“How were the chocolates delivered?” asked Jupiter.
“They came through the mail. Nothing unusual.”
Mrs Bortz’s door opened. The manager had gotten control over herself. She came outside and looked at the pool. “I suppose something good comes of everything,” she said. “Gwen Chalmers is the only one who uses the pool in this weather. She won’t be swimming for a few days at least. I can have the pool drained and cleaned while she’s away. It’s long past time that it had a proper cleaning.”
Murphy opened his mouth as if to say something, then shrugged, lit a cigarette, and went into his own apartment. Hassell left, too.
Mr Prentice looked sourly at Mrs Bortz and headed for the stairs. “Really, that woman has no sensitivity,” he muttered to the boys. “Imagine, worrying about the pool at a time like this!”
“Who would try to poison Miss Chalmers?” wondered Prentice again when he and the Investigators were inside his apartment.
“Someone who knew her or her habits,” said Jupe. “Someone who knew that the moment she opened the chocolates, she would eat one or two. The real question is, why did someone want to poison her?”
No one had an answer. Jupe sat down cross-legged on the floor where he could keep an eye on the television monitor. The courtyard below was empty.
“You live in a very interesting place,” said Jupe to Prentice. “We have known you scarcely three days, and in that time we have caught one intruder in your apartment–Mrs Bortz–and I have twice observed another–the shadow. You have been robbed of an irreplaceable work of art and have received a ransom demand for it. Now one of your neighbours has been poisoned.”
“Don’t forget the janitor in the church next door,” prompted Bob. “He got knocked on the head, and then Jupe got locked in the church, where he saw a phantom priest, or somebody.”
“It’s all too coincidental,” said Jupiter. “There must be some connection. But so far, location is the only link. Everything has happened in or near this building.”
“Yeah, and everything’s happened when Sonny Elmquist has been around,” remarked Pete. “Never when he’s away at work.”
Mr Prentice suddenly looked up in alarm. “Do you think he can hear us? If he is the shadow, then he could be in here listening and we wouldn’t know it.”
Bob got up and went through the apartment room by room, turning on all the lights. No shadow person lurked anywhere. Prentice was reassured by the empty brightness of the apartment and busied himself with the dinner dishes. The Investigators settled down to watch the TV monitor.
For several hours nothing happened in the courtyard, except that Mrs Bortz carried some garbage back to the trash cans. The boys began to get bored and sleepy.
“Look!” said Jupe suddenly. Sonny Elmquist had come out of his apartment and was standing by the pool, staring into the water. The Investigators watched him closely.
The door to Murphy’s apartment opened, and the stocky man came out. He was smoking, carrying the ashtray that he usually used. He made a gesture of half-greeting to Elmquist. Then he put his cigarette out, set the ashtray on a table, and went out the front gate. An instant later the boys heard a car start. Pete went to the window that overlooked the street.
“He’s going someplace,” he reported. “He’s going fast.”
“Possibly he is simply going for a drive,” said Prentice. “He was upset, I think, when he returned from the hospital. Probably he can’t sleep.”
Sonny Elmquist went back into his apartment and pulled his curtains.
“Blast!” said Pete. “We can’t see what he’s doing.”
“Doubtless he’s getting ready to go to work,” said Jupe. “He’s due at the market at midnight.”
Just then the lights in the courtyard below were snapped out. The screen of the television monitor became a grey blue, with the only light visible a patch of brightness behind Elmquist’s curtains.
“Double-blast!” said Pete. “Now we can’t see anything.”
“There’s an automatic timer on the lights,” said Mr Prentice. “They go out at eleven.”
“So much for closed-circuit TV.” Jupiter snapped off the set.
“Well, if it’s dark, we don’t really need it, do we?” said Pete. “Look, if Elmquist is going to work tonight, and if he is the one who’s been getting in here, he’ll have to pull his funny stuff in the next hour or not at all. You guys stay in here with Mr Prentice. I’m going out on the balcony to watch. No one will be able to see me. I’ll stay behind that rubber tree.”
