Calamity Town (10 page)

‘That's not the answer,' said Ellery stubbornly. ‘There's a pattern here. His conduct doesn't
fit
, Patty. If only he'd talk. But he won't. Ed Hotchkiss brought him home in the cab last night. I was waiting on the porch—Nora'd gone to bed. Jim was pretty well illuminated. But when I began to pump him—' Ellery shrugged. ‘He swung at me…
Pat
.'

Pat jerked. ‘What?'

‘He's pawning jewelry.'

‘Pawning jewelry! Whose?'

‘I followed him at lunch today, when he left the bank. He ducked into Simpson's, on the Square, and pawned what looked to me like a cameo brooch set with rubies.'

‘That's Nora's! Aunt Tabitha gave it to her as a high-school graduation present!'

Ellery took her hands. ‘Jim has no money of his own, has he?'

‘None except what he earns.' Pat's lips tightened. ‘My father spoke to him the other day. About his work. Jim's neglecting it. You know Pop. Gentle as a lamb. It must have embarrassed him dreadfully. But Jim snapped at him, and poor Pop just blinked and walked away. And have you noticed how my mother's been looking?'

‘Dazed.'

‘Muth won't admit anything's wrong—even to me. Nobody will, nobody. And Nora's worse than any of them! And the town—Emmy DuPré's busier than Goebbels! They're all whispering…I hate them! I hate the town, I hate Jim…'

Ellery had to put his arms around her.

Nora planned Thanksgiving with a sort of desperation—a woman trying to hold on to her world as it growled and heaved about her. There were two of Wilcy Gallimard's fanciest toms, and chestnuts to be grated in absurd quantities, and cranberries from Bald Mountain to be mashed, and turnips and pumpkins and goodies galore…all requiring preparation, fuss, work, with and without Alberta Manaskas's help…all requiring
concentration
. And while her house filled with savory odors, Nora would brook no assistance from anyone but Alberta—not Pat, not Hermione, not even old Ludie, who went about muttering for days about ‘these snippy young know-it-all brides.'

Hermy dabbed at her eyes. ‘It's the first Thanksgiving since we were married, John, that I haven't made the family dinner. Nora baby—your table's so beautiful!'

‘Maybe this time,' chuckled John F., ‘I won't have indigestion. Bring on that turkey and stuffing!'

But Nora shooed them all into the living room—things weren't quite ready. Jim, a little drawn, but sober, wanted to stay and help. Nora smiled pallidly at him and sent him after the others.

Mr Queen strolled out to the Haight porch, so he was the first to greet Lola Wright as she came up the walk.

‘Hello,' said Lola. ‘You bum.'

‘Hello yourself.'

Lola was wearing the same pair of slacks, the same tight-fitting sweater, the same ribbon in her hair. And from her wry mouth came the same fumes of Scotch. ‘Don't look at me that way, stranger! I'm invited. Fact. Nora. Family reunion an' stuff. Kiss and make up. I'm broad-minded. But you're a bum just the same. How come no see little Lola?'

‘Novel.'

‘Your eye,' laughed Lola, steadying herself against his arm. ‘No writer works more than a few hours a day, if that. It's my Snuffy. You're making love to Pat. ‘Sall right. You could do worse. She's even got a brain on that swell chassis.'

‘I could do worse, but I'm not doing anything, Lola.'

‘Ah, noble, too. Well, give 'em hell, brother. Excuse me. I've got to go jab my family's sensibilities.' And Lola walked, carefully, into her sister's house. Mr Queen waited on the porch a decent interval, and then followed. He came upon a scene of purest gaiety. It took keen eyes to detect the emotional confusion behind Hermy's sweet smile, and the quivering of John F.'s hand as he accepted a Martini from Jim. Pat forced one on Ellery; so Ellery proposed a toast to ‘a wonderful family,' at which they all drank grimly.

Then Nora, all flushed from the kitchen, hustled them into the dining room; and they dutifully exclaimed over the magazine-illustration table…Rosemary Haight holding on to John F.'s arm.

It happened just as Jim was dishing out second helpings of turkey. Nora was passing her mother's plate when she gasped, and the full platter fell into her lap. The plate—Nora's precious Spode—crashed on the floor. Jim gripped the arms of his chair. Nora was on her feet, palms pressed against the cloth, her mouth writhing in a horrid spasm.

‘Nora!'

Ellery reached Nora in one leap. She pushed at him feebly, licking her lips, white as the new cloth. Then with a cry she ran, snatching herself from Ellery's grip with surprising strength. They heard her stumble upstairs, the click of a door.

