If Death Ever Slept

“Haven’t I mentioned that she doesn’t play bridge? She doesn’t. And we went to bed. Today I saw four of them at breakfast-Jarrell, Wyman, Lois, and Nora-but not much of anybody since, except Susan and Trella at lunch. Jarrell mentioned at lunch that he would be out all afternoon, business appointments. At two-thirty, when I went around looking for company, they were all out. Of course Roger had gone to Jamaica, with the sixty bucks I gave him-by the way, I haven’t entered that on the expense account. At three o’clock I went for a walk and phoned you, and when I got back there was still nobody at home except Nora, and she is no-oh, I forgot. The pictures.”

“Pictures?”

“Sure, from the camera. A Horland’s man brought them while I was out phoning you, and when I got back Nora had them. She wasn’t sure whether she should let me look at them, but I was. That woman sure plays them close to her chin; I don’t know now whether Jarrell had told her about the rug affair or not. If not, she must have wondered what the pictures were all about. There were three of them; the camera takes one every two seconds until the door is shut. They all showed the rug broadside, coming straight in. He must have kicked the door shut. That rug is seven by three, so it could have been a tall man holding the top edge a little above the top of his head, or it could have been a short woman holding it as high as she could reach. At the bottom the rug was just touching the floor. At the top its edge was turned back, hiding the hands. I was going to bring the pictures along to show you, but would have had to shoot Nora to get away with them. Jarrell wasn’t back when I left at five-thirty.”

I turned a hand over. “That’s it. Any instructions?”

He made a face. “How the devil can I have instructions?”

“You might. For instance, instruct me to take Lois out tonight. Or take Trella to lunch tomorrow. Or stick around until Sunday and take Susan to church.”

“Pfui. Give me a plain answer for once. How likely is it that you’ll accomplish anything up there?”