"Let's get back to business," Richard said urgently. "I think I'm beginning to see why you tried to pretend that we were secret lovers, Rhynda."
Her face colored darkly, and she sprang up from her chair and stood staring at him. He went on quietly, "You know all about these murders, don't you? You know who is responsible, and why. And you're frightened. You're trying to cover up by pretending that you're something more than an intimate friend of mine."
She cried desperately, "You're a hateful liar!" and flew out of the room.
Richard and I looked at each other. "Must have hit home," he said thoughtfully.
I nodded and looked up as Joe walked in.
"What's eatin' that Jane?" he asked irritably, jerking a thumb over his shoulder. "She comes steamin' up the hall, smacks into me, and then swears at me."
"What did she say?" I asked.
But Joe had something else on his mind. "I just checked on them black-headed pins," he said, "and there's another one missing from the old lady's collection."
CHAPTER 29
Richard stood up. "We'll go and look for it, here and now. You have all the others—all the exhibits?"
'Just looked 'em over," said Joe. "All O.K., includin' the ones in Skinny here's room."
Richard nodded. "All right. We'll find the one that's missing if we have to tear the place apart. We'll start upstairs—more likely to be up there, I think."
"Right," agreed Joe, and they made for the stairs, while I followed closely behind.
They paused in the upper hall, and I pulled up behind them.
"How shall we manage it," Richard asked, "without anyone knowing about it?" I pushed my head in between them. "You want to keep it a secret?"
"From everyone but you," Richard admitted. "We wouldn't attempt the impossible."
"Now wait," said Joe. "I got it. Seein' as we can't get rid of Nosey here, and seein' also as she searches like she was trained to it, and nobody knows it better than me, I'll take her into the bedrooms with me to hunt, and you stay outside and watch. If anyone comes along, you tell them to go on down to the parlor and wait, because I want to question them."
'You're the boss," Richard said aggrievedly, "but don't think you're pulling the wool over my eyes. And you shouldn't mix business with pleasure. If you want a chance to be alone with her—"
"Cut it out! "Joe exploded. "If I want to get fancy on the side, I can always do better than a bag of bones."
We started with Rosalie's room and went through it thoroughly, without result. From there, we went on to Rhynda's room, where we were occupied for a considerable time, and I could hear Richard moving about impatiently outside the door.
Amy's room came next, and it was there that I found the pin, stuck in a fold of the window curtain.
Joe had run a sharp eye over my dress before we started to make sure that the pin was not already sticking in it, and he had watched me like a hawk while I was searching to prevent what he called funny business. So when I pulled the pin from the curtain and called, "Here it is," he felt reasonably certain that I had not brought it along and put it there in the first place.
He was jubilant. "Jeep! I never woulda thought of the curtain. I knew what I was doin' when I brought you along to snoop."
Richard opened the door and came in. "Found it?"
Joe showed it to him. "I'm all set now—I'm gonna make an arrest."
"Have you all the proof you need?"
"Sure," said Joe confidently. "But I'll get a confession out of them."
"You mean there are two of them?" I asked, staring.
"Yep," said Joe briefly.
"I think we ought to question Berg first," Richard suggested. "We haven't asked him if he remembers anything of what happened to him last night. The doctor has just left him again, and he says we may question him, as he seems to be all right."
"O.K. No harm in that. Did you send anyone down to the parlor, to be questioned?"
"Rhynda, Amy and Donald," Richard said, and Joe nodded.
We went along to Berg's room, knocked at the door, and walked in. Rosalie and Mrs. Ballinger were there, and Mrs. Ballinger sprang up from her chair and came towards us excitedly.
"You can't come in here—you'll have to go out. Berg is in a serious condition, and I won't have him disturbed."
Richard said soothingly, "We don't want to disturb him, Mrs. Ballinger, but the doctor just told me that he was quite all right, and that we might question him."
Mrs. Ballinger's face became mottled with red, and her voice sprang from a higher note. "I don't care. This is my house, and I tell you you are not to bother him."
