Unexpected Night (15 page)

“I'll talk to the feller,” he said, “and much good it will do. He's as slippery as an eel. The girl never even saw him, and when he finds that out, he'll have us where he wants us.”

“He has you where he wants you now. He has you all hypnotised.”

“Why should he, or anybody else, make away with this poor actress? Callaghan says she hadn't an enemy in the world, much less at the Cove. Who benefits by her death, I'd like to know?”

“Nobody but her understudy, I should think. Are you coming back to the Beach with us?”

“No. Cogswell's driving me to the Centre.”

Sanderson approached. “Going?” he asked.

“All ready.”

Sanderson got into the car, and Gamadge slid behind the wheel. Mitchell glowered at the glittering waters of the Cove.

“Wonder if Laroche will have to take off his clothes and wade out after Atwood,” he reflected, aloud. “There's at least six swimmers out there; pretty far out, too. Hey, Laroche.”

The trooper woke from his doze under the tree, and got to his feet; but Atwood's reedy voice said at Mitchell's elbow: “No need to call up the reserves. Here I am, right on the carpet.”

The suddenness of his appearance suggested that he had sprung from the ground. Mitchell, turning on him, asked with the irritability of one who has been startled: “Where'd you come from?”

“From behind Mr. Gamadge's car. I've been admiring it, and also doing a teeny-weeny bit of eavesdropping. You wouldn't blame me, would you?”

Mitchell flapped a hand at the state policeman, meanwhile gazing at the innocent face of his questioner with deep annoyance. Mr. Atwood, who was now dressed in a green shirt, pale fawn-coloured trousers, and brown-and-white sport shoes, leaned an arm on the sill of the car window next to Gamadge, and returned the look, blandly.

“A lizard; that's what he reminds me of,” reflected Gamadge, and said aloud, “Perhaps it's the green shirt, though.”

“You don't care for it?” The narrow eyes, all but closed against the afternoon glare, slid sideways. Gamadge said:

“Excuse me. I didn't realise that I was thinking aloud. Very striking. Just the colour of a chameleon I had once.”

“I dress the part. Don't you recognise in me, Mr. Gamadge, a spirit of air and fire?” asked Atwood, plaintively. “Callaghan says I'm a leprechaun.”

“He may be right.” Gamadge considered him thoughtfully.

“You, Mr. Gamadge, consider yourself wiser than the children of light, do you not?”

“Far from it. Could you be persuaded to shed your Elemental qualities for a minute or two, and help us over a little difficulty we find ourselves in?”

“Delighted, if I can; but I'm afraid I can't.”

Mitchell burst out impatiently: “Why can't you come out with it, and admit that you went down there last night to meet the boy? It needn't get you into any trouble.”

“Oh, no; of course not.” Atwood looked amused.

“Perhaps you never saw him at all. He might have died and gone over the edge of the rock before you showed up. All we want is information—for the inquest,” continued Mitchell, persuasively. “Otherwise, those ladies might be kept hanging around here for days. We don't want to adjourn the inquest.”

“That would be a shame, I agree.”

“Then why not make it easy for us, and everybody concerned, and admit he was on that cliff waiting for you?”

“You wouldn't want me to perjure myself, I hope?”

“If you'd be perjuring yourself by saying that, I'll retire and sacrifice my pension.”

“Any particular reason for this certainty, or is it merely wishful thinking?”

“You are known to have been off the place, last night.”

“Seen somewhere else, was I?”

“Do you deny that you drove your car back in here shortly before three o'clock?”

Atwood's sharp attention relaxed; he smiled widely, and replied: “No, I don't entirely deny it. In a way, it's perfectly true. Now, don't get your hopes up, because I'm going to disappoint you. Have you noticed, Mr. Mitchell, that we rejoice in two parking places?”

“I hadn't.”

“No reason why you should, since the other one is not at present in use. It's over there, at the mouth of the lane, under the trees. You can imagine what the Cove is like, in rainy weather; we drive all our cars over there, and squeeze them in. You'll probably see the tracks, if you look for them. The only trouble, apart from getting them out again, is that it's a sylvan spot, and simply crawling with wild life. Upholstery is sometimes gnawed by rodents, spiders drop down the backs of our necks, ants congregate in the mats. You can imagine.”

He glanced up at Gamadge, who was listening with the tolerance of one who hears a mildly interesting tale, and glanced away again:

“My wife,” he continued, “has implored me not to leave our poor old Ford out there all night. There it is.” He waved benignly toward a battered antiquity, standing a few yards away, down the line. “A poor thing, but our only means of transport. But, being somewhat flustered by the preparations for our opening, I forgot it last night. However, I had been drinking a good deal of black coffee during the course of the evening, and I was not sleeping as soundly as usual. What I mean is,” he added hastily, “I slept soundly, but I woke once or twice. The second time this happened, I remembered the car. I arose, crossed the clearing as quietly as possible, found my way as best I could through the fog, got into the bus, and propelled it as noiselessly as possible to the spot where it now stands. I knew better than to wake anybody up; really and truly, I believe our huskier young men would have murdered me, if I had. Does that solve your difficulty, Mr. Mitchell? I sincerely hope so.”

Mitchell answered, woodenly: “You didn't need any light, for all this?”

“Oh, I can see in the dark. I even saw little Susie Baker, peering out from behind that tree, down there behind the trailer,” said Atwood, in an airy tone.

“It's about as thin a story as I ever heard in my life.”

“But it will serve, Mitchell, it will serve.”

“I'll see you again. Don't go off this place.”

“Why keep on repeating that injunction? Come up to the show, to-night; you will certainly see me, if you do. Before Callaghan gets through with me, I shall be in
all
the plays.”

