There Was an Old Woman (17 page)

“It's loaded, too, Inspector!” said Sheila. “Ellery, your father's right.”

“Of course it's loaded,” said Charley frowning. “He went to an awful lot of trouble to show 'em it's loaded.”

“You wouldn't have a chance, Ellery,” said the Inspector. “You've set a trap, all right—they all think you know who did it and here's a loaded gun within easy reach—you've set a trap, but if you think I'm going to let you use yourself as live bait—”

“I've taken a few precautions,” said Ellery lightly. “Come over here, the three of you.”

The Inspector followed Ellery into the heavier shadows, away from the windows. “What precautions?”

Charley and Sheila backed off from the windows, joining them. “You'd better
get
out of here, Sheila—”

“Just a minute, Charley,” snapped the Inspector.
“What
precautions, Ellery?”

Ellery grinned. “Velie's posted outside on the terrace behind one of those Moorish pillars. He'll nab whoever comes in before—”

“Velie?” The Inspector stared. “
I
just came in from the terrace and Velie didn't see or hear
me.
It's dark as a coal passer's glove out there—he couldn't have known it was me—so why didn't he nab me before I stepped through the French door?”

Ellery stared back at his father. “Something's gone wrong,” he muttered. “Velie's in trouble. Come on!” He took two strides toward the open French door behind the occasional table, the others following. But then he stopped. On the very edge of the circle of lamplight.

A slender thing had darted in from the black terrace, a snake. But it was not a snake; it was a human arm. Even this was the impression of an instant, for it all occurred so quickly that they could only halt, Ellery included, and glare, powerless to move, unable to comprehend its nature or its purpose.

The hand was gloved, a gloved blur. It snatched the .25 automatic from the bird's nest on the table, brought it to a level in an amazingly fluid extension of its original movement, and for the fragment of a second poised the snub nose of the weapon on a direct line with Ellery's heart.

In that instant several things happened. Sheila screamed, clutching Charley. Ellery's hand came up from his side, defensively. With a snarl the Inspector dived head-first at Ellery's legs.

But one thing happened before any of the other three got fairly started . . . The gloved finger squeezed the trigger of the Colt and smoke and flame enveloped it. Ellery toppled to the floor.

25 . . . The Light That Succeeded

The arm, the hand, the weapon disappeared. Only the smoke remained, hovering over the table, a little cloud. It began to drift lazily toward the lamp.

Inspector Queen, on the floor, rolled over swiftly and grasped Ellery by his jacket lapels. “Ellery. Son.”

He shook Ellery.

Sheila whispered: “Is he . . . ? Charley!” She hid her face in Paxton's coat.

“Inspector—” Charley paid no attention. “Ellery,” he said, and tugged.

Ellery groaned, opening his eyes.

“Ellery!” The Inspector's voice lifted with incredulity. “Are you all right, son?”

“All right?” Ellery struggled to sit up. He shook his head. “What hit me? I remember an arm—a shot—”

“The Inspector dived for your legs,” said Sheila, dropping to her knees beside him. “Don't move now—lie back! Charley, take a look. Help me get his jacket off—”

“Sit still now, you blinking hero,” growled Charley. “Setting traps!”

“Please,” said the Inspector. They sat back on their haunches. Ellery was still shaking his head. “Where does it hurt, son? I don't see any blood—”

“Doesn't hurt anywhere,” said Ellery testily.

“Out of his head,” Sheila whispered. “Do you think … possibly … internal injuries?”

“Let's get him over to that easy-chair,” said Charley in a low voice.

The Inspector nodded, bent over again. “Now look, son. Don't you try to do a thing. We're going to pick you up and carry you over to that chair. It can't be your back, because you sat up by yourself, so I think it's safe enough to try—”

“Sheila,” whispered Charley, “call a doctor.”

Ellery looked around suddenly, as if for the first time conscious of what was going on about him. “What is this?” he snarled. “Why are you fussing over me? Get after that murdering maniac!” And he sprang to his feet.

The Inspector shrank from him, open-mouthed. “You're not
wounded?”

“Of course I'm not wounded, Dad.”

“But—that shot, son! Fired at a range of five feet!”

“A child couldn't have missed you,” cried Sheila.

“He
must
have hit you, Ellery,” said Charley. “Maybe it was just a flesh wound, a scratch somewhere, but—”

Ellery lit a cigaret with slightly shaking fingers. “Do I have to do a strip-tease to convince you?” He ripped open his shirt front. Something metallic shone in the lamplight.

