Death From a Top Hat

Chapter 16 The Red-Haired Wench

As we stood there waiting for the Inspector to verify this amazing assertion, the sound of voices and footsteps came from outside the window.

“Damn!” said the Inspector. He stepped into the hall, and as the front door opened, we heard him order, “Malloy, you’ll find Detective Grimm upstairs. Take Duvallo up there. Bennett, you come in here and get busy with that camera. Who’s this gentleman?”

“Ching Wong Fu, Inspector. He showed up just after you left.”

“All right, he goes up with Grimm, too. Then you come in here.”

“Dammit, Inspector,” Duvallo’s voice said, peevishly, “what’s the idea? Malloy has to spend a half hour dictating a report before he leaves, then he stops on the way and putters around at the station house and takes half the night to get here. What’s happened here, anyway?”

Gavigan’s reply should easily reach the finals in any contest for the best understatement of the year. “I’m not quite sure yet,” he said. “But you’ll hear about it soon enough. In the meantime, please do as I suggest.”

His tone made it obvious that there was no alternative.

Duvallo gave in reluctantly. “I’m getting fed up with this nonsense.” Then he went slowly up the stairs, Ching and Malloy following.

Bennett came in and busied himself over the body with camera, tripod, and lights. In a few moments Malloy returned and, while we waited, Gavigan gave him a hasty summary of the situation. When Bennett finally said, “Okay, Chief,” we gathered around the body.

Gavigan lifted the glasses from the still face, looked through them and said, “Dime store.” Then he pulled tentatively at the mustache and found that it peeled off.

“I didn’t get a decent look at Tarot in good light at Sabbat’s,” he said, “but this still doesn’t look much like him to me.”

“That facial expression, of course,” Merlini said, “is hardly characteristic of the suave Tarot, and the absence of the monocle makes him look positively naked. I’ve never before seen him without it. But what makes the greatest difference is the sun tan.” He ran his finger across the dead man’s cheek and held it up. There was a yellowish-brown smear on the finger and a pale streak across the face.

“Make-up,” he said.

Gavigan leaned forward and twisted the head to one side, looking closely at the right side of the jaw.

“You win,” he said gravely.

I saw it too. The strip of adhesive that had seemed so out of place on the immaculately groomed Tarot was there, covered and partially concealed by the cosmetic.”

Merlini, seeing it for the first time, scowled. “Tarot had that on his face before?”

Gavigan nodded, and then reasoned, “He could just about have made it. After ducking out of that taxi at 49th Street, he could have made a quick change at his hotel, and then… well, the subway would get him here in under fifteen minutes. Allowing another fifteen minutes for the change into this disguise, he’d have arrived here maybe five minutes to ten, but not any earlier. A taxi’s no faster than the subway for that distance. That gets him here just before the snow and no trouble about footprints. But why the disguise?”

“Maybe,” I suggested, “he was doing a little private detecting. He seemed to think Duvallo was the guilty person, so he might have come here to hunt for evidence. The disguise was to prevent his recognition should Duvallo happen to be at home.”

“He seems to have done a bit of ‘breaking and entering,’ at any rate. He’s got no key and, this time, no picklocks, so he must have come in by the ladder. But Grimm was out front from ten on, saw and heard nothing. What was Tarot up to during that half hour?”

“I wouldn’t know that,” I said. “Something sinister, probably, and the murderer coming along caught him at it, recognized him, and let him have it.”

Gavigan made a wry face. “Harte,” he protested, “if you’re going to submit theories make the words mean something. The murderer just ‘comes along,’ does he? Isn’t it bad enough that he got away without leaving footprints? You’ve got him coming in that way.”

“If he did it once,” Merlini said, “he might have done it twice.”

“Sure, but it would be a damn sight simpler to suppose he came in like Tarot, before the snow. That leaves us a little less to explain.”

“Does it?” Merlini asked. “It leaves me wondering what two people, murderer and victim, did to amuse themselves so quietly during the half hour Grimm was outside.”

“Any way you look at it, there’s plenty to wonder about. For instance, where did that ladder come from in the first place?”

“The murderer,” Merlini said slowly, “may, as you say, have entered by the ladder; but if we could prove he left by it, then we’d know one very interesting fact about him.”

“Such as?”

“We’d know that he was a Lung-Gom-Pa.”

