The Circular Staircase by Mary Roberts Rinehart (mini ebook reader txt) 📕

After luncheon Mr. Jamieson suggested that I go with him to Richfield, and I consented.

“I am inclined to place more faith in Doctor Stewart’s story,” he said, “since I found that scrap in old Thomas’ pocket. It bears out the statement that the woman with the child, and the woman who quarreled with Armstrong, are the same. It looks as if Thomas had stumbled on to some affair which was more or less discreditable to the dead man, and, with a certain loyalty to the family, had kept it to himself. Then, you see, your story about the woman at the card-room window begins to mean something. It is the nearest approach to anything tangible that we have had yet.”

Warner took us to Richfield in the car. It was about twenty-five miles by railroad, but by taking a series of atrociously rough short cuts we got there very quickly. It was a pretty little town, on the river, and back on the hill I could see the Mortons’ big country house, where Halsey and Gertrude had been staying until the night of the murder.

Elm Street was almost the only street, and number fourteen was easily found. It was a small white house, dilapidated without having gained anything picturesque, with a low window and a porch only a foot or so above the bit of a lawn. There was a baby-carriage in the path, and from a swing at the side came the sound of conflict. Three small children were disputing vociferously, and a faded young woman with a kindly face was trying to hush the clamor. When she saw us she untied her gingham apron and came around to the porch.

“Good afternoon,” I said. Jamieson lifted his hat, without speaking. “I came to inquire about a child named Lucien Wallace.”

“I am glad you have come,” she said. “In spite of the other children, I think the little fellow is lonely. We thought perhaps his mother would be here to-day.”

Mr. Jamieson stepped forward.

“You are Mrs. Tate?” I wondered how the detective knew.

“Yes, sir.”

“Mrs. Tate, we want to make some inquiries. Perhaps in the house—”

“Come right in,” she said hospitably. And soon we were in the little shabby parlor, exactly like a thousand of its prototypes. Mrs. Tate sat uneasily, her hands folded in her lap.

“How long has Lucien been here?” Mr. Jamieson asked.

“Since a week ago last Friday. His mother paid one week’s board in advance; the other has not been paid.”

“Was he ill when he came?”

“No, sir, not what you’d call sick. He was getting better of typhoid, she said, and he’s picking up fine.”

“Will you tell me his mother’s name and address?”

“That’s the trouble,” the young woman said, knitting her brows. “She gave her name as Mrs. Wallace, and said she had no address. She was looking for a boarding-house in town. She said she worked in a department store, and couldn’t take care of the child properly, and he needed fresh air and milk. I had three children of my own, and one more didn’t make much difference in the work, but—I wish she would pay this week’s board.”

“Did she say what store it was?”

“No, sir, but all the boy’s clothes came from King’s. He has far too fine clothes for the country.”

There was a chorus of shouts and shrill yells from the front door, followed by the loud stamping of children’s feet and a throaty “whoa, whoa!” Into the room came a tandem team of two chubby youngsters, a boy and a girl, harnessed with a clothes-line, and driven by a laughing boy of about seven, in tan overalls and brass buttons. The small driver caught my attention at once: he was a beautiful child, and, although he showed traces of recent severe illness, his skin had now the clear transparency of health.

“Whoa, Flinders,” he shouted. “You’re goin’ to smash the trap.”

Mr. Jamieson coaxed him over by holding out a lead-pencil, striped blue and yellow.

“Now, then,” he said, when the boy had taken the lead-pencil and was testing its usefulness on the detective’s cuff, “now then, I’ll bet you don’t know what your name is!”

“I do,” said the boy. “Lucien Wallace.”

“Great! And what’s your mother’s name?”

“Mother, of course. What’s your mother’s name?” And he pointed to me! I am going to stop wearing black: it doubles a woman’s age.

“And where did you live before you came here?” The detective was polite enough not to smile.

“Grossmutter,” he said. And I saw Mr. Jamieson’s eyebrows go up.

“German,” he commented. “Well, young man, you don’t seem to know much about yourself.”

“I’ve tried it all week,” Mrs. Tate broke in. “The boy knows a word or two of German, but he doesn’t know where he lived, or anything about himself.”

Mr. Jamieson wrote something on a card and gave it to her.

“Mrs. Tate,” he said, “I want you to do something. Here is some money for the telephone call. The instant the boy’s mother appears here, call up that number and ask for the person whose name is there. You can run across to the drug-store on an errand and do it quietly. Just say, `The lady has come.’”

“`The lady has come,’” repeated Mrs. Tate. “Very well, sir, and I hope it will be soon. The milk-bill alone is almost double what it was.”

“How much is the child’s board?” I asked.

“Three dollars a week, including his washing.”

“Very well,” I said. “Now, Mrs. Tate, I am going to pay last week’s board and a week in advance. If the mother comes, she is to know nothing of this visit—absolutely not a word, and, in return for your silence, you may use this money for—something for your own children.”

Her tired, faded face lighted up, and I saw her glance at the little Tates’ small feet. Shoes, I divined—the feet of the genteel poor being almost as expensive as their stomachs.

As we went back Mr. Jamieson made only one remark: I think he was laboring under the weight of a great disappointment.

“Is King’s a children’s outfitting place?” he asked.

“Not especially. It is a general department store.”

He was silent after that, but he went to the telephone as soon as we got home, and called up King and Company, in the city.

After a time he got the general manager, and they talked for some time. When Mr. Jamieson hung up the receiver he turned to me.

“The plot thickens,” he said with his ready smile. “There are four women named Wallace at King’s none of them married, and none over twenty. I think I shall go up to the city tonight. I want to go to the Children’s Hospital. But before I go, Miss Innes, I wish you would be more frank with me than you have been yet. I want you to show me the revolver you picked up in the tulip bed.”

So he had known all along!

“It WAS a revolver, Mr. Jamieson,” I admitted, cornered at last, “but I can not show it to you. It is not in my possession.”