The Silver Leopard

by Helen Reilly

  They couldn’t be sure. Her hands hot and tight in her lap, Catherine said it looked like the same one.

  Of course it was. Because the bonds had been in it, the bonds Stephen Darrell had. She hadn’t seen him since he had walked out of her room through the window with the bonds in his pocket at around nine o’clock, and it was almost half-past ten. She gritted her teeth. She had to see him, had to find out what he intended to do.

  She had come to terms with herself. She had put all doubts and questions about his inexplicable behavior firmly behind her. There was no percentage in futile exploration. He had insulted and injured her once too often. From now on, no matter what the circumstance, Stephen Darrell would be one thing and one thing only to her, the man who was going to marry her cousin.

  Meanwhile the matter of the bonds had to be settled, let the chips fall where they would. He mightn’t be believed, she mightn’t—it didn’t affect the issue. You couldn’t drop a piece of evidence, and $20,000 worth of someone else’s money, down a sewer opening because their possession was embarrassing to you.

  “You’re sure about that envelope, Catherine?” Tom said.

  “I’m positive.”

  Silence met her certainty. Tom, Angela, and Flat had no answer. Coming back, Francine had. She said, “Whoever killed Mike is pretty clever. I believe we were followed here and that that envelope was thrown down in the snow at the back of the house deliberately, to make us look suspicious for police assumption. Gangway, Catherine my pet, I’m going to pack.” She lifted Angela’s bag to the bed and Catherine got up and moved to a chair at one of the windows.

  Nicky had gone into the village to fill the Bentley with gas and oil. Guilt stirred in Catherine fitfully. If only she could feel for Nicky what she had once felt for Stephen Darrell. But that sort of thing only came once.

  Perhaps it was just as well. What did it lead to but disillusion and unhappiness? Nicky had been rather wonderful, considering his natural impatience, taking the disruption of their plans in his stride. Stephen Darrell’s friend, Judge Fountain, had refused point-blank to have anything to do with marrying any of them. Under the circumstances, you couldn’t blame him. Nicky hadn’t. His concern was for Angela, and for Catherine. “If you ask me, I don’t like this place. It isn’t what I’d call salubrious. The sooner we get you out of here, the better.” His cheerful acceptance had made Catherine feel ashamed of her own overwhelming relief.

  The preparations for departure continued. Tom went to shave, and Francine to pack her own things. Their stay here was almost over. It had served its purpose as far as Hat was concerned. Angela had agreed to her marriage to Stephen, as soon as it could be conveniently arranged. Sitting on the floor at Angela’s feet, putting fresh enamel on her nails, her lovely little face had a glow on it.

  “I’m happy that you’re happy about it, darling,” she said, nuzzling her bright head against Angela’s knee.

  Angela drank some water. “I’ll be glad to see you settled. I always liked Stephen. Your uncle liked him. He’ll make a good husband—he’s a man you can depend on.”

  Watching star-shaped flakes flatten themselves against glass, Catherine reflected acidly that that was all her aunt knew, and wondered what Angela would think if she were aware of that interlude between Hat and Stephen Darrell two years earlier, up in Stephen’s cottage in Brookfield, less than a mile from the Wardwell house.

  She stopped the surging rush of old bitterness with a peremptory hand. Ancient history wasn’t important. The present was, and the bonds, and what was to be done with them. Was Stephen Darrell keeping out of her way deliberately?

  The door opened and he walked into the room carrying a tea tray. He put it down on the table beside Angela. He had a topcoat on. Snow powdered it. “Here you are, madam. The cup’s a bit thick but the brew’s the thing.”

  He didn’t so much as glance toward Catherine. He put his hands on Hat’s shoulders from behind and she tilted her head back and looked up at him. He drew her toward him, asked Angela how she was and when she said, “Much better, thanks,” he said, “I’ve got to be off. You people ought to be moving too, the snow’s beginning to pile up. I’ve just been talking to Bracheen, the boy I borrowed the Buick from. Bracheen wants the Buick back. Unreasonable fellow. Can Hat drive down with me?”

  Angela poured cream into her cup. “I think not, Stephen. I’d rather she came in the Bentley.”

  Catherine was glad Hat wasn’t going back with them in the Buick. It would make it easier for her to have a word alone with Stephen Darrell on the way down. She waited for him to turn to her with some remark about the journey.

