[Mark Twain Mysteries 05] - The Mysterious Strangler

by Peter J. Heck

  “Maybe he does feel that way,” said Mr. Clemens. “Cops can get just as petty as anybody else, and they’re often jealous of anybody butting in on their business. Remember, back in London, how stiff-necked that Chief Inspector Lestrade got about amateurs trying to compete with Scotland Yard? Rosalia may hide it better, but I wouldn't be surprised if he felt the same way.”

  “And while he salves his pride, the murderer may escape!” I slammed my fist into the open palm of my other hand and continued: “If only the police would be reasonable!”

  “Don’t bet on it,” said Mr. Clemens, with a grimace. “If we’re going to wait for the police to tell us what we need to know, it’ll be next Christmas before we get started on the case. I think we’d better just light out on our own. I say we start by trying to find that stolen painting. I’ll guarantee you, Wentworth: Whoever’s got that Raphael, knows what happened to the young lady.”

  “Don’t be so certain that the killer is the thief.” I countered. “The Raphael could have been stolen hours before her death. I think we need to turn our efforts toward discovering the details of the murder. I’d particularly like to know where they found the body.” I stopped abruptly, shocked at the words I had just said. The body. A short while ago. that would have been Virginia—the woman I had contemplated sharing my life with…

  “Yes, it would be useful to know that.” said Mr. Clemens, breaking into my thoughts. “I just don’t see how we’re going to find it out, if Rosalia isn’t talking.” He paused a moment, then looked up and said, “We could call your watchdog in and ask him.” He gestured toward the window overlooking the courtyard, where Agente Maggio was wailing.

  “I think not.” I said. “I'm not in the mood for jokes, at the moment. You can pull his leg without my participation.”

  “Oh, I’m serious,” said my employer. “He might not know he isn’t supposed to tell us about the murder. If we play our cards right, he might be a good deal of help to us.”

  “I’d be surprised if he even speaks English.” I said. “He didn’t look to be a very bright fellow, to me.”

  Mr. Clemens shook his head. “He can't be all that dense, if the captain's set him to shadow a Yale man. As far as English, I’d bet he knows as much as he needs to. He must run into his share of Englishmen and Americans who’ve been robbed. Go call him in and we'll find out if he knows anything—or, even better, if he wants to talk about it.”

  “Very well,” I said, starting for the door. “But please try not to antagonize the fellow—after all. I’ll have to spend my time in his company, if I want to leave the villa.”

  “The last thing I want to do is antagonize the cops,” said Mr. Clemens, with a look of utter innocence. “In fact, I was going to offer him a cigar and a drink.”

  I smiled in spite of myself. Mr. Clemens had an undeniable talent for making me smile when I least expected it. “Why do you call the carabinieri ‘cops’.” I asked. “Isn’t ‘policeman’ a more polite translation?”

  Mr. Clemens chuckled. “That’s an old writer’s trick,” he said. “Never use a nine-letter word when there’s a three-letter one that means the same thing. If you're getting paid by the word, you pay attention to things like that.”

  I laughed at his explanation, and started to go fetch Agente Maggio. Then another thought crossed my mind. “I hope the cop doesn't think we’re trying to bribe him with the cigar and drink.” I said, suddenly apprehensive.

  “Of course we’re trying to bribe him.” said Mr. Clemens. “Do you take me for an infant? Now go get him. and let’s find out if he's a mind to help us.”

  “Very well,” I said again, and headed for the courtyard.

  Capitano Rosalia must have been very emphatic in ordering Agente Maggio not to follow me when I entered someone's home, for it took all my meager stock of Italian to get the carabiniere to come into the villa, even at my express invitation. But after repeating “Avanti in casa, per favore, avanti in casa,” and elaborating on these words with broad gestures. I managed to convey my meaning. At last, Agente Maggio rolled his eyes, no doubt making some unspoken comment on the insanity of Americans, and followed me inside.

