Murder in the Telephone Exchange (24 page)

“Thanks,” I murmured, lying back against the pillows. “My head is fit to split. What did I do last night to deserve this hangover?”

“Have you any aspirin?” Mac asked, looking about her.

“Top left-hand drawer of the chest of drawers,” I directed, closing my eyes and trying to marshal my brain into working lines. I remembered there were several questions I wanted to ask Mac.

“Drink this down, Maggie,” said Mac's voice. “Then you'd better try to have some more sleep. You've got the dog-watch to-night.”

“Hell!” I groaned. “I'll never do it. Have I got any sick leave owing?”

“Scurvy trick,” she answered, starting to dress rapidly. “You'll be all right presently. Didn't you sleep well'?”

I shifted to a sitting position and jammed a pillow against the small of my back.

“Too well!” I exclaimed. “It seemed like five minutes, and during that time Bertie was throwing buttinskys at me in a lively fashion. I guess one of them must have contacted to give me such a head. Have you had breakfast?”

“Yes, thanks,” Mac answered, applying lipstick skilfully. “I'll fix everything up with Mrs. Bates as I go.”

“Are you leaving already?” She met my eyes in the pink-tinted mirror.
I thought that she couldn't have slept too well herself in spite of her fresh appearance, Mac's eyes are the most tell-tale that I have ever looked into.

“I've got some shopping to do,” she declared, looking around for her hat.

“On top of the wardrobe. Before you go, Mac,” I continued slowly, “I'd like to know what made you so late last night.”

“I've told you,” she said, tilting her Breton over her eyes. “The tram got held up.”

I watched the back of her head grimly. “That was last night's story. Now give me the true one in the sober light of morning.”

“Don't be silly, Maggie,” she said coolly. I longed for the energy to get out of bed and shake her. “I'm telling you the truth.”

“Mac,” I declared firmly, “let's face things clearly. You haven't been straight with me since Wednesday night, and you know it.”

She turned around from the mirror slowly. Her eyes were those of a stranger. They looked through me with a hauteur of which I had not thought Mac capable.

“Good heavens, girl,” I yelled in exasperation, “don't you think that I'm entitled to some sort of explanation. Last night you came to me trembling with fear, begging to stay the night and now—Mac, if you're tired of me, if my friendship means no more to you, say so. I am so weary of this everlasting hedging. It's driving me mad. I can't understand what you're worrying about. You saw Sarah Compton on Wednesday night going down in the lift-right! Can't you take it in that at least two other people saw her after that? You are as far out of the picture as Clark and I are.”

Mac came over to the bed and looked down at me wistfully. “Last night, Maggie,” she said in a low voice, “you promised that you would not worry me with questions. Won't you be very much—my friend and keep that promise?” I dropped my eyes from her appealing look and wriggled about.

“I'd like to know what your game is,” I grunted. “However, I'll be mum. Sorry for the dramatic outburst.”

She went to the door and paused, one hand on the knob. “Shall I tell Mrs. Bates to send up some breakfast?”

“No, don't bother, I rarely have any. I probably won't see you until Saturday now. Are you going to the dance?”

“I'll be on duty for part of the evening, but I'll have a look in after work. Good-bye, Maggie.”

“So long,” I returned. “Mac!”

She put her head round the door. “Yes?”

“Be careful with whatever you're doing, won't you, old girl?”

I lay back against my pillows and closed my eyes, but not to court
sleep. I had no desire to conjure up weird visions again. Mrs. Bates's voice floated up to my room as she saw Mac off the premises. I heard footsteps below my window, and then the creak of the gate.

“She's gone,” I said aloud, and wondered why I had spoken so uneasily. “Now,” I continued to talk aloud in an absurd fashion, addressing two flies buzzing around on the ceiling, “let's get down to business.”

