The Black Dream_Rue Morgue Vintage Mysteries

by Constance Little

  "What on earth are you doing?" she asked, blinking at me.

  "Preparing for the fray," I said, and sounded a bit feverish. "You'd better get up and make some coffee—we're going to need it."

  I left her gaping at me and went out into the hall in time to follow Egbert, Ken, and Mac into Mary's bedroom.

  Egbert peered into the drawer and then nodded five times. "This bears me out, you see—mad as a hatter."

  "We'd better find out who it is," Ken suggested. "Shall we unwind it?"

  "Yes, of course," said Egbert. "Here, give me a hand—we'll lift it onto the bed."

  I had presence of mind enough to snatch Mary's spread off the bed as Ken and Mac leaned over the drawer. Egbert glanced at me, and I thought he was going to order me from the room, but instead he turned back to help the other two. As they raised the thing I thought I heard something drop from it back into the drawer, but no one else seemed to notice it. They lowered the wrapped figure onto the bed, and Egbert closed the drawer with an impatient foot. As the three of them bent over the bed I moved around to the other side—and this time Egbert spoke his mind.

  "Miss Gates, I think you should go out while we do this."

  I said, "No," and stood my ground, feeling like a naughty child, and Egbert shrugged.

  They were searching for the end of the binding, so that they could start to unwind, but before they could find it Lucy burst in with Mary following her. Egbert and Mac turned together and tried to hustle them out, but Mary's quick eye had caught the outline on her bed.

  "What is it? Oh, please—what is it?" she cried feverishly.

  Since the attention was thus diverted from Lucy, she was able to make her way to the bed and have a good look. Her mouth opened, and she took on breath for a magnificent scream—and then no sound at all came out, and I knew that she was really scared.

  I stepped over to her and gave her arm a little shake. "You're wonderful not to lose control, Lucy. You're going to make us some coffee, aren't you? We'll need it."

  She swallowed a couple of times and whispered, "But what is it?"

  Mary was getting unruly, so they let her come and take a look, and she screamed and hung onto Lucy.

  "Oh, Homer! Oh, poor Homer! My God! Who did it?"

  Egbert had been perspiring for some time; he now began frankly to sweat.

  "It's not Mr. Fredon," he said irritably. "Mac, will you unwind the goddam thing—or do you want to stand there all night and play with it?"

  Ken and Mac began to unwind in a silence broken only by Mary's sobs— but when the feet were free she blew her nose and dried up a bit. They were obviously the feet of a woman. From time to time, after that, Mary mopped at her eyes and murmured, "Oh, poor Betty!"

  The girl's underwear was still on her body, and the rest of her clothes been wrapped in with her. I caught a glimpse of tousled golden-brown hair, but Lucy and I turned away when the face was exposed.

  Mary began to get noisy again, and Egbert snapped, "Look at her, Mrs. Fredon, and see if you can identify her."

  "It's Betty Emerson," Mary moaned. "Oh, the poor thing—"

  Egbert turned to Ken, who nodded, and then to Lucy, who snatched a quick look and muttered, "Yes—yes, it's Betty."

  Ken moved away from the bed and touched my arm. "Come on—Lucy, Mary—you'd better go."

  The four of us went out and along to the living room, where we sat down. Mary was crying into a damp ball of handkerchief, but Lucy was quiet, and looked shocked and scared. Ken was swearing softly.

  "They'll think Homer did it," Mary wailed. "In fact they've told me It's not fair—just because he isn't here ... Homer would never do a dreadful thing like that. I tell you I know him, and he never would—but they won't listen to me—"

  Lucy said slowly, "Poor John—this is going to be terrible for him."

  "Oh, John!" Mary exclaimed, diverted. "What did he care for her, anyway—always running around with other women?"

  "I'm sure John loved Betty," Lucy said conventionally, "but I was thinking of the money. He only makes peanuts, you know—they all lived on Betty's money."

  "Well, one of them will surely get it now," I said, surprised.

