Death and Letters Read online

  “Indeed we’ll all be glad to do anything. There’s not a soul at home, sir.”

  “Well, we don’t need them. First of all,” said Gamadge, taking a clean five-dollar bill out of his wallet, “Mrs. Coldfield wants you to have this for your trouble about her luggage.”

  “The nurse did most of it, sir. How is Mrs. Glendon, sir?”

  “Perfectly well, she always was.”

  “There now.”

  “It was all a mistake.”

  Agnes received this familiar and all-sufficient formula with satisfaction. “We all knew it would come out like that.”

  “I’m back again because Mrs. Glendon thinks she left something she’s going to need. A heavy coat.”

  Agnes looked doubtful. “There’s her trunk, sir, we were going to send it on by express on Monday. But—”

  “She says she thinks it’s in a trunk in the attic. A big locked trunk; if you’d go up with me I could find it.”

  Agnes was astonished. “But that trunk has Mrs. Ira’s old riding clothes and Mr. Ira’s fishing boots and things in it.”

  “Mrs. Glendon is pretty sure her coat is there. Couldn’t we just look?”

  “Yes, sir, of course. But I haven’t the key.”

  “She had one.”

  “She did, sir?”

  “Yes, I can open the trunk. But first might I telephone?”

  “Certainly, sir.”

  “And meanwhile you might just make sure that there’s no heavy coat in Mrs. Coldfield’s trunk, you know. I’ll join you.”

  Agnes left him to go upstairs. Gamadge sat down at the telephone and dialled Geegan.

  Geegan sounded amused. “Hello, where are you?”

  “At Cliffside-on-Hudson. Here’s the number.” Gamadge supplied it. “You can get me here for the next hour, say. But I’ll try to ring you before I leave.”

  “I might be ringing you myself, the subject is moving around.”

  “Is he?”

  “They sat a long time over lunch, Bardo says; then he said a fond farewell to the lady, and got in his car and drove uptown—to Yorkville.”

  “Yorkville!”

  “Yorkville, way over east; to a little beergarden, the Schönbrunn, between Second and Third. Sawdust on the floor, checked table-cloths, one waiter, and the garden is out back; has the fountain in it too, all correct—dwarf made of lead, pouring water out of a beer-keg; only the water isn’t running today.”

  “Picturesque,” said Gamadge.

  “I guess that’s the idea. The place is empty this time of day, Bardo says there’s nobody in it but the subject and himself, with Shaff parked outside a little way down. The subject is parked at the table beside the one window, enjoying a beer. Bardo’s trying to make his last—he’s back at the bar, end of the room. But after a while he’ll have to leave, sit in the car.”

  “Couldn’t he go quietly to sleep in a booth?”

  “He will, that’s his idea, but he won’t be able to stay forever. Well, looks as if we might have some more to report pretty soon, don’t it? I’ll say goodbye now.”

  Gamadge rang off, climbed the two flights of stairs to the top floor.

  Agnes came into the hall to meet him. “It’s not there, sir. I thought sure I put her tweed coat into her big case.”

  “This seems to be another one.”

  Agnes preceded him into the attic, and stood gazing blankly at the Saratoga trunk in the corner near the window. Gamadge said: “Just see if any of the others are locked, would you?” and walked up to the monster with its great hasps and its iron bands. He bent to the lock, and after a moment it snapped open with a click that brought Agnes to his side.

  “That’s the one, sir, sure enough.”

  “Seems to be.” He raised the lid. Both of them stood gazing down at a carefully packed top tray.

  Agnes said faintly: “Is them hers?”

  “You don’t recognize anything?”

  “Never saw them in my life. That’s mink, isn’t it?”

  “Here, let’s get some of the stuff out.”

  “This trunk here is dusted,” said Agnes, giving it an extra wipe with her apron. Gamadge piled garments one after the other into her waiting arms: a full-length mink coat, a short white-fur jacket, a set of silver fox, a pink costume trimmed with bands of beaver. He lifted the tray out, and delved further down.

  “Shot-silk dress,” he said. “Cocktail dress, would you say? Boy, look at the label. Here’s an evening thing, gold and silver. Summer dresses. And underneath, sure enough, at the bottom, the riding clothes and boots, and Mr. Coldfield’s waders.”

