The Spanish Cape Mystery

Chapter Twelve In Which a Blackmailer Encounters Difficulties

The privilege of dying quietly is reserved to nonentities. Death by violence automatically turns a peu de chose into a torn figure of importance, making a vital symbol out of the commonplace. In death Laura Constable found the very notoriety she had tried so hard to escape in life. Her broken body became a focal point for all the prying eyes of authority. In one brief swoop through space from grass-grown clifftop to gray rock in blackened water she achieved the significance that passes for immortality in the modern world of news.

Men came. Women came. Camera lenses stared at her unlovely shape, rendered infinitely unlovelier by the impaling it had gone through in the process of extinction. Pencils scribbled smoking words. Telephones jarred to monosyllabic messages. The bony coroner violated her fat blued flesh with impersonal, faintly bored fingers. Mysteriously a scrap of her gown disappeared, torn away by some one whose hunger transcended the ethics of special privilege.

In all this madness of activity Inspector Moley stalked silently, his lowering visage masking his thoughts. He let the reporters have their way with the corpse and the northern slice of Spanish Cape and the bloodstained rock. His men scurried about like headless chickens, plainly bewildered by the turn of events. The Godfreys, Cort, the Munns huddled together in the patio, posed in a daze for the avid photographers, answered questions mechanically. One of Moley’s men had already discovered Mrs. Constable’s city address and had wired to her son; it was Ellery who, with a poignant recollection of the dead woman’s voice, advised against tracing her husband. Everything happened, and nothing happened. It was a nightmare.

The scribblers surrounded Moley. “What’s the dope, Inspector?” He grunted. “Who did it? Think it was this Cort guy? Suicide or murder, Chief? What’s the connection between this Constable dame and Marco? Somebody says she was his mistress; is that right, Inspector? Come on, give us a break. You haven’t told us a thing in this merry-go-round!”

When it was all over and the last reporter had been forcibly ejected, the Inspector motioned one of his men to the door of the lantern-lighted patio, rubbed his forehead wearily, and said in the most conversational of voices: “Well, Cort, how about it?”

The young man glared at Moley out of red-rimmed eyes. “She didn’t do it. She didn’t!”

“Who didn’t do what?”

It was deep night now, and the flaring Spanish torches, cunningly electrical, cast long splashes of light over the flagstones. Rosa cowered in a chair.

“Rosa. She didn’t push her over. I swear, Inspector!”

“Push—” Moley stared, and then burst into a guffaw. “Who said anything about Mrs. Constable’s being pushed over, Cort? I want the straight of it, just for the record. I’ve got to make a report, you know.”

“You mean,” muttered the young man, “you don’t believe it was — murder?”

“Now, now, never mind what I believe. What happened? Were you with Miss Godfrey when—”

“Yes!” said Cort eagerly. “All the time. That’s why I say—”

“He was not,” said Rosa in a tired voice. “Stop it, Earle. You’ll only make matters worse. I was alone when it — it happened.”

“For God’s sake, Earle,” growled Walter Godfrey, his ugly face a gargoyle of worry, “tell the truth. This is getting... getting...” He wiped his face, although it was quite chilly.

Cort gulped. “As long as she — I’d been looking for her, you see.”

“Again?” smiled the Inspector.

“Yes. I didn’t feel much like — well, anything. Somebody — I think it was Munn there — told me he’d seen her strolling about on the links, so I went there. When I came out of that patch of brush near the — the spot, I saw Rosa.”

“Well?”

“She was leaning over the edge. I couldn’t understand. I yelled to her and she didn’t even hear me. Then she threw herself back and fell on the grass and began to cry. When I got there I looked over and saw the body lying on the rocks below. That’s all.”

“And you, Miss Godfrey?” Moley smiled again. “This is, as I say, just for the record.”

