The Roman hat mystery A problem in deduction
and my slate’s clean. You can put that in your pipe and smoke it!”
The Inspector took a pinch of snuff, as if the woman’s reference
to the vile weed had reminded him of his favorite vice. He said:
“That’s fair enough,” in dulcet tones. “Here you are, a lonely woman
suddenly tumbled out of bed in the middle of the night—you _were_ in
bed, weren’t you—?”
“Sure I was,” she flashed instantly, then bit her lip.
“—And confronted by a policeman.... I don’t wonder you were frightened,
my dear.”
“I was not!” she said shrilly.
“We’ll not argue about it,” rejoined the old man benevolently. “But
certainly you have no objection to telling me your name?”
“I don’t know why I should, but I can’t see any harm in it,” retorted
the woman. “My name is Angela Russo—Mrs. Angela Russo—and I’m, well,
I’m engaged to Mr. Field.”
“I see,” said Queen gravely. “Mrs. Angela Russo and you are engaged
to Mr. Field. Very good! And what were you doing in these rooms last
night, Mrs. Angela Russo?”
“None of your business!” she said coolly. “You’d better let me go now—I
haven’t done a thing out of the way. You’ve got no right to jabber at
me, old boy!”
Ellery, in a corner peering out of the window, smiled. The Inspector
leaned over and took the woman’s hand gently.
“My dear Mrs. Russo,” he said, “believe me—there is every reason in the
world why we should be anxious to know what you were doing here last
night. Come now—tell me.”
“I won’t open my mouth till I know what you’ve done with Monte!” she
cried, shaking off his hand. “If you’ve got him, why are you pestering
me? I don’t know anything.”
“Mr. Field is in a very safe place at the moment,” snapped the
Inspector, rising. “I’ve given you plenty of rope, madam. Monte Field
is dead.”
“Monte—Field—is—” The woman’s lips moved mechanically. She leaped to
her feet, clutching the _negligée_ to her plump figure, staring at
Queen’s impassive face.
She laughed shortly and threw herself back on the bed. “Go on—you’re
taking me for a ride,” she jeered.
“I’m not accustomed to joking about death,” returned the old man with
a little smile. “I assure you that you may take my word for it—Monte
Field is dead.” She was staring up at him, her lips moving soundlessly.
“And what is more, Mrs. Russo, he has been murdered. Perhaps now you’ll
deign to answer my questions. Where were you at a quarter to ten last
night?” he whispered in her ear, his face close to hers.
Mrs. Russo relaxed limply on the bed, a dawning fright in her large
eyes. She gaped at the Inspector, found little comfort in his face and
with a cry whirled to sob into the rumpled pillow. Queen stepped back
and spoke in a low tone to Piggott, who had come into the room a moment
before. The woman’s heaving sobs subsided suddenly. She sat up, dabbing
her face with a lace handkerchief. Her eyes were strangely bright.
“I get you now,” she said in a quiet voice. “I was right here in this
apartment at a quarter to ten last night.”
“Can you prove that, Mrs. Russo?” asked Queen, fingering his snuff-box.
“I can’t prove anything and I don’t have to,” she returned dully. “But
if you’re looking for an alibi, the doorman downstairs must have seen
me come into the building at about nine-thirty.”
“We can easily check that up,” admitted Queen. “Tell me—why did you
come here last night at all?”
“I had an appointment with Monte,” she explained lifelessly. “He
called me up at my own place yesterday afternoon and we made a date for
last night. He told me he’d be out on business until about ten o’clock,
and I was to wait here for him. I come up”—she paused and continued
brazenly—“I come up quite often like that. We generally have a little
‘time’ and spend the evening together. Being engaged—you know.”
“Ummm. I see, I see.” The Inspector cleared his throat in some
embarrassment. “And then, when he didn’t come on time—?”
“I thought he might’ve been detained longer than he’d figured. So
I—well, I felt tired and took a little nap.”
“Very good,” said Queen quickly. “Did he tell you where he was going,
or the nature of his business?”
“No.”
“I should be greatly obliged to you, Mrs. Russo,” said the Inspector
carefully, “if you would tell me what Mr. Field’s attitude was toward
theatre-going.”
The woman looked at him curiously. She seemed to be recovering her
spirits. “Didn’t go very often,” she snapped. “Why?”
The Inspector beamed. “Now, that’s a question, isn’t it?” he asked. He
motioned to Hagstrom, who pulled a notebook out of his pocket.
“Could you give me a list of Mr. Field’s personal friends?” resumed
Queen. “And any business acquaintances you might know of?”
Mrs. Russo put her hands behind her head, coquettishly. “To tell the
truth,” she said sweetly, “I don’t know any. I met Monte about six
months ago at a masque-ball in the Village. We’ve kept our engagement
sort of quiet, you see. In fact, I’ve never met his friends at all....
I don’t think,” she confided, “I don’t think Monte had many friends.
And of course I don’t know a thing about his business associates.”
“What was Field’s financial condition, Mrs. Russo?”
“Trust a woman to know those things!” she retorted, completely restored
to her flippant manner. “Monte was always a good spender. Never seemed
to run out of cash. He’s spent five hundred a night on me many a time.
That was Monte—a damned good sport. Tough luck for him!—poor darling.”
She wiped a tear from her eye, sniffing hastily.
“But—his bank account?” pursued the Inspector firmly.
Mrs. Russo smiled. She seemed to possess an inexhaustible fund of
shifting emotions. “Never got nosey,” she said. “As long as Monte was
treating me square it wasn’t any of my business. At least,” she added,
“he wouldn’t tell me, so what did I care?”
