Jerome Straight looked startled at this announcement, but neither Irene nor Monica exhibited the slightest perturbance. This struck me as strange, since a hundred-thousand dollar shortage in in inheritance of mine would have made me quite angry. Seemingly it struck the inspector as strange too.
“You ladies don’t seem upset over the losing the money,”-he remarked.
Both raised their eyebrows, but it was Monica who replied.
“Fibrolux Plastics wasn’t part of our inheritance. Aunt Aggie had that all tied up so nobody could get at it.”
Jerome Straight cleared his throat. “Fibrolux Plastics was founded by Mr. Chambers,” he said ponderously. “On his death a few years back Mrs. Chambers intelligently recognized she had no business sense and placed Adrian Thorpe in complete charge. He had been first vice president under Mr. Chambers for years and is a very able executive. I must say I am shocked to learn he is a thief. Mrs. Chambers felt the business would suffer if on her death the stock fell to her nieces and nephew and they voted in... ah... someone else as company president. So she placed her shares in perpetual trust, the dividends to go to her heirs, but voting power to remain with the administrator of the trust.”
“And who is the administrator?”
“At present I am,” the lawyer admitted.
Gerald Rawlins broke in. “Listen, I been stewing over something ever since we arrived and found Aunt Aggie dead. But it’s a kind of rought deal to accuse somebody of murder.”
Nobody said anything, waiting for him to go on, but he merely self-consciously wiped his red face with a handkerchief and looked embarrassed.
Sedalia broke the silence. “If this Adrian Thorpe arrived on a noon train like he was supposed to, he had plenty of time to get over here and bash the old lady. That what’s on your mind?”
He looked worried. “Yes,” he admitted. “But I just can’t imagine Ad killing anybody. Frankly I’m not too fond of him, but I want to be fair. Ad just plain would be incapable of murder.”
“His limit’s embezzlement, eh?” Sedalia asked. “Young man, our prisons are full of people who seem incapable of crime. Your aunt know of Thorpe’s misdeeds?”
Reluctantly Gerald nodded. “I phoned her just before I caught a plane.”
“I think,” Inspector Home said, “we better put out a call on Mr. Adrian Thorpe.” He looked at Gerald. “Happen to know where he generally stays when he’s in town?”
Gerald shook his head. “Different hotels. One of the better ones as a rule. The Statler, Lennox or the Sheridan.”
Home turned to one of the silent policemen. “Phone headquarters to put out a pickup order on Adrian Thorpe. Get a description from this guy.” He jerked a thumb at Gerald. “Then phone the major hotels and find out if anybody that name is registered. Phone’s in the hall.”
A few moments later the inspector had the other policeman take down the local addresses of the three relatives and Jerome Straight, warned them not to leave town until they received clearance, and released them. By my wrist watch I noted it was only shortly after nine.
“We still have time for the last half of the concert,” I suggested to Sedalia.
She put an ivory-tipped cigarette in her mouth, watched me thoughtfully as I touched my lighter to it, and then shook her head as though she failed to understand me. She did not even bother to reply.
When the others left, Alvin Christopher had stayed behind, awaiting the results of the policeman’s phone survey of the hotels. He did not have a very long wait, for in a few minutes the man in blue entered the room.
“Second try, Sir,” he said to the inspector. “Thorpe’s registered at the Sheridan, and as far as they know he’s in his room right now. I told them not to ring his phone, because we’d be right over.”
“Good. We will.” He looked at Sedalia and the — assistant D.A. “Coming along?”
Both decided they would.
The manager at the Sheridan Hotel was very helpful. He personally assisted the inspector in questioning the desk clerk, who was very helpful in turn. The clerk said he came on duty at noon, and shortly after coining on Adrian Thorpe had phoned from Union Station for a reservation. He had not actually arrived to claim the room until shortly after seven, however.
“Number six-twelve,” he finished. “I believe he is in now, if you wish me to ring.”
“We’ll go up,” Inspector Home said. He looked at the slim, debonair hotel manager. “Got a pass key?”
“Oh yes, of course,” the man said. He fluttered off ahead of us toward the elevators.
On the ride up he smiled nervously at the inspector and said, “If this is an arrest, you’ll make it as quiet as possible, won’t you, Sir? We’re always glad to cooperate with the police, but there’s no need of the other guests knowing.”
“Be as quiet as possible,” Home conceded, and added, “If possible.”
Through an open transom we could see there was light in room six-twelve, and a radio was playing moderately loud. But no one answered the hotel manager’s repeated knock. Finally he smiled at all of us nervously, slipped a pass key in the door and pushed it open. He stepped aside to let the inspector enter first.
The rest of us waited either side of the door to see if there was going to be any shooting, but when no sound came from the inspector, we all trailed in behind him. We found him thoughtfully staring at the figure on the bed.
Adrian Thorpe was about fifty years old, sparse-haired and slight of build, and with a shrewd, intelligent face. He lay on his back, his head comfortably resting on a pillow. His left arm lay at his side, and his right hand clenched the hilt of what seemed to be a hunting knife.
We could not tell how long the knife’s blade was, for it was buried in his heart.
It was after eleven when we finally got away from the Sheridan. We had to wait until the last police technician had finished his duties and until Inspector Home had questioned everyone he could think of, of course. At a murder Sedalia is like an alcoholic at a party: she is always the last one to go home.
She also had to be the one to make it a murder instead of a nice simple suicide which would have neatly ended the whole affair. At first glance it seemed obvious Adrian Torpe had killed Agatha Chambers when she confronted him with his chicanery, then checked in at the hotel and killed himself in remorse. But as I may have mentioned, Sedalia is constitutionally incapable of minding her own business.
“No suicide would lie on a bed and stick himself with a knife,” she announced didactically. “Remember Ernest Fox, Steve?”
“That nutty kid doctor used to come to your parties?” the inspector asked. “He commit suicide?”
She frowned at him. “He wasn’t nutty and he wasn’t a kid. He was young, but he held a Ph.D. in abnormal psychology. His graduate thesis was on techniques of suicide, and it covered thousands of case histories. One of his conclusions was that suicide by stabbing is extremely rare, but when it is practiced, it always follows a definite pattern. The suicide always either sits or stands and always pushes the blade in with both hands.”
Home gazed at her in amazement. Finally he said, “That’s the silliest thing I ever heard in my whole life.”
“Silly or not, it’s a fact. Ernest pointed out that stabbing yourself is harder than it seems. It takes a lot of force to push a knife in your own chest, because you can’t put the weight of your body behind the thrust or get the leverage you can get when you’re stabbing at someone else. About the only possible way to do it is to put the point carefully between a couple of ribs and suddenly pull in with both hands. Ernest’s thesis lists dozens of cases who tried it by stabbing with one hand, but they all either were discouraged by minor flesh wounds, or after cutting themselves all up, finally got down to business and did it his way.”