The Case of the Weird Sisters

by Charlotte Armstrong

  "Mr. Johnson's nothing to scare you," Innes said with conviction. "He's not sneaky."

  "You suggest," said Duff, "that if he wanted to murder anyone he'd be rather direct about it?"

  "He is direct," said Innes, frowning. 'That's what makes him so reliable. He does exactly what comes into his head. He . . ."

  "But he's so mysterious." insisted Alice,

  Imies pouted. "He doesn't seem mysterious to me. I'm used to him."

  Duffs eyes were dreamy. "I wonder. Is he mysterious? Or isn't he? The Indian was, they say, fond of fancy speaMng, of indirect, symbolic, image-full language. He was oratorical. Your Mr. Johnson upsets my conception. Perhaps he isn't typical. But if he is . . . How I would like to know the set of ideas he lives by! Or if he has any ideas." Duff shook his head slightly. He smiled at Alice. "I don't understand Mr. Johnson either," he admitted.

  Innes stirred a little impatiently. "However"—Duff roused himself—"that's my hobby, not your trouble. Suppose we get Fred up here and pool what we know? I have been hired to find out what goes on, without unnecessarily offending anybody. A very ticklish job. One that will take some careful doing. Before I meet the Misses Whidock—-who are not yet visible, are they?"

  Alice shrugged.

  "—let's get the facts. Facts are good enough to start with," Duff said carelessly.

  Alice ran downstairs. She saw Art Killeen working on a typewriter in the sitting room as she went by. Fred was in tiie kitchen. Alice said, "May I have a cup of coffee to take with me, Josephine? Fred, Mr. Duff wants you. Come on upstairs."

  Fred came to attention. "The lawyer's here," he said, watching her face.

  "Yes, I know," said Alice. "But come on. Duff wants us."

  As the council went into session. Duff leaned back in a chair beside Innes's bed, quite as if he had all day. Innes reclined on his pillows. Alice sat on a hassock against the wall, following eagerly, and Fred sat in a straight chair at the other side of the bed, facing Duff, his ankle on his knee, looking extremely intelligent.

  "This business of the veal in the meat loaf," said Duff, "seems to yield very little. It's quite possible that Miss Isabel, who seems most active in the running of the house, deceived herself into thinking it wouldn't matter. She is, I gather, rather set against unnecessary expense. Perhaps she didn't want to prepare another kind of meat, on account of the expense, or on account of the bother, and convinced herself, therefore, that there was no reason to do so. Do you think that's possible, or am I doing Miss Isabel an injustice?"

  "You're right," said Iiines wryly. ''Miss Gertrude is aloof from the details," Duff went on. "Perhaps she felt it wasn't any concern of hers. And Maud didn't hear about it beforehand. Maud may have known, at the tabid, that she was eating veal. We do know she said nothing about it But is Maud likely to have said anything about it?"

  "No. You're right again. She wouldn't worry. You say you haven't met my sisters?"

  "Not yet," said Duff, "but Fve been gleaning, here and there. Now, you see, the veal-eating and Mr. Whitlock's consequent iUness may have been the result of carelessness or of a simple mistake."

  "In other words, an accident," said Fred, whom Duff had gently maneuvered into the position of a man with opinions to give, and who accepted that position simply.

  "Yes. And since nothing was actively done, the dinner was served as originally planned, the only crime was neglecting to change it, I don't think the incident can tell us much."

  "Things like that add up, though," said Alice.

  "Oh, yes. Of course. Nevertheless, let's go on to the first attempt to do Mr. Whitlock harm. If it was an attempt and not still another accident The lamp fell off the table upstairs. It might have fallen by itself. None of us can see how. But we can't say it couldn't have happened. The devil in the inanimate, you know. Still, if we assume that someone pushed it over, let's see who might have done so. You point out to me that Miss Maud, who is totally deaf— Is that true, Mr. Whitlock?"

  "She never hears anything that I know of," said Innes.

  "Well, being deaf, she couldn't, we say, have known that you were walking down the hall. You had opened the bathroom door, malang a sound, of course, and your footsteps could have been heard. But you couldn't have been seen from upstairs? There is no glass in which you might have been reflected?"

