The Case of the Seven Sneezes

by Anthony Boucher

  iii

  It took a half hour to reach Blackman’s Island in the Joque, which was the name painted on the bow of Jesus Ramirez’ small and sturdy motor launch. (Fergus fretted his highschool Spanish in vain for some time before he realized that this was simply a phonetic spelling of the nickname “Hokay.”)

  The launch rode low, and cool spray splashed on you and felt good, almost as good on the outside as the steam beer had on the inside. The boat was heading southwest to where the island loomed like a rocky castle against the backdrop of red afterglow.

  From a distance it looked like sheer rock, and you wondered how anyone could exist on it, much less throw a houseparty. Then as you drew closer you saw the sheltered beach here on the northeast side, beyond it the house nestling in the protection of the rock and in front of it the rude makeshift wharf jutting out.

  The ride over to Blackman’s was silent. Ramirez concerned himself solely with the boat, and Tom sat in bewildered concentration. The hint which Fergus had dropped seemed to impress him deeply. You could almost see his mental wheels whirring to cope with this sudden new development.

  It was Fergus who finally broke the silence. “Whenever I’m in a boat,” he said dreamily, “I feel like there must have been an O’Breen in the crew that set out for Saint Brendan’s Island. Water makes you want to fare forth on it forever and find the goddamnedest things.”

  Tom Quincy was frowning. “We may at that.”

  “May what?”

  “Find the goddamnedest things. If Stella Paris’ cat—”

  Fergus jerked a thumb at the silent Ramirez. “No use starting gossip around Santa Eulalia. And we may be all wrong. We’ll wait and see what breaks.”

  The makeshift wharf was empty. “As the ostrich observed,” said Fergus while Ramirez made the launch fast, “‘where is everybody?’”

  “Probably dressing for dinner,” Tom suggested. “Tonight’s the big night, and we’re late.” He laid a hand on the wharf and vaulted upward so lightly that his spring hardly shook the launch.

  “Give us a hand,” said Fergus. “I haven’t quite your fettlesome agility.” He landed on the wharf with something less than perfect grace, recovered his footing, and lifted up the bags which the Mexican handed him.

  “You wait here, Ramirez,” said Tom. “Brainard may have some errands or messages to take back to the mainland.”

  “Hokay,” said Hokay.

  The two young men set off for the house, suitcases in hand. “I hadn’t thought about Dressing for Dinner,” Fergus mused. “Think there’s any danger of the Empire-in-the-Tropics tradition?”

  “On a major occasion like this? Sure to be.”

  “Damn. Oh, I have a suit in here. Don’t think I was planning to attend a gala function in this yellow sports shirt. But still I’ll feel damned silly if everybody else is in dinner jackets. You come equipped?”

  “Sure. I always—” Tom Quincy stopped dead. “There’s somebody. And unless I’m mistaken …”

  In the gloom on the sands Fergus could make out the figure of a woman. She stood stockstill, staring fixedly down at the sand. Her cloak was black and voluminous. You could not guess her age in the dusk, but she was too short for Janet and too slender for Stella Paris. Fergus glimpsed in the back of his mind an illustration in his old Collier edition of The Moonstone: Rosanna Spearman standing on the sands and contemplating her death. He turned a shudder into a shrug and hastened after Tom.

  “I thought so!” Tom cried as they neared the woman. “Alys!”

  She seemed to look at them without taking her gaze from the sands. “Tom,” she said quietly. “Where did you come from?”

  “Didn’t you know? We’re bringing youth and gaiety to this party. It’s Stella’s idea. Keep you and Janet company among the graybeards.”

  “Janet,” she said with indifferent contempt. “And who’s your thin friend?”

  “Fergus O’Breen.”

  “At your service, milady.” Fergus bowed.

  “Who fits in where?” the woman asked directly.

  “Nowhere yet,” said Fergus cheerily. “But just watch me.”

  “Fergus,” Tom went on, “this is Alys Trent. My aunt-to-be.”

  The woman turned. Fergus could see that the cloak was thin, and that under it she wore only a scant black evening gown. The night was turning cold, but her flesh did not tremble. Her face he still could not see; her eyes refused to move from the sand. But her body was young, not with the fresh youthfulness of Janet’s, but with a kind of early-ripe maturity.

