diff options
Diffstat (limited to '56780-0.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | 56780-0.txt | 7475 |
1 files changed, 7475 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/56780-0.txt b/56780-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..abf02be --- /dev/null +++ b/56780-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7475 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 56780 *** + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + 1. Page scan source: Internet web archive + http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924021765239 + (Cornell University Library) + 2. "Roman Doubleday" is a pseudonym for "Lily Augusta Long." + 3. The diphthong oe is represented by [oe]. + + + + + + +The Hemlock Avenue Mystery + + + + + + +[Illustration: "IN A MOMENT HALF A DOZEN MEN WERE BETWEEN THEM."] + + + + + + +The Hemlock Avenue Mystery + + + + +By Roman Doubleday + + + + +Illustrated from Drawings by +Charles Grunwald + + + + + +Boston +Little, Brown, and Company + + + + + + +_Copyright, 1907_, +By Street & Smith. + +----- + +_Copyright, 1908_, +By Little, Brown, and Company. + +----- + +_All rights reserved_. + + + + + +Printers +S. J. Parkhill & Co., Boston, U.S.A. + + + + + + +The Hemlock Avenue Mystery + + + + +CHAPTER I + + +Young Lyon, lounging in the Court House to make up his daily tale of +items for the Waynscott _News_, was perhaps the only man who knew +exactly how the quarrel between Lawrence and Fullerton began, though, +when later events had made that quarrel take on an unexpected +significance, he was exactly the one man who did not talk about it. + +Through the glass side-panel of the door he had seen Lawrence coming +up the stone walk from the street, and he had watched him with +eagerness, meaning to get a nod as he passed, for Lawrence was not +only a rising young lawyer, but, what was more important to the cub +reporter, he had just won the championship in the curling contest of +the city clubs. Slight as was Lyon's acquaintance with him, it had the +touch of hero-worship which a youth is always ready to pour out as an +offering before a man who is at once an athlete, a social success, a +man eminent in professional life, and withal magnetic and charming in +his personal relations, as Lawrence was. So he counted it luck just to +have the chance to say "Good morning." It seems that Fullerton must +have approached from the side street, for the two men met at the foot +of the Court House steps and came up together. Lyon noticed that +though they nodded to each other they did not speak. At the top +Fullerton pushed ahead so as to come first through the revolving +pepperbox of a storm-door which made the entrance of fresh air to the +Court House as difficult as was the exit of foul air within. Lawrence +swung through in the next compartment, pushing the door around much +more rapidly than suited Fullerton's dignified gait. The knowledge +that he had thumped his distinguished predecessor's heels probably +cheered Lawrence's heart, for he cried gayly as he emerged, + +"You see I follow in your footsteps." + +"Not for the first time," said Fullerton in level tones, with a slow +lifting of his lowered eyelids. + +The effect of those quiet words on Lawrence's temper was surprising. +Instantly his hand flashed out and he slapped Fullerton's face. + +In a moment half a dozen men were between them. Some one restored +Fullerton's hat, which had fallen off at his sudden start, while +others officiously laid restraining hands on Lawrence, who was +trembling like a nervous horse. + +"You may think a trick will win, but, by my soul, I'll take the +trick," he cried hotly. + +Fullerton, who was quite white except where the marks of Lawrence's +fingers burned like a new brand on his cheek, stood perfectly still +for an instant, with his eyes on the floor, as though waiting for +anything further that his opposing counsel might have to say. Then he +replaced his hat, bowed slightly to the group, and walked away to the +elevator. + +"Jove, if I had the grip on my temper that Fullerton has, I'd be +Attorney General by now," said Lawrence lightly. "Guess I'll take the +other elevator, all the same." And he walked jauntily down the hall. + +The collected group of men burst into excited cross-currents of talk. + +"What was it all about?" + +"What will Fullerton do?" + +"Gee, but Lawrence might be disbarred for that." + +"Fullerton, of all men! He must be getting old, if he lets that pass." + +"Oh, this isn't the end of it, you can bet on that all right." + +"But what was it all about?" + +"Why, Fullerton got a decision in the Symes case yesterday,--beat +Lawrence on a technicality. It was rather sharp practice, but +Fullerton goes into a case to win, and he knows all the tricks of +the trade. You heard what Lawrence said about taking the trick?" + +Yes, they had all heard what Lawrence had said. Lyon listened to the +gossip, but contributed nothing. He was perfectly certain that +Lawrence's hot speech about a trick had been expressly intended for +the by-standers. The champion was too good a sport to take a +professional defeat like a baby. And the quick speeches that had +preceded the blow no one had heard but himself. He walked down the +steps thoughtfully. It was his business to understand things. + +But the quarrel did not appear among the news items he turned into the +city editor. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +"I follow in your footsteps."--"Not for the first time." + +The words echoed in Lyon's mind like a rebus which he must solve. +There was a puzzle in them. Could he, by turning them and trying them, +find the answer? Of course it wasn't really his business, but for some +reason the puzzle haunted his mind. + +He had an assignment that evening to report a concert given at the +Hemlock Avenue Congregational Church, under the auspices of certain +ladies sufficiently prominent in society to ensure a special reporter. +He had timed himself to reach the church a little before nine, and as +he walked briskly up the north side of Hemlock Avenue, his attention +was attracted by the opening of a door in a house on the opposite side +of the street. The light, streaming out toward him into the snowy +whiteness of the night, showed a man at the door, parleying with the +maid-servant within. After a moment the door closed and the man came +slowly down the steps. He appeared to hesitate when he reached the +street, then he turned up the avenue in the same direction that Lyon +was going, and almost opposite him. As he passed under the street +lamp, Lyon saw, with a sudden quick pleasure, that the man was +Lawrence. He was walking laggingly, with his head bent. At the corner +he turned south on Grant Street, and so soon passed out of sight. + +Lyon's lively personal interest in Lawrence made him glance back at +the house where his hero had evidently made an ineffective call, and +wonder who it might be that lived there. Hemlock was an avenue that +carried its air of sublimated respectability in every well-kept lawn +and unfenced lot. Each house was set back from the street and was +"detached," with trees and concrete walks and front lawn and back yard +of its own. It was not a show street, but it was supremely well-bred. +It struck Lyon, newly come from a busier city, as curious that, but +for himself, Lawrence was the only person moving in the street. Not +even a policeman was in sight. + +This same seclusion and peace brooded over the scene when he retraced +his way down that block on his early return from the concert an hour +later. He was commenting upon the stillness to himself when he heard +the sound of running feet approaching, and in a moment he saw the +figure of a woman come running wildly toward him. About the middle of +the block she cut diagonally across the street and ran into one of the +houses opposite. Lyon had instinctively quickened his own pace, for +her panic flight suggested that she was pursued, but he could see no +one following her. Then he noticed that the house where she had run in +was, curiously enough, the same house where Lawrence had called +earlier that evening. She had not gone in at the front door but had +run around to the side of the house. + +"Some servant maid who has overstayed her leave," he thought. "She ran +well, though,--uncommonly good form for a kitchen girl. Bet she's had +gymnasium work, whoever she is." + +Reaching the end of the block he stopped and looked up and down the +cross-street, Sherman, from which the girl had seemed to come. There +was no one in sight. The street, snowily white and bare in the light +of the gas lamps, lay open before him for long blocks. The music from +a skating rink in the neighborhood came gayly to him on the frosty air +and an electric car clanged busily in the near distance. As he moved +on, his eye was caught by something dark on the white snow at the edge +of the pavement,--a black silk muffler it proved to be, when he picked +it up. Had the girl dropped it or merely hurried past it? It was a +man's muffler. He was about to toss it back into the street when some +instinct--the professional instinct of the reporter to understand +everything he sees--made him roll it up and tuck it instead into his +overcoat pocket. + +He hurried on, meaning to catch the next car a few blocks below, when +the shrill and repeated call of a policeman's whistle cut across the +night. Lyon stopped. That sharp and insistent call suggested a more +exciting "story" than his church concert. He hurried back to Sherman +Street, and half-way down the block, midway between Hemlock Avenue and +Oak Street, he saw the officer standing. It was not until he came +close up that Lyon saw the gray heap on the ground near the officer's +feet. + +"What's up?" he demanded. + +"Man dead," the officer answered laconically. + +Running feet were answering the signal of the whistle, and in less +time than it takes to tell it, they were the center of an excited +crowd. Donohue, the police officer, ordered the crowd sharply to stand +back, while he sent the first watchman who had come up to telephone +for the patrol wagon. + +"If any one is hurt, I am a physician," one man said, pushing his way +to the front. + +"He's hurted too bad for you to do him any good," Donohue said. + +The physician knelt down beside the fallen man, however, and made a +hasty examination. + +"The man is quite dead," he said, at length. "There's a bruise on the +temple,--the blow probably killed him instantly. But he has been dead +a few minutes only." + +At that there were excited suggestions that the murderer could not +have got far away, and some one proposed an immediate search of the +neighborhood. But no one started. The center of interest was in that +gray-clad heap on the ground. + +"Who is the man?