The Philo Vance Megapack

by S. S. Van Dine

  Heath, who had been following all the proceedings closely, now projected himself into the conversation.

  “I’m not so sure about things around here being normal, sir.” Though deferential, his tone was vigorous. “I’m for going ahead with this case. Some mighty queer things have happened tonight, and I don’t like ’em.”

  Vance smiled appreciatively at the Sergeant.

  “Stout fella!” He glanced toward Markham. “Another half-hour and we’ll stagger home.”

  Markham gave in ungraciously.

  “What more do you want to do here tonight?”

  Vance lighted another cigarette.

  “I could bear to commune with Greeff.… Suppose you tell the butler to fetch him, Sergeant.”

  A few minutes later Alex Greeff was ushered into the drawing-room by Trainor. He was a large, powerfully built man, with a ruddy bulldog type of face—wide-spaced eyes, a short, thick nose, heavy lips, and a strong, square chin. He was slightly bald, and there were cushions of gray hair over his small, close-set ears. He was wearing a conventional dinner suit, but there were certain touches of vulgar elegance in his attire. The satin lapels of his coat were highly peaked. There were two diamond studs in his shirt-bosom. Across his satin waistcoat was draped a platinum chain set with large pearls. His tie, instead of being solid black, had white pin-stripes running through it; and his wing collar seemed too high for his stocky neck.

  He took a few steps toward us with his hands in his pockets, planted himself firmly, and glowered at us angrily.

  “I understand one of you gentlemen is the District Attorney—” he began aggressively.

  “Oh, quite.” Vance indicated Markham with a careless movement of the hand.

  Greeff now centred his bellicose attention on Markham.

  “Well, perhaps you can tell me, sir,” he growled, “why I am being held a virtual prisoner in this house. This man”—indicating Heath—“ordered me to remain in my room until further notice, and refused to let me go home. What is the meaning of such high-handed tactics?”

  “A tragedy has taken place here tonight, Mr. Greeff—” Markham began, but he was interrupted by the other.

  “Suppose an accident has happened, is that any reason why I should be held a prisoner without due process of law?”

  “There are certain phases of the case,” Markham told him, “that we are looking into, and it was to facilitate the investigation that Sergeant Heath requested all the witnesses to remain here until we could question them.”

  “Well, go ahead and question me.” Greeff seemed a little mollified, and his tone had lost some of its belligerency.

  Vance moved forward.

  “Sit down and have a smoke, Mr. Greeff,” he suggested pleasantly. “We sha’n’t keep you long.”

  Greeff hesitated, looked at Vance suspiciously; then shrugged, and drew up a chair. Vance waited until the man had fitted a cigarette into a long jewelled holder, and then asked:

  “Did you notice—or sense—anything peculiar about Montague’s disappearance in the pool tonight?”

  “Peculiar?” Greeff looked up slowly, and his eyes narrowed to shrewd slits. “So that’s the angle, is it? Well, I’m not saying there wasn’t something peculiar about it, now that you mention it; but I’m damned if I can tell you what it was.”

  “That seems to be the general impression,” Vance returned; “but I was hoping you might be more lucid on the point than the others have been.”

  “What’s there to be lucid about?” Greeff seemed to be avoiding the issue. “I suppose it’s reasonable enough when a chap like Montague—who’s always been riding for a fall—gets what’s coming to him. But somehow, when it happens so neatly and at the right time, we’re apt to think it’s peculiar.”

  “Yes, yes, of course. But it wasn’t the logical eventualities I was referring to.” Vance’s voice held a tinge of annoyance. “I was referring to the fact that the conditions in the house here during the last two days constituted a perfect atmosphere for a type of tragedy quite removed from the merely accidental.”

  “You’re right about the atmosphere.” Greeff spoke harshly. “There was murder in the air—if that’s what you mean. And if Montague had passed out by any other means except drowning, I’d say his death warranted a pretty thorough investigation. But he wasn’t poisoned; he wasn’t accidentally shot; he didn’t get vertigo and fall out of a window; and he didn’t tumble down-stairs and break his neck. He simply dived off a spring-board, with every one looking on.”