  “Well, there you are.” said Mr. Clemens, as the tall policeman came into the parlor. He gestured toward a chair next to the fireplace, and said. “Sit down, sit down and get comfortable “

  Agente Maggio looked around the room with narrowed eyes, as if searching for something incriminating. In fact. I realized, he was looking for something incriminating. Despite Capitano Rosalia's denials that he considered me a prime suspect in the murder, I had no doubt he had instructed his subordinate to report anything that might prove me guilty after all. But after a moment. Maggio understood my employer’s gesture, and took a seat in the chair Mr. Clemens had indicated.

  “How about something to drink while we talk?” Mr. Clemens asked. He lifted his own glass and pantomimed filling it from a bottle, adding. “Nothing better to warm the blood on a chilly day.”

  “Grazie, signore.” said Agente Maggio. nodding and pointing to my wineglass, which I had left on the mantelpiece. “Un bicchiere di vino, per favore. “

  Mr. Clemens raised his eyebrows. “What's he want? A pitcher of wine?”

  “No, that means a glass of wine.” I said. “I've heard people ordering in the cafe.”

  “That's a bit better,” said my employer. He rang for the butler, then said. “I can see I need to learn some more Italian. If the grammar weren't so damned complicated…” I refrained from pointing out that it was the vocabulary, not the grammar, that he had misunderstood, and said instead. “If we're having trouble with a sentence that commonplace. I don’t know how much farther we can get with this fellow. I haven’t learned the Italian for murder victim. let alone the other things we want to ask him about.”

  “You’re right, Wentworth.” said Mr. Clemens, looking at Agente Maggio. who sat waiting with a bland expression.

  “Do you speak English?” asked my employer. “We have questions we’d like to ask you.”

  “Non capisco, signore,” said the policeman, shrugging and spreading his hands.

  “I know what that means, at least,” said my employer, scowling. “It stands to reason the rascal doesn’t understand me when I want to ask him questions, but does just fine when I offer him a drink. That’s a pretty convenient degree of ignorance.”

  “Don't judge him so harshly. You understood the Italian for wine, yourself,” I pointed out.

  “That’s the mark of an experienced traveler.” he said. “You learn how to communicate the important things. But here we’ve got important things to ask this fellow, and neither of us can understand the other. What are we going to do?”

  I had no ready answer, but just then the butler arrived. Mr. Clemens turned to him and said, “Bring this fellow a glass of wine.”

  “Si, signore,” said the butler. “Does he wish the red or the white?”

  Mr. Clemens frowned. “Damned if I know—why don’t you ask him?’

  “Si, signore,” said the butler, again, and turned to Agente Maggio. “Per favore, agente, prende di vino rosso o bianco?”

  “Di rosso, grazie,” said the policeman, with a hint of a smile. Mr. Clemens and I asked for our own glasses to be refilled, and, after giving a little bow, the butler went to fill the orders.

  “That was easy enough,” I said when the butler had left. “I even understood most of it, once somebody else came up with the right words. What we need is an Italian interpreter”

  “I suppose you’re right,” said Mr. Clemens. “I don’t like having to rely on some stranger, though—not when we’re dealing with a life-and-death problem here. It’s got to be somebody we can trust.”

  “You don’t have to rely on some stranger.” came a voice from the doorway. “I know enough Italian to do the job. and you know you can trust me.”

  Mr. Clemens and I turned to look, although we both already knew from the voice who the speaker was. Clara Clemens, my em
ployer’s second daughter, stood there with a little smile.

  “You’ve been listening.*' said Mr. Clemens.

  “Of course I have.” said Clara, walking farther into the room to confront her father. “You’re trying to solve another murder case, and now you need somebody to help you.”

  “Yes. But…” her father began, but she interrupted him.

  “I can do it.” she said, tossing her head. “I speak the best Italian of anyone in the family. Besides, we can’t let them put poor Wentworth in jail.” Standing straight, with confidence in her eye and voice, she seemed more like an eager lawyer than a pretty young girl.

  Mr. Clemens shook his head. “No,” he said. “I'm not going to have any of my daughters mixed up in a murder case. Even if you are almost twenty…”

  “Susy was already mixed up in one. back in England.” said Clara, sticking out her chin. “She was right there when the man was killed, and she told me and Jean all about it when she got home. It wasn't that bad.”