‘She's sick. Nora's sick!'

‘Nora—where are you?'

‘Call Doc Willoughby, somebody!'

Ellery and Jim reached the upper floor together, Jim looking around like a wild man. But Ellery was already pounding on the bathroom door. ‘Nora!' Jim shouted. ‘Open the door! What's the matter with you?'

Then Pat got there, and the others. ‘Dr Willoughby will be right over,' said Lola. ‘Where is she? Get out of here, you men!'

‘Has she gone crazy?' gasped Rosemary.

‘Break the door down!' commanded Pat. ‘Ellery, break it down! Jim—Pop—help him!'

‘Out of the way, Jim,' said Ellery. ‘You're a bloody nuisance!'

But at the first impact, Nora screamed. ‘If anyone comes in here I'll—I'll…
Don't come in!
'

Hermy was making mewing sounds, like a sick cat, and John F. kept saying: ‘Now Hermy. Now Hermy. Now Hermy'

At the third assault the door gave. Ellery catapulted into the bathroom, and pounced. Nora was leaning over the basin, trembling, weak, greenish, swallowing huge spoonfuls of milk of magnesia. She turned a queerly triumphant look on him as she slumped, fainting, into his arms.

But later, when she came to in her bed, there was a scene. ‘I feel like a—like an animal in a zoo! Please, Mother—get everybody out of here!' They all left except Mrs Wright and Jim. Ellery heard Nora from the upper-hall landing. Her tone was stridulous; the words piled on one another. ‘No, no, no! I
won't
have him! I don't
want
to see him!'

‘But dearest,' wailed Hermy, ‘Dr Willoughby—surely the doctor who brought you into the world—'

‘If that old—old goat comes near me,' screamed Nora, ‘I'll do something desperate! I'll commit suicide! I'll jump out the window!'

‘Nora,' groaned Jim.

‘Get out of here! Mother, you too!'

Pat and Lola went to the bedroom door and called their mother urgently. ‘Mother, she's hysterical. Let her alone—she'll calm down.' Hermy crept out, followed by Jim, who was red about the eyes and seemed bewildered.

They heard Nora gagging inside. And crying.

When Dr Willoughby arrived, breathless, John F. said it was a mistake, and sent him away.

Ellery softly closed his door. But he knew before he turned on the light that someone was in the room. He pressed the switch and said: ‘Pat?'

Pat lay on his bed in a cramped curl. There was a damp spot on the pillow, near her face. ‘I've been waiting up for you.' Pat blinked in the light. ‘What time is it?'

‘Past midnight.' Ellery switched the light off and sat down beside her. ‘How is Nora?'

‘She says she's fine. I guess she'll be all right.' Pat was silent for a moment. ‘Where did
you
disappear to?'

‘Ed Hotchkiss drove me over to Connhaven.'

‘Connhaven! That's seventy-five miles.' Pat sat up abruptly. ‘Ellery, what did you do?'

‘I took the contents of Nora's plate over to a research laboratory. Connhaven has a good one, I discovered. And…' He paused. ‘As you say, it's seventy-five miles—from Wrightsville.'

‘Did you—did they—?'

‘They found nothing.'

‘Then maybe—'

Ellery got off the bed and began to walk up and down in the dark room. ‘Maybe anything. The cocktails. The soup. The hors d'oeuvres. It was a long shot; I knew it wouldn't work out. Wherever she got it, though, it was in her food or drink. Arsenic. All the symptoms. Lucky she remembered to swallow milk of magnesia—it's an emergency antidote for arsenic poisoning.'

‘And today is…Thanksgiving Day,' said Pat stiffly. ‘Jim's letter to Rosemary—dated November twenty-eighth…today. “My wife is sick.”
My wife is sick
, Ellery!'

‘Whoa, Patty. You've been doing fine…It could be a coincidence.'

‘You think so?'

‘It may have been a sudden attack of indigestion. Nora's in a dither. She's read the letters, she's seen that passage about arsenic in the toxicology book—it may all be psychological.'

‘Yes…'

‘Our imaginations may be running away with us. At any rate, there's time. If a pattern exists, this is just the beginning.'

‘Yes…'

‘Pat, I promise you:
Nora won't die
.'

‘Oh, Ellery' She came to him in the darkness and buried her face in his coat. ‘I'm so glad you're here…'

‘Get out of my bedroom,' said Mr Queen tenderly, ‘before your pa comes at me with a shotgun.'

