Greek Coffin Mystery (29 page)

The sole morsel of information which seemed to Ellery Queen to possess even a modicum of digestibility was this: that Gilbert Sloane had died instantly. But how this fact was to assist him Ellery confessed to himself, in the thickening fog, he could not see.

The fog, although he did not in this period of darkness realize it, was to be dispelled very shortly; and the fact of Gilbert Sloane’s instantaneous death was to become a brightly visible signpost indeed.

I
T BEGAN, INNOCENTLY ENOUGH
, on Tuesday, October the nineteenth, a little before noon.

How Mrs. Sloane had contrived to elude the keen eyes of her tormentors she did not explain, but the fact remained that, unescorted and unpursued, she appeared at Police Headquarters—dressed, to be sure, in unostentatious black and lightly veiled—asking in a timid voice if she might see Inspector Richard Queen on a matter of importance. Inspector Richard Queen, it appeared, would have preferred to isolate the lady on the isles of her sorrow, but being a gentleman and something of a fatalist in feminine matters, he resigned himself to the inevitable and consented to see her.

The Inspector was alone when she was brought in—a slight frail middle-aged woman with eyes burning fiercely even through their filmy covering. He handed her into a chair after murmuring a few words of practiced sympathy, and stood by his desk waiting—as if by standing he might subtly suggest to her that the life of a detective-inspector was a busy one indeed and she would be serving her city well to come directly to the point.

She did so, disconcertingly. Speaking in a voice tinged by the merest hysteria, she said: “My husband was not a murderer, Inspector.”

The Inspector sighed. “But the facts, Mrs. Sloane.”

She was prone to ignore, it seemed, those precious facts. “I’ve told reporters all week,” she cried, “that Gilbert was an innocent man. I want justice, do you hear, Inspector? The scandal will follow me—all of us—my son—to the grave!”

“But, my dear lady, your husband took justice into his own hands. Please remember that his suicide was practically a confession of guilt.”

“Suicide!” she said scornfully; she snatched at her veil with an impatient hand and her eyes blazed at him. “Are you all blind? Suicide!” Tears blurred her voice. “My poor Gilbert was murdered, and no one—no one …” She began to sob.

It was very distressing, and the Inspector stared out of his window uncomfortably. “That’s a statement which calls for proof, Mrs. Sloane. Have you any?”

She jumped out of the chair. “A woman doesn’t need proof,” she cried.
“Proof!
Of course I haven’t any. But what of it? I know—”

“My dear Mrs. Sloane,” said the Inspector dryly, “that’s where the law and womenfolk differ. I’m sorry, but if you can’t offer new evidence pointing directly to some one else as the murderer of Albert Grimshaw, my hands are tied. The case is closed on our records.”

She left without a word.

Now surely this short, unhappy, sterile incident was on the surface no matter of great moment. And yet it was to set in motion an entirely new and related series of events. The case would in all probability—Ellery has maintained this with conviction for many years—have remained a dead issue in the burdened police archives had not the Inspector, shrewdly gauging his son’s sour expression at the dinner table that evening, recounted the incident of Mrs. Sloane’s visit over the coffee-cups—in the pathetic paternal hope that news; any news, would sweeten that grim unhappy face.

To his astonishment—for it had been after all a forlorn hope—the ruse worked perfectly. Ellery became interested at once. The restless lines vanished, to be replaced by others characteristically thoughtful. “So she thinks Sloane was murdered, too,” he said with faint surprise. “Interesting.”

“Isn’t it?” The Inspector winked at skinny Djuna, who had grasped his mug in two thin hands and was staring with large black gypsy eyes over its rim at Ellery. “Interesting how women’s minds work. Won’t be convinced. Like you, by heaven.” He chuckled, but his eyes awaited a responsive twinkle.

It failed to appear. Ellery said quietly: “I think you’re taking this thing much too flippantly, dad. I’ve lolled about too long, sucking my thumbs and sulking like a child. I’m going to get busy.”

The Inspector was alarmed. “What are you going to do—rake up the old coals, El? Why don’t you let well enough alone?”

“The attitude of
laissez faire,”
remarked Ellery, “has operated much to the detriment of others than the French, and in other fields than physiocratic economics. Do I sound didactic? I’m afraid many a poor devil is buried in the unhallowed soil of a homicide’s grave who has no more right to be known to posterity as a murderer than you or I.”