“That would be such a help,” Gavigan said, suspecting where this was leading. “I don’t want to hear about it.” He turned and busied himself examining the catch on the window and then, stepping part way out, surveyed the balcony.

Grimm, however, was interested. “What is it in English?” he asked.

“Madame Alexandra David-Neel,” Merlini said, watching Gavigan out of a corner of his eye, “a Frenchwoman who lived in Tibet for eighteen years and who claims to be the only white woman ever to have made the dangerous trip, in disguise, to the holy city of Lhassa, writes that one day when travelling she came upon a naked lama whose sole wearing apparel consisted of heavy chains wrapped about him. Inquiry disclosed that this conception of what the well-dressed lama should wear was not as lacking in logic as might be supposed. Through the practice of Lung-Gom the fakir’s body had become so light that, without sufficient ballast, he was always in danger of floating in midair.”[9]

Gavigan studiously avoided any appearance of interest. Grimm snorted, “Does Barnum and Bailey’s know?”

“In order to get off that ladder,” Merlini went on, “without having disturbed the snow that surrounds its foot, Mr. X would have had to float in midair, no less. Just what the practice of Lung-Gom is, Madame David-Neel neglects to say. One of the breath-control systems, probably. Nevertheless it’s the only practicable method of getting off that ladder. I have many times caused a young lady assistant to float some six feet above a stage floor and then passed an examined hoop completely over and around her body. I didn’t resort to Lung-Gom, and the method I did use is, in this instance, quite useless.”

Quickly, before Merlini could go on, Gavigan put in, “That’s your way of saying that the window and the ladder are out. Okay. Perhaps you know how the murderer did get out? Let’s have it, and no moonshine about Tibetan lamas, Transylvanian werewolves, Javanese hobgoblins, or witches on broomsticks. It may be entertaining table talk, but we’re supposed to be busy catching a murderer.”

“Hmm,” Merlini said speculatively, “sailing out the window on a broomstick. I missed out on that one.” He pushed his cigarette, lighted end first, into his closed fist, and by squeezing gently made it vanish. Gavigan’s face flew storm signals, and he took a step toward Merlini.

Quickly the latter said, “Perhaps it is time we looked into the possibilities. There’s one method in particular—”

“Oh, so there are a couple of methods, are there? All right, Mr. Magician, bring out your rabbits.”

Merlini turned to me. “How about you, Harte? Doesn’t our recent review of Dr. Fell’s outline suggest anything?”

“Yes,” I said not too cheerfully, “it does. But I don’t like it. It would be an awfully flat finish to what is so far a really writable mystery yarn.”

“Class B, method 2, the secret exit?” Merlini asked.

I nodded.

“That would be lamentable,” he agreed, “though, unless he’s still in it, you’d also have to postulate a tunnel that would bring him out a block or so away in order to duck that snow. Still, I suppose we’d better look into it.”

“I intend to,” Gavigan said. “Duvallo’s a magician, and this house is probably riddled with secret passages. If he denies it, we’ll take the place apart.”

“Don’t count your chickens too soon, Inspector. The Merlini mansion doesn’t have those conveniences. Mrs. Merlini says secret passageways gather dust and attract mice. Grimm, have you any ideas?”

Grimm was disgruntled. “Oh, sure,” he said sarcastically. “The murderer might have had an Autogiro parked in the air outside the window, only I’d have heard it. Or he could be one of those human cannon balls they have in the circus, and he shot himself through the window, landing over on Barrow Street somewhere, only I haven’t seen anything that looks like a cannon. If Tarot only could have strangled himself.”

“Has anybody,” Merlini asked, “thought what an odd feature of this case that is — both here and at Sabbat’s? Usually when a corpse is found in a locked room the murderer uses a means of death consistent with suicide. Much more logical. There’s always the chance that the police may fall for it.” He gestured toward the study. “As to your preoccupation with the open window, Grimm, there’s a simpler and somewhat more practical possibility. Duvallo mentioned it at Sabbat’s. Rope.”

The Inspector spoke to Patrolman O’Connor. “Get Duvallo’s keys and open that trap door to the roof. Look for footprints, and — and you might include the top of that carriage house next door while you’re at it.”

“Not counting Grimm’s pulp magazine suggestions,” Merlini said, “two methods have been submitted. And I think Gavigan is toying with number three. A variation on the davenport theory. Am I right?”

