The House Without a Key

by Earl Der Biggers

  “Not at all,” Miss Minerva assured him. “We shall need all the help we can get.”

  Captain Hallet had taken a paper from his pocket. He faced John Quincy.

  “Young man,” he began, “I said I wanted to meet you. Last night Miss Winterslip told me of a cablegram received by the dead man about a week ago, which she said angered him greatly. I happen to have a copy of that message, turned over to me by the cable people. I’ll read it to you:

  “JOHN QUINCY SAILING ON PRESIDENT TYLER STOP OWING TO UNFORTUNATE ACCIDENT HE LEAVES HERE WITH EMPTY HANDS. SIGNED ROGER WINTERSLIP.”

  “Yes?” said John Quincy haughtily.

  “Explain that, if you will.”

  John Quincy stiffened. “The matter was strictly private,” he said. “A family affair.”

  Captain Hallet glared at him. “You’re mistaken,” he replied. “Nothing that concerns Mr. Dan Winterslip is private now. Tell me what that cable meant, and be quick about it. I’m busy this morning.”

  John Quincy glared back. The man didn’t seem to realize to whom he was talking. “I’ve already said—” he began.

  “John Quincy,” snapped Miss Minerva. “Do as you’re told!”

  Oh, well, if she wanted family secrets aired in public! Reluctantly John Quincy explained about Dan Winterslip’s letter, and the misadventure in the attic of Dan’s San Francisco house.

  “An ohia wood box bound with copper.” repeated the captain. “Initials on it, T.M.B. Got that, Charlie?”

  “It is written in the book,” said Chan.

  “Any idea what was in that box?” asked Hallet.

  “Not the slightest,” John Quincy told him.

  Hallet turned to Miss Minerva. “You knew nothing about this?” She assured him she did not. “Well,” he continued, “one thing more and we’ll go along. We’ve been making a thorough search of the premises by daylight—without much success, I’m sorry to say. However, by the cement walk just outside that door”—he pointed to the screen door leading from the living-room into the garden—“Charlie made a discovery.”

  Chan stepped forward, holding a small white object in the palm of his hand.

  “One-half cigarette, incompletely consumed,” he announced. “Very recent, not weather-stained. It are of the brand denominated Corsican, assembled in London and smoked habitually by Englishmen.”

  Hallet again addressed Miss Minerva. “Did Dan Winterslip smoke cigarettes?”

  “He did not,” she replied. “Cigars and a pipe, but never cigarettes.”

  “You were the only other person living here.”

  “I haven’t acquired the cigarette habit,” snapped Miss Minerva. “Though undoubtedly it’s not too late yet.”

  “The servants, perhaps?” went on Hallet.

  “Some of the servants may smoke cigarettes, but hardly of this quality. I take it these are not on sale in Honolulu?”

  “They’re not,” said the captain. “But Charlie tells me they’re put up in air-tight tins and shipped to Englishmen the world over. Well, stow that away, Charlie.” The Chinese man tenderly placed the half-cigarette, incompletely consumed, in his pocketbook. “I’m going on down the beach now to have a little talk with Mr. Jim Egan,” the captain added.

  “I’ll go with you,” Jennison offered. “I may be able to supply a link or two there.”

  “Sure, come along,” Hallet replied cordially.

  “Captain Hallet,” put in Miss Minerva, “it is my wish that some member of the family keep in touch with what you are doing, in order that we may give you all the aid we can. My nephew would like to accompany you—”

  “Pardon me,” said John Quincy coldly, “you’re quite wrong. I have no intention of joining the police force.”

  “Well, just as you say,” remarked Hallet. He turned to Miss Minerva. “I’m relying on you, at any rate. You’ve got a good mind. Anybody can see that.”

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “As good as a man’s,” he added.

  “Oh, now you’ve spoiled it. Good morning.”

  The three men went through the screen door into the bright sunshine of the garden. John Quincy was aware that he was not in high favor with his aunt.

  “I’ll go up and change,” he said uncomfortably. “We’ll talk things over later—”

  He went into the hall. At the foot of the stairs he paused.

