Murder at Bridge Part 27

As had been agreed between the coroner and the district attorney, Dundee's testimony, after the preliminary questions, was confined to the offering of Nita Selim's "last will and testament" and the note to Lydia.

The reporters, who had obviously feared that nothing new would eventuate, sat up with startled interest, then their pencils flew, as Dundee read the two doc.u.ments, after he had told when and where he had discovered them. As District Attorney Sanderson had said; "Better give the press something new to chew on, but for G.o.d's sake don't mention that checkbook of Nita's. It's dynamite, boy--dynamite!"

While the morgue chapel was still in a buzz of excitement, Dundee was dismissed, and District Attorney Sanderson requested an adjournment of the inquest for one week.

The police were urging the crowd upon its way before it became fully aware that it had been cheated of the pleasure of hearing, at first hand, the stories of that fatal bridge and c.o.c.ktail party from the guests themselves.

"Tell the Carr woman I want to speak to her," Sanderson directed Dundee.

"She'll thank you for rescuing her from the reporters."

As Dundee pushed his way through the jam he heard a reporter earnestly pleading with Lois Dunlap: "But I'm sure you can remember the cards each player held in that 'death hand,' Mrs. Dunlap--"

Cheerfully sure that he could trust Lois Dunlap's discretion and distaste for publicity, Dundee went on, grinning at the reporter's use of his own lurid phrase.

Two minutes later Sanderson, Strawn and Dundee were closeted in Dr.

Price's own office with Lydia Carr.

"First, Lydia," began Sanderson, "I want to warn you to give the reporters no information at all regarding the nature or extent of your mistress' bequest."

"It was little enough she had, poor girl, beyond her clothes and a few pieces of jewelry," Lydia answered stubbornly. "Are you going to let me do what she told me to, in that note?... Not that I hold with burning--"

"I see no reason why you should not take charge of the body, Lydia, and arrange it immediately for cremation.... Do you, Captain Strawn?"

Sanderson answered.

"No, sir. The quicker the better."

"Then, Lydia, if Captain Strawn will send you out to the Selim house with one of his boys, you may get the dress described in Mrs. Selim's note--"

"And the curls she cut off and had made into switches," Lydia interrupted. "I can't dress my poor girl's hair in a French roll without them!"

"The curls, too," Sanderson agreed. "Now as to the cremation--"

"Mrs. Miles let me come in early to see about that," Lydia interrupted again. "They can do it this afternoon, and you don't need to worry about the expense. I've got money enough of my own to pay my girl's funeral expenses."

"Good!" Sanderson applauded. "The will shall be probated as soon as possible, of course, but it makes it simpler if you will pay the necessary expenses now."

"Just a minute, chief," Dundee halted the district attorney as he was about to leave. "Under the circ.u.mstances, I think it highly advisable that we get pictures of the burial dress. I suggest you have Lydia bring the things to your office before she lays out the body, and that Carraway photograph the dress there, from all angles. I should also like to have a picture of the body after Lydia has finished her services."

The maid's scarred face flushed a deep, angry red, but she offered no protest when the district attorney accepted both of Dundee's suggestions.

"Then you'll have Carraway with his camera at my office in about an hour?" Sanderson turned to Captain Strawn. "Let's say twelve o'clock. By the way, Lydia, you may bring in with you the few pieces of jewelry you mentioned. I'll keep them safely in my offices until the will is probated and they are turned over to you."

"I don't know where she kept them," Lydia answered.

"_What?_" exclaimed Bonnie Dundee.

"I said I don't know where she kept her jewelry," Lydia Carr retorted.

"It wasn't worth much--not a hundred dollars altogether, I'll be bound, because Nita sold her last diamond not a week before we left New York.

She owed so many bills then that the money she got for directing that play at the Forsyte School hardly made a dent on them."

"Do you know whether the jewelry was kept in the house or in a safe deposit box?" Dundee asked, excitement sharpening his voice.

"It must have been in the house, because she wore the different pieces any time she pleased," the maid answered. "I didn't ask no questions, and I didn't happen to see her get it out or put it away. I didn't ever do much lady's-maid work for her, like dressing her or fixing her hair--just kept her clothes and the house in order, and did what little cooking there was to do--"

"Her dressing-table?" Dundee prodded. "Her desk?"

The maid shook her head. "I was always straightening up the drawers in both her dressing-table and her desk, and she didn't keep the jewelry in either one of them places."

"Captain Strawn, when you searched the dressing-table and desk for the gun or anything of importance, did you have any reason to suspect a secret drawer in either of them?"

"No, Bonnie. They're just ordinary factory furniture. I tapped around for a secret drawer, of course, but there wasn't even any place for one," Strawn a.s.sured him with an indulgent grin.

"I want to see Penny Crain!" Dundee cried, making for the door.

"Then you'd better come along to the courthouse with me," Sanderson called after him. "I sent her back to the office as soon as the inquest was adjourned."

The two men pa.s.sed through the now deserted morgue chapel and almost b.u.mped into a middle-aged man, obviously of the laboring cla.s.s in spite of his slicked-up, Sunday appearance.

"You're the district attorney, ain't you, sir?" he addressed Sanderson in a nervous, halting undertone.

"Yes. What is it?"

"I come to the inquest to give some information, sir, but it was adjourned so quick I didn't have time--"

"Who are you?" Sanderson interrupted impatiently.

"I'm Rawlins, sir. I worked for the poor lady, Mrs. Selim--gardening one day a week--"

"Come to my office!" Sanderson commanded quickly, as a lingering reporter approached on a run.... "No, no! I'm sorry, Harper," he said hastily, cutting into the reporter's questions. "Nothing new! You may say that the police have thrown out a dragnet--" and he grinned at the trite phrase "--for the gunman who killed Mrs. Selim, and will offer a reward for the recovery of the weapon--a Colt's .32 equipped with a Maxim silencer.... Come along, George, and I'll explain just what Mrs.

Sanderson and I have in mind."

The district attorney and Dundee strode quickly away, and the man, Rawlins, after a moment of indecision, trotted after them.

"I don't understand, sir, and my name ain't George. It's Elmer."

"You don't have to understand anything, except that you're not to answer any question that any reporter asks you," Sanderson retorted.

When the trio entered the reception room of the district attorney's suite in the courthouse Sanderson paused at Penny Crain's desk:

"Bring in your notebook, Penny. This man has some information he considers important."

A minute later Sanderson had begun to question his voluntary but highly nervous witness.

"Your name?"

"It's Elmer Rawlins, like I told you, sir," the man protested, and flinched as Penny recorded his words in swift shorthand. "It was my wife as made me come. She said as long as me and her knowed I didn't do nothing wrong, I'd oughta come forward and tell what I knowed."

"Yes, yes!" Sanderson encouraged him impatiently. "You say you worked for Mrs. Selim as gardener one day a week--"