by Zenith Brown
“Oh, my dear!” she said. She got up, came over to me and threw her arms around my neck. “He didn’t do it. He didn’t do it.”
“All right,” I said. “I didn’t think he did.”
“I was so afraid,” she went on, “because when I went downstairs I knew it was Franklin by the light switch. I knew it, and I was frightened. I wanted to get over to you without having to speak to him, so I wouldn’t know it was him.”
“But you did know it,” I said, sitting down in the window seat.
“I knew it inside of me, but I hadn’t seen him. I just sensed him. If I’d seen him or spoken to him, or he’d said ‘It’s Franklin,’ then I’d have had to tell Mr. Sullivan—in fairness to Uncle Dan.”
I passed over that. She sat down beside me, and absently both our gazes roamed through the window; and both of us caught the flash of Susan’s yellow head in the orangery. Sebastien Baca was beside her.
“I wonder how poor Bill’s taking it,” said Thorn, shaking her head dreamily.
“Why?”
“Oh, you know it’s always been taken for granted that Bill and Susan would marry. Even Uncle Dan thought so. Bill did too. Now she’s upset the apple cart.”
“Definitely?”
“Perhaps not definitely. Definitely enough so that Dan, who’s chiefly noted for minding his own business,, as well as asked Aunt Mildred to ask Baca to leave.”
I looked at her in surprise.
“Aunt Mildred asked Mr. Rand, and he said he’d ask Mr. Sullivan.”
No wonder, I thought, if that’s the case, that young Sue decided to go along. I was a little annoyed at Thorn. After what she’d been through the last week she seemed rather callous about Susan’s little affair.
“Well,” I said, “what are you going to do now? Sit in your ivory tower, or come out of it?”
She smiled wanly. Her desperate struggle of the day before had left her smooth eggshell cheeks the transparent waxiness of a white magnolia petal.
“I’ve come out already,” she said. “I had an hour’s chat with Mr. Sullivan. I gathered that either Franklin or Wally, or you or I, did it. Bill was here with us—as chaperon. He came out of the dumps long enough to suggest we play a foursome to decide.”
“I thought Mr. Sullivan had decided you and Franklin and I were out of it?”
“I thought he’d decided absolutely nothing,” Thorn said. “But it doesn’t matter. I know I didn’t do it, and I know you didn’t, and I know Franklin didn’t. As for Wally, it’s just the sort of trick I’d expect from him.”
We lapsed into silence. I was thinking about Susan, and I suppose Thorn was thinking fuzzy indefinable things the way one does. We heard a sound below of someone walking on the gravel path, and looked down. It was young Basil the state policeman. We watched him make his way down the path, disappearing under the feathery maze of a pink magnolia. He reappeared again in the entrance to the orangery. Thorn and I looked at each other, then back at him. Susan and Sebastien Baca rose to their feet. I saw the Mexican turn and bow to Susan. Then he and young Basil started back to the house together. Thorn and I looked silently at one another.
CHAPTER XXVI
While Thorn and I were still discussing the probabilities of Mr. Baca’s summons, Miss Carter’s maid appeared with the news that her aunt was not well and would like to see her. It seemed that from the day of Daniel Sutton’s death Miss Carter had spent practically all of her time in her room. It was Thorn’s belief that while he was alive she hadn’t dared to have even a headache, and that she had now, in a new freedom, abandoned herself to the vapours like any eighteenth century Seaton.
We separated in the hall.
“I’m going to see Susan,” I said.
“See if you can get her to give up her Aztec prince,” Thorn called after me.
“I’ve got more sense than that.”
When I was half-way down the stairs I saw the library door open and Susan’s Aztec prince come out, his urbanity more than a little ruffled.
“Hello,” I said. “How are you by now?”
He bowed rigidly.
“Good morning,” he said in his precise English. “I am very well, thank you so much. Do you think I might speak with you for a moment?”
“Surely,” I said. I joined him at the foot of the stairs and we went into the front drawing room and sat down, near the side window. I thought it was rather a shame to keep him from Susan.
“I want to talk with you, Mrs. Niles,” he said, “because you are the only one here who seems in the least friendly towards me.”
