The Curved Blades Page 9

  IX FURTHER TESTIMONY

  Count Henri Charlier was being questioned, and he was distinctly ill atease. His French _savoir faire_ was not proof against definite inquiriesas to his intentions regarding the late Miss Carrington, and indefiniteallusions concerning his movements on the night of her death.

  He had related, straightforwardly enough, his visit at Garden Steps thatevening and his departure at or about midnight. He denied his engagementof marriage, but admitted that he had paid Miss Carrington suchattentions as might lead her to suspect an attachment.

  "You did not return to this house after leaving on Tuesday night?"

  "Most assuredly not."

  "You were not in Miss Carrington's boudoir at one o'clock orthereabouts?"

  Count Charlier's black eyes snapped. But by a successful effort hecontrolled his indignation, and said, simply, "I was not."

  "But she was heard to address you."

  "Impossible, as I was not there."

  "She distinctly declared that you were the mark she aimed at. Whatconstruction do you put upon those words?"

  "It is not for me to boast of my attraction for a lady."

  Count Charlier simpered a little, and Gray Haviland looked at him with afrown of undisguised scorn. Haviland had never liked the Count, indeed,he even doubted his right to the title, and especially had he feared amarriage between him and Miss Lucy. And, granting that this feeling waspartly due to a consideration of his own interests, Haviland alsodistrusted the Frenchman and doubted Miss Lucy's happiness as his wife.

  "Did Miss Carrington leave you a bequest of ten thousand dollars inUnited States bonds?" went on the Coroner.

  "I--I don't know," and the Count stammered in an embarrassed way.

  "You do know!" shouted Haviland; "the will has been read, and you knowperfectly well that such a bequest was left to you."

  "Why did you deny the knowledge?" asked Scofield, sternly.

  "I'm--I'm not sure----"

  "You are sure!" stormed Gray. "Now where were you when Miss Carringtonspoke those words to you? If not in her boudoir, then on the balconyoutside the window, perhaps."

  "Absurd," said the Coroner.

  "Not at all," said Gray; "that window opens on a balcony enclosed byglass. It is easily reached from outside by a small staircase, mostlyused in summer, but always available. How could Miss Carrington speak tothe Count concerning the bonds and concerning her infatuation forhimself, which is no secret, unless he were there before her? And howcould he be in the room--in her boudoir--unknown to the servants?Moreover, Mr. Coroner, I believe the glove found in Miss Carrington'shand to be the property of Count Charlier."

  "But no!" cried the witness, excitedly; "I have repeatedly disclaimedthat glove. It is not mine, I know not whose it is. I know nothing ofthis sad affair, whatever. If the money is left to me, as I have beentold, it is a--a surprise to me."

  "Surprise nothing!" murmured Haviland, but he said no more to the Count.

  "If my story might be told now,--" ventured Mrs. Frothingham.

  After a moment's hesitation, Coroner Scofield decided to let her tell it,as having a possible bearing on Count Charlier's testimony.

  The rather stunning-looking widow was fashionably dressed, and shefluttered with an air of importance as she took the stand. She relatedagain the story she had told of the supposed burglar, whom she sawleaving the living-room by way of a window, at four o'clock on Wednesdaymorning.

  "How can you be so sure it was a burglar?" asked Scofield.

  "Oh, he looked like one. All huddled up, you know, and his face buriedbetween a high coat collar and a drawn-down cap. And he walkedslyly,--sort of glided among the shrubs and trees, as if avoiding notice.No man on legitimate business would skulk like that."

  "Might it not have been Count Charlier?" asked the Coroner, bluntly.

  "Certainly not!" and Mrs. Frothingham gave a little shriek. "The Count isa slim and elegant figure; this was a stocky, burly man; a marauder, Iknow."

  "It may be," said the Coroner, wearily. "It may be that a burglar wasconcealed in the house, or let in by a servant, and that he attacked MissCarrington as she was seated at her dressing table. It seems impossiblethat he should have administered poison to her, however, and theconjoined circumstances may indicate collusion between----"

  "Between whom?" asked Inspector Brunt.

  "I don't know," confessed Scofield. "Every way I try to think it out, Iran up against an impassable barrier."

  "That's what I say," began Haviland; "it is a most involved case. I shallcable Carrington Loria for authority to employ an expert detective."

  "Why cable him?" asked Pauline; "I am equally in authority now. Carr andmyself each receive half the residuary estate of Aunt Lucy, and, ofcourse, I am as anxious to find the--the murderer, as Carr can possiblybe."

