At One-Thirty by Isabel Ostrander (adult books to read .txt) 📕

it matter what a woman said at such a time?”

“It matters a great deal,” the detective replied, quietly. “It was most significant.”

“I do not remember what it was,” Mrs. Appleton reiterated, quickly. “It could not have been significant, for it was said unconsciously. ‘ I was beside myself.”

“You called your son, ‘Cain!’ That, Mrs. Appleton, is the name of the oldest fratricide on record. You are a woman, if you will pardon me, of very superior mentality. You say, or do, nothing without reason. When you branded your son with that name, you considered him the murderer of his brother.”

“Ah, no, no, Mr. Gaunt! You exceed the power I myself have vested in you, in this case. The application was not a literal one, but a reproach for the words my son had uttered to his elder brother in a late quarrel. I see that I must tell you, in order to avert a terrible mistake on your part. My sons were the most loving of brothers.” The detective’s face was a study. “But Garret was the more prudent of the two; Yates the spendthrift. They were both of violent temper, and their frequent quarrels would have sounded quite fearful to those who did not know that they meant not a word of it, and that the whole matter would be forgotten in an hour or two.

“Their quarrels, of course, were only about money. During a recent one—very recent—Yates told Garret he wished he was dead. It was in reference to that, if anything, that I used the word ‘Cain,’ if I did so. I don’t remember it, as I say; but I do know that the memory of that quarrel returned to me, when I turned from my dead to my living son. Had such a preposterous suspicion as that which you surmise entered my head, do you not think that I would have shielded my son all that I possibly could from the consequences of his act—if not for his own sake, at least, to save the family name from disgrace? Yet, I sent at once for the police, and for the highest authority on the detection of crime in this country—for you, Mr. Gaunt.”

He accepted the compliment gravely, and said:

“Will you tell me then, Mrs. Appleton, why, after having retained me to discover the truth for you, you were not entirely frank with me?”

She half-rose from the chair.

“My dear Mr. Gaunt—” she began indignantly.

But he silenced her.

“You told me that the whole suit between your two sons was a test case, an entirely amicable affair; yet Mr. Yates Appleton has told me it was not so. He has admitted, to use his own words: ‘That there was bad blood between him and his elder brother.’”

The lady bit her lip, and then said, more vehemently than she had spoken;

“But can you not see, Mr. Gaunt, I knew that the differences between my sons were absolutely irrelevant to this case, as I informed you during our first interview? I do not see any further need of talk and raking up of scandal.”

“That is all, Mrs. Appleton. May I see your maid now?”

“/‘Yes. If you will step into my dressing-room you will find her—the door there, just at the right of your chair.”

With a bow, he entered the next room, closing the door gently, but decisively, behind him, and heard the rattle of spools and scissors, as the maid rose hastily at his unexpected entrance.

“M’sieur Gaunt!”

“Marie, I want a word with you. To whom did you telephone the news of the murder, immediately after it was discovered, this morning?”

“I answer to no one. Why should anyone think that I—”

“You were overheard telephoning the news of the death of Mr. Garret Appleton to some one. Who was it?”

“If m’sieu does not jest, someone has been telling him an untruth. I have telephone’ to no one.”

“I suppose you know, Marie, that the Central Exchange can be compelled on a court order to give the number which you called on the ‘phone at that hour. Of course, if you wish me to carry the matter to Mrs. Appleton, or Judge Carhart—”

“Ah, in that case,” the maid interrupted, with superb insolence, “if nCsieu knows the number I called, why does he question me?”

“You called Miss Carhart, to warn her in advance of the death—of the murder—of Mr. Garret Appleton. You thought she would wish to know privately before the news reached her house. Why did you think she would wish to know?”

“Well, Mademoiselle Carhart is vairy young and a great friend of the family. She had dined there only the night before, and I thought that the shock—”

“No, Marie, I want the truth. You are in Mrs. Appleton’s employ, not Miss Carhart’s. Why should you telephone this news to her privately?”

The maid shrugged her shoulders with a gesture of surrender.

“M’sieur if you must know, there had been a leetle affaire—how do you say?—a flirtarion. Oh, of an innocence absolutely, between M’mselle Carhart and M’sieu Appleton. M’sieu had coniidea in me. I had carried a note—a leetle lettair, once or twice; but it was nothing—nothing to which anyone could object. But I—I imagine that mademoiselle had become so greatly interested in m’sieu that, if the sudden news of his death came to her in the presence of her father, she might— might pairhaps give herself away. I like the young mademoiselle, so joliey, so ingenious, and I am romande—me.”

“And you were well paid, I suppose, for carrying these notes, eh?”

“But yes.” The maid’s tone suggested surprise at the superfluous question. “Both M’sieu Appleton and Mademoiselle Carhart were most generous;.”

