The Devil Loves Me

4

Aspasia passed from a coma into hysterics without going through an intermediate stage which would permit questioning. Aspasia’s hysterics, like everything else about her, were subdued and ladylike so that no one in the house was aware of the scene in the drawing room except those who were there.

Dennis Williams had shut himself up in his room on the third floor and refused to admit Prye or Mrs. Shane. They went downstairs again, Prye frowning, Mrs. Shane still calm but annoyed with Dennis.

“Of course Aspasia’s prediction — if it was a prediction — was sheer accident,” she said briskly. “It has no bearing on the poisoning.”

Prye said nothing.

Her voice became a little sharper. “Paul, you surely don’t believe in this telepathy nonsense?”

“I wouldn’t classify it as nonsense,” Prye said. “I haven’t experienced the phenomenon myself but others have. The inexplicable isn’t the impossible.”

“Aspasia’s been predicting disaster for forty years. I don’t begrudge her being right once,” Mrs. Shane said dryly. “One could hardly do worse, the laws of chance being what they are.”

“Chance,” Prye said, “is one explanation. Another is that Aspasia really knows something or guesses something about the poisoning and about Duncan. I hope you’ll change your mind about telling Inspector Sands.”

“I have nothing to hide. If you think it’s best, tell him. But make it clear that he is not to bother Aspasia about it. I’m sure no one was as surprised as Aspasia herself.”

“Except Dennis,” Prye said. “Dennis, I thought, seemed very surprised.”

He opened the door of the drawing room and she went in. He remained standing in the hall.

“And just who is Dennis?” he asked.

Mrs. Shane turned and regarded him bleakly. “Who is anybody, for that matter? He’s a young man whom I rather dislike; he’s going to marry my niece; he seems to have enough money. And even if he hasn’t, Dinah has.”

“But he’s your guest, isn’t he?”

She shrugged her shoulders. “Of course. I enjoy having people around me. But I don’t ask them for their registration cards. Dinah wanted an invitation for the young man and I sent one. She is—”

She stopped suddenly as the door of the room across the hall opened and Hilda catapulted out toward the kitchen. The inspector materialized in the doorway.

“Oh, Mrs. Shane,” he said softly. “Would you mind answering another question?”

Her smile was gracious and friendly as she walked toward him. “Of course not.”

“Your daughter tells me you use eyedrops,” Sands said. “May I see them please?”

“You may certainly. I haven’t used them for some time. They’re in the bathroom between my room and my sister’s.”

“No,” Sands said, “they’re not. Your daughter thought you kept them there and I looked for them. You have no further information to give me?”

“Why?” She turned to Pry. “Why eyedrops?”

Prye gave her a wry smile. “Why anything for that matter? But I suspect it’s because the lab analyzed Duncan’s pillowcase and sheet and found traces of atropine.”

Sands silenced him with a small movement of his hand.

“What has Duncan’s pillowcase to do with my eyedrops or Jane’s poisoning?” Mrs. Shane demanded.

“It seems obvious,” Sands said, “that Duncan was the intended victim. His sister drank some of the water that was in the pitcher beside his bed. I’d like to find this Duncan.”

“Why?” Mrs. Shane said again.

The inspector smiled gently. “To prevent him from being murdered.”

Mrs. Shane made a queer sound in her throat, walked back into the drawing room, and shut the door firmly behind her.

Sands looked at Prye, half smiling. “How did Duncan behave when he saw his sister collapse in the church? Was he puzzled, anxious, frightened?”

“Frightened,” Prye said.

“Interesting. There is a possibility then that he realized she had gotten the poison intended for him and that he has gone into hiding to protect himself. How does atropine taste?”

“Pure atropine is slightly bitter. It depends on the solution whether the taste would be noticeable.”

“The amount of muscarin used as an antidote was about one fiftieth of a grain. The doctor guessed at the amount, but it must have been a close guess. Miss Stevens is recovering rapidly. So we can estimate one fiftieth of a grain of atropine as the amount she took.”

Prye frowned. “Not nearly a lethal dose. Have you phoned Mrs. Shane’s doctor and found out how many grains of atropine were in the eyedrops?”

“One twentieth,” Sands said.

“Still not enough, under the circumstances.”

“The circumstances being that when the poison took effect he would be surrounded by people who would get him to a hospital? You’re sure that one twentieth of a grain wouldn’t have killed him?”

