The Iron Gates

by Margaret Millar

  Andrew’s voice crept into the room. “Sands? No, I’m sorry I don’t think I do remember. Sands.” A pause, a change of tone. “Oh. Oh, yes.” He cleared his throat. “I’m—I’m very glad you were able to—to get that far. S-sunnyside? No, I was at home. The maids were frightened and called me home from the office. Will you hold the line, please?”

  Gray-lipped, he came to the door of the living room and shut it without saying anything.

  “It’s the police,” Giles said. “I suppose they’ve found out something. I—Polly, what’s the matter?”

  Her shoulders were shaking and a film had spread over her eyes like ice over a river.

  “Giles, it’s that man, it’s that same one. Sands. He came with a lot of men and I could see them from my window going over the snow. Parts of it were like red slush.”

  “I don’t understand . . .”

  “One of them, Sands, came in the house and sat over there, in that chair. He just sat and looked at us, at Martin and me, for a long time. Martin kept laughing. I don’t know why, but he kept on laughing and laughing.”

  She rose unsteadily and walked across the room and stood in front of Mildred’s portrait. For a minute the implacable brown eyes stared into the mild and vacuous blue eyes.

  Giles looked after her, puzzled. “Who is that?”

  “My mother.”

  “Oh.”

  “She was quite young when she died.” Polly turned around. Her face was hard and merciless. “Probably it’s just as well. She was the type who would have run to fat.”

  Giles didn’t want to look at her. He was always a little frightened of her. In their relationship it was Polly who was the realist, he the dreamer; she was the leader, he the follower.

  “I’d better go up and tell Martin,” she said. “He’ll want to know.”

  “Do you still want to leave? Do you want me to go up and pack?”

  “What?” she said, as if she had forgotten about it, had even forgotten him and who he was and why he was there. “I’ll have to tell Martin.”

  “It was in the winter,” Sands said. “For a couple of months there’d been stories of children being chased in the park on their way home from school. The stories were vague and nobody was ever arrested. Then one night Mildred Morrow was out visiting a friend. She didn’t come home.”

  Sands paused. “The friend was a widow who lived in the next house. Her name was Lucille Lanvers. Her statement was that Mildred had left her house before eleven o’clock, ostensibly to go home. Dr. Morrow was at the hospital on a confinement case and when he returned at one o’clock Mildred Morrow still hadn’t come home. He called his sister Edith who was in bed and they went over to Mrs. Lanvers’ house. The three of them looked around the park for an hour or so and then called in the police.

  “About six o’clock the next morning we found Mildred Morrow lying against a tree with her head split open. Her purse and some valuable jewels were missing. The weapon wasn’t found but we were pretty sure it was an axe. There was a heavy snowfall during the night, the body was almost completely covered and while there were indentations in the snow where foot tracks had been they were useless to us.”

  “Who had the case?” Bascombe said.

  “Inspector Hannegan. I was a patrolman at the time.

  I rode a motorcycle.”

  “Oh, for Christ’s sake,” Bascombe said. “A motorcycle.”

  Sands smiled quietly. “Sure. Hannegan figured the case was simple robbery and he had a great time hauling in all the boys who’d ever stolen a balloon from the dime store. As a favor, he let me fool around with the case from another angle. I got nowhere. There seemed to be no motive for the crime except robbery. I talked to the family and to Mrs. Lanvers, but I had no official standing. Then Hannegan got tired of the case and closed it after a few weeks.”

  “What was your verdict?”

  “I had none. Dr. Morrow had an alibi. His sister Edith puzzled me, she’s one of these rather unstable people, and I had an idea that she was jealously fond of her brother and probably preferred him without a wife. Mrs. Lanvers was a quiet restrained woman, quite plain-looking, not as pretty as she is now, if her photographs don’t lie. She was Mildred Morrow’s best friend, and here again there was no motive but the vaguely possible one that she wanted Mildred’s husband.”

  “And got him.”

  “Yes, but it’s not unusual for a man to marry his wife’s best friend. It’s happening all the time, especially in cases like this where the man was profoundly in love with his wife. Morrow was crazy about Mildred. He was very sick for a long time after she was killed.”

