Death of an Old Sinner (The Mrs. Norris Mysteries Book 1)

by Dorothy Salisbury Davis

  The gardener who, on necessary occasions, doubled as houseman, wandered in then to say there were callers paying their respects in the living room. When Jimmie returned to the kitchen, Mr. Tully had arrived and was warming his hands at the grate. Helene was slicing bread.

  “The course of true love never does run smooth,” the investigator was saying over his shoulder, and unaware of Jimmie’s presence.

  “To say nothing of the course of false love,” Jimmie said.

  Tully screwed his ugly head around and squinted at him. “What, my boy, is false love—is there such a thing?”

  Jimmie was hooked on his own hasty cast. “Love of self,” he said, somewhat steadying his position.

  “Oh, that runs smooth as butter,” Tully said. “The trouble is it never gets a man anywhere. Now as I was about to say, it seems the General and his fair lady had a tiff after he rushed home to her from Brooklyn. He couldn’t have got there before nine, and at ten-twenty-five he was on Third Avenue and Fifty-first Street where he caught a cab down to his club.”

  Jimmie repeated the address, and that of the parking lot—Sixtieth and Second. “There’s a lot of city in there, Jasp.”

  Tully nodded. “One side or the other, he did a bit of walking. Then when he got to his club he complained at the bar to a gentleman named Webster Toll, that his fair lady had refused to go on a trip with him.”

  Jimmie and Mrs. Norris exchanged glances. No word of the proposed trip had ever come to them, but it might have been the reason for all the cash, whatever its source.

  Helene put the bread in a basket and suggested they eat something before more people arrived. Tully finished his account at the buffet: “The General wound up saying he was not jealous, that it was beneath him to be jealous, certainly of a man like that. Now who would you say he was talking about?”

  Jimmie shook his head. “It could have been anyone from the Secretary of State to…”

  “To Johnny Rocco?” Tully prompted. Then he went on to outline his own speculations about the old Johnny Rocco, whose career he had checked up on that afternoon. The Rock had been a very dapper fellow in the twenties, and more than one gentleman of means had invited him to his party—providing he brought enough whiskey, of course.

  Jimmie, having made exactly the same speculation, had to admit the possibility of such an association. He himself had not been old enough to remember, however.

  “You forget,” said Mrs. Norris, “I was around then, too, and of an age to remember, and I can tell you there was no man by that name ever in your father’s house. The first time I ever heard of this Rocco person was when you, Master Jamie, were District Attorney.”

  “Well,” Tully said, “that cancels out another afternoon’s work.” He looked around the table, the buffet… “What kind of a family is this, a wake without a drop of whiskey?”

  “Oh,” said Mrs. Norris, “I was getting the ice when you came.”

  “Never mind the ice,” said Tully with a wink at Helene, “it’s already broken.” He lifted his glass when they all had one: “To the old gentleman, God rest him. Whatever else he’s done to it, he’s certainly brought some new light into my life.”

  “I think I can say the same,” said Mrs. Norris, and God knows it was true, she thought. It was only Thursday on her way to Brooklyn that she was contemplating how little exciting ever happened to her nowadays. And right now she could truly say she had not felt better in many a long year. But thinking of Brooklyn she was reminded of the Robinsons. Poor Mag…Strange, until Thursday, if she admitted the truth now, since almost the day she met him, she would have said, “Poor Mr. Robinson.”

  Helene and Jimmie drank and ate without comment.

  23

  “I REMEMBER HIM WHEN…”

  “Do you remember the day he…”

  “Let me tell you about when he came back from…”

  Such were the whispered commencements to conversations all over the house. A military guard had taken up the watch, and the living room, the library, the hall, the stairs were crowded with people remembering the General and the various milestones of his busy life. It was great tribute to the old man, Jimmie thought, that there was more subdued laughter than letting of tears.

  He was on the stairs himself, his arm in the clasp of an ex-envoy to Sweden, when what he called “the political contingent” arrived. He had expected Judge and Mrs. Turner, but for them to come in the company of Big Mike Zabriski and Miss Barker seemed poor taste to Jimmie. But then taste was an uncommon word in politics. Jimmie found for the diplomat a contemporary with whom to share reminiscences, and went down to Mrs. Turner who opened her arms to him and gave his cheek a tearful kiss.

