At One-Thirty by Isabel Ostrander (best book series to read .txt) 📖

GAUNT encountered Katie, the housemaid, in the hall, and she guided him back to the library.

“Oh, sir,” she asked, at the door, “have you found out anything? Does the Inspector gentleman know what—what happened to Mr. Appleton?”

“Not yet,” he returned. “You will all know as soon as the family does.”

“Oh, thank you, sir!” she stammered.

“Will you send the butler—Dakers—to me, please?”

“Yes, sir.”

Dakers was tardy in coming, and in the meantime Gaunt turned over in his mind the result of his last interview. So young Mrs. Appleton, too, had been in that fatal room during the previous night 1 That telltale strand of hair had given her away, and her agitation, her terror, her palpable falsehood, had betrayed her no less than the last despairing cry he had overheard. It was incredible that she had fired the shot which killed her husband. Yet she was maddened b^ his abuse of her, and his open attention to another woman under her roof, and women in her condidcm were sometimes rendered temporarily abnormal mentally. Would that account for the pried-open window, the eflForts to make the crime seem the result of an ordinary burglary? Could that have been the work of the devoted sister? She had the strength of mind to conceive and carry it out. She was resolute, possessed of admirable self-control. Then, too, the obvious, sketchy way the ruse had been perpetrated hinted at feminine illogic. Yet it did not seem to be within the realm of possibility that young Mrs. Appleton could deliberately, or on insane impulse, have taken her husband’s life.

Dakers finally made his appearance. He was bearing a huge silver tray covered with a napkin, and he placed it on a low table before Gaunt, with a flourish.

“A bit of lunch, sir,” he remarked briskly. “Mrs. Appleton—Mrs. Finlay Appleton—sent it. She said you must be famished, sir. It’s past three.”

Gaunt suddenly became conscious that he was hungry, wolfishly hungry. He had had nothing that day save his early-morning coffee, and he ate heartily, with Dakers standing by.

The butler was a pompous, rotund, little man, with sharp, rat-like eyes in his smug face, and large, soft, white hands.

He stood regarding the detective with lofty con-, tempt while the latter uncovered the dishes upon the tray; but his expression changed somewhat when Gaunt, after passing his fingertips lightly over the silver tops of the salt-and pepper-shakers, selected the one with the smallest perforations, and poured a bit of its contents into his hand. He felt it delicately with his finger, and then turned to the waiting servant.

“This is white pepper,” he remarked, quietly. “I prefer the black. Will you bring me some, please?”

With prompt servility, not untinged with respectful awe, Dakers obeyed, and when Gaunt, satisfied, pushed away his cup and plate, and addressed him, he replied obsequiously.

“You are the butler? How old are you, Dakers?”

“Fifty-six, sir. I’ve been with the Appleton family for nine years. Before that I was with the Staceys and the Postleys—”

“That’s all right, Dakers. I don’t want your pedigree. I want to know what you can tell me about this affair.”

“I, sir? Nothing, sir,” the butler replied, with an air of injured innocence.

“What did you do last night, after you served dinner?”

“I attended to my usual duties, sir. Locked up the silver, and carried the decanter and ice and siphon up to the—the den,” he stammered over the word as the others had done, “for Mr. Appleton to use later, just as I always do. Then I went down to the servant’s diningroom—that’s in the front basement, sir—and stayed until the family had retired, and it was time to lock up the house. Then I went to bed.”

“You heard nothing during the night?”

“Nothing, sir, until Katie’s screams woke me. I thought first of burglars. I remembered the plate under my charge, and I hurried down.”

“And then what?”

“When I saw the poor master, sir, I—I don’t know what I did, I was that shocked. I went all to pieces, sir.”

“Who was there before you?”

“I—I hardly know, sir. Katie the housemaid, and Marie, and the cook, I think, and Mr. Yates’ man, James.”

“Then the family came?”

“Yes, sir. James tried to buck me up, and, when I’d pulled myself together a bit, Mrs. Finlay Appleton sent me out to notify the police. That’s all I know, sir.”

“After you attended to your usual duties, did you serve anything to the family during the evening?’

“Yes, sir. A grenadine lemonade to the ladies—Mrs. Finlay Appleton and Miss Carhart—and Scotch highballs to Judge Carhart and Mr. Appleton.”

‘Nothing to Mrs. Garret Appleton?”

‘No, sir. She had retired when I served them.”

