The Room Under the Stairs

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 846, 14 December 1929, Page 26

The Room Under the Stairs

The Baffling Story of a Man Who Read of His Own Murder.

By

Herman Landon

Copyright by G. Howard Watt. Serialised by Ledger Syndicate.

CHAPTER VI. (Continued). “Seems to me Littleby could have sent a servant for the prescription,” mumbled Shane. “Maybe he was curious to know how we interpreted the scene in Lamont's bedroom,” Dean suggested. “Well, Sbane, did you satisfy your curiosity iu regard to Lamont’s secret worry?” “No,” said the lieutenant after an appreciable pause. “I still think he is brooding over something that has little or nothing to do with the murder of Forrester.” He glanced queerly at his companion. “If the shock he received should kill him, then we’ll never find out the cause of his worry, I suppose.” Dean nodded uncertainly, and neither man spoke until the train rolled into the station. “Now let’s have it,” said Shane, when they were seated in the smoker. “I didn’t blame you for not wanting to talk in Littleby’s presence, but you needn’t keep any secrets from me. Three of us heard and saw everything that happened in Lamont’s room, but you were the only one that understood anything. Spill it, Dean.” “I think you overestimate my sagacity,” countered Dean. “Now you’re talking like the characters in your stories. What I want is plain words. In the first place, what’s the meaning of the scar Lamont spoke about?” “I don’t know,” said Dean after a brief hesitation. He spoke candidly enough, for the matter of the scar had only complicated still further an already hopeless situation. Shane regarded him doubtfully. “I could see you got a jolt when Lamont spoke about the scar. It seemed to touch you on the raw.” “The whole scene did. I swear I understood nothing,” said Dean, empratically and truthfully. “I was just as nonplussed as you and Littleby were. Even more so,” he added under his breath and with a significance that was lost on Shane. “All right, then,” said Shane resignedly, “but there’s something else you can tell me. Till my dying day I'll never forget, the way Lamont stared at you just before he collapsed. What did it mean?” "Sorry, but I am at a loss there too. I know he looked at me in a most peculiar way, but I can’t tell you why.” “Did you ever see Lamont before?” Dean hesitated, searching his mem-

ory. The Question had already occurred to him. “To the best of my knowledge,” he declared, “I never saw him until this evening.” Shane gave him a quick, sceptical look. “If I didn’t know you as well as I do, I’d call you a first-rate liar. While I was watching you and Lamont X could have sworn that you were wise to all that was going on.” “On the contrary, I was flabbergasted.” Shane thought for a moment. “Since you say it, I believe you, of course. Now let me try a different tack. A man with an imagination like yours ought to be able to think up an explanation of what happened in Lamont’s room a little while ago. Just look at it as a mystery, from the point of view of a writer of fiction, and give me your idea of what the solution ought to be. Can you do that?” Dean smiled. “Well, I’ve solved pretty hard riddles. If I understood you correctly, you want me to put my imagination to work and give you a fictitious solution of the scene that took place in Lamont’s bedroom?” “Just that.” Leaning back against the seat, Dean thought for a while. The faint smile on his lips and the intent look in his eyes showed that the problem fascinated him. ”1 think I have it,” he said at length, without looking at his companion, “but you mustn’t forget that it is only a fictitious solution. It accounts, at any rate, for Lamont’s terrific excitement. When he saw me at his bedside, he suddenly realised that he had made a mistake in regard to the Identity of the man he killed five and a-half years ago.” “How is that?” Shane seemed somewhat disappointed. “Well,” said Dean, slowly, weighing each word, “it came to bint all at once that I was Paul Forrester, aud that consequently he had killed the wrong man.” “That you were Paul Forrester?” Shane, as the novelist had expected, laughed at the suggestion as if it were utterly preposterous. “The shock of such a discovery would-be enough to overcome a man in Lamont’s -weakened condition, wouldn’t it?” , “Of course it would, but why on earth should he think you were Paul Forrester? Why, it’s —” Shane seemed at a loss for words. “Your imagination isn’t in its usual form tonight, Dean?” “Apparently not,” said the novelist plaintively. I admit it isn’t a very good solution. There is a hole in it big enough for an elephant to walk through.” “It’s all holes, as I see it, and nothing else. What particular hole have you in mind?” “The only one that my imagination isn’t capable of filling in. I might plug up the others if you gave me a little time, but I would never be able to explain why, if Lamont killed the -wrong man, a watch bearing Paul For-

