Death in the Back Seat

by Dorothy Cameron Disney

  “Take chairs, you two. I think it’s time we had a talk.”

  We sat down and waited. Swinging to his untidy desk, Dr. Rand selected a labeled envelope and shook from it a charred splinter of bone. “I perceive,” he began, “that my good advice met the usual fate of good advice. I deliver a spirited lecture on the evils of curiosity and today you bring me this. Not content with ordinary prying, Mr. Storm, you indulge in housebreaking—a serious crime—run violent hazards, expose your wife to the gravest danger. You’re fortunate you didn’t get her killed. And for what, I ask? For this!”

  There was no adequate answer to his disgust and disapproval. We made none. He replaced the bone in its envelope. He continued to glare at Jack.

  “Are you without reason? Without common sense? Does your life mean nothing to you? Your wife’s life? Must you satisfy your unwarranted curiosity at any cost? Haven’t you learned at your age to mind your own business? I say it’s time you should.”

  Jack valued the other man’s opinion. He looked very young and taken aback as a guilty schoolboy, when he said defensively, “Probably last night’s performance was foolish and dangerous. I know I wouldn’t repeat it. But as things turned out, it was lucky we went up the hill.”

  “Lucky!” The exclamation came in quieter tones. The physician was silent a moment before he spoke again. “Hiram Darnley is dead, murdered. Someone else may also be dead. We can’t bring them back to life. I grant a policeman’s right to concern himself in such affairs. It’s his business, just as it’s mine to heal the sick, and yours to paint, and your wife’s to write. It’s not your business and it isn’t mine, to go through the world as a Peeping Tom. You’ve heard of the Elwell mystery? The Hall-Mills case? Murderers, my dear young man, can go unhung and the world remain a pleasant place.” He looked out his office window to the garden underneath, where early jonquils were opening to the sun. He looked back at us. “What do you two kids know about people? About human trials and tribulations? What do you know about suffering? Only the young and callous would try so hard to trap an old, half-mad woman and get her hauled up for murder.”

  “In other words,” Jack said slowly, “you believe Mrs. Coatesnash is a murderess?”

  Dr. Rand drummed thin, white fingers on his desk. “You’ve got detective blood. Personally, I haven’t.”

  “That’s hardly fair.”

  “I suppose it isn’t.” The physician hesitated. “I would like to find in your heart, assuming you have a heart, a little honest sympathy. I’m half inclined to bargain. If I say what I think, will you promise to go back to painting? And keep what I say in confidence? The police will find out soon enough.”

  Jack said gravely, “I’ll do only what I am required by law to do. Unless—” He, too, hesitated. “—unless I am positive that either Lola or myself is in actual danger. Of course, anything you say is between us two. Is that enough?”

  After deliberation, Dr. Rand inclined his head. “Very well. Since the identification, I’ve believed that Mrs. Coatesnash was the moving force behind Hiram Darnley’s death.”

  “She’s three thousand miles away in Paris.”

  “She could leave confederates.”

  “And her motive?”

  Dr. Rand went into a long reverie. Finally he started off on a tangent. “Bachelors,” he said slowly, “often develop soft spots. Comes from no responsibilities, irregular hours and restaurant cooking. My own soft spot is families. Family life. I like seeing fathers with their sons, whooping it up at baseball games, like seeing mothers shopping with their daughters, like the vigor and noise of crowded households. Kids going off to school, rushing home to spend vacations.” He paused again. “If Luella Coatesnash conspired to murder Hiram Darnley, she had the best motive a grief-crazed mother ever had. Her only child. Her daughter Jane.”

  I leaned forward. “Dr. Rand, has it ever occurred to you that Jane Coatesnash may be alive?”

  “It never has,” said the doctor brusquely, “because it isn’t true. The identification was unquestionable. The girl is dead.” Again I interrupted. He ignored me. A second time he said harshly, “Jane Coatesnash is dead. I know. The poor child killed herself. She killed herself for love of a worthless scoundrel. I knew she would. I couldn’t stop her. She was just nineteen and the man was married.”

  “The man was…”

  Dr. Rand took the words from Jack’s mouth. “The man was Hiram Darnley.”

  The cheeping of robins came loudly into the quiet office, and sun splashed the faded carpet. White hair rumpled, blue eyes lacking the usual gleaming light, Dr. Rand sat and looked at us.