"It's all right, Aunt Mabel," Berg said from the bed. "I'm feeling quite well enough to talk."
He was wearing a gaily striped dressing gown and was sitting propped up with pillows and smoking a cigarette. His aunt fell back a few steps and looked at him uncertainly.
"I must tell them what I can," he said to her, gently, "and any delay makes it harder for them."
"Thanks, Berg," said Richard. "Begin at the beginning, will you?"
But Berg started off with a question. "Who found me?" he asked, looking around at us.
Joe and I spoke together. I said, "I did," and Joe said, "Nosey, of course, guaranteed to find anything."
Berg looked at me and said, "Thanks, Leigh. Seems that you saved my life. But how did you come to find me?"
"Now listen," Joe broke in, "we've heard her story plenty already, and we wanta hear yours."
Rosalie said, "Please, gentlemen, come to the point, and let's have it over with. My patient should be perfectly quiet."
I looked at her and realized that she was enjoying herself immensely. "Nothing like tending the sick for keeping some women amused," I thought pensively.
Berg laughed shortly. "Won't take me long to come to the point. Something woke me up last night, and I sat up on my elbow and distinctly heard someone going down the back stairs—the stairs, by the way, are right next to this room. I thought at first it was Joe or one of his henchmen, but then it struck me that whoever it was was being too quiet—there was too much —well—stealth. Joe and Company always clatter wherever they go, possibly because they buy their shoes at the same place." He paused and looked at Joe. "Cholmondedly's, in New York, is a good place for shoes, old man."
"If it's the same place," said Joe equably, "that you got them lavender underpants I seen you wearin', I ain't havin' any truck with it."
Berg grinned at him and went on. "I was uneasy about it, and at last I got up, put on my dressing gown, and went downstairs. I found my way to the kitchen, put on the light there, and walked through into the dining room."
"Did you open a drawer in the kitchen and get something out?" Joe interrupted.
"No," Berg said. "I went through the dining room and on into the drawing room, turning on and off the lights on my way. I got to the front hall and turned on the light there, then I went a little way down into the back hall, and the light went out. I turned around at once and tried to see through the darkness, but for a moment I was quite blind. I started to grope my way back but had not gone more than a step or two when I was hit, and I went down. I must have been right beside the gong, because after an interval I became vaguely conscious that I was lying under it. My head was hurting, and I felt it, and it seemed to be bleeding. I tried to call out, but I was weak and dizzy, and I could not seem to make a sound. Then I noticed the stick that hangs by the gong and found that I could reach it. I banged out all the tunes that came into my head, and suddenly I was hit again, and I went out like a light. I woke up in bed here."
Richard stirred and asked soberly, "Did you sit up to play the gong?"
"Good lord, no," Berg said. "Remember, I couldn't even call
out.
'Then how did you manage to play 'Swanee River'? If you were lying on the floor, you could not have reached more than two notes— I tried it."
CHAPTER 30
Berg took out a fresh cigarette, a
nd Rosalie bustled to light it. "That's funny, Dick," he said slowly. "Perhaps I have longer arms than you."
"Let's measure," Richard said promptly, but at that moment the door opened and Rhynda, Amy and Donald poured into the room. Amy demanded to know, in a loud voice, why they had been sent downstairs for questioning and then left to their own devices.
Joe drowned her out. "Sit down here, youse," he said belligerently. "Before anyone leaves this room there's going to be an arrest."
A general gasp went up, and he turned importantly to Rhynda.
"You," he barked. "There was a lot of time last night that you ain't accounted for. What were you doin'?"
"I was in the bathroom," Rhynda said coldly.
"For over half an hour?"
"Certainly—I was washing out some things. You know perfectly well that it's almost impossible to get in there in the daytime."
Joe looked a bit balked, and Richard broke in. "Berg," he said, "were you conscious when you were thrown out of the window?"
"I've told you that I wasn't."
Richard said oddly, "You haven't changed your mind on that point?"