“No, I’m not,” Prye said. “But I think it’s unlikely. Duncan is still young — people become progressively more intolerant to atropine as they grow older — and his physical condition is good. Aside from his drinking habits he takes extremely good care of himself. Suppose the poison was intended to give him a really fine scare.”

Sands studied the ceiling. “The scare theory would account for one thing which has been worrying me, the anonymous telephone call. The poisoner intended to scare Duncan, poisoned Jane by mistake, and phoned the hospital to make sure that the poison was identified and the proper antidote administered.”

Sands went into the library and came back carrying his hat and topcoat. Prye followed him to the door.

“One more point,” he said. “One twentieth grain of atropine in that pitcher of water would have only a slightly bitter taste. But a bottle of eyedrops is a different matter. The antiseptic alone would flavor the water strongly, I think.”

“Miss Stevens mentioned the flavor,” Sands remarked. “But Duncan, in hangover condition, would perhaps not have noticed anything. The poisoner probably depended on the morning-after taste. By the way, what time do you dine here?”

“Seven.”

“If Duncan Stevens appears let me know immediately.”

He was putting on his gray topcoat when Nora came running down the stairs.

“Inspector!” she called. “Wait.”

Sands watched her approach, calm, unsurprised. Women, he thought, have good memories. They keep adding to their stories until they’re almost complete. He said, “You’ve thought of something else?”

Nora passed Prye with a cold stare and smiled at the inspector.

“It just occurred to me. Jane is coming home before dinner so she couldn’t have had very much poison. And Duncan is still missing.”

The inspector was patient. He was becoming accustomed to the tortuous ways by which the Shane family arrived at their points.

“Meaning?” he prompted.

“Meaning that Duncan might have poisoned her.”

“Any one of us might have,” Prye said. “Why Duncan?”

“To stop the wedding,” Nora said sweetly. “You see, Duncan asked me to marry him last night.”

Prye said “Phew!” and let out his breath. “Rather tardy, wasn’t it?”

“He’d asked me before, several times. I always said no.” She looked distantly at Prye. “I have since wondered if I wasn’t a little hasty. Duncan has his faults but he doesn’t maltreat defenseless women.”

“I didn’t touch Dinah,” Prye said violently.

“Gorilla.”

“It was the taxi driver.”

“I suggest,” Sands interrupted mildly, “that you settle the gorilla question after I’ve gone. While we’re on the subject, however, is Mr. Dennis Williams’ black eye a result of — ah, the machinations of Mrs. Revel?”

Prye grinned. “Oh yes. And speaking of Dennis—”

“Yes?” The inspector’s voice was alert.

Prye related the scene in the drawing room, Aspasia’s prediction of disaster, and Dennis’ subsequent behavior.

“Keep an eye on Williams,” Sands said, frowning. “I have a murder case on the books right now and can’t stay myself.” He buttoned his coat and put on his gray fedora.

They watched him go down the stone steps of the veranda and walk along the flagstones to his black sedan, his shoulders hunched against the raw autumn wind.

Nora shivered and closed the door. “I wonder where Duncan is. He shouldn’t stay away like this.”

Only one man in the world knew where Duncan was. He was a colored redcap at the Union Station. He didn’t come forward at the inquest to give his evidence because it might have cost him his job. But later he told his wife about it.

About four o’clock in the afternoon George Brown went down to the basement of the station. George was getting too old for his job, and he knew of a small storage room where he could go for a nap between trains.

Halfway down the stairs he caught sight of a man at the bottom. He was quite a young man, rather short and fat, and he wore a silk hat and striped pants and a wilted carnation in the buttonhole of his coat. In one hand he carried an imitation-leather knitting bag. With the other he clung to the brass railing of the stairs.

George classified him instantly as a big tip and hurried down to take the knitting bag from his hand. But the young man turned out to be very drunk, and with the tenacity of the very drunk he clutched the bag with both hands.

George said, “Taking a train, sir?”

Duncan focused his eyes with an effort on the redcap.

“I am on a mission,” he said gravely. “I am on a great and important mission.”

“Yes sir,” George said. “Taking a train?”

Duncan thought for a minute. “Possibly, Rastus, possibly I shall get into a train and ride into the sunset.” There’s no big tip here, George thought, and turned to go away. But the young man put a hand on his shoulder and held him back.

“See this bag, Rastus?”

“Yes sir,” George said.

“Guess what’s in it.”

