CHAPTER XIV
a
I wandered into the den, the door
of which was ajar, and walked aim-
lessly about the reem, looking at
the various pictures and etchings.
Just then Vance entered. As he
came in he threw the door open
wider, half pocketing me in the cor-
ner behind it, where I was not im-
mediately noticeable. I was about
to speak to him, when Zalia Graem
came in.
“Philo Vance.” She called his
name in a low, tremulous voice.
He turned and looked at the girl
with a quizzical frown.
“I've been waiting in the dining-
room,” she said. “I wanted to see
you before you spoke to the oth-
ers.”
I realized immediately, from the
tone of her voice, that my presence
had not been noticed.
Vance continued to look squarely
at the girl, but did not speak. She
came very close to him now.
‘“Tell me why you have made me
suffer so much,” she said.
“I know I have hurt you,” Vance
returned. ‘‘But the circumstances
made it imperative. Please believe
that I understand more of this case
than you imagine I do.”
“I am not sure that I under-
stand.” The girl spoke hesitantly.
“But I want you to know that I
trust you.” She looked up at him,
and I could see that her eyes were
glistening. Slowly she bowed her
head. "I have never been inter-
ested in any man,” she went on—
and there was a quaver in her
voice. “The men I have known
have all made me unhappy and
seemed always to lead me away
from the things I longed for . o
She caught her breath. “You are
the one man I have ever known
whom I could—care for.”
So suddenly had this startling con-
fession cme, that I did not have
time to make my presence known,
and after Miss Graem finished
speaking I remained where I was,
lest I cause her embarrassment.
Vance placed his hands on the
3 shoulders and held her away
from him.
“My dear,”
ously
he said, with a curi-
suppressed quality in his
“I am the one man for whom
wuld not care.” There was no
aking the finality of his words.
Vance smiled wistfully at the girl.
“Would you mind waiting
drawing-room a little while? . . .
She gave him a searching look
and, without speaking, turned and
went from the den.
Vance stood for some time gaz-
ing at the floor with a frown of in-
decision, as if loath to proceed with
whatever plans he had formulated.
I took this opportunity to come
out from my corner, and just as I
did so Floyd Garden appeared at
the hall door.
“Oh, hello, Vance,” he said. “1
didn’t know you had returned until
Zalia just told me you were in
here. Anything I can do for you?”
Vance swung around quickly.
“I was just going to send for you.
Everyone here?”
Garden nodded gravely. ‘Yes,
and they're all frightened to death—
all except Hammle
whole thing as a lark.
body had shot him
Woody."
“Will
instead
you send him in here,”
Vance asked. “I want to talk to
him. I'll see the others presently.”
Garden walked up the hall, and at
that moment I heard Burke speak-
ing to Markham at the front door.
Markham immediately joined us in
the den.
“Hope I haven't kept you wait-
ing,”’ he greeted Vance.
‘No. Oh, no.” Vance leaned
against the desk. "Just in time.”
Markham had barely seated him-
self when Hammle strutted into the
den with a jovial air. Vance nod-
ded to him brusquely.
“Mr. Hammle,”” he said, “we're
wholly familiar with your philoso-
phy of minding your own business
and keeping silent in orde: to avoid
all involvements. A defensible at-
titude—but not in the present cir-
cumstances. This is a criminal
case, and in the interest of justice
to everyone concerned, we must
have the whole truth. Yesterday
afternoon you were the only one
in the drawing-room who had even
a partial view down the hallway.
And we must know everything you
saw, no matter how trivial it may
seem to you.”
Hammle gave in.
“First of all, then,” said Vance,
without relaxing his stern gaze,
“when Miss Graem left the room,
ostensibly to answer a telephone
call, did you notice exactly where
she went?”
« “Net exactly,” Hammle returned:
“but she turned to the left, toward
the den. You understand, of course,
that it was impossible for me to see
very far down the hall, even from
where I sat.”
“Quite.” Vance nodded. “And
when she came back to the draw-
ing-room?”’
“1 saw her first opposite the den
door. She went to the hall closet
where the hats and wraps are kept,
and then came back to stand in the
archway until the race was over.
After that I didn’t notice her either
coming or going.”
“And what about Floyd Garden?”
asked Vance. “You remember he
followed Swift out of the room. Did
you notice which way they went, or
what they #d?”
by S: S. VAN DINE
Copyright 8. 8. Van Dine
WNU Service
‘““As I remember, Floyd put his
arm around Swift and led him into
the dining-room. After a few mo-
ments they came out. Swift seemed
to be pushing Floyd away from
him, and then he disappeared down
the hall toward the stairs. Floyd
stood outside the dining-room door
for several minutes, looking after
his cousin, and then went down the
hall after him; but he must have
changed his mind, for he came back
into the drawing-room in short or-
der.”
