MRS2 Madame Storey

by Hulbert Footner

  I found Mrs. Cruger in her dressing-room, a fairy-like pink bower. She was seated at her dressing-table, having her fine, blonde hair brushed, while she stared into the mirror with a face that had a silvery look in its pallor. She was alone but for Agnes. Seeing me, she sent the maid into the next room. I delivered her the handkerchief, together with my message. She nodded, and, dropping the handkerchief in a jewel case, let the top fall.

  "It will be quite safe," she murmured.

  When I got back to the office Mme. Storey was deep in her conversation with Crider over the 'phone. She had not much more than concluded it when there came a tap on the door, and Miss de Guion entered. The old lady was dressed just as we had last seen her, in the shimmering and artfully draped gown that made her look almost slender. Her back was stiff and her head up; she had the look of one who had conquered human weakness.

  "I thought perhaps I could be of some assistance to you after the others were out of the way," she said simply.

  "I'm so glad you came!" rejoined Mme. Storey quickly (and quite truthfully). "You can help me."

  "What is the real situation?" asked Miss de Guion anxiously.

  Mme. Storey made a gesture of helplessness. "I wish I knew! I suspect—but have no proof. I can go no further without the assistance of the chemists."

  "Whom do you suspect?" asked Miss de Guion.

  "Ah, you know!"

  The old lady nodded.

  "What I want you to do," Mme. Storey went on, "is to keep this dreadful handkerchief until tomorrow. I do not know what efforts may be made to recover it. I have no place to put it. There is a safe here, but Glasgow has the combination, and even Glasgow has his price, of course. Any drawer I might choose to lock it in may have a duplicate key. But the guilty person would never guess I had put it in your keeping."

  Mme. Storey produced another handkerchief from the drawer, and offered it.

  "I will keep it gladly," said Miss de Guion, tucking it inside her dress.

  After some further conversation about the case, which seemed to have great significance, but had none (so I omit it), Miss de Guion went back upstairs.

  Having given her time to get out of the way, Mme. Storey said: "Bella, I fancy there must be a telephone in Vera McPeake's boudoir. Ask Glasgow to connect me with her."

  It was so, and in a few minutes Vera appeared in the office wearing an all-enveloping white robe of exquisite fleecy Angora, and a remarkable lace cap. Her fine trappings only made the pinched and spiteful face look more common.

  She came in with a defiant air. "What have you got to say to me?" she demanded.

  "Hardly necessary for me to say anything," replied Mme. Storey blandly. "You and I understand each other. I could not let it appear before the others, of course."

  "I thought you were against me, too," muttered the girl.

  "By no means!" said Mme. Storey quickly. "And the best proof of that is, that I'm going to ask you to keep the most important bit of evidence I have. No place in this house would be safe for me. I have no assurance that the murderer would not kill me to get it back again. But it would never be supposed that I had given it to you to keep. Will you do that for me?"

  Mme. Storey offered her the last handkerchief out of the drawer.

  The girl put forth a slow hand for it. She was deeply suspicious. With her sharp black eyes she was endeavouring to bore through Mme. Storey. "Oh, I'll keep it safe," she said with a sneer. "Is that all?"

  "That is all," said Mme. Storey pleasantly. "And thank you."

  Vera turned and left the room without another word. I began to see Mme. Storey's purpose, and commended it.

  "Now to bed, Bella," said my mistress. "We have a day before us!"

  XII

  At ten o'clock the next morning Mme. Storey and I were waiting in the little office for the others to gather. That astonishing woman, my mistress, was reading her mail (which had been sent up from town) with perfect coolness, concentrating on each letter in turn, and issuing her instructions concerning it. I remember how I resented her self-command, for my nerves were in strings. I had slept very little. My hand trembled so that I could scarcely make legible notes. These scenes are more than I care for.

  An hour earlier Crider had reported that nobody in the house had made any attempt to get away during the night. Crider had received certain other instructions in private, and had driven into White Plains. We were momentarily expecting him back.

