by Todd Downing
“And it was he, of course, who took my paper knife from my seat and hid it in the ladies’ lounge?”
“Yes, he wished to keep a weapon handy in case he needed it.” Rennert looked at her squarely. “Did it ever strike you as peculiar—the manner in which the murderer of Torner and of the porter was able to move about in the darkness?”
As if with an effort, her eyes centered on his face. “Yes,” she said, “I had wondered at his being able to conceal the needle in the hatbox so quickly while we were in the tunnel.”
“Exactly—and it is this matter of the darkness which still convinces me that Searcey was guilty.”
“I don’t understand.”
Rennert crushed the end of his cigarette into an empty plate. “It was only this morning that I could understand why the murderer was able to strike with such deadly exactness, seemingly unhampered by the obscurity. Searcey was an albino.”
“An albino?” faint surprise tinged her voice.
“Yes, his hair is dyed and the dark glasses hide his eyes. The lack of pigmentation of his skin isn’t noticed except on close inspection on account of the sunburn.”
“But I thought that albinos had weak eyesight?”
“In the daylight, yes, they are often shortsighted. But at night their sight is better than normal, owing to the greater amount of light reaching the retina. This explained why Searcey was able to move about in the darkness with so little difficulty. I once had a friend who was an albino—a boy back in college—and I remember the uncanny way in which he could find his way about the dormitory after the lights had been turned off. Searcey told a story of having resorted to a disguise in order to obtain a job down here. This may be true or not, but there’s no doubt that it also served to eliminate danger of detection at the border.”
Rennert paused. The train was creeping between walls of pink and cream and white plaster, rendered flamboyant by painted signs. Voices and automobile horns and the clang of street cars poured through the windows.
“I was positive that Searcey was guilty, so positive that I was going to have him arrested when this train pulled into the station at Mexico City. And now my whole theory has fallen down unless it can be proven that Searcey committed suicide rather than face arrest. That would be the logical conclusion because I was standing at the door and am positive that no one approached his table after he entered the diner. On the other hand, there’s nothing about his table, or his person or on the floor underneath to indicate how he did it. If it had been by means of a hypodermic needle the needle would have remained. If it had been poison there would be some trace of a container. His clothing and his luggage were searched yesterday and nothing of a lethal nature was found.” Rennert got up. “So, you see, the affair, instead of being ended, is only beginning.” He let some of the weariness which the prospect caused him creep into his voice.
Miss Talcott sat very still, her eyes fixed down the aisle and a vague half-smile upon her lips. Her hands rested upon the top of the table, as white as the cloth. Rennert noticed, with something of a start, that the ring which had adorned the third finger of her right hand was no longer there. (She had left the diner, his thoughts raced, and had gone back into the Pullman….)
“All that you need, then, to make the guilt of this certain is evidence of how he died?” she asked in a low far-away voice.
“Yes, otherwise it will be another murder.” (She had returned from the Pullman a few minutes later.)
“Here is the evidence.”
She had opened the fiber bag. She took out of it a small pasteboard box and laid it upon the table. She opened it and pushed it toward him.
Rennert took it in his hands. It was empty. Upon the label pasted over the top had been written the word “Veronal.” He had seen the box before, he recalled, when he had examined her bag.
He stared at it and then at her.
“The contents—all of them—were emptied into the glass of water which he drank,” she glanced over at the empty tumbler on the table opposite.
“Before you left the diner?” he asked, with the curious feeling that the voice which was speaking was not his own.
“Yes.”
Incredulity numbed him. “How did you know that he would sit at that table? That he would drink out of that glass?”
She stared at him oddly, then a convulsive movement seemed to spread over her face as if at the sudden snapping of a tautened wire. She leaned back in her chair and her laughter scaled for an instant into hysteria.
“You think that I meant the glass for him?” her voice was smothered. She leaned forward and covered her face with her hands.
She sat thus for a long time.
When she lowered her hands her face was composed again but retained its terrible lifeless look. She got unsteadily to her feet.
“I meant it for myself,” she stood in the aisle, swaying slightly back and forth. “I never thought of anyone sitting there while I went to the observation platform. I wanted to take one last look—”
Rennert started forward but she raised a hand to stop him. He could see the way in which she steeled herself to force the same pleasant smile to her lips.
She reached over and picked up the newspaper from the table in front of Searcey. She folded it with careful fingers and handed it to him, pointing to a paragraph halfway down the first column.
She stood and waited until he ran his eyes down it.
Rennert did not look up for a moment. When he did his eyes were clear with understanding as they rested upon her right hand.
“The ring?” his voice was slightly husky.
She closed her eyes and smiled happily. “The baby has probably lost it in the dust by now,” she said. “It doesn’t matter—everything else has gone too. He may have gotten a moment of happiness out of it.”
A long aching tremor passed through the train as it stopped.
Miss Talcott stood for an instant longer, as if in reverie, then opened her eyes. The smile died slowly from her face. She looked out the window and said in a matter-of-fact voice: “This is the Colonia Station. I must get my things together.”
She turned, without meeting his eyes again, and walked with stiff erect carriage from the car.
Rennert stood and watched her go. Then his eyes fell to the newspaper which he still held in his hands.
The paragraph which he reread was a brief dispatch from Coyoacan.
“The residents of Coyoacan were thrown into a state of panic yesterday noon by an explosion which occurred when a truck loaded with nitroglycerine ran into the wall of a private home in the suburbs. The driver of the truck was blown to bits and two passers-by were severely injured. The residence which was destroyed is believed to have been empty at the time since the owner, an American lady by the name of Talcott, is at present in the United States. It was known locally as La Casa de los Alamos, from the poplar trees which surrounded it, and its gardens of flowers were the most beautiful in the city.”
Originally published in 1935.
Cover design by Amanda Shaffer
ISBN: 978-1-5040-6157-5
This edition published in 2020 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
180 Maiden Lane
New York, NY 10038
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