  "Lace curtain on the front door," said Fred prompdy.

  "No mirror?"

  "It's on the side wall," Alice said. "I was standing in front of it. I couldn't see the top of the stairs in it."

  "Could you see the mirror, Mr. Whitlock?"

  "No, no, I'm sure I couldn't."

  "Very well," said Duff. "This crime, if one, was done by ear. The victim must have been heard approaching, and Maud can't hear. Exit Maud. What about Gertrude, who can't see?"

  "She knows every inch of this house," said Innes. "She goes anywhere she pleases, upstairs or down. She knows exactly what's on every table. She knew that lamp was there. Nothing's ever changed around in this house. And her ears are sharp."

  "All true," said Duff. "But tell me, when was that downstairs bathroom put in?"

  "When? About... let me see ..." ' "Before or after Gertrude lost her sight?"

  "Oh, after," said Innes. "Some years after."

  "Yes," said Duff. "Well... I don't suppose Miss Isabel would have been prevented from pushing that lamp by the fact of her having one arm?"

  "Not a bit. Isabel could have pushed the lamp," said Fred.

  "Does anything about their opportunity help us at all? As far as we know, all three of them had the chance to be there in the upstairs hall at that time? Is that right?"

  "Not all three," said Fred. "One wasn't. But I don't know which one."

  "How is that?"

  "When I came up on the front porch, on my way inside, I saw one of them through the window. She was in the parlor. The curtains were drawn across the arch so nobody would know that from the hall. But I saw her,"

  "What was she doing?"

  "She was looking at the newspaper."

  "Oh?" Duff seemed polite but incredulous. "The local paper?"

  "I dunno. Just a newspaper. But that's why I couldn't see who it was."

  "You could see her feet?"

  "Just her skirt," said Fred. "It was dark. They all wore dark dresses yesterday."

  Duff sat still a moment. "Please realize that I am just running lightly over the facts," he said at last. "Perhaps I they aren't going to mean much. They sometimes don't. ' We shall have to get at the feellngs. Have to know why. What drives each of them. Those are, to my mind, the important things and are more likely to tell us the truth about this. But we'll clear away these times and opportunities and possibilities first. Let's leave the fallen lamp that so fortunately didn't hit you—"

  "Thanks to Fred," said Innes graciously.

  "—and go on to the second attempt or accident. The detour sign across the road at the bottom of the hill was moved. Now, you tell me that all three sisters were out of doors earlier that evening?" "

  "Yes."

  "And Isabel, rather suspiciously, went in person to fetch a woman who has a telephone."

  "Yes."

  "Susan Innes says people do forget her new telephone. Isabel may have forgotten.''

  "Maybe," said Alice. '

  "But here we come upon the significance of Gertrude's blmdness. This was a crime that was done by sight Being blind, she wouldn't have known anything about that sign, its meaning; nor would she probably have been able to find it and place it in another more or less logical position. Not without eyes."

  "The dark wouldn't bother her," murmured Fred.

  Duff said, "No. But this was a deed that required some light. To read, to understand, to replace. However, Maud, too, puzzles us. She couldn't have overheard you speak of the route you were planning to take."

  "Maybe somebody told her afterward," suggested Alice.

  "Who heard? Mr. Johnson?"

  "Sure. He was the one I asked about it.
"

  "Um," said Duff. "You don't, I suppose, know whether they were together after that?"

  "No."

  "I didn't see hide nor hair of Mr. Johnson that evening," said Fred wonderingly. "After that"

  "But Isabel could have done it?"

  ''I don't see why not, do you?" said Alice.

  "No, I don't see why not," Duff agreed. "Then we have attempt number one, the lamp. Not Maud, Possibly Gertrude. Possibly Isabel. We have attempt number two, the detour sign. Not Gertrude. Possibly Maud. Possibly Isabel."

  "Unless . . .'' began Fred.

  "Of course," Duff took up the unspoken doubt, ''unless Maud's not deaf. Unless Gertrude can see."

  "But for God's sake!" cried Innes.

  "You realize we must be sure."

  "But for years . . ."

  "Your sisters may not be totally blind or totally deaf or even totally cripples," said Duff. "A litde sight, a little hearing, a little use of the right arm, might damage these particular conclusions."