--Do you know who it is, officer?" some one asked. + +Donohue, obviously resentful of the presence of this unauthorized +jury, made no answer. Lyon, watchful professionally for all details, +suddenly recognized Lawrence in one of the men who stood nearest the +body. There was something in the fixity of the look which he was +bending upon the dead man that made Lyon's eye follow his, and then in +his amaze he pushed past Donohue and knelt to look into the face +resting against the curb. + +"Good heavens, it's Fullerton,--Warren Fullerton, the lawyer," he +cried. + +The volley of exclamations and questions which he drew down upon +himself by this declaration were interrupted by the clang of the +patrol wagon, which came down the street at a run. The three men on +the wagon swung themselves down and cleared the crowd out of their way +in a moment, and expeditiously lifted the limp gray body in. Donohue +swung himself on the step and the wagon drove off at a decorous gait, +leaving another police officer on the ground to watch the rapidly +dispersing crowd. + +Lyon, well aware that a more experienced hand than his own would be +assigned to work up the story he had stumbled upon, deemed it his duty +to report at once to the office instead of trying to do anything +further on his own account, and hurried away to catch the car +down-town. A man came up behind and fell into his own hurried gait to +keep pace with him. + +"You've struck an exciting story," said Lawrence's voice. + +"Yes," said Lyon, eagerly. His eagerness was more due to the pleasant +surprise of having Lawrence single him out to walk with than to +anything else. His secret hero-worship had never brought him anything +more than a friendly nod before. + +"Are you going to write it up?" + +"I'll have to report for instructions. They'll probably send some one +else up to the station to follow matters up, but perhaps the city +editor will let me write up this part of it." + +"You have a good deal of responsibility," said Lawrence. + +"Responsibility?" + +"I mean in the way of influencing public opinion." + +"I have nothing to do but to tell the facts, and there aren't many of +them yet." + +"You have to select the facts to speak of," Lawrence said. He was +keeping up with Lyon's quick pace, but his voice was so deliberate +that it made Lyon unconsciously pull up. + +"I suppose so." + +"If you wanted to make a sensational report, for instance, you could +work in the peaceful night and the deserted street and other things +that really have no relation to the facts in such a way as to connect +them in the public mind." + +"Yes, I suppose so." + +"That's what I meant about your responsibility,--responsibility to the +public and responsibility to the individuals you may happen to work +into your story." + +Lyon nodded. He felt that there was something behind this not yet +clear to him. + +"You were fortunate in being on the spot. You must have been the first +man there. I was close behind you, I think. I was not far behind you +when you came down Hemlock Avenue." + +Then suddenly Lyon understood. It was quite as though Lawrence had +said, "I hope you will not consider it necessary to mention that a +minute or two after the time of the murder you saw a woman running in +terror from the spot and going into a house where I call." He had +quite forgotten the running girl for the moment. Now the sudden +bringing together of the two ideas staggered him. + +"There are things that once said can never be unsaid," said Lawrence. + +"Yes." + +"That's why I am glad it has fallen into your hands to write it up +instead of into the hands of some sensation monger who would not have +the instinct of a gentleman about what to say and what to leave +unsaid. By the way, it was you who identified the man as Fullerton, +wasn't it?" + +"Yes," said Lyon slowly. He recalled the fixed look that Lawrence had +bent upon the body in silence. It was impossible that he had not +recognized his enemy in the dead man. Why had he held back the natural +impulse to speak his name? + +"I'll look for your report with interest. And, by the way, don't you +lunch at the Tillamook Club? Look me up some day. I'm usually there +between one and two. Glad to have seen you. Good night." + +Lyon found that "story" more difficult to write up than he had +anticipated. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +To say that Waynscott was amazed on the appearance of the _News_ the +next morning would be to put it mildly. That a prominent lawyer should +be found dead in the best residence quarter of the city at the early +hour of ten, and that the police authorities should have nothing to +offer, was enough to set the whole city talking. Fullerton had not +been particularly popular, but he was a man of mark. A bachelor, he +had lived at a fashionable apartment house, the Wellington; he had no +family, no intimate friends, and there were men at his club who would +not play with him, but still he was a personage. The city buzzed with +the decorous joy of discussing a full-fledged sensation of its own. + +Was it murder? Was it an accident? Had he any personal enemies? Was it +highway robbery? What were the police good for, anyhow? The result of +the coroner's inquest was awaited with the keenest interest. + +The body had been taken to the morgue, and the inquest was held there +the next day. The significant testimony, as it was sifted out, was as +follows: + +Donohue, the police officer, was called first. He testified that he +had been at the corner of Oak and Grant Streets when he heard the +Court House clock strike the quarter before ten. He had walked down +Oak Street one block at a slow pace, and had turned south on Sherman +Street, when his attention was caught by a gray something on the +ground at the edge of the sidewalk. At first he thought it was a large +dog. Then, as he walked toward it, he saw that it was a man fallen +against the curbing. He touched him, lifted his head, and found that +the man was not drunk but dead. He had heard no outcry, no +disturbance, no sound of running. + +After satisfying himself that the man was dead he had blown his +whistle to call the officer on the next beat, and had sent him to +telephone for the patrol wagon. The first person who came up was Mr. +Lyon, but there soon was a crowd about them. + +"Did you recognize the body as Mr. Fullerton?" the county attorney +asked. + +"Not just at first," Donohue answered with some hesitation. + +"Did you know him by sight?" + +"Yes, sir." + +"Yet you did not recognize him?" + +"It was his coat. He didn't have that gray coat on usually,--not when +I saw him before that evening." + +"When and where did you see him before that evening?" + +"I was coming up Oak Street past the Wellington, and I saw Mr. +Fullerton come out with a lady. They walked so slow that I passed +them. Mr. Fullerton wore a long loose black topcoat. I noticed because +he had both his hands stuck in his pockets. So when I found the man in +a gray coat it threw me off. Afterwards--" Donohue hesitated again +over his astonishing conclusion--"afterwards we found that he had his +black coat on wrong side out. The inside was gray." + +The overcoat was brought out for the jury and examined. It was a long, +loose garment, black on the outside, gray on the inner. Though not +intended for reversible wearing, it was obvious that it could have +been easily turned. The question that at once occurred to every +listener was whether the garment had been turned by Fullerton himself, +or whether it had been hastily and carelessly put on him by some one +else after he had fallen unconscious. This was obviously in the +examiner's mind when he asked next, + +"Was the overcoat buttoned when you came upon him?" + +"No, it was open." + +"How was the body lying?" + +"In a heap, as though his knees had crumpled up under him." + +"Officer, did you see no one on the street from the time you left Oak +Street and Grant Street until you found the body?" + +"No one but Mr. Lawrence. It is a quiet neighborhood." + +"When and where did you see Mr. Lawrence?" + +"On Grant Street, going toward Hemlock Avenue. He passed me while I +was standing on the corner." + +"Just before you left the corner?" + +"May be ten minutes before." + +"If you had walked straight down Grant Street to Hemlock Avenue, down +Hemlock Avenue to Sherman Street, and up Sherman Street to the spot +where the body was found, how long would it have taken you to get +there?" + +Donohue considered carefully before he answered, "About seven +minutes." + +"Was Mr. Lawrence walking rapidly?" + +"You might call it so." + +"Officer, you spoke of seeing a lady with Mr. Fullerton when he left +the Wellington earlier in the evening. Did you recognize the lady?" + +"No, sir. I did not see her face. She wore a veil." + +"Did you notice anything else about her or her dress?" + +"She wore a short fur coat and a muff. Her dress was dark. I noticed +as I passed by that she was crying under her veil,--sort of sobbing to +herself. That made me look sharp. Mr. Fullerton was walking kind of +swaggering, with his hands in his pockets." + +"Would you know the lady if you saw her again? + +"If she wore the same clothes, I might," Donohue answered somewhat +doubtfully. + + +The physician, Dr. Sperry, who had pronounced Fullerton dead, was next +called. He testified that he was returning from the concert, and was +on Hemlock Avenue when he heard the police whistle. When he saw the +crowd gathered on Sherman Street he had thought some one might be +hurt, and had gone up to offer his professional assistance. He had +found the man dead, with the mark of a severe blow on his temple. + +"Dr. Sperry, will you describe the appearance of the wound?" + +"It was a bruise rather than a wound. The temple was indented, showing +that the delicate bone there had been crushed in. The skin was broken, +and the blood had oozed down the left side of the face." + +"Should you say that it was the mark of a heavy blow?" + +"Yes, or a swinging blow. It was undoubtedly made by some dull +instrument, heavy enough to crush, and yet with a metallic edge that +cut the skin sharply." + +"Would such a blow cause death at once?" + +"Instantaneously." + +"Can you say how long the man had been dead?" + +"Not less than ten minutes. Not more than half an hour." + +After an intimation that Dr. Sperry would be recalled later, Lyon was +called. + +Lyon had made no mention of the running girl in his report for the +_News_, but he foresaw that that matter would come out in his +examination, and he hastily resolved that there was one point of +information which he would not volunteer,--the house which she had +entered. Let them ask him, if they wanted to get at that! + +He testified, in answer to the preliminary questions, that he was +returning from the concert and was on Hemlock Avenue between Sherman +and Hooker Streets when he heard the policeman's whistle and ran back +to see what the disturbance was. + +"You had passed the corner of Sherman Street a few minutes before?" + +"Yes." + +"And you saw nothing unusual?" + +"I saw a man's muffler on the ground. I have turned it over to the +officers." + +The muffler was produced and examined. At one place the folds were +stiff and matted together. The jury examined the