“And Wrede said ‘get Mr. Markham.’” Vance drew deep on his cigarette. “Something dodging about in the recesses of Wrede’s brain, too, no doubt.… Well, any more?”
“Only that the body was bolted in Coe’s bedroom.”
“Bolted on the inside?”
“Exactly.”
“Amazin’!”
“Gamble brought up Coe’s breakfast at eight as usual, but received no answer to his knocking.…”
“So he peeped through the keyhole—yes, yes, butlers always do. Some day, Markham, I shall, in a moment of leisure, invent a keyhole that can’t be seen through by butlers. Have you ever stopped to think how much of the world’s disturbance is caused by butlers being able to see through keyholes?”
“No, Vance, I never have,” returned Markham wearily. “My brain is inadequate—I’ll leave that speculation to you.… Nevertheless, because of your dalliance in the matter of inventing opaque keyholes, Gamble saw Coe seated in his armchair, a revolver in his hand, and a bullet wound in his right temple.…”
“And, I’ll warrant, Gamble added that his master’s face was deathly pale—eh, what?”
“He did.”
“But what about Brisbane Coe? Why did Gamble call Wrede when Archer’s brother was in the house?”
“Brisbane Coe didn’t happen to be in the house. He’s at present in Chicago.”
“Ah! Most convenient.… So when Wrede arrived he advised Gamble to phone direct to you, knowing that you knew Coe. Is that it?”
“As far as I can make out.”
“And you, knowing that I had visited Coe on various occasions, thought you’d pick me up and make it a conclave of acquaintances.”
“Do you want to come?” demanded Markham, with a trace of anger.
“Oh, by all means,” Vance replied dulcetly. “But, really, y’ know, I can’t go in these togs.” He rose and started towards the bedroom. “I’ll hop into appropriate integuments.” As he reached the door he stopped. “And I’ll tell you why your invitation enthralls me. I had an appointment with Archer Coe for three this afternoon to look at a pair of peach-bloom vases fourteen inches high he had recently acquired. And, Markham, a collector who has just acquired a pair of peach-bloom vases of that size doesn’t commit suicide the next day.”
With this remark Vance disappeared, and Markham stood, his hands behind him, looking at the bedroom door with a deep frown. Presently he lighted a cigar and began pacing back and forth.
“I shouldn’t wonder if Vance were right,” he mumbled, as if to himself. “He’s put my subconscious thought into words.”
A few minutes later Vance emerged, dressed for the street.
“Awfully thoughtful of you, and all that, to pick me up,” he said, smiling jauntily at Markham. “There’s something positively fascinatin’ about the possibilities of this affair.… And by the by, Markham, it might be convenient to have the pugnacious Sergeant150 on hand.”
“So it might,” agreed Markham drily, putting on his hat. “Thanks for the suggestion. But I’ve already notified him. He’s on his way uptown now.”
Vance’s eyebrows went up whimsically.
“Oh, pardon!… Well, let’s grope our way hence.”
We entered Markham’s car, which was waiting outside, and were driven rapidly up Madison Avenue. We cut through Central Park to the West Side, came out at the 72nd-Street entrance, and went for a block against traffic on Central Park West. Turning into 71st Street, we drew up at No. 98.
The Coe house was an old brownstone mansion of double frontage occupying two city lots, built in a day when dignity and comfort were among the ideals of New York architects. The house was uniform with the other residences in the block, with the exception that most of the houses were single structures with only a twenty-foot frontage. The basements were three or four feet below the street level and opened on a sunken, paved areaway. Flights of stone stairs, with wide stone balustrades, led to the first floors, each house being entered through a conventional vestibule.
As we ascended the steps of the Coe house the door was opened for us before we had time to pull the old-fashioned brass bell-knob; and the flushed face of Gamble looked out at us cringingly. The butler made a series of suave bows as he pulled the heavy oak door ajar for us to enter.
