The Norths Meet Murder Page 20

  Except for the quiet animosity with which Martha, in the kitchen, and Kumi, in charge, temporarily, of the rest of the apartment, regarded each other, Mrs. North could find nothing wrong with the preparations. She plumped a chair cushion, turned off a light and turned it on again and put folders of matches in all the ash-trays. Mr. North removed the matches and put them beside the ash-trays, thus completing the ritual. Mrs. North saw that all the cigarette-boxes were filled, and Mr. North reminded Martha to empty all the ice-containers into the ice-preserving-pan and fill them again. Then he filled the tallest martini mixer with gin and vermouth and reminded Martha to be sure that there were plenty of strips of lemon peel and cocktail olives in the silver dish sacred to their use. The Norths did a number of other things, most of them two and three times over, and sat down, almost completely exhausted, to wait for their guests. Mr. North got up and moved a chair and Mrs. North decided it was cool enough for a small fire if they opened the windows. Mr. North built the fire and Mrs. North went to the bedroom to see, for the fourth time, if she had really remembered to fill the glass dish with little powder puffs for the women, who would use their compacts anyway. Kumi, proper in his white coat, said how did he let people in, pliss? and Mr. North, for the third time, showed him the little button on the wall phone in the hall, and explained to him how to push it. Mrs. North rearranged a vase of flowers.

  The Norths sat down, even more exhausted than before, and the guests began to arrive. They arrived very rapidly for several minutes, so that Kumi darted from hall to door and back to hall again, clicking madly, and small batches of guests stood around waiting to be digested. Then Mr. North brought ice in himself and added it to gin and vermouth, and all the guests looked relieved and hopeful. They drank and sighed, relaxedly, and the Norths had a chance to identify them.

  Clinton Edwards had been among the first group, rather elegantly attired for Sunday evening, and for Sunday evening only in striped trousers. The rest of the men were in dinner clothes, except for one young man who had, years before, chosen gray tweeds and blue shirts as the garb for all occasions, and was sticking grimly to it. Edwards was talking, in an assured and easy rumble, to Ann Lambert, who sometimes painted pictures, and Edwards seemed to be telling her how to paint pictures. It was, so far as Mrs. North could see after a quick checkup, a perfectly normal party. Miles Sackett handed her a cocktail and smiled at her and said that he had been drinking daiquiris all afternoon, and might fall over at any time. It was a perfectly normal party and with, so far, only one suspect.

  As was so often true of Mrs. North, one invitation had led to another and now, looking at the already comfortably full living-room, she wondered with something of a start how many, in all, she had invited. She tried to count, and ran over, first, the suspects themselves—“guests of honor,” Mrs. North told herself. There was Edwards, whom she had invited herself, and the Fullers, only the Fullers were not there yet. There was Kumi, not so much invited as borrowed. There were the Norths themselves, if one wanted to count them. Mrs. North thought this over, impersonally and from the viewpoint of Weigand, and decided that one did. There would be, on invitation of Weigand, Mrs. Brent and Berex. That was the lot, and not so many; not enough to make, more than a sprinkling among the non-suspects who were, Mrs. North began alarmedly to feel, myriad. She checked further—Ann Lambert, Ralph Birtman, Clarence Fitch, who did something on a magazine and spent a lot of time at Twenty-one, Miles Sackett, who came from Mr. North’s office and was a tall, diffident man who wrote brisk, utterly undiffident books, and Henry Cordon, who spent most of his life explaining that his name was not, was really not, Gordon. “With his hands on his hips,” Mrs. North thought. There was Harold Klingman, who wanted only to get a boat and spend his time floating off Florida, and who meanwhile built boats in which other people floated off Florida, and his wife, Loretta, who wanted to live in a penthouse in the East Seventies and go to all the first nights. “It’s funny how people do,” Mrs. North said to herself.

