Читать книгу The Handsome Young Men - Footner Hulbert - Страница 5

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Mr. Harker wanted to carry Mme. Storey down to Police Headquarters that she might interview Cornelia. “No use my trying to talk to her,” he said bitterly.

“Very well,” said Mme. Storey, “I’ll go. We are rather a large party. Is it necessary for the gentlemen outside to accompany us?”

“They are good friends of mine,” said Harker.

“I don’t doubt it,” said Mme. Storey dryly. “Still ...”

“I’ll send them away,” said Harker.

“Let Mr. Bleecker come with us,” suggested my mistress. “I’d like to talk to him.”

As we were leaving the office we met our operative, Stephens, coming in in response to my summons. Mme. Storey, dropping back, instructed him to get hold of Mr. Harker’s valet if he was able, and bring him down to Headquarters. They were to wait outside in a car.

The four of us set off down town in the Harker limousine. Mme. Storey sat on the back seat between Mr. Harker and Mr. Bleecker; while I was on one of the extra seats in front of them. I do not believe that Harker opened his mouth the whole way. Mme. Storey and Mr. Bleecker talked. She was affable and friendly as if she had repented of snubbing him; but I, who know her methods so well, could see that she was sounding him out. He answered like a man without a care on his mind. He had a boyish, impulsive manner, which may have been a pose, but was not unattractive.

From his talk I learned (a) that his family was one of the best in New York; and that he was related to all the other Knickerbockers: (b) That he pursued no regular occupation, but lived the life of a gentleman of leisure: (c) That “Society” was the be-all and end-all of his existence: (d) That for many years he had acted as a sort of superior social secretary to the billionaire Harkers; that is to say, he had supervised all their entertainments, and had advised them whom to cultivate, and whom to drop. It was clear that Harker leaned on him to an absurd degree. During the drive no reference was made to the immediate tragedy.

We must have been expected at Police Headquarters, for we found a whole brigade of press photographers lined up on the sidewalk. Mme. Storey’s appearance in the case created an additional sensation. Inside, the whole building was pervaded by an air of excitement; and I may say it takes something out of the common to get them going at 300 Mulberry Street. The hardest-boiled door-keeper amongst them was affected by it. Even the high officials, who are in general no respecters of persons, were impressed by the magic name of Harker. Clearly they did not know exactly what to do with so grand a young lady as Cornelia. They had tried to get information out of her, but had not liked to push her too hard.

We were taken up to a big room on the second floor where a sort of informal investigation was in progress. Everybody connected with the case was coming and going. We found that the police end was in charge of our friend Inspector Rumsey. There was also a representative of the district attorney’s office present; a man called Harden, whom we were to know only too well in another case. A well-known criminal lawyer named John Jerrold was representing Cornelia. With Jerrold was his clerk, a dark, Spanish lad as handsome as Antinous. I did not learn his name until later. It was Pedro d’Escobar.

I wondered about this Jerrold. He was quite well-known; but why had they not engaged one of the best in town, I asked myself. A curious thing was, that, though he was working in Cornelia’s interest, he received Mme. Storey with scarcely veiled antagonism. Inspector Rumsey was perfectly willing to allow my mistress to question the girl in the presence of the police, but Jerrold said no.

“I must stand upon the rights of my client,” he said stiffly. “A charge may be laid later.” So saying, he went off to consult with Cornelia.

Mme. Storey made no comment; but Harker looked at Bleecker in surprise. “What’s the matter with him?” he asked.

Bleecker shrugged. “Jealous,” he said. “He is afraid that Madame Storey will steal the limelight. These court-room stars are as temperamental as opera singers. I’ll speak to him.”

A succession of prospective witnesses was examined while I was in the room; Cornelia’s maid; guests who had occupied nearby rooms; various employees of the hotel. None of these people were able to say they had heard the sound of a shot.

I listened to the maid’s story with keen interest. At ten o’clock that morning she had admitted Mr. Van Sicklen Harker to the suite, and had ushered him into the sitting-room. She had then returned to her own room. At first she could hear nothing. When the gentlemen began to quarrel she could hear the angry voices, but could not distinguish anything that was said.