“Thank you for coming, Mr. Markham.” His voice reeked of oily subservience. “It’s very terrible, sir. And I really didn’t know just what I should do—”
Markham brushed the man aside and we stepped into the dimly lighted hallway. A heavy deep-napped carpet covered the entire hall, and several dingy oil paintings made enormous black squares against the dark tapestry on the walls. Ahead of us a broad flight of carpeted stairs led upward into a vault of darkness. On the right hung a pair of deep maroon portières evidently veiling double sliding doors. To the left were other portières; but these were drawn back, and we could look through the open doors into a stuffy drawing-room, filled with all manner of heavy ancient furniture.
Two men came forward from this room to greet us. The one in advance I recognized immediately as Raymond Wrede. I had met him several times at the Coe home when I had accompanied Vance there to inspect some particular “find” in Chinese pottery or bronzes, which Archer Coe had made. Wrede, I knew, was a close friend of the Coe family, and particularly of Hilda Lake, Archer Coe’s niece. He was a studious man in his late thirties, slightly gray, with an ascetic, calm face of the chevaline type. He was mildly interested in Oriental ceramics—probably as a result of his long association with Coe—though his particular fancy was ancient oil lamps; and he owned a collection of rare specimens for which (I have been told) the Metropolitan Museum of Art had offered him a small fortune.
As he greeted us this morning, there was a look bordering on bewilderment in his wide-set, gray eyes.
He bowed formally to Markham, whom he knew slightly; nodded perfunctorily to me; and extended his hand to Vance. Then, as if suddenly remembering something, he turned toward the man behind him, and made a brief presentation, which in reality was an explanation.
“Signor Grassi.151…Mr. Grassi has been a house guest of Mr. Coe’s for several days. He represents an Italian museum of Oriental antiquities at Milan.”
Grassi bowed very low, but said nothing. He was considerably shorter than Wrede, slim, immaculately dressed, with shiny black hair brushed straight back from his forehead, and a complexion whose unusual pallor was accentuated by large luminous eyes. His features were regular, and his lips full and shapely. His manicured hands moved with an almost feline grace. My first impression was that he was effeminate, but before many days had passed I radically changed my opinion.
Markham wasted no time on ceremony. He turned abruptly to Gamble.
“Just what is the situation? A police sergeant and the Medical Examiner will be here any moment.”
“Only what I told you on the telephone, sir.” The man, beneath his obsequious manner, was patently frightened. “When I saw the master through the keyhole I knew he was dead—it was quite unnerving, sir—and my first impulse was to break in the door. But I thought it best to seek advice before taking such a responsibility. And, as Mr. Brisbane Coe was in Chicago, I phoned to Mr. Wrede and begged him to come over immediately. Mr. Wrede was good enough to come, and after looking at the master he suggested that I call you, sir, before doing anything else—”
“It was obvious”—Wrede took up the story—“that poor Coe was dead, and I thought it best to leave everything intact for the authorities. I didn’t want to insist on having the door broken in.”
Vance was watching the man closely.
“But what harm could that have done?” he asked mildly. “Since the door was bolted on the inside, suicide was rather plainly indicated—eh, what?”
“Perhaps you are right, Mr. Vance.” Wrede appeared ill at ease. “But—somehow—my instinct told me that it might be best—”
“Quite—quite.” Vance took out his cigarette-case. “You, too, were s
ceptical—despite the appearances.”
Wrede gave a start, and stared fixedly at Vance.
“Coe,” Vance continued, “wasn’t exactly the suicidal type—was he?”
“No-o.” Wrede’s eyes did not shift.
Vance lighted a cigarette.
“My own feeling is you acted quite wisely.”
“Come!” Markham turned toward the stairs and made a peremptory gesture to Gamble. “Lead the way.”
The butler turned and mounted the stairs. Markham, Vance and I followed, but Wrede and Grassi remained below. At the head of the stairs Gamble fumbled along the wall and pressed an electric switch-button. A light flooded the upper hallway. Directly ahead of us was a wide door, ivory enamelled. Gamble stood by the switch and, without a word, indicated the door.
Markham came forward, tried the knob, and shook it. Then he knelt down and looked through the keyhole. When he rose his face was grim.
