Return to the Scene

by Patrick Quentin

  So it was there, after all. It hadn’t been found. Everything was all right.

  She pulled the folder out, gripping it against the wet slicker. She took a step away from the bed.

  And then her newly found steadiness collapsed with sudden, dreadful speed.

  A sound had come from the living room, a sound which no imagination could have conjured up. A sound of distinct, squeaking footsteps.

  She stood absolutely still, frozen into immobility. They came again. They were louder. They were coming straight toward the bedroom door.

  Her thoughts, acidly clear, pitilessly incapable of helping her, said: So there was someone here. I was right. And then: I locked the door. We’re—we’re locked in together.

  She stood there, the raindrops sliding off her slicker, falling—plop, plop—on the cedar floor. The footsteps were at the door. Then a figure, vague, indistinguishable but immensely real, stood in the doorway.

  She had reached a point where she made no effort to wonder who it was, whether friend or enemy. To her this was just part of the horror that had dogged her in the form of Alice Lumsden.

  The figure moved into the room straight toward her.

  Then, at the crowning point of panic, a voice sounded, a soft voice, faintly amused: “It is you, Miss Winyard, isn’t it? I thought you’d be here.”

  She recognized Dr. Thorne’s voice, recognized it mechanically, not knowing whether to be glad or not, knowing only that she was no longer afraid.

  He said: “We needn’t go in for all this darkness. This room faces away from the mainland. No one’s going to see a light anyway.”

  He slipped back to the door. There was a click and the room was flooded with light.

  “You’re wet,” he said. And then, the faint smile fading: “You look as if you’d seen a ghost. I’m sorry if I scared you. I didn’t mean to.”

  Kay’s mind was still not working properly. Her fingers tightened over the folder in her hand and then anxiety slid into her as she saw that he was staring straight at it.

  He looked away, his gaze traveling to the bed with the disarranged spread. “You hid it under the mattress, did you? I should have guessed.”

  The jolt of those words brought back her powers of reasoning. Suddenly she saw what the truth must be. With a quick upsurge of anger, she said: “So that’s why you came to the house and dropped those hints about Constable Masters having left the dock. You wanted me to come to the island just so you could follow and—and snoop on me.”

  The smile came again. It was a queer smile, almost as if he were mocking her. “More or less,” he said. “I knew you’d hidden something here this morning. I guessed it was what I wanted. I was right.”

  Quickly he came to her. And, before she realized it, he had taken the folder, the folder which held so much—the Chilterns’ future, Terry’s destiny.

  “Give that back to me.”

  “In a moment, Miss Winyard.”

  “I trusted you. I thought…” Anger overwhelmed Kay, blotting out the memory of Alice—everything.

  She stared at him. He stared back, holding the folder unopened. His face was vividly real to her as if she had known every little thing about it for years, the way the sensitive nostrils curved, the turn of his jaw, that curious look, steady and enigmatic, which kept his eyes strangers from her. She hated him.

  “You were on the Major’s side all along,” she said passionately. “You just bluffed me, tried to get into my confidence. And now Major Clifford sent you after that folder.”

  His face did not change its expression. “That isn’t true. Major Clifford doesn’t know this folder exists.”

  “Then you’re working on your own. Trying to be the great detective. Being so clever and…”

  “I’m not trying to be a detective. I hoped you’d give me the chance to follow you here because I wanted you to show me where this folder was. That’s true. But I only did it because I have a reason of my own for wanting the folder.”

  “As if I believe that!”

  “It’s the truth.” He came closer. His hand gestured toward her. It was strange how, although he didn’t touch her, she could almost feel the pressure of his fingers, warm, tingling, on her cold arm. “And what I told you yesterday is the truth too. You may as well believe me. Do you suppose I’d be working hand in glove with Clifford—feeling the way I felt about Ivor?”

  She could still feel that imaginary tingling on her arm—as if he had touched her. She’d never felt that way about a man since—since Ivor. She hated him even more for this physical intrusion into her life. Hated him, and was a little afraid too.

