“They should install elevators,” I said weakly.
“What happened?”
“Someone shoved me.”
“Did you see who it was?”
“No … too dark. The lights were out on the second landing.”
“What were you doing up?”
“I wanted to get some soda … upset stomach.” I stretched my arms carefully; my shoulder throbbed. Nothing was broken, though.
“I wonder.…” Then the Lieutenant was gone in a flash, running up the stairs two at a time. I followed him as fast as possible. When I reached the second landing, I was almost bowled over again by a gust of ice-cold air from the end of the hall. Then the lights came on and I saw Winters standing in front of the wrecked study; he was bending over the unconscious figure of a plain-clothes man. The blanket which had been hung over the study door was gone. I shivered in the cold.
“Is he dead?” I asked.
Winters shook his head. “Help me get him downstairs.” Together we carried the man down to the drawing room and stretched him out on a couch. Then Winters went to the front door and called one of the guards in and told him to look after his fallen comrade, to bring him to. “Somebody hit him,” said the Lieutenant, pointing to a dark red lump over one temple. The man stirred and groaned. The other plain-clothes men went for water while Winters and I went back upstairs again.
It was the first time I had been in the study since my interview with the Senator. The lights were still out of order in this room. Winters pulled out a small pocket flashlight and trained the white beam of light on the room. There was a gaping hole in the wall where the fireplace had been. All the ruined furniture had been pushed to the far end of the room, away from the hole. The various filing cabinets were open, and empty.
“You mean to say somebody got in here and took all the papers just now?” I was amazed.
Winters grunted, flashing his light over the shelves of books, over the photographs which hung crazily on the walls. “We took them,” he said. “They’re all down at headquarters. I wonder if our prowler knew that.”
“A wasted trip then,” I said, stepping back into the warm corridor, out of the cold room. Winters joined me a moment later. “Nothing’s been touched as far as I can tell,” he said. “We’ll have the fingerprint squad go over the place tomorrow … not that I expect they’ll find anything,” he sounded discouraged.
“Maybe the guard will know something,” I suggested cheerfully.
But the guard remembered nothing. He rubbed his head sheepishly and said: “I was sitting in front of that blanket when all of a sudden the lights went out and then I stood up and the next thing I knew I went out.”
“Where’s the light switch?” asked Winters.
“At the head of the stairs,” said the man unhappily. “Right by the door to Mr. Hollister’s room, in the center of the landing.”
“How could somebody turn off those lights without your seeing them?”
“I … I was reading.” He looked away miserably.
Winters was angry. “Your job was to watch that corridor, to make sure that nothing happened, to protect these people as well as to guard the study.”
“Yes sir.”
“What were you reading?” I asked, interested as always in the trivial detail.
“A comic book, sir.” And this was the master race!
Winters ordered the other plain-clothes man upstairs to take prints of the light switch. Then we went upstairs again and the Lieutenant proceeded to wake up everyone in the house for questioning. It was another late night for all of us and the discomfited politicos complained long and loudly but it did no good … it also did the law no good as far as I could tell. No one had heard my fall downstairs or the clubbing of the policeman; everyone had been asleep; no one knew anything about anything, and, worst of all, as far as the police could tell, nothing had been taken from the study.
2
I shall draw a veil of silence over the Governor’s funeral oration: suffice it to say it was heroically phrased. The occasion, however, was hectic.
It was the first time I had been out of the house since the murder. I had no business in Washington and since my main interest was the murder I had spent most of the time talking to the suspects, calling various newspaper people I knew to check certain facts. Consequently, it was something of a relief to get out of the house, even on such an errand.
We were herded into several limousines and driven downtown, through a miserably gray sleet, to the National Cathedral, a vast Gothic building only half completed. A crowd was waiting for us outside one of the side doors. Flash bulbs went off as Mrs. Rhodes and Ellen, both in heavy black veils, made a dash through the sleet from their car to the chapel door.
We were led by a pair of ushers down into a stone-smelling crypt, massive and frightening: then along a low-ceilinged corridor to the chapel, brilliant with candles and banked with flowers: the odor of lilies and tuberoses was stifling.
Several hundred people were already there … including the police, I noticed. I recognized a number of celebrated political faces: Senators, members of the House, two Cabinet officers and a sprinkling of high military brass. I wondered how many of them were there out of sympathy and how many out of morbid curiosity, to survey the murder suspects of whom I was one. I was very conscious of this, as I followed Mrs. Rhodes and the Governor down the aisle to the front row. When we sat down the service began.
It was very solemn. I sat between Mr. Hollister and Mrs. Pomeroy, both of whom seemed much affected. It wasn’t until the service was nearly over that I was aware of a slight pressure against my left knee. I glanced out of the corner of my eye at Mrs. Pomeroy but her head was bowed devoutly and her eyes were shut as though she was praying. I thought it must be my imagination. But then, imperceptibly, the pressure increased: there could be no doubt about it, I was getting the oldest of signals in a most unlikely place. I did nothing.
At the cemetery, the service was even quicker because of the sleet which had now turned to snow. There were no tourists: only our party and a few cameramen. I thought it remarkable the Senator’s wife and daughter could behave so coolly … for some reason only Rufus Hollister seemed genuinely moved.
When the last bit of hard black earth had been thrown onto the expensive metal casket, we got into the limousines again and drove back across the Potomac River to Washington and Massachusetts Avenue. It was a very depressing day.
The drawing room, however, was cheerful by contrast. The fire was burning brightly in the fireplace and tea had been prepared. Mrs. Rhodes, a model of serenity, poured. Everyone cheered up a good bit, glad to be out of the black December day.
Ellen had thrown off her veil; she looked fine in her basic black dress. “I loathe tea,” she said to me in a low voice as we sat together on a Heppelwhite couch at the far end of the room, close to the windows. The others were buzzing about the room in a dignified manner.
“Good for the nerves,” I said; as a matter-of-fact tea was exactly what I wanted at the moment. “What’s next on the agenda?”
“Reading the will, I suppose.”
“Your mother seems to be holding up awfully well.”
“She’s pretty tough.”
“Was she very fond of your father?”
Ellen chuckled. “Now that’s a leading question … as far as I know she was, but you never can tell. They used to be very close but then I’ve been away such a long time that I’ve rather lost touch with what’s been going on.” Across the room the Governor was talking gravely to Mrs. Rhodes who looked pale but controlled.