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  “Although it was dark during the séance, there was just enough light to see under the table where that floozy was playing footsy with Jay. It was all I could do to control my temper. Then, as luck would have it, the planchette flew off the board and accidentally hit her temple. I instantly knew it wouldn’t have enough clout to have caused any real harm except to give her a nasty bruise. So, I helped it along with my cane. I gave her a good whack on the side of the head. You must believe me; I only meant to give her a bit of a headache.”

  “I’ll say, one hell of a headache!” noted Wolfe.

  “So that’s when the tip of that stick got discolored,” Goldie said. “Good thing the police didn’t analyze it for blood.”

  “Sorry, Madame, but the secret about Mr. Jay would have come out eventually.”

  “Oh shut up, Salisbury,” Tamaya sulked. “And pour me another drink!”

  “Of course, Madame.”

  “So that makes two, and only three to go.” Goldie felt exonerated from her guilt now that she knew about Tamaya.

  “This is quite extraordinary,” remarked Tamaya sipping her drink. “All this time, everyone thought there was just one culprit, and here we have two.”

  “Make that three, Madame.”

  “You, Salisbury?” questioned the hostess taking note of the houseman’s sullen mood.

  “I am afraid so,” he admitted, and placing the bottle of whiskey to his lips, he swallowed what was left. Then he dabbed his mouth on the napkin and looked for a place to sit. Ms. Rosebud shifted her feet aside and tapped the chaise, where he plopped down with the bottle resting between his legs.

  “Oh, cheer up, once you get it off your chest, you’ll feel so much better. I know I do!” replied Goldie with a bit too much glee by someone who had just admitted to a murder.

  Salisbury nodded and sighed heavily as if the burden of the world was on his shoulders and his alone. “It was I who spiked the whiskey,” he professed. “I didn’t mean to kill anyone, just put them to sleep.”

  “I’ll say,” remarked Wolfe. “Not this stuff, I hope!” he growled.

  “Oh, no. It was last evening’s nightcap Miss Tisbe made for herself and Miss Peri. They were forever making such a chatter, idle gossip; all I wanted was a good night’s rest.” The houseman looked up with remorse; however, no one believed his pathetic excuse.

  “Come on, Salisbury,” Tamaya said. “Didn’t you really know how much sedative you added?”

  “Actually, no, Madame, it always works on you.” Salisbury pulled the cork from the bottle and tipped it back into his mouth. A few drops slithered down the side and into his throat.

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake, take that out of your mouth and stop sulking,” scolded Goldie. “So let’s see, that makes three.” She reached over and gave Wolfe a shove with her elbow. “Your turn.”

  A gathering of clouds had gathered overhead, and the sun that only minutes ago was shining upon the veranda had retreated. Mr. Wolfe put his finger in his drink and stirred it around. He could feel the attention shift towards him, and although he objected to joining into this game, he began to feel himself cave. “How do I know that one of you won’t turn us all in?”

  “You don’t,” remarked Ms. Rosebud. “However, why would we. Two bodies and two confessions remain unaccounted for. As a result, one of us must be the murderer, or as in Salisbury’s case, the accidental murderer.”

  “Which I’m not buyin’,” remarked Goldie coldly.

  Mr. Wolfe finished his drink. “I’ll pass.”

  “Pass, you can’t pass, we made a pact!” screamed Goldie tipping her eyeglasses over her nose. “And if you do pass, then we’ll assume you offed Harold and Norman. You don’t want two murders on your conscience, do you?”

  “If it makes you feel any more in the mood to confess, I saw you,” said Salisbury.

  “What! You saw me; you saw me do what?” demanded Wolfe. He glared at the houseman as if possessed.

  “I saw you go outside with the trash.”

  “And what does that mean?”

  “It means,” said Goldie, “that you were in the same place where we found Norman dead. I was wondering how the big guy could have fallen.”

  “If you saw me, then why didn’t you speak up?” Wolfe prodded.

  “Because, Sir, I had no proof that you were the perpetrator of the crime. But, by bringing it up now, it appears that you have incriminated yourself.” Salisbury smiled wilily.

  “Poor Norman,” sighed Tamaya shaking her head with regret. She flashed an image in her mind of the large man and sighed loudly again.