stain. + +"Was this spot wet when you picked the muffler up?" + +"I did not notice." + +"Did you see any one on the street?" + +"While I was farther up on Hemlock Avenue I noticed a woman running +across the street." + +"How was she dressed?" + +"I was too far away to see." + +"Did she wear a veil?" + +"I think not. I could not swear to it, however." + +"Did you see Mr. Lawrence?" + +"No, not until I saw him in the crowd afterwards." + +"I believe it was you who first identified the body?" + +"Yes." + +"Was Mr. Lawrence present when you did so?" + +"Yes." + +"Did you see him examine the body?" + +"I did not see him touch it." + +"Was he near enough to identify the body?" + +"He was near enough, so far as that goes." + +"He did not volunteer any information as to who the dead man was, +though he was near enough to recognize him, and presumably must have +recognized him?" + +"I did not hear him say anything." + +"Was the light sufficiently bright to enable you to see clearly?" + +"It was rather a shadowy spot. There are lamps at the corners of the +block only. We were standing about the middle of the block." + + +The next witness sprung the surprise of the day. He was a boy of +eighteen, Ed Kenyon by name, who had been attracted by the quickly +spreading report of a murder. Asked to tell his story, he said: + +"After the rest of the crowd had gone home, some of us fellows thought +we would hunt for the murderer, so we made up a party and looked in +all the alleys and went through some of the back yards around there. +Right across the street from where the body was found there is a +vacant lot. It is a good deal lower than the sidewalk and there is a +fence at the inside edge of the walk to keep people from falling off. +We looked over the fence and we could see that the snow had been +tramped down, as though there had been a scrap or something, so we +jumped in and explored for what we could find. When you are down +inside the lot there is a hole under the sidewalk, and we found this +poked in behind some weeds in the hole." And he produced the two +pieces of a broken cane. + +Lyon happened to glance at Lawrence at that moment, and he was +startled by the look he surprised there. In an instant it was +banished, and Lawrence's face was as non-committal, as impassive, as +any in the room. But Lyon, watching him now in wonder, felt that the +passivity was fixed there by a conscious effort of the will. + +The county attorney then recalled Dr. Sperry. + +"In your opinion, could the fatal blow have been struck by such an +instrument as this cane?" + +"It would be quite possible." + +"Would such a blow be apt to break the cane?" + +"That would depend on how it was held." + +"Will you examine the gold knob at the end of this piece and say +whether you see anything to indicate that such a blow was actually +struck with it?" + +"There are a few short hairs caught by a rough place where the metal +is joined to the wood. They look matted. It would require a scientific +examination to determine whether that is blood or not." + + +Arthur Lawrence was then called. + +"Do you recognize this cane, Mr. Lawrence?" + +"Yes, it is mine. My name is engraved around the gold top." + +"Will you inform the jury when you last had it in your possession?" + +"I regret to say I cannot. I lost the cane sometime ago." + +"When and how did you lose it?" + +"That I cannot say. I suppose I must have forgotten it somewhere. I +simply know that I have not had it in my possession for some little +time. I had missed it, but supposed it would eventually turn up and be +returned to me, as my name was on it." + +"Please search your memory, Mr. Lawrence, as to the last time you had +it in your possession." + +Lawrence looked thoughtful. + +"I remember that I had it last Wednesday when I was in the State +Library, because I used it to reach a book on the top shelf." + +"Did you leave it there?" + +"I am under the impression that I took it away with me, but I have a +careless habit of forgetting canes and umbrellas, and I had an +exciting debate with Mr. Fullerton just before I left the room." + +"With Warren Fullerton?" + +"Yes." + +"Did you leave the library with him?" + +"No, I left alone. He was still there." + +"You were on Sherman Street last night?" + +"Yes." + +"Will you give an account of your movements?" + +"I was coming down Hemlock Avenue--" + +"One moment. Where were you coming from?" + +"I had been out for a tramp and was coming back. I had not been +anywhere in particular." + +"How long had you been tramping?" + +Lawrence seemed to consider his answer before he spoke. "Something +over an hour," he said. + +"Were you alone all that time?" + +"Yes." + +"Did you see any one to speak to?" + +"I spoke to Officer Donohue as I was coming back. I don't remember +noticing any one else on my walk." + +"You may resume your account. You say you were coming down Hemlock +Avenue,--" + +"I was midway between Grant and Sherman Streets when I heard the +policeman's whistle and I ran down to Sherman Street to see what the +trouble was." + +"Did you see Mr. Lyon on Hemlock Avenue?" + +"Yes." + +"Where was he?" + +"He was going down the street ahead of me." + +"Mr. Lyon has testified that he was between Sherman and Hooker Streets +when the whistle was heard. That would put him nearly a block ahead of +you. Did you identify him at that distance?" + +"He was not so far away when I first saw him." + +"Where was he when you first saw him?" + +"On Hemlock Avenue between Grant and Sherman Streets." + +"Then you stood still, practically, while he walked a block?" + +"He was certainly walking at a faster pace." + +"Was there any one else on the street?" + +"I saw no one except the girl who ran across Hemlock Avenue, of whom +Mr. Lyon spoke." + +"Can you describe her?" + +"No. I was farther from her than Lyon was." + +"When you heard the policeman's whistle, did you go at once to the +spot?" + +"No, I paid no attention to it at first. Afterwards, when I saw a +crowd was gathering, I fell in with the rest to see what had +happened." + +"Did you recognize the body when you came up?" + +"Yes." + +"Did you have any reason for refraining from so stating?" + +"I was shocked and startled to see who the man was. I had no definite +reason, either for speaking or for silence." + +"What were your personal relations with Mr. Fullerton?" + +"We were not friendly." + +"When did you speak to him last?" + +"Yesterday morning, in the Court House." + +"What was the nature of your conversation at that time?" + +"It was of rather a violent nature," said Lawrence, with the slightest +drawl. "I had occasion to slap his face." + + +The boys who had been with Ed Kenyon were called to corroborate his +story of finding the broken cane. Lawrence had changed his seat, and +now sat beside Lyon. He gave no sign of recognition at first, but +after a few minutes, when there was a buzz of talk in the room, he +turned to Lyon and said, with a casual air that could not conceal his +intention, + +"You see what this is leading to. They will arrest me for the murder +before I leave the room. Don't answer me. Only listen and remember. I +am going to ask you to do me a favor,--the very greatest favor that +any living man could do me. I want you to go to the house that girl +entered and tell her that I am sending her word by you to keep from +speaking of this affair. Make her understand that she must volunteer +no information, make no explanation, say nothing, no matter what +happens. She will hear of my arrest. Make her understand that arrest +is a long way off from conviction. Make that as strong as you can. +Tell her that no jury in the world would convict on such evidence. +Make light of the whole thing as much as possible, but tell her that I +implore and entreat--I would use a stronger word if I dared--that she +say nothing to any one at any time in regard to this whole matter. To +you I will say--and remember this--that I would rather die than to +have her name entangled in this affair in any manner. I'll make a +fight for it first, of course, but literally, I would rather go +through with it to the bitter end than to have her life darkened by +any shadow, and this would be a shadow that could never be lifted. If +I could speak more strongly, I would. I am trusting this to you +because I must get word to her at once and convincingly, and I dare +not write,--and because I believe you are my friend. Her name is Edith +Wolcott." + +And before Lyon could frame any answer, Lawrence had slightly moved +his position again, so as to put a space between them. + +Lyon listened to the remaining testimony with attentive ears but a +throbbing brain. He had been suddenly swept into the very center of +the mystery. He knew no more than before, but knowledge was all around +him, pressing against the thin walls of his ignorance. His own share +in the evening's events suddenly became significant. Lawrence had made +no mistake in choosing his envoy. Neither had he made any mistake in +his diagnosis of the situation. Before he left the room, he had been +arrested for the murder of Warren Fullerton. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +Percy Lyon had a natural gift for human nature, as some people have +for music or for mechanics. Unconsciously and instinctively, he could +read character, and as with all instinctive knowledge, he was utterly +unable to say how he reached his conclusions. His judgment had so +often proved to be truer than appearances that it had surprised even +himself. His success in his newspaper work depended almost wholly upon +this gift. In news as news he had little interest, and he often chafed +at the routine drudgery of his assignments, but when his work was to +"write up" some one, whether it was a drunken tramp arrested for +disorderly conduct, a visiting diplomat surrounded with mystery and +red tape, a famous actress or an infamous trust-president, he was in +his element. He would sit and look at his victim with quiet, dreaming +eyes, listen with sympathetic attention to whatever he might say, and +then go away and write up a sketch that would reveal the inner life of +his subject's mind in a manner that was sometimes startling to the man +himself. + +"Who told you that?--How did you find that out?" was frequently asked. + +And Lyon would laugh and pass it off as a joke, or if pressed, would +probably answer, "Why, I don't know; that's what I should do, or feel, +or think, if I were in his place.