“A bullet-proof vest!” gasped the Inspector.

“Told you I'd taken precautions, Dad. I didn't depend merely on Velie. This is that steel-mesh vest the Commissioner of Scotland Yard presented to you last year.” He grinned. “What the well-dressed dilettante of detection will wear.” Ellery clapped his father on the shoulder and helped the old gentleman to his feet.

The Inspector shook off Ellery's hand, becoming gruff. “Sissy,” he growled. “Letting me knock the wind out of you. You'd never make a cop.”

“And talking about cops,” said Charley, “what happened to Sergeant Velie?”

“Velie!” exclaimed Ellery. “Knocked my brains out, too, Dad. Gangway!”

“Be careful, Ellery! Whoever that was took the gun with him!”

“Oh,
that
character's made his exit from the script long ago,” snapped Ellery; and he dived through the nearest French door. “Sheila, turn the lights on out here, will you?” he called back.

Sheila ran for the foyer. A moment later the terrace was flooded with light.

“No sign of whoever it was,” panted Charley Paxton.

“Here's the gun,” cried the Inspector. “Dropped it on the terrace just outside the study. Velie! Where are you, damn your idiot's hide?”

“Velie!” shouted Ellery.

Detective Flint stamped out of the house by way of the foyer, his big hand on Sheila's arm. “I caught this gal in the foyer, Inspector. Monkeying with the light switch.”

“Start looking for the Sergeant, you dumb ox,” snarled the Inspector. “Ellery sent Miss Brent!”

“Yes, sir,” said Flint startled, and at once he began to search among the empty chairs of the terrace, as if he expected Sergeant Velie to materialize in one of them.

“Here he is.” Ellery's voice was faint. They found him at the far end of the terrace. He was kneeling by the Sergeant's still, supine figure, slapping the big man's cheeks without mercy. As they ran up, Velie gurgled deep in his throat and blinked his eyes open.

“Glug,” said Sergeant Velie.

“He's still dizzy,” Inspector Queen bent over him. “Velie!”

“Huh?” The Sergeant turned glassy eyes on his superior.

“Are you all right, Sergeant?” asked Ellery Queen anxiously. “What happened?”

“Oh,” Velie groaned and sat up, feeling his head.

“What happened, Velie?” roared the Inspector.

“Take it easy, will ya? Here I am hidin' behind one of these pillars,” rumbled Velie, “and—ouch! The roof comes down on my conk. Say,” he said excitedly, “I'm wounded. I got a lump on the back of my head!”

“Slugged from behind,” said Ellery, rising. “Sees nothing, hears nothing, knows nothing. Come along. Sergeant. It's a miracle you're alive.”

There was no clue to Velie's assailant. Detective Flint had seen nothing. They agreed it was the same person who had attempted to assassinate Ellery.

“It was a good trap while you set it,” laughed Charley as they returned to the library. Then he shook his head.

“Smart,” said Ellery through his teeth. “And quick. Slippery customer. Have to use grappling hooks.” He fell into a fierce study. The Inspector examined his clothes while Sergeant Velie groped in the liquor cabinet for first aid.

“Funny,” mumbled the Inspector.

“What?” Ellery was scarcely paying attention.

“Nothing, son.”

The Inspector then examined the room under full light. The longer he searched, the more perplexed he seemed. And finally he stopped searching and said, “It's impossible.”

“What's impossible?” asked Sergeant Velie. He had administered two glasses of first aid and was himself again.

“What are you talking about, Dad?”

“You're still slug-nutty from that fall you took,” said the Inspector, “or you'd know without my having to tell you. A shot was fired in this room, wasn't it?”

“The bullet!” cried Ellery. “You can't find it?”

“Not a sign of it. Not a mark on the walls or the furniture or, as far as I can see, the floor or ceiling. No bullet, no shell, no nothing.”

“It must be here,” said Sheila. “It was fired point-blank into the room.”

“Ricocheted off, most likely,” said Charley. “Maybe took a funny carom and flew out into the garden.”

“Maybe,” grunted the Inspector. “But where are the marks of the ricochet? Bullet doesn't ricochet off empty space, Charley. It just isn't here.”

“My vest!” said Ellery. “If it's anywhere, it's in my bullet-proof vest. Or at least some mark of it, if it bounced off.” He opened his shirt again and he and his father together examined the steel vest covering his torso. But there was no indication of a bullet's having struck—no dent in the fabric, no powder burns, no glittering line of abrasion. Moreover, his shirt and jacket were clean and whole.

