The Burglar in the Library

by Lawrence Block

  “Why not just carry the pillow away?” Littlefield wanted to know. “Why leave it around?”

  “Where would he put it? In his luggage? Or on the chair in his room?”

  “I don’t know, but—”

  “It would draw attention anywhere else,” I said. “It would be least conspicuous in its usual position, on the couch where he’d found it. Even if he knew there was blood on it, he was better off leaving it there. His hope was that no one would be looking for blood, that the death would get a cursory inspection by the police, that the autopsy would be perfunctory and incomplete, and that Rathburn’s death would go into the books as an accident.

  “If that happened,” I went on, “he was home free. If not, there’d be more of Rathburn’s blood to contend with than a stain on the pillow and a drop or two on the camel. A good forensic investigation would turn up blood drops all over the place, probably enough to establish just where Rathburn was sitting when the blow was struck.”

  Some of the women seemed to draw in their shoulders, as if to avoid contact with all this blood that was allegedly all around them.

  “In fact,” I said, “we probably ought to leave the room and seal it until the police get here. No one’s touching anything, and that’s good, but we shouldn’t even be here. This is a crime scene.”

  “Quite right,” Colonel Blount-Buller said, “although I don’t know that the local police will treat a crime scene quite as Scotland Yard might. But you’re correct all the same, sir. Experienced in these matters, are you? Served with the police, I shouldn’t wonder.”

  “Not exactly,” I said.

  “Not a private detective, I don’t suppose?”

  I shook my head. “I’m a big reader,” I said, “and I read a lot of mysteries. And I watch a lot of TV. You know, locked-room cases? Impossible crimes? English-country-house murders?”

  “Poirot and all that,” the colonel said.

  “That’s the idea.”

  “Never would have guessed it was quite so instructive,” he said. “Blood spatters, pinpoint hemorrhages, direction the blow was struck—you certainly seem to know what you’re about, Rhodenbarr.”

  I was preening a little, I have to admit. It’s hard to avoid when someone with that kind of accent gives you that kind of compliment. I was busy enjoying the feeling when the good colonel went on to ask me just what it was I did for a living.

  “As a matter of fact,” I said, “I’m out of work at the moment. My job was eliminated. Corporate downsizing, at least that’s what they call it. Getting more work out of fewer people is what it amounts to, and it’s a hell of a thing when you’re the victim of it.”

  “Had some of that in the British army,” he said, “after we lost India.” His face darkened. “Might have put a better face on it if they’d called it downsizing. What did you do for the ungrateful swine before they cut you loose?”

  “He’s a burglar,” Millicent Savage said.

  All conversation stopped. I managed a laugh, and what a hollow ring it had in that huge room. “I was joking with the child last night,” I said. “I’m afraid she’s taken it seriously.”

  “You say it’s a joke,” said the little horror, “but I think it’s true. I think you really are a burglar, Bernie.”

  “Millicent,” Leona Savage said, “go to your room.”

  “But Mommy, I—”

  “Millicent!”

  “It’s all right,” I said. “I’m sure she didn’t mean any harm. At any rate there’s no harm done, and—”

  I stopped. Nigel Eglantine had come back to the room, a frown darkening his brow.

  “I’m sure it’s the snow,” he said.

  We looked at him.

  “The phone,” he explained. “The line is dead. I’m sure it must be the snow.”

  CHAPTER

  Thirteen

  What we needed to do, Nigel Eglantine insisted, was remain calm. He said this over and over, as if the words were a mantra designed to ward off panic, and with only partial success.

  Carolyn rescued him. “Look, Nigel,” she said, “there’s good news and bad news, right?”

  “Good news and bad news? There is?”

  “There always is,” she assured him. “Suppose you start off by giving us the bad news.”

  “The bad news,” he said.

  “Like the phones are out, and whatever else goes with it.”

  “Ah,” he said. “The bad news. Well, the phone service is definitely not on at the moment. I’m sure that’s a result of the storm. Bad weather often knocks out our telephones. In the spring and fall the phones are often out after severe electrical storms, and in the winter a bad snowstorm can do it.”

  “Nothing about that in the brochure,” Miss Hardesty murmured to Miss Dinmont.

  “But the good news,” he said, brightening, “is that we’re never without phone service for very long. I’d say that we’ll have service again within a couple of hours at the most.”

  “That’s good news,” Carolyn agreed. “Tell us the rest of the bad news.”

  “The rest of the bad news?”

  “The snow,” she prompted.

  “Ah, the snow. Well, there’s a great deal of it, as you can readily see. Just over two feet of it, according to the newscast, with drifts deep enough to bury an automobile to the roofline. Most of the county roads will be impassable until the plows get through, and that may take quite some time.”

  “So even if we were to phone the police,” the colonel said, “it’s doubtful they could get through to us.”

  “Highly doubtful,” Nigel said. “Even if our road were cleared, they couldn’t get up our driveway. Nor can anyone else. For the time being, there’ll be no deliveries and no guests arriving.”