“A bottle, sir.”

“You’re getting warm, Rastus, you’re getting warm. Try again.”

“Two bottles, sir?”

Duncan let out a howl of delight. “Psychic! You niggers are all psychic. Two bottles. One for you, one for me.”

“Never touch it, sir,” George said.

“I’m going to drink my bottle, Rastus. Take yours home to the wife and kiddies. But I’m going to drink mine right here. I’m going to get boiled and then I’m going to lie down on the tracks and go to sleep.”

“You can’t get up to the tracks without a ticket.”

Duncan fumbled in his vest pocket and brought out a ticket.

“Got you there, Rastus. I have a ticket. A ticket to” — he peered down at the card in his hand — “to Mimico.”

George reached for the ticket. “Better let me keep it for you, sir. That train pulls out in twenty minutes.”

“I said I was going to lie down on the tracks, Rastus. I said it and I meant it.”

“What’s your name, sir?”

Duncan leaned forward, grabbing George’s coat by the sleeve. George got an overpowering scent of whisky.

“My name,” Duncan said, “is Aram.”

“Aram what, sir?”

“Just Aram.”

Ten minutes had been wasted. George disentangled his coat sleeve. “Sorry, sir, this is my time off. Come along if you want to. You can sober up.”

When they got inside the small storage room George pulled a crate over against the door. Duncan sat down on the floor with the knitting bag on his lap, and George sat down beside him. They both looked tired and a little sad.

“You see, Rastus,” Duncan said, “if anyone wants to murder you, you’ve got to take steps. You’ve got to foil them.”

“Yes sir,” George said. “Certainly do.”

“And the best way to foil them is to murder yourself first. Take it from me, Rastus.”

“That would only do them a favor, sir,” George said wearily.

Duncan smiled craftily, wagging his forefinger under George’s nose. “We shall see. We shall see.”

He’s drunker than I thought, George decided. He’s drunk enough to do it. I’ll have to take away his ticket. I’ll have to find out who he is and send him home. Maybe I’ll get a reward.

“Is somebody going to murder you, sir?”

“No,” Duncan said. “I’m foiling them.”

He’s one of these swells with a lot of money, George thought, and he thinks everyone is trying to get it away from him.

“Better give me your ticket, sir,” he said.

“Rastus, you’re a nagger,” Duncan said. “I’ve got a sister like you, Rastus, a nagger. She’s going to get the surprise of her life. Want to do me a favor, Rastus?”

“No sir. This is my time off.”

“After the train goes past and I am a battered, bloody pulp, you go and tell my sister that I think — that I thought, that is — that she’s a nagger. You do that, Rastus. I’ve got fifty dollars that wants you to do that.”

“What’s your sister’s name, sir?”

“Jane. T hat’s her name,” Duncan said.

“Jane what, sir?”

“Aram. Jane Aram.” Duncan laughed, tears rolling down his cheeks and dripping onto the knitting bag.

“Better give me your ticket,” George said again. “We don’t want any trouble at the station.”

Duncan had stopped laughing and his face looked suddenly ugly. “Hands off me, nigger.”

But George already had his hand in Duncan’s vest pocket and had hold of the ticket. He brought it out. Duncan made a grab for it and George hit him on the point of the chin. He hadn’t meant to hit him, but he did. Duncan slumped sideways and his silk hat rolled off into a pile of sawdust.

He’ll sleep it off now, George thought uneasily. I better find out who he is.

He went through all of Duncan’s pockets. There were no letters, no registration card, not even a driver’s license. But the silk handkerchief had “D.S.” embroidered in one corner.

So his name isn’t Aram, George thought. He just made that up.

The knitting bag was lying between Duncan’s legs. George opened it and found two bottles of scotch. There was also a gun, a small pearl-handled gun with “D.S.” engraved on the handle.

George took the gun out carefully. It was heavier than it looked. Maybe it was loaded. He put the gun in Duncan’s pocket, peeled a five off the roll of hills he’d found, and closed the knitting bag. Then he slid the crate away from the door and went out, holding the bag under his arm as inconspicuously as he could. Nobody noticed him.

Shortly before seven o’clock Miss Jane Stevens was being assisted into Nora’s coupe by a nurse. Nora had brought along Jane’s clothes, a soft blue wool dress, a scarf to tie over her head, her mink coat.