“It’s as Earle says.” She rubbed her lips with the back of her hand and stared down at her rouged skin. “That’s the way he found me. I heard him shout, but I was... petrified.” She shuddered and continued quickly: “I’d been out hitting a few golf balls about by myself. It’s been so — so deadly around here since... Then I grew tired and thought I’d stroll out to the cliff to lie down and just — well, lie down. I wanted to be alone. But I’d no sooner stepped out of the tangle of woods and brush that’s one of the hazards when I... saw her.”

“Yes, yes,” said Judge Macklin eagerly. “That’s most important, my dear. Was she alone? What did you see?”

“I suppose she was alone. I didn’t notice anything — else. Just her. She was standing with her back to me, facing the sea. She was so close to the edge of the cliff that I... I became frightened. I was afraid to move, to shout, to do anything. I was afraid that if I made a sudden sound she’d be startled and lose her balance. So I just stood there, watching her. She seemed like a — oh, I know all this is silly and hysterical!”

“No, Miss Godfrey,” said Ellery gravely. “Go on. Tell us everything you saw and felt.”

She plucked at her tweed skirt. “It was uncanny. It was! It was getting darker. She stood there so still and black against the sky she looked like a — well,” cried Rosa, “a stone statue! Then I suppose I must have gone a little cuckoo myself, because I remember thinking that she — the whole scene-looked like something out of a movie, as if it had been... well, planned. You know, with an eye to effects of light and shade. Of course, that was merely hysteria.”

“Now, Miss G.,” said Inspector Moley genially, “that’s all very well, but how about Mrs. Constable? Exactly what happened to her?”

Rosa sat very still. “Then... She just disappeared. She was standing there like a statue, as I said. The next thing I knew she had thrown up her arms and, with a sort of — of scream, fell forward over the edge. Vanished. I... I heard the thud when she struck the... Oh, I’ll never forget that as long as I live!” She twisted about in her chair, her mouth working, and blindly groped for her mother’s hand. Mrs. Godfrey, who seemed frozen, patted her stiffly.

There was a silence. Then Moley said: “Anybody else see anything? Hear anything?”

“No,” said Cort. “I mean,” he muttered, “I didn’t.”

No one else replied. Moley turned on his heel and said to Ellery and the Judge out of the corner of his mouth: “Let’s go, gents.”

They went upstairs in a straggling line, each occupied with his own thoughts. In the corridor outside Mrs. Constable’s room they found two men waiting in the uniform of the Department of Public Welfare, with the familiar and slightly macabre-looking crate at their feet. Moley opened the door with a grunt and the others followed.

The coroner was just replacing the sheet. He straightened and turned with a sour glance. The body made a mountainous heap on the bed. There were blots of blood on the sheet.

“Well, Blackie?” said Moley.

The thin bony man went to the door and said something to the men outside. They trooped in, set the basket down, and turned to the bed. Ellery and the Judge instinctively looked away; when they looked back the bed was empty, the crate full, and the two uniformed men were wiping their brows. No one spoke until they left.

“Well,” said the coroner. He was angry; red spots glowed in his cadaverous cheeks. “What the hell do you think I am, a magician? Well! She’s dead, that’s all. Died as a result of her fall. Broke her back in two, as a matter of fact, besides doing a little damage to her skull and legs. Well! You birds make me sick.”

“What’s eatin’ you?” grumbled Moley. “No bullet-wound, no knife-cut — nothing like that?”

“No!”

“That’s good,” said Moley slowly, rubbing his hands. “That’s swell. Clear case, gentlemen. Mrs. Constable faced ruin — her particular brand of hell, what with a dying husband, a middle-class laced-up-the-back background, and the rest of it. She wouldn’t go to her hubby for the hush-hush, and she didn’t have the dough herself. So, as soon as she heard from me that the letters and stuff had been delivered to me — too bad, but what the devil! — she took the only way out she could see.”

“You mean she committed suicide?” demanded the Judge.

“Smack on the button, your honor.”

“For once,” snarled the coroner, snapping his bag shut with a vicious gesture, “you’re talking sense. That’s just what I figure. There’s no physical evidence of foul play.”

“Possible,” murmured Judge Macklin. “Emotionally unstable, her world crashing about her ears, in the dangerous age for a female... yes, yes, quite possible.”