  “Can’t you find Mrs. Glendon’s coat, sir?”

  “No. Here, let’s get these things back again.”

  Agnes, panting, folded them. “But who do they belong to, sir? Mrs. Glendon never—”

  “How much would they be worth, should you say, Agnes?”

  “My God; I don’t know.”

  “Just look at where they all came from; I’ve heard my wife say a thing or two. And those furs—and the coat. As near ten thousand dollars as makes no matter, minus perhaps a little something for expenses.”

  Agnes straightened to look at him, a thought striking her: “It wouldn’t be Miss Susie’s trousseau, sir?”

  “Well, don’t they seem to have been worn?”

  Agnes nodded, and replaced the last of them in a daze. At last she said: “Lock it up good, sir, it’s supposed to be safe against the moths when it’s locked.”

  Gamadge pushed the hasp of the lock in, and snapped the side fastenings. He said: “Mrs. Glendon made a mistake. No mink in her philosophy.”

  Wheels sounded faintly on gravel. Agnes went to one of the low windows and looked out. “It’s a cab—Mr. Ames has come home.”

  “Good. I’ll go down with you and meet him at the door.”

  But Gamadge withdrew into the drawing-room while Agnes let Ames Coldfield into the house. He replaced his key in his pocket, spoke to Agnes, and then looked up and saw the visitor standing just beyond the doorway on the left.

  His coat half-way off, Ames stared.

  “Glad I waited, Mr. Coldfield,” said Gamadge.

  Ames, slowly removing the coat, spoke even more slowly: “Mr. Gamadge. Did we expect you?”

  “No, I came up for a word with you.”

  Agnes looked puzzled, took the coat, and retired with it and Ames’s hat to the back of the hall. Ames said: “Always glad to see you, of course,” and led the way back through the drawing-room and the library to his den. There he turned. “Anything special that I can do for you?”

  “Special, yes.”

  Ames walked over to the French window, and stood looking out. He said: “Curious and beautiful light effects at this time of the year; but I always think there’s a desolateness about the early Spring; the chill in the air.” He stepped back a little, and moved to the cupboard on his left without looking at Gamadge. “A little brandy?” he asked.

  “Not for me. You might not care to offer it to me when we’ve had our talk.”

  Still with his back turned, Ames got out a decanter and a glass, filled the tiny bell, and drank the brandy off. Then at last he faced Gamadge, but kept his eyes averted as he came over to the hearth. He bent and touched a match to the fire.

  “Might as well be comfortable,” he said. “No need to sit freezing. Well, Mr. Gamadge.” He straightened up, the cold blue eyes were on Gamadge’s now. “More trouble about my sister-in-law?”

  Gamadge met the stare with one as cold. “I bring it to you as head of the family. Poetic justice, Mr. Coldfield.” He put his hand into the side pocket of his coat, and brought it out with a folded paper in it. “If you hadn’t betrayed her when she came to you, if you’d accepted her word and allowed her to go, this”—he laid the blue envelope on the table between them—“would eventually have been lost or thrown away.”

  Ames leaned over to look at it. When he raised his head, his face was mottled, patched with red; the face
of an old man. He said in a whisper: “If it’s her revenge, it’s an ugly one.”

  “You still underrate her,” said Gamadge. “She’d never use it as you seem to think she would.”

  Ames pointed at it. “Where?” he asked, searching Gamadge’s eyes.

  “It was in her husband’s crossword book.”

  There was a long silence. Then Ames said in a different voice: “I see.”

  “Where the others are, she doesn’t know.”

  “We know where the letters are,” said Ames dryly. “And it’s due to my own cursed folly that they weren’t destroyed.” He had recovered himself a little. “I more or less gather that you exonerate me in the matter of the theft?” His smile was only a slight grimace, twisting up a corner of his lip.

  “Yes. You seem to have wanted information about the sale yourself…” Ames watched him, always with the smile. “And I have other reasons for exonerating you.”

