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padding-top: 1px } + + .coverpage, .titlepage, + .contents, .foreword, .preface, .introduction, .dedication, .prologue, + .epilogue, .appendix, .glossary, .bibliography, .index, .colophon, + .footnotes, + .cleardoublepage { page-break-before: right; padding-top: 1px } + + .vfill { margin-top: 20% } + h2.title { margin-top: 20% } +} +</style> +<style type="text/css"> +.pageno { position: absolute; right: 95%; font: medium sans-serif; } +.pageno:after { color: gray; content: '[' attr(title) ']' } +.toc-pageref { float: right } +pre { font-family: monospace; font-size: 0.9em; white-space: pre-wrap } +</style> +</head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 35503 ***</div> +<div class="document" id="the-girl-at-central"> +<h1 class="document-title level-1 pfirst title">THE GIRL AT CENTRAL</h1> +</div> +<div class="vspace" style="height: 4em"> +</div> +<div class="container" id="pg-produced-by"> +<p class="noindent pfirst">Produced by Darleen Dove, Mary Meehan, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at <a class="reference external" href="http://www.pgdp.net">http://www.pgdp.net</a>.</p> +<div class="vspace" style="height: 1em"> +</div> +<p class="noindent pnext">This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.</p> +</div> +</div> +<div class="align-center auto-scaled figure" style="margin-left: 27%; width: 45%" id="figure-1"> +<img style="display: block; width: 100%" alt="images/cover.jpg" src="images/cover.jpg" width="100%"/> +</div> +<div class="center line-block noindent x-large"> +<div class="line"> +THE GIRL AT CENTRAL</div> +<div class="line"> +BY GERALDINE BONNER</div> +</div> +<div class="center line-block noindent small"> +<div class="line"> +Author of "The Emigrant Trail," "The Book of Evelyn," etc.</div> +</div> +<div class="center line-block noindent small"> +<div class="line"> +ILLUSTRATED BY</div> +<div class="line"> +ARTHUR WILLIAM BROWN</div> +</div> +<div class="center line-block noindent small"> +<div class="line"> +NEW YORK AND LONDON</div> +<div class="line"> +D. APPLETON AND COMPANY</div> +<div class="line"> +1915</div> +</div> +<div class="center line-block noindent small"> +<div class="line"> +Copyright, 1915, by</div> +<div class="line"> +<span class="small-caps"> +D. Appleton and Company</span></div> +</div> +<div class="center line-block noindent small"> +<div class="line"> +<em class="italics">Copyright, 1914, 1915, by The Curtis Publishing Company</em></div> +</div> +<div class="center line-block noindent small"> +<div class="line"> +<span class="small-caps"> +Printed in the United States of America</span></div> +</div> +<div class="align-center auto-scaled figure" style="margin-left: 27%; width: 45%" id="figure-2"> +<span id="mark-my-words-there-s-going-to-be-trouble-at-mapleshade"/><img style="display: block; width: 100%" alt="'Mark my words, there's going to be trouble at Mapleshade'" src="images/illus1.jpg" width="100%"/> +<div class="caption italics"> +'Mark my words, there's going to be trouble at Mapleshade'"</div> +</div> +<div class="contents level-2 section" id="id1"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title">CONTENTS</h2> +<ul class="simple toc-list"> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#list-of-illustrations" id="id2">LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#i" id="id3">I</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#ii" id="id4">II</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#iii" id="id5">III</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#iv" id="id6">IV</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#v" id="id7">V</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#vi" id="id8">VI</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#vii" id="id9">VII</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#viii" id="id10">VIII</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#ix" id="id11">IX</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#x" id="id12">X</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#xi" id="id13">XI</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#xii" id="id14">XII</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#xiii" id="id15">XIII</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#xiv" id="id16">XIV</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#xv" id="id17">XV</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#xvi" id="id18">XVI</a></li> +<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#xvii" id="id19">XVII</a></li> +</ul> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="list-of-illustrations"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id2">LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</a></h2> +<div class="line-block"> +<div class="line"> +<a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#mark-my-words-there-s-going-to-be-trouble-at-mapleshade">'Mark my words, there's going to be trouble at Mapleshade'</a></div> +<div class="line"> +<a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#sylvia-was-in-her-riding-dress-looking-a-picture">Sylvia was in her riding dress, looking a picture</a></div> +<div class="line"> +<a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#a-day-later-he-was-arrested-at-firehill-and-taken-to-bloomington-jail">A day later he was arrested at Firehill and taken to Bloomington jail</a></div> +<div class="line"> +<a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#i-came-down-to-the-parlor-where-babbitts-was-waiting">I came down to the parlor where Babbitts was waiting</a></div> +</div> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="i"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id3">I</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">Poor Sylvia Hesketh! Even now, after this long time, I can't think of it +without a shudder, without a comeback of the horror of those days after +the murder. You remember it—the Hesketh mystery? And mystery it surely +was, baffling, as it did, the police and the populace of the whole +state. For who could guess why a girl like that, rich, beautiful, +without a care or an enemy, should be done to death as she was. Think of +it—at five o'clock sitting with her mother taking tea in the library at +Mapleshade and that same night found dead—murdered—by the side of a +lonesome country road, a hundred and eighteen miles away.</p> +<p class="pnext">It's the story of this that I'm going to tell here, and as you'll get a +good deal of me before I'm through, I'd better, right now at the start, +introduce myself.</p> +<p class="pnext">I'm Molly Morganthau, day operator in the telephone exchange at +Longwood, New Jersey, twenty-three years old, dark, slim, and as for my +looks—well, put them down as "medium" and let it go at that. My name's +Morganthau because my father was a Polish Jew—a piece worker on +pants—but my two front names, Mary McKenna, are after my mother, who +was from County Galway, Ireland. I was raised in an East Side tenement, +but I went steady to the Grammar school and through the High and I'm not +throwing bouquets at myself when I say I made a good record. That's how +I come to be nervy enough to write this story—but you'll see for +yourself. Only just keep in mind that I'm more at home in front of a +switchboard than at a desk.</p> +<p class="pnext">I've supported myself since I was sixteen, my father dying then, and my +mother—God rest her blessed memory!—two years later. First I was in a +department store and then in the Telephone Company. I haven't a relation +in the country and if I had I wouldn't have asked a nickel off them. I'm +that kind, independent and—but that's enough about me.</p> +<p class="pnext">Now for you to rightly get what I'm going to tell I'll have to begin +with a description of Longwood village and the country round about. I've +made a sort of diagram—it isn't drawn to scale but it gives the general +effect, all right—and with that and what I'll describe you can get an +idea of the lay of the land, which you have to have to understand +things.</p> +<div class="align-center auto-scaled figure" style="margin-left: 11%; width: 77%" id="figure-3"> +<img style="display: block; width: 100%" alt="images/illus2.jpg" src="images/illus2.jpg" width="100%"/> +</div> +<p class="pfirst">Longwood's in New Jersey, a real picturesque village of a thousand +inhabitants. It's a little over an hour from New York by the main line +and here and there round it are country places, mostly fine ones owned +by rich people. There are some farms too, and along the railway and the +turnpike are other villages. My exchange is the central office for a +good radius of country, taking in Azalea, twenty-five miles above us on +the main line, and running its wires out in a big circle to the +scattered houses and the crossroad settlements. It's on Main Street, +opposite the station, and from my chair at the switchboard I can see the +platform and the trains as they come down from Cherry Junction or up +from New York. It's sixty miles from Longwood to the Junction where you +get the branch line that goes off to the North, stopping at other +stations, mostly for the farm people, and where, when you get to +Hazelmere, you can connect with an express for Philadelphia. Also you +can keep right on from the Junction and get to Philadelphia that way, +which is easier, having no changes and better trains.</p> +<p class="pnext">When I was first transferred from New York—it's over two years now—I +thought I'd die of the lonesomeness of it. At night, looking out of my +window—I lived over Galway's Elite Millinery Parlors on Lincoln +Street—across those miles and miles of country with a few lights dotted +here and there, I felt like I was cast on a desert island. After a while +I got used to it and that first spring when the woods began to get a +faint greenish look and I'd wake up and hear birds twittering in the +elms along the street—hold on! I'm getting sidetracked. It's going to +be hard at first to keep myself out, but just be patient, I'll do it +better as I go along.</p> +<p class="pnext">The county turnpike goes through Longwood, and then sweeps away over the +open country between the estates and the farms and now and then a +village—Huntley, Latourette, Corona—strung out along it like beads on +a string. A hundred and fifty miles off it reaches Bloomington, a big +town with hotels and factories and a jail. About twenty miles before it +gets to Bloomington it crosses the branch line near Cresset's Farm. +There's a little sort of station there—just an open shed—called +Cresset's Crossing, built for the Cresset Farm people, who own a good +deal of land in that vicinity. Not far from Cresset's Crossing, about a +half mile apart, the Riven Rock Road from the Junction and the Firehill +Road from Jack Reddy's estate run into the turnpike.</p> +<p class="pnext">This is the place, I guess, where I'd better tell about Jack Reddy, who +was such an important figure in the Hesketh mystery and who—I get red +now when I write it—was such an important figure to me.</p> +<p class="pnext">A good ways back—about the time of the Revolution—the Reddy family +owned most of the country round here. Bit by bit they sold it off till +in old Mr. Reddy's time—Jack's father—all they had left was the +Firehill property and Hochalaga Lake, a big body of water, back in the +hills beyond Huntley. Firehill is an old-fashioned, stone house, built +by Mr. Reddy's grandfather. It got its name from a grove of maples on +the top of a mound that in the autumn used to turn red and orange and +look like the hillock was in a blaze. The name, they say, came from the +Indian days and so did Hochalaga, though what that stands for I don't +know. The Reddys had had lots of offers for the lake but never would +sell it. They had a sort of little shack there and before Jack's time, +when there were no automobiles, used to make horseback excursions to +Hochalaga and stay for a few days. After the old people died and Jack +came into the property everybody thought he'd sell the lake—several +parties were after it for a summer resort—but he refused them all, had +the shack built over into an up-to-date bungalow, and through the +summer would have guests down from town, spending week-ends out there.</p> +<p class="pnext">Now I'm telling everything truthful, for that's what I set out to do, +and if you think I'm a fool you're welcome to and no back talk from +me—but I was crazy about Jack Reddy. Not that he ever gave me cause; +he's not that kind and neither am I. And let me say right here that +there's not a soul ever knew it, he least of all. I guess no one would +have been more surprised than the owner of Firehill if he'd known that +the Longwood telephone girl most had heart failure every time he passed +the window of the Exchange.</p> +<p class="pnext">I will say, to excuse myself, that there's few girls who wouldn't have +put their hats straight and walked their prettiest when they saw him +coming. Gee—he was a good looker! Like those advertisements for collars +and shirts you see in the back of the magazines—you know the ones. But +it wasn't that that got me. It was his ways, always polite, never +fresh. If he'd meet me in the street he'd raise his hat as if I was the +Queen of Sheba. And there wasn't any hanging round my switchboard and +asking me to make dates for dinner in town. He was always jolly, but—a +girl in a telephone exchange gets to know a lot—he was always a +gentleman.</p> +<p class="pnext">He lived at Firehill—forty miles from Longwood—with two old servants, +David Gilsey and his wife, who'd been with his mother and just doted on +him. But everybody liked him. There wasn't but one criticism I ever +heard passed on him and that was that he had a violent temper. Casey, +his chauffeur, told a story in the village of how one day, when they +were passing a farm, they saw an Italian laborer prod a horse with a +pitchfork. Before he knew, Mr. Reddy was out of the car and over the +fence and mashing the life out of that dago. It took Casey and the +farmer to pull him off and they thought the dago'd be killed before they +could.</p> +<p class="pnext">There was talk in Longwood that he hadn't much money—much, the way the +Reddys had always had it—and was going to study law for a living. But +he must have had some, for he kept up the house, and had two motors, one +just a common roadster and the other a long gray racing car that he'd +let out on the turnpike till he was twice arrested and once ran over a +dog.</p> +<p class="pnext">My, how well I got to know that car! When I first came I only saw it at +long intervals. Then—just as if luck was on my side—I began to see it +oftener and oftener, slowing down as it came along Main Street, swinging +round the corner, jouncing across the tracks, and dropping out of sight +behind the houses at the head of Maple Lane.</p> +<p class="pnext">"What's bringing Jack Reddy in this long way so often?" people would say +at first.</p> +<p class="pnext">Then, after a while, when they'd see the gray car, they'd look sly at +each other and wink.</p> +<p class="pnext">There's one good thing about having a crush on a party that's never +thought any more about you than if you were the peg he hangs his hat +on—it doesn't hurt so bad when he falls in love with his own kind of +girl.</p> +<p class="pnext">And that brings me—as if I was in the gray car speeding down Maple +Lane—to Mapleshade and the Fowlers and Sylvia Hesketh.</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="ii"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id4">II</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">About a mile from Longwood, standing among ancient, beautiful trees, is +Mapleshade, Dr. Dan Fowler's place.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was once a farmhouse, over a century old, but two and a half years +ago when Dr. Fowler bought it he fixed it all up, raised the roof, built +on a servants' wing and a piazza with columns and turned the farm +buildings into a garage. Artists and such people say it's the prettiest +place in this part of the State, and it certainly is a picture, +especially in summer, with the lawns mown close as velvet and the +flower-beds like bits of carpet laid out to air.</p> +<p class="pnext">The Doctor bought a big bit of land with it—I don't know how many +hundred acres—so the house, though it's not far from the village, is +kind of secluded and shut away. You get to it by Maple Lane, a little +winding road that runs between trees caught together with wild grape and +Virginia creeper. In summer they're like green walls all draped over +with the vines and in winter they turn into a rustling gray hedge, woven +so close it's hard to see through. About ten minutes' walk from the gate +of Mapleshade there's a pine that was struck by lightning and stands up +black and bare.</p> +<p class="pnext">When the house was finished the Doctor, who was a bachelor, married Mrs. +Hesketh, a widow lady accounted rich, and he and she came there as bride +and groom with her daughter, Sylvia Hesketh. I hadn't come yet, but from +what I've heard, there was gossip about them from the start. What I can +say from my own experience is that I'd hardly got my grip unpacked when +I began to hear of the folks at Mapleshade.</p> +<p class="pnext">They lived in great style with a housekeeper, a butler and a French maid +for the ladies. In the garage were three automobiles, Mrs. Fowler's +limousine, the Doctor's car and a dandy little roadster that belonged to +Miss Sylvia. Neither she nor the Doctor bothered much with the +chauffeur. They left him to take Mrs. Fowler round and drove themselves, +the joke going that if Miss Sylvia ever went broke she could qualify for +a chauffeur's job.</p> +<p class="pnext">After a while the story came out that it wasn't Mrs. Fowler who was so +rich but Miss Hesketh. The late Mr. Hesketh had only left his wife a +small fortune, willing the rest—millions, it was said—to his daughter. +She was a minor—nineteen—and the trustees of the estate allowed her a +lot of money for her maintenance, thirty thousand a year they had it in +Longwood.</p> +<p class="pnext">In spite of the grand way they lived there wasn't much company at +Mapleshade. Anne Hennessey, the housekeeper, told me Mrs. Fowler was so +dead in love with her husband she didn't want the bother of entertaining +people. And the Doctor liked a quiet life. He'd been a celebrated +surgeon in New York but had retired only for consultations and special +cases now and again. He was very good to the people round about, and +would come in and help when our little Dr. Pease, or Dr. Graham, at the +Junction, were up against something serious. I'll never forget when Mick +Donahue, the station agent's boy, got run over by Freight No. 22. But +I'm sidetracked again. Anyhow, the Doctor amputated the leg and little +Mick's stumping round on a wooden pin almost as good as ever.</p> +<p class="pnext">But even so they weren't liked much. They held their heads very high, +Mrs. Fowler driving through the village like it was Fifth Avenue, +sending the chauffeur into the shops and not at all affable to the +tradespeople. The Doctor wouldn't trouble to give you so much as a nod, +just stride along looking straight ahead. When the story got about that +he'd lost most of the money he'd made doctoring I didn't bear any +resentment, seeing it was worry that made him that way.</p> +<p class="pnext">But Miss Sylvia was made on a different measure. My, but she was a +winner! Even after I knew what brought Jack Reddy in from Firehill so +often I couldn't be set against her. Jealous I might be of a girl like +myself, but not of one who was the queen bee of the hive.</p> +<p class="pnext">She was a beauty from the ground up—a blonde with hair like corn silk +that she wore in a loose, fluffy knot with little curly ends hanging on +her neck. Her face was pure pink and white, the only dark thing in it +her big brown eyes, that were as clear and soft as a baby's. And she was +a great dresser, always the latest novelty, and looking prettier in each +one. Mrs. Galway'd say to me, with her nose caught up, scornful,</p> +<p class="pnext">"To my mind it's not refined to advertise your wealth on your back."</p> +<p class="pnext">But I didn't worry, knowing Mrs. Galway'd have advertised hers if she'd +had the wealth or a decent shaped back to advertise it on, which she +hadn't, being round-shouldered.</p> +<p class="pnext">There was none of the haughty ways of her parents about Miss Sylvia. +When she'd come into the exchange to send a call (a thing that puzzled +me first but I soon caught on) she'd always stop and have a pleasant +word with me. On bright afternoons I'd see her pass on horseback, +straight as an arrow, with a man's hat on her golden hair. She'd always +have a smile for everyone, touching her hat brim real sporty with the +end of her whip. Even when she was in her motor, speeding down Main +Street, she'd give you a hail as jolly as if she was your college chum.</p> +<p class="pnext">Sometimes she'd be alone but generally there was a man along. There were +a lot of them hanging round her, which was natural, seeing she had +everything to draw them like a candle drawing moths. They'd come and go +from town and now and then stay over Sunday at the Longwood Inn—it's a +swell little place done up in the Colonial style—and you'd see them +riding and walking with her, very devoted. At first everybody thought +her parents were agreeable to all the attention she was getting. It +wasn't till the Mapleshade servants began to talk too much that we heard +the Fowlers, especially the Doctor, didn't like it.</p> +<p class="pnext">I hadn't known her long before I began to notice something that +interested me. A telephone girl sees so many people and hears such a lot +of confidential things on the wire, that she gets to know more than most +about what I suppose you'd call human nature. It's a study that's always +attracted me and in Miss Sylvia's case there was a double attraction—I +was curious about her for myself and I was curious about her because of +Jack Reddy.</p> +<p class="pnext">What I noticed was that she was so different with men to what she was +with women—affable to both, but it was another kind of affability. I've +seen considerably many girls trying to throw their harpoons into men and +doing it too, but they were in the booby class beside Miss Sylvia. She +was what the novelists call a coquette, but she was that dainty and sly +about it that I don't believe any of the victims knew it. It wasn't what +she said, either; more the way she looked and the soft, sweet manner she +had, as if she thought more of the chap she was talking to than anybody +else in the world. She'd be that way to one in my exchange and the next +day I'd see her just the same with another in the drugstore.</p> +<p class="pnext">It made me uneasy. Even if the man you love doesn't love you, you don't +want to see him fooled. But I said nothing—I'm the close sort—and it +wasn't till I came to be friends with Anne Hennessey that I heard the +inside facts about the family at Mapleshade.</p> +<p class="pnext">Anne Hennessey was a Canadian and a fine girl. She was a lady and had a +lady's job—seventy-five a month and her own bathroom—and being the +real thing she didn't put on any airs, but when she liked me made right +up to me and we soon were pals. After work hours I'd sometimes go up to +her at Mapleshade or she'd come down to me over the Elite.</p> +<p class="pnext">I remember it was in my room one spring evening—me lying on the bed and +Anne sitting by the open window—that she began to talk about the +Fowlers. She was not one to carry tales, but I could see she had +something on her mind and for the first time she loosened up. I was +picking over a box of chocolates and I didn't give her a hint how keen I +was to hear, acting like the candies had the best part of my attention. +She began by saying the Doctor and Miss Sylvia didn't get on well.</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's just like a novel," I answered, "the heroine's stepfather's +always her natural enemy."</p> +<p class="pnext">"He's not that in this case," said Anne—she speaks English fine, like +the teachers in the High—"I'm sure he means well by her, but they can't +get on at all, they're always quarreling."</p> +<p class="pnext">"There's many a gilded home hides a tragedy. What do they fight about?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Things she does he disapproves of. She's very spoiled and self-willed. +No one's ever controlled her and she resents it from him."</p> +<p class="pnext">"What's he disapprove of?"</p> +<p class="pnext">Anne didn't answer right off, looking thoughtful out of the window. Then +she said slow as if she was considering her words:</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'm going to tell you, Molly, because I know you're no gossip and can +be trusted, and the truth is, I'm worried. I don't like the situation up +at Mapleshade."</p> +<p class="pnext">I swung my feet on to the floor and sat up on the edge of the bed, +nibbling at a chocolate almond.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Here's where I get dumb," I said, sort of casual to encourage her.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Sylvia Hesketh's a girl that needs a strong hand over her and there's +no one has it. Her father's dead, her mother—poor Mrs. Fowler's only a +grown-up baby ready to say black is white if her husband wants her +to—and Dr. Fowler's trying to do it and he's going about it all wrong. +You see," she said, turning to me very serious, "it's not only that +she's head-strong and extravagant but she's an incorrigible flirt."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Is there a place in the back of the book where you can find out what +incorrigible means?" I said.</p> +<p class="pnext">Anne smiled, but not as if she felt like it.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Uncontrollable, irrepressible. Her mother—Mrs. Fowler's ready to tell +me anything and everything—says she's always been like that. And, of +course, with her looks and her fortune the men are around her like flies +round honey."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why does the Doctor mind that?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I suppose he wouldn't mind if they just came to Mapleshade or Longwood. +But—that's what the quarreling's about—he's found out that she meets +them in town, goes to lunch and the matinée with them."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Excuse me, but I've left my etiquette book on the piano. What's wrong +about going to the matinée or to lunch?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Nothing's really wrong. Mind you, Molly, I know Sylvia through and +through and there's no harm in her—it's just the bringing-up and the +spoiling and the admiration. But, of course, in her position, a girl +doesn't go about that way without a chaperone. The Doctor's perfectly +right to object."</p> +<p class="pnext">I was looking down, pretending to hunt over the box.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Who does she go with?" I said.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, there are several. A man named Carisbrook——" I'd seen him often, +a swell guy in white spats and a high hat—"and a young lawyer called +Dunham and Ben Robinson, a Canadian like me. People see her with them +and tell the doctor and there's a row."</p> +<p class="pnext">I looked into the box as careful as if I was searching for a diamond.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Ain't Mr. Reddy one of the happy family?" I asked. "Ah, here's the last +almond!"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, of course, young Reddy. I think it would be a good thing if she +married him. Everybody says he's a fine fellow, and I tell you now, +Molly, with Sylvia so willful and the doctor so domineering and Mrs. +Fowler being pulled to pieces between them, things at Mapleshade can't +go on long the way they are."</p> +<p class="pnext">That was in May. At the end of June the Fowlers went to Bar Harbor with +all their outfit for the summer. After that Jack Reddy didn't come into +Longwood much. I heard that he was spending a good deal of his time at +the bungalow at Hochalaga Lake, and I did see him a few times meeting +his company at the train—he had some week-end parties out there—and +bringing them back in the gray car.</p> +<p class="pnext">At the end of September the Fowlers came home. It was great weather, +clear and crisp, with the feel of frost in the air. Most everybody was +out of doors and I saw Sylvia often, sometimes on horseback, sometimes +driving her motor. She was prettier than ever for the change and seemed +like she couldn't stay in the house. I'd see her riding toward home in +the red light of the sunset, and as I walked back from work her car +often would flash past me, speeding through the early dark toward Maple +Lane.</p> +<p class="pnext">Anne said they'd had a fairly peaceful summer and she hoped they were +going to get on better. There had only been one row—that was about a +man who was up at Bar Harbor and had met Sylvia and paid her a good deal +of attention. The Doctor had been very angry as he disapproved of the +man—Cokesbury was his name.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Cokesbury!" I cut in surprised—we were in Anne's room that +evening—"why, he belongs round here."</p> +<p class="pnext">Anne had heard that and wanted to know what I knew about him, which I'll +write down in this place as it seems to fit in and has to be told +somewhere.</p> +<p class="pnext">When I first came to Longwood, Mr. and Mrs. Cokesbury were living on +their estate, Cokesbury Lodge, about twenty-five miles from us, near +Azalea. They had been in France for a year previous to that, then come +back and taken up their residence in Mr. Cokesbury's country seat, and +it was shortly after that Mrs. Cokesbury died there, leaving three +children. For a while the widower stayed on with nurses and governesses +to look after the poor motherless kids. Then, the eldest boy taking sick +and nearly dying, he decided to send them to his wife's parents, who had +wanted them since Mrs. Cokesbury's death.</p> +<p class="pnext">So the establishment at the Lodge was broken up and Mr. Cokesbury went +to live in town. There were rumors that the house was to be sold, but in +the spring Sands, the Pullman conductor, told me that Mr. Cokesbury had +been down several times, staying over Sunday and had said he had given +up the idea of selling the place. He told Sands he couldn't get his +price for it and what was the sense of selling at a loss, especially +when he could come out there and get a breath of country air when he was +scorched up with the city heat?</p> +<p class="pnext">I'd passed the house one day in August when I was on an auto ride with +some friends. It was a big, rambling place with a lot of dismal-looking +pines around it, about five miles from Azalea and with no near +neighbors. Mr. Cokesbury only kept one car—he'd had several when his +wife was there—and used to drive himself down from the Lodge to the +station, leave his car in the Azalea garage, and drive himself back the +next time he came. He had no servants or caretaker, which he didn't +need, as, after Mrs. Cokesbury's death, all the valuable things had been +taken out of the house and sent to town for storage.</p> +<p class="pnext">It gave me a jar to hear that Sylvia Hesketh—who, in my mind, was as +good as engaged to Jack Reddy—would have anything to do with him. I'd +never seen him, but I'd heard a lot that wasn't to his credit. He hadn't +been good to his wife—everybody said she was a real lady—but was the +gay, wild kind, and not young, either. Anne said he was forty if he was +a day. When I asked her what Sylvia could see in an old gink like that, +she just shrugged up her shoulders and said, who could tell—Sylvia was +made that way. She was like some woman whose name I can't remember who +sat on a rock and sang to the sailors till they got crazy and jumped +into the water.</p> +<p class="pnext">My head was full of these things one glorious afternoon toward the end +of October when—it being my holiday—I started out for a walk through +the woods. The woods cover the hills behind the village and they're +grand, miles and miles of them. But wait! There was a little thing that +happened, by the way, that's worth telling, for it gave me a +premonition—is that the word? Or, maybe, I'd better say connected up +with what was in my mind.</p> +<p class="pnext">I was walking slow down Main Street when opposite the postoffice I saw +all the loafers and most of the tradespeople lined up in a ring staring +at a bunch of those dago acrobats that go about the State all summer +doing stunts on a bit of carpet. I'd seen them often—chaps in dirty +pink tights walking on their hands and rolling round in knots—and I +wouldn't have stopped but I got a glimpse of little Mick Donahue +stumping round the outside trying to squeeze in and trying not to cry +because he couldn't. So I stopped and hoisted him up for a good view, +telling the men in front to break a way for the kid to see.</p> +<p class="pnext">There was a dago scraping on a fiddle and while the acrobats were +performing on their carpet, a big bear with a little, brown, +shriveled-up man holding it by a chain, was dancing. And when I got my +first look at that bear, in spite of all my worry I burst out laughing, +for, dancing away there solemn and slow, it was the dead image of Dr. +Fowler.</p> +<p class="pnext">You'd have laughed yourself if you'd seen it—that is, if you'd known +the Doctor. There was something so like him in its expression—sort of +gloomy and thoughtful—and its little eyes set up high in its head and +looking angry at the crowd as if it despised them. When its master +jerked the chain and shouted something in a foreign lingo it hitched up +its lip like it was trying to smile, and that sideways grin, as if it +didn't feel at all pleasant, was just the way the Doctor'd smile when he +came into the Exchange and gave me a number.</p> +<p class="pnext">It fascinated me and I stood staring with little Mick sitting on my arm, +just loving it all, his dirty little fist clasped round a penny. Then +the music stopped and one of the acrobats came round with a hat and +little Mick gave a great sigh as if he was coming out of a dream. "If +you hadn't come, Molly, I'd have missed it," he said, looking into my +face in that sweet wistful way sickly kids have, "and it's the last time +they'll be round this year."</p> +<p class="pnext">I kissed him and put him down and told the men as I squeezed out to keep +him in the front or they'd hear from me. Then I walked off toward the +woods thinking.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was a funny idea I'd got into my head. I'd once read in a paper that +when people looked like animals they resembled the animals in their +dispositions—and I was wondering was Dr. Fowler like a bear, grouchy +and when you crossed him savage. Maybe it was because I'd been so +worried, but it gave me a kind of chill. My thoughts went back to +Mapleshade and I got one of those queer glimpses (like a curtain was +lifted for a second and you could see things in the future) of trouble +there—something dark—I don't know how to explain it, but it was as if +I got a new line on the Doctor, as if the bear had made me see through +the surface clear into him.</p> +<p class="pnext">I tried to shake it off for I wanted to enjoy my afternoon in the woods. +They are beautiful at that season, the trees full of colored leaves, and +all quiet except for the rustlings of little animals round the roots. +There's a road that winds along under the branches, and trails, soft +under foot with fallen leaves and moss, that you can follow for miles.</p> +<p class="pnext">I was coming down one of these, making no more noise than the squirrels, +when just before it crossed the road I saw something and stopped. There, +sitting side by side on a log, were Sylvia Hesketh and a man. Close to +them, run off to the side, was a motor and near it tied to a tree a +horse with a lady's saddle. Sylvia was in her riding dress, looking a +picture, her eyes on the ground and slapping softly with her whip on the +side of her boot. The man was leaning toward her, talking low and +earnest and staring hard into her face.</p> +<div class="align-center auto-scaled figure" style="margin-left: 27%; width: 45%" id="figure-4"> +<span id="sylvia-was-in-her-riding-dress-looking-a-picture"/><img style="display: block; width: 100%" alt="Sylvia was in her riding dress, looking a picture" src="images/illus3.jpg" width="100%"/> +<div class="caption italics"> +Sylvia was in her riding dress, looking a picture</div> +</div> +<p class="pfirst">To my knowledge I'd never seen him before, and it gave me a start—me +saying, surprised to myself, "Hullo! here's another one?" He was a big, +powerful chap, with a square, healthy looking face and wide shoulders on +him like a prize fighter. He was dressed in a loose coat and +knickerbockers and as he talked he had his hands spread out, one on each +knee, great brown hands with hair on them. I was close enough to see +that, but he was speaking so low and I was so scared that they'd see me +and think I was spying, that I didn't hear what he was saying. The only +one that saw me was the horse. It looked up sudden with its ears +pricked, staring surprised with its soft gentle eyes.</p> +<p class="pnext">I stole away like a robber, not making a speck of noise. All the joy I'd +been taking in the walk under the colored leaves was gone. I felt kind +of shriveled up inside—the way you feel when someone you love is sick. +I couldn't bear to think that Jack Reddy was giving his heart to a girl +who'd meet another man out in the woods and listen to him so coy and yet +so interested.</p> +<p class="pnext">As far as I can remember, that was a little over a month from the fatal +day. All the rest of October and through the first part of November +things went along quiet and peaceful. And then, suddenly, everything +came together—quick like a blow.</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="iii"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id5">III</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">For two days it had been raining, heavy straight rain. From my window at +Galway's I could see the fields round the village full of pools and +zigzags of water as if they'd been covered with a shiny gray veil that +was suddenly pulled off and had caught in the stubble and been torn to +rags. Saturday morning the weather broke. But the sky was still overcast +and the air had that sort of warm, muggy breathlessness that comes after +rain. That was November the twentieth.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was eleven o'clock and I was sitting at the switchboard looking out +at the streets, all puddles and ruts, when I got a call from the +Dalzells'—a place near the Junction—for Mapleshade.</p> +<p class="pnext">Now you needn't get preachy and tell me it's against the rules to +listen—suspension and maybe discharge. I know that better than most. +Didn't the roof over my head and the food in my mouth depend on me doing +my work according to orders? But the fact is that at this time I was +keyed up so high I'd got past being cautious. When a call came for +Mapleshade I <em class="italics">listened</em>, listened hard, with all my ears. What did I +expect to hear? I don't know exactly. It might have been Jack Reddy and +it might have been Sylvia—oh, never mind what it was—just say I was +curious and let it go at that.</p> +<p class="pnext">So I lifted up the cam and took in the conversation.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was a woman's voice—Mrs. Dalzell's, I knew it well—and Dr. +Fowler's. Hers was trembly and excited:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, Dr. Fowler, is that you? It's Mrs. Dalzell, yes, near the Junction. +My husband's very sick. We've had Dr. Graham and he says it's +appendicitis and there ought to be an operation—now, as soon as +possible. <em class="italics">Do</em> you hear me?"</p> +<p class="pnext">Then Dr. Fowler, very calm and polite:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Perfectly, madam."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, I'm so glad—I've been so <em class="italics">terribly</em> worried. It's so unexpected. +Mr. Dalzell's never had so much as a <em class="italics">cramp</em> before and now——"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Just wait a minute, Mrs. Dalzell," came the Doctor. "Let me understand. +Graham recommends an operation, you say?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, Dr. Fowler, as soon as possible; something awful may happen if +it's not done. And Dr. Graham suggested you if you'd be so kind. I know +it's a favor but I <em class="italics">must</em> have the best for my husband. <em class="italics">Won't</em> you +come? Please, to oblige me."</p> +<p class="pnext">Dr. Fowler asked some questions which I needn't put down and said he'd +come and if necessary operate. Then they talked about the best way for +him to get there, the Doctor wanting to know if the main line to the +Junction wouldn't be the quickest. But Mrs. Dalzell said she'd been +consulting the time tables and there'd be no train from Longwood to the +Junction before two and if he wouldn't mind and would come in his auto +by the Firehill Road he'd get there several hours sooner. He agreed to +that and it wasn't fifteen minutes after he'd hung up that I saw him +swing past my window in his car, driving himself.