Curtain for a Jester (19 page)

Bill wondered now.

Grace Monteath had had a heart attack; a serious enough attack, but no more serious than many people had and recovered from, and lived for years after. She had been brought to the hospital by her husband on a summer morning. She had been put to bed—given digitalis, and oxygen and anti-coagulant drugs. And, the prognosis had been favorable. She had not gone into shock; there was every prospect that, with a few weeks of rest and treatment, she would recover sufficiently to lead an almost normal life. They told her that, and she did not seem to hear them.

The doctor had been able to reassure Monteath, to tell him there was no immediate danger. He had driven back to the cottage “to get their things, you know” and had returned the next day, quite early. He had seen his wife briefly, with the nurse present. Grace Monteath had seemed cheerful enough, then. She had said, “Of course I'll be all right, darling.”

“I remember how she said that,” Nurse Blanchard said. “It was for him, really.”

Monteath had said nothing about what had happened at the cottage earlier that morning; of that Nurse Blanchard was sure. He had not stayed long; the doctor would not let him stay long. Later in the day they had heard at the hospital of the shooting, and had cautioned Monteath not to mention it. He had said that he knew better than to do that, and he had not when he visited his wife again that afternoon. “He spent most of the day at the hospital,” Nurse Blanchard said. “He was terribly upset, of course.”

By then, Nurse Blanchard had begun to suspect Grace Monteath did not want to live. “She just lay there, waiting to die.” The nurse could not understand it. “She had so much to live for, and she loved him so much, and he loved her so much.”

Mrs. Monteath had fallen into a light sleep the evening of the day after her attack, and she had talked in her sleep. She had said, “I've spoiled it all. Spoiled everything” and “I didn't mean to, Art. I didn't—” Her voice had trailed off, then. But, a few minutes later, she had spoken again, this time excitedly. “Don't try to do anything,” she had said. “There's nothing anybody can do. Not anybody, Art. I've spoiled it all.” She had had morphine to quieten her; had been quiet through the night.

But when she wakened the next morning, Grace Monteath had lain with her eyes wide, staring up at the ceiling. She had not wanted food, not wanted anything.

Nurse Blanchard, on duty again, had been disturbed by her patient's condition, although physically there had been no change—had been nothing to change the originally hopeful prognosis. When it was almost time for the doctor to make his morning calls, Nurse Blanchard had gone to the door to watch for him, to ask him to see Mrs. Monteath before the others. She had stood in the open door, looking down the corridor, and then had heard the sound behind her.

Mrs. Monteath had thrown off the covers, the oxygen tent. She had thrown herself out of bed, violently; she had stood and then—

“It was as if she was trying to dance,” Nurse Blanchard said. “It was—the last thing she should have done, of course. If she had wanted to live.”

It had, quite literally, been the last thing Grace Monteath had done. She had cried out in her strange dance and collapsed while the nurse was still crossing the room toward her. She had died a few minutes later of a second attack.

“Which she wanted to happen,” the nurse said. “Which she made happen.”

“She couldn't have been sure,” Bill Weigand said. “Even violent exercise might not have killed her.”

“No,” Nurse Blanchard said. “But—it did. And, she wanted it to.”

Monteath had not been told of the circumstances of his wife's death—not by Nurse Blanchard certainly; she was almost sure not by the physician. He had been let believe she had died peacefully, after a second attack which, while it had not been thought probable, had always been a possibility.

“What good would it have done to tell him?” Nurse Blanchard asked.

“None,” Bill said. “You're quite certain she hadn't heard of this business at the cottage. The shooting of this man?”

“I'm as sure as I can be,” Nurse Blanchard said. “Nothing that would worry her. We always try to avoid that.”

Weigand looked at the telephone and did not see it. In effect, Grace Monteath had killed herself because she no longer wanted to live. Because she had “spoiled” something, “spoiled everything.” And someone—almost certainly her husband—was not to try to do anything, because there was nothing that could be done.

And somehow, Bill told himself, that is linked with this. It was irrational to decide so; there was no evidence to support the decision. But Bill knew there was a link. Call it a hunch. Call it that strange, urgent tightening of the nerves. It was linked by Monteath himself. By a man named Behren. Or, now, a man named Barron—Albert Barron.

Bill consulted a telephone book. There was half a column of Barrons, including several Alberts. He used the telephone. The Albert Barron who was associated, as sales manager, with Wilmot's Emporium, lived in Mount Kisco. He had a telephone number, and Bill asked for it. For a long time a telephone rang somewhere in Mount Kisco, and was not answered. Bill hung up while it was still ringing.

He drummed with fingers on the surface of his desk. He took up the telephone again, got another number from the files. Mr. Bertram Dewsnap lived in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn which seemed, at the moment, almost as far as Mount Kisco.

Bill called Mr. Dewsnap. This time the telephone was answered. Mr. Dewsnap was anxious, as always, to be of help. No, he had no plans for the evening. He would be at home. If Captain Weigand wanted to come, to ask about this new thing which had come up, Mr. Dewsnap would be waiting to give what help he could. He couldn't imagine what it would be, but still—

Bill went down to his car. He drove toward Brooklyn.

There were lights in almost all the comfortable houses, set back with decent reserve on either side of the comfortable street in Forest Hills. Cars stood against the curb in front of some of the houses, and in the driveways of others—sensible, family cars; cars for shopping, for driving to the station, for unhurried vacation trips in the summer. Parked in front of the home of Mrs. Gertrude Wilmot, Mullins's car looked like any of the others. Mullins himself, getting out, might have been, in the gentle light which came from widely distributed street lamps, which came, too, from the houses themselves, any husband and father coming home, a little late—“some things came up at the last minute, mother”—from any office in the city.

Sergeant Mullins stood for a moment beside the small sedan and looked up and down the street. Some of the people had gone to the early show; they had left lights on in entrance halls. Sergeant Mullins counted the number of houses which, were he a burglar, he would be reasonably sure he could enter safely—houses where lights in entrance halls, and not elsewhere, said, “We've all gone to the movies. Come and get whatever we have.” Sergeant Mullins walked up the cement path, and up wooden steps, to the porch of Mrs. Gertrude Wilmot's home. He pressed the doorbell. Inside a bell shrilled.

A radio, or television, sounded in the house. Perhaps Mrs. Wilmot, living others' lives, laughing others' laughter, had not heard the bell. Mullins pressed again, this time, automatically, twice in quick succession. The sound stopped inside; the porch light went on; after a moment the door opened and Mrs. Gertrude Wilmot, plump and comfortable, looked up at Mullins from blue eyes and said, “Oh, you're one of the policemen, aren't you?”

“Yes ma'm,” Mullins said. “There're one or two points, Mrs. Wilmot.”

“Come in,” Mrs. Wilmot said. “Do come in, Mr.—?” Mullins told her his name, he went in. The chintz living room was bright; silk-shaded lamps, a pair of them with fringe, were warm centers of light. It was a very pretty room, Sergeant Mullins thought. He would not have supposed, however, that Mrs. Gertrude Wilmot smoked a pipe. Mullins did not permit himself to appear to sniff.

“I do hope I can help,” Mrs. Wilmot said.

“The captain wonders—” Mullins said.

“Please sit down, sergeant,” Mrs. Wilmot said. “I wonder if I couldn't get you a cup of coffee?”

“I guess not, ma'm,” Mullins said. “The captain wonders whether you can't give us a little more complete description of this cab you took last night. This morning, rather. The one you took home?”

“Oh dear,” Mrs. Wilmot said. “I'm so afraid I can't, sergeant. I didn't notice. It was—it was just a taxicab. And the driver didn't say much. I always mean to look at the picture and make sure that the driver is really the right man, but somehow I never do.”

“No ma'm,” Mullins said. “Nobody does much. Still—” He paused. “You see,” he said, “they like us to get all the loose ends tied up. You see what I mean, Mrs. Wilmot? What people call shipshape. We haven't been able to find the driver of the cab you took. We'd like to take a look at his trip record sheet, so we wouldn't have to bother you any more.”

“So you'd know I really did take a cab,” she said. “Didn't just say I did, but really go back and kill my former husband?”