  From above came a low, heart-breaking moan of anguish. Barbara. Poor Barbara, who had been so happy less than an hour ago.

  John Quincy felt his head go hot, the blood pound in his temples. How dare anyone strike down a Winterslip! How dare anyone inflict this grief on his Cousin Barbara! He clenched his fists and stood for a moment, feeling that he, too, could kill.

  Action—he must have action! He rushed through the living-room, past the astonished Miss Minerva. In the drive stood a car, the three men were already in it.

  “Wait a minute,” called John Quincy. “I’m going with you.”

  “Hop in,” said Captain Hallet.

  The car rolled down the drive and out onto the hot asphalt of Kalia Road. John Quincy sat erect, his eyes flashing, by the side of a huge grinning Chinese man.

  Chapter 9

  At the Reef and Palm

  They reached Kalakaua Avenue and swerving sharply to the right, Captain Hallet stepped on the gas. Since the car was without a top, John Quincy was getting an unrestricted view of this land that lay at his journey’s end. As a small boy squirming about on the hard pew in the First Unitarian Church, he had heard much of Heaven, and his youthful imagination had pictured it as something like this. A warm, rather languid, country freshly painted in the gaudiest colors available.

  Creamy white clouds wrapped the tops of the distant mountains, and their slopes were bright with tropical foliage. John Quincy heard near at hand the low monotone of breakers lapping the shore. Occasionally he caught a glimpse of apple-green water and a dazzling white stretch of sand. “Oh, Waikiki! Oh, scene of peace—” What was the rest of that poem his Aunt Minerva had quoted in her last letter—the one in which she had announced that she was staying on indefinitely. “And looking down from tum-tum skies, the angels smile on Waikiki.” Sentimental, but sentiment was one of Hawaii’s chief exports. One had only to look at the place to understand and forgive.

  John Quincy had not delayed for a hat, and the sun was beating down fiercely on his brown head. Charlie Chan glanced at him.

  “Humbly begging pardon,” he remarked, “would say it is unadvisable to venture forth without headgear. Especially since you are a malihini.”

  “A what?”

  “The term carries no offense. Malihini—stranger, newcomer.”

  “Oh.” John Quincy looked at him curiously. “Are you a malihini?”

  “Not in the least,” grinned Chan. “I am kamaaina—old-timer. Pursuing the truth further, I have been twenty-five years in the Islands.”

  They passed a huge hotel, and presently John Quincy saw Diamond Head standing an impressive guardian at the far end of that lovely curving beach. A little farther along, the captain drew up to the curb and the four men alighted. On the other side of a dilapidated fence was a garden that might have been Eden at its best.

  Entering past a gate that hung sorrowfully on one hinge, they walked up a dirt path and in a moment a ramshackle old building came into view. They were approaching it on an angle, and John Quincy saw that the greater part of it extended out over the water. The tottering structure was of two stories, with double-decked balconies on both sides and the rear. It had rather an air about it; once, no doubt, it had been worthy to stand in this setting. Flowering vines clambered over it in a friendly endeavor to hide its imperfections from the world.

  “Some day,” announced Charlie Chan solemnly, “those rafters underneath will disintegrate and the Reef and Palm Hotel will descend into the sea with a most horrid gurgle.”

  As they drew nearer, it seemed to John Quincy that Chan’s prophecy might come true at any
moment. They paused at the foot of a crumbling stair that led to the front door, and as they did so a man emerged hurriedly from the Reef and Palm. His once-white clothes were yellowed, his face lined, his eyes tired and disillusioned. But about him, as about the hotel, hung the suggestion of a distinguished past.

  “Mr. Egan,” said Captain Hallet promptly.

  “Oh—how are you?” the man replied, with an accent that recalled to John Quincy’s mind his meeting with Captain Arthur Temple Cope.

  “We want to talk to you,” announced Hallet brusquely.

  A shadow crossed Egan’s face. “I’m frightfully sorry,” he said, “but I have a most important engagement, and I’m late as it is. Some other time—”

  “Now!” cut in Hallet. The word shot through the morning like a rocket. He started up the steps.