  "Well, somebody will have to authorize it who is willing to pay for it.As man of business in this home, I am willing to attend to all suchmatters, but I must have authority."

  "You seem to me a little premature, Mr. Haviland," commented theInspector. "Perhaps when the inquest is concluded, it may not benecessary to call on any other detective than our own Mr. Hardy."

  "Perhaps not," agreed Haviland; "but unless you people all wake up,you're not going to get anywhere. I admit the getting is difficult, butthat's just the reason a wise sleuth should be called in before thetrails grow cold."

  And then the Coroner returned to his task of questioning Mrs.Frothingham.

  The widow was not definitely helpful. Her statements were oftencontradictory in minor details, and when she corrected them they seemedto lose in weight. She stuck to the main points, however, that by thehelp of a strong field-glass she had discerned, in the bright moonlight,a man leave by way of the French window, at four o'clock, and had seenhim make his way stealthily out by the great entrance gates of the place.

  Cross-questioning on this brought no variations, and the jurymen waggedtheir heads in belief of her story.

  But her accounts of her own doings on Tuesday evening were vague andindefinite.

  "I was in my own home all the evening," she said at one time; and again,"I went out for a short walk at eleven o'clock." This last in refutationof Haskins, the Carrington butler, who deposed to having seen the ladywalk across the lawns of Garden Steps.

  "Where did you walk?"

  "Oh, just around my own place; and for a moment I strolled over herebecause the Steps looked so beautiful in the moonlight."

  "You were alone?"

  "I was. I have no house guests at present, save the Count; and as mybrother, who lives with me, is on a Western trip, I was alone, and Iwalked about to kill time until Count Charlier should return after hisbridge game over here."

  "Did you walk near the house, while on the Garden Steps' estate?" askedScofield, scenting a possible espionage of her titled visitor.

  "Oh, no!" and the witness bristled with indignation; "why should I! I wasnot really an acquaintance of Miss Carrington, merely a neighbor."

  "Beg pardon, ma'am, but I saw you on the conservatory verandah," saidHaskins, in a deprecatory way.

  "That is not true, Mr. Coroner," said the lady, glancing scornfully atthe butler. "I beg you will not accept a servant's statement inpreference to mine!"

  "You are sure of this, Haskins?" said the Inspector gravely.

  "Yes, sir. Sure, sir." and the man looked doggedly certain, though alittle scared.

  "And you deny it?" went on Scofield to Mrs. Frothingham.

  "I most certainly do! How absurd for me to be over here, and how morethan absurd for me to deny it if I were!"

  This seemed sensible. Why should she deny it? And mightn't the butler bemistaken? Or deliberately falsifying?

  If there were collusion or criminal assistance by any of the servants,surely the word of all of them must be mistrusted unless proven.

  And, too, what could have brought Mrs. Frothingham to the verandah of ahom
e where she was not an accepted guest? Or, could she have been spyingon the Count?

  For it had slowly entered the Coroner's not very alert mind that perhapsthe volatile widow had her own plans for the Count's future, and MissCarrington did not figure in them. The manner of the witness bore outthis theory. She was self-conscious and at times confused. She frequentlylooked at the Count and then quickly averted her gaze. She blushed andstammered when speaking his name or referring to him. In a word, sheacted as a woman might act in regard to a man of whom she was jealous.And the situation bore it out. If Mrs. Frothingham had matrimonialdesigns on her distinguished guest, would she not naturally resent hisvisits to a rich neighbor? Mrs. Frothingham was not rich, and she maywell have been afraid of Miss Carrington's charm of gold, which couldcause many a man to overlook anything else that might be lacking.

  Coroner Scofield was getting more and more tangled in the mazes of thisextraordinary case. He was practically at his wits' end. At last heblurted out: "It is impossible, it seems, to get a coherent, or evenplausible story from a woman! Is there any man present, who knows any ofthe details of the happenings of Tuesday evening and night?"

  There was a moment's silence at this rather petulant speech, and thenStephen Illsley rose, and speaking very gravely, said:

  "It seems to be my unpleasant duty to tell what little I know of thesematters."

  The relieved Coroner heard this with satisfaction. Accepting his goodfortune, he prepared to listen to Illsley's testimony.

  "I was spending the evening here," the witness began, "and during myvisit I was in the various rooms. At a late hour, perhaps something aftereleven,--I was crossing the hall, and I saw Mrs. Frothingham on thestairway."