“Any reason why not? It’s still the simplest. The murderer hid behind that chair near the French window. After Grimm and Jones came in and dashed madly into the study, he slipped out on to the balcony and hoisted himself from the top of the railing to the roof of the carriage house next door. It’s low enough so that it wouldn’t require any abnormal acrobatics.”

“I knew Jones had something to do with it,” Grimm broke out, apparently taking to the Inspector’s idea. “If that’s what happened, he knows it. He didn’t follow me into the study. He was still standing just inside the window when I came out of the study.”

“If O’Connor finds tracks on the roof, you can take Jones apart.” Gavigan turned to Merlini. “There are three possible solutions to an impossible situation. I don’t suppose it’s too much to ask you for a fourth, and a better one?”

“No, not at all,” Merlini grinned. “Do you know what that is?” He pointed at the silent Turk who sat rigidly, contemplating his chessboard.

“No, do you?”

“It’s an exact replica of Maelzel’s Automaton Chess Player, the original of which was destroyed when the Chinese Museum in Philadelphia burned in 1854. Mechanical marvels weren’t common as dirt in those days, as they are now; and a machine that could apparently think through the complicated moves of chess, and, what’s more, almost invariably win, created what Variety would term ‘a hit playing to stand-up biz’.”

Merlini walked over and opened one of the doors in the face of the cabinet, disclosing an intricate mass of cogwheels, springs, and pulleys. “These doors are for the purpose of showing that the innards are purely mechanical. Maelzel opened a door in the rear and held a lighted candle there to show that this compartment contained nothing but cogs and gears. Edgar Allan Poe, for one, however, demonstrated very ably that a chess genius, by name Schlumberger, who was connected with Maelzel’s party, but who was never in evidence when the automaton was playing, could have concealed himself in the compartment behind those other doors and then, when Maelzel had closed the rear door, could move over behind the machinery so that the two remaining doors could be opened.[10]

Gavigan’s hand came from his pocket gripping an automatic.

“Open those other doors,” he commanded.

Merlini pulled with both hands and swung them open simultaneously. Gavigan’s gun pointed squarely at the black opening, and from behind him Malloy flashed a torch. The interior was empty. Merlini stepped behind the cabinet and opened the rear door he had mentioned.

“Nobody home,” he said. Coming around to the front again, he knelt and stuck his head inside, peering about interestedly. “Well, there goes solution number four. If the murderer had never left this room the mystery of the absent footprints would dissolve. It would have been the simplest solution of the lot.” Grimm suddenly turned and went into the study. He came back almost at once announcing, “And that Spanish Maiden contraption is just as empty.”

There were steps on the stair and O’Connor came back. “The roof’s clean as a whistle,” he reported, “except for snow. And there’s not a footprint in a carload.”

“And the roof next door?” Gavigan asked.

“It’s the same.”

Merlini had been swallowed by the automaton until only his long legs projected awkwardly from one of the open doors. The Turk’s hand lifted, with a jerky mechanical motion, and completed the move with the Bishop which he had been studying so long. Merlini’s muffled voice issued from the Turk’s chest.

“Checkmate, Inspector! Three from four leaves one. You can get odds on your secret exit now, Ross.” The Turk caressed his beard in deep thought.

Gavigan said, “Merlini, if you could pull those long legs of yours inside, I’d lock you in for the duration of this case. Crawl out of there and—”

He stopped, listening. In the hall a woman’s voice was saying, “I want to see Mr. Duvallo at once.” The voice was young and determined.

A patrolman appeared in the doorway, and Gavigan said, “Show her in.”

The girl stopped abruptly just inside the door. “Dave… ” she started, and then saw that he wasn’t there. “Where’s Mr. Duvallo and who—” Her blue eyes, frank and direct until they took in the body, grew suddenly wide, startled. She stepped back, one hand reaching for the door jamb.

Her tall, slim figure stood there, arrested in a pose that was at once graceful and rigid. Her face was cool, capable, and her complexion had a smooth, wind-blown look. She wore a short fur jacket over a smartly tailored blue dress and an oddly twisted snippet of cloth perched insecurely on her head pretending to be a hat. Her mouth was soft and crimson.

“Your name, please?” Gavigan asked.

