“I am becoming a reader of the evening papers,” Sam told Alix. “Perforce, as it were. They contain such choice bits about my intimate friends. When I read this about you, my first impulse was to find Gorman and punch his head.”
“It’s my head that ought to be punched,” Alix explained. “This is really all my fault.
It’s possible I couldn’t have helped it, but the other night when he returned after you left, I filled him up with all sorts of crazy ideas and coached him in what to say to Hugh Oliver. I mean I put him up to saying all the things I could think of that would make it certain Hugh wouldn’t sell him that play. You see, I thought that would end the matter. You remember I phoned you not to let the two men meet? I was frightened at what I had done, but I still thought that Gorman’s views, conveyed through Hugh’s lawyer perhaps, would be sure to let me out of my difficulty...And now what am I going to do? I may be arrested any minute.”
“You’re going to see a lawyer tomorrow, let him look over your contract and point out to Gorman that his publicity has made it doubly impossible for you to play in ‘This Business of Being a Woman.’ If you went on in it, I verily believe you’d be hissed off the boards as Connie’s murderess. It would certainly be said openly that you had rid yourself of her to get your play back.” Sam preferred to center her mind on the professional angle. He himself was unsure what view Dolan and his subordinates might take, but he hid his anxiety and Alix nodded.
“And Gorman thinks that would be good advertising. He claims curiosity would fill any theater.”
“The man must assume that his stars have hides like a rhinoceros—or like his own.”
“Do you know, Sam, I feel as if my career were ended. I don’t believe I’ll ever again be equal to facing an audience. Certainly not unless you catch the murderer.”
“That’s now.” Sam returned. “It’s a result of shock. You couldn’t give up the theater. It wouldn’t let you. And sooner or later we’ll find you another play. How about something from the Chinese? Our brilliant Sing might help us there.”
“I’ve meant to speak to you about him for some time,” Alix began, diverted from her own situation. “What do you know about that man? He isn’t the usual type of houseman. At least he doesn’t seem so to me.”
“How does he seem to you?” Sam asked, lazily. It was not often that he had Alix to himself like this and he was enjoying it.
“I’m afraid sinister is the only word I can suggest at the moment. And it isn’t because he’s Chinese. I’ve met a lot of Chinese, on and off, and I like most of them extremely. They usually have such a keen sense of humor. Now I’ve never seen this man smile.”
Sam laughed. Alix was always so delightfully earnest.
“I see. First requirement for houseman, can he see a joke? What do I try him with? Wodehouse or the New Yorker! The jokes in it are sometimes a trifle subtle.”
Alix ignored his frivolity.
“Where was Sing the night that Connie—died?”
Sam started, all the banter gone immediately.
“By Jove, Alix!” he said. “By Jove! The little beggar lied to me about that and I’ve no idea why. He said he was going to a lecture at the Town Hall, and when I asked him about it the next morning, he told me it had been Very informing,’ and in the paper, staring me in the face, was the statement that it had been necessary to disappoint the audience because the lecturer was caught in the blizzard on his way East.”
In sudden excitement Alix seized his arm and shook it.
“Can we have stumbled on the murderer?...By accident, like this?...Oh, Sam, where could he have hidden?” She bent her brows, then her face cleared. “I know!” She exclaimed. “In the lavatory off the pantry.”
“Possibly,” Sam agreed. “No, on (second thought, impossible. I went in there to get rid of lime rinds.”
“Is there no place that he could have concealed himself from you? How about back of the door?”
“The vacuum cleaner fits in there, leaving no room for anything else.”
Just then the telephone rang, and on Sam’s going to answer it Alix jumped up and went out to the pantry; as he put down the receiver, she called to him, sharply:
“Sam, the vacuum cleaner isn’t here.”
“The devil you say!” Sam exclaimed.
“Open the lavatory door,” she called, peremptorily, from inside.
He obeyed, to find the little room apparently empty.
“You see?” She stepped out from behind the door. “And on the floor there I picked these up.”
“What are they?” Sam inquired.
“Chewing-gum wrappers,” Alix told him. “Sing chews gum. I’ve seen him trying to hide it when I came here unexpectedly once or twice. Oh, Sam, what ought we to do?”
“To my mind, we ought to lay all our cards on the table. I’ve concealed too many things too long,” Sam acknowledged, with no attempt to minimize the seriousness of the situation. “I’m sure I ought to call Dolan and tell him the whole truth. If he thinks I’m in it up to my neck, I can’t help it. There’s one other reason for phoning him,” he added as he took up the telephone: “Miss Livingston called me to let me know that she can inform us where Connie’s emerald ring—your emerald ring—is. She wanted to come up and tell me all about it. She says she can’t be mistaken. Both she and Eliza (that’s her maid, a character, too) have seen it. I told her to come along...The question is whether to bring Dolan here before she comes or after?”
