Mother Paul Investigates

I first knew Mother Paul at school—a serene and scholarly nun gifted, as I realized later, with a unique ability in guiding rebellious young wills through the tiresome years of adolescence. We kept up a yearly correspondence when I left school to commence my nursing career. I came into more direct contact with her again when, with a severe bout of pneumonia, she was admitted to the private hospital where I was night sister.

Confounding her doctor by a miraculously fast recovery, Mother Paul began her convalescence by taking a lively interest in those about her. Within forty-eight hours she knew more about the staff than I had learned in two years. Being confined to her room her charitable curiosity was limited. But presently, when she was allowed to wander a little about the hospital passages, the other patients found in her a ready sympathetic listener to their maladies, both imaginary and real.

Coming on duty one evening, I found old Mrs Porter’s smooth, handsome nephew chatting brightly to Stella while he waited for his aunt to finish her conversation with Mother Paul. Mrs Porter was an immensely rich and disagreeable widow. She was in the hospital undergoing treatment for diabetes.

Mother Paul talked about her new acquaintance as I was settling her for the night. “Such a sad life. She was one of three sisters and forced to marry a wealthy man very much her senior. No children—that is why she is so devoted to her nephew Clifford, even though he is not very kind to her. His mother was the second sister. Her death was a sad cross for poor Mrs Porter. The third sister is married, but Mrs Porter says the husband took a most unreasoning dislike to her and barely allows his wife to see her.”

“You don’t really believe all that, do you?” I asked.

Mother Paul’s eyes twinkled. “I often find, dear, that even in the most biased of stories there are some glimmerings of accuracy. It is merely a matter of adjusting the facts.” Then she added thoughtfully, “It must be dreadful to be rich—so bad for the character.”

“The camel and the eye of a needle?”

“Not only that, dear. So bad for those about her. But I’m talking foolishly. I’m sure there is nothing to worry about.”

Her words did not startle as much as the memory of them some time later.

I did not see either Mother Paul or Mrs Porter for two nights, for it was my mid-week off. On the third evening as I came on duty, Stella Bray was standing outside Mrs Porter’s door ringing her little handbell. There was a faint look of impatience on her calm, lovely face, for it was well past visitors’ time and Mrs Porter’s three visitors showed no signs of leaving. I caught a glimpse of them through the open door—Clifford Hake, a fleshy-looking woman with a loud arrogant voice which marked her down as Mrs Porter’s sister, and a faded meek little man whom I guessed as the husband with the unreasoning dislike.

From the bed Mrs Porter was shouting, “I know you are only waiting for me to die so as to get my money. But don’t be so sure. You may receive a nasty surprise.”

Stella rang her bell again and went in to break up the happy family. I dealt with a couple of my other patients and then returned to tackle Mrs Porter. Holding the door knob in her hand and looking as though she would like to slam it, Stella was saying soothingly, “Yes, very well, Mrs Porter. I’ll tell her.” She shut the door quietly and made a grimace.

“Did you get rid of them?” I whispered. “Why must visitors stay overtime? They forgot they keep the staff on duty. What was wrong with the old girl?”

Stella shrugged. “She likes wielding the big stick. I gave her a sedative. She doesn’t want to be disturbed.”

“I don’t want to go near the old dear. Thanks, Stella. Did Clifford exude his charm all over you? Why the tuxedo?”

“He’s going on to some dinner, I believe. Good-night. Will you be all right now? That nun of yours has been asking for you all day.”

I went to see Mother Paul. She was sitting at the low window that opened onto the balcony, reading. She put down her book. “So glad to see you, dear. Did you enjoy your time off?”

“Yes, thank you. Has everything been all right? How is the friendship with Mrs Porter progressing?”

“I haven’t seen her. A little dry man with a briefcase has been with her most of the time.”

We talked for a while. Gradually the hospital settled into silence and darkness. I sat down at the dimly-lit desk at the end of the hall and began to enter charts. Paper work kept me awake and busy for an hour or two. Presently I got up and went along the hall intending to make some tea. Passing Mrs Porter’s door, I noticed the light was still on. I opened the door quietly and put my hand in to the switch, which was operable also at the patient’s bedside. Mrs Porter was asleep with the sheet pulled over her face as a protection from the light. A strong draught from the window almost pulled the door from my hand. The long balcony window was open wide. With the room in darkness I felt my way across quietly and pulled it down. The curtains ceased their long billowings, and the shut-out night breeze rendered the room strangely quiet.

It was the silence that caused me to check my step and to fumble automatically for my pocket torch.

I pulled the sheet down and shone my light full onto Mrs Porter’s face. For a few seconds I stared aghast. I was as used to death as any hospital nurse, but not death like this—the swollen bloated face, the protruding tongue and the tortured eyes. I shut off the light, hoping to shut the sight out of my mind.

A bell rang from the board near the hall desk and I stumbled out of the room. An appendectomy was complaining of insomnia. I mixed a sleeping draught with shaking fingers, very glad of his company.