  "On the stairway!" exclaimed the Coroner, in amazement.

  "Yes," returned Illsley, his grave eyes resting on the face of the widow,who stared at him as if stricken dumb. "Yes, I saw her distinctly. Shewas evidently coming downstairs, one hand rested on the banister, and shewas looking upward at the ceiling."

  "Did she see you?"

  "I think not. If so, she made no sign. But she was not looking my way,and I went on into the reception room, where I was going in search of ascarf Miss Stuart had left there. When I recrossed the hall, the lady haddisappeared."

  "Did not this seem to you a strange circumstance?"

  "I had no right to any opinion on the subject. It was not my affair whatguests were at the house I was visiting, or what they might be doing."

  "But Mrs. Frothingham asserts she was not an acquaintance of MissCarrington."

  "I did not know that, then; and even so, it gave me no right to speculateconcerning the lady's presence there. Nor should I refer to it now,except that in view of the subsequent tragedy it is due to everyprinciple of right and justice that all truths be known as to thatevening. Mrs. Frothingham will, of course, recall the episode and candoubtless explain it."

  "I should like to hear the explanation!" said Pauline, with flashingeyes. "As mistress here now, I am interested to know why a strangershould wander about this house at will."

  Mrs. Frothingham sat silent. Her face showed not so much consternation ordismay as a cold, calculating expression, as if debating just whatexplanation she should offer.

  At last she spoke. "I may as well own up," she said, and laughednervously. "I _was_ on the verandah, as the vigilant butler noticed. Idid step inside the hall, as I had so often heard of the rare tapestriesand paintings, and, in my _ennui_, I thought it no harm to take a peep.The great door was ajar, and I was a little chilled by my walk across thelawns. I said to myself, if I meet any one I will merely beg a fewmoments' grace and then run away. Yes, I did take a step or two up thestair, to look at a picture on the landing. It was all innocent enough,perhaps not in the best of taste, but I was lonely, and the light andwarmth lured me. In a moment I had slipped out and run away home,laughing over my escapade like a foolish child."

  Her light laugh rippled out as she concluded her story. She lookedingenuous and truthful, but the Coroner distrusted feminine fairy-tales,and this was a little too fanciful to be true.

  Moreover, Mrs. Frothingham was looking at him sharply from the corner ofher eye. Clearly, she was watching him to see how he took it.

  He didn't take it very well. The acknowledged presence of an outsider inthe house, for a not very plausible reason, was illuminating in hisestimation. She had been on the stairway. Had she been to MissCarrington's room? True, she said she went only to the landing,--butpshaw, women had no regard for the truth! Had she and Count Charlierplanned between them to--bah, _why_ did this woman want to kill herneighbor? Even if she were jealous of the Count's attention, would she goso far as crime? No, of course not! He must question her further. Andyet, what good would that do, if she would not tell the truth?

  Well, she was in the house at half-past eleven, that much was certain,for Stephen Illsley's story and her own and also the butler's testimonyall coincided as to that.

  And then, Detective Hardy, who had just returned from a short errand,made a startling statement. He declared that the glove which had beenfound clasped tightly in the dead fingers of the late Miss Carrington didbelong to Count Henri Charlier.

  Mr. Hardy had been searching the Count's wardrobe, and though he did notfind the mate to that particular glove, he found many others, some wornand some entirely unused, but all of the same size and made by the samefirm as the one now in the Coroner's possession!

  Thus cornered Count Charlier reluctantly admitted that it was his glove.

  "I denied it," he thus excused himself, "because I have no idea how itcame into Miss Carrington's possession, and I did not wish to implicateher in an affair with my unworthy self."

  "H'm," thought Gray Haviland, fixing his attention on the Count and onthe flustered Mrs. Frothingham; "a precious pair of adventurers! I expectScofield is right, we won't need an expert detective."

  There was more of the inquest. But its continuance brought out nodevelopments not already here transcribed. There was muchcross-questioning and probing; there was much rather futile effort tomake all the strange details fit any one theory; there was variance ofopinion; and there was more or less dissension.

  But as a final result, the Coroner's jury brought in a verdict that MissLucy Carrington met her death by poison administered by a person orpersons unknown, who thereafter, probably for the purpose of divertingattention from the poison, struck her a blow on the head. The jury intheir deliberation felt that Count Henri Charlier was implicated. But nothaving sufficient evidence to make a charge, suggested to the detectiveforce that he be kept under surveillance.