“I didn’t realize, of course, that Mrs. Blair had much the same feeling and had already gone out with him and insisted that he take the pills and go right to bed, so I foolishly decided I would go out myself just to be sure he was all right. I slipped on a robe and went downstairs. There was still a light in the study, but I assumed Marvin was too stupid with drink to hear me going out.”
She paused to bite her underlip thoughtfully. “I realize that makes it sound as though I felt guilty about going out to see Charles. I didn’t… really. It was just that Marvin has a nasty mind, and once or twice before when he was drinking heavily he made some insinuating remarks about having a handsome and virile young chauffeur, and about… John being so much older than I. So I just wanted to avoid anything like that, and I went out the back way without knowing he heard me.”
She paused again to run the tip of her tongue over her lips. “I saw the light was on in Charles’ rooms over the garage, and I turned on the floodlight and went out. Charles came to the door in his pajamas and robe when I knocked, and he went back and got under the covers and I sat down for a minute after he told me he had already taken his pills and was waiting for them to take effect. He wanted to talk about Mr. Shayne and about how he’d been taken completely by surprise and hadn’t a chance to defend himself when he was assaulted, and I tried to make him see it had come out all right because his vigilance had protected poor Daffy’s grave. And that…” Her voice faltered. “… was all.
“But then Marvin came staggering and storming in and made the most awful scene.” She bowed her head and covered her face with her hands for a moment, and Shayne thought wryly to himself that it was one of the most superb bits of acting he had ever witnessed on or off the stage. He glanced aside slyly at Gentry to see how he was reacting and wasn’t surprised to see a look of fatherly compassion on the chief’s heavy features. Because Gentry hadn’t (he reminded himself) been present the past evening when she had stood against him and whispered, “I want you, Michael Shayne.”
She took her hands away from her face and her eyes were wide and dewy and innocent. “He made the most awful and obscene accusations, and I had to get between him and the bed to prevent Charles from leaping up and tearing him limb from limb there and then.”
She began sobbing quietly and covered her face again. “My own brother! I was so ashamed. And then suddenly I was furious.” She lifted her head and her eyes sparkled and her chin was arrogant. “He had no right to even think such things. And I told him so. I threatened to scratch his eyes out if he didn’t go at once, and he did go, but without apologizing or admitting he was wrong.”
She drew a deep breath. “Well, I didn’t know what to say except remind Charles that Marvin was drunk and wasn’t responsible. And then I left in a few minutes and came back in to bed and I didn’t see Marvin again until… until this morning when I… when I went to his room…” She bowed her head and sobbed again.
Very gravely and sympathetically, Will Gentry said, “I know it’s difficult, Mrs. Rogell, but I want you to tell me exactly how it happened and what you found.”
“Yes… well… I awoke about nine o’clock and all I could think about was what had happened last night. After Marvin sobered up I was sure he would realize what an awful thing he had done, and I went to his room determined that he should apologize to me and to Charles. I knocked on his door and opened it when he didn’t reply… thinking he was still sleeping it off. And the light was on and… there he lay. On the floor. And there was the bottle of strychnine on the table. I knew he was dead. I knew it even before I forced myself to kneel down and touch his cold flesh. And then I looked around wildly and saw… the note he had written and left lying on the table beside his glass.
“I read it half a dozen times, I guess, trying to understand it… to understand why he had taken his own life. Then I realized how it sounded… how it would look to some outsider like… well, like you. The police. So I snatched it up and ran back to my room.”
She shuddered at the recollection. “I know I shouldn’t have touched it. Charles said I should have left it lying right where it was. But I was hysterical and I didn’t think. I didn’t think anything except trying to keep anyone from knowing why my brother had taken his own life. Because he was ashamed of his sister. Because he thought I was a loose and wanton female… being intimate with another man before my husband was even in his grave.
“So I called Charles on his extension and told him. And he ran into the house and told Mrs. Blair and they went to Marvin’s room, and then Charles came in, terribly worried because Marvin hadn’t left any suicide note. He said the police were always suspicious if they didn’t find a note… and that with Henrietta’s crazy accusations against me they would probably suspect I had put the strychnine in Marvin’s drink too.
“I wasn’t even going to show him the note until he made me understand how really serious it might be. Then I read it to him and told him I’d rather tear it up and be suspected than have it all come out in the papers that my brother had killed himself because he was ashamed of me. And I did start to tear it up in front of Charles, but he snatched at it and tore the top part off, and then he pried my hand open and got the bottom part and said we had to give the two parts to the police.
“And he said you always kept the contents of suicide notes a secret and wouldn’t give the text out to any papers if they had something in them that embarrassed living people, and I finally agreed. And you won’t, will you?” she ended pleadingly. “Let it be printed in the papers, I mean. Even though Marvin was mistaken and I can prove there’s nothing like that between Charles and me, you know how they’d crucify me. And everyone who read it in the papers would believe the worst. People always do.”
“Why, no Ma’am,” Gentry assured her in a kindly voice. “In cases like this we don’t give out such information to reporters.”
From his side pocket he withdrew Marvin’s note which had been carefully put together with scotch tape so that the ragged edges of the two portions fitted against each other exactly.
“Now this first part,” he said slowly. “Your story and the one Charles told seems to explain that all right. But what did he mean by saying: ‘Death holds no fears for me any longer.’ And: ‘John and Henrietta were old and mean and deserved to die.’ Is that a confession that he killed your husband and tried to poison Henrietta?”
“I just don’t know what it means,” she confessed tearfully. “Charles and I went over and over it together, but it just sounds crazy to me. I can’t believe that’s what it means. I just can’t. Marvin couldn’t kill anybody. He just wasn’t like that. He was… well, he was weak and lazy, and he drank too much. And he knew John didn’t like him hanging around here and borrowing money from me, but Marvin would never have done anything like that. Besides, John died from a heart attack. I was there and saw it happen. And Dr. Evans said there wasn’t the slightest question about it. So I simply don’t know what Marvin meant when he wrote that line. He was drunk, of course, and terribly upset by what he believed about Charles and me.”
“I realize that,” Gentry soothed her. “Just while we’re on the subject, let’s go back to your husband’s death. I understand Mr. Peabody was upstairs with him going over some business affairs from about ten until midnight. Where were you and Marvin?”
“Downstairs in the study. I was reading a magazine and Marvin was drinking… as usual. I went up a few minutes before twelve to take John his hot milk and give him his medicine in it.”