“Why not consult her?” Alix suggested. “That is, if you think she’s a sensible person.”
“I never met a more sensible one,” Sam returned, taking up the telephone, “or one less likely to go off at half-cock. If she says she knows where the emerald ring is, she knows, and it’s all over but the shouting.”
Miss Livingston’s reply to his question about Dolan was characteristic.
“Certainly we want him. I can’t tell this story over a dozen times. I knew you’d need him, so I called to make certain of him before I spoke to you. You see, I was sure you were at home. I’m waiting for him now.”
Sam hung up.
“The thing for me to do is to resign and have her appointed Police Commissioner,” he said, meekly. “I adore that woman, but she certainly has me intimidated. She’s so damned efficient, and her single eye-glass bores a hole in me right clear through to my backbone, which it turns to jelly.”
“Does she use a single eye-glass—honestly?” Alix demanded. “You’re joking.” Then as Sam’s face answered her question. “If you catch me studying her too hard, pinch me or something. I don’t want to disgrace my profession, but I intend to embalm her in my memory. The day is bound to come when I’ll have to take to dowagers; and when I act an old aristocrat I want the impersonation to be beyond cavil. Louise assures me that Miss Livingston is the real thing.”
“The realest thing I know. She must raise the batting average of the Four Hundred appreciably. The way she took charge of Harvey Thorne and hustled him out of the city right from under McCurdy’s paws is something to talk about.”
“Harvey Thorne?” Alix was startled; it was Sam’s first mention to her of his name.
“Yes, he was here that night.”
“But, Sam——”
“Don’t jump to conclusions,” Sam said, in haste. “He adored Connie right to the end, although he did advise me never to fall in love with an actress.”
“And what did you say?” Alix looked away, refusing to meet his eyes.
“I didn’t say anything. How could I? Probably it was good advice, but it was given too late.”
“To be sure,” said Alix, rallying, “you were in love with Connie.”
“Was I?” Sam’s tone was contemplative. “In my sane old age I’m inclined to doubt that. Naturally, I was fascinated. Who wasn’t? Even you found her irresistible at times.”
Alix nodded an acquiescence.
“I loved to watch her. She was so brilliant. Like a firefly on a dark night.”
“A brilliance without warmth,” Sam cut in. “She knew her lack, did Connie. Do you remember her letter? ‘It’s hard for a girl to be born without a name—even harder to be born without a heart!’”
“I’ll never forget it,” Alix assured him, with more than her usual thoughtful gravity, “because, to my mind, it was the proof of exactly what she denied. Probably she had fought it all her life, but Connie had a heart.”
“Then it never was shown to me,” Sam said, without bitterness. “Not that I blame her, understand. I didn’t love her as I fancied I did or I’d have been more cut up when she threw me over. I don’t claim to be an actor, but I certainly dramatized my own situation to myself. The truth is, I took it damn’ philosophically. Now if I lost—Hang it, there’s the bell. I never have a chance to see you alone any more.”
He went to the door to admit Miss Livingston and the faithful Eliza, backed up by the solid presence of Inspector Dolan and Detectives McCurdy and Knudsen, he of the kind blue eyes.
The ladies were introduced and, with the detectives placed discreetly in the background, Miss Livingston at once got down to business.
“Am I right when I say you are satisfied that when you find the present holder Of that emerald ring, Inspector Dolan, you will have come close to the perpetrator of the murder?” She raised her eyeglass and regarded the stout Inspector as she might an aspirant for social honors whose money was derived from dealing in second-hand clothing.
“Yeah—I mean yes, Miss Livingston.” He wriggled under her inspection. “He’d have a lot of explaining to do, that much I’ll say.”
“Then I suggest that you post your two men in the passage just inside the back door. They must seize Sing on his return.”
The detectives sat forward on their chairs, gaping at her.
“How—how—how do you know this?” Inspector Dolan sputtered.
Instead of answering she turned to Sam. “Commissioner Mellon” (and was she mistaken or did Alix actually see her wink at Sam?), “please explain to Inspector Dolan that you are entirely willing that I should go anywhere I choose in your apartment.”
“Absolutely,” said Sam, his own eyes twinkling. “If Miss Livingston wanted to borrow anything from the Encyclopedia Britannica to a yeast cake, all she had to do was to come and get it—or send Eliza. As the Spanish say, ‘my house is hers.’”
(“Jus’ one great big fambly,” McCurdy murmured, skeptically, to Knudsen.)