  “And Lucille nursed him, I suppose,” Bascombe said with a cynical smile.

  “I don’t know,” Sands said. “But it was the children who worried me most. I don’t know much about children and I found their reactions very queer. The girl was ten or eleven at the time. She acted as though nothing had happened and whenever I asked her a question she would stare at me and pretend she hadn’t heard. The boy was a couple of years older, going to Upper Canada College at the time, he acted wild and crazy. He laughed a great deal and offered to fight me. He said he’d take me on with one hand tied behind his back provided I promised to keep clear of his spine which he’d had broken once in a football game.”

  “What happened to him?”

  “He’s now literary editor of the Review”

  “My God!”

  “The only one of the family I’ve seen since is the girl, Polly. I came across her three years ago in court. She was testifying in some charity case. She recognized me and turned her head away.”

  “Funny she remembered you.”

  “Yes. Funny. Her father didn’t when I phoned. Anyway, Hannegan closed the investigation and I was called off. Now I think it’s opening again.” He looked across at Bascombe. “Don’t you?”

  “Yeah,” Bascombe said.

  Miss Flack emerged from the small cubicle where she’d been gilding the lily.

  “It surely is nice of you to offer to drive me home,” she said. “To tell the honest truth I was scared to death when you said you were policemen. Now I’m not a bit scared.”

  “Good for you,” Sands said.

  Miss Flack was deposited at her apartment.

  “What now?” Bascombe said.

  “We look around.”

  “I think somebody told me once that Toronto was fifteen miles east and west and nine miles north and south.”

  “Is that a fact,” Sands said.

  “What I want to know is who’s holding the baby, you or me?”

  “We’re sharing it until it’s old enough to choose.” The car shot ahead almost as if it knew what direction to take, like a well-trained horse. “I want to get to Mrs. Morrow first.”

  Mr. Greeley and his lady friend were at £ dime-a-dance hall out on the pier. Neither of them felt at home. The place was too classy. Greeley was ashamed to take off his overcoat and show his old suit. By the end of the second dance the sweat was pouring down his neck and the effects of the champagne were wearing off. Greeley needed something stronger than champagne.

  “Let’s get the hell out of here,” he said.

  “What for?” the woman said. “I’m having a swell time.”

  “Hell, if it’s rear-bumping you want you can get it in a street car and cheaper.”

  “We just get some place and then you want to go.”

  “I got a date, anyway. Come on.”

  He walked out, not even looking around to see if she followed.

  When they were outside she said, “You got no manners, Eddy.”

  She buttoned her coat. The lake slapped at the pier with cold contemptuous hate.

  “Jesus, Eddy, let’s go home.”

  “Quit crabbing.”

  “I don’t like it here.”

  “Well, for Christ’s sake, wait a minute.”

  He pushed aside the flap of his overcoat, and stabbed something into his thigh through his cloth
es. His thigh felt sore but his mind began to see things right again, he had the right perspective now. Life was a stinker, but he, Greeley, had it licked.

  Me, Greeley.

  It was two o’clock in the morning when Sands called up again. Andrew hadn’t gone to bed, he was sitting in his den with a book in his lap.

  “Yes?” he said into the phone.

  “Dr. Morrow? Inspector Sands. Could you get dressed . . .”

  “I am dressed. What’s happened?”

  “I’m at the Lakeview Hotel. It’s on Bleacher Street, right off the Boulevard, west of Sunnyside. Your—your wife is here.”

  “Yes . . . yes . . .” It was as if something had split inside his head and he had to talk above a terrible roaring. “Is she—she’s all right?”

  “She’s alive,” Sands said.

  “She’s sick, then? You say she’s sick? I . . .”

  Edith appeared at the door .of the den, wrapped in an old plaid bathrobe. “What is it, Andrew? Tell me this instant! What is the matter?”

  “I’m coming right away,” Andrew said and laid down the phone.

  “I’m going with you,” Edith said. “Whatever it is I’m going with you, you can’t face it alone.”