  “And while we’re asking questions,” said Fergus, “where do you fit in? I’d gathered this was a party for no one under fifty.”

  “I was the flower-girl at the wedding,” she explained in a nervously abstracted tone. “I was only three then.”

  “Uncle Lucas says you were seven,” Tom remarked quite without malice. “Just for the sake of statistics.”

  She laid a hand on an arm of each of the men. “Come now. It’s late and you must get ready for dinner. It will be nice having you here,” she added. On that last sentence she finally wrenched her eyes from the sand and her voice became abruptly human and warm. She leaned heavily on Fergus’ arm, and he found his hand, half-guided by hers, resting against a rich breast.

  He looked down at her face. It was a sulkily pretty face, the features too small but good and the makeup brazenly enticing. He saw, however, not the face but its expression. The eyes were almost closed. The lips were parted, and a pink tongue-tip showed between them. The head was thrown back and the body slightly arched. She looked, Fergus thought grotesquely, like a woman ridden by an incubus and loving it.

  Fergus set down his suitcase and fumbled in his pockets. “Damn. Must have dropped my cigarettes. Be back in a minute.” Not too brilliant an excuse, but what do you want on the spur of the moment?

  He hastened back to where Alys Trent had been standing, dropped to his knees, and looked for—well, for whatever he might find.

  He found it.

  Dark stains. He couldn’t be sure of what. Even when he lit a match (plausible enough in his supposed cigarette hunt) he couldn’t be positive. But he had little doubt that the stains were of the same sort which he had seen on Stella Paris’ porch. He only wondered if it had been a cat this time.

  He leaned over so that his cigarettes dropped from his breast pocket. Then he picked them up with a sharp noise of relief, lit one, and strolled back to his companions.

  But there had been no need for acting out that little comedy of discovery. It had not even been seen. Alys’ body was pressed tight against Tom’s. Her cloak had fallen back from her head, and the mass of her hair (pure white, Fergus observed with astonishment) hid his face.

  When she leaned back from the kiss, Fergus saw Tom’s expression. It was that of a man ridden by a succuba, and not caring much for it.

  It was Stella Paris who answered the door, with a large white apron covering a vast evening gown which must have gone out of public esteem at much the same time that she herself did.

  “What ho!” cried Fergus ringingly. “Let the trumpets sound to herald the advent of Youth and Gaiety!”

  “Hi, Stella,” said Tom, and kissed her like a nephew. “But what’s the matter? A Brainard domicile, and no slaves to answer the door?”

  “Corcoran came down with something today,” said Miss Paris. “Hugh says it’s nothing serious, but he should stay in bed. Of course Horace is simply raging … Alys, weren’t you cold out there?”

  “Frightfully, darling,” said Alys Trent. “But I know where the whisky is.” The brooding, ridden quality had left her now. Here in the harsh bright light of the hall (from a private generator plant, Fergus decided after a moment’s puzzling), she seemed nervously gay, a Bankhead-like hangover from the brittle twenties. “Come have a snort with your aunt, Tommy.”

  Tom hesitated. “Just a quick one and then I’ve got to get dressed. Join us, Fergus?”

  Fergus felt the light pressure
of Stella Paris’ hand on his arm. “Be with you in a minute.”

  “Your friend’s cute,” Alys Trent said to Tom as they went off. “It takes genius to wear yellow with that so red hair.”

  Stella Paris looked at Fergus silently for a long moment. Then, “How’s the rest of your genius?” she asked.

  “Functioning,” he said tersely. “What happened on the sand today?”

  She was puzzled. “On the sand? I don’t understand.”

  “Look, Miss Paris. Rhymed couplets extempore are all very well, but you know why you asked me here. My eyes are nice and green, but they’re not so fair as all that. And if I’m to accomplish anything, I’ve got to know what goes on.”

  “But I’m not trying to keep things from you. I don’t know anything about the sand.”

  “Do you know where Lucas Quincy is?”

  “Upstairs dressing, I suppose. But why—?”

  “Miss Paris,” Fergus said slowly and patiently. “You know my profession. And I’ve got a hobby that fits in helpful with it. I like the classics of criminology.”