Berg raised his eyebrows, and there was a moment of silence. When he spoke, I could have sworn that there was a faint regret in his voice. "No," he said, "I'll stick to my first story."
"Then why were you dropped out and then carefully moved from where you landed and laid across the path?"
"Was that done?" Berg asked politely.
"Yes. There were two distinct heelmarks, but no toemarks. Since you must have landed on your feet, you would certainly have fallen back towards the house, and since you were unconscious, you would have remained there. So you must have been moved."
"Strange," murmured Berg.
"Wait a minute! "Joe thundered, and everybody fell silent. Having got to the floor, he scratched his head in evident perplexity as to his next move. "Wait a minute," he repeated uncertainly, and after a moment's thought added, "Suppose you let me do the questioning."
"Pleasure," said Richard amiably.
"No use jumpin' around from one thing to another."
"Right," said Richard.
Joe turned back to his audience and fixed a gimlet eye on Amy.
"Now, then, you, Miss Perrin, what was the idea of throwin' them black-headed pins around? Tryin' to put the blame on Mrs. Ballinger?"
"Black-headed pins?" said Amy scornfully. "I never saw one in my life."
"Not one?" Rhynda murmured. "In all the hundreds of corsages you must have received?"
Amy flashed her a malevolent glance and said, "No. They usually send lavender-headed pins with orchids."
Rhynda laughed, and Joe shouted for silence. He produced the pin we had just found in the curtain and waved it under Amy's nose. "Have you ever seen this before?"
Amy drew back her head sharply. "Never," she said, "and I'll thank you to remove it from my face."
Joe swung around on Donald Tait. "You ever see this before?"
"Never met it," said Donald mildly. "Not even a nodding acquaintance."
"You're lyin',"Joe growled.
Amy burst into a flood of talk about how she was going to send for her lawyer, who would undoubtedly reduce Joe to a state where he would wish he had never been born.
Richard was talking to Berg again, quietly. " 'The Elms' is all right—also 'Far Point' or 'Windy Point'—but 'Harrington' shows a certain amount of conceit. If you must have a family name, why not 'Ballinger'? It's better-suited to the place—it's been owned by Ballingers for generations."
Berg laughed shortly. "I don't know what you're talking about, but I don't like your tone. I'm going to get my lawyer down—he can come with Amy's lawyer, and they'll be company for each other."
"I don't like to make a point of it," Richard said, "but you seem to have forgotten that I'm your lawyer. You engaged me last November and brought me along this time so that your lawyer would be handy in case of necessity."
"And instead of protecting me," Berg took him up bitterly, "you stand there asking me insulting questions."
"My father is very sticky about the sort of things we take on," Richard said.
Amy was still shouting, and I sidled closer to Richard so that I would not miss anything. Rhynda moved with me and stayed close beside me.
"The telephone was out on the dining-room table," Richard was saying, "with blood on it, for all to see as the weapon which was used on you, but the cut on your head, which was made with the kitchen knife, was dead straight, not curved at all. You know, the minute I saw that cut I knew it had not been made by the telephone. I wonder why it was not sufficient for you to have been hit only with the telephone?"
"I was cut with a knife?" Berg asked. "Evidently."
"Ghastly," Berg muttered.
"Well, no, not really. Neither the blow with the telephone, if there was such a blow, nor the cut was very bad."
"I lost a lot of blood, though," Berg said, almost resentfully. "The doctor said so."
"How do you know? Did you hear him say so?"
"No," said Berg. "Aunt Mabel told me."
"Oh. Well, the doctor was mistaken. There wasn't much blood— we looked everywhere for it. There was a bloodstained cloth, and about three extra drops. The cut was very superficial."
Berg sighed and murmured, "Lucky escape, wasn't it?"
"Escape?" Richard repeated and hoisted his eyebrows as high as they would go.
Berg moved restlessly and said after a moment, "You're—not going to tell Joe, are you, Dick?"
"I must. You know that."
"Honor of the Joneses," said Berg wryly. "I should have brought Sam Stephens instead of you. Only I didn't think the old lady would swallow him."