  Andrew looked at her, but he couldn’t see her properly. She was just a blur of colors, a whirling chart of colors without form or meaning or substance. He didn’t even feel his own hand pushing her aside, and though his legs moved, his feet didn’t seem to touch the floor.

  His eyes functioned but only if he looked at one thing at a time, one separate stationary thing, the door, the instrument bag packed and ready in the front seat of the car, a street lamp, a house, a tree.

  She sat upright in a chair. Beside her the steam radiator was turned on and gave off blasts of noise and heat that smelled of paint. But her face remained cold and waxy and her eyes frozen.

  “Mrs. Morrow . . .”

  (There is a man in my room. Is it my room? No. Yes, my room. One man and another man. Two men.)

  “. . . I’ve phoned your husband. He’s coming right away.”

  (What a lot of men in my room and so much talk.)

  “If there’s anything I could get you . . .”

  (They might be talking to me.)

  Bascombe shifted uneasily. “I don’t think she hears you.”

  (But I do. You’re making a mistake, young man. Young man? Old man? Two, anyway. Two, two.)

  “Mrs. Morrow, I’d like to help you. If you can remember what happened to you . . .”

  An expression moved across her face, softly, like a cat walking. She knew she must be clever now, these were her enemies.

  (She was in the lake, she was swimming, and the water was cold and dark and the waves passionate against her and so strong. She saw a hand stretched out to help her, she reached for the hand and it pushed her savagely away, down, down, down, so black, so dying, dying.)

  “Mrs. Morrow, here is your husband.”

  “Lucille—Lucille, darling . . .”

  He came into the sweltering room. She turned her head very slowly and saw him hold out his hand to her.

  She began to scream. The screams came out of her throat smoothly, almost effortlessly, like a song from a bird.

  When the ambulance came she was still screaming.

  The ambulance neglected to pick up Mr. Greeley. The headlights just missed him.

  He was sitting in the alley behind the hotel propped up against the wall. The wind from the lake stabbed at his face but Greeley didn’t mind it. Life was a stinker but he, Greeley, had it licked. The night was dark but full of bright dreams—warm women, silk, thick soft fur, velvet hills and soft snug places.

  Dreaming, he passed into sleep and sleeping into death.

  Part Two

  THE FOX

  6

  She felt safe again. Behind her there was an iron gate and a hundred doors that locked with a big key. One of the nurses kept the key in the palm of her hand all the time.

  There were no steps, only inclines that you walked up with someone beside you talking pleasantly and impersonally, and then finally the last door, the last clink of a key and the enemy was shut out. The room had windows but no one could get in ’through them. On both sides there was steel mesh.

  She went immediately to the windows and felt the mesh, knowing that the nurse was watching her and would report it to the superintendent. But she had to know the room was safe and the feel of the mesh under her fingers was reassuring.

  “It’s strong, isn’t it?” she said.

  “Oh, yes,” the nurse said cheerfully. She was young, with blonde curls and a pretty smile. She looked trim and efficient, but her eyes seemed to be laughing as though they lived a secret giddy life of their own. “I’m Miss Scott.”

  “Miss, Scott,” Lucille repeated.

  “We’ll just unpack your clothes now and put them away, Mrs.—Morrow.”

  “Mrs. Morrow.”

  “You’ll be sharing this room with Miss Cora Green. Miss Green is down in the library at the moment. I’m sure you’ll like her very much. We all do.”

  She began to unpack Lucille’s clothes, keeping the key flat in the palm of her left hand. She did not turn her back to Lucille or take her eyes off her, but her vigilance was unobtrusive. She talked pleasantly and steadily. When Lucille finally noticed how closely she was being watched she did not resent it. Miss Scott was so smooth. She gave the impression that she was being merely careful, not suspicious, cautious but not in the least mistrustful.

  “What a pretty blue dress,” Miss Scott said. “Almost matches your eyes, doesn’t it? I think we’ll save that one for the movie night.”

  “I didn’t know I was to share a room.”

