The Tragedy of Z (8 page)

He was on his knees before the fireplace behind the desk, studying something with considerable interest. A detective was saying something in a low voice, and a man with a camera was busy to one side photographing the interior of the fireplace. A blue light flashed, and there was a muffled explosion; the room filled with smoke. The photographer motioned father aside and took another picture of something on the edge of the rug abutting the fireplace, directly before the grate in the middle. I looked, and saw that it was a neatly imprinted outline of the toe of a man's left shoe. Ashes had untidily scattered from the fireplace a little out into the room; a man had inadvertently stepped into them.… The photographer grunted, and began to pack away his apparatus; I gathered that this was his last chore, for someone had mentioned that photographs of other parts of the room and the dead man had been taken before our arrival.

The object of father's interest, however, was not the toe-print on the rug, but something in the grate itself. It looked innocent enough—a considerably blurred but distinguished footprint impressed in a little layer of lightcolored ashes which lay, quite observably separated, atop an older and darker mass of ashes, evidently the residue of the evening's fire.

“What d'ye think of that, Patty?” exclaimed father as I craned over his shoulder. “What's it look like to you?”

“The print of a man's right shoe.”

“Correct,” said father, and rose. “And something else. See the difference in shade between that top layer of ashes in which the print was made, and the bottom layer? Different stuff was burned, kid. Burned not long ago, and stamped on. Now who the devil burned it, and what the devil was it he burned?”

I had my ideas, but I said nothing.

“Now, this other print, the toeprint,” muttered father, looking down at the rug. “Makes the layout pretty clear. He stood right smack before the fireplace, got his left foot in the ashes on the rug, and then he set fire to something in the grate and stamped on it with his right foot.… Okay?” he growled to the photographer, and the man nodded. Father knelt again and began digging cautiously among the light-colored ashes. “Ha!” he cried, straightening up in triumph; he was holding a tiny scrap of paper.

It was heavy creamy paper, undoubtedly part of what had been freshly burned. Father tore off an infinitesimal part, and applied a match to it. The wisp of ash was the same color as the light-colored ashes in the grate.

“Well,” he said scratching his head, “that's that. Now where in hell did this come from?—'Scuse me, Patty. I wonder——”

“From that pad on the desk,” I replied calmly, “I saw that at once, father. That's extremely distinguished stationery the Senator used, even if he did have it made up in pads.”

“By God, Patty, you're right at that!” He hurried over to the desk. A comparison of the remaining scrap of unconsumed paper with the paper of the pad told us at once, as I had predicted, that what had been burned in the grate had been a sheet of paper from this very pad.

Father mumbled: “Yes, but that doesn't give us much. How do we know
when
it was burned? Might have been hours before the criminal got here. Maybe Fawcett himself—Wait a minute.” He ran back to the fireplace and rooted about in the ashes again. And again he found something—this time fishing out of the fine crumbly residue a long sliver of sticky glued linen. “Yep, that cinches it. Part of the adhesive binding of the pad. Stuck to the sheet, and when the sheet was burned this escaped the flames. But I still——”

He turned and exhibited his finds to John Hume and old Rufus Cotton. I took advantage of their conference to do a bit of private scouting. I peered beneath the desk and found what I was looking for—a waste-paper basket. It was quite empty. Then I poked through the drawers of the desk; but I could not find what I sought—another pad, used or unused. So I slipped out of the study and went on a still-hunt for Carmichael. I found him in the drawing room, peacefully reading a newspaper—under the eye of a detective who strove to appear as innocent as W. S. Gilbert's new-laid
egg.

“Mr. Carmichael,” I demanded, “that pad on the Senator's desk—is it the only one in the house?”

He jumped to his feet, crumbling the newspaper. “I—I beg your pardon. The pad? Oh, yes, yes! The only one. There were others, but they've all been used up.”

“When was the last used, Mr. Carmichael?”

“Two days ago. I threw the cardboard back away myself.”

I returned to the study thinking hard. There were so many possibilities that my brain spun dizzily; but so many facts, too, were missing. Were there other facts at all? Should I ever be able to prove what I now suspected—?

My speculations ceased abruptly.