  “The last part,” Carolyn said, “about no new guests, is more good news than bad, if you ask me. Right now the last thing we need is new people in the house. But the rest is bad news, all right. What’s the good news?”

  “Even without deliveries,” he said, “we’ve no cause for alarm. The larder’s fully stocked with enough food to feed us all royally well into April. That includes an emergency supply of bottled water, which we’re unlikely to need because the well is functioning perfectly. And, though it’s early in the day to mention it, the Cuttleford cellar is fully stocked. We’ve enough beer and wine and spirits to carry us well into the next century.”

  “Well, that’s a relief,” Carolyn said.

  “And actually,” he went on, warming to the task, “there’s more good news. It’s true we’re isolated here, albeit in comfortable isolation, but we won’t be confined for long. Orris assures me that as soon as he has the snowblower operating, he’ll be able to clear a path to the bridge. Just across the bridge our Jeep is parked, with a stout snowplow attached to it. In a matter of hours, Orris ought to be able to have our driveway cleared all the way to the road.”

  “Hear, hear!” the colonel said, and there was an ill-coordinated round of applause for Orris, who acknowledged it by dropping his head so that he was staring at his boots, as if to gauge how far above them the snow would reach.

  “But before anything else,” Cissy Eglantine said, “I think it’s ever so important that we all have a proper English breakfast.”

  “I wonder what this is,” Carolyn said. “Maybe it’s toad-in-the-hole.” She looked at her plate, on which reposed a thick slice of toasted white bread. Its center had been removed, and an egg cooked in the circular space thus created.

  “You sound disappointed,” I said.

  “Well, it’s not bad,” she said. “It’s a little like Adam and Eve on a raft.”

  “That’s what, two poached eggs on toast?”

  “Uh-huh. Except in this case Adam fell off and drowned, and the raft’s got a hole in the floorboards. So all that’s left is Eve, holding on for dear life.” She took a bite. “Not bad, though, I have to admit. Even if it’s not what I expected.”

  “What did you expect?”

>   “I don’t know, Bern. Some exotic form of comfort food, I suppose, if that’s not a contradiction in terms. Like this black pudding.”

  “It’s exotic comfort food, eh?”

  “Well, kind of.” She lifted a forkful to her mouth, chewed thoughtfully. “Very simple,” she said, “but very tasty at the same time. And it’s black, all right, but it’s not like any pudding I ever tasted.”

  “A far cry from Jell-O,” I said.

  “They’ve got funny ideas about pudding, Bern. Look at Yorkshire pudding. I mean, it’s good, too, but you wouldn’t rush out and squirt Cool Whip on it, would you? Black pudding. What do you suppose they make it out of?”

  “Blood.”

  “Seriously, Bern.”

  “I’m serious. ‘Blood sausage’ is another name for it.”

  “I wish you hadn’t told me that, Bern.”

  “Well, you asked.”

  “That didn’t mean you had to tell me. At least now I know why they call it black pudding. If they called it blood sausage, no one would want any. What about the white pudding, Bern? What do they make that out of, lymph?” She frowned. “Don’t answer that. You want more kippers, Bern?”

  “I think I’ve had my limit.”

  “I guess I should just be grateful,” she said, “that they don’t use a real toad for toad-in-the-hole. Listen, if they serve us bubble and squeak, do me a favor, okay? If there’s something disgusting doing the bubbling and squeaking, keep it to yourself.”

  “I think it’s leftover cabbage and potatoes.”

  “That would be fine,” she said. “Just so it’s not recycled reptiles and rodents. Bern? Who do you figure killed Jonathan Rathburn?”

  “How should I know?”

  She shrugged. “I just thought you might have a hunch. That was pretty cool the way you proved it was murder, and found the two murder weapons and everything. Struck down with a camel, then smothered with a throw pillow. What a way to go, huh?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “What’s the matter, Bern?”

  “I was right there,” I said.

  “So was I, Bern. So was everybody, at one time or another. You want to know something? All the time we were in there standing around Rathburn’s body, I couldn’t stop glancing up at the top shelf to see if The Big Sleep was still there.”

  “It’s still there.”

  “I know. And I didn’t want to stare at it, but I kept looking at it over and over. I don’t think anybody noticed. I hope they didn’t.”

  “I think the dead body got most of their attention.”

  “Yeah, and I wish I knew who killed him.” She frowned. “What do you mean, you were right there? You don’t mean just now.”

  “No.”

  “And you don’t mean last night, when we were both there.”

  “No.”

  “You mean you were there when he was killed? Bern, you didn’t…you couldn’t have…”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “Then what do you mean? And why is the book still on the shelf? I thought you were going to get it last night. And how come—”

  I filled her in quickly on the events of the previous night. When I told her about the interlude with Lettice in the East Parlour, her eyes widened and her jaw dropped. “My God,” she said. “Imagine doing something like that on your wedding night.”

  “Lots of women do something like that on their wedding night,” I pointed out. “The thing is, most of them do it to their husbands.”

  “But not Lettice.”

  “I don’t know what she did upstairs with him,” I said. “I just know what she did downstairs with me.”