  “That’s what makes it so difficult, don’t y’ know.… I understand that you and Mr. Leland and young Tatum dived in after the johnny.”

  “It was the least we could do,” Greeff came back pugnaciously; “though I’m frank to admit it was more or less a gesture on my part, as I can’t swim much, and if I had run into him he’d probably have dragged me down with him. Still, you hate to see any fellow, however rotten, pass out of this world in front of your eyes without making some attempt to save him.”

  “Quite noble of you, I’m sure,” Vance murmured indifferently. “By the by, I understand Montague was engaged to Miss Stamm.”

  Greeff nodded and drew on his cigarette.

  “I never knew why it was, except that good women always fall for that type of man,” he commented, with a philosophic air. “But I think she would have broken the engagement sooner or later.”

  “Would you mind my asking what your own feelings toward Miss Stamm are?”

  Greeff opened his eyes in surprise, then laughed noisily.

  “I see what you’re getting at. But you can’t make me out the villain of the piece. I like Bernice—everybody who knows her likes her. But as for my being sentimental about her: I’m too old and wise for that. My feeling for her has always been a fatherly one. She often comes to me for advice when Stamm’s too deep in his cups. And I give her good advice—yes, by Gad! I told her only yesterday that she was making a fool of herself to think of marrying Montague.”

  “How did she take this advice, Mr. Greeff?”

  “The way all women take advice—haughtily and contemptuously. No woman ever wants advice. Even when they ask for it, they’re merely looking for agreement with what they’ve already decided to do.”

  Vance changed the subject.

  “Just what do you think happened to Montague tonight?”

  Greeff spread his hands vaguely.

  “Bumped his head on the bottom—or got a cramp. What else could have happened to him?”

  “I haven’t the vaguest notion,” Vance admitted blandly. “But the episode is teeming with possibilities. I was hopin’, don’t y’ know, that you might help to lead us out of our darkness.” He spoke lightly, but his eyes were fixed with cold steadiness on the man opposite.

  Greeff returned the gaze for several moments in silence, and his ruddy face tightened into a mask.

  “I understand perfectly,” he enunciated at length, in a chill, even tone. “But my advice to you, my friend, is to forget it. Montague had it coming to him, and he got it. It was an accident that fitted in with everybody’s wishes. You can play with the idea till doomsday, but you’ll end up with the fact I’m telling you now: Montague was accidentally drowned.”

  Vance smiled cynically.

  “My word! Are you intimatin’ that Montague’s death is that liter’ry pet of the armchair criminologists—the perfect crime?”

  Greeff moved forward in his chair and set his jaw.

  “I’m not intimating anything, my friend. I’m merely telling you.”

  “Really, y’ know, we’re dashed grateful.” Vance crushed out his cigarette. “Anyway, I think we’ll do a bit of pryin’ around.…”

  At this moment there came an interruption. We heard what sounded like a scuffle on the stairs, and there came to us the angry, shrill tones of Stamm’s voice:

  “Let go of my arm. I know what I’m doing.”

  And then Stamm jerked the drawing-room portières aside and glared
at us. Behind him, fuming and remonstrative, stood Doctor Holliday. Stamm was clad in his pajamas, and his hair was dishevelled. It was obvious that he had just risen from bed. He fixed his watery eyes on Greeff with angry apprehension.

  “What are you telling these policemen?” he demanded, bracing himself against the door jamb.

  “My dear Rudolf,” Greeff protested ingratiatingly, rising from his chair. “I’m telling them nothing. What is there to tell?”

  “I don’t trust you,” Stamm retorted. “You’re trying to make trouble. You’re always trying to make trouble here. You’ve tried to turn Bernice against me, and now, I’ll warrant, you’re trying to turn these policemen against me.” His eyes glared, and he had begun to tremble. “I know what you’re after—money! But you’re not going to get it. You think that if you talk enough you can blackmail me.…” His voice sank almost to a whisper, and his words become incoherent.

