这次的喘息声来自伊迪丝?文宁。她的丈夫说：“听着，我们没必要都在这里守着这个。我要下楼去喝一杯。”

This time the gasp came from Editha Venning. Her husband said, “Look here, we don’t all have to stay up here with that. I’m going downstairs and have a drink.”

“我也是。” 罗特斯?艾伦无力地说。

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“Me too,” Lotus Allen said weakly.

“我们都去。” 莫娜?麦克莱恩说。“在等警察到来的时候，我们不妨舒服点。” 她几乎调皮地笑了笑。“在警察到来之前我们应该做点什么消遣。”

“We all will,” Mona McClane said. “We might as well be fortable while we wait for the police.” She smiled almost impishly. “What to do until the policeman es.”

她领着大家来到走廊。马龙注意到卢埃拉?怀特挽着文宁太太的胳膊。他心想，与其说她像个女伴，倒不如说她更像个警察看护，超级富有的人品味总是很奇怪。他又环顾了一下房间，电话的位置让他有点困惑，那张揉皱的纸片从死者的手指间滑落了一半。马龙几乎是漫不经心地把它捡起来，展开。

She led the way into the hall. Malone observed that Louella White took Mrs. Venning’s arm. More like a police matron than a panion, he thought, but the very rich had funny tastes. He took another look around the room. The position of the telephone puzzled him a little. The scrap of crumpled paper had half slipped from the dead man’s fingers; almost absent-mindedly Malone picked it up and smoothed it out.

上面除了一个数字什么都没有：“114”。

There was nothing on it save a number: “114.”

他又把它揉成一团，放回他发现它的地方，然后跟着其他人下了楼。

He crumpled it up again, dropped it back where he had found it, and followed the others downstairs.

114。这个数字让人有种奇怪的似曾相识的感觉，也和一起谋杀案有关。

One-fourteen. There was something maddeningly reminiscent about that. Something to do with a murder, too.

他能听到客厅里传来兴奋的谈话声。每个人似乎都想比别人说得更多。他听到迈克尔?文宁那刻意调整过的声音说：“我记得在 1929 年在加尔各答的时候……”，而罗特斯?艾伦那带有新英格兰口音的声音打断了他，说：“不管怎么说，罗斯应该是不会被怀疑的，他肯定已经醉得不省人事好几个小时了……”，还有女仆在问：“夫人，您要苏格兰威士忌还是波旁威士忌？”

He could hear the sound of excited conversation from the living room. Everyone seemed to be trying to outtalk everyone else. He heard Michael Venning’s carefully modulated voice saying, “I remember once in Calcutta, in 1929,” and Lotus Allen’s New Englandish voice cutting across it with, “Well anyway, Ross won’t be someutist”

莫娜?麦克莱恩在楼梯最下面的台阶上等他。

Mona McClane was waiting for him on the bottom step.

“你邀请我过来的时候，不会是故意安排了这一切吧？” 他问。

“You didn’t plan this, by any chance, when you invited me over?” he asked.

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她对他微笑，好像他不是认真的。“不，我没有。我确实安排了一些事情，但这件事破坏了我原有的安排。我也没有杀那个人，如果这是你想问的问题。”

She smiled at him as though he didn’t mean it. “No, I failed. I did plan something, but this has spoiled it. I didn’t murder that man, either, if that’s what you were going to ask.”

“我不是这个意思。” 他告诉她。“杰拉尔德?图伊兹是谁？”

“I wasn’t,” he told her. “Who was Gerald Tuesday?”

“只是个客人。” 她轻描淡写地说。“我在国外认识的人。共同的朋友写信告诉我他要来芝加哥，所以我当然邀请他来这儿住了。”

“Just a house guest,” she said lightly. “Someone I’d met abroad. Mutual friends wrote me he was ing to Chicago, and so of course I invited him to stay here.”

“好吧。” 马龙说。他又把雪茄拿出来，这次他彻底拆开了包装。“如果这是你的说法，我希望它能站得住脚。”

“All right,” Malone said. He took the cigar out again, this time he finished unwrapping it. “If that’s your story, I hope it’ll stand up.”

“它会的。” 她冷静地说。

“It will,” she said coolly.

他正要跟着她走进客厅，海伦从走廊走过来，一把抓住了他的胳膊。

He had started to follow her into the living room, when Helene came down the hall and clutched at his arm.

“马龙！” 这是一声低沉而急切的耳语。“这不是…… 或者…… 是么？”

“Malone!” It was a low, insistent whisper. “This isn’t—or is it?”

“别打哑谜，也别小声说话。你什么意思？”

“Don’t ask riddles and don’t hiss. What do you mean?”

“莫娜的谋杀案。”

“Mona’s murder.”

他看了她一会儿才回答。“你又忘了赌约里的条件了。这个人不是在公共街道上被杀的，也没有很多的目击者。他是被刺死的，就像另一个……”

He looked at her a moment before answering. “You’re forgetting the terms of the trade again. This man wasn’t shot down in the public streets, with plenty of witnesses. He was stabbed, just like the other—”

“像另一个什么？”

“Like the other what?”

“被…… 刺…… 死…… 的…… 人。” 他机械地说。他刚刚想起为什么那个数字，114，会让人觉得这么熟悉。

“Man—who—was—stabbed,” he said automatically. He had just remembered why that number, 114, was familiar.

