Episode of the Wandering Knife

by Rinehart, Mary Roberts;

  “Well, what do you make of this? Still holding out for the girl?”

  He did not wait for a reply. He stalked back to the kitchen and she followed him. The two men from the cruise car and Rogers were standing near the kitchen door. They stood back to let him survey the body, but he did nothing more than that.

  “The Half-Truck will be here soon,” he said. “Just hold everything until it comes.”

  The Half-Truck was the humorous name given by the force to the Police Mobile Laboratory. It carried everything from pulmotors to a sound-amplifying device for bombs, and its crew consisted of print experts, several technicians, a photographer, a chemist and a variety of tools. Fuller was proud of it, but now he wanted Hilda’s story. She told it to him in the library.

  She gave him only the bare facts as she knew them, and he listened attentively.

  “All right,” he said when she finished. “You don’t claim the girl was sleepwalking this time, do you?”

  “I don’t claim anything.”

  “You saw the kitchen table. One of them came down to get something to eat, and the other followed. They quarreled, and perhaps the aunt got scared. She picked up a knife, so the girl took it from her and then got the milk bottle. That’s the way it looks from here, anyhow.”

  “What would take Alice Rowland downstairs? She was barely able to walk.”

  “Yet she did go down. She’s still down. Don’t forget that, Miss Pinkerton.”

  Angry color rose in Hilda’s cheeks.

  “So Tony killed her!” she said. “What about the other people in this house? What about that open kitchen door, and the man who attacked me last night?”

  He was not obliged to answer. The Half-Truck arrived just then with its crew, and Fuller followed it back. But Hilda did not go with him. She knew the ritual too well, and there was nothing she could do anyhow. When some time later he came forward again he found her sitting on the stairs, her head buried in her hands and her whole small body dejected and hopeless. She looked up at him as though she did not see him.

  “What took Tony downstairs?” she said, her voice unsteady. “And why did Alice follow her? If I knew that …”

  “It might have been the other way.”

  She shook her head.

  “Alice was still far from well. She’d never have gone down alone anyhow, with me there. She followed Tony. I’m sure of that. If she thought she was sleepwalking—”

  “Cutting bread and butter in her sleep! And I suppose she’s still asleep when she picks up a milk bottle and brains her aunt.”

  Hilda got up slowly. She felt drained of all vitality.

  “It’s just possible she’ll say exactly that,” she said drearily.

  Fuller’s look at her was fond, but exasperated.

  “Why?” he said. “Don’t act the sphinx with me. You’re no good at it. Why would she say that?”

  “She probably thinks she has to,” she said.

  XI

  She followed him stiffly up the stairs to the girl’s room. The doctor was in the bathroom preparing a hypodermic, while Aggie hovered over the bed. Tony’s hand had been neatly dressed by that time. There was no sign of Nina, but both servants were in the room. Fuller cleared it of everyone except Wynant.

  Tony lay with her eyes closed, and he went to the bed and stood looking down at her.

  “I want you to tell me what happened downstairs tonight,” he said sternly. “Everything. Why you were there. How you cut your hand. And what happened to your aunt.”

  “I don’t know,” she said weakly, not opening her eyes. “I went down to get something to eat and she followed me. I went into the pantry for something. I was still there when I heard—when I heard her fall.” She shuddered. “I found her—like that.”

  “How did you cut your hand?”

  She raised her hand and looked at the bandage, as though she had not seen it before.

  “I don’t know,” she whispered. “Maybe the knife slipped.”

  “Did your aunt have the knife? And did you try to take it from her?”

  “No,” she said, and began to cry slow tears which rolled unnoticed down her white cheeks. “She never touched it. I was fond of her. We didn’t quarrel, if that’s what you mean. She was good to me.”

  “Were you in the habit of going down for a night supper?”

  She shook her head, without replying.

  “You saw nothing? Or nobody?”