  Jimmie took the hand Madeline Baker offered him. But in the middle of her sympathetic gaze her eyes caromed off his check and fastened on someone behind him. She excused herself and as he turned, he saw her make a mercurial journey to Helene.

  Mrs. Turner was watching also. “So she’s here, too,” she said.

  “Mrs. Joyce is a dear friend,” Jimmie said.

  The Judge was solicitous of his wife. “Madeline will manage, my dear,” he murmured; and practically in the same breath so that Jimmie had no opportunity to speak his annoyance, the Judge went on: “Touching story in the afternoon papers, Jimmie, about your father’s managing his medals before dying. Very like him, don’t you think?”

  “Rather,” Jimmie said.

  “That was Madeline’s release, by the way.”

  By the way…Jimmie thought. The Judge was trying hard to ingratiate Madeline with him of late. Then it occurred to him: what the devil was Madeline doing, giving a release to the papers about General Jarvis’ death? James Jarvis did not belong to his party body and soul, family and fortune.

  “Yes, just like the man I best remember—duty first, death second,” the Judge went on.

  Jimmie tried hard not to be harsh on him. Many a wise man spouted gibberish in the presence of a corpse which by some little chance of fate was not his own. Jimmie excused himself, laid his hand a moment on Big Mike’s shoulder, passing, so that he would not need to pause there for more such morbid sentiment.

  Mike’s contribution echoed after him: “Well, it comes to all of us. The older the better, I say.”

  “You didn’t know your Mrs. Joyce and I once were intimates, did you, Jimmie?” Madeline smiled as he joined them.

  “I may have heard it and forgotten,” Jimmie said coldly. He was wondering at the moment if ever she had written anything on a subway wall.

  “You haven’t really changed, Helene. Only I have changed,” Madeline mourned.

  “It is hard to discern it with chameleons,” Helene said. “And long ago I ceased to care. Only you and the Turners cherish painful recollections. Poor Jimmie, he knows nothing of what we’re saying.”

  Madeline threw back her head as though to laugh, but remembered in time the occasion of this meeting. “You mean to say you haven’t told him of our Bohemian days?”

  Jimmie was distinctly uncomfortable. It was like two women undressing before him; one at a time would be interesting, but two was nihilistic.

  “I don’t cherish mine with that much affection,” Helene said. “I lost something very dear to me.”

  “So did the Turners,” Madeline snapped.

  “But look what they gained in you, my dear. To lose a daughter and gain another?”

  “For God’s sake put away your arrows,” Jimmie said.

  Helene laid her hand on his arm. “No, Jimmie. Let’s count them now, but not in front of all these people. Couldn’t we go into your study?”

  Jimmie did not like to take them there. It was a place he wished to keep inviolate. But he had little choice. Nor was he placated much when both women paused in their baiting of each other to compliment him on it. He lit cigarettes for them and filled a pipe for himself. “I can’t stay long,” he murmured.

  Helene smiled. “Like they say, that’s the story of my life.” She lifted her head:
“Very well, I shall be both brief and blunt. When I was an artist’s model—more years ago than I care to number—I had a friend who ran away from her high-born kinsmen, from a house that was as cold as her father’s justice. Her name was Margaret Turner. And she had a college friend named Madeline who doesn’t belong in the story yet except for a chance introduction. Margaret and I shared everything—including my assignments as an artist’s model. After a while I was married…common-law we called it, but in my mind it was binding. How ironic it is, when I think of it now, that I am the one accused!”

  Helene got up and started to pace back and forth. Madeline watched her rather as though she thought she might plunge for escape. Jimmie pulled at his pipe.

  “Perhaps you can guess the rest, Jimmie? I was faithful to the faithless. I lost the husband to my friend, and both of them to Paris, where as the story goes, they are living happily ever after.” She whirled around on the other woman. “Now comes Madeline, a veritable Joan of Arc. Perhaps you’ll account your contribution?”