“I wouldn't miss it for worlds,” Gamadge assured him. Atwood turned, stared into the impassive face so near his own, and said:

“On second thought, I do not include you in the invitation, my dear sir. You have the evil eye.”

“That's unkind of you.” Gamadge started the engine, and Atwood withdrew his arm and stepped back.

“Love to my relations, Sanderson,” he said, “and all my sympathy. I'll be down to see them, when the law allows. Take good care of my aunt by marriage and my cousin Alma, won't you?”

The car started. He waved, and suddenly, as Gamadge grinned at him over a shoulder, extended the first and fourth fingers of his hand in a curiously ugly sign.

“What's he doing?” asked Sanderson, as they crossed the clearing.

“Oh—making the sign that's supposed to keep off the evil eye,” said Gamadge.

“Why on earth has he got that idea about you?”

“Goodness knows. Perhaps he didn't like my suggesting that the gods were fixing to destroy him.”

“Oh,
hubris
. I see. But do you think they are?”

“I'm not at all sure of it. Mr. Atwood wouldn't behave as he does if he weren't confoundedly satisfied with himself.”

“He thinks he can get away with anything.” Sanderson's expression was one of brooding anger. “Can't Mitchell do something or other?”

“Not without evidence; and that's the one and only thing Mr. Arthur Atwood isn't giving away.”

“Curse the little brute.” Sanderson gazed sombrely out of the window. “He's inhuman.”

“Not really, you know,” answered Gamadge. “That's all part of the performance.”

CHAPTER NINE

W
HEN THEY DREW
up at the Ocean House steps, Waldo ran out to them.

“Colonel Barclay's after you, Mr. Sanderson,” he announced. “He wants you to come right down to the cottage.”

“What for?”

“Mrs. Barclay and Fred Barclay are out somewheres, and the Colonel is having trouble with newspapers calling up. He wants help.”

“Where the devil has Fred Barclay got to?”

“I don't know. The Colonel's been telephoning and telephoning.”

“Blast it, I suppose I'd better go down.” Waldo disappeared. Gamadge said, “I'll run you along there.”

“But I can't desert like this. I'll have to see whether Mrs. Cowden—”

“I'm taking her and Miss Cowden out for a stroll on the golf course.”

“No! That's splendid. I wish I could come along.”

“I was going to suggest it, but I suppose you'd better see what the Colonel wants.”

Gamadge made the trip to the Barclay cottage in four minutes. The Colonel received Sanderson with open arms, and made a valiant effort to detain Gamadge.

“These fellows are driving me out of my mind,” he complained, “and I don't know what to say to them. Can't get hold of Ormville. You'll have to help me with something discreet—formula, you know.”

“I'll do my best, sir. Less said the better I should think.”

“If I had my way, I'd say nothing—hang up on 'em; but they tell me I mustn't do that.”

“Oh, for God's sake, no. I'll handle it for you, Colonel.”

The telephone rang madly from within the cottage.

“There they go again; New York's starting now,” chattered the colonel. “The Ocean House is putting 'em all on me. My wife and Fred—don't know where they've got to.”

“It's a shame, Colonel. I'll stand by.”

Gamadge drove off to the frantic ringing of the telephone. He parked his car on the right of the hotel steps, and hurried in. Peabody sat on his bench near the desk.

“I'll be down in a minute,” Gamadge told him. “Want you to do something for me. You, mind; not Waldo. That boy's always in too much of a hurry; attracts attention. This business requires tact.”

“Yes, sir.”

Gamadge climbed to his room, changed into golf clothes, and descended to the floor below. Hoskins sat at the doorway of Room 22, looking wizened in a porter's uniform much too big for him.

“Hello,” said Gamadge. “Any callers?”

“Three. Tall, dark young feller came, just after you and Mitchell left. Looked at the sign on the door, and poked a piece of paper under before I could stop him.”

“That was Lieutenant Barclay, I suppose.”

“Whoever he was, he didn't like it much when I tapped him.”

“Startle him, did you?”

“Well, he jumped.”

“If you made Lieutenant Barclay jump, Hoskins, you performed something in the nature of a miracle.”

“He made me so mad, pushin' that paper under the door, with that sign up sayin' not to disturb, that I fished it out again.”

“You did?”

“Got down flat on my face, after he was gone, and slid it out with a foot rule I had in my pocket. I made a copy of it, and then I pushed it under again.”

“I'm shocked at you. What did it say?”

“Here it is.” Hoskins, looking at him owlishly, produced and handed over a folded sheet of Ocean House stationery. “Then,” he went on, “a lady came up. Right after lunch. Pink dress, white hat, big knitting bag with wool flowers on it.”

“That was Mrs. Barclay, Lieutenant Barclay's mother.”

“She said she was Miss Cowden's aunt. She took a little bottle out of the bag, before she saw me, and went up to the door, and started to knock. When I sneaked up on her, she put the bottle back in a hurry.”

“Aunt Julia's tonic, I suppose.”

“She was mad as anything when I told her that sign meant business; but she went off quiet.”

“Didn't try to see Mrs. Cowden?”

“No. Then the Colonel came, and he looked as though he was due for a stroke. Had a bunch of telegrams in his hand. Mrs. Cowden let him in, after I knocked and interduced him. He was quite polite about me,” said Hoskins, looking surprised. “Said I was a good idea.”

“Good for the Colonel.”

“He told her he was glad they was goin' out with you to play golf, and they could get together after dinner and get busy on the correspondence. He left the telegrams, and went off. At four, Miss Cowden rang for her tea. Peabody brought it.”