"Hunting the American Indian," said Duff pleasantly, and the blond boy laughed.
"No doubt you people are wondering what on earth I'm doing here," Killeen said. "I happen to be Mr. Whitlock's lawyer. I had a wire yesterday asking me to come up. He's here, isn't he?"
"Yes," said the doctor. "Yes, of course. But he had an unpleasant experience last night. I'm afraid he is asleep, Mr. Killeen, and I don't think he ought to be awakened."
Curiosity shone in the lawyer's eyes, but he suppressed it. "Isn't Miss Brennan here, too?" Killeen turned to Duff. "You remember Alice Brennan?"
"I do," said Duff. "I've come to see her myself. But this house is asleep. We must aU wait Meanwhile, doctor . . ."
Susan said, "Have you had breakfast, Mr. Killeen? I'm sure Josephine can find you a cup of coffee. I don't think they'U mind." She carried him off to the dining room.
The doctor looked uncertainly at Duff. He cleared his throat to make a remark, searching for a polite phrase.
Duff said, his quiet voice asking for the truth, "What actually happened?"
"I don't quite know," Dr. Follett said uncomfortably. "AH I know is that something went wrong with the heating arrangements, and a considerable amount of coal gas poured into Mr. Whitlock's room by way of his register. The house has a hot-air system. I suppose . . ."
"Was it an accident?" No excitement or horrid speculation. Just a question.
The doctor squirmed. "I don't know. Perhaps it was. I really couldn't say."
"Has anyone been in the cellar?''
"Oh, yes, yes . . ."
"I'd like very much to see the cellar," Duff said.
The doctor stiffened. "I'm afraid only the Misses Whitlock can give you permission, and they are not awake yet. Are you a heating expert, Mr. Duff?"
"I am a detective," Duff said sweetly.
"Oh." The doctor's eyes fell, came sharply back to Duff's face, and fell again.
"I wonder"—Duff's voice was the voice of the tempter—"if I could find the cellar. Do you know where the stairs are?"
The doctor turned his palms up. "I am in a very awkward position in this house, Mr. Duff. I am Mr. Whitlock's doctor, but I do not attend his sisters. Nor have, for many years. I'm afraid I can't help you."
"I think perhaps you can help me," Duff said with his sudden appealing smile, "but not here and not now. Suppose I call on you in your office, sometime later?"
"Very happy," said Dr. Follett with relief. "Good. Do that. I must get along. I have a call to make, and I must sleep, myself. But I shall expect you. Yes, thank you. Good-by."
Dr. Follett went out. He was a man bursting with talk but muzzled, unable to say anything.
Duff slipped his eye aroimd the hall, identified the exits and entrances, the two archways to the two front rooms, the bathroom door under the stairs, and the dining-room at right angles to it. Through this he went.
Susan was chatting pleasantly with young Killeen.
"Everybody's asleep except the chauffeur," Duff said. "I'd like very much to talk to him, Mrs. Innes."
"Then I'll just go and sit with Innes myself," she said promptly and went briskly off.
Killeen said, "She's Innes's mother, she says. Amazing. Pleasant old soul, though."
"At least," said Duff gently. "Is Innes going to change his will?"
"I don't know. Maybe so. What's going on up here? For instance, you're not looking for Indians," Killeen challenged with an air of shrewdness, "in this house."
"I lead a double life," said Duff cheerfully. "Sometunes the two halves coincide."
"I've heard what the other half of you double life is, lately. Well, well. . ." Killeen was being the old pal, on the inside track, man-to-man stuff.
Duffs mild eye put him in his place. Art Kileen got ten years younger m as many seconds. "I suppose," he murmured to his coffee cup, "I had better just wait until Whitlock can see me."
"Yes. Just wait," Duff said indulgently
When Fred appeared it was with respectful attention a servant thoroughly in his place, and MacDougal Duff went gently to work to put him out of it.
"Susan Innes recommends you," he said, when they were alone in the sitting room, having left Killeen to his coohng coffee. "So I thought, as long as the house is asleep, I'd like to talk to you."
"You're a friend of Mrs. Innes?" Fred asked, a little more ready to relax.
"I'm her paying guest, that's all," Duff said. "I happen to know Killeen. I also know Miss AHce Brennan."
"I see," said Fred, who didn't.
"They were both students of mine, m the same class, now that I remember. I used to teach, you see "
Fred looked enlightened. "That wasn't in Chicago?"
"No. In New York."
Fred nodded.
"I don't teach histoy anymore. I'm a detective. Anyhow, I have investigated various murder cases with some success. Yesterday morning at the railroad station, I saw Miss Brennan on the platform. She seemed to want to speak to me. That's why I'm here. I came to find out what it was she wanted to say."
"Does she know you're a detective now?"
"I don't know. What do you think?"
"She probably does," Fred said.
"Yes," Duff said, "I think so. Mrs. Innes has told me the sequence of events."
"Some sequence. Since last night, I'm pretty sure."
"Sure?"
"Sure that somebody's trying to do in my boss," Fred said. "What can a detective do in a case hke that? Is trying to kill him a crime, even if they don't succeed?"
"Certainly," said Duff, "but a very difficult one to prove."
"Yeah," said Fred, "I dunno how you'd prove it."
"As I've been able to gather from Mrs. Innes, the things that have happened might have been accidents."
"Not what happened last night That's why I'm pretty
sure now."
"Could we go down cellar?" asked Duff softly.
Fred grinned. "Why not? Tve been down there. I'd like to show you."
"It's so awkward to explain to your hostesses that you think they're up to a litde murder and therefore you would like to see the cellar."
Fred grinned wider. 'They're asleep, aren't they?"
He led Duff through the kitchen, where Josephine looked around at them without protest, and down the cellar stairs. It was a shallow, old-fashioned cellar, with stone walls that hadn't been whitewashed for a long time. Duff had to duck constantly, for the roof was crisscrossed with a large number of fat pipes, branching out of the big furnace like the tentacles of a deformed octopus. There was a coal fire. Fred looked in at it briefly.
"The fire was almost smodiered with fresh coal last night," he said, "and closed up tight Gas just pouring off."
"Who tends the furnace?"
"Mr. Johnson. The handyman around here."
"Ah, yes. Mr. Johnson." Duff lingered over the name. "Does he drink?"
"I don't know," said Fred, "but that's not the point
Look. Every one of these pipes has a damper. Well, Innes got the full dose. The other rooms were like ice. Because somebody had carefully gone around down here and turned all the dampers shut but one. That wasn't any accident"
Duff pursed his lips in a soundless whistle. He wandered among the pipes. "Which one goes to the room where Innes is?"
"This one."
"How do you know?"
'They've got labels scratched on them. See. 'Papa's room.'"
"Oh, yes."
"You'd never know otherwise," Fred said. "Gee, it's some contraption." He stood, feet apart, gazing contemptuously at ihs, heating plant.
"It more or less heats a house," Duff said mildly. "You are of the new era. Too bad we can't get fingerprints. But I suppose not."
"Mine," Fred said. "Believe me, I had some fun scrambling around here trying to find all those cocks to turn."
"That one is certainly rather well hidden," Duff said thoughtfully. "Where does it lead, do you know?"
Fred looked at the scratches. "Kitchen."
Duff thrust his hand between two of the enormous pipes.
I'Look out," said Fred, "they may be pretty hot."
"This one was turned, too? You're sure'?"
"I'm sure," Fred said.