The Greatest Murder Mysteries of S. S. Van Dine - 12 Titles in One Volume (Illustrated Edition). S.S. Van Dine
Читать онлайн книгу.
The woman shifted her gaze.
“I—wasn’t worried.”
“Yes, you were, Mrs. Platz. And I’ll tell you why. You were afraid we might think Miss Hoffman shot him.”
“Oh, no, sir, I wasn’t!” she cried. “My girl wasn’t even here that night—I swear it!—she wasn’t here. . . .”
She was badly shaken: the nervous tension of a week had snapped, and she looked helplessly about her.
“Come, come, Mrs. Platz,” pleaded Vance consolingly. “No one believes for a moment that Miss Hoffman had a hand in Mr. Benson’s death.”
The woman peered searchingly into his face. At first she was loath to believe him,—it was evident that fear had long been preying on her mind,—and it took him fully a quarter of an hour to convince her that what he had said was true. When, finally, we left the house she was in a comparatively peaceful state of mind.
On our way to the Stuyvesant Club Markham was silent, completely engrossed with his thoughts. It was evident that the new facts educed by the interview with Mrs. Platz troubled him considerably.
Vance sat smoking dreamily, turning his head now and then to inspect the buildings we passed. We drove east through Forty-eighth Street, and when we came abreast of the New York Bible Society House he ordered the chauffeur to stop, and insisted that we admire it.
“Christianity,” he remarked, “has almost vindicated itself by its architecture alone. With few exceptions, the only buildings in this city that are not eyesores, are the churches and their allied structures. The American æsthetic credo is: Whatever’s big is beautiful. These depressin’ gargantuan boxes with rectangular holes in ’em, which are called skyscrapers, are worshipped by Americans simply because they’re huge. A box with forty rows of holes is twice as beautiful as a box with twenty rows. Simple formula, what? . . . Look at this little five-story affair across the street. It’s inf’nitely lovelier—and more impressive, too—than any skyscraper in the city. . . .”
Vance referred but once to the crime during our ride to the Club, and then only indirectly.
“Kind hearts, y’ know, Markham, are more than coronets. I’ve done a good deed to-day, and I feel pos’tively virtuous. Frau Platz will schlafen much better to-night. She has been frightfully upset about little Gretchen. She’s a doughty old soul; motherly and all that. And she couldn’t bear to think of the future Lady Vere de Vere being suspected. . . . Wonder why she worried so?” And he gave Markham a sly look.
Nothing further was said until after dinner, which we ate in the Roof Garden. We had pushed back our chairs, and sat looking out over the tree-tops of Madison Square.
“Now, Markham,” said Vance, “give over all prejudices, and consider the situation judiciously—as you lawyers euphemistically put it. . . . To begin with, we now know why Mrs. Platz was so worried at your question regarding fire-arms, and why she was upset by my ref’rence to her personal int’rest in Benson’s tea-companion. So, those two mysteries are elim’nated. . . .”
“How did you find out about her relation to the girl?” interjected Markham.
“’T was my ogling did it.” Vance gave him a reproving look. “You recall that I ‘ogled’ the young lady at our first meeting,—but I forgive you. . . . And you remember our little discussion about cranial idiosyncrasies? Miss Hoffman, I noticed at once, possessed all the physical formations of Benson’s housekeeper. She was brachycephalic; she had over-articulated cheek-bones, an orthognathous jaw, a low flat parietal structure, and a mesorrhinian nose. . . . Then I looked for her ear, for I had noted that Mrs. Platz had the pointed, lobeless, ‘satyr’ ear—sometimes called the Darwin ear. These ears run in families; and when I saw that Miss Hoffman’s were of the same type, even though modified, I was fairly certain of the relationship. But there were other similarities—in pigment, for instance; and in height,—both are tall, y’ know. And the central masses of each were very large in comparison with the peripheral masses: the shoulders were narrow and the wrists and ankles small, while the hips were bulky. . . . That Hoffman was Platz’s maiden name was only a guess. But it didn’t matter.”
Vance adjusted himself more comfortably in his chair.
“Now for your judicial considerations. . . . First, let us assume that at a little before half past twelve on the night of the thirteenth the villain came to Benson’s house, saw the light in the living-room, tapped on the window, and was instantly admitted. . . . What, would you say, do these assumptions indicate regarding the visitor?”
“Merely that Benson was acquainted with him,” returned Markham. “But that doesn’t help us any. We can’t extend the sus. per coll. to everybody the man knew.”
“The indications go much further than that, old chap,” Vance retorted. “They show unmistakably that Benson’s murderer was a most intimate crony, or, at least, a person before whom he didn’t care how he looked. The absence of the toupee, as I once suggested to you, was a prime essential of the situation. A toupee, don’t y’ know, is the sartorial sine qua non of every middle-aged Beau Brummel afflicted with baldness. You heard Mrs. Platz on the subject. Do you think for a second that Benson, who hid his hirsute deficiency even from the grocer’s boy, would visit with a mere acquaintance thus bereft of his crowning glory? And besides being thus denuded, he was without his full complement of teeth. Moreover, he was without collar or tie, and attired in an old smoking-jacket and bed-room slippers! Picture the spectacle, my dear fellow. . . . A man does not look fascinatin’ without his collar and with his shirt-band and gold stud exposed. Thus attired he is the equiv’lent of a lady in curl-papers. . . . How many men do you think Benson knew with whom he would have sat down to a tête-à-tête in this undress condition?”
“Three or four, perhaps,” answered Markham. “But I can’t arrest them all.”
“I’m sure you would if you could. But it won’t be necess’ry.”
Vance selected another cigarette from his case, and went on:
“There are other helpful indications, y’ know. For instance, the murderer was fairly well acquainted with Benson’s domestic arrangements. He must have known that the housekeeper slept a good distance from the living-room and would not be startled by the shot if her door was closed as usual. Also, he must have known there was no one else in the house at that hour. And another thing: don’t forget that his voice was perfectly familiar to Benson. If there had been the slightest doubt about it Benson would not have let him in, in view of his natural fear of house-breakers, and with the Captain’s threat hanging over him.”
“That’s a tenable hypothesis. . . . What else?”
“The jewels, Markham—those orators of love. Have you thought of them? They were on the center-table when Benson came home that night; and they were gone in the morning. Wherefore, it seems inev’table that the murderer took ’em—eh, what? . . . And may they not have been one reason for the murderer’s coming there that night? If so, who of Benson’s most intimate personæ gratæ knew of their presence in the house? And who wanted ’em particularly?”
“Exactly, Vance.” Markham nodded his head slowly. “You’ve hit it. I’ve had an uneasy feeling about Pfyfe right along. I was on the point of ordering his arrest to-day when Heath brought word of Leacock’s confession; and then, when that blew up, my suspicions reverted to him. I said nothing this afternoon because I wanted to see where your ideas had led you. What you’ve been saying checks up perfectly with my own notions. Pfyfe’s our man——”
He brought the front legs of his chair down suddenly.
“And now, damn it, you’ve let him get away from us!”
“Don’t fret, old dear,” said Vance. “He’s safe with Mrs. Pfyfe, I fancy. And anyhow, your friend, Mr. Ben Hanlon, is well versed in retrieving fugitives. . . . Let the harassed Leander alone for the moment. You don’t need him to-night—and to-morrow you won’t want him.”