  “Oh, don’t poor Norman me!” cried Wolfe. “The man was a two-bit thief. When I accidentally met up with him by the trash bins, he was all ready to take the deal, perfectly content to change sides against Goldie and me. He was a greedy bastard. With Ray and Javotte out of the way, he said nothing was stopping him from getting more. That’s when things got heated. He pushed, I shoved, and as the story goes, things got a bit rough. That’s when my second shove knocked him down.”

  “So, you’re trying to tell us this was another accident,” Goldie remarked.

  “No, this was no accident. It was him or me.” Wolfe looked around the veranda and then stood up. His legs were shaky, and he brushed his hair back with his hand. “Let’s get us another bottle, Salisbury. Anyone else needs a drink?”

  ***

  They followed Salisbury into the library, where he liberated the corkscrew from the bar and waved it above his head. “To the last one standing!” he joked, and having drunk a bit too much, he was feeling more like a guest than a houseman.

  “Oh, my, perhaps you should lie down,” Ms. Rosebud suggested after the butler began to take on a shade of green. “You look positively awful,” she said.

  “Yes, Madame, I believe you’re correct. If you will excuse me, I think I will follow your wise instructions.” Like a teenager after his first drink, Salisbury stumbled, hanging on to the furniture until he reached the threshold. Rather than gliding, he appeared to skate, poorly that is until he opened the door leading downstairs to his quarters. “I’m okay!” he shouted, and in the next few minutes, the rest of the partygoers could hear the slow retreat downward.

  “He could never hold his liquor,” remarked Tamaya. “He’ll sleep it off and then act as if nothing in the world happened.”

  “Nothing did happen,” said Wolfe.

  “Nothing except three confessions to murders and death by accidental poisoning,” Goldie reminded him. “We do have the matter of Harold; anyone want to take a swipe?”

  “Oh, yes, Harold. Well, he’ll be missed, so we had better come up with a decent excuse for his departure,” Tamaya said. “I suppose I could tell the office he never arrived. But no, Harold was such a stickler for detail, he most likely called his secretary.” She set her cane against the chair and sat down. “You know, I could just say nothing.” Both Goldie and Wolfe looked at each other for a cue to speak, but neither had anything to say. “If anyone comes around, I’ll just tell them he left without saying goodbye.”

  “And no one would find that irregular?” Wolfe asked, feeling as though her suggestion was filled with holes.

  “Oh, I don’t know, let someone prove it wasn’t true.” Ms. Rosebud was tired and wished for the entire event to go away. All she wanted to do was to be left alone.

  “She’s got a point, Wolfe. Except for one minor detail. What the hell are you going to do with everyone still in the wine cellar?” Goldie asked, turning to Tamaya.

  “Since no one seems to want them, Trigg said I could put them in the crypt.” She pointed to the window. “Didn’t you see the family cemetery? Would you like to go outside and see it?” Tamaya was quite willing to take them. “It’s such a lovely day; I could show you around.”

  “No, that’s alright, I’ll take your word for it. An
yway, we never got to the heart of the last matter.” Mr. Wolfe walked over to the window and pulled the drapes so he could look outside. An ornate, marble structure appeared in the distance. He flinched and then shut the curtain.

  “Yeh, who did in Harold? Want to take bets?” Goldie snickered.

  “Well, unless it was one of us, we’ll never know,” Tamaya sighed.

  Goldie was pacing the floor, leaving a ring of footprints in the soft rug as she spoke. “Except, there must be a clue we’ve overlooked. We know who it couldn’t be because they’re dead. And we know that Harold was coming up from the cellar with a bunch of onions. He took the back stairwell, which was dark, so he most likely tripped.”

  “Did anyone look in the cellar after he was pronounced dead?” asked Wolfe.

  “An obvious faux-pas!” exclaimed Goldie. “Only, if the killer was in the cellar, then how did he or she escape? I say we go in through the back entrance and look around. Tamaya, check out the top of the rear hallway stairs and look around where Dover fell.”

  “You know, if one of us is the killer, it will save us a hell of a lot of trouble to just confess,” Wolfe remarked. He was too comfortable and wanted nothing to do with moving. But to his disappointment, neither woman admitted to the crime. “Damn, okay, okay, but Goldie, this is the last thing I want to do!”

