The Book of the Dead (3 page)

“On the twenty-first of June I started out on that walk, and before I got to the house I turned off up a field to a stone wall, thinking I'd climb over it and sit in the orchard. When I got over the wall, I nearly died; there was somebody sitting on the other side of it, sitting up against it, with his hat over his eyes. It was this Mr. Howard Crenshaw. He was just as nice as he could be; he said please go right ahead through the property, or sit there if I wanted to; but excuse him for not getting up, he hadn't been feeling well. We got talking.”

Gamadge said: “I don't like to interrupt; what did or does he look like, your Mr. Crenshaw? I always like to know.”

“Well, he's about forty-five, I should say; he has very light hair and blue eyes, and he has a nice quiet way of talking. He had nice clothes, and a Panama hat. He was rather pale, but I think his skin is that way naturally—he doesn't sunburn or tan. He was medium sized, rather thin. Clean shaven.”

“Very good sketch.”

“Just nice-looking. He told me about his uncle leaving him the old place, and about his coming all the way from California to see about it and settle the estate. He said he'd met a man—Pike—in Unionboro, and this man was very good at cooking and so on, and they were kind of camping at the house. I don't wonder; the hotel isn't any good any more.”

“What was Pike like?”

Miss Fisher said in a different voice: “I didn't see much of
him
. He was some man with a Ford car who drove Mr. Crenshaw up from Unionboro when he got there from New York; on the fifteenth of June, that was. When I met him they'd been at the house nearly a week. Mr. Crenshaw just took a fancy to Pike; said he was a philosopher. Anyway, they were settled in the house, and Mr. Crenshaw said he hadn't had such a nice vacation in years. He'd never been in Stonehill before. He intended to stay till sometime in July, and then go back to New York for awhile.

“Well, we ended that first time by climbing up to the top of the orchard, where you can see over the valley and across the mountains; and you can see the road to Stonehill for half a mile, until it goes around a bend.

“Mr. Crenshaw told me that Pike had been selling something on commission, and had lost the job on account of shortages, and that he didn't know but that he'd take this Pike back to New York with him; he wasn't well, and this Pike just suited him.

“While we were talking, Pike came around the bend in the road and along in his car; he'd been getting groceries in Stonehill. Mr. Crenshaw got up rather fast, and said: ‘There's Pike now. I won't keep you.'

“Well, of course,” and Miss Fisher gave Gamadge her dry smile, “when people say they won't keep you, they mean they don't want to be kept.”

“So they do.”

“I had a feeling that Mr. Crenshaw didn't want Pike to see me. I didn't mind. I know how these country people talk, and I didn't want to embarrass Mr. Crenshaw. I just went off through the woods south of the orchard, and hit the road further down. I came back the next day, same time, but a little earlier. Mr. Crenshaw asked me to.”

“It isn't often that we have the luck to meet congenial people by the wayside.”

“I never met anybody like Mr. Crenshaw! I don't know why he ever wanted to talk to me. But we had the nicest talks, and he said he looked forward to them. He'd read everything, and he was so interesting. I didn't realize that he must have been getting sicker all the time. He never said so.”

“What was the trouble?”

“He didn't say.”

“And you never met Pike at all?”

“I saw him on the road a couple of times, and once in Stonehill. Mr. Gamadge…Mr. Crenshaw was afraid of him.”

“Crenshaw was afraid of his tame philosopher?”

“It wasn't just on account of the gossip; I knew that the first time, but I didn't realize it till I thought it over, going home. When Pike's car came around the bend Mr. Crenshaw was frightened.”

Gamadge considered her thoughtfully. “You were convinced by Crenshaw's expression?”

“I was convinced that he was afraid to have Pike see anybody on the place, talking to him. When he hustled me off that first time I was embarrassed, and I just thought—you know; that Mr. Crenshaw was afraid of its getting around in the village—our meeting in the orchard. Then, on the way home, I realized that there was more to it than that.”

“You didn't read more into Mr. Crenshaw's expression than was actually there? Perhaps you didn't like to think that he was afraid of gossip.”

