The Book of the Dead (11 page)

“Stay on? I have my tickets for the trip back!”

“Your niece—”

“If my niece stays, it won't be in a big housekeeping apartment. I want you to do your very best to rent it for the rest of the summer.”

“We'll let you know immediately if we do. There is a small advertising charge.”

“Really! In the circumstances, I should think you might pay that!”

Mr. Watt, coughing, said that it was not always easy for a tenant to understand the nature of a lease.

“Especially,” retorted Mrs. Crenshaw in her dry voice, “when she hasn't signed it herself.”

“Naturally,” continued Mr. Watt, amiably—he was a gray, slender man, with all the polite skepticism of his calling—“all this has been most upsetting for you, Mrs. Crenshaw. You feel yourself among strangers. But you can safely leave this matter in Mr. Humbert's hands.”

“But the apartment will have to wait for the money until the estate is settled, won't they?”

“They will.”

“Then that's arranged. I shall want a cab early, Mr. Humbert; I shall be dropping my niece before I take my train. And we each have one bag.”

Humbert, taking this as a dismissal, moved with some alacrity towards the door. But she halted him with another question: “Mr. Humbert, I understand that this man Pike went back to Stonehill?”

“The night Mr. Crenshaw left for the hospital; Wednesday, the twenty-first,” said Humbert. “On the midnight train to Unionboro, I think. He left everything in perfect shape, as I said.”

“But who on earth was he, and where did my husband find him? I never heard of him until now.”

“Wherever he found him,” said Humbert, “he was most fortunate
to
find him. A very efficient man; he must have saved your husband two, perhaps three nurses. And that,” said Humbert demurely, “
would
have been a bill.”

“I dare say he was paid as much as three nurses.”

“He was worth it.”

Humbert withdrew, and Gamadge recalled himself from rapt consideration of Mrs. Crenshaw's business instinct. Was the performance a true revelation of character, or was it the result of widow's panic, or was it put on to conceal the fact that she knew all about Pike, all about Crenshaw's illness, all about his isolated death? It might be put on, he thought; her kind of face revealed nothing, and it is not so difficult to pretend avarice.

When Humbert had gone she revealed herself still further, or (alternatively) went on with the exhibition: “I can't understand any of it. My husband wasn't a letter writer, he only wrote me one letter after he came East, and I suppose he didn't want to worry me. I hadn't the slightest idea anything was wrong. When he left he seemed perfectly well—I saw him off on the train. We don't live in San Francisco, you know, we live in a suburb called Sundown. He never travelled much. His letter was postmarked here in New York on the twenty-eighth of May, and now I understand that he never reached Stonehill until the middle of June. That's what his doctor told the hospital.”

Mr. Watt uncrossed his legs, and crossed them again. He said: “We must make allowance for the fact that he was developing this fatal illness, Mrs. Crenshaw. After he took this apartment he may have felt the first effects of the leukemia, and decided to go to some resort and rest before he tackled the business in Vermont.”

“He always did like to manage his own affairs in his own way, and I suppose he thought he was showing me great consideration by paying all those bills in advance, and bringing a copy of his will East with him. It's just the way it always was—he hadn't changed it at all. But I've been put in a most awkward position at home; it isn't as if we ever had a quarrel in our lives.”

Watt looked sympathetic. “People do strange things when they're ill, Mrs. Crenshaw. I think you will be quite justified if you—er—give the impression at home that your husband died suddenly.”

“I didn't know what
had
happened,” said Mrs. Crenshaw. “I didn't know who might have got hold of him. I was ever so much relieved when you brought me the copy of that will. But why should he have had it with him, unless he knew he was very sick?”

Gamadge volunteered a suggestion: “People take precautions when they set out on a long journey. Insurance, now; they take out insurance, and they don't tell their families.”

Mrs. Crenshaw said: “There wasn't any insurance. It wasn't necessary. When he sold the old family business in 1939—and how right he was! I always said so!—he settled half the money on me. I've been independent ever since then, and now he's left me all the rest. I have no financial worries at all. Only I do wish I knew what had happened to that two thousand five hundred dollars.”