  He didn’t do anything of the kind. He said, “Oh,” in a disappointed tone. Then, “Well, if Hat’s not coming with me, I’ll go on ahead and drop the Buick at River-dale.”

  Catherine’s throat swelled with mingled amazement and anger. No look in her direction, no acknowledgment, covert or otherwise, of her existence—she might have dreamed that scene in her room two hours ago. All right, say it had meant nothing to Stephen Darrell—at least, he could be decently polite. He had brought Nicky and her up here. He wasn’t going to be bothered with them on the way back. Yet now, right now, as he stood there, in all likelihood, he had the bonds in his pocket.

  She had to talk to him about them before they left.

  She didn’t accomplish it. Hating her pursuit of a man who kept out of her way either by accident or design, and she couldn’t be sure which, she continued with it, in vain.

  Nicky came back, enlivened at the prospect of action, any action, and bags were assembled and the bill attended to, and they descended in a body to the cars drawn up in the driveway at the foot of the steps. And then, at the last moment, their plans were disrupted.

  The unusually heavy fall of snow for that time of year had caught the townships unprepared, with their ploughs inoperative. The roads to the south and west were impassable. A hasty consultation was held. Angela was equally opposed either to remaining at the boardinghouse or to going over to Brookfield, the only other alternative. Brookfield was at least feasible. It lay to the east, where the snow wasn’t nearly as bad. Once over the next ridge, they should have no real trouble. Brookfield was finally decided upon as the lesser of two evils.

  Stephen Darrell had already disappeared alone in the Buick. The rest of them got into the Bentley, Tom and Francine in front, Angela and Hat in back, Nicky and Catherine on the two little upholstered chairs, and they were off.

  Furious at her failure to get hold of Stephen Darrell before he left, burning with humiliation at her enforced pursuit of a man she didn’t want to be pursuing, Catherine soothed raw nerves with the reflection that it couldn’t go on forever. The roads would be clear by tomorrow and once back in the city and unhampered by the presence of the others, Stephen Darrell couldn’t continue to elude her. She would telephone to him and issue an ultimatum. If he didn’t go to the police with the truth about the bonds, she would.

  She had had very little sleep the night before; she slept most of the way across country, and so missed the state police car waiting for the Bentley at the Brookfield town line. When she woke it was to find herself back again within the landmarks of familiar nightmare. The car had stopped. It was motionless, on the main street of the village, in front of the Inn.

  The inspector was there and wanted to see her. He had come up from New York earlier that morning. Angela announced her intention of going in with Catherine. Stilling outcry with the air of command she knew so well how to assume, she said to Tom, “You and Nicky take the girls home. I telephoned to Barker to turn the heat on, but you’d better look at it and light some fires. Catherine and I will join you as soon as we’re through here.”

  The Inn at Brookfield was totally unlike the great gloomy boardinghouse they had left behind them 30 miles to the west. It was old but cheerful, with fresh paint and chintzes and plenty of light.

  Entering the wide hall, they found a state policeman waiting for them unobtrusively
in a corner. Following the policeman up the stairs, Catherine was aghast. She thought, It’s the bonds Inspector McKee wants to see me about. He’s been in touch with the Clearwater police and he believes I have them, because of that envelope. What am I going to say?

  To her immeasurable relief she was wrong. They found the inspector in a pleasant suite of rooms on the second floor. A woman and a man were with him. The woman was Mike’s sister, Mrs. Joseph Treadgold. The man was Jonathan Harris. Mrs. Treadgold and Harris had driven up from New York with the inspector under the erroneous impression that Angela was in Brookfield. McKee said, “I thought that you might have remained in your house here.”

  “No,” Angela loosened her coat, “I went on to Clearwater last night with my niece and nephew.”

  Genevieve Treadgold was tall and thin, with a nervous manner, fading blond hair in disarray, and the shattered remains of Mike’s good looks. Catherine didn’t know her very well. She was a background piece of Mike’s life that had remained in the background. But she had a certain flying force. She wore a lot of bracelets and chains, kept tugging at them, jingling them, as she talked. She said nothing with a great many words in incoherent phrases and unfinished sentences.