“But we heard the shot,” cried Inspector Queen. “We saw it fired. What is this, another magic trick? Another gob of Mother Goose nonsense?”

Ellery buttoned his shirt slowly. Sergeant Velie was frowning in a mighty, dutiful effort at concentration, a bottle of Irish whisky in his fist. The Inspector was glaring at the Colt which he had recovered from the terrace floor. And then Ellery chuckled. As he was buttoning the top button of his shirt. He chuckled: “Of course. Oh, of course.”

“What are you patting yourself on the back about?” demanded the Inspector peevishly.

“That confirms everything.”

“What
confirms everything?”

Sergeant Velie set the whisky bottle down and began to shuffle toward the Queens, a curious look on his rocky face.

“Dad, I know who killed Robert and Maclyn Potts.”

PART FIVE

26 . . . The Identity of the Sparrow

“You really know?” said Inspector Queen. “It's not guesswork?”

“I really know,” said Ellery with wonder, as if he were surprised himself at the simplicity of it all.

“But how can you?” cried Sheila. “What's happened so suddenly that tells you?”

“Who cares what's happened?” said Charley Paxton grimly. “I want to know who it is!”

“Me, too,” said Sergeant Velie, feeling his head. “Put the ringer on him once for all, Maestro, so we can stop shadow-boxin' and get in there and punch.”

Inspector Queen was regarding his eminent son with suspicion. “Ellery, is this another ‘trap' of yours?”

Ellery sighed, and sat down in the straight-backed chair to lean forward with his elbows on his knees. “It rather reminds me,” he began, “of
Mother Goose
—”

“Oh, my gosh,” groaned the Sergeant.

“Who killed Robert and Maclyn? ‘I', said the Sparrow,” murmured Mr. Queen, unabashed. “Wonderful how those jingles which were originally political and social satires keep cropping up in this case. I don't know if the Cock Robin thing was one of those, but I do know the identity of the Sparrow. Except, Charley, that I can't tell you the ‘who' without first telling you the ‘how.' You wouldn't believe me otherwise.”

“Tell it any way you please,” begged Sheila. “But tell it, Ellery!”

Ellery lit a cigaret slowly. “Thurlow bought fourteen guns when he launched his dueling career. Fourteen … Sergeant, how many of those did you manage to round up?”

Velie started. “Who, me? Twelve.”

“Yes. Specifically, the two used in the duel with Bob Potts, the one the Old Woman stole from Thurlow's hoard in that false closet of his, and the nine you found there afterwards, Sergeant. Twelve in all. Twelve out of the fourteen we knew Thurlow had purchased from the small-arms department of Cornwall & Ritchey. So two were missing.”

Ellery looked about absently for an ashtray. Sheila jumped up and brought him one. He smiled at her, and she ran back to her chair. “Two were missing,” he resumed, “and subsequently we discovered which two. They were exact duplicates in manufacture and type of the two guns Thurlow had produced for his duel with Bob: a .25-caliber Colt Pocket Model automatic, and a Smith & Wesson number known as the S. & W. .38/32 revolver, with a 2-inch barrel.

“That struck me as a curious fact. For what were the first twelve weapons?” Ellery took his inventory from his wallet. “A Colt .25 automatic, Pocket Model; a Smith & Wesson .38—the .38/32 revolver with 2-inch barrel; a Harrington & Richardson .22, Trapper Model; an Iver Johnson .32 Special, safety hammerless automatic; a Schmeisser .25 automatic, safety Pocket Model; a Stevens .22 Long Rifle, single-shot Target pistol; an I. J. Champion .22 Target single action; a Stoeger Luger, 7.65 millimeter, refinished; a New Model Mauser of 7.63 millimeter caliber with a ten-shot magazine; a High Standard hammerless automatic Short, .22 caliber; a Browning 1912 of 9-millimeter caliber; and an Ortgies of 6.35-millimeter caliber.”

Ellery tucked away his memorandum. “I even remarked at the time that every one of the twelve guns listed was
of different manufacture.
I might have added what was evident from the list itself: that not only were the twelve utterly different in manufacture, but they were as nearly varied in caliber and type as one could reasonably gather in a gun shop.

“Yet the thirteenth and fourteenth weapons
—
the two missing ones
—
were exact duplicates of the first two on the list; not merely similar, but identical.”
Ellery stared at them. “In other words, there were two
pairs
of guns in the fourteen items Thurlow bought at Cornwall & Ritchey's. Why? Why
two
Colt .25 automatics of the Pocket Model type, whose overall length is only four and a half inches, as we pointed out at the time? Why
two
S. & W. .38/32's, whose overall length is only six and one-quarter inches? Hardly dueling pistols, by the way!—although of course they could serve that purpose. There were much larger and longer pistols in Thurlow's arsenal for such romantic bravura as a duel at dawn. Why
those,
and such little fellows, too?”

