ALM06 Who Killed the Husband? (28 page)

Agnes, clinging to Coler's arm and glancing fondly in his face, said: "Mr. District Attorney, is there any objection to having my friend, Mr. Coler, present? He has no evidence to give, but I should be so thankful to have his support."

"Certainly, Mrs. Gartrey."

Lee wondered what this public avowal of a fondness for Coler portended. The butterfly dartings of Agnes' mind were unpredictable. Coler, who loved her, ought to have been overjoyed by her present attitude, but if he was, he didn't show it.

Agnes dropped gracefully in a love seat on the District Attorney's right. All the men resumed their chairs. Coler drew up a chair behind Agnes. The District Attorney looked around.

"Is there anything you require?" asked Agnes languidly.

"A small table for my secretary, if you please." He pointed to a little table against the wall and the secretary moved toward it.

Agnes arrested him with a graceful gesture. "Don't trouble yourself, please." She looked at Coler and he pressed a button in the wall behind him.

Denman entered. "Remove the things from that table," said Agnes, "and place it before the District Attorney's secretary."

It was done. The manservant was visibly longing to remain in the room, but Agnes dismissed him. "Close the doors when you go out, and also the doors into the music room."

When the second pair of doors closed, she settled her bracelet and said: "Now, Mr. District Attorney."

He bowed. "Please tell the story in your own way, Mrs. Gartrey. I am distressed that I have to subject you to this ordeal, and I want to make it as easy for you as I can. Take your own time."

Agnes' eyelids flickered with contempt. She began languidly to tell the same story that she had told Lee, rounding it out with small added details here and there. Everybody listened with sympathetic attention. She told how she had seen Al standing over the body of her husband with the smoking gun in his hand; how he had dropped the gun and fled; she did not forget to mention this time that Al had a glove on his right hand. If this story stood up in court, a jury would have no choice but to send Al Yohe to the chair. However, this was not the courtroom and Lee quietly bided his time.

The District Attorney made no attempt to pin her down or to question any part of her story. There was no reminder that she had in the beginning told an entirely different story. Occasionally Agnes' eyes strayed to Lee's face, but Lee was taking care to look as bland as milk. Satisfied as she went on that she was creating a perfect effect, the hint of a satisfied smirk appeared around her beautiful lips. She is enjoying herself, God forgive her! thought Lee. When she had come to the end, Agnes said:

"As long as you are here, would you like to hear my maid's story? She was with me throughout that terrible afternoon."

"If you please, Mrs. Gartrey."

Denman was therefore summoned and sent to fetch Eliza Young. While they waited for Eliza, Agnes refreshed herself with a cigarette, but none of the men ventured to light up.

Eliza's large, pale face was damp with excitement and the pince-nez kept slipping down her nose. The presence of Lee in the room made her nervous. But nobody interrupted her; nobody questioned any part of her story, and she came through all right. She corroborated her mistress' story at every point.

After Eliza had been dismissed, the District Attorney arose to make a little speech. "I don't think we need trouble you any further, Mrs. Gartrey. Permit me to thank you for your co-operation and to compliment you on the absolute clearness of your story. May I also express my deepest sympathy..."

He was interrupted by a knock on the door. "Excuse me," said Agnes. "Come in!"

It was the golden-haired Fanny Parran. Everybody stared. Fanny said: "Excuse me, Mr. Mappin. Mrs. Bradford is here."

"Who is this person?" asked Agnes.

"My secretary," said Lee mildly.

"And who may Mrs. Bradford be?"

"That requires a word of explanation. Mrs. Bradford is a very old lady who lives across the street. She has some evidence to give in this case. It hasn't anything to do with Mrs. Gartrey's story, but as Mrs. Bradford is a cripple, I have taken the liberty of bringing her to the District Attorney in order to save her the fatigue of a journey downtown. Perhaps her evidence is of no importance, but I assume the District Attorney will have to listen to it sooner or later."