  “It’s very simple,” Miss Barker said, “I was the one who told.”

  “Not that simple, it isn’t,” Helene said. “She came searching for her friend to me, and soon pretended herself my friend, and got the story from me. The Judge paid you, didn’t he?”

  “Many times over,” Miss Barker said, and there was something in her way of saying it that touched Jimmie as nothing she had ever said in his presence had.

  “The trouble was she did not use the word ‘wife’ in my instant, when she told the story to His Honor. I was all blame—and I had no papers, no wedding words to prove my honor. In other words, Jimmie, I took the rap for corrupting the Judge’s daughter. In time he got a copy of a French wedding certificate to look at, the bona fide Mrs. Gregory Joyce. But she would not come home to her parents’ house. And Madeline would not leave it. She had bought herself a home at the expense of my reputation.”

  “Now things have greatly changed,” Miss Barker said. “Your reputation could buy you almost anything.”

  Jimmie swore a violent oath beneath his breath.

  But Helene shrugged. “That does not even anger me any more, but now you know why Judge Turner sent you home to bed, Jimmie. I am not good company. In fact, I am still unclean in spite of the fact that he took me home with him that night and tried to fumigate me. How does the song go—‘wash me in the water that you washed your dirty daughter?’…”

  “I don’t get it,” Jimmie said.

  “ ‘…And I will be as pure as the whitewash on the wall.’ Now do you get it?”

  “No!”

  “He asked me if I would like a fellowship to work in England. He has much admired my work, you see,” she said with mock naiveté, “after all these years, and out of the work of all the sculptors in America, mine deserved a fellowship…created overnight.”

  “It was a legitimate offer, Helene, and not created overnight,” Madeline said quietly. “The endowment relates to a small estate outside London. I once administered it.”

  Jimmie got a start then that made him glad the women were attending only each other at the moment. His first personal encounter with Madeline Barker had related to England after the Albany meeting. Jimmie looked at the woman who was calmly watching Helene move about like a restless panther. Very sure of herself, Madeline Barker, much in control. He got to his feet and caught Helene’s hand in his, drawing her to some ease at his side. The hand was cold and damp, and he was reminded of the feeling when someone has long dangled her fingers in the water from a boat. He lifted it to his lips, the public display of affection costing him considerable discomfiture.

  Madeline looking from him to Helene smiled a little and dropped her eyes as though deeply hurt. That really embarrassed him. She looked up again immediately and fiercely. The softness had been but a moment’s lapse. “Mrs. Joyce,” she said, and her voice sounded choked up, “what touching loyalty to a lost cause, your having kept that name for all these years.” She got to her feet. “That makes you almost as pitiable as me. I’ll be forty-five soon, Helene, an acknowledged spinster.” She looked a moment at the doorknob before putting her hand to it. “In that regard, I do believe the only difference between us is the light in which we have conducted our affairs. Goodnight, all.”

  “Now there,” said Jimmie as the door closed on her, “is a witch if ever I saw a broom.”

  “No,” Helene said, slowly, “I do believe the years have touched her with humanity. I think she is in love with you.”

  As long as he lived, Jimmie thought, he would never understand the perceptivity of women.

  “No more scenes like that, Jimmie,” Helene said smiling up at him, “you might learn to reciprocate.”

  “Just what do you mean by that?”

  “Public confession.”

  “Heaven forbid!” said Jimmie.

  24

  MRS. NORRIS HUNG UP the phone and sat down heavily. The Robinsons were not coming. Mag was not feeling very well. “I’ve put her to bed, Annie. No more than her stomach, I think. She’ll be fine in the morning.”

  Oh, a very cheerful man was Mr. Robinson. But the fact remained, she had not seen her sister, nor heard her voice, since the morning at three when Mr. Robinson came home and ordered Mag to bed when she questioned where he had been all night.