  “The classics … ?”

  “In other words, I’ve heard of the Stanhope case.”

  “Oh …” Stella Paris was silent. “That’s a relief,” she said at last. “Then you do know why I invited you—that is, you know a little of it.”

  “Including Valentino,” said Fergus.

  She shuddered. “That too? But how could you know that? No, we haven’t time now. I’m supposed to be getting dinner while Corcoran’s laid up … Look, Mr. O’Breen. You go in and have a drink with the children so they won’t think we’re hatching anything. Then get dressed and— You said you could cook, didn’t you?”

  “Not compared to you.”

  “Is this a time for blarney? Then you come out to the kitchen and help me. There’s not another person in this house who’s a bit of use. That way we can talk.”

  “Fine.” Fergus started to pick up his suitcase.

  “Leave that there. I don’t know what room Catherine decided to put you in and of course she’s late coming down. Just leave it and you’ll probably find her after you’ve had a drink.”

  Reluctantly Fergus set his bag down. But after all, toting it around as a guarded and priceless treasure would only make it conspicuous. No use asking for more trouble than Blackman’s Island was apt to provide anyway.

  The sound of a kiss made Fergus pause outside the livingroom door. He could hear Tom’s voice, low and tense.

  “We were damned fools once.”

  “Why not forever?” Alys’ voice was throaty.

  “Lucas is my uncle. He’s been good to me.”

  “So have I …”

  “You’ve never been good to anyone.”

  Alys laughed. “Such a devoted nephew! Won’t play with uncle’s dolly, my no! You expect me to believe that?”

  “It’s true.”

  “You’re out after Janet, and you don’t want me making passes at you in front of that b … business-woman. I know. But at least,” there was a clink of bottle against glass, “you did bring me a cute redhead.”

  Fergus shivered, and walked in. Alys inevitably said “Speak of the devil,” and Fergus replied, “I don’t wear horns; I cause them,” which was just Alys’ type of gag but too subtly phrased. It fell flat on its face and Fergus respectfully stepped over the corpse and poured himself a drink.

  “Are you related to the Brainards, Miss Trent?” he asked conversationally.

  “No. Why?”

  “Just the O’Breen curiosity. A flower girl is so often some adorable young relation.”

  “Well, in a way I was. You see, my aunt Martha was bridesmaid. Only she wasn’t really my aunt. The Stanhopes were some kind of cousins and they took me in and brought me up. I’m an orphan,” she added almost proudly.

  “So am I,” said Fergus. “And Tom too. We must all get together some time and be caught by pirates.’”

  “Why? But I mean really an orphan. Not like Tommy. He had a mother for a long time. I never had anybody.”

  “Come, darling,” Tom murmured. “Even you must have had a mother.”

  “Uh uh. I was post-whateveritis and then my mother died in the hospital and I never had anybody so the Stanhopes took me in.”

  “And raised you,” said Fergus, “to the flower of young womanhood we see before us.”

  Alys giggled. “I told you he’s cute, Tommy. Yes, they raised me. Oh, they were good people, the Stanhopes. God, were they good!”

  “I know,” said Tom. “I’ve been planning to do a paper on Alys to disprove the importance of early environment.”

  Alys paused to decide what her reaction to this should be, and compromised on taking another drink. “I hate parties,” she said. “I mean this kind of party where everything’s formal and you’ve got to behave. Let’s the three of us get plastered and see what happens, huh? Who wants another drink now?”

  “I should, if I may,” said a new voice. Fergus turned to see a thin man with sharp, strong, and almost handsome features, wearing his dinner jacket with as impeccable style as the hero of a drawingroom comedy.

  Alys handed him a drink while Tom performed introductions. “Dr. Arnold, this is Fergus O’Breen. My collaborator in bringing youth to the party.”

  A doctor, thought Fergus. That would be the Hugh that Miss Paris had said looked after Corcoran. Good; a doctor might be a handy thing to have on this island. He only prayed that this wasn’t a Ph.D.

  “Getting cold out,” Arnold observed as he took his glass. “This will feel good.”

  “Been to see your patient?” Fergus asked.

