Arrow Pointing Nowhere (14 page)

“Not that; disabled.”

“I don't like to disturb her; but if I can give out a statement to the press that the whole family says Mr. Mott Fenway was in a normal frame of mind—”

“I'll go up with you myself.” Fenway rose. “And I should like to say that I am very grateful to you for the consideration you are showing us all.”

“No other way for me to act. It's a straight case of accident, we could even check up with Craddock about that telephone call; that was a piece of luck for you, Mr. Fenway. There might have been some question—you know how some of these scandal sheets go on—about whether deceased had had bad news over the telephone.”

“Bad news! He talked to me afterwards—”

“That's so. We won't,” said Nordhall, with his first faint indication of a smile, “bother Mr. Hendrix.”

“Hendrix?”

“Gentleman called him about the bridge game.”

“Oh, yes; some friend of his at his little club.”

“If we could go upstairs now?”

The uniformed man closed his notebook. Craddock appeared and came past him, his hair brushed back now from his forehead, and his face composed. He said: “All clear, Mr. Fenway.”

“My dear boy, I don't know how to thank you. If it hadn't been for you, God only knows what I mightn't have done; you've saved us all from a lot of trouble and distress, I'm sure. Did you—did you see Bedlow?”

“Bedlow came himself. He'll be back in an hour to talk to you; the thing now is to get the street quieted down. I don't know where people come from.” Craddock rubbed the back of his head.

“We're going upstairs now, to talk to Mrs. Fenway and Mrs. Grove. I don't want the boy upset; you'll come along?”

“Of course, sir.” Craddock looked at Gamadge, and murmured: “Friend in need.”

The others seemed to have forgotten all about him, and he could not imagine how to attach himself to them
when they left the drawing room. He found himself alone with Caroline, wondering by what means he could possibly get himself upstairs. He did not even know how he could decently remain in the house.

Caroline solved the problem for him. She took a cigarette out of a box on a table, allowed him to light it for her, and said: “I want very much to talk to you.”

“I'm at your service, Miss Fenway.”

“Would you tell me why you came back to the house tonight? I won't repeat what you say.”

They faced each other silently for a moment. Then Gamadge said: “I came by invitation.”

“Whose?”

“Mr. Mott Fenway's.”

C
AROLINE SAID:
“Thank you for treating me like an intelligent human being. I don't mean that I'm more intelligent than the others, but they haven't my reasons for thinking that you didn't merely happen to pass by. Cousin Mott told you this afternoon, didn't he, that we thought Alden tore the picture out of the book?”

“And that you thought Alden killed your dog.”

“He didn't agree with me about that. Let's sit down, Mr. Gamadge; but first will you close the door into the hall? You'll be able to see straight through the front drawing room; we shan't have eavesdroppers from that direction.”

Gamadge closed the door; it faced the entrance to the library, and as he came back to the fire and sat down opposite Caroline he wondered afresh why Mott Fenway had been killed. He was sure they couldn't have been overheard that afternoon, unless the Fenway house were a trick house where privacy was an illusion and the walls had ears.

“I thought your cousin rather minimized the dangers of being listened in on,” he said.

“He wasn't afraid; I am. I'm afraid of Alden. I was before, and now I have good reason to be. Don't you think so?”

She sat leaning back in her chair, velvet-clad knees crossed. One hand emerging from its long velvet sleeve lay open on her lap; when she raised her cigarette to her lips with the other, her ring sparkled.

Gamadge studied her gravely. At last he said: “Your nerve is good, Miss Fenway.”

“Not as good as I pretend.”

“You seriously think that your cousin Alden pushed Mr. Mott Fenway out of that window?”

“How can anybody know how a mind like his functions? They say it's a child's mind, but a vicious child isn't harmless. A child can do dreadful things, and physically Alden is a strong man. A child might strike a dog that irritated it; Alden killed the dog. A child might tear the page of a book; Alden tore it out and hid it cunningly. A child might give a person a push; Alden pushed Cousin Mott out of the window, and pretended he hadn't.”

“Any evidence?”

“If I had evidence I shouldn't be troubling you, and I shan't trouble you now unless you let me engage you professionally.”

“That's out of the question. Mr. Mott Fenway is dead, and I can do nothing for him now; I'll be glad to do what I can for you. But I can't do much without evidence.”

“If I had evidence I should take it to Aunt Belle; I should invite her to leave the house—with Alden.”

“Invite
her
to leave?”

“She won't be separated from him. Her affection for him is morbid—she's never left him since he was born. She must have had plenty of chances to marry since Uncle Cort died,
and he left her a small income, all he had. But I suppose no man wanted Alden in his household.”

“You wouldn't take the evidence to your father?”

“Not if she agreed to put Alden in an institution for life. It would be no hardship for her to go elsewhere, Mr. Gamadge; the estate pays her enough to maintain them both in luxury; she could afford an army of servants to run a house. Why does she stay on here?”

“Your father ought to know what you think about Alden.”

“I hope he never need hear a word of it. I really think it might kill him. It's a question of sentiment, and those questions can't be dealt with rationally. My father loved Uncle Cort, and Uncle Cort worshipped Aunt Belle, and Alden's their son. But I do think we shouldn't run such a fearful risk any longer. Who knows what grudge Alden may develop next? Perhaps the next one will be against my father.”

“He had a grudge against Mr. Mott Fenway?”

