The Affair Next Door (20 page)

The woman's look was too quick and suspicious for denial; but she was
about to attempt it, when I cut her short by saying:

"I wish to see Mrs. Boppert very much, but not in her own rooms. I will
pay any one well who will assist me to five minutes' conversation with
her in such a place, say, as that I see behind the glass door at the end
of this very shop."

The woman, startled by so unexpected a proposition, drew back a step,
and was about to shake her head, when I laid on the counter before her
(shall I say how much? Yes, for it was not thrown away) a five-dollar
bill, which she no sooner saw than she gave a gasp of delight.

"Will you give me
that
?" she cried.

For answer I pushed it towards her, but before her fingers could clutch
it, I resolutely said:

"Mrs. Boppert must not know there is anybody waiting here to see her, or
she will not come. I have no ill-will towards her, and mean her only
good, but she's a timid sort of person, and—"

"I know she's timid," broke in the good woman, eagerly. "And she's had
enough to make her so! What with policemen drumming her up at night, and
innocent-looking girls and boys luring her into corners to tell them
what she saw in that grand house where the murder took place, she's
grown that feared of her shadow you can hardly get her out after
sundown. But I think I can get her here; and if you mean her no harm,
why, ma'am—" Her fingers were on the bill, and charmed with the feel
of it, she forgot to finish her sentence.

"Is there any one in the room back there?" I asked, anxious to recall
her to herself.

"No, ma'am, no one at all. I am a poor widder, and not used to such
company as you; but if you will sit down, I will make myself look more
fit and have Mrs. Boppert over here in a minute." And calling to some
one of the name of Susie to look after the shop, she led the way towards
the glass door I have mentioned.

Relieved to find everything working so smoothly and determined to get
the worth of my money out of Mrs. Boppert when I saw her, I followed the
woman into the most crowded room I ever entered. The shop was nothing to
it; there you could move without hitting anything; here you could not.
There were tables against every wall, and chairs where there were no
tables. Opposite me was a window-ledge filled with flowering plants, and
at my right a grate and mantel-piece covered, that is the latter, with
innumerable small articles which had evidently passed a long and forlorn
probation on the shop shelves before being brought in here. While I was
looking at them and marvelling at the small quantity of dust I found,
the woman herself disappeared behind a stack of boxes, for which there
was undoubtedly no room in the shop. Could she have gone for Mrs.
Boppert already, or had she slipped into another room to hide the money
which had come so unexpectedly into her hands?

I was not long left in doubt, for in another moment she returned with a
flower-bedecked cap on her smooth gray head, that transformed her into a
figure at once so complacent and so ridiculous that, had my nerves not
been made of iron, I should certainly have betrayed my amusement. With
it she had also put on her company manner, and what with the smiles she
bestowed upon me and her perfect satisfaction with her own appearance, I
had all I could do to hold my own and keep her to the matter in hand.
Finally she managed to take in my anxiety and her own duty, and saying
that Mrs. Boppert could never refuse a cup of tea, offered to send her
an invitation to supper. As this struck me favorably, I nodded, at which
she cocked her head on one side and insinuatingly whispered:

"And would you pay for the tea, ma'am?"

I uttered an indignant "No!" which seemed to surprise her. Immediately
becoming humble again, she replied it was no matter, that she had tea
enough and that the shop would supply cakes and crackers; to all of
which I responded with a look which awed her so completely that she
almost dropped the dishes with which she was endeavoring to set one of
the tables.

"She does so hate to talk about the murder that it will be a perfect
godsend to her to drop into good company like this with no prying
neighbors about. Shall I set a chair for you, ma'am?"

I declined the honor, saying that I would remain seated where I was,
adding, as I saw her about to go:

"Let her walk straight in, and she will be in the middle of the room
before she sees me. That will suit her and me too; for after she has
once seen me, she won't be frightened.
But you are not to listen at the
door.
"

This I said with great severity, for I saw the woman was becoming very
curious, and having said it, I waved her peremptorily away.