“It looks as if our suspicions were unfounded,” he said in a low voice. “Coe is sitting in his chair, a black hole in his right temple, and his hand is still clutching a revolver. The electric lights are on.… Look, Vance.”
Vance was gazing at an etching on the wall at the head of the stairs.
“I’ll take your word for it, Markham,” he drawled. “Really, y’ know, it doesn’t sound like a pretty sight. And I’ll see it infinitely better when we’ve forced an entry.… I say! Here’s an early Marin. Rather sensitive. Same feeling for delicate composition we find in his later water-colors.…”
At this moment the front door bell rang violently, and Gamble hastened down the stairs. As he drew the door back, Sergeant Ernest Heath and Detective Hennessey burst into the lower hallway.
“This way, Sergeant,” Markham called.
Heath and Hennessey came noisily up the stairs.
“Good morning, sir.” The Sergeant waved a friendly hand to Markham. Then he cocked an eye at Vance. “I mighta known you’d be here. The world’s champeen trouble-shooter!” He grinned good-naturedly, and there was genuine affection in his tone.
“Come, Sergeant,” Markham ordered. “There’s a dead man in this room, and the door’s bolted on the inside. Break it open.”
Heath, without a word, hurled himself against the crosspiece of the door just above the knob, but without result. A second time his shoulder crashed against the crosspiece.
“Give me a hand, Hennessey,” he said. “That’s a bolt—no foolin’. Hard wood.”
The two men threw their combined weight against the door, and now there was a sound of tearing wood as the bolt’s screws were loosened.
During the process of battering in the door, Wrede and Grassi mounted the stairs, followed by Gamble, and stood directly behind Markham and Vance.
Two more terrific thrusts by Heath and Hennessey, and the heavy door swung inward, revealing the death chamber.
CHAPTER II
THE DEAD MAN
(Thursday, October 11; 9.15 a. m.)
The room, which was at the extreme rear of the house, was long and narrow, with windows on two sides. There was a bay window opposite the door, and a wide double window at the left, facing east. The dark green shades were all drawn, excluding the daylight. But the room was brilliantly lighted by an enormous crystal chandelier in the centre of the ceiling.
At the rear of the room stood an enormous canopied bed, which, I noticed, had not been slept in. The covers were turned back with meticulous precision. The bedroom, like the drawing-room, contained far too much furniture. On the right was a large embayed book-case filled with octavo and quarto volumes, and, facing the door was a mahogany kidney-shaped desk covered with books, pamphlets and papers—the desk of a man who spends many hours at literary labor. To the left of this desk, in the east wall, was a large fireplace with an Empire mantel of bronze and Venetian marble, supported by two ugly caryatides. Gas logs were in the grate. About the walls hung at least a dozen Chinese scroll paintings. Had there not been a bed and a dressing-table in the room, one would have taken it for a collector’s sanctum.
These details of the room, however, protruded themselves upon us later. What first focused our attention was the inert body of Archer Coe, with its quiet pallid face and the black grisly spot on the right temple. The body was slumped down in a velour upholstered armchair beside the desk. The head seemed to lie almost on the left shoulder, as if the impact of the bullet had forced it into an unnatural angle.
There was an expression of peace on the thin aquiline features of the dead man; and his eyes were closed as though in sleep. His right hand—the one nearest the fireplace—lay on the end of the desk clutching a carved, ivory-inlaid revolver of fairly large calibre. His left hand hung at his side over the tufted arm of the chair.
There was a straight Windsor chair behind the desk, and I could not help wondering why Coe had selected the armchair at the side of the desk, facing the door. Was it because he had considered it more comfortable for his last resting place in this life? The answer to this passing speculation of mine did not come for many hours; and when it did come, as a result of Vance’s deductions, it constituted one of the vital links in the evidential chain of this strange and perplexing case.
Coe’s body was clothed in a green silk-wool dressing-gown which came nearly to his ankles; but on his feet, which were extended straight in front of him, was a pair of high, heavy street shoes, laced and tied. Again a question flashed through my mind: Why did Coe not wear bedroom slippers with his dressing-gown? The answer to this question also was to prove a vital point in the solution of the tragedy.
