The bizarre murders, p.68
The Bizarre Murders, page 68
“God in heaven,” said Mrs. Constable queerly. “Who are you? Where did you get them? He had them. I can’t—”
“Listen to me,” said the vague voice. “And never mind who I am or where I got them. The point is they’re in my possession. You’d like to have them, wouldn’t you?”
“Yes. Yes,” whispered Mrs. Constable.
“Well, you can. For a price.”
The woman was silent for so long that Ellery wondered what had happened to her. But then she replied; in a tone so weary and broken and hopeless that Ellery’s heart contracted in a spasm of pity. “I can’t…pay your price.”
The blackmailer hesitated, as if surprised. “What do you mean—you can’t pay my price? If you’ve any idea that I’m bluffing, Mrs. Constable, that I haven’t got those films and letters—”
“I suppose you have,” muttered the stout woman. “They aren’t here. So some one must have got them—”
“You bet! I have. Maybe you’re afraid I won’t give up the stuff when you pay me? Listen, Mrs. Constable—”
Unusual blackmailer! thought Ellery grimly. It was the first time he had ever heard one stoop to argument. Could this be a false trail after all?
“He got thousands out of me,” croaked Mrs. Constable. “Thousands. All I had. Each time he promised me…But he didn’t. He didn’t! He fooled me. He was a cheat as well as a—a…”
“Not me,” said the muffled voice eagerly. “I’m on the level in this thing. I want my cut and I won’t bother you any more. I know just how you feel. You can take my word I’ll turn the stuff over on payment. Just you send me five thousand dollars by the route I’ll tell you, and you’ll. have them back in the next mail.”
“Five thousand dollars!” Mrs. Constable laughed—such an eerie laugh that Ellery’s scalp prickled. “Is that all? I haven’t got five thousand cents. He milked me dry, damn him. I have no money, do you hear? Not a cent!”
“Oh, so that’s your angle, is it?” snarled the anonymous caller. “Pleading poverty! He got enough out of you. You’re a rich woman, Mrs. Constable. You’re not going to get out of this so easily, I tell you! I want that five thousand and you’re going to give it to me, or—”
“Please,” Ellery heard the woman whisper in agony.
“—or I’ll make you wish you had! What’s the matter with your husband? He made a fortune only two years ago. Can’t you get it from him?”
“No!” she shouted suddenly. “No! I’ll never ask him!” Her voice broke. “Please, don’t you understand? I’ve been married so long. I—I am really an old woman. I have grown children, nice children. He—my husband would die if he knew. He’s a very sick man. He’s always trusted me and we’ve always been happy together. I’d rather—die myself than tell him!”
“Mrs. Constable,” said the blackmailer with a note of desperation in his voice, “you evidently don’t realize what you’re up against. I’ll do anything, I tell you! This pig-headedness won’t get you anywhere. I’ll get that money out of you if I have to go to your husband myself!”
“You won’t find him. You don’t know where he is,” said Mrs. Constable hoarsely.
“I’ll go to your children!”
“It won’t do you any good. Neither of them has any money in their own right. Their money is tied up.”
“All right, damn you!” Even through the muffled tones Ellery detected the sheer, lashing fury. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you. I’ll teach you a lesson. You think I’m fooling around. That photo, the film, the statement, and the letters will be in the hands of Inspector Moley so damn’ quick—”
“No, please, please!” cried Mrs. Constable. “Don’t! I tell you I’m helpless, haven’t got the money—”
“Then get it!”
“But I can’t, I tell you,” sobbed the woman. “I’ve no one to go to that I’d—Oh, don’t you understand? Can’t you get money from some one else? I’ve paid for my sin—oh, I’ve paid a thousand times with—with tears, with blood, with all the money I had. How can you be so heartless, so—so…”
“Maybe,” screamed the voice, “you’ll wish you’d scraped up that five thousand when Inspector Moley gets that stuff and turns it over to the newspapers! You damned fat, stupid cow!” And there was the crash of a slammed receiver.
