Midnight, Octavus Roy Cohen [summer reads txt] 📗

house a good deal more than just ordinary friendship would have indicated. But that's just an idea. And there's your dope—"

"And on the night of the murder?" questioned Carroll. "Where were they?"

"Mrs. Lawrence was at home. Lawrence—if you're thinking of him in connection with it—seems to have an iron-clad alibi. He went to Nashville on a business trip and didn't get back until the following morning."

"Alibi, eh?" Carroll's eyes narrowed speculatively, "are you sure he was in Nashville all that time?"

"Hm-m!" Leverage shook his head. "I don't know—but I can find out."

Carroll rose. "Do it please. And get the dope straight."

Carroll went to his apartment where he reluctantly commenced dressing for the ordeal of the night. He felt himself rather ridiculous—a man of his age calling on a girl not yet out of high school. The thing was funny—of course—but just at the moment the joke was too entirely on him for the full measure of amusement.

At that, he dressed carefully, selecting a new gray suit, a white jersey-silk shirt and a blue necktie for the occasion. At six-thirty Freda served his dinner and at fifteen minutes after eight o'clock he rang the bell of the Lawrence home.

The door was opened by Evelyn: palpitant with excitement, and garbed attractively in the demi-toilette of very-young-ladyhood.

"Mr. Carroll—so good of you to come. I'm simply tickled to death. Let me have your hat and coat. Come right into the living room—I want you to meet my brother-in-law and my sister—"

Sheepishly, Carroll followed the girl into the room. Mr. and Mrs.
Lawrence rose politely to greet him.

At the sight of the man he had really come to see, Carroll was conscious of an instinctive dislike. Lawrence was of medium height, slightly stooped and not unpleasing to the eye. But his brows were inclined to lower and the eyes themselves were set too closely together. He was dressed plainly—almost harshly, and he stared at Carroll in a manner bordering on the hostile.

The detective acknowledged the introduction and then turned his gaze upon the woman of the family. There he met with a surprise as pleasant as his first glance at Lawrence had been unpleasant.

There was no gainsaying the fact that Naomi Lawrence was a beautiful woman. Dressed simply for an evening at home in a strikingly plain gown of a rich black material, and with her magnificent neck and shoulders rising above the midnight hue—she caused a spontaneous thrill of masculine admiration to surge through the ordinarily immune visitor in the gray suit.

Her face was almost classic in its contour: her coloring a rich brunette, her hair blue-black. No jewelry, save an engagement ring, adorned her perfect beauty, and Carroll felt a loathing at the idea that this magnificent creature was the wife of the stoop-shouldered, sour-faced man who stood scowling by the living room table.

He gravely acknowledged the introduction of the young lady upon whom he had called: feeling a faint sense of amusement at Lawrence's overt disdain—and a considerable embarrassment under Naomi's questioning, level gaze. For a few moments they talked casually—but that did not satisfy Evelyn, and she dragged him into the parlor—

"—just the eleganest jazz piece—" Carroll heard as through a haze "—just got it—feet can't keep still—play it for you—"

He found himself standing by the piano, the door between the music room and the living room unaccountably closed. Evelyn banging out the opening measures of the "elegant jazz piece."

He was still staring moodily at the closed door when the din ceased and he again heard Evelyn's voice. "A penny for your thoughts, Mr. Carroll. A real honest-to-goodness-spendable penny!"

"I was thinking," he remarked quietly, "that your sister is a very beautiful woman."

"Naomi? Shucks! She isn't bad looking—but she's old. Abominably old! Thirty!"

He glanced down on the girl and smiled. "That does seem old to you, doesn't it?"

"Treacherously! I don't know what I'd ever do if I was to get that old.
Take up crocheting, probably."

The conversation died of dry-rot. Carroll was not at all pleased. His excuse—the plea that he had come to call upon Evelyn—had been taken too literally. He had fancied—in his blithe ignorance of the seventeen-year-old ladies of the present day—that he could engineer himself into a worthwhile conversation with the Lawrences. Since meeting them, he was doubly anxious. There was a thinly veiled hostility about the man which demanded investigation. And about the woman there was a subtle atmosphere of tragedy which appealed to the masculine protectiveness which surged strong in his bachelor breast.

But Carroll was a sportsman. The girl had carried things her own way—and he was too game to spoil her evening. Therefore, he temporarily gave over all thought of a chat with the Lawrences and devoted himself to her amusement. He informed her that the jazz music she had strummed was simply "glorious" and that he regretted he knew very little popular stuff. She leaped upon his remark—

"Oh! do you play: really?"

He was in again. "I have—a little."

"I wonder if you would? Here's the grandest little old song I bought downtown—" and she placed on the piano a gaudy thing with the modest title—"All Babies Need Daddies to Kiss 'Em." Its cover exposed a tender love scene wherein a gentleman in evening clothes was engaged in an act of violent osculation with a young lady whose dress was as short as her modesty. Carroll shrugged, placed his long, slender fingers on the keys—shook his head—and went to it.

He played! A genuine artist—he tried to enter into the spirit of the thing and succeeded admirably. The itchy syncopation rocked the room. His hostess snapped her fingers deliciously and executed a few movements of a dance which Carroll had heard referred to vaguely as the shimmy. In the midst of the revelry he gave thought to Eric Leverage and chuckled.

He played the chorus a second time—then stopped on a crashing chord.
Evelyn's face was beaming—

"Gracious! You can play, can't you?"

"I used to—Suppose we talk awhile."

She agreed—reluctantly. They seated themselves in easy chairs before the gas logs. Evelyn glanced hopefully at the chandelier. "I wish the belt would slip at the power house, don't you?"

