And Dangerous to Know

by Elizabeth Daly

  “Not a thing,” said Mr. Dunbar. “But he has what his mother invested here. Quite enough for him. He could really do anything if he liked.”

  “I like him as he is,” said Abigail.

  “There’s a word for him,” said Alice. “Faux bonhomme.”

  “That’s like you,” said Abigail without looking at her. “Just like you.”

  “I have always found him candid and sincere,” said Mr. Dunbar, glancing at his elder daughter in some surprise.

  “I suppose he is. Yes, I think he is.”

  “And his high spirits are certainly not put on,” said Mrs. Dunbar, rising.

  They all rose. “No, they’re not,” agreed Alice.

  “Then what did you mean?”

  “I mean they don’t mean anything.” Alice Dunbar dismissed him, and the subject, with coldness and finality. She followed the others out of the room, and began to climb the stairs.

  “Alice,” said her mother.

  “Yes?” She turned and looked over her shoulder, her hand on the balustrade.

  “Gail says she is going out at five, and your father will be at his office until all hours. Don’t plan to stay out yourself later than five, if you do go out again.”

  Alice smiled faintly. “I ought to be back by then; but if I don’t come, there are three servants.”

  “Your father doesn’t wish me to be alone in the house with the servants.”

  The sound of the piano came from the drawing-room. Alice said: “If Gail can find a party to go to at this time of the year, perhaps I could.”

  “Nonsense, your friends are not in town.”

  “There’s that.”

  She went on up the two flights of stairs; there was a pinched look about her face as she turned into her bedroom at the back of the house.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Bargains

  ALICE DUNBAR CLOSED the door behind her. She stood for a few moments leaning her shoulder against it, her hand still on the knob; she felt herself trembling a little, and waited as she was until she had controlled that absurd chattering of the teeth and had stiffened her knees. Then she turned and walked firmly across the room and sat down in front of the low dressing-table.

  It was a girl’s room, hardly changed from the day when she had been promoted to it from the nursery. Pink walls, white woodwork, iridescent pink tiles enclosing the gas log fire, maple furniture, Dresden ornaments on the mantelpiece. Pictures in maple frames—flower pieces. One of them was an early effort of her own, a watercolour and an awful daub, she knew very well. But it always got rehung after the walls were repainted.

  The curtains and the old-rose rug had been put away for the summer, and their absence gave the room a pleasantly bare look; as if it were ready for a change. But in the autumn the pink curtains would go up again, the imperishable rug go down.

  She sat looking at herself closely in the glass. Not bad features, she had never been able to see anything much wrong with them. Baffled by that problem as always, she turned her eyes away from herself and opened a drawer. She took out a large black handbag with a wide, stiff base, which seemed well-filled already. She transferred a few things to it from her other bag, the one she had carried that morning; a compact, a plain handkerchief, a purse with clean notes in it.

  She got up, took the small plain hat off the bed and put it on, pulled her gloves on, picked up the handbag, and stood looking about her; seeing nothing, merely thinking whether she had forgotten something. Then she went quietly out into the hall.

  The house was silent; all the way downstairs there was not a sound. Her mother would be in her room, her father reading in the upstairs sitting-room—unless he had gone to his office. Not that it mattered. She opened the front door and went out, slammed the great walnut-and-glass bulwark behind her, and descended the steps. Turning left, she walked to Fifth Avenue; turning left again, she went south for several blocks; then she crossed to the park side.

  She waited for a bus, boarded it, and settled herself next to a window as for a long ride. She got off at a busy corner in the midtown shopping district, and stood surprised at the crowds; Alice Dunbar had had a vague idea that there were very few people in New York in summer. The Friday afternoon bustle astonished her.

  She entered a department store, looking about her as if she was unfamiliar with it, but asking no questions. After a while she found a stocking counter, a table where boxes of stockings were displayed at a reduction. She pushed through the crowd, found a pair of stockings that would fit her, and got hold of a salesgirl. The things were an ugly light colour, and would not last long, but she saw many just like them on the legs that went past in droves up and down the aisles.

