Roscoe Carstairs’ voice! To Harrington’s ears it was both menacing and exhilarating. His quick appraisal of the man in Carmody’s house had told him that an evil and cunning brain was at work behind that astonishingly white face. It would be a duel of wits now—and life and death would be the stakes.
Unlike the other rooms he had seen, this one was furnished. A light fell from a small window in the sloping roof, and directly beneath it Carstairs was sitting at perfect ease in an armchair. Just now, with the misty morning light falling upon it, his face seemed gray rather than white.
Harrington entered, closed the door behind him, and advanced, pistol in hand. Carstairs looked him over coolly. He saw the pistol, and his lips took on the curious smile Harrington had already seen—the smile that lay like a shadow against his skin.
“Sit down, Harrington.” With a slight motion of his white hand he indicated a chair. “By the way, do you always carry firearms when you make calls?”
“It depends,” said Harrington curtly. He walked up close to the man in the chair and held the pistol leveled at Carstairs’ broad chest. “Carstairs, what did you do with Miss Lanyard?”
“Oh,” carelessly, “she is somewhere around the house. Do you wish to see her?”
“I do,” said Harrington, rather taken aback by the casual reply.
“Well, I expect her in here any moment. If you are not in too great a hurry, sit down and wait. She won’t be long.”
Harrington stared at him, bewildered by his calm manner. It seemed impossible this could be the same man who, a short time ago, had abducted Theresa in such roughshod fashion.
“I don’t believe you,” he declared.
“No matter. Miss Lanyard herself will bring the proof of what I say. When you see her, then you will believe me. In the meantime, you might as well be comfortable.”
Harrington’s bewilderment grew. It was either superb acting, or else entire candor. Which of the two? “You are not denying you kidnapped her?”
“Why, no. You saw me, so why should I deny it? Anyway, the word is subject to definition. It would be more correct to say that I rescued her.”
“Oh,” sarcastically, “you call it a rescue. A rescue from what?”
“Death.”
The startling little word fell casually from Carstairs’ lips. Harrington searched his face. It seemed to grow whiter with the brightening of the light falling from the overhead window.
“Look here, Harrington.” Carstairs spoke in a slightly altered tone. “If you came here with the idea of taking Miss Lanyard back to Carmody’s house, you might as well go back now. I don’t know how you stand in this matter, but I’m rather sorry I had to twist your arm so unmercifully. Anyway, as long as I can help it, Miss Lanyard is not going to be exposed to further danger.”
“Danger?” said Harrington lamely. His brain was a whirl of contradictions, and the most astonishing contradiction was Carstairs himself. “The way you acted, I thought you were dragging her off to her death. Her father thought so, too.”
“Her—what?” The soft tone bespoke acute puzzlement.
“Her father—Mr. Carmody.”
Carstairs turned his white face upward and gave him a long stare. The muscles of his mouth twitched.
“Did Martin Carmody tell you that he is Miss Lanyard’s father?”
“Isn’t he?”
Carstairs looked as if he wanted to laugh outright.
“Ask her when she comes in,” he suggested. “In the meantime I don’t hesitate to tell you that I took Miss Lanyard away because I had good reason to believe that Carmody would have murdered her.”
Harrington gaped at him. His brain felt as if it had been turned Inside out. Mechanically he lowered the pistol and sat down.
“But she went voluntarily to Carmody’s house,” he pointed out.
“Voluntarily? Well, perhaps. That’s another word that requires definition. It would be more correct to say that she was enticed there.”
There was no direct connection, but for an instant Harrington’s thoughts went back to Samuel Tarkin.
“But don’t take my word for it,” Carstairs hastened to say. “Let Miss Lanyard tell you all about it. Ask her what she thinks of Martin Carmody as a father.” Again his lips twitched humorously. “Father, indeed! “ he said under his breath.
Harrington regarded him narrowly. His imagination conjured up a vision of the fear-stricken old man he had left a while ago. Had Carmody worked a hoax on him? Or was Carstairs working a hoax on him now? Well, he would reserve judgment for a while.
He looked about him. The room was poorly furnished, and the roof overhead had an ominous sag. Carstairs, with his white face and his shadowy smile, seemed to dominate the scene.