Gamadge looked politely interested. Mr. Watt swung his foot. He said: “Need you worry? You have the itemized accounts for two thousand and sixty-odd; we don't know what Mr. Crenshaw's private disbursements were, but we do know that the doctor's bill and Pike's wages must have come out of the twenty-five hundred.”

She turned to Gamadge. “It's the strangest thing, Mr. Gamadge. My husband told all these people—he filled it out on papers when he entered the hospital—that he had nobody in the world! Nobody! Except those distant cousins in the west, and we never saw them. If he didn't want me to worry about him, if he didn't want me coming East, that's all very well; but think how I feel now! And he drew his whole balance—four thousand five hundred and sixty-seven dollars—out of the bank, and paid for everything in advance, even the funeral; and we can't find two thousand five hundred dollars at all. We don't know what's become of it.”

Watt said: “Why not go up yourself, Mrs. Crenshaw, and see Pike? There are bound to be bills up there; he'll explain them to you.”

Mrs. Crenshaw said quietly: “I'm not going to Stonehill, Mr. Watt. I came to New York because I had to look into my husband's affairs. They thought in Stonehill that he wasn't married; I'm not going up there to be talked about and stared at.”

Gamadge said: “Can't blame you.”

“I'm going home,” said Mrs. Crenshaw. “I'm letting the hospital dispose of his things—except his watch and studs, of course. I even let them keep his pigskin bags. They say that doctor is all right; I suppose he wouldn't overcharge. I hope Pike isn't walking off with more than two thousand dollars that he was entrusted with by my husband and isn't entitled to. I wonder if I oughtn't to call up this Miss Fisher after all and see what she thought of him. Did she tell you what he was like, Mr. Gamadge?”

“She never met him.”

Watt said: “Our Mr. Ferris met him, you know; the day he brought up Mr. Crenshaw's bank balance.”

“Oh; did he?”

“Yes. We sent Ferris up because he was with me when Mr. Crenshaw came into the bank on the twenty-eighth of May to bring us the letter from our San Francisco branch, and get his checkbook, and introduce himself. I thought him a very charming man, Mrs. Crenshaw.”

“Oh; yes. He was,” said Mrs. Crenshaw in her veiled voice.

“We gave him the checkbook which is now in your possession,” continued Watt, “and we informed him that his deposit was arranged for, and was all ready to be drawn on; five thousand dollars. We took over the San Francisco letter with his signature, and showed him the letter they sent us, and that was all we ever saw of him down there.

“He drew checks, of course; for the advance rent here, and for various expenses. But he must have had plenty of cash with him when he left California, because he never came in for cash, or cashed checks.”

“He always did carry lots of money on him,” said Mrs. Crenshaw.

“Well, the next we heard from him was on the twenty-first; he telephoned to say that he was not well—we got the impression that he might be suffering from something slight, no worse than a summer cold. He said he'd changed his mind about staying in town, and that he thought he'd go home.”

Mrs. Crenshaw's eyes, bright and shallow as jet, did not move from the bank manager's.

“Ferris took the telephone call,” continued Watt, “and came up here as soon as he had had his lunch. He brought the money in a special case we use for that purpose. It was all in large bills, by Mr. Crenshaw's request, fifties and hundreds. Pike let him into the apartment. Ferris described Pike to me today; in the circumstances I was rather interested. Ferris says he was a rather tall, thin, ‘Yankee-looking' man; whatever that may mean.” Watt smiled. “He says Pike was more like a farmer than a valet, sunburned, and badly in need of a haircut. Kept pushing his hair back off his forehead—it was too long.

“Pike seemed rather easy-mannered, but he took every care of Mr. Crenshaw; and Mr. Crenshaw seemed to have the greatest confidence in him. Pike got his checkbook for him, and set up a writing-pad on his knees. Mr. Crenshaw was sitting up in bed; Ferris says he didn't look particularly ill, only tired.”

“It's outrageous!” exclaimed Mrs. Crenshaw. “Only this untrained man to take care of him!”

“Oh, Ferris says he was evidently good at his job—had everything as cool and neat as possible. It was a terrible day, hotter than this, the end of that first heat wave; but Mr. Crenshaw seemed quite comfortable. He wrote out a check for the amount and handed it to Ferris, who then turned the cash over to him. Mr. Crenshaw counted it, and Pike put it away in the desk. Ferris was rather horrified at this casual way of treating the money, and suggested the safe downstairs; I suppose there is one. Your husband laughed, and said it wouldn't be with him long.”