  But here the doctor intervened. Tony was badly shocked. The questions could wait. Just now she needed rest and quiet. And Fuller too realized that the girl had said all she intended to. After Dr. Wynant had given the hypodermic both men left, and Hilda, alone with her at last, went quietly to the bed. Tony lay very still with her eyes closed, but Hilda knew she was conscious. There was no softness in her voice now.

  “Was Herbert in the kitchen tonight?” she asked. “You’d better talk, Tony. I’m warning you.”

  “Herbert!” Tony gasped, trying to sit up. “What do you know about him? He hasn’t anything to do with all this. He wasn’t even here. He …” She gulped and stopped. Hilda’s face was stony.

  “I think he was here tonight,” she said gravely. “I think he came here tonight to hide from the police, and that you were getting food for him. That’s when your Aunt Alice discovered him, wasn’t it?” And when Tony said nothing: “He’s been blackmailing you, hasn’t he? And today your aunt got a letter from Honolulu. She had it in her hand when she followed you to the kitchen.”

  “Oh God!” Tony lay back in her bed, shivering. “Please don’t tell anyone about it. It—it hasn’t anything to do with what happened.”

  “What became of it, Tony?” Hilda said, her voice still hard. “I want it. Where have you hidden it?”

  “I haven’t got it. I never did have it.”

  “But you know what was in it, don’t you?”

  Tony however only shook her head and closed her eyes. She refused to speak again, and Hilda stood looking down at her, divided between anger and pity. Any psychiatrist would say she was a mental case, she thought. But she did not believe it.

  It was imperative, she realized, to see Nina. But the Nina she found in the bed across the hall was a wild-eyed, hysterical creature, entirely beyond reason, who dared her to think Tony had done anything wrong and tried to order her out of the house. She was not prepared however for Nina’s rage when she told her she had been working for the police, and still was.

  “So that’s it!” she said furiously. “You’ve been here snooping all the time, and my poor Tony …”

  Hilda listened as long as she could. When Nina stopped she spoke quietly.

  “I would like to see that arm of yours, Mrs. Rowland,” she said. “I assure you it’s necessary. If you have been wounded and infection has set in, it needs attention.”

  Whatever she had expected it was not what followed. For Nina almost immediately went into a fit of screaming hysteria, laughing and crying wildly. It was necessary for Dr. Wynant to give her a hypodermic before she quieted, and after it had taken effect he followed Hilda out of the room.

  “I don’t know whether you are staying here or not, Miss Adams,” he said. “I do advise you to keep away from her. Let the maids look after her. She’s pretty badly shocked. What set her off this time?”

  “I asked to see her arm.”

  “Still harping on that?” he said indulgently. “Well, keep away from her anyhow. It’s her arm.”

  Tony lay in a drugged stupor the rest of the night, while the usual reporters crowded the grounds and used various devices to get into the house, while late as it was a crowd gathered on the pavement and in the alley back of the house, to be held in bounds by the police, while flashbulbs burst, measurements were taken, the bottle fragments carefully gathered up and while at last Alice Rowland left her home for the last time.

  Hilda, not needed elsewhere, spent the time in a search for the letter which she was confident Alice had carried downstairs with her.
It was not in Tony’s room, and if it had been burned the kitchen stove showed no sign of it. The kitchen was quiet again, and by daylight only the smear on the floor remained to remind her of the tragedy. The police and the crowds had gone, the Half-Truck had departed, the grounds had been examined, and only a policeman outside, a guard in the lower hall and Fuller drinking coffee in the dining room with Dr. Wynant remained.

  They paid no attention to her when she joined them. The doctor put down his cup. He looked tired and unhappy.

  “I can’t believe it,” he said. “I like the girl. Always have. It was a fine family—until lately, at least.”

  “When did you notice a change?”

  “Only recently. Mind you, I’m not saying Tony’s abnormal even now. She’s not been herself since she broke her engagement, of course. But a thing like this …!”

  Fuller lit a cigarette and surveyed the doctor over it.

  “How do you get around the other facts? She did try to shoot her mother, didn’t she? And there was the automobile accident later. Why all that? Does she hate her?”