"It's all right with me," said the District Attorney, "if Mrs. Gartrey has no objection."

Agnes moved her shoulders pettishly. "I think I might have been consulted in advance. Is my house a railway station?" Everybody except Lee looked alarmed. "Oh, well," Agnes went on, "as long as she's here, bring her in."

Fanny wheeled Mrs. Bradford into the room in her chair. In a smart hat and a short fur jacket the old lady was very modish. Her eyes were starry with excitement. She waved her hand gaily in Lee's direction and bowed to Agnes as to an equal. Agnes stared at her rather rudely, but Mrs. Bradford was not at all put about by that. She took in everything and everybody in the room.

The District Attorney invited her to tell him what she knew about the Gartrey case and she launched forth on her story. She told him all about her arthritis; how good her son and his wife were to her; and how dull life was, nevertheless, for an invalid. The District Attorney had not Lee's patience. He began to fidget on his chair and finally signed to her to stop. He said to Lee sarcastically:

"Mr. Mappin, you are responsible for this witness. I can't see how her story applies to the case we are investigating. Perhaps you can bring it out--if there is any connection."

Mrs. Bradford looked affronted and then smiled at Lee. "It is so much easier to deal with a gentleman!" she murmured.

"Mrs. Bradford," said Lee, "where do you live?"

"In the penthouse of the apartment across the street, Mr. Mappin."

"From the terrace of the penthouse can you overlook the roof of this house?"

"Yes, sir. The roof of this house is about all I have to look at."

"I ask you to cast back in your memory to Monday afternoon two weeks ago, November 3rd."

All the listeners in the room pricked up their ears as he named the day Jules Gartrey was shot.

"Can you remember that afternoon?" asked Lee. "Yes, sir. Perfectly."

"What happened to fix that particular afternoon in your mind?"

"I saw a man on the roof of this house. He came out of one door, crossed the roof and went through the other door."

The District Attorney intervened. "How can you be sure that it was that particular afternoon instead of another?"

"Because I broke' a teacup that afternoon," said Mrs. Bradford coolly. "I happened to be telling my nurse about the man I had seen when the cup slipped from my hand."

Lee resumed his questioning. "Are you able to fix the hour at which you saw this man?"

"I can fix it almost exactly, Mr. Mappin. My nurse brings me my tea at four and it was about half an hour before she came that I saw the man. I remember using those words to my nurse: 'Half an hour ago I saw a man on the roof across the way.' So it was about half past three. The same nurse is with me. You can ask her if you distrust my memory."

"That will hardly be necessary," said the District Attorney stiffly.

"Mrs. Bradford," said Lee, "there are nine gentlemen in this room. I would like to have you look around and see if you can pick out the man you saw on the roof of this house at half past three on the afternoon of November 3rd."

"One moment," interrupted the District Attorney. "How could she possibly identify a man that she had only seen across the street?"

"I looked at him through my binoculars," said Mrs. Bradford sharply. "That brought him right close."

"Proceed, please."

The old lady, enjoying her moment in the limelight, looked slowly from one man to another. Each man became self-conscious in his turn. She smiled coquettishly at Lee. "It certainly wasn't you, Mr. Mappin."

"Eliminate me," said Lee.

After she had looked at them all, her glance returned to George Coler. "The gentleman in the corner," she said, "I can't see him very well. The light is poor."

The District Attorney smiled as one who humors the vagaries of a very old person. "Would you mind standing, Mr. Coler?"

Coler stood up. His face was like a mask.

"That is the man," said Mrs. Bradford.

The silence of stupefaction fell on the room. Coler's face turned brick red and his eyes bulged. "It's a lie!" he burst out.

Mrs. Bradford drew herself up. "I beg your pardon, sir!"

Coler struggled hard to regain his poise. "I'm sorry," he said. "I did not mean to imply that you were making a misstatement, but only that you were mistaken." He tried to carry it off with a laugh. "On the afternoon in question I was engaged in my business as I am every afternoon. I have never been on the roof of this house. I have never been on any roof since I was a boy."

