“Shall I salaam now?”
He got his hand tangled in the lapels of my coat. The hand felt surprisingly strong. “You’re going to leave Jeannie alone — that’s what you’re going to do, Martin! Everybody around here’s got it in for her, and I’m using a little of my time to look after her. Jeddrath Sloan hates her, makes things unbearable for her. I could kill Jeddrath for that — and anybody else!”
I glanced at the girl. Hannibal Constan was very much that way about her; but she looked at him pityingly. She was just not his type and couldn’t feel that way in return. “Brother,” I told Constan, “you’ve got it bad. But if you don’t take your hand off my coat you’re going to have something else a lot worse. I’m not going to be unfair to anybody, especially a girl, but if you think you’re up to...”
I saw it in his eyes, but I never thought he’d do it. Until he’d done it. He swung at my face, and I rolled enough so that the blow caught me high on the shoulder. Even so, I slammed back into an antique gate-leg table, spilling the vase of flowers on it with a crash. My whole arm was numb. That guy wasn’t all fat, I realised, looking up from the carpet where I’d tripped beside the table.
The girl saw me flashing to my feet, and fearing an explosion in the first degree, grabbed Hannibal’s arm and rushed down the hall with him. I think he’d have liked more words with me, considering the way he looked at me over his shoulder, but he’d have rushed anywhere with Jean Dupree.
That pinch-faced maid had heard the vase crash. She came down the hall. I told her, “I’ll personally pick you some more posies, Matilda. It was worth it. The things life does teach us about human nature.”
Then I went off to find a phone and call Ansel Mace.
Mace’s voice, coming from his country place just outside New Orleans, sounded strained. “What’s the lowdown, Martin? Have you seen the girl?”
“Yes,” I hesitated. “She doesn’t exactly seem the type...”
“Listen, Martin! I’ve never seen the girl, but don’t you go letting a good-looking face and figure make you forget who you’re working for.”
“I couldn’t forget that,” I bit back at him, “but there’s nothing I can do but ride the boat. Your father’s asleep. Everybody around hero knows he’s mentioned changing his will in your favor. Doctor Delanard let it leak out. If the old man rallies, he might do just that I’ll be on hand to see that nothing happens to him, that he gets the chance to change his will if that’s what he wants.”
“Maybe I’d better try to come on up there,” Mace said tightly. “My wife’s got my town car and my roadster’s in the garage with a couple of crumpled fenders. I’ll have to get a bus. I can’t get there before midnight, five hours or so from now.”
“Suit yourself, Mace. Personally, I’m going to eat. I smell some very savory odors coming out of the kitchen.”
He muttered a curse and slammed the phone up.
Doctor Delanard stayed in Theron Mace’s room, not coining down to dinner. I’d expected that, and I’d guessed Jean Dupree and I would have dinner in the mellow, brown-panelled dining room. I hadn’t thought anyone else would be there. But Hannibal Constan was. Evidently, the girl had been talking to him, for he begged my pardon for socking me. I told him sure, let it ride at that. It made the girl less strained.
From the kitchen, I could hear Jeddrath Sloan’s leathery voice as he ate and talked to the pleasant, gigantic Negress cook. Hannibal Constan, living up to the promise he must have made the girl, tried to be a good dinner companion. I learned that he’d been here at the Mace house the day she’d arrived. He’d stuck around, and was occupying one of the guest rooms upstairs.
Objectively, the dinner was dry enough; but the girl’s presence lent spice. I kept trying to figure her. Angel? Or female devil?
After dinner, Constan and the girl went off in the direction of the library. I walked upstairs, tapped on Theron Mace’s door, and called out to Doctor Delanard. He cracked the door, told me everything was okay, and I went back down. I got a couple of magazines from a rack in the sunken living room, planted myself where I could watch the hall, the stairway, Theron Mace’s room. As long as I didn’t let anybody get in there with divers notions of forever making old Theron unable to make a new will I was earning my dough.
Outside, the Louisiana night was thick, black. Faintly I could hear the murmur of night creatures, now and then the sounds of Jean’s and Hannibal’s voices in the library. I had called Ansel Mace just before seven. It was now nine, perhaps ten after. If he’d got the seven-thirty bus out of New Orleans, he’d be another three hours getting here.
I yawned, wondering how much longer I was going to have to keep up this vigil. Then Cole Delanard burst out of Theron Mace’s room upstairs, and I took a look at him and bounded to my feet. He was yelling for the maid and cook. I said, “Anything wrong?”
“No,” Delanard said, “the old man has rallied. There’s often a last burst of strength in stroke cases of this type. I think he knows he’s dying. He wants to change his will. I need the cook and maid for witnesses.”
The maid scurried by me, followed a moment later by the cook. I followed them up the stairs. I’d expected to sec Jed Sloan bursting out in the hallway.
And quite suddenly, I knew that Jean Dupree hadn’t been acting. Here was a grim, cold household, soggy with riches, waiting for an old man to die, as chill and implacable as if they’d been waiting for the final turning of a card, which would decide which way the riches would go. Jeannie Dupree had brought the only warmth, the only real tenderness and pity to the house.
Delanard had left the door to old Theron’s room cracked in his haste. The maid and cook were huddled back against the wall. The room was so deeply shadowed the man in bed was obscured in gloom. I could hear the wheezing of his breath, see faintly the outlines of his face. The nightcap covering his head to his ears with its bright tassel looked pathetic.
Delanard was bending over the bed, close to the old man to catch his every word. Between wheezes the old man said, “...Is my only son, after all. So to Ansel Mace, I, being in sound... mind... bequeath all my stocks, bonds, and securities, to the total... of three million dollars... to my servants... each... I leave ten thousand dollars cash... and to Jean Dupree... I leave this house... the acreage adjoining...” The voice was a lost whisper. Cole Delanard was scribbling like mad on a sheet of paper he’d grabbed. “...And to Doctor Cole Delanard... who... has kept me alive... this... long, I bequeath stocks and cash in the sum of five hundred thousand dollars... all properties and cash not specifically named... go to my son, Ansel Mace... I...”
I thought he was going to croak then and there. I’d never heard a hollow, whispering voice Like that one. Then he pulled a trembling hand from the covers, fumbled the pen from Delanard’s hand. A spasm crossed the aged face; for a moment it seemed he would rear up in bed and die before he could ever sign that will. Then he smashed the pen against the paper and made two strokes, a shaking X, I guessed. Without strength to sign even his full name, he lay back, shivered once, and died.
I heard the maid sob, the cook mumble soft, dark words. Delanard pulled the coverlet over Theron Mace’s head, ushered the maid and cook to the door. I turned and went down the hall.
I met Jean and Hannibal Constan in the downstairs hallway. She said, “Is he... is...”
“He’s dead,” I said. “He managed to make his new will.”
“I don’t care anything about the will! Can’t you understand? The poor man! The poor, poor old man!” Despite the fortunes Theron Mace had left, I saw what she meant.