  They knew a great many odd people, she told herself, thinking of Isaac Romenman, who, years before, had come around and invited them to a party and only told them, after they had accepted, that there would be a nominal charge of fifty cents for each person, and of how, someway, he was still around—and might even be there that evening, if he remembered about it—although neither of them was or, for that matter, ever had been, in the least interested in him. And there was Mary Brown, whom they both liked very much and almost never saw, and who was advertising manager of one of the big stores and had a breathless energy which seemed never to diminish. And there was Florence Sackett, wife of, but for the present unattached to, Miles Sackett. She seemed always to be asleep, and never really was, and was, it had turned out, an old and close friend of Claire Brent, although the Norths had never known it until recently.

  Mrs. North gave up counting and decided it was time for her to receive guests. She received Isaac Romenman with great expressions of pleasure, and a dark, angry young woman whose name she did not get, and whose name, as it turned out, she never did get. And after her there was a graceful, blond young woman and Mrs. North found herself saying, “Mrs. Brent, so glad,” to a suspect whose gracious politeness was not in the least marred by the evident fact that she was unobtrusively looking the party over for a face she did not see. The bell rang again, and Louis Berex came in with Ralph Birtman, both with the frozen friendliness of men who, not knowing one another, have met on their way to the same party, and need only hostess approval for acquaintance, but are rigidly obligated to await it before either can acknowledge the presence of the other. Mrs. North greeted Birtman, hesitated for a moment and guessed:

  “Mr. Berex?” she said, with the hostess inflection, found she was right, and added: “So glad you could come.”

  “Are you?” said Berex. “Why?” But he said it very pleasantly.

  “It will please the Lieutenant so very much,” Mrs. North said, sweetly. “Do you know Mrs. Brent?”

  That, she figured, was catching up with them. She relented and introduced Birtman and Berex, who suddenly found themselves left together and moved, as one man, to Mr. North, who was dispensing drinks. Kumi arrived with canapes and set them down to let in the Fullers, who seemed very gay and had, Mrs. North realized, really been drinking something all afternoon. “But reasonably,” Mrs. North decided, after a quick inspection.

  The Fullers greeted Mrs. Brent, who had come back from removing her coat, and the three picked up Berex, and Birtman, who clung. Everybody seemed very comfortable and at ease, Mrs. North decided, although the suspects seemed to be drifting together.

  Edwards rose from the sofa to give a seat to Florence Sackett and loomed within sight of the little suspect group, and bowed and smiled. They bowed and smiled back and he joined them, and Mrs. North was called away by Kumi, who touched her on the arm and made sounds which seemed to indicate that the supply of canapes was diminishing. Mrs. North said it couldn’t be, had a martini to reinforce her, and went to see. There were plenty of canapes, but Martha was frowning above them and making grumbling sounds, indicative of little use for the small houseman. Mrs. North carried back a plate of canapes and entrusted them to Kumi, and went back to see that Martha did not forget to open the wine. Then she switched on the electric chafing-dish, looked at the watch hanging in its little silver ball around her neck, and counted the guests. Not all present, yet; time for another drink. Mrs. North circulated, keeping an eye on things. Mr. North had, by now, mixed a new batch of cocktails and turned bartending over to Kumi, who was circulating with a tray of drinks. Everything went fine. The Norths drifted together for a moment, toasted themselves and their party silently and swiftly, and drifted apart to host.

  The room was full of smoke and talk, and the contented restlessness of people who are getting enough to drink. The party swirled and eddied around Mrs. North and she smiled at it, and was not disconcerted to discover that its edges were softening for her eyes. It was always odd and interesti
ng to be a little changed by alcohol, but only enough to appreciate the change and relish it—to see how some faces came clear out of the crowd and others wavered; to feel that faint, indescribable fluidity which was a little akin to dizziness, but was not dizziness, but only a pleasant state to be maintained judiciously. “I can come clear out of it any time I want to,” Mrs. North told herself, “only I must drink very slowly, now, and not hurry it.”

  She felt very good and it no longer seemed like a suspect party, or anything serious. The situation, even the murder itself, seemed less real than the pleasant, warm stir of the party; looking around at the suspects, who had scattered again, she realized that it was absurd to think of any of them as having actually killed Brent and decided that Weigand must have made a mistake. “It must have been a gangster,” Mrs. North told herself. “That’s what it was, a gangster.”

