The Withdrawing Room Read online

  “I’ll remember that when the time comes, dear.”

  “Thank you, darling. Mrs. Kelling, do have Max bring you over to visit us soon. We’re always at home on Sunday evenings and we have some marvelous things that will be going over with the next shipment. George would adore telling you all about them. Now don’t you think we’ve done our duty here? There’s such a mob we’ll never be missed. Could we give you people a lift back to the Hill?”

  “Thanks, but I have my own car and a load of passengers to round up,” said Bittersohn somewhat abstractedly. “Good to see you both.”

  The Saxes smiled and faded through the crowd. Sarah turned to Mr. Bittersohn. “Then Mr. Hartler wasn’t really a Friend of the Iolani Palace at all?”

  “Sounds more like an enemy to me. I’m not sure what their membership setup is, but he obviously didn’t hold any sort of official position.”

  “I can’t believe it! Rather, I couldn’t if I hadn’t known Great-uncle Frederick. He’s the only other person I’ve ever seen get totally involved in something that was none of his business. No wonder Mr. Hartler was so scatty about letting his visitors wander around loose and mess up the house. I should have realized from the beginning that he was missing on one or two cylinders, as Alexander would have said. Don’t you think it’s strange Miss Hartler would go tootling off to Rome and leave him on his own in a city he’d been out of touch with for so long? Of course she may not have realized because she adored him so and I’m not sure she isn’t a bit shaky in the brain herself. Or perhaps she didn’t feel able to cope so she blocked it out and tried to escape. People can be awfully blind about things they don’t want to see.”

  “That’s right,” said Bittersohn. “How about introducing me to your ex-aunt-in-law?”

  “Whatever for?” gasped Sarah.

  “I just want to ask her something.”

  “And I’m sure she’ll want to ask you something. Like are you married and can you play bridge and what are you doing for dinner tomorrow evening. You don’t realize what you’d be getting into, Mr. Bittersohn. Meeting Aunt Marguerite is like getting a formal introduction to the giant squid in a horror movie.”

  “That’s a risk I’ll have to take.”

  “Then on your own head be it.” Sarah wriggled back through the mass of humanity with him and went through the ceremony with what grace she could muster.

  ‘This is Mr. Bittersohn, who has my downstairs room, Aunt Marguerite. You didn’t meet him before because he was parking the car. He’s an art expert.”

  That bit of information was, she knew, superfluous. Aunt Marguerite wouldn’t have cared if he was the window washer. Sarah got shunted to the periphery and buttonholed by Iris Pendragon, who was so eager to know how Sarah had ever managed to latch on to anything so gorgeous that she couldn’t hear a word of what he’d wanted to ask Aunt Marguerite. Poor man, little did he ken what a spate of invitations he was calling down on his head from this gaggle of bored women. But perhaps he met a great many bored women in his profession. Perhaps he didn’t find them all boring, either. Sarah rather wished she hadn’t thought of that.

  In any event, he must have developed a knack for dealing with them. In less time than she’d thought possible, he’d managed to break away and put a protective wall of bodies between himself and her and the ladies from Newport.

  “Mrs. Kelling, could you help me round up our passengers? I’ve got to take you home and then get back to work.”

  “Yes, of course. I didn’t realize—”

  But he was already gone from her side and heading toward Miss LaValliere, who would need no coaxing. Sarah, able to slip under people’s arms and elbows because of her slender littleness, managed to reach Mrs. Sorpende, who was better equipped than she to serve as a battering-ram. This crowd was horrendous. What if they all showed up at the house tomorrow?

  They wouldn’t, surely. Some, like the Saxes, must be people who’d felt an obligation to put in an appearance but would be unlikely even to attend the funeral. And no doubt there were a number who’d never met Mr. Hartler at all but merely wanted to be in on a sensation.