Ellery’s fingers raced over the board, working feverishly. He barely made out Mrs. Constable’s whimper of pure despair as he broke the connection and dialed the operator.
“Operator! Trace that call. Just hung up. This is the police—the Godfrey house. Quick!”
He waited, chewing his fingernails. “Fat stupid cow.” The other things, the intimate knowledge apparently of Marco’s affairs. This was some one who knew more than mere chance possession of incriminating photographs and documents might indicate. Some one vitally involved. He felt sure of that. What he had learned crystallized his suspicions. When the time came his judgment would be vindicated. Meanwhile, if he could speed matters along…
“I’m sorry, sir,” sang the operator. “The call was made from a dial telephone. I have no way of tracing it. Thank you,” and there was a little click in Ellery’s ear.
Ellery sat back, frowning, and lit a cigaret. He sat there for some time in silence. Then he called Inspector Moley’s office in Poinsett. But Moley’s deskman informed him that the Inspector was out; and after leaving word for Moley to call him back Ellery put down the headset and wandered off.
In the main hall a thought struck him, for he ground out his cigaret in a cast-iron pot filled with sand and made his way upstairs to the door of Mrs. Constable’s room. He shamelessly put his ear against the center panel and listened. It seemed to him that the sound he heard was the choked result of sobbing.
He rapped. The sobbing ceased. Then Mrs. Constable’s voice said strangely: “Who is it?”
“May I see you a moment, Mrs. Constable?” called Ellery in a friendly tone.
Silence. Then: “Is that Mr. Queen?”
“Yes, it is.”
“No,” she said in the same strange voice. “No, I don’t want to talk to you, Mr. Queen. I—I don’t feel well. Please go away. Some other time, perhaps.”
“But I wanted to tell you—”
“Please, Mr. Queen. I’m really not at all well.”
Ellery stared at the door, shrugged, said: “Quite all right. I’m sorry,” and strolled off.
He went to his room, changed into bathing-trunks, slipped into canvas shoes and robe, and went down to the Cove. He would have at least one swim in the Atlantic Ocean, he thought grimly as he nodded to the trooper on guard at the terrace, before this accursed case was polished off. He felt sure that there was nothing to be gained by haunting the switchboard any longer that day. This was to be a lesson…to the others. He would hear from Inspector Moley soon enough.
The tide was fairly high. He dropped his things on the sand, plunged into the water, and with powerful strokes headed out to sea.
He opened his eyes to a blunt touch on his shoulder. Inspector Moley was leaning over him. On the Inspector’s massive red features there was an expression so peculiar that Ellery snapped into wakefulness and sat up in the sand abruptly. The sun was very low on the horizon.
“This,” said Inspector Moley, “is a hell of a time to sleep.”
“What time is it?” Ellery shivered; the breeze against his naked chest was chilly.
“After seven.”
“Hmm. I had a long swim and when I got back to the Cove I couldn’t resist this soft white sand. What’s happened, Inspector? Your face is eloquent. I left a message with your deskman, you know, to have you call me back. That was early this afternoon. Haven’t you been to your office since two-thirty?”
Moley compressed his lips and turned his head in an exploratory way. But the terrace was deserted except for the trooper on duty, and the rims of the cliffs on both sides were blank and stark against the sky. He squatted down in the sand beside Ellery and dug into his pocket, which bulged.
“Take a look,” he said quietly, “at this.” His hand emerged with a flat small packet.
Ellery rubbed his nose with the back of his hand, sighed: “So soon?” and took the packet.
“Eh?”
“I beg your pardon, Inspector. I was thinking aloud.”
It had been done up in plain brown wrapping-paper and tied with cheap, rather soiled white string. Inspector Moley’s name and the address of his Poinsett office had been block-lettered on one face of the packet in watery blue ink that had a suspiciously post-office look. Ellery removed paper and string; out tumbled a thin bundle of envelopes, a small photograph, and a tiny reel of what appeared to be motion-picture film. He opened one of the letters, glanced briefly at the signature, inspected the photograph with a flickering annoyance, unwound a few feet of the film and held the celluloid strip up to the light…Then he restored everything to its original state and returned the packet to Moley.
