Murder at Bridge

by Anne Austin

  MURDER AT BRIDGE

  A Mystery Novel

  by

  ANNE AUSTIN

  Author of "Murder Backstairs"

  Grosset & Dunlap Publishers New YorkSet up and electrotyped. Published February, 1931. Reprinted March,April, 1931; February, 1932.Printed in the United States of America

  For ARLINE AND F. HUGH HERBERT

  Ground-floor plan of Nita Selim's house in PrimroseMeadows, showing the bedroom in which the murder was committed.]

  CHAPTER ONE

  Bonnie Dundee stretched out a long and rather fine pair of legs,regarding the pattern of his dark-blue socks with distinct satisfaction;then he rested his black head against the rich upholstery of an armchairnot at all intended for his use.

  His cheerful blue eyes turned at last--but not too long a last--to thesmall, upright figure seated at a typewriter desk in the corner of theoffice.

  "Good morning, Penny," he called out lazily, and good-humoredly waitedfor the storm to break.

  "Miss Crain--to _you_!" The flying fingers did not stop an instant, butDundee noticed with glee that the slim back stiffened even more rigidlyand that there was a decided toss of the brown bobbed head.

  "But Penny is so much more like you," Dundee protested, unruffled. "Andwhy should I be forced always to think of you as a long-legged bird,when even our mutual boss, District Attorney William S. Sanderson, hasthe privilege of calling you what you are--a bright and shining newpenny?"

  "I've known Bill Sanderson since I was born," the unseen lips informedhim truculently, even as the unseen fingers continued their fiercelystaccato typing.

  "Ah! That explains a lot!" Dundee conceded handsomely. "I just wondered,amidst all this bonhommie of 'Bill' and 'Penny,' why I--"

  "I only call Mr. Sanderson 'Bill' when I forget!" the small creaturedefended herself sharply. "Goodness knows I _try_ to be an efficientprivate secretary! And I could be a lot more efficient if lazy strangersdidn't plump themselves down in our best visitors' chair, and try toflirt with me. I don't flirt! Do you hear?--_I don't flirt withanybody!_"

  "Flirt with you, you funny little Penny?" Dundee's voice was a littlesad, the voice of a man who finds himself grievously misunderstood. "Ionly want you to like me, if you can, and be a little nice to me, forafter all I--"

  "Oh, I know!" Penny Crain jerked the finished letter from her typewriterand spun about on her narrow-backed swivel chair to face him. "I knowyou are 'Mr. James F. Dundee, Special Investigator attached to theoffice of the District Attorney,' and that you have a right to drive mecrazy if you want to."

  "_Crazy?_" Dundee was genuinely amazed, contrite. "I beg your pardonmost humbly, Miss Crain. I'll go back to my cell--"

  "Your office is almost as big and nice as this one," Penny retorted, buther sharp, bright brown eyes--really almost the color of a newpenny--softened until they took on a velvety depth.

  Dundee did not fail to notice the softening, nor did the littleheart-shaped face, with its low widow's-peak, its straight, short nose,and its pointed little chin, made almost childish by the deep cleftwhich cut through its obvious effort to look mature and determined, failto please him any more acutely than on the other days of the one shortweek he had been privileged at intervals to gaze upon it.

  "But the files, and--other things--are in this office," he told her, hisblue eyes twinkling happily once more.

  "Don't you _dare_ touch my files again!" Penny cried, springing to herfeet and running toward the wall which was completely concealed bydrawers, cabinets and shelves, filled with the records of which she wasthe proud custodian. "That's why I said just now that you were drivingme crazy. Thursday you took a whole folder of correspondence out of theletter files and put it back under the wrong initial. I had to hunt forit for two hours, with Bill--I mean, Mr. Sanderson--gnawing his nailswith impatience. He thought I had filed it wrong, and you might havemade me lose my job."

  Unconsciously her slightly husky contralto voice had sunk lower andtrembled audibly.

  "I'm awfully sorry. I shan't touch your files again, Miss Crain."

  "Oh--go on and call me Penny," she conceded impatiently. "What do youwant now?... And you can get anything you need out of the files ifyou'll just put the folder in the bottom drawer of my desk, so that Ican file it myself--correctly!"

  "Thank you, Penny," Bonnie Dundee said gravely. "I'd like awfully tohave the complete transcript of 'The State versus Maginty.' Mr.Sanderson is determined to get a conviction where our former districtattorney most ingloriously failed. The new trial comes up in two weeks,and he wants me to try to uncover a missing link of evidence."

