The Philadelphia Murder Story (12 page)

She started to speak, and then glanced around sharply. A car had stopped in front of the house. The car door slammed, there was a sound of heavy feet on the concrete. Her face was white as she ran across to the front window and moved the velvet curtain aside just enough to see out. She flashed around.

“It’s the police. They’re coming in.” She came quickly back, her eyes wide, looking at me with terror. “I’ve got to get rid of it,” she whispered desperately. “They’ll search the house; he told me they’d—”

I could hear the ring of the doorbell from the back of the house. The Irishwoman came plodding along the hall. Laurel Frazier took one look at the fireplace. The next instant she was over in front of it. She thrust her hand into her coat pocket and pulled something out. It was a tightly wadded ball of white cloth.

“Oh, don’t!” I gasped.

It was too late. The white ball was in the fire and the flames spreading up over it. She grabbed the poker from the holder beside the hearth and jabbed it down under the coals. My heart sank.

The maid stopped by the door, sniffing.

“I smell something burning,” she said. “Have you dropped a cigarette on the carpet?”

If Laurel had been white-faced before, she was whiter now. The smell of burning cloth was unmistakable.

“It’s all right, Annie,” she said breathlessly. “Go on to the door.”

The instant the maid was out of sight, she did the most incredible thing. I caught my breath as she snatched up the corner of her coat, knelt down and thrust it into the fire. I expected to see the whole thing go up in a sheet of flame.

A voice as soft as a cat’s tail came from the front door. “Is Judge Whitney in? Captain Malone, tell him. I’d like to—”

The voice was still soft, but it spoke a little more quickly. “I smell something burning. What is it?”

“It must be my iron, sir,” the maid said. “If you’ll come in, please. The judge’s secretary is here.”

Laurel stood up quickly, the corner of her coat skirt burned black. She’d smothered the fire with her bare hands. She thrust them into her coat pockets and moved across the room to the door, her head erect. I’d never seen greater self-possession.

“I’m Laurel Frazier, Judge Whitney’s secretary, Captain Malone,” she said. “Will you come in?”

“Something is burning,” Captain Malone said quietly. “It’s in this room?”

“Yes, my coat,” Laurel said. “I got too near the fire. It’s my only coat too,” she added ruefully.

The room smelled like a fire at a rummage sale. Captain Malone stood in the doorway, sniffing the air. Or he was there for an instant. I couldn’t have believed anybody’s mind—and body in this case—could move so fast. Before I was aware at all of what he was thinking, even, he was across the room, the poker in his hand, delving through the flames into the coals in the bottom of the iron basket grate. Out came the blackened, evil-smelling wad. As the air struck it again, it burst into a pale pompon of flame on the green glazed tiles of the hearth. Captain Malone was down on his knees, smothering the flame with his brown pigskin glove, gently, as if the cloth were alive and could be hurt. Laurel Frazier stood motionless, white-faced again, her lips parted, staring at him.

Captain Malone got to his feet and looked around at her. “You shouldn’t have done a thing like that, Miss Frazier,” he said reproachfully. His voice was gentle as the morning dew, and his face was very grave and paternal as he shook his head at her—and the senior Hamlet’s ghost never looked so much more in sorrow than in anger.

“Don’t you see what you’ve done? Now I’ve got to begin thinking all over again. I’ve got to ask myself why Judge Whitney’s secretary is so anxious for me not to know she’s burning a piece of cloth that she spoils a coat to do it— because anybody can tell the difference. Cloth and fur don’t smell the same when they burn. It’s easy to tell when they’ve both been burned. You ought to have known that, oughtn’t you?”

He was speaking as if to a three-year-old child, and she nodded her head not unlike one. He turned back to the hearth and knelt down, scooping up the black blob into an envelope he took out of his pocket. He went over to the table and put it down on a newspaper under the lamp, prying the burned layers off gently with the point of his silver pencil.

“When you want to burn anything,” he said soberly, “don’t wad it up. Just lay it out on top of the fire, where the air will get at it. You see?”

He looked over his shoulder at the girl staring strickeneyed at the unfolding mass. The inside of the wadded cloth was untouched. It was still white—or it was except for the brown stains on it, and some of them not all brown yet, but still faintly red—red enough to show that blood could have made them. Captain Malone pulled very gently with his thumb and forefinger. I saw it was a handkerchief, man’s size, and in the corner he was pulling out there was an embroidered monogram. He took out his spectacles and put them on.