  “Aren’t you two willing to let up on the old lady? Wouldn’t you say she’s had her share of trouble?”

  Jack stirred and sighed. “Why did Mrs. Coatesnash wait fifteen years?”

  “Wait!” Dr. Rand expelled a breath. “You don’t imagine she knew the situation at the time! No one knew—no one except myself. I learned only because the girl appealed to me as a physician, an old family friend. She came to this office, sat in that very chair and calmly asked for poison. She wanted a deadly poison, quick, painless, not disfiguring. Poor heartbroken youngster, she favored a pretty death.” His eyes seemed to look down the corridor of the years. “We had a talk, Jane and I; she cried but I got the story out. A heartless, threadbare tale—conventional enough. Darnley was a thoroughgoing rascal, the type of man who feeds his vanity on conquest and on youth. Little Jane, just nineteen, was probably his easiest victim. I tried to talk iron into the girl, good hard sense; thought I’d succeeded, though obviously she still adored the man.”

  “Then you didn’t tell the mother?”

  “Certainly not! I didn’t guess I had failed until Jane disappeared from college. I knew then. It was too late. Three weeks too late. Three weeks after coming here she killed herself.”

  “Then you were the only person who had an inkling of the truth?”

  “Unquestionably I was. Jane was a reserved kid, no chatterbox.”

  “Then how,” inquired Jack, “would Mrs. Coatesnash stumble on the facts after fifteen years? She trusted Hiram Darnley with the very search for Jane. Until two weeks ago he handled all her business.”

  Scraps of information began to fit together in my mind like pieces in a jig-saw puzzle. Laura Twining had exhibited a surprising interest in the Coatesnash girl. Suppose she had discovered not that the girl was alive, but that she was a suicide. A forgotten letter might have put her on the right track, a diary—could Jane have kept a diary?—or a phrase of idle gossip. Such an impetus might clarify her visit to the library.

  I jumped into the conversation. “Perhaps Laura Twining found out and told Mrs. Coatesnash.”

  “Why should she?” said Jack. “She would have felt as the doctor did. That the dead past should stay dead.”

  Unexpectedly Dr. Rand came to my assistance. “Don’t be so glib, young man. Human beings are the product of their brain cells, their hormones and their experience. They vary, they progress, they disintegrate. Experience changed Laura, or in my opinion it did. She was a good fool when first she came to Crockford, pious, eager to please, humble, meek, a collection of the drearier virtues. But she had years of a damn tough life, and worms turn; fools change their coats.

  “Women in Laura’s position—paid companions, living in an atmosphere of wealth without a penny to bless themselves—often go to pieces, morally, spiritually, any way you choose. They lead unnatural, servile, hemmed-in lives; they breed neuroses, envies, gnawing jealousies. For a decade Laura got kicked around, grinned and bore it. People sometimes turn the other cheek, but they seldom love the person who makes them turn it. Say Laura did learn about Jane. Would she remain a Christian? I doubt it. Would she keep her mouth shut when by breaking the news in some subtle feminine way she could do Mrs. Coatesnash a mortal injury and even the score of years?”

  I saw Laura in a new and blinding light. It made me uncomfortable and—sad. Jack stared at the physician. “Sheer malic
e sounds rather weak. Laura needed her job. Mrs. Coatesnash would probably refuse to credit the story and Laura would be out on the street.”

  “Assuming Laura did find out and did tell, we can assume she had a better motive than malice. Jane Coatesnash is still a vivid conversational topic in Crockford. How’s this? Laura threatened to broadcast the news unless …” Dr. Rand shrugged. “Mrs. Coatesnash is wealthy. The companion hadn’t a dime. Maybe the poor soul thought she saw a chance to secure the independent old age she often talked about. And then discovered,” the doctor finished grimly, “that blackmailers sometimes have no old age to worry about.” With that he stood up from his desk. “I haven’t talked so much in a month. I’ve said things I shouldn’t have said. But anyhow you’ve heard my facts and my opinions.”

  Jack rose, too. “Of course, there are a good many unanswered questions. Why, for instance, did Hiram Darnley carry that bagful of money? On what pretext did Mrs. Coatesnash lure him here? You probably know that Franklyn Elliott is in the village, has been since the day of the inquest. What’s his purpose? Do you think he’s implicated in his partner’s murder? Could Elliott explain what happened to Laura?”