  “You’ve heard about that already? Yes, he’s doing fine. Pity that the man of all work should have an accident today of all days.”

  “Accident?”

  “Yes, he … Why, James, how are you? I didn’t see you there.”

  Apparently no one had, but Alys did not seem in the least disconcerted at the thought that a quiet man in an armchair had been the audience to her scene with Tom. The man rose now and came to the group, still holding a light-blue book and still puffing contentedly at a heavy curved briar with a silver band.

  “It’s all right, Hugh,” he said softly. “I’m quite used to being invisible. How are you, Tom? Janet will be glad to see you.”

  “Mr. Herndon, this is Fergus O’Breen.”

  It was a large firm-fleshed hand that took Fergus’, but the grip was weak. Not a bad piece of symbolism, Fergus reflected. The man himself had a body that looked as though it might have rivaled Tom’s twenty years ago and was still not badly preserved; but his eyes were a watery gray and his mouth was irresolute. His voice was almost timid as he said, “Mrs. Brainard’s brother, you know,” as though he felt bound to account for himself even to this stranger.

  “It was James’ privilege, twenty-five years ago,” said the doctor, “to give the bride away.”

  “And you, sir?”

  “I was best man. Horace Brainard and I were very close friends then.” He stressed the last word only just perceptibly.

  Fergus turned to Alys. “And your aunt Martha that was bridesmaid, am I to meet her in this happy throng too?” he asked, all innocence.

  There was a silence. At last James Herndon took his pipe from his mouth and said quietly, “Martha Stanhope died twenty-five years ago tonight.”

  Fergus watched the doctor, but not a flicker of emotion passed over his aquiline face. The silence continued relentlessly as though Herndon had not spoken.

  Then Alys uttered one word. “Men …” she sighed.

  “I beg your pardon?” said the doctor.

  “Men. Isn’t it fun? Here’s me, and here’s four men. Nice men too. All different, and all nice … Know what I’m going to do? I’m going to kiss every one of you!” And before anyone could reply to this proposition, she had pressed her lips firmly against the nearest mouth, which happened to be Dr. Arnold’s.

  The doctor stood ramrod erect and impass
ive and let himself be kissed. To the casual glance, he was as indifferent as the beloved of a necrophilist. But as Alys withdrew from him, Fergus noticed her bare arm. The marks of four fingers stood out in glaring white and red.

  She turned, not quite steady on her feet, to James Herndon. “You next,” she said gleefully. “Put away that pipe.”

  Herndon kept the pipe in his mouth. As she drew very close to him, he did at last remove it, only to expel a mouthful of smoke full in her face. Then he turned on his heel and left the room without a word.

  Alys choked and swore with a vocabulary which she had certainly not learned from the good Stanhopes.

  “Curious,” said Dr. Arnold. “I have never in my life known James to be rude before.”

  “Old sissy!” Alys snorted. “Come on, Tom. We’ll show him.”

  And just as she held out open arms to Tom Quincy, Janet stepped into the room. She hesitated a moment, seeming unwilling to believe the tableau. And in that instant, Fergus, feeling exactly like something in a Restoration farce, stepped into those open arms and descended vigorously upon the open mouth.

  “O’Breen!” said Janet in a voice abristle with raised eyebrows. “Such taste!” But she looked nonetheless relieved. “How are you, Tom?”

  Tom was not quite over his moment of embarrassment. “Fine, Janet. Long time since we’ve seen each other.”

  Fergus freed himself and handed Alys over to Arnold. “Night air, wouldn’t you prescribe, doctor? I’ve got to go dress.”

  Fergus’ hand was on his suitcase when he heard a roaring “So! There you are!”

  He looked up. It was a little man who stood on the stairs, a very little man to have produced such a roar. His gruffness clearly fell into three parts, one motivated by the just-finished struggle with his dinner jacket, one by the sight of Fergus, and one that was just pure natural cussedness.

  “Mr. Brainard?” Fergus asked courteously. “I’m O’Breen. Congratulations on your anniversary, sir. And most kind of you to—”

  “Nothing of the sort!” Brainard’s bristly little gray mustache quivered with vexation. “No doing of mine. But come on; can’t brawl in the hallway. People in the livingroom, I suppose? Come in here, sir!”