“I simply wished to have that understood before I told you that Eliza and I saw both the ring and the jade leaf in Sing’s room this evening.”
The three police officers hardly waited to let Miss Livingston get the words out of her mouth before they were on their feet.
“Where are you going?” she inquired, the eyeglass again coming into play.
(“I’m going to get me one of them,” Knudsen whispered to his partner.)
“To pick up the little things you mention,” Dolan said, with an elephantine attempt at either irony or playfulness, it was hard to tell which.
“You can’t get in. Sing’s door is locked and he carries the key with him.”
“And he won’t be here till the end of the first pickshurs,” Eliza volunteered, helpfully. “You got a good ten minutes yet.”
“What made you suspect Sing, Miss Livingston?” Sam put this question. “It’s curious, because just when you rang up, Miss Ruland and I had decided that for certain reasons Sing would bear investigating.”
His query remained unanswered. The bell rang once more, and while Sam went to open the front door, Dolan, who was taking no chances, sent the two officers to await Sing’s coming, with orders to bring him directly into the front room. He meant to be the one to explore Sing’s belongings himself to recover the stolen property. There might be other things, too, that would tell an officer of his experience much; exactly what he could not foretell, since they already had the weapon.
The newcomer was Louise, not altogether surprised, when she stopped to think, to find the assemblage.
“Ed dropped me on his way to The Lambs,” she explained. “I had nothing to read and had sewed till my eyes were tired. You’re to take me home, Sammie darling.”
Sam introduced his niece to Miss Livingston, who, however, boasted a royal memory and at once recalled having met Mrs. Harris before. Inwardly she was rather sorry for this girl. With a sound instinct for social distinctions, she acquitted her of any encouragement of the houseman’s infatuation and was ready to fly to her rescue if defense proved necessary. It was most unfortunate for the poor child that she had happened to come in at this crucial instant.
“Why this gathering of the clans?” Louise asked Alix. “Has anything new cropped up?”
“Yes,” Alix told her. “Miss Livingston has discovered the ring——”
Sam and Dolan were talking to the distinguished lady guest, so the two girls were practically alone, and Louise, seizing Alix’s hand, pressed it convulsively.
“Don’t let them arrest Sing,” she whispered, repenting too late, as is the way of womankind. “He means to accuse Sam.”
“Impossible to stop it,” Alix returned, and a commotion at the back door told the rest.
A moment later Sing was hustled into the room between the two officers.
Dolan went close to him.
“Key to your room,” he said, succinctly. “My room is my own,” Sing declared, haughtily. “I shall insist on preserving my privacy unless you can show me a search warrant.”
“I don’t need a warrant.” Dolan’s tone was menacing. “Give up the key or we’ll take it from you. The choice is up to you.”
Sing’s narrow eyes had at once discovered Louise’s presence and his heart was bitter within him. Thus did women keep their promises. Well might it be said that such were but writing on water.
“You come for the ring, I presume,” he said, an unassailable pride in his gesture as he handed over the key to his door. “You may have it. It cost me nothing and I have no further use for it.”
It cost him nothing? Sam and Alix exchanged glances. That was what Connie had said about that ring.
“It’s liable to cost you a good long term in prison, if not your life,” Dolan snarled at him.
“It was a free gift to me,” Sing returned, evidently surprised to find himself accused of anything ignoble. “If it is your idea that I stole it, inquire of the Legation of my country in Washington. They will tell you that I am a prince and have no need to steal.”
Dolan smirked in entire disbelief.
“An’ so you come here to take a job cookin’?” he sneered. “I’m afraid your story won’t washee-washee.”
A dark Audi mounted to Sing’s forehead. “Commissioner Mellon, I appeal to you as a gentleman, and to Miss Livingston.” He bowed. “Am I to be insulted as well as forcibly restrained and humiliated? I am telling the truth. That ring and a small jade pin were given to me. As to my being poor—yes, I am poor in America. My honorable father cares only for the learning of our own philosophers. So long as I stay here in disobedience to his commands, I dare not ask him for funds; but once I set foot in China again, all that he has is also mine.”
Miss Livingston nodded.
“I am sure we can accept as true anything that Prince Sing tells us.” She ignored a stifled “Mercy on us!” from Eliza, who stood behind her chair. “Will you fetch the ring first, or will you first hear his story?”
“The ring ain’t goin’ to run away,” Dolan conceded after a moment of heavy thinking. “Shall we sit down?”
“I prefer to stand.” Sing began his recital in the measured academic cadence of a lecturer addressing a class. “I came out of the butler’s lavatory after the murder was committed ——“