</p> +<p class="pnext">Later on in the afternoon I got another call from the Dalzells' for +Mapleshade and heard the Doctor tell Mrs. Fowler that the operation had +been a serious one and that he would stay there for the night and +probably all the next day.</p> +<p class="pnext">Before that second call, about two hours after the first one, there came +another message for Mapleshade that before a week was out was in most +every paper in the country and that lifted me right into the middle of +the Hesketh mystery.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was near one o'clock, an hour when work's slack round Longwood, +everybody being either at their dinner or getting ready for it. The call +was from a public pay station and was in a man's voice—a voice I +didn't know, but that, because of my curiosity, I listened to as sharp +as if it was my lover's asking me to marry him.</p> +<p class="pnext">The man wanted to see Miss Sylvia and, after a short wait, I heard her +answer, very gay and cordial and evidently knowing him at once without +any questions. If she'd said one word to show who he was things +afterward would have been very different, but there wasn't a single +phrase that you could identify him by—all anyone could have caught was +that they seemed to know each other very well.</p> +<p class="pnext">He began by telling her it was a long time since he'd seen her and +wanting to know if she'd come to town on Monday and take lunch with him +at Sherry's and afterward go to a concert.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Monday," she said very slow and soft, "the day after to-morrow? No, I +can't make any engagement for Monday."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why not?" he asked.</p> +<p class="pnext">She didn't answer right off and when she did, though her voice was so +sweet, there was something sly and secret about it.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I've something else to do."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Can't you postpone it?"</p> +<p class="pnext">She laughed at that, a little soft laugh that came bubbling through her +words:</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, I'm afraid not."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Must be something very interesting."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Um—maybe so."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You're very mysterious—can't I be told what it is?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why should you be told?"</p> +<p class="pnext">That riled him, I could hear it in his voice.</p> +<p class="pnext">"As a friend, or if I don't come under that head, as a fellow who's got +the frosty mit and wants to know why."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I don't think that's any reason. I have no engagement with you and I +have with—someone else."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Just tell me one thing—is it a man or a woman?"</p> +<p class="pnext">She began to laugh again, and if I'd been the man at the other end of +the wire that laugh would have made me wild.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Which do you think?" she asked.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I don't think, I <em class="italics">know</em>," and <em class="italics">I</em> knew that he was mad.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Well, if you know," she said as sweet as pie, "I needn't tell you any +more. I'll say good-bye."</p> +<p class="pnext">"No," he shouted, "don't hang up—wait. What do you want to torment me +for?" Then he got sort of coaxing, "It isn't kind to treat a fellow this +way. Can't you tell me who it is?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, that's a secret. You can't know a thing till I choose to tell you +and I don't choose now."</p> +<p class="pnext">"If I come over Sunday afternoon will you see me?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"What time?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Any time you say—I'm your humble slave, as you know."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'm going out about seven."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Where?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's another secret."</p> +<p class="pnext">I think a child listening to that conversation would have seen he was +getting madder every minute and yet he was so afraid she'd cut him off +that he had to keep it under and talk pleasant.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Look here," he said, "I've something I want to say to you awfully. If I +run over in my car and get there round six-thirty, can you see me for a +few minutes?"</p> +<p class="pnext">She didn't answer at once. Then she said slow as if she was undecided:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Not at the house."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I didn't mean at the house. Say in Maple Lane, by the gate. I won't +keep you more than five or ten minutes."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Six-thirty's rather late."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Well, any time you say."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Can't you be there exactly at six-fifteen?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"If that's a condition."</p> +<p class="pnext">"It is. If you're late you won't find me. I'll be gone"—she began to +laugh again—"taking my secret with me."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'll be there on the dot."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Very well, then, you can come—at the gate just as the clock marks one +quarter after six. And, maybe, if you're good, I'll tell you the secret. +Good-bye until then—try not to be too curious. It's a bad habit and +I've seen signs of it in you lately. Good-bye."</p> +<p class="pnext">Before he could say another word she'd disconnected.</p> +<p class="pnext">I leaned back in my chair thinking it over. What was she up to? What was +the secret? And who was the man? "Run over in his car"—that looked like +someone from one of the big estates. How many of them <em class="italics">had</em> she buzzing +round her?</p> +<p class="pnext">And then, for all I was so downhearted, I couldn't help smiling to think +of those two supposing they were talking so secluded and an East Side +tenement girl taking it all in. Little did I guess then that me breaking +the rules that way, instead of destroying me was going to——But that +doesn't come in here.</p> +<p class="pnext">And now I come to Sunday the twenty-first, a date I'll never forget.</p> +<p class="pnext">It seemed to me afterward that Nature knew of the tragedy and prepared +for it. The weather was duller and grayer than it had been on Saturday, +not a breath of air stirring and the sky all mottled over with clouds, +dark and heavy looking. A full moon was due and as I went to the +Exchange I thought of the sweethearts that had dates to walk out in the +moonlight and how disappointed they'd be.</p> +<p class="pnext">Things weren't cheerful at the Exchange either. I found Minnie Trail, +the night operator, as white as a ghost, saying she felt as if one of +her sick headaches was coming on and if it did would I stay on over +time? I knew those headaches—they ran along sometimes till eight or +nine. I told her to go right home to bed and I'd hold the fort till she +was able to relieve me. We often did turns like that, one for the other. +It's one of the advantages of being in a small country office—no one +picks on you for acting human.</p> +<p class="pnext">About ten I had a call from Anne Hennessey. "Have you got anything on +for this evening, Molly?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I have not. This is Longwood, not gay Paree."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Then I'll come round to Galways, about seven and we'll go to the Gilt +Edge for supper. I want to talk to you."</p> +<p class="pnext">The Gilt Edge Lunch was where I took my meals, a nice clean little joint +close to the office. But I didn't know when I'd get my supper that +night, so I called back:</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's all right, sister, but come to the Exchange. Minnie's head's on +the blink and I'll stay on here late. Anything up?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes. I don't want to talk about it over the wire. There's been another +row here—yesterday morning. It's horrible; I can't stand it. I'll tell +you more this evening. So long."</p> +<p class="pnext">I put my elbows on the table and sat forward thinking. If you'd asked me +a year ago what I wanted most in the world I'd have said money. But I'd +learnt considerable since then. "Money don't do it," I said to myself. +"Look at the Fowlers with their jewels and their millions scrapping till +even the housekeeper on a fancy salary with a private bath can't stand +it."</p> +<p class="pnext">And there came up in my mind the memory of the East Side tenement where +I was raised. I thought of my poor father, most killed with work, and my +mother eking things out, doing housecleaning and never a hard word to +each other or to me.</p> +<p class="pnext">The night settled down early, black, dark and very still. At seven Anne +Hennessey came in and sat down by the radiator, which was making queer +noises with the heat coming up. Supper time's like dinner—few calls—so +I turned round in my chair, ready for a good talk, and asked about the +trouble at Mapleshade.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, it was another quarrel yesterday morning at breakfast and with +Harper, the butler, hearing every word. He said it was the worst they'd +ever had. He's a self-respecting, high-class servant and was shocked."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Sylvia and the Doctor again?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, and poor Mrs. Fowler crying behind the coffee pot."</p> +<p class="pnext">"The same old subject?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, of course. It's young Reddy this time. Sylvia's been out a good +deal this autumn in her car; several times she's been gone nearly the +whole day. When the Doctor questioned her she'd either be evasive or +sulky. On Friday someone told him they'd seen her far up on the turnpike +with Jack Reddy in his racer."</p> +<p class="pnext">I fired up, I couldn't help it.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why should he be mad about that? Isn't Mr. Reddy good enough for her?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"<em class="italics">I</em> think he is. I told you before I thought the best thing she could +do would be to marry him. But——" she looked round to see that no one +was coming in——"don't say a word of what I'm going to tell you. I have +no right to repeat what I hear as an employee but I'm worried and don't +know what's the best thing to do. Mrs. Fowler has as good as told me +that her husband's lost all his money and it's Sylvia's that's running +Mapleshade. And what <em class="italics">I</em> think is that the Doctor doesn't want her to +marry <em class="italics">anyone</em>. It isn't her he minds losing; it's thirty thousand a +year."</p> +<p class="pnext">"But when she comes of age she can do what she wants and if he makes it +so disagreeable she won't want to live there."</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's two years off yet. He may recoup himself in that time."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, I see. But he can't do any good by fighting with her."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Molly, you're a wise little woman. <em class="italics">Of course</em> he can't, but he doesn't +know it. He treats that hot-headed, high-spirited girl like a child of +five. Mark my words, there's going to be trouble at Mapleshade."</p> +<p class="pnext">I thought of the telephone message I'd overheard the day before and it +came to me suddenly what "the secret" might be. Could Sylvia have been +planning to run away? I didn't say anything—it's natural to me and you +get trained along those lines in the telephone business—and I sat +turning it over in my mind as Anne went on.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'd leave to-morrow only I'm so sorry for Mrs. Fowler. She's as +helpless as a baby and seems to cling to me. The other day she told me +about her first marriage—how her husband didn't care for her but was +crazy about Sylvia—that's why he left her almost all his money."</p> +<p class="pnext">I wasn't listening much, still thinking about "the secret." If she <em class="italics">was</em> +running away was she going alone or with Jack Reddy? My eyes were fixed +on the window and I saw, without noticing particular, the down train +from the city draw into the station, and then Jim Donahue run along the +platform swinging a lantern. As if I was in a dream I could hear Anne:</p> +<p class="pnext">"I call it an unjust will—only two hundred thousand dollars to his wife +and five millions to his daughter. But if Sylvia dies first, all the +money goes back to Mrs. Fowler."</p> +<p class="pnext">The train pulled out, snorting like a big animal. Jim disappeared, then +presently I saw him open the depot door and come slouching across the +street. I knew he was headed for the Exchange, thinking Minnie Trail was +there, he being a widower with a crush on Minnie.</p> +<p class="pnext">He came in and, after he'd got over the shock of seeing me, turned to +Anne and said:</p> +<p class="pnext">"I just been putting your young lady on the train."</p> +<p class="pnext">Anne gave a start and stared at him.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Miss Sylvia?" she said.</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's her," said Jim, warming his coat tails at the radiator.</p> +<p class="pnext">I could see Anne was awful surprised and was trying to hide it.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Who was she with?" she asked.</p> +<p class="pnext">"No one. She went up alone and said she was going to be away for a few +days. Where's she going?"</p> +<p class="pnext">Anne gave me a look that said, "Keep your mouth shut," and turned quiet +and innocent to Jim. "Just for a visit to friends. She's always visiting +people in New York and Philadelphia."</p> +<p class="pnext">Jim stayed round a while gabbing with us, and then went back to the +station. When the door shut on him we stared at each other with our eyes +as round as marbles.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, Molly," Anne said, almost in a whisper, "it's just what I've been +afraid of."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You think she's lighting out?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes—don't you see, the Doctor being at the Dalzells' has given her the +chance."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Where would she go to?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"How do I know? Heaven send she hasn't done anything foolish. But this +morning she sent Virginie, that French woman, up to the village for +something—on Sunday when all the shops are shut. The housemaid told me +they'd been trying to find out what it was and Virginie wouldn't tell. +Oh, dear, <em class="italics">could</em> she have gone off with someone?"</p> +<p class="pnext">We were talking it over in low voices when a call came. It was from +Mapleshade to the Dalzells'. As I made the connection I whispered to +Anne what it was and she whispered back, "Listen."</p> +<p class="pnext">I did. It was from Mrs. Fowler, all breathless and almost crying. She +asked for the Doctor and when he came burst out:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, Dan, something's happened—something dreadful. Sylvia's run away."</p> +<p class="pnext">I could hear the Doctor's voice, small and distant but quite clear:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Go slow now, Connie, it's hard to hear you. Did you say <em class="italics">Sylvia'd run +away</em>?"</p> +<p class="pnext">Then Mrs. Fowler said, trying to speak slower:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, with Jack Reddy. We've been hunting for her and we've just found a +letter from him in her desk. Do you hear—her desk, in the top drawer? +It told her to meet him at seven in the Lane and go with him in his car +to Bloomington."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Bloomington? That's a hundred and fifty miles off."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I can't help how far off it is. That's where the letter said he was +going to take her. It said they'd go by the turnpike to Bloomington and +be married there. And we can't find Virginie—they've evidently taken +her with them."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I see—by the turnpike, did you say?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes. Can't you go up there and meet them and bring her back?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes—keep cool now, I'll head them off. What time did you say they +left?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"The letter said he'd meet her in the Lane at seven and it's a little +after eight now. Have you time to get up there and catch them?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Time?—to burn. On a night like this Reddy can't get round to the part +of the pike where I'll strike it under three and a half to four hours."</p> +<p class="pnext">"But can you go—can you leave your case?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes—Dalzell's improving. Graham can attend to it. Now don't get +excited, I'll have her back some time to-night. And not a word to +anybody. We don't want this to get about. We'll have to shut the mouth +of that fool of a French woman, but I'll see to that later. Don't see +anyone. Go to your room and say nothing."</p> +<p class="pnext">Just as the message was finished Minnie Trail came in. I made the record +of it and then got up asking her, as natural as you please, how she +felt. Anne did the same and you'd never have thought to hear us +sympathizing with her that we were just bursting to get outside.</p> +<p class="pnext">When we did we walked slow down the street, me telling her what I'd +heard. All the time I was speaking I was thinking of Sylvia and Jack +Reddy tearing away through that still, black night, flying along the +pale line of the road, flashing past the lights of farms and country +houses, swinging down between the rolling hills and out by the open +fields, till they'd see the glow of Bloomington low down in the sky.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was Anne who brought me back to where I was. She suddenly stopped +short, staring in front of her and then turned to me:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why, how can she be eloping with Reddy by the turnpike when Jim Donahue +saw her get on the train?"</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="iv"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id6">IV</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">When I come to the next day I can't make my story plain if I only tell +what I saw and heard. I didn't even pick up the most important message +in the tragedy. It came at half-past nine that night through the Corona +Exchange and was sent from a pay station so there was no record of it, +only Jack Reddy's word—but I'm going too fast; that belongs later.</p> +<p class="pnext">What I've got to do is to piece things together as I got them from the +gossip in the village, from the inquest, and from the New York papers. +All I ask of you is to remember that I'm up against a stunt that's new +to me and that I'm trying to get it over as clear as I can.</p> +<p class="pnext">The best way is for me to put down first Sylvia's movements on that +tragic Sunday.</p> +<p class="pnext">About five in the afternoon Sylvia and Mrs. Fowler had tea in the +library. When that was over—about half-past—Sylvia went away, saying +she was going to her room to write letters, and her mother retired to +hers for the nap she always took before dinner. What happened between +then and the time when Mrs. Fowler sent the message to the Doctor I +heard from Anne Hennessey. It was this way:</p> +<p class="pnext">They had dinner late at Mapleshade—half-past seven—and when Sylvia +didn't come down Mrs. Fowler sent up Harper to call her. He came back +saying she wasn't in her room, and Mrs. Fowler, getting uneasy, went up +herself, sending Harper to find Virginie Dupont. It wasn't long before +they discovered that neither Sylvia nor Virginie were in the house.</p> +<p class="pnext">When she realized this Mrs. Fowler was terribly upset. Sylvia's room was +in confusion, the bureau drawers pulled out, the closet doors open. Anne +not being there, Harper, who was scared at Mrs. Fowler's excitement, +called Nora Magee, the chambermaid. She was a smart girl and saw pretty +quickly that Sylvia had evidently left. The toilet things were gone from +the dresser; the jewelry case was open and empty, only for a few old +pieces of no great value. It was part of Nora's job to do up the room +and she knew where Sylvia's Hudson seal coat hung in one of the closets. +A glance showed her that was gone, also a gold-fitted bag that the +Doctor had given his stepdaughter on her birthday.</p> +<p class="pnext">All the servants knew of the quarreling and its cause and while Mrs. +Fowler was moaning and hunting about helplessly, Nora went to the desk +and opened it. There, lying careless as if it had been thrown in in a +hurry, was Jack Reddy's letter. She gave a glance at it and handed it to +Mrs. Fowler. With the letter in her hand Mrs. Fowler ran downstairs and +telephoned to the Doctor.</p> +<p class="pnext">The poor lady was in a terrible way and when Anne got back she had to +sit with her, trying to quiet her till the Doctor came back. That +wasn't till nearly two in the morning, when he reached home, dead beat, +saying he'd come round the turnpike from the Riven Rock Road and seen no +sign of either Sylvia or Jack Reddy.</p> +<p class="pnext">No one at Mapleshade saw Sylvia leave the house, no one in Longwood saw +her pass through the village, yet, two and a half hours from the time +she had made the date with Mr. Reddy, she was seen again, over a hundred +miles from her home, in the last place anyone would have expected to +find her.</p> +<p class="pnext">Way up on the turnpike, two miles from Cresset's Crossing, there's a +sort of roadhouse where the farm hands spend their evenings and +automobilists stop for drinks and gasoline. It's got a shady reputation, +being frequented by a rough class of people and once there was a dago—a +laborer on Cresset's Farm—killed there in a drunken row. It's called +the Wayside Arbor, which doesn't fit, sounding innocent and rural, +though in the back there is a trellis with grapes growing over it and +tables set out under it in warm weather.</p> +<p class="pnext">At this season it's a dreary looking spot, an old frame cottage a few +yards back from the road, with a broken-down piazza and a door painted +green leading into the bar. Along the top of the piazza goes the sign +"Wayside Arbor," with advertisements for some kind of beer at each end +of it, and in the window there's more advertisements for whisky and +crackers and soft drinks. Nailed to one of the piazza posts is a public +telephone sign standing out very prominent.</p> +<p class="pnext">At the time of the Hesketh mystery I'd only seen it once, one day in the +summer when I was out in a hired car with Mrs. Galway and two gentlemen +friends from New York. We'd been to Bloomington by train and were +motoring back and stopped to get some beer. But we ladies, not liking +the looks of the place, wouldn't go in and had our beer brought out to +us by the proprietor, Jake Hines, a tough-looking customer in a shirt +without a collar and one of his suspenders broken.</p> +<p class="pnext">It's very lonesome round there. The nearest house is Cresset's, a half +mile away across the fields. Back of it and all round is Cresset's land, +some of it planted in crops and then strips of woods, making the country +in summer look lovely with the dark and the light green.</p> +<p class="pnext">Sunday evening there were only two people in the Wayside Arbor bar, +Hines and his servant, Tecla Rabine, a Bohemian woman. Mrs. Hines was +upstairs in the room above in bed with a cold. There was a fire burning +in the stove, as a good many of Hines's customers were the dagoes that +work at Cresset's and the other farms and they liked the place warm. +Hines was reading the paper and Tecla Rabine was cleaning up the bar +before she went upstairs, she having a toothache and wanting to get off +to bed.</p> +<p class="pnext">At the inquest Hines swore that he heard no sound of a car or of +wheels—which, he said, he would have noticed, as that generally meant +business—when there was a step on the piazza, the door opened and a +lady came in. He didn't know who she was but saw right off she wasn't +the kind that you'd expect to see in his place. She had on a long dark +fur coat, a close-fitting plush hat with a Shetland veil pushed up round +the brim, and looked pale, and, he thought, scared. It was Sylvia +Hesketh, but he didn't know that till afterward.</p> +<p class="pnext">She asked him right off if she could use his telephone and he pointed to +the booth in the corner. She went in and closed the door and Hines +stepped to the window and looked out to see if there was a car or a +carriage that he hadn't heard, the mud making the road soft. But there +was nothing there. Before he was through looking he heard the booth door +open and turning back saw her come out. He said she wasn't five minutes +sending her message.</p> +<p class="pnext">That telephone message was the most mysterious one in the case. It was +transmitted through the Corona Exchange to Firehill and there was no +one in the world who heard it but Jack Reddy. I'm going to put it down +here, copied from the newspaper reports of the inquest:</p> +<blockquote><div> +<p class="pfirst">Oh, Jack, is that you? It's Sylvia. Thank Heavens you're there. +I'm in trouble, I want you. I've done something dreadful. I'll +tell you when I see you. I'll explain everything and you won't +be angry. Come and get me—start now, this minute. Come up the +Firehill Road to the Turnpike and I'll be there waiting, where +the roads meet. Don't ask any questions now. When you hear +you'll understand. And don't let anyone know—the servants or +anyone. You've got to keep it quiet, it's vitally important, +for my sake. Come, come quick.</p> +</div></blockquote> +<p class="pfirst">That was all. Before he could ask her a question she'd disconnected. +And, naturally, he made no effort to find out where the call had come +from, being in such a hurry to get to her—Sylvia who was in trouble and +wanted him to come.</p> +<p class="pnext">When she came out of the booth she carried a small purse in her hand and +Hines then noticed that she had only one glove on—the left—and that +her right hand was scratched in several places. Thinking she looked cold +he asked her if she would have something to drink and she said no, then +pushed back her cuff and looked at a bracelet watch set in diamonds and +sapphires that she wore on her wrist.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Twenty minutes to ten," she said. "I'll wait here for a little while if +you don't mind."</p> +<p class="pnext">She went over to the stove, pulled up a chair and sat down, spreading +her hands out to the heat, and when they were warm, opening her coat +collar, and turning it back from her neck. Both Hines and Tecla Rabine +noticed that her feet were muddy and that there were twigs and dead +leaves caught in the edge of her skirt. As she didn't seem inclined to +say anything, Hines, who admitted that he was ready to burst with +curiosity, began to question her, trying to find out where she'd come +from and what she was waiting for.</p> +<p class="pnext">"You come a long way, I guess," he said.</p> +<p class="pnext">She just nodded.</p> +<p class="pnext">"From Bloomington maybe?" he asked.</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, the other direction—toward Longwood."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Car broken down?" he said next, and she answered sort of indifferent,</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, it's down the road."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Maybe I might go and lend a hand," he suggested and she answered quick +to that:</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, it's not necessary. They can fix it themselves," then she added, +after a minute, "I've telephoned for someone to come for me and if the +car's really broken we can tow it back."</p> +<p class="pnext">That seemed so straight and natural that Hines began to get less +curious, still he wanted to know who she was and tried to find out.</p> +<p class="pnext">"You come a long ride if you come from Longwood," he said.</p> +<p class="pnext">But he didn't get any satisfaction, for she answered:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Is it a long way there?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"About a hundred and eighteen miles by the turnpike—a good bit shorter +by the Firehill Road, but that's pretty bad after these rains.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Most of the roads <em class="italics">are</em> bad, I suppose," she said, as if she wasn't +thinking of her words.</p> +<p class="pnext">They were silent for a bit, then he tried again:</p> +<p class="pnext">"What's broke in your auto?"</p> +<p class="pnext">And she answered that sharp as if he annoyed her and she was setting him +back in his place:</p> +<p class="pnext">"My good man, I haven't the least idea. That's the chauffeur's business, +not mine."</p> +<p class="pnext">He asked her some more questions but he couldn't get anything out of +her. He said she treated him sort of haughty as if she wanted him to +stop. So after a while he said no more, but sat by the bar pretending to +read his paper. Tecla Rabine came and went, tidying up for the night and +none of them said a word.</p> +<p class="pnext">A little before ten she got up and buttoned her coat, saying she was +going. Hines was surprised and asked her if she wouldn't wait there for +the auto, and she said no, she'd walk up the road and meet it.</p> +<p class="pnext">He asked her which way it was coming and she said: "By the Firehill +Road. How far is that from here?"</p> +<p class="pnext">He told her about a quarter of a mile and she answered that she'd just +about time to get there and catch it as it came into the turnpike.</p> +<p class="pnext">Hines urged her to stay but she said no, she was cramped with sitting +and needed a little walk; it was early yet and there was nothing to be +afraid of. She bid him good night very cordial and pleasant and went +out.</p> +<p class="pnext">He stood in the doorway watching her as far as he could see, then told +Tecla, whose toothache was bad, to go to bed. After she'd gone he locked +up, went upstairs to his wife and told her about the strange lady. His +wife said he'd done wrong to let her go, it wasn't right for a person +like that to be alone on such a solitary road, especially with some of +the farm hands, queer foreigners, no better than animals.</p> +<p class="pnext">She worked upon his feelings till she got him nervous and he was going +to get a lantern and start out when he heard the sound of an auto horn +in the distance. He stepped to the window and watched and presently saw +a big car with one lamp dark coming at a great clip down from the +Firehill Road direction. The moon had come out a short while before, so +that if he'd looked he could have seen the people in the car, but +supposing it was the one the lady was waiting for, he turned from the +window, and, thinking no more about it, went to bed.</p> +<p class="pnext">Before he was off to sleep he heard another auto horn and the whirr of a +car passing. He couldn't say how long after this was, as he was half +asleep.</p> +<p class="pnext">How long he'd slept he didn't know—it really was between four and five +in the morning—when he was roused by a great battering at the door and +a sound of voices. He jumped up just as he was, ran to the window and +opened it. There in the road he could see plain—the clouds were gone, +the moon sailing clear and high—a motor and some people all talking +very excited, and one voice, a woman's, saying over and over, "Oh, how +horrible—how horrible!"</p> +<p class="pnext">He took them for a party of merry-makers, half drunk and wanting more, +and called down fierce and savage:</p> +<p class="pnext">"What in thunder are you doing there?"</p> +<p class="pnext">One of them, a man standing on the steps of the piazza, looked up at him +and said:</p> +<p class="pnext">"There's a murdered woman up the road here, that's all."</p> +<p class="pnext">As he ran to the place with the men—there were two of them—they told +him how they were on a motor trip with their wives and that night were +going from Bloomington to Huntley. The moon being so fine they were +going slow, otherwise they never would have found the body, which was +lying by the roadside. A pile of brushwood had been thrown over it, but +one hand had fallen out beyond the branches and one of the women had +seen it, white in the moonlight.</p> +<p class="pnext">They had unfastened an auto lamp and it was standing on the ground +beside her. Hines lifted it and looked at her. She lay partly on her +side, her coat loosely drawn round her. The right arm was flung out as +if when the body stiffened it might have slipped down from a position +across the chest. As he held the lantern close he saw below the hat, +pulled down on her head, with the torn rags of veil still clinging to +it, a thin line of blood running down to where the pearl necklace +rested, untouched, round her throat.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was Sylvia Hesketh, her skull fractured by a blow that had cracked +her head like an egg shell.</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="v"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id7">V</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">There were so many puzzling "leads" and so much that was inexplicable +and mysterious in the Hesketh case that it'll be easier to follow if, in +this chapter, I put down what the other people, who were either suspects +or important witnesses, did on that Sunday.</p> +<p class="pnext">Some of it may not be interesting, but it's necessary to know if you're +going to get a clear understanding of a case that baffled the police and +pretty nearly.... There I go again. But it's awfully hard when you're +not used to it to keep things in their right order.</p> +<p class="pnext">I've told how Jim Donahue said he put Sylvia on the train for the +Junction that night at seven-thirty. Both Jim and the ticket agent said +they'd seen her and Jim had spoken to her. She carried a hand bag, wore +a long dark fur coat and a small close-fitting hat that showed her hair. +Both men also noticed in her hand the gold mesh purse with a diamond +monogram that she always carried. Over her face was tied a black figured +veil that hid her features, but there was no mistaking the hair, the +voice, or the gold mesh purse.</p> +<p class="pnext">Sands, the Pullman conductor, said this same woman rode down in his +train to the Junction, where she got off. Clark, the station agent at +the Junction, saw her step from the car to the platform. After that he +lost track of her as he was busy with the branch line train which left +at eight-forty-five and was the last one up that night. No woman went on +it, there were only two passengers, both men.</p> +<p class="pnext">The Doctor didn't make his whole story public till the inquest. They +said afterward the police knew it, but it was his policy to say little +and keep quiet in Mapleshade. What we in the village did know—partly +from the papers, partly from people—was that after the message from +Mrs. Fowler saying Sylvia had eloped, he told Mrs. Dalzell he would have +to leave, having been called away to an important case. When the +Dalzells' chauffeur brought his car round he asked the man several +questions about the shortest way to get to the turnpike. The chauffeur +told him that the best traveling would be by the Riven Rock Road, which +he would have to go to the Junction to get. The Doctor left the +Dalzells' at a little after eight, alone in his car.</p> +<p class="pnext">He reached the Junction about eight-thirty-five, a few minutes after the +train from Longwood had arrived. On the platform he spoke to Clark, +asking him how to get to the Riven Rock Road. Clark gave him the +directions, then saw him disappear round the station building. Neither +Clark nor anyone at the Junction—there were very few there at that +hour—saw him leave in his car, though they heard the honk of the auto +horn.</p> +<p class="pnext">But it was Jack Reddy's movements that everybody was most interested in. +There was no secret about them.</p> +<p class="pnext">Sunday at lunch he told Gilsey that he was going away for a trip for a +few days. If he stayed longer than he expected he'd wire back for his +things, but, as it was, he'd only want his small auto trunk, which he'd +take with him. When Mrs. Gilsey was packing this he joked her about +having a good time while he was gone, and she told him that, as there'd +be no dinner that night, she and Gilsey'd go over to a neighbor's, take +supper there and spend the evening. After that he asked Casey, the +chauffeur, to have the racing car brought round at five, to see that the +tank was full, a footwarmer in it and the heaviest rugs and a drum of +gasoline, as he was going on a long trip.</p> +<p class="pnext">At five he left Firehill in the racer. At a quarter to seven two boys +saw him pass the Longwood Station in the direction of Maple Lane. He +said he came back through the outskirts of the village at seven-thirty, +but no one could be found who had seen him.</p> +<p class="pnext">After he left Firehill the Gilseys cleared up and walked across the +fields to the Jaycocks' farm, where they spent the evening, coming home +at ten and finding the house dark and quiet. Casey went to another +neighbor's, where he stayed till midnight, playing cards.</p> +<p class="pnext">He slept over the garage, and about four in the morning—he looked at +his watch afterward—was awakened by a sound down below in the garage. +He listened and made sure that someone was trying to roll the doors back +very slow and with as little noise as possible. Casey's a bold, nervy +boy, and he reached for his revolver and crept barefooted to the head of +the stairs. On the top step he stooped down and looked through the +banisters, and saw against the big square of the open doors a man +standing, with a car behind him shining in the moonlight.</p> +<p class="pnext">He thought it was a burglar, so, with his revolver up and ready, he +called:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Hello, there. What are you doing?"</p> +<p class="pnext">The man gave a great start, and then he heard Mr. Reddy's voice:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, Casey, did I wake you? I've come back unexpectedly. Help me get +this car in."</p> +<p class="pnext">They ran the car in, and, when Casey went to tell how he thought it was +a burglar and was going to shoot, he noticed that Mr. Reddy hardly +listened to him, but was gruff and short. All he said was that he'd +changed his mind about the trip, and then unstrapped his trunk from the +back and turned to go. In the doorway he stopped as if he'd had a sudden +thought, and said over his shoulder:</p> +<p class="pnext">"You don't want to mention this in Longwood. I'm getting a little sick +of the gossip there over my affairs."</p> +<p class="pnext">Casey went back to bed and in the morning, when he looked at the car, +found it was caked with mud, even the wind-guard spattered. At seven he +crossed over to the house for his breakfast and told the Gilseys that +Mr. Reddy was back. They were surprised, but decided, as he'd been out +so late, they'd not disturb him till he rang for his breakfast.</p> +<p class="pnext">Monday morning was clear and sharp, the first real frost of the season. +All the time I was dressing I was thinking about the elopement and how +queer it was Mrs. Fowler saying they'd gone by turnpike and Jim Donahue +saying he'd seen Sylvia leave on the train. I worked it out that they'd +made some change of plans at the last moment. But the <em class="italics">way</em> they'd +eloped didn't matter to me. Small things like that didn't cut any ice +when I was all tormented wondering if it was for the best that my hero +should marry a wild girl who no one could control.</p> +<p class="pnext">I hadn't been long at the switchboard, and was sitting sideways in my +chair looking out of the window when I saw Dr. Fowler's auto drive up +with the Doctor and a strange man in it. I twirled round quick and was +the business-like operator. I'll bet no one would have thought that the +girl sitting so calm and indifferent in that swivel chair was just +boiling with excitement and curiosity.