“Let’s see now,” he said. “Here’s an
M.
And here’s
W.
And this is a
T?
Isn’t that a
T?”

Laurel said nothing.

“That wouldn’t be the judge, for instance,” Captain Malone said. “His name’s Nathaniel.”

He took two steps toward her. She was standing there with her hands still thrust deep down into her pockets. He put his own hands out, palms up, without saying anything, and waited. After a moment, she took hers out of her pockets and held them out. The palms were blistered, but not so badly as I’d been afraid they were going to be. He shook his head.

“Don’t you see I’ve got to tell myself a young lady would have to think an awful lot of anybody to burn her coat and burn her hands like this to keep me from finding a handkerchief with somebody’s blood on it?”

Her face flushed suddenly to the color of her hair. “That isn’t so,” she said quickly. “It’s just something I—I found, and I thought—I thought it could be misinterpreted—”

She stopped short. I heard a key grating in the lock and the front door opening. Laurel’s face turned white, then flushed deeply. She snatched her hands out of Captain Malone’s and thrust them back into her pockets. Something alive and alert moved in Captain Malone’s eyes as he looked from her face to the door.

Monk Whitney was in the hall in the process of putting his battered gray felt hat on the table. He looked around, a very sober-faced young man even before he saw any of us. He came across the hall then, looking from one of us to the other.

“Smells like the city dump in here,” he said. “What goes on?” He looked at Captain Malone. “My name’s Whitney. You’re the chief of homicide, aren’t you?”

Captain Malone nodded. “Would your middle initial be
T,
by any chance?” he asked gently.

“A guessing game?” Monk inquired. His glance from one to the other of us was sardonic. “I’ll bite, anyway. My middle initial is
T.
For Tyler. Monckton Tyler Whitney. What’s the catch?”

Captain Malone motioned toward the unsavory mess lying on the morning paper. “This yours?”

Monk looked at it for an instant. “Not to recognize. Why?”

“It’s got your initials on it,” Captain Malone said. “And quite a lot of blood. Or I’d guess it’s blood; I wouldn’t want to say for sure till it’s analyzed. The young lady hasn’t told me yet where she found it or why she was trying to burn it up.”

I thought that when Monk looked at Laurel Frazier, the chief of homicide must have been puzzled. It would have been hard to imagine anything more impersonal and detached than his level gaze.

“Does the young lady say it belongs to me, whatever it is?” he inquired politely.

“The young lady hasn’t said anything,” Laurel said hotly. “And she doesn’t intend to say any more.”

The sudden shower of blue sparks flying around must have been a further blow to what I suppose Captain Malone’s theory was. He looked from one to the other of them and returned to the handkerchief. It was a rather elaborate arrangement, with interlacing letters embroidered in tan on the white linen inside a medallion.

Monk glanced at it. “I suppose it’s mine if it’s got my initials on it,” he said casually. “Maybe I got it for Christmas. I don’t pay much attention to such items, plain or fancy.”

“Perhaps the one you’ve got with you is like this,” Captain Malone said gently.

Monk started to put his hand in his pocket and stopped. “As a matter of fact,” he said calmly, “I just remember. I don’t happen to have one. My valet neglected to lay it out this morning.”

Captain Malone’s eyes brightened a little. “Maybe you’d just better tell me where you were today—say between twelve o’clock and three—if you don’t mind.”

“I’d be glad to, captain, but it just happens I can’t.”

“Why not, son?”

“Because where I was is my business. I don’t mean to be offensive, captain. It’s just a plain statement of fact. I wasn’t at any time at The Curtis Publishing Company, if that’s what you’re getting at.”

“I’m mighty glad to hear you say so,” Captain Malone said benevolently. “Somebody was down there, and he’s going to burn for it. I don’t like murderers, and I don’t care whether they live south or north of Market Street, Main Line or water front. I suppose you know Kane Was murdered this afternoon?”

“Yes, I know it. I heard it on the radio.”

Captain Malone looked at him steadily. He turned back to the table and began making a neat bundle of the burned handkerchief in the two top sheets of the newspaper.

“It seems to me the judge told me you were in the Army, son. Not out already, are you?”

