rug?”
“Why, the pattern. The squares, the lines crossing. I saw it.”
“It might be one of a pair. He might be in there now, in the closet or the bathroom.”
“Oh.” He squared his shoulders. “Stand aside.”
“Don’t bother, I looked. He’s gone. He didn’t stay long.” I turned to Jarrell. “You might try the switch. Go and turn it on and we’ll enter.”
He did so. After he was in I shut the door, and when he called to us I pushed it open, and the blaze of light came. I swung the door shut, and the light went, and we crossed to his desk.
“After you saw it on the screen, the rug coming in,” I asked Horland’s, “how long was it before you phoned?”
“Right away. No time at all. I didn’t phone, the other man did, I told him to.”
“How long did it take the call to get through?”
“It got through right away. I was putting on my cap and jacket and getting my gun, and I wasn’t wasting any time, and he had Mr. Jarrell when I left.”
“Then say thirty seconds. Make it a minute, not to skimp. Even two minutes. You answered the phone in your room, Mr. Jarrell?”
“Yes.”
“How long were you on the phone?”
“Only long enough for him to tell me what had happened. Not more than a minute.”
“And you came on the run immediately? Only stopping at my door on the way?”
“You’re damn right I did.”
“Then add another minute. That makes four minutes from the time the rug came in to the time we got here, and probably less, and he was gone. So he didn’t have time for much more than turning off the switch.”
“We ought to find out who it was,” Horland’s said. “While it’s hot.”
He certainly worked his brain, that bird. Obviously it had been a member of the household, and how and when to find out who it was was strictly a family affair. Jarrell didn’t bother to tell him so. He merely gave him a chore, to unlock and open the door of a metal box that was set in the wall facing the entrance. Its door had a round hole for the lens to see through, and inside was the camera. Horland’s took the camera out, extracted the film and put in a new one, returned the camera and locked the door, and departed.
Jarrell regarded me. “You realize it could have been anybody. We may know more when we see the picture. But with that rug in front of her, she could have held it up high with her hands not showing, nothing at all showing, and you couldn’t tell.”
“Yes,” I agreed, “she could. Anybody could. One pronoun is as good as another. As I said, she didn’t have time for much more than turning off the switch, but you might look around. Is any little item missing?”
He moved his head from side to side, got up, went and tried the knobs of the safes, crossed to the battery of cabinets and pulled at the handles of the drawers in the two end tiers, which had locks on them, went and opened the top drawer of Nora Kent’s desk and took a look, and then came back to his own desk and opened the top drawer of it. His face changed immediately. He pulled the drawer wide open, moved things around, and pushed it shut. He looked at me.
“Don’t tell me,” I said. “Let me guess.”
He took a breath. “I keep a gun in there, a Bowdoin thirty-eight. It’s gone. It was there this afternoon.”
“Loaded?”
“Yes.”
“Whoever got it knew you had it. He-I beg your pardon-she came straight to the desk, turned off the switch, grabbed the gun, and ran. That’s all there was time for.”
“Yes.”
“Horland’s was right about one thing. If you want to find out who it was, the sooner the better, while it’s hot. The best way would be to get them all in here, now, and go to it.”
“What good would that do?” His hands were fists. “I know who it was. So do you.”
“I do not.” I shook my head. “Look, Mr. Jarrell. Suspecting her of cheating your son and diddling you, without any evidence, that’s your privilege. But saying that I know she came in here and took a loaded gun, when I don’t, that is not your privilege. Of course you have a permit for it?”
“Certainly.”
“The law says when a gun is stolen it must be reported. It’s a misdemeanor not to. Do you‹want to report it?”
“Good God, no.” The fists relaxed. “How about this? I’ll get her in here, and Wyman too, and I’ll keep them here while you go up and search their rooms. You know how to search a room.”
One of two things, I thought. Either he is sure it was her, for some reason or no reason, or he took it himself and planted it in her room. “No good,” I declared. “If she took it, the last place she would hide it would be in her room. I could find it, of course, in a couple of days, or much quicker if I got help in, but what if it turned up in one of the tubs on the terrace? You’d have the gun back, that’s true, if that’s what you want.”