“Miss Atwood?”
He smiled, but the smile disappeared at once.
“But this other thing,” he said with a frown. “It seems there is some belief here that I am connected with Mr. Fenton—or that he is connected with me in my project for the ranch.”
“Isn’t he?”
“No, no, no, senora . . . Mrs. Niles.” He shrugged, and raised the palms of his hands in absolute despair at the idea.
“I have never seen Mr. Fenton before I came here.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
His response was very emphatic.
“I came here, as I told you, to try to buy El rancho del Ojo del Espiritu Santo from Mr. Sutton. My fathers owned it, they were great landholders. They sold it to Senator Centrone, who left the rancho to his widow. Mr. Sutton paid her twenty-five cents the acre—there are two hundred fifty thousand acres—and he established a fund for her. I offered him one dollar the acre. You see, I am an engineer, and I have backers with much money, a syndicate in California and Mexico. But Mr. Sutton said no. Then I explained to him how great value the land has—two hundred and fifty thousand acres with oil, oil shale, gold maybe, silver certainly, copper, lead, gypsum, antimony, zinc, galena, arsenic—they may all be there, in the greatest quantities.”
“Really!” I gasped, beginning to understand now for the first time the extent of the thing.
“Yes, really. And Mr. Sutton thinks he will develop this land then, himself. He is tired of this life, he will go with me. Together we will survey the land, and form a company. We make big plans, Mrs. Niles. Then this thing . . . ah!”
He buried his head in his hands and shook it stormily.
“Then they tell me I am connected with Fenton.”
“It’s probably because you and he talked so much together that night,” I said calmly.
“No, no!” he cried. He jumped up, and paced back and forth with sparkling eyes and wild gestures. Then he sat down as abruptly, and began, with elaborated gesticulation, to tell me what had happened in his interview with Mr. Sullivan.
“The young officer said they wished to speak with me. I have already talked with Mr. Rand, but because you had said Mr. Sutton was murdered I have said nothing more than I could. I go in there. There sits Mr. Rand with telegrams, they are from Barton, the mining engineers in Los Angeles. They have investigated for him, they have found there is no doubt the Rancho del Ojo del Espiritu Santo will be worth millions.”
And none of us, I thought, in our quiet Maryland hamlet, had seen further than our noses.
“Mr. Sullivan then turns to Fenton, and says, You know this. Mr. Fenton then—like you, Madam—says Really? That makes Mr. Sullivan angry. So I know that Mr. Fenton has been saying Really? for some time. Then Mr. Sullivan points his finger at Fenton and accuses him of trying to sell his Aunt Charlotte’s cabin for $25,000.”
I let the relationship go uncontested. “What then?” I asked.
“He was not comfortable. He—what is it you say?—he swaggered. He said, Yes, he did. The old man had pots of money and did nothing for him. He would make $15,000 which he needed. His uncle would have the cabin, which he wanted. His Aunt Charlotte would have $9,000, and somebody would have $1,000. He admitted this all.”
“What did Mr. Sullivan say?”
The slim elegant shoulders shrugged eloquently.
“He said, ‘Why did you suddenly
give up the idea?’ ”
“What did Wally say?”
“Mrs. Niles,” he said, looking at me severely, “you are as bad as Susan. If you will give me a chance I will tell you.”
I felt that perhaps he wouldn’t be a bad husband for Susan after all.
“Fenton said he had decided it was not worth the trouble. And that was all, not another thing could they get out of him. Then he suggested that Fenton talked to me, or I to Fenton, and I persuaded him to go in the project of the Rancho with me, and Oh! I don’t know what else! He brought out these telegrams showing the Rancho to be valuable. And he demanded an explanation from Fenton.”
“Which Fenton declined to give.”
“Yes,” Mr. Baca nodded. “He then accused Fenton of a murderous attack on my life, while we were swimming, to get the whole thing for himself!”
He looked at me with a smile.
“Well?” I said.
“Oh, it is so absurd. No, no, it was nothing. There is no connection.”
“It must have been something. You were almost drowned and something or someone struck you.”