</p> +<p class="pnext">The Doctor looked bad, yellow as wax, with his eyes sunk and inflamed. +He didn't take any notice of me beside a fierce sort of look and a +gruff,</p> +<p class="pnext">"Give me Corona 1-4-2."</p> +<p class="pnext">That was Firehill. I jacked in and the Doctor went into the booth and +shut the door. The strange man stood with his hands behind him, looking +out of the window. I didn't know then that he was a detective, and I +don't think anyone ever would have guessed it. If you'd asked me I'd +have said he looked more like a clerk at the ribbon counter. But that's +what he was, Walter Mills by name, engaged that morning, as we afterward +knew, by the Doctor.</p> +<p class="pnext">Watching him with one eye I leaned forward very cautiously, lifted up +the cam and listened in on the conversation:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Is this Gilsey?"</p> +<p class="pnext">Then Gilsey's nice old voice, "Yes, sir. Who is it?"</p> +<p class="pnext">The Doctor's was quick and hard:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Never mind that—it doesn't matter. Do you happen to know where Mr. +Reddy is?"</p> +<p class="pnext">My heart gave a big jump—he hadn't caught them! They'd got away and +been married!</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, sir, Mr. Reddy's here."</p> +<p class="pnext">There was just a minute's pause before the Doctor answered. In that +minute all sorts of ideas went flashing through my head the way they say +you see things before you drown. Then came the Doctor's voice with a +curious sort of quietness in it.</p> +<p class="pnext">"<em class="italics">There</em>, at Firehill?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, sir. Can I take any message? Mr. Reddy was out very late last +night and isn't up yet."</p> +<p class="pnext">The Doctor answered that very cordially, all the hurry and hardness +gone.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, that's all right. I'll not disturb him. No, I won't bother with a +message. I'll call up later. Thanks very much. Good-bye."</p> +<p class="pnext">I dropped back in my chair, tapping with a pencil on the corner of the +drawer and looking sideways at the Doctor as he came out of the booth. +He had a queer look, his eyes keen and bright, and there was some color +in his face. The strange man turned round, and the Doctor gave him a +glance sharp as a razor, but all he said was: "Come on, Mills," and they +went out and mounted into the car.</p> +<p class="pnext">When the door banged on them I drew a deep breath and flattened out +against the chair back. They <em class="italics">hadn't</em> eloped!</p> +<p class="pnext">Gee, it was a relief! Not because of myself. Honest to God, that's +straight. I knew I couldn't have him any more than I could have had the +Kohinoor diamond. It was because I <em class="italics">knew</em>—deep down where you feel the +truth—that Sylvia Hesketh wasn't the girl for him to marry.</p> +<p class="pnext">That was about half-past eight. It was after ten when a message came for +Mapleshade that made the world turn upside down and left me white and +sick. It was from the Coroner and said that Sylvia Hesketh had been +found that morning on the turnpike, murdered.</p> +<p class="pnext">Poor Mrs. Fowler took it!</p> +<p class="pnext">Anne Hennessey told me afterward that she heard her scream on the other +side of the house. I heard it, too, and it raised <em class="italics">my</em> hair—and then a +lot of words coming thin and shrill along the wire. "Sylvia, my +daughter—dead—murdered?" It was awful, I hate to think of it.</p> +<p class="pnext">Nora and Anne ran at the sound and found Mrs. Fowler all wild and +screaming, with the receiver hanging down. I could hear them, a babble +of tiny little voices as if I had a line on some part of Purgatory where +the spirits were crying and wailing.</p> +<p class="pnext">Suddenly it stopped—somebody had hung up. I waited, shaking there like +a leaf and feeling like I'd a blow in the stomach. Then Mapleshade +called and I heard Anne's voice, distinct but broken as if she'd been +running.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Molly, is that you? Do you by any chance know if the Doctor's in the +village?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"He was here a little while ago with a man calling up Firehill. Anne, I +heard—it can't be true."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, it is—it is—I can't talk now. I've <em class="italics">got</em> to find him. Give me +Firehill. He may have gone there. Quick, for God's sake!"</p> +<p class="pnext">I gave it and heard her tell a man at the other end of the line.</p> +<p class="pnext">I'll go on from here and tell what happened at Firehill. I've pieced it +out from the testimony at the inquest and from what the Gilseys +afterward told in the village.</p> +<p class="pnext">The Doctor and Mills went straight out there from the Exchange. When +they arrived Gilsey told him Mr. Reddy wasn't up yet, but he'd call him. +The Doctor, however, said the matter was urgent and they couldn't lose a +minute, so the three of them went upstairs together and Gilsey knocked +at the door. After he'd knocked twice a sleepy voice called out, "Come +in," and Gilsey opened the door.</p> +<p class="pnext">It led into a sitting-room with a bedroom opening off it. On a sofa +just opposite the door was Jack Reddy, dressed and stretched out as if +he'd been asleep.</p> +<p class="pnext">At first he saw no one but Gilsey and sat up with a start, saying +sharply:</p> +<p class="pnext">"What's the matter? Does anyone want me?"</p> +<p class="pnext">Gilsey said, "Yes, two gentlemen to see you," and stepped to one side to +let the Doctor and Mills enter.</p> +<p class="pnext">When Reddy saw the Doctor he jumped to his feet and stood looking at +him. He didn't say "Good morning" or any sort of greeting, but was +silent, as if he was holding himself still, waiting to hear what the +Doctor was going to say.</p> +<p class="pnext">He hadn't to wait long. The Doctor, in the doorway, went right to the +point.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Mr. Reddy," said he, "where's my daughter?"</p> +<p class="pnext">Reddy answered in a quiet, composed voice:</p> +<p class="pnext">"I don't know, Dr. Fowler."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You do!" shouted the Doctor. "You ran away with her last night. What +have you done with her?"</p> +<p class="pnext">Reddy said in the same dignified way:</p> +<p class="pnext">"I haven't done anything. I know nothing about her. I haven't any more +idea than you where she is."</p> +<p class="pnext">At that the Doctor got beside himself. He shouted out furiously:</p> +<p class="pnext">"You have, you d——d liar, and I'll get it out of you," and he made a +lunge at Reddy to seize him. But Mills jumped in and grabbed his arm. +Holding it he said, trying to quiet down the Doctor:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Just wait a minute, Dr. Fowler. Maybe when Mr. Reddy sees that we +understand the situation, he'll be willing to explain." Then he turned +to Reddy: "There's no good prevaricating. Your letter to Miss Hesketh +has been found. Now we're all agreed that we don't want any talk or +scandal about this. If you want to get out of the affair without trouble +to yourself and others you'd better tell the truth. Where is she?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Who the devil are you?" Reddy cried out suddenly, as mad as the Doctor, +and before Mills could answer, the branch telephone on the desk rang.</p> +<p class="pnext">Reddy gave a loud exclamation and made a jump for it. But Mills got +before him and caught him. He struggled to get away till the Doctor +seized him on the other side. They fought for a moment, and then got him +back against the door, all the time the telephone ringing like mad. As +they wrestled with him Mills called over his shoulder to Gilsey:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Answer that telephone, quick."</p> +<p class="pnext">Gilsey, scared most out of his wits, ran to the phone and took down the +receiver. Anne Hennessey was at the other end with her awful message.</p> +<p class="pnext">When he got it Gilsey gave a cry like he was stabbed, and turned to Mr. +Reddy, pinioned against the door.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Good Lord, have mercy, Mr. Jack," he gasped out. "Miss Hesketh's dead. +She's murdered—on the turnpike—murdered last night!"</p> +<p class="pnext">The Doctor dropped Reddy, tore the instrument out of Gilsey's hand and +took the rest of the message.</p> +<p class="pnext">Reddy turned the color of ashes. There wasn't any need to hold him. He +fell back against the door with his jaw dropped and his eyes staring +like a man in a trance. Gilsey thought he was going to die and was for +running to him, crying out, "Oh, Mr. Jack, don't look that way." But +Mills caught the old servant by the arm and held him back, watching +Reddy as sharp as a ferret.</p> +<p class="pnext">The Doctor turned from the phone and said: "It's true. Miss Hesketh's +been murdered."</p> +<p class="pnext">There was a dead silence. The click of the receiver falling into its +hook was the only sound. The three other men—the Doctor as white as +death, too—stood staring at Reddy. And then, seeing those three faces, +he burst out like he was crazy:</p> +<p class="pnext">"No—she's not—she can't be! I was there; I went the moment I got her +message. I was on the turnpike where she said she'd be. I was up and +down there most of the night. And—and——" he stopped suddenly and put +his hands over his face, groaning, "Oh, my God, Sylvia—why didn't you +tell me?"</p> +<p class="pnext">He lurched forward and dropped into a chair, his hands over his face, +moaning like an animal in pain.</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="vi"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id8">VI</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">Longwood was stunned. By noon everybody knew it and there was no more +business that day. The people stood in groups, talking in whispers as if +they were at a funeral. And in the afternoon it <em class="italics">was</em> like a funeral, +the body coming back by train and being taken from the depot to +Mapleshade in one of the Doctor's farm wagons. It lay under a sheet and +as the wagon passed through the crowd you couldn't hear a sound, except +for a woman crying here and there.</p> +<p class="pnext">Then it was as if a spring that held the people dumb and still was +loosed and the excitement burst up. I never saw anything like it. It +seemed like every village up and down the line had emptied itself into +Longwood. Farmers and laborers and loafers swarmed along the streets, +the rich came in motors, tearing to Mapleshade, and the police were +everywhere, as if they'd sprung out of the ground.</p> +<p class="pnext">By afternoon the reporters came pouring in from town. The Inn was full +up with them and they were buzzing round my exchange like flies. Some of +them tried to get hold of me and that night had the nerve to come +knocking at Mrs. Galway's side door, demanding the telephone girl. But, +believe me, I sat tight and said nothing—nothing to them. The police +were after me mighty quick, and there was a séance over Corwin's Drug +Store when I felt like I was being put to the third degree. I told them +all I knew, job or no job, for I guessed right off that that talk I'd +overheard on the phone might be an important clew. They kept it close. +It wasn't till after the inquest that the press got it.</p> +<p class="pnext">Before the inquest every sort of rumor was flying about, and the papers +were full of crazy stories, not half of them true. I'd read about places +and people I knew as well as my own face in the mirror, and they'd sound +like a dime novel, so colored up and twisted round the oldest +inhabitant wouldn't have recognized them.</p> +<p class="pnext">To get at the facts was a job, but, knowing who was reliable and who +wasn't, I questioned and ferreted and, I guess, before I was done I had +them pretty straight.</p> +<p class="pnext">Sylvia had been killed by a blow on the side of her head—a terrible +blow. A sheriff's deputy I know told me that in all his experience he +had seen nothing worse. Her hat had evidently shielded the scalp. It was +pulled well down over her head, the long pin bent but still thrust +through it. Where she had been hit the plush was torn but not the thick +interlining, and her hair, all loosened, was hanging down against her +neck. There was a wound—not deep, more like a tearing of the skin, on +the lower part of her cheek. It was agreed that she had been struck only +once by some heavy implement that had a sharp or jagged edge. Though the +woods and fields had been thoroughly searched nothing had been +discovered that could have dealt the blow. Whatever he had used the +murderer had either successfully hidden it or taken it away with him. +The deputy told me it looked to him as if it might have been some +farming tool like a spade, or even a heavy branch broken from a tree. +The way the body was arranged, the coat drawn smoothly together, the +branches completely covering her, showed that the murderer had taken +time to conceal his crime, though why he had not drawn the body back +into the thick growth of bushes was a point that puzzled everybody.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was impossible to trace any footprints, as the automobile party and +Hines had trodden the earth about her into a muddy mass, and the grass +along the edge was too thick and springy to hold any impression.</p> +<p class="pnext">Close behind the place where she lay twigs of the screening trees were +snapped and bent as if her assailant had broken through them.</p> +<p class="pnext">There were people who said Hines would have been arrested on the spot if +robbery had been added to murder. But the jewelry was all on her, more +than he said he had noticed when she was in the Wayside Arbor. The pearl +necklace alone was worth twenty thousand dollars, and just below it, +clasping her gown over the chest, was a diamond cross, an old ornament +of her mother's, made of the finest Brazilian stones. In the pocket of +her coat was a purse with forty-eight dollars in it. So right at the +start the theory of robbery was abandoned.</p> +<p class="pnext">Another inexplicable thing was the disappearance of the French maid, +Virginia Dupont. Jack Reddy denied any knowledge of her. He said Sylvia +had never mentioned bringing her with them and he didn't think intended +to do so. The Mapleshade people thought differently, all declaring that +Sylvia depended on her and took her wherever she went. One of the +mysteries about the woman that was quickly cleared up was the walk she +had taken to the village on Sunday morning. This was to meet Mr. Reddy +and take from him the letter for Sylvia which had been found in the +desk.</p> +<p class="pnext">I know from what I heard that the police were keen to find her, but she +had dropped out of sight without leaving a trace. No one at Mapleshade +knew anything about her or her connections. She was not liked in the +house or the village and had made no friends. On her free Sundays she'd +go to town and when she returned say very little about where she'd been. +A search of her rooms showed nothing, except that she seemed to have +left her clothes behind her. She was last seen at Mapleshade by Nora +Magee, who, at half-past five on Sunday, met her on the third floor +stairs. Nora was off for a walk to the village with Harper and was in a +hurry. She asked Virginie if she was going out and Virginie said no, she +felt sick and was going up to lie down till she'd be wanted to help Miss +Sylvia dress for dinner.</p> +<p class="pnext">If you ask me was anyone suspected at this stage I'd answer "yes," but +people were afraid to say who. There was talk about Hines on the street +and in the postoffice, but it was only when you were close shut in your +own room or walking quiet up a side street that the person with you +would whisper the Doctor's name. Nobody dared say it aloud, but there +wasn't a soul in Longwood who didn't know about the quarreling at +Mapleshade, whose was the money that ran it, and the will that left +everything to Mrs. Fowler if her daughter died.</p> +<p class="pnext">But no arrests were made. Everything was waiting on the inquest, and we +all heard that there were important facts—already known to the +police—which would not be made public till then.</p> +<p class="pnext">Wednesday afternoon they held the inquest at Mapleshade. The authorities +had rounded up a bunch of witnesses, I among them. The work in the +Exchange had piled up so we'd had to send a hurry call for help to +headquarters and I left the office in charge of a new girl, Katie +Reilly, Irish, a tall, gawky thing, who was going to work with us +hereafter on split hours.</p> +<p class="pnext">Going down Maple Lane it was like a target club outing or a political +picnic, except for the solemn faces. I saw Hines and his party, and the +railway men, and a lot of queer guys that I took to be the jury. Halfway +there a gang of reporters passed me, talking loud, and swinging along in +their big overcoats. Near the black pine the toot of a horn made me +stand back and Jack Reddy's roadster scudded by, he driving, with Casey +beside him, and the two old Gilseys, pale and peaked in the back seat.</p> +<p class="pnext">They held the inquest in the dining-room, with the coroner sitting at +one end of the long shiny table and the jury grouped round the other. +Take it from me, it was a gloomy sight. The day outside was cold and +cloudy, and through the French windows that looked out on the lawns, the +light came still and gray, making the faces look paler than they already +were. It was a grand, beautiful room with a carved stone fireplace +where logs were burning. Back against the walls were sideboards with +silver dishes on them and hand-painted portraits hung on the walls.</p> +<p class="pnext">But the thing you couldn't help looking at—and that made all the +splendor just nothing—were Sylvia's clothes hanging over the back of a +chair, and on a little table near them her hat and veil, the one glove +she had had on, and the heap of jewelry. All those fine garments and the +precious stones worth a fortune seemed so pitiful and useless now.</p> +<p class="pnext">We were awful silent at first, a crowd of people sitting along the +walls, staring straight ahead or looking on the ground. Now and then +someone would move uneasily and make a rustle, but there were moments so +still you could hear the fire snapping and the scratching of the +reporters' pencils. They were just behind me, bunched up at a table in +front of the window. When the Doctor came in everyone was as quiet as +death and the eyes on him were like the eyes of images, so fixed and +steady. Mrs. Fowler was not present—they sent for her later—but Nora +and Anne were there as pale as ghosts.</p> +<p class="pnext">The Coroner opened up by telling about how and where the deceased had +been found, the position, the surroundings, etc., etc., and then called +Dr. Graham, who was the county physician and had made the autopsy.</p> +<p class="pnext">A good deal of what he said I didn't understand—it was to prove that +death resulted from a fracture of the skull. He could not state the +exact hour of dissolution, but said it was in the earlier part of the +night, some time before twelve. He described the condition of the scalp +which had been partially protected by the hat, thick as it was with a +plush outside and a heavy interlining. This was held up and then given +to the jury to examine. I saw it plainly as they passed it from hand to +hand—a small dark automobile hat, with a tear in one side and some +shreds of black Shetland veil hanging to its edge. She bore no other +marks of violence save a few small scratches on her right hand. She had +evidently been attacked unexpectedly and had had no time to fight or +struggle.</p> +<p class="pnext">The automobilists who had found the body came next. Only the men were +present—two nice-looking gentlemen—the ladies having been excused. +They told what I have already written, one of them making the creeps go +down your spine, describing how his wife said she saw the hand in the +moonlight, and how he walked back, laughing, and pulled off the +brushwood.</p> +<p class="pnext">After that Mrs. Fowler came, all swathed up in black and looking like a +haggard old woman. The Coroner spoke very kind to her. When she got to +the quarrel between Sylvia and the Doctor her voice began to tremble and +she could hardly go on. It was pitiful to see but she had to tell it, +and about the other quarrels too. Then she pulled herself together and +told about going up to Sylvia's room and finding the letter.</p> +<p class="pnext">The Coroner stopped her there and taking a folded paper from the table +beside him said it was the letter and read it out to us. It was dated +Firehill, Nov. 21st.</p> +<blockquote><div> +<p class="pfirst">"<span class="small-caps"> +Dearest</span>:</p> +<p class="pnext">"All right. This evening at seven by the pine. We'll go in my +racer to Bloomington and be married there by Fiske, the man I +told you about. It'll be a long ride but at the end we'll find +happiness waiting for us. Don't disappoint me—don't do what +you did the other time. Believe in my love and trust yourself +to me—<span class="small-caps"> +Jack</span>."</p> +</div></blockquote> +<p class="pfirst">In the silence that followed you could hear the fire falling together +with a little soft rustle. All the eyes turned as if they were on pivots +and looked at Jack Reddy—all but mine. I kept them on Mrs. Fowler and +never moved them till she was led, bent and sobbing, out of the room.</p> +<p class="pnext">Nora Magee was the next, and I heard them say afterward made a good +witness. The coroner asked her—and Anne when her turn came—very +particular about the jewelry, what was gone, how many pieces and such +questions. And then it came out that nobody—not even Mrs. Fowler—knew +exactly what Sylvia had. She was all the time buying new ornaments or +having her old ones reset and the only person who kept track of her +possessions was Virginie Dupont. All any of them could be sure of was +that the jewel box was empty, and the toilet articles, fitted bag, and +gold mesh purse were gone.</p> +<p class="pnext">Hines was called after that. He was all slicked up in his store clothes +and looked very different to what he had that day in the summer. Though +anyone could see he was scared blue, the perspiration on his forehead +and his big, knotty hands twiddling at his tie and his watch chain; he +told his story very clear and straightforward. I think everyone was +impressed by it and by Mrs. Hines, who followed him. She was a miserable +looking little rat of a woman, with inflamed eyes and a long drooping +nose, but she corroborated all he said, and—anyway, to me—it sounded +true.</p> +<p class="pnext">Tecla Rabine, the Bohemian servant, followed, and when she walked over +to sit in the chair, keyed up as I was, I came near laughing. She was a +large, fat woman with a good-humored red face and little twinkling eyes, +and she sure was a sight, bulging out of a black cloth suit that was the +fashion when Columbus landed. On her head was a fancy straw hat with one +mangy feather sticking straight up at the back, and the last touch was +her face, one side still swollen out from her toothache, and looking for +all the world as if she had a quid in her cheek.</p> +<p class="pnext">Though she spoke in a queer, foreign dialect, she gave her testimony +very well and she told something that no one—I don't think even the +police—had heard before.</p> +<p class="pnext">While Hines was locking up she went to her room but couldn't sleep +because of the pain of her toothache.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Ach," she said, spreading her hand out near her cheek, "it was out so +far—swole out, and, oh, my God—<em class="italics">pain</em>!"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Never mind your toothache," said the Coroner—"keep to the subject."</p> +<p class="pnext">"How do I hear noises if my toothache doesn't make me to wake?" she +asked, giving him a sort of indignant look.</p> +<p class="pnext">Somebody laughed, a kind of choked giggle, and I heard one of those +fresh write-up chaps behind me whisper:</p> +<p class="pnext">"This is the comic relief."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, you heard noises—what kind of noises?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"The scream," she said.</p> +<p class="pnext">"You heard a scream?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes—one scream—far away, up toward Cresset's Crossing. I go crazy +with the pain and after Mr. Hines is come upstairs I go down to the +kitchen to make——" she stopped, looking up in the air—"what you call +him?"—she put her hand flat on the side of her face—"for here, to stop +the pain."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Do you mean a poultice?"</p> +<p class="pnext">She grinned all over and nodded.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, that's him. I make hot water on the gas, and then, way off, I hear +a scream."</p> +<p class="pnext">"What time was that?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"The kitchen clock says ten minutes past ten."</p> +<p class="pnext">"What did you do?"</p> +<p class="pnext">She looked surprised.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I make the—you know the name—for my ache."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Didn't you go out and investigate—even go to the door?"</p> +<p class="pnext">She shook her head and gave a sort of good-humored laugh as if she was +explaining things to a child.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Go out. For why? If I go out for screams I go out when the dagoes +fight, and when the automobiles be pass—up and down all night, often +drunken and making noises;" she shrugged her shoulders sort of careless; +"I no be bothered with screams."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Did you go to bed?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I do. I make the medicine for my swole up face and go upstairs."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Did you hear any more screams?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No—there are no more. If there are I would have hear them, for I can't +sleep ever all night. All I hear is automobiles—many automobiles +passing up and down and maybe—two, three, four times—the horns +sounding."</p> +<p class="pnext">The Coroner asked her a few more questions, principally about Hines' +movements, and her answers, if you could get over the lingo, were all +clear and in line with what Hines had said.</p> +<p class="pnext">The railway men followed her, Sands and Clark and Jim Donahue. Jim was +as nervous as a cat, holding his hat in his hands and twisting it round +like a plate he was drying. He told about the woman he put on the +seven-thirty train on Sunday night.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Where did you first see this woman?" he was asked.</p> +<p class="pnext">"On the platform, just before the train came in. She came down along it, +out of the dark."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Can you swear it was Miss Hesketh?"</p> +<p class="pnext">Jim didn't think he could swear because he couldn't see her face plain, +it being covered with a figured black veil. But he never thought of it +being anyone else.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why did you think it was she?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Because it looked like her. It was her coat and her gold purse and I'd +know her hair anywhere. And when I spoke to her and said: 'Good evening, +Miss Hesketh, going to leave us?' it was her voice that answered: 'Yes, +Jim, I'm going away for a few days.'"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Did you have any more conversation with her?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, because the train came along then. She got in and I handed her her +bag and said 'Good night.'"</p> +<p class="pnext">When he was asked to describe the bag, he said he hadn't noticed it +except that it was a medium sized bag, he thought, dark colored.</p> +<p class="pnext">Then he was shown the clothes—that was heart-rending. The Coroner held +them up, the long fur coat, the little plush hat, and the one glove. He +thought they were the same but it was hard to tell, the platform being +so dark—anyway, it was them sort of clothes the lady had on, and though +he couldn't be sure of the glove he had noticed that her gloves were +light colored.</p> +<p class="pnext">Sands, the Pullman conductor, and Clark, from the Junction, testified +that they'd seen the same woman on the train and at the Junction. Sands +particularly noticed the gold mesh purse because she took her ticket out +of it. He addressed her as Miss Hesketh and she had answered him, but +only to say "Good evening."</p> +<p class="pnext">Then came the Firehill servants. The two old Gilseys were dreadfully +upset. Mrs. Gilsey cried and poor old David kept hesitating and looking +at Mr. Reddy, but the stamp of truth was on every word they said. Casey +followed them, telling what I've already written.</p> +<p class="pnext">When Mr. Reddy was called a sort of stir went over the people. Everybody +was curious to hear his story, as we'd only got bits of it, most of them +wild rumors. And there wasn't a soul in Longwood that didn't grieve for +him, plunged down at the moment when he thought he was most happy into +such an awful tragedy. As he sat down in the chair opposite the Coroner, +the room was as still as a tomb, even the reporters behind me not making +so much as the scratch of a pen.</p> +<p class="pnext">He looked gray and pinched, his eyes burnt out like a person's who +hasn't slept for nights. You could see he was nervous, for he kept +crossing and uncrossing his knees, and he didn't give his evidence +nearly so clear and continued as the newspapers had it. He'd stop every +now and then as if he didn't remember or as if he was thinking of the +best way to express himself.</p> +<p class="pnext">He began by telling how he and Sylvia had arranged to go in his car to +Bloomington, and there be married by his friend Fiske, an Episcopal +clergyman. The Coroner asked him if Fiske expected them and he said no, +he hadn't had time to let him know as the elopement was decided on +hurriedly.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why was the decision hurried?" the Coroner asked and he answered low, +as if he was reluctant to say it.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Because Miss Hesketh had a violent quarrel with her stepfather on +Saturday morning. It was not till after that that she made up her mind +she would go with me."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Did you know at the time what that quarrel was about?"</p> +<p class="pnext">His face got a dull red and he said low.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, she told me of it in a letter she wrote me immediately afterward."</p> +<p class="pnext">Then he told how on Saturday night he had received a special delivery +letter from her, telling of the quarrel and agreeing to the elopement. +That letter he had destroyed. He answered it the next morning, she +having directed him to bring it in himself and deliver it to Virginie, +who would meet him opposite Corwin's drugstore. This he did, the letter +being the one already in evidence.</p> +<p class="pnext">The Coroner asked him to explain the sentence which said "Don't +disappoint me—don't do what you did the other time." He looked +straight in front of him and answered:</p> +<p class="pnext">"We had made a plan to elope once before and she had backed out."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Do you know why?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"It was too—too unusual—too unconventional. When it came to the +scandal of an elopement she hung back."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Is it your opinion that the quarrel with Dr. Fowler made her agree the +second time?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I know nothing about that."</p> +<p class="pnext">Then he told of leaving Firehill, coming into Longwood, and going down +Maple Lane.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I reached there a few minutes before seven and ran down to the pine +tree where I was to meet her. I drew up to one side of the road and +waited. During the time I waited—half an hour—I neither saw nor heard +anybody. At half-past seven I decided she had changed her mind again and +left."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You didn't go to the house?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No—I was not welcome at the house. She had told me not to go there."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You were in the habit of seeing her somewhere else, though?"</p> +<p class="pnext">His face got red again and you could see he had to make an effort not to +get angry.</p> +<p class="pnext">"After I had heard from Miss Hesketh and seen from Dr. Fowler's manner +that I was not wanted at Mapleshade, I saw her at intervals. Once or +twice we went for walks in the woods, and a few times, perhaps three or +four, I met her on the turnpike and took her for a drive in my car."</p> +<p class="pnext">He then went on to tell how he drove back to Firehill, reaching there a +little after nine. The place was empty and he went up to his room. He +didn't know how long he'd been there when the telephone rang. It was the +mysterious message from her.</p> +<p class="pnext">He repeated it slowly, evidently trying to give it word for word. You +could have heard a pin drop when he ended.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Did you attempt to question her on the phone?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, it all went too quick and I was too astonished."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Did you get the impression that she was in any grave danger?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, I never thought of that. She was very rash and impulsive and I +thought she'd done some foolhardy thing and had turned to me as the one +person on whom she could rely."</p> +<p class="pnext">"What do you mean by foolhardy?"</p> +<p class="pnext">He gave a shrug and threw out his hands.</p> +<p class="pnext">"The sort of thing a child might do—some silly, thoughtless action. She +was full of spirit and daring; you never could be sure of what she +mightn't try. I didn't think of any definite thing. I ran to the garage +and got out my car and went northward up the Firehill Road. It was +terrible traveling, and I should say it took me nearly three-quarters of +an hour to make the distance. When I was nearing the pike I sounded my +horn to let her know I was coming.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Just before I got there the clouds had broken and the moon come out. +The whole landscape was flooded with light, and I made no doubt I'd see +her as soon as I turned into the pike. But she wasn't there. I slowed up +and waited, looking up and down, for I'd no idea which way she was +coming, but there wasn't a sign of her. As far as I could see, the road +was lifeless and deserted. Then I ran up and down—a mile or two either +way—but there was no one to be seen."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Did you hear any sounds in the underbrush—footsteps, breaking of +twigs?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I heard nothing. The place was as still as the grave. I made longer +runs up and down, looking along both sides and now and then waiting and +sounding the auto horn."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Did you stop at any of the farms or cottages and make inquiries?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No. I didn't do that because I had no thought of her being in any real +danger and because she'd cautioned me against letting anyone know. After +I'd searched the main road thoroughly for several miles and gone up +several branch roads I began to think she'd played a joke on me."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Do you mean fooled you?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes—the whole thing began to look that way. Her not being at the +rendezvous in Maple Lane and then phoning me to meet her at a place, +which, when I came to think of it, it was nearly impossible for her to +reach in that space of time. It seemed the only reasonable +explanation—and it was the sort of thing she might do. When I got the +idea in my head it grew and," he looked down on the floor, his voice +dropping low as if it was hard for him to speak, "I got blazing mad."</p> +<p class="pnext">For a moment it seemed like he couldn't go on. In that moment I thought +of how he must be feeling, remembering his rage against her while all +the time she was lying cold and dead by the road.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I was too angry to go home," he went on, "and not thinking much what I +did, I let the car out and went up and down—I don't know how far—I +don't remember—miles and miles."</p> +<p class="pnext">"According to Mr. Casey it was half-past four when you came back to the +garage."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I daresay; I didn't notice the time."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You were from 9:30 to 4:30 on the road?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You spent those seven hours going up and down the turnpike and the +intersecting roads?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, but at first I waited—for half hours at a time in different +places."</p> +<p class="pnext">He looked straight at the Coroner as he said that, a deep steady look, +more quiet and intent than he'd done since he started. I think it would +have seemed to most people as if he was telling the absolute truth and +wanted to impress it. But when a girl feels about a man as I did about +him, she can see below the surface, and there was something about the +expression of his face, about the tone of his voice, that made me think +for the first time he was holding something back.</p> +<p class="pnext">Then he went on and told about going home and falling asleep on the +sofa, and about the doctor and Mills coming.</p> +<p class="pnext">"When I saw the Doctor my first thought was that I must keep quiet till +I found out what had happened. When he asked me where his daughter was I +was startled as I realized she wasn't at home. But, even then, I hadn't +any idea of serious trouble and I was determined to hold my tongue till +I knew more than I did.</p> +<p class="pnext">"The ring of the telephone gave me a shock. I had been expecting to get +a call from her and instinctively I gave a jump for it. By that time I +was sure she'd got into some silly scrape and I wasn't going to have her +stepfather finding out and starting another quarrel. They," he nodded +his head at the Doctor and Mills, "caught on at once and made a rush for +me.</p> +<p class="pnext">"After that——" he lifted his hands and let them drop on his knees—"it +was just as they've said. I was paralyzed. I don't know what I said. I +only felt she'd been in danger and called on me and I'd failed her. I +think for a few moments I was crazy."</p> +<p class="pnext">His voice got so husky he could hardly speak and he bent his head down, +looking at his hands. I guess every face in the room was turned to him +but mine. I couldn't look at him but sat like a dummy, picking at my +gloves, and inside, in my heart, I felt like I was crying. In the +silence I heard one of the reporters whisper:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Gee—poor chap! that's tough!"</p> +<p class="pnext">He was asked some more questions, principally about what Sylvia had told +him of the quarrels with her stepfather. You could see he was careful in +his answers. According to what he said she'd only alluded to them in a +general way as making the life at Mapleshade very uncomfortable.</p> +<p class="pnext">He was just getting up when I saw one of the jurors pass a slip of paper +across the table to the Coroner. He looked at it, then, as Mr. Reddy was +moving away, asked him to wait a minute; there was another +question—had he stopped anywhere during Sunday night to get gasoline +for his car?</p> +<p class="pnext">Mr. Reddy turned back and said very simply:</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, I had an extra drum in the car."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You used that?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes."</p> +<p class="pnext">"What did you do with the drum?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Threw it into the bushes somewhere along the road."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Do you know the place?"</p> +<p class="pnext">He gave a sort of smile and shook his head.</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, I don't remember. I don't know where I filled the tank. When it was +done I pitched the drum back into the trees—somewhere along the +turnpike."</p> +<p class="pnext">Several more of us came after that, I among them. But the real sensation +of the day was the Doctor's evidence, which I'll keep for the next +chapter.