  “How do I know you really felt that way about Ivor and Rosemary? You’re the coroner’s physician. You’re part of the law. That could have been just a ruse to worm confidence out of me for Major Clifford.”

  “You’re stubborn, aren’t you?” His teeth showed white in a smile. “Did I act as if I was lying yesterday when I told you that story?”

  “No. I believed you. B-but…”

  “And do you think I’d exploit you for Major Clifford anyway?” His face was suddenly grave—dark and difficult. He looked at her intently. “In all this madness haven’t you felt anything about me? I thought women were meant to be intuitive. I thought you’d guessed that I think you’re the most exciting person I’ve met in years. You’re beautiful too.” The smile was there again, shadowy in the corners of his eyes. “Even now—although you look like a drowned rat in that slicker.”

  None of this made sense any more. He had taken the folder from her, cut the ground away from under her feet. And now he was saying this!

  It was insane. And more insane still was the way her knees felt weak, the way her heart was beating with quick uncertainty in answer to the excitement of his voice.

  “You’re—you’re crazy,” she faltered.

  “Of course I am. Nothing could be crazier. I realized that.”

  He put the folder down on a table. She made no move to snatch it.

  He came to her, taking her arms, looking down into her face.

  “I don’t believe this any more than you do,” he said softly. “But I’m in love with you.”

  It was as if both of them were acting beyond the sphere of their own wills.

  He drew her toward him. The drenched tweed of his jacket was cold against her face. Then, inevitably, like something she had always known must happen but had forgotten about, she felt his lips, warm, resilient, on hers.

  That was the moment of enchantment. But even as she yielded to it, something in the back of her mind stirred. Slowly, as his lips still held hers, that other thing grew and grew, a vivid, loathsome image in her brain. Alice Lumsden. Alice Lumsden in her red slicker lying in the rain—dead. The horror of death, here in this warm room where Thorne’s arms were around her, where his lips…

  She wrenched herself free. She was trembling all over. And now that she was in the grip of that other dreadful spell, there was no more magic to Dr. Thorne. She felt only suspicion, shame for her own weakness, shreds of her old anger.

  “Darling, what’s the matter…?”

  “You’re playing some game with me.” She stared at his dark, startled face, not really seeing it. Her voice was shaking. “Why don’t you tell me what you really want out of me? If it’s the folder, you won’t get it.”

  She sprang to the table, snatching up the folder, turning to him defiantly, expecting him to take it from her again.

  But he didn’t.

  Her teeth were chattering. That was because she was cold—wet. Swiftly she shuffled through the contents of the folder with numbed fingers. Stocks… bonds… Yes, here was a check. A check, written by Ivor, for a thousand dollars. There was a slip of paper clipped to it. She unfolded it, staring at it, seeing the pitiful confession of forgery signed by Terry.

  She folded the paper back, clipped it to the check, shut the folder.

  “Kay!” Thorne’s voice made her look up. The expression of shock and bew
ilderment was still there in his eyes. “Why are you acting this way? Don’t you believe me? Is it too crazy for you to believe?”

  “Believe that you lured me over here to the island just because you wanted to tell me you loved me?” Her words, sharp, harsh, shocked even herself. She saw his dark eyes flicker as if she’d hit him.

  “Kay…”

  “How do you expect me to believe you when you’ve admitted you only wanted to find out where the folder was.”

  “I had to find that folder.”

  “Why?”

  “I told you. There’s something in it I have to get.”

  “There’s—there’s nothing here that concerns you.”

  “How do you know? Have you seen everything in it?” His lips were pale now—and tight. He said: “If I tell you the truth about the folder, will you trust me?” She tried to sort out her feelings, tried to keep herself from admitting that queer throbbing in her temples as she looked at him.

  “Let me have a look through the papers for a moment,” he asked.

  Her fingers tightened over the folder instinctively. “This is just a trick.”