  A little farther on, at a cosmetics counter, she bought a compact of a lighter powder than her own carefully blended brand, and bright lipstick. The girl was too busy to help her, so she found rouge for herself, thrusting her arm between other women to get it. She held out her hand with the things in it, and they were snatched from her and wrapped. She had to wait for her change.

  She fought her way out of the store, crossed the avenue, and went into another bigger place. Here she found a counter where hats were being sold—mere strips of ribbon and cheap flowers. She bought one, and on her way out, a white muslin collar worked with machine-made embroidery. At a nearby ten cent store, she bought a paper shopping bag and put her parcels into it.

  On the avenue again, she crossed and took a bus downtown. She got out and walked to a huge emporium which she had often heard of but never seen. Here she acquired a pair of fabric gloves, thick and white; gilt earrings, fastened to a card; and a transparent red raincoat off a rack. Then she went up in the elevator to the ladies’ room.

  It was a big place with cross-aisles, and no attendant in sight. She shut herself into a cubicle, changed her stockings, changed her hat, put on the earrings, and, as well as she could without a mirror, adjusted the collar. Afterwards, at one of the long row of mirrors, she fastened the collar more firmly and began to make up. When she had finished she half smiled at the figure in the glass; by her own standards she looked like a clown, but no more clownish than the faces around her; and there was a certain haggard handsomeness about her that she had certainly never had before.

  She slipped on the mackintosh, leaving it open. A warm day to be wearing any coat, but perhaps the kind of suburbanite she had turned into would carry one from the end of some mysterious subway line, in case of a thunderstorm, and wear it for convenience.

  Would anybody recognize her now? Not her own parents. She had changed more than her appearance, she had changed her whole personality.

  Her handbag under her arm, her shopping bag in her white-gloved hand, she went down in the elevator and out into the street. She found an up-town subway station, and stood aghast; shoppers were already making for home. But she finally allowed herself to be swept down the stairs, dropped her dime in the turnstile, and pushed her way into the local that was standing there as if actually waiting for her. The doors closed her in, the lights of the station moved past, there was a roar, and they were in the dark.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Sheltered Life

  “OFF THE MAP,” said Macloud. “Right off the map.”

  It was Sunday, August the fourteenth. Gamadge and his old coloured servant Theodore were keeping house together for the few days that Gamadge had to be in New York on business, and Macloud the lawyer had invited himself to dinner. They sat in the library, facing each other in one of the long windows. There was coffee on a table between them, and they were smoking.

  “I’ve been in the country until this week,” said Gamadge. “I only know what I saw in the papers, and you know what it’s like among the bees and the flowers. You simply don’t get all the details. But it’s an extraordinary case. I wondered how deep you’d be in it.”

  “I’m a partner of old Angus Dunbar’s, as you know, and I was in town on the Woodworth Estate business; the aunt, you remember? She died the week before, and
Dunbar was sole executor. They called me up that night—the evening of the day the girl disappeared. I persuaded them to set the police on it and start the Bureau of Missing Persons going. Mrs. Dunbar, poor thing, would have liked to keep it quiet a little longer, till we’d tried the hospitals; but Dunbar saw my point and didn’t wait. She must have left the house soon after lunch, not much after two o’clock—a parcel came for her at a quarter past, something she bought that morning, and she was gone by that time. Mrs. Dunbar expected her back by five, but wasn’t really worried until dinner time. At eight o’clock Dunbar called me. Six hours.” Macloud shook his head. “Into space in six hours.”

  Gamadge said: “And now it’s twenty-three days. Well, if means of communication have improved, so have means of transportation.”

  “But nowadays you can do a lot of eliminating,” said Macloud. “And the search was nation-wide in twelve hours, and world-wide in not much more than twenty-four. Not a trace. The police say she must have gone voluntarily, but they usually do say that.”

  “Most people do.”

  “Give them an elopement every time. But she took nothing but what she stood up in, not even a top-coat; and she can’t have had much money with her—the remains of her July allowance. She didn’t spend much, her clothes went on her mother’s accounts.”

