The Emperor's Snuff-Box

by John Dickson Carr

  “Say anything, monsieur?” repeated the nurse, in reply to Dermot’s question. “Yes, he mutters sometimes.”

  “Well?”

  “But he speaks in English. I do not understand English. And then, very often, he laughs and calls out a name.”

  Dermot, who had been turning towards the door, whirled round again.

  “What name?”

  “Sh-h!” admonished Dr. Boutet.

  “I cannot say, monsieur. All the syllables sound alike. No, monsieur, I regret that I cannot give you an imitation.” The nurse’s eyes were anxious in the gloom. “If you insist, I will try to write down what it sounds like when he says it again.”

  No: there was nothing more here. Dermot had done what he came to do. He had a few more inquiries to make, in the various bars of the hotel, where one waiter spoke with enthusiasm of little Mees Janice Lawes. Sir Maurice himself, it appeared, had looked into the noisy back bar on the very afternoon before his death: surprising barman and waiters.

  “How he has ferocious eyes!” rumbled the barman. “Afterwards Jules Seznec sees him walking in the Zoological Gardens, beside the monkey house, talking to someone whom Jules cannot see because the other person is hidden behind a bush.”

  Then Dermot had just time to telephone Maître Saulomon, his legal friend of the firm of Saulomon & Cohen, before he booked a seat in the Imperial Airways plane leaving La Bandelette airport at half-past ten.

  The rest of the day he afterwards remembered as something of a nightmare. In the plane he dozed, to recuperate himself for the important part of the journey. The bus trip from Croydon seemed interminable; and London, after some days of rest, seemed choked with soot and petrol fumes. Dermot took a taxi to a certain address. Half an hour later, he could have shouted for triumph.

  He had proved what he came to prove. When, under a yellow evening sky, he climbed into the plane which was to take him back to La Bandelette, he felt tired no longer. The engines thundered; wind-rush blew flat the grass as the plane taxied in a bump of balloon tires; and Eve was safe. Dermot, his briefcase in his lap, sat back in his seat while air ventilators buzzed in the stuffy cabin, watching England dwindle first to red-and-gray roofs, and then to a moving map.

  Eve was safe. And Dermot made plans. He was still making them, just before dark, when the plane dipped down at the airport. A few lights twinkled in the direction of the town. Driving back through the avenue of close-set trees, breathing the clean pine-scented air at dusk, Dermot let his mind run beyond the present bedevilment to a future when…

  An orchestra was playing at the Donjon Hotel. The lights and clamor of the foyer struck against his senses. As he passed the reception desk, a clerk signalled him.

  “Docteur Kinross! There have been inquiries for you all day. One moment! I believe there are two persons waiting to see you even now.”

  “Who are they?”

  “A Monsieur Saulomon,” replied the clerk, consulting a pad, “and a Mademoiselle Lawes.”

  “Where are they?”

  “Somewhere in the foyer, monsieur.” The clerk struck on a bell. “I will have you taken to them. Yes?”

  Escorted by a page-boy, Dermot found Janice Lawes and Maître Pierre Saulomon in one of the alcoves of the alleged “Gothic” foyer. The alcove had sham stone walls, and was hung with sham mediaeval weapons. A padded seat ran round it, with a little table in the middle. Janice and Maître Saulomon sat very far apart, as though each brooded over a separate trouble. But both of them got up as Dermot approached; and he was astounded to see the look of reproach on their faces.

  Maître Saulomon was a very large fat man with an imposing manner, an olive complexion, and a deep bass voice. He gave Dermot a very curious look

  “So you have returned, my friend,” he stated in that sepulchral voice.

  “Naturally! I told you to expect me. Where is Mrs. Neill?”

  The lawyer inspected the fingernails of one hand, turning them from side to side. Then he looked up.

  “She is at the town hall, my friend.”

  “At the town hall? Still? They’re keeping her there a long time, aren’t they?”

  Maître Saulomon’s expression became grim.

  “She is locked up in a cell,” he answered. “And I much fear, old man, that she will be kept there an even longer time. Madame Neill has been placed under arrest on a charge of murder.”