  "Go on," said Innes. He leaned back, but he looked pale.

  15

  Duff said thoughtfully, "It will be hard to be sure. But we must try. You see, sometimes you can get at a clear and true picture of what happened by the facts of physical possibilities, by logic, and by elimination. Sometimes you can get at the same truth by a careful reading of character and the facts of character, which are true facts, of course, and solid facts; but so difficult to demonstrate that the use of them nearly always passes for intuition. Sometimes you can get at the truth both ways, and the coincidence of two kinds of facts checks and double checks your conclusion. We are now trying to fish out of confusion a few physical facts that we can believe and use to go on. Please don't be discouraged if they show no pattern. .We still have another whole class of facts to check them by.

  "Let's look at attempt number three, the one made on your life last night."

  "No accident," said Fred.

  "I agree with you," said Duff. "This, at least, was really such an attempt. But we know almost nothing about it yet. How about opportunity? Where was everybody?"

  Alice began, "Fred and I were in here with Innes, nearly all the time, until a few minutes after eleven. I got to bed about eleven ten. I must have slept for a while. About twelve, something woke me up. There was a storm, wind and rain."

  "Let's find out the disposition of all of you until then," said Duff. "You went to sleep promptly, Mr. Whidock?"

  "Oh, yes. It was the pill, I guess. I was pretty much on edge, and I didn't think I'd sleep, but I did. I didn't wake at all until after the doctor was here. Everybody was in here by the time I woke up." Innes pouted as if he'd been left out of a party.

  "Are these your pills?" Duff picked up the box.

  "Yes."

  "Well, Fred?"

  "Sat on the backstairs, on guard. The storm came up around eleven fifteen. Started with a lot of wind. Rain coming down in buckets by twelve o'clock. Maybe the storm woke you, Alice."

  "Maybe," said Alice. None of them noticed that the chauffeur called her Alice.

  "The Three Graces had all gone to bed by the time I took up my post," Fred went on. "I wouldn't know about Gertrude, though, come to think of it. She's downstairs. She could have been roaming around. But I saw hide nor hair of them from where I was. Isabel's door, which I could see, was closed all the time, and she didn't pass me."

  Alice said slowly, "Just after I woke up I thought I heard a sound."

  "Yes?" said Duff.

  "A funny litde sound. I heard it once before. When I was on my way downstairs I heard it as if it were down there. The evening Innes was hurt. The doctor was here. I was going down after his bag. It's a little sound in the throat. I can't describe it."

  "You heard it again last night!" Fred said with excitement.

  "When have you heard it?" Duff asked him. "Or haven't you?"

  "I think I know what she means. I heard it right after the lamp fell. As if it were up here."

  "The same sound, you think?"

  "I think so," Fred said. "And Josephine tells me she heard something like it, too, down at the foot of the hill, just before we left here in the car, just before our accident."

  "Just before something happens, you hear noises," said Duff. "Three of you each heard at different times a small indescribable sound?"

  "Nothing happened after I heard it the first time," Alice pointed out.

  "How do we know?" Duff said.

  "But . . ."

  "No two of you heard it at the same time, I take it?"

  "No, but something makes that sound. Doesn't it mean— What can it mean?"

  "We must keep it in mind," said Duff, "although if the sounds weren't identical, you see, it needn't mean anything. Unless . . . Mr. Whitlock, do you know of any such sound? Has one of your sisters the habit of clearing her throat or coughing or anything of the sort?"

  "I couldn't tell you," said Innes. "Not that I can remember. I'm so useless. I just don't know." He flung his palms up on the bedspread.

  "Tell me," said Duff suddenly to Alice, "what was the feeling? How do you imagine die person felt who made that sound? Was there a feeling to it? If so, what was it? Don't say. You try to remember, too, Fred. What feeling does it suggest to you? Make up your minds before you hear each other's judgment. Don't analyze. Just try to remember your first quick impression."

  "I think I know," said Alice in a moment

  "Me, too," said Fred. Duff nodded. "It was dirty," Fred said. "Something mean about it."

  "I thought it was triumphant,'' said Alice, "and satisfied and excited, too."