‘Did you come upstairs again before locking up?”

“Yes, sir. To open the door for Judge Carhart and Miss Carhart when they left. After that, I locked the house.”

“You did not admit Miss Ellerslie?”

“No; she had her keys. She expected to be out until very late. It was Mr. Appleton’s orders, sir. I never waited up for Mr. Yates.”

“And then you went directly to bed?”

“Yes, sir.”

“That will do, Dakers, thank you. Ask Marie to come here, please.”

“Very good, sir.” Dakers picked up his tray, and departed.

Had the man really “something up his sleeve,” as Inspector Hanrahan had suspected? He had seemed guilelessly prompt in his replies; but his servility was misleading, and the detective did not like his manner of licking his lips, like a cat. The man’s manner suggested slyness; but Gaunt did not credit him with enough intelligence to conceal ^ny important evidence, should he possess it.

Marie heralded her entrance with a quick tapping of pointed finger-nails upon the door, and exuded a slight odor of the delicate perfume, when she approached, that Gaunt had previously noticed in the presence of the elder Mrs. Appleton. Evidently, the maid had taken a secret dip into her mistress’ scent bottle, in honor of this interview—a touch of coquetry inherent in those of her nationality. She was a sallow, angular, sharp-featured woman of middle age, with bold, black eyes, and full, scarlet lips, and she flashed a respectful, ingratiating smile at him, with a gleam of her even, white teeth, forgetting for the moment that it was wasted.

“I am here, m’sieu. I am Marie.”

“Will you tell me, Marie, what happened when you rushed to the den this morning, in response to the housemaid’s cries?”

“Weeth plaisir, m^sieu. I was ze firs’ to respon’. Katee was still shr-rieking, and the poor M’sieu Appleton—but zat you know. I scream once, me, also, an’ zen I try to quiet Katee. Zen ze cook, she have come, and Dakairs and James, an’ zen Mees Ellerslie. Aftair zat, arrive Madame Appleton and la petite madame, an’, at ze last, M’sieu Yates.”

“Marie, do you remember exactly what happened when Mrs. Finlay Appleton turned from her son’s body, and saw her younger son standing in the doorway? Did you hear the words she said to him?”

“Yes, m’sieu, She pointed her hand at him, like zis—oh, I forget! Pardon, m’sieu!—and she say, ‘Cain!’ Joost zat one leetle word, ‘Cain!’”

“Ah!” the detective permitted the involuntary ejaculation of satisfaction to escape him. Then he added: “And Mr. Yates Appleton—what did he reply?”

“He say, ‘Mon Dieu!’—no, in Engleesh—‘My God! Not zat—not zat!’ An’ he seenk down on his knees, zere een ze doorway, an’ put hees hands to hees face, an’ sob, joost like a leetle chir, an’ ze tears tr-reeckle down between hees fingairs.”

“Thank you, Marie. That is all I wanted to know. Er—you heard nothing during the night?”

“Nosing, m’sieu, Onlee—” The woman hesitated.

“Only what?” the detective asked, sharply.

“Mees Ellerslie, m’sieu. She have ze room directly ondaimeath mine, an’ she walk, walk, most of ze night; but nearly ze morning have arrive all ees quiet, an’ I sleep. Zat ees all, I have hear. No report of a pistol.”

“Very well, Marie. That will do. But, before you go, I should like to know if your mistress, Mrs. Appleton, permits you to take her perfume for your personal use. “

“Her pairfume? I—I do not comprehend, m^sieu! I do not touch ze pairfume of madame. “

“You have a touch of it upon you now. I should advise you to be more careful, if you wish to retain your place.”

“Ah, m’sieuj eet was an accident—ze bottle teeped, an’ I ‘ave speel a few drops. Eeet ees nosing. M’sieu, I pray, weel say no word of eet to madame!” The brazen flare in her voice was replaced by an anxious note.

“Very well, Mary; but be careful. Please, send Dakers to me again.”

When the butler appeared, Gaunt sent him to ask Miss Ellerslie to come to him for a moment, and then sat quietly waiting, with a half-smile upon his lips. “Cain!^’ Mrs. Appleton had brand’ ed her youngest son. She believed him to be the midnight visitant, the assassin of his brother. She herself had given no credence to the clumsy evidences of burglary; although she had had no time or opportunity to examine them, and although she had so stoutly asserted her belief in them to the detective,