The one-armed man grew even paler. “I... I wasn’t?” he faltered. Then, fearing he had given himself away, he said loudly: “I was so!”
“Come, come,” sneered Val. “Where were you at a quarter past five?”
The man started. He crouched a little and peered anxiously at the detective in the distance. “Not so loud, Miss Jardin. I didn’t mean nothing wrong. I just—”
“Speak up,” said Ellery in an authoritative voice. “Were you at that gate, or weren’t you?”
“I just sneaked down the hill a ways to Jim’s Diner for a cup of coffee. I was getting awful hungry — I always do late afternoons — I got something wrong with me...”
“What time was this, Frank?” asked Val excitedly.
“You won’t tell nobody? I went down the hill a little after five. Maybe eight, ten after. I was back just about half-past five. Just about.”
“Did you leave the gate locked?” demanded Ellery.
“Yes sir, I did, sir. I wouldn’t go away and leave—”
“Twenty minutes,” breathed Val, her eyes shining. “That means any one could have... Frank, not a word about this, do you understand?”
“Oh, no, ma’am, not me. I won’t say anything. If the people at the bank found out I’d lose my job. I only been on it a couple of months. I’m a poor man, Miss Jardin—”
“Let’s go, babe,” said “Scoop” King, bravura. And he linked Val’s arm in his and marched her up the drive toward the Spaeth house.
Val hurried along, trying to match his long stride. “That man Ruhig is a liar,” she panted. “He got here at five-fifteen, he says, couldn’t get in, went away. And came back a few minutes past six. That’s simply unbelievable. If you knew Solly Spaeth. He didn’t like to be kept waiting. And Spaeth had said it was urgent. Oh, Ruhig didn’t go away!”
Ellery strode on, head down, silent.
“Do you know what I think?” whispered Val.
“Certainly.” Ellery lit a cigaret. “You think that when Mr. Ruhig found the gate locked but unguarded, he climbed over the fence and visited Mr. Solly Spaeth per appointment.”
“Yes!”
“I’m inclined,” said Ellery, “to agree.” And he walked on, smoking like a demon.
“In the house. In the house between five-fifteen and five-thirty!”
“That’s only theory,” warned Ellery.
“I’m sure he was! The car could have been parked on the other side of Sans Souci so that when he left, nobody — not even Frank — would have seen him. Climbed over the fence again. Got out the way he got in—” She stared at Ellery with a feverish absorption. “That means — that means—”
“Let us,” murmured Mr. King, “interview the glamorous bride-to-be.”
Miss Moon opened the door herself.
“So you’re afraid to hire servants, too,” said Val.
“What do you want?” said Miss Moon. She was flushed with anger.
“We want in, as they say,” said Val, and she slipped by Miss Moon with a winning smile and skipped toward the study. Miss Moon glared at Mr. King, who spread his hands apologetically.
“After you, Miss Moon,” said Mr. King. Miss Moon stamped off to the study.
“What is this, anyway?” she stormed, withering Val with one devastating look. “Can’t a lady have any pwivacy?”
“Mr. King, Miss Moon,” murmured Val, unwithered and undevastated. “We won’t take too much of your time.”
“I don’t talk to murdewews!”
“If I wasn’t a woiking goil,” said Val, “I’d scratch those mascaraed eyes of yours out, dearie. I’m writing for a Los Angeles newspaper, however, and I want to know: Is it true what they say about you and Anatole Ruhig?”
Winni raised her pale plump arms dramatically. “I’ll go mad!” she cried. “I told that nasty little— I told Anatole to keep his twap shut! You’re the second one; a reporter was just here fwom the Independent!”
“Are you going to marry Anatole?”
“I’ve got nothing to say — especially to you!”
“I wonder what the secret of her success is, Mr. King,” sighed Val. “Would you say it was charm, or manners?”
“Miss Moon,” said “Scoop” King, taking out pencil and paper and pretending to write. “What are you going to do with Solly Spaeth’s fifty million dollars?”
“I’ll talk to you,” cooed Miss Moon, calming magically and fussing with her wheat-colored hair. “I’m buying and buying and buying. It’s wonderful how the shops give you cwedit when you’re an heiwess, isn’t it?”
She swept Val’s neat costume with a scornful glance.
“And is your aunt buying and buying and buying, too?” asked Mr. King, still scribbling doodads.
Miss Moon drew herself up. “My awnt isn’t here any more. My awnt has gone away.”
“When do you expect her back?”
“Nevaw! She deserted me in my hour of distwess, and now she can go lump it.”
“Apparently,” remarked Val, “she didn’t hear about the fifty million soon enough. Well, thank you, dear Miss Moon. I hope your new pearls choke you to death.”
And she went out, followed meekly by Mr. King and a female glare that had the glitter of knives in it.
Mr. King grabbed Miss Jardin’s arm and pulled her stealthily into the doorway of a room off the corridor. He kept peering out and back toward the study.
“What’s the idea?” whispered Valerie.
He shook his head, watching. So Val watched, too. In a few moments they saw Miss Moon flounce out of the study, lifting her beige hostess-gown and scratching her naked left thigh in an inelegant manner, and mumbling crankily to herself. She clumped up the stairs, her hips rising and falling like a watery horizon in a monsoon.
Ellery took Val by the hand and tiptoed back to the study.
“There,” he said, closing the study door. “Now we can reconnoiter a bit, unknown to the Presence.”
“But why?” asked Val blankly.
“Sheer nosiness. This is where the last rites were administered, isn’t it? Park your pretty carcass in that chair while I snoop a bit.”
“You’re a funny sort of newspaperman,” said Val, frowning.
“I’m beginning to think so myself. Now shut up, darling.”
Val shut up and sat down, watching. What she saw puzzled her. Mr. King lay down on the floor near the ell in which Mr. Solomon Spaeth had been sitting so quietly Monday night. He nosed about like Mickey’s Pluto; Val could almost hear the sniffs. Then he rose and examined the wall of the alcove. After a moment he stood off and looked up at the wall above the fireplace. Then, shaking his head, he went to Solly’s desk and sat down in Solly’s chair and thought and thought and thought. Once he looked at his wrist-watch.
“It’s an impressive act,” said Val presently, “but it conveys absolutely nothing to my primitive mind.”
“How do you get the gateman’s booth by telephone?” he asked in reply.
“Dial one-four.”
He dialed. “This is that reporter again. It’s five after six, so Walewski ought to be there. Is he?”
“So what?” rasped the detective’s voice.
“Put him on. What’s your name?”
“David Greenberg. Say, listen, pal, if—”
“I’ll remember that, Dave. Put Walewski on.” He waited, saying meanwhile: “That’s the hell of these post-mortem investigations. If there was any clue in this room, the police have ruined it... Walewski? I’m a reporter. You remember Monday a few minutes past six, when Mr. Ruhig drove up to the gate?”
“Yes, sir, yes, sir,” came Walewski’s quavering voice.
“Was he alone in his car? Or were there two men with him?”