The aspirin seemed to have lived up to all its makers advertised. My brain became keen and alert as I separated and lined up facts into their chronological order. Firstly, there was the central figure of the whole case to be considered—Sarah Compton. Inspector Coleman said a ‘thoroughly bad woman.' I cocked my head on one side, considering the phrase. Well, yes, I thought I agreed with him, but somehow the description seemed a little too conclusive. True, she was a blackmailer, an adulteress and a despoiler of youth's innocence—poor Dulcie, for example. Wait a moment, one half of my mind said to the other, we'll deal with Gordon presently. To continue with Compton. She was inquisitive; too inquisitive, that was obvious. An eavesdropper and a backbiter. Surely, there must have been some good in her somewhere! She certainly had the welfare of the Exchange at heart. That devout instinct in any woman was diverted from the usual things in life, such as home, husband and family, to an abstract thing, Central. Perhaps she was murdered for gain. She could have been quite comfortably off, from what I knew of her shady dealings. I promised myself to suggest it to the Inspector, although, no doubt, he had gone into the matter long ago.

The fact remained that Compton was murdered; beaten to death in the Exchange restroom with the buttinsky belonging to the Senior Traffic Officer. That hadn't been definitely proved, but I was working on the supposition that it was true. She was killed between 10.40 p.m. and 11.10 p.m. on Wednesday night, shortly after a clandestine meeting with Bertie, who had owned to intimate relations with her.

Bertie—he had known Sarah Compton for a long time. Perhaps she was putting the screws on him; trying to make him divorce his wife or something similar. Still, he said that he left about 10.30 p.m. and the guard corroborated his statement. Ormond, stupid though he appeared, would not be likely to mistake someone else for the Senior Traffic Officer. Or mightn't he? Supposing Bertie walked out of the Exchange, and then turned round and came in again a few minutes later. Poor Ormond would be so confused at the continual comings and goings, that he would not be able to tell exactly what the Senior Traffic Officer's movements were. A decided possibility! Disregarding that theory, there might be another entrance to the Exchange; one known only to a few.

‘I'll have a look-see to-day,' I promised myself again. ‘One cannot overlook the fact that Bertie's buttinsky was the weapon used.'

I came to Patterson, and considered her thoughtfully. A fool of a girl or a splendid actress? Without any doubt an unmitigated liar, and Mrs. Bates didn't like her. Still, she's no judge. Compton had had her claws on Gloria in some way, but I didn't see quite how. There were those letters written by someone called Patterson, but that could not possibly be Gloria. I shelved the letters affair into one corner of my mind. Gloria had had something worrying her that Compton had learned about. Hence her desire to keep out of the latter's way. She was the last to see the monitor, except for the murderer, unless she committed the crime herself. But somehow, the idea of Gloria, with her blonde prettiness, stealing the Senior Traffic Officer's buttinsky in a premeditated fashion and bashing Compton's face in, did not seem right. But it was another possibility.

Then there was Bill the liftman. I rather shrank from analyzing his part in the tragedy. He could have stayed back on Wednesday night without the slightest fear of discovery. My opinion of the night-guard was so low, that I considered that there was a strong chance to slip by him without attracting his notice. He would merely think that it was one of the many mechanics who buzzed in and out of the Exchange like flies. There was no reason why Bertie could not have passed as one, if he re-entered the Exchange. A mechanic's bag would be a very useful receptacle for a bloodstained buttinsky. Where could he beg, borrow or steal one? Nothing had come out about a bag being missing. But I was contemplating the liftman's movements. He, too, had known Sarah many years before. Could he be a disappointed lover? Or, better still, as Mac and I had speculated without voicing our thoughts, the husband of Compton's friend, Irene? To further that, if he was Dan Patterson, what relation to him was Gloria? Was she the daughter that he owned to having, or was the same name just a matter of coincidence? Working on the supposition that Irene was his wife, it would be quite probable that he knew the strength of the quarrel she had had with Sarah. The fact that he had overheard the quarrel seemed a bit too plausible. I didn't like the way he could remember things that happened years before quite so clearly.

‘I wish that I'd never started this,' I thought miserably. Then there was Bill eavesdropping at tea last night, and the indelible pencil that I had found. How easy it would have been for him to manipulate the lift from the cabin on the roof so that it stopped while he threw down his letter to Sarah. In spite of all these cogitations, I could not believe Bill had anything to do with Sarah's death. He was too decent. I had always respected and liked him. Surely he would not let me down as Bertie and Mac had.