  Mr. Clemens walked over and patted his daughter on the head. “You may not think so, young lady, but I’m the judge of what's appropriate for my daughters, and I say no. Besides. your mother would kill me if I got you into trouble.”

  “There's no danger at all.” insisted Clara. “All I’d be doing is helping you ask a policeman a few questions. Mama couldn't object to that. Besides, who else are you going to get to do it?”

  “The butler speaks the lingo.” said Mr. Clemens, without a great deal of conviction. Just as he spoke, the individual in question returned with the drinks, which he gave to each of us and then departed, without a word.

  “Maybe the butler can translate, but you can’t trust the butler to keep mum—you don’t trust him. I can tell, because you all clammed up the minute he got here. But you can trust me.” said Clara, when the servant had left. “Nobody outside the family would ever hear a word of what I heard.”

  “But everybody inside the family would hear all about it. and I’d have to listen to every syllabic of it at every meal, and you'd all ask questions about what every detail meant, until I was sick of it.” said my employer. This was true beyond much doubt. All three of the Clemens children were lively and intelligent, and interested in far more than the usual girlish subjects of conversation.

  “You’re going to have to listen to all that, anyway,” said Clara. “Except this time, I won’t be asking the questions, because I’ll already know the answers I’ve helped you find. And the other girls will come ask me what I know, instead of pestering you. So we won’t be anywhere near as bothersome as we were in England.”

  “And if I don’t let you help me?” said Mr. Clemens warily.

  “You already know the answer to that,” said Clara. Her eyes twinkled. “I promise I’ll ask enough questions to make you even more miserable than Jean and Susy put together. And you know I can do it.” She arched her brow and smiled.

  “She’s got me over a barrel. Wentworth.” said my employer, sighing. “All right, then. Miss Sass-pot. you’ve got the job. Let’s see if you can get this fellow to tell us what we need to know.”

  Agente Maggio had observed the conversation between father and daughter with obvious curiosity. But his eyebrows rose when Clara walked over to him and said. “Buon-giomo. agente,” then followed it up with a stream of rapid-fire Italian that I had not the slightest chance of deciphering. The policeman replied in the same language, and my employer and I were left to stare at one another, wondering when we would be let in on the conversation.

  At last Mr. Clemens’s stock of patience ran out. “What the dickens are you two chattering about, Clara? Wentworth and I need to ask the man some questions.”

  “Really, Father, you ought to give me a few minutes to put the agente at his ease before you pepper him with questions.” said Clara. “After all. he is a guest in our home.”

  Mr. Clemens’s mouth fell open at this answer, and without saying another word he sat down in a chair across the fireplace from the policeman while Clara returned to her dialogue with Agente Maggio.

  After a few more exchanges between the two. Clara turned to her father and said, with all the apparent innocence imaginable, “Now, Papa, what did you want to ask the agente?”

  My employer hemmed and hawed for a moment, then said, “Captain Rosalia told us that Miss Fleetwood, a young American woman staying in the city, has been murdered. But he didn't tell us how the poor girl was killed, or where her body was found, or when they think it must have happened. If the agente can tell us any of those details, it would be a great help to us.”

  Clara spoke to the policeman, who frowned and replied in a sentence or two. She turned back to her father and said. “He says he doesn’t know everything you’ve asked him. not yet—he expects to find most of it out from the captain before long. But he also wants to know why you’re asking.”

  “Why, so I can help find the murderer.” said Mr. Clemens. “Wentworth won’t be able to leave the city until the police decide he’s not guilty. I need to clear him if I’m going to be able to take him along on my travels, and I need to travel if I’m going to pay the bills. I need him along to handle all the arrangements: it'd be a nuisance to have to do it without him.”

  The policeman laughed when Clara relayed this information to him. He took a sip of his wine, then gave a brief answer, which Clara reported to her father: “He asks why protecting you from a nuisance is worth his getting into trouble with his captain.”

