I sat there for as short a spell as I politely could. It was a cluttered room, overawed by the biggest grand piano I ever saw; you had to edge past the piano bench to get to the front of the room where the tables and chairs were.
“Me and Mrs. Garr, we’re taking us a trip!” Mrs. Halloran told me grandly the news I had been called in to hear. “We’re going to Chicago for the excursion on Memor’yal Day!”
I said that was lovely. The two girls went out into the hall, where they sat on the black chair whispering to each other and furtively sniggering; I wondered if everyone attached to Mrs. Garr was as unpleasant as the Hallorans.
Mrs. Halloran was full of excited plans, but Mrs. Garr, I noticed, mostly kept silent, looking at me, looking at Mrs. Halloran. She nodded, now and again. That was all the cooperation Mrs. Hallo-ran’s conversation needed.
During that evening and the next day I heard either Mrs. Halloran or Mrs. Garr telling everyone in the house about the trip, in detail.
I wondered about it, mildly. Except for that one movie, which had had such burglarious results, and for quick trips to the grocer’s when she couldn’t get someone to go for her, I had never known Mrs. Garr to leave the house. She brooded over that house, I’d thought, like a hen over chickens. And now she was calmly leaving it for four days.
“That shows you,” I said to myself. “You’re a hot psychologist, you are.”
Mrs. Garr and Mrs. Halloran were leaving Friday night. I went down cellar early Thursday morning, to pay my rent.
Even at eight thirty Mrs. Garr was already established in her rocker near the furnace. The five-dollar bill I gave her was badly worn, I remember; it had been torn almost an inch at one end, in the lateral crease. Mrs. Garr said something about people not having decent respect for money. She went limping off to her kitchen to get the change, said:
“Don’t you plan too wild parties for when I’m gone, now.”
That was all. Nothing unusual, nothing strange.
We worked until almost seven o’clock at Benson’s that Friday night; they were right in the middle of their Anniversary Sale. Hilda Crosley and I—Hilda was the other copywriter—stayed downtown for dinner because it was so late, then went to see After the Dark Man for fifteen cents at the Lido, which is about a tenth-run movie house, but gets all the good pictures in the end.
The hall at Mrs. Garr’s house was as dark as usual when I stepped into it about ten o’clock that evening. I’d no sooner stepped in than something light and small came hurtling down the stairs from the second floor.
I turned the light switch and bent to peer under the bookcase. Sure enough, the green eyes of the gray cat stared out at me; it was her favorite hideout. A minute later, someone ran downstairs. Mr. Buffingham.
“Good evening,” I said. I was particularly nice to him now, whenever I saw him.
“Hello,” he said.
“One of the cats is loose,” I told him. “Mrs. Garr must have forgotten to lock her in the kitchen before she went. She told me she was going to lock them in with food enough to last until she got back.”
Mr. Buffingham shrugged. “I guess she couldn’t have caught this one. I nearly fell over her upstairs.”
“But this is the one that—my goodness, I should think she’d be especially careful to get this one in, because she may have kittens anytime, and you know how cats are about picking the best sofa. Do you think we ought to try to get her in the basement room?”
“Why should we worry? Mrs. Tewman’ll feed her.”
“Well . . .” I said; then, “Of course it isn’t any of my business, either,” and went on into my rooms.
I was dead tired and had another hard day coming; I was going to have eight pages of proofs to read next day. I went to bed right away but was too dead tired to sleep.
With Mrs. Garr gone the house felt different. Almost empty, in spite of the people I knew were upstairs. It seemed to me there were more noises than usual, too. Someone stayed an unconscionable time in the bathroom, right over my head. Later on I thought I heard footsteps too stealthy to be real, first coming down from upstairs, then going on to the cellar, footsteps so slow they took twenty minutes for the trip.
But there were always noises in the cellar, of course; the animals were down there. Occasionally the dog would grumble, and once he barked quite sharply for a while.
After that, I was just dropping off to sleep when I suddenly found myself lying tense with my eyes staring wide.
This time I knew I had heard unusual sounds. Quiet, furtive sounds at the back of the house.
Then, almost as if it were directly under me, a sharp plink!
It was a late May night, clear and quiet. No wind. My windows were open from the top. There wasn’t any doubt of it. Someone was fiddling around at the back of the house.
That was getting to be too much.
If anyone was really prowling around Mrs. Garr’s house—well, I was going to find out if my imagination was working overtime or what.
I wrapped my negligee around me, clicked on my light, slipped quietly to my back door. The bolt made a tiny whine when I pushed it back.
There were basement windows below the back porch both to the right and to the left; it was from one of those that I thought the sound must have come. I leaned to the right over the rail to peer at that window.
What happened next was incredibly quick.
I tried to scream but couldn’t. The hands were too soon on my throat.
I hadn’t heard a sound. I’d had no feeling of a body