"You are the man I saw!" said Mrs. Bradford firmly.

Coler looked at Lee and laughed again. "This is a farce staged by the clever Mr. Mappin!"

It was an error in tactics, for all the policemen and the attorneys in the room were familiar with Lee's work in criminology. They began to think there was something in the old woman's story. Lee was looking at Agnes. Her air of complete astonishment satisfied him that she had never known the truth. She had really believed that Al Yohe shot her husband and had embroidered her evidence only to make certain of his conviction.

Fanny started to wheel Mrs. Bradford from the room. Lee shook hands with the old lady. "Thank you," he said gravely. "You have served justice today."

"Will I be called upon to testify in court?" she whispered eagerly.

"Without a doubt."

The District Attorney was in a state approaching consternation. "I don't understand," he said. "What does this mean, Mr. Mappin? Are you suggesting that Mr. Coler should be arrested for this crime?"

"Not at all," said Lee calmly. "Certainly not on such inconclusive evidence. Mr. Coler is one of the most prominent citizens of New York. He's not going to run away. Should any explanations from him be required later, I'm sure he'll be glad to satisfy you at any time."

Coler was not deaf to the ironic intonations in Lee's voice, and his glance was poisonous. He laughed again. "This is the most preposterous thing I ever heard of!" With a glance at Agnes, he tried to draw her into his laughter, but Agnes was stony and dazed.

"Please take me to my room," she whispered. They went out together.

The men got out of the apartment as best they could. Loasby whispered to Lee:

"Is it wise to let them go free?"

"What else can we do?" said Lee.

An hour later Lee and the District Attorney were sitting with Inspector Loasby in the latter's private office when word came over the teletype of a shocking accident in the neighborhood of Fort Lee. A Cadillac sedan had been driven at full speed over the edge of the Palisades, evidently with suicidal intent, and had smashed on the rocks below.

Shortly afterwards, word came that the two occupants of the sedan had been identified from papers on their persons as George Coler, President of Hasbrouck and Company, and Mrs. Jules Gartrey.

"What did I tell you!" cried Loasby.

"It was the cleanest way out," said Lee. "Far better than the poison of a long-drawn trial."

Chapter 24

"The circumstances were such," Lee said to the District Attorney, "that Al Yohe believed Mrs. Gartrey had shot her husband and Mrs. Gartrey believed that Yohe had done it."

"How could that be, Mr. Mappin?"

"Mrs. Gartrey was in her dressing room. We must assume that she had left the door into the corridor open as a precaution. She heard the elevator door open, and ran out with some idea of preventing Gartrey from discovering that Al was in her boudoir. But the shot was fired before she reached him and she fell fainting in the corridor. A moment later, Yohe found her lying there. She must have come to as soon as Yohe ran back to the service entrance, and, finding him gone, drew the natural conclusion. When she heard the butler coming, she ran into the music room."

"Where was the lady's maid then?"

"She was still in the dressing room, paralyzed with terror, one may suppose. She didn't appear in the foyer until after her mistress came out of the music room."

"Mr. Mappin," asked the District Attorney, "when did you begin to suspect that George Coler was guilty?"

"It was a matter of slow development," said Lee. "In the beginning I was convinced, like everybody else, that Al Yohe was the murderer. It was not until after Al had forced himself into my presence and told me his story that I began to doubt."

"What put the doubt into your mind?"

"The fact that Al Yohe's story absolutely coincided with that of Hawkins, the butler. I was already satisfied that Hawkins was telling the truth. I then re-examined the stories told by the different inmates of the Gartrey household, and in some cases I questioned them myself. I questioned Mrs. Gartrey and the maid, Eliza Young, on several occasions. All this testimony satisfied me at length that neither Al Yohe nor Mrs. Gartrey could have done it.