"I
'
m
back from town. So are the others. The film at the Riviera was over at ten-thirty. Rip Hillboro came on to the Swamp Fox Room and joined Bob and me. Then we drove back."
"Are the others with you, ma'am? Here at the school, I mean?"
"No, they're not. Rip insisted he must watch the late show on television. On Saturday nights it goes on at eleven-fifteen, not eleven-thirty. Bob said, 'You've already seen one film tonight; must you have a damn dreary one to go to bed on?' But Rip insisted. They were both half asleep, so they poured a drink and sat down.—Can you guess why
I'm
here?"
"I expect, ma'am, you understood the blackboard message too."
"Oh, I understood the message; a child would have understood it. That's only what told me where to come; it's not why I
'm
here. I
'm
here," Valerie almost screamed, "to denounce somebody and tell the truth at last. There's all the wickedness of hell behind this, and yet you don't see it. You're supposed to be intelligent, especially Dr. Fell. But you're not intelligent; you just don't
see!"
"See what?" demanded Captain Ashcroft. "If you want to accuse somebody, hadn't you better do it? And who would you want to accuse, anyway? You've stuck pretty close to Mr. Crandall, I've noticed.
We
thought it was because you liked him, maybe liked him a lot. But maybe you had some other reaso
n. Do you accuse Mr. Crandall of
murder now?
.
"Accuse Bob Crandall?
Are you crazy?"
Tick
went the metronome,
tick-tick-tick.
The breath whistied through Valerie's nostrils. She had run to the front of the desk. Abandoning all pretense of addressing Captain Ashcroft, she was hurling her words straight at Dr. Fell
"He's a good man. I've said so before; I say it again now. He's too good for that house and the things
he
won't see either. No, I do not mean Bob Crandall! I mean somebody who's e
vil and damned as nobody's been
really evil and damned since the days of sorcery three hundred years ago.
I
mean—"
The report of a small-calibre revolver, fired by somebody who had been standing outside one window and bending down, exploded with sharp concussion as a clean hole appeared in the glass.
Valerie was not flung backwards, as she might have been by the impact of a heavier bullet. Instead she lurched sideways and to the right. The handbag flew from under her arm. With ungainly movements for so lithe and graceful a woman, she staggered forwards in a diagonal direction, with both arms outstretched ahead.
Her hands struck the Victrola with its four small casters. She pitched on her face and lay twitching. Against the white dress, a fact not understood until later, blood welled up from a wound in the middle of her back. When the Victrola rolled backwards to thud against the wall, some trigger of mechanism released arrested song. With ghastly earnestness and unction, full-throated if scratchy voices soared to a finale.
"Den I wish I was in Dixie! Hooray! Hooray!
In Dixie land I’ll
take my stand
To live and die in Dixie:
Away, away, away down south in Dixie—
Away, away, away down south in Dixie!"
17
Following the tumult that ensued, Alan did not see Maynard Hall again until the night of Sunday, May 16th, nearly twenty-four hours later. But there was news of Valerie Huret long before that.
Valerie had been shot about half-past eleven on Saturday night. Returning to their hotel at well after one in the morning, Alan and Dr. Fell were having a final smoke in the lobby when Dr. Fell had been summoned to the telephone. It was Captain Ashcroft,
calling from the big hos
pital on Calhoun Street not far away. Lending an ear just outside the booth, as Dr. Fell picked up the phone and asked a question, Alan could distinctly hear the captain's voice in reply.
"Dead?" the voice exclaimed, with a kind of bursting incredulity. "No, the lady's anything but dead! As a matter of fact, though they've got her under sedation now, she's not even seriously hurt."
"Sir—!"
"It's a freak wound, the doctor says, not common but not unheard-of either. I don't have to tell you the set-up, do I? You yourself found two revolvers in the cellar at the Hall: a Smith & Wesson target .32 and a .38 police-positive. Remember?"
"Oh, ah. I remember."
"From what they see on TV, people
will
think it's easy to shoot somebody dead. The murderer, a would-be murderer this time, stole the .32 and fired down through the window, aimin' at Mrs. Huret's heart. The bullet hit her a little below the breastbone. Instead of penetrating very far, it travelled around a rib underneath the skin and came out her back without going through the chest at all. Then our murderer threw the gun down and ran; no fingerprints, but no death either. There'll be some pain, maybe, but she'll be fine and dandy in a very short time."
" 'For this relief much thanks.' Is there any other news?"
"Is there any other
news,
blow me down? So much
I
can't tell you over the phone!" "Well?"
"I'm right proud to be in charge of this case, though you're the one who told me where to look. For most of tomorrow, Dr. Fell, I
am
goin' to be in charge; I can't put off the dirty work any longer. By 'dirty work' I don't mean the arrest; that's easy; that's a pleasure; anyway, it comes later. I mean—oh, never mind! So, if it's agreeable to you, I won't need you until early tomorrow evening, a little after dinner time; I'll send a car for you and say when. Then, if our plans go right . . ."
"If
our plans go right. Oh, ah!"
"Tomorrow," said Captain Ashcroft, "it's likely to be a long night and maybe a rough one too. So
I
won't need
Mr. Grantham until after
I
see you; well fix that up later. Meanwhile, go about your own
business and take it easy; you’ll
get word in good time. Understand?"
" Take it easy,'" said Dr. Fell, "is not quite applicable to the present business. But
I
understand.