  The papers had played up Mr. Hartler’s gruesome murder, but somehow the fact that he’d been Sarah Kelling’s second boarder to die by violence had been kept out. How Mr. Bittersohn and Sergeant McNaughton had managed that she couldn’t imagine, but she’d be grateful to them both forevermore. No doubt she was being pointed out right now as the dead man’s landlady and the story would leak to the press sooner or later, but by then, God willing, the funeral would be over and Miss Hartler gone and she wouldn’t have to call the police to control the hordes.

  Between them, she and Mr. Bittersohn got the group herded out of the place and walked down to the elegant car that was parked around the corner. Miss LaValliere suggested dropping in somewhere for a drink, and was shattered to learn that she’d be driven straight back to Tulip Street and left standing on the sidewalk while Mr. Bittersohn drove off into the night alone. Sarah was none too happy about that, either, but right now she wasn’t too happy about anything.

  Chapter 20

  SARAH STAYED DOWNSTAIRS AFTER they got home, not because she wanted to, not because she had to. Aunt Marguerite’s chauffeur would drive Miss Hartler to Tulip Street after the visiting hours were over. Charles would be on the alert to meet the car and help the old woman into the house. Having her back would be no joy, and the sooner they could get her out of here, the better for everyone. Nevertheless, Sarah waited.

  There were so many things that could happen to a person her age, especially if that person might not happen to have all her wits about her. Look what had happened to the brother.

  But exactly what had happened to William Hartler? Was he robbed and killed by that still-unidentified man who’d lured him from the house with a beguiling story about King Kalakaua’s dining room chairs? How did the man know the crime would be worth the effort? Most people with any sense at all didn’t carry large sums of cash around in the city.

  Maybe the man had insisted he must be paid in cash that same night and Mr. Hartler had withdrawn a large sum earlier in the day when the banks were open. No, that wasn’t possible, because the man was still in Mr. Hartler’s room when Sarah had returned to find that odious woman ransacking her china closet. That was his excuse for having left the woman where he couldn’t keep an eye on her. Mr. Hartler hadn’t gone anywhere afterward, except for his quick shopping spree on Charles Street just before dinner.

  Sarah’s impression was that Mr. Hartler had known nothing of the chairs until the man with the photographs showed up. If he’d got wind of them earlier, he’d surely have been bending everyone’s ear at breakfast, or shouting the glad tidings to Mariposa over the roar of the vacuum cleaner.

  Miss Hartler had insisted to the police that dear Wumps was always careful about money, though she didn’t seem to have the foggiest idea about the true state of his affairs. She’d also been unable to find any reference to the man with the chairs among his papers, but that didn’t mean anything. There probably had been no letter, only the personal interview. Mr. Hartler would have made a note of the address and stuck it in his pocket for later reference. After he found the right place, he’d have thrown the note away, or lost it in his excitement, or had it taken from him either inadvertently or on purpose.

  After what the Saxes had said, Sarah thought it quite possible someone had been setting the old man up for a swindel. If the chairs were authentic, the seller would have been more apt to get in touch with the curator or one of his approved agents, of whom Mr. Hartler had certainly not been one. That woman who’d given her such a hard time in the dining room might have been there for that specific purpose, to distract anybody else who might be in the house so that the man could dangle his bait before the gullible Mr. Hartler and get away without being seen.

  If that was the case, she’d done her job well. She’d got both Sarah and Mariposa so busy counting the spoons that they hadn’t given a thought to what
was happening out front. The woman had been a stranger to Mr. Hartler. He couldn’t even recall whatever name she’d given him. After the previous visitor had gone, she’d made no effort to accomplish what she’d supposedly come for, but cleared out as fast as she could. Whoever the woman was, she’d been no shrinking violet. If she’d left something of value for appraisal, wouldn’t it have been more in character for her to insist on getting either her money or her property before she left?

  Everything fitted in nicely, except the murder. Swindlers didn’t usually kill their victims; Mr. Bittersohn had told her so. Why should they? It was easier and less risky to get the money and slip away before the purchaser realized he’d been stung.