“Besides,” said Moley with an odd accent of satisfaction, “if this Rosa girl is telling the truth — and certainly she’s clear on all counts — it just couldn’t have been anything else but suicide.”

“Oh, yes, it could,” drawled Ellery.

“Hey?” Moley started.

“If you want to start an argument, Inspector... and speaking theoretically, I repeat: Yes, it could.”

“Why, man, there wasn’t a soul within fifty feet of that woman when she took the dive! She wasn’t shot at, that’s a cinch, and there isn’t any knife-wound. So there you are. Cripe, it’s a pleasure to write it off with so little trouble!” But he continued to eye Ellery with a broad doubt on his face.

“Pleasures differ. Doctor, the woman landed on her back, did she not?”

The coroner picked up his bag and scowled. “Do I have to answer this fella?” he asked complainingly of Moley. “All he does is ask fool questions. Didn’t like him the minute I saw him.”

“Come on, Blackie, don’t be cute,” growled the Inspector.

“Well, mister,” sneered the coroner, “she did.”

“You don’t take kindly to the Socratic method, I see,” grinned Ellery; then his grin vanished and he said: “And just before she went over the cliff she was standing on the edge, wasn’t she? Quite so. It wouldn’t have taken much to make her lose her balance, would it? Of course not.”

“What are you driving at, Ellery?” asked the Judge.

“Inspector Moley, my dear Solon, believes with Caesar that fere libenter homines id, quod volunt, credunt. You find Mrs. Constable’s suicide very convenient, don’t you, Inspector?”

“What the devil do you mean?”

“Wish fathering the thought business, eh?”

“Listen here—”

“Now, now,” drawled Ellery, “I’m not saying she didn’t commit suicide. I merely wish to point out that it would have been possible even under the circumstances for Mrs. Constable to have been murdered.”

“How?” exploded Moley. “How? You can’t keep on pullin’ rabbits out of your hat! You tell me—”

“I was about to do so. Oh, by a very primitive method, to be sure, but in this case vastly to be preferred over some modern gimcrack. I suggest that it is theoretically possible some one stood in the brush nearby, out of sight of Miss Godfrey and ourselves, and merely threw a stone at Mrs. Constable’s back — a very broad target, if you will recall the general construction of her anatomy.”

They greeted this with dead silence. The coroner glared at him in a gnawed and defeated way. Moley sucked a fingernail.

Then Judge Macklin said: “Granted that Rosa would not have heard a sound nor seen the assailant. But she was looking straight at Mrs. Constable. Wouldn’t she have noticed the stone striking?”

“Yeah,” said Moley at once, his frown vanishing. “That’s right, Judge! Wouldn’t she have, Mr. Queen?”

“I don’t believe she would,” shrugged Ellery, “but then that’s only an opinion. Mind you, I’m not saying that’s what happened. I’m just pointing out the danger of leaping to conclusions.”

“Well!” said Moley, wiping his face with a limp handkerchief. “I guess there really can’t be any question about the suicide. This is all swell-soundin’ chatter, but it doesn’t get you anywhere. Besides, I’ve got this whole thing figured out in my mind now. It’s a theory you can’t blast, Mr. Queen.”

“A theory covering the entire set of facts?” murmured Ellery, visibly surprised. “If that’s true, Inspector, I owe you an apology, for you will have seen something that so far has escaped me.” There was no sarcasm in his tone. “Well, let’s have it!”

“You think you know who killed Marco?” said the Judge. “I sincerely hope you do. This is scarcely a vacation and, in all conscience, I’d as lief get away from here today as not!”

“Sure, I know,” said Inspector Moley, taking out a twisted cheroot and sticking it into his mouth. “Mrs. Constable.”