  “I am sure you have.” Ames suddenly struck the table with the flat of his hand, turned away and sat down in his chair before the fire. He clenched the hand and spoke hurriedly, in a thin, angry voice: “God Almighty, the women the Coldfield men marry and cherish—the unspeakable women they bring into this house! You know Serene’s quality now. My mother, poor lady, was colorless. But this—this—” he glanced at the envelope on the table and looked away—“this perhaps excuses me for wondering at the time whether Glendon’s wife wasn’t another of our strange women, bent on disgracing us. Can you—” he looked at Gamadge pleadingly—“can you understand why I wasn’t quite fair to her when she came to me with that story? I’d seen those Garthwain letters, and then when I looked into the box after I read that Quarterly article, they were gone. I don’t mean I thought she’d taken them. No indeed.”

  “I suppose you couldn’t bring yourself to destroy them when you first found them?”

  “Couldn’t, simply couldn’t; as a man of letters, you know,” said Ames.

  “It was a responsibility.”

  “Vandalism—I couldn’t bring myself to it. What I feebly tried to persuade myself was that Susan would inherit them, and throw them out unread—unfound—as rubbish. At least the responsibility wouldn’t be mine. I left it to destiny—but destiny never manages things as we foresee. Well, when next I looked for them they were gone, as I said; and having read the article, I knew where.”

  “And you couldn’t guess at the agent?”

  Ames struck the table again. “Who knows what friends a woman like that picks up, or where she finds them? She’s always at my poor brother for money, you know; on whom does she spend it? I dare say she’d find good use for the proceeds of this sale. I don’t know what Serene’s honor brought in the market.”

  “Ten thousand.”

  Ames put his head back to stare. “Ten thousand! Well, that’s high. I imagine that Garthwain wouldn’t think so.”

  “It would have been more with the envelopes.”

  “That—” Ames pointed to the blue envelope again—“you mean it’s at my disposal?”

  “Unless you feel the need of it as evidence.”

  “But what kind of evidence do I need, more than I have?”

  Gamadge sat down in the other chair. He asked: “Mr. Coldfield, do you really mean that you never realized until last night, while we were talking, the possible truth in Sylvia Coldfield’s story?”

  Ames didn’t answer; his jaw sagged a little, his fingers played with the blue envelope, that idiotic stare had come back into his eyes.

  “Your brother knew all about the Garthwain letters,” said Gamadge. “He’d read them, he’d left them, he read the article in the Quarterly and went and looked for them again. They were gone, and he knew where too. But he had evidence against the thief, and later he had proof. Do you remember that fingerprinting outfit?”

  Ames nodded vaguely.

  “There are no prints on that now,” said Gamadge, indicating the blue envelope. “It’s had careless treatment. But he found them there the day he died. Sylvia Coldfield was right—but she was too merciful. There is no insanity in your family, Mr. Coldfield.”

  Ames stammered: “Last night I—but I cast it out of my mind. Fantastic.”

  “So your sister-in-law, Glendon’s widow, thought. But when she thought so, she didn’t know about the Garthwain letters.”

  Ames suddenly got to his feet. He said faintly: “I must have some brandy. I…” He went to the cupboard, and came back with the decanter and two of the little glasses. His hands were trembling. He filled the glasses, sat down and began to sip at his own drink. After a minute he cleared his throat, and said more loudly: “Motive, yes. No proof now.”

  “But evidence—lots of evidence. Don’t you want to hear what it is?” Gamadge, his elbow on the table, was leaning towards him. “Your brother’s widow won’t use it; but don’t you think the rest of you ought to know that there’s a poisoner under your roof? Do you think that with such a murderer there may never be a next time? And the next time you might have police in the house—and they’d search more than the attics.”

  “Attics?”

  “Mr. Coldfield, last night Zelma Smyth tried to open a trunk; your brother Ira’s wife said it was full of old things, and that it was locked. This afternoon I unlocked it. It isn’t full of old things—it’s full of valuable furs and dresses, things that Agnes didn’t recognize. They cost very nearly ten thousand dollars, or I’m much mistaken.”

  Ames said, his voice quivering: “She’s mad for dress.”

  “But what opportunity would your brother’s wife have for wearing those things?” Gamadge paused. “You’re an intelligent man, Mr. Coldfield. Think! Don’t blind yourself through prejudice. How could she do it without your brother’s knowledge?” He sat back slowly. “It was the agent that interested me from the first, you know.”

