The inspector promised, somewhat superfluously, and as they descended the steps he observed to his companion:
“It’s a damn funny case, Mac! The Bellamy woman’s butler is a smooth proposition, but as far as I could make out he came clean; he’s been playing the races with Hughes in a poolroom down on Thirtieth and gambling in a joint over on the East Side, and Hughes was stuck on some new Jane named ‘Gertie.’ Snape thinks she’s a married woman, though he never saw her nor heard her last name, and she doesn’t belong on this block. He wasn’t with Hughes last night and didn’t even know he’d gone out.”
“Did you see anybody else in that house?” asked McCarty.
“Only a mighty pretty nursemaid going out with a baby. Did you have any luck at Orbit’s?”
“Not much,” McCarty responded guardedly. “I’ll tell you later if you’ll drop around to my rooms. I want to have another talk with the stout, bald little guy next door here, Goddard.”
“All right. I think we’re wasting our time, though, here in the Mall. If we can trace Hughes’ movements from the minute he passed out of that gate there until he fell dying in front of you, we’ll nail the fellow who slipped him that Calabar bean; there won’t be much to this case, Mac.”
McCarty watched the inspector cross the street to the stately old entrance to Number Seven and then proceeded to the corner house and rang the bell. An elderly butler, with the pallor of a long lifetime of indoor service admitted him, shaking his head dubiously. It was some little time before Eustace Goddard appeared.
“’Pon my soul, you fellows are persistent!” His blue eyes twinkled with lively curiosity as he spoke. “Never knew of such a fuss being made over the death of a servant before! I suppose you’ve come to question mine?”
“After a bit,” McCarty smiled grimly. “Servant or no, we’re bound to make a fuss, as you call it, when it’s a case of murder.”
“What? You don’t say so!” Goddard ran his hand over the fringe of sandy hair adorning his bald pate. “Devil of a thing for Orbit, the notoriety and all! Can’t see why he kept the fellow; I never did like his looks!—But who killed him?”