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Show Bj U.,ort gieroi gBlfrafj tHAPTKB IX visit itb Mn. Petuodjr. Mn. resboiijr Or. Craae, former kuibsod el Mary TUB STORY THIS FAB: Retornln (ulil Itarm aboat the death of Adeline Helen, well at llelra, aad fcusaa from a lsit with Dyke McKionoa, bit TilUlt. They decided to stay er and frt Laliara. aaraa of Slisi Tlllsli. Mary aarle, Todd MrKinnon, r.rurjlne V)rth married. Todd wantrd to Investigate the llelra, who .as Interested la Dyke, aad email daughter, llarby, atupprd to drath of Mlis Tillsit. Thry talked with aeema to bo willing to talk. CHAPTER IX She stood there at the table, turning and turning the handle of the egg-beater, and listening while Todd's easy How of words came from the corner where he was carefully care-fully keeping out of the way. And then, dropped casually Into the middle of an outline of this plot, the question: "By the way, several people have mentioned the name of Serena, as If I should recognize rec-ognize it. Who was she?" Nella did not start nor seem troubled, nor hesitate. She looked round at him, her face sweeter than ever In its absolute calm. "Oh, poor Serena! She taught us all what tragedy was, dying so young the first one out of our generation genera-tion to go. Why, she was Gilbert's Bister. She was much younger than he, but when he got out of college they set up housekeeping together. He simply adored her." "And Gilbert's sister died. How long ago?" Todd asked. "Gh five years ago. Her Illness was long and terribly painful, Inflammatory In-flammatory rheumatism. Of course Gilbert gave her every care. Poor Serena, she was the most beautiful thing you ever saw, and It broke her heart to be so dependent on Gilbert, and know that he was going go-ing deeper and deeper into debt over her illness. And such pain! It's no sin, I hope, to say that it was the most blessed relief when she died to all of us. Thanks, Mrs. Wyeth, those egg-whites are just right now." "Yes, that's dreadful pain," Todd said almost absently. "Tell me, how much suffering can they spare the patient? Do they let him have morphia, or " "I don't believe so," Nella said, as if she were trying to recall. Georgine went to wash her hands, and stood drying them for a long time, untU the paper towel was a lump of wet pulp against her falms. She thought, Horace said could draw my own conclusions. Well, I don't like any of them. A blessed relief luminal Gilbert adored her he was going deeper and deeper Into debt he and Nella had been so patient, so patient for all those years, and he couldn't have left an invalid sister to fend for herself If you can persuade yourself he didn't think of It as a crime" i Nella looked about her, swooped on a forgotten spoon and put It to soak with the rest of her cooking utensils. "Shan't we go Into the sitting room? I'm through here for the present Oh, no, I'm sorry! I have to take something over to Rose Klnter, she knew she was having twins, but, of course, you're never really prepared with all the things you need two of everything-" I They stood on the front porch and watched her go down the street, walking sedately under the towering elms, her slight graceful body dappled with their shade. Todd said slowly, "Let's stroll up and down the walk for a few minutes. min-utes. I'd like to make sure nobody can hear us." , She glanced at him and agreed. "Tell me again, will you, what Horace said? . . ." "Lord, yes," he said when she had finished. "That puts the lid on. Means: a drug right at hand, maybe may-be three or four tablets left over from the sedative his sister had taken, and the suggestion of a painless elimination already In his mind. Motive: love and gain, mixed. Opportunity: any one of three times, the visit In the morninginteresting morn-inginteresting suggestion about the candy or the two In the afternoon." after-noon." "Two. Todd?" "Did you forget Vlrdette's story about the door that opened and shut, and Susie's report of the visitor vis-itor who came a ll'le after two?" "Yes, but I knew what you were thinking, about someone'i coming along the back lane, unseen, un-seen, and up the enclosed stairs; but I thought that would spoil the case against Gilbert, somehow." "That," said Todd remotely, could have been Gilbert, too. He might have made the second visit an hour or so later to see If she'd been affected by the drug as yet. I'll admit It's not likely, but then this poor guy seems to have behaved be-haved oddly all along. If that was someone else, Gilbert may have done the drugging when he went in at three o'clock. It needn't have taken the old lady ery long to go under." "Todd, I don't like it. I wish you had never made that promise to Nella!" They were in front of the TUlsit house at the moment. She glanced up at Its monstrous facade, fa-cade, and winced as if In physical pain. "I keep seeing him," she added ad-ded piteously, "tall and homely, and dressed up in a Hollywood sports outfit that didn't suit him. I see him paying those patient duty-visits to an old lady, and running run-ning her errands for her, and remembering re-membering Jokes to tell when he called; and I can't bear to think that he or must I?" She faced Todd with sudden hope. "Are all the returns in?" "Just about." They reached the line of great maple trees and he swung her about to pace back in the other direction. "Just about, Georgine. There's a good hypothetical hypothet-ical case against Gilbert Peabody, his potentialities of character, his actions after the fact, everything. And this about his sister makes me understand a li'le better why everyone thought of him as a possible pos-sible murderer." "Oh, dear!" said Georgine; nobody no-body could make that mild phrase sound as fierce as she. "What proof Is there that Serena didn't just plain die?" "None at all. None for Miss Adeline, Ade-line, either. One or the other, or both, could have been natural. But," said Todd, his gaze directed far down the tunnel of spring greens, "the whispers can go on from now till Doomsday. Nella was right. What is there for him to come back to, in this town?" "And, just as there's no proof, there's nothing to refute? I see. It makes me furious for her," said Georgine, her eyes blazing. "And yet, wnen she just smiles away all the implications of what she's asked or told, it gives me the most horrible feeling; like talking to