“That's the worst of it—he never showed anything of the kind. But he's never seemed the pathetic being to me that others think him; I meet him wandering in the hallways and I turn cold. It's ridiculous to have no attendant for him but a nervous half-invalid like Bill Craddock, who knows nothing about mental disease; and I'm not sure that Bill wouldn't conceal even this for Alden's sake. If Alden did kill my dog, Bill Craddock must have been the one who concealed the fact.”

“If he killed Mr. Mott Fenway, his mother and Mrs. Grove must be lying to save him.”

“They'll never admit he was out of the sitting room.”

“Mrs. Grove wouldn't?”

“She's utterly dependent on Aunt Belle, and she has the niece to think of. I don't like to think that Bill Craddock would lie about such a dangerous thing, but he's quite penniless at present except for his salary, and not able
to earn money in the usual ways; and he wants to get married.”

“To Miss Grove? Your cousin Mott Fenway said something.”

“Hilda Grove is penniless too, and Father doesn't want her to plunge into marriage with a man in Bill's circumstances, a man she doesn't even seem to be particularly in love with.” Caroline smiled a little. “Poor father couldn't make a blighted romance out of it. He thinks she's a rare creature, he wants to give her a beautiful life; he hopes that I shall be able to introduce her to eligibles. She's a very nice girl indeed, but I don't think it will be easy to marry her off. It never would have been easy—there are so many nice girls in the world! And now most of the nice young men are otherwise engaged. Father is romantic about women, you know; he would have liked to be romantic about me.”

“He wants to shelter them?”

“When they're like Hilda. There must be something special about her, though, that escapes me. At present she seems quite happy at Fenbrook, and I certainly don't grudge her that bleak shelter and the Dobsons.”

“She's not in love with Mr. Craddock?”

Caroline smiled faintly again. “She ‘doesn't know.' She's known him always, and Father thinks she ought to meet other young men. But she's young, her problems will solve themselves.”

“Yours are more immediate.”

“They are indeed. I hoped
you'd
try to find evidence for me, Mr. Gamadge—they say you're so good at that.”

“Evidence that Alden Fenway killed Mott Fenway? If there is evidence, the police have it now.”

“The police?” She sat up, amazed. “They're convinced that it was an accident!”

“They accept the accident theory provisionally, but they take nothing for granted.”

“Lieutenant Nordhall was
pretending
?”

“Being considerate. I dare say he'll find nothing, but he'll miss nothing. Your cousin's body will be examined, you know; for bruises.”

“Bruises? Cousin Mott fell from the top of the house down on an iron railing!”

“There might be ante-mortem bruises on the back of the head or on the shoulders.”

She frowned. “There won't be!”

“No; a slight push would have been enough, and a slight push doesn't leave a bruise. But they'll look. I'll be glad to go over the scene with you, however, and I should very much like to see your aunt and Mrs. Grove. If they think as you do, they must be in a frightful state.”

“Father will have told them that you're here; I could take you in. But I'm not at all sure that you'll learn anything from them; they're used to hiding what they feel!”

“Used to it?”

“That brings me to the view of old Fenbrook. Mr. Gamadge, I'm absolutely convinced that Alden tore it out and has hidden it, and that there's evidence on it that he did tear it out. And I'm convinced that he's told Aunt Belle something about it, and that she's told Mrs. Grove. Ever since the day the books came into the house they've been like—I can only compare them to clockwork figures; wound up and tense. They sit there doing their everlasting needle point, never even talking to each other, and I should think they'd go mad; and Aunt Belle keeps looking at Alden in a kind of desperation. And they're looking for the picture—at least Mrs. Grove is, or perhaps Bill Craddock. I've heard people wandering about downstairs, but I've never done anything about it. I was afraid to look myself, because I
was afraid it might be Alden and that I should meet him in the dark; and if it had been one of the others, and I called Father and made a fuss, they'd simply say they were looking for a book or something. What
could
I do?”

“Not much.”

“It's easy to get about this house without being seen; I could take you up by the back stairs now and we shouldn't be seen at all; the servants will be in their basement sitting room unless they're rung for.”

“Let's go by all means.” Gamadge rose and dropped his cigarette into the fire. “After all, there may be evidence on the top floor that Nordhall hadn't the special knowledge to interpret.”

“And you may get some idea where to look for the picture.” Caroline had risen also. “Perhaps we ought to go over the whole house?”

“We can't do much tonight; but if you like I'll come back tomorrow. I can bring your father that first edition, you know; but I won't shock Phillips by asking to see him or anybody.”

“Phillips will have orders to tell me when you come.”

“The trouble is, I don't know quite when I
can
come. I have to see people tomorrow, and they can't be put off; some of them come a long way.”

“I'll wait in all afternoon.” She paused, and looked at him gravely. “This matter can't seem very important to you, Mr. Gamadge, I realize that; compared, I mean, with the kind of thing you must be fighting now.”

“Not important? It's a manifestation of the powers of evil.”

“I shouldn't give it such an imposing name as that. After all, it was the work of a mental deficient.”

“If your assumptions are correct we may figuratively call it the work of one possessed of an evil spirit; and that work is being condoned by persons who owe your father
frankness, and who are all—even Mrs. Fenway—actuated by self-interest. If,” he repeated, “your assumptions are correct.”

“At any rate, they're all making the rest of us run a fearful risk. Mr. Gamadge—if you don't find the picture in a day or so I will speak to Father.”

“Good.”

“Shall we go straight up to the top floor, then?”