The Devil's Cook

13

The old house seemed to have withdrawn into depth and darkness to guard half a century of secrets. The long walk leading from the street was rough underfoot, the cracks between its broken bricks still sprouting the dead moss and grass left over from the summer. Captain Bartholdi, who had preceded Jay and Farley through the thin traffic from downtown, now preceded them from street to house. He went up across the high front porch and knocked on the front door, which seemed an absurdity to Jay until he realized that the place was now, of course, occupied by the police. The door swung open with a classic creak, and the three passed in, Bartholdi still in front.

“Well, Brady,” he said, “how’s everything?”

“Cold,” said Brady, a bulky shadow barely discernible. “I’d give a leg for a quart of hot coffee.”

“You’ll be relieved at midnight. No one’s been around, I suppose?”

“Not a soul, dead or alive. I won’t say I haven’t thought about ghosts.”

“These gentlemen are. Professor Miles and Mr. Moran. We’ll just have a quick look upstairs.”

“Right. Watch your step on the stairs. The carpet’s worn through in a couple of places.”

Bartholdi switched on a flashlight. He held it pointed at the floor. Jay followed, Farley followed Jay, and the three men climbed single file to the second floor, where Bartholdi opened the first door on his right. Jay, beside him, could have sworn that a breath of colder air issued from the room but he knew this was only the trickery of an inflamed imagination in an exhausted mind.

“This is the room,” Bartholdi said, “where the kids found her.”

He played the light on floor and walls. On the floor lay nothing but a thin layer of dust, tracked now and disturbed in a far corner — where Bartholdi held the light steady for a minute — by a once-recumbent body. On the walls, only paper with a-design of faded roses, just slightly brighter in one small rectangular place where a picture had hung.

Bartholdi shut the door. The trio huddled in the hall, standing in the puddle of Bartholdi’s light.

“You see, Jay?” Bartholdi assumed the familiarity, to which he had been invited, without effort. “No tricks. No psychology.”

“Can you tell me, then, what has been gained by bringing me here?”

“Have you ever seen this house before?”

“I have no recollection of it.”

“Had your wife?”

“I wouldn’t know, but I should think it very unlikely.”

“She never mentioned any place that might seem, now that you are here, to have been a reference to this house?”

“No, not to me.”

They stood in silence, their feet unmoving in the bright puddle, a frail and tiny circumference established against the darkness. The cold numbed their flesh. Jay’s voice, when he spoke at last, was intense and harsh, almost guttural.

“Who could have done it? Who?”

“That remains to be seen. But we’ll find out.”

“But why kill her? If she was kidnapped, wouldn’t it have been better to let her live, at least until the ransom was collected?”

“It depends on the point of view. A dead victim can’t identify anybody.”

“Whoever did it, you’ve got to find him!”

“We will. The Personal is something to go on. I have another lead, too, and I’m hoping both may get us to the same person. This house has been rented.”

“Who rented it?”

“It was rented two weeks ago by a man who gave the name of Ivan Harper. He paid a month’s advance rent in cash. He hasn’t, so far as I can learn, been seen since. Not by the people at the agency or any of the neighbors. The gas and electricity have not been turned on, no telephone has been installed. It’s a safe bet that Harper, whatever his name really is, is our man. He rented this house solely for the purpose for which he used it. I haven’t been able to see the agent who personally rented the house, but I’ll get him in the morning at the agency.”

“He should be able to give a description. He can surely recognize this man if he sees him again.”

“Oh, he’ll give a description, all right, probably inaccurate. He saw the man only once, two weeks ago, and you have to assume that anyone who risked this caper would have taken the elementary precaution of disguise.”

Farley suddenly made a noise that was half sigh, half groan. His feet backed out of the puddle, and his arms made slapping sounds against his sides.

“It’s cold,” he said. “Do we have to stand talking in this house all night?”

“Sorry.” Bartholdi’s feet also began to move, taking the puddle along.

They went downstairs and out to their cars. Bartholdi stopped outside his car and spoke to Jay, who had veered off with Farley toward his own.

“I’m not sure of the location of The Cornish Arms. I’ll follow you.”

“Oh?” Jay stopped and turned, colliding with Farley, who was at his shoulder. “Are you coming along?”

“Yes.”

“I’m very tired. I don’t think I can keep going much longer. Couldn’t we put it off until tomorrow?”

“I want that newspaper, the one with the Personal in it. And maybe Green has got back from wherever he went — I want to talk to him. There are other things, too.”

“Well, all right.”