The Black Dream_Rue Morgue Vintage Mysteries

by Constance Little

  I said nothing, but Egbert had heard the whispering, too, and motioned to his pals, who got up and went into the kitchen. The whispering stopped, there was a word or two, and then the two men returned with Ken. Lucy, and the coffee.

  "Ah, Sergeant Smith," said Egbert, beaming through his glasses. "I am investigating the death of Suzy Howland, and I'm sure you'll cooperate by giving me any information that you can." He added with a slight bow, "Bartholomew Egbert."

  Ken looked a bit stunned, but pulled himself together and said. "Good morning, Mr. Bartholomew. Anything I can do, of course."

  "You don't know him well enough to use his first name," I interposed, hungrily watching the coffeepot.

  They both ignored me, but Egbert repeated his name, and added that it was a cross he'd born all his life because his aunt had been given the honor of naming him—and only because his parents owed her money and hoped she'd be pleased enough to forget it for a while longer. He said he'd thought of shortening it to Bart, but Bart Egbert wasn't quite right either, somehow.

  "You can't build any sort of a decent house on a faulty foundation," I said, still watching the coffee. "Your aunt had to end up with Egbert, no matter how she started."

  Egbert didn't even turn his head, but he observed to Ken that I was without doubt the rudest young lady he had ever met. Ken agreed heartily, and Egbert went on smoothly to suggest that I had probably crossed swords, in my usual crude fashion, with Suzy.

  Ken wiped the smile from his face and frowned, and Lucy, busy pouring the coffee, looked up and said loudly, "Nonsense! Eugenia has better manners than a lot of people I know. At least she wouldn't take the food right off the serving plates and wrap it up to take home."

  The two men dropped their eyes to the empty plates and broke into grins, and Egbert, in a sudden fit of temper, ordered them out into the hall to wait.

  "That's rude, if you like," Lucy said indignantly. "You could have let them have their coffee."

  "We are policemen, madam." said Egbert, still annoyed, "and we did not come here to drink coffee."

  "Now, Sergeant Smith, I understand that Mr. Homer Fredon recently eloped with Mrs. Emerson from the next apartment—as far as can be learned. However, several people seem to think that the lady did not go away with Mr. Fredon, and have, in fact, hinted that you know where she is."

  Ken lost his temper and practically bellowed. He denied everything at least six times, and talked at some length about how it had been only a beautiful friendship.

  Egbert calmly wrote something down in a notebook, read it over, and looked up again.

  "I believe Mr. Fredon turned up here last night?"

  "Yes, he did," said Lucy. "Suzy was the only one who saw him. But he came back again—he spent the night on the living-room couch."

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  EGBERT SWUNG AROUND on Lucy and asked, "What do you mean, Mrs. Davis?" and at the same time I said, "I don't see how that's possible. The party was going on in there first, and then later poor Suzy was there."

  Egbert transferred his attention to me and requested, as a favor to him— or else—that I remain quiet for a few consecutive minutes.

  "Now go on, Mrs. Davis. How do you know that Mr. Fredon spent the night on a couch in the living room?"

  "Why don't you go and look?" Lucy said impatiently. "He left a light blanket on the couch, and a pair of his pajamas. Somebody certainly was lying there, because it's a soft couch, and it's all squashed in. You know the one, Eugenia—that large thing over by the piano. Mary always starts to squirm if anybody sits on it, because she has to fluff up the pillows again when they get up."

  Egbert decided to investigate, and we all trailed after him. The couch was a bit out of the way of general traffic—probably so it wouldn't be sat on too often—and was as Lucy described it. A light summer blanket lay across it. with one corner trailing on the floor, and a pair of crumpled pajamas with quiet striping in subdued colors.

  We gazed for a while, Egbert tapping his teeth with a pencil, until I said thoughtfully. "He couldn't have been here long, anyway."

  Egbert stopped tapping and asked, "Why?"

  "Well, I heard the party leave, and then after a little while I heard Mary come in. If Homer had come in before Mary, I'd have heard him too."

  "You might have been sleeping," Egbert suggested. "He was trying not to be seen or heard, anyway, as far as I can gather."