Ellery kept eying him during the entire time in which they left the bedroom, escorted the coroner downstairs and to his car, and strolled out through the patio into the moon-drenched gardens. The patio was deserted. Moley had a wrestler’s jaw, and he did not seem especially gifted in intellectual attainments; but Ellery had learned through hard-won experience never to judge a man on appearances or even superficial acquaintance. It was possible that Moley had struck something nutritious. Ellery had felt all along that his own thinking had been sterile in this case; and so he waited impatiently for Moley, who seemed to be enjoying himself, to explain.

The detective did not speak until they had reached a quiet spot under a dark roof of leaves. He devoted himself for a full minute to drawing upon his cheroot and watching the breeze whisk the acrid smoke away.

“Y’see,” he said at last, in a provocative drawl, “it’s open and shut, now that she’s dead by her own hand. I’ll admit,” he continued with magnificent modesty, “that I hadn’t specially thought of her before. But that’s the way it goes in this business. You’re in a fog, but you bide your time and then, whango! — something pops and it’s all over but the shouting. All you need is patience.”

“Which, as Syrus said,” sighed Ellery, “‘when too often outraged is converted into madness,’ Talk, man, talk!”

Moley chuckled. “Marco played his usual game with this Constable woman, made love to her, smashed down her defenses, became her lover. She was probably easy pickin’s — just at the age when a handsome phiz is something to moon at in the movies and dream about at home. Well, she soon woke up. Soon as he had his letters and photo and roll of film, he laid his cards on the table: Pay up, sweet sucker. She paid up, scared to death. She was sick at heart, I suppose, but she figured she’d pay him what he asked, get back the proofs, and bury the whole business. Just a fling that didn’t work out.”

“So far,” murmured Ellery, “nothing startling, to be sure, and probably correct. Proceed.”

“But we know from the conversation you yourself overheard this afternoon,” continued the Inspector equably, “that she was fooled. She paid and didn’t get back the proofs. And she paid again, and again, until... what?” He leaned forward, brandishing his cigar. “Until she was cleaned out; until she didn’t have any more dough to stuff into that skunk’s craw. What could she do? She was desperate. She couldn’t or wouldn’t go to her husband, she had no further sources of funds. And yet Marco didn’t believe her, because it was through Marco that she came up here. He wouldn’t have finagled it so that she’d be invited here unless he thought he could still squeeze a few grand out of her. Now, would he?”

“No, that’s perfectly true,” said Ellery with a nod.

“Now, Marco was settin’ the stage for one last clean-up. He figured it would be easier if he got all his victims together, cracked down on ’em at one time, collected, took Rosa away with him — maybe he did intend to marry her, for all I know — and in that way set himself up for life. Godfrey would have paid plenty to get rid of such a son-in-law and have his daughter back. What happens? Mrs. Constable comes up here, because he ordered her to and she can’t help herself, he demands more dough, she pleads poverty, he gets tough and says if she doesn’t quit stalling and come across he’ll either send his proofs to some tab or to her husband. But she is telling the truth; she’s got her back to the wall. What’s she do?”

“Oh,” said Ellery oddly, “I see.” He looked disappointed. “Well, what does she do?”

“She plans to kill him,” said Moley with triumph. “She plans to have him killed, rather; and on the chance that he’s got the letters and things with him, steal them back and destroy them. So she hunts up this Captain Kidd that she’s heard about while she’s here, hires him to bump Marco off, Kidd picks up Kummer by mistake, she finds out almost immediately, types the note off making the fake appointment with Marco that night on the terrace, goes down, picks up that bust of Columbus and socks Marco, then strangles him with the wire she’s brought with her, and—”

“Undresses the corpse?” asked Ellery quietly.

Moley looked annoyed. “That’s just pink candy!” he exploded. “Just smoke in our eyes. Doesn’t mean a thing. Or if it does, she just got a kick out of — well, you know what I mean.”

Judge Macklin shook his head. “My dear Inspector, I can’t say I agree with you on any specific count.”

“Go on,” said Ellery. “The Inspector isn’t finished, Judge. I want to hear this out to the bitter end.”

