Death, My Darling Daughters

by Jonathan Stagge

  “My God,” she whispered. “The flute. I should have remembered. I saw her doing it. Nanny polished Uncle George’s flute too….”

  XIV

  I felt for Dr. Hilton’s pulse and knew that he was dead. Dr. Kenton-Oakes, Vic, and Dr. Stahl had pushed ahead of the others and were grouped around me. None of us said anything. With the memory of Nanny’s symptoms fresh in our minds, it was only too obvious that Dr. Hilton had died from cyanide poisoning.

  The switch in mood from the pretty enchantment of Mozart to the ugliness and horror of sudden death was too much for me. Hardly more than an hour before, I had been warning Dr. Hilton of just this; he had scoffed at me; and now—it had happened. A feeling that I should somehow have prevented this second tragedy swept over me. Mixed with the sense of guilt were anger and a vague fear of what might come next.

  It was Helena’s sobs, deep and blubbering, that made me conscious of my responsibilities. She was kneeling at my side, clutching her father’s hand, abandoning herself to hysterical grief.

  I looked up at the pinched faces around me. Of all the women, Belle Kenton-Oakes seemed the most in control of herself.

  I said: “Take Helena away, Mrs. Kenton-Oakes. Take all the women away. Take them back to the house, for God’s sake.”

  “Yes, yes, of course.”

  Janie came forward then, staring down at her husband’s figure, her lips pale.

  “Doctor, is he dead? Oh, is he—?”

  Mrs. Kenton-Oakes drew her backward. She gathered up Helena too. I have a dim memory picture of her shepherding the dowdy group of women away to the door, with my daughter, white and peaky, bringing up the rear.

  Soon I was alone with the three doctors, and the mood of the room changed to one of impersonal though distracted scientific interest.

  Dr. Kenton-Oakes was the first to speak. His eyes still bright from shock, he was stooping over his brother-in-law.

  “Rosalind says Nanny polished the flute. What a really terrible thing.”

  Dr. Stahl had picked up the flute and was examining it with gimlet eyes and twitching nose.

  “Ja,” she exclaimed. “I see. Here by the mouthpiece—steel the polish I see.”

  Vic said huskily: “I was watching him. He hadn’t been practicing. He was rusty. He was concentrating everything on hitting the right notes. That must be why he didn’t notice. He was only thinking of the music. God, if only Rosalind had said something about the flute. We’d have wiped it. This—this wouldn’t have happened.”

  “An accident,” murmured Dr. Kenton-Oakes distractedly. “Dear me, yes, another terrible accident.”

  There was no use putting off what I had to say any longer.

  I said: “I’m afraid I don’t agree that it’s an accident. I’m afraid the polish was deliberately put there on the mouthpiece of the flute to poison Dr. Hilton.”

  All three of them swung round to me, each face registering its own type of incredulous astonishment.

  “I also think,” I said, “although we can’t be sure till we get the formula from England, that some of Dr. Stahl’s cyanide was added to the polish.”

  Lisl Stahl’s scarlet lips dropped open. “My cyanide!”

  “You know the way you leave it around in that lab of yours. A child of five could steal enough to kill a regiment.”

  “But, Westlake, why?” Vic Roberts’s black eyes were blazing into mine. “Why in God’s name are you saying this?”

  I stared straight back at him. “Because I happen to know that there’s already been one attempt on Dr. Hilton’s life and because I happen to know that Nanny was murdered.” I paused. “I warned Dr. Hilton of this just a couple of hours ago. He wouldn’t take me seriously.”

  Dr. Kenton-Oakes was the steadiest of them. In a clear, clipped voice, he asked: “But what evidence do you have for making these extraordinary statements?”

  “What evidence do I have that Dr. Hilton here was murdered? None. That’s the point. The murderer’s been smart enough to be simple—so simple that there couldn’t be any evidence. There shouldn’t have been any evidence of murder in Nanny’s death either, but by a bit of luck there is.”

  “There is?” echoed Dr. Kenton-Oakes.

  “Yes,” I said, praying inwardly that Mrs. Kenton-Oakes wouldn’t let me down. “There’s one person who can prove definitely that Nanny was murdered.”

  “And that person?”

