Bertha tried the next door and found what she wanted. Here were two bedrooms at the front of the house, finished in knotty pine, connected by a bathroom. The front room was evidently Everett Belder’s. The one in back undoubtedly had been used by his wife.
Bertha gave the room itself only a hasty inspection, going almost at once to the closet, taking an inventory of the clothing, searching for some significant clue which would loom large in the eyes of a woman, but would escape the masculine analysis of the detectives.
As Sergeant Sellers had so aptly pointed out the first time, everything about the case pointed to a man: Sally Brentner apparently peeling potatoes with a ten-inch carving-knife. Mabel Belder presumably fleeing from the scene of a murder she had just committed, yet leaving behind a whole closetful of fine clothes, taking only a small assortment of plain garments with her, even leaving her cosmetics behind.
Whoever had removed the things which had been taken, however, must have left some clue somewhere. Perhaps in the house itself was concealed the suitcase in which Mabel Belder’s things had been packed, stored and concealed.
Bertha prowled into the back recesses of the closet, the beam of her flashlight penetrating the dark corners. She frowned down at several small particles on the floor, then bent down and picked up some of these in her thumb and forefinger. Bits of wood twisted into tight spirals which had broken and left little curved segments of that yellowish appearance which is typical of freshly cut wood.
Beyond doubt these bits of wood had been turned out by an auger from a pine board. Bertha could almost tell the diameter of that auger from the shape of the tightly compressed bits of wood.
But there was no hole.
Bertha made it a point to cover every inch of that closet with her flashlight; no slightest sign of a hole anywhere in the walls, floors or ceiling.
Forgetful for the moment of her surroundings, Bertha deliberated over her discovery.
“Damn it,” she muttered, “if Donald were only here, he’d find a way out of this mess. Brainy little devil!... I’m in awfully bad. Only way to get out is to find something. What the hell are these shavings doing in the corner of the closet? Somebody bored a hole and then made the hole disappear. No chance that the hole’s been cunningly plugged up — or is there?”