“No, Inspector Queen.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about this when I questioned you Monday afternoon?”
“I was afraid,” whispered Eva.
“Afraid of what?”
“I don’t know. Just afraid.”
“Afraid it would look bad for you?”
“I... Yes. I suppose so.”
“But why should you be afraid if you didn’t kill Karen Leith? You knew you were innocent, didn’t you?”
“Of course! I didn’t kill Karen! I didn’t!”
The Inspector surveyed her in silence. Then Eva’s eyes fell and filled with tears. It was supposed to be a sign of clear conscience and honesty to be able to look a person straight in the eye. But how could she, when that eye was so merciless, so hostile, so suspicious? Anyone with sensitivity would look away from something disagreeable, cruel...
“If that’s all you’ve got, pop,” said Terry Ring derisively, “you’d better go home and play your harmonica.”
Inspector Queen stalked back to his desk without replying. He opened the top drawer again, put down the half-scissors, and took out a manila envelope. Then he stalked back.
“In the grate of the fireplace in the sitting-room next to the scene of the crime,” he said, “we found this.” He took something out of the envelope. Eva forced herself to look, feeling nauseated. It was impossible. It couldn’t be. Fate couldn’t play such a mean trick. But it had. It had. There it was, the corner of her cambric handkerchief, just the corner, with the hypotenuse of the triangular scrap a wavy, charred edge, and her silk-stitched initials of white smeared hideously with Karen Leith’s blackish blood.
She heard Terry Ring suck in his breath behind her. There was one danger he hadn’t foreseen. That was the only job he’d given her to do, had thought she’d done, and that he saw she had bungled. She could almost feel his bitterness, the bite of his contempt, from behind.
“Is this your handkerchief, Miss MacClure?”
“Eva! Don’t answer, honey! Don’t say a word. He’s got no right!”
She’d run away before making sure the handkerchief was completely consumed. And, of course, the fire petered out. It would. It would.
“It bears the initials EM,” said the Inspector coldly, “and don’t delude yourself, Dr. MacClure, that it will be hard to prove this handkerchief belongs to your daughter. As a matter of fact—” But then he stopped, as if he felt he might say too much. “Another thing. This stain on the corner is human blood. Our chemists have established that. They have also established that it is blood of the type in Karen Leith’s body — a rather unusual type, just to make it easier for us and harder for you, Miss MacClure.”
“Eva. Shut up,” said Terry queerly. “Keep your mouth shut.”
“No!” Eva managed to get out of the chair. “This is stupid, stupid! Yes, it is my handkerchief, and it is stained with Karen’s blood, and I did try to burn it!”
“Ah,” said the Inspector. “Did you get that, Mushie?”
“My God,” said Dr. Scott again, in exactly the same way as before. He seemed incapable of saying anything else. Terry Ring glanced at Ellery, shrugged, and lit a cigaret.
“But it was only because I’d stooped over Karen in the oriel and... and got some blood from the floor on my hand, and wiped it with my handkerchief. It was like jelly.” Eva shuddered. “Don’t you see? Anyone would have done it. No one likes to... to get blood on his fingers. You wouldn’t, would you?” She began to sob. “And then I burned it. I burned it! I was afraid again, afraid!” She collapsed in the doctor’s arms.
“So that’s how it was,” said Inspector Queen.
“Listen, pop, Inspector.” Terry Ring caught the old man’s arm. “I’ll give it to you on the level. It was my idea. I told her to burn it.”
“Oh, you did, did you?”
“When I popped in there she told me what had happened. I made her burn the damned thing. So don’t think you can pin that on her. I’ll testify to that!”
“And why,” purred the Inspector, “did you advise Miss MacClure to burn the handkerchief, Mr. Ring? Were you afraid, too?”
“Because I knew what a dumb cop with a catcher’s mitt for a brain would think if he found it. That’s why!”
Morel coughed. “Inspector Queen, do you really need me? I have — ah — a client waiting...
“You stay where you are!” yelled the old man. Morel shrank back, clutching the chair harder. “Did you get down what this wisenheimer said, Mushie? Okay! Now, Miss MacClure, I’ll tell you what really happened!
“You stabbed Karen Leith with the half-scissors, you wiped the blood off the blade with your handkerchief, and then you tried to burn the handkerchief to destroy the evidence. We have two exhibits — evidence no lawyer could shake — to prove our theory. If our friend Mr. Ring wants to stick to his story that it was his suggestion to burn the handkerchief, we’ll hang an accessory charge around his neck.
“We have the Japanese woman’s testimony to prove that Karen Leith was alive when you were left alone in the sitting-room. We have your own statement, taken at the scene, that no one went through that sitting-room during the half-hour in which you claim you sat there. We have Karen Leith’s own letter to prove that she had no thought of murder or death in her mind when she sat down to write an ordinary business note to Morel — a letter which wasn’t started until after Kinumé gave her the stationery, which was just when you arrived. We’ll show that only the murder could have interrupted that letter. We have Terry Ring’s own statement of Monday that when he arrived he found you in the bedroom over the still-living body of Karen Leith with no one else there.” The old man spun about. “Well, Morel, you’re a lawyer. Is there a case?”
“I... I’m not a criminal lawyer,” stuttered Morel.
“Well,” said Inspector Queen dryly, “Henry Sampson is — and he’s the smartest D.A. this town ever had. And Sampson thinks he’s got something to work on.”
There was a profound silence, punctuated rather than broken by Eva’s exhausted sobbing on Dr. MacClure’s breast.
“Excuse me for butting in,” said Terry Ring in the silence, “but what about the blonde dame from the attic?”
The Inspector blinked. Then he went over to his desk and sat down. “Oh, yes. The blonde woman. Karen Leith’s sister.”
“Yeah, her sister. What about her?”
“What about her?”
“Don’t you think you might clear that up before you go putting the finger on this poor kid? You know that Karen Leith kept that woman practically a prisoner for nine years in that room. You know she escaped. You know she had a damned good reason to hate her sister’s guts — with the little one stealing her stuff and taking credit for it. You know she had a way to come down and a way to get out. You know the scissors came from the attic, where she lived!”
“Karen Leith’s sister,” murmured the Inspector. “Yes, indeed, Doctor, we’ve traced that suicide business.”
“You listen to me!” shouted Terry.
“The body was never found in the sea. She just disappeared. We also found out that when Karen Leith came over from Japan, she traveled with two people — this Kinumé and a blonde woman who kept to their cabin all through the voyage and was listed under an obviously false name. That’s why Miss Leith didn’t let you know she was coming — she wanted to get settled and her sister hidden away before anyone from her old life found out.”
“Then it is true,” mumbled Dr. Scott unexpectedly. “That woman — the one who murdered Dr. MacClure’s brother—”