  XVI

  “TELL ME, MY BOY,” pursued the imposing personage, in a tone of real interest. “Just in confidence. And between friends. Are you mocking me?”

  “Or mocking her?” interposed Janice.

  Dermot stared at them.

  “I don’t quite understand what you’re talking about.”

  Maître Saulomon pointed a finger at him, waggling it as though asking a question in court.

  “Did you, or did you not,” he said, “instruct Madame Neill to tell her story to the police, in every detail, exactly as she seems to have told it to you?”

  “Yes, of course I did!”

  “Ah!” rumbled Maître Saulomon, with rich satisfaction. He squared himself, putting two fingers into his waistcoat pocket. “My friend, have you gone out of your mind? Are you stark, staring mad?”

  “Look here …”

  “Up to this afternoon, when they questioned Madame Neill, the police are almost convinced of her innocence. Almost! You have made them waver.”

  “Well?”

  “But—the moment she finishes her testimony—they waver no longer. M. Goron and the examining magistrate look at each other. Madame Neill has made a slip so fatal, so damning to anyone who knows the evidence, that there can be no doubt of her guilt. Boum! It is finished. All my skill, even mine, could do nothing for her.”

  On the little table, beside Janice Lawes, there was a half-empty Martini and three stacked saucers to indicate three previous drinks. Janice sat down and finished the Martini, accentuating the slight flush on her face. If Helena had been there, Helena would have said many things. But Dermot was not concerned with this aspect of the girl’s character.

  He stared back at Maître Saulomon.

  “One moment!” he urged. “Had this so-called ‘slip’ of hers something to do with—the Emperor’s snuff-box?”

  “It had.”

  “Her description of it, I mean?”

  “Exactly.”

  Dermot dropped his brief-case on the table.

  “Well, well!” he said, with a full-blown and sardonic bitterness which made the others draw back. “Then the very evidence which should have convinced them she’s innocent is the very evidence which convinces them she’s guilty?”

  The lawyer shrugged his elephantine shoulders.

  “I can’t say what you mean by that.”

  “M. Goron,” said Dermot, “gives the impression of being an intelligent man. What in God’s name has gone wrong with him?” He brooded. “Or gone wrong with her, maybe?”

  “She was certainly upset,” the lawyer admitted. “Her story was not altogether impressive even on the points which might reasonably be called truth.”

  “I see. Then she didn’t give the account to Goron as she gave it to me this morning?”

  Again Maître Saulomon shrugged his shoulders.

  “As to what she may have told you, that’s another pair of sleeves. I can’t say.”

  “May I have a word?” interposed Janice softly.

  Janice twirled the stem of the cocktail glass. After several false starts, she spoke to Dermot in English.

  “I don’t know what’s going on. I’ve been tagging about all day after Appius Claudius here,”—she nodded towards Maître Saulomon,—“and all he’ll do is make noises in his throat and stand on his dignity. We’re all a good deal on edge. Mother and Toby and Uncle Ben are at the town hall now.”

  “Oh? Are they?”

  “Yes. Trying to see Eve. And failing conspicuously.” Janice hesitated. “I gathered from Toby that there was a royal dust-up last night. It seems Toby
wasn’t in his right mind (he often isn’t), and said some things to Eve he’s regretting horribly today. I never saw the poor boy so conscience-stricken.”

  After a quick glance, at Dermot’s face, which had grown grim enough to mark a danger sign, Janice continued to twirl the stem of the cocktail glass in even more unsteady fingers.

  “These last couple of days,” she continued, “everything hasn’t been exactly gas and gaiters. But we are on Eve’s side, in spite of what you may think. When we heard about her arrest, we were as thunderstruck as you.”

  “I am gratified to hear it.”

  “Please don’t talk like that! You look like—an executioner, or something.”

  “Thank you. I hope to be one.”

  Janice looked up quickly. “Of whom?”

  “When I last spoke to Goron,” said Dermot, ignoring the question, “he had two good cards to play for all they were worth. One was what is known as a grilling of Yvette Latour, from which he expected results. The other was the fact that a certain person, in describing events on the night of the murder, has been telling lies. Why the devil he’s thrown those cards into the dust-bin in order to arrest Eve is beyond what feeble wits I can bring into this business.”