“马龙……”

“Malone—”

“现在别管了。这房子里的电话是怎么用的？电话是什么样的系统？”

“Never mind now. How do the telephones work in this house? What kind of a system is it?”

“是分机电话系统。用任何一部电话都可以接听来电，或者你可以拿起任何一部电话拨打外线号码。一共有三条线路，以防其中一条被占线，而且每部电话都有一个小开关用来管线路。”

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“Extension phones. A call can be picked up on any telephone. Or you can pick up any telephone and call an outside number. There are three lines, in case one is busy, and every telephone has a little switch connected with it.”

“那么你可以在这所房子里的任何一部电话上打电话，而不会被其他人察觉吗？”

“Then you could make a telephone call from any phone in the house, without anyone else knowing it?”

“是的，除非你打电话的时候有人恰好拿起同一条线路上的另一部电话。但如果发生这种情况，拿起电话的人应该按下小开关，除非他出于好奇就是想偷听。”

“Yes, unless someone happened to pick up another phone hitched to the same line while you were making it. When that happens, the person picking up the phone is supposed to press the little switch, unless he’s curious and feels like eavesdropping.”

“谢谢。” 马龙说。他沉默了一会儿。“现在我想打个电话。最近的电话在哪里？”

“Thanks,” Malone said. He was silent a moment. “Now I want to make a call. Where’s the nearest phone?”

她带他来到走廊尽头的一个小壁橱处。他说：“在这儿等我一下。” 然后关上了门，拨打了他自己办公室的号码。过了一会儿，玛吉的声音回答道。

She led him to a little closet down the hall. He said, “Wait for me,” closed the door, and dialed the number of his office. After a minute Maggie’s voice answered.

“我正要回家呢，马龙先生。”

“I was just going home, Mr. Malone.”

“去吧。但先告诉我，在过去的一个小时左右的时间里，有没有人打过电话找我？”

“Go ahead. Tell me first, have I had any calls in the past hour or so?”

“有两个。一个是路易打来的，关于他的支票。另一个我不知道是谁打来的。”

“Two. One from Louie, about his check. I don’t know who the other was from.”

“你什么意思，怎么会不知道？”

“What do you mean, you don’t know?”

“我的意思是打电话的人没说。我接起电话，一个奇怪的声音说：‘马龙。’声音听起来像是从火星来的。我刚要开口说你不在，那个声音又说：‘马龙。114。114。’然后我还没来得及再说一个字，他就挂了电话。就这样。”

“I mean whoever it was didn’t say. I answered the phone and a funny-sounding voice said, ‘Malone.’ It sounded like a voice from Mars. I started to say you weren’t in, and the voice said, ‘Malone. One-fourteen. One-fourteen.’ Then before I had a chance to say another word, he hung up. Just like that.”

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回到走廊，马龙告诉海伦：“我想我知道他在电话簿里找谁了。”

Back in the hall, Malone told Helene, “I think I know who he was looking for in the phone book.”

“谁？”

“Who?”

“我。”

“Me.”

他们还没来得及再说一句话，突然从死者的房间里传来一阵声响，接着又是一阵。有人在里面走动。

Before either of them could say another word, there was a sudden sound from the dead man’s room, and another. Someone was moving about.

有那么一瞬间，他们面面相觑，然后马龙两步并作一步冲上了楼梯。在房间门口，他停了下来，一只手抓着门框，然后推开了门。

For just an instant they stared at each other, then Malone raced up the steps, two at a time. At the door to the room he paused, one hand clutching the door jamb, then pushed it open.

两米高的彭德利?泰德韦尔手里拿着相机，平趴在房间中央的地板上，正在给被谋杀的人拍照。

The six-foot Pendley Tidewell, camera in hand, was stretched flat on the floor in the middle of the room, engaged in photographing the murdered man.

马龙还没来得及说话，他的注意力就被从写字台上吸墨纸下面露出的一小张白纸条吸引了过去。趁彭德利?泰德韦尔在不好意思地收拾他的摄影器材时，小个子律师把那张白纸条从吸墨纸下面抽了出来塞进了自己的口袋。

Before Malone could say a word, his attention was distracted by a thin sliver of white paper protruding from under the desk blotter. While Pendley Tidewell apologetically gathered up his photographic equipment, the little lawyer had slipped the paper out from under the blotter into his own pocket.

直到年轻的摄影师离开，马龙才又拿出来查看他的发现。然后他默默地读完了那张纸，脸上毫无表情，一言不发地把它递给了海伦。

Not until the young photographer had gone did Malone examine his find. Then he read it through silently, his face expressionless, and handed it to Helene without a word.

那似乎是一封信的第二页，是用一种果断的、竖体的字体书写的。

It appeared to be the second page of a letter, written in a decisive, vertical handwriting.

“没有人能把罪行强加在一个已经死了二十年的人身上。”

“No one can pin a crime on a man who’s been dead for twenty years.”

马龙说：“他可能是听到走廊里有动静的时候正在写这封信，然后把它塞到了桌垫下面。” 他皱起眉头，一脸阴郁。“如果你要我解释这是什么意思，这将是你问我的最后一个问题。”

Malone said, “He probably was writing it when he heard someone in the hall, and slipped it under the blotter.” His brows drew together in a heavy scowl. “If you ask me what it means, it will be the last thing you ever ask me.”

他小心地把纸条放进内侧口袋，然后带着海伦下了楼。

He stowed the note carefully in an inside pocket and led the way downstairs.