“Coincidence?” asked Sheila.

“It might have been coincidence,” admitted Ellery. “But the weight of logic was against it, Sheila. Because what happened? In giving Bob his choice of weapons at the dinner table the evening before the duel, Thurlow didn't offer Bob one of a
pair
of guns—one of the pair of Colt .25 automatics we know he had at that time, or one of the pair of Smith
&
Wessons—which would have been the natural thing to do in a duel. No, Thurlow offered Bob his choice of two quite
dissimilar
weapons. Coincidence? Hardly. I could only say to myself: There must have been some purpose, some motive, some plan behind this.”

“But what?” Inspector Queen frowned.

“Well, Dad, what was the effect of Bob's choosing one of the two dissimilar guns Thurlow offered him? This:
that no matter which weapon Bob chose
—whether he chose the Colt automatic or the Smith & Wesson revolver—
Thurlow was left not with one gun for himself, but a pair.”

“A pair!” exclaimed Charley. “Of course! Since Bob picked the Smith & Wesson, Thurlow was left with two identical Colts!”

“And it would have been the same if Bob had selected the Colt,” nodded Ellery. “Thurlow couldn't lose, you see—he
had
to be left with a pair of identical weapons. The question was: What was the advantage to Thurlow in this? I couldn't answer it then; but I can now!”

“Wait a minute, son,” said the Inspector irritably. “I don't see what difference it would have made if Thurlow'd been left with a dozen identical guns.”

“Why not?”

“Why not? Because Thurlow couldn't have murdered Bob Potts, that's why not. From the time you left that Colt .25 in Thurlow's bedroom with a blank in it till you handed Thurlow that same gun the next morning at the duel, Thurlow couldn't possibly have touched it. You said so yourself!”

“That's right, Maestro,” said Sergeant Velie. “He never could of got into his bedroom during the night to take the blank out and put the live bullet in the gun—he was with Miss Brent and Charley Paxton, and later you, all the time.”

“Either here in the study with us,” nodded Charley, “or in Club Bongo, where all four of us went that night after you came downstairs from putting the blank-loaded gun in Thurlow's room, Ellery.”

“Not only that,” added Inspector Queen, “but you told me yourself, Ellery, that the only ones who positively did
not
have opportunity to switch bullets in that gun in Thurlow's room were Charley, Miss Brent, and Thurlow.”

“From the facts, Maestro,” chided the Sergeant. “From the facts.”

Ellery smiled sadly. “How you all belabor the ‘facts'! Although I shouldn't cast the first stone—I did a bit of belaboring myself. I agree: Thurlow could not have replaced the blank cartridge with the live one in that Colt I left on his highboy.”

“Then what are you talking about?” expostulated his father.

“Just this,” said Ellery crisply.
“Thurlow murdered his brother Bob deliberately nevertheless.”

“Huh?” Sergeant Velie reamed his right ear doubtfully.

“Thurlow murdered—” Sheila stopped.

“But Ellery,” protested Charley Paxton, “you just got through admitting—”

“That Thurlow couldn't have replaced the blank with the live cartridge, Charley? So I did. And I still do. But don't you people see that by having two identical guns, Thurlow not only prepared a colossal alibi for himself but pulled off a seemingly impossible murder, too? Look!” Ellery jumped up, grinding out his cigaret. “We all assumed that the killer replaced the blank in the Colt with a live bullet; we all assumed that this was the only possible way in which Bob Potts could have been murdered.
But suppose that blank had never been replaced?”

They gaped at him.

“Suppose the blank-loaded Colt was not used in the duel at all, but the other Colt was used
—
the duplicate Colt?”

At that the Inspector groaned and clapped his palms to his gray head in an agony of realization.

“Very fundamental,” said Mr. Queen, lighting a fresh cigaret. “Thurlow didn't use the Colt .25 we'd put the blank cartridge in. He simply used the other Colt .25, loaded with a live bullet. The attack on me a few minutes ago proved this—proves that
Thurlow switched the two Colt .25's just before his duel with Bob,
switched them right under our noses. How does the attempt on my life in this room prove this?