As she turned her head, the light in her hair flashed warningly, a hot, bright red. The waves of her coiffeur swirled down from under the hat and broke in a foam of small curls at the back of her neck.

“You’re the police?” she said.

The voice from the Turk spoke again, louder this time. “Miss Barclay, this is Inspector Gavigan of the Homicide Squad. Also Captain Malloy and Mr. Harte.”

Merlini slid out of the automaton. “David is upstairs and will be down any moment.”

The girl turned again toward the body and stared. Her shoulders shivered a little, then drew themselves straight.

“You know the man?” Gavigan asked gently.

“Yes!” Her voice was low and taut. “I didn’t at first, but I do now. It’s Eugene! But why is he here? What… what has happened?”

“He’s been murdered,” the Inspector said, stepping across the room so that he stood between her and the body.

From somewhere over our heads we heard a solid thump, a cry, and then feet came pounding down the stairs.

“Judy!”

Duvallo burst in at the door and took her in his arms.

“Dave,” she said breathlessly, “I was afraid… I saw the police cars outside and I had to know — who did it?”

Duvallo glowered at the Inspector. “I’m fed up with being pushed around. When I heard Judy I tripped up my jailer and came on. What’s going on in here anyway? Why—?”

Gavigan moved to one side, and Duvallo saw the body. His arm tightened around the girl, and he turned her so that she couldn’t see. But he kept on looking over her shoulder. Grimm appeared in the doorway behind him, rubbing his jaw, revenge written all over his face.

Duvallo said, “Listen, kid, you wait outside for a minute. Then I’ll take you home.”

She moved away from him and took a seat on the divan. “Don’t be silly. I’m of age. I want to know what happened.”

He scowled at Gavigan. “I’d like to know myself.”

The Inspector said, “Forget it, Grimm. And go watch Jones and that Chinaman before they take a run-out powder.” And to Duvallo, “Now you’re here you can stay, but you’ve put yourself right where I want you. One crack out of you at the wrong time and I’ll run you in for assault and battery. That clear? Sit down.”

“But what…?”

“I said ‘sit down!’ ” Gavigan’s Irish temper was moving over a wet pavement, skidding.

Duvallo started for a place next to Miss Barclay.

Gavigan objected, “No, over here.”

Duvallo looked at the Inspector obstinately for a moment, then obeyed. Taking out a pack of cigarettes, he tossed one across to Judy and took one himself.

The Inspector stood over Judy. “How did you happen to stop in here just now?”

She held up her cigarette and smiled at him. He took a paper of matches from his pocket and lit one for her.

“It sounds criminal, Inspector, the way you put it. I was on my way home when I noticed the police cars out in Grove Street. Naturally I was curious.”

“You live near here?”

“On Bedford Street, just around the corner off Grove.”

“And you were coming from—?”

“A movie at the Music Hall. Mystery thriller, full of policemen that barked. I didn’t like it.”

Gavigan elected to ignore that one. “You went by yourself?”

“Yes, I work at NBC in Radio City. Mother was having her evening of bridge tonight, so I stayed uptown for dinner and then went to the show.”

“Alone?”

“Yes.”

“Time, please.”

“Oh, am I a suspect, Inspector?”

“I don’t know. That’s what I’m trying to find out.” Gavigan saw Duvallo edge forward in his seat as if about to speak. “Well? You were going to say something?” It didn’t take a mind reader to gather that what the Inspector really meant was, “You aren’t going to say anything.”

Duvallo settled back. “I’m as quiet as a mouse, Inspector. Go ahead, browbeat the lady.” But that wasn’t what he meant either.

Judy broke in, “I finished work at five-thirty, dined at the Hotel Bristol from six to seven, and entered the Music Hall at a quarter to eight. I believe I still have my ticket stub.” She looked in her purse and finding it, handed it to Gavigan.

“What do you do at NBC?”

“I write continuities for sustaining programs.”

“Where were you at 2 to 3 A.M. this morning?”

Judy had placed her cigarette to her lips, but she took it away without drawing on it. “Do you always ask people that, Inspector, or do those times mean something?”

Duvallo straightened again, then relaxed as she went on, “I was home and in bed. I have to be at work at 9 A.M., you know.”