  Dr. Rand would not be drawn. “I don’t,” he said, “propose to work out the convolutions of the mystery. I wouldn’t if I could. And you’ll remember, please, that you two promised to abandon any independent activities. Go home and give your brains a rest. Though,” he concluded meditatively, “it might not be a bad idea to keep an eye on Silas.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  A Telltale Piece of Glass

  At three o’clock that April afternoon John Standish returned to Crockford from Osage, New York. He had seen Hiram Darnley’s widow in her mountain sanitarium; he had found her a languid, willing, non-productive witness. A woman well past middle age, crippled with arthritis, Abigail Darnley had lived for so long in a world of pain that her husband’s murder had little significance except as it affected her. Since the early period of an ill-starred marriage, their interests had been diverse and separate; she had concerned herself with the petty routine of the invalid and Darnley had paid the bills.

  “I hadn’t seen him in months, Inspector. He hated hospitals.”

  “Can you tell me why, on the night of March twentieth, he thought it necessary to use an alias?”

  She said in querulous bitterness, “I can’t imagine, unless he was planning to visit some girl. He was your careful sort.” Standish was old-fashioned enough to wince. “The money your husband transported in his satchel, a hundred and eight thousand dollars, has been traced to his account. It almost wiped him out. A sizeable business transaction must have been involved to demand such an amount of cash. Wouldn’t you know about his business?”

  “I didn’t,” she said fretfully. “That was like Hiram—to keep me in the dark.” Then she said in sudden alarm, “The money reverts to me, of course. When will you turn it back?”

  “Very soon, madam. We would prefer, however, for you to collect the money after we arrest your husband’s murderer.”

  This, then, was in Standish’s mind as he turned into the village police station. Jack and I, weary as we were, awaited him there. We had wanted to go home to bed, but Harkway had insisted upon our presence. After Standish summarized the sparse results of his interview with Darnley’s widow, we outlined the Crockford situation. We told of our expedition to Hilltop House, of the garden grave, of Laura Twining’s vanished luggage. We told of the charred bone fragment, of the transformed house and grounds. Only one thing was omitted from our account, and that was the story which had been related by Dr. Rand.

  But the account was telling enough. That was patent from John Standish’s shocked and sober face. For the first time Jack and I managed to shake him in his allegiance to Mrs. Coatesnash. Unwilling as he was, he could not fail to see the implications of her lengthy silence on the subject of her companion. Luella Coatesnash might be a member of an old and honorable Connecticut family, but here was proof of a continued lack of candor.

  “That lawyer of hers,” said Standish, “has been aiding and abetting her. He told me he went down to the Burgoyne to see the women off to Europe. He volunteered the statement. I didn’t ask.”

  “He told us the same.” Jack hesitated. “Did you know that Elliott was here at the Tally-ho Inn?”

  “I saw him yesterday,” said Standish shortly. “I wanted to find out what he was doing here, why he evaded the inquest and still saw fit to make a trip to Crockford. I didn’t find out. Elliott said he came here to protect Mrs. Coatesnash’s interests in the investigation. That’s nonsense! He didn’t choose to protect her interests by appearing at the inquest.”

  I had a vivid recollection of a hurrying figure on a moonlit beach. I said, “He called on Annabelle Bayne that very night.”

  “So he told me,” said Standish, “though I suspect it was because he thought I’d gather the information from some other source. Elliott has a talent for anticipating questions and answering them before they’re asked. So far as that goes, if he is in Crockford for the reason he says—feeble as that reason appears—it’s quite plausible he’d call on Annabelle Bayne.”

  “Surely,” I said, confused, “Elliott must have been—well—embarrassed when you asked him why he avoided the inquest.” “Lawyers,” said Standish, “aren’t easily embarrassed. Elliott merely said he didn’t consider his presence necessary at an informal hearing. Said Miss Willetts could tell us as much about the case as he could, so he delegated the job to her. Well, maybe. But it does seem queer that directly afterward he should climb in his car, drive to Crockford and settle down for a lengthy visit.”