“Well, it suits me,” snapped Moley, nettled. “She thought she was safe, then. No clue left, the note was either destroyed or, if not, pointed to Rosa. Then she goes lookin’ for those letters of hers and those photos. Well, she can’t find them. In fact, she goes back with the idea of lookin’ again the next night — last night, when you caught her and this Munn doll and Mrs. Godfrey. Then she gets the call from the one who’s really got the proofs and sees she’s in for the whole damned business of blackmail all over again. She’s killed a man for nothing. This time she doesn’t even know who’s hitting her up. So the game’s up and she commits suicide. That’s all. Her suicide was a confession of guilt.”

“Just like that, eh?” murmured Judge Macklin.

“Just like that.”

The old gentleman shook his head. “Aside,” he said mildly, “from a number of inconsistencies in your theory, Inspector, surely you must see that the woman doesn’t fit as the criminal psychologically? She was petrified with fear from the moment of her arrival at Spanish Cape. She was a middle-aged woman of the bourgeois type — the family woman pure and simple; good clean stock, narrow in her moral viewpoint, attached to home, husband, and children. The Marco incident was an emotional explosion, over as soon as it was set off. Now a woman like that, Inspector, may commit murder on impulse when she’s pushed far enough, but not an ingenious murder deliberately planned in advance. Her mind couldn’t have been clear enough. Besides, I doubt whether she possessed sufficient intelligence.” He shook his fine old head. “No, no, Inspector, it doesn’t ring true.”

“If you gentlemen are through heckling each other,” drawled Ellery, “perhaps you, Inspector, will be kind enough to answer a few questions? You’ll have to answer them to the press eventually, you know; they’re sharp lads and lassies; and you don’t want to be caught, as they say in our robuster literature, with your pants down.”

“Shoot,” said Moley, no longer triumphant or annoyed. If anything, he was worried. He sat biting his fingernails, head cocked on one side as if he were fearful of losing the merest word.

“In the first place,” said Ellery abruptly, shifting on the rustic bench, “you say Mrs. Constable, unable to pay blackmail to Marco, planned to kill him. But in planning to kill him, you maintain, she hired Captain Kidd to do the dirty work! I rise to ask: Where did she get the money to pay Kidd?”

The Inspector was silent, fretting over his nails. Then he muttered: “Well, I admit that’s a sticker, but maybe she just promised to pay him when his job was done.”

The Judge smiled, and Ellery shook his head. “And run the risk of having Cyclops on her neck as a result of welching? I think not, Inspector. Besides, it doesn’t strike me that Kidd is the type of scoundrel who would commit murder without payment in advance. You see, there’s at least one weakness in your theory, and a very basic one. In the second place, how did Mrs. Constable know about the Marco-Rosa connection — so well as to be certain that the bait of the note would work?”

“That’s easy. She kept her eyes open and found out.”

“But Rosa,” smiled Ellery, “has apparently been very secretive about it. You see, if there’s anything in my objection, it’s weakness number two.”

Moley was silent. “But those things—” he began after a moment.

“And in the third place,” continued Ellery regretfully, “you haven’t explained that business of Marco’s nudity. Most important omission of all, Inspector.”

“Damn Marco’s nudity!” roared Moley, jumping to his feet.

Ellery rose, shrugging. “Unfortunately, we can’t dispose of this case so easily, Inspector. I tell you we shan’t have a satisfactory theory until we’ve discovered one that explains sanely why—”

“Hush,” said the Judge in a whisper.

They all heard it at the same instant. It was a woman’s voice, choked and faint, but she had screamed somewhere nearby in the gardens.

They made their way rapidly toward the source of the cry, running noiselessly on the thick grass. The cry was not repeated. But the sound of a queer feminine mumbling came to their ears, growing louder as they advanced. Instinctively they felt the need for stealth.

Then they were peering through a yew-hedge into a grove set in a circle of blue spruce. One look, and Inspector Moley set his muscles to spring through the hedge. Ellery’s hand tightened on the detective’s arm, and Moley sank back.

Mr. Joseph A. Munn, the South American millionaire with the poker face, stood tensed and furious in the girdle of trees, his big brown hand clamped over the mouth of his wife.