  “You know,” she said, “I was watching her while you were explaining things in the library, and there was something about the way she was looking at you.”

  “Oh?”

  She nodded. “She looked like the cat that swallowed the cream.” She frowned. “Make that the cat that ate the canary, okay?”

  “Whatever you say.”

  “Anyway, she looked smug. I guess I know why. You know what, Bern? I think it’s something in the air.”

  “In the air?”

  “Last night. Some sex vibe or something. You wouldn’t believe the dream I had.”

  “Oh?”

  “Amazingly vivid. I could have sworn—” She broke off in midsentence and motioned to our waitress, who was in fact Molly Cobbett, the downstairs maid who had happened upon Rathburn’s corpse and awakened the house with a scream. “Say, Molly,” she purred, “do you suppose we could have a little more tea?”

  “Why, of course you could, mum.”

  “I’m Carolyn, Molly. And this is Bernie.”

  “Very good, mum.”

  We sat in silence while Molly poured our tea. As soon as she was out of earshot, Carolyn said, “She was in it.”

  “Who was in what?”

  “Molly. In my dream.”

  “Oh.”

  “You wouldn’t believe how real it was, Bern.”

  “Yes I would.”

  “You would? How come? You weren’t in the dream, Bernie. It was just Molly and me.” She made a face. “That sounds like a song cue, doesn’t it? ‘My Blue Heaven.’ Anyway, it was unbelievably hot. Now I want to blush every time I look at her.”

  “She’s a country girl, Carolyn.”

  “I know.”

  “Pretty unsophisticated.”

  “I realize that,” she said. “Her idea of eating out is a burger at the Dairy Queen. I know all that.” She pursed her lips. “But in the world of dreams,” she said, “the woman is hot hot hot. But I still don’t understand what you said before. About being there when it happened.”

  For a moment I missed the transition, and I thought she meant that I was there when her dream-moment with Molly Cobbett took place. As indeed I was, but that was something she never had to know about.

  Then I said, “Oh, when the murder took place. I wasn’t, not exactly.” And I explained how I’d been about to enter the darkened room when I’d heard two people whispering.

  “It must have been Rathburn,” she said.

  “One of them must have been Rathburn.”

  “And the other was the man who killed him.”

  “The man or woman.”

  “Right, and now we’re back to he or she and his or hers. You think a woman could have done it?”

  “I think anybody but Millicent Savage could have done it,” I said. “It wouldn’t take too much strength to hit a person hard enough with a bronze camel to knock him senseless and split his head open. A fatal blow might take more in the way of brute force, although an athletic woman like Miss Hardesty could probably supply as much sheer brute force as most of the men around here. But in this case the blow wasn’t fatal, and it may not have been all that hard. So I don’t think we can rule out anybody.”

  “Except Millicent.”

  “Well, it’d be a reach for a ten-year-old girl.”

  “And Miss Dinmont.”

  “What about Miss Dinmont?”

  “Well, for openers, she’s in a wheelchair.” Her eyes widened. “Wait a minute, Bern. You don’t think…”

  “I don’t think what?”

  “That the wheelchair is a ruse? That she’s really physically fit? Is that what you think?”

  “Why would I think that?”

  “Because you’ve read Agatha Christie,” she said, “and you know that things are seldom what they seem in situations like this one. Bernie, you’ve got to do something. I hope you realize that.”

  “I know what I have to do,” I said. “I have to get the book, which is going to be a neat trick with the library out of bounds. And I have to get out of here, which is impossible as long as we’re snowed in, and probably out of the question until the police send us home. So I can’t do either of the things I have to do, not for the time being. In that case, I know what I’m going to do.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I’m going to find s
omething to read,” I said. “Some book from some room other than the library. God knows there are plenty of rooms, and plenty of books in them, and I ought to be able to find something I feel like reading. I’ll take it upstairs and crawl into bed with it, and if it puts me to sleep I won’t complain, either.”

  “Bern, that’s not what you have to do.”

  “I didn’t say it was what I had to do, I said it was what I was going to do, and—”

  “There’s something else you have to do.”

  “What?”

  “You have to solve the murder.”

  I looked at her. She looked back at me. Conversations, pitched too low to be overheard, continued at the other tables. Outside, you could hear the sound of someone trying to get an engine to turn over. Orris, I thought, having a go at snowblowing.

  “That’s ridiculous,” I said.

  “Who else is going to solve it? Nigel Eglantine pours a good drink, but he couldn’t solve a jigsaw puzzle. The colonel’s used to being in charge, and that’s helpful, but he’s a straightforward military type. What does he know about the criminal mind?”

  “Not much,” I said. “On the other hand, what do I know about the criminal mind?”

  “Well, you’ve got one, Bern, and you’ve been using it for years. Come on, who else has a chance of trapping the killer?”

  “How about the cops?”

  “In the first place,” she said, “they’re going to be hick cops with a strong family resemblance to Orris. The folks who live around here have been marrying their cousins for centuries. They’ve been diving into the shallow end of the gene pool, and you can get hurt that way.”