  She wished Weigand would come so she could tell him what she had discovered about its being a gangster, and then he could join the party and they could all have a fine time. And then—

  “Feeling all right, kid?” Mr. North said, suddenly beside her with two cocktails, one for her. She smiled and nodded and started to tell Mr. North about its being a gangster after all, but then didn’t. It would sound as if she had had too much to drink if she said it, because of course it wasn’t true—not true in the different, outside, factual world which was not the party; not true yesterday and not true tomorrow, but only true at this moment, while she was thinking of it. She looked at Mr. North and decided he was feeling fine too, only perhaps not quite so fine. He sat on the edge of her chair for a moment and, seeing him sit, Mrs. North realized how physically tired they both were, and that probably everybody needed food.

  The conversation was a blur around her and she sipped her drink very slowly, because when she finished it, it would be time to start the serving of food and after that, she knew, she would not feel at all the same. After that she would not drink anything more, but only get soberer and soberer and after a long time, she knew, she would begin to wonder why people did not go. She could think all this and still enjoy the moment, and she did not want to break the moment with action. Then she looked at Mr. North and raised her eyebrows and nodded. Pam North stood up, completely herself again, and hoped that everything would be hot and that Kumi would manage the business of serving without too many hitches. She told Martha she could start, now, and touched the cover of the chafing-dish with wary fingers, and said “Uh!” She sought out Kumi, still serving drinks, and summoned him with an eye, and when he came, she began to fill plates. She put on each a spoon of lobster from the chafing-dish and a slice of ham and some of the salad and a small, hot buttered roll which had just come out of the oven. Mr. North poured cool wine into glasses and set them on a tray and everybody found, or tried to find, a place to sit. Most of the men found places on the floor.

  Everything went without a hitch and, with everybody sitting and eating, the party seemed much smaller and more manageable. Berex and Mrs. Brent were sitting together on the floor and Berex was talking quickly and eagerly while Mrs. Brent leaned back against the wall and looked, smiling faintly, over the party and now and then nodded, or turned her head toward Berex. Edwards was still talking to Ann Lambert, and he was sunk a little more comfortably into the sofa, but still rumbled diligently. The Fullers had drifted into separate groups, but every now and then, Mrs. North noticed, each would look at the other and when their eyes met they would smile, as if in reassurance. Kumi brought Mrs. North a glass of wine, and made a little bow and said: “Wine, pliss?” She took a glass and tasted the food on her plate. She might find, when she tasted it, that she was too tired to eat.

  They were all, Mrs. North thought, looking at them, nice people and she wished it could have been a gangster. Only now, of course, she knew it wasn’t, and that Weigand was right. It was one of the people on his list, Mrs. North knew, looking at them one after another. It was Berex or Mrs. Brent or Clinton Edwards or Benjamin Fuller (or even Jane Fuller?) or Kumi, because it wasn’t she, and it wasn’t Jerry and—

  She lifted her fork again and then, with no warning, it was as if some cold fluid were running through Mrs. North, or as if her blood had grown suddenly cool and shivered. It was not until some time afterward that she was able to define what had happened, and comprehend its cause, because now it was too frightening and cold. She had given, she saw, a little start, and some of the wine in her glass had slopped over and the surface was still agitated. That frightened her still more, because it might have been seen by the one who might, somehow, know it for what it was—know that Mrs. North now, as she lowered the fork from her lips, knew who had killed Stanley Brent, and that the person who had killed him was in the room.

  “I mustn’t show it,” Mrs. North told herself, and arranged a smile on her lips again. “I mustn’t show it. Oh, Jerry—Jerry!”

  But Mr. North, from across the room, merely smiled back at her, and Mrs. North could see that he did not realize she was calling to him frantically.

  21

  SUNDAY

  9:25 P.M. TO 11 P.M.