  "I know," she nodded, and stretched her short, slender body to pull downthe two heavy volumes he required.

  Without a by-your-leave, Special Investigator Dundee resumed hiscomfortable seat, and laid the first of the volumes open upon his knees.But he did not seem to take a great deal of interest in the impanellingof jurors in the case of one Rufus Maginty, who had won the temporarytriumph of a "hung jury" under the handling of the state's case byDistrict Attorney Sherwood, deposed in November's election.

  Rather, his eyes followed the small, brisk figure of Miss PenelopeCrain, as it moved about the room, and his ears listened to the somehowcharming though emphatic tapping of her French heels.... French heels!Hadn't she been wearing sensible, Cuban-heeled Oxfords all other days ofthis first week of his "attachment" to the district attorney'soffice?... Cunning little thing, for all her thorniness and hersharpness with him, which he now saw that he had deserved.... Pretty,too.... Damned pretty!... What color was that dress of hers?... Ummm,let's see ... Chartreuse, didn't they call it? Chartreuse with big browndots in it. Bet it was sleeveless under that short little jacket ofgolden-brown chiffon velvet.... By Jove--and Dundee lapsed into one ofthe Englishisms he had picked up during his six months' work in Englandas a tyro in the records department of Scotland Yard, before he had cometo Hamilton to make a humble beginning as a cub detective on theHomicide Squad--yes, by Jove, she was all dressed up, for some reason orother.

  "Of course! Because it's Saturday and you have the afternoon off!"Dundee finished his reverie aloud, to the astonishment of the smallperson trying to reach a file drawer just a little too high for her. "Imean," he hastened to explain, "that I've just noticed how beautifulyour costume is, and found a reason for it."

  There was sudden color in the creamy face. The French heels tapped anangry progress across the big office, and Penny sat down abruptly in herswivel chair, reached across the immaculate desk, snatched up a morningpaper and tossed it, without a glance, in the general direction of hertormentor.

  "Page three, column two, first item," she informed him ungraciously, andthen began to search with a funny sort of desperation for more work toconsume her extraordinary energy.

  Bonnie Dundee grinned indulgently as he opened _The Hamilton MorningNews_ and turned to the specified page and column.

  "Ah! My old friend, the 'society editress,' in her very best style," hecommented as he began to read aloud:

  "'Mrs. Juanita Selim, new and charming member, is entertaining theForsyte Alumnae Bridge Club this afternoon, luncheon to be served at theexclusive new Breakaway Inn on Sheridan Road--'"

  "I've read it--and I'm busy, so shut up!" Penny commanded, as shegathered up pencils to sharpen.

  Quite meekly, Bonnie Dundee subsided into silent perusal of an item hewas sure could have no possible interest for himself, in either apersonal or professional capacity, unless Penny's name was in itsomewhere:

  "--after which the jolly party of young matrons and maids will adjournto Mrs. Selim's delightful home in the Primrose Meadows Addition." Hechuckled, and dared to interrupt the high importance of pointing-uppencils. "I say, that's funny, isn't it?... 'Primrose MeadowsA
ddition'!"

  "I don't think it's funny," Penny retorted coldly. "It so happens thatmy mother named it, that my father went into bankruptcy trying to make ago of it, and that 'Mrs. Selim's delightful home' was built to be ourhome, and in which we were fortunate enough to live only two monthsbefore the crash came."

  "Oh!" Dundee groaned. "Penny, Penny! I'm dreadfully sorry."

  "Shut up!" she ordered, but her voice was huskier than ever with tears.

  Dundee's now thoroughly interested eyes raced down the absurdly writtenparagraphs:

  "Although not an alumna of that famous and select school for girls,Forsyte-on-the-Hudson, graduation from which places any Hamilton girl inthe very inner circle of Hamilton society, Mrs. Selim has been closelyidentified with the school, having for the past two years directed andstaged Forsyte's annual play which ushers in the Easter vacation.

  "Indeed it was Mrs. Selim's remarkable success with this year's playwhich caused Mrs. Peter Dunlap, long interested in a Little Theater forHamilton, to induce the beautiful and charming young directress to cometo Hamilton with her. Plans for the Little Theater are growing apace,and it is safe to conjecture that not all the conversation flying thickand fast about 'Nita's' bridge tables this afternoon will be concernedwith contract 'conventions,' scores, and finesses which failed.

