02 The Mad Hatter Mystery by John Dickson Carr

Author:John Dickson Carr [Carr, John Dickson]
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

11

The Little Plaster Dolls

NEVER before that time, Rampole afterwards thought, had he ever seen a man’s naked face. Never had he seen it as for a brief instant he saw Lester Bitton’s face in the mirror. At all times in life there are masks and guards, and in the brain a tiny bell gives warning. But here was a man caught blind in his anguish.

He looked a little like his brother, though his face was inclined to be reddish and have heavy folds. But you could not tell now.

The lost, damned eyes stared back at them from the mirror. His wrist wobbled, and the figure almost slid through his fingers. He took it with his other hand and put it back up on the mantelpiece..

‘Who the hell,’ said Lester Bitton, ‘are you?’

His deep voice was hoarse, and it cracked. That almost finished him, but he fought his nerves. ‘What God damned right have you got to walk in…’

‘Steady,’ said Hadley, quietly. ‘I’m afraid it’s you who have to make an explanation. This flat has been taken over by the police, you know. And I’m afraid we can’t respect private feelings in a murder case. You are Lester Bitton, aren’t you?’

The man’s heavy breathing quieted somewhat, and the wrath died out of his eyes.

‘I am,’ he said in a lower voice. ‘Who are you?’

‘My name is Hadley

‘Ah,’ said the other, ‘I see.’ He was groping backwards, and he found the edge of, a heavy leather chair. Slowly he lowered himself until he was sitting on the arm. Then he made, a gesture. ‘Well, here I am.’

‘What are you doing here, Mr Bitton?’

‘I suppose you don’t know?’ Bitton asked, bitterly. He glanced back over his shoulder, at the smashed figure on the hearthstone.

The chief inspector played his advantage. He studied Bitton without threat and almost without interest. Slowly he opened his brief-case, drew out a typewritten sheet - which was only Constable Somers’ report, as Rampole saw - and glanced at it.

‘We know, of course, that you have employed a firm of private detectives to watch your wife. And - he glanced at the sheet again- ‘that one of their operatives, a Mrs. Larkin, lives directly across the hall from here.’

‘Rather smart, you Scotland Yard men,’ the other observed in an impersonal voice. ‘Well, that’s right. Nothing illegal in that, I suppose. You also know, then, that I don’t need to waste my money any longer.’

‘We know that Mr Driscoll is dead.’

Bitton nodded. His heavy, reddish, rather thickly-lined face was assuming normal appearance.

‘Yes,’ he said, reflectively. ‘The swine’s dead. I heard it when I went home to dinner. But I’m afraid it hasn’t cut my detective agency off from much money. I was intending to pay them off and get rid of them to-morrow. Business conditions being what they are, I couldn’t afford an unnecessary expense.’

‘That, Mr Bitton, is open to two meanings. Which of them do you imply?’

‘Let’s be frank, Mr… er… Hadley. I have played the fool. You know I was having my wife followed.

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