</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="vii"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id9">VII</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">The Doctor was as calm and matter-of-fact as if he were giving a lecture +to a class of students. He looked much better than he did that morning +in the Exchange; rested and with a good color. As he settled himself in +the chair, I heard one of the reporters whisper:</p> +<p class="pnext">"I wouldn't call that the mug of a murderer."</p> +<p class="pnext">I looked over my shoulder right at the one who had spoken, a young chap +with a round, rosy, innocent sort of face like a kid's and yellow hair +standing up over his head as thick as sheep's wool. I'd seen him several +times in the Exchange and knew his name was Babbitts and that the other +fellows called him "Soapy." When he caught my eye he winked, and you +couldn't be mad because it was like a big pink baby winking at you.</p> +<p class="pnext">The Doctor told his story more straight and continuous than any of the +others. It went along so clear from point to point, that the coroner +didn't have to ask so many questions, and when he did the doctor was +always ready with his answer. It sounded to me as if he'd thought out +every detail, worked it up just right to get the best effect. He began +with Saturday morning, when he'd got the call to go to the Dalzells'.</p> +<p class="pnext">"An operation was performed early that afternoon and I stayed during the +night and all the next day, going out on Sunday morning at ten for an +hour's ride in my motor. I had decided to remain Sunday night +too—though the patient was out of danger—when at about eight I +received a telephone message from my wife saying Miss Hesketh had run +away with Jack Reddy. Hearing from her that their route would be by the +turnpike to Bloomington I made up my mind that my best course was to +strike the turnpike and intercept them."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You disapproved of their marriage?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Decidedly. Miss Hesketh was too young to know her own mind. Mr. Reddy +was not the husband I would have chosen for her—not to mention the +distress it would have caused Mrs. Fowler to have her daughter marry in +that manner. My desire to keep the escapade secret made me tell Mrs. +Dalzell a falsehood—that I was called away on an important case.</p> +<p class="pnext">"The Dalzells' chauffeur told me that the road from their place to the +turnpike was impassable for motors. The best route for me would be to go +to the Junction, where I could strike the Riven Rock Road, which came +out on the turnpike about a mile from Cresset's Crossing. I had plenty +of time, as the distance young Reddy would have to travel before he +reached that point was nearly a hundred and twenty miles.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I arrived at the Junction as the train for Philadelphia was drawing +out. I spoke to Clark, the station agent, about the road, and, after +getting the directions, walked round the depot to the back platform, +where my car stood. As I passed the door of the waiting-room it suddenly +opened and a woman came out."</p> +<p class="pnext">He stopped—just for a moment—as if to let the people get the effect of +his words. A rustle went over the room, but he looked as if he didn't +notice it and went on as calm and natural as if he was telling us a +fiction story.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I probably wouldn't have noticed her if she hadn't given a suppressed +cry and cowered back in the doorway. That made me look at her and, to my +amazement, I saw it was Miss Hesketh's maid, Virginie Dupont."</p> +<p class="pnext">Nobody expected it. If he'd wanted to spring a sensation he'd done it. +We were all leaning forward with our mouths open.</p> +<p class="pnext">"The moment I saw her I remembered that my wife had told me the woman +had gone with Miss Hesketh. One glance into the waiting-room told me +she was alone and I turned on her and told her I knew of the elopement +and asked her what she was doing there. She was evidently terrified by +my unexpected appearance, but seeing she was caught, she confessed that +she knew all about it, in fact, that she had been instructed by Miss +Hesketh to go to Philadelphia by the branch line, take a room in the +Bellevue-Stratford, and wait there till her mistress appeared.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I was enraged and let her see it, pushing her round to the car and +ordering her into the back seat. I vaguely noticed that she carried a +bag and wrap over her arm. She tried to excuse herself but I shut her up +and took my seat at the wheel. There was no one on the platform as we +went out.</p> +<p class="pnext">"It took me over an hour to negotiate the distance between the Junction +and the turnpike. The road was in a fearful condition. We ran into chuck +holes and through water nearly to the hubs. Once the right front wheel +dropping into a washout, the lamp struck a stump and was so shattered +it had to be put out. My attention was concentrated on the path, +especially after we left the open country and entered a thick wood, +where, with one lamp out of commission, I had to almost feel my way.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I said not a word to the woman nor she to me. It was not till I was +once again in the open that I turned to speak to her and saw she was +gone."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Gone!" said one of the jury—a raw-boned, bearded old man like a +farmer—so interested, he spoke right out.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, gone. I guessed in a moment what she had done. Either when I had +stopped to put out the lamp or in one of the pauses while I was feeling +my way through the wood she had slipped out and run. It would have been +easy for her to hide in the dark of the trees. I glanced into the +tonneau and saw that the things she had carried, the bag and the wrap, +were also missing. She had been frightened and made her escape. +Unfortunately, in the shock and horror of the next day the whole matter +slipped my mind and she had time to complete her getaway, probably by +the branch line early Sunday morning."</p> +<p class="pnext">The Coroner here explained that inquiries had since been made at the +branch line stations for the woman but nobody had been found who had +seen her.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I had no time to go back and look for her, and, anyway, it would have +been useless, as she could have hidden from a sheriff's posse in the +wood. Besides, my whole interest was focused on reaching the turnpike. I +could see it before me, a long winding line between the dark edges of +small trees. I turned into it and let the car out. Though the road has +many turns I could have seen the lamps of a motor some distance ahead +and I ran fast, looking neither to the right nor left but watching for +approaching lights. On my ride back I met only a few vehicles, several +farmers' wagons and the car of Dr. Pease, the Longwood practitioner.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I reached home about two and went at once to my wife's room. She was in +a hysterical state and I stayed with her an hour or so trying to quiet +her. When she was better I retired to my own apartment and at seven +called up Walter Mills, a detective in New York, telling him to come to +Longwood as soon as he could. By this time I was uneasy, not that I had +any suspicion of a real tragedy, but the disappearance of Miss Hesketh +alarmed me. I met Mills at the train and told him the situation and that +I intended telephoning to Fiske at Bloomington, thinking they might have +reached there by some other way. It was his suggestion that before any +step was taken which might make the matter public, it would be well to +communicate with Firehill and see if the servants knew anything. I did +this and to my amazement learned that Reddy was there."</p> +<p class="pnext">That is all of the Doctor's testimony that I need put down as the rest +of it you know.</p> +<p class="pnext">It left us in a sort of mixed-up surprise. No one could have told it +better, no one could have been more sure about it or more quiet and +natural. <em class="italics">But</em>—it seems like I ought to write that word in the biggest +letters to give the idea of how it stood out in my mind.</p> +<p class="pnext">Of all the stories it was the strangest and it was so <em class="italics">awfully</em> pat. I +don't know how you feel about it, reading it as I've written it here, +but I can say for myself, listening and watching that man tell it, I +couldn't seem to believe it.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was near to evening, the room getting dusk and the fire showing up +large and bright when the jury brought in their verdict: "The deceased +met her death at the hands of a person or persons unknown."</p> +<p class="pnext">I walked back up Maple Lane. The night was setting in cold and frosty. +The clouds had drawn off, the air was clear as crystal and full of the +sounds of motor horns. Big and little cars passed me, jouncing over the +ruts and swinging round the bend where the pine stood. I was looking up +at it, black like a skeleton against the glow in the West, when a step +came up behind me and a voice said:</p> +<p class="pnext">"You're a good witness, Miss Morganthau."</p> +<p class="pnext">It was that fresh kid Babbitts and I wasn't sorry to have him join me as +I was feeling as if I'd been sitting in a tomb. He was serious too, not +a wink about him now, his eyes on the ground, his hands dug down in the +pockets of his overcoat.</p> +<p class="pnext">"A strange case, isn't it?" he said.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Awful strange," I answered.</p> +<p class="pnext">"If it wasn't for your story of that man on the 'phone I think they'd +arrest Dr. Fowler to-night."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Didn't you believe what he said?"</p> +<p class="pnext">I wasn't going to give away my thoughts any more than I'd been willing +to give away what I heard on the wire. And it seemed that he was the +same, for he answered slow and thoughtful:</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'm not saying what I believe or don't believe, or maybe it's better if +I say I'm not ready yet to believe or disbelieve anything,"—then he +looked up at the sky, red behind the trees, and spoke easy and careless: +"They say Miss Hesketh had a good many admirers."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Do they?" was all he got out of me.</p> +<p class="pnext">That made him laugh, jolly and boyish.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, you needn't keep your guard up now. Your stuff'll be in the papers +to-morrow, and, take it from me, that fellow that sent the message is +going to get a jar."</p> +<p class="pnext">"The man I listened to?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Sure. He hasn't got the ghost of an idea anyone overheard him. Can't +you imagine how he'll feel when he opens his paper and sees that a smart +little hello girl was tapping the wire?"</p> +<p class="pnext">It's funny, but I'd never thought of it that way. Why, he'd get a shock +like dynamite! It got hold of me so that I didn't speak for a spell, +thinking of that man reading his paper to-morrow—over his coffee or +maybe going down in the L—and suddenly seeing printed out in black and +white what he thought no one in the world knew except himself and that +poor dead girl. Babbitts went on talking, me listening with one +ear—which comes natural to an operator.</p> +<p class="pnext">"We've been rounding up all the men that were after her—not that they +were backward with their alibis—only too glad to be of service, thank +you! Carisbrook was at Aiken, a lawyer named Dunham was up state trying +a case; Robinson, a chap in a bank, was spending the week-end on Long +Island. There was only one of them near here—man named Cokesbury. Do +you know him?"</p> +<p class="pnext">Both my ears got busy.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Cokesbury," I said, sort of startled, "was Cokesbury at the Lodge last +week?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"He was and I know just what he did."</p> +<p class="pnext">"What did he do?"</p> +<p class="pnext">He laughed out as gay as you please, for he saw he'd got me just where +he wanted.</p> +<p class="pnext">"When I've tried to find out things from you you've turned me down."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Aw, go on," I said coaxing, "don't you know by experience I'm no +talking machine to give out every word that's said to me."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I believe you," he answered, "and it'll be good for your character for +me to set a generous example. Cokesbury was at the Lodge from last +Saturday on the one-ten train to last Monday on the eight-twenty."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Gee!" I said, soft to myself.</p> +<p class="pnext">"You can quell those rising hopes," he replied. "He wasn't the man you +heard."</p> +<p class="pnext">"How do you know?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Because hearing that he was a friend of Miss Hesketh's, I spent part of +yesterday at Azalea and found that Mr. Cokesbury can prove as good an +alibi as any of them."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Did you see him?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, he wasn't there and if he had been I wouldn't have bothered with +him. I saw someone much better—Miner, the man who owns the Azalea +Garage, where Cokesbury puts up his car. It appears that the trip before +last Cokesbury broke his axle and had to have his car towed down to the +garage and left there to be mended. When he came down Saturday he +expected it to be done and when it wasn't, got in a rage and raised the +devil of a row. He had to go out to his place in one of Miner's cars +which left him there and went back for him Monday morning."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Then he had no auto on Sunday."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Miss Morganthau will take the head of the class," then he said, low, as +if to someone beside him: "She's our prize pupil but we don't say it +before her face for fear of making her proud," then back to me as solemn +as a priest in the pulpit, "That is the situation reduced to its lowest +terms—he had no car."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Well that ends <em class="italics">him</em>," I said.</p> +<p class="pnext">"So it seems to me. In fact Cokesbury gets the gate. I won't hide from +you now that I went to Azalea because I'd heard a rumor of that talk on +the phone and thought I'd do a little private sleuthing on my own. +Didn't know but what I was destined to be the Baby Grand Burns."</p> +<p class="pnext">"And nothing's come of it."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Nothing, except that it drops Cokesbury out with a thud that's dull and +sickening for me, but you can bet your best hat it's just the opposite +for him."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Well, I guess yes," I said and walked along wondering to myself whose +voice that <em class="italics">could</em> have been.</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="viii"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id10">VIII</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">After the inquest there was no more question about who was suspected. It +was as if every finger in Longwood was raised and pointed to Mapleshade. +The cautious people didn't say it plain—especially the shop-keepers who +were afraid of losing custom—but those who had nothing to gain by +keeping still came out with it flatfooted.</p> +<p class="pnext">It wasn't only that nobody liked the Doctor, or believed his story, it +was because the people were wild at what had been done. They wanted to +find the murderer and put him behind bars and seeing that things pointed +more clearly to Dr. Fowler than to anybody else they pitched on him. All +the gossip about the quarreling came out blacker than ever. The papers +were full of it and the other worse stories, about Sylvia's allowance +and the will of her father. There wasn't a bit of dirty linen in the +Fowler household that wasn't washed and hung out on the line for the +public to gape at, and some of it was dirtier when they'd got through +washing than it had been before.</p> +<p class="pnext">There were those who didn't scruple to say that the whole tragedy was a +frame-up between Virginie Dupont and the Doctor. If you talked sensible +to them and asked them how Virginie could have got word to him that +Sylvia was running away, they'd just push that to one side, saying it +could be explained some way, everything wasn't known yet—but one thing +you <em class="italics">could</em> be sure of—the one person who knew the whereabouts of that +French woman was Dr. Daniel Fowler.</p> +<p class="pnext">I believe there were some days after the inquest when, if there'd been +an anarchist or agitator to stand on the postoffice steps and yell that +Dr. Fowler ought to be jailed, a crowd would have gathered, gone down to +Mapleshade, and demanded him.</p> +<p class="pnext">Fortunately there was no one of that kind around, and he stayed quiet in +his home, not even coming to the village. Two days after the inquest I +saw Anne and she said he and Mrs. Fowler hadn't been out of the +house—that they were in a state of siege what with reporters and the +police and morbid cranks who hung round the grounds looking up at the +windows.</p> +<p class="pnext">That same evening I stayed over time in the Exchange, lending a hand. +The work was something awful, and Katie Reilly, the new girl, was most +snowed under and on the way to lose her head. I wanted to see her +through and I wanted the credit of the office kept up, but it's also +true that I wanted to be on the job myself and hear all that was +passing. Believe me, it was hard to quiet down in my bedroom at night +after eight hours at the switchboard right in the thick of the +excitement. Besides, I'd got to know the reporters pretty well and it +was fun making them think I could give them leads and then guying them.</p> +<p class="pnext">I liked Babbitts the best, but there were three others that weren't bad +as men go. One was Jones, a tall thin chap like an actor, with long +black hair hanging down to his collar, and Freddy Jasper, who was +English and talked with an awful swell dialect, and a sallow-skinned, +consumpted-looking guy called Yerrington who belonged on a paper as +yellow as his face and always went round with a cigarette hanging from +his lip like it was stuck on with glue.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was nearly eight and work was slacking off when I started to go home. +What with the jump I'd been on and listening to the gabbing round the +door I'd forgotten my supper. It wasn't till I saw the Gilt Edge window +with a nice pile of apples stacked up round a pumpkin, that I remembered +I was hungry and walked over. There were only three people in the place, +Florrie Stein, the waitress, and a woman with a kid in the corner.</p> +<p class="pnext">I was just finishing my corn beef hash with a cup of coffee at my elbow +and stewed prunes on the line of promotion when Soapy and Jones and +Jasper came in and asked me if they could sit at my table. "Please +yourself," said I, "and you'll please me," for politeness is one of the +things I was bred up to, and they sat down, calling out their orders to +Florrie Stein.</p> +<p class="pnext">They naturally began talking about "the case"—it was all anybody talked +about just then—and for all I knew so much about it, I generally picked +up some new bits from them. So I went to the extravagance of three cents +worth of jelly roll, not because I wanted it, but because I could crumb +it up and eat it slow and not give away I was sitting on to listen.</p> +<p class="pnext">"We can talk before you, Miss Morganthau," said Babbitts, "because while +we all agree you're the belle of Longwood, we've found out by sad +experience you're a belle without a tongue."</p> +<p class="pnext">Florrie Stein, bringing the food then, they were silent till she'd set +it out, and when she'd drawn off to the cashier's desk, they started in +again. They were, so to speak, looking over Hines as a suspect.</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, Hines won't fit," said Babbitts. "The presence of the jewelry on +the body eliminates him. They've dug up his record and though the place +he ran wasn't to be recommended for Sunday school picnics, the man +himself seems to have been fairly decent."</p> +<p class="pnext">"It's odd about the bag—the fitted bag and the jewelry gone from the +room," said Jasper.</p> +<p class="pnext">"The police have an idea that Virginie Dupont could tell something of +them."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Theft?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Theft on the side."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, pshaw!" said Jones, "what's the good of complicating things? If +theft was committed it was a frame-up, part of a plot."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You believe in this idea they've got in the village that Fowler and the +French woman worked together?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I do—to my mind the murderer's marked as plain as Cain after he was +branded on the brow or wherever it was."</p> +<p class="pnext">Then Jasper spoke up. He's a nice quiet chap, not as fresh as the +others. "Let's hear what you base that assertion on."</p> +<p class="pnext">Jones forgot his supper and twisted round sideways in his chair, looking +thoughtful up at the cornice:</p> +<p class="pnext">"As I understand it, in a murder two things are necessary—a crime and a +corpse; and in a murderer one, a motive. Now we have all three—the +motive especially strong. If Miss Hesketh married, her stepfather lost +his home and the money he had been living on, so he tried to stop her +from marrying. Saturday night he heard that his efforts had failed. I +fancy that on Sunday morning when he went for that auto drive he stopped +at some village—not as yet located—and communicated with Virginie +Dupont, who was in his pay. She, too, went out that morning, you may +remember."</p> +<p class="pnext">"There's a good deal of surmise about this," said Babbitts.</p> +<p class="pnext">Jones gave him a scornful look.</p> +<p class="pnext">"If the links in the chain were perfect Dr. Fowler'd be eating his +dinner to-night in Bloomington Jail."</p> +<p class="pnext">"How do you account for Miss Hesketh—presupposing it was she—being on +the train instead of the turnpike?" said Jasper.</p> +<p class="pnext">"A change of plans," Jones answered calmly, "also not yet satisfactorily +cleared up. To continue: Sometime on Sunday the Doctor conceived the +plan of ridding himself of all his cares—his troublesome stepdaughter, +the disturbance of his home and his financial distress. <em class="italics">How</em>," he +turned and looked solemnly at us, fate played so well into his hands I +can't yet explain—the main point is that it did. He met Miss Hesketh at +the Junction, either by threats, persuasion or coercion made her enter +his auto and carried her up the road to the turnpike.</p> +<p class="pnext">"And now," said Babbitts, leaning his arms on the table, "we come to her +appearance in the Wayside Arbor."</p> +<p class="pnext">"We do," Jones replied, nodding his head. "You may remember that both +Hines and his servant said there were twigs and leaves on the edge of +her skirt and that her boots were muddy. Traces of this were still +visible in her clothes when they found her body. She <em class="italics">did</em> get out of +the automobile, but not so far from the turnpike as he said. Either he +and she had some fierce quarrel and she ran from him in rage or terror, +or he may have told the truth and she slipped out at the turn from the +Riven Rock Road without his knowledge. Anyway she got away from him and +ran for the only light she saw. There she telephoned Reddy, withholding +the main facts from him, perhaps merely to save time, but cautioning him +against letting anyone know of the message. That, as I see it, was a +natural feminine desire to guard against gossip. When she thought Reddy +was due she started out to meet him—and instead met the Doctor."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Who'd been hanging about for a half-hour on the roadside?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Precisely. He killed her, concealed the body, and went home."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Just a minute," said Yerrington—"what did he kill her with? The weapon +used is a disputed point. Many think it was a farm implement. Did he go +across lots to Cresset's and arm himself with a convenient spade or rake +for the fatherly purpose of slaying his stepdaughter?"</p> +<p class="pnext">But you couldn't phase Jones, he said as calm as a May morning:</p> +<p class="pnext">"He <em class="italics">could</em> have done that. But I don't think he did. He didn't need it. +The tool box of the car was nearer to hand. A large-sized auto wrench is +a pretty formidable weapon, and a tire wrench—did you ever see one? One +well-aimed blow of that would crush in the head of a negro."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Gentlemen, the evidence is all in," said Babbitts.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Your case might hold water," said Jasper, "if it wasn't as full of +holes as a sieve. Why, you can make out as good a one for almost +anybody."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Who, for example?" Jones asked.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Well—take Reddy."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Jack Reddy?" I said that, sitting up suddenly and staring at them with +a piece of jelly roll halfway to my mouth.</p> +<p class="pnext">"He's as good as another," said Jasper, and then he added sort of +dreamy: "I believe I could work up quite a convincing case against +Reddy, allowing for a hole here and there. But our illustrious friend +here admits holes at this stage."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Fire away," said Babbitts. "Give it to us, holes and all."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Well—off the bat here it is. You may remember that no one saw him +coming back from Maple Lane that night. There is no one, therefore, to +deny that he may have had Miss Hesketh in the car with him. Instead of +going back to Firehill, as he says he did, he followed his original plan +of taking her by the turnpike."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Right at the start I challenge that," said Babbitts. "She appeared at +the Wayside Arbor at nine-thirty. The date in Maple Lane was for seven. +Supposing she kept it and was on time—which is a stretch of the +imagination—he would have had to travel one hundred and eighteen miles +in two hours and a half."</p> +<p class="pnext">"He could have done it."</p> +<p class="pnext">"On a black, dark night? nearly forty-eight miles an hour?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"You forget he knew the road and was driving a high-powered racing car. +It's improbable but not impossible."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I count that as a hole, but go on."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Now in this hypothetical case we'll suppose that as that car flew over +the miles the man and the woman in it had high words?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Hold on," said Jones, holding out his fork—"that's too big a hole. +They were lovers eloping, not an old married couple."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'll explain that later. The high words inflamed and enraged the man to +the point of murder and he conceived a horrible plan. As they neared +the Wayside Arbor he told the woman something was wrong with the car and +sent her to the place ostensibly to telephone, really to establish her +presence there at a time when, had she been with him, she could hardly +have got that far."</p> +<p class="pnext">I jumped in there. I knew it was only fooling, but even so I didn't like +hearing Mr. Reddy talked about that way.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Who did he send her to telephone to, Mr. Jasper—himself?"</p> +<p class="pnext">Babbitts laughed and jerked his head toward me.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Listen to our little belle sounding the curfew on Jasper."</p> +<p class="pnext">But Mr. Jasper was ready.</p> +<p class="pnext">"He could have done that, knowing his house was empty. Hines, you +remember, said she wasn't five minutes in the booth. We've only Reddy's +word for that message. We don't even know if she got a connection. I +telephoned out to the Corona operator Saturday and she answered that +there was no record of the message and she herself remembered nothing +about it."</p> +<p class="pnext">"But Sylvia," I said—"she told Hines she was expecting someone to come +for her."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Sylvia was eloping. Mightn't she have told Hines—who was curious and +intrusive—what wasn't true?"</p> +<p class="pnext">A sort of hush fell on us all. Babbitts's face and Jones's, from being +just amused, were intent and interested.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Go ahead, Jasper," said Babbitts, "if this isn't buying the baby a +frock it's good yarning."</p> +<p class="pnext">Jasper went on.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Her story of the broken automobile <em class="italics">she</em> believed to be true. But she +didn't want Hines to know who she was or what she was up to, so she +invented the person coming to take her home. Why she sat so long there +talking is—I'll admit—a hole, but I said in the beginning there would +be some. The end is just like the end of Jones's case. She went back to +Reddy and he killed her with, as our friend has suggested, one of the +auto tools. Very soon after it would have been as that Bohemian—what's +her name?—heard the scream at ten-ten."</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's all very well," said Jones, "but before we go further I'd like +you to furnish us with a motive."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Nothing easier—jealousy."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Jealousy!" I said, sudden and sharp.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Jealousy in its most violent form. The lady in this case was a peculiar +type—a natural born siren. She had made the man jealous, furiously +jealous. <em class="italics">That</em> was the reason of the high words in the motor."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Who was he jealous of?" It was I again who asked that.</p> +<p class="pnext">Jasper turned round and looked at me with a smile.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why, Miss Morganthau," he said, "<em class="italics">you</em> gave us the clue to that. He was +jealous of the man who made the date you heard on the phone. Don't you +see," he said, turning to the others, "<em class="italics">that</em> man kept his date and +Reddy came and found him there."</p> +<p class="pnext">I can't tell what it was that fell on us and made us sit so still for a +minute. All of us knew it was just a joke, but—for me, anyway—it was +as if a cloud had settled on the room. Babbitts sat smoking a cigarette +and staring at the rings he was making with his eyes screwed up. +Presently, when Jones spoke, his voice had a sound like his pride was +taken down.</p> +<p class="pnext">"A great deal better than I expected, but it's simply riddled with +holes."</p> +<p class="pnext">Before Jasper could answer the door opened and Yerrington came in. The +cigarette was hanging off his lip and as he said "Good evening" to me it +wobbled but clung on. Then he pulled out a chair, sat down and, looking +at the other three with a gleam in his eye, said:</p> +<p class="pnext">"A little while ago Dr. Fowler's chauffeur in dusting out his car found +the gold mesh purse squeezed down between the back and the cushion."</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="ix"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id11">IX</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">The finding of the gold purse established the fact that part, anyway, of +the Doctor's story was true—the woman who had gone down to the junction +and then disappeared <em class="italics">had</em> disappeared in his auto. Was she Sylvia +Hesketh?</p> +<p class="pnext">The general verdict was yes—Sylvia Hesketh, for some unknown reason, +running away from her lover and her home. All the world knew now that +she was wild and unstable, a girl that might take any whim into her head +and act on the spur of the moment. There were theories to burn why she +should have thrown down Reddy and slipped away alone, but those that +knew her said she was a law unto herself and let it go at that.</p> +<p class="pnext">The morning after that supper in the Gilt Edge, Anne came in to do the +marketing and stopped at the Exchange. The room was empty but even so I +had to whisper:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Are they going to arrest the Doctor?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"He's waiting," she whispered back.</p> +<p class="pnext">"What do you make of it?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"What I always have. I think the woman was Virginie. I think she took +Sylvia's things and lit out on her own account."</p> +<p class="pnext">"What does Mrs. Fowler say?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"She's going to offer a reward for the murderer. That's her way of +answering. This last seems to have roused her. She knows now it's going +to be a fight for her husband's liberty, perhaps his life. She's +employing Mills and some other detectives and she keeps in close touch +with them."</p> +<p class="pnext">The next day the reward was made public. It was in all the papers and +nailed up at the depot and in the post office, the words printed in +black, staring letters:</p> +<blockquote><div> +<p class="pfirst">TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS REWARD!</p> +<p class="pnext">TO ANYONE DISCOVERING THE MURDERER OF THE LATE SYLVIA HESKETH, +THIS SUM WILL BE PAID BY HER MOTHER, CONSTANCE GREY FOWLER, +MAPLESHADE, NEW JERSEY.</p> +</div></blockquote> +<p class="pfirst">Late that afternoon Babbitts came into the office. He was staying at the +Longwood Inn, but it was the first time that day I'd seen him and after +our supper together I'd begun to feel real chummy with him. Contrary to +his usual custom he was short and preoccupied, giving me a number +without more words and then banging shut the door of the booth. It got +me a little riled and seeing he wasn't wasting any manners I didn't see +why I should, so I lifted the cam and quietly listened in. Not that I +expected to hear anything very private. The number he'd given was his +paper.</p> +<p class="pnext">The chap at the other end had a way of grunting, "I got you," no matter +what was said. I'd heard <em class="italics">him</em> before and he had a most unnatural sort +of patience about him, as if his spirit was broken forever taking +messages off a wire.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Say," says Babbitts, "I got a new lead—up country near Hines' place. I +been there all morning. There's a farm up that way. Cresset's"—he +spelled the name and the other one did his usual stunt—"Good people, +years on the soil, self-respecting, stand high. Their house is about +half a mile across woods and fields from the Wayside Arbor, lonely with +a bad bit of road leading up from the pike. Do you hear?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Get on," said the voice.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I stopped in there and had a séance with Mrs. Cresset, nice woman, fat +with a white apron. I said I was a tourist thirsting for a drink of +milk."</p> +<p class="pnext">The other one seemed to rouse up. "Did you thirst that bad?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"For information—and I got it. She's been scared of the notoriety and +has held back something which seems important. Her husband's been prying +her up to the point of going to the District Attorney and she's agreed, +but tried it on me first. Do you hear?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I got you."</p> +<p class="pnext">"The night of the murder, about nine, a man knocked at her door saying +he'd lost his way and wanting to know where he was, and how to get to +the turnpike. She spoke to him from an upper window and couldn't see his +face, the night being dark. All she could make out was that he was large +and wore an overcoat. He told her his auto was in the road back of him +and he'd got mixed up in the country lanes. The thing's funny, as there +are very few roads that side of the pike."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Hold on—what's that about pike?"</p> +<p class="pnext">Babbitts repeated it and went on:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Doesn't appear to have been in the least drunk—perfectly sober and +spoke like a gentleman. She gave him the direction and here's what +caught me—describes his voice as very deep, rich and pleasant, almost +the same words the Longwood telephone girl used to describe the voice +she overheard speaking to Miss Hesketh Saturday noon."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Any more?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Impossible to identify man but says she'd know the voice again. He +thanked her very politely—she couldn't lay enough stress on how good +his manners were—and she heard him walk away, splashing through the +mud."</p> +<p class="pnext">There were a few ending-up sentences that gave me time to pull out a +novel and settle down over it. I seemed so buried in it that when +Babbitts put down his money I never raised my eyes, just swept the coin +into the drawer and turned a page. He didn't move, leaning against the +switchboard and not saying a word. With him standing there so close I +got nervous and had to look up, and as soon as I did it he made a motion +with his hand for me to lift my headpiece.</p> +<p class="pnext">"If two heads are better than one," he said, "two ears must be; and the +words I am about to utter should be fully heard to be appreciated."</p> +<p class="pnext">Of course I thought he was going to tell me what he'd found out at +Cresset's. It made me feel proud, being confided in by a newspaper man, +and I pushed up my headpiece, all smiling and ready to be smart and +helpful. He didn't smile back but looked and spoke as solemn as an +undertaker.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Miss Morganthau, yours is a very sedentary occupation."</p> +<p class="pnext">Believe me I got a jolt.</p> +<p class="pnext">"If you're asking me to violate the rules for that," I answered, "you're +taking more upon yourself than I'll overlook from a child reporter with +a head of hair like the Fair Circassian in Barnum & Bailey's."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I speak only as one concerned for your health. A walk after business +hours should be the invariable practice of those whose work forbids +exercise."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Thank you for your interest," says I, very haughty, "but it's well to +look at home before we search abroad. The man who spends all his time +riding in autos at the expense of the Press would be better employed +exercising his own limbs than directing those of others. So start right +along and walk quick."</p> +<p class="pnext">He didn't budge, but says slow and thoughtful:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Your remarks, Miss Morganthau, are always to the point. I'm going to +take a walk this evening—say about seven-thirty."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I hope you'll enjoy it," says I. "As for me, I'm going straight home to +rest. I need it, what with my work and the ginks that stand round here +taking up my time and running the risk of getting me fired"—the door +handle clicked. I looked over my shoulder and saw a man coming in. +"Which way?" I says in a whisper.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Down Maple Lane," he whispers back, and I was in front of my board with +my headpiece in place when the man came in.</p> +<p class="pnext">We walked up and down Maple Lane for an hour, and it may amuse you to +know that what that simple guy wanted was to tell me to listen to every +voice on my wires.</p> +<p class="pnext">I looked at him calm and pitiful. <em class="italics">Me</em>, that had been listening till, if +your ears grow with exercise, mine ought to have been long enough to tie +in a true lover's knot on top of my head!</p> +<p class="pnext">There's a wonderful innocence about men in some ways. It makes you feel +sorry for them, like they were helpless children.