In the same doorway which earlier tonight had framed a murderer, the police, ourselves, Rufus Cotton, suddenly appeared a remarkable apparition. Tangible or not, the detective who accompanied this creature was taking no chances; his big hand was clamped tightly about her upper arm, and he was scowling fiercely.

She was immensely tall and broad and husky, an Amazon. I put her down at once as forty-seven, and did not applaud my own acumen—she made no effort whatever to disguise her age. There was no powder or rouge on her heavy masculine face; she had not bleached the prominent hairs of her broad upper lip. Her hideously carmine hair was covered with a felt hat which I was sure had been purchased at a haberdashers rather than a milliner's. She made no style concession to her sex; for she was dressed in startling mannish clothes. A double-breasted, lapelled suit-coat; a severely tailored skirt; heavy broad-soled shoes; a white waist buttoned high at the neck; a man's necktie loosely knotted at her throat … the woman was appalling in the ensemble. I noticed with wonder that even her waist was stiffly starched, man-fashion, and that the cuffs which protruded from the sleeves of her coat sported large cufflinks, beautifully filigreed in a curious metallic design.

And there was something aside from the bizarre which was arresting in this extraordinary creature. Her eyes were like diamonds, keen and brilliant. Her voice, when she spoke, was very deep and soft, with a remote hoarseness that was not unpleasant. And, despite the grotesquerie, she was a woman of intelligence—if of a crude, natural sort.

I had no doubt that this was Fanny Kaiser.

Kenyon awoke from his lethargy. He bellowed: “Hel-
lo
, Fanny!” in such a tone of man-to-man camaraderie that I stared. Who
was
this woman?

“Hello to you, Kenyon,” she rumbled. “Damn your eyes, what's the idea of the pinch? What's goin' on here?”

Here telescopic glance took us all in—Hume, to whom she nodded indifferently; Jeremy, whom she passed without expression; father, who made her thoughtful; and myself, over whom she lingered with something like amazement. Then the inspection ceased; and, staring into the district attorney's eyes, she demanded: “Well, are you all dumb? What is this, a wake? Where's Joe Fawcett? Talk, somebody!”

“Glad you dropped in, Fanny,” said Hume quickly. “We wanted to talk to you. Saved us a trip. Er—come in, come in!”

She obeyed with large slow steps, heavy-footed, massive as
Il Penseroso;
and she dipped her large fingers into her large breast pocket as she came in, bringing out a large fat cigar which she thrust thoughtfully between her large lips. Kenyon lumbered forward with a match. She puffed a billow of smoke and regarded the desk in a squint, the cigar crushed between her immense white teeth.

“Well?” she growled, and leaned against the desk. “What's happened to His Nibs the Senator?”

“Don't you know?” asked Hume quietly.

The tip of the cigar rose in a slow arc. “Me?” The cigar fell. “How the hell should I know?”

Hume turned to the detective who had brought the woman in. “What happened, Pike?”

The man grinned. “She comes marchin' in bold as brass—smack up to the house, an' when she gets to the front door an' sees the boys standin' there, and the lights—why, she looks kind of surprised. So she says: ‘What the hell's goin' on here?' An' I says: ‘You better come on in, Fanny. The D.A.'s lookin' for you.'”

“Did she try to make a break, get away?”

“Be yourself, Hume,” said Fanny Kaiser abruptly. “What the hell for? And I'm still waitin' for an explanation.”

“All right,” murmured Hume to the detective, and the man went out. “Now, Fanny, suppose you fell me why you've come here tonight.”

“What's that to you?”

“You came here to see the Senator, didn't you?”

She flicked a gob of ash off the tip of the cigar. “Wouldn't expect me to come here to meet the President, would you? Why, is it against the law to go visitin'?”

“No,” smiled Hume. “Although I have suspicions, Fanny. So you don't know what's happened to your pal the Senator?”

Her eyes flashed angrily, and she snatched the cigar from her mouth. “Hey, what is this? Sure not! I wouldn't ask if I did, would I? What's the gag?”

“The gag, Fanny,” said Hume in a friendly tone, “is that the Senator departed this earth tonight.”

“Listen, Hume,” grated Kenyon, “what's the big idea? Fanny, she don't——”

“So he's dead,” said Fanny Kaiser slowly. “Dead, hey? Well, well. Here today, gone tomorrow.—Kicked off just like that, hey?”

