He was aware that Jay was standing over him and the dark glasses, reflecting the light, frightened Joe. Then suddenly he saw his wife standing behind Jay and smiling at him. She was wearing the white brocaded dress in which she had died and he felt vaguely surprised that there was no blood on the dress.
She was beckoning to him and he tried to lift his head to see her more clearly, but the effort was too much for him. Then he became aware that the boy was doing something and his dazed eyes shifted from his wife to the boy’s hands.
The boy was holding a scarlet cord between his fingers and the cord formed into a loop.
Joe thought this was odd and he made a desperate effort to try to understand what was happening, but the whisky fumes now had taken control of him.
He felt himself grinning stupidly as the boy moved slowly and silently up to him, the scarlet loop held in front of him.
Joe looked from the boy to his wife and he saw a big patch of blood was now forming on the front of her dress. He started up, not feeling the loop of silk as it dropped around his neck, staring with drunken horror at the steadily increasing circle of red on the white dress.
It wasn’t until the scarlet cord bit savagely into his raddled, ageing throat that it flashed through his mind that he was being murdered.
III
It was a little after a quarter past eleven when Madame Brossette, bending over her magazine, suddenly lifted her head to listen.
Somewhere upstairs she could hear a tap running and she frowned. The only person she allowed to use the bathroom was Joe. Surely he hadn’t gone in there when she had told him to remain in the hideout? Maybe it was one of those wretched girls, although what they would want in the bath-room puzzled her.
Again she listened and her frown turned into an angry scowl as the sound of running water continued. If there was one thing Madame Brossette hated more than anything else it was waste.
Grunting with annoyance, she pushed back her chair and got up. She walked to the foot of the stairs and stared up them, listening.
Water was gushing out of the taps, she decided. Someone had been in the bathroom and not only had left the taps open but had also left the bathroom door open.
“Turn that water off!” she bawled but without much hope that anyone up there would take any notice. The thought of climbing the long, steep flight of stairs in the night heat irritated her, but after waiting a few more seconds, she caught hold of the banister rail and started the long plod up.
Jay watched her come through the crack between the door and the door post. He had turned on the taps and had left the bathroom door open in the hope the sound of the running water would bring the woman up the stairs.
He was very tense. He could feel a muscle twitching in his cheek and he had difficulty in controlling his quick, hard breathing.
He watched the woman reach the head of the stairs, then move heavily down the passage to the bathroom.
Silently he opened the door, stepped out into the passage and going down three of the stairs, he laid across the fourth stair the bolster he had taken from his bed. Then he stole up the stairs and back into his room as Madame Brossette, muttering angrily, turned off the tap.
She came out of the bathroom, turned off the light, then walked half way down the passage and paused outside the door of the broom cupboard.
Jay stiffened. This was the risk he knew he would be taking if he brought the woman up the stairs. Would she look in to see how Joe was?
But he relaxed as Madame Brossette shrugged her heavy shoulders and then continued on down the passage.
Jay watched her. He tensed himself and as Madame Brossette reached the head of the stairs and turned to descend them, her back now to him, Jay silently opened the door and stole out behind her.
Madame Brossette had reached the third stair before she became aware that there was someone behind her. She suddenly felt hot, quick breath on the back of her neck and she had a vague idea that she could hear the thump-thump-thump of heartbeats.
Her foot descended to the fourth stair as she turned her head. She saw a crouching figure of a man just behind her, his hands outstretched and in the dim light the dark glasses he wore gave him an inhuman look.
She caught her breath sharply. Then she felt the stair give under her weight as she stepped on to something that had a horrible soft feeling.
She lost her balance. She made a desperate grab at the banister rail.
Jay put his hand on her shoulder and gave her a violent push.
She began to fall backwards, her mouth wide open, her eyes bulging with shock and a thin, wailing scream starting from her throat.
Jay reached down and snatched up the bolster as the woman’s great body landed in the lobby with a crash that shook the house.
The thud of her body made an appalling sound and it was immediately followed by a violent crashing of bottles on the shelf over the bar, jerked loose by the shock of the woman’s fall.
Jay jumped up the three stairs and moved quickly into his bedroom, closing the door. He threw the bolster on the bed, then taking out his handkerchief he wiped his sweating face.
Was she dead?
He couldn’t imagine anyone falling like that without being instantly killed, but there was a chance that she had survived the fall.
For a few seconds there was no movement nor sound in the hotel. It was as if everyone who had heard the sound of the fall were paralysed, staring at each other, listening and wondering.
Then doors began to open. There came the sound of running footfalls and girls screaming.
The two detectives, sitting at the table outside La Boule d’Or, heard the sound of the fall and they started to their feet, staring at each other.
The senior officer, Lemont, said: “What the devil was that?”
He started across the street at a run, followed by the other detective.
As he entered the hotel, he pulled up short.
Lying in the dimly lighted lobby was the gross, broken body of Madame Brossette.
A girl, wearing only a brassiere and a skirt, was standing over her, her hands in her hair, her mouth open as she screamed softly.
Looking up, Lemont saw several men and a number of girls leaning over the banister rail, staring down.
He shoved the screaming girl aside and knelt beside Madame Brossette. He put his finger on one of her staring eyes and seeing no flicker, he grimaced, then touched the artery in her neck.
Farcau, his companion, moved closer.
“She’s dead,” Lemont said. “Better get statements. I’ll call the ambulance.”
The men at the head of the stairs, hearing this, started down the stairs, anxious to get away before their names could be taken, but found their way barred by Farcau.
From his room, Jay watched the activity. He had heard Lemont say Madame Brossette was dead and his lips curved into a quick grin of relief. Now he had to get out of the hotel without being seen.
The stairs were blocked by men and girls trying to get down. Their backs were turned to him.
He opened the door and moved out of the room, then he went softly and quickly down the passage to the broom cupboard, opened the door, stepped inside, groped his way to the back wall, found the spring release and opened the false door.
Leaving it open, he left the broom cupboard, leaving that door also wide open.
Then he returned to his bedroom, took out a ten franc piece from his pocket, unscrewed the light bulb, put the ten franc piece on the lamp socket and screwed it into the lamp holder.
The lights in the hotel were instantly fused and the place was plunged into darkness.
The men, caught on the stairs, realizing their chance to get away without getting involved with the police, plunged madly down through the darkness, swept Farcau aside and rushed out into the street. At their heels ran Jay.