Richard Deming - Gallows in My Garden

“See here, Ann!” Jonathan Mannering put in. “Do I understand both you and Doctor Lawson knew this all along?”

“Yes,” Ann said simply.

“But this changes everything!” the lawyer exploded. “With young Don dead, and Grace married, you automatically become heir. Why on earth did you keep it silent?”

“Just a minute!” Inspector Day roared. “Let me ask the questions here.” He peered over his glasses at Ann. “All right, Mrs. Lawson. Mind telling me what you’re talking about?”

Ann looked as though she were ready to cry at any minute. “You see, Inspector, I never approved of the marriage clause in my husband’s will. Of course, with Grace being so young, had I known she planned to marry, I would have done everything in my power to dissuade her.” She glanced quickly at Arnold. “Not that I disapprove of you, Arnold. I just feel you should both have finished school first.”

Her eyes turned back to the inspector, then shifted to Jonathan Mannering. “But once the deed was accomplished, I felt it unfair for Grace to lose her heritage simply because she married the man she loved. And of course up to Saturday it would merely have meant Don got everything if the secret got out. But even though it now makes me the heir, I still feel it unfair to Grace.” She paused and looked defiantly at the lawyer. “The money’s going to Grace anyway. I won’t take it from her.”

Mannering stroked his chin and said ponderously, “I’m afraid you have no choice, my dear. What you do with your money afterward is your own business, but there is no way I know of you can avoid inheriting.”

“Do I understand,” Warren Day asked in a pinched voice, “you don’t want twenty million dollars?”

“It’s not that exactly,” Dr. Lawson explained for her. “Maybe you’ll understand better if I tell you the whole story.”

“Do,” Day told him.

The doctor carefully smoothed his trouser crease and lit a cigarette before starting. “You see, Grace has always been a favorite of mine, and since Don died — my older brother, that is, Don Senior — I’ve sort of taken the place of her father insofar as advice and confidences are concerned. It was for this reason more than any other, I suppose, she told me about planning to marry Arnold. I tried to talk both of them into waiting, for, after all, Grace is still little more than a child. But when it seemed obvious they were going ahead with or without my blessing, I gave up arguing and decided to help them.” He turned faintly red. “Matter of fact, I gave the bride away. Naturally I felt honor-bound to keep the secret—”

“Then how’d you happen to tell Mrs. Lawson?” the inspector interrupted.

The doctor’s color deepened even more. “Why — I’m in the habit of — I mean, we generally confide family affairs to each other—” He paused, smiled crookedly, and blurted out, “Maybe I’m just henpecked. We’re planning to be married one of these days.”

“Douglas!” Ann’s face had turned crimson, but the light dancing in her eyes was certainly not from embarrassment.

I glanced at Jonathan Mannering in time to see his face slowly contract. The pompousness fell away from him, and suddenly he looked like an old man.

Lieutenant Hannegan strode into the room and delivered the longest speech I ever heard him make.

“That trained ape up there won’t let me in the room,” he said loudly.

Warren day’s nose began to whiten at the tip. He asked softly, “Would you like reinforcements, Lieutenant? Say a couple of squads with tear gas?”

Hannegan’s face slowly turned red. Without a word he about-faced and started upstairs again.

“Excuse me,” I said to Day, and ran after Hannegan.

I caught the lieutenant at the top of the stairs, grabbed his coattail, and said, “Whoa!”

He turned a beet-red face in my direction and slapped my hand away from his coat. But it slowed him enough for me to get past him and reach the bedroom door first.

Mouldy Greene sat in the chair where I had left him, a twin of the automatic he had loaned me in his hand. It was at full cock, and the safety was off.

“Hi, Sarge,” he greeted me. “What d’ya think? That plain-clothes cop who’s always with Warren Day tried to bust in here.”

Behind me Hannegan made a growling noise deep in his throat.

“Put up your gun, Mouldy,” I said.

“Sure,” he said obligingly, snapping on the safety and tucking it under his arm.

Crossing to the dresser, I picked up the four bottles by their necks with one hand and picked up the glasses with the other. I delivered them to Hannegan in the doorway.

“Got a permit for that gun?” Hannegan growled at Mouldy.

“Sure. Wanta see it?”

The lieutenant expelled air through his nose, made a sharp right turn, and disappeared.

“He acts mad about something,” Mouldy commented.

I examined the two women, found them still breathing deeply, and returned to the drawing-room.

As I entered the room, Jason, the gardener, was saying, “I can’t help what I oughta seen or heard. I didn’t see or hear nothing.”

Hannegan had set the empty glasses and Coke bottles on the bar. Just after I came into the room, Kate appeared through the dining-room arch with a paper bag in her hand. She crossed and gave it to Hannegan.

“This big enough?” she asked.

The lieutenant grunted and began transferring the Coke and glasses to the bag.

Warren Day said to me, “The gardener here says he was rolling and lining the badminton court about the time Miss Lawson was tossed in the pool. The badminton court isn’t fifty yards from the pool, but he’s blind and deaf.”

“They’s a hedge between the badminton and tennis courts,” Jason said sullenly.

“I know,” I said. “One about shoulder-high. Were you working on your hands and knees?”

“Part of the time,” Jason said. “While I was laying the chalk-line.”

“I passed there on the way in not a half hour before Doctor Lawson yelled,” I told Day. “Nobody was on the badminton court then.”

Jason’s expression turned belligerent. “Maybe I hadn’t started yet. Didn’t say I spent all afternoon there. All I know is when I pushed the roller past the pool after getting it out of the garage, Miss Grace and that other woman was sitting there. After that I never left the court till Edmund came after me.”

I asked, “Did the two women have glasses in their hands when you saw them?”

His tone indicated bored indifference. “Never noticed. Miss Grace called hello to me and I said hello back, then went about my business. You can ask questions all day, and I won’t know no more when you stop.”

I turned to Day. “How about Karl here?”

“In the stable at the time,” Day said gloomily. “Claims he’d been currying the three riding-horses for over an hour when Edmund found him.”

He ran his eyes over the five servants. “All right,” he snapped suddenly. “You can go back to work.”

The servants quietly began to fade from the room. Day turned his attention to Ann Lawson, tried to keep his tone gruff, but could not prevent a querulous note from creeping into it.

“I’d advise you to get your stepdaughter out of the house and keep her away somewhere until this is cleared up.”

“We tried to,” Ann said in her soft voice. “Mr. Moon took her away, but she refused to stay.”

Day peered over his glasses at me. “Better try again, Moon. Another incident like this and your bodyguarding reputation won’t be worth a hoot in Hades, because I’ll run you out of here and assign a department man to protect Miss Lawson.”

He turned and strode out of the house without even saying good-by, followed by his shadow, Hannegan. I caught them at the bottom of the veranda steps.