  "Thank you," said Duff. "Now, what happened after twelve o'clock?"

  "I woke up," said Alice, "and I couldn't get to sleep. I began to feel cold. Finally I got to worrying about Fred's being cold because it was freezing, really. Besides, I couldn't sleep. So I got up and came out here. That was about two o'clock, I guess."

  "Was the heat coming into your room as usual when you first went to bed? Do you remember?"

  "Yes, it was. I'm quite sure."

  "That's helpful," said Duff. "Because, of course, the heat stopped coming up through out the rest of the house after the deed was done. The heat was normal at eleven ten?"

  "Oh, yes, I know it was."

  "Then the deed was not done until after eleven ten. Fred, nobody moved in the upstairs hall after that hour?"

  "Nobody," said Fred. "Nobody that I saw."

  "Could anyone have come up the front stairs without your seeing them?"

  "Maud might have," Fred admitted, "if she turned sharp at the very top step and went off the hall toward her own room. I can't see that part. I should think I would have heard her."

  "I did hear her," said Alice in a low voice.

  "But nobody came this way, to Isabel's room?"

  "Nobody, until Alice came."

  "And after that?"

  "We smelled it. I mean Alice did. I'd been sitting there so long, I guess I wouldn't have noticed it for a while longer."

  "Mr. Whitlock, you had fallen asleep with the help of a drug? And you smelled nothing?"

  Innes plucked at his spread. His eyes went miserably to Alice. "Very few people know this," he said, "and it's fairly imimportant, but ... I ... I have no sense of smell. You see, we Whitlocks all lack something." He said it as if he hoped it would be a joke, but he was ashamed. He was afraid Alice would recoil from him. He would never in all his life have admitted this, she knew, had he not been forced to.

  She tried to smile at him. "You're lucky," she said. "You got off the easiest." But, she thought, never any perfume of flowers or of good cooking or salt in the air. And she did recoil, invisibly.

  "Who knows about this lack of yours?" Duff was asking.

  "My family."

  Alice, thinking of the advantages, began to laugh a little

  hysterically. "I wondered how you could get so close to her. Oh . . ." She choked.

  "To whom?"

  "Maud,
" said Alice. "Oh, Mr. Duff, she's dreadful!"

  "I know what you mean," said Fred, with his nose wrinkled.

  "What do you mean?" demanded Innes. "What are you talking about?"

  "She smells . . . well. . . like an Indian," said Fred.

  "Does she indeed?" Duff said.

  Alice put her head in her hands. "I'm sorry, Innes. They're your sisters. Are we crazy, Mr. Duff? Is there something ugly and malign and wicked ... or are we just cruel to think so because we are healthy and they are more or less . . . deformed?"

  Duff said, "I've wondered. I think it is remarkably self-critical of you, Alice, to be able to think of that."

  Innes said, "Alice is sweet and good."

  "I'm not."

  He paid no attention. "But please don't think because they're my sisters that any of you have to guard your tongues with me. I never liked them, and they never loved me. Never. I was a little boy, and they were young ladies, and I never felt the slightest warmth from any of them. But they . . . they awe me." His voice sank. "When I get away from here I can make myself believe they don't matter very much. Put them in their place, you know. I can even feel sorry for them.

  "But the minute I step back into this house, I believe again. They seem just as important as they think they are. And this house, kept up just as it used to be, and their reputations here, and the whole Whitlock background, sucks me back in. I can't help it. I. . . dislike them. They make me nervous."

  Innes wound up with this understatement and looked defiantly at them all.

  "They never loved you," said Duff. "Did they love their parents?"

  "No. I don't know. Papa used to crack the whip. They'd hover around him like . . . like a chorus, you know. His three daughters. That's what they were. His. Like his coattails. And he got away with it."

  "They resented him?"

  "I don't know. But I don't think they loved him. If they loved anyone, it would have been their mother. She was dead before I was born, and Gertrude made her into a legend. But I don't know. I wasn't here. She was supposed to be something superfine, and my father was her worthy consort. And my mother wasn't worthy of him. All I know is, they don't. . . aren't affectionate."

  "Toward each other?"

  "No," said Innes. "Toward anybody."

  "You speak as if they were all alike?" Duff made this a question.