</p> +<p class="pnext">Then he capped the climax by telling me about Mrs. Cresset that +morning—hadn't thought I'd heard a word. And as he told it, believing +so honest that I didn't know, I began to feel kind of cheap as if I'd +lied to someone who couldn't have thought I'd do such a thing. I didn't +tell him the truth—I was too ashamed—but I made a vow no matter how +sly I was to the others I'd be on the square with Babbitts. And I'll say +right here that I've made good resolutions and broken them, but that one +I've kept.</p> +<p class="pnext">There's a little hill part way along the Lane where the road slopes down +toward the entrance of Mapleshade. We stopped here and looked back at +the house lying long and dark among its dark trees. The sky was bright +with stars and by their light you could see the black patches of the +woods and here and there a paler stretch where the land was bare and +open. It was all shadowy and gloomy except where the windows shone out +in bright orange squares. I pointed out to Babbitts where Sylvia's +windows were, not a light in them; and then, at the end of the wing, +four or five in a row that belonged to Mrs. Fowler's suite. Her +sitting-room was one of them where Anne had told me she and the Doctor +always sat in the evenings.</p> +<p class="pnext">"They're there now," I said. "What do you suppose they're doing?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Search me," said Babbitts, "I can't answer for another man, but if I +was in the Doctor's shoes I'd be pacing up and down, with my Circassian +Beauty hair turning white while you waited."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes," I said, nodding. "I'll bet that's what he's doing. I can see +them, surrounded by their riches, jumping every time there's a knock on +the door, thinking that the summons has come."</p> +<p class="pnext">And that shows you how you never can tell. For at that hour in that room +the Doctor and Mrs. Fowler were talking to Walter Mills, who had just +come from Philadelphia, bringing them the first ray of hope they'd had +since the tragedy. It was in the form of a diamond and ruby lavalliere +that he had found the day before in a pawn shop and that Mrs. Fowler had +identified as Sylvia's.</p> +<p class="pnext">Four days later a piece of news ran like wildfire through Longwood: +Virginie Dupont had been arrested and brought to Bloomington.</p> +<p class="pnext">They put her in jail there and it didn't take any third degree to get +the truth out of her. She made a clean breast of it, for she was caught +with the goods, all the lost jewelry being found in the place where she +was hiding. It sent her to the penitentiary, and her lover, too, for +whom—anyway she said so—she had robbed Sylvia's Hesketh's room on the +night that Sylvia Hesketh disappeared.</p> +<p class="pnext">If her story threw no light on the murder it exonerated the Doctor, for +it fitted at every point with what he had said.</p> +<p class="pnext">I'll write it down here, not in her words, but as I got it from the +papers.</p> +<p class="pnext">For some time she had been planning to rob Sylvia, but was waiting for a +good opportunity. This came, when the Doctor, being out of the house, +she discovered that an elopement was on foot. She had read Sylvia's +letters, which were thrown carelessly about, and knew of the affair with +Jack Reddy, and when on Sunday morning she was sent to the village to +get a letter from Reddy she guessed what it was. Before giving it to +Sylvia she went to her own room, opened the envelope with steam from a +kettle, and read it. Then she knew that her chance had come.</p> +<p class="pnext">When evening drew on she hung about the halls and saw Sylvia leave at a +few minutes past six, carrying the fitted bag. The coast being clear, +she went to her room, took an old black bag of her own and stole back. +It was while she was getting this bag that the idea came to her of +impersonating her mistress, as in that way she could steal some clothes. +She secured the jewelry in a pocket hanging from her waist, took some +false hair that Sylvia wore when the weather was damp, and covered her +head with it, and selected a little automobile hat of which there were +several, over all tying a figured black lace veil.</p> +<p class="pnext">What she particularly wanted was a new Hudson seal coat that had been +delivered a few days before. No one but herself and Miss Hesketh knew of +this coat as there had been so much quarreling about Sylvia's +extravagance, that the girl often bought clothes without telling. After +putting it on she filled her bag with things from the bureau drawers, +and just as she was leaving saw the gold mesh purse on the dresser and +snatched it up.</p> +<p class="pnext">All this was done like lightning and she thinks she left the house not +more than twenty or twenty-five minutes after Sylvia. To catch the +train she had to hurry and she ran up Maple Lane behind the hedge. She +was nearing the village when she heard the whirr of an auto and through +the hedge saw the two big headlights of a car, coming slowly down the +Lane. For a moment she paused, peeking through the branches and made out +that there was only one person in it, Jack Reddy.</p> +<p class="pnext">She reached the station only a few minutes before the train came in. As +she had a ticket, she stood at the dark end of the platform, not moving +into the light till the engine was drawing near. Then Jim Donahue saw +her and came up, addressing her as Miss Hesketh. She had often tried to +imitate Sylvia's voice and accent which she thought very elegant, and +she did so now, speaking carefully and seeing that Jim had no doubt of +her identity. On the ride to the Junction she had only murmured "Good +evening" to Sands, being afraid to say more.</p> +<p class="pnext">At the Junction she was going to get off, take the branch line to +Hazelmere and transfer there to the Philadelphia Express. In the +women's waiting-room, which would probably be deserted at that hour, she +intended taking off Sylvia's coat and hair and reappearing as the modest +and insignificant lady's maid. She had thought this out in the +afternoon, deciding that Sylvia would probably communicate with her +mother in the morning and that the theft would then be discovered. +Inquiries started for the woman who had been seen on the train would +lead to nothing, as that woman would have dropped out of sight at the +Junction.</p> +<p class="pnext">Everything worked without a hitch. The waiting-room was empty and she +had ample time to take off the hair and put it in the bag, hang the coat +over her arm with the lining turned out, and even pinch the small, soft +hat into another shape. No one would have thought the woman who went +into the waiting-room was the woman who came out.</p> +<p class="pnext">And then came the first mishap—as she opened the door she stepped +almost into Dr. Fowler. She was terror stricken, but even then neither +her luck nor her wits left her, for almost the first sentence he uttered +showed her that he knew of the elopement and gave her a lead what to +say. She must have been a pretty nervy woman the way she jumped at that +lead. Right off the bat she invented the story about being sent by +Sylvia to Philadelphia—to wait there at the Bellevue-Stratford.</p> +<p class="pnext">The Doctor was furious and ordered her into his auto. There was nothing +for it but to obey and in she got, sitting in the back. As she was +stepping up, he close beside her, she remembered the gold mesh purse +plain in her hand. Like a flash she bent forward and jammed it down +between the back and seat.</p> +<p class="pnext">The ride up the Riven Rock Road was just as the Doctor described it. It +was after the lamp had been broken and he was back in the car starting +it up, that she slipped out. She was determined to get away with all her +loot and took the bag and coat with her, but between the hurry and fear +of the moment forgot the purse.</p> +<p class="pnext">She wandered through the woods till she saw a small scattering of lights +which she took for one of the branch line stations. When the dawn came +she had lost some of her nerve and felt it was too risky to carry the +extra things. So she hid them at the root of a tree, took off the hat, +tying the veil over her head, and walked across the fields to the +station. As it was Monday morning there were a lot of laborers, men and +women, on the platform. She mingled with them, looking like them in her +muddy clothes and tied up head, and got away to Hazelmere without being +noticed.</p> +<p class="pnext">She was feeling safe in her furnished room in Philadelphia when she read +of the murder in the papers. That scared her almost to death and she lay +as close as a rabbit in a burrow, afraid to go out and cooking her food +on a gas ring. It was the man she had stolen for who gave her away. When +she refused to raise money on the jewels, he stole the lavalliere and +pawned it.</p> +<p class="pnext">Under the trees where she said she'd left them, the police found the +coat and hat. Beside them was the bag stuffed full of lingerie, gloves +and silk stockings, and with the false hair crowded down into the inside +pocket.</p> +<p class="pnext">Besides clearing the Doctor her confession threw light on two important +points—one that Sylvia had left the house at a little after six, and +the other that Reddy had been at the meeting place at the time he said.</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="x"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id12">X</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">After the excitement of the French woman's arrest there was a sort of +lull. For a few days people thought we were going to move right on and +lay our hands on the murderer. But outside of proving that the Doctor +wasn't the guilty one the crime was no nearer a solution than it had +been the day it happened. Though there was still a good deal of talk +about it, it began to die down in the public interest and it was then +that the papers got to calling it "The Hesketh Mystery" in place of "The +Hesketh Murder."</p> +<p class="pnext">The reporters left the Inn and went back to live in town, coming in +every few days to snoop around for any new items that might have turned +up. Babbitts came oftener than the others and stayed later, and he and I +had several more walks. We were getting to be like partners in some +kind of secret business, meeting after dark, and pacing along the roads +round the village, with the stars shining overhead and the ground hard +and crumbly under our feet.</p> +<p class="pnext">If you'd met us you'd have set us down for a pair of lovers, walking +side by side under the dark of the trees. But if you'd followed along +and listened you'd have got cured of that romantic notion mighty quick. +Our flirtation was all about evidence, and leads, and clues—not so much +as a compliment or a baby stare from start to finish. I don't believe if +you'd asked Babbitts he could have told you whether my eyes were brown +or blue, and as for me—outside his being a nice kid he didn't figure +out any more important than the weathervane on the Methodist Church.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was "the case" that drew us together like a magnet drawing nails. +We'd speculate about it, look at it all round as if it was something we +had hold of in our hands. I guess it was the mysteriousness of it that +attracted him, and the reward, too. There was more in it for me as you +know—but he never got a hint of <em class="italics">that</em>.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was one evening, nearly four weeks after the murder that he gave me a +shock—not meaning to, of course, for even then I'd found out he was the +kind that wouldn't hurt a fly. We were talking of Jack Reddy, who we'd +seen that evening in the village, the first time since the inquest.</p> +<p class="pnext">"You know," said Babbitts, "it's queer but I keep thinking of that yarn +of Jasper's, that evening in the Gilt Edge."</p> +<p class="pnext">I drew away like he'd stuck a pin into me.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why do you think about <em class="italics">that</em>?" I asked loud and sharp.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why," he said, slow as if he was considering, "I suppose because it was +so plausible. And I've been wondering if many other people have thought +of it."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I guess they have," I answered kind of fierce; "there's fools enough in +the world, God knows, to think of anything. I make no doubt there's +people who've tried to work out that <em class="italics">I</em> did it, the reward tempting +them to lies and sin."</p> +<p class="pnext">Babbitts looked at me surprised.</p> +<p class="pnext">"What's there to get mad about?" he asked. "I'm not for a moment +suggesting that Reddy really had any hand in it. Why, he could no more +have killed that girl than <em class="italics">I</em> could kill <em class="italics">you</em>."</p> +<p class="pnext">I simmered down—it was awful sweet the way he said it.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Then you oughtn't to be casting suspicions on an innocent man," I said, +still grouchy.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, you're such a little pepper pot. Do you think for a moment I'd say +this to anybody but you. Look at me!" I looked into his eyes, clear as a +baby's in the starlight. "If you believe I'm the sort of fellow who'd +put a slur on Reddy I wonder you'll come out this way and walk with me."</p> +<p class="pnext">I smiled, I couldn't help it, and Babbitts, seeing I was all right +again, tucked his hand inside my arm and we walked on, very friendly. +Being ignorant of the true state of my feelings, he went straight back +to the subject.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Now understand that I mean nothing against Reddy and that I've never +said this to a soul but you, but ever since the inquest there's been one +thing that's puzzled me—the length of time he was out that night."</p> +<p class="pnext">"He explained that," I said.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I know he did, and everybody's accepted his explanation. But seven +hours in a high-powered racing car! He could have gone to Philadelphia, +taken in a show and come back."</p> +<p class="pnext">"But he told all about it," I insisted.</p> +<p class="pnext">"He did," said Babbitts, "but I'll tell you something, Miss +Morganthau—between ourselves not to go an inch farther—Reddy's story +impressed me as the undiluted truth till he got to <em class="italics">that</em> part of it."</p> +<p class="pnext">"What do you mean?" I said, low, and being afraid I was going to tremble +I pulled my arm away from him.</p> +<p class="pnext">"This—I was watching him very close, and when he began to talk about +that night ride, some sort of change came over him. It was very subtle, +I never heard anyone speak of it, but it seemed to me as if he was +making an effort to give an impression of frankness. The rest of his +testimony had the hesitating, natural tone of a man who is nervous and +maybe uncertain of his facts, but when he came to that he—well, he +looked to me as if he was internally bracing himself, as if he was on +dangerous ground and knew it."</p> +<p class="pnext">If I'd been able to speak as well as that those were exactly the words I +would have used. I cleared my throat before I answered.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Looks like to me, Mr. Babbitts, that you ought to be writing novels +instead of press stories."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, no," he said careless, "but, you see, I've been on a number of +cases like this and a fellow gets observant. It's queer—the whole +thing. If that French woman's evidence is to be trusted Miss Hesketh +<em class="italics">did</em> leave the house early to keep that date with the Voice Man."</p> +<p class="pnext">I didn't say a word, looking straight before me at the lights of +Longwood through the trees. Babbitts, with his hands in his pockets +swinging along beside me, went on:</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's what's made me think of Jasper's hypothetical case. Do you +remember? He said Reddy'd come down to the meeting place, found Miss +Hesketh with the other man and got into a Berserker rage. Say what you +like, it does work out."</p> +<p class="pnext">When he bid me good night at Mrs. Galway's side door he wanted to know +why I was so silent? Even if I'd wanted to give a reason I hadn't one to +give. Don't you believe for a minute I was really worried—it was just +that I hated anyone even to yarn that way about Jack Reddy. Poor—me—if +I'd known then what was coming!</p> +<p class="pnext">It began to come two days later, the first shadow that was going to +darken and spread till—but I'm going on too quick.</p> +<p class="pnext">I'd just had my lunch, put away my box and swept off the crumbs, when I +got a call for the depot from the Rifle Run Camp. That's a summer +resort, way up in the hills beyond Hochalaga Lake. The voice, with a +brogue on it as rich as butter, was Pat Donahue's, Jim's eldest son, a +sort of idle scamp, who'd gone up to the camp to work last summer and +had stayed on because there was nothing to do—at least that's what Jim +said.</p> +<p class="pnext">I made the connection and listened in, not because I was expecting +anything worth hearing, but because I wasn't taking any chances. I guess +Pat Donahue was the last person anyone would expect to come jumping into +the middle of the Hesketh mystery—but that's what he did, with both +feet, hard.</p> +<p class="pnext">I didn't pay much attention at first and then a sentence caught my ear +and I grew still as a statue, my eyes staring straight in front, even +breathing carefully as if they could hear.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was Pat's voice, the voice answering Jim's at the Depot:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Me and Bridger was in to Hochalaga Lake yesterday forenoon, fishin' +through the ice. Can you hear me, Paw?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Fine. Are you payin' for a call to tell me you're that idle you have to +play at fishin'?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Jest you listen close and hear me before you come back. I seen in the +papers that Miss Hesketh that was murdered had one glove lost. Do you +mind what the one that wasn't lost looked like?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Sure I do—why shouldn't I? Didn't I see it at the inquest?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Will you be answering me instead of tellin' me what you saw?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Ain't I doin' it? It was a left-hand glove, light gray with three pearl +buttons and a furrener's name stamped in the inside."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Well, then, I got the feller to it—right hand. I found it on the wharf +at the lake, in front of the bungalow. Seeing that there's ten thousand +dollars reward offered, I thought I'd be a blowin' in the price of a +call to tell you, though it's so ungrateful ye are for the news I'm +sorry I done it. But I'll not bother you no more, for it's in to the +District Attorney I'll be goin' with the evidence."</p> +<p class="pnext">That was what he did, that very afternoon. By the next day everybody in +Longwood knew how Pat Donahue had found Sylvia Hesketh's missing glove +on the wharf just in front of the Reddy bungalow. There was a person who +didn't close an eye that night, and I guess you know what her name was.</p> +<p class="pnext">Gee, those were awful days that followed! When I think of them now I can +feel a sort of sinking come back on me and my face gets stiff like it +was made of leather and couldn't limber up for a smile. Each morning I'd +get up scared sick of what I was going to hear that day, and each +evening I'd go to bed filled with a darkness as black as the night +outside.</p> +<p class="pnext">I couldn't believe it and yet—well, I'll tell you and you can judge for +yourself.</p> +<p class="pnext">The police went out to Hochalaga and made a thorough examination of the +house and its surroundings.</p> +<p class="pnext">The bungalow stood at one end of the lake right on the shore, with a +little wharf jutting out in front of it into the water. The door opened +into a big living-room, furnished very pretty and comfortable with green +madras curtains at the windows, a green art rug on the floor, and wicker +chairs with green denim cushions. At one side was a big brick fireplace +with a copper kettle hanging on a crane and over in a corner was a desk +with a telephone on it. Along the walls were bookcases full of books and +in the center was a table with chairs drawn up at either side of it.</p> +<p class="pnext">The police noticed right off that it didn't have the damp, musty feel of +a place shut up through a long spell of rain. The air was cold and dry +and they could scent the odor of wood fires and a slight faint smell of +cigar smoke. Then they saw that the fireplace was piled high with ashes +and that several cigarette ends were scattered on the hearth. On the +center table was a shaded lamp and near it a match box with burnt +matches strewn round on the floor. The desk drawer was open and the +papers inside all tossed and littered about as if someone had gone +through them in a hurry. Two armchairs stood on either side of the table +and another was in front of the fireplace. All over the floor were earth +stains as if muddy feet had been walking about. There were no signs that +the place had been broken into—windows and doors were locked and the +locks in good condition.</p> +<p class="pnext">Outside against the wall of the house they found a pile of broken china, +what seemed to be the remains of a tea set. It was not till the search +was nearly ended that one of the men, studying the grass along the +roadside for traces of footprints, came on a gasoline drum hidden among +the bushes.</p> +<p class="pnext">But that wasn't the worst—leading up the road to within a few yards of +the wharf were the tracks of auto wheels. At the time when these tracks +were made the road was deep in mud which, about the wharf, had evidently +been a regular pool. The driver of the motor had stopped his car at the +edge of this, got out and walked through it to the bungalow. Clear as if +they had been cast in plaster his footprints went from where the ruts +ended to the edge of the wharf. There, just at the corner of the planks, +three small, pointed footprints met them—a woman's. Either the man had +carried the woman or she had picked her way along the grass by the +roadside, and joining him on the planks had made a step or two into the +soft earth. On the wharf the prints were lost in a broken caking of mud. +The man's went back to the car, close to where they had come from it, +and they returned as they had come—alone.</p> +<p class="pnext">Jack Reddy's shoes fitted the large prints and Sylvia Hesketh's the +small ones!</p> +<p class="pnext">It came on Longwood with an awful shock. The faces of the people were +all dull and dazed looking, as if they were knocked half silly by a +blow. They couldn't believe it—and yet there it was! The papers printed +terrible headlines—"The Earth gives up a Murderer's Secret"—and "Jack +Frost versus Jack Reddy." There were imaginary accounts of how Mr. Reddy +could have done it, and Jasper, in his paper, had a long article worked +out like the story he'd told us that night in the Gilt Edge, but with +all the holes filled up. Everything was against Mr. Reddy, even the +telephone message that Sylvia had sent him from the Wayside Arbor +couldn't be traced. The Corona operator could remember nothing about it +and there was no record—only Jack Reddy's word and nobody believed it.</p> +<p class="pnext">They had him up before the District Attorney and his examination was +published in the papers. I can't put it all down—it's not +necessary—but it was bad. After I read it I sat still in my room, +feeling seasick and my face in the glass frightened me.</p> +<p class="pnext">When they asked him if he had been at the bungalow that night he said he +had, he had gone there after he had given up his hunt for Sylvia.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why didn't you say this at the inquest?" was asked.</p> +<p class="pnext">He answered "that he hadn't thought it was necessary—that——" then he +stopped as if he wasn't sure and after a moment or two said: "I didn't +see that it threw any light on the murder, as I was alone."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You wished to conceal the fact that you were there, then?"</p> +<p class="pnext">To that he answered sharp:</p> +<p class="pnext">"I did not—but I saw no reason to give my movements in detail, as they +were of no importance."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why did you go there?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I was angry and excited and it was a place where I could be quiet."</p> +<p class="pnext">Asked how long he had been in the bungalow he said he wasn't sure—it +might have been an hour or two. He had lit the fire and sat in front of +it thinking and smoking cigarettes.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Didn't you hunt in the desk for something?"</p> +<p class="pnext">He answered with a sort of shrug as if he'd forgotten.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, yes—I was hunting for a bill I thought I left there."</p> +<p class="pnext">To the questions about Sylvia—whether she had been there with him—he +answered almost violently that she had not, that he had not seen her +there or anywhere else that night.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Did you notice any footprints in the mud when you came?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I did not."</p> +<p class="pnext">"There were no evidences on the wharf or in the house of anyone having +been there before you?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"None. The bungalow was locked and undisturbed."</p> +<p class="pnext">Then they switched off on to the gasoline drum and asked him if he had +filled the tank there and he said he might have but he didn't remember.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Was it dark when you left the place?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No—very bright moonlight."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You remember that?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes. I recollect thinking the ride back would be easier than the ride +up in the dark."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why did you say at the inquest that you filled the tank somewhere on +the turnpike?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I suppose I thought I had. In the angry and excited state I was in +small things made no impression on me. I had no clear memory of where +I'd done it."</p> +<p class="pnext">All the papers agreed that his testimony was unsatisfactory and made +much of his manner, which, under an effort to be calm, showed a +spasmodic, nervous violence.</p> +<p class="pnext">A day later he was arrested at Firehill and taken to Bloomington jail to +await indictment by the Grand Jury.</p> +<div class="align-center auto-scaled figure" style="margin-left: 27%; width: 45%" id="figure-5"> +<span id="a-day-later-he-was-arrested-at-firehill-and-taken-to-bloomington-jail"/><img style="display: block; width: 100%" alt="A day later he was arrested at Firehill and taken to Bloomington jail" src="images/illus4.jpg" width="100%"/> +<div class="caption italics"> +A day later he was arrested at Firehill and taken to Bloomington jail</div> +</div> +<p class="pfirst">That night—shall I ever forget it! I heard the sounds in the street +dying away and then the silence, the deep, lovely silence that comes +over the village at midnight. And in it I could hear my heart beating, +and as I lay with my eyes wide open, I could see on the darkness like a +picture drawn in fire, Jack Reddy in the electric chair.</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="xi"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id13">XI</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">Looking back now I can remember dressing the next morning, all trembly +and with my hands damp, and my face in the glass, white and pinched like +an East Side baby's in a hot wave. But there wasn't anything trembly +about the thinking part of me. That was working better than it had ever +worked before. It seemed to be made of steel springs going swift and +sure like an engine that went independent of the rest of my machinery.</p> +<p class="pnext">And, thank God, it did work that way, for it had thought of something!</p> +<p class="pnext">The idea came on me in the second part of the night, flashed out of the +dark like a wireless. I'd been wondering about the man who made the +telephone date with Sylvia—the Unknown Voice they'd got to calling +him. People thought as Jasper had said, that Reddy had found her with +this man and there had been a terrible scene. But whatever had happened +the Unknown Voice was the clew to the mystery. The police had tried to +locate him, tried and failed. Now <em class="italics">I</em> was going to hunt for him.</p> +<p class="pnext">My plan was perfectly simple. From what I had seen myself and heard from +Anne Hennessey I was sure I knew every lover that Sylvia had had. I was +going to call each one of them up on the phone and listen to their +voices, and I wasn't going to tell a soul about it. Everybody would +say—just as you say as you read this—"but all those men gave +satisfactory alibis." I knew that as well as anyone, but it didn't cut +any ice with me, I didn't care what they'd proved. I was going to hear +their voices and see for myself. If I was successful, then I'd tell +Babbitts and have him advise me what to do. I'd heard Jack Reddy had +retained Mr. Wilbur Whitney, the great criminal lawyer, but I wouldn't +have known whether to go to him or the police or the District Attorney +and if I did it at all I wanted to do it right.</p> +<p class="pnext">Now that there were three of us in the Exchange my holiday had been +changed to Monday, and I made up my mind not to put my plan into +execution till that day. I didn't want to be hurried, or confused, by +possible interruptions, and also I wanted to hear the voices at short +range and could do that better from the city. I telephoned over to +Babbitts that I'd be in town Monday to do some shopping, and he made a +date to meet me at the entrance of the Knickerbocker Hotel and dine with +me at some joint near Times Square.</p> +<p class="pnext">Monday morning I was up bright and early and dressed myself in my best +clothes. From the telephone book I got the numbers of the four men who +were known to have been Sylvia's lovers and admirers—Carisbrook, +Robinson, Dunham and Cokesbury. I had found out from Anne what their +businesses were and I had no trouble in locating them. With the slip of +paper in my purse I took the ten-twenty train and was in town before +midday.</p> +<p class="pnext">On the way over I worked out what I'd say to each of them. I was going +to ask Carisbrook, who was a soft, dressed-up guy, if he knew where +Mazie Lorraine, a manicure who'd once been in the Waldorf, had moved to. +It was nervy but I wanted to give him a dig, he having put on airs and +treated me like a doormat. Robinson was easy—he had a common name and +I'd got the wrong man. Excuse <em class="italics">me</em>, please, awful sorry. Dunham was a +lawyer and I was a dressmaker that a customer wouldn't pay. And +Cokesbury was easy, too—I'd heard Cokesbury Lodge was for rent and was +looking for a country place.</p> +<p class="pnext">I got Carisbrook first and he was as mad as a hornet.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I don't know what you're talking about. <em class="italics">Manicure</em>? I don't know any +manicure called Lorraine or anything else. I've never been manicured in +the Waldorf—or any other hotel—in the city. The woman is a liar——" +and so forth and so on, sputtering and fizzing along the wire. I had +hard work not to laugh and in the middle of it I hung up, for he had a +thin, high squeak on him like an old maid scared by a mouse.</p> +<p class="pnext">Robinson was a sport, I liked <em class="italics">him</em> fine:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Don't apologize. It's the penalty of being called Robinson. Still +there's a bright side to every cloud. It might have been Smith, you +know."</p> +<p class="pnext">It wasn't Robinson. He talked with a dialect that sounded like Jasper's, +English, I guess.</p> +<p class="pnext">Dunham was very smooth and awful hard to get rid of. He kept on asking +questions and I had to think quick and speak unnaturally intelligent. In +the middle of it—I'd got what I wanted—I said it was too complicated +to tell over the phone and I'd be in to-morrow at two and my name was +Mrs. Pendleton.</p> +<p class="pnext">It wasn't Dunham.</p> +<p class="pnext">When I tackled Cokesbury I ran into the first snag. I tried his office +and a real pleasant young man (you get to know a young voice from an old +one) asked me what I wanted. I said business, and he answered:</p> +<p class="pnext">"What is the nature of your business, Madam?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'd rather tell that to Mr. Cokesbury," I said.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Mr. Cokesbury doesn't like to be interrupted in the office. If you'll +tell me what you want to see him about——"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Say, young feller," said I, in a cool, classy way, "suppose we stop +this pleasant little talk, and you trot into Mr. Cokesbury and say a +lady's waiting on the wire."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Very well," he answered, calm and cheerful, "I'll do just as you say."</p> +<p class="pnext">There was a wait and then he was back.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Mr. Cokesbury says it's impossible for him to come to the phone and +will you kindly tell me what your business is."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I guess I'll have to wait till he's not so busy," I answered, languid, +like I've heard ladies when they're mad and don't want to show it, and +I hung up.</p> +<p class="pnext">Afterward I saw I'd made a mistake, for, when I called up two hours +later that polite guy was still on the job and handed me the same line +of talk.</p> +<p class="pnext">I went into a drugstore and looked up Cokesbury—Edward L., residence. +It was in the East Fifties and at six I tried him there.</p> +<p class="pnext">I drew a man that I guess was a servant:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Is Mr. Cokesbury home?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Who is it?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"That doesn't matter. I want to know if he's home."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I don't know, ma'am. Will you please give me your name?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Say, you're not taking the census or compiling a new directory, you're +answering the phone. Tell Mr. Cokesbury a party wants to see him on +business."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I have orders, ma'am, not to bother Mr. Cokesbury with messages unless +I know who they're from," said the voice, and then I knew he <em class="italics">was</em> +there.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'm sure he'll come if you say it's a <em class="italics">lady</em>," I said, sort of coaxing +and sweet.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'll try, ma'am," said the voice, and I could hear the echo of his feet +as he walked off.</p> +<p class="pnext">Presently he was back.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Beg pardon, ma'am, but Mr. Cokesbury says he can't possibly come and +please to give me the message."</p> +<p class="pnext">By that time I was getting mad.</p> +<p class="pnext">"You ought to get double pay, for you seem to be a District Messenger +boy as well as a butler. If it's not too much trouble would you mind +telling me what Mr. Cokesbury's friends do when they want a word with +him over the phone?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"They tell the butler who they are and what they want, ma'am. That's the +orders in this house. Good-bye."</p> +<p class="pnext">When Babbitts and I were sitting at a table in a little dago joint near +Broadway, I couldn't help but tell him what I'd been doing.</p> +<p class="pnext">He looked at me with his eyes as big as half-dollars and then began to +laugh.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Well, what do you make of that? Spending your holiday and your nickels +rounding up a lot of men that rounded themselves up weeks ago."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I want to get that voice."</p> +<p class="pnext">"But everyone of them have proved that voice couldn't be theirs."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Maybe they did," said I, "but I want to know it myself."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Listen to her," he said, looking round the table as if a crowd was +collected, "calmly brushing aside the police, the detectives, the might +of the law and the strong arm of the press."</p> +<p class="pnext">"And anything else that stands round trying to discourage me."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Far be it from me to discourage you in any eccentricity that may +develop. But there's no need in following up Cokesbury, for we know that +he was marooned in Cokesbury Lodge."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I don't care what we know. The only things I believe are the things I +see myself."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Thomas!" he said, laughing, and I didn't see any sense in his calling +me that, but he often said things I wasn't on to. "Do you intend to camp +on his trail all night?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I do," I answered. "As soon as you get through lapping up that red ink +I'm going to go to the nearest pay station and ring up Edward L., +residence."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'll toddle along," he said. "Anything goes with me that adds to the +entertainment of Mary McKenna Morganthau."</p> +<p class="pnext">He held up his glass as if he was drinking a toast, and something about +the look of him—I don't know what—made me get all embarrassed. It +never happened before and it took me so by surprise I blushed and was +glad I'd dropped my gloves on the floor so I could bend down and hide +how red my face was.</p> +<p class="pnext">I tried Edward L., residence, at a drug store on Broadway and again I +drew that butler gink, who was sort of sassy and hung up quick. Then we +walked along and I could see that Babbitts was getting interested.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Tell you what," he said, "that servant knows you. I'll make the +connection, say I want to see Cokesbury on business, and if I get him, +hand on the receiver to you."</p> +<p class="pnext">We fixed it that way, went into a hotel, and I stood at the door of the +booth while Babbitts got the house. Standing at his elbow I could see he +was up against the same proposition as I had been. He finally had to say +he wanted to see Mr. Cokesbury about renting Cokesbury Lodge.</p> +<p class="pnext">He turned to me with his hand over the mouthpiece and said:</p> +<p class="pnext">"He's there and he won't come."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Has the servant gone to get him?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes. He wouldn't say whether his boss was home or not, but his +willingness to take the message gave him away. Now stand close and if +it's a new voice I won't say a word, just get up and let you slide into +my place." He started and turned back to the instrument. "Yes. What?" I +could see a look of surprise come over his face. "Soon? You don't +know—in a few days. Hasn't any idea of renting. Thanks. That's +all—good-bye."</p> +<p class="pnext">He hung up and turned to me:</p> +<p class="pnext">"It was the servant. Cokesbury hasn't any intention of renting and is +leaving for Europe."</p> +<p class="pnext">"For Europe!" I cried out. "<em class="italics">When?</em>"</p> +<p class="pnext">"The man didn't know exactly. He said he thought in a few days."</p> +<p class="pnext">We walked down the street silent and thoughtful. The only feeling I had +at first was disappointment. I didn't get the whole thing clear as +Babbitts did. It came on him all in a minute, he told me afterward.</p> +<p class="pnext">We were on Broadway as light as day with the signs and people walking by +us and crowding in between us as if they were hurrying to catch trains. +I felt Babbitts' hand go round my arm, steering me into a side street. +It was darker there and there were only a few passers-by. We slackened +up and still with his hand around my arm, he bent his face down toward +my ear and said low, as if he was afraid someone was listening:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Kiddo, are you on?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"To what?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Cokesbury. Don't you get it? He won't answer the phone."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Do you mean he won't answer at all?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Not unless it's someone he knows. He's got his clerks in the office +holding the fort and his servants at home."