I stood in the hall wondering what to do—whether to summon Mrs Porter’s doctor or the matron or the police or just to start screaming. Then I thought of Mother Paul, and the great load seemed to lift.

Mother Paul was fully awake in ten seconds and had a grip of the situation within another fifteen. “Strangled with her dressing-gown cord, did you say? Run outside, dear, and I will be with you in one minute.”

How she kept her word I do not know, for it isn’t as though nuns can cut corners over dressing. After a minimum of delay she joined me in the hall, not a fold of her habit out of place. She even wore a pair of black cotton gloves. “So confusing for the police. The fewer fingerprints about the better,” she explained. I started guiltily, and she added, with her percipient shrewdness, “Well, it can’t be helped, dear, but don’t touch anything more.”

I clasped my hands behind my back and followed her to Mrs Porter’s room. “Now tell me exactly what you saw, dear. First impressions are so important.”

“The light was on. I thought she’d fallen asleep forgetting to switch it off.”

Mother Paul flicked it on with the tip of one black finger.

“And the window was wide open.”

She moved across and pulled it up. I shivered and held the door wide open with my foot. “The sheet was right over her face. I—I just dropped it like that.”

Mother Paul placed it carefully over the face and stood back to observe the effect. “Anything else, dear?”

“I don’t think so,” I replied, frowning at the bedside table. Mother Paul’s eye was bright and alert. “Bedside lamp, a basket of fruit, two books, carafe and tumbler, clock. What is puzzling you?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, never mind,” she said comfortingly. “You’ll remember when the time comes.”

“Mother Paul, don’t you think we ought to call the police?”

She was poking gingerly into the wardrobe. “Is this Mrs Porter’s dressing gown? Yes, the cord is missing. Still knotted around the poor creature’s throat. Now, isn’t that odd! The dressing gown, I mean. The police presently, dear. First, old Father Smith. Only the good God knows what flash of His mercy may have pierced her poor soul in those last seconds.”

I called the Priest and guided his footsteps to Mrs Porter’s body. I left him with Mother Paul, warning him not to disturb the body more than necessary, and went to ring the police.

The next few hours were a maelstrom of detectives, doctors, photographers, finger-print experts and ambulance men until the time I was due to go off duty and the whole unpleasant affair resolved itself into Mother Paul and I facing a tough-looking detective in the hospital parlour.

“Mother Paul? Mother Mary St. Paul of the Cross?” he elaborated, and Mother Paul nodded meekly. “I’ve heard of you. What’s it all about, Mother Paul?”

We told him everything we had seen and spoken of and what we knew concerning Mrs Porter.

Mrs Porter’s sister, the husband, and Clifford had been summoned. They entered, aggressively, timidly, and suavely. The detective asked for their movements between the hour of eight, when Mrs Porter was last seen by Sister Bray and eleven, which the police doctor had given as the outside limit of her death.

“Outrageous!” boomed Mrs Wilson, “that anyone should insult the kinship of blood by inferring—”

“Please, my dear,” interrupted her husband, dabbing at her hand like a mouse trying to soothe an angry lioness. “My wife and I, after visiting her unfortunate sister, went to the pictures. There is a theatre only a block away from here.”

“You were together the whole time?”

“Of course.”

The detective turned to Clifford Hake.

“Mr Hake?”

“Clifford went to a club dinner,” snapped Mrs Wilson.

For a moment Hake seemed inclined to let his aunt’s reply stand. Then he laughed and said in his most disarming manner, “I certainly intended to go, but at the last minute I felt I couldn’t face it. These dinners are rather boring.”

‘Where did you go then, Mr Hake?”

“Back to my flat. I read for a while, had a drink and then went to bed.”

“Can anyone vouch for that?”

“To be quite frank, no. Does it matter?”

“It may, Mr Hake.” The detective addressed the three of them. “During your visit to the hospital last evening, I understand Mrs Porter became very upset. She was heard to say, ‘I know you are only waiting for me to die so as to get my money. But don’t be so sure. You may receive a nasty surprise’.”

“My sister was always being vulgar about her wealth,” Mrs Wilson said. “She often talked in that strain. But for Perce’s persuasions, I would never have gone to see her.”

“Then you did not know that Mrs Porter was seriously considering altering her will?”

“Most certainly not! Did you know, Cliff?”

“No,” he answered slowly, “I didn’t.”

The detective got up and went to the door. A little man with a black satchel and an expression of distaste entered. I felt Mother Paul start a little.

“Mr Bone—Mrs Porter’s solicitor,” the detective introduced him.

“I thought he might be,” Mother Paul murmured.

Mr Bone produced the new will that he had drawn up. “Not legal, you understand. Unsigned and unwitnessed. In the original will the main beneficiaries are Mrs Wilson and Mr Hake. Mrs Porter called me in for consultations extending over the last two days. She wished that her very considerable estate be spread instead over a number of charities. A small sum was to be divided between her first beneficiaries—that is Mrs Wilson and Mr Hake—and three other persons were to share in a similar amount. Mrs Porter wished to reward those who had been her faithful friends during her life.”