  I shook my head. "I didn't sleep—I was reading. If he came in first, then he knows how to open and close the front door without making any sound."

  This caused a major spurt of activity. Egbert, Ken, and the male chorus pounded along to the front door to see whether it could be opened without noise, and Lucy and I retired to the dining room to drink some more coffee.

  "Such a commotion!" Lucy sighed. "And all over nothing. Just imagine anyone murdering that poor little inoffensive thing! Perfect nonsense!"

  "Do you think she killed herself?"

  "For heaven's sake, no. Suzy was quite happy and contented."

  "You can't be sure of that," I said slowly. "She was only a young girl, and doing housework for Mrs. Budd couldn't have been much of a life. I mean, would you like to be a domestic employed by Mrs. Budd?"

  Lucy almost shuddered. "Of course not—but you're forgetting that if Suzy didn't like it she could have had dozens of other jobs for the asking. You know what it's like these days. So what's the use of saying that she committed suicide because she couldn't stand working for Sarah Budd? Even though I don't know how she did stand it. Sarah is one of my oldest friends, and I'm devoted to her, but she's an aggravating fusspot, and—"

  "How do you think Suzy came to be poisoned then?" I interrupted hastily.

  "Oh, it was some sort of an accident—and if they weren't all crazy they'd see it. Fussing around and carrying on. Why don't they let the poor child rest in peace?"

  They all came back from the front door at that point, and Egbert asked me to go to my room, leave my door as it had been last night, and see whether I could hear them opening and closing the front door. I did as I was asked, and took the opportunity to get dressed—but although I listened carefully, I heard no sound from the front door.

  So Homer could have come back after the last of the guests had left and before Mary arrived. Apparently he had got his blanket and pajamas and gone to bed on the couch. It seemed probable that Suzy had come in while Mary and I were having coffee in the kitchen, and she must have seen Homer. My presence in the kitchen probably deterred him from having it out with Mary— and so he had gone on down the hall and out again. Poor Homer—unable to find a place to lay his head in all his vast apartment.

  When I had finished dressing I wandered out into the hall and. glancing at the two busts on the antique desk, decided that it was Homer who had rearranged them. Probably, in his homesickness, he'd wanted to see things the way they'd always been.

  The doorbell rang, and I went along to answer it—deadheating with one of Egbert's men.

  We opened the door to John Emerson and Mrs. Budd, who passed me with a couple of brief words and walked in silently.

  "Lovely day," I said politely. "This is the police—outer fringe. The nucleus is in the dining room."

  John glanced at the stooge and away again, but Mrs. Budd went pale to the lips and repeated in a hoarse whisper, "Police!"

  "Will you come into the dining room?" said the spider politely.

  Mrs. Budd and John followed him—Mrs. Budd looking scared and John grim. I wandered along behind but continued into the living room and then out onto the balcony. The sun was bright and warm, and I tried to enjoy it, but my thoughts kept turning to Suzy, and I couldn't shake off a feeling of depression. I could not imagine her committing suicide but it seemed even more impossible that anyone would murder her.

  I glanced at the silly partition that divided the balcony, and the next instant I had climbed across and slipped into the Emerson apartment. I did not know what I intended to do, exactly, and I
felt scared and guilty, but for some reason I kept on.

  The layout was identical with Mary's apartment, and I made straight for the smallest bedroom—the one Lucy had been forced to use, at Mary's. It had been Suzy's room, all right. I stood with my back against the door and my two hands behind me on the knob, and looked. Everything very neat and tidy and simple—appropriate and in quiet taste. I took a long breath and moved forward to the closet. Neat and clean inside, with a few modest clothes on hangers. I closed the door, crept over to the bureau, and went rapidly through the drawers. Neatness and order again—nicely laundered underwear, gloves, handkerchiefs, a few cosmetics in one of the top drawers, and a small blue leather appointment book.

  I hesitated over the little book and then opened it, wondering what earthly excuse I had for doing such a thing.

