‘Better call a carpenter, I’d say. And I think the lady should be sent for—and—’
‘No, wait a few moments for that. But I’ll get a carpenter.’
Stone stepped into the other rooms and found Potter just cradling the telephone. He bade the man call again for a carpenter of skill and advised that he bring a helper.
It seemed but a few moments before the place was filled with people. The engineer took one look and rushed back to telephone that the steam pressure be turned off all over the house.
The manager, a big man named Latimer, took in the situation at a glance.
‘How long has he been in there?’ he cried. ‘Potter, call Doctor Kelsey from six-o-three. Lord knows how we may find the poor fellow!’
‘Not alive,’ Stone said, sadly. ‘There’s no other way to get in, Mr Latimer? We must break in?’
‘Yes, yes! Go to it, men. Boss the job, Mike. Break in, or cut out the lock, as you think best, but hustle!’
An electric drill soon cut out the knob and lock, and at a push the door opened about half way.
The men sprang away from the flood of steam that issued, and waiting impatiently, tried to peer in through the clouds. But having been turned off in the basement, the supply soon ceased, and the vapour began to disappear.
Burnet was the first man in, and Stone quickly followed.
Waving back the others and holding a Turkish towel to his face, Stone saw what had kept the door from opening fully. The nude body of Guy Balfour lay on the floor, dead from the effects of the escaping steam.
‘Get the doctor in here,’ Burnet said, ‘we can’t wait for Jamison now.’
Stone held the door, allowing Doctor Kelsey to enter the steam room. It was still too warm to be pleasant, but the danger was past, and better visibility obtained.
The physician knelt by the body, and shook his head. ‘Nothing to be done,’ he said. ‘Poor chap, he was trying to reach the door sill, in hope of getting air to breathe. He was suffocated, you see, and died before he was greatly affected by the burning steam. Give a hand, Burnet, we’ll lay him on the couch for further examination.’
‘Want any of these workmen any more?’ Latimer asked.
‘Let the carpenters go,’ Burnet directed, ‘but hold the plumber. We may want him.’
The carpenters, cautioned to say nothing about the matter, were dismissed, and then Burnet said Manton must be called.
‘Of course,’ returned the manager, who was nearly beside himself with dismay and anxiety. ‘Such a thing to happen in this house! The head and front of all fine apartment houses in the city!’
‘Captain Burnet,’ Latimer went on, pleadingly, ‘when the Inspector comes, can’t you and he get the body away at once? You know what these high-class tenants are. And this thing is an awful blow. I hope you can take him to the morgue right away. I want to do anything I can for Mrs Balfour, of course, but this—coming right after her husband’s—er—sudden death is too much! He, thank goodness, died away from home, but this horror right here on the premises is not good for the house—no, not at all.’
‘I’m sorry, Mr Latimer,’ Burnet told him, ‘but there is a police routine that must be carried out. The Medical Examiner must come here and give his permission before the body can be removed. Also, the Inspector will have something to say; I can only promise that after police regulations are carried out and Mrs Balfour’s wishes consulted, I will do all I can to have your request granted. But, unless your workmen chatter, the story need not get out until much has been accomplished. Now, someone must tell Inspector Manton, also Mrs Balfour and Mr Ramsay, what has happened. Will you do this and send them all up here? Doctor Kelsey must remain until the Examiner comes. Sorry, Doctor, but it won’t be long.’
Latimer hurried away, glad to get matters started, and running down the curving staircase he flung open the door of the room where the Inspector was still waiting the return of his associate.
‘There’s another murder,’ the manager announced explosively. Then as he saw Alli pale and tremble, he turned his back on her and whispered to Manton, ‘Guy Balfour is dead—you tell her and look after things, I must get to my office.’
He fairly ran from the room and all but slammed the door behind him.
Ramsay took the situation in hand. ‘Latimer is a very excitable person,’ he said. ‘Suppose I go and see what is the matter?’
‘We’ll both go,’ Manton said. ‘Please remain here, Mrs Balfour. I will send for you.’