  “Angela, so sorry—I was so surprised when I heard about you and Mike—Mike never—but then he was always unpredictable—And Catherine Lister—Who would have thought—but there—it doesn’t matter. At least, the inspector doesn’t think—Although Mike always lived as if—not that I ever knew much about his affairs—”

  Harris shook hands with Angela and then with Catherine. He had been the executor, with Mike, of her uncle’s estate. He was also Mike’s executor. He seated himself, his umbrella beside him, and brought order out of Genevieve Treadgold’s verbal chaos.

  Harris was lengthy and precise. He went into Mike’s will, explaining its terms again painstakingly. With the exception of the $10,000 to his sister, Mrs. Treadgold, Catherine was residuary legatee. Harris had not, himself, he said, had any previous knowledge of the extent of Mike’s estate. When Mrs. Treadgold arrived in New York the previous day, he had done what he could, with the assistance of Inspector McKee and the police. Michael Nye’s apartment had been examined, his bank consulted, his effects gone through. His, Harris’s efforts, had been fairly exhaustive. The fact was—

  Mike had no estate.

  The stillness in the room was portentous, heavy. Catherine was at a loss to understand it. Mr. Harris was looking at her commiseratingly. He brought out the statement that Mike wasn’t, after all, a wealthy man, as though it were earth-shaking. It wasn’t. Catherine glanced at the inspector, silent in a distant chair, at Angela’s white profile. Mrs. Treadgold said, with restrained violence, “There it is, you see.”

  Well, there it was. So then—? Catherine’s brows went up. What did they expect her to do—burst into tears? You couldn’t miss what you never had, and Mike’s money had always been unreal to her. The idea of possessing it had never given her any pleasure.

  There was more to it than that. The next development, brought out in the lawyer’s measured tones, was different. It did surprise Catherine. It provoked storming protest from Angela.

  Mike had taken care of the $12,000 left to Catherine by her mother, investing it for her, through his power of attorney, in Universal Skyways. Some six weeks earlier Mike had sold her block of Universal Skyways, transferring the money thus obtained to his bank. Unfortunately, it hadn’t remained there. He had clipped into it to the tune of some $1,700 before he died, so that the net result was that instead of being richer by Mike’s death, Catherine was poorer to that extent, as his tangible assets would just about cover his debts and the $10,000 bequest to his sister.

  At that, lethargy dropped from Angela. She threw folds of black broadtail from her shoulders. Her eyes flashing coldly, she said she didn’t believe that Mike had appropriated a single dollar of Catherine’s. There was some explanation they didn’t know about. Mike would no more touch a penny belonging to someone else than he would fly to the moon. He was the most honest of men, absurdly, scrupulously honest, with a more than Scotch conscience. Anyone who had had any dealings with him over the years would testify to that. What had probably happened was that Mike had reinvested Catherine’s money in something more profitable. He certainly hadn’t spent it on himself. He was always busy, his paintings brought high prices and he had more commissions than he could fill. He had sent for Catherine the other night, the night he died, to give her money. Not money that belonged to her, but money of his own. He must have assets somewhere, in other banks, safe deposit boxes.

  At that point, McKee came to life. He produced the slip of scratch paper he had found on Nye’s desk on the night the painter died. He read the scribbled figures aloud, “Eighty-seven thousand multiplied by two.” He said he had confidently expected to find some such sum important in Mike Nye’s holdings. “Can you tell me, Mrs. Wardwell?”

  The figures meant nothing to Angela. “I don’t know what Michael had. We never discussed it.”

  Genevieve Treadgold kept glancing at her watch. She was going back to Ohio. She had to catch the one o’clock train at Bridgeport in order to make connections in New York. “Mr. Harris will see me there safely. So sorry not to have had longer with you, Angela.”

  Rattling her bracelets and chains, she went presently, accompanied by Mr. Harris, swathed in an ankle-length ulster, his umbrella clasped to his breast.

  When they were gone, Angela spoke of what had happened in Clearwater. “They told you, Inspector?”

  “Yes, Mrs. Wardwell.”

  McKee spoke without accent. Both women waited for a conclusion concerning the appearance of the bloodstained envelope in the vicinity of the boardinghouse. “You, or one of your party—” No such conclusion was forthcoming. The Scotsman merely said, “We’ll have to wait until we know more,” and passed on to another subject.

