The man on the floor did not move.
There were footsteps in the hallway and Dundy came in, followed by the two younger Binnetts. Dundy’s face was dark and furious. “Kitchen door wide open,” he said in a choked voice. “They run in and out like—”
“Forget it,” Spade said. “Uncle Tim is our meat.” He paid no attention to Wallace Binnett’s gasp, to the incredulous looks on Dundy’s and Ira Binnett’s faces. “Come on, get up,” he said to the old man on the floor, “and tell us what it was the butler saw when he peeped through the keyhole.”
The old man did not stir.
“He killed the butler because I told him the butler had peeped,” Spade explained to Dundy. “I peeped, too, but didn’t see anything except that chair and the window, though we’d made enough racket by then to scare him back to bed. Suppose you take the chair apart while I go over the window.” He went to the window and began to examine it carefully. He shook his head, put a hand out behind him, and said: “Give me the flashlight.”
Dundy put the flashlight in his hand.
Spade raised the window and leaned out, turning the light on the outside of the building. Presently he grunted and put his other hand out, tugging at a brick a little below the sill. Presently the brick came loose. He put it on the window sill and stuck his hand into the hole its removal had made. Out of the opening, one at a time, he brought an empty black pistol holster, a partially filled box of cartridges, and an unsealed manila envelope.
Holding these things in his hands, he turned to face the others. Joyce Court came in with a basin of water and a roll of gauze and knelt beside Timothy Binnett. Spade put the holster and cartridges on a table and opened the manila envelope. Inside were two sheets of paper, covered on both sides with boldly penciled writing. Spade read a paragraph to himself, suddenly laughed, and began at the beginning again, reading aloud:
“ ‘I, Timothy Kieran Binnett, being sound of mind and body, do declare this to be my last will and testament. To my dear nephews, Ira Binnett and Wallace Bourke Binnett, in recognition of the loving kindness with which they have received me into their homes and attended my declining years, I give and bequeath, share and share alike, all my worldly possessions of whatever kind, to wit, my carcass and the clothes I stand in.
“ ‘I bequeath them, furthermore, the expense of my funeral and these memories: First, the memory of their credulity in believing that the fifteen years I spent in Sing Sing were spent in Australia; second, the memory of their optimism in supposing that those fifteen years had brought me great wealth, and that if I lived on them, borrowed from them, and never spent any of my own money, it was because I was a miser whose hoard they would inherit; and not because I had no money except what I shook them down for; third, for their hopefulness in thinking that I would leave either of them anything if I had it; and, lastly, because their painful lack of any decent sense of humor will keep them from ever seeing how funny this has all been. Signed and sealed this—’ ”
Spade looked up to say: “There is no date, but it’s signed Timothy Kieran Binnett with flourishes.”
Ira Binnett was purple with anger, Wallace’s face was ghastly in its pallor and his whole body was trembling. Joyce Court had stopped working on Timothy Binnett’s arm.
The old man sat up and opened his eyes. He looked at his nephews and began to laugh. There was in his laughter neither hysteria nor madness: it was sane, hearty laughter, and subsided slowly.
Spade said: “All right, now you’ve had your fun. Let’s talk about the killings.”
“I know nothing more about the first one than I’ve told you,” the old man said, “and this one’s not a killing, since I’m only—”
Wallace Binnett, still trembling violently, said painfully through his teeth: “That’s a lie. You killed Molly. Joyce and I came out of her room when we heard Molly scream, and heard the shot and saw her fall out of your room, and nobody came out afterwards.”
The old man said calmly: “Well, I’ll tell you: it was an accident. They told me there was a fellow from Australia here to see me about some of my properties there. I knew there was something funny about that somewhere” — he grinned — “not ever having been there. I didn’t know whether one of my dear nephews was getting suspicious and putting up a game on me or what, but I knew that if Wally wasn’t in on it he’d certainly try to pump the gentleman from Australia about me and maybe I’d lose one of my free boarding houses.” He chuckled.
“So I figured I’d get in touch with Ira so I could go back to his house if things worked out bad here, and I’d try to get rid of this Australian. Wally’s always thought I’m half-cracked” — he leered at his nephew — “and’s afraid they’ll lug me off to a madhouse before I could make a will in his favor, or they’ll break it if I do. You see, he’s got a pretty bad reputation, what with that Stock Exchange trouble and all, and he knows no court would appoint him to handle my affairs if I went screwy — not as long as I’ve got another nephew” — he turned his leer on Ira — “who’s a respectable lawyer. So now I know that rather than have me kick up a row that might wind me up in the madhouse, he’ll chase this visitor, and I put on a show for Molly, who happened to be the nearest one to hand. She took it too seriously, though.
“I had a gun and I did a lot of raving about being spied on by my enemies in Australia and that I was going down and shoot this fellow. But she got too excited and tried to take the gun away from me, and the first thing I knew it had gone off, and I had to make these marks on my neck and think up that story about the big dark man.” He looked contemptuously at Wallace. “I didn’t know he was covering me up. Little as I thought of him, I never thought he’d be low enough to cover up his wife’s murderer — even if he didn’t like her — just for the sake of money.”
Spade said: “Never mind that. Now about the butler?”
“I don’t know anything about the butler,” the old man replied, looking at Spade with steady eyes.
Spade said: “You had to kill him quick, before he had time to do or say anything. So you slip down the back stairs, open the kitchen door to fool people, go to the front door, ring the bell, shut the door, and hide in the shadow of the cellar door under the front steps. When Jarboe answered the doorbell you shot him — the hole was in the back of his head — pulled the light switch, just inside the cellar door, and ducked up the back stairs in the dark and shot yourself carefully in the arm. I got up there too soon for you; so you smacked me with the gun, chucked it through the door, and spread yourself on the floor while I was shaking pinwheels out of my noodle.”
The old man sniffed again. “You’re just—”
“Stop it,” Spade said patiently. “Don’t let’s argue. The first killing was an accident — all right. The second couldn’t be. And it ought to be easy to show that both bullets, and the one in your arm, were fired from the same gun. What difference does it make which killing we can prove first-degree murder on? They can only hang you once.” He smiled pleasantly. “And they will.”