“Not at all. I don’t care what you do with the gun, except that it’s my property and I want it returned some time. What I suggest is that we go with Miss Gladd to see your mother. It is she who needs and deserves an explanation, and who should decide what is going to be done.”
“You mean—” Ross stared at him. “You have the gall to say that you want to explain to my mother?”
“I say that, my boy. It can be left to your mother whether it is an exhibition of gall.”
“Take him up,” Heather said.
“He’s stalling,” Ross declared. “He doesn’t want to go to the police.”
“You’re an imbecile,” Vail asserted.
Ross regarded him. “Okay,” he said finally. His hand came out of his pocket with the gun in it. “You and I will go in your car and you’ll drive. Miss Gladd will follow us in the other car. If you try any monkey business...”
“I’ll stay right behind,” Heather said. “But you’ll have to be careful. No matter what he does, you can’t shoot him while he’s driving. If you shoot him while he’s driving, the car might—”
“You don’t necessarily,” Ross said indignantly, “have to consider me an imbecile just because he called me one. And you’d better try to drive a little better than you did on the way here.”
Twenty-one
Margie Hart had determined, come what might, to hold fast. First, there was loyalty. She had worked for Mrs. Dundee for over twenty years, and was quite convinced that should she die or quit, Mrs. Dundee would be utterly helpless, starving and clothed in rags, within a matter of weeks or even days. Second, there was her pay, which, thanks to an uninterrupted series of annual raises, was now stupendous. Third, there was her curiosity. The scenes recently overheard by her between Mr. and Mrs., the murder, actual murder, at that place in Katonah which she had never seen, the visits and questionings by real detectives in that very apartment — it was an earthquake, a cosmic spasm, a nightmare. Anything could happen. The whole shooting match might be arrested and thrown into jail. She herself might be drawn into the pitiless glare of a murder trial. It was a horrible and fascinating prospect.
But she wasn’t sleeping well, partly because she knew Mrs. wasn’t, and partly because of the feeling she had that the next development would be that Mr. would come in the night, letting himself in with his key, and kill Mrs. She derided herself for having the feeling, since it was completely unjustified and unreasonable, but she had it; and because she did, she heard, in her half sleep, the front door of the apartment open and close at twenty minutes past midnight. For a second she was rigid under the sheet, unable to move; here it was, here he was, he had come to do it; her heart stopped beating; then she was out and up, clicking the light, grabbing her dressing gown, flying from the room, down the service hall, through the kitchen, dining room, living room, into the reception hall...
“Well!” she cried indignantly.
“Hello, Margie. Is Mother up?”
“This is unseemly,” Margie said, showing how flustered she was, for she had not used that phrase to Ross since the far-off days when she had taken him to Central Park. She glared at Ross, at the young woman behind him whom she didn’t know, at the man beside him whom she did know... but Mr. James Vail wasn’t welcome at this apartment any more...
“Your mother’s in bed,” she said shortly.
“I’ve got to see her. Tell her I’m here. Will you, please?”
Margie turned and marched out. Ross ushered the other two into the living room, turned on lights, gave them seats, seated himself, and then got up again to help Heather when she started to rid herself of the long dark coat. Though the coat certainly had no aspirations to elegance, he handled it as if it had been chinchilla as he draped it over the back of a chair. A voice from the doorway turned him:
“Ross, my child? You devil of a child!”
He crossed to meet his mother, took her hands, put his hands on her shoulders, looked at her face, and kissed her on the cheek.
“I always forget how big you are,” she said. She squeezed his arm and released it. “I was expecting you. That is, I was expecting Miss Gladd, with you probably escorting her. I suppose this is Miss — what — what’s the matter?”
Approaching Heather, she halted to stare. Heather was herself staring, her mouth open, her eyes wide with stupefaction and incredulity — the frozen gaze that a ghost might expect to be met with, but not a comely matron in a yellow house gown from Hattie Carnegie. Ross, seeing it, stared too and demanded:
“What is it? What’s the matter?”
“Her voice—” Heather stammered.
“My voice? What’s the matter with my voice?”
“My dear Judith.” It was James Vail, out of his chair. “This was bound to happen sooner or later. Miss Gladd is speechless with astonishment because of the remarkable resemblance of your voice to that of her sister. You can judge of how remarkable the resemblance must be by the shock it gave her. Isn’t that true, Miss Gladd? It is an amazing resemblance, isn’t it?”
Heather nodded. “I can’t — it’s unbelievable—”
Judith was frowning at her. “You mean my voice is like your sister’s?”
“Exactly like! If I shut my eyes — it’s incredible!”
“Then that’s why!” Ross said excitedly. “Heather! That’s why! About that sonograph plate! You thought it was your sister’s voice and I thought it was Mother’s!” He stared at his mother, and suddenly seized her arm. “By God! That’s why I thought you were out there! I heard her talking and thought it was you!” He pumped the arm up and down. “And it wasn’t your voice on that sonograph plate at all! It was Heather’s sister! It wasn’t you talking with Vail, it was her! It was Heather’s sister who—”
He stopped.
He looked at Heather, stunned, incredulous.
“My God,” he said in a wilted voice.
“Precisely.” Vail said in a dry harsh tone.
Ross confronted him. “You can go to hell, you. I’ve knocked you cold once and if you want some more—”
Judith spoke incisively: “Behave yourself, Ross. If you mean the sonotel record—”
“You know nothing about it, Mother. If you heard it—”
“I have heard it. Mr. Hicks kindly brought it—”
“Hicks? For God’s sake! When?”
“No matter when. I’ve heard it. And if it was Miss Gladd’s sister having that conversation with Vail—”
“My sister never had any conversation with Vail!” Heather put in. “She never knew him! She never heard of him!”
“Didn’t you hear that plate?” Ross demanded.
“No! I only heard the first few words of it! And if it was a conversation with Vail it must have been your mother—”
“Please,” Judith Dundee interposed. “You children know less than I do about it, and certainly less than Vail. His conversation on that plate wasn’t with me, because it wasn’t. And it wasn’t with Miss Gladd’s sister, because he called the lady Judith.”
“Are you suggesting,” Vail inquired dryly, “that by a double freak of nature there is a third lady, not only with the same voice, but named Judith?”
“No. I’m not suggesting anything.” Mrs. Dundee surveyed him stonily. “I have nothing to suggest, and if I had I wouldn’t waste my breath on you.” She walked to the divan, sat beside Heather, and reached for the girl’s hand. “My dear, I am ashamed of myself. I knew there was a girl out there at my husband’s place who was having it hard, and if I had been human I would have gone to you. I wasn’t having it any too easy myself, but that’s all the more reason, and anyway I’m twice your age. Now we’ll stick it out together. Won’t we?”