Jane huddled in the seat and thanked the nurse with a wan smile. She was very pale and there were blue shadows under her eyes and a faint bruise on one cheek. She leaned back with her eyes closed.

Nora glanced at her sharply. The child looked really ill. She shouldn’t be allowed to go home.

“Janie,” she said, “wouldn’t it be better if you stayed at the hospital for another day?”

Without any warning Jane burst into tears, not her usual facile tears but deep sobs that shook the seat of the car. Nora let her cry, watching her quietly. The sobs went on, interspersed with broken words: “Duncan — all alone — cares at all.”

She cried nearly all the way home, wiping the tears away with the blue scarf. But by the time she entered the house Jane had composed herself somewhat. She stood in the doorway of the drawing room, clutching the knob as if she were too feeble to stand alone. Her smile was very, very brave.

“You were terribly sweet to wait dinner for me. I could have managed.”

Dinah groaned aloud and finished off her cocktail.

Jane suffered the perfunctory embrace of Mrs. Shane and the warm one of Aspasia. Dennis Williams said, “Hello,” in an embarrassed voice.

Jane noticed his eye and gave a little cry, “Dennis, you’ve been hurt too!”

There was an adroit accent on the “too” which, Prye decided, was meant to imply that Dinah was responsible for both incidents.

Dinah refused to take the bait. She got up, yawning. “The corpse has arrived. So let’s eat.”

Jane opened her mouth to reply, but Mrs. Shane grasped her firmly by the arm and propelled her toward the dining room, murmuring soothing sentences. “So glad you’re all right again. We were all worried to death. No, my dear, you’re not to think about Duncan. I’m quite sure he’s off just getting quietly drunk.” She went on talking while the rest filed into the dining room and sat down.

To her intense annoyance, Aspasia found herself sitting beside Dennis Williams. She did the best she could under the circumstances. She kept her head turned to the person on her other side, like a robin studying a worm. It was unfortunate that the worm she was to study turned out to be Dinah. Aspasia violently disapproved of Dinah.

Dennis was no less uncomfortable but the thought of his bags already packed and three strong cocktails had improved his state of mind.

She doesn’t know anything, he thought. She was guessing. I was a fool to pay any attention to her.

He smiled rather sheepishly at Mrs. Shane and said, “Afraid I’ll have to pull out tomorrow morning, Mrs. Shane. Business, you know. It’s been awfully good of you to have me—”

“Dennis!” Dinah’s voice was sharp.

He looked past Aspasia at Dinah, sitting bolt upright in her chair staring at him.

“But I told you, Dinah. I have to get back to the office. I’m a workingman.”

Jane smiled sweetly across the table. “Of course. We understand even if Dinah doesn’t. I don’t think Dinah is feeling very well tonight. Perhaps she had a wee droppie too much this afternoon.”

“I don’t think any of us is feeling very well,” Mrs. Shane said hastily. “It’s the strain of having Jane poisoned on our hands, as it were.”

Jane’s smile faded. “Really, Aunt Jennifer, I think I have had most of the strain. I’m sorry I’ve put you all to so much trouble, but if you can’t stand the strain of poisoning people, why did one of you poison me?”

There was a short, grim silence broken finally by Dinah’s dry voice:

“It’s not impossible that someone may dislike you, my dear. It’s not even impossible that you fixed yourself up a nice dose of poison—”

Jane began to weep. Jackson was coming in the door with a platter of meat and he stopped short, his eyes moving warily along the table and coming to rest at last on Jane.

“That’s quite an accusation, Jane,” Mrs. Shane said, “against your own relatives!”

“There are the servants too,” Dennis said, looking at Jackson. “Three of them, are there not?”

Jackson looked at him woodenly. “The servants would have no object in poisoning Miss Stevens.”

“We are not asking you to defend yourself, Jackson,” Mrs. Shane said. She turned to Jane and patted her hand. “After all, there’s no use in crying over spilt milk. As long as we’re all together we shan’t any of us get a chance to perform the dire deeds which would give Aspasia such satisfaction.” She favored Aspasia with a cold glare and went on talking. “And since you’ve already been poisoned once, Jane, the laws of chance make it extremely unlikely that you’ll be poisoned again.”

“I don’t think I want any dinner.” Jane’s voice was injured and reproachful.

“Wise girl,” Dinah said approvingly. “I wouldn’t depend on the laws of chance either if I were you.”

Nora got up and went over to Jane. “You’d be better off upstairs, Jane.”