The hand covered most of her face; only her eyes, frantic with fear, showed. She was struggling in a mad panic, and it was from her mouth that the mumbling issued, choked and distorted by his hand. Her hands beat backward over her head at his face, and she was kicking him with her sharp heels.

He paid no more attention to her blows and kicks than he would have paid to the thrashings of a bug.

Mr. Joseph A. Munn looked neither like millionaire nor poker-faced gambler at the moment. The little veneer he had so carefully cultivated had curled off in a flash of passion, and the cold mask he wore had been dropped at last to reveal a terrifying rage. The muscles of his powerful jaws were drawn back in a brutish snarl. They could see the fierce humps of muscle on his shoulders and the iron bulk of his biceps through the taut coat.

“First lesson,” muttered Ellery, “in how to treat your wife. This is truly educational...”

The Judge poked a sharp elbow in his ribs.

“If you’ll shut that trap of yours,” rasped Munn, “I’ll let you go.”

She redoubled her efforts, the mumble mounting shrilly. His black eyes flashed; he lifted her from the ground. Her head snapped back and her breath was shut off. The mumble ceased.

He flung her from him to the grass, wiping his hands on his coat as if they were dirtied from the contact with her. She fell in a heap and began to cry in short, gasping sobs, almost inaudible.

“Now you listen to me,” said Munn in a tone so strangled that the words were blurred. “And you answer my questions straight. Don’t think that forked snake’s tongue o’ yours is going to get you out of this one.” He glared down at her balefully.

“Joe,” she moaned. “Joe, don’t. Don’t kill me. Joe—”

“Killings too good for you! You ought to be staked down on an ant-hill, you two-timing, rotten little bitch!”

“J-Joe...”

“Don’t ‘Joe’ me! Spill it! Quick!”

“What... I don’t know—” She was quaking with fear, looking up at him as if to ward off a blow, her bare arms raised.

He stooped suddenly, thrust his hand in one of her armpits, heaved effortlessly, and she flew backward to a bench, landing with a thud. He took one stride, raised his hand, and slapped her cheek three times in the same spot. The slaps sounded like revolver-shots. They jarred her to the spine, her head flying back and her blonde hair coming loose. She was too frightened to cry out, to protest. She slumped on the bench, holding her cheek and staring up at him out of her darting eyes as if she had never seen him before.

Both men were muttering in rebellion to either side of Ellery. He said: “No!” in a sharp whisper, and dug his fingers into their arms.

“Now talk, damn you,” said Munn evenly, stepping back. He jammed his big hands into the pockets of his sack-coat. “When did this happen between you and that crawling scum?”

Her teeth chattered, and for an instant she could not speak. Then she said in an unnatural voice: “When — you were — off on that business trip to Arizona. Right after we — got married.”

“Where’d you meet him?”

“At a party.”

“How long did you let him—” He choked and finished with a vile, blistering phrase.

“Two... two weeks. While you were away.”

He slapped her again. She buried her reddened face in her hands. “In my apartment?” They could scarcely hear his voice.

“Y-yes...”

His hands bunched in his pockets. She looked up and at their concealed bulk with slow horror. “Did you write him letters?”

“One.” She was whispering now.

“Love stuff?”

"Yes..."

“You changed maids while I was away, didn’t you?”

“Yes.” There was the strangest note in her whisper, and he looked at her sharply. Ellery’s eyes narrowed.

Munn stepped back and strode about the grove like a leashed animal, his face a thundercloud. She watched him with almost panting anxiety. Then he paused.

“You’re getting a break,” he said with a snarl. “I’m not going to kill you, see? Not because I’m softenin’, understand, but because there are too many bulls around here. If this was out West, or down in Rio, I’d have wrung your neck instead of slappin’ you around like a nance.”

“Oh, Joe, I didn’t mean to do anything wrong—”

“Don’t yap! I’m liable to change my mind. How much did that Marco bastard suck out of you?”