  “If you think that…” He shrugged.

  Suddenly—she didn’t know why—she was holding the folder out to him.

  He took it without a word. The line of his jaw was very pronounced as he opened it, leafed through it. At the very end he found an envelope. It had been slit and the letter stuffed inside showed through the tear.

  He put the folder down on the table and fingered the letter. Abruptly he glanced up.

  “No one knows about this. I hoped no one ever would—particularly not you. But since you doubt my sincerity…” He paused. “You think I’m a spy of Major Clifford’s. Tell me what you think of me after you read this.”

  Uncertainly, she took the letter from his outstretched hand.

  The envelope had a Bermudian stamp and an eighteen-month-old postmark. It was addressed in a blunt masculine hand to:

  Mrs. Ivor Drake,

  Hotel Mireille,

  New Orleans,

  La.

  She pulled out the letter and read:

  Rosemary, darling…

  As her eyes followed line after line of that bitter, heartbroken letter, she felt ashamed. She had no right to be seeing something meant so intimately for one person alone. It was the letter of a man without hope. A man who knew that the girl he loved was married to a husband who was deviously, relentlessly torturing her to death; the letter of a man who understood so much more than the girl herself what was happening, a man whose one pitiful idea was to save Rosemary Drake, not only from Ivor, but from the blind, distorted thing in her which would not let her love for Ivor die.

  She stared at the concluding paragraph:

  … Rosemary, darling, you must leave him. That’s your only hope. If you don’t, he’ll kill you, subtly, indirectly, but as certainly as if he’d struck you in the back with a knife. You’ve got to understand and be strong. Soon you’ll be back again in Bermuda. Do you think I’ll be able to stand by and watch what he’s doing to you? I’d rather die. Yes, I’d rather he died. Rosemary, I mean this. I’m a doctor, the coroner’s doctor of the parish. There are dozens of ways. No one need ever guess. I could sign the death certificate and…

  And then the name at the end: Tim.

  She couldn’t read any more. Her pulses pounding she looked up from the letter, straight into his eyes.

  His face, taut with a kind of bitter anxiety, had been watching her, not losing sight of her for a second.

  He gave a desperate little shrug. “Well, do you agree now that there was something in the folder that concerned me? Do you still think I’m likely to be spying on you for Major Clifford?”

  “You—you wrote this to Rosemary?”

  “I must have been mad,” he said. “I was mad. She used to write to me—pathetic little notes. Oh, she didn’t tell me all, but I could read between the lines, read what sort of hell he was making for her. And I couldn’t stand it any more because I knew how she was, too much of a kid, too blind and helpless to be able to save herself. That was the last letter I wrote, when I was almost crazy, ready to do anything.”

  His voice stopped jerkily. He stood there, his face almost gray. Then, in a dry, pinched voice, he added: “She never received it. Before it reached her, she— she had died, jumped out of the window. It came there to the hotel and Ivor got it. They gave it to him. He read it.”

  Kay looked at his grim, tormented face, her heart melting for him. Absurdly, because she was so sorry for him, she wanted him to comfort her, to put his arms around her again and shut out the memory of his suffering.

  “Ivor kept it,” he was saying softly. “He came back to Bermuda and he was afraid of me. In a way I think I’m the only person he was ever afraid of, because he knew that I knew what he’d done to Rosemary and would never forgive him.”

  His lips moved in a pale, twisted smile. “But he had me beaten. You see, that letter made him safe. I think he knew I would gladly have killed him, and once he knew he was safe, it amused him. The week after he came back, when Rosemary was dead, he got me to the house. He told me he had the letter; he pointed out that any day he could give it to the police—let them know not only that I’d planned to murder him, but that I’d planned to abuse my official position to cover my crime. Of course, by lifting his finger, he could have destroyed my life.”