</p> +<p class="pnext">We were just under a lamp and I stopped with my mouth falling open, for +sudden, like a flash of light, it came to me.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Soapy!" I gasped and wheeled round on him. His face bent down toward +me, was intent like a hunting dog's when it sees a bird, his eyes, +bright and fixed, looking straight into mine.</p> +<p class="pnext">"You've made the first real discovery in this case, Molly Morganthau. +Cokesbury's scared, d——d scared, so scared he's lost his nerve and is +lighting out to Europe."</p> +<p class="pnext">We walked round into Bryant Park and sat down on a bench. We were so +excited we didn't notice anything—that I'd grabbed Babbitt's hand and +kept hold of it, that it was freezing cold, that we'd got on a bench +with a drunk all huddled up on the other end. We were as certain as if +he'd confessed it that Cokesbury was the Unknown Voice and that he'd +killed Sylvia Hesketh. We just brushed his alibi aside as if he'd never +made one and planned how I was to hear him before he got away to Europe. +We laid plots there in the dark, sitting close together to keep warm, +with the drunk all lopped over and muttering to himself on the seat +beside us.</p> +<p class="pnext">When Babbitts left me at the Ferry we'd fixed it that he was to call me +up the next day and tell me what he'd done in town and I was to tell him +what I'd accomplished at my end of the line.</p> +<p class="pnext">The next morning I tried Cokesbury's office with the same results. At +one Babbitts called me and said he'd tried twice to get him as a test +and been told that Mr. Cokesbury wasn't down to-day and his whereabouts +were unknown. By inquiries at the steamship offices he'd found that Our +Suspect—that's what we called him on the wire—had taken passage on the +<em class="italics">Caronia</em> for the following Saturday. That was four days off—four days +to hear the man who wouldn't answer the phone.</p> +<p class="pnext">That afternoon I had an idea, called up Anne Hennessey and asked her to +meet me at the Gilt Edge for supper. She came and afterward in my room +at Galway's I told her—I had to, but she's true-blue and I knew it—and +she agreed to help. She was to come to the Exchange the next morning, +call up Cokesbury and say she was Mrs. Fowler, who wanted to bid him +good-bye before he left. While she spoke—imitating Mrs. Fowler—I was +to listen. We did it—though she'd have lost her job if she'd been found +out—and I heard the clerk tell her that Mr. Cokesbury wasn't in his +office, that he didn't know where she could find him, and that it was +very little use trying to get him on the phone as he was so much +occupied prior to his departure.</p> +<p class="pnext">When Anne came out of the booth I was crying. I guess I never before in +my life had my nerves as strung up as they were then.</p> +<p class="pnext">It wasn't long after that that I had a call from Babbitts. He'd been +able to do nothing. When he heard of my last attempt he said:</p> +<p class="pnext">"He's not answering any calls at all now. His own mother couldn't get +him. It's no use trying that line any more. We've got to think up some +other way."</p> +<p class="pnext">That was Wednesday—I had only three days. Three days and I hadn't an +idea how to do it. Three days and Jack Reddy was waiting indictment in +Bloomington jail. We couldn't stop Cokesbury going or get anybody else +to stop him unless we could light on something more definite than a +hello girl's suspicions.</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="xii"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id14">XII</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">Thursday afternoon I was sitting in the Exchange, feeling as if the +bottom had fallen out of the world. I hadn't given up yet—I'm not the +giving-up kind—but I <em class="italics">couldn't</em> think of anything else to do. I'd +tossed on my bed all night thinking, I'd dressed thinking, I'd tried to +eat thinking, I'd put in the plugs and made the connections +thinking—and nothing would come.</p> +<p class="pnext">Two days more—two days more—two days more—those three words kept +going through my head as if they were strung on an endless chain.</p> +<p class="pnext">And then—isn't it always that way in life? Just when you're ready to +throw up the sponge and say you're beaten, Bang—it comes!</p> +<p class="pnext">It came in the shape of a New York call for Azalea.</p> +<p class="pnext">Like a dream, for I was pretty nearly all in, I could hear the +operator's voice:</p> +<p class="pnext">"That you, Longwood? Give me Azalea, 383."</p> +<p class="pnext">And then me answering:</p> +<p class="pnext">"All right. Azalea 383. Wait a minute."</p> +<p class="pnext">I plugged in and heard that queer grating sound as if the wires were +rubbing against each other:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Hello, New York. All right for Azalea 383."</p> +<p class="pnext">And then a woman's voice, clear and small.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Here's your party. Just a minute. There you are—Azalea 383."</p> +<p class="pnext">Then a man's voice far away as if it might be in Mars:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Hello, is that Azalea 383?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yep—the Azalea Garage," that was close and plain.</p> +<p class="pnext">"This is Mr. Cokesbury's butler——" Believe <em class="italics">me</em>, I came to life. +"Cokesbury, Cokesbury of Cokesbury Lodge—get it?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yep."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I've a message for Miner—the manager."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Fire away, I'm Miner."</p> +<p class="pnext">"He wants to know if you found a raincoat in that auto he had from you +last time he was down? <em class="italics">Raincoat</em>, waterproof. Do you hear?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes sir, I hear perfect. We've got it and I'd 'a' sent it back but I +thought he'd be down again any time and it was just as well to keep it +here."</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's all right. The coat doesn't matter—but he's lost a key that +does. Thinks maybe he left it in the pocket. Have you found any key?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I haven't looked. Hold the wire while I see?"</p> +<p class="pnext">There was a pause while I prayed no one would come in or call up. My +prayer was answered. There was nothing to interrupt when I heard the +garage man's voice again:</p> +<p class="pnext">"The key's there."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Good work! Mr. Cokesbury's had the house here upside down looking for +it. He wants you to do it up careful and give it to Sands the Pullman +conductor on the six-twenty to-night. I'll come across and get it off +him at Jersey City."</p> +<p class="pnext">"All right. Will I send the raincoat along, too?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, he don't want that. He's goin' to Europe Saturday and I guess he's +calculating to buy a new one. Thanks for your trouble. Good-bye."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Good-bye."</p> +<p class="pnext">I dropped the cam, sat tight, and thought. People kept coming in and out +and calls came flashing along the wires and I worked swift and steady +like an operator that's got no thought but for what's before her.</p> +<p class="pnext">But my mind was working like a steam engine underneath. How could I get +him—how could I get him? It was as if I had two brains, one on the top +that went mechanical like a watch and one below that was doing the real +business.</p> +<p class="pnext">Before the afternoon was over I'd decided on a line of action.</p> +<p class="pnext">I called up Katie Reilly and asked her if she'd relieve me at +five-thirty instead of six—that I'd an invitation to go down to a party +at Jersey City and I was keen to get there early. She agreed and at six +I was on the platform of the station waiting for the New York train.</p> +<p class="pnext">I took a seat in the common coach and at Azalea watched from the window +and saw a man on the platform give Sands a packet. I knew Sands well and +when he passed back through my car nodded to him and he stopped and +stood in the aisle talking.</p> +<p class="pnext">It wasn't long before I said, careless:</p> +<p class="pnext">"I hear Cokesbury Lodge is for rent."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I ain't heard it," said Sands, "but I ain't surprised. Now he's sent +his family away he don't want a house that size on his hands."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Has he been down lately?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No—not for—lemme see—it's several weeks. Yes—the last time was the +Sunday before Sylvia Hesketh's murder."</p> +<p class="pnext">I knew all that but it doesn't do to jump at what you're after too +quick.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Lucky for him he could prove his car was on the blink that time," I +said, looking languid out of the window.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Sure. He and Reddy were the only ones of her fellers within striking +distance. But no one ever'd suspicion Cokesbury. He ain't the murderin' +kind, too jolly and easy. I hear he's goin' to Europe."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Is he now? Where'd you hear that?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"From Miner, that runs the Azalea Garage. He come down to the station +just now and gave me a package. Something Cokesbury left in the motor +the last time he was down. I'm to hand it over to his servant at Jersey +City."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Is it love letters that he don't want to leave behind?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, I guess he's careful of them. Here it is," he drew out of his +breast pocket an envelope with Cokesbury's name and address written on +it and held it out to me. "That ain't no love letter."</p> +<p class="pnext">I pinched it.</p> +<p class="pnext">"It's a key. It may open the desk where the love letters are kept."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I guess he's too fly to keep any dangerous papers like that around."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes," I says, "they might set the house on fire."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Well, ain't you the sassy kid," says he and then the train slowing up +for a station he walked on up the aisle.</p> +<p class="pnext">In the Jersey City depot I went like a streak for the Telephone +Exchange. My one chance was to catch him at dinner and I gave the +operator the number of his house. When she pointed to the booth I was +trembling like a leaf.</p> +<p class="pnext">The voice that answered me was a woman's—Irish—the cook's, I guess. +She began right off: "Yes, this is Mr. Cokesbury's residence, but you +can't see him."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Wait," I almost screamed, scared that she was going to disconnect, +"this is important. It's about a key I've just found. If Mr. Cokesbury's +there tell him a lady wants to see him about a key she picked up a few +minutes ago on the New Jersey train."</p> +<p class="pnext">"All right. Hold the wire."</p> +<p class="pnext">I knew he'd come. My heart was beating so I had to hold it hard with my +free hand and I had to bite my lips to make them limber. But, honest to +God, when I heard him—clear and distinct right in my ear—I thought I +was going to faint. For at last I'd got the Voice!</p> +<p class="pnext">"What's this about finding a key?" he said gruff and sharp.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Am I speaking to Mr. Cokesbury?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"You are. Who is it?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No one you know, sir. I've just come in from Philadelphia and on the +Pullman step I found a package which seems to have a key in it. I +noticed that it was addressed to you and I looked you up in the +telephone book and am phoning now from Jersey City."</p> +<p class="pnext">He was very cordial then. His voice was the same deep, pleasant one he'd +used to Sylvia.</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's very kind of you and very thoughtful. I can't thank you enough. +The package was given to the Pullman conductor and he's evidently +dropped it."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Then shall I give it to the Pullman conductor now?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"If you'll be so kind. My servant's gone over there to get it. Just hand +it to the conductor—a tall, thin man, whose name is Sands."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'll do it right off. Ain't it lucky I found it?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Very. I'm deeply grateful. It would have put me to the greatest +inconvenience if it had been lost. I'd like to know to whom I'm +indebted."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, that don't need to bother you. I'm just a passenger traveling down +on the train. Awful glad I could be of any service. Good-bye."</p> +<p class="pnext">I waited a minute till I got my heart quieted down, then took a call +for Babbitts' paper. Luck was with me all round that night, for he was +there. I couldn't tell him everything—I was afraid—but I told him +enough to show him I'd landed Cokesbury and he answered to come across +to town and he'd meet me at the Ferry. I caught a boat as it pulled out +of the slip and at the other side he was waiting for me.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Come on," he said, putting his hand through my arm and walking quick +for the street, "I got a taxi here. We'll charge it up to the defense."</p> +<p class="pnext">I got in, supposing he was going to take me somewhere to dinner, but he +wasn't. When I heard where we were bound I was sort of scared—it was to +Wilbur Whitney's house, Jack Reddy's lawyer.</p> +<p class="pnext">"He's expecting us," Babbitts explained. "I called him up right after +I'd heard from you. You see, Kiddo, we don't want to lose a minute for +we can't stop Cokesbury going unless we got something to stop him for."</p> +<p class="pnext">Mr. Whitney's house was a big, grand mansion just off Fifth Avenue. A +butler let us in and without waiting to hear who we were showed us into +a room with lights in bunches along the walls, small spindly gold chairs +and sofas, and a floor that shone like glass between elegant soft rugs. +There was some class to it and Babbitts and I looked like a pair of +tramps sitting side by side on two of the gold chairs. I was nervous but +Babbitts kept me up, telling me Mr. Whitney was a delightful gentleman +and was going to jump for all I had to say. Then we heard steps coming +down the stairs—two people—and I swallowed hard being dry in the +mouth, what with fright and having had no supper.</p> +<p class="pnext">Mr. Whitney was the real thing. He was a big man, with a square jaw and +eyes deep in under thick eyebrows. He spoke so easy and friendly that +you forgot how awful sharp and keen those eyes were and how they watched +you all the time you were talking. A young man came with him—a real +classy chap—that he introduced to me as his son, George.</p> +<p class="pnext">They couldn't have acted more cordial to me and Babbitts if we'd been +the King and Queen of Spain. When they sat down and asked me to tell +them what I knew I loosened up quite natural and told the whole story.</p> +<p class="pnext">The young man sat sideways on the gold sofa, smoking a cigarette and +looking into the air with his eyes narrowed up as if he was spying at +something a long ways off. Mr. Whitney was sort of slouched down in an +easy chair with his hands—white as a woman's—hanging over the arms. +Now and then he'd ask me a question—always begging my pardon for +interrupting—and though they were so calm and quiet I could feel, as if +it was in the air, that they were concentrated close on every word I +said.</p> +<p class="pnext">When I got through Mr. Whitney said, very cheerful, as if I'd been +telling some yarn in a story book:</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's very interesting, Miss Morganthau, and very well told. Quite a +narrative gift, eh George?" and he looked at his son.</p> +<p class="pnext">"First-class story," said George, and as careless as you please flicked +off his cigarette ashes on the rug.</p> +<p class="pnext">Mr. Whitney leaned forward clasping his big white hands between his +knees and looking into my face, half-smiling but with something terrible +keen behind the smile.</p> +<p class="pnext">"How can you be so sure of the voice, Miss Morganthau? I don't know +whether on the phone I could recognize the voice of my own son here."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You get that way in my work," I answered. "Your ear gets trained for +voices."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You're absolutely certain," said young Mr. Whitney, "that in that +message you overheard, the man spoke of coming to the meeting place in +his auto?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, sir, I'm certain he said that."</p> +<p class="pnext">He turned and looked at his father.</p> +<p class="pnext">"And investigations have shown he had no auto, he telephoned to no other +garage for one, he kept no horses, and to get there on his own feet, +would have had to walk through bad country roads a distance of +twenty-five miles."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Um," answered old Mr. Whitney as if he wasn't interested and then he +said to me: "In this message you heard to-day no suggestion was given of +what that key was the key of?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"No, sir. The man just said it was important and Mr. Cokesbury'd had the +house upside down looking for it."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Um," said Mr. Whitney again. "I rather fancy, Miss Morganthau, you've +done us a double service; in hunting for a voice, you've stumbled on a +key."</p> +<p class="pnext">Young Mr. Whitney laughed.</p> +<p class="pnext">"It's probably the key of his front door."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Perhaps," said his father, and looked down on the carpet as if he was +thinking.</p> +<p class="pnext">Then Babbitts spoke up:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Don't criminals, no matter how careful they are, often overlook some +small clew that maybe is the very thing that gives them away?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Often," said Mr. Whitney. "In most crimes there's a curious lack of +attention to detail. The large matters are well conceived and skillfully +carried out. And then some minor point is neglected, sometimes +forgotten, sometimes not realized for its proper value."</p> +<p class="pnext">He got up and shook himself like a big bear and we all rose to our feet. +I was feeling pretty fine, not only the relief of having delivered the +goods, but proud of myself for getting through the interview so well. +Mr. Whitney added to it by saying:</p> +<p class="pnext">"You're a pretty smart girl, Miss Morganthau. <em class="italics">You</em> don't know and <em class="italics">I</em> +don't know yet the full value of the work you've done for me and my +client. But whatever the outcome may be you've shown an energy and +keenness of mind that is as surprising as it is unusual."</p> +<p class="pnext">I just swelled up with importance and didn't know what to say. Behind +Mr. Whitney I could see Babbitts' face, all beaming and grinning, and I +was so glad he was there to hear. And then—just when I was at the +top-notch of my pride—Mr. George Whitney, who'd been silent for a +while, said suddenly:</p> +<p class="pnext">"If you don't mind me asking, Miss Morganthau, I'd like to know what +lucky chance made you listen in to that conversation between Miss +Hesketh and the Unknown Man."</p> +<p class="pnext">Believe me I came down to earth with a thud. How could I tell them? Say +I listened to everything in the hope of hearing Jack Reddy talking to +Sylvia. I looked down on the floor, feeling my cheeks getting as red as +fire.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Go ahead," said Babbitts. "Don't be afraid to say anything."</p> +<p class="pnext">"We're as close here as the confessional," said old Mr. Whitney, smiling +at me like a father.</p> +<p class="pnext">I had to say something and took what seemed to me the most natural.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'd heard Miss Hesketh was a great one for jollying up the men and I +wanted to hear how she did it."</p> +<p class="pnext">And they all—that means Babbitts, too—just burst out and <em class="italics">roared</em>.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Good for you, Miss Morganthau," said Mr. Whitney, and he put his hand +on my shoulder and gave it a shake. "Only I'll bet a hat you didn't need +any teaching."</p> +<p class="pnext">He turned to his son and said something about "the car being there," and +then back to me:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Now for a few days, Miss Morganthau, I'll expect you to be off duty in +a place accessible by telephone."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Off duty!" I exclaimed. "How can I do that?"</p> +<p class="pnext">He smiled in his easy way and said:</p> +<p class="pnext">"We'll attend to that, don't you worry about it. Go home and stay there +till you get a call from me. If anyone asks what's the matter say you're +ill and laid off for a few days. Don't bother about reporting at the +office; that'll be arranged. And I need hardly tell you not to speak a +word of what you've discovered or of this interview here to-night."</p> +<p class="pnext">"She won't," said Babbitts. "I'll go bail for that."</p> +<p class="pnext">He gave Mr. George Whitney Mrs. Galway's telephone number and then we +shook hands all round. I was just wondering what was the quickest way to +the Ferry when Mr. Whitney said:</p> +<p class="pnext">"The motor's waiting for you and I'm sure Mr. Babbitts will escort you +to the boat. Good night and remember—hold yourself ready for a call to +come to my office."</p> +<p class="pnext">The car waiting outside was Mr. Whitney's own. Gee, it was swell! A +footwarmer and a fur rug and a clock and a bottle of salts for me to +sniff at. I didn't tell Babbitts I'd had no dinner, for I was ashamed to +have the chauffeur stop at the kind of joints we patronize, and so I +bore the ache in my insides and tried to believe the footwarmer and the +salts made up for it.</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="xiii"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id15">XIII</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">At noon the next day—Friday—I was called to Mrs. Galway's phone. It +was Mr. George Whitney telling me to come over to the city at once. I +wasn't to bother about addresses or finding my way. I'd be met at the +Ferry and taken to Mr. Whitney's office in Broad Street—all I was to do +was to say nothing to anybody and come.</p> +<p class="pnext">I did both.</p> +<p class="pnext">At the Ferry a fine-looking chap came up to me, with his hat in his +hand, and asked me if I was Miss Morganthau. For a moment I was uneasy, +thinking maybe he was a masher, when he turned to a kind-faced elderly +woman beside him and said:</p> +<p class="pnext">"This is Mrs. Cresset, who's come over on the boat with you and is +going to Mr. Whitney's office, too."</p> +<p class="pnext">Then I knew it was all right and we three got into a taxi. On the way +across to Broad Street he told us what we were to do. It was nothing +much. All Mr. Whitney wanted of us was that we'd sit in the inner office +and listen to some gentleman talking in the next room. If we heard the +voice I'd got on the wire and Mrs. Cresset had heard the night of the +murder we were to say nothing, but sit perfectly still till we were +called.</p> +<p class="pnext">"If you recognize the voice make no sign or sound. All we ask of you is, +if you're not certain of the identification, to say so."</p> +<p class="pnext">The office was a great big place, rooms opening out of rooms, and a +switchboard with a girl at it, dressed very neat and not noticing us as +we passed her. Mr. George Whitney met us and took us into a room +furnished fine with leather armchairs and books all up the walls and a +wide window looking out over the roofs and skyscrapers. There was a door +at one side, and this he opened a crack and told Mrs. Cresset to sit +down close to it with me opposite. He cautioned us to be quiet and not +to move or even whisper till we were called.</p> +<p class="pnext">We sat there for a while with nothing happening. We could hear voices, +and now and then people walking and doors shutting, and once a bell +tinkled far off in the distance. Then suddenly I heard someone—Mr. +George Whitney, I think—say, "Show him in, the private office," and +heavy steps coming up the passage, past our door and into the next room, +then old Mr. Whitney's voice, very loud and cheerful.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Ah, Mr. Cokesbury, this is truly kind of you. I have to apologize for +taking up your time, just as you're leaving, too, but we hoped you might +help us in some minor points of this curious case."</p> +<p class="pnext">The voice that answered was Cokesbury's; I knew it well now. At the +sound of it Mrs. Cresset gave a start and leaned forward, her ear close +to the door.</p> +<p class="pnext">He was as cordial and hearty as if he was at a pink tea.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Only too glad to be of service, Mr. Whitney. If I had thought I could +be of any help I would have offered before. Fortunately for me—as you +probably know—I was held up in my place on the day of the murder. If my +car had been in working order I suppose I'd have been quite a prominent +figure in the case by now."</p> +<p class="pnext">He laughed out, a deep, rich sort of laugh, and it made my flesh creep +to think he could do it with that girl's death at his door.</p> +<p class="pnext">The talk went on for a bit, back and forth between them, Mr. Whitney +asking him some questions about the roads, the distances, and Miss +Hesketh's friends; he answering as calm and fluent as if he'd hardly +known her at all.</p> +<p class="pnext">In the middle of it the clerk who had met us at the Ferry came softly +in, and without a word, beckoned us to follow him through a door that +led into another room. We rose up as stealthily as burglars and stole +across the carpet without making so much as a creak or a rustle. When +we were in he shut the door, told us to wait there, and left us. We sat, +afraid to speak, staring at each other and wondering what was going to +happen next. In a few minutes the door opened and Mr. Whitney came in.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Well?" he said, turning to me, "are you as sure as you were over the +phone?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Certain," I answered. "It's the man."</p> +<p class="pnext">He looked at Mrs. Cresset.</p> +<p class="pnext">"How about you, Mrs. Cresset? Remember, a mistake in a matter like this +is a pretty serious thing."</p> +<p class="pnext">Mrs. Cresset was as sure as I was.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I couldn't tell the man from Adam," she said, "but I knew his voice the +minute I heard it."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Very well. Now I want you to come into the private office. Don't be +frightened; nothing disagreeable's going to happen. All you have to do +is to answer simply and truthfully any questions I may put to you. Come +along."</p> +<p class="pnext">We followed him up the passage to the room where he'd been talking. +Sitting in a large chair by the desk was the man I'd seen that day in +the woods with Sylvia Hesketh. He didn't look so robust and hearty as he +had then; his skin was paler and his forehead lined; but I noticed his +large coarse hands with the hair on them—a murderer's hands—<em class="italics">they</em> +were the same.</p> +<p class="pnext">When he saw us, walking in solemn behind Mr. Whitney, his face changed. +It's hard to explain how it looked, but it was as if the muscles +tightened up and the eyes got a fixed startled expression like you see +in the eyes of an animal you've come on sudden and scared. He rose to +his feet and I saw one of his hands close till the knuckles turned +white. Mr. George Whitney, who was standing near by, watched him like a +cat watching a mouse.</p> +<p class="pnext">Old Mr. Whitney spoke up as genial as if he was introducing us at a +party.</p> +<p class="pnext">"These ladies, Mr. Cokesbury, come from Longwood and its vicinity. Miss +Morganthau is one of the operators in the Telephone Exchange, and Mrs. +Cresset you've met before, I think, one night at Cresset's Farm."</p> +<p class="pnext">Mrs. Cresset bowed very polite and made as if she was going to shake +hands. But Cokesbury didn't meet her half or a quarter way. He turned to +the men and—I guess he did it without knowing—looked like lightning +from one to the other—a sort of wild glance. They never took their eyes +off him, and there was something awful about their stare, for all both +of them were behaving so pleasant. Under that stare he got as white as a +sheet, but he tried to put up a bluff.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Cresset," he said, "Cresset? There's some mistake. I never saw her +before in my life."</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's quite true," said Mr. Whitney, "you didn't see her nor she you. +If you remember it was very dark. But you spoke to her and she's willing +to swear that yours was the voice she heard. Aren't you, Mrs. Cresset?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, sir," said Mrs. Cresset, as solid and sure as the Bartholdi +statue. "This is the gentleman that asked me the way that night. I'd +know his voice among a thousand."</p> +<p class="pnext">"What night?" said Cokesbury. "I don't know what she's talking about."</p> +<p class="pnext">It was pitiful to see him trying to keep it up with his face gray and +his hands trembling.</p> +<p class="pnext">Mr. Whitney went on as if he didn't notice anything.</p> +<p class="pnext">"And Miss Morganthau here is also ready to swear to your voice as the +one she overheard on the phone Saturday, November the twentieth, in a +conversation with the late Miss Hesketh—a message you've probably seen +a good deal about in the papers."</p> +<p class="pnext">I saw one of those big, hairy hands make a grip at the back of the +armchair. I thought he was going to fall and couldn't take my eyes off +him till Mr. Whitney turned to me and said in that bland society way:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Perhaps you'll be so good, Miss Morganthau, as to tell Mr. Cokesbury of +your efforts during the past week to get him on the phone."</p> +<p class="pnext">I told him the whole thing and ended up with the story of how I fooled +him about the key. And, honest to God, though I thought I was talking to +a murderer, I was sorry for him.</p> +<p class="pnext">All the life seemed to leave him and he got as haggard as an old man, +with his lips shaking and the perspiration in beads on his forehead. +When I got through he suddenly gave a sort of groan, dropped back into +his chair and put his hands over his face. I was glad it was hidden, and +I was glad when Mr. Whitney turned to me and Mrs. Cresset and said quick +and commanding:</p> +<p class="pnext">"That'll do. You can go into the other room. Ring the bell, George."</p> +<p class="pnext">We huddled out into the passage where we met that spry clerk coming up +on the jump. He went into the office and shut the door, and we could +hear a murmur of voices, we standing up against the wall not knowing +what to do next.</p> +<p class="pnext">Presently the clerk came out again, rounded us up and sent us into the +room down the hall where Mr. Whitney had talked to us. He told us to +wait there for a minute, then lit out as if he was in a great hurry. We +stood stiff in the middle of the floor, expecting to hear the tramp of +policemen and then Cokesbury being dragged off to jail. But it was all +very still. I never supposed when you caught a criminal the proceedings +would be so natural and dignified.</p> +<p class="pnext">After a while the clerk came back. He said Mr. Whitney'd sent us his +thanks for our kindness in coming—I never saw people waste so many +words on politeness—and hoped we'd excuse him from thanking us in +person, but he was just now very busy. He warned us not to say a word to +anyone of what had transpired, and then a boy coming to the door and +saying, "It's here," he told us a taxi was waiting below to take us to +the Ferry.</p> +<p class="pnext">If we couldn't talk to anyone else we could to each other and I guess we +did more gabbing going down in the taxi and across in the boat than Mrs. +Cresset had done for years. She told me about the night when Cokesbury +had come to her house. It was wonderful to see how luck was with +him—the way it sometimes is with sinners. Usually at that hour she was +round in the kitchen and when he knocked would have opened the door and +seen his face in the lamplight. But she'd gone upstairs early as her +little daughter had a cold.</p> +<p class="pnext">To go back over the small things that happened would make you sure some +evil power was protecting him. That morning the little girl's cold +wasn't bad and she'd gone to school as usual. But at the schoolhouse she +heard that the dancing bear—the one I saw in Longwood which had been +performing along the pike on its way back to Bloomington—had been at +Jaycock's farm and might be round by Cresset's that afternoon. Like all +children, she was crazy about the bear, and after school hours she and a +chum slipped off and stood around in the damp, waiting. But the bear did +not show up and when she came home, crying with disappointment, the +cold was heavy on her. Her mother bundled her off to bed and went up +early to sit with her. Only for that, Cokesbury would probably have been +landed in jail weeks before, the State saved money and two innocent men +saved shame and suffering.</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's the way it is with the Devil's own," I said. "I guess he takes +care of them for a while; jollies them along the downward path."</p> +<p class="pnext">"It looks like that was the case," said Mrs. Cresset, her kind, rosy +face very solemn. "But the power of evil gets broke in the end. 'Murder +will out'—that's true if anything is. Think of that man feeling so safe +and every hour the cords tightening round him."</p> +<p class="pnext">"And <em class="italics">we</em> did it," said I, awful proud. "We found the cords and then +pulled on them."</p> +<p class="pnext">"We did," says she. "I never thought to be the one to put a +fellow-creature behind bars, but I have and my conscience tells me I've +done right."</p> +<p class="pnext">My, but we both felt chesty!</p> +<p class="pnext">The next morning Babbitts phoned me to say he'd be over Sunday evening. +The information of "Our Suspect" would be given to the press Sunday +morning for the Monday papers and after it was in he'd come across and +tell me about it.</p> +<p class="pnext">Mr. Whitney had arranged for me not to go back to work till Tuesday and +though I suppose the rest was good for me, the strain of waiting wore on +me something dreadful. I kept wondering how Cokesbury had done it, and +how he was going to explain this and account for that. Most of Sunday I +lay on the bed trying to read a novel, but a great deal more interested +in the hands of the clock than I was in the printed pages.</p> +<p class="pnext">When it began to darken up for evening I told Mrs. Galway I was +expecting a gentleman caller and asked for the loan of the parlor. She's +a great one for love affairs and it always discouraged her that I had no +regular company. Now she thought I'd got a steady at last and wanted to +lend me her cameo pin, and decked up the parlor as if the minister was +coming to call, with the hand-painted leather cushion and the punch-work +tablecloth.</p> +<p class="pnext">Long before Babbitts was due I was sitting by the stove, burning bright +and clear, with the drop light throwing a glow over the center table. +Upstairs I could hear Mrs. Galway tramping round as she went to bed, +which was considerate of her as she was something of a night bird. When +I heard his knock at the side door, I gave a sort of squeal of +excitement and ran to let him in.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Well?" I said, grabbing his arm, too worked up to say good evening, +"has he confessed?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes," he said, "he has and he's told an uncommon queer story."</p> +<p class="pnext">"He killed her?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's the queerest part of it," said Babbitts slowly, "he didn't."</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="xiv"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id16">XIV</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">Now I don't believe if I gave you twenty guesses you'd know what I did +when I heard those words—burst out crying.</p> +<p class="pnext">It wasn't because I wanted Cokesbury to be executed; it wasn't because I +wanted the reward; it wasn't even that I was so crazy to have Jack Reddy +exonerated—it was just because I was so disappointed—so <em class="italics">foiled</em>—that +I couldn't seem to bear it.</p> +<p class="pnext">I cried so hard I didn't know what I was doing, and I suppose that's the +reason I leaned on Babbitts' shoulder, it being the nearest thing handy. +He brought me to my senses, patting me on the arm and saying sort of +soothing as if he was comforting a child who'd broken her doll:</p> +<p class="pnext">"There, there—don't cry—it'll be all right soon. We'll get the right +man. Don't take it to heart that way."</p> +<p class="pnext">Then I began to laugh, for it did seem so comical—me crying because +Cokesbury wasn't a murderer, and Babbitts telling me not to take it to +heart as if I'd been disappointed in not seeing the electrocution. The +laughter and tears got mixed up together and I don't know where I'd have +landed if I hadn't seen he was getting frightened and wanted to call +Mrs. Galway. That pulled me up, and I got a hold on myself. In a few +minutes we were sitting side by side in front of the stove, the storm +over, all but a little hiccupy kind of sob, that came upon me unexpected +at intervals.</p> +<p class="pnext">For the next hour we sat there without moving while Babbitts told me +Cokesbury's story.</p> +<p class="pnext">I'll put down what he said as near his words as I can remember it. The +way he told it was better than any of the newspaper accounts, even his, +though he got a raise of salary for the way he'd handled it:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Cokesbury says he didn't kill Sylvia Hesketh and I believe him and so +do the Whitneys. Besides the corroborative evidence is absolutely +convincing. He's not a murderer but he's a coward—no good at all—and +that explains why he didn't come out after the crime and tell what he +knew. Instead he got in a panic, lost what little nerve he had, and was +skipping out to Europe when you nabbed him.</p> +<p class="pnext">"He was in love with Sylvia Hesketh, if you call that sort of thing +love. Anyway, instead of being simply what you might describe as a beau +of hers, he was mad about her. I fancy even she, poor girl, didn't +realize the passion she'd kindled, but was like a child playing with a +dynamite bomb. It appears she saw more of him than anybody guessed. +After the first flirtation at Bar Harbor, he came down to Cokesbury +Lodge nearly every Sunday and used to meet her in the woods and on the +side roads, and make dates with her for theaters and concerts in town. +He kept it quiet for he knew without being told that the Doctor +wouldn't stand for it. His hope was that, willful and unstable as he +knew her to be, he'd eventually win her by his persistence and devotion.</p> +<p class="pnext">"It was one of those situations that may end in nothing or may end as +this one did in a tragedy. The girl was foolhardy and flirtatious; the +man infatuated. Very quickly he got on to the fact that he was not the +only victim of her beauty and her wiles. He watched and questioned and +found out about the other men. Of them he soon saw that Reddy was the +favored one and a deadly jealousy seized him, for Reddy might have +attracted any woman.</p> +<p class="pnext">"When he tried to find out from her how she stood with Reddy he could +get no satisfaction. She'd tell him one thing one day and another the +next. She kept them all guessing, but it didn't mean to any of the +others what it meant to Cokesbury. All through October he spied and +queried, and learnt that she was meeting Reddy in his car and going off +for long jaunts with him. He says he was half mad with jealousy and +fear, but he hid it from her.