Mark of Murder - Dell Shannon Read Free Page A

feeling well enough to answer a couple
of questions, Mrs. Nestor?" Hackett sat down facing her, got out
his notebook.
    "Oh yes," she said obediently. "Of
course it's been quite a shock, coming so suddenly. I can't realize
it yet."
    Her eyes were a greeny brown, oddly flat and dull.
But she hadn't, he thought, done any crying. Of course that didn't
say anything: some people didn't cry easily.
    "Your husband seems to have been doing very well
here."
    She looked around the waiting room. "Oh yes, he
was, I think. People liked him, I suppose. He put up such a good
appearance, and made people like him. He'd always said he knew he'd
be a success at it, he'd wanted to be a doctor--a real medical
doctor, I mean--but of course this was a shorter course and not so
expensive. Not but what it cost quite a bit at that, it's a four-year
course now."
    "How long had he been in practice?"
    "Oh, only a little over three years."
    Hackett, asking these questions he didn't really care
about, to get her talking, was surprised. This office must have cost
something to rent. "How long had he been here, in this office?"
    "Oh, he started out here. He had--it was
lucky--a legacy about then, and he said it was better to invest it in
the office, because a good front always impressed people."
    "I see. Well, he had an appointment last
evening?"
    She nodded. She spoke flatly, emotionlessly. "He'd
do that for people who couldn't get in during the day. I think it was
for eight o'clock."
    "Did he tell you what time to expect him home?"
    "No."
    "It seems you didn't get really worried until
this morning," said Hackett. "Enough to--investigate. I'm
sorry to ask you, Mrs. Nestor, but was that because he had stayed
away overnight--before?”
    She looked at him thoughtfully, as if really seeing
him for the first time; her expression didn't change at all. She
dabbed at her pale lips with a wadded-up handkerchief and after a
moment said deliberately, "I expect I'd better tell you why.
It's not very pleasant, but I can see you'd have to know. I only hope
it doesn't all have to come out in the papers. That wouldn't be very
nice." She spoke like a woman of some education; but he thought
that, whatever emotions she'd once had, they'd been driven out of
her, or wasted away, somehow, for some time. "Yes, I'm sorry to
have to say it, but he had stayed away like that before, without
telling me."
    "I see. Do you know of any other woman in his
life?"
    Hackett felt like apologizing for the cliché, but
how else would you put it?
    "I wouldn't know any names," she said. "I
didn't know many of Frank's friends. Not any more. I expect I'd
better say how it was, or you'll think that's awfully queer. You see,
my father had quite a lot of money, and that was why Frank married
me. I didn't realize that until Father died and we found he'd lost
all the money some way--I never understood exactly how. Frank
was--very angry about that. I expect he'd have left me then, but he'd
got used to me. And I kept a nice place for him, a comfortable home,
and good meals and so on. And of course as long as he had a wife no
other woman could catch up to him, if you see what I mean. It was
convenient for him. And then, of course, there was Mr. Marlowe.”
    "Who is Mr. Marlowe?”
    She dabbed at her lips again. "He was a friend
of my father's. When--before Frank was doing so well, he'd drop
around sometimes and give me little presents--to see we had enough to
eat, at least." No trace of bitterness in her tone. "And he
lent Frank the money for the chiropractic course. Of course Frank
paid him back."
    "l see. Your husband didn't keep any regular
routine, about coming home?"
    "Oh, you mustn't think we ever quarreled,"
she said. "It was just sort of understood. It wasn't like
that--he was home to dinner most nights, or he'd call if he wasn't
going to be. A few nights a week he'd be out somewhere, and
sometimes--as I say--he wouldn't come home at all, but then he'd
usually go straight to his office, from--wherever