There was a commotion at the door, and Dr. Hesse walked in. He started to take off his coat when he saw the pictures on the walls. He stood there, one arm in and one out, looking around the room with a mildly thunderstruck expression on his face. There was a covetous gleam in his eye as he surveyed the posters and playbills.

“Where are we anyway?” he asked. Then he saw Duvallo. “Oh, I see.” He finished removing his coat and threw a distasteful glance at the corpse. “Hmm! Some more of the same. Is this going to go on all night, Inspector? Maybe I’d better just stick around. No sense in all this commuting.”

“Stop griping, Doc. And get on with it. I’m busy.” Gavigan faced Duvallo. “Do you own a twenty-foot ladder?”

Duvallo’s eyebrows went up. “Yes. There’s one in the garden. Lying by the wall. Why? Someone been using it?”

“Something like that. This is an interesting place you have here, Duvallo. Would you mind showing us the trap doors and secret passageways?”

“Oh, oh! Another locked-room gag.” He turned and eyed the door, noticing for the first time that it had been removed from its hinges. Getting up, he went over and looked at the lock. “Sorry about the secret passageways, but those only come with castles. Walls aren’t thick enough here. I’m thinking of buying a moat, though. They’re useful things.”

“It would be a lot less messy if you didn’t take that line, Duvallo,” Gavigan appealed. “I’d like to hear if you can give us as neat an answer this time. It’s on your home grounds.”

Duvallo looked at Merlini. “You at a loss again? Or is he just asking to hear my answer?”

“You’re too suspicious, Dave,” Merlini said, from where he sat near Judy. “He wants information. He’s just had several answers shot out from under him, and he’s looking for a replacement.”

“Okay. If he’ll stop snapping at Judy, I’ll take a stab at it. Try anything once. What’s the setup?”

Rapidly Merlini explained, and Duvallo listened eagerly, his bright, black eyes shifting impatiently, searching the room. Presently, as Merlini told about the window and the ladder, they went into the study. Judy followed, listening.

Just then Grimm’s voice came from upstairs. “For Crissake! Will you stumblebums get the hell outta there! I mean it. Scram now!”

Coming up from the garden outside, a new voice replied, “All right, Juliet. Don’t get sore about it. When’s the Inspector going to feed the animals?”

The two windows near the Turk that were black empty squares flared briefly with bright, soundless flashes of light.

“Malloy,” the Inspector exclaimed quickly, “get some men out there and keep those reporters from messing up that yard. Hurry!”

Malloy was gone before he had finished.

Dr. Hesse snapped his black bag shut and announced, “Same report as last time, Inspector. Death from same cause with same markings. Weapon still missing?”

“No. Grimm found that around his neck.” Gavigan pointed at the cord on the mantelpiece.

Dr. Hesse examined it and nodded. “Yes, that’s about what I’d expect.”

The others came back from the study just then, and Gavigan faced Duvallo. “Well, was it another string trick? Or is it mirrors this time?”

Dr. Hesse stood in the doorway, putting on his overcoat. “Pardon me, Inspector, but haven’t you forgotten something?”

“What?”

“It’s not like you. You didn’t ask me when he died.”

“Thanks, but we know that. Ten thirty-five.”

“Oh? Well, that’s a help. Good night. There’ll be a report on your desk in the morning.”

He went out, and Gavigan reminded Duvallo, “Well?”

There was a deep scowl on Duvallo’s face and a worried, restless look in his eyes. “Offhand, Inspector, I don’t know. And this time that’s on the level. I doubt if you realize how much I hate to have to admit that.”

“Miss Barclay?” Gavigan asked.

“Me? Heavens, no! If Dave is up a tree, who am I to have a guess?”

“And neither of you have any suggestions as to who might have had a motive for killing Tarot?”

They both shook their heads.

“And you, Miss Barclay. Did you know Cesare Sabbat?”

“Did I know…?” she turned to Duvallo. “Has he been — murdered, too?”

“Yes.”

I saw her breast rise as she caught her breath quickly. Duvallo put his arm around her again, but her slender body was stiff, unyielding, except for the hand that held her purse and trembled.

“No,” she said, keeping the tremor from her voice, “I didn’t know Dr. Sabbat. I’ve heard Dave speak of him, but that is all.”

Gavigan hesitated, eyed Merlini once, and then said, “All right, you two can go for now. Duvallo, you’d better camp out tonight. This is going to be a busy place, and you wouldn’t get much sleep.”