“Well?” growled Moley after a moment. “You don’t seem very surprised. Aren’t you even interested?”
“To number one—I’m not. To number two—profoundly. Have you a cigaret? I’ve forgotten mine.” Ellery nodded as the Inspector held a match for him. “I was going to tell you about this, Inspector, when I called.”
Moley spluttered: “You knew?”
Patiently Ellery recited the details of the conversation he had overheard between Mrs. Constable and the mysterious caller. Moley listened with a thoughtful frown. “Hmm,” he said when Ellery had finished. “So this bird, whoever it is, made good his threat to send the stuff to me. But tell me, Mr. Queen.” He stared directly into Ellery’s eyes. “How’d you know there was going to be a call?”
“I didn’t know; it seemed, however, a likely happenstance. Let’s defer discussion of the actual thought-process; I’ll tell you about it some day. Now suppose you tell me what’s happened.”
Moley balanced the packet in his paw. “I was out checking up on what looked like a hot trail to this Pitts woman. Took me to Maartens. But it fizzled out, and when I got back to my office my man told me you’d called. I was about to call you back—this was more than an hour ago—when the messenger came.”
“Messenger?”
“Yeah. Boy about nineteen. Came in an old Ford he told me he’d picked up for twenty bucks last year. Just a kid. We’ve checked up on him and he’s absolutely all right.”
“How did he happen to have the packet?”
“He’s a Maartens boy. Well-known in town; lives with a widowed mother. We worked fast by ’phone with the Maartens police. But the kid’s story checked with his mother’s. Around three o’clock or so this afternoon the boy and his mother were in the house when they heard a thud on their front porch. They went out and found this package. Attached to it was a note in a faked handwriting and a ten-dollar bill. The note simply said the package was to be delivered to me in Poinsett immediately. And the boy took out his old Ford and delivered it. They needed that ten bucks.”
“And they didn’t see the person who threw the package on their porch?”
“By the time they got out he was gone.”
“Too bad.” Ellery smoked thoughtfully, eyes on the purpling sea.
“And that’s not the worst of it,” muttered Moley, scooping a fistful of sand from the beach and letting the grains cascade through his big fingers. “The minute I got these things and had a look at ’em I called up Mrs. Constable—”
“You what?” Ellery came to life with a start, the cigaret slipping from his fingers.
“What else could I do? I didn’t know that you’d listened in and heard the whole story. I wanted information. When I spoke to her I thought she sounded funny. I told her—”
“Don’t tell me,” groaned Ellery, “you said anything about having received these letters and things!”
“Well…” The Inspector looked miserable. “I suppose I did sort of hint at it. And, since I expected to be busy at the office keeping in touch with the Maartens police on the trail of the one who’d sent this stuff, I asked her to jump into her car and come down to my office for a chat—told one of my boys over the ’phone it would be all right. She—well, she said she would, right away. Then I got busy on the ’phone and by the time I woke up almost an hour had passed. And the fat dame hadn’t come. She should have been there by that time. Doesn’t take more than a half-hour slow driving to get to Poinsett from here. I called one of my men here and he said she hadn’t left the estate. So—well, here I am.” A note of desperation crept into his voice, born of conscience. “I’m going to find out what the hell changed her mind.”
Ellery blinked at the sea, his eyes stormy; and then he grabbed his robe and canvas shoes and sprang to his feet. “You’ve messed this business horribly, Inspector,” he snapped, struggling into his shoes and robe. “Come along!”
Inspector Moley rose docilely, brushed himself off, and followed like a lamb.
They found Jorum transplanting a bed of flowers in the patio. “Have you seen Mrs. Constable?” panted Ellery. He was breathing hard after their swift climb from the terrace.
“Th’ fat one?” The old man shook his head. “Nope.” He continued stolidly with his work without looking up.
