“What?” Elsie Brand asked.
“The man who ran into Josephine Dell was drunk. Josephine Dell thought she took his licence number. She didn’t. She got the wrong licence number. She got a couple of figures juggled somewhere, but, as luck would have it, the man whose licence number she did get had also been driving his car, and he was also drunk, so drunk that he didn’t know but what he actually had hit her. Therefore, she’s in the position of being able to collect from two insurance companies, only she hasn’t sense enough to—”
“You’d better read Donald Lam’s letter first, Mrs. Cool.” Elsie Brand said.
“Was there a letter from Donald?”
“He dictated it to me.”
“To you!” Bertha Cool exclaimed.
“Yes.”
“When?”
“Last night.”
“Where?”
“Here at the office.”
“You mean Donald Lam was here?”
“Yes, he got a thirty-six-hour leave of absence, took a plane down here, and dropped in to see us. My, but he looked swell in his uniform, and he’s really filling out. He’s getting fit, putting on some weight, and looks hard as—”
“Why in hell,” Bertha exclaimed, “didn’t you get in touch with me?”
“I did everything I could, Mrs. Cool. You told me that you were going to Redlands. I told Donald everything that you had told me, and he started out to Redlands after you. I don’t think that you had been gone more than half an hour when Donald came in, and evidently he followed right along behind you. Do you want his letter?”
Bertha snatched the envelope out of Elsie Brand’s hand, started for her private office, turned, and snapped over her shoulder, “I don’t want to be disturbed. No telephone calls. No visitors. No clients. Nothing.”
Elsie Brand nodded.
Bertha, once more seething with indignation, ripped off the end of the sealed envelope, plumped herself down in the chair, and started reading the long letter:
Dear Bertha,
I am very sorry I missed you. I have taken a keen interest in the case from the correspondence, and when I unexpectedly received a thirty-six-hour leave, decided to come down and see what could be done. You weren’t in the office. Elsie said you had gone to Redlands where you thought Josephine Dell was or had been located. I hired a car and drove to Redlands.
Because of certain peculiar circumstances, I had already come to the conclusion that Josephine Dell might be in an out-of-town hospital. The fact that two gifts had been sent to the blind man, one a very tactful gift such as a sympathetic young woman would give to a man in his position with no note accompanying it, and the other a rather tactless gift accompanied by a note, made me think that there might be two Josephine Dells; one the real Josephine Dell, and the other an imposter.
The conversation you had with the manager of the Bluebonnet Apartments should have shown you that the girl you met who was checking out was the one the manager knew as Myrna Jackson. Recall that conversation, remember your visit the night the girl was checking out, and you’ll see the whole thing.
It didn’t take me long once I had arrived in Redlands to find Josephine Dell in the sanitarium. I arrived about forty minutes after you had left. I told Miss Dell who I was, and found her in a very hostile and suspicious frame of mind, but she was willing to talk and answer questions and let me explain.
I think you made your mistake, if you will pardon my saying so, in being a little too greedy. You kept looking at it from your angle. Because you were interested in getting a twenty-five-hundred-dollar cut from the insurance company, you kept thinking of the insurance angle; whereas it was manifestly apparent that this was really a very minor issue.
By being sympathetic and tactful, and convincing Miss Dell that I was trying to right a wrong and clear up an injustice, I was able to get her talking. Once she started talking, the whole solution became apparent.
I first convinced myself that Josephine Dell actually had been employed by Harlow Milbers in his lifetime. I asked her about the occasion when she executed the will as a witness, and she remembered it perfectly. She also remembered that the second witness to the will was not Paul Hanberry at all, but was a man by the name of Dawson who, at that time, had a photographic studio adjoining Harlow Milber’s office. The will was not made at the house at all, but was made at the office.
I got Josephine Dell to sign her name for me. The signature did not in the least agree with the signature of Josephine Dell which was appended to the will.
I had already deduced much of this because I took the precaution of looking up the weather on the twenty-fifth of January 1942 — apparently something you neglected doing. Had you done it, you would have found that it was raining steadily on the twenty-fifth of January. Therefore, Paul Hanberry would hardly have been washing a car in the driveway during a pouring rainstorm.
I also questioned Miss Dell as to the symptoms which accompanied Harlow Milber’s death and. found very definitely that he did complain of cramps in the calves of his legs. Under the circumstances the symptoms are so absolutely typical of arsenic poisoning that it would seem possible to make a very convincing diagnosis for the police.
In short, then, Harlow Milbers was poisoned on Friday morning. He died late Friday afternoon. Josephine Dell, returning home, was struck by an automobile, and had a mild concussion. She called a doctor the next morning when she experienced unusual symptoms. The doctor diagnosed a concussion and suggested she should keep absolutely quiet, preferably that she should go at once to a hospital or a sanitarium. Miss Dell had no money, but she thought that Nettie Cranning might make an advance from the household allowance. She thereupon went to Milber’s residence and explained the circumstances to Nettie Cranning.
That is where Mrs. Cranning showed unusual genius. In place of telephoning to the person who had struck Josephine Dell, she proceeded to get some money. She got some friend of hers to pose as a man named Milbran who claimed to be representing an insurance company which had no actual existence.
By means of this deception, they were able to get Miss Dell out of town into a sanitarium where she would be out of circulation for at least two months. That gave them ample opportunity to go to work on the will. As I suspected, the first page of the will was genuine. The second page was a complete forgery. You will remember that Myrna Jackson had moved in with Josephine Dell about three weeks prior to the accident. At the time there was no sinister purpose in this whatever. However, it is well to remember that Myrna Jackson was a friend of Mrs. Cranning and of her daughter, Eva, of about the same mental and moral calibre.
Following the death of Harlow Milbers, Nettie Cranning discovered the will. She found that the cousin was cut off with ten thousand dollars. In fact the first page of that will is absolutely genuine. It wasn’t until the next day the possibility of changing the will occurred to Mrs. Cranning, Eva Hanberry, and Paul Hanberry. Mrs. Cranning evidently was the one who conceived the idea. By getting rid of Josephine Dell for two months they would be able to substitute a second page of the will, leaving most of the property to themselves. You will remember that I pointed out to you the possibility of this in my telegram. It was only necessary to get someone to take the part of Josephine Dell, get her to sign as a witness on the fraudulent second page of the will, have Paul Hanberry also sign as a witness, forge the signature of Harlow Milbers, and then make some compromise with Christopher Milbers, who was the only other relative, get rid of him, and be sitting pretty. The real Josephine Dell was out of circulation for sixty days. The ‘insurance company’ had promised her a job when she was able to leave the sanitarium. Doubtless that job would have been one which took her to South America or some place where she would never see or hear of Milbers again.