  But why had he said they were coming if he had no such intention? And the answer to that was plain enough: when she expected to see Mag that night in Nyack, she was sure not to try to see her in Brooklyn before it. And once in Nyack, what with the house in mourning, callers streaming in from over the country, politicians poking under the carpets, and the funeral still ahead of them, Mrs. Norris was not likely to interfere with Mr. Robinson’s ministrations to his wife.

  And then of course it could all be her imagination, considering the things going on in this house.

  Mrs. Norris jumped when Tully spoke to her. “I thought you were out of the way for the night,” she said.

  “I wondered if you could use any iodine,” the investigator drawled.

  “If I could use any or if I have any?”

  “If you could use some. The old gentleman had three bottles of it, and by the looks of it, all bought at Shea’s Drug Store recently. You don’t think he had in mind trying suicide?”

  “No more than I would,” she said, and thought about it further.

  Tully shook his head. “What on earth would a man buy three bottles for?”

  Mrs. Norris shrugged. It was too much for her mind in its present condition.

  “There’s something else I’ve been wanting to go over with you,” Tully said, “if you’re not too tired.”

  She made up her mind then to concentrate on what he was saying. “Go ahead, Mr. Tully.”

  “When the General arrived at his hotel last night with his fair lady and the other one, do you remember what he said to the clerk?”

  “Something profane, wasn’t it?”

  “But besides that. I got the exact transcript from the precinct man. ‘Give the lady the key to my suite, you so-and-so, etcetera.’ Now the General didn’t have a suite. He had a room. And if I’m not mistaken, he was the kind of man to call a room a room, eh?”

  Mrs. Norris nodded.

  “But his fair lady, now, that’s something else. Her notion of where the likes of the General ought to be staying, and her notion of the Mulvany, would put the word ‘suite’ in her mouth.”

  Mrs. Norris leaned forward. It was easy enough now to concentrate. “You have the ingredients of something there, Mr. Tully.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Norris. The trouble is, I don’t know what it’s going to cook up into.”

  She put one finger on Mr. Tully’s hand where it was resting on the telephone. “Was he hypnotized, do you think?”

  “That’s the line of inquiry I’m about to pursue. The troublesome thing about it—he was a man of such strong will.”

  “He was strong enough willed, as you say, Mr. Tully, but there were
times he didn’t have much won’t.”

  Mr. Tully put in a call to New York to a psychiatrist of his acquaintance. It was possible for the General to have been hypnotized and set in a drunken pattern—except that, having never been slobbering drunk himself, he would probably over-act.

  “He’d probably over-act,” Tully repeated for Mrs. Norris’ benefit. And that was certainly what he had done. The detective then asked his friend about the probabilities in the arrangement of the medals. When he hung up he repeated the gist of the opinion to Mrs. Norris. “If he put them on himself in the state of hypnosis, thinking himself drunk, he might’ve deliberately mixed ʼem up.”

  “That doesn’t help much as I see it,” Mrs. Norris said.

  “Nope, we’re never going to get three multiplying one by two,” Tully said, and started upstairs again. “Think about that iodine,” he added, pausing, “was he accident-prone, as they say?”

  “He was very steady, Mr. Tully, the nerves of an aristocrat.” When he was gone, Mrs. Norris picked up the phone herself and called Shea’s Drug Store, inquiring when the General had bought the iodine. No one knew, and checking the Jarvis account the clerk discovered that the purchase had not been charged, although the old gentleman was in the habit of charging everything.

  “Indeed he was,” Mrs. Norris said to herself, taking the information up to the detective. “He never paid for a thing he could get on tick.”

  “More of his aristocratic ways,” Tully said. “But it’s on the label: Shea’s Drug Store. You’re a perceptive woman, Mrs. Norris. Thank you for the information.” He entered a note in his book. He then pointed to the portrait without raising his head. “Who’s that?”

  “That, Mr. Tully, was once the President of the United States.”

  “I thought he was familiar,” Tully said. “You must excuse my ignorance, Mrs. Norris, but I’m a long time out of school, and I’ll tell you the truth, I don’t think I’ve heard of him since.”

  “He was a distant relative.”

  “He looks it,” Tully said, “I’ve been going over the old gentleman’s memoirs. I have to do that, you know, looking for clues.”