  “You might ask him,” suggested the lawyer, nodding towards the foyer. “He is coming to join us now.”

  Aristide Goron, as bland and dapper as ever despite a worried forehead, made a great play of striking the ferrule of his stick on the floor as he stumped towards them; he had a walk like the Grand Monarch.

  “Ah! Good evening, my friend,” he greeted Dermot, with a faintly defensive note in his voice. “You have returned from London, I see.”

  “Yes. To find a beautiful situation here.”

  “One regrets,” sighed M. Goron. “Still, justice is justice. You acknowledge that? May one further ask why it was necessary for you to rush to London like that?”

  “In order,” answered Dermot, “to get proof of motive against the real murderer of Sir Maurice Lawes.”

  “Ah, zut!” exploded M. Goron.

  Dermot turned to Maître Saulomon. “It will be necessary for me to have a little conversation with the prefect of police. Miss Lawes, will you excuse my discourtesy if I ask to have a word with these gentlemen in private?”

  Janice rose with the utmost composure.

  “Shall I make myself scarce, or what?”

  “Not at all. M. Saulomon will join you in a moment, and take you back to your family at the town hall.”

  He waited until Janice—whether angry or merely mocking could not be told—had gone out of the alcove. Then he addressed the lawyer.

  “Could you, my friend, manage to convey a message to Eve Neill?”

  “I can at least try,” shrugged Maître Saulomon.

  “Good. You might tell her that, after I have spoken to M. Goron, I hope to effect her release within an hour or two at the outside. For good measure, I propose to hand over the real murderer of Sir Maurice Lawes in her place.”

  There was a pause.

  “This is hokey-pokey!” cried M. Goron, shaking the malacca stick in the air. “This is a juggle with words. I tell you, I will have nothing to do with it!”

  But the lawyer bowed. He moved out into the foyer, like a galleon under full sail. They saw him stop to address a word to Janice. He offered his arm, which she refused. Yet they left the foyer together, disappearing into the throng. Then Dermot, seating himself on the bench in the alcove, opened his briefcase.

  “Will you sit down, M. Goron?”

  The prefect swelled. “No, monsieur, I will NOT sit down!”

  “Oh, come! Considering what I can promise you—”

  “Pfaa!”

  “Why not be comfortable and take something to drink?”

  “Well!” growled M. Goron, still on his dignity but relaxing nevertheless. He sat down on the padded seat. “Perhaps a little moment. And perhaps a small glass of something to drink. If monsieur insists, I will have a hokey-pokey … I mean, I will have a visky-soda.”

  Dermot ordered the drinks.

  “You surprise me,” he said with ferocious suavity. “After such a sensational capture as arresting Madame Neill, why aren’t you at the town hall pounding her with questions?”

  “I have business at this hotel,” replied M. Goron, and drummed his fingers on the table.

  “Business?”

  “In effect,” said M. Goron, moving his neck. “Some while ago Dr. Boutet telephones me. He says that M. Atwood has recovered consciousness, and that perhaps some small judicious questioning might be permitted…”

  At the expression of satisfaction on Dermot’s face, the prefect simmered again.

  “Then I tell you this,” Dermot said. “M. Atwood is going to tell you exactly what I am going to tell you. That will be the last link. If he confirms what I say, without any prompting from me, will you give my evidence a hearing?”

  “Evidence? What evidence?”

  “One moment,” interrupted Dermot. “Why have you done this about-face turn and arrested the lady?”

  M. Goron told him.

  The prefect explained with a wealth of detail, punctuated by sips from a visky-soda. Though M. Goron did not seem altogether happy even now, Dermot had to admit that there was some cloud of reason in the prefect’s suspicions and the thunderous certainty of M. Vautour the examining magistrate.

  “Then,” muttered Dermot, “she didn’t tell you after all. She didn’t tell you what slipped out, when she was half dead from lack of sleep this morning. She didn’t tell you the one really important thing which completes her defence and proves the case against somebody else.”

  “Which is?”

  “Listen!” said Dermot, and opened the brief-case on the table.