  Doctor Holliday took him gently by the arm and tried to lead him from the room, but Stamm, with an exhausting effort, threw him off and moved unsteadily forward.

  Greeff had stood calmly during this tirade, looking at his accuser with an expression of commiseration and pity.

  “You’re making a great mistake, old friend,” he said in a quiet voice. “You’re not yourself tonight. Tomorrow you’ll realize the injustice of your words, just as you’ll realize that I would never betray you.”

  “Oh, you wouldn’t, eh?” Much of the anger had gone out of Stamm’s attitude, but he still seemed to be dominated by the idea of Greeff’s persecution. “I suppose you haven’t been telling these people”—he jerked his head toward us—“what I said about Montague—”

  Greeff raised his hand in protest and was about to reply, but Stamm went on hurriedly:

  “Well, suppose I did say it! I had more right to say it than any one else. And as far as that goes, you’ve said worse things. You hated him more than I did.” Stamm cackled unpleasantly. “And I know why. You haven’t pulled the wool over my eyes about your feelings for Bernice.” He raised his arm and wagged a quivering finger at Greeff. “If anybody murdered Montague, it was you!”

  Exhausted by his effort, he sank into a chair and began to shake as if with palsy.

  Vance stepped quickly to the stricken man.

  “I think a grave mistake has been made here tonight, Mr. Stamm,” he said in a kindly but determined voice. “Mr. Greeff has reported nothing to us that you have said. No remark he has made to us could possibly be construed as disloyalty to you. I’m afraid you’re a bit overwrought.”

  Stamm looked up blearily, and Greeff went to his side, placing a hand on his shoulder.

  “Come, old friend,” he said, “you need rest.”

  Stamm hesitated. A weary sob shook his body and he permitted Greeff and Doctor Holliday to lift him from the chair and lead him to the door.

  “That will be all tonight, Mr. Greeff,” Vance said. “But we will have to ask you to remain here till tomorrow.”

  Greeff turned his head and nodded over his shoulder.

  “Oh, that’s all right.” And he and the doctor piloted Stamm across the hallway toward the stairs.

  A moment later the front door-bell rang. Trainor admitted the nurse for whom Doctor Holliday had telephoned and led her immediately up-stairs.

  Vance turned from the door, where he had been standing, and came back into the room, halting before Leland who had remained passive throughout the strange scene between Stamm and Greeff.

  “Have you, by any chance,” he asked, “any comments to make on the little contretemps we have just witnessed?”

  Leland frowned and inspected the bowl of his pipe.

  “No-o,” he replied, after a pause, “except that it is obvious Stamm is frightfully on edge and in a state of shock after his excessive drinking tonight.… And it might be, of course,” he supplemented, “that in the back of his mind there has been a suspicion of Greeff in connection with financial matters, which came to the surface in his weakened condition.”

  “That sounds reasonable,” Vance mused. “But why should Stamm mention the word murder?”

  “He is probably excited and suspicious because of the presence of you gentlemen here,” Leland suggested. “Not having been a witness to the tragedy, he is ignorant of all the details.”

  Vance did not reply. Instead he walked to the mantelpiece and inspected a carved gold clock which stood there. He ran his fingers over the incised scroll-work for a moment, and then turned slowly. His face was serious, and his eyes were looking past us.

  “I think that will be all for tonight,” he said in a flat, far-away tone. “Thank you for your help, Mr. Leland. But we must ask you too to remain here till tomorrow. We will be here again in the morning.”

  Leland bowed and, without a word, went softly from the room.

  When he had gone, Markham rose.

  “So you’re coming here again in the morning?”

  “Yes, old dear.” Vance’s manner had suddenly changed. “And so are you, don’t y’ know. You owe it to your constituency. It’s a most absorbin’ case. And I’d wager one of my Cezanne water-colors that when Montague’s body is found, the Medical Examiner’s report will be anything but what you expect.”