“And you saw no one else in the
hall?”
“No. No one else.”
“Very good.” Vance took a deep
inhalation on his cigarette. ‘‘And
now let's go to the roof-garden, fig-
uratively speaking. You were in
the garden, waiting for a train,
when the nurse was almost suffo-
cated with bromin gas in the
vault. The door into the passage-
way was open, and if you had been
looking in the direction you could
easily have seen who passed up and
down the corridor.” Vance looked
at the man significantly. “And I
have a feelin’ you were looking
through that door, Mr. Hammle.
Your reaction of astonishment when
we came out on the roof was a bit
overdone. And you couldn't have
seen much of the city from where
you had been standing, don't y’
know."
Hammle cleared his throat and
grinned.
“You have me there, Vance,” he
admitted with familiar good-humor.
“Since I couldn't make my train, I
thought I'd satisfy my curiosity and
stick around for a while to see
She Gave Him a Searching Look.
what happened. 1 went out on the
roof and stood where I could look
through the door into the passage-
way] wanted to see who was go-
ing to get hell next, and what
would come of it all.”
“Thanks for your honesty.”
coldly formal.
“Please tell us now exactly what
you saw through that doorway while
you were waiting, as you've con-
fessed, for something to happen.”
Again Hammle cleared his throat.
“Well, Vance, to tell you the
truth, it wasn’t very much. Just
people coming and going. First 1
saw Garden go up the passageway
toward the study; and almost im-
mediately he went back downstairs.
Then Zalia Graem passed the door
on her way to the study. Five or ten
minutes later the detective—Heath,
I think his name is—went by the
door, carrying a coat over his arm.
A little later—two or three minutes,
I should say—Zalia Graem and the
nurse passed each other in the pas-
sageway, Zalia going toward the
stairs, and the nurse toward the
study. A couple of minutes after
that Floyd Garden passed the door
on his way to the study again—"
“Just a minute,” Vance interrupt-
ed. “You didn't see the nurse re-
turn downstairs after she passed
Miss Graem in the passageway?”
Hammle shook his head emphat-
ically. ‘No. Absolutely not.”
Vance took another deep puff on
his cigarette.
“One more thing, Mr. Hammle:
while you were out there in the
garden, did anyone come out on the
roof from the terrace gate?”
“Absolutely not. I didn’t see any-
body at all on the roof.”
“And when Garden had returned
downstairs, what then?"
“I saw you come to the window
and look out into the garden. I
was afraid I might be seen, and the
minute you turned away I went over
to the far corner of the garden, by
the gate. The next thing I knew,
you gentlemen were coming out on
the roof with the nurse.”
Vance moved forward from the
desk against which he had been
resting.
“Thank you, Mr. Hammle.
You've told me exactly what I want-
ed to know. It may interest you
to learn that the nurse informed us
she was struck over the head in
the passageway, on leaving the
study, and forced into the vault
which was full of bromin fumes.”
Zalia Graem was the first to en
ter the den. She glanced at Vance
appealingly and seated herself with-
out a word, She was followed by
Miss Weatherby and Kroon, who sat
down uneasily beside her on the
davenport. Floyd Garden and his
father came in together. Miss Bee-
ton was just behind them and
stopped hesitantly in the doorway,
looking uncertainly at Vance.
“Did you want me too?”
asked diffidently.
“I think it might be best, Miss
Beeton,” said Vance. “We may
need your help.”
At that moment the front door
bell rang, and Burke ushered Doc-
tor Siefert into the den.
“I just got your message, Mr,
Vance, and came right over.” He
looked about the room questioning.
ly
she
“1 thought you might care to be
present,” Vance said, ‘in case we
can reach some conclusion about
the situation here. I know you are
personally interested. Otherwise I
wouldn't have telephoned you.”
“I'm glad you did,” said Siefert |
blandly, and walked across to a
chair before the desk. |
Vance lighted a cigarette with |
slow deliberation, his eyes moving
aimlessly about the room. There
was a tension over the assembled
group.
The taut silence was broken by
Vance's voice, He spoke casually,
but with a curious emphasis. i
“lI have asked you all to come |
here this afternoon in the hope that |
we could clear up the very tragic
situation that exists."
He was interrupted by the
startling sound of a shot ominously
like that of the day before. Every-
one in the room stood up quickly,
aghast at the sudden detonation.
Everyone except Vance. And be-
fore anyone could speak, his calm
authoritative voice was saying:
need for alarm.
I expressly ar-
“There is no
Please down.
ranged that shot for all of you to
hear—it will have an important
bearing on the case . . ."”
Burke appeared at the door.
‘““Was that all right, Mr. Vance?"
“Quite all right,” Vance told him.
“The same revolver and blanks?"
“Sure. Just like you told me.
And from where you said. Wasn't
it like you wanted it?"