‘Latimer told me young Balfour is dead,’ the Inspector said to Ramsay as the two went upstairs.
‘Did I do it?’ asked Ramsay, sarcastically.
‘You’re quite likely to be suspected, I imagine,’ returned Manton.
‘Don’t let your imagination run away with you,’ Ramsay advised, and no further word was spoken.
Burnet met them in the bedroom, gave a brief recital of what had happened and led the way to the bathrooms.
Stone watched Ramsay’s face as he took in the scene and heard the particulars, but, as the investigator had anticipated, there was no definite expression of emotion on that immobile countenance.
Ramsay was exceedingly angry at the Inspector’s attitude toward him—and if he were innocent he had a right to be angry. But was he innocent?
He showed a decent amount of regret and sorrow at the passing of young Balfour, but made no observation nor asked any question regarding the strange circumstances of his death.
Feeling no vital interest in the conversation going on, Stone wandered off by himself. He paused in the dressing room, which was between the bedroom and the main bathroom.
He saw only the traces of the most natural actions on the part of Guy Balfour. The suit that he had worn was hung in a clothes closet. His underwear was tossed on a chair and his shoes and socks were untidily thrown on the floor. The bed was turned down, but had not been used. In the bathroom Stone had noticed a flung bathrobe and a pair of kicked-off slippers, for Guy had stepped into the steam room unclothed.
In the bathroom, too, Stone saw the lock that had been taken from the door. This he took with him and went on to the small room that had been Philip Balfour’s office, which his son had planned to turn into a bar.
Stone’s attention was attracted to the lock he was holding.
As far as he could see the lock was unimpaired. It was the type of lock often used in apartment houses, the kind that has in the edge of the door a small catch or bolt which pushed in will lock the door, and another, just below it, when pushed in will leave the door unlocked.
But, and this is what engrossed Stone’s mechanical brain, it was positively certain that the way that lock was arranged, when the latch was off the door could be opened from either side, but when it was on the door could be opened from the outside only.
Absurd, Stone thought to himself. No sense to it at all. But I must be mistaken about it, for Philip Balfour lived here three years, presumably using that lock, and he must have turned it on or off at will. I’ll see what the police mechanicians make of that.
Also, he thought, he would see where this new tragedy was leading them.
Ramsay was the pet suspect of the police. Could he have managed this horrible crime if he had so chosen?
Stone had to admit that he could have done so. He didn’t for a moment believe Ramsay did do it, but it was within the possibilities.
Indeed, who else could have managed it? Ramsay, living in the apartment, having lived there a year or more, had ample opportunity to fix up the lock of a door to suit himself.
But the steam business—what about that?
Stone had been tacitly taking for granted that that was an accident. He argued that Guy, unaccustomed to such elaborate plumbing fixtures, might easily have turned on the steam at a greater pressure than he meant to and had been unable to turn it off again. A further examination of the pipes would settle that question, but now it must wait.
Stone thought further. The doctor had said G
uy was suffocated. Quite apparently he had fallen to the floor, and had crawled toward the door either in hope of getting air or to call for assistance.
So he was conscious up to then, anyhow. The steam suffocated him and he died, then and there, unable to call out or to reach the door. But where—and this is what baffled Stone—where was any hint or sign of foul play?
Why did the manager immediately lament the direful stigma of murder on his house? Why did Burnet assume murder? Why did he, himself, Fleming Stone, feel sure it was a murder?
But that must be settled later. He was basing his present thoughts on the crime, if it was a crime—on the murder, if it was a murder.
And he would go on, for a few moments, investigating the circumstances.
If a murder, then a perpetrator. Who? The police would surely say Ramsay. But was it necessarily Ramsay? There was still Gill to suspect. Could Gill get in the house and get into Guy’s rooms and fix up that steam gauge? Oh, ridiculous! Of course he couldn’t!
Then—and Stone knew he now had to face it—then how about Alli?
The word was out, in his mind, and he felt as if he had blazoned it to a thrill-hungry crowd.