She didn't like it, but a thought of the five dollars comforted her.
Casting one final look at the table, which was far from uninvitingly
set, she slipped out and I was left to contemplate the dozen or so
photographs that covered the walls. I found them so atrocious and their
arrangement so distracting to my bump of order, which is of a pronounced
character, that I finally shut my eyes on the whole scene, and in this
attitude began to piece my thoughts together. But before I had proceeded
far, steps were heard in the shop, and the next moment the door flew
open and in popped Mrs. Boppert, with a face like a peony in full
blossom. She stopped when she saw me and stared.

"Why, if it isn't the lady—"

"Hush! Shut the door. I have something very particular to say to you."

"O," she began, looking as if she wanted to back out. But I was too
quick for her. I shut the door myself and, taking her by the arm, seated
her in the corner.

"You don't show much gratitude," I remarked.

I did not know what she had to be grateful to me for, but she had so
plainly intimated at our first interview that she regarded me as having
done her some favor, that I was disposed to make what use of it I could,
to gain her confidence.

"I know, ma'am, but if you could see how I've been harried, ma'am. It's
the murder, and nothing but the murder all the time; and it was to get
away from the talk about it that I came here, ma'am, and now it's you I
see, and you'll be talking about it too, or why be in such a place as
this, ma'am?"

"And what if I do talk about it? You know I'm your friend, or I never
would have done you that good turn the morning we came upon the poor
girl's body."

"I know, ma'am, and grateful I am for it, too; but I've never understood
it, ma'am. Was it to save me from being blamed by the wicked police, or
was it a dream you had, and the gentleman had, for I've heard what he
said at the inquest, and it's muddled my head till I don't know where
I'm standing."

What I had said and what the gentleman had said! What did the poor thing
mean? As I did not dare to show my ignorance, I merely shook my head.

"Never mind what caused us to speak as we did, as long as we helped
you
. And we did help you? The police never found out what you had to
do with this woman's death, did they?"

"No, ma'am, O no, ma'am. When such a respectable lady as you said that
you saw the young lady come into the house in the middle of the night,
how was they to disbelieve it. They never asked me if I knew any
different."

"No," said I, almost struck dumb by my success, but letting no hint of
my complacency escape me. "And I did not mean they should. You are a
decent woman, Mrs. Boppert, and should not be troubled."

"Thank you, ma'am. But how did you know she had come to the house before
I left. Did you see her?"

I hate a lie as I do poison, but I had to exercise all my Christian
principles not to tell one then.

"No," said I, "I didn't see her, but I don't always have to use my eyes
to know what is going on in my neighbor's houses." Which is true enough,
if it is somewhat humiliating to confess it.

"O ma'am, how smart you are, ma'am! I wish I had some smartness in me.
But my husband had all that. He was a man—O what's that?"

"Nothing but the tea-caddy; I knocked it over with my elbow."

"How I do jump at everything! I'm afraid of my own shadow ever since I
saw that poor thing lying under that heap of crockery."

"I don't wonder."

"She must have pulled those things over herself, don't you think so,
ma'am? No one went in there to murder her. But how came she to have
those clothes on. She was dressed quite different when I let her in. I
say it's all a muddle, ma'am, and it will be a smart man as can explain
it."

"Or a smart woman," I thought.

"Did I do wrong, ma'am? That's what plagues me. She begged so hard to
come in, I didn't know how to shut the door on her. Besides her name was
Van Burnam, or so she told me."

Here was a coil. Subduing my surprise, I remarked:

"If she asked you to let her in, I do not see how you could refuse her.
Was it in the morning or late in the afternoon she came?"

"Don't you know, ma'am? I thought you knew all about it from the way you
talked."

Had I been indiscreet? Could she not bear questioning? Eying her with
some severity, I declared in a less familiar tone than any I had yet
used:

"Nobody knows more about it than I do, but I do not know just the hour
at which this lady came to the house. But I do not ask you to tell me if
you do not want to."