They made directly for Mrs. Constable’s room. There was no answer to Ellery’s knock and he pushed the door open and they went in. It was untidy—bedclothes crushed and wrinkled, a dressing-gown lying in a heap on the floor, an ashtray on the night-table-overflowing with acrid butts…Silently they looked at each other and went out.
“Where the deuce is she?” growled Moley, refusing to meet Ellery’s eyes.
“Where the deuce is who?” asked a mild baritone, and they turned to find Judge Macklin in the middle of the corridor, opposite the staircase.
“Mrs. Constable! Have you seen her?” asked Ellery sharply.
“Certainly. Is anything wrong?”
“I trust not. Where?”
The old gentleman looked at them. “On the other side of the Cape. Just a few minutes ago. I’d been over there on the links, you know, strolling about and enjoying myself. I saw her sitting on the very edge of the cliff—feet hanging over—staring at the sea. North side. I walked over that way and said something to her. Poor soul, she looked desperately lonely. She didn’t even turn her head; just as if she hadn’t heard me. Kept staring down at the water. So I left her to her thoughts and—”
But Ellery was already racing down the corridor toward the stairs.
They sped up the steep steps cut out of the naked rock wall, Ellery in the van, Inspector Moley puffing behind them, and old Judge Macklin laboring with stern features in the rear. The north segment of Spanish Cape presented the same flat surface, but here the trees and shrubbery were much sparser than on the southern side and the ground had a finished, smoothly grassed appearance that betrayed the workmanship of man. Judge Macklin pointed straight ahead of him as they reached the top of the stairs. They ran that way, thrashed through a clump of trees, burst into the open again—and stopped.
There was no one there.
“Strange,” said the Judge. “Perhaps she’s wandered off—”
“Separate,” said Ellery quickly. “We’ve got to find her.”
“But—”
“Do as I say!”
There were violet streaks in the sky; it was growing darker.
They beat their way separately through the middle of the northern segment, which was its most thickly wooded part. Occasionally one of them darted out into the open, looked about, and plunged back into the woods again.
Rosa Godfrey trudged seaward from the links, her golf-bag hanging from one shoulder. She was tired, and her hair was blowing about in a careless way.
She paused suddenly. It seemed to her that she had caught a glimpse of something glimmer-white in the distance, near the edge of the cliff. Without thinking she turned away and made for the shelter of the copse nearby. She felt like being alone. There was something about the evening sky and the approaching wrinkles of the sea that gave her a distaste for human company.
Earle Cort wandered over the sixth tee, his eyes roving.
Mrs. Constable sat on the grassy edge of the cliff, her thick legs hanging over space. Her head was low, her chin almost on her breast. She gazed with glassy eyes at what lay below her.
After a while she placed both her pudgy hands on the very edge and pushed toward the sea, wriggling backward. Her rump scraped against the rubble in the roots of the grass; she almost tumbled in a sidewise fall. Then she drew her legs up and on the very verge of the abyss got to her feet.
Her eyes still looked out to sea.
She stood facing the ruffled water, the tips of her slippers an inch past the edge. The skirt of her gown whipped about in the wind. She did not move, did not stir. Only her gown fluttered about in the wind. She stood black and still against the sky.
Mr. Ellery Queen slipped out of the woods for the tenth time. His eyes were weary with strained looking. And his heart was beginning to feel heavier, with the leaden feeling that seems to drag it into the pit of the stomach. He quickened his pace.
One moment Mrs. Constable was standing on the edge of the cliff, staring out to sea. The next she was gone.
It was difficult to say what had happened. She had flung up her arms and something hoarse and elemental had pushed past the clogged muscles in her throat and split the evening air. Then she was gone without a trace, as if the earth itself had swallowed her.
In the half-light of dusk there was something magical about it. Magical and dreadful. If the sun had come speeding up again from below the horizon and the sea had vanished in a twinkling it could not have been more dreadful. To vanish like a puff of smoke…