“And that was all; just that Mr. Garret Appleton permitted you to know of— his flirtation? And you carried notes once or twice. You saw nothing at any time, in the Appleton home, or elsewhere, between these two; no confidential meetings— in the den, say, or elsewhere?”

“Oh, but yes, m’sieur I have eyes. Once or twice, when there was a large reception, or dinner, or dance, on at the house of M’sieu Appleton, they would slip away for a little talk of but a minute or two in the hall, or library, or—or den.”

“Marie, did you see them in the den on the night of the murder?”

“The evening before, after dinner, M’sieu means? It is possible. After Madame Appleton—Madame Garret Appleton—had retired, I passed along the hall from the staircase leading from the servant’s diningroom up to Madame Appleton’s, my mistress’s, to prepare her things for the night. I pass the door of the den, and I see then M’sieu Appleton and a lady. I did not turn and look in, I glanc’ with the corner of my eye, and I could not see who the lady was, but I think it was Mademoiselle Carhart.”

“Very well, Marie. That was all I wanted of you. Only, if Inspector Hanrahan comes to you, do not lie to him. You might find yourself in serious trouble.”

As the maid turned, with a sigh of relief, to show him to the door, he stopped.=

“Why do you sew without a thimble?” he asked, with the whimsical smile that always accompanied his sudden, irrelevant questions. “You are proud of your hands, yet you permit the middle finger to become all roughened and abrased, from the needlehead.”

“I cannot sew wiz ze theemble. Eet ees what you call—l’eccentricitee, pairhaps? But how, m’sieu—”

“I heard the rough skin of your finger rasp against your starched apron, as you turned, just now. And I knew you were proud of your hands, because you keep your nails so unusually long and pointed.”

With a little cry of dismay, the woman thrust both her hands behind her.

“If m’sieu will pardon—but when did m’sieu discover zat?”

“Yesterday, when you came to the library of the Appleton house, at the time I sent for you for an interview, and you tapped upon the door before entering…. I must go now. Remember what I have told you. Speak the truth to Inspector Hanrahan when he comes, or you may have cause for regret.”

He took leave of Mrs. Appleton, and, with the aid of a bell-boy, made his way to his car. There was one errand yet before him, and one which he anticipated with reluctance, persuaded as he was in his own mind that the affair between Garret Appleton and the Judge’s daughter had been innocent of what the world regards as the one unpardonable wrong, in whatever despicable light it might be considered otherwise. He felt he must get at the truth of the matter, and that from the girl herself.

On arrival at the Carharts’, he was shown to the drawing-room, and she came to him almost immediately. Her uneasiness at his visit was plainly evidenced in her voice, as she greeted him.

“Miss Carhart,” he said very gravely, “did you acquaint your father at once, yesterday morning, of the death of Mr. Garret Appleton?”

“My father?” she faltered. “Why, it was he who told me. The news was brought to him.”

The detective shook his head.

“I mean, when Marie, Mrs. Appleton’s maid, telephoned you.”

“Telephoned me? Marie telephoned me?” Her voice was scarcely above a whisper, and it seemed as if she could do no more than echo his words.

“Miss Carhart,” he went on, “whatever you say to me, if you are perfectly frank, will be strictly confidential; but if you do not disclose the whole truth, I may be compelled to carry the matter to your father. I must know the exact relations which existed between you and Garret Appleton.”

The girl rose to her feet indignantly.

“How dare you!” she cried. “What do you mean to insinuate? My father would be the first to order you from this house, if you dared to approach him with any story which reflected upon my reputation.”

“Nevertheless,” he went on doggedly, “I know. and can prove, that an affair of some sort existed between you and the man whose death I am investigating. I know that Marie, his mother’s maid, frequently carried messages from him to you; that she knew, and admits the knowledge, of an affair between you, and that she will so testify, if necessary, and that she telephoned you privately of his death, in order that you might not betray your shock to your father, when the news reached you officially.”

The girl, who had seated herself, clasped and unclasped the arms of her chair nervously, and beat a little angry tattoo with her foot upon the floor.

“If you must know, Mr. Gaunt,” she said at last, with a little, quick intake of breath, “I did have a sort of flirtation with Garret Appleton; but It was an entirely innocent affair, the same sort of thing that goes on every day in society. We had been engaged at one time, and it was only natural that I should want to—to pique his wife, and punish him for his defection. I hadn’t married, because I never found any one whom I—liked, as I had liked Garret, and I did not think he should have married, either. I knew that he and his wife weren’t happy, weren’t getting along together, and I flirted with him a little, deliberately; but I never saw him alone, nor was indiscreet in any possible way. Don’t you understand,. Mr. Gaunt? It was only to punish him.”

“You did see him alone. Marie has come upon you often in his own house, talking very confidentially.”

“But that was only when an affair was on at his house, at which all our set were present. He might have talked as frequently, and said the same things, to any other young girl ofxhis mother’s or wife’s acquaintance.”

“When was the last time you saw