It was a tomb. It smelled of must and damp. The furniture, ponderous pieces which once no doubt had been regal, was uniformly dilapidated and dusty. The walls were peeling, showing broken, discolored laths beneath. There was dirt and debris everywhere. It was inconceivable that a human being could once have inhabited this grubby den.
The girl stumbled about, her eyes a blank horror, Dr. Reinach steering her calmly. How long the tour of inspection lasted Ellery did not know; even to him, a stranger, the effect was so oppressive as to be almost unendurable. They wandered about, silent, stepping over trash from room to room, impelled by something stronger than themselves.
Once Alice said in a strangled voice: “Uncle Herbert, didn’t anyone... take care of father? Didn’t anyone ever clean up this horrible place?”
The fat man shrugged. “Your father had notions in his old age, my dear. There wasn’t much anyone could do with him. Perhaps we had better not go into that.”
The sour stench filled their nostrils. They blundered on, Thorne in the rear, watchful as an old cobra. His eyes never left Dr. Reinach’s face.
On the middle floor they came upon a bedroom in which, according to the fat man, Sylvester Mayhew had died. The bed was unmade; indeed, the impress of the dead man’s body on the mattress and tumbled sheets could still be discerned. It was a bare and mean room, not as filthy as the others, but infinitely more depressing. Alice began to cough.
She coughed and coughed, hopelessly, standing still in the center of the room and staring at the dirty bed in which she had been born. Then suddenly she stopped coughing and ran over to a lopsided bureau with one foot missing. A large, faded chromo was propped on its top against the yellowed wall. She looked at it for a long time without touching it. Then she took it down.
“It’s mother,” she said slowly. “It’s really mother. I’m glad now I came. He did love her, after all. He’s kept it all these years.”
“Yes, Miss Mayhew,” muttered Thorne. “I thought you’d like to have it.” “I’ve only one portrait of mother, and that’s a poor one. This — why, she was beautiful, wasn’t she?”
She held the chromo up proudly, almost laughing in her hysteria. The time-dulled colors revealed a stately young woman with hair worn high. The features were piquant and regular. There was little resemblance between Alice and the woman in the picture.