"O ma'am," she humbly remonstrated, "I am sure I am willing to tell you
everything. It was in the afternoon while I was doing the front basement
floor."

"And she came to the basement door?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"And asked to be let in?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Young Mrs. Van Burnam?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Dressed in a black and white plaid silk, and wearing a hat covered with
flowers?"

"Yes, ma'am, or something like that. I know it was very bright and
becoming."

"And why did she come to the basement door—a lady dressed like that?"

"Because she knew I couldn't open the front door; that I hadn't the key.
O she talked beautiful, ma'am, and wasn't proud with me a bit. She made
me let her stay in the house, and when I said it would be dark after a
while and that I hadn't done nothing to the rooms upstairs, she laughed
and said she didn't care, that she wasn't afraid of the dark and had
just as lieve as not stay in the big house alone all night, for she had
a book—Did you say anything, ma'am?"

"No, no, go on, she had a book."

"Which she could read till she got sleepy. I never thought anything
would happen to her."

"Of course not, why should you? And so you let her into the house and
left her there when you went out of it? Well, I don't wonder you were
shocked to see her lying dead on the floor next morning."

"Awful, ma'am. I was afraid they would blame me for what had happened.
But I didn't do nothing to make her die. I only let her stay in the
house. Do you think they will do anything to me if they know it?"

"No," said I, trying to understand this woman's ignorant fears, "they
don't punish such things. More's the pity!"—this in confidence to
myself. "How could you know that a piece of furniture would fall on her
before morning. Did you lock her in when you left the house?"

"Yes, ma'am. She told me to."

Then she was a prisoner.

Confounded by the mystery of the whole affair, I sat so still the woman
looked up in wonder, and I saw I had better continue my questions.

"What reason did she give for wanting to stay in the house all night?"

"What reason, ma'am? I don't know. Something about her having to be
there when Mr. Van Burnam came home. I didn't make it out, and I didn't
try to. I was too busy wondering what she would have to eat."

"And what did she have?"

"I don't know, ma'am. She said she had something, but I didn't see it."

"Perhaps you were blinded by the money she gave you. She gave you some,
of course?"

"O, not much, ma'am, not much. And I wouldn't have taken a cent if it
had not seemed to make her so happy to give it. The pretty, pretty
thing! A real lady, whatever they say about her!"

"And happy? You said she was happy, cheerful-looking, and pretty."

"O yes, ma'am;
she
didn't know what was going to happen. I even heard
her sing after she went up-stairs."

I wished that my ears had been attending to their duty that day, and I
might have heard her sing too. But the walls between my house and that
of the Van Burnams are very thick, as I have had occasion to observe
more than once.

"Then she went up-stairs before you left?"

"To be sure, ma'am; what would she do in the kitchen?"

"And you didn't see her again?"

"No, ma'am; but I heard her walking around."

"In the parlors, you mean?"

"Yes, ma'am, in the parlors."

"You did not go up yourself?"

"No, ma'am, I had enough to do below."

"Didn't you go up when you went away?"

"No, ma'am; I didn't like to."

"When did you go?"

"At five, ma'am; I always go at five."

"How did you know it was five?"

"The kitchen clock told me; I wound it, ma'am and set it when the
whistles blew at twelve."

"Was that the only clock you wound?"

"Only clock? Do you think I'd be going around the house winding any
others?"

Her face showed such surprise, and her eyes met mine so frankly, that I
was convinced she spoke the truth. Gratified—I don't know why,—I
bestowed upon her my first smile, which seemed to affect her, for her
face softened, and she looked at me quite eagerly for a minute before
she said:

"You don't think so very bad of me, do you, ma'am?"

But I had been struck by a thought which made me for the moment
oblivious to her question.
She
had wound the clock in the kitchen for
her own uses, and why may not the lady above have wound the one in the
parlor for hers? Filled with this startling idea, I remarked: