Dorothy Fielding - Chief Inspector Pointer's Cases - 12 Golden Age Murder Mysteries

Pointer leant forward in his chair. "Maggie, shut your eyes and think yourself back again in Miss Leslie's room. Don't forget anything, however trifling: it might be of the greatest help in getting at Mr. Eames' friends. Just shut your eyes and live Saturday afternoon over again out loud. You've just heard the clink of Mr. Eames' tumbler on the washstand—"

His rapt attention stimulated the girl. She, too, sat forward on her seat, shut her eyes, and locked her fingers.

"—then I heard him give a sort of exclamation, or more like a choke—I mean to say, it sounded like a bit of both"—she was evidently trying to live the hours over again—"and then I heard him drop into his armchair; it creaked as though he had fairly fallen into it. After that I heard nothing more for a long while. You know how hard it rained day before yesterday, and what a noise it made coming down, then I wasn't paying any attention—I mean to say I little thought—"

"You heard him drop into his chair"—Pointer's voice was almost hypnotic—"and next—?"

"Nothing for a long while. Then I heard his door shut. Ah, thinks I to myself, he's gone downstairs as usual at four-thirty to the lounge for his tea—tea is included in the board here, you know, sir,—but it must have been him back after 'phoning to the office. Anyhow, I heard him lock his door, and then moving about, opening and shutting drawers very quickly and softly. Like this"—she jumped up and began to open and shut the table-drawer, with quite a pause between—"packing, I'm sure, sir, which shows that he did mean to go into the country—"

"Never mind what it shows. Sit down and shut your eyes again. You heard him opening and shutting drawers—"

"Oh, yes, and I heard him moving about, too, but so light! I couldn't hear any footsteps, only all the floors here creak fearful. Then"—she went quite pale and fixed a genuinely horrified stare on the Chief Inspector—"I heard him pull the wardrobe out from the wall. I listened to that, of course, sir, for that did catch my ear—what I mean to say, the furniture being my lookout, so to speak, I noticed the way he tugged it. That'll mark the carpet, I thought to myself. Little did I—"

"After the pulling out of the wardrobe, what then?" Pointer's voice was intentionally matter-of-fact.

"Well"—she seemed puzzled as to how to put her recollection into words—"it sounded just as though he dragged the armchair about the room, but so—so—as if it were so heavy, scraping and creaking, and then—then"—her eyes dilated—"I heard the most awful sounds of the chair straining and—and a sort of knocking sound, and yet sort of dragging—oh, sir, I suppose he had just stopped his packing and taken the poison then, and what I heard was his death agonies—if only I'd known, I might have run for a doctor!"

"No, no, Maggie, no one could have helped him. He had taken too much poison."

"And to think I wondered what larks he was up to in there! Then all got quieter, though I could still hear sort of rustling sounds—what I mean to say, creepy sort of noises, so quiet-like; and then I heard him shove the wardrobe back against the wall, scraping it more than ever, and that's what I don't understand. How could he do that after taking the poison and all?"

"He may have felt better for a little while," suggested the man from Scotland Yard.

"Well, I know I very nearly went in to speak about his hauling the furniture about like that. I should have, only I was supposed to be lying down. Then I heard the French window opened. I suppose, as you say, sir, he felt a bit better and stood there for a breath of air, but the rain was coming down so just then that I couldn't be sure what I heard. I had the blind down, it had come over so dark, and was working by the electric light. I didn't hear anything more, for which I'm thankful; I mean to say, I don't think I could stand it to've heard him shut himself into that wardrobe—it's quite bad enough to've heard what I did. When I went in to get the room ready for Mr. Beale the window-catch was open, though the window had blown shut. To think that when I was getting the room ready I actually tugged at the door of that wardrobe. My goodness, if it had opened!"

"You heard nothing more?"

"Nothing, sir. Not a sound."

"You didn't hear Mr. Eames walk up and down on the balcony or pass your window?"

"The rain was pouring so just then, sir, that he might have shouted and I shouldn't have heard anything outside. What I mean to say, it really was a clatter which came on just then, so as you couldn't hardly hear yourself think."

"You didn't look out at all after the blind was down?"

"Oh, no, sir, I had a rush to get the dress done in time as it was."

"Humph." Pointer seemed in no hurry to speak. The Eames case was to remain a "suicide" as long as possible.

"How were you sure it was Mr. Eames? I mean when you heard the glass clink? It might have been some friend of his in there at first?"

"I heard him sneeze when I had scarcely sat down. He had such a bad cold. I think myself that it was the influenza that made him go off his head and drink poison and all. I mean to say I've read of such cases."

"It looks very like it," he agreed, "and now, Maggie, I think I heard Miss Leslie go out a little while ago?"

"Yes, sir. She's due at a rehearsal at the Columbine."

"Then seat yourself in her room and listen. I shall drop something on the table, then I shall drop something else on it. I want you to come back and tell me which of the two sounds the heaviest. Listen carefully."

Maggie disappeared. Pointer could hear the wicker easy-chair creak slightly. He dropped one of the dental works which Eames had always had out on his table. Then after a pause he dropped it again. He and Watts had already tested just how much could be heard through the partition wall, but this time he was testing Maggie's accuracy.

She came back a second later, looking rather awkward.

"Well, sir, they both sounded alike. I mean to say I reely couldn't tell any difference, not to speak of."

"That proves they were both about the same weight, which is quite likely. Now, Maggie, go back again; sit where you sat on Saturday afternoon. I shall drop into this easy chair. I want to find out if the chair makes as much noise with me as it did with Mr. Eames. I mean to say"—the Superintendent bit his lip for a second—"that time you heard Mr. Eames fall into it, after he had taken his medicine. Knock once on the wall if it's not so loud, and twice if it's louder."

He listened till he heard Maggie draw up her chair, then he dropped heavily into his. Maggie knocked once. He let himself fall with all his weight, and Maggie came in.

"That's as near as no matter, sir, to the sound poor Mr. Eames made."

Pointer weighed fourteen stone and Eames he had guessed as under ten. The drug must have acted very quickly.

"And now I want to move about the room and see if I can make as little noise as Eames did later on—when you heard him come back and lock his door."

Maggie changed rooms again. Pointer took off both boots. He prided himself on his light footwork, and walking like Agag he crept around the room. Maggie knocked twice. He tried again. Again she knocked twice and then came in.

"Oh, you made ever so much more noise, sir, but then you'd make four of poor Mr. Eames. With him I didn't hear steps at all."

"You didn't hear my steps either surely," Pointer insisted, as he re-laced his boots.

"Perhaps not as steps, sir, but, dear me, with Mr. Eames on Saturday I could only hear a drawer being pulled out ever so gently and then shut, after a minute almost without a sound, as you might say. If it hadn't been for the boards creaking and papers rustling, I couldn't have believed there was anyone in there, part of the time."