  "Lovely 'Nita' was elected to membership a fortnight ago, when a vacancyoccurred, due to the resignation of Miss Alice Humphrey, who has goneabroad for a year's study in the Sorbonne. The two-table club nowincludes: Mesdames Hugo Marshall, Tracey A. Miles, Peter Dunlap, John C.Drake, Juanita Selim, and Misses Polly Beale, Janet Raymond, andPenelope Crain."

  Dundee lowered the paper and stared at the profile of District AttorneySanderson's private secretary. So she was a "society girl," a "Forsyte"girl! Was that the reason, perhaps, why she had been so thorny with him,a mere "dick"? Well, he wasn't just a dick any longer. He was a SpecialInvestigator ... A society girl, playing at work....

  But there was more, and he read on: "As is well known, the 'girls' havetheir 'hen-fight' bridge-luncheon every Saturday afternoon from thefirst of October to the first of June, and a bridge-dinner, in whichmere men are graciously included, every other Wednesday evening duringthe season. Mr. and Mrs. Tracey A. Miles are scheduled as nextWednesday's host and hostess."

  "I take off my hat to your 'society editress'," Dundee commented withfalse cheerfulness, when he had laid the paper back upon Penny's desk."She makes half a column of this one item in what must be a meagerSaturday bunch of 'Society Notes,' then writes it all over again, in thepast tense, for an equally meager Monday column.... Like bridge, MissCrain?"

  Penny snatched up the paper and crushed it into her wastebasket. "I do!And I like my old friends, even if I am not able, financially, to keepup with them.... If that's why you've suddenly decided to stopbeing--comrades--"

  "Please forgive me again, Penny," he begged gently.

  "I was born into that crowd, and I still belong to it, because all ofthem are my real friends, but get this into your thick Scotch-Irishhead, Mr. Dundee--I'm working because I have to, and--and because I loveit, too, and because I want to earn enough before I'm many years olderto give Mother some of the things she's missing so dreadfullysince--since my father failed and--and ran away."

  "Ran away?" Dundee echoed incredulously. How could any man desert adaughter like this!

  "Yes! Ran away!" she repeated fiercely. "I might as well tell youmyself. Plenty of others will be willing to, as soon as they know youare--my friend.... As I told you, my father"--her voice broke--"myfather went bankrupt, but before the courts knew it he had sent somesecurities to a--to a _woman_ in New York, and when he--left us, he wentto her, because he left Mother a note saying so. His defrauded creditorshere have tried to--to catch him, but they haven't--yet--"

  Very gently Bonnie Dundee took the small hand that was distractedlyrumpling the brown waves which swept back from the widow's-peak. It layfluttering in his bigger palm for a moment, then snatched itself away.

  "I won't have you feeling sorry for me!" she cried angrily.

  "Who owns your--the Primrose Meadows house now?--Mrs. Selim?" he asked.

  "The 'lovely Nita'?" Her voice was scornful. "No. She rents it fromJudge Hugo Marshall--or is supposed to pay him rent," she added with atrace of malice. "Hugo is an old darling, but he is fearfully weak wherepretty women are concerned. Nita Selim had known Hugo in NewYork--somehow--and as soon as Lois--Mrs. Dunlap, I mean--had got Nitaoff the train, the stranger in our midst hied herself to Hugo's officeand he's been tagging after her ever since.... Though most of the men inour crowd are as bad as or worse than poor old Hugo. How Karen keeps onlooking so blissfully happy--"

  "Karen?" Dundee interrupted.

  "Mrs. Hugo Marshall," she explained impatiently. "Karen Plummer made herdebut a year ago this last winter--a darling of a girl. JudgeMarshall--retired judge, you know--had been proposing to the prettiestgirl in each season's crop of debs for the last twenty years, and Hugomust have been the most nonplussed 'perennial bachelor' who ever led agrand march when Karen snapped him up.... Loved him--actually! And itseems to have worked out marvelously.... A baby boy three months old,"she concluded in her laconic style. Then, ashamed; "I don't know why I'mgossiping like this!"

  "Because you can't find another blessed scrap of work to do, you littleefficiency fiend," Dundee laughed, "Come on! Gossip some more. MyMaginty case will wait till afternoon, to be mulled over while you'relosing your hard-earned salary at bridge with rich women."