roster’s initials on the back should be louud in the room under the stairs.” “That’s so," said Shane, thoughtfully.: “I didn’t spot that one till you pointed it out. It tears your solution to shreds, of course.” “Of course,” echoed Dean in queer tones. He looked as if his mind were still wrestling with the hypothetical solution. For several minutes the men sat silent, swaying with the motions of the train; then Dean added; “I’ve found another hole. Did you notice the queer way Lamont stared at the telephone?” “I did. He looked at it as if he expected it to fly up and bite him. What do you suppose it meant” v Dean shook his head. “A satisfactory solution of a mystery is supposed to account for all the facts. My ' solution leaves Lamont’s behaviour with regard to the telephone unexplained, so I guess it won’t do. There are two holes already.” ! “And I have found a third,” said Shane, just as the train dipped into the humid jaw of the tunnel. “There’s 1 another thing that your solution doesn’t take into account at all. If 1 Lamont killed the wrong man, who was the fellow with the scar on his ■ neck?” Dean glanced down the length of ■ the swaying coach. “You’ve got me there again,” he confessed. “It’s an interesting point. Well, I warned you it was only a fictitious solution. Let’s drop it. My head is swimming.” “So is mine,” said Shane. Imps of incongruity were still cavorting in Dean’s mind when, after leaving Lieutenant Shane, he walked into a restaurant and ordered a late dinner. One must eat even though the heavens fall, and Dean made the best of the necessity. He was in no mood to go back to Top o’ the Hill, and he was glad he had brought his bag along. Of a sudden he had lost all interest in the half-done novel that lay on his cluttered desk at home. The work of his imagination seemed pallid and stale beside the mystifying realities that surrounded him. Dallying over his cigar and coffee, he made several vain efforts to shatter the fog in his mind. At one time he was tempted to leave things as they were, to let Paul Forrester remain dead. If the truth came out; he should once more have to live down his mortifying affair with Beulah Vance, and the resulting publicity would not only he humiliating, but it might damage his professional standing as well. Moreover, it was dangerous to ventilate the dusty corners of the past, The name of Paul Forrester was too intimately associated with an episode that Thomas Dean had long tried to forget. But, on the other hand, he knew that his mind would never be at rest until the mystery of Bamon’t confession had been solved. THE UNSOLVABLE RIDDLE Besides, Dean was rather vexed at his inability to work out a satisfying solution of the riddle. In the seclusion of his workshop at Top o’ the Hill he had pounded out on his typewriter many a mystery as tangled and inscrutable as this one appeared to be, chuckling at the ease with which he conducted his characters in and out of labyrinthine passages, but he had always confessed to himself that he was merely romancing; that such things could not be in a world of hard facts. But for once hard facts had outstripped his imagination, and

this was humiliating. As he himselt had admitted, the theory he had offered Lieutenant Shane suffered from several discrepancies, chief among them being the monogrammed watch and the look of dread with which Lamont had regarded the telephone beside his bed. Time and again he reviewed in his mind the scene that had been enacted in Lamont’s bedroom, but he felt himself slipping into a sea of incongruities whenever he tried to interpret the dying man’s words and actions. Lamont’s mention of the scar on his victim’s neck was the culminating touch of the riddle. So far as external evidence went, it seemed to prove beyond possibility of doubt that the man who had been murdered in the Hudson Street house five and ahalf years ago was Dean himself. He laughed shortly as his mind hurdled this staggering conclusion. From that point on his thoughts drifted into strange, metaphysical realms. Perhaps the explanation was to he found there. He had heard and road of duality, metempsychosis and other things that were only words to him. But thinking along that line seemed to lead nowhere. He would continue his search for a more rational explanation first. But where was he to begin? The confession itself seemed tha logical starting point, but he had already considered it from all possible angles. He had made inquiries which satisfied him in regard to the trust worthiness and professional standing of the alienist who examined Lamont just before the confession was taken down. He had also learned that the notary public who had witnessed the dying man’s signature was a man of unquestioned honesty. Moreover, he had ascertained that the professional standing of Dennis Littleby, Lamont’s host, was excellent in every respect. The confession and the circumstances under which it had been made seemed unassailable from every point of view. Then where was he to make a start? A picture of the drab house on Hudson Street flashed across his mind. It was there the murder had been committed; it was from there the tangled threads of the mystery radiated. Luckily Dean ha'd retained a key to the house and he had brought it with him from Top o’ the Hill that morning, having dredged it out from a jumble of useless odds and ends in his desk drawers. It was just possible that on the scene of the murder he would find something that might shed a little light on the matter. CHAPTER VII. BACK TO THE SCENE OF THE CRIME It was nearly nine o’clock when Dean left the restaurant and took a taxicab for Hudson Street. As he stepped inside the cab a fleeting impression caused him to glance quickly through the little window in the rear. Was he mistaken, or had some one in the passing throng given him a sustained glance? He decided he had either been mistaken, or else the incident was meaningless, and he had quite forgotten it by the time he arrived in the house on Hudson Street. The policeman who had been on duty at the door earlier in the day was no longer there. Evidently the authorities had concluded their investigation as far as the old house was concerned. This relieved Dean’s mind of the possibility of an embar-

witU his key, struck a match, and spent several minutes looking for a light fixture before he realised that the gas must have been turned off long ago. Here was a difficulty, for he could accomplish nothing in the dark, but he recalled that there had been a supply of candles in the pantry back of the kitchen. Luckily they were still there, and he took several of them and went back to the living room. After seeing that the shades were drawn, he lighted the candles and distributed them in advantageous positions, exiling the shadows to the farthest corners. Slowly he let his glance wander over the room. The very air seemed charged with dark hints. It was here, in this memory-environed room witn its musty scents and fading colours that the murder had occurred according to Lamont’s confession. It was from the curiously wrought brass rack beside the fireplace that the murderer had taken the tongs with which he had dealt the deadly blow. Dean’s imagination pictured the swift thrust; he could almost see

the victim crumpling into a twisted heap. His eyes slanting downward, fixed on a point between the old redwood table and the grate. Perhaps it was there the man had fallen after receiving the mortal blow, later being dragged by the murderer to the room under the stairs. The candles that flickered so oddly, as if there were a draught somewhere, seemed to give wings to his imagination. Who could the murdered man have been, and by what strange vagary of destiny had his name been linked with that of Paul Forrester? What mysterious errand had drawn him to the house where he was to meet his doom? And why—Dean’s mind was beginning to spin and whirl anew. He raised his glance and sent it roving over the room. There was dust everywhere, on the table, the chairs, the mantelpiece, the uncarpeted portions of the floor. The air was clogged with it, making breathing difficult. (To be continued on Monday.)

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