“Talk sense, son,” said the old man uneasily. “You’re still convinced, against all reason, that Sloane was innocent?”

“Not precisely. I don’t say that in so many words.” Ellery tapped a cigaret against a fingernail. “I do say this: Many elements of this case which you, Sampson, Pepper, the Commissioner and God knows how many others consider irrelevant and unimportant remain unexplained. I mean to pursue them just so long as there is the feeblest hope of satisfying my admittedly vague convictions.”

“Anything clear in your mind?” asked the Inspector shrewdly. “Got any notions of who did do it, since you suspect Sloane didn’t?”

“I haven’t the shadow of an idea who might be behind these little excursions into crime.” Ellery expelled a gloomy lungful of smoke. “But one thing I’m as certain of as that all’s wrong with the world. And that is that Gilbert Sloane did
not
kill Albert Grimshaw—or himself.”

It was bravado, but bravado with stern intent. The next morning, after a fitful night, Ellery betook himself immediately after breakfast to East Fifty-fourth Street. The Khalkis house was shuttered—unguarded outwardly, but as lifeless as a tomb. He mounted the steps and rang the bell. The vestibule door did not open; instead he heard a grouchy, most unbutlerlike voice grunt: “Who is it?” It required patience and much conversation to induce the owner of the voice to unlatch the door. It did not open so much as it twitched aside a bit; and through the crack Ellery saw the pink cranium and harassed eyes of Weekes. After that, there was no difficulty; and Ellery did not even smile as Weekes pulled the door quickly open, thrust his rosy skull out in a hasty reconnaissance of Fifty-fourth Street, as hastily shut the door behind Ellery, and after latching it led the way to the drawing-room.

Mrs. Sloane, it appeared, was barricaded in her rooms upstairs. The name of Queen, Weekes coughingly reported a few moments later, had flushed the widow’s face, caused her eyes to flash, and brought bitter invective to her lips. Weekes was sorry, but Mrs. Sloane—cough!—could not, should not, or would not see Mr. Queen.

Mr. Queen, however, was not to be denied. He thanked Weekes gravely and instead of turning south in the corridor, in which direction lay exit, he turned north and made for the staircase leading to the upper floor. Weekes looked shocked and wrung his hands.

Ellery’s plan for gaining admittance was simplicity itself. He knocked on the Sloane door and when the widow’s harsh, “Who is it now?” grated in his ears, said: “Some one who doesn’t believe Gilbert Sloane was a murderer.” Her response was immediate. The door flew open and Mrs. Sloane stood there, breathing fast, searching the face of this Delphic oracle with hungry eyes. When she saw who her visitor was, however, the hunger changed into hate. “It’s a trick!” she said angrily. “I don’t want to see any of you fools!”

“Mrs. Sloane,” said Ellery gently, “you’re doing me grave injustice. It wasn’t a trick, and I believe what I said.”

The hatred drained away, and in its place appeared cold speculation. She was silent as she studied him. Then the coldness melted, she sighed, held the door wide, and said: “I’m sorry, Mr. Queen. I’m a—a little upset. Do come in.”

Ellery did not sit down. He placed his hat and stick on the desk—Sloane’s fateful humidor was still there—and said: “Let’s come to the point, Mrs. Sloane. Evidently you want to help. Certainly you possess the greatest animus for desiring to clear your husband’s name.”

“God, yes, Mr. Queen.”

“Very well, then. We’ll get nowhere with evasions. I am going to comb every crevice of this case, see what’s lurking in each dark unexplored cranny. I want your confidence, Mrs. Sloane.”

“You mean …”

“I mean,” said Ellery firmly, “I want you to tell me why you visited Albert Grimshaw at the Benedict several weeks ago.”

She hugged her thoughts to her breast then, and Ellery waited without too much hope. But when she looked up, he saw that he had won the first skirmish. “I’ll tell you everything,” she said simply. “And I pray to God it may help you … Mr. Queen, I was telling the truth in a way when I said that time that I didn’t go to the Benedict to see Albert Grimshaw.” Ellery nodded encouragingly. “I didn’t know
where
I was going. For you see,” she paused and stared at her floor, “I was following my husband all that evening …”

The story came out slowly. For many months before the death of her brother Georg, Mrs. Sloane had suspected that her husband was conducting a clandestine affair with Mrs. Vreeland, whose bold beauty and tempting proximity in the house, coupled with Jan Vreeland’s long absences and Sloane’s self-centered susceptibility, made the affair almost inevitable. Mrs. Sloane, nursing the worm of jealousy in her breast, could find nothing material with which to feed it. Unable to verify her suspicions she had kept silent, deliberately pretending to be ignorant of what she sensed was going on. But always she kept her eyes open for signs and her ears alert for sounds of possible assignations.

For weeks Sloane had made it a habit to return to the Khalkis house at late hours. He gave varying excuses—a rigorous diet for the worm. Unable to endure the gnawing agony, Mrs. Sloane had succumbed to her canker for verification. On Thursday evening, the thirtieth of September, she had followed her husband; he had offered an obviously mythical “conference” as a pretext for leaving the Khalkis house some time after dinner.

Sloane’s movements had been apparently aimless; certainly there was no conference; and of contacts that entire evening there were none until ten o’clock. Then he had turned off Broadway and made for the shabby exterior of the Hotel Benedict. She had pursued him into the lobby, the worm whispering that here was to be enacted the Gethsemane of her marital life; that Sloane, acting in a strange and furtive manner, was about to meet Mrs. Vreeland in some dingy room at the Hotel Benedict for purposes to which Mrs. Sloane shut her mind with horror. She had seen him go to the desk and speak to the clerk; whereupon, in the same peculiar manner, he went on to the elevator. She had managed to overhear, while Sloane was conversing with the clerk, the words: “Room 314.” Consequently, she approached the desk, certain that Room 314 was to be the scene of the assignation, and demanded the room adjoining. This action was born of impulse; nothing tangible was in her mind, except perhaps some wild notion of eavesdropping on the guilty pair and bursting in upon them when they were locked in each other’s lustful arms.

The woman’s eyes were burning with the recollection of those heated moments, and Ellery gently fed her regurgitated passions. What had she done? Her face flamed; she had gone directly to the room she had rented and paid for, Room 316, had pressed her ear to the wall … But she could hear nothing: the masonry of the Hotel Benedict, if nothing else, was aristocratic. Baffled, trembling, she had leaned against the silent wall, almost weeping; when suddenly she heard the door of the next room open. She had flown to her own door and opened it cautiously. Just in time to see the object of her suspicions, her husband, leave Room 314 and stride down the corridor toward the elevator. … She did not know what to make of it. She left the room stealthily and ran down the three flights of emergency stairs to the lobby. She caught sight of Sloane hurrying out. She followed him; to her astonishment he headed for the Khalkis house. When she arrived there herself, she discovered by an adroit question directed at Mrs. Simms that Mrs. Vreeland had been home all evening. For the night, at least, then she knew that Sloane had been innocent of adultery. No, she did not remember what time it was when Sloane emerged from Room 314. She did not remember
any
times.

That, it seemed, was all.

She challenged him anxiously with her eyes, as if to ask whether this recital had furnished a clew, any clew. …

Ellery was thoughtful. “While you were in Room 316, Mrs. Sloane, did you hear any one else enter Room 314?”

“No. I saw Gilbert enter, then leave, and I followed him away at once. I’m sure that if any one had opened or closed that door while I was in the next room I should have heard.”

“I see. That’s helpful, Mrs. Sloane. And since you’ve been so completely candid, tell me one thing more: did you telephone your husband from this house last Monday evening, the night of his death?”

“I did not, as I told Sergeant Velie when he questioned me that same night. I know I’m suspected of having warned my husband, but I didn’t, Mr. Queen, I didn’t—I hadn’t any idea that the police intended to arrest him.”

Ellery studied her face; she seemed sincere enough. “You will recall that that evening, as my father, Mr. Pepper and I left the study downstairs, we saw you hurrying down the corridor to the drawing-room. Please pardon this question, Mrs. Sloane, but I must know—did you listen at the study door before we came out?”

She flushed darkly. “I may be—oh, vile in many other respects, Mr. Queen, and perhaps my conduct in connection with my husband doesn’t bear this out … but I swear I didn’t eavesdrop.”

“Can you suggest some one who might have eavesdropped?”

Spite crept into her voice. “Yes, I can! Mrs. Vreeland. She—she was close enough to Gilbert, close enough …”

“But that doesn’t follow from her action in relating to us that evening the story of having seen Mr. Sloane go into the graveyard,” said Ellery gently. “She seems to have been more inclined to malice than, to defense of a lover.”