  What if Mr. Hartler had got there and realized he was dealing with the same person who’d tricked him in some previous deal? And why should he recognize the man on the second visit when he hadn’t spotted him back in his own bedroom? Anyway, what if he had? Surely an expert confidence man could fast-talk someone so easily fooled into believing the previous episode was merely some dreadful misunderstanding, or that he himself had been taken in by a third party. Or he could have paid Mr. Hartler back with a rubber check and gone hunting for a new victim.

  If anybody had tried such a stunt on Barnwell Quiffen instead of feckless old Wumps, murder might have been the only way out. Left alive, Mr. Quiffen would have called the police, filed a lawsuit, sent damning letters to every newspaper between Boston and Los Angeles, and put his own private eye on the trail. But Mr. Quiffen had been dead and buried a week ago. Why try to drag him into this just because he’d happened to occupy the same room for almost as short a time, and meet almost as violent an end?

  Suppose more than one swindle was going on. If Mr. Hartler could let himself be gulled by a whole series of bogus antiquarians, mightn’t he also be apt to fall for a scheme set forth by, say, a young man with an urge to rise in the world, an expert’s knowledge of figures, and a gift for talking wisely on a wide range of subjects? Or an old friend’s wide-eyed granddaughter with a thirst for adventure and a pair of strait-laced parents keeping her on a short leash and a tight allowance? Or a noted professor with some great scientific project to finance, or a lady with a handsome front and a murky past who was earning a hand-to-mouth existence reading tea leaves?

  Or, she might as well face all the possibilities, an art expert who knew the Iolani Palace at least as well as William; Hartler did? Or a frustrated actor who wanted his tooth capped, or the woman who was in love with him and had no money except what she got washing dishes and mopping floors for a hard-up widow with back taxes and interest on two mortgages to pay? Maybe if she’d happened to think of it in time, Sarah herself would have had a go. Well, she could rule herself out, but how did she really know what anybody else would do if the temptation was great and an easy mark available?

  Sarah didn’t want to dwell on such thoughts. She didn’t want to think about Miss Hartler and what was to become of the old woman, either, but she couldn’t help it. There weren’t any relatives to look after her; that was why Bumps had stuck so close to Wumps all these years. Anyway, relatives didn’t come with any guarantee. What about those two sharks who’d rushed over here as soon as they heard of Mr. Quiffen’s death? What had they ever done for old Barnwell Augustus while he was alive, except perhaps to make sure he didn’t stay that way?

  Since she was making up a list of possible swindlers, why exclude either the nephew or the cousin? They both knew Mr. Hartler was going to take over the dead man’s room because she’d told them so when she was urging them to get his stuff out quickly. They’d probably had some sort of casual acquaintance with Mr. Hartler, since he seemed to know everybody, and knew what a cinch he’d be to deal with. And, as Mr. Bittersohn would probably say, would she buy a used car from either of them?

  But they had Mr. Quiffen’s money now, or would have once the estate was settled. And what if one of them couldn’t wait that long? And what if one, or both, might be in for a disappointment? She’d been so busy with her own concerns, she’d never checked back with George and Anora to find out who got how much. That cantankerous man might well have left a secret will cutting them both out and turning over the lot to some casual acquaintance out of pure cussedness. Somebody like William Hartler and his Iolani Palace project, for instance.

  Oh, that was absurd! Why didn’t she concentrate on the most immediate problem? Did Miss Hartler have anybody to protect her interests, or did she not? Precisely how dangerous would it be to tell her she had to move?

  How many of that mob there tonight realty cared about her and how many simply felt they ought to put in an appearance? Aunt Marguerite was putting on a great show of being Joanna’s loyal friend, but Sarah knew how much that was worth. How many times had she herself entreated Aunt Marguerite to invite Aunt Caroline, her own and only sister, for a week or a few days or even overnight so that Sarah and Alexander could have a little time to themselves? How many times had Marguerite found urgent and pressing reasons why she didn’t care to be bothered?

  There were lots of delightful people in Newport. Sarah had met quite a few of them at those many parties which had meant a long drive down and a long drive back and often stark boredom in between. But she’d never met anyone interesting at Aunt Marguerite’s more than once or twice. The only acquaintances who stuck were the ones like Iris Pendragon, who hadn’t the wit or the wisdom to find places in more discerning company. And William Hartler, who was quaint and fun in his way and didn’t care whom he talked to so long as he got to talk, and his sister Joanna, who went wherever Wumps went.