“Mr. Crenshaw didn't let me come on Sunday, when Pike didn't go down to the village for groceries and newspapers.”

“Oh. I see.”

“Mr. Crenshaw said he rested on Sundays. Why should he? He rested all the time. But that wasn't all, either, Mr. Gamadge.” She looked down at the bulging handbag on her lap, opened it, and exclaimed in annoyance when several small objects fell out and dispersed themselves on the floor.

Gamadge begged her to sit still while he retrieved them. He restored her door key to her, a leather stamp-case, a collection of dress-samples fastened together by a pin, and a cardboard rectangle upon which Gamadge commented as he handed it over:

“You don't smoke, Miss Fisher; why carry paper matches in your handbag?”

She looked amused. “It fools everybody.”

“Fools everybody?”

She opened it, and held it out for his inspection. “Well, I'll be hanged.” He peered at it. “A nice little sewing kit.”

“Darning kit,” said Miss Fisher with satisfaction. “It's cute, isn't it? I got it at a department store, at the notion counter. It has four little reels of imitation silk, and two needles, and I carry it back and forth to the office. I don't live near the office now, I moved over to the west side on Monday. It's a rooming house, and of course there's only the telephone in the hall. That's one reason why I wanted to get in touch with Mr. Crenshaw, if I could; to tell him my new address. Nobody knows it yet except my aunt and uncle in Hartsdale. And I wanted to return his book.”

She put her hand into the bag, and with some difficulty extracted a brown octavo, somewhat the worse for wear.

“Mr. Crenshaw lent me this,” she said. “It's a Shakespeare, one of a set. He brought it with him to read; he said he always liked to have some Shakespeare to read when he went on a trip. He forgot it when he left; I wouldn't like him not to have it—it has his grandfather's name stamped on it.”

She showed Gamadge the name in gold—
Elisha M. Crenshaw
—on the cover.

“Family book,” said Gamadge, looking at it with some interest. “How did he come to forget it, I wonder?”

“Because he left in such a hurry; I came up on the sixth of July, and the house was shut up, and they were gone.”

“Really.”

“Mr. Crenshaw lent me the book because we'd been talking about things—the war, and so on, and he wanted me to say whether I thought human nature changed much.”

“A broad question.”

“He was awfully interesting; he liked to talk about such things. He wanted me to read
The Merchant of Venice
—about Shylock, you know, and how he felt, and the way they treated him. He wanted me to say whether I thought Shakespeare meant him to be a comic character.”

“If he meant that, all I can say is that he had a funny way of expressing it.”

“I didn't get a chance to read it. But I saw the marked passages in another play, and after that I was afraid of Pike seeing me.”

Gamadge raised an eyebrow.

“You may think I'm crazy,” continued Miss Fisher in an apologetic tone. “Perhaps I am. I'd seen Pike on the road once before. After I read those marked passages I saw him twice again, not very close; he was in his car. He was just an ordinary country feller, only he looked kind of pleased with himself; but I was glad he never had seen me up there talking to Mr. Crenshaw, and I was glad he didn't know I knew Mr. Crenshaw, or who I was.”

“That's interesting.” Gamadge's eyes were on the Crenshaw Shakespeare. “What did he look like?”

“He's around forty, thin, rugged looking, sunburned—the way farmers are; with rough-looking brown hair and a sharp nose, and these sharp, light eyes. He always wore shirtsleeves and an old felt hat, and needed a shave.”

“What was terrifying about him?”

“Nothing, except that Mr. Crenshaw was afraid of him—”

“Afraid he'd see you,” amended Gamadge.

“Afraid of him,” repeated Miss Fisher firmly, “and marked the passages in the book. I never had a chance to speak about them to Mr. Crenshaw; the next time I went up—on the sixth of July—they were gone. I made sure they were gone, and then I climbed in.”

“Climbed in?”

“Through a back window; those catches aren't much, and the house wasn't boarded. I was bound and determined to find out where Mr. Crenshaw had gone to—if I could.” She added, with some dignity: “I didn't care to ask at the post office. Mr. Crenshaw hadn't told anybody he knew me, and I wasn't going to tell anybody I knew him.”

