The Door (21 page)

“You saw or heard nothing suspicious? Near the lot, I mean?”

“I heard some dogs barking.”

“Where?”

“Back on the Larimer lot.”

“You knew Miss Bell’s dogs well, didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Well enough to recognize the noise they made? A dog’s bark is as individual as a man’s voice, Mr. Blake.”

“I didn’t recognize them, no.”

“Where did you put the sword-stick, on your return?”

“In the hall, with my others.”

“And it disappeared from there?”

There must have been a slight delay, a slower reaction to that question.

“It disappeared. Yes.”

“Just when?”

“I don’t know. I was ill at the time.”

“How did you learn that it was gone?”

“I had gone into the hall to call Amos. I looked down, and it was not there.”

“You didn’t ask Amos about it?”

“I don’t recall. I think possibly I did.”

“And he said it was missing?”

“That’s the way I remember it.”

“Now, Mr. Blake, I am going to the night of the twenty-seventh of April. Where were you that night?”

“The twenty-seventh of April?”

“The night Judy Somers was struck down in the Bell garage.”

Jim stared across the desk.

“You are not intimating that I attacked my own niece, are you?”

“I have asked you a question.”

“I was at home. So far as I can recall, I have not been out of the house at night since Sarah Gittings was killed. And I certainly never struck Judy. That’s—that’s ridiculous.”

The District Attorney glanced at the paper in front of him.

“Do you recall the night when Miss Bell went to see you, after Florence Gunther’s body was found?”

“Perfectly.”

“Had you sent for her?”

“No.”

“Not telephoned, or sent any message?”

“None whatever.”

“She walked over?”

“Yes.”

“But you sent her home in your car?”

“I did.”

“During the course of that visit, were the two crimes discussed?”

“Somewhat.”

“Did you make any suggestion to Miss Bell about your car?”

“I don’t know what you mean. It had been her car. I bought it from her.”

“There was nothing said about the carpet of that car?”

“Nothing.”

“Do you keep the mileage of this car, Mr. Blake?”

“No. Amos may. I don’t know.”

“Who carries the key to the garage?”

“Amos. I don’t drive myself.”

“You don’t know how to drive?”

“I can drive, but I dislike it.”

“Is the window of the garage kept locked?”

“Usually. Not necessarily.”

“If some one entered the garage by a window, could he take the car out?”

“Yes. The doors to the alley are bolted. The key is to the small door into the garden.”

“That is, some one who wished to take out the car could climb through the window, providing it was not locked, and take the car out?”

“Probably. The window is rather high.”

“But if he took a chair from the garden it would be easy?”

“I imagine so. I hadn’t thought of it.”

“So that if Amos had the key, it would still be possible to take the car out?”

“I never crawled through a window and took that car out. If that’s what you mean.”

“Do you know Miss Bell’s garage?”

“I’ve been in it once or twice.”

“It overlooks the ravine in the park, doesn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know the tool room?”

“I’ve never been in it.”

“But you know she keeps a ladder there?”

“I know she has a ladder. I don’t know where she keeps it.”

This, or something very like it, went on for hours. And some time in that long interrogation they brought in the man Parrott. He came in on some excuse or other, looked Jim over and went out again. Jim was not suspicious.

But by midnight he was showing signs of exhaustion, and even the District Attorney showed strain. It was a warm spring night. The men who came and went had taken off their coats, but Jim still sat there in his hard chair, neat and tidy, and twitching, and faced them all down.

“You still decline to account for the time between seven o’clock and ten-thirty, on the night of April eighteenth?”

“I shall do that if necessary. Not before.”

“What were your relations with Sarah Gittings?”

“Relations? I knew her, of course. Had known her for years.”

“In case of distress she might come to you?”

“She might, yes.”

“Then this letter to you would not be unusual.”

“I never received a letter from her. Why should she write me? She could have seen me at any time.”

“We have absolute proof that she did write to you, Mr. Blake. And we believe that you received the letter.”