She had no suspicion of any serious trouble until, a good while after, her mistress called her into the sitting-room. She found Cornelia in a hysterical and half-fainting condition. While in the sitting-room, she could hear the angry voices of the men in the bedroom; but she had been too much concerned about her mistress’s condition to take note of anything they said. She half led, half carried her mistress into the further bedroom; that is to say the maid’s own room, where Cornelia fainted on the bed. Some time passed before she succeeded in bringing her to; she was unable to say just how long. When she came to her senses, though she was still weak and shaken, she insisted on returning to the men. She ordered the maid to remain in her own room. During all this time she had said nothing that gave the maid any clue as to what the men were quarrelling about.

The maid had remained in her own room for awhile. She could hear nothing. She became very anxious. She finally ventured out into the foyer. Still she could hear nothing from the bedroom opposite. She listened at the door of that room and no sound came to her. At last she knocked. There was no answer. She tried the door. It was not locked, yet it resisted her at the bottom. She thought somebody was holding it. There was no sound from inside. Screaming with terror, the maid ran out into the main corridor of the hotel. A number of the guests ran out of their rooms; and various employees were attracted to the scene. The maid refused to return to the suite; and it was a hall-porter who actually discovered the tragedy.

This man stated that he had not attempted to enter the bedroom from the foyer; but had gone through the bathroom which lay between bedroom and sitting-room. None of the doors were locked. He beheld Arpad Rody lying on his back on the bed with a gaping wound in his temple. Mrs. Rody was crumpled up in a heap against the door into the foyer. That was why the maid had been unable to open it. There was a smell of gunpowder in the room. There was no gun visible anywhere. The wound had bled some on the bed, but not so much as you might expect. Rody’s clothing was not disarranged in any way; nor did the room show any indications that a struggle had taken place. The body was still warm of course; but as far as the porter could tell, the man was already dead. The next persons to enter the room were the hotel physician, and one of the managers. The porter had then been stationed at the door to keep everybody else out.

The physician deposed that the man was dead when he first looked at him. Death must have been instantaneous. He had been shot with a bullet from a gun of .32 calibre. The gun must have been pressed close to his head. The bullet had passed through his brain and was lodged against the skull on the other side. The physician had also discovered a swelling on top of the man’s head, which suggested that he had been struck by some instrument; probably a blunt instrument; but he could not say positively. There was no abrasion. The lady was only in a swoon. She was carried into another room and brought to her senses. The doctor described, meanwhile, the vain hunt for a weapon. When the lady recovered, she had broken away from those who were attending her, and had rushed back to her husband’s body, where she gave vent to extravagant protestations of affection. Nothing that she said suggested that she had any knowledge of who had shot him. She was incapable at that moment of answering any questions intelligibly.

Mme. Storey asked permission of Inspector Rumsey to put a few questions: This was readily accorded her.

“Doctor,” she said, “please tell us more particularly the position in which you found the body.”

He said: “There were two beds in the room, Madame, which were shoved together. The body was lying across both of them, the head pointing towards the windows.”

“Were the legs touching the floor?”

“No, Madame, the body was lying completely across the beds.”

“Had the room been made up for the day?”

“No, Madame, the bed-clothing was tumbled.”

“The door into the foyer, I take it, was opposite to the windows?”

“Not exactly, Madame. The foyer being an irregularly shaped room, the door was cut across one corner of the bedroom.”

“I see. And where was the door into the bathroom?”

“Facing the foot of the beds, Madame.”

“These were the only doors in the room?”

“No, Madame. There was a door near the head of the beds, on the side above the windows. This led into a clothes closet. We looked in there for the gun.”

“I get it. We can check this up later on the plan. Now please tell us what sort of a man, physically, the victim was in life.”

“A very well-made young man, Madame; tall and muscular.”

“A difficult customer to handle, eh?”

“So I should say, Madame.”

“About what weight?”

“A hundred and seventy pounds.”

“Thank you. Now please describe the effect when a man is shot through the brain.”

“Why, Madame, he drops like a felled ox.”

“There is no movement afterwards?”

“No, Madame—That is, if he was in motion when he was shot, he might stagger forward a step, or spin around. But if he was standing, he would drop all of a piece.”

“Was there blood anywhere in the room except where it had run down on the bed?”

“No, Madame.”

“Thank you very much. That is all.”