--I got that impression about him, +that's all." But the point was that the impressions he received were +so apt to be psychologically correct that it seemed almost uncanny. It +was something like clairvoyance. + +As he turned away from the inquest to carry out the mission that had +so unexpectedly been entrusted to him, he felt perfectly convinced, in +his own mind, of Lawrence's innocence. + +In spite of the quarrel in the morning with its proof of Lawrence's +temper and Fullerton's self-control, in spite of the damning fact that +Lawrence's cane, broken and hidden, would appear to be the instrument +with which the fatal blow was struck, in spite of the curious fact +that Lawrence had held his peace when he must have recognized the dead +man, Lyon found himself inwardly committed to the faith that Lawrence +was not directly involved. He faced and set aside as simply +unexplained the fact of Lawrence's presence in the neighborhood. By +Donohue's testimony, Lawrence was going in the direction of the +tragedy about half an hour before the body was discovered. By Lyon's +own knowledge, Lawrence must have been behind him on Hemlock Avenue as +he came down that block, else how had he, too, seen the running girl? +In other words, he had spent half an hour loitering on the street of a +winter night within a compass of two blocks. Of course the mystery +involved the girl, for whose good name he was so deeply concerned. + +How she was involved he could not even hazard a guess--until he should +have seen her. Did Lawrence entertain the thought that she was +involved in the affair in any other way than as a possible witness? If +she was merely a disinterested witness, would he have felt bound, at +such cost, to keep her from being called upon? Lyon felt that was a +forced explanation. No, Lawrence must either know or believe that the +girl was vitally connected with the murder. Nothing else would explain +his anxiety on her behalf. Now, who was the girl? It was luck and +great luck that he had so good a justification for calling, as +otherwise he would have been forced to invent an occasion. It was +beyond all reason to expect him to relinquish the pursuit of such a +clue. + +He made his way at once to the house where he had seen Lawrence call. +His ring was answered by an elderly servant, slow and stiff in her +movements. Lyon recalled with a smile his fancy that the running girl +might possibly be the maid, hurrying to conceal a tardy return to the +house. This woman could not run for a fire. + +"Is Miss Wolcott at home?" he asked. + +The woman looked dubious and discouraging. "I'll see," she said. + +"Please tell her that I will detain her only a moment, but that I have +a very important message for her," Lyon said, giving the girl his card +and quietly forcing his way past her into the reception room. + +The old servant went slowly up-stairs, and Lyon took a swift survey of +the room in which he was left, striving to guess the character of the +owners. Books, pictures, flowers, all betokened refined and gentle +ways of living. Unpretentious as it was, this was evidently the home +of cultured people. + +A slow step was heard in the hall, and an old man came to the door of +the drawing room and looked in at Lyon with a mingling of mild dignity +and child-like friendliness that was peculiarly attractive. + +"I _thought_ I heard some one come in," he said, with obvious pleasure +at finding his guess right. "Did you come to see my granddaughter?" + +"I have sent up my card to Miss Wolcott," Lyon answered. + +"She is my granddaughter. Didn't you know?" the old gentleman asked, +in surprise. "I am Aaron Wolcott, you know. Maybe you are a stranger +in Wayscott." + +"Yes, I am a good deal of a stranger yet." + +"What is your name, may I ask?" + +"Percy Lyon." + +The old gentleman took a chair opposite and regarded him with cheerful +interest. "I am pleased to meet you, Mr. Lyon. My granddaughter will +be down soon. Eliza, our old servant, is slow because she has +rheumatism. She's getting old,--but that isn't a crime, is it? I'll be +getting old some time myself, I suppose. But I've got all my faculties +yet, thank Heaven." + +"Have you lived in this house long?" Lyon asked. + +"I built this house twenty-five years ago for my son,--Edith's father, +you know. There have been many changes, many changes. He died when he +was thirty, and his young wife followed him and left the baby Edith +and me alone together. There's something wrong when young people die +and old people are left. We should not outlive our children." + +"Do you mean that you live here entirely alone with your +granddaughter?" asked Lyon, quickly. This was significant. + +"Except for Eliza. Eliza is a good servant. Edith isn't much of a +housekeeper. She doesn't care for anything but her music. But she's a +good girl, Edith is." + +"Did you wish to see me?" a cool, low voice asked at the door. + +Lyon rose to his feet and bowed. "If you are Miss Wolcott, I have a +message for you," he said, and by a pause he conveyed to her the idea +that the message was for her alone. + +Miss Wolcott regarded him for a moment with an observant scrutiny +which she made no attempt to disguise, and then she turned to her +grandfather. + +"It is time for your walk, Dandy," she said. She got him his overcoat, +hat, and stick from the hall, and herself buttoned his coat up to his +throat. + +"You see how she spoils me," Mr. Wolcott said, with evident pride in +his voice. "I'm old enough to look out for myself." + +Edith did not speak. In grave silence she gave him his gloves, and +watched him put them on while Lyon as intently watched her. She was a +tall girl of perhaps twenty-five, with eyes of midnight blackness, +broad black eyebrows that drooped in straight heavy lines toward her +temples, and black hair that was drawn in smooth, broad bands at the +side of her head to repeat the drooping line of her brows. Her mouth +drooped too, in lines too firm to be called pensive, too proud to be +sad. Altogether it was a face of mystery,--a face not easily read, but +not the less powerful in its attraction. Lyon had a swift +comprehension of Lawrence's feeling. + +If this woman was in any way connected with the murder, the matter was +serious as well as delicate. Lyon's pulses began to tingle as a +hunter's do when he sees a mysterious "track" which he does not +understand. + +She let her grandfather out at the front door, and then came back to +the room where Lyon was waiting. Calmly seating herself, she bent an +inquiring and unsmiling look upon him. It struck him that she had +shown nothing of her grandfather's tendency to unnecessary words. + +"I have come at the request of Mr. Lawrence, who wished me to bring +you a message," Lyon said. + +There was something like a flash of light in her shadowy eyes, but +whether it meant eagerness or anger, love or hate, Lyon could not say. +She bent that same intent, unsmiling regard upon him, with only a +deepening of its intentness, as though waiting for his next word with +held breath. + +"Mr. Lawrence considered it important that I should see you personally +and at once, since he could not come himself to explain his reasons +for what may sound like an extraordinary request," he went on +deliberately. + +She moved restlessly. "I have not seen Mr. Lawrence since--" + +Lyon interrupted. "Pardon me, may I give you the message before you +say anything more? Mr. Lawrence has been arrested on the charge of +killing Warren Fullerton--" + +"Oh, heavens, has it come to that?" the girl gasped, with horror on +her face. + +Lyon raised a warning hand. "And his urgent request to you is that you +refrain from giving any information which, you may possess in regard +to the matter to any one. That of course includes myself." + +Miss Wolcott was holding fast to the arms of the chair and her pallor +seemed to have deepened visibly, but she did not lose her self-control +for a moment. + +Lyon would have given much to be able to tell whether the feeling +which she obviously held back from expression was fear or concern or +contempt. + +"You of course saw the account of the murder in the morning papers," +he continued, deeming it advisable to put her in possession of the +situation as fully as possible. "The inquest was held today, and Mr. +Lawrence has been taken into custody,--merely on suspicion, of course. +It is known that he had had a quarrel with Mr. Fullerton, and his +broken cane was found in the neighborhood." + +Miss Wolcott's intense eyes seemed trying to drag out his words faster +than he could utter them, but she asked no questions. + +"This means that he will be held for the action of the Grand Jury, +which will meet in about two weeks. Of course he will have an attorney +to present his case. You are not to think that his arrest necessarily +means anything worse than the necessity of making his innocence as +obvious to the world at large as it is now to his friends. But in the +meantime his great and immediate anxiety was that you should be warned +to say nothing about the whole matter. Frankly, Miss Wolcott, I don't +know whether your silence is to protect him or to protect some one +else, but I do know that he was profoundly in earnest in hoping that +you would preserve that silence unbroken as long as possible." + +"What do you mean by as long as possible?" she asked, slowly. + +"If you should be summoned as a witness at the trial, you will of +course have to tell everything within your knowledge connected with +the affair." + +She frowned thoughtfully. "Am I likely to be summoned as a witness?" +she asked. + +"That will depend on whether the prosecuting attorney or Mr. +Lawrence's attorney gets an idea that you have any information in your +possession which will help his side of the case." + +She sat very still, with downcast eyes, for a long moment. Lyon made a +movement of rising, and she checked him. + +"One moment. When the trial comes off, will there be any way of my +knowing how it is going?" + +"It will be fully reported in the papers. You could be present in the +court room if you think it advisable." + +"I will think of it," she said quietly. Then her splendid self-control +wavered for a moment. "If I should feel that I had to talk to some +one, to understand things,--would you--might I--" + +"May I come occasionally to tell you of any new developments?" Lyon +asked, simply. + +"Thank you. It will be kind of you." + +"I shall be very glad to keep you informed." And then he added +deliberately, intending that however much she might veil her own +sympathies there should be no doubt in her mind as to his position, "I +am a friend of Mr. Lawrence's. That is why he entrusted me with this +word for you." + +She bowed, somewhat distantly, without speaking, and Lyon left. + +When he got outside, he allowed himself to indulge in a moment of +puzzled and half-reluctant admiration. What superb nerve! Her +connection with this mysterious case was evidently a close and vital +one, yet she had held herself so well in hand that it was impossible +for him to say now, after this momentous interview, whether her +sympathies were with Lawrence or not. She had most completely +understood and heeded his injunction to keep silence, at any rate. Was +the injunction needed, in the face of such self-control? What was it +that lay behind that shield? Lyon felt as though his hands were being +bound by invisible bands, and he had a frantic desire to break his way +clear and force a way to an understanding of things. Turning a corner +he came upon the old grandfather taking his leisurely constitutional +in the sun, and instantly he realized that