Mrs Wilson stopped making noises of outraged indignation and gave a derisive snort. “She never kept one faithful friend, let alone three.”

“The names of these three persons,” Mr Bone went on severely, “are Mother Mary St Paul of the Cross—”

“Oh, dear!” Mother Paul said in an uncertain voice.

“Sister Estelle Bray and Sister Joan Brown.”

“Oh, dear!” I repeated, stunned.

The detective’s toughness seemed to soften. “Did you murder Mrs Porter so as not to inherit her money, Mother Paul?”

Mother Paul patted my hand. “Perhaps you’d better tell Sister Bray to come down, dear.”

I fled upstairs and burst in on Stella counting a pulse. Her beautiful face lost its customary aloof calm when I told her what had been happening in the parlour. “I’m coming down with you,” she declared.

The detective had become tough again, and was hammering Clifford Hake over his lack of alibi. He didn’t look quite so handsome now, and his hands shook as he lighted a cigarette, playing for time before answering the detective’s question whether he had ever used the balcony to enter his aunt’s room.

“Cliff!” Stella said sharply, as we entered. He got up and went to her. “It’s all right, Stella.”

Mrs Wilson glanced from one to the other and said grudgingly, “You’ll make a good looking couple. Why didn’t you tell us before, Clifford?”

His laugh was shaky, too. “We didn’t decide until just this moment.”

“But, Cliff,” Stella said insistently, “you said you were going to that dinner.”

“Mr Hake,” the detective began in an ominously official tone. He stopped as he caught Mother Paul’s eye. “I’d like you all to wait outside for a few moments.”

We trooped out in sombre file, and waited in the draughty hall under the chill impersonal eye of a police constable. My heart was thumping hard.

I knew that if Mother Paul was not satisfied with Clifford Hake’s motive and lack of alibi, then she could be as dissatisfied with the Wilson’s water-tight one.

After a long wait, we were called in. Mother Paul was standing at the window with her back to the room. I joined her and she gripped my arm hard. No, it wasn’t so as to stop me from breaking away when the detective made his formal arrest. It was to give me support when Stella Bray started screaming and kicking, her loveliness now completely lost in the frenzy of her discovered guilt.

“Such a lovely looking girl!” Mother Paul said sadly, as, later that day, she sat at the low window opening onto the balcony. “They get so much from life and then expect more. Far better to be plain-pretty like you, dear. So often great beauty demands great material possessions. Stella Bray saw her chance with Clifford Hake, a beneficiary of an extremely wealthy woman. You know the way we patients tell you nurses everything. Probably Mrs Porter had let drop hints that there might be a little something in it for Stella. But Stella didn’t want a little—she wanted a lot. Then there was Mr Bone. If I could guess from his appearance that he was a solicitor, so could she.”

“But how did you know it was Stella?” I asked.

“There were several little odd matters; unimportant, but odd. The window was wide open so as to make it appear that someone entered from the balcony, but the dressing-gown, of which the cord was used to strangle Mrs Porter, was in the wardrobe. Now, if it had been hanging behind the door in view of the window, it would have been more reasonable. And then there was the sheet. Remember you told me, dear, it was right over the face. Who but a nurse would cover a dead face so instinctively.”

“But I was sitting in the hall. She couldn’t have entered Mrs Porter’s room without my seeing her.”

“And no one could have entered by the balcony,” Mother Paul said, “because I was sitting at my window. That is why Mr Hake’s not having an alibi did not seem as serious to me as it did to the detective. She was so cross with him not going to that dinner, wasn’t she. The murder was committed after Mrs Porter’s visitors left.”

I goggled at her incredulously. “But I heard Stella speak to Mrs Porter.”

“Quite, dear. But you didn’t hear Mrs Porter speak to Stella. It was there she made her bad mistake. What were her words again?”

I answered slowly, “‘Very well, Mrs Porter, I’ll tell her.’ Then she shut the door and told me she had given her a sedative and that Mrs Porter did not wish to be disturbed.”

Mother Paul watched me closely. “Do you see the mistake now?”

I shook my head, feeling abominably dense.

“A basket of fruit, two books, a carafe and tumbler,” she chanted softly.

“The medicine glass,” I cried; “there was no medicine glass, and Stella wasn’t carrying it, because she had her bell in one hand and she used the other to close the door.”

“That’s very good, dear. Stella was supposed to be off duty. If she stayed on, it must be with the appearance of giving you a hand—for example, soothing a restless patient with a sleeping draught. If she wasn’t carrying out some nursing duty in Mrs Porter’s room, what was she doing?”

I shuddered at the thought of what Stella was doing, and Mother Paul sighed without replying to her own question.

“Don’t think me rude, dear,” she said apologetically, “but I’ll be glad when I can go back to my convent.”

THE END