  ***

  The vegetables are stored in the root cellar, a dark, spacious room of stone walls, dirt floor, and wooden bins. Its subterranean location usually weathered a storm; however, this had been no ordinary storm. The continuous rain saturated the ground beneath the house, and as the earth became gorged, the water that could not be absorbed in the bedrock drew upward. Goldie held on to the handrail behind Wolfe. From the bottom steps, they could see the floor of the root cellar. Embedded in the mud were footprints, a man’s footprints which headed in one direction from the stairwell to the vegetable bin and back again. “Doesn’t look like anything is out of sorts,” said Goldie. A reluctancy to step into the mud with her newly polished shoes held her back from proceeding further.

  Wolfe remained skeptical and observed the room and, with his keen vision, assembled a more analytic observation. “I can see from here that the prints were all made from one pair of shoes. No reason to get into the muck of things,” he laughed, noting his pun. “Yes, indeed. We can without reservations confirm Harold Dover was alone when he collected the onions.”

  “Unless someone had the exact same size and shoe,” Goldie added.

  “True, but highly unlikely,” he remarked with an air of authority.

  Goldie glanced down at Wolfe’s feet and whistled. “Well, Sasquatch, you have nothing to worry about!”

  Tamaya Rosebud tugged on the cord dangling in the upstairs’ stairwell, but no light came on. It wasn’t until she flipped on the hallway switch that she was in full sight of her disgust. “My lovely wooden stairs!” she exclaimed, and with her cane poked the muddy footprints.

  ***

  Salisbury had removed a pan of scones from the oven and was feverously slicing lemons when he heard a knock on the door. His neatly starched uniform had been pressed, as usual, to perfection, over which he wore a red and white apron. “Can someone get that?” he called with tempered annoyance.

  Goldie opened the door for the seaman, who was trailed by a beam of sunlight. “I’ve come by report some good news. The ferry is up and running, and anytime you wish to leave, we can call the coach to retrieve you and your belongings,” the man said. Sporting a day-old beard, he looked even more like the part of a lighthouse keeper.

  “Finally,” scowled Goldie. “Well, come on in, I’m sure Tamaya will be glad to see you,” goaded the old woman remembering the hostess’s confession. The house had a distinct smell of baked goods that wafted from the kitchen into the library where Mr. Wolfe and Tamaya were enjoying the peace of the afternoon. “Here Jay, sit next to Tamaya,” insisted Goldie, and watching the librarian’s face, she thought she saw a grin of approval.

  The old skipper took off his cap and set it on his lap. “So, what’s this about the ferry,” asked Wolfe. “I was hoping I could finally get out of here, no offense to you, Ms. Rosebud.”

  “None taken,” the woman said.

  “Yep, looks like Reggie got the ferry going this morning. I’ll be taking her out in about an hour. Figure I can make at least two more runs before nightfall.”

  “I can be packed in less than a half-hour,” exclaimed Goldie. Her enthusiasm only rivaled Tamaya Rosebud, who was more than ready to rid herself of the two guests.

  “Me, fifteen minutes, that’s all I need,” Mr. Wolfe announced.

  “Before tea?” asked Tamaya, now a bit sorry that she had secretly wished her guests away. The sound of her lament gave way for the two guests to reconsider her request.

  “Okay, one cup and a scone, and then we gotta get going!” Goldie agreed.

  There was a soft patter across the floor as Salisbury entered. “Tea, Madame,” he proposed, but as he set the tray on the table, the hostess expelled a sudden gasp followed by a disparaging look.

  “What is it?” Mr. Jay asked, noticing Ms. Rosebud’s expression turn from sweet-tempered to sour.

  “Salisbury, your shoes!” she exclaimed. A path of dried mud had followed the houseman into the library.

  “Nothing that can’t be cleaned up with a brush and dustpan, Madame,” Salisbury said, and with a slight smirk, he bent down and took off his shoes. Standing in yellow stocking feet, he went on with his business as if nothing happened.

  “You don’t suppose you’re thinking what I’m thinking?” Goldie whispered, leaning over to Wolfe. She found herself watching the man as he glided about the room serving tea.

  Wolfe sighed and smiled widely. “Well, not to sound trite, but perhaps this time, the butler did it.”