Vance went immediately to the body, touched the dead man’s hand, and bent forward over the wound in the forehead. Then he walked back to the door with its hanging bolt, scrutinized it for a moment, ran his eye around the heavy oak framework and lintel, and turned slowly back to the room. A frown wrinkled his brow. Very deliberately he reached in his pocket and took out another cigarette. When he had lighted it, he strolled to the west wall of the room and stood gazing at a faded ninth-century Chinese painting of Ucchushma.152
In the meantime the rest of us had pressed round the body of Coe, and stood inspecting it in silence. Wrede and Grassi seemed appalled in the actual presence of death. Wrede spoke to Markham.
“I trust I did right in advising Gamble to call you before breaking in the door. I realize now that if there had remained a spark of life—”
“Oh, he was quite dead hours ago,” Vance interrupted, without turning from the painting. “Your decision has worked out perfectly.”
Markham swung about.
“What do you mean by that, Vance?”
“Merely that, if the door had been broken in, and the room overrun with solicitous friends, and the body handled for signs of life, and all the locked-in evidence probably destroyed, we would have had a deuced difficult time arrivin’ at any sensible solution of what really went on here last night.”
“Well, it’s pretty plain to me what went on here last night.” It was Heath who projected himself, a bit belligerently, into the talk. “This guy locked himself in, and blew his brains out. And even you, Mr. Vance, can’t make anything original outa that.”
Vance turned slowly and shook his head.
“Tut, tut, Sergeant,” he said pleasantly. “It’s not I who am going to spoil your simple and beautiful theory.”
“No?” Heath was still belligerent. “Then who is?”
“The corpse,” answered Vance mildly.
Before Heath could reply, Markham, who had been watching Vance closely, turned quickly to Wrede and Grassi.
“I will ask you gentlemen to wait downstairs.… Hennessey, please go to the drawing-room and see that these gentlemen do not leave it until I give them permission.… You understand,” he added to Wrede and Grassi, “that it will be necessary to question you about this affair after we have had the verdict of the Medical Examiner.”
Wrede showed his resentment at Markham’s peremptory manner; but Grassi, with a po
lite smile, merely bowed; and the two, followed by Hennessey, passed out of the room and down the stairs.
“And you,” said Markham to Gamble, “wait at the front door and bring Doctor Doremus here the moment he arrives.”
Gamble shot a haunted look at the body, and went out.
Markham closed the door, and then wheeled about, facing Vance, who now stood behind Coe’s desk gazing down moodily at the dead man’s hand clutching the revolver.
“What’s the meaning of all these mysterious innuendos?” he demanded testily.
“Not innuendos, Markham,” Vance returned quietly, keeping his eyes on Coe’s hand. “Merely speculations. I’m rather interested in certain aspects of this fascinatin’ crime.”
“Crime?” Markham gave a mirthless smile. “It was all very well for us to theorize before we got here—and I was inclined to agree with you that suicide seemed incompatible with Coe’s temperament—but facts, after all, form the only reasonable basis for a decision. And the facts here seem pretty clean-cut. That door was bolted on the inside; there’s no other means of entrance or exit to this room; Coe is sitting here with the lethal weapon—”
“Oh, call it a revolver,” interrupted Vance. “Silly phrase, ‘lethal weapon.’”
Markham snorted.
“Very well.… With a revolver in his hand, and a hole in his right temple. There are no signs of a struggle; the windows and shades are down, and the lights burning.… How, in Heaven’s name, could it have been anything but suicide?”
“I’m sure I don’t know.” Vance shrugged wearily. “But it wasn’t suicide—really, don’t y’ know.” He frowned again. “And that’s the weird part of it. Y’ see, Markham, it should have been suicide—and it wasn’t. There’s something diabolical—and humorous—about this case. Humorous in a grim, satirical sense. Some one miscalculated somewhere—the murderer was sitting in a game with the cards stacked against him.… Positively amazin’!”
“But the facts,” protested Markham.
The Philo Vance Megapack Page 139