Providence had placed in +his hands the means of removing some of his assorted varieties of +ignorance,--if it is Providence who helps a man when he is trying to +peer into his neighbor's business. There may be a difference in the +point of view as to that. With a surreptitious glance at his watch, he +fell into step beside Mr. Wolcott. + +"Your quiet neighborhood has made itself rather notorious," he began, +at a safe distance from his objective point. "I suppose you first +learned of the murder through the papers this morning. Or did you hear +the excitement last night?" + +"I heard the grocer boy telling Eliza this morning," Mr. Wolcott +answered. "I don't read the paper very much. My eyesight is all +right,--my faculties are all as good as ever,--but they print the +papers in such fine type nowadays, I don't care to read them." + +"Well, Miss Wolcott would surely have read it and noticed about the +murder." + +"She wouldn't talk about it." + +"Of course it is not a pleasant thing to talk about." + +"That isn't all. You see, Edith was engaged to marry that Mr. +Fullerton at one time." + +"Really?" This was so startling a piece of information that Lyon +stopped short in his surprise, trying to fit it into its place with +the other things he knew or guessed. "Really!" + +"Don't let on I told you," said the old gentleman, confidentially. +"Edith doesn't like to have me talk about her affairs. But that's the +reason she is so strange to-day. Maybe you didn't notice, but she was +very quiet all day." + +"Do you think that she cared for him still?" demanded Lyon. + +"Oh, no, no! That's all past. But it must have given her a queer +feeling to have him killed so near her own door. No, she didn't care +for him. If he had died in some other way, I think she would have been +glad. I'm not sure she isn't glad as it is, though maybe she was a +little scared to have her wish come true.--It is kind of awful to have +something up there take you at your word." + +"What makes you think that she would be glad?" + +"Oh, I see things, if I am old. Edith doesn't think I notice, but I +know more about things than she guesses. She said once that she wished +he was dead.--I heard her." + +"Really? How was that?" + +"I had gone to sleep on the couch in the library,--not really asleep, +of course, but I was lying down to rest my eyes for a moment,--and +Edith didn't know I was there. I woke up and saw her standing by the +window looking out, and she was so excited that she was talking aloud +to herself. She threw up both hands, like this, and said aloud,--'I +wish to heaven you were dead, dead, dead!' Then she ran out of the +room like a whirlwind, and I got up and looked out of the window. Mr. +Fullerton was standing on the sidewalk, looking up at the house. He +touched his hat when he saw me, and smiled a nasty, sarcastic kind of +a smile, and walked off." + +"When was this?" + +"Maybe two weeks ago." + +"Did you ever speak of it to anyone?" + +"Never, not a word. Not to anybody except Lawrence." + +"Oh, you told Arthur Lawrence?" + +"Yes, you see I like Lawrence, and I thought it was just as well to +let him know that there wasn't anything between Edith and Fullerton +any longer. I haven't forgotten about such things, even if I am +getting to be an old man. You see, if Lawrence heard about that old +engagement of Edith's it might make him hold off, so I just thought +I'd let him know there wasn't anything to it now. It was all off." + +"What did Mr. Lawrence say?" + +"Not much. But he made me tell him again just what she said, and what +she did. I guess he was glad to have the old man tell him, all right." + +"You know Arthur Lawrence pretty well, don't you?" Lyon asked +abruptly. + +The old gentleman chuckled. "Oh yes, I don't have much chance to +forget Mr. Lawrence. Of course it isn't me that he comes to see, but +still he's very civil to the old grandfather! A deal more civil than +Mr. Fullerton ever was, by the same token. Edith was well off with +that old love before she was on with the new." + +Lyon was certainly getting more than he had expected. There was not +much mystery now about the significance of Fullerton's slur on +Lawrence for following in his footsteps, or about Lawrence's +resentment. He was so absorbed in his own speculations on the subject +that Mr. Wolcott had twice repeated a question before he heard it. + +"Do you know if Mr. Lawrence is out of town?" + +"No, he is here." + +"He said Sunday he would bring me some new cigars the next time he +came. I thought he might come last night, but he didn't. For that +matter, Edith wasn't at home last night. Maybe he knew she wouldn't +be. But she didn't tell _me_ she was going to be out." + +"Indeed?" + +"No, she didn't. But I found it out. Even if my own eyes are not as +young as they were, I can see things that are right under my nose. +Edith said she had a headache and would have to go to her room instead +of playing cribbage with me. So I had to play solitaire, and I don't +like to play solitaire of an evening. When I was young the evening was +always the time for society, and I'm not so old that I want to be +poked off in a corner to play solitaire. So I went to her room about +ten o'clock to see if her head was better. We could have had a game of +cribbage yet. Well, she wasn't there. She had gone out without saying +a word to me. And while I was looking around she came in by the side +door and came up the back stairs. I asked her where in the world she +had been at that time of the night, and she never answered,--just went +in to her room and locked the door. Now, do you think that is a proper +way for a young woman to treat her elders? When I was young, we didn't +dare to treat _our_ elders in that way." + +"I am sure you didn't," said Lyon, soothingly. + +"And do you think it was proper for her to be out so late at night +without saying anything to anyone in the house?" + +"I am sure Miss Wolcott will be worried if you stay out so long," said +Lyon, evasively. "She'll blame me for keeping you talking. Good-by. I +am very glad to have met you. Some evening you must let me come and +play a game of cribbage with you." + +He turned to leave him, and then, with a sudden second thought, he +came back. "Tell Miss Wolcott that I fell in with you, and that we had +a pleasant chat," he said. + +He had sufficient confidence in Miss Wolcott's discretion by this time +to feel sure the message would set her to investigating the nature of +the conversation, and possibly she would know how to sequestrate or +suppress her garrulous relative until the peculiar circumstances of +that evening should have faded out of his memory. The circumstances +were so peculiar that Lyon could not help feeling it was fortunate +that he, and not some police officer for instance, had received the +old gentleman's confidences. + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +Lyon went straight to the jail to report to Lawrence. He had little +difficulty in securing admittance, for the sheriff was sufficiently +pliable and Lawrence sufficiently important to permit a softening of +the rigors of prison discipline in his case. His arrest might, indeed, +be considered merely a detention on suspicion until the Grand Jury had +formally indicted him, and the sheriff had evidently considered that +his duty was filled by ensuring his safety, without undue severity. +The room was guarded without and barred within, but in itself it was +more an austerely furnished bedroom than a cell, and Lawrence had more +the air of a host receiving his guests than a prisoner. That, however, +was Lawrence's way. It would have taken more than a stone wall and a +locked door to force humiliation upon him. He tossed circumstances +aside like impertinent meddlers, and scarcely condescended to be aware +of their futile attempts to hamper him. + +At the moment he was in consultation with his attorney, Howell,--or, +rather, Howell was trying to hold a consultation with him, and, +judging by his looks, not very successfully. + +"It is unfortunate that your memory should be so curiously unequal," +Howell said drily, as Lyon entered. + +"If it is equal to the occasion, that's sufficient," Lawrence said +carelessly. "Don't you be putting on airs with me, Howell. I'm your +associate counsel in this affair. You go and see if you can get me out +on bail, and then we'll talk some more. Hello, here's Lyon, of the +_News_. At last I have attained to a distinction I have secretly +longed for all my life. I am going to be interviewed." + +"If he succeeds In getting any really valuable information out of you, +I'll take him on for associate counsel," grumbled Howell, as he +gathered up his papers and took his departure. + +"Well?" demanded Lawrence, the instant they were alone. His Celtic +blue eyes were snapping with impatience. + +"I delivered your message. Judging from the balance of our interview, +your hint was accepted." + +Lawrence laughed. He threw himself down in his chair and laughed with +a keen appreciation of the situation suggested by Lyon's words and a +sudden relaxation of his nervous tension that struck Lyon as +significant. + +"Come, you might tell me something more, considering!" he said. + +"There isn't much that I know," said Lyon. But he understood very well +what it was that Lawrence wanted and he went over his interview with a +good deal of detail. Lawrence sat silent, listening, with his hand +hiding his mouth and his eyes veiled by their drooping lids. At the +end he drew a long breath and slowly stretched his arms above his +head. + +"Well, that's all right, and you're a jewel of an ambassador," he +said. Then suddenly he pushed the whole subject away with an airy wave +of his hand. "You are here on professional business, I suppose. Are +you going to write up my picturesque appearance in my barren cell, or +do you want my opinion of Yeats' poetry or on the defects of the jury +system? By Jove, old man, you'd have to hunt hard to ask for something +that I wouldn't give you." + +"I am very glad you gave me the opportunity," said Lyon simply. Then +he hesitated. He had an instinctive feeling that, as a mere +ambassador, he must not presume to assert any personal interest in the +situation, and yet he felt there was something which Lawrence might +consider important in the old gentleman's revelation. Of course he +could not repeat the whole of that conversation! That, luckily, was +not necessary. But if he might venture on the friendly interest which +he really felt, he must mention one item. + +"I met Miss Wolcott's grandfather," he said, with the casual air of +one who is filling in a conversational break. "He inquired if you were +in town,--said he had expected you to call Monday night, but supposed +perhaps you had not done so, because you knew Miss Wolcott was to be +out." + +Lawrence looked up sharply. + +"He said that, did he?" + +"Yes. He seemed to be cherishing a grievance because she had gone out +without notifying him, and because she let herself in by the side-door +when she returned at ten o'clock." + +Lawrence