Read Online The Cases of Susan Dare by Mignon G. Eberhart - Free Book Online Page B

the astral body,” said Caroline suddenly into the silence, “couldn’t have talked. And I heard Marie speak. She was in Jessica’s room, and the door was closed, and I heard her talking to Jessica. And then—that’s what’s queer—I went straight on past the door and into Marie’s room, and there was Marie sitting there. Isn’t it queer?”
    “Why were you frightened?”
    “Because—because—” Caroline’s hands twisted together. “I don’t know why. Except that I had a—a feeling.”
    “Nonsense.” Jessica laughed. There was again the luminous flash in her shadowed eyes, and she spoke more rapidly than usual. “You see, Susan Dare, how nonsensical all this is. How utterly fantastic!”
    “There was Marie,” said Caroline. “She was talking to you.”
    Jessica’s silks rustled, and she walked rigidly and quickly to Caroline and leaned over so that she could grip Caroline’s shoulder and force Caroline to meet her eyes. David tried to intervene, and she brushed him away and said hoarsely:
    “Caroline, you poor little fool. You thought you’d get this young woman here and try to establish your innocence of the crime. All this talk is sheer nonsense. You are cunning after the way of fools such as you. Tell me this, Caroline—” She paused long enough to take a great gasp of breath. She was more powerful, more invincible than Susan had seen her. “Tell me. Where was David when the revolver was fired?”
    Caroline was shrinking backward. David said quickly: “She’ll say anything to protect me. She’ll say anything, and you—”
    “Be quiet, David. Caroline, answer me.”
    “He was at the door of his room,” said Caroline.
    For a long moment Jessica waited. Then with terrible deliberation she relaxed her grip and straightened and looked slowly from one to the other.
    “You’ve as good as confessed, Carrie,” she said. “There was no one else. You admit that it was not David. Why did you kill her, Carrie?”
    “She didn’t kill her!” David was between the two women, his face white and his eyes blazing, “It was you, Jessica. You—”
    “ David ! Stop !” The two sharp exclamations were like lashes. “I was here in this room when the shot was fired. I didn’t kill Marie. I couldn’t have killed her. You know that. Come, Caroline.”
    She put her gray hand upon Caroline’s shoulder. Caroline, as if mesmerized by that touch, arose, and Jessica turned to the doorway. No one moved as the two women crossed the room. Jim Byrne glanced at Susan unrevealingly and then, at Jessica’s imperious gesture, opened the door. Susan was vaguely aware that there were men in the hall outside, but she was held as if enchanted by the extraordinary scene she was witnessing.
    No one moved, and there was no sound save the rustle of Jessica’s silks while she led Caroline to the stairway. At the bottom step Jessica turned, and there was suddenly something less harsh in her face; it was for an instant almost kind, and there was a queer sort of tenderness in the pressure of her hand upon Caroline’s shrinking shoulder.
    But that hand was nevertheless compelling.
    “Go upstairs,” she said to Caroline, in a voice loud enough so that they all heard. “Go upstairs and do what is necessary. There’s enough veronal on my dresser. We’ll give you time.”
    She turned as if to barricade the stairway with her own rigid body and. looked slowly and defiantly around her. “I’ll make them give you time, Carrie. Go on. ”
    There was the complete and utter silence of sheer horror. And in that silence something small and gray and quick flashed down from the curtain and up the stairs.
    “Holy Mother,” cried someone. “What was that?”
    And David sprang forward.
    “You can’t do that—you can’t do that! Caroline, don’t move—” Susan knew that he was thrusting himself between Jessica and Caroline, that there was sudden confusion. But she was mainly aware of something that had clicked in her own