“Was she at the party?” asked Gleason, turning to Mr. Washburn, the sobs muffled now by a closed door.
“No, no …” Mr. Washburn looked about distractedly, as though ready to make a run for it.
“She’s been sick,” I volunteered.
“I know she has,” said Gleason. Then the sobbing stopped and presently the door to the bedroom opened and Magda, supported on one side by the doctor, joined us. Whatever shot the doctor had given her was obviously working like a charm for she was in complete control of herself now … even when she looked at the sheet-covered figure on the floor, she remained calm.
“Now,” said Gleason, in a voice which was, for him, gentle, “why did you come here tonight?”
“To see Miles.” Her voice was emotionless; she kept staring at the white sheet.
“Why did you want to see him?”
“I … I was afraid.”
“Of what?”
“Of his being arrested. You were going to arrest him, weren’t you?”
“He was guilty.”
She shook her head, slowly. “No, he didn’t kill her … but I told you that once, when you came to see me.”
“What did you intend to do tonight? Why did you come?”
“I wanted to … to get him to run away, with me, the two of us. We could have gone to Mexico … any place. I wanted …” But she didn’t finish her sentence; she looked dully at Gleason.
“You couldn’t have got away,” said Gleason quietly. “He couldn’t have got away. You see, he was watched every minute; didn’t you know that? Why, there was even a man watching this building tonight.”
Mr. Washburn gave a start. “You mean …”
Gleason nodded, looking very pleased with himself. “I mean, Mr. Washburn, that at one-ten you were seen entering this building and at one-twenty-seven you left it, in a great hurry. What were you doing here?”
Mr. Washburn shut his eyes, like an ostrich heading for a sandpile.
“What were you doing here?”
“I came to talk to Miles.” Mr. Washburn opened his eyes and his voice was even and controlled: he was still the intrepid Ivan Washburn, the peerless impresario … he could take care of himself, I decided.
“And did you talk to him?”
“Yes, I did … and if you’re implying that I killed him you are very much mistaken, Inspector Gleason.”
“I implied no such thing.”
“Don’t even think it,” said Mr. Washburn coolly, as though he were saying: if you go after me I’ll see that you end up pounding a beat in Brooklyn. “I had some business I wanted to talk over with Miles. That’s all.”
“What kind of business?”
“His contract, if you must know. I told him that it would not be renewed. That we would tour without him.”
“What was his reaction to this?”
“He was upset.”
“Why did you tell him this tonight? Why didn’t you have him come to your office tomorrow? Or you could have written him.”
“I wanted to tell him myself. He was a friend of mine, Mr. Gleason … a very good friend.”
“Yet you were prepared to fire him?”
“I was indeed.”
“Why?”
“Because I suspected that sooner or later you would arrest him and that, even if you didn’t, too many people thought he was a murderer … too many of our backers, to be blunt about it.”
“I see … and you left in the middle of a party to come tell him this?”
“We both seem agreed that I did,” said Mr. Washburn.
“Could anyone else have visited Sutton this evening?” I asked, eager to get my employer off the hook.
Gleason ignored me. “Did you notice anything unusual about the deceased?”
“He was not deceased when I arrived, if that’s what you mean, and he was very much alive when I left.”
“I meant did he act peculiar in any way, say anything which might throw light on what subsequently happened.” Excellent sentence, Gleason, I said to myself; he was beginning to face up to the fact that none of his “deceased” talk was going to get him anywhere with this gang.
“He objected to my firing him and he said that he did not kill his wife no matter what the police thought and that he would welcome a trial.”
“So he told us,” said Gleason. “And we were perfectly willing to give him a chance to tell all, under an indictment, of course. But then what did you say?”
“I told him that I was convinced of his innocence, but that no one else was, that I would be only too happy to take him back after a trial, presuming he was acquitted.”
“You got the feeling, then, that Sutton was looking forward to a trial?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“But you said …”
“As a matter of fact, he was terrified of appearing in court. As you know he took drugs and he was positive that the prosecution would throw all that at him … I can tell you that he was not afraid of the murder charge … I don’t know why but he wasn’t; it was the drug thing that disturbed him: the idea not only of being sent to jail for it, or whatever the law is, but, worse, of having it taken away from him even for a few days during the trial …”
“He was going to give all that up when we were married,” said Magda in a tired, faraway voice. “There’s a place in Connecticut where they cure you. He was going to go there. We were to spend our honeymoon there.” She stopped abruptly, like a phonograph when the needle’s lifted.
“Then when you left the … Sutton he was alive and angry.”
“I’m afraid so … angry, I mean.”
“Did anyone else come to see him in the last hour?” I repeated.
“I’m asking the questions,” snapped Gleason. “Was that fire escape watched?” I asked, just to be ornery. “The one outside the kitchen window.”
“So you noticed there was a fire escape, eh?”
“I did.”
“Were you at the party, too?”
“Yes … remember, Mr. Gleason, I’m the one without a motive.”
Gleason gave me a warning or two about the possible dangers into which my insouciance might yet lead me.
While we had been talking, the detectives had ransacked the apartment and the photographer had taken pictures of everything in sight. They were now ready to push off. Gleason, receiving a signal from his chief lieutenant, stood up, rubbing his hands together as though washing them of the guilt of others.
“I will see all of you, tomorrow. Can you get home alone?” He turned to Magda.
“Yes … yes,” she said, stirring in her chair.
“You better see her home, Macy.” The detective in question nodded and helped her to her feet.
“I hope,” said Mr. Washburn, “that this turns out to be the end of the whole ugly business.”
“Or the beginning,” said Gleason darkly.
“I presume that you had a case against him. Now that he is dead … suicide, accident, who knows how he died? … the fact remains that a man about to be arrested for a murder has died and so the case … Oh, Lord, look!” Mr. Washburn leaped back and we all turned to stare at the figure on the floor. The sheet which covered him had caught fire from the still smoldering head and a yellow flame, like a daffodil in the wind, blossomed on the white sheet. I was not there, however, to see it put out; I had followed, as quickly as I could, Mr. Washburn’s blind dash down the stairs to the street outside.
3
For once I didn’t really want to see the newspapers; neither did my employer but of course we read them all, together, in absolute silence. “Death Company” … “Slain Dancer’s Husband Suicide” … “Mystery Death of Murder Suspect” … “Second Death in Jinx Ballet” … Needless to say, we had all the front pages to ourselves. When we had finished the lot we looked at one another. Fortunately, at that moment, Alma Edderdale saw fit to telephone and I left the office and headed for the Met.