“Very proper.”

“I looked at all the thrown-out papers I could find, and in the bottom of a coal-scuttle I found this.”

She offered Gamadge a newspaper cutting which looked as though it had been carried about in a wallet. A marked item read:

Sublet. May 1st, October 1st. Large living-room, dining-room, bedroom. Kitchen, maid's room, two baths. Telephone. Unusual. Apply on premises
.

There followed an address on upper Park Avenue.

“I thought,” said Miss Fisher, “that Mr. Crenshaw had this in his wallet when he engaged the apartment in New York, the one he told me he'd taken for the summer. I also found an envelope in the bottom of the coal-scuttle, with the address on it; but it had been addressed wrong and corrected, and thrown away. What I think is that the coal-scuttle was full of papers, and they were thrown on the fire in the stove, and these stuck. They were covered with dirt and dust, and nobody noticed them. I threw the envelope away.”

“Upon my word, Idelia,” said Gamadge, admiration making him forget formality, “you don't seem to need much help in getting your man; but it wasn't like you to throw the envelope away.”

“I didn't see any reason to keep it, since I had the address on the clipping.”

“You hadn't had difficulty in finding Crenshaw then; but you can see that it constitutes better proof that he went to the apartment than the clipping does.”

“I couldn't get in touch with him at the apartment at all. I didn't like to write; after all, he did forget all about me and the book; but I thought he ought to have his book, and I thought I'd wait till I came down to New York myself, and then telephone. I came down on the fifteenth, and I telephoned; they said he was there, but that he had a private wire, and they couldn't ring him.”

“A telephone is advertised in the clipping. It means that there is no switchboard in that apartment house, or that that particular apartment has no telephone connection with the house system.”

“So they said. They wouldn't give me the name in the book.”

“Wouldn't they?”

“No, the man said they weren't to give out telephone numbers. That's when I began to feel so helpless.”

“They had you, I must admit; being a sublet, the apartment telephone wouldn't be listed under Crenshaw's name; not unless he notified the telephone company.”

“He hadn't. I tried them.”

“He doesn't seem to have craved communication by telephone with the outer world.”

“He hadn't anybody; and I did begin to feel as if he was cut off.”

“Not by Pike, though; he had his freedom at Stonehill. He could have walked away from the place while Pike was in the village.”

“Just the same, I didn't send the book; I was afraid Pike might get hold of it. Mr. Crenshaw didn't want him to know he knew me—”

“Knew anybody, didn't you decide?”

“Knew anybody, then: and there were those marked passages—and words rubbed out in the margin.”

“Words rubbed out?”

“You can't read them; but they were there. Anyway, I didn't send the book. But I thought I'd go up to the apartment some night, and see whether I couldn't leave it with somebody, and pay him to give it straight to Mr. Crenshaw. I hated to go. Finally, last Wednesday after office hours I telephoned again—to find out if he was still there. They told me he'd just gone to St. Damian's hospital. They didn't know why, or for how long, or they wouldn't say.”

“Well, he must be safe enough at St. Damian's hospital—wherever that is; I never heard of it.”

“It isn't far from the apartment; a big old place with a wall around it, in its own grounds. I went over there that night and last night, and they said he was resting quietly.”

“That's what they always say.”

“Last week I left my name and address; I thought it would be all right to do it now—Pike wouldn't be at the hospital. But tonight there was no message.”

“We haven't a leg to stand on, Idelia; I could pull wires and try to get information for you about Crenshaw's illness, but for reasons that occur to me vaguely I might not succeed in getting it. You didn't send his book up to him; why didn't you?”

“The girl in the office there was so uninterested, I thought it might not get to him at all until after it had been in the hands of strangers. He may be very sick,” said Idelia in a low voice. “He may have been very sick when he left Stonehill. I thought before we did anything about the hospital that you might look at those marked passages and those rubbed-out words. Perhaps you could bring them back again. Mr. Macloud said you could do anything with handwriting—anything at all.”