The Burning Court (15 page)

He stood holding to the banisters, feeling suddenly tongue-tied and averse to answering. If it were Marie, he did not know what to say to her, despite the speeches he had rehearsed throughout the night. The downstairs lights were still on; the living-room was full of stale smoke. He had not gone to bed that night, for the reason that he could not sleep. His head ached a little, and his wits were none of the best: to thrash endlessly through the same thoughts all night is not a good preparation for a meeting, since you never say what you have so carefully planned to say. Even the hallway looked unfamiliar. Dawn had come up strangled in a cold white mist which pressed with a dead stare against the windows. The only heartening thing was a faint hiss and bubble from the dining-room, where he had connected the coffee-percolator.

He went downstairs, into the dining-room, and carefully disconnected the plug of the percolator. That early morning aroma of coffee was good. Then he answered the door.

“I beg your pardon,” said an unfamiliar voice, and his heart sank again. “I wondered——”

He was looking down at a sturdy woman in a long blue coat. Though her manner was hesitant, a smoldering anger underlay it. She seemed vaguely familiar. Her face, under a small blue hat pulled down in waves as though by violence, was not good-looking; but it was attractive and intelligent. Sandy eyelashes hardly flickered over her alert brown eyes. She looked (as she was) direct, brisk, and capable.

“I don’t know whether you remember me, Mr. Stevens,” she went on, “but I’ve seen you at the Despards’ several times. I noticed that your lights were on, and so—I’m Myra Corbett. I nursed Mr. Miles Despard.”

“Oh, Lord, yes; certainly! Come in.”

“You see,” she said, giving another twitch to her hat and glancing in the direction of the Park, “something seems to have gone wrong. Last night some one sent me a message to come here immediately——”

Again she hesitated. Another of those damned telegrams, Stevens knew.

“—but I was out on a case and I didn’t get it until an hour or so ago, when I got home. Then, for various reasons”—the anger deepened—“I thought I ought to come as soon as possible. But when I went up there I couldn’t make anybody hear. I hammered and hammered on the door, but nobody answered it. I can’t imagine what’s wrong. So, when I saw your light, I wondered if you would mind my sitting down and waiting a little while.”

“Not in the least. Please come in.”

He stood back, glancing down the road. In the gauzy white mist a car was chugging up the hill, its lights full on. The car swerved, rather erratically, slowed down, and then drew up at the curb.

“Heigh-ho, heigh-ho!” bellowed a voice. It was Ogden Despard, beyond a doubt.

A car door slammed and Ogden’s rather tall figure moved up the walk out of the mist. He wore a light camel’s hair topcoat, under which showed the legs of dress-trousers. Ogden was one of the throwbacks which occur in most families: he resembled nobody in it. He was dark, sleek, and somewhat hollow-cheeked, with a blue chin. Though he needed a shave this morning, his black hair was carefully brushed and shining like a helmet; the face, with lines drawn slantwise under the eyes, was so sallow that you could see every pore. His heavy-lidded dark eyes moved from the nurse to Stevens in amusement. Though he was only twenty-five (and often acted younger) he looked older than Mark.

“Good morning,” he said, shoving his hands into his pockets. “The reveller returns. Hello! what’s this? An assignation?”

Ogden usually made remarks like this. He was not exactly unpleasant; but it is true that you seldom felt comfortable with him. Stevens, who was in no mood to meet him this morning, led Miss Corbett into the hall, and Ogden sauntered after them, closing the door.

“The place is in a mess, I’m afraid,” Stevens said to the nurse. “I’ve been working most of the night. But I’ve got some coffee boiling. Would you like a cup?”

“I would, very much,” answered Miss Corbett, and suddenly shivered.

“Coffee!” said Ogden, with a contemptuous “puh!” “That’s no way to greet a man on the morning after a party. But if you’ve got such a thing as a drink on the premises——?”

“There’s whisky back in my den,” said Stevens. “Help yourself.”

He saw the nurse and Ogden eyeing each other curiously; but neither spoke, and a curious air of tension had begun to grow. With a stolid face Miss Corbett went into the living-room. Stevens got the percolator from the dining-room, went out into the kitchen, and began rummaging after caps. In the midst of it Ogden pushed through the swing door, carrying several fingers of whisky in a glass; he was humming to himself, but keeping a wary eye out. While he opened the door of the refrigerator in search of ginger ale, he spoke conversationally.