  There were a few dates scattered through it things like "visit Aunt Agnes" and "dinner and movies with Emily"—these always on a Thursday or a Sunday. But the last entry had been written on a Monday, only two days previously. It said: "Must go in there today."

  I had a combined attack of nerves and conscience, at that point, and got myself out of Suzy's room a good deal more quickly than I had gone in. I was barely in time, for I had only just made the living room when I heard someone open the front door. I flew back to Mary's apartment, wondering all the way what had possessed me to be such a fool—and then I discovered that I still had the little appointment book clutched in my hand. I stood and looked at it, feeling guilty and annoyed with myself. There was no way of getting it back now—and although it didn't seem important, I felt that Egbert had a right to play with his own toys.

  Ken walked into the living room and raised his eyebrows at me. "So you've been over in the Emersons' apartment?"

  I said, "What do you mean?" but I could feel myself blushing.

  "We looked everywhere for you, until some bright soul concluded that you'd gone in to look after Mary. The cops departed, but they'll be back, because they want to see Mary, and they want to talk to you again. So what were you doing in the Emerson apartment?"

  I sat down and pulled out a cigarette. "Well—as a matter of fact, I just wanted to see Suzy's room."

  He regarded me in silence for a moment and then asked, "Did they catch you?"

  I slouched down in my chair and grinned at him. "It was touch and go, but I made it. That poor kid's room is as neat as a pin."

  "You'd better sit tight and behave yourself," he said ominously. "This thing is serious—probably murder."

  "I know B. Egbert wants to think so." I admitted. "But after all, poison is mostly taken by accident."

  Ken shook his head with a bothered look. "There's something going on, though. Homer and his game of hide-and-seek, and all that. I wish he'd show up again."

  "How long had Suzy been with the Emersons?" I asked presently.

  He said, "About two years," as Lucy walked in and demanded, "What are you two talking about?"

  "About Suzy—how long she'd been with the Emersons."

  "Suzy," said Lucy emphatically, "was a jewel—an absolute jewel. I often wonder what Betty was thinking of to go off and leave her. She'll never get another like that."

  "She probably didn't stop to think," Ken said, and Lucy bridled.

  "You can be sarcastic, but most women spend the best years of their lives with the responsibility for a lot of stupid housework dumped in their laps."

  "No system," said Ken absently. "The housework should be off anybody's mind by 9 a.m." He turned to me and added, "You'd better go and get Mary up. They want to ask her some questions."

  "Certainly not. She's sleeping, and they can wait."

  But Mary walked in while I was still speaking. She was dressed, but not quite her usual tidy and immaculate self.

  "I can't sleep in there," she said querulously. "I haven't been able to sleep there since Homer left. I believe the room is haunted."

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  LUCY BUSTLED OVER, put her arm around Mary, and led her to a chair. "My dear, you're just nervous and tired out. I knew of a house once that was haunted—but apartments never are—I mean there just isn't the right atmosphere. "

  "That room is," Mary said tiredly. "I can't sleep there any more—and I need sleep badly."

  "Come on, then, and have a snooze in one of the other rooms," Ken suggested. "You can have mine."

  Mary sighed and shook her head. "No, no—I'm dressed now, and besides, I have things to do. But I'd like some breakfast."

  Lucy explained that breakfast was over, but said that she'd fix something and went off to the kitchen, and I turned to Mary and suggested that perhaps it would be better if I left and went back to New York. "You're having trouble," I added, "and I'm only in the way."

  Mary looked doubtful and undecided, but Ken walked over and stuck his face almost into mine.

  "Oh no, you don't!" he said softly. "In the first place the police wouldn't like it, and we need you. You can't just go flitting off at the first sign of trouble."

  That seemed to decide Mary, and she said definitely, "No, don't go, Eugenia—I'm going to need all the help that I know you'll be kind enough to give me."

  "Eugenia," said Ken idly. "It's a moniker with a bit too much starch in it. as far as I'm concerned. To myself, I have always called you Gussie."

  I ignored him, and Mary broke in fretfully, "Ken, the furniture is all out of place here—we'd better set it right again."

