Mike Ashley - The Mammoth Book of Locked-Room Mysteries And Impossible Crimes

“You are aware, Delacroix, I do not believe in the supernatural.”

“Not all vampires are of the supernatural variety,” she replied.

Abel Chase ran a finger pensively beneath his moustache. “What is your professional opinion, then? Are you suggesting that Hunyadi died of erythroxylon alkaloid intoxication?”

“I think not,” frowned Claire Delacroix. “If that were the case, I would have expected Nolan Young to report damage to the heart, and none was apparent. Further, the condition of the needle-pricks is most intriguing. They suggest that Hunyadi had received no injections for some time, then resumed his destructive habit just tonight. I suspect that a second substance was added to the victim’s customary injection of cocaine. The first drug, while elevating his spirits to a momentarily euphoric state, would have, paradoxically, lulled him into a false sense of security while the second killed him.”

“And what do you suppose that fatal second drug to have been?”

“That I do not know, Abel. But I have a very strong suspicion, based on my conversation with the ladies of the company – and on your own comments earlier this night.”

“Very well,” Chase growled, not pleased. He knew that when Claire Delacroix chose to unveil her theory she would do so, and not a moment sooner. He changed the subject “What did you learn from the Misses Miller and Stallings?”

“Miss Miller is a local girl. She was born in the Hayes Valley section of San Francisco, attended the University of California in Los Angeles, and returned home to pursue a career in drama. She still lives with her parents, attends church regularly, and has a devoted boyfriend.”

“What’s she doing in a national touring company of the vampire play, then? She would have had to audition in New York and travel from there.”

“Theatre people are an itinerant lot, Abel.”

He digested that for a moment, apparently willing to accept Claire Delacroix’s judgment of the ingenue. “Her paramour would almost certainly be Timothy Rodgers, then.”

“Indeed. I am impressed.”

“Rodgers did not strike me as a likely suspect,” Chase stated.

“Nor Miss Miller, me.”

“What about Miss Stallings?” he queried.

“A very different story, there. First of all, her name isn’t really Jeanette Stallings.”

“The nom de theatre is a commonplace, Delacroix. Continue.”

“Nor was she born in this country.”

“That, too, I had already learned. That was why Pollard was coaching her in diction. Where was Miss Stallings born, Delacroix, and what is her real name?”

It was the habit of neither Abel Chase nor Claire Delacroix to use a notebook in their interrogations. Both prided themselves on their ability to retain everything said in their presence. Without hesitation Claire stated, “She was born in Szeged, Hungary. The name under which she entered the United States was Mitzi Kadar.”

“Mitzi Kadar! Imre Hunyadi’s Hungarian wife was Elena Kadar.”

“And Mitzi’s mother was Elena Kadar.”

“Great glowing Geryon!” It was as close to an expletive as Abel Chase was known to come in everyday speech. “Was Jeanette Stallings Imre Hunyadi’s daughter? There was no mention of a child in any biographical material on Hunyadi.”

“Such is my suspicion,” Claire Delacroix asserted.

“You did not have the advantage of reading the threatening note that Captain Baxter found in Hunyadi’s dressing room, Delacroix.”

“No,” she conceded. “I am sure you will illuminate me as to its content.”

“It was made up to look like a newspaper clipping,” Chase informed. “But I turned it over and found that the obverse was blank. It appeared, thus, to be a printer’s proof rather than an actual cutting. Every newspaper maintains obituaries of prominent figures, ready for use in case of their demise. When the time comes, they need merely fill in the date and details of death, and they’re ready to go to press. But I don’t think this was a real newspaper proof. There was no identification of the paper – was it the Call or the Bulletin the Tribune or the Gazette ? The proof should indicate.”

Abel Chase paused to run a finger beneath his moustache before resuming. “The typographic styles of our local dailies differ from one another in subtle but significant detail. The faux obituary came from none of them. It was a hoax, created by a malefactor and executed by a local job printer. It was cleverly intended as a psychological attack on Hunyadi, just as was the dead rodent that was found in his dressing room.”

“And for what purpose was this hoax perpetrated?” Delacroix prompted.

“It did not read like a normal newspaper obituary,” Abel Chase responded. “There is none of the usual respectful tone. It stated, instead, that Hunyadi abandoned his wife in Hungary when she was heavy with child.”

“An act of treachery, do you not agree?” Claire put in.

“And that his wife continued her career as a medical researcher while raising her fatherless child until, the child having reached her majority, the mother, despondent, took her own life.”

“Raising the child was an act of courage and of strength, was it not? But the crime of suicide – to have carried her grief and rage for two decades, only to yield in the end to despair – who was more guilty, the self-killer or the foul husband who abandoned her?”

Chase rubbed his moustache with the knuckles of one finger. “We need to speak with Miss Stallings.”

“First, perhaps we had best talk with Captain Baxter and his men. We should determine what Sergeant Costello and Officer Murray have found in their examination of the premises.”

“Not a bad idea,” Chase assented, “although I expect they would have notified me if anything significant had been found.”

Together they sought the uniformed police captain and sergeant. Costello’s statement was less than helpful. He had examined the inner sill opening upon the window through which Abel Chase had peered approximately an hour before. It was heavily laden with dust, he reported, indicating that even had a contortionist been able to squeeze through its narrow opening, no one had actually done so.

“But a bat might have flown through that window, sir, without disturbing the dust,” the credulous Costello concluded.

Murray had gone over the rest of the backstage area, and the two policemen had examined the auditorium and lobby together, without finding any useful clues.

“We are now faced with a dilemma,” Abel Chase announced, raising his forefinger for emphasis. “Count Hunyadi was found dead in his dressing room, the door securely locked from the inside. It is true that he died of heart failure, but what caused his heart to fail? My assistant, Doctor Delacroix, suggests a mysterious drug administered along with a dose of cocaine, through one of the marks on the victim’s neck.” He pressed two fingers dramatically into the side of his own neck, simulating Hunyadi’s stigmata.

“The problem with this is that no hypodermic syringe was found in the dressing room. Hunyadi might have thrown a syringe through the small open window letting upon the alley. But we searched the alley and it was not found. It might have been retrieved by a confederate, but the lack of footprints in the so-unusual snow eliminates that possibility. A simpler explanation must be sought.”

Abel Chase paused to look around the room at the others, then resumed. “We might accept Sergeant Costello’s notion that a vampire entered the room unobtrusively, in human form. He administered the fatal drug, then exited by flying through the window, first having taken the form of a bat. It might be possible for the flying mammal to carry an empty hypodermic syringe in its mouth. This not only solves the problem of the window’s narrow opening, but that of the undisturbed dust on the sill and the untrampled snow in the alley. But while I try to keep an open mind at all times, I fear it would take a lot of convincing to get me to believe in a creature endowed with such fantastic abilities.”