Puzzle of the Silver Persian

by Stuart Palmer

  The chief constable leaned forward. “Careful, doctor. This woman may have been subject to seizures, as you call them. But she was also afraid for her life. A short time ago, I am informed, she received a warning letter, and Sergeant Secker of the C.I.D. is here making an investigation. It is of the utmost importance that we make sure that there could be nothing off-color about this death.”

  The doctor looked annoyed. “Of course I was careful. I know drowning when I see it. Besides, wasn’t she locked and bolted in the bathroom?”

  Polfran nodded. He turned to Sergeant Secker, and Miss Withers, who was trying to make herself inconspicuous in the offing, sensed a barely concealed rivalry between the representatives of the urban and rural forces. “Well, sergeant, are you convinced that this has nothing to do with the case that brought you down into country society?”

  The sergeant was not convinced. “I could answer you better if I knew the exact time of death,” he admitted.

  “That’s easy enough,” cut in the doctor. “Less than three hours ago, certainly.” Miss Withers breathed again.

  “You are sure of that?” demanded Secker.

  “Positive. A cadaver cools off at approximately the rate of two degrees an hour, and we can set the time of death by that fact. The body registered just over 93 degrees when I got here, setting the time of death at—” the doctor consulted an ancient golden watch—“between eleven-fifteen and eleven-thirty.”

  “Good enough,” said the chief constable. “You heard young Reverson testify that he and the young lady house guest left to play golf at nine and returned a little before one? The girl says the same. And this lady—” he motioned toward Miss Withers—“bears them out in her statement. So does the butler, who was in the hall all morning. Reverson was the only person who could profit by his aunt’s death, and little enough when you consider that he would have inherited everything in a few years anyhow. Of course, we’ll check with the golf course people, but I don’t see how there could be anything to it.”

  Nor did the sergeant. “Only it’s damned awkward just at this time,” he admitted.

  “Perhaps Miss Pendavid herself would rather have postponed this event,” said the doctor pointedly. Nobody laughed.

  “Very well, then,” said the chief constable. “There’ll be an inquest, of course. But I shan’t order an autopsy unless young Reverson, as the next of kin, demands it.”

  “He won’t,” prophesied Miss Withers softly.

  She went down the stairs with a tremendous feeling of relief coursing through her veins. It was a coincidence—but they happened everywhere in life. For a time she had feared that her juggling with dangerous matters had resulted in a horrible mistake, but it was turning out all right. The end justified the means. There was still Chief Inspector Cannon to contend with, but she could point out certain facts to him of which he seemed to be unaware. She went to her room for her handbag, made sure of its contents, and then hurried down.

  If there had been a state of tension in the drawing room when Miss Withers mounted the stairs, it was there a thousandfold when she came down, for two new arrivals had appeared on the scene.

  Chief Inspector Cannon of the C.I.D. brushed past her, headed for the stair. She would have stopped him, but he gave her a blunt “good-afternoon” and went up three steps at a time. He was wearing a very streaked motor duster and cap, and his feet left little puddles of water on the stair.

  “Good heavens,” said Miss Withers to herself. “Is the Yard equipped with airplanes?” She had not expected him until after the five o’clock train pulled in. “Anyway,” she thought, “it won’t be long now.”

  She came into the drawing room and saw Tom Hammond standing stiffly by the portières. He, too, made unpleasant little puddles on the floor.

  “That frozen-faced schoolmaster said you’d set out in this direction,” he was saying to his wife. The reunion did not seem to be a warm one. Loulu turned her shoulder to him and gave Miss Withers a baleful glance.

  “And you said Tom had nothing to do with arranging this!” she accused.

  Miss Withers shrugged her shoulders. “I should think you’d blame Mr. Cannon,” she suggested. “He seems to have escorted your husband to Dinsul.”

  “We met on the pier or whatever you call it that leads to this movie set of a place,” retorted Tom Hammond. “Of all the impossible houses to get to—” He snorted. “This morning I came here and they threw me out. This afternoon I can’t get out for love nor money!”

