The Greatest Murder Mysteries of S. S. Van Dine - 12 Titles in One Volume (Illustrated Edition). S.S. Van Dine
shot was fired.”
Vance affected incredibility.
“Eh—my word! She was actu’lly there? Most extr’ordin’ry!”
“The evidence of her presence is unassailable,” pursued Markham. “As you know, the gloves she wore at dinner, and the hand-bag she carried with her, were both found on the mantel in Benson’s living-room.”
“Oh!” murmured Vance, with a faintly deprecating smile. “It was not the lady, then, but her gloves and bag which were present,—a minute and unimportant distinction, no doubt, from the legal point of view. . . . Still,” he added, “I deplore the inability of my layman’s untutored mind to accept the two conditions as identical. My trousers are at the dry-cleaners; therefore, I am at the dry-cleaners, what?”
Markham turned on him with considerable warmth.
“Does it mean nothing in the way of evidence, even to your layman’s mind, that a woman’s intimate and necessary articles, which she has carried throughout the evening, are found in her escort’s quarters the following morning?”
“In admitting that it does not,” Vance acknowledged quietly, “I no doubt expose a legal perception lamentably inefficient.”
“But since the lady certainly wouldn’t have carried these particular objects during the afternoon, and since she couldn’t have called at the house that evening during Benson’s absence without the housekeeper knowing it, how, may one ask, did these articles happen to be there the next morning if she herself did not take them there late that night?”
“’Pon my word, I haven’t the slightest notion,” Vance rejoined. “The lady herself could doubtless appease your curiosity. But there are any number of possible explanations, y’ know. Our departed Chesterfield might have brought them home in his coat pocket,—women are eternally handing men all manner of gewgaws and bundles to carry for ’em, with the cooing request: ‘Can you put this in your pocket for me?’ . . . Then again, there is the possibility that the real murderer secured them in some way, and placed them on the mantel delib’rately to mislead the polizei. Women, don’t y’ know, never put their belongings in such neat, out-of-the-way places as mantels and hat-racks. They invariably throw them down on your fav’rite chair or your center-table.”
“And, I suppose,” Markham interjected, “Benson also brought the lady’s cigarette butts home in his pocket?”
“Stranger things have happened,” returned Vance equably; “though I sha’n’t accuse him of it in this instance. . . . The cigarette butts may, y’ know, be evidence of a previous conversazione.”
“Even your despised Heath,” Markham informed him, “had sufficient intelligence to ascertain from the housekeeper that she sweeps out the grate every morning.”
Vance sighed admiringly.
“You’re so thorough, aren’t you? . . . But, I say, that can’t be, by any chance, your only evidence against the lady?”
“By no means,” Markham assured him. “But, despite your superior distrust, it’s good corroboratory evidence nevertheless.”
“I dare say,” Vance agreed, “—seeing with what frequency innocent persons are condemned in our courts. . . . But tell me more.”
Markham proceeded with an air of quiet self-assurance.
“My man learned, first, that Benson dined alone with this woman at the Marseilles, a little bohemian restaurant in West Fortieth Street; secondly, that they quarrelled; and thirdly, that they departed at midnight, entering a taxicab together. . . . Now, the murder was committed at twelve-thirty; but since the lady lives on Riverside Drive, in the Eighties, Benson couldn’t possibly have accompanied her home—which obviously he would have done had he not taken her to his own house—and returned by the time the shot was fired. But we have further proof pointing to her being at Benson’s. My man learned, at the woman’s apartment-house, that actually she did not get home until shortly after one. Moreover, she was without her gloves and hand-bag, and had to be let in to her rooms with a pass-key, because, as she explained, she had lost hers. As you remember, we found the key in her bag. And—to clinch the whole matter—the smoked cigarettes in the grate corresponded to the one you found in her case.”
Markham paused to relight his cigar.
“So much for that particular evening,” he resumed. “As soon as I learned the woman’s identity this morning, I put two more men to work on her private life. Just as I was leaving the office this noon the men ’phoned in their reports. They had learned that the woman has a fiancé, a chap named Leacock, who was a captain in the army, and who would be likely to own just such a gun as Benson was killed with. Furthermore, this Captain Leacock lunched with the woman the day of the murder and also called on her at her apartment the morning after.”
Markham leaned slightly forward, and his next words were emphasized by the tapping of his fingers on the arm of the chair.
“As you see, we have the motive, the opportunity, and the means. . . . Perhaps you will tell me now that I possess no incriminating evidence.”
“My dear Markham,” Vance affirmed calmly, “you haven’t brought out a single point which could not easily be explained away by any bright school-boy.” He shook his head lugubriously. “And on such evidence people are deprived of their life and liberty! ’Pon my word, you alarm me. I tremble for my personal safety.”
Markham was nettled.
“Would you be so good as to point out, from your dizzy pinnacle of sapience, the errors in my reasoning?”
“As far as I can see,” returned Vance evenly, “your particularization concerning the lady is innocent of reasoning. You’ve simply taken several unaffined facts, and jumped to a false conclusion. I happen to know the conclusion is false because all the psychological indications of the crime contradict it—that is to say, the only real evidence in the case points unmistakably in another direction.”
He made a gesture of emphasis, and his tone assumed an unwonted gravity.
“And if you arrest any woman for killing Alvin Benson, you will simply be adding another crime—a crime of delib’rate and unpardonable stupidity—to the one already committed. And between shooting a bounder like Benson and ruining an innocent woman’s reputation, I’m inclined to regard the latter as the more reprehensible.”
I could see a flash of resentment leap into Markham’s eyes; but he did not take offense. Remember: these two men were close friends; and, for all their divergency of nature, they understood and respected each other. Their frankness—severe and even mordant at times—was, indeed, a result of that respect.
There was a moment’s silence; then Markham forced a smile.
“You fill me with misgivings,” he averred mockingly; but, despite the lightness of his tone, I felt that he was half in earnest. “However, I hadn’t exactly planned to arrest the lady just yet.”
“You reveal commendable restraint,” Vance complimented him. “But I’m sure you’ve already arranged to ballyrag the lady and perhaps trick her into one or two of those contradictions so dear to every lawyer’s heart,—just as if any nervous or high-strung person could help indulging in apparent contradictions while being cross-questioned as a suspect in a crime they had nothing to do with. . . . To ‘put ’em on the grill’—a most accurate designation. So reminiscent of burning people at the stake, what?”
“Well, I’m most certainly going to question her,” replied Markham firmly, glancing at his watch. “And one of my men is escorting her to the office in half an hour; so I must break up this most delightful and edifying chat.”
“You really expect to learn something incriminating by interrogating her?” asked Vance. “Y’ know, I’d jolly well like to witness your humiliation. But I presume your heckling of suspects is a part of the legal arcana.”
Markham