Jane rose, clinging to Nora’s arm, and they went out of the room. Aspasia resumed her robin pose, its effect marred somewhat by a series of nervous hiccoughs.

Prye leaned over and whispered to Mrs. Shane. She nodded, dubiously, and he got up and stood behind his chair.

“Now that Jane has gone upstairs,” he said, “I can speak frankly to you. It’s fairly unlikely that a perfect stranger could walk into the house and poison the pitcher of water that was intended for Duncan.”

Aspasia’s head jerked to the front. “Then it really was — then Duncan was the one—”

“The inspector thinks so, and I agree,” Prye said.

“Not guilty,” Dennis said loudly. “I wouldn’t have any object in doing—”

Dinah said, “Be quiet, Dennis,” in a warning voice.

“Why should I be quiet?” Dennis demanded. “I didn’t do it. I know everyone will blame me. I’m the only one who’s not a member of this precious family of yours.”

Mrs. Shane said, smiling, “That’s quite beside the point, Dennis. Go on, Paul.”

Prye went on.

“Sands thinks that the poison may have been intended to warn or frighten Duncan. If any of you did this, I suggest an immediate confession to Sands. I’m sure Duncan and Jane would not prosecute.”

“Ha ha,” Dinah said. “Duncan would send his own grandmother to the chair for stealing a safety pin.”

Prye frowned at her. “You’re being helpful, Dinah.”

“Well, don’t try kidding us. No one will admit anything. We all know that Duncan is the most vindictive man who ever lived. And I know there isn’t one of us who’d be sorry if he forgot to come back—”

Duncan thought he was dead. He was in hell, of course. He always knew he’d go to hell when he died and here he was, and the devil was tapping his head smartly with a hammer. Once he struck Duncan’s chin by mistake so it hurt there too. Duncan said, “O God!” but this didn’t seem to frighten the devil at all. The hammering went on.

He opened one eye tentatively and discovered that he was blind.

Possibly, Duncan thought, my eyes have been plucked out. Maybe they do it to everyone down here or maybe I’m a special case. I wish I knew whether I was a special case or not, it would make it easier for me to know how to act. But I don’t know. I’ll have to be very casual until I find out. There is plenty of time. I’m going to be here forever and ever and ever—

“Stop that hammering!” Duncan shouted, not casually at all.

He hadn’t moved yet except for one eyelid. Now his hand slowly came to his head and found his eyes. He had two eyes anyway, and a hand. Then his leg twitched and he had a leg and another leg, and pretty soon he was all there, right down to the silk hat and the carnation.

So I’m all there.

All where? What is this place? Has it any time, and if it has what is the time? And who is this man who is all there in this place that has no time?

I am Duncan Stevens.

I am a short, powerful young man with some shares of International Paper.

How many shares of International Paper?

Two hundred.

Then you must be Duncan Stevens?

Yes, I am. I am Duncan Stevens, a short, powerful young man with a silk hat.

This seemed very satisfactory. Duncan propped himself on one elbow to survey the place that had no time. He was probably the only man who would ever see it. When he had seen it he would go and tell Mr. Einstein about it, he would win the Nobel prize, he would have his picture in the Christian Herald, and the devil would never dare lay hands on him.

He struck a match.

The room was filled with shapes, precise, geometrical shapes. They looked like boxes.

The match went out. So mathematics is at the bottom of everything, after all. I don’t dare tell anyone this. It will revolutionize the revolution. I will be burned as a witch. I will go home, and I will never tell anyone anything about this place.

He lit another match and found the door.

There were lights in the corridor outside, strong lights, and a clock. The clock said twelve-thirty.

Duncan was very sad about this. He stood in the corridor blinking at the lights and thinking of the other place with no lights and no time.

He went up the marble steps, clinging to the railing. At the top of the stairs a man came up and asked him if he wanted a cab. He followed the man without protest.

All the way home he crouched in the back seat of the taxi, his eyes closed, thinking of the other place. When the taxi stopped he opened his eyes and saw that the Shane house was dark. He gave the driver a bill and got out.

Someone had left the door unlocked for him. He opened it quietly. He didn’t want to waken anyone, to meet anyone. He wanted to think. He seemed to be thinking very well tonight...

But he hadn’t had his picture in the Christian Herald in time. The devil was at his head again, taking his vengeance. There were only two taps but they were hard.

They cracked Duncan’s skull.