“Don’t ring the doorbell if you see anything,” warned Jupe. “Just knock very softly. We’ll come out.”
“Okay.” Pete got into his ski jacket. For a moment the lights in the Prentice apartment were extinguished, and Pete opened the door and stepped out on to the balcony. The door closed behind him, but this time it was not locked. Pete knew that Jupe and Bob were waiting on the other side of the door and would be there, ready, if he needed them.
The lights in Elmquist’s apartment glowed for a short time, then went out. Pete waited for Elmquist to come out of the apartment and set off for work. Nothing happened. A faint reflection of the city lights kept the pool area below from being a complete pit of blackness. Pete knew he could see anything that moved down there, but nothing did move.
Soon after midnight a man came in through the front gate. Pete stiffened, then relaxed as the dark figure stopped at a poolside table. It was Murphy, retrieving his ashtray. The stockbroker went into his apartment, and a light went on behind his curtains.
Pete blinked. For a few seconds–for just as long as it had taken Murphy to get his ashtray and open his door–Pete had taken his eyes off Elmquist’s door. In those few seconds, Elmquist had come out of his own place. In the faint light from Murphy’s windows, Pete could see that Elmquist was dressed in a bathrobe and slippers. The young man moved noiselessly around the pool, approaching Murphy’s door.
Pete blinked again. Elmquist was gone! Twenty yards from his own front door, he had vanished!
Pete rapped quickly on Prentice’s door. Without waiting for anyone to answer, he stole down the stairs towards the courtyard. He intended to put himself at Elmquist’s door, to intercept the wandering young man when he returned.
Pete had just reached the decking that surrounded the pool when his foot came down on something soft and alive!
There was a hideous screeching sound–the sound of a creature in torment!
Shuddering, Pete tried to jump aside, but the living, moving thing had gotten between his ankles. He shouted once and fell forward.
The screech came again.
As if on slow-motion film, Pete saw the edge of the pool come towards him. He saw something clinging to his leg. He felt claws. Then, with a splash, he was in the pool!
Alex Hassell’s door flew open.
The courtyard lights snapped on.
Pete came to the surface of the pool, gasping and spitting chlorinated water.
The screeching menace snarled, swam to the edge of the pool, and was scooped out by Hassell. It was a black cat.
“You . . . you brute!” said Hassell to Pete.
Pete clambered out of the pool into the chill air.
“Mr Prentice!” shouted Mrs Bortz. She had appeared wrapped in her robe, her hair rolled on pink curlers. “Mr Prentice, you will have to keep these boys from wandering around in the night!”
Jupiter came down the stairs. Sonny Elmquist was suddenly standing in the door of his apartment.
“I . . . I wasn’t able to sleep,” said Pete lamely.
Murphy’s door opened. “Now what?” bellowed the stockbroker.
“That fresh kid stepped on one of my cats!” said Hassell. He cuddled the dripping, forlorn creature in his arms. “It’s okay, baby,” he said soothingly. “You come with me. I’ll get you all fixed up. Don’t pay any attention to that nasty boy!”
“I don’t want to catch you out here again!” said Mrs Bortz angrily.
“No, ma’am,” said Pete.
Mrs Bortz retreated to her lair and turned off the lights.
“Another night off?” Jupe said, eyeing Elmquist.
Sonny Elmquist nodded.
“Sorry it’s not a quieter one,” said Jupe.
“I almost . . . almost saw . . .”
“What?” asked Jupe.
“Nothing.” Elmquist rubbed his eyes. “I was dreaming, I guess. Not really awake . . .”
The skinny young man stepped back and closed his door.
Pete went up the stairs to Prentice’s apartment on the double. Jupe followed him. Prentice was waiting in the living room with a huge towel, and in the bathroom Bob had turned on a hot shower.
“Where’d Elmquist come from?” demanded Pete as he peeled off his jacket. “I was out there watching and I saw him go around the pool towards Murphy’s place. Then, all of a sudden, he wasn’t there any more. He wasn’t anyplace. So I went downstairs to look for him and I stepped on that darned cat and–“