  After all, if the Hartlers had been particularly close to anybody in Newport, they’d have been reluctant to uproot themselves at their time of life and move back to Boston. If they’d had strong ties in Boston beforehand, they’d never have gone to Newport in the first place. That disappointing trip to Rome was an example of how they operated. Miss Joanna couldn’t ever have taken the trouble to know this Dorothea, who turned out to be totally different from the classmate she’d thought she remembered. People didn’t change a great deal as they aged, they only became more like whatever they’d started out to be in the first place.

  Even Alexander must always have had that boy-stood-on-the-burning-deck streak in him, or he’d have found some way to break away from Aunt Caroline. Then he and Sarah would never have married, and his young widow wouldn’t be sitting here wondering who was going to get murdered next. A footfall sounded in the hallway, and she jumped a foot.

  It was Mrs. Sorpende. “I thought you might be down here, Mrs. Kelling, after I rapped at your door and got no answer. You’re waiting for Miss Hartler, I expect.”

  “Yes, I felt I ought to. I don’t know why, particularly, except that she’s an old woman going through a dreadful experience, and I’ve got her on my conscience because I plan to get rid of her as fast as possible and I’m wondering what’s going to happen to her after that.”

  “And what about me?”

  Sarah blinked. “What do you mean?”

  Mrs. Sorpende was standing square in front of her, those lovely, tapered hands twisted into an ugly, white-knuckled knot. “Please, Mrs. Kelling, don’t try to spare my feelings. Just tell me. Do I stay or go?”

  All Sarah could think of to say was, “It depends.”

  “On what?”

  How did one answer that? On whether you happen to be the person who’s killing off my boarders? Sarah hedged as best she could.

  “Mrs. Sorpende, I can’t tell you at this point because I don’t know. I started this boardinghouse thing in the hope of helping myself out of a dreadful mess, as you know. So far all it’s brought me is worse trouble. I may be able to carry on with it, or I may not. As for you personally, if you think I feel any more embarrassed by your job than I do about my Uncle Jem’s pretensions to satyriasis or my Cousin Dolph’s making a jackass of himself in public about once a week, forget it. I want Miss Hartler out because she’s even more disruptive than her br
other was and harder to get along with than Mr. Quiffen. You know I like you as a boarder because I’ve already told you so. That’s as plain as I can put it.”

  “That’s as plain as anyone could want it. You’re a most unusual woman, Mrs. Kelling.”

  “Am I? Perhaps so. I never had a chance to be usual. I didn’t even go to school. I learned from my parents and out of books. I’ve never been anywhere except to visit among the family. My husband was also my fifth cousin once removed, whom I’d known all my life. That’s hardly a normal sort of existence, is it?”

  “No, I don’t suppose it would be, from your point of view. As it happens, I myself had much the same sort of upbringing. The main difference was that you lived comfortably in a stable environment, and I slept in the corners of empty stores, in whichever city we hadn’t yet been driven out of.”

  “Your people were refugees?”

  “No, they were gypsies. At least my mother was. My father, as far as I know, was a college student who happened to be doing research in sociology and got more closely involved with his subject than he meant to. I haven’t the faintest idea what his name was. My mother hadn’t got around to asking when the police came and moved her family on. She didn’t even know she was pregnant until it was far too late to go back and try to find out. She was fourteen at the time, which didn’t constitute an acceptable excuse for her behavior according to our rules.”

  “But she was only a child!”

  “Gypsy girls aren’t children at fourteen, Mrs. Kelling. Anyway, she never got a second chance to stray. From the time I can remember, my mother was worked like a dog and watched like a hawk. She’d managed to pick up a little schooling here and there. I myself was never allowed to attend school for fear I might pick up the sorts of ideas that were supposed to have led to my mother’s downfall, but she taught me what she could.