</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's the way things were when he sent the phone message that you +caught. You sized him up just right. When she told him she had a date +that was a secret, he got a premonition of the truth, the way a man does +when his reason is under the dominion of his emotions. He felt certain +she was going off with Reddy, and the brakes that he'd kept down till +then were lifted. He determined he'd find out and if it was true stop +them if the skies fell.</p> +<p class="pnext">"And now here comes the queer part of the story. If anybody'd guessed it +a lot of things that were dark would have been as clear as daylight. He +<em class="italics">did</em> keep the date you heard him make on the phone."</p> +<p class="pnext">"How could he? He had no car, or horse, or anything."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Only part of that's true—he had no car, or horse, but he <em class="italics">did</em> have +something."</p> +<p class="pnext">"What?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"An aeroplane."</p> +<p class="pnext">I fell back staring at him.</p> +<p class="pnext">"An aeroplane—in Cokesbury Lodge?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"In the garage there. <em class="italics">That's</em> why he wouldn't rent the house; <em class="italics">that's</em> +why he kept going down over Sunday all summer. The year he was in France +he'd done a lot of flying and was fascinated by it. Before he left there +he was an expert aviator, but his wife hated it and it was one of their +grounds of dissension. After she died he had a machine brought down in +sections, set it up himself, and kept it in the garage. Not a soul knew +it. He only flew at night for he wanted it kept a secret."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Why—what for?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Because—here's the best thing I've heard about him—he carried a heavy +life insurance policy secured to his children. Cokesbury's not a rich +man, though he has a good business, and if he died his children would +have had to live on what their mother left them, which wasn't much. If +it was known that he was aviating the policy would have been +invalidated, so he indulged his secret passion at night. The isolated +position of the house made it easy to escape detection and his machine +was equipped with a very silent muffler. No one had a glimmering of it, +not even Sylvia.</p> +<p class="pnext">"The phone message you heard was sent from the station at Jersey City +and when he sent it he <em class="italics">did</em> intend coming to Mapleshade in his motor. +When he got to Azalea and found the car unmended in the garage he flew +into a rage, as he thought his plans were blocked. Alone in the Lodge, +ravaged by jealousy, he lost all caution and decided to take out the +aeroplane.</p> +<p class="pnext">"You remember that there was a moon that night, but that in the evening +the skies were clouded and the air breathless. The darkness and the +weather were on his side and he came down in a field about ten minutes +walk from the house, closing the cut-out as he descended. He was early +and hid himself among some trees where he could watch the front door. He +says it was while he was waiting there for her that the idea came to him +of frustrating an elopement by carrying her off.</p> +<p class="pnext">"He was laying round in his mind how he would get the truth from her, +when he saw her come out and gave a low whistle. She heard it and came +toward him. It was not till she was close to him and he could see the +outlines of her figure through the dark, that he made out a bag in her +hand. <em class="italics">Then</em> he knew for certain she was going and decided on his +course.</p> +<p class="pnext">"In all his other dealings with her he had found her subtle and evasive. +Now, perhaps because for the first time in her life she had decided on a +positive action, she went straight to the point. Without any preamble +she told him what she was going to do and that within a half-hour Reddy +would be waiting for her in the Lane.</p> +<p class="pnext">"He showed no anger or surprise, apparently accepting the situation in +the most friendly spirit. He says he thought she was relieved, having +expected a scene with him. When he had disarmed her of her suspicions, +he told her of the airship and asked her if she wouldn't like to come up +for a spin before Reddy arrived. They had over half an hour and he could +take her for a short flight and would bring her down in ten or fifteen +minutes.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Everybody agrees that she was a bold, venturesome girl, and the idea +appealed to her, as she had never been up. They walked quickly through +the fields and bit of woodland to the aeroplane. She was in high spirits +as she tucked herself in; he could hear her laughter as he took his +seat, and then, closing the cut-out, they soared up.</p> +<p class="pnext">"They rose high—about two thousand feet, he thought—and then he headed +East. They were winging their way over Cokesbury Lodge on toward the +hills in the distance when Reddy must have sighted the lights of +Longwood as he came down the Firehill Road.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Cokesbury swears he had no intention of kidnapping her. He says he had +no definite idea of where he was going, that his plan was simply to get +her away from Reddy and put an end to the marriage. Personally, I don't +believe him. I think he had a perfectly clear idea of carrying her off +to Cokesbury Lodge, and that his chivalrous scheme was to put her into +such a compromising position she would be willing to marry him. Maybe +I'm wrong—I don't know. Anyway, he very soon saw you can't abduct a +high-spirited, hot-tempered girl against her will.</p> +<p class="pnext">"After about fifteen or twenty minutes he was conscious of her getting +uneasy and speaking to him—words that he couldn't hear but that he knew +to be at first startled questions, then angry commands. He shouted +replies, but the great machine kept steadily on its way, neither turning +nor dipping downward. Then she realized and broke into a fury, turning +upon him in the dark, putting her face close to his and screaming for +him to bring her down. The noise made it impossible to argue with her, +and fearful of what she might do, he held her off with his elbow, the +delicately balanced machine swaying as she seized his arm and shook it, +lunging up against him, her cries of rage rising above the thunder of +the screw.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Can't you imagine it? The big ship sailing through the night with the +lights of farms and little towns sliding by far below, and above the sky +muffled deep in black clouds. Poised between them the man and woman, +each gripped by a different passion—suspended there like two naked +souls in a sort of elemental battle of the sexes.</p> +<p class="pnext">"He admits he was scared and if he could have spoken to her would have +pacified her with all sorts of assurances. But speech was out of the +question, and when she made a sudden lunge across him for the wheel he +realized she would kill them both if he didn't bring her to earth. +Throwing her back with a blow of his elbow, he yelled that he was coming +down and as she felt the machine begin its glancing, downward glide she +fell back into her place, suddenly quiet, then leaned forward scanning +the country below them.</p> +<p class="pnext">"A momentary break of the clouds let a little light spill through and by +this he saw a bare, bold landscape darkened by woods, and with the gleam +of a large body of water to the right, showing against the blackness +like polished steel. He made a landing in an open space, an uncultivated +field with a hillock in the center covered with grass and surrounded by +trees. The water had drained off this and it was quite dry.</p> +<p class="pnext">"She was hardly out on the ground and he was preparing for an +explanation when to his surprise she curtly told him to follow her and +led the way along a ridge that skirted the lake. This, too, was dry, a +fact curiously in his favor, for their feet left no tracks, the grass +closing on the trail they swept through it. She did not address him +again till, the dim shape of a house appearing, he asked her if she was +going there and she answered in the same, curt way: Yes; she was cold. A +wharf jutted out in front of the house and in stepping from the grass to +the planks he made a motion to help her, but she started away from him +as if he was a snake, making two or three steps into the liquid mud that +ran up to the wharf's edge. It was then he thought she dropped the +glove. Once again on the planks she took a key from her purse, fitted it +in the lock and opened the door.</p> +<p class="pnext">"The room was pitch dark and Cokesbury stood in the doorway while she +went in. She moved about as if she was accustomed to the place, lit a +lamp, set a match to the fire already laid and gave him a copper kettle +to fill with water from the lake. When he came back with it the table +was set out with tea things and the fire was leaping up the chimney. She +hung the kettle on a crane, swung it over the flames and then, turning +to him, said:</p> +<p class="pnext">"'Do you know where you are?' He said he didn't and she answered: +'You're in Jack Reddy's bungalow at Hochalaga Lake, the place where I've +spent the happiest days of my life.'</p> +<p class="pnext">"He looked at her in amazement and she smiled scornfully back at him. +'You fool!' she said, 'to think you could come blundering in and stop me +from marrying the only man of all of you who's worth a heartbeat.'</p> +<p class="pnext">"She made tea and then motioned him to sit down by the table, taking a +seat at the other side. Facing each other in the lamplight they had a +conversation that put an end to all his dreams. For the first time in +his acquaintance with her he thought she spoke frankly. She told him of +her friendship with Reddy from the start, and how the Doctor's senseless +opposition had fanned a boy-and-girl flirtation into a passionate love +affair.</p> +<p class="pnext">"When the quarrels began at Mapleshade they found that they could meet +without fear of detection at the Lake, she going out there in her car +and he in his. She had her own key and often, during the autumn, she had +gone to the bungalow in the morning, Reddy had joined her and they had +spent the day together, canoeing and fishing on the lake, cooking a +picnic meal over the fire, and driving home in the afternoon, the racer +towing her car till they came to the turnpike.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Cokesbury says he thinks at first it was only the spirit of romance and +adventure which made her do such a rash thing, but that in the end +Reddy's devotion and chivalrous attitude made a deep impression on her +and she came as near loving him as she could any man. He says there is +no doubt that the meetings were perfectly innocent and that Reddy had +behaved from the start as a gentleman.</p> +<p class="pnext">"'Whether she really loved him or not,' he said, 'he'd taught her to +respect him.'</p> +<p class="pnext">"They talked for over an hour, taking the tea she had made and Cokesbury +smoking a cigar. He remembered leaving the butt in the saucer of his +cup. It was half-past eight when they rose to go. Sylvia put out the +lamp but the fire was still burning and the tea things were left on the +table. Cokesbury says he promised to take her home, that he saw his case +was hopeless, and he'd made up his mind to have done with her forever.</p> +<p class="pnext">"The sky was clouded over and it was as dark as a pocket when they went +back to the aeroplane. He had to direct the machine by guesswork, the +country black below him and the sky black above. He swears that he +intended to take her back to Mapleshade, and I believe him. No man—not +even a bad egg like Cokesbury—wants to run away with a woman who hands +out the line of talk that girl had in the bungalow.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Anyway, we've only his word for the statement that he completely lost +his bearings. He could see no lights and after making an exploratory +circle, realized he hadn't the slightest idea which way to go. To make +matters worse, he could hear from shouted remarks of hers that her +suspicions were on the alert and that she was ready to flare up again. +By this time there wasn't much of the lover left in him. According to +his own words he was as anxious to get her home again as she was to be +there. With his head clear and his blood cold he did not relish a second +flight with a woman fighting like a wildcat.</p> +<p class="pnext">"This was the situation—she, angry and disbelieving; he, scared and +unable to conciliate her—when the twinkle of a light caught his eye and +he decided to come down and ask his way. They dropped into a stretch of +grass land among fields, with the light shining some way off through a +screen of trees. Farther away, just a spark, he saw another light. He +told her to wait while he went to inquire, and walked off toward the one +that was nearest.</p> +<p class="pnext">"It was Cresset's Farm. There he had the interview with Mrs. Cresset, +telling her he had an auto in order to explain his presence. When he +went back he found that Sylvia had disappeared. At first he didn't know +what to do, realizing that if the story of their flight got abroad, +there would be the devil to pay. He was certain she had disbelieved him +and had taken the opportunity to get away from him. She was either +hiding or had gone for the second light. This being the most plausible, +he walked toward it—quite a distance across fields and through +woods—and brought up at a ramshackle roadhouse—the Wayside Arbor.</p> +<p class="pnext">"He stole round from the back to a side window and there, through a +crack in the shutter, looked in and saw Sylvia talking to Hines. He says +he stayed there for some minutes, afraid if he went in after her she +would make a scene and start a scandal. Then his eyes fell on the +telephone booth and he felt sure she had telephoned either to her own +home or to Reddy. Her air of waiting—she was sitting by the stove with +her feet on its lower edge—confirmed him in this and he decided to let +her alone.</p> +<p class="pnext">"He went back to the aeroplane, wondering what would be the outcome of +the whole crazy escapade. He says he felt confident of her cleverness +to hush the thing up, but he was uneasy. His discomfort wasn't lessened +when he found that she had left her bag in the machine, and on his way +home one of the things that preoccupied him was thinking up the best way +of getting the bag back to her.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Monday morning he went to town in a state of suspense. If she should +tell there was no knowing what might happen and he was on the alert for +a visit from the Doctor or even Reddy. But the day passed without any +sign of trouble, and he was just calming down, thinking she had either +found Reddy and gone with him or invented some story to quiet the +Mapleshade people, when he read of the murder in the evening paper.</p> +<p class="pnext">"<em class="italics">Then</em>, you better believe he was frightened. He knew the bag was +hidden in his room at the Lodge and that as far as he could tell, not a +soul had seen the airship. As to Mrs. Cresset, he felt safe for she +couldn't possibly have made out a feature in the darkness."</p> +<p class="pnext">"But," I cried out, "why if he hadn't done it——"</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's all right," Babbitts interrupted. "He hadn't done it, but I tell +you he was a coward. He was in a sweat for fear of being suspected, of +being pulled in as a witness, of his reputation, his business, his +position. He wanted to keep out of it at any cost."</p> +<p class="pnext">"What a cur!" I said.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, he's that and more, and he's ready to admit it himself. But it +wasn't as smooth sailing as he thought it would be. After the inquest he +read of the overheard phone message and that brought him up with a jolt. +He got in a state of terror, realizing too late that his silence was +more incriminating than any confession.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Every day his fears grew worse. He wouldn't answer any phone calls, +faking up reasons to his clerks and his servants. Finally it got on his +nerves so he couldn't stand it and he made ready to skip to Europe. The +key was what tripped him up. Do you remember Mr. Whitney saying how +criminals overlooked important details? Well, what he overlooked was the +key of the garage. In his preoccupation on Monday morning he had put it +in the pocket of the raincoat he was accustomed to leave in the auto and +had simply forgotten it. Then when he went to pack his things he +couldn't find it, hunted in a nervous frenzy and finally had his man +telephone over to Miner's place. You and the key were the combination +that beat him."</p> +<p class="pnext">"But Jack Reddy?" I said. "Was he going to slink off and let him be +tried for the murder when he could have cleared it all up?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"He <em class="italics">says</em> not and I guess the fellow's not as yellow as to have stood +by and let an innocent man go to his death. He says there wasn't enough +evidence to convict Reddy and if things had gone badly he would have +come out and told what he knew. And I think that's true—anyway, we'll +give him the benefit of the doubt."</p> +<p class="pnext">"How can you be so sure? How do you know he's <em class="italics">not</em> the murderer after +all?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, there's no doubt. Everything fits in too well. The police were out +at Cokesbury Lodge on Saturday and saw the aeroplane and found Miss +Hesketh's bag. Both the Whitneys—father and son, who've had a vast +experience in this sort of case—say there's no question of his +innocence."</p> +<p class="pnext">We sat silent for a spell, looking at the stove, then I said:</p> +<p class="pnext">"We're back just where we were in the beginning."</p> +<p class="pnext">Babbitts leaned forward and shook down some ashes.</p> +<p class="pnext">"The case is, but we're not," he said.</p> +<p class="pnext">"How do you make that out?" I asked.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Six weeks ago we didn't know each other and now we're friends."</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's so," I said, and we both sat staring thoughtfully at the red eye +of the stove.</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="xv"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id17">XV</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">Cokesbury's story made a great sensation. Even if it didn't bring us any +nearer to finding the murderer, it explained the mystery of Sylvia's +movements up to the time she appeared in the Wayside Arbor, and it +cleared Jack Reddy. Babbitts told me that the Whitneys were doing some +legal stunts—I won't tell what they were for I'd never get them +straight—to have him liberated, and that they would soon issue a +statement to the press.</p> +<p class="pnext">When it came out everybody saw why he had said such contradictory things +about those seven hours on the road.</p> +<p class="pnext">Babbitts and I had guessed right when we thought he was holding +something back and when I heard why I was grateful to him. Yes, +grateful, that's the word. And I'll tell you why I use it. He was my +hero and he stayed a hero, didn't fall down and disappoint me, but made +me know there were people in the world who could stick to their standard +no matter <em class="italics">what</em> happened. Don't you think that's a thing to be grateful +for?</p> +<p class="pnext">The reason he didn't tell was to protect the memory of that poor dead +girl, who couldn't rise up and protect herself. He knew what wicked lies +would be told and believed and he was going to shield her in death as he +would have in life.</p> +<p class="pnext">That night after he had searched the roads, he suddenly thought that in +some wild freak she had gone to the bungalow in her own car and phoned +him from there. As soon as the idea entered his head he went out to the +lake. One glance showed him someone had been there before him—the room +was warm, the fire still smouldering on the hearth. He lit the light and +saw the two teacups and the cigar butt on the saucer. He examined the +doors and windows and found that they were locked and there was no sign +of anyone having broken in. The only person beside himself who had a key +to the bungalow was Sylvia.</p> +<p class="pnext">Then he knew she had been there with another man and one of those fierce +rages came on him.</p> +<p class="pnext">For a spell he was outside himself. He thought of things that never +happened, the way people do in a fury—imagined Sylvia sending him the +phone message with the other man standing by and laughing. He tore her +letters out of the desk and threw them in the fire and smashed the tea +things against the side of the house. He was half crazy, thinking +himself fooled and made a mock of by the woman he had loved.</p> +<p class="pnext">When his rage quieted down he sat brooding over the fire for a long +time. It was moonlight when he left, bright enough for him to fill the +tank. He had never thought about any inquiries for the missing drum till +at the inquest the question of the gasoline was sprung on him. Then he +lied, feeling certain that no one would ever go out to the lake. It was +his intention to go there himself, hide the drum and clear out the +cottage, but he put it off, hating to go near the place. If Pat Donahue +hadn't gone there to fish through the ice—a thing no one would have +dreamed of—the secret of the bungalow would never have been discovered.</p> +<p class="pnext">One of the features of the case that he couldn't understand and that he +spent the days in jail speculating about, was how she had reached the +lake. The mud showed the tracks of only one auto, his own. He could find +no solution to this mystery and he could speak to no one about it. +Whatever happened to him, he had made up his mind he would never give +her up to the evil-minded and evil-tongued who would blacken and tear to +pieces all that was left of her.</p> +<p class="pnext">He was liberated, and, believe me, Longwood rejoiced. It was as if a +king who had been banished had come back to his throne.</p> +<p class="pnext">I don't think he was home two days when he telephoned in asking me if +he could come to see me and thank me for what I'd done. Wasn't that like +him? Most men would have been so glad to get out of jail they'd have +forgotten the hello girl who'd helped to free them, but not Jack Reddy.</p> +<p class="pnext">He came in the late afternoon, at the time I got off. I'll never forget +it. Katie Reilly was at the switchboard and I was standing at the +window, watching, when I saw the two lights of the gray racer coming +down the street.</p> +<p class="pnext">I ran and opened the door—I wasn't bashful a bit—and when I saw him I +gave a little cry, for he looked so changed, pale and haggard and older, +a good many years older. But his smile was the same, and so was the +kind, honest look of his face. Before he said a word he just held out +his hand and mine went into it and I felt the clasp of his fingers warm +and strong. And—strange it is, but true—I wasn't any more like the +girl who used to tremble at the mere sight of him, but was calm and +quiet, looking deep and steady into his eyes as if we'd got to be +friends, the way a man might be friends with a boy.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Miss Morganthau," he said, "I've heard what you've done, and I want to +thank you."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You needn't have taken all the trouble to come in from Firehill, Mr. +Reddy," I answered. "You could have said it over the wire."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Could I have done this over the wire?" he said, giving my hand a shake +and a squeeze. "You know I couldn't. And that's what I wanted to +do—take a grip of the hand that helped me out of prison."</p> +<p class="pnext">I said some fool words about its being nothing and he went on smiling +down at me, yet with something grave in his face.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I want to do more—ask a favor of you. I hope it won't be hard to grant +for I've set my heart on it. Can I be your friend?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, Mr. Reddy," I stammered out, "you make me proud," and suddenly +tears came into my eyes. I don't know why unless it was seeing him so +changed and hearing him speak so humble to a common guy like me.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, come now," he said, "don't do anything like that. You'll make me +think you don't like the idea."</p> +<p class="pnext">I sniffed, wanting to kick Katie Reilly, who was gaping round in her +chair, and I guess getting mad that way dried up my tears.</p> +<p class="pnext">"It's your friend I'll be till the end of my life, Mr. Reddy," I +answered. "And the only thing I'm sorry for is that I didn't get the +right man the way I thought I'd done."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Never mind about that," said he, his face hardening up, "we'll get him +yet. Don't let's think of that now. It's the end of your day, isn't it? +If you're going home will you let me take you there in my car?"</p> +<p class="pnext">There was a time when if I'd thought I'd ever ride beside Jack Reddy in +that racer I'd have had chills and fever for a week in advance.</p> +<p class="pnext">But now I sat calm and still beside him as he rode me through Longwood +to Mrs. Galway's door.</p> +<p class="pnext">As we swung up the street he talked very kind to me, complimenting me +something awful, and saying that if he ever could do anything for me to +let him know and he'd do it if it was within the power of man.</p> +<p class="pnext">"You see, Miss Morganthau," he said as we drew up in front of the Elite, +"a man in my position feels pretty grateful to the person who's lifted +off him the shadow of disgrace and death."</p> +<p class="pnext">Up in my room I sat quiet for a long time thinking. The thing that +phased me was why I'd changed so, come round to feel that while he was +still a grand, strong man, I'd always look up to and do anything for, +I'd quit having blind staggers and heart attacks when he came along.</p> +<p class="pnext">Something had sidetracked me. I didn't know what. All I did know was +that two months ago if he'd asked me to be his friend I'd not have known +there was such a thing as food in the world. And that evening at +half-past seven, being too lazy to go to the Gilt Edge, I was so hungry +I had to go down to Mrs. Galway and beg the loan of three Uneedas and a +hard boiled egg.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was one evening, not long after, that Anne Hennessey came in to see +me. Babbitts was coming that night and Mrs. Galway had given up the +parlor again and was in bed with a novel and a kerosene lamp. Anne was +quite excited, the reason being that Mrs. Fowler had given her a +present. She took it careful out of a blue velvet case and held it up in +the glow of the drop light. It was a diamond cross and the minute I set +eyes on it I knew where I'd seen it before.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Sylvia's," I said, low and sort of awed.</p> +<p class="pnext">Anne nodded.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, the one she had on that night. Mrs. Fowler said she wanted to give +me something that had been hers. I wouldn't have taken anything so +handsome but I think the poor lady couldn't bear the sight of it, +reminding her of her sorrow as it did."</p> +<p class="pnext">She moved it about and the stones sparkled like bits of fire in the +lamplight. I stretched out my hand and took it, for diamonds tempt me +like meat the hungry—that's the Jew in me, I suppose.</p> +<p class="pnext">"You won't call the King your cousin when you wear this," I said, and I +held it against my chest, looking down at the brightness of it.</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's just where Sylvia had it on," said Anne almost in a whisper, +"where the front of her dress crossed. One of the police officers told +me."</p> +<p class="pnext">My mother was a Catholic and it's Catholic I was raised, for though my +father was a Jew he loved my mother and let her have her way with me.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Wouldn't you think," I said, "that when the murderer saw the cross on +her it would have stayed his hand?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Wouldn't you," said Anne, "but to men as evil as that the cross means +nothing. And then out in the dark that way, he probably never saw it."</p> +<p class="pnext">Babbitts' knock sounding, I handed it back to her and let him in, +feeling bashful before Anne, who didn't know how often Mrs. Galway was +retiring at eight-thirty. She left soon after, saying Mrs. Fowler liked +her to be round in the evening, which was news to me, as she'd told me +that the Fowlers always sat in the sitting-room together, the Doctor +reading aloud till Mrs. Fowler got sleepy.</p> +<p class="pnext">After she'd gone, Babbitts and I drew up to the stove, cozy and +cheerful, with our feet on the edge of it. We'd come to know each other +so well now that we'd other topics beside "the case," but that night we +worked around to it, me picking at the box of candy Babbitts had brought +and rocking lazily as contented as a child.</p> +<p class="pnext">Babbitts was still keen for that reward. He said to me:</p> +<p class="pnext">"You had your fingers on it once, and it's my wish that you'll get your +whole hand on it next time."</p> +<p class="pnext">"What a noble character," said I, "calculating for little Molly to get +it all! Where do <em class="italics">you</em> come in?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, don't bother about me," says he. "You've a bad habit of thinking +too much where other people come in. You got to quit it—it isn't good +business. Now what I want to arrange is for you and me to make an +excursion out to the Wayside Arbor some afternoon."</p> +<p class="pnext">"The Wayside Arbor—what'll we do there?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Take a look over the ground. You see, with the process of elimination +that's been going on things have narrowed down to the vicinity of the +crime. It's my opinion that the murder was not only committed but was +planned round there. The police are losing heart and not doing much. As +far as I can find out Fowler's detectives—Mills and his crowd—are +getting their pay envelopes regular but not getting anything else. +Now—just for devilment—let <em class="italics">us</em> combine our two giant intellects and +see what we can see."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Haven't they gone over every inch of it?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"They have—with a fine-tooth comb. But that doesn't prevent us going +over it and taking our fine-tooth combs along."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Isn't Hines under surveillance?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Good Lord," says he laughing, "<em class="italics">everybody's</em> under surveillance. +There's not one of the suspects but knows he's expected to stay put and +is doing it. But who's getting anywhere? There's no reason why we +shouldn't go out that way, call on Mrs. Cresset, and take a look in at +the Wayside Arbor ourselves."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'm game," I said, "though I can't see what good it's going to do."</p> +<p class="pnext">"It'll give us a half-day together," said he. "I don't know how you feel +about it but that looks worth while to me."</p> +<p class="pnext">We made a date for the following Monday, my holiday, just eight weeks +from the murder.</p> +<p class="pnext">The next morning I had a surprise—a kind that hasn't often come my +way. It was a letter directed in typewriting with a half-sheet of paper +inside it inclosing a fifty-dollar bill. On the paper, also typed, was +written:</p> +<blockquote><div> +<p class="pfirst">For Miss Morganthau—A small return for her recent good work in +the Hesketh Murder Case.</p> +</div></blockquote> +<p class="pfirst">That was all—no name, no date, no handwriting. I don't know what made +me think right off of Mr. Whitney, unless it was because there was no +one else who knew of what I'd done and could have afforded to send that +much. The only other person it could have been was Jack Reddy, and +somehow or other, after he'd asked me to be his friend, I felt certain +he wouldn't send me money, no matter what I'd done for him. Friends +don't pay each other.</p> +<p class="pnext">I guess there wasn't a more elated person in Longwood that morning than +yours truly. I'd had that much before—saved it—but I'd never had it +fall out of the sky that way in one beautiful, crisp, new bill.</p> +<p class="pnext">The Jew and the Irish in me had some tussle, one wanting to salt it down +in the bank and the other to blow it in. But that time the Irish had a +walk-over, probably because I was limp and weary with all the excitement +of the last two months and felt the need of doing something foolish to +tone me up. When I thought of the clothes I could buy with it, the Jew +just lay down without a murmur and you'd have supposed I was all County +Galway if you'd seen me writing a list of things on the back of the +envelope. If it'll make you think better of me I'll confess that I +wanted to look nice on that trip with Babbitts, the first real jaunt +we'd ever taken, for I didn't count those times in New York when we were +sleuthing after Cokesbury. Just once in my life I was going to have a +real blowout, and I wanted the chap who was taking me to feel he'd some +lady with him.</p> +<p class="pnext">With three of us in the office I fixed things so I got Saturday +afternoon and I hiked over to town with that bill burning in my purse +like a live coal. And, my it was great spending it! I was cool on the +outside, looking haughty at the goods and casting them aside +contemptuous on chairs, but inside I was drunk with the feeling of +riches.</p> +<p class="pnext">I bought a one-piece silk dress that fitted me like every measure was +mine and a long black plush coat, rich fine plush like satin, that was +draped something elegant and fastened in front with a novelty ornament. +For a hat I selected a small dark felt, nothing flashy, no trimming, +just a rosette at one side. And with the last three dollars a purse, +black striped silk, oval shaped with a ribbon to hang it to your wrist.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was six when I got home, carrying the boxes myself—all but the coat; +that I <em class="italics">had</em> to wear—pretty nearly dead with the weight of them, but +not regretting—neither the Jew nor the Irish—one nickel of it.</p> +<p class="pnext">Midday Monday, when I came down to the parlor where Babbitts was +waiting, he put his hand over his eyes like the Indians in front of +cigar stores and pretended to stagger.</p> +<div class="align-center auto-scaled figure" style="margin-left: 27%; width: 45%" id="figure-6"> +<span id="i-came-down-to-the-parlor-where-babbitts-was-waiting"/><img style="display: block; width: 100%" alt="I came down to the parlor where Babbitts was waiting" src="images/illus5.jpg" width="100%"/> +<div class="caption italics"> +I came down to the parlor where Babbitts was waiting</div> +</div> +<p class="pfirst">"What good deed have I ever done," says he, "that I'm allowed to walk +the world with such a queen!"</p> +<p class="pnext">Then I felt certain that to break loose now and again is a healthy +change.</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="xvi"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id18">XVI</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">It was a long ride to Cresset's Crossing, first on the main line to the +Junction and then just time to make a close connection with the branch +line to the Crossing.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was three when we reached there and started out to walk to Cresset's +Farm. There'd been rain the day before and the road was muddy, with +water standing here and there in the ruts. The weather was still +overcast, the sky covered with clouds, heavy and leaden colored. It was +cold, a raw, piercing air, and we walked fast, I—careful of my new +dress—picking my steps on the edge of the road and Babbitts tramping +along in the mud beside me.</p> +<p class="pnext">I'd never been up there at that season and I thought it was a gloomy, +lonesome spot. The land rolled away with fences creeping across it like +gray snakes. Here and there were clumps of woods, purplish against the +sky, and between them the brown stretches of plowed land, that in the +springtime would be green with the grain. Now, under those dark, +low-hanging clouds with the naked trees and the bare, empty fields, it +looked forlorn and dreary. It was as still as a picture, not a thing +moving, but one man, someways off, walking along the top of a hill. You +could see him like a silhouette, going slow, with a bundle on a stick +over his shoulder, and a bit of red round his neck. When he got to the +highest point he stopped and looked down on the road. He couldn't see +us—the trees interfered—and he seemed, as Babbitts said, like the +spirit of the landscape—sort of desolate and lonely, plodding along +there, solitary and slow, between the earth and the sky. Then presently +even he was gone, disappearing over the brow of the hill.</p> +<p class="pnext">When we passed the Riven Rock Road and I could see the Firehill one, +making a curving line through the country beyond, I had a creepy +feeling, thinking of what had happened there eight weeks ago.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Where's the place?" I said, almost in a whisper, and Babbitts pointed +ahead with his cane.</p> +<p class="pnext">"A little further on, where the bushes grow thick there."</p> +<p class="pnext">Right along from the station, clumps and bunches of small trees had +edged the way like a hedge. After we passed the Riven Rock Road they +grew thicker, making a sort of shrubbery higher than our heads. I +remembered that just before the murder men had been cutting these for +brushwood and even now we passed piles of branches, dry and dead, with +little leaves clinging to them like brown rags. Where the Firehill Road +ran into the turnpike the growth was tangled and close, almost a small +wood.</p> +<p class="pnext">It wasn't far beyond that Babbitts pointed out the place. There was an +edge of shriveled grass and on this she had been found with the +branches piled over her. He drew with his cane where she had lain +between the trees and the road.</p> +<p class="pnext">"You can see just how the murderer worked," he said. "He attacked Miss +Hesketh here, burst out of the darkness on her and killed her with one +blow—you remember there was no sign either about her or the +surroundings of a struggle—and almost immediately heard the Doctor's +auto horn. We can place that by the scream the Bohemian woman heard."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Do you think he was there when the Doctor passed?" I asked.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Of course he was. He hadn't had time to arrange the body. That was done +after the Doctor had gone by—done after the moon came out. Reddy said +it was as bright as day when he got there. By that brightness the +murderer did the work of concealment."</p> +<p class="pnext">I stepped back into the mud and looked down to where the Firehill Road +entered the turnpike a few yards farther on.</p> +<p class="pnext">"He must have heard Mr. Reddy's horn before the car came in sight. By +that time he had probably finished and stolen away."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I don't think so," said Babbitts. "He couldn't have done it without +some noise and Reddy, who was listening and watching for Sylvia, was +positive there wasn't a sound. That human devil was back among the +bushes when Reddy's car came round the turn. And he must have stayed +there—afraid to move—watching Reddy, first as he waited, then as he +slowly ran back and forth. God, what a situation—one man looking for +the woman he loved, her murderer hidden a few yards from him, and +between them both her dead body!"</p> +<p class="pnext">I seemed to see it: the road bathed in moonlight, the murderer huddled +down in the black shadow, and Reddy in the car looking now this way and +now that, expecting her to come. How terribly still it must have been, +not a sound except the rustling of the withered leaves. I could imagine +the light from the racer's lamps, shooting out in two long yellow rays, +showing every rut and ridge, so that that grim watching face had to draw +down lower still in the darkness of the underbrush. Did he know who +Reddy was waiting for? What did he feel when the auto moved and one +swerve sideways would have sent those yellow rays over the heap of +branches on the grass? As Babbitts said, he must have been afraid to +move, must have cowered there and seen the racer glide away and then +come back; and still bent behind the network of twigs have watched the +man at the wheel, as he looked up and down the road, waited and +listened, every now and then sounding the horn, that broke into the +silence like a weird, hollow cry.