“Nobody says that,” Mullins told her. “We—well, we just want it made certain you couldn't of.” Mullins paused. A familiar voice was in his remembering ears. “Couldn't have,” Mullins said, with care. “But, if you don't recall, you don't.”

She was, she said, terribly sorry.

“You came out here just for that?” she asked.

Sometimes, Mullins told her, they had to go a long way for very little. Just to get one fact for the record—or to try to get it.

“All the way out for nothing,” she said. “I'm so sorry. Can't I at least give you a cup of coffee? Or even—something a little stronger?”

It was very nice of her, but no. Mullins then appeared to remember something else.

“There's one other point,” he said. “Have you seen your nephew—Mr. Parsons, that is—today?”

Her face clouded. She shook her head.

“I did so hope he'd call me up,” she said. “But—nothing. I'm so worried he's—well, you know—I—”

“There're one or two points the captain thinks he might help clear up,” Mullins said. He spoke a little more loudly than was entirely necessary; it was as if he had rather suddenly come to the conclusion that Mrs. Wilmot was deaf. “One's about a topcoat.” The last was louder than ever. Then Mullins said, “Come now, Mrs. Wilmot. Don't tell me you smoke a pipe.”

“No,” Clyde Parsons said. He stood in a doorway which led from the living room to a room behind it. “No. She couldn't very well get you to believe that, could she? Not Aunt Trudie.” He put a hand on the frame of the doorway. “Not that she wouldn't try,” he said. “She'd try damn near anything, bless her.”

“Oh Clyde!” Mrs. Wilmot said. “I'm so
sorry,
Clyde.”

“We were foolish to try it,” Parsons said. “Doesn't look so good, now we didn't get away with it. Does it, sergeant?”

“No,” Mullins said. “It wasn't very bright, Mr. Parsons. If it had been a cigarette, now, it would have been—” He broke off and regarded Mrs. Wilmot. “Even that wouldn't have been so good,” he said. “What was the idea, Mr. Parsons?”

“Not that I know anything I haven't told you,” Parsons said. He came into the room. He was very pale; his hand shook a little as he took his pipe out of his pocket and put it between his teeth. “I just couldn't see any point in going over it again.”

“He's not well,” Mrs. Wilmot said. “He's in no condition to be—”

“Now, Trudie,” Clyde Parsons said, and his voice was gentle.

“Well, you're not,” she said. “You need a good rest and—”

“I,” Parsons said, “have got one of the world's fanciest hangovers. I've got the shakes. The sergeant can see what's the matter with me, Trudie. My head's in pieces. I need a drink. I'm not taking one.”

“Oh dear,” Mrs. Wilmot said. “Perhaps under the circumstances you ought—”

“No,” Parsons said. “I guess I won't, Trudie. Well, sergeant, what's this about a topcoat?”

“You lost yours last night,” Mullins told him. “It might be important where you lost it.”

“I don't know,” Parsons said. He sat down, rather slowly, a little carefully. “That is—yes, I seem to have lost it. I don't know where. This morning when I woke up, it wasn't around. That's all I know.” He nodded. “Believe it or not,” he said. “That's all I know about it. I pulled a blank—a complete blank.”

“You didn't have it when you got home about four this morning,” Mullins said. “But—we hear your coat was found, later, in Mr. Wilmot's apartment.”

Parsons looked quickly at Gertrude Wilmot. He looked away, again at Mullins.

“I gotta tell you, I guess,” Mullins said. “You don't have to answer anything without a lawyer, if you want one.”

Parsons shook his head.

“I can't answer,” he said. “A lawyer wouldn't help. I don't know, sergeant. That is—”

“But,” Gertrude Wilmot said, “I know, Clyde. And I'm going to tell the sergeant. Because there isn't anything to hide and we—we don't
need
a lawyer.”

It was rather more than Mullins had bargained for. That, if the relationship between Clyde Parsons and his aunt was as close as Frank had indicated, he might well go to her had been obvious. That he would wait there, smoking a pipe to make his presence known, until the police arrived, was possible, but not to be expected. That now Mrs. Wilmot was “going to tell the sergeant” was something the sergeant had not anticipated. But of course, Mullins thought, if the nice little lady was going to tell too much it might help and—they couldn't hold her to it. Not with only Mullins to hear.