“So our Myra,” he observed, “also got a telegram from the police department, requesting her presence here. The same as I did.”

Stevens said nothing.

“I got mine last night,” Ogden pursued, “but I was on a good round of parties, and I really couldn’t let it interrupt my drinking. Still, I’m glad the cops have got on the trail. It’ll establish what everybody knows.” He took out the tray of ice-cubes, batted it in the edge of the sink, and dropped one cube into the glass as carefully as though he were sighting a plumb-line. “By the way, I see you spent the night helping Mark open the crypt.”

“What makes you think that?”

“I’m not dumb.”

“No. Not in any sense.”

Ogden put down the glass. His sallow face looked somehow crooked and out of line. “What do you mean,” he said quietly, “by that crack?”

“Look here,” said Stevens, turning round. “In my present mood I would take great pleasure in pasting you straight through that china-closet. Or anybody else who gave me the excuse. But, for the sake of keeping both our heads, try not to start a row at seven-thirty in the morning. Hand me the cream out of the refrigerator, will you?”

Ogden laughed. “Sorry. But I don’t see why
you
should be on edge.—It’s my detective instincts. There are a couple of Mark’s self-rolled cigarettes in your den, where I got the whisky. There’s also a little drawing of the paving over the crypt, evidently done by Mark. Oh yes; I notice everything. It helps. I knew Mark was considering doing something like that; it was why he wanted us all away from the house last night.” His long face grew sharp and malicious. “What did the police say when they got there and found you boys having so much fun taking up the pavement?”

“The police didn’t arrive.”

“What?”

“What’s more, it seems pretty evident that those telegrams didn’t come from the police.”

Ogden, chewing at his lower lip, glanced at him sharply. Something shifted and altered in Ogden’s look. “Yes, I’d thought of that, too. But—but— Look, Stevens. You might as well tell me, because I’ll only find it out when I go up to the house. There were three people back in that room of yours. I saw three glasses. Who was the third?”

“A Doctor Partington.”

“Whe-ew!” said Ogden. His look grew thoughtful, with a far-off pleasure in it. “There’s something big coming. The unfrocked one, of course. I thought he was safely in England. If he ever finds out— But I might have known it. I see it all now, said he, said he.” (This was another irritating mannerism of speech peculiar to Ogden.) “Of course. Mark wanted him to do the whatisit, poke into the innards, and so on. Come on: you might as well tell me. What did you find?”

“Nothing.”

“Eh——?”

“I mean we found literally nothing. The body wasn’t in the crypt at all.”

Ogden drew his head back, and on his face there was a look of such pale scepticism that it was like a light. Stevens had never disliked his face so much as at that moment. After peering for a moment, Ogden slid his hand into the refrigerator, gravely drew out a small dish of applesauce, and pushed it across the drain-board towards the other.

“What you mean,” he said, “is that you staunch friends and allies, rallying round the flag, found that poor old Uncle Miles was full of poison. And you hid the body somewhere so that nobody should learn about it. I know Mark’s opinion about the police. Do you mind
my
opinion?”

“No. I’m just telling you what happened, that’s all.—Mind holding that door open while I carry these cups in?”

Ogden, evidently startled but now very thoughtful, absent-mindedly complied. Stevens could see that his nimble brain was searching into corners, looking after loopholes; and he fixed on his host a gaze of disconcerting quality.

He said: “By the way, where’s Marie?”

“She’s—still in bed.”

“Odd,” remarked the other. Stevens was aware that there was probably nothing behind this; that Ogden merely said it on his usual principle of trying to make some one uncomfortable, even out of a casual word; but, nevertheless, it tightened the strain. Carrying the two cups, Stevens went on ahead to the living room. Ogden, who had apparently come to a decision, strode past him and saluted Miss Corbett with his glass.

“I had intended, my dear, to speak to you before,” he began. “But the fact is I needed liquid sustenance first.
À votre santé.”

Stevens thought: If he keeps on using these
clichés,
I think I’ll empty this cup over his head. Miss Corbett, who was sitting with her hands folded calmly in her lap, eyed Ogden, and was not impressed.

“About this matter of the telegrams,” Ogden continued; “what does yours say?”