  "Oh no," Lucy replied with an emphatic shake of her head. "When Mr. Budd died he left Betty an annuity, and that's all. She wasn't married then, and she was supposed to look after her mother. But the money stops at her death, and the others haven't a dime."

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  "I THOUGHT John Emerson must be a big executive somewhere," I said in some surprise. "He has that air about him."

  "He's an insurance salesman," Ken explained. "Occasionally he sells something, but more often he just goes around with the girls and boys."

  "I suppose that's partly why he was so upset when Betty left," I said thoughtfully. "No money and no prospects."

  "You're wrong about the prospects," Lucy objected. "That what'saname— the oculist's widow—is simply rolling in the stuff, and she's been standing on tiptoe, holding her breath for months, waiting for him to say the word. And with all that, he's busy casting her off like an old glove right now."

  "John is not a money snatcher," Mary said soberly.

  Ken backed her up. "No, he isn't. Since Betty had it, they lived comfortably and he didn't bother much—but he'll buckle down now and make a decent living."

  "He'll have to buckle to some tune," Lucy sniffed, "to make as much as Betty had."

  Mary lost interest and began to agonize over Homer again, and after a while we heard Egbert in the hall, and then the voices of Mrs. Budd and John Emerson. We waited in dead silence, and I was conscious that my hands had balled into fists and I was hardly breathing.

  When Mrs. Budd's scream came it seemed to release the tension and we all stood up. Mary said, "I must go to her," and hurried into the hall, and the rest of us followed slowly.

  We came face to face with John Emerson, who looked at us rather wildly, without really seeing us. A strand of his dark hair lay across his forehead, and his face was livid. He was muttering, "Who did it? Who did it? I'll find out—"

  Lucy and Mary began to speak soothingly to him. and Ken went off, with his jaw set, to get him a drink.

  I went into the bedroom to see whether I could help Mrs. Budd. She was on her knees beside the bed, crying quietly, and as I approached, Egbert stepped away from her.

  "What's the matter with Emerson?" he asked in a low voice. "He's taking it very hard, and I understood they were not a very happy couple."

  "He was supposed to be fond of her," I said inadequately, but Egbert shook his head and looked vaguely dissatisfied.

  A group of men pushed into the room, one of them carrying a camera, and I helped Mrs. Budd to her feet and urged her along to the living room with my arm around her. Mary and John were sitting on a couch, John holding a drink, and Ken, with another drink, was in a chair close to them. Lucy had disappeared, and I supposed that she had gone to the kitchen to make coffee.

  John's face was pallid, and he stared straight in front of him and seemed to have no interest in the drink, which was tipped at a dangerous angle. Mary was talking to him quietly—mostly sympathy, with an occasional plug for Homer. John suddenly interrupted her in mid-sentence. He downed the drink at one gulp and stood up. "I've got to get to my little girl—I'll have to think of something to say to her—and I don't want anyone with me when I tell her!" He glared around at us wildly and then plunged out of the room.

  Mrs. Budd broke away from me and hurried after him, pushing aside Mary, who tried to stop her, and calling hysterically, "John! Wait for me."

  Into the uneasy silence that they left behind I asked, "Where is the child'.1"

  "She's at camp," Mary sighed. "Poor little thing."

  She began to cry again, and I was vastly relieved when Lucy, cheerful as ever, came in with a loaded tray.

  Ken went to help her, and she said, "Pull those portieres—the place is full of weird men. We all ought to have our pocketbooks with us—e
ven if they are the police."

  Ken pulled the portieres with a heave of his arm, which brought Mary out of her sorrow at once and set her to worrying about whether he had done any damage.

  We gathered around the tray, and Ken said restlessly, "I don't know what Egbert's doing, but I should think this problem ought to be easily solved now. Those two girls killed . . ." He drank coffee, squinting into space. "Betty wrapped up, like that... what was that stuff that was wound around her?"

  "I bought it some time ago," Mary said dully. "Wanted it for ruffles for the curtains at the country house."

  "Why, I remember that," Lucy exclaimed, round-eyed. "But I didn't realize that it was that ruffle stuff. Don't you know, I told you it was a too yellowy pink—only you wouldn't have it. I suppose you found out—that I was right."