  He explained the two-pronged effort on which the police had been concentrating. It was vitally important to establish the identity of the man or woman who had re-moved the leopard from Catherine’s apartment in advance of murder. It was equally important to find the visitor who had gone to see Michael Nye after Angela left the Fifty-ninth Street apartment and before Catherine arrived. When they succeeded in answering these two questions, the case would be solved. Neighbors, tenants, the personnel of both buildings, were being questioned exhaustively, so far without result. But it would come.

  His attitude was one of dismissal. Both Angela and Catherine fastened their coats and rose. McKee detained Catherine. “I’d like you to remain for a few minutes, Miss Lister.”

  Angela looked blank. “She’s very tired, Inspector.”

  “I’m sure she must be. I won’t keep her long, Mrs. Wardwell.”

  Angela wasn’t pleased. “Trumley will take me out. I’ll send him back for you, Catherine.” Trumley was the local cab man. Her aunt went then and Catherine was alone with the inspector.

  McKee didn’t waste any time. There was a brief case on a chair on the other side of the room. He unstrapped the case and took out a long envelope, a fresh white one. From the envelope, he removed two oblongs of folded paper. Advancing toward the chair in which Catherine sat, he held the missing bearer bonds out, watching her face, her eyes.

  Catherine was sharply startled. She forced herself to inertia, looked at the bonds in silence, her lashes lowered. How had they got here? How much did the inspector know? Had Stephen Darrell brought the bonds to McKee himself—or had he left them some place in Clearwater where they had been found and forwarded by the sheriff or the state police? She had to be sure before she spoke.

  The inspector said, “You evidently recognize these, Miss Lister. You saw them earlier today, didn’t you?”

  It was useless. She couldn’t deny it. When she didn’t say anything, when she simply stared at him whitely, mutely, McKee tried her with names in order. “Captain Bray had them? Miss La Mott?”

  “No—No.”

  “St
ephen Darrell?”

  Catherine was helpless. She couldn’t permit anyone else to be unjustly accused. She didn’t answer. Her expression answered for her.

  McKee had made the experiment deliberately. He was pleased at Catherine’s response. This girl was incapable of a convincing lie. She might want to tell one, she simply couldn’t carry it off successfully. He had had to assure himself that this was true. The pressure against her was mounting. The D.A.’s office was clamoring for her arrest. He wanted to prevent it if he could. “Well, Miss Lister?”

  As long as he knew so much, he had to know it all. Sitting stiffly upright, smoothing wrinkles out of her gloves, Catherine told him what had happened, in careful words. When she finished, McKee made some sort of sign to the state trooper in the hall, a door opened and closed distantly, and Stephen Darrell walked into the room.

  He hadn’t gone to New York. He had brought the bonds to the inspector himself. He smiled at Catherine, said with friendly ease that he had called the inspector, had been told where he was, and had come on here.

  She had been balancing on a tight rope suspended over space. To find her feet on firm ground was a heavenly rest. But not for long. If Stephen Darrell hadn’t concealed the bonds in her room up in the boardinghouse in Clearwater, and she had never really believed he had, then it was someone else—

  The inspector went after him about it. “You’re sure you didn’t see the person leaving Miss Lister’s room after planting the bonds, Mr. Darrell?”

  “I’m sure.” Stephen was crisply emphatic.

  “But you have an idea, a suspicion of who it was?” Stephen’s smile was a dark sparkle across the fatigue of a face whose expression, in an odd way, reminded Catherine of Angela’s. There was the same rocklike composure to them both, a composure that was guarded and watchful. “Look, Inspector,” Stephen shrugged. “I might have all the ideas in the world—and they might all be wrong. Ideas aren’t worth a tinker’s damn. I imagine you have plenty of ideas yourself. I presume that what you want from me are facts. I’ve told you every tiling I know.” McKee doubted it mightily. Catherine Lister had corroborated Darrell’s story in part. It wasn’t the important part. There were various other considerations. The Scotsman studied the younger man thoughtfully. He was attractive, likable, gave an impression of controlled strength and mental toughness, of a reserve that wasn’t cold, of thinking plenty and saying only a fraction of what he thought. He had a lot on the ball, there was no mistake about that. McKee had encountered murderers before who were just as direct and as seemingly straightforward.