  “Impossible,” said Egan. He did not raise his voice. “Nothing on earth could keep me from the dock this morning—”

  The captain of detectives seized his arm. “Come inside!” he ordered.

  Egan’s face flushed. “Take your hand off me, damn you! By what right—”

  “You watch your step, Egan,” advised Hallet angrily. “You know why I’m here.”

  “I do not.”

  Hallet stared into the man’s face. “Dan Winterslip was murdered last night,” he said.

  Jim Egan removed his hat, and looked helplessly out toward Kalakaua Avenue. “So I read in the morning paper,” he replied. “What has his death to do with me?”

  “You were the last person to see him alive,” Hallet answered. “Now quit bluffing and come inside.”

  Egan cast one final baffled glance at the street, where a trolley bound for the city three miles away was rattling swiftly by. Then he bowed his head and led the way into the hotel.

  They entered a huge, poorly furnished public room, deserted save for a woman tourist writing post-cards at a table, and a shabby Japanese clerk lolling behind the desk. “This way,” Egan said, and they followed him past the desk and into a small private office. Here all was confusion, dusty piles of magazines and newspapers were everywhere, battered old ledgers lay upon the floor. On the wall hung a portrait of Queen Victoria; many pictures cut from the London illustrated weeklies were tacked up haphazardly. Jennison spread a newspaper carefully over the window-sill and sat down there. Egan cleared chairs for Hallet, Chan and John Quincy, and himself took his place before an ancient roll-top desk.

  “If you will be brief, Captain,” he suggested, “I might still have time—” He glanced at a clock above the desk.

  “Forget that,” advised Hallet sharply. His manner was considerably different from that he employed in the house of a leading citizen like Dan Winterslip. “Let’s get to business.” He turned to Chan. “Got your book, Charlie?”

  “Preparations are complete,” replied Chan, his pencil poised.

  “All right.” Hallet drew his chair closer to the desk. “Now Egan, you come through and come clean. I know that last night about seven-thirty you called up Dan Winterslip and tried to slide out of an appointment you had made with him. I know that he refused to let you off, and insisted on seeing you at eleven. About that time, you went to his house. You and he had a rather excited talk. At one-twenty-five Winterslip was found dead. Murdered, Egan! Now give me your end of it.”

  Jim Egan ran his fingers through his curly, close-cropped hair—straw-colored once, but now mostly gray. “That’s all quite true,” he said. “Do—do you mind if I smoke?” He took out a silver case and removed a cigarette. His hand trembled slightly as he applied the match. “I did make an appointment with Winterslip for last night,” he continued. “During the course of the day I—I changed my mind. When I called up to tell him so, he insisted on seeing me. He urged me to come at eleven, and I went.”

  “Who let you in?” Hallet asked.

  “Winterslip was waiting in the garden when I came. We went inside—”

  Hallet glanced at the cigarette in Egan’s hand. “By the door leading directly into the living-room?” he asked.

  “No,” said Egan. “By the big door at the front of the house. Winterslip took me out on his lanai, and we had a bit of a chat regarding the—the business that had brought me. About half an hour later, I came away. When I left, Winterslip was alive and well—in good spirits, too. Smiling, as a matter of fact.”

  “By what door did you leave?”

  “The front door—the one I’d entered by.”

  “I see.” Hallet looked at him thoughtfully for a moment. “You went back later, perhaps.”

  “I did not,” said Egan promptly. “I came directly here and went to bed.”

  “Who saw you?”

  “No one. My clerk goes off duty at eleven. The hotel is open, but there is no one in charge. My patronage is—not large.”

  “You came here at eleven-thirty and went to bed,” Hallet said. “But no one saw you. Tell me, were you well acquainted with Dan Winterslip?”

  Egan shook his head. “In the twenty-three years I’ve been in Honolulu, I had never spoken to him until I called him on the telephone yesterday morning.”

  “Humph.” Hallet leaned back in his chair and spoke in a more amiable tone. “As a younger man, I believe you traveled a lot?”

  “I drifted about a bit,” Egan admitted. “I was just eighteen when I left England—”

  “At your family’s suggestion,” smiled the captain.

