The Hand in the Glove by Rex Stout

Author:Rex Stout [Stout, Rex]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2011-11-01T17:12:47+00:00

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CHAPTER 10

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Luncheon, naturally, was a complete failure socially, and not a marked success biologically; plates went back with rejected contents far in excess of the politeness percentage. Meals are the times above all others for household solidarity, not only as a preservative of civilization, but also for digestion’s sake; and they can be horrible and dismal affairs when hostility or apprehension or any acute disruptive emotion has invaded the breasts of the partakers. They were all present, even Mrs. Storrs, and including Martin Foltz, who had apparently not taken advantage of the permission given him to go home. The hostess informed them that Mr. Sherwood and Colonel Brissenden had declined her invitation and gone to Ogowoc, but would return shortly.

They were eating in the shadow of death, but not with the reliquiae under the roof with them; the body of P. L. Storrs had been taken to Bridgeport for an autopsy.

The ordeal over, Dol got away and outdoors again, alone. Forlornly, without any expectation of the event, she intended nevertheless to satisfy herself regarding the phenomenon which she had finally dragged into memory. Once more she took the path to the kennels, turned aside at the gap in the hedge, entered the vegetable garden and followed the central path to the other end where the compost heaps were. Glances both ways had assured her that for the moment no one else was exercising any curiosity regarding this part of the grounds; nobody was in sight.

She stood and looked at the compost heap in recent use. It did not appear to have been disturbed since she had seen it three hours previously; there were the corn husks, the spoiled tomatoes, cabbage leaves and roots, celery and carrot tops, the little pile of pink and unripe watermelon meat…

She didn’t want to walk onto the mess, nor did she wish to disturb it. Lifting her skirt, she stepped on top of the low brick wall enclosing the heap, and edged around it, bending over, peering. She went clear around, inspecting every inch, arriving at the other side and jumping back to the ground. She stood frowning, thinking, “Of course I’m a fool. Probably they forked this thing over before I was here this morning and covered up the rind. But the fact remains that that’s not more than a fourth of a watermelon, and it’s not ripe, and there’s not a speck of rind or the white part in sight. If somebody tried one and threw it away… anyhow, what the dickens, what else have I got to do?”

She returned along the central path, near its middle turned left, and stood surveying the patch of watermelon vines. It was a mat of luxuriant foliage perhaps sixty feet square, with here and there, for a sharp eye, a glimpse of the rounded, rich green top of a melon. She saw that she could expect no hint from displaced vines or trampled leaves or stems, because those signs of recent disturbance

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