The French Powder Mystery
- Автор: Куин (Квин) Эллери
- Серия: Ellery Queen #2
- Год: 1930
- Язык: английский
- Год: Frederick A. Stokes
- Жанр: Классические детективы
Электронная книга - «The French Powder Mystery». Краткое содержание книги:
“Any visitors of that sort lately?” inquired Ellery, his hand on the knob of the inner door.
“Oh, no! Not for several months, I think. The Old Man’s been too wrapped up in the approaching merger with Whitney. Anti-Vice League has suffered, I guess.”
“Well, then,” said Ellery judiciously, “since there’s nothing here of interest, let’s proceed.”
They walked into the next room, and the door swung shut behind them. This door, however, had no lock.
“This,” said Weaver, “is the library.”
“So I see.” Ellery slouched against the door, surveying the room with open eagerness.
Weaver seemed afraid of silences. He wet his lips and said. “This is also the conference room for directors’ meetings, the Old Man’s hideaway, et cetera. Rather neat layout, don’t you think?”
The room was at least twenty feet square, Ellery estimated, and presented a businesslike, if informal, appearance. In the center of the room stood a long mahogany table, surrounded by heavy red-leather-covered chairs. The chairs presented a ragged appearance, distributed unevenly around the table, showing signs of the haste with which the morning’s meeting had been adjourned. Papers in disorderly piles were scattered over the table.
“Not usually that way,” commented Weaver, noticing Ellery’s grimace of distaste. “But the conference was an important one, everybody was excited, and then the news of the accident downstairs... It’s a wonder everything isn’t in more of a mess than it is.”
“Naturally!”
One the wall opposite Ellery was a severely framed portrait in oils of a ruddy-faced, masterful-jawed man, dressed in the fashion of the ’Eighties. Ellery lifted an eyebrow inquiringly.
“Mr. French’s father — the Founder,” said Weaver.
Under the portrait were built-in bookcases, a large comfortable-looking chair, and an end-table of modern design. An etching hung over the chair.
The wall on the corridor side and the wall near which they stood were tastefully furniture-covered. On both walls, left and right, were identically decorated doors of the swinging, rotary-hinged type. The doors were finished in a fine-grained reddish leather, studded with brass bolts.
The Fifth Avenue side of the room held a large flat-topped desk, at about five feet from the rear wall. Its shining surface held a French-style telephone, a slip of blue memorandum paper, and at the edge of the desk facing the rest of the room five books between handsome onyx book-ends. Behind the desk the wall was pierced by a large dormer-window, draped in heavy red velvet. This window overlooked Fifth Avenue.
Ellery completed his stationary examination with a frown. He looked down at Weaver’s key-case, which he still held in his hand.
“By the way, Wes,” he said suddenly, “is this your own key? Ever lend it to anybody?”
“That’s my own, all right, Ellery,” replied Weaver indifferently. “Why?”
“I merely thought that it might be interesting to discover whether the key has ever been out of your possession.”
“Nothing there, I’m afraid,” said Weaver. “It’s never been off my person. As a matter of fact, as far as I know, all five keys have been exclusively in their owners’ possession since the apartment was built.”
“Hardly,” said Ellery in a dry tone. “You forget Mrs. French’s.” He eyed the key contemplatively. “Greatly bother you, Westley, if I appropriate yours for the time? I do believe I shall go into the business of collecting this particular type of key.”
“Help yourself,” replied Weaver in a small voice. Ellery detached the key from the case, which he forthwith returned to Weaver. The key he put into his vest-pocket.
“By the way,” said Ellery, “is this your office too?”
“Oh, no!” replied Weaver. “I have my own office on the fifth floor. I report there in the mornings before coming up here.”
“Enfin!” Ellery moved suddenly. “Aux Armes! Westley, it is my earnest desire to peep into the privacy of Mr. French’s bedroom. Will you oblige by leading the way?”
Weaver indicated the brass-studded door on the opposite wall. They traversed the thick-carpeted distance silently and Weaver swung the door inward. They emerged into a large squarish bedroom, with windows overlooking both Fifth Avenue and 39th Street.
The bedroom was, to Ellery’s unaccustomed eyes, astonishingly modernistic in tone and decoration. Twin beds sunk almost to the floor level, both based on concentric ovals of a highly polished wood, caught the eye at once. A queerly shaped man’s wardrobe and a daringly designed woman’s dressing-table indicated that the room had been laid out for the use of Mrs. French as well as of her husband. Two diversions in the quietly toned but cubistic design of the walls pointed to closets within. Two chairs of unorthodox shape, a small night-table, a telephone table between the twin beds, a few bright scatter-rugs — Ellery, unacquainted with the Continental vogue at first hand, found the French bedroom a most engaging study.
On the wall toward the corridor was a door. It was partly open. Through it Ellery saw a lavatory in colored tiles as strikingly modern as the bedroom itself.
“Just what are you looking for, if you’re looking for anything specific at all?” inquired Weaver.
“Lipstick. Should be here... And key. Let’s hope it isn’t here.” Ellery smiled and stepped into the center of the room.
He observed that the beds were made up. Everything seemed in perfect order. He strode over to the wardrobe, looked at its bare top. The dressing-table caught his eye. He walked toward it as if half afraid of what he might find. Weaver followed him curiously.
The top surface of the dressing-table held few articles. A small tray of mother-of-pearl; a powder-jar, a hand-mirror. On the tray were some feminine accoutrements — tiny scissors, a file, a buffer. Nothing had the appearance of recent use.
Ellery frowned. He turned his head away, turned it back as if fascinated by the dressing-table.
“Really,” he muttered, “it should be here. Of all places. The logical one. Of course!”
His fingers had touched the tray. Its shell was slightly curved at the edges. As the tray moved, something rolled off the table, where it had nestled under the tray’s edge, and fell to the floor.
With a grin of triumph Ellery picked up the article. It was a small, gold-chased lipstick. Weaver came over in some astonishment to see the find. Ellery pointed to the three initials on the cap: W. M. F.
“Why, that’s Mrs. French’s!” cried Weaver.
“Dear Mrs. French,” murmured Ellery under his breath. He lifted the cap of the stick and twisted. A pinkish blob of paste appeared.
“Seems to jibe,” he said aloud. As if struck by a thought, he searched his coat pocket and pulled out the larger, silver-chased lipstick from the dead woman’s bag in the window.
Weaver suppressed an exclamation. Ellery looked at him pointedly.
“So you recognized it, Wes?” he asked, smiling. “Now tell me — since we’re tête-à-tête and your innocent mind can grope trustingly in my presence... To whom does this lipstick marked C belong?”
Weaver winced, raised his eyes to Ellery’s cool ones. “To Bernice,” he said slowly.
“Bernice? Bernice Carmody? The missing lady,” drawled Ellery. “I suppose Mrs. French was her real mother?”