  The doctor looked shocked.

  “Hate her!” he said. “Hate Nina! She is and has been devoted to her. Perhaps like most girls at her age she cared most for her father, but as for hate—that’s absurd.”

  “Then you do think she was walking in her sleep when she fired the gun?” Fuller persisted.

  “Something of the sort.”

  “It wasn’t possible Alice did it, I suppose? And that last night was the result of Tony’s knowing it?”

  “I’d consider it highly unlikely,” the doctor said gravely. “Alice Rowland had her faults. But she took in her brother’s family and looked after them. Not too amiably, perhaps. As I say, she was pretty difficult at times. But she did it as well as she could, I imagine.”

  Fuller looked thoughtful.

  “The boys think they have a case against Tony,” he said. “That story of hers won’t wash. They got her prints on the knife and the table, both bloody. If they find any on the pieces of the milk bottle and they turn out to be hers we’ll have to take her in for questioning. Hilda’s going to fight that, I suppose.”

  He looked at Hilda and smiled.

  “Why?” The doctor was puzzled. He too stared at Hilda, who said nothing. She had poured herself a cup of coffee and was slowly sipping it.

  “Don’t ask me. Ask her. One of her hunches probably. Something she’s got in her head about Honolulu. But four years is a long time.” He got up and, picking up his hat, set it carefully on his head. “I have a great deal of respect for her hunches,” he said, and went out.

  The doctor looked at Hilda.

  “What’s all this about Honolulu?” he said gruffly. “I don’t believe in hunches, but if you know anything …”

  Hilda did not reply directly. She put down her coffee cup and looked at him stonily.

  “When you see Nina Rowland again will you examine her arm?” she inquired.

  “What the hell has her arm got to do with Alice’s murder?”

  “That’s what I want to find out.”

  He was irritated. He got up and gazed down at her with extreme distaste.

  “I’ll examine her arm when and if she asks me to,” he said. “Not before.”

  “You may be sorry,” she told him. But he picked up his bag and flung it out of the room without replying.

  She did not see Fuller again that morning. Now that it was daylight he wandered around the lawns surrounding the house. But he found nothing and at last he got into his car and drove to his office. He found a message there from the Commissioner and discovered that gentleman surrounded by morning papers and a distinct aura of unpleasantness. His cold was better, however, so he was articulate. Very completely articulate.

  “What sort of a mess is this?” he demanded. “I give you one of my best men to watch the house, you put the Pinkerton woman in it, and under both their noses we have a murder.” He eyed Fuller coldly. “At least you saved Hilda Adams. That probably pleases you.”

  “It does,” Fuller said. “I’m very fond of Hilda.”

  “Well, goddammit, she was there. How did she let this happen?”

  “She was asleep,” Fuller said serenely. “She’d been knocked on the head the night before, and she was about all in.”

  “And who the hell did that?” said the Commissioner. “Not that I haven’t felt like doing it myself every now and then. And to some other people I could name,” he added darkly as Fuller grinned.

  When he got back to his office, having left his chief in a state bordering on apoplexy, he found a young officer waiting for him, a tall boy with a white face and a pair of desperately clenched hands holding his cap.

  “Lieutenant Hayes, sir,” he said. “I’ve just come from the Rowland house.”

  “I see,” Fuller said politely. “Sit down, son, and relax. No use getting into a dither about it, you know. Easy does it.”

  The lieutenant did not sit down. He stood stiffly, staring at Fuller.

  “Are you going to arrest Tony Rowland?” he asked. “Because if you are—”

  “We don’t arrest people as easy as you seem to think, Lieutenant. This isn’t the Army.”

  If he had hoped his last words would distract Johnny Hayes he failed. That single-tracked young man ignored them.

  “Then why did you take her prints?” he demanded. “Aggie—one of the maids—says you did.”

  “We print everybody in a case like this.”

  Hayes however refused to relax.

