Rex Stout_Tecumseh Fox 01 Read Online Free PDF Page A

me and start looking for the damn murderer. They brought me in here to see if you would recognize me as someone who has been prowling around the basement door. Do you?”
    “No.”
    “Have you looked at me long enough?”
    “Yes, thank you.”
    He walked out.
    Miranda’s eyes followed him to the door, then her face returned to the district attorney. “I—” She bit it off and compressed her lips.
    “Yes, Mrs. Pemberton?”
    “I believe him.”
    “Rot.” Her brother snorted. “You have no reason to believe him or disbelieve him either. Maybe he’s a good liar. He certainly knows how to look into a girl’s eyes and hand it out, Sis dear.” He looked at Derwin. “But one thing, I’ve never seen him before.”
    “Have you, Mrs. Pemberton?”
    “No. Never.”
    “Why do you say you believe him?”
    “I do, that’s all.” She shrugged. “And I think—”
    She stopped and he prodded her. “Yes, Mrs. Pemberton?”
    “I think you’re going to find things that will make it more painful than it is now. If I didn’t think you’d find them eventually, I wouldn’t say this, but I think you will. I know you have the impression that I’m cold-blooded about my father’s sudden death, but Ridley Thorpe wasn’t much of a father. He was too busy being a financier and a philanthropist and a great man. The fact is that since Mother died, when I was ten years old, my brother and I have been orphans except that we have had our bills paid. But I knew my father a good deal better than he knew me, because I was interested in him—at least I used to be—and he was never interested in me. And what I think you’re going to find out eventually, if a murder is investigated the way it’s supposed to be, is that he didn’t have that bungalow for seclusion with Luke and his thoughts. He had it for—I mustn’t shock you, I suppose—for secret female companionship.”
    “Good lord!” her brother blurted incredulously. “Him?”
    “Yes, Jeff, him,” she declared imperturbably. “I knew him a lot better than you did and I’m a woman myself. He didn’t want to be bound by marriage again, because he was too selfish to be bound by anything, and open philandering would have been bad for his reputation as a national ornament, but he was by no means devoid of carnality. I’m not saying tritely find the woman; I just predict you’ll find out things about that bungalow if you really try, instead of puttingit on to this Grant man because by bad luck the poor devil—”
    “Excuse me,” Derwin put in a little less patiently. “I assure you, Mrs. Pemberton, we’re not putting it on to any one. Every angle is being thoroughly investigated. The New York police are cooperating from that end. An intensive search is being made for the three people who have disappeared: Luke Wheer, Nancy Grant, this man’s niece, and Vaughn Kester, your father’s confidential secretary. We’re not putting it on to Grant, though I repeat that the evidence against him is strong. He was there, right there when the shots were fired. There is no evidence that any one else was, except Luke Wheer. He was a disgruntled employee, fired from his job. And he has been caught in a lie regarding the time he got there. The servants at the New York residence, and others, have corroborated what you and your brother told me about your father’s invariable custom of listening to Dick Barry’s broadcast every evening from eleven to eleven-thirty. So Grant lied and his niece, too. But we’re not neglecting other angles. For one thing and perhaps the most important, where’s Vaughn Kester? Possibly he could tell us things about Grant that we don’t know. And where the devil is he? Has he been murdered too? Colonel Brissenden thinks so. Regarding your surmise about your father’s—uh—his weekends in that bungalow—yes, Bolan?”
    The man who talked nasally closed the door behind him, approached, stopped and cleared his throat. “Excuse me,” he said,