'V
arium et mu
tabile semper feminal'
I understand only too well."
Both he and Alan slept late next morning, having breakfast at midday. The afternoon they spent at what sightseeing could be done on a drowsy Sunday. It seemed a time to explore the churches: gray St. Philip's, wrapped in peace under its tall spire; porticoed St. Michael's, whose bells ring special tunes for special holidays, and in whose garden it is a joy to linger. At the Gibbes Art Gallery, not far from St. Michael's, Dr. Fell stared long at Benjamin West's portrait of Colonel (later General) William Moultrie.
But no distraction would serve. Both had a tendency to fume and bite their knuckles with impatience. It was not merely that Dr. Fell refused to comment on the Maynard affair; contrary to custom, he refused even to hint, despite his obvious and growing worry.
"What did you mean," Alan burst out once, "by that Latin tag about woman being always fickle and changeable? Which particular woman, and under what circumstances?"
"If only," wheezed Dr. Fell, "she had stuck to one man at a time! It would have been much simpler, don't you think?"
They had a very early dinner to make up for the lack of lunch. At just past seven o'clock a police car driven by Sergeant Duckworth arrived at the hotel for Dr. Fell, leaving Alan to await his own summons.
In his own room at the hotel, with the paperback book of puzzles he had bought at a drugstore across the street, he did not even open the book. That the case was headed towards some kind of smash he did not doubt, but he could get no further. Darkness descended on Charleston; a plain of lights blossomed south to the Battery; endlessly Alan reviewed the events of last night, after Valerie Huret had pitched forward with blood staining her white dress.
By instinct they had rushed
outside, finding under the
third of four windows in the west wall
a
discarded revolver with one spent shell in the magazine. They were phoning for an ambulance from the office upstairs when Yancey Beale, explaining that he had chased some purely imaginary intruder all over the gymnasium, returned cursing and apologetic. As
a
last try for evidence they had hurried to Maynard Hall, where Rip Hillboro and Bob Crandall—the late show just concluded—sat spiritless before the television set and had nothing whatever to contribute.
Still Alan pondered.
"Varium et mutabile semper f
emina"
That wasVirgil
wasn't it? Since both Dr. Fell and Captain Ashcroft swore no woman was guilty, it w
ould be poetic irony if the mur
derer should prove to be a woman after all. Could Dr. Fell be holding back something for a tactical ambush to stagger slower wits? What if the murderer were Valerie Huret herself, and the apparent attempt on her life only error or a part of misdirection?
No!
Mentally, even physically, Alan shook himself. He was thinking along the lines of a detective story, of the least likely person, and it would never do. Instead, a pleasanter field for speculation, he began thinking of Camilla. He could not have told how long he had been sitting there, his mind wandering down all sorts of byways with Camilla at the end of each, when the phone rang to rouse him.
"Yes, it's me," said Camilla's voice. "Yes, I'm at the Hall. Alan, what's happening here?"
"You ring me at the hotel to ask what's happening
there?"
"Well, something did!"
"After Dr. Fell got there, you mean?"
"No, before Dr. Fell got here. In the afternoon, when it wasn't even dark!"
"Camilla, what are you talking about?"
"Lots of hush-hush comings and goings by the police," Camilla said mysteriously. "Fee! Fi! Fo! Fum! And—you remember late Friday night, when Valerie almost screamed the house down?"
"Well?"
"It wasn't Valerie today. I was reading Joyce in the library this afternoon when a woman's voice upstairs cut loose with one absolutely blood-curdling screech that nearly sent me through the roof. Just one scream; then silence and a kind of cover-up."
"Who screamed?"
"I can't find out; nobody seems to know; it was one of the maids, I think. Ever since Friday night poor George, the butler, has been having a dreadful time preventing the maids and the cook from leaving in a body. Outwardly you can't rattle George at all, though inwardly I think he's as disturbed as the other
s. He can hide it, that's all. I
didn't scream, and I don't think Madge did. So I vote for Sylvia or Judith or Minnie Mae; who else is there?"
"What about Madge, by the way? How is she?"
"She's not incommunicado any longer. She's up and dressed and about, after a fashion; but very shaky and not speaking much to anybody, for which I don't blame her. Once Captain Ashcroft passed her on the stairs and muttered something. Madge just said, 'Not
again,
you silly boy?' and paid no more attention to him. That's not all, either. Are you listening, Alan?"
"Yes?"
"After the inquest tomorrow afternoon, Captain Ashcroft says, we're all free to leave here and go home. You wouldn't think that would make people
more
jumpy than they already were, but it has. Dr. Fell—" Camilla herself jumped and hesitated. "Just a moment! Here
is
Dr. Fell,
wig
-wag
ging at m
e. He wants to speak to you." ""My dear fellow," Dr
.
Fell’s
voice
interjected, "do you know what time it is?"
"Getting on for nine, I should think; does it matter?"
"Not particularly, though in
fact it is a quarter to nine. If
you would care to drive out here now, your presence would be most welcome."
"Yes, Alan," cried Camill
a, "do come as soon as you can.
.
”
The phone clicked; the line went dead. Hurrying downstairs to get his car from the auto lobby, Alan found that the night, though fine, had turned unseasonably cool and even chilly. On the way to James Island he met certain thick remnants of Sunday traffic; it was a little later than half-past nine when he drove
into the grounds of May
nard Hall.