  “Your wife,” I said.

  “Belle?” Dr. Kenton-Oakes’s voice cracked. “How on earth could Belle—?”

  “You’ll soon see,” I said.

  For a moment the three of them stood in silence, staring at me. The first shock was over, and they did not seem to know what to do. I glanced down at the huddled body of Dr. Hilton lying on the platform among its refined props—the overturned music stands, the tilted cello, the viola astraddle a chair where Rosalind had dropped it. The pompous aura of importance which Dr. Hilton had always carried with him like a briefcase had gone. He looked no more impressive than the lowliest cadaver destined for the Arkwright’s dissecting room.

  Suddenly Dr. Kenton-Oakes spoke. He seemed to have shrunk in size. “It would be folly to suppose you would make these charges lightly, Dr. Westlake. Very well. We must accept them. This is all distinctly out of my province. I am not accustomed to—to horrors. What exactly do you propose to do?”

  “There’s nothing we can do here. We’d better lock this place up, and I’ll call Cobb. While we’re waiting for him, we can at least talk to your wife, see if we can’t get a few things straightened out.”

  Thoroughly chastened, Dr. Roberts, Dr. Stahl, and Dr. Kenton-Oakes followed me out of the music room, waited while I locked the double doors, and then moved with me to the house.

  I left them in the hall and called Cobb from the telephone closet, telling him the worst and asking him to come at once. I found the other doctors still waiting for me in the hall. We entered the living room in a body.

  Except my daughter and Helena Hilton, who had presumably taken her filial grief to her room, all the women were assembled there. Mrs. Lanchester, beautiful and severe, sat alone on a worn ottoman, disassociating herself not only from the others but from all contact with unpleasantness. Her sister, her face an irritable pink, strode up and down with the air of a woman who was being expected to stand a great deal more nonsense than she was accustomed to stand. Rosalind and Perdita sat together, childishly cross-legged on the floor. Little Janie, as if conscious of the fact that her husband’s death made her even more of an outcast, huddled on the faded window seat in pale exile.

  While they all, even Mrs. Lanchester, watched us with anxious expectancy, I crossed to Rosalind. I said: “Tell us about Nanny polishing the flute.”

  Her eyes showed that flutter of panic I had seen in them that afternoon when we had been together in the attic. “Just that she polished it,” she faltered. “Nanny loved Uncle George, always wanted to do everything for him. I happened to go down to the kitchen for—for something yesterday morning. Nanny was there polishing other things, and she told me to get Uncle George’s flute. It was to be a surprise for him, she said, to have a lovely polished flute. She was sure no one had been taking care of it in Boston. I got it from Uncle George’s room. Nanny polished it, and I stayed with her. When she finished I—I took it back.”

  “Then Dr. Hilton didn’t know it had been polished?”

  “No, I don’t suppose so. I—Oh, I never realized.”

  “Did anyone see you taking the flute back to his room?”

  “I don’t know. I—” She paused. “People were coming in and out of the kitchen all the time Nanny was polishing it, and—yes, there were people in the living room when I went through. Mother, Aunt Belle—oh, I can’t remember exactly who.”

  Belle Kenton-Oakes stopped pacing. She glared from me to her husband.

  “Why on earth is Dr.—er—er asking all these questions about flutes, Richard?”

  Dr. Kenton-Oakes shrugged. “I
t would be more suitable to ask Dr. Westlake himself, dear.”

  “Ask him? Why?”

  “This whole matter is out of my hands now,” he said. “Dr. Westlake is a representative of the police. I believe, by the way, that he has a question to ask of you, Belle. I do not know what it is, but I must beg you to tell the truth.” He turned to me, a ghost of the old malicious whimsy in his eyes. “My wife is virtually incapable of telling the truth, Dr. Westlake. You must be firm. I remember one occasion some years ago. It was a small luncheon for Madame Curie. I…”

  He must have realized that this was not a moment for reminiscence. The anecdote faded. Vic moved to the window seat and sat down next to Janie. Dr. Stahl stayed by the door, watching me brightly. Everyone was watching me, in fact. It was rather unnerving.

  Suddenly Mrs. Lanchester came out of her ivory tower.