“Yes, precisely,” nodded Vance.
“Thanks, Burke.”
The detective grinned broadly
and moved away down the hall.
“That shot, 1 believe,” resumed
Vance, sweeping his eyes lazily
o%Ver those present, “was similar to |
the one we heard yesterday after-
noon--the one that summoned us to |
Swift's dead body. It may interest |
you to know that the shot just fired
by Detective Burke was fired from
the same revolver, with the same |
cartridges, that the murderer used
yesterday — and from about the |
same spot.”
“But this shot sounded as if it |
were fired down here somewhere,” |
cut in Siefert.
“Exactly,” said Vance with sat- |
isfaction. “It was fired from one |
of the windows on this floor.”
“But I understand that the shot |
yesterday came from upstairs.’ Sie- |
fert looked perplexed. ;
“That was the general, but er-
roneous, assumption,” explained |
Vance. “Actually it did not. Yes- |
terday, because of the open roof |
door and the stairway, and the |
closed door of the room from which |
the shot was fired, and mainly be- |
cause we were psychologically |
keyed to the idea of a shot from
the roof, it gave us all the im-
pression of coming from the gar-
den."
Zalia Graem turned quickly to
Vance.
“The shot yesterday didn't sound
to me as if it came from the garden.
When I came out of the den I won-
dered why you were all hurrying
upstairs.”
Vance returned her gaze square-
sit
ly.
‘No, it must have sounded much
closer to you,” he said. “But why
didn’t you mention that important
fact yesterday when I talked with
you about the crime?”
“l— don’t know," the girl stam-
mered. “When I saw Woody dead
up there, I naturally thought I'd
been mistaken.”
“But you couldn't have been mis-
taken,” returned Vance, half under
his breath. “And after the revolver
had been fired yesterday from a
downstairs window, it was surrep-
titiously placed in the pocket of
Miss Beeton's top-coat in the hall
closet. Had it been fired from up-
stairs it could have been hidden to
far better advantage somewhere on
the roof or in the study.” He turned
again to the girl. “By the by, Miss
Graem, didn’t you go to that closet
after answering your telephone call
here in the den?”
The girl gasped.
“How--how did you know?"
“You were seen there,” explained
Vance.
flashing eyes.
“I'll tell you why I went to the
hall closet. I went to get a hand-
kerchief I had ‘eft in my handbag.
Does that make me a murderer?”
‘No. Oh, no.” Vance shook his
head and sighed. ‘“Thank
be so good as to tell me
what you did last night
answered Mrs. Garden's
mons?”
(TO BE CONTINUED)
Ask Me
Another
A Quiz With
Answers Offering
Information on
Various Subjects
1. How often does the United
States gain one in population?
2. Was Sir William Blackstone
successful as a lawyer?
3. Do baseball or football play-
ers receive more injuries?
4. How fast must an object trav-
el to escape from the gravitational
attraction of the earth?
5. Does an elephant eat as much
as a mouse in proportion to its
size?
6. Was the United States Su-
preme court ever closed for a pe-
riod more than one year?
Answers
1. There is one birth in the Unit-
every 14% minutes,
2. Sir William Blackstone (1723-
1780) whose fame as England's
greatest jurist is based on his
“Commentaries,” actually pos-
sessed only the vaguest possible
grasp of the elementary concep-
tions of law and was considered
a failure as a lawyer, jurist and
parliamentarian, according to Col-
lier's Weekly.
3. Baseball players receive
more minor injuries, but fewer
permanent injuries and fatalities.
4. It must have a speed of 6.05
miles per second.
5. If an elephant ate the same
amount proportionally as a mouse
it would consume 10 tons of food
daily. Actually it eats only about
100 pounds.
6. Rushed through congress in
| 1801, a measure directing that the
Supreme court should meet only
| once a year, on the second Mon-
{ day of February, closed the court
{ for 14 months, until February,
' 1803.
Joweholi ®
® Questions
Use for Celery Leaves.—Celery
leaves can be chopped fine and
put into meat or salmon loaf or
bread-crumb stuffings for such
meats as roast shoulder of lamb
or poultry. They can also be dried
and used like other herb season-
ings.
* “ -
Washing Handkerchiefs — Dis
colored handkerchiefs will regain
their whiteness if a few drops of
peroxide of hydrogen are added
to the last rinsing water,
* * -
Oilcloth for Shelves.—Oilcloth,
if white, can be used to line the
shelves and walls of dark cup-
boards. It will lighten them con-
siderably. If placed on the last
step of a dark cellar staircase, it
will make the descent easier.
- - *
Removing Mildew Stains, —
Moisten a little soft soap with
the strained juice of a lemon.
Spread this paste thickly over the
stains. Put out to bleach, and
afterwards wash in the usual way,
WNU Service,
nr,
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