The Best Detectives Murder Mysteries for Christmas Holidays. Эдгар Аллан По
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an admiring “Bully.” Sir James said nothing until she had finished, when his quiet “well done, Miss Tuppence,” made her flush with pleasure.
“There’s one thing I don’t get clearly,” said Julius. “What put her up to clearing out?”
“I don’t know,” confessed Tuppence.
Sir James stroked his chin thoughtfully.
“The room was in great disorder. That looks as though her flight was unpremeditated. Almost as though she got a sudden warning to go from some one.”
“Mr. Brown, I suppose,” said Julius scoffingly.
The lawyer looked at him deliberately for a minute or two.
“Why not?” he said. “Remember, you yourself have once been worsted by him.”
Julius flushed with vexation.
“I feel just mad when I think of how I handed out Jane’s photograph to him like a lamb. Gee, if I ever lay hands on it again, I’ll freeze on to it like—like hell!”
“That contingency is likely to be a remote one,” said the other dryly.
“I guess you’re right,” said Julius frankly. “And, in any case, it’s the original I’m out after. Where do you think she can be, Sir James?”
The lawyer shook his head.
“Impossible to say. But I’ve a very good idea where she has been.”
“You have? Where?”
Sir James smiled.
“At the scene of your nocturnal adventures, the Bournemouth nursing home.”
“There? Impossible. I asked.”
“No, my dear sir, you asked if anyone of the name of Jane Finn had been there. Now, if the girl had been placed there it would almost certainly be under an assumed name.”
“Bully for you,” cried Julius. “I never thought of that!”
“It was fairly obvious,” said the other.
“Perhaps the doctor’s in it too,” suggested Tuppence.
Julius shook his head.
“I don’t think so. I took to him at once. No, I’m pretty sure Dr. Hall’s all right.”
“Hall, did you say?” asked Sir James. “That is curious—really very curious.”
“Why?” demanded Tuppence.
“Because I happened to meet him this morning. I’ve known him slightly on and off for some years, and this morning I ran across him in the street. Staying at the Metropole, he told me.” He turned to Julius. “Didn’t he tell you he was coming up to town?”
Julius shook his head.
“Curious,” mused Sir James. “You did not mention his name this afternoon, or I would have suggested your going to him for further information with my card as introduction.”
“I guess I’m a mutt,” said Julius with unusual humility. “I ought to have thought of the false name stunt.”
“How could you think of anything after falling out of that tree?” cried Tuppence. “I’m sure anyone else would have been killed right off.”
“Well, I guess it doesn’t matter now, anyway,” said Julius. “We’ve got Mrs. Vandemeyer on a string, and that’s all we need.”
“Yes,” said Tuppence, but there was a lack of assurance in her voice.
A silence settled down over the party. Little by little the magic of the night began to gain a hold on them. There were sudden creaks of the furniture, imperceptible rustlings in the curtains. Suddenly Tuppence sprang up with a cry.
“I can’t help it. I know Mr. Brown’s somewhere in the flat! I can FEEL him.”
“Sure, Tuppence, how could he be? This door’s open into the hall. No one could have come in by the front door without our seeing and hearing him.”
“I can’t help it. I FEEL he’s here!”
She looked appealingly at Sir James, who replied gravely:
“With due deference to your feelings, Miss Tuppence (and mine as well for that matter), I do not see how it is humanly possible for anyone to be in the flat without our knowledge.”
The girl was a little comforted by his wards.
“Sitting up at night is always rather jumpy,” she confessed.
“Yes,” said Sir James. “We are in the condition of people holding a seance. Perhaps if a medium were present we might get some marvellous results.”
“Do you believe in spiritualism?” asked Tuppence, opening her eyes wide.
The lawyer shrugged his shoulders.
“There is some truth in it, without a doubt. But most of the testimony would not pass muster in the witness-box.”
The hours drew on. With the first faint glimmerings of dawn, Sir James drew aside the curtains. They beheld, what few Londoners see, the slow rising of the sun over the sleeping city. Somehow, with the coming of the light, the dreads and fancies of the past night seemed absurd. Tuppence’s spirits revived to the normal.
“Hooray!” she said. “It’s going to be a gorgeous day. And we shall find Tommy. And Jane Finn. And everything will be lovely. I shall ask Mr. Carter if I can’t be made a Dame!”
At seven o’clock Tuppence volunteered to go and make some tea. She returned with a tray, containing the teapot and four cups.
“Who’s the other cup for?” inquired Julius.
“The prisoner, of course. I suppose we might call her that?”
“Taking her tea seems a kind of anticlimax to last night,” said Julius thoughtfully.
“Yes, it does,” admitted Tuppence. “But, anyway, here goes. Perhaps you’d both come, too, in case she springs on me, or anything. You see, we don’t know what mood she’ll wake up in.”
Sir James and Julius accompanied her to the door.
“Where’s the key? Oh, of course, I’ve got it myself.”
She put it in the lock, and turned it, then paused.
“Supposing, after all, she’s escaped?” she murmured in a whisper.
“Plumb impossible,” replied Julius reassuringly.
But Sir James said nothing.
Tuppence drew a long breath and entered. She heaved a sigh of relief as she saw that Mrs. Vandemeyer was lying on the bed.
“Good morning,” she remarked cheerfully. “I’ve brought you some tea.”
Mrs. Vandemeyer did not reply. Tuppence put down the cup on the table by the bed and went across to draw up the blinds. When she turned, Mrs. Vandemeyer still lay without a movement. With a sudden fear clutching at her heart, Tuppence ran to the bed. The hand she lifted was cold as ice… . Mrs. Vandemeyer would never speak now… .
Her cry brought the others. A very few minutes sufficed. Mrs. Vandemeyer was dead—must have been dead some hours. She had evidently died in her sleep.
“If that isn’t the cruellest luck,” cried Julius in despair.
The lawyer was calmer, but there was a curious gleam in his eyes.
“If it is luck,” he replied.
“You don’t think—but, say, that’s plumb impossible—no one could have got in.”
“No,” admitted the lawyer. “I don’t see how they could. And yet—she