  Every member of the little house party had breakfasted upstairs, and we had not yet seen anybody. All the usual routine of the great household had proceeded in as quiet and orderly a fashion as if no suggestion of tragedy had ever approached those gorgeous, still rooms. I remember it was a lovely day out of doors. The sunlight was washing the leaves of Cariswoode with liquid gold, and the branches were full of singing birds. How I longed that I might be able to give myself up to it!

  The four persons came in practically together. Mrs. Cruger and Miss de Guion side by side, followed by Vera McPeake, and a moment afterwards, Rowcliffe, giving Vera a wide berth. Four of the plain chairs the room contained had already been placed for them in a line facing Mme. Storey at the desk. I was sitting at the end of the desk on her left, resting my note-book upon it. There was a moment's confusion as they seated themselves, owing to Vera's silent refusal to sit next either Rowcliffe or Miss de Guion. They finally arranged themselves with Vera nearest the windows, then Mrs. Cruger, Miss de Guion and Rowcliffe in that order. Nobody had said a single word.

  Mme. Storey seemed scarcely to glance at the four. I studied their faces covertly. Nothing conclusive was to be read there. All were agitated according to their several natures; all silenced by agitation; but there was no guilty quality to be perceived any more in one face than in another. It was significant though, that while the three women were breathlessly watching Mme. Storey, Rowcliffe was watching them, just as I was.

  "First of all, the handkerchief if you please," said Mme. Storey quietly.

  All four made a simultaneous move to produce it, and each, seeing what the others were about, stared in confusion and anger. When all four handkerchiefs were visible: "A trick!" each one murmured in various tones of anger and fright.

  "Yes, a trick," said Mme. Storey coolly. "But one that only a guilty person need fear."

  Such was their agitation, one would have said at the moment that all four were equally guilty.

  Mme. Storey was unconcerned. "Bella, please take the handkerchiefs one at a time," she said. "Mark each in pencil with the initials of the person from whom you receive it."

  I obeyed; putting each handkerchief on the desk and writing the initials: V.M., B.C., T.deG. and J.R. All four were placed in a pile under a paper-weight for the time being.

  "As you have guessed, none of you had the original handkerchief," Mme. Storey continued. "That has not left my possession; I have it here." She produced it.

  "I have taken every precaution that it may be identified," she said. "Before handling the others I added two dots in the corner; Miss Brickley and Mr. Crider looking on while I did so. You can therefore be sure that the handkerchief I hold in my hand is the same one that Mr. Rowcliffe took from the hand of the dead girl upstairs."

  Again one seemed to feel the shudder in the air.

  "Bella," said Mme. Storey. "See if Crider has returned."

  I went to the door. Crider was waiting in the hall. At a sign from me he came in, holding a small object hidden mysteriously under his coat.

  "Sit down by the door for a moment," said Mme. Storey. To the others she resumed: "First I want to establish if possible that this handkerchief was really responsible for Miss Mayfield's death; and if so, how. I have not yet had an opportunity to obtain scientific aid; but I have a theory of my own; and I will now undertake a simple experiment to prove whether or not it is the correct one."

  Rowcliffe looked at her now. All four white faces remained turned towards her without stirring. Only the eyes seemed alive.

  "The p
erson who sent this handkerchief to the girl," Mme. Storey went on, "was perfectly familiar with the doings and the plans of this household. He or she must have known that if it was mailed in White Plains in mid-afternoon it would be delivered here at half past six, or shortly after you had all left for the dinner and dance. I assume that the sender also knew the girl was going out soon after, and that the delivery of the packet would find her dressing in her room. And so it happened.

  "From that moment, of course, we can only proceed upon surmise. Miss Mayfield opened the envelope, and was astonished and charmed by the contents. What girl would not have been? She did not know who sent it to her, but I do not suppose she was much put about by that, for every pretty girl receives anonymous gifts. No doubt she had her own idea as to who had sent it.

