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:
“Did you check up at all on the night freight-entrance on 39th Street while you were downstairs?” asked Ellery.
“Sure did.” The Inspector took a pinch of snuff reflectively. “That’s a funny place, El. With the watchman and the truckman in the little booth, it would have been pie for somebody to slip into the building, especially at night. Went over it with particular thoroughness. It certainly looks like the answer to how the murderer gained entry last night.”
“It may answer the question of how the murderer got in,” remarked Ellery lazily, “but it doesn’t answer the question of how he got out. That exit was closed to him by eleven-thirty. If he left the building by that door, then, he must have done so before eleven-thirty, eh?”
“But Mrs. French didn’t get here until eleven-forty-five, El,” objected the Inspector, “and according to Prouty she was killed about midnight. So how could he have left by that door before eleven-thirty?”
“The answer to that,” said Ellery, “is that he couldn’t, and therefore didn’t. Is there a door through which he could have slipped into the main building from the freight room?”
“Nothing to it,” growled the Inspector. “There’s a door ’way back in the shadows of the room. It wasn’t locked — never is — because these fools took it for granted that if the outer door was locked, the inner door didn’t have to be. Anyway, it heads right onto a corridor which is parallel with the corridor that runs past the nightwatchman’s office, but farther into the body of the main floor.[3] In the darkness, it must have been ridiculously easy to slip through the door, sneak down that corridor, turn the corner, and cover the thirty feet or so to the elevator and stairs. That’s probably the answer.”
“How about the master-key in that office, downstairs?” asked Ellery. “Did the day-man say anything about it?”
“Nothing there,” replied the Inspector disconsolately. “O’Shane is his name, and he swears the key never left the locked drawer during his shift.”
The door opened and Hesse escorted a preternaturally tall man with penetrating eyes and a straggly grey beard into the room. He was handsome in a sophisticated way, and striking. Ellery noted with interest the triangular lean jaw. The man was dressed carelessly, but in clothes of quality. He bowed stiffly to the Inspector and stood waiting. His eyes shifted luminously from man to man in the room.
“I had barely a chance of talking to you downstairs, Mr. Carmody,” said the Inspector pleasantly. “There are a few things I want to ask you. Won’t you sit down?”
Carmody dropped into a chair. He nodded curtly to Weaver as he caught the secretary’s eye, but said nothing.
“Now, Mr. Carmody,” began the Inspector, striding up and down before the desk at which Ellery sat quietly, “a few unimportant but necessary questions. Hagstrom, you’re ready?” He cocked an eye at the detective, who nodded, notebook in hand. The Inspector resumed his march on the rug. Suddenly he looked up. Carmody’s eyes burned deeply into thin air.
“Mr. Carmody,” said the Inspector abruptly, “I understand that you are the sole owner of the Holbein Studios, dealing in antiques?”
“That is precisely correct,” said Carmody. His voice was startling — low and vibrant and deliberate.
“You were married to Mrs. French, and divorced some seven years ago?”
“That is also correct.” There was a finality in his tones that impinged unpleasantly on the ear. He emanated an aura of complete self-control.
“Have you seen Mrs. French since your divorce?”
“Yes. Many times.”
“Socially? There was no particular unpleasantness in your relations?”
“None whatever. Yes, I met Mrs. French socially.”
The Inspector was slightly nettled. This witness answered exactly what he was asked, and no more.
“How often, Mr. Carmody?”
“As often as twice a week during the social season.”
“And you last saw her—”
“A week ago Monday evening, at a dinner given by Mrs. Standish Prince at Mrs. Prince’s home.”
“You spoke to her?”
“Yes.” Carmody stirred. “Mrs. French was very much interested in antiques, an interest cultivated perhaps during our marriage.” The man seemed made of steel. He showed not the faintest trace of emotion. “We conversed for a time about a Chippendale chair she was particularly anxious to have.”
“Anything else, Mr. Carmody?”
“Yes. About our daughter.”
“Ah!” The Inspector pursed his lips, pulled at his mustache. “Miss Bernice Carmody was placed in the custody of your wife after your divorce?”
“Yes.”
“You have seen your daughter periodically, perhaps?”
“Yes. Although Mrs. French secured custody of my daughter, our informal arrangement at the time of our divorce was that I might see the child anytime.” A warm color floated into his voice. The Inspector regarded him quickly, looked away. He plunged into a new line of questioning.
“Mr. Carmody, can you suggest any possible explanation to account for this crime?”
“No, I cannot.” Carmody grew colder at once. For no apparent reason his eyes shifted to Ellery, and held there intently for an instant.
“Had Mrs. French any enemies, to your knowledge?”
“No. She was singularly free from the profundity of character which so often breeds animosity in others.” Carmody might have been talking of an utter stranger; his tone, his bearing were wholly impersonal.
“Not even yourself, Mr. Carmody?” asked the Inspector softly.
“Not even myself, Inspector,” said Carmody in the same frozen tones. “If it is any concern of yours, my love for my wife dwindled during our wedded life and when it had entirely disappeared, I secured a divorce. I felt no bitterness toward her then, nor do I now. You will, of course,” he added without a change in inflection, “have to take my word for that.”
“Did Mrs. French seem nervous the last few times you saw her? Did anything seem to be troubling her? Did she give you any clue to a possible secret worry?”
“Our conversations, Inspector, were hardly of so intimate a nature. I noticed nothing unusual about her. Mrs. French was an extraordinarily prosaic person. Not at all the worrying kind, I can assure you.”
The Inspector paused, Carmody sat quietly. Then he spoke, without warning, without passion. He merely opened his mouth and began to speak, but it was so unexpected that the Inspector started violently and took a hasty pinch of snuff to conceal his agitation.
“Inspector, you are evidently questioning me with the secret hope that I may have something to do with the crime, or that I may be in the possession of vital information. Inspector, you are wasting your time.” Carmody leaned forward, his eyes strangely blazing. “Believe me when I say that I haven’t the slightest interest either in the live Mrs. French — or the dead Mrs. French. Or the whole damned French tribe put together. My own concern is with my daughter. I understand that she is missing. If she is, there has been foul play. If you have any idea in your head that my daughter is a matricide, the more fool you... You will be perpetrating a crime against an innocent girl if you do not immediately seek to discover Bernice’s present whereabouts and the reason for her disappearance. And in that connection, you are welcome to my unstinting cooperation. If you do not look for her immediately, I shall set private detectives on her trail. I think that is all.”
Carmody rose to his astonishing height and stood immovably waiting.
The Inspector stirred. “I should advise a slight softening of tone in the future, Mr. Carmody,” he said dryly. “You may go.”
3
See diagram at frontispiece.