  He hesitated: “And from then on he played with me like a cat with a mouse. Some days he’d give me hope. Other days he’d send me home sure that at any minute I’d hear the doorbell ring and it’d be— the police. For over a year he’s done that to me, just for the fun of it, just for the delirious, intoxicating fun of torturing me because I’d dared to hate him.”

  He looked away. Kay saw his hands clenching into fists, the bones of his knuckles standing out hard and white.

  “In those days he kept the letter in a strongbox in New York. He knew I couldn’t get at it. Once he even dared me to kill him—because he knew he was safe, that if I did, inevitably the letter would come to light and put a noose around my neck.” His jaw was working. “And then, this last time, he grew more rash. I guess the game had gone to his head. Yesterday, after he’d come back, he told me he’d brought the letter with him, it was in a folder in his suitcase. He tantalized me, making me think he was going to give it back to me. Then—then he just laughed and walked away. That’s what’s been happening to me since Rosemary died.”

  “Tim, if—if only I’d known…”

  “… you wouldn’t have suspected me of being on the side of the police.” He laughed shortly. “You can imagine how I’ve been feeling since I heard Ivor was dead. I was in a cold sweat that the Major would find that letter. My one idea was to get it back, but there was no chance till this afternoon. This morning when we found you and your sister on the island I guessed you’d come over to look for something too. Then, this afternoon when I slipped over here and searched the suitcase, I couldn’t find the folder. I was sure you’d taken it, hidden it. That’s why I thought out the scheme of making you come over to the island—and following you.” He added: “You understand, don’t you?”

  “Of course I understand.”

  “And maybe you can believe that other thing now, believe that I’m in love with you. It happened—just like that. And it’s real. It isn’t a mirage.”

  He was smiling. Feeling the crazy exhilaration in herself, Kay wanted to cry. But he came to her, putting his hand on her wet shoulder. And it was all right again.

  “I’ve thrown myself on your mercy, Kay. You know the worst now. And—and you’ve got the letter.”

  She looked down. She still had the letter in her hand. She’d forgotten that.

  “If you like,” he said slowly, “you can show it to Major Clifford. After all there’s nothing to stop you.”

  Suddenly sure of herself, Kay picked a box of matches from the table. She lit one. While he watched her, his face relaxing slowly
from its haggard intensity, she carried the match to a corner of the letter.

  In the long moment when the flames, licking up toward her fingers, demolished the paper, their eyes never left each other’s faces. Kay let the letter drop, a flake of ash, to the floor.

  “That’s what I’ll do with the letter,” she said.

  He didn’t move. He just gave an awkward little shrug. “Thank you, Kay.”

  And for the first time she felt there was no barrier of suspicion, felt her own confidence flowing out to meet his. With a thrill of excitement she thought: There’s two of us now. Before she’d had to fight the Chilterns’ losing battle alone. Now there was Tim’s battle to fight—together.

  She said quickly: “You’ve shown you can trust me. I want to show I can trust you. Ivor did that dreadful thing to you. He did the same sort of thing to Terry. He had evidence against him. It was in the folder too. That’s why I came here—to get it.” Then, as the searing memory of Alice Lumsden rose up once more, she added: “And that’s not all, Tim. There’s something much worse I’ve got to tell you, something I…”

  “Don’t tell me,” he broke in quietly. “I don’t want to know any more than I can help. It’s awkward enough as it is, being trusted by Major Clifford and knowing I’m as much of a suspect as anyone else.”

  “A suspect! You’re not really a suspect. There’s just the letter. It’s burnt now. And even if the Major had found it, he knows you have an absolute alibi for Ivor’s death.”

  “Absolute!” His dark mouth moved in a smile. “No more absolute than Don’s.”

  “What do you mean? You said Don reached your house before eleven-thirty and…”

  “So he did. At least, that’s what he told me.”

  “But…”

  “Why should you expect me to have told Major Clifford the truth any more than the rest of you? Don told me he arrived at my house before eleven-thirty. He probably did. I don’t know because I wasn’t there.”