“Well, ever since Bob's death, the Colt that killed him the one we know had a live bullet in it
because
it killed him, the Colt that Thurlow aimed at him—has been in your possession, Dad, as the murder weapon, the vital piece of evidence. Today Horatio Potts found the
duplicate
Colt .25 in the sycamore tree on the estate. A few minutes ago that duplicate Colt was fired at me at point—blank range. Yet there was no mark on me, no bullet hole, no abrasion on my steel vest, no powder burn; and no bullet or bullet hole or sign of ricochet anywhere in this room. Only possible explanation: That duplicate Colt fired at me tonight
was loaded with a blank cartridge.
But we'd loaded a Colt .25 with a blank cartridge for Thurlow to use in his duel with Robert!

“Conclusion: The weapon fired at me tonight
was that first gun,
the gun that had been on Thurlow's highboy the whole night before the duel, the gun I'd run up to fetch for him, the gun I'd handed him at dawn and which he immediately put, you'll recall, into the right-hand pocket of his tweed jacket . . . The gun he did
not
take out of that pocket a few moments later! Yes, Thurlow switched guns on us under our eyes; and how he did it becomes childishly apparent once you recognize the basic fact that he
did
switch guns. The fact that, having
two
guns, he had no need to switch
bullets
was the strongest and wiliest part of Thurlow's plan. It made it possible for him to create an unassailable alibi. He must have eavesdropped and overheard our plan to replace the live bullet with a blank in the only Colt .25 we knew at the time he possessed. But
he
knew he had a duplicate Colt. So why not let us go through with our plan to draw the death out of the first Colt, give himself that powerful alibi, and still manage to kill Robert? Moreover, under such circumstances that he'd seem the witless tool of some mysterious other person?

“Thurlow snatched his opportunity. Sheila, he permitted you to get him ‘out of the way.' Charley, he welcomed your joining him and Sheila here in the study later. And he must have been beside himself with delight when I came down, too, to join the party. Then what did he do? If you'll recall, it was
Thurlow
who suggested going to Club Bongo; it was
Thurlow
who managed things so that we stayed out all night and didn't get back until it was time for the duel—whereupon it could never be said that he'd had opportunity to switch bullets in that gun in his room at any time after I placed the blank-loaded weapon there. How were we to know that all the previous evening, all that night at Club Bongo, all the early morning coming back to the grounds, Thurlow had the duplicate Colt .25, loaded with a lethal bullet, in his right-hand pocket?

“And now observe how cunning he is. We get back, and he sends
me
upstairs to his room to fetch the blank-loaded Colt, under the ‘artless' pretense that I'm his second! For it must not be said afterwards that Thurlow Potts for even two minutes was alone with that gun …

“I fetched the gun, playing the dupe, handed it to Thurlow in sight of numerous witnesses, and he slipped it at once into his coat pocket.

“The dueling silliness began. Thurlow took a Colt .25 from that pocket. How were we to know that it was not the same weapon, loaded with a blank? How were we to know that the Colt he took out of that pocket was a duplicate of the one I had just handed him, a weapon identical in shape and size and appearance, and that the one just handed him was still in his pocket? And remained there?”

Inspector Queen groaned. “Who'd ever think to search the nut? We didn't even know at the time that there
were
duplicate Colt .25's!”

“No, we did not. And Thurlow knew we didn't. He was running no risks. Later, he simply disposed of the first Colt—hid it in that starling's nest in the sycamore tree, the blank cartridge still in it.”

“And then, of course,” muttered the Inspector, “he pulled that second challenge—to Mac—as a fake and a cover-up. By that time we were sure to pass his part in the killing off as irresponsible craziness. So he murders Mac in an ordinary way during the night, while we're expecting a duel in the morning. Clever is right.”

“But
why'd
he kill the twins?” demanded Sergeant Velie.

Sheila said: “Because he hated them,” and began to cry.

“Stop it, darling,” said Charley, putting his arms about her. “Or I'll take you out of here.”

“It's just that it's the same old story—hate, insanity—” Sheila sobbed.

“Not at all,” said Mr. Queen dryly. She looked up quickly; they were all startled. “There's no insanity in Thurlow's murder plan, believe me. It was cold, brutal, logical, criminal ruthlessness.”

“Now how do you figure that?” demanded Paxton.

“Yes, what in time did he gain by killing the twins?” echoed the Inspector.

“What did he gain?” Ellery nodded. “Very pointed question, Dad. Let's explore it a bit. But first let's state an interesting fact: This is not a case of one murder; it's a case of two. ALL RIGHT. Who gained most by the deaths of
both
Bob and Mac?”