  "We don't play for high stakes," she corrected him. "Just a twentieth ofa cent a point, though contract can run into money even at that. Thewinnings all go to the Forsyte Scholarship Fund. On Wednesday eveningsthe crowd plays for higher stakes--a tenth--and winners keepers.Therefore I can't afford to go, unless I sink so low as to let my escortpay my losses--which I sometimes do," she confessed, her brown head lowfor a moment.

  "Is this Mrs. Peter Dunlap a deep-bosomed club woman, who startsMovements?" he asked, more to bring her out of her depression thananything else. "Bigger and Better Babies Movements, and Homes for FallenGirls, and Little Theater Movements?"

  The brown head flung itself up sharply, and the brown eyes hardened intobright pennies again. "Lois Dunlap is the sweetest, finest, most_comfortable_ woman in Hamilton, and I adore her--as does everyone else,Peter Dunlap hardly more than the rest of us. She _is_ interested in aLittle Theater for Hamilton, but she won't manage it. That's why she gothold of Nita Selim. Lois will simply put up barrels of money, withoutmissing them, and give a grand job to a little Broadway gold-digger.Funny thing is, she really delights in Nita. Thinks she's sweet and hasnever had a real chance."

  "And what do you think?" Dundee asked softly.

  "Oh--I suppose I'm a cat, but I can see through her so clearly. Not thatshe's bad; she's simply an opportunist. She's awfully sweet anddeferential and 'frank' with women, but with men--well, she simply tucksher head so that her shoulder-length black curls fall forwardenchantingly, gives them one wistful smile out of her big eyes that arelike black pansies and--the clink of slave chains!... Now go on andthink I'm catty, which I suppose I am!"

  Bonnie Dundee grinned at her reassuringly. Not for him to explain thatpractically all women and many men found themselves "gossiping" when heled them on adroitly, for reasons of his own. Which of course helpedmake him the excellent detective he was.

  "So all the men in your crowd have fallen for Nita Selim, have they?"

  "Practically all, in varying degrees, except Peter Dunlap, who has neverlooked at another woman since he was lucky enough to get Lois, and CliveHammond, who's engaged to Polly Beale," Penny answered reluctantly, hercolor high.

  "Including _your_ young man?"

  "I haven't a 'young man,' in the sense of being engaged," Pennyretorted, then added honestly: "I _have_ been letting RalphHammond--that's Clive's brother, you know--take me about a gooddeal.... Ralph and Clive have plenty of money," she defended herselfhastily. "They are archit
ects, Clive being the head of the firm andRalph, who hasn't been out of college so very long, a junior partner.It was the Hammond firm that drew up the plans for Dad's--I mean, myfather's--Primrose Meadows Addition houses. He had our house built as asort of show-place, you know, so that prospective builders out therecould see how artistic a home could be put up for a moderate sum ofmoney. But he didn't quite finish even that--left half the gabled topstory unfinished, and Nita has been teasing Hugo to finish it up forher. It looks," she added with a shrug, "as if Nita will get what shewants--as usual."

  "And Ralph has acquired a set of slave chains?" Dundee suggested, withjust the slightest note of sympathy.

  "_And how!_" Penny assured him, grimly. "A simile as out-of-date as myclothes are going to be if I don't get some new ones soon. Not that thecrowd minds what I wear," she added loyally. "I could dress up in awindow drape--"

  "And be just as charming as you are in that grand new party dress youhave on now," Dundee finished for her gallantly.

  "_New!_" Penny snorted and turned back to her desk in a futile effort tofind something left undone.

  Dundee ignored the rebuff. "How many suckers--I mean, how many gentlemenwith moderate incomes actually built in Primrose Meadows?"

  "You are inquisitive, aren't you?... None! Our house, or rather the oneNita Selim is living in now, is the only house on what used to be a bigfarm.... Why?"

  "I was just wondering," Dundee said softly, almost absent-mindedly,"why the 'lovely Nita' chose so isolated a place in which to live,when Hamilton has rather a large number of 'For Rent' signs out justnow.... By the way, know what time it is now?... Twenty to one! Get yourhat on, young woman. I'm going to drive you out to Breakaway Inn."

  "You're not! I'm going to take a bus. One runs from the Square rightpast the Inn," she told him firmly.

  And just as firmly Dundee escorted her out of the almost deserted,rather dirty old courthouse to where his brand-new sportsroadster--bought "on time"--was awaiting them in the parking spacedevoted to the motors of those who officially served Hamilton County.