He had to keep on. Alli? Why, yes, many people would say she had motive, all would say she had opportunity, and if the means, including as they seemed to, mechanical knowledge—well, Ramsay was known to be a handy man at mending books, why not at a bit of simple plumbing?
It was out, and Stone faced it squarely. He didn’t believe it at all, but he had to know if such a theory would hold water.
Still and all, did Alli have such a strong motive to be rid of Guy? Her husband was a different consideration, he stood in the way of her happiness with Ramsay. But Guy didn’t do that, unless—oh, that trite old reason—unless Guy knew some secret detrimental to Ramsay or, even, to Alli.
Now he was started, Stone pursued his thoughts further, knowing he could have no peace till he did so.
It was all such an easy solution; such a plausible, such a likely solution. The two young people in love; the much older man, so careless of the situation that he scoffed at Ramsay’s confession. The ready-made opportunity—all three under the one roof—oh, he’d considered all that before. Say it was true, say Alli had killed her husband with or without Ramsay’s assistance. Then say Guy had discovered it; that meant that only Guy’s death could save the guilty pair.
Stone rose, shook himself and walked to the window.
I won’t have it, he told himself, emphatically. I discard all such deductions or suppositions or beliefs. Whoever committed that murder or those murders, it was not Mrs Balfour and I do not think it was Keith Ramsay, either.
My God! He suddenly remembered: today, Alli was to see about that ransom letter! I wonder what the poor girl is doing in there with the police! I’m going to see.
Stone went back through the rooms and found the two policemen, Alli and Ramsay in the dressing room.
‘Have you reached any conclusion?’ he spoke to Manton, but he sat down beside Alli.
‘Not a definite one,’ the Inspector said, ‘but Jamison will be here any minute now and he may be of some help.’
‘Young Balfour’s death is a murder,’ Burnet declared, shortly. ‘I have no doubts as to that.’
‘Why are you so sure?’ Stone inquired, urbanely.
‘Because it couldn’t be anything else. Philip Balfour used all these dinky gadgets—these gauges and stopcocks and pressure meters for three years and they never bothered him. Along comes his son, who is nobody’s fool, and he falls dead in forty-eight hours or so. What’s the answer? Somebody preferred his absence to his presence. That’s all.’
‘No, Captain,’ Stone said, ‘that isn’t all.’
CHAPTER XI
ALLI RESPONDS TO THE LETTER
‘AS I see it,’ Stone went on, ‘the first thing to do is to find out for certain whether this is accident or murder.’
It was afternoon now and they were again downstairs, presumably undergoing an inquisition by the police, but really deferring to Fleming Stone’s leadership.
The Medical Examiner had been and gone. He had merely corroborated the statement of Doctor Kelsey that Guy Balfour had been suffocated by the escaping steam and had died a swift and probably painless death. He had given permission to remove the body and it had been sent to the mortuary.
A buffet luncheon had been arranged in the dining room, of which both the policemen had partaken separately.
Alli Balfour refused food with a mere shake of her head and sat like one benumbed, gazing out of a window and saying no word.
Keith Ramsay sat beside her, also silent, but alert and watchful.
They were in the library, Alli having chosen to go there, and they were grouped round a table on which were a few notes or lists belonging to the two policemen.
Stone had a few notes on a card in his pocket, but he did not display them.
‘I have spoken with the plumber and the electrician,’ he said, ‘but they seem to have no definite or personal knowledge of the fixtures in Mr Balfour’s steam room. They are new men, I think, and had nothing to do with the installation of the special plumbing Mr Balfour had put in. But I am even more curious about the lock on the steam room door.’
‘There’s no lock on the steam room door,’ said Alli, still looking and speaking like one in a daze. ‘He said no one could come in except his valet, and he never wanted to lock him out.’
‘There isn’t a lock on the door exactly,’ Stone explained, ‘but there is a catch which may be pushed in, that prevents the door being opened from the inside.’