She made not the slightest effort to appear surprised. But I noticed a tightening of the muscles in her great jaws, and a wary narrowing of her eyes.

“No, Fanny. He didn't kick off just like that.”

She puffed evenly. “Oh! Suicide?”

“No, Fanny. Murder.”

She said, “Oh!” again, and I knew that despite her calmness she had been steeling herself against this, had been waiting for it, perhaps dreading it.

“So, Fanny,” went on the district attorney pleasantly, “you see why we have to ask questions. Did you have an appointment with Fawcett tonight?”

“This sure puts you in a sweet spot, Hume … Appointment?” she rumbled absently. “No. No, I just dropped in. He didn't know I was comin'—” She shrugged her broad shoulders with sudden decision and flung the cigar into the fireplace—
over her shoulder,
I noted, and without looking. This lady, then, was quite familiar with Senator Fawcett's study. Father's face grew blanker; he, too, had seen the significance of her action. “Now, listen, kid,” she said harshly to Hume. “I know what's buzzin' in your think-tank. You're a nice lad, an' all that, but you're not puttin' anything over on little Fanny Kaiser. Would I 'a' walked in here like this if I had anything to do with this damn' killin'? You lay off, kid. I'm goin'.”

She strode thunderously toward the door.

“Just a minute, Fanny,” said Hume without moving. She stopped. “Why jump at conclusions? I haven't accused you of anything. But I'm very curious about one thing. What was your business with Fawcett tonight?”

She said, in a dangerous tone: “Lay off, I tell you.”

“You're being very foolish, Fanny.”

“Listen, kid.” She paused, and then she grinned like a gargoyle and flung a peculiarly humorous glance at Rufus Cotton, who stood stonily in the background, a horrible smile fixed on his cheeks. “I'm a lady with a lot of business connections, see? You'd be surprised how many friends I got among the big shots of this burg. If you're thinkin' of pinnin' anything on me, Mr. Hume, you just remember that. My customers mightn't like, f'instance, to be advertised; and they'd step on you, Mr. Hume, just like
that
”—she stamped viciously on the rug with her right foot—“If you took a notion to be nasty.”

Hume turned his back, coloring, and then whirled upon her unexpectedly, thrusting beneath her Promethean nose the letter Senator Fawcett had written to her: the fifth letter from the stack on the desk.

She read the short message coolly, without blinking. But I sensed the panic behind her mask. This note, in the Senator's authenticated handwriting, addressed to her in terms of mystery but indubitable intimacy, could be neither laughed nor threatened away.

“What's this about?” said Hume coldly. “Who's Maizie? What are these mysterious telephone messages that the Senator was afraid were being listened in on? Whom did he mean by ‘friend H'?”

“You tell me.” Her eyes were frozen. “You can read, mister.”

I knew instantly, as Kenyon shuffled forward with a comical expression of anxiety to draw Hume aside and speak to him in urgent undertones, that the district attorney had made a tactical error in showing Fanny Kaiser the letter the Senator had written. She was armed with knowledge now; she bristled with grim decision and a queer disquietude which would never be fear, but might become menace.… And while Hume listened to Kenyon's rasping protests, she tossed her head, drew a deep breath, stared at Rufus Cotton icily, and with a curious pucker between her brows stalked out of the study.

Hume permitted her to leave unmolested. He was angry, I saw, but somehow helpless. He nodded curtly to Kenyon and turned to father.

“Can't hold her,” he muttered. “But she'll be watched.”

“Nice gal,” drawled father. “What's her racket?”

The district attorney lowered his voice, and father's shaggy brows went up. “So that's it!” I heard him say. “Should have known. I've met her kind before. Hard to handle.”

“Suppose,” I said tartly to Hume, “you let me in on the secret. She isn't Juno, is she?”

Hume shook his head, and father smiled grimly. “Those things aren't for you, Patty. Don't you think you'd better be getting back to the Clay place now? Young Clay'll take you.…”

“No!” I said peevishly. “I don't see why—I'm over twenty-one, you know, Inspector darling. What's the secret of this woman's power? It can't be sex appeal.…”