"Nor would she. Sam would never have done—he looks a proper thug."
"I know. That's why I decided on you. But you've done the complete boomerang on me."
Richard shrugged. "Joe would always have been here."
"Yes, and he probably would have hounded Amy to the hot seat, and a very good place for her, too."
I was suddenly conscious that Rhynda was gripping my arm with desperate fingers. I turned to look at her and saw that her head was bent and she was crying quietly.
Joe turned on us at this point and bellowed, "What are youse all talking about? Why can't I have silence while I investigate this thing?"
He was glaring at Richard, but his expression changed to one of blank astonishment as Richard said, "I'm sorry, Joe, but if you wouldn't mind holding up the investigation for a bit, I think Berg wants to confess."
CHAPTER 31
There was a dead silence, and then Mrs. Ballinger gave a little scream.
Berg looked around at us calmly. "No," he said. "Really, there's nothing."
"Wait a minute," Richard broke in. "If you don't want to tell it, suppose you let me? You can correct me when I go wrong."
Berg laughed. "You'll be wrong from start to finish."
"No, I don't think so," Richard said, and half turned to the others. They were nearly all gaping with open mouths, including even Joe. Richard put on a good imitation of a lawyer and cleared his throat.
"Berg came down here about a week before the houseparty and arranged that contraption in the attic. He tried it out and frightened Mrs. Ballinger and Leigh, and then he left. Leigh heard him go."
Berg said, "Where did I go? No trains at that hour."
"You came and went in a car which you had hired that day from the Hamden Auto Hire Company."
"All the details," said Berg, smiling. "Only it happens that I was out with Rhynda on that particular night."
Rhynda covered her face with her hands. "Oh," she groaned, "can't you leave me out of it?"
Richard turned to her. "Did you stay out late that night, Rhynda? Don't lie, because I know about it, anyway."
"No," she sobbed. "I was home by eight o'clock, because I knew John was coming back early."
Richard nodded. "Berg drove straight out here after he had left
you. He had a flashlight with him, and he'd planned the thing carefully in his mind."
"Wait a minute," Berg interrupted. "For God's sake, let me tell it. You're making a botch of it."
Richard agreed, and Berg settled himself more comfortably and smoothed back his hair.
"It all began when I fell in love with Rhynda."
Rhynda muttered, "Oh, Berg!" and moved closer to me. I put my arm around her.
"I wanted her," Berg continued, "but I knew that it wasn't possible unless I had a decent income and a nice place to live. Rhynda always liked nice things. I knew I couldn't earn an adequate income. Nobody seemed to want my services, and if they did put up with me, they never paid me anything.
"It occurred to me that if John were to die accidentally, his insurance would make a handsome sum for Rhynda—he carried double indemnity. Not only that, but Freda and I would then split his share of our trust fund. Further, if Freda were to die, I would get the entire amount from the fund, something like two hundred and twenty-five dollars a month that could be depended upon. With that and Rhynda's insurance, and perhaps a job for the sake of appearances and cigarette money, I thought we could manage.
"I'd heard about Aunt Mabel's angina and knew that the house was to be left to John, Freda and myself."
Amy raised her head sharply and started to interrupt, but Berg got in ahead of her. "It's all right, Greedy," he said smoothly. "We were to get the house because we had the Ballinger name. You were to be compensated, but just how I don't know and don't care." Amy subsided, and he resumed. "I thought it would make a nice country gentleman sort of place for us. Rhynda could raise all the dogs for show that she wanted, and we might even have horses.
"I figured that the idea was a good one, but if I was to get the house John and Freda must be disposed of before the angina got Aunt Mabel, because the house was not like the trust fund. There would be no reversion to me, and the chances were that it would simply be sold and the money divided. So I decided to do it all in a hurry, and I arranged it for the Christmas holiday."
He paused to get another cigarette, but this time Rosalie made no move to light it for him. I observed, with a little thrill of horror, that he was enjoying himself thoroughly.
The Black-Headed Pins Page 17