  Mrs. North’s lips ached with the smile, and her jaws ached with their pressure against food gone tasteless. And still, not knowing what else to do, she moved mechanically through the actions of a hostess; she caught Kumi’s eye and indicated the empty plates; she rose, as in a nightmare, and poured coffee. She wanted to scream the name, and she wanted to run. She wanted to get Jerry by the hand and run to a quiet place where they could talk. She wanted Lieutenant Weigand to come, so that she could tell him what she knew and then get away until it was over. Desperately, she waited for the bell which would announce that Weigand had come, but the bell was silent. She set her mind hard and did not look at anybody who mattered, because her face might give her away; she looked stabbingly at the back of Mr. North’s head, turned toward her as he talked, and the back of his head was impervious to her thrusting demands. Later, she knew that it would have been better if she screamed, better if she did almost anything but what she did.…

  Empty cups were beside most of the guests, now, and there was that pause which comes in parties when one thing is ended and before the next begins. Anxiously, Mrs. North sought the words to break it; only in the party, in its warm segregation and unreality, was there safety. But before she could speak, she heard Mr. North speak.

  “Why, yes,” Mr. North said, “if you want to. But there’s nothing to see and it—”

  He was speaking, she saw, to Loretta Klingman, who was nodding eagerly.

  Her voice was quick and eager in the comparative silence.

  “But I want to see it,” she said. “I want to. I love murderers—but I love them. If we can’t, I’ll never forgive you.”

  She turned swiftly to face the others.

  “Listen, everybody,” she said. “I want to see the place—oh.”

  She had realized, Mrs. North saw, that the audience she was addressing with such enthusiasm included the widow of the central figure in this so exciting and delightful murder. Mrs. North felt everything grow still inside her, and heard a small voice which no one else could hear crying “No! no!” And yet everything outside was suddenly clear and sharp; across the room she could see the symptoms of withdrawal and distaste which always appeared in Mr. North when he was discomfited, and at a loss.

  But Mrs. Brent was smiling, in a rather fixed fashion, and saying words.

  “But of course,” Claire Brent was saying. “Why shouldn’t you?” She picked a tiny glass of cognac from the mantel near her, and drank it quickly. “Why shouldn’t we all,” she said. “Sightseers. On your left, ladies and gentlemen, is the bathtub in which—” Her voice, Mrs. North realized, was close to hysteria. But before anybody could stop her she was at the door. “Come on,” Claire Brent called, her voice high. “Come on, everybody!” She cupped one hand to her lips, and there was a high-pitched brittleness in her voice which Weigand would have recognized. Only Weigand wasn’t there.

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p; Mrs. Brent flung the door open, and the click of the released lock was loud in the room. There was a nervous uneasiness in the party, and a hesitancy. “In a moment somebody will scream,” Mrs. North thought. Then she heard her husband’s voice, desperately—but only she could hear the desperation—calm and matter of fact.

  “Why, yes,” he said. “Why not? There’s nothing there, of course. Only empty rooms. But why not?”

  There was a stir in the room; a kind of settling.

  “We’ll need candles,” Mr. North said, moving to the mantel and picking lighted candles from the girandoles. He looked at Mrs. North, and she could tell that he read in her face something more than the general uneasiness. He nodded, almost imperceptibly. “Candles, Pam,” he said. “We’re going exploring.” Mrs. North took a candle in its silver stick from the table.

  And so, the Norths and some of the others with candles, they went exploring. It was confusing, crowded in the narrow stair hall, and Mrs. North had a vague impression that some did not go; some shrugged and turned back to drinks; some stood for a moment undecided, and there was a movement of two or three toward the front room, which could only be for hats and coats. There went the party, Mrs. North thought, in an odd, and entirely unexpected, return to hostess-ship. The explorers went up and along the third-floor hall and up to the door of the fourth-floor apartment, which was closed. Mr. North, leading, pressed against it and it opened. It was dark in the apartment, except where light came faintly in through the street windows, and the candles illuminated it flickeringly. Dark and, Mrs. North realized with a flooding relief, matter-of-fact.

  Perhaps it was merely that there was, after all, nothing to see; perhaps it was that there were so many there to see it, that the basic artificiality of this mass search for the bizarre and exciting trampled excitement into powder. At any rate, once there, the party found very little to do about it.