  "After examining it, I think she dropped it on her table while she finished dressing. The handkerchief would furnish just the touch she needed to complete her costume. Being all ready, she would pick it up again, and moisten it with perfume. She was fond of fine scent, but it is a significant circumstance that she used it in the form of a toilet water rather than an extract. The reason is a simple one; the toilet water is much less expensive than the extract. But you have to use more. I have the bottle here that I took from her dressing-table; a violet toilet water of one of the best makers. This bottle was evidently left uncorked all night. Someone who entered the room after the body was discovered, replaced the stopper.

  "After she moistened the handkerchief—liberally," Mme. Storey continued gravely, "what would be her next act? The natural, the inevitable thing since she loved the scent, would be to apply it to her nostrils and breathe of it deeply. That, if I am correct, was the last act of her life—Crider, please—"

  Crider came to the side of the desk opposite to me. He produced from under his coat—a guinea-pig!

  "A guinea-pig," said Mme. Storey, "because the physical reactions of this little animal most closely resemble those of the human organism."

  There was a brief-case lying on the desk. A messenger had brought up the letters in it. Mme. Storey threw back the cover, and let it remain so. She then uncorked the bottle of toilet water, and pouring a few drops on the handkerchief, clapped the wet spot over the guinea-pig's nostrils. There was a convulsive movement under Crider's hand. Mme. Storey quickly dropped the handkerchief into the brief-case, and threw the cover shut. Crider removed his hand, the little animal lay dead on the desk.

  With the briefest of pauses Mme. Storey went on: "As to these other handkerchiefs: Bella, spread them out on the desk with the initials turned down—now examine them carefully, you and Crider, and tell me if any one of them is changed, since they left our hands last night."

  I obeyed her automatically. Crider came around to my side, and we examined the handkerchiefs together. Whereas all four had been exactly alike the night before, one was now unmistakably different from the others. I looked at Crider and he confirmed it with a nod.

  "This one has been washed," I said.

  "Read the initials," commanded Mme. Storey.

  I tried to, but my tongue would not form the sounds. It was Crider who said:

  "T.deG."

  Miss de Guion pitched forward out of her chair, and crashed to the floor. A scene of indescribable confusion took place. Vera McPeake shrieked; Rowcliffe sprang up, knocking over his chair, and clapping his hands to his head ejaculated hoarsely over and over: "My God! My God! My God!" Mrs. Cruger's head fell backward, and the last vestiges of life seemed to leave her inert frame. As for me, I dropped into my chair like one paralysed.

  What happened immediately after this is vague to me. I remember Mme. Storey and Crider hastening to raise Miss de Guion up. Crider must have summoned Glasgow, for I saw the two men carrying the heavy body from the room. What became of Vera and Rowcliffe I do not know. When clear recollection returned, Mrs. Cruger was alone in the room with us. She had covered her face with her hands, and was weakly weeping.

  "You suspected this from the first?" said Mme. Storey.

  Mrs. Cruger nodded without taking down her hands.

  "Explain to me—when you are able."

  The other began to speak brokenly: "It was my fault—in a way. But I couldn't foresee this. It began months ago. Teresa irritated me more and more with her masterful ways. And the entertainments she arranged didn't represent me. She was growing old—old-fashioned—made a fool of me. And she presumed to dictate whom I might and might not have for friends! Then I saw Louise; so young, so intelligent; she understood. And in a moment of exasperation with Teresa, I wrote to Louise suggesting that she, well, act for me direct. You understand. Louise never got that letter. I found it out from her indirectly. I never told her I had written to her. I knew it had fallen into Teresa's hands—I just drifted—I never dreamed of any outcome like this—"

  "Why didn't you tell me this at first?" asked Mme. Storey.

  "How could I? It was just a suspicion—it was too dreadful. Teresa is so old. I wanted it hushed up!"

  That was all. She made her way out of the room unaided. Crider came back.

  "Telephone to the police," Mme. Storey said to him, gravely.