‘Oh, yes, I remember now,’ and Alli suddenly became alert. ‘When the steam room was installed—you know Mr Balfour had all those bathrooms built to his own order—the knob or the scutcheon or whatever you call it was of a very elaborate type, and somehow the workmen put it on wrong, and the result was you could open the steam room door from the outside but not from the inside, unless the catch was off. Then it would open from either side. Mr Balfour always intended to have it fixed, but he procrastinated and after a time, he wouldn’t bother about it, for, as he said, the catch was never turned on, it was always off, and so the door would open either way. Now, in some way that catch must have got turned on, probably Guy did it himself, not knowing about it. I never thought of it, of course, and Victor, Mr Balfour’s valet, was here only one night while Guy was in those rooms—that very first night, you know, and he left the next day. He never liked Guy. I don’t know why, I’m sure.’
‘If the valet didn’t like young Mr Balfour, might not he have turned the catch to make trouble for him? Not thinking, of course, of tragedy.’ The Inspector asked this question, but Alli made no reply. She just sat and stared, seemingly at nothing.
Keith Ramsay answered.
‘I’m sure Victor never did that. I’ve known him more than a year, and he is an honest, reliable chap, devoted to his master and careful about his work. He had no real quarrel with Guy, but he was a superstitious sort, and he was terribly upset by Mr Balfour’s death, more because of the mystery and gruesomeness of it than because of personal sorrow. He came to me and told me he must leave at once, he was afraid to go into Mr Balfour’s rooms any more. I urged him to wait a few days, but he said no, and he gave me an address which would always find him and went off early that next morning.’
Manton gave the speaker a glance of disapproval.
‘And you didn’t care to report that episode to me? Seems a bit strange. Were you a special friend of his?’
‘No,’ Ramsay spoke coolly, ‘I have no interest in the man. Nor had I any thought of his implication in the matter of Mr Philip Balfour’s death, nor do I now think of him as connected in any way with the death of Mr Guy Balfour.’
‘He must be thought of, and seriously,’ Manton said. ‘He was the only one who would have had opportunity to adjust the latch of the steam room door so that it would make anyone shut in there a prisoner.’
�
�No,’ Ramsay said; ‘several of the other servants could have done that. The chambermaids, the cleaning women and the man who takes care of all the tiled floors and the bathroom fixtures. Any of these could have fixed that catch had they wanted to. It was probably done by Guy himself, unconsciously or unthinkingly. He may have known about it but forgotten it. I’m sure his death was an accident.’
‘I’m not sure of that,’ Fleming Stone said. ‘I am here to investigate the death of Mr Balfour, Senior, and I think that death and the death of his son were brought about by the same hand. It seems to me that Guy Balfour after a shower bath went into the steam room, closed the door, not thinking of lock or catch, and turned on the steam. Unfamiliar with the gauges and dials of which there is a bewildering array, he turned on what he thought was right, but which was not right, because, to my way of thinking, the murderer had so manipulated the pressure gauge that it gave higher pressure than was indicated by the dial. Then, as I see it, Guy became more and more frightened and confused and, beginning to lose his breathing power, he fell to the floor and endeavoured to reach the door either to open it or to get air from under it. This may not have been his exact procedure but it must necessarily be just about what he did. Now, it may be all accidental or it may be the premeditated work of a heartless fiend. If the latter, we must discover his identity; if the former, we have to prove it.’
‘I suppose you realize, Mr Stone,’ the Inspector spoke slowly, ‘that all you have just said points unmistakably to Mrs Balfour and Mr Ramsay who are here with us?’
‘If it points to them, it points mistakenly,’ and Stone began to show a spirit of contradiction. ‘If you suspect them, Inspector, please say so openly and not make use of my words.’
‘Very well, then, I do suspect them, either separately or in collusion. I came over here today expecting to arrest Mr Ramsay, but the excitement of Mr Guy Balfour’s death interrupted all else. We have now to discover the truth about that as well as the truth about the death of his father. I have grave suspicions of Mr Ramsay’s guilt and I have fears that Mrs Balfour is also implicated. But owing to this new tragedy, I shall postpone any action until some further investigation. In the meantime these two are forbidden to leave this house without my consent and are under strict surveillance.’
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