  “Maybe,” Jack suggested, “Elliott feels Mrs. Coatesnash needs ‘protection’ of a different kind than that furnished at inquests.” Standish did not reply. He swung to his feet. “I propose we have a talk with Franklyn Elliott. The situation has changed since yesterday. I hope we can persuade him to be more communicative by using Laura Twining as a lever.”

  Together with the two policemen, Jack and I drove to the Tally-ho Inn. Bill Tevis grinned at us from the desk. Standish talked to the clerk a moment and I gathered that the lawyer was in his room. “He’s almost always in,” Bill said cheerfully. “Only goes out for meals. No, he’s had no callers. Too busy, I suppose. He keeps the wires to his New York office busy.”

  Bill then telephoned our names from the lobby, and Elliott requested that we come up at once. The fat man met us in the upper hall. He was in his shirtsleeves, and was casually pulling on a velvet house coat. He welcomed Standish and Harkway cordially enough, though he did cast an odd glance at Jack and me.

  “This is quite a convention,” was the way he put it. “But I daresay in small towns you run your investigations differently. Come in. Sit down. Make yourselves comfortable.”

  I found myself watching him in a kind of angry wonder. What right had he, if half the suspicions I harbored were correct, to be looking and acting so calmly, to be suggesting with every faintly patronizing gesture that we were presuming on his time?

  He ushered us into a room which indicated an indefinite stay. A portable typewriter had been set up, and various personal possessions were scattered about. On the dresser I saw and immediately recognized a photograph of Annabelle Bayne. I chalked up another lie to her score. Not four hours earlier she had told me Elliott was a stranger to her on the night he called at her home. The lawyer intercepted my gaze and I know for a minute I annoyed him. I know, for he managed to pass by the dresser, and knock the photograph face down. But he wasn’t really disturbed.

  And it was he who opened the interview. “Well, Mr. Standish, what can I do for you? Have you any fresh information on my partner’s murder?”

  Standish brushed that aside. “Mr. Elliott,” he began, “you and I have talked before. Relative to your presence in Crockford, what you’re doing here, what your real purpose is.”

  “And during our previous conversations,” Elliott broke in less affably, “I’ve ex
plained repeatedly that I came up here, at some personal sacrifice, to watch out for Luella Coatesnash’s interests. Ordinarily I wouldn’t touch a criminal case, but this situation, as you fully comprehend, is different. My own partner was murdered. For a reason which I fail to fathom my partner was responsible for leaving suspicion on an old and valued client. Under those circumstances I felt morally obligated to drop my other business, come to Crockford and see that Mrs. Coatesnash received justice.”

  “No lawyer is morally obligated to stand between a client and the police!”

  “I don’t like your tone.” Elliott stood up. “I’m Mrs. Coatesnash’s lawyer, and that’s all I am. Certainly I’m not standing between her and the police. On the contrary! I’m more than ready to answer any civil questions.”

  “You’re convinced in your own mind Luella Coatesnash was not responsible for Hiram Darnley’s murder?”

  “Utterly convinced!”

  The fat man sat down again upon the bed. A slanting bar of sunshine illumined his placid face. His expression didn’t vary when Standish said, “When did you last see Laura Twining?”

  Elliott knit his brows. “It must have been the day the Burgoyne sailed. Offhand, I can’t recall the date. But I recall the occasion vividly.”

  “Then—” said Standish, and a note of urgency crept into his voice, “you saw her off with Mrs. Coatesnash.”

  “No,” said Elliott smoothly, “I didn’t see her off. Miss Twining didn’t sail.” For a moment I couldn’t believe my ears and then Elliott repeated in a meditative tone, “Miss Twining didn’t sail.” There was a moment of utter consternation. The big scene had gone awry. Jack and I looked blankly at each other. Beside us Harkway emitted a noiseless whistle. Then Standish strode into the center of the room.

  “Why wasn’t I told before? You deliberately gave me the impression both women were aboard the Burgoyne.”

  “I did nothing of the kind,” said Elliott, and sounded merely peevish. “I never mentioned Laura Twining, nor did you. If you got the wrong impression, it’s not my fault. How could I guess you’d be interested in Laura Twining’s plans? You could easily have learned she didn’t sail by consulting the Burgoyne passenger list, by asking me at any time, by cabling Mrs. Coatesnash.”