“Marine Corps,” Monk said shortly. “I’m on leave. I go back next week.”

Captain Malone took a piece of string out of his pocket and tied it around his bundle. “You’re out of uniform?”

“Exercise,” Monk said calmly.

“You’ve been out exercising,” Captain Malone said. “Not golf—you wouldn’t hear a radio on a golf course, now, would you?”

Monk said nothing.

“And you wouldn’t have been out walking. Your shoes would be wet if you had.”

“I told you I wasn’t going to tell you where I was today, Captain Malone,” Monk said quietly. “And I meant it.”

Captain Malone looked from him to Laurel, standing by the fireplace, her face expressionless. “You’re making a mistake, both of you,” he said earnestly. “I hope you’ll think it over and come and see me.” He put his little package carefully in his pocket. “Will you tell the judge I’m here?”

Laurel turned. “Colonel Primrose is in the library with him,” she said. “Do you want to wait or—”

“I’ll go up now, if it’s all right with the judge,” Captain Malone said. “The colonel’s business and mine are pretty much the same, I guess.”

Monk Whitney moved out of their way, deliberately avoiding looking at the girl.

“Will you tell Colonel Primrose, Laurel,” I said, “that Mrs. Whitney says he’s welcome any time he wants to go over?” Captain Malone glanced at me sharply. It probably wasn’t the most tactful way of delivering a message, but I didn’t see any other way to do it. We heard their feet going up the stairs, and Monk turned promptly as they got to the top and started along the hall.

“Come on,” he said. “Let’s shove out of the fire trap and go get a drink. I could use a couple. Just wait till I get hold of that redheaded—”

“She was trying to get rid of that handkerchief,” I interrupted. I was startled at the sudden resentment in his voice. “She really was.”

“I’ll bet.”

He laughed or at least he made a sardonic noise. It could only be called mirthless. He picked up his raincoat.

“Come on, let’s get out. Unless you don’t want to be seen with—”

“Don’t be funny,” I said.

We went out and down the steps. Captain Malone’s car, with a couple of detectives hunched up in the front seat, was parked on the other side of the street. There was a green coupe in front of the pink house next door. Monk took my elbow.

“Come on, quick,” he said. “That’s Trav’s. He must be up with Abigail. I don’t want to see him.”

“Why not?” I was surprised at the sudden intensity in his voice.

“Why not? Good God, I should think you’d know.”

We cut across in front of the police car to the square. He glanced back.

“It’s not fair,” he said. “They’re not even watching us.”

The reason was pretty obvious, I thought. Until Captain Malone caught Laurel red-handed, he’d refused to believe the Whitney clan could have had anything to do with Myron Kane’s murder.

My bird of evil omen had flitted back. Mr. Toplady was sitting on a bench in the periphery of one of the hooded lights, gazing fixedly up, at the second-story windows of the pink house across the street.

“Stop a minute,” I said. “I want to speak to that man. Or go on. I’ll catch up with you.”

I stopped at the bench.

“Mr. Toplady,” I said.

He started at the sound of his name, and looked around at me. I was appalled at his face. It was ashy-gray and haggard as an old dishrag. He stared at me dumbly, without any sign of recognition.

“I’m the woman you gave the letter to for Mr. Kane,” I said. And I stopped. I didn’t know quite how to go on.

He shook his head vaguely without speaking, just looking at me with a kind of helpless agony in his eyes. The light made the whites of them glitter a little, and I edged back a step, wishing I hadn’t sent Monk on. He wasn’t far, at that, just along to where the path intersected the circle, standing by a trash can, lighting a cigarette.

Mr. Toplady was still looking up at me.

“Don’t you remember?” I asked.

“It doesn’t matter,” he said slowly. His voice was cracked and torn as if it hurt him to use it. “He’s… dead now.”

“I know. I’m terribly sorry.”

He looked back at me, moving his head painfully.

I would have gone then, but as I moved to go something compelling in the haggard misery in his face held me there.

“Yes, he’s dead,” he mumbled. “They—they killed him. I know why.” The words began to come faster, all strung together, suddenly articulate, as if a dam inside him had broken, letting them through. “I’m the only one who knows why. I know. I know which one of them did it. I know.”

“If you do know,” I said, “you ought to go to the police. Captain Malone is over at Judge Whitney’s now. Why don’t you go and tell him?”