  "I know why you want to drive me out to the Inn," Penny told himsuddenly, as the proud owner maneuvered his car through Saturday noontraffic. "You want to see Nita Selim. Clank! Clank! I can hear thepadlocks snapping on the slave chains right now."

  "Meow!" Dundee retorted, then grinned down at her with as much comradelyaffection as if they had been friends for years instead of for a coupleof hours. "Is Nita very small?" he added.

  "Little enough to tuck herself under the arm of a man a lot shorter thanyou," Penny assured him with curious vehemence. "And if Penelope Crainis no mean prophet, that's exactly what she'll do within five minutesafter she meets you--just as she is wistfully inviting you to join theother men for the cocktail party which is scheduled to break up thebridge game at 5:30. Then, of course, you'll be urged to join us all atthe dinner-dance at the Country Club tonight."

  "Will she?" Dundee pretended to be vastly intrigued, which caused theremainder of the drive to be a rather silent one, due to Penny'sunresponsiveness.

  Breakaway Inn was intensely Spanish in architecture and transplantedshrubbery, but its stucco walls were of a rather more violent raspberrycolor than is considered quite esthetic in Spain or Mexico.

  "There's Lois Dunlap's car just driving up," Penny cried, her facesoftening with the adoration she had freely professed for her friend.But it clouded again almost instantly. "And Nita Selim. I suppose Nitawas a little ashamed to drive up in her own Ford coupe."

  As Dundee helped his new friend to alight his eyes were upon the twowomen being assisted by a uniformed chauffeur from Lois Dunlap'slimousine.

  In a moment the four were a laughing, exclamatory group.

  "Oh, what a tall, grand man you've got yourself, Penny darling!" thetiny, beautiful creature who could only be Mrs. Selim cried out happily."_May_ I meet him?"

  "I shouldn't let you," Penny answered frankly, "but I will.... Mrs.Selim, Mr. Dundee.... And Mrs. Dunlap, Mr. Dundee.... How are you, Lois?And Peter and the brats?"

  "All well, Penny. Petey's off on a week-end fishing trip, and not one ofthe brats has measles, scarlet fever or hay fever, thank God," Dundeeheard Mrs. Dunlap say in the comfortable, affectionate voice that wentwith her comfortable, pleasant face and body.... Nice woman!

  But his eyes were of necessity upon Nita Selim, for that miniature Venuswas, as Penny had predicted, almost tucked under his arm by this time,her black-pansy eyes wide and wistful, her soft black curls fallingforward as she coaxed:

  "You'll come to the cocktail party at my house at 5:30, won't you, Mr.Dundee?"

  "Afraid I can't make it," Dundee smiled down at her. "I'm a busy man,Mrs. Selim.... You see, I'm Special Investigator attached to theDistrict Attorney's office," he explained very deliberately.

  "O-o-oh!" Nita Selim breathed. Than, step by step, she withdrew, so thathe was no longer submitted to the temptation to put his arm about hertoo intriguing little body. And as she retreated, Dundee's keen eyesnoted a hardening of the black-pansy eyes, the sudden throbbing of apulse in her very white neck....

  "No, don't mind about calling for me," Penny protested a moment later."Ralph has already volunteered.... Thanks awfully!"

  As Dundee backed out of the driveway his last glance was for a verysmall figure in a brown silk summer coat and palest yellow chiffonfrock, slowly rejoining Penelope Crain and Lois Dunlap. What the devilhad frightened her so? For she had been almost terrified.... Of courseshe might be one of those silly women who shudder at the sight of adetective, because they've smuggled in a diamond from Paris or a bottleof Bacardi from Havana....

  But long before his car made the distance back to the city Dundee hadshrugged off the riddle and was concentrating on all the facts he knewregarding the Maginty case. It was his first real assignment fromSanderson, and he was determined to make good.

  Four hours later he was interrupted in his careful reading of the trialof Rufus Maginty by the ringing of the telephone bell. That made fourtimes he had had to snap out the fact that District Attorney Sandersonwas playing some well-earned golf on the Country Club links, Dundeereflected angrily, as he picked up the receiver.

  But the call was for Dundee himself, and the voice on the other end ofthe wire was Penny Crain's, although almost unrecognizable.

  "Speak more slowly, Penny!" Dundee urged. "What's that again.... GoodLord! You say that Nita Selim...."

  After a minute of listening, and a promise of instant obedience, Dundeehung up the receiver.

  "My God!" he said slowly, blankly. "Of all things--_murder at bridge_!"