  “What’s that to you?” Egan flared.

  “Where did you go?”

  “Australia. I ranched it for a time—and later I worked in Melbourne.”

  “What doing?” persisted Hallet.

  “In—in a bank.”

  “A bank, eh? And then—”

  “The South Seas. Just—wandering about—I was restless—”

  “Beach-combing, eh?”

  Egan flushed. “I may have been on my uppers at times, but damn it—”

  “Wait a minute,” Hallet cut in. “What I want to know is—those years you were drifting about—did you by any chance run into Dan Winterslip?”

  “I—I might have.”

  “What sort of an answer is that! Yes or no?”

  “Well, as a matter of fact, I did,” Egan admitted. “Just once—in Melbourne. But it was a quite unimportant meeting. So unimportant Winterslip had completely forgotten it.”

  “But you hadn’t. And yesterday morning, after twenty-three years’ silence between you, you called him on the telephone. On rather sudden business.”

  “I did.”

  Hallet came closer. “All right, Egan. We’ve reached the important part of your story. What was that business?”

  A tense silence fell in the little office as they awaited Egan’s answer. The Englishman looked Hallet calmly in the eye. “I can’t tell you that,” he said.

  Hallet’s face reddened. “Oh, yes, you can. And you’re going to.”

  “Never,” answered Egan, without raising his voice.

  The captain glared at him. “You don’t seem to realize your position.”

  “I realize it perfectly.”

  “If you and I were alone—”

  “I won’t tell you under any circumstances, Hallet.”

  “Maybe you’ll tell the prosecutor—”

  “Look here,” cried Egan wearily. “Why must I say it over and over? I’ll tell nobody my business with Winterslip. Nobody, understand?” He crushed the half-smoked cigarette savagely down on to a tray at his side.

  John Quincy saw Hallet nod to Chan. He saw Chan’s pudgy little hand go out and seize the remnant of cigarette. A happy grin spread over the Oriental’s fat face. He handed the stub to his chief.

  “Corsican brand!” he cried triumphantly.

  “Ah, yes,” said Hallet. “This your usual smoke?”

  A startled look crossed Egan’s tired face. “No, it’s not,” he said.

  “It’s a make that’s not on sale in the Islands, I believe?”

  “No, I fancy it isn’
t.”

  Captain Hallet held out his hand. “Give me your cigarette case, Egan.” The Englishman passed it over, and Hallet opened it. “Humph,” he said. “You’ve managed to get hold of a few, haven’t you?”

  “Yes. They were—given me.”

  “Is that so? Who gave them to you?”

  Egan considered. “I’m afraid I can’t tell you that, either,” he said.

  Hallet’s eyes glittered angrily. “Let me give you a few facts,” he began. “You called on Dan Winterslip last night, you entered and left by the front door, and you didn’t go back. Yet just outside the door leading directly into the living-room, we have found a partly smoked cigarette of this unusual brand. Now will you tell me who gave you these Corsicans?”

  “No,” said Egan, “I won’t.”

  Hallet slipped the silver cigarette case into his pocket, and stood up. “Very well,” he remarked. “I’ve wasted all the time I intend to here. The district court prosecutor will want to talk to you—”

  “Of course,” agreed Egan, “I’ll come and see him—this afternoon—”

  Hallet glared at him. “Quit kidding yourself and get your hat!”

  Egan rose too. “Look here,” he cried, “I don’t like your manner. It’s true there are certain matters in connection with Winterslip that I can’t discuss, and that’s unfortunate. But surely you don’t think I killed the man. What motive would I have—”

  Jennison rose quickly from his seat on the window-ledge and stepped forward. “Hallet,” he said, “there’s something I ought to tell you. Two or three years ago Dan Winterslip and I were walking along King Street, and we passed Mr. Egan here. Winterslip nodded toward him. ‘I’m afraid of that man, Harry,’ he said. I waited to hear more, but he didn’t go on, and he wasn’t the sort of client one would prompt. ‘I’m afraid of that man, Harry.’ Just that, and nothing further.”

  “It’s enough,” remarked Hallet grimly. “Egan, you’re going with me.”