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, come on," I said suddenly, seizing Babbitts' arm. "Let's go up to +Cresset's where it's bright and cheerful."</p> +<p class="pnext">We had a lovely time at Cresset's. My, but they were a nice family! +Farmer Cresset, a big, kind, jolly man and his two sons, splendid, +sun-burned chaps, and his little daughter, as fresh as a peach and as +shy as a kitten. I loved them all, and Mrs. Cresset best. She made me +think of my mother, not that she looked like her, but I guess because +she had something about her that's about all women who've had families +they loved.</p> +<p class="pnext">They gave us tea and cake and they joked Babbitts good and hard about +coming out there and pretending to be a tourist.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Never mind, son," Farmer Cresset said, "you got it out of the old +woman. I couldn't make her tell; seemed like she thought she'd be +arrested for the crime if she up and confessed about that feller."</p> +<p class="pnext">It was getting on for evening when we left to go to the Wayside Arbor. +We'd planned to have our supper there and then go back by the branch +line, catching a train at the Crossing at eight-thirty. The Cressets +were real sorry to have us go, especially there.</p> +<p class="pnext">"It ain't a nice place," said Mrs. Cresset, as she kissed me good-bye, +"but we're hoping to see it cleared out soon. Tom's stirring Heaven and +earth to get Hines' license revoked."</p> +<p class="pnext">"I guess Heaven's lending a hand," said the farmer, "for I hear Hines' +business is bad since the fatality. We've a lot of foreign labor round +here and they're mighty superstitious and are giving his place the +go-by."</p> +<p class="pnext">It was dark when we saw the lights of the Wayside Arbor, shining out +across the road. We'd expected a moon to light us home, but the clouds, +though they weren't as thick as they had been, were all broken up into +little bits over the sky, like Heaven was paved with them.</p> +<p class="pnext">The Arbor was quiet as we stepped up and opened the bar door, and there, +just like on the night of the murder, was Hines, sitting by the stove +reading a newspaper. He jumped up quick and greeted us very cordial and +you could see he was glad to get a customer. He sure was a tough looking +specimen with a gray stubble all over his chin, and a dirty sweater +hanging open over a dirtier shirt that had no collar and was fastened +with a fake gold button that left a black mark on his neck. If I thought +his looks were bad that day in the summer I thought they were worse now, +for he seemed more down and dispirited than he was then.</p> +<p class="pnext">We asked him if we could have supper and he went out, calling to Mrs. +Hines, and we could hear someone clattering down the stairs and then a +whispering going on in the hall. When he came back he said they'd get us +a cold lunch, but they didn't keep a great deal on hand, seeing as how +they hadn't much call for meals at that season.</p> +<p class="pnext">You could see that was true. I never was in such a miserable, +poverty-stricken hole. Leaving Babbitts talking to Hines in the bar, I +went back into the dining-room, a long, shabby place that crossed the +rear of the house. It was as dingy as the rest of it, with the paper all +smudged and peeling off the walls and worn bits of carpet laid over the +board floor. At the back two long windows looked out on the garden. +Glancing through these I could see the arch of the arbor, with the wet +shining on the tables and a few withered leaves trembling on the vines.</p> +<p class="pnext">When I turned back to the room I got a queer kind of scare—a thing I +would have laughed at anywhere else, but in that house on that night it +turned me creepy. There was a long, old-fashioned mirror on the opposite +wall with a crack going straight across the middle of it. As I caught my +reflection in it, I raised my head, wanting to get the effect of my new +hat, and it brought the crack exactly across my neck. Believe me I +jumped and then stood staring, for it looked just as if my throat was +cut! Then I moved away from it, pulling up my collar, ashamed of myself +but all the same keeping out of range of the mirror.</p> +<p class="pnext">In the bar I could hear the voices of Babbitts and Hines, Hines droning +on like a person who's complaining. From behind a door at the far end of +the room came a noise of crockery and pans and then a woman's voice, +peevish and scolding, and another woman's answering back. I don't think +I ever was in a place that got on my nerves so and what with the cold of +the room—it was like a barn with no steam and the stove not lit—I sat +all hunched up in my coat thinking of Sylvia Hesketh coming <em class="italics">there</em> for +shelter!</p> +<p class="pnext">Suddenly the door at the end of the room opened and Mrs. Hines came in. +She was the match of it all, with her red nose and her little watery +eyes and her shoes dropping off at every step so you could hear the +heels rapping on the boards where the carpet stopped. She began talking +in a whining voice, and as she set the table, told me how the business +had gone off, and they didn't know what they were going to do.</p> +<p class="pnext">Her hands, all chapped and full of knots like twigs, smoothed out the +cloth and put on the china so listless it made you tired to look at +them. It was better talking to her than sitting dumb with no company but +dismal thoughts, so I encouraged her and between her trailings into the +kitchen and her trailings out I heard all about their affairs.</p> +<p class="pnext">For a while after the murder they'd done a lot of business—it made me +sort of shrivel up to see she didn't mind that; anything that brought +trade was all the same to her—but now, nothing was doing. Only a few +automobiles stopped there and the farmhands had dropped off, so their +custom hardly counted. And Tecla Rabine, the Bohemian servant, who was a +first-class girl, if she did have grouchy spells, had got so slack she'd +have to be fired, and she, Mrs. Hines, didn't see how she was to get +another one what with the low wages and the lonesomeness.</p> +<p class="pnext">She trailed off into the kitchen again and I could hear her snapping at +someone and that other woman's voice growling back. I supposed it was +Tecla Rabine, though it didn't sound like her, my memory of her at the +inquest being of a fat, good-natured thing that wouldn't have growled at +anybody. And then the door was opened with one swift kick and Tecla +came in, carrying a plate of bread in one hand and a platter with ham on +it in the other. She didn't look grouchy at all, but gave me that broad, +silly sort of smile I remembered and put the things down on the table!</p> +<p class="pnext">"Well, Tecla," I asked for something to say, "how are <em class="italics">you</em> getting on?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Ach!" she answered disgusted, and pounded over the creaky floor to a +cupboard out of which she took some dishes. "Me? I get out. What for do +I stay? No luck here, no money. Who comes—nobody. Everything goes on +the blink."</p> +<p class="pnext">She put the things on the table and then stood looking at me, squinting +up her little eyes and with her big body, in a dirty white blouse and a +skirt that didn't meet it at the waist, slouched up against the table.</p> +<p class="pnext">"I heard business was bad," I said, and thought that in spite of her +being such a coarse, fat animal, she was rosy and healthy looking, +which was more than you could say for the other two.</p> +<p class="pnext">"What do I get?" she said, spreading out her great red hands, "not a +thing. Maybe five, ten cents. Every long time maybe a quarter. Since +that lady gets killed all goes bad. The dagoes say 'evil eye.' They walk +round the house that way," she made a half-circle in the air with her +arm, "looking at it afraid. Me, too, I don't like it."</p> +<p class="pnext">"It sure is awful dismal," I agreed.</p> +<p class="pnext">"No good," she said. "Last year this time all the room +full—to-night—<em class="italics">one</em> man"—she held up a finger in the air—"one only +man, and he have lost what makes us to laugh. When I see him, I say, +'Hein, Tito, good luck now you come. Make the bear to dance.' And he +says this way"—she hunched up her shoulders and pushed out her hands +the way the Guineas do—"'Oh, Gawda, there is no more bear; he makes +dead long time.'"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Bear?" I said, and then I remembered. "You mean the one that went +round with the acrobats. It's dead, is it?"</p> +<p class="pnext">Tecla nodded.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Gone dead in the country. And he says he starve now with no bear to get +pennies. The boss says we all starve, and gave him a drink and cheese +and bread. Ach!"—she shook her head, as if the loss of the bear was the +last straw—"I no can stand it—nothing doing, no money, no more +laughs—I quit."</p> +<p class="pnext">I didn't blame her. If you gave me two hundred a month I wouldn't have +stayed there.</p> +<p class="pnext">Just then Babbitts came in and we began our supper; cold ham and stale +bread and coffee that I know was the morning's heated over. Tecla went +into the kitchen and I said to him, low and guarded:</p> +<p class="pnext">"What's Hines been saying to you?"</p> +<p class="pnext">He answered in the same key:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh, putting up a hard luck story. Cresset needn't bother. He wants to +pull up stakes and go West."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Will they let him?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"That's one of the things he's been talking about. He says if he makes a +move it'll look suspicious, and if he stays he'll be ruined. He +certainly is up against it."</p> +<p class="pnext">I shot a glance from the kitchen to the bar door and then leaned across +the table, almost whispering:</p> +<p class="pnext">"I don't see that our investigations have got us anything but a bad +supper."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Neither do I," he whispered back. "The place looks like a stage setting +for The Bandits' Den, but the people don't impress me that way at all."</p> +<p class="pnext">The kitchen door swung back and Mrs. Hines came in with a pumpkin pie +that tasted like it was baked for Thanksgiving. She hovered round, +fussing about us and joining in the conversation. You could see she was +hungry for someone to talk to. Both she and her husband impressed me +that way, as if they were most crazy with the dreariness of the place, +and were ready to fasten on anybody who'd speak civil to them and +listen to their troubles.</p> +<p class="pnext">Before we left, Babbitts went into the bar to settle up and I, +remembering Tecla's complaints, called her in from the kitchen and +fished a quarter out of my new purse. She was as pleased as a child, +grinning all over, and wanting to shake hands with me, which I hated but +couldn't avoid.</p> +<p class="pnext">When we were once more in the road I gave a gasp of relief. I felt as if +I'd crept out from under a shadow, that was gradually sinking into me, +down to the marrow of my bones. The night was cold, but a different +kind; fresh and clear, the smell of the damp fields in the air, and the +country quiet and peaceful.</p> +<p class="pnext">We had a good two miles before us and stepped out lively. It was dark; +the clouds mottled over the sky; and in one place, where the moon was +hidden, a little brightness showing through the cracks. Babbitts said he +thought they'd break and that we'd have the moonlight on our way back.</p> +<p class="pnext">All around us the landscape stretched black and still. When you got +accustomed to it, you could see the outlines of the hills against the +sky, one darkness set against another, and the line of the road showing +faint between the edgings of bushes. We couldn't hear anything but our +own footsteps, soft and padding because of the mud, and off and on the +rustling of the twigs as I brushed against them. I don't remember ever +being out on a quieter night, and there was something lovely and +soothing about it after that horrible house.</p> +<p class="pnext">We hadn't gone far—about ten minutes, I should think—when I suddenly +clasped my wrist and felt that my purse was gone. I had taken it off to +give Tecla the quarter and I remember I'd laid it on the supper table +when she made me shake hands.</p> +<p class="pnext">"Oh dear!" I said, stopping short. "What shall I do—I've left my purse +there."</p> +<p class="pnext">Babbitts stared at me through the dark.</p> +<p class="pnext">"At Hines'?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Yes, on the supper table. And it's new, I'd only just bought it. Oh, I +<em class="italics">can't</em> lose it."</p> +<p class="pnext">"You needn't. We've time, but you'll have to hit up the pace. Come on +quick—that's not just the place I'd select to leave a purse in."</p> +<p class="pnext">He turned to go but I stood still. I hated going back there and it was +lovely walking slowly along through the sharp chill air and the peaceful +night.</p> +<p class="pnext">"You go," I said, coaxing. "I'll saunter on and you can catch me up."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Don't you mind being alone? Aren't you afraid?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"Afraid?" I gave a laugh. "I'm much more afraid in that queer joint. +Besides, I can't go as fast as you can and whatever happens we've got to +catch that train."</p> +<p class="pnext">"If you don't mind that's the best plan. I'll run both ways."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Then hustle and I'll walk on slowly. But come whether you find the +purse or not, for that's the last train to the Junction to-night, and we +mustn't lose it."</p> +<p class="pnext">"Right you are, and we won't lose anything, the train or the purse. I'll +make it a rush order. Go slow till I come."</p> +<p class="pnext">He turned and went off at a run and I walked on. At first I could hear +the thud of his feet quite plainly and then the sound was suddenly +deadened and I knew he was on the moist turf by the roadside. The +silence closed down around me like a black curtain that seemed to be +shutting me off from the rest of the world. I walked on slowly, +gathering my skirts up from the wet and the twigs, as noiseless as a +shadow in the dark of the trees.</p> +<p class="pnext">I don't know how much further I went, but not very far because I could +just make out the line of the Firehill Road curving down between the +fields, when I heard behind me a fitful, stealthy rustling in the +bushes.</p> +</div> +<div class="level-2 section" id="xvii"> +<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id19">XVII</a></h2> +<p class="pfirst">In beginning this chapter, which is going to end my story of the Hesketh +Mystery, I want to say right here that I'm no coward. The reason that +things happened as they did was that I was worn out—more than I +knew—by the strain and excitement of the last two months. Also I do +think that most any girl would have lost her nerve if she'd been up +against what I was.</p> +<p class="pnext">The gloom of that dreadful Wayside Arbor was still on me as I walked +along with Babbitts. After a few moments I thought it had gone off and +when I told him I wasn't afraid I said what seemed to me the truth. But +when the sound of his footsteps died away, the loneliness crept in on +me, seemed to be telling me something that I didn't want to hear. Down +deep I knew what it was, and that every step was taking me closer to +what I was afraid of—the place where Sylvia Hesketh had been murdered.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was when I was peering out ahead, trying to locate it, telling myself +not to be a fool and gathering up my courage, that I heard that faint, +stealthy rustling behind me.</p> +<p class="pnext">I stopped dead, listening. I was scared but not clear through yet, for I +knew it might be some little animal, a rabbit or a chipmunk, creeping +through the underbrush. I stood waiting, feeling that I was breathing +fast, and as still as one of the telegraph poles along the road. The +trees hid me completely. A person could have passed close by and not +seen me standing there in my black cloak against the black background.</p> +<p class="pnext">Then I heard it again, very soft and cautious, a crackle of branches and +then a wait, and presently—it seemed hours—a crackle of branches +again. I moved forward, stepping on tiptoe, stifling my breath, my head +turned sideways, listening, listening with every nerve. Even then I +wasn't so terribly frightened, but I was shivery, shivery down to my +heart, for I could hear that, whether it was beast or human, it was on +the other side of the trees, just a little way back, going the way I +was.</p> +<p class="pnext">It only took a few minutes—me stealing forward and it coming on, now +soft as it stepped on the earth, now with a twig snapping sharp—to tell +me I was being followed.</p> +<p class="pnext">When I got that clear, the last of my courage melted away. If it had +been anywhere else, if it hadn't been so dark, if there'd been a house +or a person within call, but, oh, Lord, in that lonesomeness, far off +from everything—it was awful! And the awfullest part was that right +there in front of me, getting nearer every minute, was the place where +another girl had been murdered on a night like this.</p> +<p class="pnext">I tried to pull myself together, to remember that Babbitts would be back +soon, but I couldn't stop my heart from beating like a hammer, terrible +thuds up in my throat. Way off through the trees I could see the +twinkle of Cresset's lights and I thought of them there; but it was as +if they were at the other end of the world, too far for me to reach them +or for them to hear my call.</p> +<p class="pnext">I don't know why I walked on, but I think it was pure fear. I was afraid +if I stopped that dreadful following thing would overtake me. Once I +tried to look back but I couldn't. I thought I might see it and I stole +forward, now and then stopping and listening and every time hearing the +crackle and snap of the twigs as it crept after me. I could see now the +place where Sylvia was found, the shrubs curving back from the road as +if to leave a space wide enough for her body.</p> +<p class="pnext">The sight made me stop and, as I stood there still as a statue, I heard +the sounds behind me get louder, as if a big body was feeling and +pushing its way between the trees, not so careful now, but trampling and +crushing through the interlaced boughs. Then for the first time in my +life I knew what it means when they say your hair stands on end. Down +at the roots of mine there was a stirring all over my head and my heart! +It was banging against my chest, blow after blow, as if it was trying to +break a hole.</p> +<p class="pnext">The sky began to brighten. I got a sort of impression of those cracks in +the clouds parting and the moonlight leaking through; but I didn't seem +to see it plain, everything in me was turned to terror. The noise behind +me was closer and louder and through it I heard a breathing, deep, +panting breaths, drawn hard. Then I knew if I turned I could have seen +what was following me, seen its awful face, glaring between the branches +and its bent body, crouched, ready to spring.</p> +<p class="pnext">It's hard for me to tell what followed—everything came together and I +couldn't see or think. I remember trying to scream, to give one shriek +for Babbitts, and no sound coming, and that the thing, as if it knew +what I was doing, made a sudden crashing close at my back. The +brightness of the sky flashed in my eyes. I saw the clouds broken open, +and the moon, big and white, whirling round like a silver plate. I tried +to run but the earth rose up in waves and I staggered forward over them, +wave after wave, with the moon spinning close to my eyes, and then +blackness shutting down like the lid of a box.</p> +<p class="pnext">The next thing I remember was the sky with clouds all over it and in one +place an opening with a little star as big as a pinhead set in the +middle. I looked at that star for a long time, having a queer feeling +that I was holding on to it and it was pulling me up. Then I felt as if +something was helping the star, a strong support under my shoulders that +raised me still further, and while I seemed to be struggling out of a +darkness like water, I heard Babbitts' voice close to my ear:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Thank God, she's coming out of it."</p> +<p class="pnext">I turned my head and there was his face close to mine. A strong yellow +light shone on it—afterward I saw it came from a lantern on the +ground—and without speaking I looked into his eyes, and had a lovely +feeling of rest as if I'd found something I was looking for.</p> +<p class="pnext">"You're all right?" he said; "you're not hurt?"</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'm very well, thank you," I said back, and my voice was like a +whisper.</p> +<p class="pnext">The support under my shoulders tightened, drew me up against him, and he +bent down and kissed me.</p> +<p class="pnext">We said no more, but stayed that way, looking at each other. I didn't +want to move or speak. I didn't feel anything or care about anything. It +seemed like Babbitts and I were the only two people in the whole world, +as if there <em class="italics">was</em> no world, just us, and all the rest nothing.</p> +<p class="pnext">After that—he's often told me it was only a minute or two, though if +you'd asked me I'd have said it was hours—I began to look round and +take notice. I heard queer sounds as if someone was groaning in pain, +and saw the shrubs and grass plain by the light of two lanterns +standing on the ground. Near these was a man, lit up as far as his +knees, and close by him, all crumpled on the earth, another person. The +lanterns threw a bright glow over the upper part of that figure, and I +saw the head and shoulders, the hair with leaves and twigs in it and +round the neck a red bandanna. Then I made out it was a man and that it +was from him the sounds were coming—moans and groans and words in a +strange language.</p> +<p class="pnext">"What is it?" I whispered to Babbitts. "What's happened?"</p> +<p class="pnext">And he whispered back:</p> +<p class="pnext">"I'll tell you later. You're all right—that's all that matters now."</p> +<p class="pnext">It was like a dream and I can only tell it that way—me noticing things +in little broken bits, as if I was at the "movies" and kept falling to +sleep, and then woke up and saw a new picture. The man who was standing +turned round and it was Hines. He looked across the road and gave a +shout and others answered it, and lights danced up and down, coming +closer through the dark. Then men came running—Farmer Cresset and his +sons—and behind them Mrs. Hines, with her clothes held up high and her +thin legs like a stork's. I could hear them breathing as they raced up +and one man's voice crying:</p> +<p class="pnext">"It's all right, is it? There ain't been no harm done?"</p> +<p class="pnext">After that the men were in a group talking low, the lanterns in their +hands sending circles and squares of light over the bushes and the +grass. Presently Farmer Cresset broke away and went to the figure on the +ground. He tried to pull him up, but the man squirmed out of his hand +and fell back like a meal sack, his face to the earth, the moans coming +from him loud and awful.</p> +<p class="pnext">After a while they put me on something long and hard with a bundle under +my head and took me away up the road and through the woods. It was dark +and no one said anything, the Cresset boys carrying what I was on and +Babbitts walking alongside. As we started I heard someone say the +Farmer would stay with Hines and "communicate with the authorities." And +then we went swinging off under the trees, the footsteps of the men +squashing in the mud. Soon there were lights twinkling through the +branches, and just as I saw them and heard a dog bark, and a woman call +out, my heart faded away again and that blackness swept over me.</p> +<p class="pnext">I didn't know till afterwards how long I was sick—weeks it was—lying +in Mrs. Cresset's spare room with that blessed woman caring for me like +her own daughter. No people in this world were ever better to another +than that family was to me. And others were good—it takes sickness and +trouble to make you value human nature—for when I got desperate bad Dr. +Fowler came over and took a hand. Mrs. Cresset herself told me that +respecting Dr. Graham as she did, she thought I'd never have come +through if Dr. Fowler hadn't given himself right up to it, staying in +the house for two days the time I was worst. And not a cent would he +ever take for it, only a pair of bed slippers I knitted for him while I +was getting better.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was not till I was well along on the upgrade that I heard what +happened on that gruesome night. I was still in bed, sitting up in a +pink flannel jacket that Anne Hennessey gave me, with the sunlight +streaming in through the windows and a bunch of violets scenting up the +room. Babbitts had brought them and it was he that told me, sitting in a +rocker by the bedside and speaking very quiet and gentle so as not to +give me any shock. For without my knowledge, just like an instrument of +fate, it was I that had solved the Hesketh mystery.</p> +<p class="pnext">Neither man nor woman had killed Sylvia Hesketh. The murderer was the +dancing bear.</p> +<p class="pnext">The man they found on the ground beside me that night was its owner, +Tito Malti, the dago I had seen nearly three months before making the +bear dance at Longwood, and the man Babbitts and I had seen that +afternoon on the hill. Hines and Farmer Cresset carried him—he was +unable to walk at first—to the Wayside Arbor and in the bar there he +told them his story.</p> +<p class="pnext">He had been associated with the acrobats for several years, working over +the country with them during the summer and lying up in small towns for +the winter. That spring, when the company went out on their tour, he had +noticed that his bear (he called it Bruno and spoke of it like a human) +showed signs of bad temper. It was a big strong beast, but was getting +old and a viciousness that it had always had was growing on it. He kept +quiet about it as he hoped to get through the season without trouble and +knew, if the company thought it was dangerous, they wouldn't stand for +having it around. All the summer he wandered with them, guarding the +bear carefully, never leaving it unmuzzled, and sleeping beside it at +night.</p> +<p class="pnext">Toward the end of the season it began to grow worse. It had tried to +attack one of the acrobats and there had been a quarrel. He saw he'd +have to part from them, but they patched up the fight and he stayed on +for their last performance at Longwood, where the business was always +good.</p> +<p class="pnext">After that they separated, the company going into winter quarters at +Bloomington and Malti telling them he would take Bruno across country +and make a little extra money at the farms and villages. He did intend +to do this but he really wanted to get off by himself, watch the animal, +and try and gain his old control over it.</p> +<p class="pnext">He started, working round by the turnpike, letting Bruno perform when he +seemed good tempered, but a good part of the time being afraid to. In +this way he made enough money to keep himself, sleeping when the nights +were bad, in barns and on the lee side of hayricks, the bear chained to +him.</p> +<p class="pnext">On the night of the murder he had got round as far as the Wayside Arbor. +His intention had been to take his supper there—he knew the place +well—and have the bear dance for the Italian customers. But by the time +he reached the Arbor he didn't dare. For some days Bruno had been sullen +and savage—that afternoon Malti had had to beat him with the +iron-spiked staff he always carried. The poor man said he was half crazy +with fright and misery. He told Hines and Cresset, who said he was as +simple as a young child, that what between his fear of getting into +trouble with the authorities and his fear of losing the bear which was +all he had in the world, he was distracted.</p> +<p class="pnext">In the afternoon he had begged some food at a farm and with this in his +pocket he tracked across the fields and woods to the turnpike near the +Firehill Road. Here—it being a lonely spot—he sat down in the shade of +the trees that hid him from the highway and ate his supper. As he had +been on the tramp for days he was dropping with fatigue and, seeing the +bear seemed quiet, he stretched out and with the chain in his hand, had +fallen asleep.</p> +<p class="pnext">He was wakened by a scream—the most awful he had ever heard. Half +asleep as he was, he leaped to his feet, feeling in the dark for the +chain. It was gone and the bear with it.</p> +<p class="pnext">The scream had come from the other side of the trees. With his staff in +his hand he burst through them and in the darkness saw dimly the shape +of that fearful, great beast reared upon its hind legs, with a black +thing lying at its feet. He yelled and struck it in the face with the +staff and it dropped down to all fours, growling and terrible, but as if +the sound of his voice and the blows had cowed it. Then he grabbed for +the chain, moving along the ground like a snake, and holding it, knelt +and looked at the black thing—the thing the scream had come from.</p> +<p class="pnext">He raised it and saw the faint white of the face and hands and felt by +the clothes it was a woman. He knew the way an enraged bear +attacks—rising up to its hind legs and giving a blow with its paw, a +blow that if the body it strikes is unprotected, can break bones and +tear muscles out of their place. In the dark he felt the woman till his +hand came on the trickle of blood on her face. That told him the brute +had struck at her head, and sick and trembling, he lit a match and held +it low over her. The hat had protected her from the claws; without it +they would have torn through the scalp like the teeth of a rake. But +when he saw her face and felt of her pulse, he knew that that savage +blow had broken her skull and she was dead.</p> +<p class="pnext">At first he was too paralyzed to think, kneeling there beside her with +the bear crouched at the end of his chain, not stirring as if it was +scared at what it had done. Then the horn of the Doctor's auto woke him +and, clutching the body, he drew back into the shadow. The car passed at +furious speed, its noise drowning any sound that that strange and awful +group might have made. Shaking in every limb he laid his burden on the +grass and tried to compose it, putting back the hat which was torn off, +but was caught to the hair by its long pin.</p> +<p class="pnext">While he was doing this the clouds broke and he was drawing the coat +about her when the moon came out bright as day. By its light he saw the +pearl necklace and in his own words, "All the badness in his heart came +up into his head."</p> +<p class="pnext">When he told that part of his story he wrung his hands and sobbed, +declaring over and over that he was an honest man and a good Catholic. +Never before had he stolen, though often he had gone cold and hungry. +But he knew now that he must kill the bear, and then he would be left an +old man without a penny or any way to earn one. "And the pearls," he +moaned out, "what are they to the dead? And to me, who must live, they +mean riches forever."</p> +<p class="pnext">He said his hands shook so he couldn't find the clasp and to get at it +he pulled open the coat. And then he gave a cry and drew back like he +was burnt, for there on the breast of the dead woman, sparkling like a +thing of fire, was the cross.</p> +<p class="pnext">Babbitts said the two men were greatly impressed by the way he acted +when he told this. The perspiration broke out on his face and he crossed +himself, bowing his head and shuddering. "It was God's voice," he +whispered. "It said: 'Stop, Tito; hold your hand. No man can rob the +dead.'"</p> +<p class="pnext">So he closed the coat, folded the arms across the chest and covered all +with branches he found in a pile near by. As he moved about the bear +watched him, not stirring, as if it knew it was guilty and was waiting +to see what he would do to it.</p> +<p class="pnext">When the work was finished the two of them stole away, as noiseless as +shadows. His head was clear enough to think of the footprints and he +kept on the grass till he was near the Firehill Road. He was approaching +this when he heard Reddy's horn, and with the bear following, he slipped +through a break in the trees into the open space beyond. Here, huddled +into the blackness under the boughs, he saw the car swing past. It went +a little way down the road and then stopped and stood for what seemed to +him a long time, every now and then the horn sounding. When it finally +started again he moved on, the bear padding silently beside him. He said +the car came back soon and passed and repassed him a number of times. +Each time he was ready for it, the noise and the lamps warning him of +its approach. Crowded up against the bear, he watched it through the +branches, all the road bright in front of it where the lamps threw their +two long shoots of light.</p> +<p class="pnext">When they asked him if he wasn't afraid of the bear making some sound he +shook his head and said just like a child:</p> +<p class="pnext">"Bruno? No—he is wise like a man. When I look him in the eye I see he +knows he is a murderer and must die, and it makes him very quiet."</p> +<p class="pnext">He had made up his mind to kill Bruno. As he told the men about it the +tears ran down his face, for he said the bear was like his brother. +When Reddy had gone, he made off, Bruno walking at the end of the chain +behind him, both keeping to the grass edges of the fields. All night +they walked, those two—and strange they must have looked slipping +across the moonlit spaces, two black shadows moving over the +lonesomeness, not a sound from either of them, one leading the other to +his execution.</p> +<p class="pnext">At dawn they entered the woods. There, when the light was clear enough +to see, that poor, scared dago killed the bear with the knife he had +carried all summer. The rest of the day he spent scooping a grave for +him. When he told how he dragged the great body into the hole and +covered it with earth, he put his hands over his face, rocking back and +forth, and crying like a baby.</p> +<p class="pnext">After that he went to Bloomington and joined the acrobats, telling them +the bear had died. They thought no more about it and welcomed him back, +sharing their quarters with him and promising him a place with them in +the summer.</p> +<p class="pnext">But his knowledge of the crime haunted him. Like all those dagoes, he +was superstitious and full of queer notions. Babbitts said he was as +ignorant as the animal he was so fond of, seeming to think as they +couldn't hang the bear they might hang him in its place. He wanted to go +to the priest and confess, but when he heard people talking of the +murder he was afraid. After a while he couldn't eat or sleep and the +torment of his terror and remorse was like to drive him crazy.</p> +<p class="pnext">Finally he couldn't stand it any more and got the idea that if he could +go back to the place and offer up prayers there he might get some +relief. He told the acrobats he was going to hunt for work on a farm, +left Bloomington and once again walked across the country.</p> +<p class="pnext">It was night when he reached the region he was bound for, and feeling +too weak and sick to go straight to the spot, he went to the Wayside +Arbor to beg for food which would give him strength to bear the task he +had set himself. They gave him what he asked for and he took it to his +old nook under the trees and there in the cold and dark ate ravenously. +Then, just as on that other night, he lay down and the sleep that had +left him for so long came back to him.</p> +<p class="pnext">He never heard us pass, but I guess without his knowing it we wakened +him, for he said he was sitting up, rubbing his eyes, when he heard +Babbitts' footsteps as he ran back to the inn.</p> +<p class="pnext">He listened and, making sure no one else was on the road, got up and +began to steal cautiously forward. He felt sure that God would hear his +prayers after he had walked so far and his misery had been so great.</p> +<p class="pnext">I guess the poor thing was about all in, and was as scared when he came +near the place as I was. Of course he had no idea I was in front of him +and wasn't following me as I thought. With the trees between, both of us +were making for the same spot, the only difference being that while I +heard him he never heard me.</p> +<p class="pnext">What he saw when he broke through the hedge would have terrified anyone, +let alone a man in the state he was. For there, just as he had last seen +her, lay a woman in a black coat with the moonlight shining on her dead +white face—a ghost waiting to accuse him.</p> +<p class="pnext">They say the shriek he gave was the most awful that man ever heard. +Babbitts, who was on his way back, said it sounded like it came from a +lost soul in Hell. He tried to yell back, but couldn't and ran like a +madman, and when he got there saw me lying as if I was dead in the +moonlight and a wild, screaming figure crouched on the ground beside me. +The two Hines heard it. Hines picked up a lantern and ran with Mrs. +Hines at his heels. When he came up he found Babbitts kneeling over me, +half crazy, thinking I was murdered, too. They felt my pulse and found +it was going and sent Mrs. Hines on the run to Cresset's. She lit out, +calling and crying as she flew through the woods, and met the Cresset +crowd, hiking along with their lanterns, having heard her and not +knowing <em class="italics">what</em> had happened.</p> +<p class="pnext">Well—that's the end of my story. Oh, I forgot the reward—<em class="italics">I</em> got it. I +oughtn't to have for I didn't do anything but fall in a faint, which was +the easiest thing I could do. But Mrs. Fowler and the Doctor wouldn't +have it any other way, so I gave in. Not that I didn't want to. Believe +me, Jew or Gentile gets weak when ten thousand dollars is pressed into +her palm. It's invested and I get good interest on it, but I'm saving +that up. You never can tell what may happen in this world.</p> +<p class="pnext">As to the rest of us—the bunch that in one way or another were drawn +into the Hesketh mystery—we're all scattered now.</p> +<p class="pnext">Jack Reddy's not living at Firehill any more. He's taken an apartment in +town where the two old Gilseys look after him like he was their only +son, and he's studying law in Mr. Whitney's office. Sometimes Sunday he +comes to see us, just as cordial and kind and handsome as ever, and it's +I that'll be glad when he tells me he's found the right girl—God bless +him!</p> +<p class="pnext">Cokesbury Lodge is sold and Cokesbury's living in town, too. They say +his part in the Hesketh case sort of finished him. High society wouldn't +stand for it, which shows you can't believe all you hear about the idle +rich. I've heard that he's seen round a lot with an actress-lady and one +of the papers had it he was going to marry her.</p> +<p class="pnext">The Fowlers went to Europe. They're living in Paris now and I hear from +Anne Hennessey, who corresponds with Mrs. Fowler, that they're going to +reside there. Anyway, Jim Donahue told me last time I was down at +Longwood that Mapleshade was to let.</p> +<p class="pnext">Annie's got a new job in town, on Fifth Avenue, grand people who never +quarrel. She dines with us most every Sunday and we sit till all hours +talking over the past, like people who've been in some great disaster +and when they get together always drift back to the subject.</p> +<p class="pnext">Me?—you want to know about me?</p> +<p class="pnext">Well, I'm living uptown on the West Side in the cutest little flat in +New York—five rooms, on a corner, all bright and sunny. And furnished! +Say, I wish I could show them to you. When Mrs. Fowler broke up she gave +me a lot of the swellest things. Why, I've got a tapestry in the parlor +that cost five hundred dollars and cut glass you couldn't beat on Fifth +Avenue.</p> +<p class="pnext">It's on 125th Street, near the Subway. We had to be near that for +Himself—he likes to stay as late as he can in the morning and get up as +quick as he can at night. If you're passing that way any time, just drop +in. I'd love to see you and have you see my place—and me, too. You'll +see the name on the letter-box—Morganthau? Oh, quit your kidding—it's +<em class="italics">Babbitts</em> now.</p> +<div class="level-3 section" id="the-end"> +<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">THE END</h3> +<div class="vspace" style="height: 5em"> +</div> +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 35503 ***</div> +</body> +</html> |