  Miss Withers nodded to herself. Then it had been Hammond—the young man who had an argument with Treves that morning. She could think of only one reason why he might have come. But there were worse worries on her mind.

  Miss Withers did not have her heart and soul in the somewhat unpleasant gathering in the drawing room. She highly valued her excellent eye teeth, but she would cheerfully have had both of them pulled in order to know what was going on in that room upstairs.

  Leslie Reverson pulled himself together and remembered that he was host. “I say,” he said brightly, “it’s getting on. We might have some tea.” He pulled at the bell rope. But there was no answer. The faithful Treves seemed to have made himself invisible.

  Nobody wanted tea anyway. There was a long silence in which nothing was heard except the remorseless striking of the grandfather clock in the hall. It struck three mellow notes and was silent again.

  “We could tell riddles,” suggested Loulu Hammond. “Anybody know any good parlor games?”

  “I suggest Truth and Consequences,” said Miss Withers wickedly. And it was at that moment that the police constable reappeared.

  “Miss Noring,” he said. “The chief inspector would like a word with you.”

  “It’s come!” Miss Withers breathed. She rose—and then sat down again. Candida went somewhat nervously out of the room and up the stairs. She did not reappear.

  “Excuse me,” gasped Miss Withers, who could remain an onlooker no longer. The three who waited in that drawing room excused her—in fact, not one of them but felt easier when she went. Tom Hammond dripped on the carpet and stared at his wife. Loulu Hammond pretended to read a book which she picked up from the table. It was Pre-Roman Remains in Cornwall, but as she held it upside down that did not matter. Leslie Reverson wished that they would all go away—all except Candida.

  Miss Withers met Sergeant Secker in the upper hall. “Where are they?” she demanded. “Cannon and the girl. Did he arrest her?”

  “He did not,” said the sergeant. “You see—”

  At that moment Chief Inspector Cannon came out into the hall. As a matter of fact, he stepped from the door of the room that was Candida Noring’s.

  Miss Withers seized upon him. “Before you place that girl under arrest,” she began, “listen to me. Don’t you understand—”

  Cannon smiled wearily. “You here again? Well, you may as well know. I spent yesterday afternoon trying to get a warrant for the Noring girl’s arrest out of the D.P.P.—Department of Public Prosecutions, you know. In an international case of this kind I have to have their backing. And this morning they turned me down flat. Insufficient evidence, they decided, the bloody idiots. And I had a marvelous case against her, too.”

  “Case! Don’t you ever try to achieve justice?”

  “That is for the courts,” said Cannon stiffly.

  “But if you didn’t come here to arrest her…?”

  “I drove down here,” said Cannon, “to put an end to this whole business. The D.P.P. spiked my guns by refusing a warrant on the evidence at hand. But we’ve got other weapons. I came to warn Candida Noring that the Yard knew all about her and that in five days our Special Branch, which deals with aliens, would see that her passport visa was cancelled. She’s got to get out of England.” His manner implied that he wished Miss Withers were in the same predicament.

  “That,” said the school teacher, “will probably break her heart.”

  “More likely break mine,” said the chief
inspector humorously. “But what can I do? My hands are bound…”

  “Muscle-bound,” Miss Withers told him.

  Cannon stared at her. “You don’t think that she had anything to do with the death of Miss Emily Pendavid, do you? I’ve naturally paid a considerable bit of attention to that possibility.”

  “Not unless she managed to be in two places at the same time,” Miss Withers admitted. “It’s easy enough for you to check up at the golf course and make sure that Reverson and Candida are telling the truth.”

  “I already have done so,” said Sergeant Secker quietly. “They arrived before nine, and were seen on the course until after twelve.”

  Cannon nodded. “I’m satisfied,” he said. “You can’t fool a police surgeon. And that man swears that the Honorable Emily died between eleven-fifteen and the half hour… in a locked bathroom.” He began to put on his faded dust coat. “Well, I bid you good-afternoon, ma’am. The sergeant and I will soon be getting back to our day’s work in London.”

  “Are you taking Candida with you?” asked Miss Withers.

