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Page 80
Meanwhile I had noticed a bit of by-play between Enid Faye and
Lawrence Millard, the only others of our possible suspects about.
Enid first had caught my eye because she seemed to be pleading
with the writer, trying to hold him. I gathered from the look of
disgust on Millard's face that he wanted to get Shirley out of
the set before Kennedy should observe the heavy man's odd
reaction to the tragedy. While I had never seen Millard and
Shirley together, so as to establish in mind the state of their
feelings toward each other, this would seem to indicate that they
were friendly. Certainly Shirley was making a fool of himself.
Enid acted, I guessed, so as to prevent Millard's interference,
probably with the idea that Millard in some fashion might bring
suspicion upon himself. It struck me that Enid had a wholesome
respect for Kennedy.
At any rate, Millard watched the little scene between Kennedy and
Shirley with a quizzical expression. As Shirley left he shrugged
his shoulders, then he gave Enid's cheeks a playful pinch each
and started out after the heavy man in leisurely fashion.
Just about the same moment Kennedy called me to his side.
"Walter," he pleaded, in a low voice, "will you hurry out to the
dressing room where the doctor and I took Werner and get the
blood smears and sample of the stomach contents? I don't want to
leave this, because we must work fast and get all the data we
need before the police arrive. With perhaps a hundred people to
question they'll be apt to make a fine mess of everything. This
is an outlying precinct where we'll draw the amateurs, you know."
I saw that Mackay was helping him and so I left cheerfully,
making my way as fast as I could toward the door through which
both Shirley and Millard had passed.
In the hallway of the building devoted to dressing rooms I found
that I did not know which one contained Werner's body. This
corridor was familiar. Here Kennedy and I had waited for Marilyn
Loring and had witnessed the scene between Shirley and herself.
Now I did not even remember the location of her room.
At last, on a chance, I tried a door softly. From within came
whispered voices of deep intensity. About to close it quickly, I
realized suddenly that I recognized the speakers in spite of the
whispers. It was Marilyn and Shirley. They were together. Now I
recollected the figured chintz which covered the wall and was to
be seen through the crack made by the open door. It was her room.
They had not heard my hand on the knob, nor the catch, did not
know that anyone could eavesdrop.
"You see!" Her tones were the more vibrant "You waited!"
"I had to!"
"No! I advised you to act at once."
"I couldn't! I can't even now!"
"All right!" Her tone became bitter. "Go ahead, your own way. But
you must count the cost. You may lose me again, Merle Shirley."
"How do you mean?"
Her answer, in the faintest of whispers, staggered me.
"If you have the blood of another man on your hands I'm through."
XXII
THE STEM
Though my hands trembled so that I could hardly control them, I
managed to close the door softly and to back away down the hall
without being discovered. My head was spinning and I was dizzy.
With my own ears I had heard Marilyn Loring virtually betray the
guilt of the man she loved and whom therefore she had tried to
shield. "If you have the blood of another man on your hands--"
What more could Kennedy want?
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