12

Christmas: The Second Warning

The first snows fell. Breaths steamed in the valleys. Hermy was busy planning her Christmas baskets for the Poor Farm. Up in the hills skis were flashing and boys watched restlessly for the ponds to freeze. But Nora…Nora and Jim were enigmas. Nora recovered from her Thanksgiving Day ‘indisposition,' a little paler, a little thinner, a little more nervous, but self-possessed. But occasionally she seemed frightened, and she would not talk. To anyone. Her mother tried. ‘Nora, what's wrong? You can tell me—'

‘Nothing. What's the matter with everybody?'

‘But Jim's drinking, dear. It's all over town,' groaned Hermy. ‘It's getting to be a—a national disgrace! And you and Jim
are
quarreling—that
is
a fact…'

Nora set her small mouth. ‘Mother, you'll simply have to let me run my own life.'

‘Your father's worried—'

‘I'm sorry, Mother. It's my life.'

‘Is it Rosemary who's causing all these arguments? She's always taking Jim off and whispering to him. How long is she going to stay with you? Nora darling, I'm your mother. You can confide in your mother—' But Nora ran away, crying.

Pat was ageing visibly. ‘Ellery, the three letters…they're still in Nora's hatbox in her closet. I looked last night. I couldn't help it.'

‘I know,' sighed Ellery.

‘You've been keeping tabs, too?'

‘Yes. Patty, she's been rereading them. They show signs of being handled—'

‘But why won't Nor face the truth?' cried Pat. ‘She knows that November twenty-eighth marked the first attack—that first letter told her so! Yet she won't have the doctor, she won't take any steps to defend herself, she refuses help…I can't understand her!'

‘Maybe,' said Ellery carefully, ‘Nora's afraid to face the scandal.' Pat's eyes opened wide. ‘You told me how she retreated from the world when Jim left her on their scheduled wedding day several years ago. There's a deep streak of small-town pride in your sister Nora, Pat. She can't abide being talked about. If this ever came out—'

‘That's it,' said Pat in a wondering voice. ‘I was stupid not to have seen it before. She's ignoring it, like a child. Close your eyes and you won't see the bogeyman. You're right, Ellery.
It's the town she's afraid of!
'

The Monday evening before Christmas Mr Queen was sitting on a stump just beyond the edge of the woods, watching 460 Hill Drive. There was no moon; but it was a still night and sounds carried crisply and far. Jim and Nora were at it again. Mr Queen chafed his cold hands. It was about money. Nora was shrill. Where was he spending his money? What had happened to her cameo brooch? ‘Jim, you've got to tell me. This can't go on. It can't!'

Jim's voice was a mutter at first, but then it began to rise, like lava. ‘Don't put me through a third degree!'

Mr Queen listened intently for something new, a clue to conduct. He heard nothing he had not already learned. Two young people screaming at each other on a winter's night, while he sat like a fool in the cold and eavesdropped. He rose from the stump and, skirting the fringe of woods, made for the Wright house and warmth. But then he stopped. The front door of Calamity House—how much apter the phrase seemed these days!—had slammed. Ellery sprinted through the snow, keeping in the shadows of the big house. Jim Haight was plowing down the walk unevenly. He jumped into his car. Ellery ran to the Wright garage. He had an arrangement with Pat Wright: she always left the keys of her convertible in the ignition lock for his use in an emergency. Jim's car sloshed down the Hill at a dangerous pace, and Ellery followed. He did not turn on Pat's headlights; he could see well enough by the lights of Jim's car. Route 16…Vic Carlatti's…

It was almost ten o'clock when Jim staggered out of the
Hot Spot
and got into his car again. By the weave and lurch of the car Ellery knew Jim was very drunk. Was he going home? No. The turn-off to town. Going into town! Where?

Jim skidded to a stop before a poor wooden tenement in the heart of Low Village. He reeled into the dark hallway. A 25-watt bulb burned drearily in the hall; by its light Ellery saw Jim creep up the stairs, knock at a door with a split, paint-blistered panel. ‘Jim!' Lola Wright's exclamation. The door closed.

Ellery slipped up the stairs, feeling each step for its creaky spot before putting his full weight on it. At the landing he did not hesitate; he went swiftly to Lola's door and pressed his ear to the thin panel. ‘But you got to,' he heard Jim cry. ‘Lola, don' turn me down. ‘M a desp'r't man. ‘M desp'r't…'