  He shook his head. “She’s not in custody. And I only have a two-seater. But the girl is packing her things. Says that she intended going away this afternoon anyhow. We’ll make certain, of course, that she takes the next boat for the States.”

  “And thus ends the mystery of the stolen cyanide,” Miss Withers murmured. “Well, you have your cases solved, even if you cannot get a conviction. I suppose that Candida Noring admitted the crimes, after she knew that you were not going to arrest her?” The school teacher gave him an odd look.

  “She’s not a fool,” said Cannon. “I only wish she had, that’s all! She’d cook her goose then, right enough. But she just listened meekly and promised to leave the country.”

  “I don’t blame her,” said the school teacher. She shook hands with the detectives. “It has been a real pleasure seeing Scotland Yard in action. Until we meet again—”

  Chief Inspector Cannon almost said “God forbid!” but stopped himself just in time.

  “A pleasure, ma’am,” he assured her. “But, of course, we won’t push off until we make sure that the girl gets aboard the train for London. No more mysterious ‘suicides’ in this case if we can help it, eh, sergeant?”

  Sergeant John Secker seemed to have something on his mind, but he nodded amiably. “Bon voyage,” he told Miss Withers.

  “But I’m not going anywhere!”

  “When you do!” he said.

  She left them there, at the head of the stairs. Everything seemed to be over, and yet that little red signal was still flashing in the back of her mind. It vaguely annoyed her intense feeling of self-satisfaction.

  She went into her own room and began to pack. There was nothing to remain for, now. Certainly Leslie Reverson did not need her, and his aunt was beyond all human help.

  Tobermory arose from her pillow and stretched himself. It had been a very long and boring afternoon for the big silver-gray cat. He blinked his great amber eyes and miaowed hungrily.

  “Insatiable stupid monster,” Miss Withers accused him. “And you claim to be hungry after your grisly feast of this morning!”

  Tobermory was hungry, in spite of the feathers which she had brushed from his mouth. He miaowed once more.

  Then the cat sat up straight, as regal as any of his ancestors—the ancient felines who were sacred in Persia and worshiped as gods in Egypt. Tobermory set about washing his face with a supreme indifference to Miss Withers and to everything in life except his own proud self.

  The school teacher stroked the fur of his silver back. “If you could talk—” she said. Suddenly she stopped short, and her hand pressed so heavily upon Tobermory’s back that he twisted away, spat, and then leaped down to the floor, where he stalked up and down angrily.

  The world whirled, and readjusted itself. The little red signal in the back of Miss Withers’ mind flared like a beacon.

  “And I called you stupid!” she cried aloud to the impassive beast. “That’s funny—so funny! I called you stupid—and you were the only one to know!”

  Tobermory stared through wise amber eyes.

  Chief Inspector Cannon of the C.I.D. was leisurely descending the stairs in company with Chief Constable Polfran, two constables, and Sergeant Secker, the doctor having long since departed. Their friendly, if somewhat guarded, conversation was rudely interrupted by the advent of a middle-aged school teacher, who darted past them like a frightened greyhound.

  “Candida! She isn’t in her room!” wailed the apparition, and then disappeared down the stair.

  The officers looked at each other. Polfran made a circle with his forefinger, around his large red Cornish ear. “Quite completely batty,” he said.

  But Miss Withers was not batty. Never before in her forty-odd years had she been in as complete control of her faculties. She saw the apple-cheeked constable at the door and turned toward the drawing room.

  There was Candida, two black traveling bags beside her. She was saying good-bye to a bewildered Leslie Reverson. Tom Hammond and his unfriendly young wife watched from opposite ends of the room, waiting until they would be permitted to depart upon their separate journeys.

  “I must, I really must,” Candida was saying. “It’s been wonderful, but I must go.”

  “No, you mustn’t!” cried a stern New England voice. “Wait! Stop her, somebody!”

  The people in the drawing room froze into a dreadful immobility. But Miss Hildegarde Withers did not realize how insane she appeared and sounded. “She killed your aunt!” cried the school teacher. Leslie Reverson blinked foolishly. “Don’t let her go!”

