The Cases of Hildegarde Withers Read Free Page A

Pender girl was shot around 6.
    “Would you care to make any changes or additions to your statement?” the schoolteacher prodded. Parkhill didn’t answer, but stared at the fire. Finally he shook his head.
    But the schoolteacher stood up. “You’d better change your story, ” s he advised the doctor. “I see you’ve burned the gloves that Elsie Pender wore when she shot herself. How about the real suicide note?”
    He was on his feet suddenly. “Yes, I burned that too! So what are going to do about it!”
    Miss Withers heaved a deep sigh. But the man went on. “Sure, I was in the dark room, and I heard a shot outside. I came out, and there she was, with a scribbled note blaming it all on Paul. I knew the girl was a manic depressive — she threw acid on herself last year because some movie star she’d never met wouldn’t accept her proposal of marriage. She had a terrific crush on Paul — but I saw a chance to get back at him for keeping me in the background all these years. I just Substituted a phony note for the real one, and clean new gloves for the ones she’d worn — ”
    “Next time,” said Miss Withers gently, “remember that a girl with good taste in clothes would never wear black gloves with a dark brown suit. That was the big mistake you made — ”
    Parkhill didn’t seem worried. “I know where I stand,” he said. “You can’t pin much on me. Two or three years, for concealing evidence … ”
    “That’s right,” the Inspector agreed. They were all standing up now, and Miss Withers edged toward the door. “You have it all figured out, Parkhill, ” Piper was continuing. “Only you forgot one thing. The Pender girl was shot twice — the first one missed the heart, but the second one hit dead center. Her own attempt wouldn’t have been fatal, but you picked up the gun and — ”
    It was a forceful, dramatic delivery, but ill-timed. Because suddenly, from underneath the sofa cushion beside him, Parkhill produced a nasty little snubnosed automatic.
    The Inspector froze and Miss Hildegarde Withers fainted. Or seemed to faint. Anyway, she slumped back against the wall with a heart-rending shriek, and perhaps it was only by blind luck that she hit the light switch and threw the room into comparative darkness.
    The gun spat twice, and then went sailing against the farther wall as Oscar Piper kicked it out of the doctor’s hand. Miss Withers put the lights on and all lights went out for Dr. Parkhill, over whose head the Inspector crashed the butt of his own gun.
     
    “I get the whole thing, ” Piper was saying, as they sat in a night coffee pot a block from Headquarters. “Except one thing. Why did you make me send out a broadcast for this Vaughan kid? We picked him and his parents up and made them madder than wet hens, all for nothing.”
    “Corinne wasn’t with him, then?”
    Th e Inspector shook his head. “With him! Listen, that gal’s been busier than a one-armed paperhanger. She’s retained a criminal lawyer and the Pinkertons in behalf of her precious Doc Severance, called up two senators and an assemblyman, and practically kicked down the front door of the Tombs.” He sighed. “All between nine and eleven p.m.”
    “I knew she loved him,” murmured Hildegarde Withers. “Some men are like that, blast them.”
    The End

The Riddle o f t he Yellow Canary
    T HE soft A pril rain was beating against the windows of Arthur Reese’s private office, high above Times Square. Reese himself sat tensely before his desk, studying a sheet of paper still damp from the presses. He had just made the most important decision of his life. He was going to murder the Thorens girl.
    For months he had been toying with the idea, as a sort of mental chess problem. Now, when Margie Thorens was making it so necessary that she be quietly removed, he was almost surprised to find that the idle scheme had reached sheer perfection. It was as if he had completed a jigsaw puzzle while thinking of something