. “As for you, I am only beginning!”


  The bow-legged gorilla with the shoulders split his moose face in a pink grin and began to chat in creole at the officer. Promptly the Widow Gladys brought up a palm and calmly shut his mouth with a resonant slap. Her son’s skull smacked the bookcase, bringing down several dusty volumes, and the vast widow opened her milk chocolate lips to liberate a riotous guffaw. A laugh that started in the cellar and ran up a staircase toward the attic, stopping halfway in a gurgle, out of breath.

  “Quiet!” Lieutenant Narcisse bawled. “You will all answer in turn, speak English, and one at a time. Each will hear what the other has to report and if there are any lies I want to know of them.” He prodded the sabre-point in Toadstool’s black midriff. “Now then, ape! You were quartered with your mother (that crimninelle!) in her room at the back of the hall?”

  “Yessuh.”

  It was the first time I’d heard Toadstool’s speech in English, his mother having rigidly enforced the dictum about children being seen and not heard. Now his voice was thin and piping, pixie-queer, a violin string for a throat in that tuba of a body.

  “Speak up! Did you hear those shots that killed Dr. Sevestre?”

  “Mebbe yes, mebbe no. Toadstool hear rada drums. Okay?”

  “Son of a two-headed bat, did you or that fiend of a mother come up the hall and shoot this doctor?”

  Anticipating a slap, Toadstool ducked sidewise; then said no. Widow Gladys giggled through a triumphant smile. “Toadstool and him mamma, we stay close our room, yessuh!”

  “Listen to me, you fat crow. You and that rascally Caco boy of yours will be sorry if you try any tricks on Lieutenant Narcisse of the Garde d’Haiti. I am aware of how the British police in Jamaica had you exiled from their island for peddling drugs and bocor charms. Criminals, both of you!”