  “What do you wish to ask my sister, Dr. Westlake?”

  “Yes,” snapped Mrs. Kenton-Oakes. “Really, I can’t imagine what it could be with poor George dead.”

  Rosalind dropped down next to Perdita, tugging her skirt over her bare, slender legs, keeping me under keen scrutiny.

  With some caution I began: “It’s about Nanny, Mrs. Kenton-Oakes.”

  “Nanny?”

  “Yesterday you said you had a visit with Nanny in her room before we all went on the picnic. Is that correct?”

  “Correct, my dear,” put in Dr. Kenton-Oakes. “That means—were you speaking the truth?”

  “I am fully aware of that fact, Richard. Really, why you should all suddenly treat me as if I was feeble-minded is beyond me.” She turned her light, browless eyes on me. “Certainly I visited Nanny just before the picnic.”

  “About what time?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. When did we go up to the Rock? About seven? It must have been about six-thirty then—just before I came down to the kitchen. You were there with Emily and Richard and poor George.”

  Feeling tense, I said: “And what did you do when you visited Nanny?”

  “Do? What do you mean, do? What could I have done? We just chatted and drank a cup of tea. Then she felt sleepy and dropped off, so I left her.”

  The fuse to the dynamite was lit now. “You drank a cup of tea yourself, Mrs. Kenton-Oakes?”

  “Really, Dr.—er—Westbrook, do I have to say everything twice?” Belle spun round to her husband. “Richard, what is this all about?”

  “It is no longer difficult to realize what Dr. Westlake has in mind, my dear.” Dr. Kenton-Oakes was quite pale. “Until now it has been generally supposed that Nanny died because she had improperly polished the teapot that morning, but you apparently drank a cup of tea with her at six-thirty in the evening and remained—er—mercifully alive.”

  A faint rustle sounded as the tension became general.

  “Great Scott,” exclaimed Mrs. Kenton-Oakes, unnecessarily British.

  “Yes,” I said. “The teapot was harmless at six-thirty. That means the poison was put there some time later, just before the picnic. It also means that Nanny’s death couldn’t have been an accident.” I paused. “I needed you to confirm that one thing before I was sure of my ground, Mrs. Kenton-Oakes. I’m sure now. Nanny was murdered.”

  Janie jumped up, stared wildly at nothing, and sat down again. Rosalind clutched Perdita’s arm. Both sisters looked as if they were going to be sick. Mrs. Lanchester, from the stately solitude of her ottoman, frowned.

  “Nanny was murdered,” I continued, “and Dr. Hilton was murdered. Probably the teapot and the flute were poisoned at the same time. If Dr. Hilton had practiced yesterday, as he should have done, he would have died almost simultaneously with Nanny. That must have been the plan. It was sheer chance that put a day between the two deaths. Two murders dressed up to look like a double accident caused by Nanny’s faulty polishing.”

  That announcement, so hopelessly out of place in Mrs. Lanchester’s genteel living room, was greeted by chilly silence. In spite of myself, I was made to feel that I was being “vulgar and American” in the extreme. The disapproval, of course, had its focus in Mrs. Lanchester herself. Majestically she rose. I am sure that dear Uncle Henry—Henry James, you know—would have been proud of her. She folded her arms across the lilac bosom and said sedately:

  “I do not like to contradict you, Dr. Westlake, but you are quite mistaken.”

  “I wish I were, Mrs. Lanchester.”

  Her lips tightened. “I do not claim to follow your technical arguments. It is possible that you sincerely believe what you say. But I should have thought that even your slight acquaintance with us would have been sufficient to make you realize that there could never be a murder in the Hilton family.”

  Mrs. Kenton-Oakes crossed to her sister’s side and put her hand on Emily’s sleeve. Both of them glared at me, completely at one, probably for the first time in many years.

  “Yes,” said Belle Kenton-Oakes with a snort, “surely even you, Dr.—er—er—can see that. Really, I mean, to suggest that a murder has been committed here—among us.”

  They were not their brother’s sisters for nothing.

  I stared back at them. Wearily I said: “The Lincolns were quite a distinguished family, too, Mrs. Kenton-Oakes. And look what happened to Abe.”