  Markham’s eyelids fluttered, and he looked searchingly at Vance.

  “You think you have learned something that would point to an explanation other than accidental death?”

  “Oh, I’ve learned an amazin’ amount,” was all that Vance would vouchsafe. And Markham knew him well enough not to push the matter further at that time.

  CHAPTER VII

  THE BOTTOM OF THE POOL

  (Sunday, August 12; 9.30 a. m.)

  At half-past nine the following day Vance drove to Markham’s quarters to take him back to the old Stamm estate in Inwood. On the way home the night before, Markham had protested mildly against continuing the case before the Medical Examiner had made his report; but his arguments were of no avail. So determined was Vance to return to the house next day, that Markham was impressed. His long association with Vance had taught him that Vance never made such demands without good reason.

  Vance possessed what is commonly called an intuitive mind, but it was, in fact, a coldly logical one, and his decisions, which often seemed intuitive, were in reality based on his profound knowledge of the intricacies and subtleties of human nature. In the early stages of any investigation he was always reluctant to tell Markham all that he suspected: he preferred to wait until he had the facts in hand. Markham, understanding this trait in him, abided by his unexplained decisions; and these decisions had rarely, to my knowledge, proved incorrect, founded, as they were, on definite indications which had not been apparent to the rest of us. It was because of Markham’s past experiences with Vance that he had grudgingly, but none the less definitely, agreed to accompany him to the scene of the tragedy the following morning.

  Before we left the Stamm house the night before, there had been a brief consultation with Heath, and a course of action had been mapped out under Vance’s direction. Every one in the house was to remain indoors; but no other restrictions were to be placed upon their actions. Vance had insisted that no one be allowed to walk through the grounds of the estate until he himself had made an examination of them; and he was particularly insistent that every means of access to the pool be kept entirely free of people until he had completed his inspection. He was most interested, he said, in the small patch of low ground north of the filter, where Heath and Hennessey had already looked for footprints.

  Doctor Holliday was to be permitted to come and go as he chose, but Vance suggested that the nurse whom the doctor had called in be confined to the house, like the others, until such time as she was given permission to depart. Trainor was ordered to instruct the other servants—of whom there were only two, a cook and a maid—that they were to remain indoors until further notice.

  Vance also suggested that the Sergeant place several of his men around the house at vant
age points where they could see that all orders were carried out by the guests and members of the household. The Sergeant was to arrange for a small corps of men to report at the estate early the following morning to close the gates above the filter and open the lock in the dam, in order that the pool might be drained.

  “And you’d better see that they come down the stream from the East Road, Sergeant,” Vance advised, “so there won’t be any new footprints round the pool.”

  Heath was placed in complete charge of the case by Markham, who promised to get the official verification of the assignment from Commanding Officer Moran of the Detective Bureau.

  Heath decided to remain at the house that night. I had never seen him in so eager a frame of mind. He admitted frankly that he could see no logic in the situation; but, with a stubbornness which verged on fanaticism, he maintained that he knew something was vitally wrong.

  I was also somewhat astonished at Vance’s intense interest in the case. Heretofore he had taken Markham’s criminal investigations with a certain nonchalance. But there was no indifference in his attitude in the present instance. That Montague’s disappearance held a fascination for him was evident. This was owing, no doubt, to the fact that he had seen, or sensed, certain elements in the affair not apparent to the rest of us. That his attitude was justified is a matter of public record, for the sinister horror of Montague’s death became a national sensation; and Markham, with that generosity so characteristic of him, was the first to admit that, if it had not been for Vance’s persistence that first night, one of the shrewdest and most resourceful murderers of modern times would have escaped justice.

  Although it was long past three in the morning when we arrived home, Vance seemed loath to go to bed. He sat down at the piano and played that melancholy yet sublime and passionate third movement from Beethoven’s Sonata, Opus 106; and I knew that not only was he troubled, but that some deep unresolved intellectual problem had taken possession of his mind. When he had come to the final major chord he swung round on the piano bench.