“You can’t prove that.”

“Perhaps not, but I can damned well try. Some one made an appointment to meet Sarah Gittings on the night she was killed; to meet her and see with his own eyes this copy of Howard Somers’ will which the Gunther girl had abstracted from the files. From that appointment Sarah Gittings never returned, and during that evening the copy of the will disappeared.”

“Why should I destroy it? Or her? The original document was safe in New York.”

“Did you know Florence Gunther?”

“No.”

“Never saw her?”

“No.”

“Never waited for her on Halkett Street, near a fruit stand, with a car?”

“Absolutely no.”

And, if the two previous denials had lacked force, this last was impressive enough.

But the heat and the tension were telling on them both. Hours had passed, putting a fine edge on Jim’s nerves. He had exhausted his cigars, and no one offered him any. He asked for water, and after a long delay it came.

And then, on top of his exhaustion he was told that Howard Somers had been poisoned. He very nearly collapsed, but if they had hoped to wear him into confession they were disappointed. He was still fighting. But he said a curious thing.

“How do you know he was poisoned? How do you know he didn’t take the stuff himself?”

“I’m not answering questions. I’m asking them.”

Jim was angry now, however, and he braced himself for one last effort.

“I never went to New York to see Howard Somers the night he died. Some one else used my name, that’s all. And the more I think over this case—and God knows it’s all I do think of—the more I am convinced that a definite attempt is being made to put the guilt on me.

“Why would I have killed him? I stood to lose by his death, not to gain. He was my sister’s husband and my friend. If you are trying to show that I escaped the watch on my house, climbed the window of my garage and drove my car to New York that night, I swear before God that I never did it, or thought of it. As for this will, I had never heard of a second will until Alex Davis revealed its existence in New York.

“I swear before God that I have never killed any one, have never thought of killing any one. And I protest against your methods. You are wearing me out. But you can’t wear me into confession. I’m innocent.”

They had worn him out, however. His face was gray with exhaustion, and sweat was running down his face. Now and then he ran his finger under his collar, as though it choked him. The whirring of an electric fan, the tick of a clock on the wall, and the District Attorney never relaxing; watching him, firing at him his staccato questions, deliberately trying to torture him until confession would be sheer relief.

Some time in that last half hour a memorandum was placed on the desk, and the District Attorney nodded his head.

“Send him in when he comes.”

Jim had listened, with an impassive face. But he felt—perhaps his exhaustion had sharpened his faculties—that something vital had happened. The questions began again, sharper, a little excitement in them.

“You have admitted that on the night Sarah Gittings was killed, you carried with you this sword-stick, and that later on it disappeared. You had no theories about that disappearance?”

“None whatever.”

“You left it in the hall and it disappeared?”

“Yes.”

“And when did you notice that it had disappeared?”

“It was several days later. I don’t know exactly.”

“I think you do know exactly, Mr. Blake. It disappeared on the day Sarah Gittings’ body was found.”

“Possibly. I’m not certain.”

“What is your explanation of that disappearance?”

“I’ve told you that before. I think it was stolen.”

“As a part of the plot against you?”

“Possibly.”

“You did not conceal it yourself? I mean, you did not feel that its presence was a dangerous thing in your house?”

“I thought of that, naturally. Yes.”

“But you did not hide it.”

Jim made an effort, moistened his dry lips.

“Not exactly. I put it in a closet.”

“What closet?”

“The liquor closet, in the hall.”

“And you locked it there?”

“Yes.”

“Then the story that it was missing from the hall was not true?”

“Not entirely. But it is true that it disappeared. It was taken from there.”

“You had the key to that closet?”

“Yes.”

“Was there more than one key?”

“No. I have wondered since if Amos took it. I was in bed. He could have taken the key.”

“And why would Amos do that?”

He was utterly confused by that time, faint, sagged in his chair and gray of face.

“He may have known—he may have thought—”

“What did Amos know?”