"Why?" innocently.

"Oh! just because Bright lights are such a nuisance when a girl has a feller calling on her. And these logs give a perfectly respectable light, don't they?"

"Indeed they do—but perhaps we'd better leave the others on."

She sighed resignedly. "I guess we'd better. Sis is so darned proper and
Gerald is an old crab—they might say something."

"I suppose they might. By they way, didn't they think it was—er—strange: my coming to see you tonight?"

She turned red. "Suppose they did—what difference does that make? I'm not a child and if a gentleman wants to call on me I guess they haven't got any kick."

"What did they say when you told them I was coming?"

"They didn't believe me at first. Then Sis said you were too old—and you're not old at all—and Gerald said—he said—" she giggled.

"What did Gerald say?"

"He said, 'Damned impertinence!'"

"H'm-m! I wonder just what he meant?"

"Oh! goodness! It doesn't matter what Gerald means. He makes me weary.
He's simply impossible—and I can't see what Sis ever married him for."

"I suppose she saw more in him than you do. They must be very happy together."

"Happy? Poof! Happy as two dead sardines in a can. They can't get out—so they might as well be happy. Besides, he's away a good deal."

"He is, eh? When was his last out-of-town trip?"

Carroll was interested now—he had steered the conversation back to matters of importance: "Oh! 'bout four days ago—you know—the day dear Roland was killed by that vampire in the taxicab."

"He was away that night: all night?"

"Uh-huh! All night long. And would you believe that Sis—who is scared of her shadow at night—was the one who suggested that I go spend the night with Hazel? And it's certainly fortunate she did, because if she hadn't I wouldn't have been with Hazel all night and you awful detectives would probably not have believed her story that she was at home in bed, and then you would have arrested her for murdering Roland—and she'd have gone to jail and been hanged—or something. Wouldn't she?"

"Hardly that bad. But it was fortunate that you were there. It made the establishing of the alibi a very simple matter. And you say your sister—Mrs. Lawrence—is nervous at night?"

"Oh! fearfully. She's just like all women—scared of rats, scared of the dark, scared of being alone—perfectly disgusting, I call it."

"Quite a few women are that way, though—"

"I'm not. I'm scared of snakes and flying bugs and things like that. But
I don't get scared of the dark—pff! Who's going to hurt you? That's what
I always say. I believe in figuring things out, don't you I read in a
book once where—"

"But maybe you do Mrs. Lawrence an injustice. Maybe she isn't as afraid at night as you imagine."

"She is, too."

"Yet you say she let you spend the night at Miss Gresham's house when Mr. Lawrence was out of the city and there wasn't anybody on the place but the servants—"

"Worse than that: the servants don't even live on the place. She spent the night here all alone—!"

"Then all I'll say is that she is a brave woman. When did Mr. Lawrence get back from Nashville?"

"Oh! not until ten o'clock the following morning. And believe me, he was all excited when he read about Roland in the papers. Poor Roland! If you were only a girl, Mr. Carroll—you'd know how terrible it is to have a man who's crazy about you and engaged to your best friend and everything—go and get himself murdered. Why, when I read the papers that morning, I couldn't hardly believe my own eyes. I just said to myself 'it can't be!' I said it over and over again just like that. Having faith, I think they call it. I was reading in a book once about having faith—"

She talked interminably. Carroll ceased to hear the plangent voice. He was thinking of what she had just told him—thinking earnestly. He knew he was desperately anxious to have a talk with the Lawrences, to talk things over in a casual manner. And tonight was his opportunity. He knew he'd never have another like it. He didn't want to be forced to seek them out in his capacity of detective.

From somewhere in the rear of the house he heard the clamor of a doorbell, then the sound of footsteps in the hall, the opening and closing of the front door—and then Naomi Lawrence appeared in the music room. Carroll could have sworn that her eyes were twinkling with amusement as she addressed Evelyn—pointedly ignoring him.

"Evelyn—that Somerville boy is here."

"Oh! bother! What's he doin' here?"

"He says he came to call. He's got a box of candy."

"Piffle! What do I care about candy? He's just a kid!"

Naomi went to the hall door. "Right this way, Charley." And as the slender, overdressed young gentleman of nineteen entered the room, Carroll again glimpsed the light of amusement in Naomi's eyes.

Mr. Charley Somerville expressed himself as being "Pleaset'meetcha" and tried to conceal his vast admiration when Evelyn informed him that this was the David Carroll. Charley was impressed but he was not particular about showing it—Charley fancying himself considerable of a cosmopolite, thanks to a year at Yale. His dignity was excruciatingly funny to Carroll as the very young man seated himself, crossed one elongated and unbelievably skinny leg over the other and arranged the creases so that they were in the very middle.

"A-a-ah! Taking a vacation from your work on the Warren murder case,
I presume?"

Carroll nodded. "Yes—for awhile."

"Detective work must be a terrible bore—mustn't it?"

"Sometimes," answered Carroll significantly.

"Charley Somerville!" Evelyn flamed to the defense of her friend's profession. "At least Mr. Carroll ain't—isn't—a college freshman."

"I'm a sophomore," asserted Charley languidly. "Passed all of my exams."

"Anyway," snapped Evelyn, "he ain't any kid!"

For a time the atmosphere was strained. Then Carroll recalled a particularly good college joke he knew and he told it well. After which Evelyn explained to Charley that Mr. Carroll was the wonderfulest piano player in the world and David Carroll, detective, strummed out several popular airs while the youngsters danced.

Horrible as the situation was, it appealed irresistibly to his sense of humor. He found himself almost enjoying it. And he worked carefully. Eventually his patience was rewarded. He succeeded