  But Ken negatived the idea, either because he didn't want to be bothered or in all sincerity. "We can't change anything just now. The police have only looked around in here, and they'll almost certainly want to go over it more thoroughly. I know they wouldn't want anything touched."

  Mary fussed and fretted a bit until Lucy appeared with coffee and various fancy little bits and pieces of food. Ken brought a small table to Mary's chair, and we all gathered around.

  He ate his share of the food in three bites and then told Lucy that she was peerless in the flavor field, but if she didn't stop teasing him by serving a mouthful at a time he'd bite a piece out of Mary's best Chippendale. Lucy let out a yell of laughter, but Mary wanted to know which piece of Chippendale he meant. I started to laugh, and choked over my coffee, and Ken gave it as his opinion that we were all about ripe for the wagon.

  Mary set down her cup, glanced about the room, and observed, "The dust around here is frightful."

  "We dusted yesterday morning," Lucy said coldly.

  "Yes, my dear, I know—I didn't mean that. You must not be offended— it's just that I'm upset—that poor child dying right in this room—and Homer behaving so oddly—"

  I took a last swallow of coffee, sighed deeply, and stood up.

  "Come on, Mary—we'll clean the place up from end to end—the way it should be done."

  The lost, helpless look she'd had disappeared at once, and her eyes sparkled with eagerness. She dusted her hands a little with her napkin, dropped it onto the table, and stood up.

  Lucy and Ken thought we were crazy, and said so quite frankly. Ken added that we'd better not clean up the living room or Egbert would be mad. But Mary was already forging ahead to the broom closet, so I followed her and called back to Ken to be sure and let me know when Eggy had his tantrum, because I wanted to see it.

  We started with the hall, and I asked Mary which way she liked the busts on the antique desk to face. She glanced at them, and then to my surprise said, "That's the way I like them—half facing each other—I fixed them last night. Homer must have turned them to face outward—I know that's the way he liked them. In fact he used to change them on me all the time—it was the only way he ever interfered. He must have been here if they were straight."

  I nodded. "Since Monday, I guess, because Lucy turned them around on Monday night."

  Mary's eyes welled with slow tears, and I said hastily, "Look at the dust under that couch! Awful!"

  She blinked, and we both stooped down. The floor under the couch seemed shining and spotle
ss to me, but she said, "Oh dear! Hand me that mop, will you? I've never seen the place in such a state."

  We worked on that clean and polished hall for fully half an hour before it was finished to Mary's satisfaction. When at last we stood and surveyed it, mops and dusters in hand, and wiping our brows, I suggested that we could save dishwashing by having our dinner on the floor there.

  Mary was not amused. She merely said, "What in the world are you talking about, my dear? There'd be crumbs all over the place."

  "Let's get on to the next room," I said hastily.

  The next room was the one occupied by Ken, and Mary sighed. "This is Homer's room. I'd like to get it all clean and ready for him. Ken can go in where Lucy is, and I'll send Lucy home. After all, we don't need her now."

  "Well, no," I said doubtfully, "but I don't think she'll want to go."

  Mary looked thoroughly cross and said, "She'll have to go, if there's no place for her to sleep."

  "She does all the cooking," I pointed out, "and while you're so upset like this, she'll save you a lot of work. Why don't you let me go instead—and she can have my room?"

  "No, no, Eugenia, I want you here—you must not leave. I shall need you."

  It didn't seem to me that I knew her well enough to be one of these pals who rally around in time of trouble, but I resigned myself. However, I didn't intend to let Lucy and her exquisite cooking go without a struggle, so I said earnestly, "I'll stay if you want me, of course—but I think we should keep Lucy—she's more of a help than you realize. Haven't you a cot or a couch or something that you could put in my room—and she can sleep in with me?"

  Mary considered it for a moment with drawn brows and then suddenly brightened.

  "All right—yes—I'll get Ken to help. There's that studio couch in the living room—I never liked it there anyway. We can bring that into your room. It's a good arrangement, actually, because it will make a double guest room, and then, too, the guest can lie on the couch, during the daytime, for a nap, or anything, without messing up the bedspread the way they always do."