  Mr. Clemens bristled, but he leaned forward and said. ‘Tell him that protecting me from a nuisance isn’t the point—it’s protecting Wentworth from being thrown in jail when he didn’t do anything to deserve it.”

  Clara spoke to the policeman again, and this time, they exchanged several sentences. At last, she turned to her father again and said, “He apologizes for being so blunt, but he can’t accept a stranger's word on such an important point. He has only your word that Wentworth isn’t the murderer.” She paused and raised her eyebrows. “And he says that Wentworth seems to be a nice person, but he has known other nice people who were bad criminals.”

  Mr. Clemens grimaced. “An honest cop! I was afraid we'd run into something like this. What are we going to do now?”

  “You might try proving that you deserve his trust.” said Clara. “He is very serious about his duty, but he doesn’t seem to be inflexible about it—so you may be able to persuade him.”

  “Well, that’s some hope,” said Mr. Clemens, though his tone implied that it might not be enough. “Tell you what— since he’s going to be out here as long as Wentworth is, why don’t you tell him he can stay inside while the weather’s nasty. That should dispose him a little better toward us.”

  “I’m surprised.” I said. “I can’t imagine working with a policeman looking over our shoulders. Are we to have him as a guest at meals, as well?”

  “Don’t be silly. Wentworth.” said Mr. Clemens. “He doesn’t have to come into the office with us. or sit at the table when we cat. He can stay in the kitchen, or the hallway, most of the time. But it ought to let him know we aren’t going out of our way to hide anything from him. and that we’re considerate enough not to leave him out in the rain and cold. Tell him that. Clara.”

  Clara spoke to the policeman again, and when she had finished he nodded toward my employer and said. “Grazie, signore. Zank you.”

  “You’re welcome, you’re welcome.” said Mr. Clemens, waving a hand. Then he raised an eyebrow. “You do speak English.”

  “Solo un po’.” the policeman said. “Hello, goodbye, zank you please, you un’er arres’” He laughed.

  “I guess that’s all you need,” said my employer, chuckling. “That's about as much as I can say in Italian. But if the fellow can't tell us any more than that, we can let him take his wine down to the kitchen and carry on our discussion in private. Tell him that. Clara.”

  She spoke briefly to Agente Maggio. who smiled, nodded and rose to his feet. He followed Mr. Cleme
ns's daughter to the door, but just as he was about to leave, he turned and said something else in Italian. Clara’s face turned pale.

  “What’s that he says7' asked Mr. Clemens. Agente Maggio was standing by the door, his eyes fixed on me, and I wondered if what he had said had some reference to myself.

  Clara's voice was subdued as she said. “He says he doesn't think the captain would mind his telling you how the American lady was killed, since it will be all over town by the evening. He says to tell you that she was strangled.” I realized that up until now the harsh fact that we were dealing with a brutal murder had not struck home to her. Nor to me. The notion of Virginia's death had still seemed abstract and unreal. Now I had been slapped in the face with the reality of it. My head reeled.

  “Strangled, eh? Well, that's something for us to start from.” I heard Mr. Clemens say. as if at a distance. “Thank the fellow again for us. and tell the cook to let him camp in the kitchen and to give him something to eat.”

  “I will,” said Clara, and she led Agente Maggio on out of the room.

  “Strangled.” I said, sinking into a chair. “What a frightful way for poor Virginia to die.”

  “Yes, I can’t think of many worse.” said Mr. Clemens, with some vehemence. “All the more reason for us to find the no-good skunk who did it and make sure he pays for it.”

  I nodded. “Yes, he must be stopped from harming anyone else—ever again.” Then my logical mind came into play, and I said. “It’s pretty certain it’s a man we’re looking for, isn’t it? No woman could have committed such a brutal murder.”

  Mr. Clemens’s face turned grave. “I’ve known a couple who could have, not that I’m eager to remember them. But yes, I think it’s odds-on that a man killed poor Miss Fleet- wood. Now, let’s start thinking about how we’re going to find him—and prove to the police that he’s the murderer. My guess is that it’ll be one of the guests at that party last night.”