a deaf person, trying to impress something serious on him, and having him simply nod and smile there's a hint of lunacy about it. What are you going to tell her, Todd?" "Nella? I don't quite know." He walked on soberly. "Can you see us cheerfully making out a case against her husband that seems to damn him up and down, and then "Everyone said there was poison poi-son but what poison?" saying thanks for her hospitality, and leaving?" "Indeed I can't. There's only one thing to do: make out the case against Gilbert, and at the same time make one of your fiction cases against everyone else who could have been involved. You can, can't you?" "I wondered If you'd think of that. I'll make some wild guesses, in good fiction form, and leave It there; but It'll take the edge off Gilbert." Georglne's heart felt lighter than It had for hours. "Good enough," she said. There was no way to keep Barby out of the attic. Here It was Monday morning, and a cool, overcast day. Barby, who had been overtired yesterday, should certainly devote herself to quiet pursuits this morning; and she had pleaded and clamored for the promised ransacking of old trunks. "Why, of course," said Mrs. Pea-body Pea-body gently. "I'll go up with you for a while and show you what you can play with, though I don't believe be-lieve there's a thing you could hurt. Don't you want to come too, Mrs. Wyeth?" I hate It, Georgine told herself, standing at the top of the attic stairs. I hate every Inch of it, and I don't know why. Rob every corner of the room of unknown terrors, and you'd be well on the way to being sensible. "That bed must have been Miss Adeline's," Ade-line's," said Georgine, looking straight down the attic to its far end. Waning against the wall, which was hardly high enough to accommodate it, was a tremendous headboard: the matching foot of t the bedstead was turned upside down on the floor below, so that you saw a ten-foot expanse of walnut, wal-nut, so carved and medallioned and knobbed that the eye could scarcely scarce-ly take it In. "That was Miss Adeline's," said Nella, seating herself on a rickety chair. "That's one of the things I'd like to sell, if I hear from Gilbert Gil-bert that I'm to do so. It's solid walnut, and I'm told the carving is very good. The Tillsits had It shipped around the Horn from New England." "It's beautiful, once you get over the first shock. And is that," said Georgine, gesturing with awe at another piece of furniture, "Is that to be sold, too?" What would you call it, she wondered, won-dered, a bureau? There was not much drawer space at the foot of this tower of mirror and carved shelves. A vanity? Scarcely, with all those side shelves, fretted and carved and pilastered, soaring to the skies. A whatnot? It was probably prob-ably a combination of all three, and the most stupendous piece of furniture she had ever seen. "Yes; that's to be sold. I have to clean It out again before I show it to a dealer, though." Nella's sweet heart-shaped face was alight with interest. "My dear, you never saw such rubbish as Miss Adeline had put away in all those drawers and hidy-holes. Patent medicines, in the cupboards that would lock" Barby gravely exhibited a pile of clothing, hats and mantles and trailing skirts. "I'm going to try 'cm all on, one after the other," she said, with a loving look at the jet and passementerie, and faded purple silks shirred Into tight bunches and smelling of years and storage. "And there's trunks and trunks full, yet!" She dived into the depths of the round-topped trunk with the Go-dey Go-dey print pasted inside the lid. "Lookit the funny shoes, Mamma; they're pointed just like needles 1 And lookit, what's this?" Georgine gave a loud scream. "Put it down, Barby! Oh, heavens, It's a dead rat! Don't touch it!" "Why not?" Barby turned, look, ing puzzled; the horrid hairy object ob-ject dangled from her upraised hand. Georgine swallowed, repenting. "I don't know, dear; I have no Idea what it is. Ask Mrs. Peabody " She glancec at Nella, and was startled at the fixed look in the gray eyes. Mrs. Peabody sat down again on a three-cornered chair ol dull yellow plush, and grasped at Its worn arms. "I'd forgotten that was there," she said, wetting her lips. "I did put away a few of Gilbert's thing in the bottom of the trunk. It's It's his toupee." Georgine was attacked by a desire de-sire to laugh. Poor Nella needn't look so embarrassed! "Lots of the best people wear them," she said soothingly. "Look at Fred Astaire, and Boyer." "Oh, I know! But everyone laughed at Gilbert so, and he had to wear it to look well, a bald-headed bald-headed artist seems so silly. He didn't need it In in the army, ol course . , . Why couldn't they have left him alone, here?" said Nells passionately. "Everyone, from Aunt Adeline down, making fun of him and" Georgine caught her breath audibly. au-dibly. She sank down on one of the trunks and sat gazing at Nella. The gray eyes, wide and piteous, returned re-turned her look. Take that thing off your head. Be yourself That had seemed the one bit ol evidence that was totally meaningless, meaning-less, that had nothing to do with Gilbert Peabody. And now ... Hadn't Nella remembered this, when for the first time she heard Susan repeat that cryptic sentence? sen-tence? Didn't she make the connection con-nection now? It wasn't possible that she had deliberately led Barby to open that trunk, and show the absurd bundle of gauze and hair to her mother so that Georgine should know-But know-But that would mean that Nella had all along been convinced of her husband's guilt, and had wanted to gather the evidence against him for for what? Did she want to believe him guilty or Innocent? And still Nella Peabody sat there, looking totally unconscloui that she'd made a damaging statement; state-ment; looking only troubled because, be-cause, two years ago, her husband had been discomfited by laughter. Once more she gave her head a hard shake, to clear it. Warmth, Imprisoned in the sun-baked old boards, seemed to be creeping round her until she was almost suffocated. She made her voice come out steadily, there was scarcely a pause between Nella'a last remark and her answer. "That seems awfully petty, don't you think? Well, let's go down now; Barby'a used to playing by herself, her-self, she'll be happy rummaging In all these trunks.4 (TO Bl CONTTTrtTtD) |