Thinking about the letters brought me to Dulcie Gordon, the latest applicant for the role of the killer. She had protested, perhaps too vehemently—Shakespeare, tagged my mind—against having written to Sarah at all. Yet last night she told me that she wrote to her, making an appointment so as to talk over the matter of the rent. Had that slipped her mind, or didn't she want it known that she had had any correspondence with Compton? If Gordon had lied there, why had she lied again about writing that seemingly harmless anonymous letter? Perhaps there was more in that last letter than met the untutored eye. Inspector Coleman had praised my perspicacity when I concluded that he had chosen those three letters from Compton's pile for some good reason. Hitherto, I had deemed only the two written by Irene Patterson of any importance. Now I wondered if the Inspector thought so, in spite of Sergeant Matheson's declaration to the contrary. Why waste time with a foolish threat that some infantile brain had concocted? With someone who would be a very unworthy candidate for the position of a cunning, coldblooded killer. It was thus they had described Sarah's assassin to be. Were they giving the murderer a build-up that was not at all accurate? Perhaps it had been Inspector Coleman's invention to scare Mac and me into telling all we knew.

Whether Gordon had been the author of that last letter or not, I would not have cared to say. The only facts I went on when I accused her were the recency of the note and the connection between the memorandum Compton was about to send into the heads regarding Sunday work, and the one mentioned in the letter. Overshadowed by the more major events of Wednesday night, it seemed a very flimsy excuse for inventing an anonymous letter. Continuing with Gordon's case, I recalled the definite look of fear that came into her eyes the previous night, when I comforted her with the reflection that now Sarah was dead all her own troubles were ended. I started to nibble my forefinger thoughtfully. Somehow, that quick shadow across her face was not quite in keeping with the Inspector's conception of the killer.

“We must not,” I declared to the buzzing flies, who had become my confidants, “disregard the fact that Gordon had both the motive and the opportunity.”

It would be a simple task to steal Bertie's buttinsky without anyone observing the deed. He left it lying around, and it was a thing no one would miss too soon. It would just be presumed that someone else was using it, and would return it by and by. As to hiding it until the right minute for use—“Aha,” I said slowly, and my mind went quickly back to the afternoon of the crime. Four girls were playing cards in the restroom when I entered-they were all on the 10.30 p.m. rota. We had chaffed Patterson a
bit about her large wardrobe, and Dulcie Gordon had mentioned about Observation on the restroom telephone; also, that her locker had been rifled. Could it be possible that she had said that to disguise the fact that she had Bertie's buttinsky hidden therein.

‘By Jove, she's deep,' I thought. ‘That is, if my deductions are correct.'

I did not feel in the least frightened by the idea of having a friend of mine a murderess. Rather, I was full of admiration at that moment for the skilful planning and daring needed to carry out such a crime. Therein I made a very grave mistake, it was not until I found myself where I am now that I realized what an appalling thought had been mine. I felt so smug and pleased with myself and the plausible conclusion that I had come to, that I overlooked the warnings issued by Inspector Coleman and his shy Sergeant concerning the type of person we were up against.

“I won't tell the police yet,” I said aloud, almost buoyantly. “I'll wait for definite proof. I wonder what Mac will say.”

At the sound of her name the satisfied smile faded from my face. ‘Oh well.' I shrugged. ‘I can't see how this will hurt her at all. Maybe Mac is doing the same as me—playing amateur detective. That might account for her fit of temperament.' I hoped that she wouldn't be sore with me for making the great discovery first. As I was in the middle of a pleasant daydream, where the Chief Commissioner of Police was presenting me with a Royal Humane medal or whatever would be its equivalent in the world of crime, the front door bell rang far away. One half of my mind listened casually to Mrs. Bates's lumbering steps down the hall, while the other was busy rehearsing a modest, declamatory speech of thanks. Voices sounded, coming up the stairs. I brushed away the Commissioner's congratulatory hand and leaped out of bed.