Read Online The Cases of Hildegarde Withers by Stuart Palmer - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Stuart Palmer
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Elleston, remember?”
Hamish still leaned over the painting, but his hand stopped in midair.
“You see,” Miss Withers continued conversationally, “Brotherly had to use a magnifying glass in his comparison of the photograph with the prints in the pigment of that picture. The glass was broken in his struggle with the murderer, ground underfoot. Police found some fragments in the dead man’s rubber heels, found others on the showroom floor. Enough to make a complete lens, except for one missing piece. Pearls may be planted in a man’s overcoat pocket, but you can’t fake the evidence of glass splinters. So if these bits in your rubber heels should happen to match … ”
She didn’t need to go on. Hamish’s eagle-face was sleepy no longer. He turned on the stool, and there was a gun in his hand.
“I was afraid that I didn’t make the story stick,” he admitted. “But it was worth trying. Don’t move, Inspector. I’m a fair shot.” He took the picture from the easel, tucked it under his arm.
“Just sit tight,” he said evenly. “I only want to exit. Want to come, Bianca?”
She looked at him as she might have at a lizard. “I thought you were innocent!” she cried.
He shrugged. “Sorry to disillusion you.” Hamish stopped.
“Dear me, but this is a situation,” Hamish paused to say. “I need at least ten minutes, and somehow I don’t think you’ll be sporting enough to give me a head start. Perhaps I ought to shoot one of you, so you’ll be busy calling a m bulances?”
“You can’t get by with this, Hamish!” Piper exploded.
“Yes? And why?”
“Ask the man who stands in the doorway behind you!”
Louis Hamish didn’t bat an eye, the gun kept steady. “An old trick, quite unworthy of you, Inspector.” He took another step back …
He had stepped into the arms of a tall young man in uniform, who held him neatly while the inspector swung a cruelly efficient fist to the pit of his stomach. And then it was over; handcuffs changed hands.
“I had to come back, Bee,” Johnny Robbins was saying, “to tell you I was sorry for saying … ” She seemed to be sorry, too, and glad.
“What I want to know is,” Piper demanded of the schoolteacher, “where you got those shoes! Without them we’d be nowhere.”
“Exactly, Oscar.” Miss Withers picked up the painting from the floor, dusted it off, and replaced it on the easel. “But I have a confession to make. The shoes aren’t Hamish’s and they haven’t any glass splinters in them. I bought them at the shoe shop on the corner, but they served just as well.”
The expression on the face of Mr. Louis Hamish, as the schoolteacher said later, was worth the whole trouble of the case. It was really too bad that Bianca Riley and her soldier weren’t noticing anything at the moment.
The End
The Riddle o f t he Doctor’s Double
“ A ND people think they must go to the country to find peace and quiet!” Inspector Oscar Piper gestured toward the lonely curves of Riverside Drive, glistening wet under the street lamps.
It was well after midnight, an unwonted hour for both the grizzled Inspector and the angular school teacher who was his best friend and severest critic. But Miss Hildegarde Withers had finally persuaded him to attend a performance of chamber music, for the good of his soul, and it had continued late.
“Manhattan is never really quiet or peaceful, Oscar,” Miss Withers told him. “Sometimes it is hushed — but only with the hush that comes just before the crescendo movement of a Wagnerian opera.”
Suddenly a light flashed on in the second story window of a sober brownstone house.
“There, Oscar!” said the school teacher. “If we only knew what scene is being played in that lighted room above us! Perhaps it is a lovers’ meeting, or a bitter quarrel. Perhaps an assassin waits … ”
The Inspector snorted.
“I can imagine what’s going on in that house because I know the place and the old codger who
Hamish still leaned over the painting, but his hand stopped in midair.
“You see,” Miss Withers continued conversationally, “Brotherly had to use a magnifying glass in his comparison of the photograph with the prints in the pigment of that picture. The glass was broken in his struggle with the murderer, ground underfoot. Police found some fragments in the dead man’s rubber heels, found others on the showroom floor. Enough to make a complete lens, except for one missing piece. Pearls may be planted in a man’s overcoat pocket, but you can’t fake the evidence of glass splinters. So if these bits in your rubber heels should happen to match … ”
She didn’t need to go on. Hamish’s eagle-face was sleepy no longer. He turned on the stool, and there was a gun in his hand.
“I was afraid that I didn’t make the story stick,” he admitted. “But it was worth trying. Don’t move, Inspector. I’m a fair shot.” He took the picture from the easel, tucked it under his arm.
“Just sit tight,” he said evenly. “I only want to exit. Want to come, Bianca?”
She looked at him as she might have at a lizard. “I thought you were innocent!” she cried.
He shrugged. “Sorry to disillusion you.” Hamish stopped.
“Dear me, but this is a situation,” Hamish paused to say. “I need at least ten minutes, and somehow I don’t think you’ll be sporting enough to give me a head start. Perhaps I ought to shoot one of you, so you’ll be busy calling a m bulances?”
“You can’t get by with this, Hamish!” Piper exploded.
“Yes? And why?”
“Ask the man who stands in the doorway behind you!”
Louis Hamish didn’t bat an eye, the gun kept steady. “An old trick, quite unworthy of you, Inspector.” He took another step back …
He had stepped into the arms of a tall young man in uniform, who held him neatly while the inspector swung a cruelly efficient fist to the pit of his stomach. And then it was over; handcuffs changed hands.
“I had to come back, Bee,” Johnny Robbins was saying, “to tell you I was sorry for saying … ” She seemed to be sorry, too, and glad.
“What I want to know is,” Piper demanded of the schoolteacher, “where you got those shoes! Without them we’d be nowhere.”
“Exactly, Oscar.” Miss Withers picked up the painting from the floor, dusted it off, and replaced it on the easel. “But I have a confession to make. The shoes aren’t Hamish’s and they haven’t any glass splinters in them. I bought them at the shoe shop on the corner, but they served just as well.”
The expression on the face of Mr. Louis Hamish, as the schoolteacher said later, was worth the whole trouble of the case. It was really too bad that Bianca Riley and her soldier weren’t noticing anything at the moment.
The End
The Riddle o f t he Doctor’s Double
“ A ND people think they must go to the country to find peace and quiet!” Inspector Oscar Piper gestured toward the lonely curves of Riverside Drive, glistening wet under the street lamps.
It was well after midnight, an unwonted hour for both the grizzled Inspector and the angular school teacher who was his best friend and severest critic. But Miss Hildegarde Withers had finally persuaded him to attend a performance of chamber music, for the good of his soul, and it had continued late.
“Manhattan is never really quiet or peaceful, Oscar,” Miss Withers told him. “Sometimes it is hushed — but only with the hush that comes just before the crescendo movement of a Wagnerian opera.”
Suddenly a light flashed on in the second story window of a sober brownstone house.
“There, Oscar!” said the school teacher. “If we only knew what scene is being played in that lighted room above us! Perhaps it is a lovers’ meeting, or a bitter quarrel. Perhaps an assassin waits … ”
The Inspector snorted.
“I can imagine what’s going on in that house because I know the place and the old codger who
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