  “I got the story from Aggie,” he said. “You’re going to pin this on Tony, aren’t you? Because she got hold of a gun once in her sleep and it went off … What sort of evidence is that? She never killed anybody, or tried to. I know her.”

  “She hasn’t been accused yet, Lieutenant.” He pushed a box of cigarettes across the desk. “Have one and get hold of yourself. I’d like to ask you a question or two. Just why did she break her engagement to you?”

  Hayes sat down. He did not take the proffered cigarette, however. He got a leather case from his pocket and lit one of his own. His hands were not steady.

  “That’s a private matter, sir,” he said.

  “Rather sudden, wasn’t it?” And when there was no reply to this: “I understand all the plans were made. Then out of a blue sky—”

  “Oh, for God’s sake. If she changed her mind that’s her business.”

  Fuller studied him. He looked like a nice boy, the clean-cut type the Army either produces or discovers.

  “Is that all? Did she merely change her mind, or did something happen between you?”

  “Nothing happened.”

  “There was no quarrel?”

  “No, sir.”

  “You realize, of course, that she isn’t in a very happy position, Lieutenant. I’m not referring to the shooting a couple of months ago. I’m speaking of last night. On the surface it looks as though she and her aunt had quarreled, that Alice Rowland picked up a knife, that Tony took it from her—her prints are on it—and then struck her aunt with a milk bottle which was on the table. On the surface, I say. If her prints are on any of the glass from the broken bottle it won’t look very good.”

  “But you haven’t got them?”

  “The bottle broke, and the milk hasn’t helped any. They’re working on them now.”

  The telephone rang at his elbow. He picked it up, aware of the boy’s eyes on him. He listened for a minute or so, then said thanks and put down the receiver. Hayes was standing by that time.

  “A good many blurred prints on the glass,” he said. “Some that seem to be hers. They’re still working on it. I’m sorry, Lieutenant. It isn’t decisive. Not yet.”

  Hayes however was not listening. He jerked his cap on his head, gave a halfhearted automatic salute and departed. Fuller sat for some time after he had gone. He had liked the boy’s looks, and dammit all, with what was ahead of him … He picked up the telephone again.

 
“Work on those other prints,” he said. “If we haven’t got them try Washington. Maybe they are the milkman’s, but maybe they’re not. That’s what I want to know.”

  XII

  At the house Hilda had had a trying day. The uniformed officer still patrolled outside the house, and another one remained in the lower hall, looking bored and now and then slipping into the library for a surreptitious cigarette. Nina’s door was locked and Tony was still only semiconscious. Hilda ate her lunch alone, feeling useless and inadequate. Before she went upstairs she went back to the kitchen.

  Stella was alone there. She had mopped the milk from the floor and cleaned up generally. Now she was at the table, drinking strong black tea to settle her nerves. She was not cordial, but she seemed glad to see anybody.

  “You’ve been here a long time, Stella,” Hilda said. “Was it usual for Miss Tony to get a night lunch for herself or her mother?”

  “No, miss. I said that to Aggie today. I’ve known her to get a piece of cheese or something like that. But that’s all, and only once in a while. As for that milk bottle, she never touched milk.” Stella’s face crumpled. Unexpectedly she began to cry. “The poor child!” she said. “So nice and kind and then breaking her engagement and now this. When I think of her carrying out her wedding dress yesterday—”

  “Are you sure of that?” Hilda asked sharply.

  “Well Aggie says it’s missing. Another dress too. And she had the car out. I saw her come back.”

  Hilda was puzzled.

  “Why on earth would she do a thing like that, Stella?”

  “I suppose she just wanted to get rid of it. Couldn’t bear to have it around, poor dear. And so crazy she was about it when it came!”

  Hilda digested this in silence. When Stella had wiped her eyes and regained some of her composure Hilda opened the door to the basement staircase.

  “I suppose the police were down there?” she asked.

  “They were all over. The dirt in this place you’d hardly believe. They even went into the butler’s room! It’s empty, of course—has been since we got rid of that Herbert Johnson.”