  Ames nodded again, still vaguely.

  “I didn’t see any other approach,” said Gamadge. “If I followed up your lead about Myers and the Locker information you wanted, it was purely from a sense of duty—Mr. Salmon didn’t seem a likely prospect to me. The agent of course had to be a man of standing and reputation, apparently good for the ten thousand dollar guarantee, or those English people wouldn’t have listened to him; but what man of standing and reputation would take such a risk? No matter how safe the agent felt, there is always a risk, and it was ruin for him if something went wrong. Did he need money? Nonsense; such a man wouldn’t do a thing of that kind for the whole ten thousand, or half of it, or any commission you care to name. No, something else came into that deal. Why did his principal trust him so absolutely? Why did he violate all business and personal standards of honor? I thought he’d behaved like a man in love.

  “But even a man in love wouldn’t presumably act unless he felt safe, and he wouldn’t have felt safe unless the Garthwain deal was protected by family sentiment. The principal in this affair would in case of trouble be protected by the Coldfields, and that probability cut out everybody but a member of the family, at least for me.

  “The agent must be a man of business reputation then, but a man who couldn’t afford to give his principal ten thousand dollars. He couldn’t have afforded therefore to pay back the ten thousand himself; was he less prosperous than he seemed?

  “Of all the family friends I had heard of, Venner seemed least unlikely to fill my requirements. He was comparatively young, therefore perhaps comparatively adventurous. His business is not so stabilizing as some others, he might still be riding on his father’s reputation. He knew the Coldfields, what they’re like and what they’d do in certain circumstances. He’s unattached, has only himself to think of; he and his father before him must have had long-standing relations with English men of business, and they’d often need the services of a solicitor. He’s extremely good-looking; a love affair wasn’t by any means unthinkable. I’ve seen him, Mr. Coldfield—he’s a man of experience and a very attractive one.”

  Ames mumbled something.

/>   “He doesn’t deny it,” said Gamadge. “He’s our man. Mr. Coldfield, you’re a man of experience too. Would Venner be likely to underwrite a deal in stolen goods for love of a middle-aged married woman, who’s losing her figure and her looks and has nothing to give him but herself? She hasn’t much to give a man like that. She probably wouldn’t be able to bring much alimony along with her if she left your brother, would she? Do you think she’d get anything? Mr. Coldfield—I’m trying to prepare you.”

  Ames moved his shoulders in a gesture of refusal.

  “Let’s imagine,” said Gamadge, “that Venner swung the deal for a young girl who had fallen violently in love with a most eligible young man. The competition must have been gruelling—no doubt she was as far out of his financial class as Zelma Smyth was out of hers. She must go on visits, go to important parties, travel, keep herself in his eye. He was young, and she knew how likely his affections were to wander.”

  There was a shrinking motion of Ames’s shoulders.

  “Her father couldn’t give her the really large sums she needed,” continued Gamadge, “but she chanced upon a way to help herself—with the help of a friend. She bought what she wanted, and she rented a place in New York to keep the things in, to change in—perhaps to meet the friend in? But she soon threw him over, and what could he do about it without implicating himself?

  “She got her man. She could manage now without the new clothes, and she would be glad to get rid of the expense of her room in New York. That trunk was never opened—she got the things up here and packed them away until she could smuggle them out somehow with her trousseau when she was married. After that, who would question her possession of them?”

  Ames was shaking his head, more as if in despair than in negation. His hands gripped the arms of his chair, his eyes were fixed on the fire.

  “This morning,” said Gamadge, “for the first time, Venner saw a chance to get her back. I gave it to him. I described this envelope, and I offered it to him in exchange for his principal’s name. I said that if he didn’t give me the name I should have to use the envelope to get it. He thought I meant to use it in England, where he’d underwritten a deal in stolen goods to the tune of ten thousand dollars; but I wasn’t going to use it in England. I was going to use it here, to get that locked trunk open if I had no chance at it myself. I thought by what your sister-in-law said about it last night that it would be a pretty safe hiding-place for the rest of the Garthwain envelopes. But after that discovery of the fingerprinting outfit in the attic I was afraid there’d be no prints on those envelopes now.”