“I don’t think I will anyway. This vanishing stunt has me worried. Come on, Judy.”

The sounds in the hall indicated the arrival of more detectives. When Duvallo and Miss Barclay had gone, Gavigan had several of them in. His brusque commands crackled efficiently as he threw the switches that set in motion the routine machinery of detection. It was obvious that the Homicide Squad was going to meet the dawn sleepless. Watrous, Rappourt, the LaClaires were to be collected at headquarters and gone over by expert inquisitors. Their backgrounds, along with those of Duvallo, Judy, Jones, Sabbat, and Tarot were to be checked and double checked, as were their lives, loves, friends, fingerprints, and habits. Telegrams to the Federal Identification Bureau were mentioned, and cablegrams to Europe for information on Rappourt, Sabbat, and Watrous. The dressing-gown cord, the stone, the Grimorium and its torn page were to be taken to the laboratory for more thorough examination. Two men with insufflators began dusting the room for prints, and Bennett was told to finish his pictures, getting the usual shots of the room and some of the garden and the roof.

Malloy answered the phone once, and came back with a report from the detectives who had been going through Tarot’s apartment. They had found his evening clothes — opera cape, hat, coat, trousers, vest, shirt, and tie — strewn about on the floor, as if he had changed in great haste. His monocle was there, and a towel with cold cream and make-up on it.

The Inspector told Malloy to send Jones over to the Charles Street Station, have him sign a statement, and then release him. And to bring in Ching Wong Fu. As Malloy left, Gavigan saw me fish in my pocket and bring out my alibi list.

“What are you going to do with that?” he asked.

“Add Miss Barclay’s name,” I said.

“And how are you checking her off?”

“One up and one to go. The movie isn’t any great shakes as an alibi, of course.”

Gavigan scowled. “I’m almost inclined to give her a clean slate, just because she’s not a magician.”

“Not so fast, Inspector,” Merlini put in. “She’s not a magician. There aren’t many among her sex, but there are a lot of female magicians’ assistants. You see, she used to work for Tarot. The lady he sawed in two.”

Gavigan threw up his hands. “I might have known it!”

“He also used her in a transposition effect. He put her in a trunk that a committee from the audience locked, roped, and sealed. Then, when he clapped his hands she appeared at the back of the theater and ran down the aisle with a revolver, firing blanks and shouting, ‘Here I am!’ They were playing Detroit one day when Judy got a little mixed and came dashing down the aisle of a theater next door where an audience of Guild subscribers were viewing O’Neill’s Mourning Becomes Electra! The Detroit Free Press next day captioned its story, ‘Mourning Becomes Electrified.’ ”

“Oh,” Gavigan said, “so she can disappear too. I wish we had just one suspect who couldn’t vanish at the drop of a hat. Oh, yes — I forgot Jones. What does he do for a living?”

Merlini made no answer. He was thoughtfully regarding a handkerchief which he had spread out on the divan beside him. It was small and obviously feminine; white polka dots scattered on a deep maroon. I had last seen it tucked under one corner of the flap on Judy’s purse. Apparently Gavigan also recognized it.

“How did you get that?” he demanded.

“Don’t hound me, Inspector,” Merlini replied. “I’ll talk. I used a little sleight of hand of the pickpocket variety.”

Merlini’s hand delved in his coat pocket and with a slow conjurers movement drew out a second and nearly identical handkerchief. It had the same dotted design and differed only in that its color was blue.

“But I didn’t steal this one. I found it. Pushed down behind the seat cushion of the armchair in Sabbat’s apartment. Do you suppose, by any chance, they could belong to the same set?”

The Inspector was suddenly all business. “The boys at the lab can tell us if the cloth is identical, and they might even manage fingerprints.” He knelt by the side of the divan and held a glass over first one, then the other, of the pieces of cloth. “And if both have touched her face there may be enough powder grains adhering that a microanalysis will establish identity. If we’re lucky—” He stopped abruptly and bent closer. After a long careful scrutiny, he sat back on his heels and said:

“Here, Harte. Tell me what that is.”

He gave me the glass and I looked through it where his finger pointed at a spot on the blue handkerchief, the one from Sabbat’s apartment.

“It’s a hair,” I said. “And it seems to be red.”