  "I did not," Mary said indignantly. "I just hadn't got around to taking it up there yet. I'm sure it would have matched perfectly."

  Lucy sniffed and passed the remark that she had a very exact eye for color.

  I said to Ken, "I don't know why you think the problem should be easy to solve now. It seems to me to be all snarled up—"

  I stopped abruptly, because I remembered the theory regarding Homer. I hadn't been much impressed with it before but now it seemed very logical.

  Surely anyone would have to be insane to wrap a body in that senseless fashion.

  "It seems pretty clear to me." Ken said reasonably. "There was no reason for Betty's death. Nobody wanted her dead—and the same goes for Suzy—" He stopped as he became conscious that Mary's eye was fixed upon him.

  "Now look, Mary," he added a bit lamely, "I didn't say it was Homer— but I do say that it's someone who's gone off his rocker."

  Mary gave him a bleak look, but she said nothing, and I wandered over to the drawn portieres and peered through.

  The police were still milling around, and I thought suddenly of the little book I had picked up in Suzy's room. I had left it somewhere in my room, and I reflected uneasily that if it were found there I might have trouble explaining it. I worried quietly for a moment and then slipped into the hall and across to my room. No one seemed to notice me, and I drew a little breath of relief as I closed the door behind me—and then turned around and came face to face with Egbert.

  To my surprise, there was a faintly guilty flash from the pince-nez, and all he said was, "Er. . ."

  I gazed at him and saw the return of complete aplomb. "I've mislaid something," he explained smoothly. "I was taking a look in here. You don't object?"

  "Not at all," I said feebly, and supposed that the apology was the result of an obscure length of red tape that put my room out of bounds for him. "If you don't mind leaving for a few minutes?" I went on, recovering myself. "I wish to do something of a personal nature."

  "Certainly, certainly," said Egbert, and made for the door.

  I found the little book in a drawer of the dressing table and then stood for a while holding it and wondering what I could do with it. In the end I decided to stuff it down behind the cushion on the chair in which Suzy had been found.

  I had been nervously turning the pages of the book, and, having made my decision, I glanced down at it—and then became interested—Suzy had had a love affair.

  She had written: "Oh, lovely Thursday—I'm going to see him."

  She saw him for three Thursdays after that, but when the fourth was in prospect she carefully explained to herself that he couldn't make it because of a business appointment. She was unhappy about it, and finally, humbly suspicious that he might be out with another woman. However, she saw him once more—apparently for the last time, because her next free Thursday bore the notation, "Saw them today—I just couldn't believe it. My world has tumbled down like a pack of cards." Poor Suzy—her big moment had evidently taken to beauing another woman around.

  She saw "them" frequently after that—not only on Thursdays, but on other days as well.

  There was only about a week more of writing in the book, but before I could finish it I heard Egbert's voice giving directions to someone in the hall. What a nose he had, I thought with reluctant admiration—trust him to search my room when I really had something hot in it.

  I stuck the book down the neck of my dress and then went along to the bathroom, where I figured I could read it in peace while Egbert finished searching my room. There were several men in the hall, but I walked through with my head up and without being molested.

  I locked the door, fished the book from the neck of my dress, and quickly read through that last recorded week. It was quite trivial but on the last page Suzy had written, "I threw that needle in the garbage."

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  I LEANED against the washbasin and thought that Suzy sounded a bit lunatic now—maybe it was catching and she had caught it from Homer.

  I left the bathroom and went along to the living room, where I quietly dropped into the chair in which Suzy had died. I slipped her little book down behind the cushion and was busy lighting a cigarette when Lucy let out an agitated cry.

  "Gene! Get up for heaven's sake! Don't you realize that that's the chair—"

  I got up hastily, and Mary looked around and frowned. "Lucy, please don't be so silly. I can't just give that chair away."

  "Where's Ken?" I asked, trying to break it up.

  "He's trailing around after the police," Lucy said, yawning. "Trying to find out what they know." She yawned again. "I'm so tired I could die—but I think I'm too excited to sleep."