  XV

  That exasperated remark succeeded only in lowering the temperature of an atmosphere that was already gelid. Fortunately a car drove up outside at that moment and I was able to use Cobb’s arrival as an excuse to hurry from the room.

  I took the inspector and his men over to the music room, where the gloomy post-murder ritual was played out. I told Cobb everything. The inspector was more shaken than I had ever known him. To him it seemed a disastrous personal failure that we had realized the danger for Dr. Hilton and had yet been unable to save him. I pointed out that, if anyone was responsible, it was the D.A. and Dr. Hilton himself who had both refused to have any investigation. It was praiseworthy in us that we had been able to do anything at all against their express orders. To Cobb and his conscience, however, that was mere casuistry.

  The flute was taken for analysis. There was little more to be done in the music room. It was only by accident that the death had taken place there. The actual murder had been committed at some undetermined moment of the past when someone had slipped into Dr. Hilton’s upstairs office and smeared the poisoned polish on the flute. Once again I was despondently impressed by the simplicity with which the two crimes had been carried out. An elaborate murder plan often collapses under the weight of its own intricacy. But here there was nothing to collapse—a smear of polish on a teapot which anyone could have reached, a smear of polish on a flute that lay in an unlocked room. Both crimes could have taken no more than a few casual moments to perpetrate.

  After the men from the morgue had come for the body, the inspector turned to me with a woebegone shrug.

  “There’s a lot of bad things about this, Westlake, but the worst thing’s going to be telling the D.A.”

  “He can hardly blame you,” I said.

  “You don’t know the D.A.” Cobb smiled wryly. “He’s never not been able to blame me for anything yet.” The smile went. “I’d better break the news to him right away. No use putting it off till he hears about it from somebody else.”

  His distressed blue eyes fixed my face. “The D.A.’s policy of hands off can’t hold up any more, of course. These people here have got to be questioned. And I guess it’s the motive we’ve got to concentrate on now. We know almost everything else. We know how the crimes were committed; we know anyone could have snitched some of Stahl’s poison. We’d better start finding out which of them had the best reason for wanting to get rid of Hilton. His will, for example. Maybe some slant will come out of the will.” He paused and added tentatively: “I guess you know what I’m going to ask, Westlake.”

  “I guess I do.”

  “You know ’em. They’d take more from you than they would from me anyway. And, seeing I have to get to the D.A., ho
w about you taking ’em over? Just for tonight, at least. Get the ball rolling.”

  “It’s going to be quite a ball,” I said.

  “I don’t have to tell you how to handle ’em.” Cobb took my consent for granted. “Psychology, all that stuff, you know about it much better than me. Give ’em the sort of polite works and, when you’re through, drive in to Grovestown and report. Maybe by then I’ll have gotten the D.A. in some sort of shape.”

  I said: “It’s kind of extracurricular for the coroner, but I’ll do it.”

  “I knew you would.” He took my hand and squeezed it gratefully. “How d’you suppose I’d get along without you?”

  “How indeed?” I said. “Think how useful I’ve been tonight, for example. I got Dr. Hilton murdered for you—all by myself.”

  After Cobb and his men drove off, I went back to the house. There was nothing new in Cobb’s having left me the task of coping with the Hiltons. In the past, whenever we had collaborated on a case, most of the handling of suspects had fallen to me. However, when I remembered the formidable determination to play ostrich shared by Emily and Belle, I did not look forward to the prospect of handling the Hiltons with a great deal of relish.

  The first thing I encountered in the house was my daughter. She appeared sulkily at the door of the dining room with Hamish at her heels.

  “We’ve been here for hours, and we’re awfully bored,” she said. “Is Dr. Hilton all right again?”

  In the emotional stress I had forgotten Dawn. I made vaguely reassuring statements and bundled her and Hamish to the front door.

  “You’d better get along home to bed quickly,” I said. “You’re not scared of going alone, are you?”

  “I don’t know,” said my daughter. “Sometimes I am; sometimes I’m not. It all depends.”

  “On what?”

  “Oh, things. Owls and things.” She stared at me suspiciously. “You’re not coming yet, then?”

  “No.”

  “But if Dr. Hilton’s all right—”

  “There are a lot of things I have to do,” I broke in.