“Live here?” Harrington inquired.
“Oh, no, I just come here occasionally for a change of scenery.”
“It seems several other persons have acquired the same habit.”
Carstairs nodded thoughtfully. “Did you know,” he asked, “that old David Mooreland was the owner of this hotel?”
Harrington started. The question was accompanied by a sharp but furtive glance. In the stress of recent events, he had almost forgotten David Mooreland and his tragic death. Yet it was his determination to find Mooreland’s murderer that had drawn him into all these complications.
“Did you?” Carstairs prompted.
“No,” said Harrington. For a moment, in imagination, he had been poking into the ash heap in Marsh’s cellar.
“But you knew Mooreland?” The other gave him a quick, searching glance as he asked the question.
“Only slightly,” Harrington prevaricated.
“Curious old fellow,” said Carstairs musingly. “He spent a great deal of time here shortly before his—er—disappearance. The hotel had then been closed for some years, and he stayed here all alone except for a trusted servant I suppose you know that?”
“No. It’s news to me.”
Evidently Carstairs was in a communicative mood.
“Some people think he came here to hide,” he went on. “It seems he spent his last years in fear of death. Somehow he had got the idea that one or more persons were after his life. It might have been nothing but a feeble old man’s delusion.”
“Yet it appears his fears were well founded. Somebody murdered him.”
“Oh, you think so? Well, you may be right. Have you any idea who killed him?”
Harrington hesitated. He wished he had not spoken so frankly.
“I see you have,” the other added. “Well, so has Whittaker. And, to be candid with you, so have I.”
Harrington looked up quickly. The smile on Carstairs’ white face seemed even more shadowy than usual.
“Who?” he asked.
“Well, if you ask Whittaker, and if he is frank with you, he will tell you that Martin Carmody is the man.”
“Carmody?” said Harrington thoughtfully. This was an entirely new slant on the Mooreland affair.
“Yes, but no arrest has been made, because Whittaker lacks the necessary evidence. And just now, of course, he is deep in quite another mystery—the Marsh murder. Queer case that, Harrington. Why on earth did you give such an incredible account of it?”
“It was the truth.”
“Was it?” asked Carstairs slowly. “Well, perhaps, but people don’t want the truth when it is hard to accept. Now, nobody is going to believe that, under the circumstances as you stated them, Marsh got into the car without your knowing it It will be supposed that you picked him up somewhere with the deliberate intention of murdering him. Then you got flustered and confused and told an impossible cock-and-bull story. That’s what they will think.”
“Yes, I suppose so.” Harrington glanced back over his shoulder. “Miss Lanyard—”
“Oh, she will be here directly. Don’t get impatient yet. By the way, are you very anxious to see her?”
“Very,” said Harrington firmly, a little of his original distrust reawakening.
“Was that your only purpose in coming here this morning?”
“Of course. What else would I be doing here?”
“Well, I was wondering—“ Carstairs leaned back in his chair and regarded him with his shadowy smile. His eyes were keen and shrewd. “Are you sure you didn’t come to look for a coffin?”
“A—what?” Harrington stared at him, but there was no sign of jocosity in his broad, white face. “What sort of coffin?”
“Pharaoh’s coffin. A rather small coffin, I should say. Possibly it was intended for a baby Pharaoh.”
Harrington glanced impatiently at the door. He felt certain now that Carstairs, despite his serious expression, was indulging in a grotesque joke.
“No,” he declared, “I’m not interested in coffins as yet.”
“I can see you are not.” A moment longer Carstairs continued his scrutiny. “And I hope it may be a long time—Come in.”
A knock had just sounded on the door. Harrington was about to turn his head to see who was entering, but he caught a most curious expression on Carstairs’ face just then. Mechanically he tightened his hold on the pistol he had been holding all the time.
“Oh, Stoddard,” said Carstairs, addressing the newcomer, “seen Miss Lanyard lately?”
Harrington turned, and in the same instant a dark object described an arc above his head and descended with savage force. The room heaved. The light filtering through the little window in the roof was blotted out. Everything was dark now, but there was laughter in the darkness. Carstairs was laughing.