  Candida smiled and shook her head. Tom Hammond put his hand on Miss Withers’ arm. “You’re overwrought,” he suggested. “This has been too much for you. Why—” She shook him off.

  They all looked at Miss Withers as if she had been particularly vulgar. “You fools!” she cried. “Don’t you see? Look at her! Look at her eyes!”

  Candida’s eyes were rather strange—smoky yellow pools that belied the polite marble of her face.

  “She drowned Miss Pendavid in her bath—she’s mad! Oh, don’t let her go!”

  “Steady,” said Tom Hammond. “You can’t—”

  His voice trailed away as he looked at Candida. Her mouth betrayed her, twisting like a nest of worms, so that her teeth gleamed. It was quite horrible for a moment.

  Then the girl moved. She bent down and snatched at the bags at her feet. One of them came hurtling through the air, knocking Miss Withers and Tom Hammond into an entangled heap. She ran past them.

  “What’s all this?” cried Cannon from the stair. “I say—”

  Whatever he may have meant to say was forever lost as a smart suitcase struck him in the face.

  Candida ran for the door. The constable, caught off his guard, blinked stupidly. “Here!” he said.

  He said nothing more, for the desperate girl snatched a mashie-niblick from the golf bag which stood in the hall and hit him just beneath the ear. He went down with a thud which shook the stone flagging.

  The way lay clear for the girl who stood in the open door way, but she waited. With desperate, sure fingers she reached for the rusty chain of the portcullis, putting all her weight upon it. There was a creaking of ancient bolts—

  Then the massive barrier fell—iron spikes dropping with a terrible, remorseless swiftness—but Candida plunged forward.

  “It’s got her!” cried Cannon, struggling to his feet. But the descending spears had missed their mark. Candida was free, running down the interminable stone steps. Her pursuers beat against the heavy iron grille which blocked the doorway. It was immovable as fate.

  “Stop her!” screamed Miss Withers. But nobody could stop her. There was not a gun in the pocket of any policeman. “Stop her! The limousine is waiting—she’ll get away!”

  Candida ran on, down and down and down. Then she stopped short. The limousine waited, as it had been ordered to do. But
it waited at the pier on the mainland. For almost a quarter of a mile between, the green rolling sea stretched over the causeway. Since noon the tide had been coming in—the tide which had wet the feet of Cannon and Tom Hammond—and now it made an unbroken, unbreakable circle around the ancient castle-fortress of Dinsul.

  It was the end for Candida Noring. She crouched there, cursing the smooth, implacable ocean, until men poured under the painfully raised portcullis and took her away.

  Chapter XV

  The Happy Ending

  “I SUGGEST THAT YOU have a good bit of explaining to do,” said Chief Inspector Cannon mildly, as he faced Miss Withers across the table in the magnificent old dining hall of Dinsul.

  She nodded, and smiled wryly. “You know more than I hoped you did,” she admitted. “I’m afraid that years of reading Sherlock Holmes stories gave me a false impression of Scotland Yard. You’re not exactly a Lestrade, you know.”

  “Thank you,” said the chief inspector. “Well?”

  She went on. “When I heard that you were coming down here to arrest Candida Noring, I felt terribly sick. By the way—just how did you come to suspect?”

  Cannon grunted. “Official secrets and all that. As a matter of fact, I got the idea that this whole case involved a woman. Poison and trickery and so forth, you see. Black-bordered letters and the rest of the frippery. As soon as I found that Rosemary Fraser had died more than two weeks ago, I eliminated her. Mrs. Hammond left the country and eliminated herself—for she couldn’t have mailed any warning letters in London while she was in Paris. That left Candida and Miss Pendavid, and I wasn’t inclined to the opinion that the Honorable Emily would be at the bottom of all this. Besides, when I came to check over the statement that Candida Noring made to me on board ship, just before the death of Noel, I discovered a contradiction or two. She swore that Noel must be responsible for the death of her friend Rosemary, who was supposed to have confessed to her all about what happened in the blanket locker, etc. But only a short time before, when the disappearance was first discovered, Candida was crying ‘suicide’ to the captain. It occurred to me that she must have learned something in the meantime to make her change her mind.”