  Gamadge said: “I suppose there wasn’t anything the papers didn’t get?”

  “Gamadge, I swear there wasn’t a thing. I was on the spot, I talked to them all—the Dunbars, and the other daughter, Abigail Tanner. If you’re thinking of a kidnapping, that’s out; the family never got any ransom letter.”

  “But accidental death, or murder, does sometimes occur during a kidnapping—as we all know.”

  “Yes, and the ransom note comes, just the same.” Macloud shook his head again, frowning. “And it was early in the afternoon on a summer’s day. A shopping tour!”

  “I admit it doesn’t seem likely,” said Gamadge. Theodore came in, took away the coffee set, and placed a tray with whisky and glasses on the table. As Gamadge mixed the drinks, Macloud went on:

  “And a woman of that type wouldn’t deliberately walk into anything, Gamadge. I’ve met her, you know. Quiet, repressed girl, over thirty years old. Rather dull. I can hardly imagine an elopement, and I certainly can’t imagine a reason for one. Now suicide—”

  Gamadge handed Macloud his tumbler. “That likely?” he asked.

  “I shouldn’t say so, but what do we know about anybody’s mind? Even families don’t know. I suppose she can’t have had a particularly happy life.”

  “No?”

  “Well, there was a broken engagement ten years ago, and she doesn’t seem to have had much to do, outside the usual social round, except a little puttering with art. She designed Christmas cards and gift cards and—er—wastebaskets. That kind of thing. And for the last five years her mother’s been more or less laid up with high blood pressure. Abigail doesn’t live at home, so most of the responsibility fell on Alice. But a good many people have a worse time than that, and manage to stay alive. And the family say they saw no signs of depression. That last day at lunch—the maid says she was laughing; laughed at least twice during the meal. The cousin, Bruce Dunbar, was there. I talked to him, so did the police.”

  “I remember that there was a cousin there that day.”

  “Only for a few minutes. But he knew them all, and I thought he might have some ideas—as a bystander. He’s an amusing fellow; lives in Washington. He’s only been in this country a year since childhood—his father was attached to various embassies, and their headquarters were in or near Paris. He was a staff interpreter during the war, knows about six languages. He was meant for diplomacy himself, but he’s rather uprooted. It’s a family joke—he’s always inventing ridiculous jobs he says he’s got. Well, this Bruce Dunbar says Alice was just as usual that day while he was there, perhaps a little quieter than usual, that’s all. He says she was anything but an unstable type, so far as he can judge—in fact, the contrary.”

  Gamadge drank some whisky. He said: “I suppose her friends were investigated.”

  Macloud laughed shortly. “Even the ones that went to Europe. As for her men friends, poor devils—I saw most of them myself. She had two or three reliable old relics from her younger days; one of them is Jennings; remember Artie Jennings?”

  “Our classmate; yes, I know Artie.”

  “Is he a blameless type? They’re all like that. They were grilled, and so was the unfortunate ex-fiancé. He hasn’t seen her since the engagement was broken; he’s married and has five children and lives in Michigan. He couldn’t have been near New York, and it doesn’t look as if she’d gone to Michigan. The papers even got hold of a little art teacher that supervised Alice Dunbar’s art work. She was on vacation in Vermont, running an art class; but Alice Dunbar didn’t go to Woodstock, Vermont. As for her women friends, she had no intimates; just old schoolmates and so on that she went to bridge parties and theatre parties with, in a crowd.”

  Gamadge said: “Evidently not much contact with the underworld.”

  “No. And no marriage, either.”

  Gamadge raised his eyebrows.

  “Decide for yourself,” said Macloud, “whether she had a chance to establish residence anywhere outside our bailiwick; and here—they haven’t missed a thing, Gamadge. They’ve been at it more than three weeks.”

  “I don’t know what chance she had. You mean she led what’s known as the sheltered life?”

  Macloud leaned forward and pointed the stem of his pipe at Gamadge. “She literally hadn’t time to make any detours.”

  “You mean that?” Gamadge was mildly astonished.