  I was tired too, so tired that I was dropping, and I suggested, "Let's go to bed anyway. Egbert's so busy that he won't miss us, and he can always ask his little questions in the morning."

  Mary and Lucy could not make up their minds about it, so I went off alone, undressed in the space of about two minutes, and crawled into bed. I was restless for a while, but I had begun to simmer down nicely and was getting drowsy when Lucy came in and woke me up again.

  "That man Egbert told us to go to bed," she explained, "so Mary and I thought we might as well. There's nothing that puts lines in your face like lack of sleep."

  I watched her as she started to pat cream into her face all over again, but this time it did not take so long, and I decided that she was slopping it a bit. She flopped onto the studio couch with a sigh and switched off the light.

  "This is an exciting week, isn't it?" she asked happily from the darkness. "Yes."

  "Of course it's obvious to everybody but Mary that poor old Homer has gone crazy, but she's acting like an ostrich and simply won't face it."

  "What is she living on?" I asked. "Has Homer's salary stopped?"

  "Either stopped or stopping—but Mary's closemouthed and won't say anything. Only as far as I know she won't have anything until Homer's dead— he has a simply huge amount of insurance for her. But of course if they simply stick him in the asylum she won't even be able to pay the premiums. Too bad."

  "What happens if they never find him?"

  "Oh well," said Lucy indifferently, "I think you have to wait seven years or something, in a case like that, and then they declare him legally dead whether he is or not."

  "So Mary will have to pull her horns in, financially, like the Emerson clan."

  "A bit, maybe," Lucy agreed, "although I think they had a basketful of bonds somewhere—but not John Emerson. He can find himself a nice rich wife any afternoon in the week. He's slick."

  Silence fell, and I took the opportunity to go off to sleep. I woke up once to find that Lucy was snoring like a trumpet, but I just said, "Hush!" and she shut up.

  In the morning I was awakened by a tapping on the door and opened my eyes to see Lucy already on her way to answer it. It was Mac, with a message that Egbert had phoned and would arrive in about an hour. He wanted a general interview, and Mac thought we'd like to dress and have some breakfast first.

  Lucy beamed at him and said, "Yes indeed—thank you. Will you wake up Mrs. Fredon and the sergeant too? I'll be right out."


  Mac departed, and Lucy closed the door and went to work on her face without delay. I went yawning to the bathroom and took a shower, and was mildly surprised, on my return, to find Lucy still busy with her face.

  "Nearly done," she announced cheerfully.

  In another minute or so her face was its usual self, and she hurried into her clothes in no time at all. I was still dressing after she had left the room and was banging pots in the kitchen.

  I got out in time to set the table and had just finished when Mary appeared and began to set it all over again, because I had not done it properly. The result was that when Lucy pushed through the swinging door with a tray loaded with food and coffee all the silver was in a heap in the middle of the table.

  Lucy lowered the tray, yelled for Ken, and sat down.

  "Pass me a knife and fork, Mary," she said. "I'm so hungry that I won't care if they don't match."

  "You shouldn't have brought the breakfast in yet," Mary fussed. "I haven't finished setting the table."

  Lucy reached over for a knife and fork and started to eat, while Mary, with three spoons in her hand, eyed her resentfully. When I helped myself to some cutlery and followed Lucy's lead, Mary gave up and tackled her own breakfast.

  Ken came in shortly and ate up everything that was left, after complaining that we hadn't saved enough for him.

  We hadn't quite finished when Egbert arrived and sat down in our midst. Lucy offered him coffee, but he refused almost impatiently and turned his pince-nez on Mary.

  "Mrs. Fredon, you insist that your husband is sane?"

  "Most certainly I do," Mary snapped.

  "We have not been able to find him," said Egbert.'

  "Maybe you haven't looked."

  "We have made a thorough search," said Egbert severely.

  "If he can elude the police so successfully he must have his wits about him," Mary pointed out.

  Egbert said, "I agree," and everybody looked at him in surprise. We all waited breathlessly for his next words, but he merely lit a cigarette instead.