“Where were you, Mrs. Russo,” came Ellery’s indifferent tones,
“_before_ nine-thirty last night?”
She turned in surprise at the new voice. They measured each other
carefully, and something like warmth crept into her eyes. “I don’t
know who you are, mister, but if you want to find out ask the lovers
in Central Park. I was taking a little stroll in the Park—all by my
lonesome—from about half-past seven until the time I reached here.”
“How fortunate!” murmured Ellery. The Inspector hastily went to the
door, crooking his finger at the other three men. “We’ll leave you now
to dress, Mrs. Russo. That will be all for the present.” She watched
quizzically as they filed out. Queen, last, shut the door after a
fatherly glance at her face.
In the living-room the four men proceeded to make a hurried but
thorough search. At the Inspector’s command Hagstrom and Piggott
went through the drawers of a carved desk in one corner of the room.
Ellery was interestedly riffling the pages of the book on character
through handwriting. Queen prowled restlessly about, poking his head
into a clothes-closet just inside the room, off the foyer. This
was a commodious storage compartment for clothes—assorted topcoats,
overcoats, capes and the like hung from a rack. The Inspector rifled
the pockets. A few miscellaneous articles—handkerchiefs, keys, old
personal letters, wallets—came to light. These he put to one side. A
top shelf held several hats.
“Ellery—hats,” he grunted.
Ellery quickly crossed the room, stuffing into his pocket the book he
had been reading. His father pointed out the hats meaningly; together
they reached up to examine them. There were four—a discolored Panama,
two fedoras, one gray and one brown, and a derby. All bore the imprint
of Browne Bros.
The two men turned the hats over in their hands. Both noticed
immediately that three of them had no linings—the Panama and the two
fedoras. The fourth hat, an excellent derby, Queen examined critically.
He felt the lining, turned down the leather sweat-band, then shook his
head.
“To tell the truth, Ellery,” he said slowly, “I’ll be switched if I
know why I should expect to find clues in these hats. We know that
Field wore a tophat last night and obviously it would be impossible for
that hat to be in these rooms. According to our findings the murderer
was still in the theatre when we arrived. Ritter was down here by
eleven o’clock. The hat therefore _couldn’t_ have been brought to this
place. For that matter, what earthly reason would the murderer have for
such an action, even if it were physically possible for him to do it?
He must have realized that we would search Field’s apartment at once.
No, I guess I’m feeling a little off-color, Ellery. There’s nothing to
be squeezed out of these hats.” He threw the derby back onto the shelf
disgustedly.
Ellery stood thoughtful and unsmiling. “You’re right enough, dad; these
hats mean nothing. But I have the strangest feeling.... By the
way!” He straightened up and took off his pince-nez. “Did it occur to
you last night that something else belonging to Field might have been
missing besides the hat?”
“I wish they were all as easy to answer as that,” said Queen grimly.
“Certainly—a walking-stick. But what could I do about that? Working on
the premise that Field brought one with him—it would have been simple
enough for some one who had entered the theatre without a walking-stick
to leave the theatre with Field’s. And how could we stop him or
identify the stick? So I didn’t even bother thinking about it. And if
it’s still on the Roman premises, Ellery, it will keep—no fear about
that.”
Ellery chuckled. “I should be able to quote Shelley or Wordsworth
at this point,” he said, “in proof of my admiration for your mental
prowess. But I can’t think of a more poetical phrase than ‘You’ve put
one over on me.’ Because I didn’t think of it until just now. But
here’s the point: there is no cane of any kind in the closet. A man
like Field, had he possessed a swanky halberd to go with evening dress,
would most certainly have owned other sticks to match other costumes.
That fact—unless we find sticks in the bedroom closet, which I doubt,
since all the overclothes seem to be here—that fact, therefore,
eliminates the possibility that Field had a stick with him last night.
_Ergo_—we may forget all about it.”
“Good enough, El,” returned the Inspector absently. “I hadn’t thought
of that. Well—let’s see how the boys are getting on.”
They walked across the room to where Hagstrom and Piggott were rifling
the desk. A small pile of papers and notes had accumulated on the lid.
“Find anything interesting?” asked Queen.
“Not a thing of value that I can see, Inspector,” answered Piggott.
“Just the usual stuff—some letters, chiefly from this Russo woman,
and pretty hot too!—a lot of bills and receipts and things like that.
Don’t think you’ll find anything here.”
Queen went through the papers. “No, nothing much,” he admitted.
“Well, let’s get on.” They restored the papers to the desk. Piggott
and Hagstrom rapidly searched the room. They tapped furniture, poked
beneath cushions, picked up the rug—a thorough, workmanlike job. As
Queen and Ellery stood silently watching, the bedroom door opened. Mrs.
Russo appeared, saucily appareled in a brown walking-suit and toque.
She paused at the door, surveying the scene with wide, innocent eyes.
The two detectives proceeded with their search without looking up.
“What are they doing, Inspector?” she inquired in a languid tone.
“Looking for pretty-pretties?” But her eyes were keen and interested.
“That was remarkably rapid dressing for a female, Mrs. Russo,” said the
Inspector admiringly. “Going home?”
Her glance darted at him. “Sure thing,” she answered, looking away.
“And you live at—?”
She gave an address on MacDougal Street in Greenwich Village.
“Thank you,” said Queen courteously, making a note. She began to walk
across the room. “Oh, Mrs. Russo!” She turned. “Before you go—perhaps