  When he began to speak, the hands of the ornate clock in the foyer stood at five minutes to nine. By five minutes past, M. Goron had begun to squirm and hunch his shoulders. By fifteen minutes past, the prefect had become silent: quiet and worried, turning up his palms in a way which indicated supplication.

  “I detest this affair,” he groaned. “I abominate this affair. No sooner are you right-side-up, than along comes somebody and turns you down-side-up again.”

  “Does it explain everything that’s seemed so difficult before?”

  “This time, I make no reply! I am cautious. But, in effect… yes, it does.”

  “Then the case is complete. You have only to ask that one question from the man who saw what happened. Ask Ned Atwood, ‘Was it so-and-so?’ If he says yes, you can prepare your violin to good purpose. And you can’t accuse me of having prompted him.”

  M. Goron rose to his feet, finishing the visky-soda.

  “Let us go and have our throats cut,” he invited.

  For the second time that day Dermot visited room 401. But on the previous occasion he had not expected such a stroke of luck as greeted him now. It was as though two influences, one good and the other ironically malign, carried Eve Neill’s destiny between them and were always tripping each other up.

  A dim lamp burned in the bedroom. Ned Atwood, though very pale and somewhat blurred of eye, was very much awake. Trying to sit up weakly, he was expostulating with the night nurse, a stout and cheery West Country girl from the English Hospital, who appeared engaged in an attempt to hold him down.

  “Sorry to disturb you,” Dermot began. “But —”

  “Look,” said Ned, in a husky croak which made him clear his throat several times. He peered past the nurse’s arm. “Are you the doctor? Then for God’s sake get this harpy off me, will you? She’s been trying to sneak up and stick me with a hypodermic.”

  “Lie down,” fumed the nurse. “You’ve got to be quiet!”

  “How the hell can I be quiet when you won’t tell me what’s happened? I don’t want to be quiet. That’s the last thing in the world I do want. I promise to be good; I promise to take every filthy medicine in the codex; if you’ll just have the common decency to tell me what happ
ened.”

  “It’s all right, nurse,” Dermot said, as the girl regarded them suspiciously.

  “May I ask who you are, sir? And what you’re doing here?”

  “I am Dr. Kinross. This is M. Goron, the prefect of police, who is investigating the murder of Sir Maurice Lawes.”

  As though a blurred lens had come into focus, the expression on Ned Atwood’s face slowly sharpened; comprehension came back into it. Breathing thinly, he half sat up, supporting himself with his hands behind his back. He peered down at his pajamas, as though he had never seen them before. He blinked at corners of the room.

  “I was coming up in the lift,” he announced, with careful articulation, “when all of a sudden I…” He touched his throat. “How long have I been like this?”

  “Nine days.”

  “Nine days?”

  “That’s right. Were you really struck by a car outside the hotel, Mr. Atwood?”

  “Car? What damn nonsense is this about a car?”

  “You said you were.”

  “I never said anything of the kind. At least, I don’t remember saying anything like that.” Full comprehension now returned. “Eve,” he said, expressing everything in one word.

  “Yes. Will you try not to get excited, Mr. Atwood, if I tell you that she’s in trouble and needs your help?”

  “Do you want to kill him?” demanded the nurse.

  “Shut up,” ordered Ned, with conspicuous lack of gallantry. “Trouble?” he asked Dermot. “What do you mean by trouble?”

  It was the prefect of police who answered. M. Goron, his arms folded, attempted to remain self-effacing and to betray nothing of the rather complicated emotions which obsessed him then.

  “Madame is in prison,” the prefect of police said in English. “She has been charged with murdering Sir Maurice Lawes.”

  During the long pause which followed, a cool night breeze stirred the curtains and the white blinds at the windows. Ned, now propped bolt upright, stared back at them. His white pajama coat was rucked up round his shoulders; his arms showed thin and white after nine days of losing weight. They had shaved the crown of his head, as is customary in such cases. Its thin gauze plastering made an almost ludicrous contrast to the white, gaunt, handsome face with the washed-out blue eyes and reckless mouth. All of a sudden he started to laugh.