“You are fanciful, Mrs. Niles. No, no. I am a mining engineer. I have no interest in violence. My one desire is to do my business and return to my wife.”
I can’t remember that I was ever before literally struck speechless. I stared at him open-mouthed, with what must have been a most ludicrously half-witted expression.
“Your what?” I said at last.
He looked puzzled.
“My wife.”
I said, “Oh.”
“Now this is my difficulty, Mrs. Niles. I am interested deeply—so very deeply—in the development of the rancho. I wish to know who inherits this ranch under Mr. Sutton’s will. But I am not, as you see, in the position to make such inquiries myself. Indeed, Mr. Sullivan has practically accused me of opening the safe to find out for myself.”
He shrugged again, in deep resignation.
“Was anything taken?” I asked perfunctorily. I wasn’t at all interested in that.
“I understand nothing.”
I was simply overwhelmed at the amazing audacity of the cool young man sitting next to me. It was clear that he didn’t know Susan had told me their plans. The thought that this handsome olive-skinned adventurer had come to Seaton Hall to get the ranch, and failing that was taking Susan—whose private fortune is considerable—made me almost ill. Worse than that, I didn’t know what to do about it.
He failed to notice my perturbation.
“Now I am leaving this afternoon. Some time soon the will must be read. If I leave you my card, will you let me know to whom the ranch goes, so that I can open negotiations with him? Am I asking too much, Mrs. Niles?”
“Not at all, Mr. Baca,” I said, hurriedly taking the card. I thought it might be useful some day. “Not at all.”
“Of course,” he went on with a shrug, “I may not be allowed to go this afternoon. I may be held by Mr. Sullivan.”
I got up.
“I’ve got to go down and see Susan,” I said pointedly. He didn’t turn a hair. I thought I’d never seen a more accomplished villain.
We went out of the room together. Colonel Arbuthnot-Howe was in the hall talking to Dan. The Mexican joined them, and after speaking to them I went on outside, glad to get a breath of fresh air and anxious to speak to Susan.
She was in the orangery practising chip shots with a mashie niblick.
“I thought you’d been arrested or something,” she said. “What’s the matter? You look like you’d seen poor Tim’s ghost.”
“I haven’t. But I want to talk to you, young woman. Put that wretched club away and sit down here.”
“I suppose I oughtn’t to be doing anything so frivolous,” she said repentantly. “I didn’t think anybody’d see me . . . and anyway, Martha, I don’t feel a bit sad. Not really.”
I was afraid she would in a minute. She sat down and I told her in a very few words what I had to say.
She sat there, digging at the lawn with the toe of the club. I thought for a while that I could have saved myself my pains. She seemed entirely unmoved. I found it hard to understand her. Pretty soon, however, I saw a great bright tear trembling on her long curling lashes. It coursed slowly down her smooth tanned cheek. Another followed, and another. Susan was crying. Suddenly she broke into sobs, and between them managed to tell me a pathetic little story that was the quintessence of tragedy for her small life.
I left her after a few minutes and went back towards the house. Lafayette was making his way painfully down the terrace steps. He saw me and stopped.
“Mistah Nathan done huntin’ for you, Miss,” he said, shaking his head ominously. “They wants to talk to you in the liberry.”
“Thanks, Lafayette. I’ll go right along.”
CHAPTER XXVII
Mr. Rand was seated in a wing chair drawn up to the long mahogany table. He had the pile of telegrams that I’d heard about so often in front of him. He looked rather more pontifical than ever. His heavy face was deadly serious.
Mr. Sullivan appeared to be still smouldering from his interview with Wally. He was pacing up and down in front of the fireplace, emitting occasional hostile snorts.
“Sit down, Mrs. Niles,” said Mr. Rand.
My heart was in my shoes as I did so.
“Mrs. Niles,” he said with alarming gentleness, “did your husband know, or have any way of knowing, that Mr. Sutton intended withdrawing the trust fund for that chair of Anthropology?”
“No, Mr. Rand. Not only that. He didn’t know—and so far as I know, unless someone else told him, he doesn’t yet know—that there is such a fund.”
Mr. Sullivan spoke up.