And then Inspector Harrison walked into the room, and laid something on the table. Jim took one look at it, and fainted dead away.

I
N THE CELLAR INSPECTOR
Harrison had renewed his prowling about, the Federal officers mildly interested, and Amos watching his movements with a sort of fascinated terror.

He rapped on the cement walls again, inspected the ceiling. Now and then, furtively, he looked at the negro, and it seemed to him that the negro was increasingly alarmed each time he neared the coal cellar. But the coal cellar was full of coal. It had overflowed into the main cellar, and lay about. And suddenly Inspector Harrison remembered that it was spring.

“Plenty of coal, for the summer?” he said to Amos. “Cook with coal?”

“No sir. With gas,” said Amos.

“And when did you get in all this coal?”

“I don’t rightly remember, sir. Seems to me it was in May some time.”

Inspector Harrison stooped down, and cleared a few lumps from the margin of the heap.

“What’s under here? Cement?”

“I don’t rightly know, sir.”

But it was not cement.

There was a shovel on the coal, and at first they put Amos to work on it. He was terrified. He made noisy protests, but there were three of them, grim and determined. They were not inhuman, however, for as the negro began to play out they took the shovel from him. One after the other, they dug into the coal, throwing it out into the clean cemented floor, scrutinizing it, and then falling to work again. It required more than two hours to clear the place, but at last they reached the end and they had found nothing.

There was the hard-pounded black earth, glistening with black dust under their flashlights, and no sign that it had been disturbed. One of the men laughed.

“Well, that’s that,” he said, “and now I want a bath and a bed. Let’s go.”

But the Inspector was not listening. He was watching Amos, and Amos was smiling again.

“If that’s all you gentlemen want,” he said, “you all can go up and I’ll put out the light.”

The Inspector was wiping his face, which was streaming.

“What’s the hurry, Amos?” he said gently.

“There’s no liquor here, sir. You’ve seen for yourself.”

“Have I? Well, maybe that’s so. Now, Amos, if you’ll go wherever you have to go to get a bucket of water, and will bring it here—”

“There’s a lavatory on the first floor, sir.”

“Do what you’re told,” the Inspector said sharply. “And be quick about it.”

The Federal officers were examining their hands for blisters and swearing at the dust. Amos went cheerfully up the cellar stairs, and came back in a moment with his pail. He carried soap and a towel also, and his face was a study when the Inspector passed them back to him.

The next procedure, however, astounded the negro. With one of the officers holding a light close to the surface of the ground, the Inspector went over it carefully. He would pour a little water on the earth and watch it, then move on, repeating the performance.

Suddenly he muttered something and asked for the shovel. Amos gave it to him, his eyes fixed on the earth, his color the peculiar gray of the terrified negro.

And there, not more than a foot beneath the surface, Inspector Harrison came across the sword-stick.

I can still see the rather smug complacence of his manner at the trial.

“I then sent Amos for a pail of water.”

“Perhaps you would better explain to the jury your purpose in sending for that water.”

“In case of buried objects the surface of the ground may not appear to have been disturbed. In case however that it has been recently dug up, small bubbles of air will appear when water has been poured over it.”

“And were there such bubbles?”

“Plenty of them.”

So there they stood in that cellar, the four of them. One of the Federal officers whistled softly. Amos was staring at the thing, pop-eyed with terror. It must have savored to him of witchcraft, that discovery; this detective, this policeman, muttering incantations to himself and then turning out that weapon into the cruel light.

“My Gawd Amighty!” said Amos, and turning, ran up the stairs.

They did not bother to follow him. The Inspector carefully wrapped the thing in paper, and some one telephoned to the District Attorney’s office. They had been holding poor Jim for the message.

But they held him after the message also. Jim Blake was placed under arrest that night, and within three days he had been indicted by the Grand Jury for the murder of Sarah Gittings.

He was to be tried only for the murder of poor Sarah, but in the opinion of the public at that time Jim Blake was guilty of two, and in the minds of the police, of a third one.