“What makes you think I got a telegram?” inquired the nurse.

“Must I explain it to everybody? All right; here goes again. Because I got one myself. As I told our friend here, I got it last night. But I was barging from house to house in a round of parties, and so——”

“If you were barging from house to house in a round of parties,” said Miss Corbett, practically, “how was the telegram delivered to you?”

Ogden’s eyes narrowed. He seemed about to say something in a manner of heavy and coy sarcasm, intended either to be crushing or to rouse the other person’s indiscreet ire. But he had the shrewdness to see that this would be wasted.

“Like to pin me down?” he enquired. “As it happens, I dropped in at the Caliban Club, and it was waiting for me there. No, seriously: why not be frank with me? You’d better, you know, for I’ll find it out when I go up to the house. And you can speak frankly in front of Ted Stevens; he knows all about it. Besides, in a way, it’s probably a very good thing you were called here. Your evidence may be important to the police. You can’t tell.”

“Thank you,” said the nurse, gravely. “My evidence about what?”

“About Uncle Miles being poisoned, of course.”

“You have absolutely no reason to say that!” she cried, and coffee spilled over the edge of her cup. “If you have anything to say, say it to Doctor Baker. There was no reason whatever to think—” She stopped. “I’ll admit I was worried afterwards; not on account of any suspicion like that, but because I was out on the night it happened, and I’d——”

“And,” interposed Ogden, pouncing instantly, “you had carefully locked up your own room; and, if he
did
happen to have a seizure, nobody could get in to get any remedies. So possibly, in one way, you killed your own patient. If that isn’t culpable negligence, I don’t know what is. It won’t be altogether good for your reputation when the story comes out.”

This was what was worrying her, they all knew, and Ogden deftly led her on.

“Oh, I’ll admit you had reason,” he conceded. “Uncle Miles was supposed to be practically well again. And, since somebody had just stolen a deadly poison out of your room—well, maybe you were right to try to prevent it happening again. But didn’t it make you suspicious at all? I know Baker’s an old fogey, and just about at his dotage; but didn’t it make even him suspicious? A poison is stolen from you on Saturday. On the following Wednesday night, Uncle Miles dies. Very funny, if you ask me.”

Ogden was enjoying himself so much that his purpose, which was trouble-making rather than detection, suddenly became apparent; the nurse realized it, and her face became stolid again.

“You seem to know a lot more than anybody else,” she told him, wearily. “So you ought to know this.
If
anything was taken, in the first place it couldn’t possibly have caused anybody’s death; and, in the second place, it couldn’t possibly have caused any of the symptoms Mr. Despard had.”

“Ah, I thought not. So it wasn’t arsenic. What was it?”

She did not reply.

“Besides, you must have some idea who took it——”

Very carefully Miss Corbett put down her empty cup on the table. Stevens, who felt himself that morning abnormally sensitive to atmosphere, knew that a new element had come into the questioning. He felt that for some reason the nurse was looking round the room; looking towards the stairs; waiting or listening; and that she wished very strongly to talk if only Ogden’s presence were removed.

“I haven’t any idea,” she answered, calmly.

Ogden was persuasive. “Come now. You’d better tell me, you know. It’ll make things easier for your conscience, and I’ll only find out——”

“Haven’t you used that dodge often enough?” asked Stevens, curtly. “For God’s sake try to act like a human being. You’re not the police. Actually, you don’t give a curse what happened to your uncle——”

The other turned round, alert and smiling. “Now I wonder what
you
have to hide?” he asked. “I’m certain there’s something. You haven’t been your old bright jolly self all morning. It may be that bunk you told me about Uncle Miles’s body having disappeared. Or it may not. I reserve judgement.” He glanced away again as the nurse got to her feet. “Not going? Yes? Let me give you a lift up to the house.”

“No, thank you.”

The air of tension had grown. Ogden remained watching them, like a fencer keeping two opponents in play; his neck was hunched down into the upturned collar of his camel’s hair coat, and on his long face there was the same sceptical smile. He remarked that his company did not seem welcome. He thanked Stevens for the whisky, observing judicially that, all things considered, it was not bad; and he left them. Not until the front door had closed did the nurse follow Stevens out into the hall. Then she put her hand on his arm and spoke rapidly.