“He does know it,” he said shortly. “Dr. Knox told him some time ago. I asked him why he hadn’t told you. He said that Sutton changed his mind so often he didn’t want to have you disappointed.”
I found myself growing unaccountably angry.
“Well?” I said.
“I’m suggesting, Mrs. Niles,” he snapped, “that both you and your husband knew you were, in the event of Mr. Sutton’s death, to get most of the income on $200,000. And that your husband, having quarrelled with Mr. Sutton, realized that you were about to lose that income.”
I stood up, perfectly furious. Mr. Rand said nothing.
“Have you any notion what my husband and Mr. Sutton quarrelled about?” I asked.
“No. Mr. Niles wouldn’t discuss it. He said it was entirely unimportant.”
“Then I’ll tell you what it was. It was about which the college needed more, a chemistry laboratory or an athletic bowl. My husband didn’t even know it was a quarrel, until Dr. Knox told him about it yesterday. More than that, the discussion didn’t take place until they had finished three rubbers of bridge the night of the swimming party.”
Mr. Sullivan was silent for a moment.
“Have you ever seen this gun before?” he asked suddenly, bringing the .38 revolver out from a drawer in the table.
“I saw it yesterday on your desk, if that’s the one.”
“Not before?”
“Never.”
“It doesn’t belong to Professor Niles?”
“It certainly doesn’t.”
“Do you know who it does belong to?”
“No, I don’t. I just told you I’d never seen it before.”
He put it back in the drawer and resumed his pacing.
“Please sit down, Mrs. Niles,” said Mr. Rand.
I sat down again, and so did Mr. Sullivan.
“Mrs. Niles,” he said, “I want you to realize your husband’s position.”
“I don’t see that he’s got one,” I returned. “You have in this house two perfect strangers, each here, as far as I can see, with the definite purpose of getting land of great value that belonged to Mr. Sutton. Neither of them has a ghost of an alibi. You even have the evidence of Franklin Knox that one or both of them were up that night around two o’cl
ock. Instead of finding out what they were up to, you trump up an absurd excuse for involving first Thorn Carter, then me, then my husband. It’s preposterous.”
Mr. Sullivan looked a little surprised at my outburst, and so did Mr. Rand. They looked at each other. Then Mr. Sullivan said, “We are investigating Mr. Sutton’s two guests, Mrs. Niles. Will you tell me about your conversation yesterday with Colonel Arbuthnot-Howe?”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“He came to me in the afternoon, after you’d gone, and said you were disturbed about Thorn Carter, but that he felt the best policy was to put all cards on the table. I agreed. He said you didn’t, and for that reason he’d decided, in Miss Thorn’s interest, to tell me what you’d told him.”
“I see,” I said acidly. “Did he tell you anything else?”
“What do you mean?” said Mr. Rand steadily.
“Did he tell you that he said he was sleeping quietly in Wally’s room on the second floor from a little after one until he heard me scream?”
Mr. Sullivan nodded questioningly.
“Did Thorn tell you that when she heard something at two o’clock she went in Wally’s room and found it empty?”
Mr. Sullivan leaned forward with interest.
“Are you sure of that?”
“Yes. And did Colonel Arbuthnot-Howe tell you why, when he came downstairs ar four o’clock, he was dressed in pajamas and a dressing gown—and had on rubber soled shoes instead of bedroom slippers?”
They were listening intently.
“More than that. When Wally Fenton announced at lunch that Colonel Arbuthnot-Howe was coming here I happened to glance at Mr. Baca. He looked almost stunned. At dinner when Miss Carter asked Colonel Arbuthnot-Howe if he’d been in Mexico, Mr. Baca straightened up like a ramrod. Yet Colonel Arbuthnot-Howe says he didn’t know him. Mr. Baca certainly knows Colonel Arbuthnot-Howe.”
I stopped for breath, and as I did so I realized that in my fury, and my desire to protect Ben, I’d made some rather dangerous accusations.
“I accused him of being a detective,” I said more calmly.
Mr. Rand shot a lightning glance at me. I got the impression that he wished I’d be a little more discreet.