She shrank away. “D-don’t hit me again, Joe! Most... most of that money you put... in my account.”

“I gave you ten thousand dollars for spendin’ money while I was away. How much did he get out of you?”

“Eight.” She looked at her hands.

“Was it this gig that got us the invite to come up here to Spanish Cape?”

“Y-yes.”

“I thought it was the bunk. What a sucker I’ve been!” he said bitterly. “I s’pose that Constable dame and this Godfrey woman were both in the same boat. Why the hell else should the fat one commit suicide? You didn’t get that letter back from him, did you?”

“No. No, Joe, I didn’t. He fooled me. He wouldn’t sell. When we got here he asked me for — more. He wanted five thousand. I... I didn’t have it. He said I should get it from you, or he’d turn the letter and — and the maid’s statement over to you. I told him I didn’t dare and he said I’d better. Then — somebody killed him.”

“And a good clean job, too. Only thing is he didn’t get the right kind of killin’. They handle those things better down in South America. They can do wonders with a knife. Did you bump him?”

“No, no, Joe, I swear I didn’t! I... I’d thought about it, but—”

“Naw, I guess you didn’t. You haven’t got the guts of a louse when it comes to the real thing. Not that I give a damn. Hell, that crooked mouth o’ yours couldn’t tell the truth if it tried. Did you find that letter?”

“I looked for it, but” — she shivered — “it wasn’t there.”

“So it’s on the level. Somebody beat you to it.” Munn scowled thoughtfully. “That’s why the Constable critter threw herself over that cliff. Couldn’t stand the gaff.”

“Joe. How did you — know?” whispered the blonde woman.

“Got a call a couple of hours ago from somebody with a voice that smelled bad. Told me all about it. Offered the letter and the maid’s written story for sale. Ten grand. Sounded kind of hard up. I said I’d think it over — and here I am.” He slowly tilted his wife’s face upward. “Only that horse-thief doesn’t know Joe Munn. He’d ‘a’ done better to go to you direct and have you steal some dough.” His fingers were biting cruelly into her flesh. “Cele, you and I are through.”

“Yes, Joe...”

“As soon as this murder stink blows over, I’m goin’ to get me a divorce.”

“Yes, Joe...”

“I’m goin’ to take that jewelry away from you — all the stuff I gave you that you loved so damn’ much.”

“Yes, Joe...”

“The La Salle roadster goes to the boneyard. I’m goin’ to burn that mink coat you bought for winter and that you haven’t worn. I’m goin’ to make a bonfire out of every stitch of clothes you’ve got, Cele.”

“Joe...”

“I’m goin’ to take your last cent away from you, Cele. And d’ye know what I’m goin’ to do after that?”

“Joe... I”

“I’m goin’ to kick you out into the gutter where you can play in the manure with all the rest of the—” For some time his voice went dispassionately on, in a catalogue of American and Spanish obscenity that made the listening men writhe. And all the time Munn’s fingers dug into those stricken cheeks, and his black eyes burned into hers.

Then he stopped and pushed her face back gently, and he turned on his heel and marched off down the path toward the house. She sat crouched on the bench, shivering as if she were cold. There were blackish welts on her face; they looked black in the moonlight. But in her attitude they sensed a queer and extraordinary gratification, as if she were also incredibly surprised to find herself still alive.

“My fault,” frowned Ellery as they made their way rapidly but cautiously back toward the house in Munn’s footsteps. “I should have anticipated that call. But so soon! How could I? The creature must be in the last stages of desperation.”

“He’ll call again,” panted Moley. “Munn practically said so. Munn’ll tell him to go to hell — he won’t pay — but then maybe we’ll get a line on where this guy is callin’ from. For all we know it may be from the house itself. Those extensions—”

“No,” snapped Ellery. “Let Munn alone. There’s no reason to expect that the call will be any more traceable than the first. And we might spoil everything. We have one card left to play — if it’s not too late.” He quickened his stride.

“Mrs. Godfrey?” muttered Judge Macklin.

But Ellery was already lost under the Moorish archway.