  “We find it’s better to have two people in a room. It’s not so lonely. And you’ll love Miss Green. She makes us all laugh.”

  “I wanted to be by myself.”

  “Of course you may feel like that at first. Would you mind handing me another hanger, Mrs. Morrow?” Lucille moved automatically. The familiar act of hanging up one of her own dresses made her feel more at home. She picked up another hanger.

  Miss Scott observed her. “Perhaps you’d like to finish up by yourself, Mrs. Morrow? Then you’ll know where everything is.”

  “All right.”

  “We let everyone help herself as much as possible. We like to feel that each suite is a little community . . .”

  “I don’t want to see the others.” The others, the crazy ones. “I want to be by myself.”

  “You’ll feel a little strange at first, but we find our system is the best.”

  It was Lucille’s first contact with the dominant “we.” We, the nurses: we, the doctors, the brass keys, the steel mesh: we, the iron gate, the fence: we, the people, society: we, the world.

  “There are four rooms to each suite,” Miss Scott said.

  “Two to a room. We try to put people of similar background together.”

  From somewhere outside the door a woman began to moan, “Give me more food and more clotherings.” The voice was weak but distinct.

  “That’s Mrs. Hammond,” Miss Scott said briskly. “Don’t pay any attention to her, she has plenty to eat and to wear.”

  “Give me more food and more clotherings.”

  “That’s all she ever says,” Miss Scott added.

  “Give me . . .”

  Lucille bent over the suitcase, as if her body had flowed suddenly out of her dress and the dress itself was ready to fold itself up in the suitcase and go home.

  “Do you feel ill, Mrs. Morrow?”

  There was a blur in front of her eyes and beyond the blur words dangled and danced, and beyond the thickness that clothed her ears voices spoke, out of turn, out of time.

  Give me more food. People of similar background. Mrs. Morrow, here is your husband. More clotherings. What a pretty blue dress. Do you feel ill, Mrs. Morrow? Do you feel ill? Ill? Ill?

  “No,” she said.

 
“Just a little upset, eh?” Miss Scott said. “We expect that. Perhaps you’d like me to leave you alone for a minute or two until you get used to the room. I’ll go down to the library and get Miss Green. Here, you’ll find this blue chair very comfortable.”

  “Are you going to lock my door? I want my door locked.”

  “We never lock individual doors during the day.”

  “I want my door . . .”

  “Tonight, when you’re all tucked in, we’ll lock your door.”

  Miss Scott reached the door without exactly walking backward but without turning her back to Lucille. She hooked the door open and stepped into the hall.

  Mrs. Hammond was standing just outside, her arms folded across her flat chest. She was a handsome young woman with thick black hair and somber brown eyes, but her skin was yellowish and stretched taut over the bones of her face. She wore a black skirt and a heavy red sweater.

  “Give me more food and more clotherings.”

  “A little quieter, please, Mrs. Hammond,” Miss Scot| said. “We have a new guest today. Tell Miss Parsons to give you an apple.”

  Miss Parsons herself appeared in the corridor. She was younger than Miss Scott and less sure of herself.

  “Well, she’s already had two apples and a banana, Miss Scott.”

  “Goodness,” Miss Scott said. “You don’t want to get a pain in your tummy, Mrs. Hammond.”

  “Give me more food . . .”

  “I could give her a milk shake,” Miss Parsons said nervously.

  “There,” Miss Scott said cheerfully, “if you’re good and behave yourself Miss Parsons will give you a milk shake. You go back to your room, Mrs. Hammond. Rest period isn’t over yet.”

  Majestically, Mrs. Hammond went down the corridor and disappeared into her room.

  “Where does she put it?” Miss Parsons said in a worn voice. “Where does she put it?”

  “Go down for Miss Cora. She’s in the library.” She lowered her voice. “I don’t think Mrs. Morrow is going to be any trouble at all, except that Dr. Goodrich wants everything she says put on her chart.”

  Miss Parsons looked desperate. “Everything?”

  “It’s all right. She doesn’t say much. Here’s the key to get Miss Cora.”