  POSTSCRIPT

  The saddest feature of the case did not take place until the first reports were published in the newspapers. Then, in the frantic young man who rushed to Cariswoode, was discovered the real lover of Louise Mayfield, a splendid young fellow, Ralph Penry. It was with him that Louise had had an engagement to dine in a hotel in White Plains the night she died. They were engaged to be married, but had felt it necessary to conceal the fact, owing to the jealous, imperious nature of Louise's employer. The young man's grief was heart-breaking to witness.

  An unexpected outcome was that Penry and Rowcliffe became friends, drawn together by their common loss. Indeed Rowcliffe's regeneration was a bit of good that came of the miserable affair. He went to work, and has made good, I hear. Vera McPeake subsequently found another impecunious young blue blood and married him.

  The trial of Teresa de Guion revealed a subtlety, a determination, a patience in that strange woman sufficient to have accomplished wonders if turned to better purpose. Her boldness was evidenced by the fact that it was she who had insisted on the investigation. She was wise enough to realise that it must be gone through with, once the story was started. She was really a mediæval character, completely out of place in the twentieth century.

  It was shown that among her thousands of acquaintances was a famous chemist, engaged upon research work in connexion with poison gases. There is no need to bring up his name again. As soon as she resolved upon a poison, Miss de Guion unostentatiously began to cultivate this man, and, little by little by the exercise of her charm and cleverness, drew his secrets from him, without his ever suspecting that he was being used. When he had told her what she wanted to know, she set up a little laboratory in a room she hired secretly for the purpose; and here she conducted experiments at no little risk to herself, until she had produced what she required.

  When she went up to Cariswoode she had the poison with her in the form of a powder contained in a bottle. Chance threw the lace handkerchief in her way. She dissolved the powder in water, and impregnated the handkerchief. The poison was inactive in water, and the handkerchief was harmless wet or dry, until a touch of alcohol released its deadly fumes. The chances were a hundred to one that the girl's death would be ascribed to natural causes, but as it happened, the hundredth chance prevailed.

  She was found guilty, but in view of her age and broken physical condition (she went all to pieces before the trial) her sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. She died in prison.

  PART THREE—THE SMOKE BANDIT

  When I announced my intention of writing up the smoke-bandit case, Mme. Storey scoffed at me. "Why, everybody seventeen years old and more," she said, "that is, everybody who was old enough to read the papers six years ago, knows all about it."

  "So much the better," said I; "people like to read what they
know about. Moreover, there was so much misrepresentation and concealment in the published accounts that I can tell them a few things they don't know. Take your part in the final clearing up of the case; for perfectly unnecessary reasons of delicacy you refused to let that be divulged. I think it ought to be known."

  She shrugged, and let me have my way.

  I

  The premises of the National Forrest Bank were built during that period of magnificence when the great banks still arrogated the choicest sites in town to their own use, without feeling the necessity of building a sky-scraper overhead to help pay the interest. The little building making a hole in the solid ranks of the sky-scrapers is extremely effective. Here is a case where smallness is impressive. A little building only in a comparative sense, for, inside, the noble dome dwarfs the bank's customers to the proportions of insects. All around under the dome run the celebrated murals of Herbert B. Weatherbee, one of the sights of New York.

  On a Friday at eleven o'clock in the morning, when the bank was at its most crowded—for that is the hour when many of the large firms draw their payrolls,—suddenly, without warning, without any sound of an explosion, great clouds of yellow smoke billowed up from the bank's floor, and instantly filled the whole place with an impenetrable acrid fog. In silence, and with a terrifying swiftness, the fumes puffed up, wiping everything out with a single gesture as it were.

  The phenomenon was received in an appalled silence. Then the crowd rushed blindly in the direction of the doors. There was a whole row of doors, but the panic-stricken customers jammed there, and frantic cries of fright and pain arose. In a minute or two the smoke had dissipated itself under the spaces of the dome sufficiently for objects to become visible again, but the panic did not subside until every man had fought his way out of the building. Those who had been knocked down crawled out on all fours. By a miracle nobody was seriously injured. The astonished clerks of the bank for the most part never left their places.