  Macloud sat back. “Let me tell you.” He waited while Theodore replenished the ice bowl, and lighted lamps. Then he got his pipe going, and went on:

  “The Dunbars are conservative people. Abigail Tanner cut loose; she married Richfield Tanner, who was not conservative, but who was such a good match that the Dunbars gave their blessing. The marriage emancipated Abigail; she lives in a suite at the Stanton.”

  “The Stanton’s conservative enough,” remarked Gamadge.

  “Yes, but she’s there, and she lives her own life. She was with the family on Cape Cod, by the way, when old Mrs. Ames Woodworth died; came down with them for the funeral. That’s why she was with them at the house on the twenty-second of July.

  “Well, since Mrs. Dunbar’s semi-invalidism, Alice seems to have had no private life at all. Alice has been nurse-companion, housekeeper, secretary, and telephone girl. After breakfast, in town or country, she and her mother went for a drive and a shopping round; they’ve got an old chauffeur they swear by. Then lunch. Then some charity board, still with her mother, or perhaps some party; but the car would take her there and bring her home on the dot. She was put down at this art teacher’s studio on Thursdays, and picked up afterwards. She was never on the street after dark. If she was a minute late, there was hell to pay. Do you see what I mean?”

  “I’m beginning to get it. How about the chauffeur?”

  “Forget him. Abigail tells me he’s a grumpy old customer, very disobliging to the younger members of the family; he wouldn’t have taken them around the block without orders from higher up. I admit,” said Macloud, “that Alice was allowed out of an evening now and then with one of the boyfriends. Theatre, a concert. But in the family car.”

  “The Dunbar car?”

  “Certainly the Dunbar car.”

  “Don’t tell me things like that,” said Gamadge. “I can’t take them.”

  “My dear fellow, don’t you know what happens to people who drive around in taxis? They get into collisions, and if they’re not killed they have to appear in court as a witness to the accident. They catch diseases. Or they’re taken for a ride and robbed of their jewellery and knocked on the head.”

  “I see.”

  “And the boyfriends were not likely to conspire with Alice in sampling the gay life. I’ll give y
ou their names.”

  “Don’t; I’d rather not hear them.”

  “And Jennings wasn’t really Alice’s friend, he’s an old suitor of Abigail’s; faithful as a burr on a tweed coat. He took Alice out if Abigail couldn’t or wouldn’t go.” Macloud threw himself back in his chair. “Now tell me how Alice Dunbar managed to cook up a love affair in those circumstances; or get married, or even meet a stranger.”

  Gamadge said: “I’m coming around to the suicide theory.”

  “Well, as to the effect on her, Abigail says she didn’t seem to mind. Since the broken engagement—I’m afraid the man did walk out on her, though of course the family said it was mutual—since then she doesn’t seem to have shown much interest. But Abigail frankly admits that she and Alice were not intimate. They lived entirely separate lives, and Alice hardly went down to the Stanton to lunch or tea more than a couple of times a year. And she only went then because Mrs. Dunbar sent her—Mrs. Dunbar wouldn’t permit a feud or an estrangement between the daughters.”

  Gamadge pondered. “The unfortunate girl seems to have been out on her own that Friday she disappeared.”

  “Yes, the bars were down that week, they hadn’t the car. Routine shattered. But you don’t engineer a final getaway like hers in a few days.” He added: “A few hours out of a few days. She was on the job at home as usual.”

  “The sister was out that afternoon, wasn’t she?”

  “Yes, having cocktails with a friend of hers, a Mrs. Lynch, who was passing through town. You don’t think the police missed any tricks, do you?”

  “No, I suppose not. Bruce Dunbar, for instance—Alice knew him.”

  “She wasn’t at his place in Washington at six the next morning.” Macloud added sombrely: “Dead or alive. He was considered a very suspicious character, you know; lives alone at present in a little house in Washington, and has a garage. But why…” Macloud brooded. “Why! You find me a motive—for getting her out of the way, for killing her. Any motive at all. Money’s out—she had none of her own, and how could anybody cash in on it if she had a million?”