Mrs. Crenshaw's expression did not change, her eyes did not waver. At least, thought Gamadge, she doesn't pretend feeling.

Watt ended his recital in a brisker tone: “Mr. Crenshaw then said that Pike would go back to Vermont, close up the house there, close accounts, and arrange for the property to be put on the market. You know the rest, Mrs. Crenshaw; the hospital received two thousand dollars from your husband in cash; they disbursed it as you know, and the small balance, and the sixty-odd dollars that was found in your husband's wallet, have been turned over to you. I really think that you will be wise not to disturb yourself about that extra twenty-five hundred. The doctor and Pike were certainly paid out of it, and you would have difficulty in establishing a claim to any part of it now.”

He rose, Gamadge and Mrs. Crenshaw rose, and Watt picked up his brief case and his hat. Mrs. Crenshaw shook hands with him.

“I'm very much obliged to you,” she said. “I can't stay on and make inquiries, because if I don't take the train this evening I won't get another reservation for two weeks. But I think I will ask Mr. Gamadge to call Miss Fisher up for me. She just might know something.”

“She won't know how Mr. Crenshaw invested that twenty-five hundred, I'm afraid,” said Gamadge, and Watt, with a somewhat commiserating glance at him, departed.

Mrs. Crenshaw went out of the room with him. When she came back she was accompanied by a small, dark young girl who must have been waiting in the maid's room off the kitchen.

“This is my step-niece, Mr. Gamadge,” said Mrs. Crenshaw. “Lucette Daker.”

Gamadge shook hands with Miss Daker. She gave the impression of being quite lovely; but the loveliness consisted of fine dark hair curling on her flawless neck, luminous eyes, and a skin whose coral tint was not applied. These might desert her when she was older; Gamadge thought that a certain quality—only to be described as magnetic—would never leave her while she lived.

She was not in mourning. Her printed dress fitted her casually—it had not cost anybody much in time or money—but it had a look of being her best. So had her brown pumps, and the little flowered hat and the checked coat which she carried with her and seemed about to put on. She raised a sad, grave face to Gamadge, and he looked down at her as gravely.

“Have you packed your bag, Lucette?” asked Mrs. Crenshaw. “I want to start early. I want to get you settled at the Y.W.C.A. before I take my train. Unless Mr. Gamadge can persuade you how foolish you will be to stay in New York.”

The girl said: “I told you I wasn't going to the Y.W.C.A., Aunt Genevieve. I told you I'm going to Stonehill tonight. I have my ticket.”

Mrs. Crenshaw stood looking at her in silence.

“I'm going to Uncle Howard's funeral,” said Miss Daker. “I'm not going to let him be buried without anybody.”

Mrs. Crenshaw said: “You seem to forget. He evidently didn't want anybody.”

“It was just that he hated a fuss so. He just wanted to be let alone.” Her voice trembled. Gamadge thought that she was under a great strain, and controlling herself remarkably.

Mrs. Crenshaw had self-control too, but her feelings towards her step-niece expressed themselves strongly in the sharp tones of her voice. She said: “As if I hadn't enough to worry me.”

“You needn't worry about me. I'll be all right in New York,” said Lucette Daker.

“You planned this before we left California. You knew I wouldn't have brought you if I hadn't thought you were coming back with me.”

“I can pay you my fare, Aunt Genevieve. I would have come anyway.”

“Your money won't last long here.” Mrs. Crenshaw turned to Gamadge. “Have you ever in your life heard of such a thing, Mr. Gamadge? A girl of twenty-two living alone in New York and depending on some job?”

“Frankly,” said Gamadge with a smile, “I have.”

“Lucette hasn't even
got
a job!”

“I can get one. There are lots of jobs now.”

“Some war job,” said Mrs. Crenshaw. “That won't support you afterwards. You'll be writing for your fare home.”

“There isn't anything in Sundown. I can't stay there now.”

Mrs. Crenshaw gave her the look that the practical reserve for sentimentalists; then she turned to Gamadge. “I mustn't keep you, Mr. Gamadge,” she said. “Would you just get me Miss Fisher on the telephone?”