Inspector Queen’s Own Case by Ellery Queen Read Free Book Online Page B

an infant? Anyway, it will do the woman good. These rich mothers! Now you stop this foolishness—no, I’ll wash the dishes, and you’re going to sit on your fanny and talk to me. By the way, how do you keep your figure? You eat like a horse!”
    Belle Berman had a few friends in after dinner, and Jessie tried hard to catch up on hospital gossip and join in the good-natured character assassination of certain doctors and nurses they all knew. But as the evening wore on she grew more and more restless. Finally, she jumped up.
    â€œBelle, I know you’re going to think I’m menopausal or something, but would you mind very much if I change our plans and I don’t stay overnight after all?”
    â€œJessie Sherwood.”
    â€œWell, I can’t bear the thought of my precious lamb being mishandled by that woman,” Jessie said fiercely. “Or suppose she got really sick today? Those maids don’t know one end of a baby from the other. If I leave now and take a cab, I can catch the 11:05 …”
    She just made the train. The trip was stifling and miserable. Jessie lolled all the way in a sickish stupor, dozing.
    It was a few minutes past midnight when she got off at the Taugus station and unlocked her car. Even here the night was a humid swelter, and the inside of the Dodge was like an oven. She rolled down the windows, but she did not wait for the car to cool off. She drove off at once, head throbbing.
    She thought Charlie Peterson would never come out of the gatehouse. He finally appeared, yawning.
    â€œWhat a night,” he said, slapping at the mosquitoes.
    â€œYes.”
    â€œHot in town, too, Miss Sherwood?”
    â€œBeastly.”
    â€œAt least you could go to an air-cooled movie. What makes this job so tough is having to look at this damn water while you’re boiling to death——”
    â€œI have such a headache,” Jessie murmured. “Would you please let me through, Mr. Peterson?”
    â€œSorry!” He raised the barrier, offended.
    Jessie drove up the Nair Island road, sighing. Now that she was here, it all seemed rather silly. The Humffrey house up ahead was dark. If the baby were sick or wakeful the house would be blazing with lights. Mrs. Humffrey took it for granted that her employes were delighted to share her troubles and got them all out of bed the moment anything went wrong. Well, this was one night when none of them was going to be disturbed. She’d leave the car just inside the grounds and let herself in the front door quietly and tiptoe upstairs and go to bed. The sound of the car going around the driveway to the garage might wake someone up.
    Jessie turned off her ignition, locked the car, and groped toward the front of the house. She located the key in her bag by touch, let herself in, shut the door carefully, felt around until she found the newel post, and climbed the stairs, grateful for the heavy carpeting.
    Then, at the door of her room, after all her caution, she dropped her purse. In the silence of the dark house it sounded like a bomb going off.
    Jessie was feeling around on all fours, trying to locate the purse and keep her head from falling, too, when a whiplash voice a few feet away said, “Don’t move.”
    â€œOh, dear,” Jessie said with an exasperated laugh. “It’s only me, Mr. Humffrey. I’m sorry.”
    A light flashed on her.
    â€œMiss Sherwood.” As her eyes accommodated to the glare she saw his robed figure utterly still, a flashlight in one hand and a gun in the other. “I thought you were spending the night in New York.”
    Jessie plucked her purse from the floor, feeling like a fool. “I changed my mind, Mr. Humffrey. I developed a headache, and the city was so hot …”
    Why did he keep the gun pointing at her that way?
    â€œAlton! What is it?”
    â€œOh, dear,” Jessie said again. She wished he would lower the gun.
    Light flooded the