looked at him with concentrated gaze. + +"I wonder to how many people he has confided his grievance," he said +slowly. "He doesn't see very many people, and he is apt to forget +things in time. We'll have to hope for the best. Here's to his poor +memory!" + +"If the subject isn't revived! But I gathered that he doesn't read the +papers." + +"No, his eyesight is really very bad, though of course he won't admit +it. If worst came to worst,--I mean if his testimony came into the +case,--it would not be difficult to cast some uncertainty on the time. +He couldn't read the face of a watch, I feel sure." + +"Then here's to his poor eyes," said Lyon with a smile. + +And Lawrence laughed and shook hands with him with a tacit acceptance +of his partisanship that bound Lyon to him more strongly than any +formal words could have done. Indeed, when Lyon went away he +considered himself pledged, heart and soul, to Lawrence's cause. No +henchman of the days of chivalry ever felt a more passionate throb of +devotion to an unfortunate chieftain than this quiet, self-effacing +young reporter felt for the brilliant and audacious man who was so +evidently determined to play a lone hand against fate. This feeling +was in no respect lessened by the possibility which he had been forced +to consider that Lawrence might in fact be much more nearly involved +than he had at first supposed. Men had been swept away from the +moorings of convention and morality by the passions of love and hate +ever since the world began, and Lawrence, for all his breeding and +gentleness, was a man of vital passions. No one could know him at all +and fail to recognize that. And he had loved Miss Wolcott and hated +Fullerton; that was clear. But the question of whether he was, in +fact, guilty or innocent, was merely secondary. The first question for +Lyon, as for any true and loyal clansman it must always be, was merely +by what means and to what extent he could serve him. And that settled +once and for all the question of his own obligation to speak. The +cause of justice might demand that he should give Howell a hint as to +important witnesses. The language in which he mentally consigned the +cause of justice to the scaffold was not exactly feminine, but the +sentiment behind it was peculiarly and winningly feminine. If Lawrence +wanted this thing, he should be allowed to have it, and the cause of +justice might go hang. + +At the same time, he was absorbed in a constant speculation on the +facts of the case. The little light he had gained only made the +darkness more visible. If Lawrence had indeed struck the fatal blow, +how had it come about? Had he encountered Fullerton and Miss Wolcott +together, and had there been a sudden quarrel with this unexpected +termination? Then Miss Wolcott was the sole witness, and Lawrence's +injunction to silence was easy enough to understand. That was of +course the most obvious explanation, though on that theory it was hard +to understand Lawrence's amazement when his cane had been produced at +the inquest. On the other hand, if Lawrence's tale was true about his +being behind Lyon on Hemlock Avenue, then his persistent evasion of +all really conclusive proof of his alibi must be due to his +determination to shield Miss Wolcott. Did he think it possible that +she herself was the murderer? It was necessary to consider even that +possibility. Lyon recalled the girl's sphinx-like composure, and he +was by no means sure that it might not cover passional possibilities +which could, on occasion, burst into devastating force. She was the +sort of woman who would be quite equal to taking the law into her own +hands if she felt it expedient to do so. Lyon knew the brooding type. +If, for instance, she loved Lawrence, and if she felt that Fullerton +stood between them, and particularly if she had any cause for +bitterness against Fullerton which would make her feel that in slaying +him she was an instrument of justice,--well, tragedies were happening +every day that were no more difficult of belief. She was not an +ordinary woman; and when a woman breaks through the lines of +convention she will go farther than a man. She had had a grudge +against Fullerton, she had prayed for his death, she had been on the +spot when he was killed. Whether she struck the blow herself or not, +it was clear that her connection with the affair was intimate. If she +was the woman Donohue had seen in Fullerton's company when they left +the Wellington together, it would seem that she had been agitated to +the point of sobbing aloud as she walked beside him. Any emotion that +could reduce Miss Wolcott to sobs must have been powerful. All this +Lawrence knew as well as Lyon, but it was conceivable that he knew +more. Had he been a witness of the murder, if not an actor in it? How +had his cane come to be on the spot unless he had been there himself? +And the fact that Fullerton's overcoat had been turned seemed to +indicate a deliberate attempt at concealment which did not accord with +the girl's frantic flight from the spot. Some one else had been +involved in that, some one with steady nerves and a cool head. In all +the uncertainty, the one thing clear was that Lawrence had been so +concerned about protecting the girl that he had almost seemed to +invite rather than to repel suspicion. Whether the Grand Jury would +consider the evidence against him as strong enough to warrant an +indictment remained to be seen, but if it did not, it would not be +because of any efforts on Lawrence's own part. That unfortunate public +quarrel in the Court House was a serious complication, and since the +murder that point had been much before the public. Half a dozen +different versions had been given by as many positive eye-witnesses. +That they differed so widely in detail only made the public more +certain that there must have been something very serious in it. The +wiseacres who had prophesied that something would come of it took +credit to themselves. + +It was merely from curiosity, and with no idea of the discovery he was +about to make, that Lyon went to Hemlock Avenue that evening at ten to +retrace the course he had taken the night before. He wanted to fix the +scene in his memory definitely, and to take note of what he had seen +and what he might have seen if he had looked. He stopped at the place +where he had seen the running girl, and looked about. Certainly she +had come from Sherman Street, and, cutting diagonally across Hemlock +Avenue, had crossed the field of his vision squarely. He shut his eyes +for an instant to recall the scene. She ran well,--he could see now +that swift, sure flight. Was it possible that the statuesque Miss +Wolcott could ever forget herself in that Diana-like run? Somehow the +picture, as he now looked at it, was not like Miss Wolcott. It was +lither, quicker, than he could imagine her. Yet there was no question +about her running in at the Wolcott house. Stay, was he so sure of +that? He had not seen her enter. She had simply run in by the walk +that led to the side door. Could she have gone through the Wolcott +yard on her way elsewhere? If the running girl was not in fact Miss +Wolcott, then his whole theory fell down. Trusting to luck and the +inspiration of the moment if he should be challenged, Lyon coolly +followed the concrete walk past the side door into the Wolcott back +yard. It was a sixty foot lot, running back about a hundred feet. At +the front it was unfenced and open to the street, but at the back and +on the two sides back of the rear line of the houses it was enclosed +by a close board wall six feet high. By the posts and the clothes +lines here, it was evident that the back yard was consecrated to Eliza +and wash day. So far as might be seen, there was no gate in the +enclosing wall. Was there an alley beyond or did this lot abut on the +lot which faced on the next street south,--Locust? Lyon felt that +might be an important question, and he went down to the corner of the +lot and pulled himself up by his hands to look over the top of the +wall. He satisfied himself of two points,--that there was no alley +between this lot and the adjoining one, and that the board which he +had laid his hand upon was not firm. He bent down to examine it. It +was a broad board near the left corner of the wall. It was fastened to +the upper cross-piece of the fence by a single large spike, and the +lower end was unnailed. The effect of this was that while it hung +straight in its place so long as it was untouched the lower end could +be easily swung on that upper spike as a pivot, leaving a triangular +aperture at the bottom quite large enough for a slender person to +squeeze through. To test it, Lyon pulled himself through, and swung +the board back into its place. He found himself in a large enclosed +space, boarded in on all sides except the front, where a high wire +fence separated it from the street. With a certain astonishment, Lyon +recognized his surroundings. He was in the enclosed grounds of Miss +Elliott's Private School for Girls on Locust Avenue,--a highly select +and exclusive establishment. Was it as easy to get out as to get in? +He hesitated a moment before deciding on further explorations, but the +trees in the yard gave him the aid of convenient shadows, and he +cautiously followed the wall around the lot, trying each board. There +were no more secret panels. Everything was as firm as it looked. He +had thought to get out by the gate on Locust Avenue, for it somehow +touched his dignity to crawl out by the little hole that had admitted +him, but to his surprise he found that the wire fence, which enclosed +the lot on the front, came up to the house itself in such a way that +no exit could be made on that side except through the house. Moreover +the fence was too high to jump, even for him. Emboldened by the fact +that the house was as entirely dark as though it were vacant, Lyon +made another and even more careful examination of the enclosing wall. +There was no break, and he was forced to make his way out, as he had +come in, by Miss Wolcott's back yard. + +He regained the open street with a tingling pulse. Perhaps his +discovery meant nothing,--but perhaps it meant everything. It might +enable him in time to tell Lawrence that the running girl was not +Edith Wolcott. The sudden recognition of that possibility excited him +keenly. Could it be that Lawrence had mistakenly jumped to the same +conclusion that he had? Were Lawrence and Miss Wolcott both keeping +silence, each to shield the other, while the guilty person made her +escape through the sacred precincts of Miss Elliott's select school? +He would interview Miss Elliott to-morrow. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +It was two o'clock in the afternoon of the next day before Lyon found +it possible to carry out his plan to interview Miss Elliott. As he +approached the Select School on Locust Avenue, he noticed a doctor's +runabout fastened before the door, and, as he came up, a young +physician whom he knew well. Dr. Barry, came down the steps. Lyon had +often found it useful to assume a curiosity when he had it not, and he +at once seized his opportunity. + +"How is your patient?" he asked with an assured air. + +"What do you know about my patient?" Barry asked in obvious surprise. + +Lyon in fact knew so little that he deemed it advisable to answer this +question with another. + +"Will she be able to see me?" + +"You newspaper men beat the devil! How did you find out she was here? +She particularly wanted to keep it quiet. Miss Elliott called me in +with as much secrecy and mystery as though her guest were a royalty +traveling incog., and here I find you on the steps ready to interview +her for the benefit of the whole public." + +"You don't understand," said Lyon quietly. "The only way to keep +things out of the newspapers is to take the newspaper men into your +confidence. By the way, is her ailment serious?" + +"Puzzling. Disordered state of the nerves," said Barry, frowning. + +Lyon laughed. "Don't put on professional airs with me." + +"That's straight. It looks very much like nervous shock. I don't at +all approve of her seeing visitors." + +"Then why don't you forbid it?" fished Lyon with curiosity. + +"I'm too young and she's too important," laughed Barry as he jumped +into the runabout. "I haven't the nerve to give orders to the wife of +a multimillionaire." And he drove rapidly off. + +Lyon rang the bell with a feeling of exhilaration. He was making +progress. + +"While the neat servant who answered his ring took his card to Miss +Elliott, Lyon waited in the reception room and hastily reviewed his +facts. The wife of a multimillionaire traveling incog., and suffering +from nervous shock. How could he surprise Miss Elliott into giving him +her name? In a few minutes Miss Elliott stood before him, looking from +his card to him with a severe and discouraging air. It was an air +which Lyon had encountered before when pursuing the elusive interview. + +"I am not here in my professional capacity," he said with a disarming +smile. "I wanted to make some personal inquiries about your school in +behalf of a friend in Cleveland." + +Miss Elliott softened. "This is not a very good time to see the +school," she said. "This is the Thanksgiving vacation, you know, and +the pupils and teachers have all gone home." + +"I didn't think of that. When did they go?" + +"The term closed last Friday. The pupils all scattered on Saturday. We +resume class work next Monday." + +"Then you have been practically alone in the building with your +servants this week," Lyon said blandly. This was significant. The +murder had taken place on Monday evening, and it was a big gain to +know that he might eliminate a score of Miss Elliott's pupils from +connection with the running girl. It seemed to make the problem much +simpler. + +"Might I look over the building?" he asked as Miss Elliott responded +to his last question with a somewhat chill bow. "My friend will be +interested In knowing the general plan of the school rooms." + +"I shall be glad to show them to you." said Miss Elliott. + +Lyon listened deferentially while Miss Elliott explained the uses of +the various rooms through which she conducted him. The building was a +large square old-fashioned house, the first floor of which contained +Miss Elliott's own suite, several large school rooms, and, in the +rear, some rooms into which she did not take him, and to which she +vaguely referred as "my resident teachers' apartments." Lyon guessed +at once that this was where her distinguished guest was quartered,--a +guess which was confirmed when the second story was thrown wholly open +to him. He took special note of the window fastenings and saw at once +that it would be the simplest thing in the world to throw open a +window and slip out into the large inclosed yard. + +"Your high wall suggests a convent school," he said with a smile. "Are +your young ladles as carefully secluded as that wall would suggest?" + +"That is one of the features of the school," Miss Elliott said, +somewhat primly. "We aim to give the care and guidance of a home to +our pupils. During lesson hours and at all other hours, they are +safeguarded, and are never unattended. We know exactly where they are +all the time, and what they are doing." + +"A wise arrangement." + +"During the school year, this large yard is our outdoor gymnasium. The +girls take their exercise here free from all observation. There is no +entrance to the grounds, except through the house." + +"An admirable plan. In fact, your arrangements are all so admirable +that I do not wonder at the reputation which your school has achieved. +And the social atmosphere is, I know, of the best." + +"We are exceedingly particular about whom we admit," conceded Miss +Elliott, with modest gratification. + +"Oh, I am aware of that, and of your distinguished patronesses. The +name of the lady whom you are at present entertaining is alone a +sufficient guarantee. Oh, don't be afraid that I am going to put an +item about her in the paper! A newspaper man respects confidences, +and I understand that she does not wish her presence here to be +heralded abroad. In fact, I may say that professionally I am quite +ignorant as to her presence here, but personally and privately,--you +understand,--" And he smiled intelligently. + +Miss Elliott bowed. "Mrs. Woods Broughton is an old personal friend," +she said simply. "She used to live in Waynscott, you know, before her +marriage. There are so many people here who used to know her that she +would have no chance for a quiet rest if it became known that she was +here, and she is very much in need of a quiet rest." + +Lyon looked sympathetic. "Yes, a nervous shock I understand from Dr. +Barry. I hope she is improving." + +"I think she is in better spirits than when she came, though any +nervous disturbance is hard to understand." + +"Will she remain after the school reopens?" + +"Necessarily, for awhile. She is not in condition to travel." + +Lyon left the building in so abstracted a state of mind that he fairly +ran into a man on the sidewalk. With a hastily muttered apology, he +hurried on. The discovery that the mysterious woman was Mrs. Woods +Broughton was, in a way, staggering. As well connect any other +national celebrity with small local affairs. Mrs. Woods Broughton's +name was known throughout the country, not only because of her +husband's wealth and position, but because of the more or less +romantic circumstances attending her marriage. She had been Mrs. +Vanderburg when Broughton met her and fell in love with her, and +everybody knew that the divorce which she had procured shortly +afterwards had been merely a preliminary to the brilliant wedding +which had set the newspapers agog. It had been a very decorous and +unsensational divorce, without a breath of scandal, for Vanderburg had +been an unknown quantity for so many years that no exception could be +taken to the deserted wife's action in securing legal recognition of +her practical and actual independence. Still, the need of securing a +divorce might never have occurred to her if Woods Broughton had not +come into her life. Lyon remembered the story in its general outline, +though he had forgotten that the scene of it was Waynscott. The papers +had been featuring the wedding at the time he began his career as a +reporter in Cleveland, and the whole affair had taken on a special and +personal interest to him from the fact that about six weeks later he +had himself met the divorced husband, Vanderburg, under dramatic +circumstances. He had been traveling a long afternoon in Ohio, and had +struck up a traveling acquaintance with a clever, cynical, world-worn +man in the smoking car. Percy Lyon's experiences at that time had been +somewhat limited, and he had never before encountered the particular +variety of liveliness which this sophisticated traveler afforded. He +had apparently been in all quarters of the globe, and if his tales had +something of a Munchausen quality, they were none the less +entertaining for that. The interruption of his last tale had been +tragic. There had been a sudden grinding of the wheels on the rails, a +tearing crash, and then confusion, horrible and soul-shaking. When +Lyon began to think consecutively again, he found that he was +frantically tugging at the crushed seat which was pinning his +companion to the floor of the overturned car. Help answered promptly +to his shout, and they soon had the man out, but he was unconscious +and so badly hurt that the physician shook his head gravely. + +"Better telegraph for his friends, if you can find out who they are." + +Lyon, in the absence of any closer acquaintance, had searched the +unconscious man's pockets for a clue to his identity, and in an inner +pocket he found an old note-book with the name "William H. Vanderburg" +written on the fly-leaf. The name had suggested nothing to his mind at +the moment, and while he was looking further for an address, the man's +eyes had opened slowly and taken the situation in with full +intelligence. + +"You have nothing to do with that book," he said harshly. "If it's my +name you are hunting for, Enoch Arden will do for my headstone. I have +no friends to notify, and you will please me best if you bury me and +forget about me, and particularly keep _that_ name out of the papers. +I have a right--" But the effort was too much. He gasped and fell back +dead. Lyon had been so impressed by the stranger's peculiarly +commanding personality that he had respected his wish to be left +unidentified. He considered that the bare accident that he had +stumbled upon the man's real name did not justify him in disregarding +the owner's wish to keep it concealed, and he did not change his view +when he saw that a bunch of newspaper clippings which had fallen out +of the note-book related to the divorce granted to Grace Vanderburg. +Lyon reviewed the situation as fully as it was known to him. Mrs. +Vanderburg had secured a legal separation in the courts and had +married again. The decree was based on the representation that William +H. Vanderburg had deserted his wife and had been unheard of for over +twelve years. Whether William Vanderburg had intended to make +difficulties or not, Lyon had no means of guessing, but if he had, +certainly his death had closed the incident for ever. The +unintentional witness slipped the old note-book into his own pocket +and allowed the railroad company to bury the body of "One unidentified +man." + +That was all three years in the past, or thereabouts, and now he had +been brought most curiously across the path of that dead man's former +wife. Truly, the Goddess of Accident was throwing her shuttle with +what almost looked like design. Was his imagination running wild in +suggesting to him a possible identity between this woman of uncommon +experience, wealth, and social standing, and the woman who had fled in +a panic from the scene of Fullerton's murder? He felt that he was in +danger of making himself absurd by harboring such a thought for a +moment, but with the desire which was characteristic of him to get at +the bottom facts, he went directly to the office of the clerk of the +Circuit Court. + +"I want to verify some dates in connection with that Vanderburg +divorce case," he said, to the lounging official in charge. "Would it +be possible for me to look at the record?" + +"I have the papers right here, as it happens," the clerk answered. +"Curious you should call for them. I made a transcript of that case +for Warren Fullerton a week or two ago." + +"Did you, really?" Lyon exclaimed in surprise. "What did he want it +for?" + +"Dunno. He was Mrs. Vanderburg's attorney, you know." + +"I didn't remember," said Lyon thoughtfully. It was beginning to look +interesting. There was, then, an established relation of some sort +between Mrs. Broughton and Fullerton. Just what did it mean? + +He felt that he was on the way to finding out when he reached his +rooms that evening, for he found awaiting him a special delivery +letter containing the following somewhat imperiously worded +invitation: + +"Mrs. Woods Broughton will be greatly indebted to Mr. Percy Lyon if he +can call upon her this evening. She appreciates his courtesy in +respecting her wish that her visit should not be made a matter of +public gossip. He will add to her obligations by giving her an +opportunity for a personal interview." + +Lyon got into his evening clothes with a jubilation that does not +always accompany an evening call. He felt that the fates were playing +into his hands. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +Lyon was evidently expected, for he was conducted at once to the rooms +which had been closed to him in the afternoon, and there he found Mrs. +Broughton awaiting him. He was prepared to be interested in the woman +whose story had so curiously touched his own experiences, but when he +came into her presence he forgot that he was before the woman whose +first husband he had buried, and whose second husband was a man +heralded by headlines across a continent. He only saw a frail, slight, +beautiful woman, with a wistful sweetness in her eyes, propped against +high pillows on a couch. She looked so ill, so like a fluttering +candle in the wind, that his concern must have betrayed itself, for +she smiled at him with an air of reassurance. + +"It was kind of you to come so promptly at a stranger's request," she +said gently. "Miss Elliott told me of your visit this afternoon, and I +wanted to thank you for respecting my wish to remain unknown to the +general public. I wonder how you came to know?" + +"It was mostly an accident," Lyon murmured. "I come across a good deal +of incidental information, you know." + +"You newspaper men are so clever," she said, and Lyon wondered whether +his imagination was playing him tricks or whether there really was +something like fear lurking in her eyes. Certainly her hands were +fluttering with nervousness, and her breath came and went in hurried +gasps that meant either extreme weakness or emotion. With an obvious +effort that awoke his admiration, she pulled herself together and went +on in a stronger voice. + +"That was not the reason I had for wishing to see you, however. I +wanted to ask you some questions that you, as a newspaper man, could +answer better than anyone else; and since you already knew of my +presence here, I could speak to you without spreading that +insignificant bit of information any further than it has gone +already." + +"I shall be very happy if I can be of any service," Lyon answered, +with more sincerity than usually goes into the polite phrase. He felt, +really, that nothing earth could offer would rejoice him more, just +then, than to have her ask questions, for nothing would more certainly +reveal where her own interests and anxieties lay. But she seemed to +find it difficult to begin, for a long pause followed,--a pause which +he would not break, and which apparently she could not. At last she +said, with an abruptness that made her voice tense, + +"I was very much shocked by that tragedy Monday." + +Lyon nodded, and kept his eyes lowered to remind her of his presence +as little as possible. But, he wondered, why did she say Monday? If +her knowledge of it came through the papers, the shock could not have +reached her until Tuesday. And how else could she have known, unless-- + +"You see, I used to know--Mr. Lawrence," she said. + +(Had she meant to say Mr. Fullerton, Lyon wondered, and veered from +the name? Since Fullerton had been her lawyer, she certainly had known +him, also.) + +"That is why," she continued, "I am anxious to learn anything that you +can tell me,--anything more significant than the reports in the public +prints, I mean." + +"There isn't much known. That is the difficulty of the situation. If +you read the account of the inquest, you saw that Mr. Lawrence was +merely held on suspicion, because the police had not been able to find +any one else to hold. Of course it does not follow that they will not +discover some other clue." + +She listened with tense interest. "The law is terrible," she said with +an involuntary shudder. "You never know what it is going to do. It is +like a wild beast, waiting to spring. It terrifies me to think of Mr. +Lawrence being actually in jail, but--they will have to let him go, +won't they? He can't really be in any serious danger?" + +"The circumstances were sufficient to warrant his arrest. Unless he +can clear himself, or unless the real murderer is discovered, his +situation is certainly serious." + +"I can't bear to think of it!" she cried nervously, pressing an +embroidered handkerchief hard against her trembling lips. "Why, Arthur +Lawrence always was the very soul of honor. It's horrible to have him +involved,--" + +"Yes, it is," said Lyon simply. + +"Has he a good attorney? If it's a question of getting the very best +lawyer in the country to defend him, would it be possible for me--Oh, +I have heaps of money, you know, and if it could possibly do anything +for an old friend--" + +"Did you wish me to make that suggestion to Mr. Lawrence?" Lyon asked. + +"I don't know," she said helplessly. "I think I wanted your advice. If +Mr. Lawrence is sure to be cleared anyhow,--" she hesitated +irresolutely. "Perhaps I would better wait awhile and see how things +go," she concluded, as Lyon gave her no help. + +"I think the help that Lawrence stands in need of," said Lyon, +deliberately, "is not money, but information that will clear up the +case." + +She started up nervously. "But I couldn't give that. I haven't any +information. You didn't think--" + +"I was only supposing a case." + +"I should like to do something, but I don't know how I can. He has +done much for me, without counting the cost to himself. I have reason +to be grateful to Mr. Lawrence. Will you remember that, and if +anything suggests itself to you that would give me an opportunity to +do anything for him, will you let me know?" + +"Is It your intention to stay here for some time, then?" Lyon said. + +She looked helpless and undecided. "I--don't know. I didn't mean to, +but I don't feel very strong. I think I may stay for a week longer. I +need rest. I have had some distressing news. It has unnerved me." + +"This is a restful place," Lyon said sympathetically. "It was +fortunate that Miss Elliott's school was closed this week. You have +been as quiet and undisturbed here as though you had been quartered in +a rest-cure sanitarium, haven't you?" He had put the rather too +personal question with intention, meaning to see how she would take +it, but he was not prepared for its effect upon her. She looked at him +with startled nervousness and laughed,--and then continued to laugh +and laugh as though he had made an irresistible joke. Lyon waited for +her to recover her poise, and it was not until her wild laughter +changed suddenly to wilder sobs that he realized she was in the grip +of nervous hysteria. He hastily rang the bell and then went out into +the hall himself to meet the slow-answering maid and send her whirling +back to bring Miss Elliott. + +"Shall I telephone for Dr. Barry?" he whispered, when Miss Elliott had +come and taken the still sobbing woman in her arms. + +"Yes, do, for goodness' sake. What in the world started her?" Miss +Elliott answered, distractedly. The situation was so alien to her +rule-regulated life that she looked bewildered by it. + +Lyon neglected the second part of her speech to attend to the first. +He found the telephone in the hall, and got Barry. + +"Hello, Dr. Barry. This is a message from Miss Elliott. She wants you +to come at once to see Mrs. Broughton." + +"That you, Lyon?" + +"Yes." + +"What's the matter with Mrs. Broughton?" + +"She's crying and laughing together in a way to make your blood run +cold. For heaven's sake, hurry along." + +"If you have been upsetting that woman, I won't answer for the +consequences," exclaimed Barry, with indignant emphasis. + +"Then get over here as quick as you can and take it out of me +afterwards," retorted Lyon, hanging up the receiver. He went back to +Mrs. Broughton's door. The sobbing had ceased, and after waiting a +moment Lyon caught one of the excited servants and sent her in to Miss +Elliott with an inquiry and an offer of service. She answered that +there was nothing more he could do, so he quietly let himself out of +the house. + +He had gone several blocks from the school when he became aware of the +fact that a man on the opposite side of the street seemed to be +keeping an eye on his movements. Was he himself an object of interest +to someone connected with the case? He was conscious now that he had +seen the man across the street without heeding him when he stepped out +from the house, and he recalled the fact that he had fairly stumbled +into the arms of a man in that same neighborhood when he came out in +the afternoon. Possibly the man perceived himself observed, for he +quickened his pace. But at the end of the block he crossed the street +and came back on Lyon's side. Lyon looked sharply at him as they +passed each other, but the man's face was indistinguishable in the +shadow. It was only after he had passed on that Lyon remembered that +the light from the street lamp must have fallen full upon his own +face. Well, he had no reason to mind being identified. + +When Lyon reached his rooms he proceeded to put into effect an +ingenious little scheme that had occurred to him. He studied Miss +Elliott's catalogue till he found the name of a pupil from a town +where he had some personal acquaintance. He then wrote an appealing +letter to an influential woman whom he knew there, telling her of his +lonely state as a stranger in a strange city, and begging that if she +knew a Miss Kitty Tayntor of her own town who was attending Miss +Elliott's school in Waynscott, she send him forthwith a letter of +introduction. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +Conscience and interest in the "case" combined prompted Lyon to call +upon Dr. Barry early the next day and inquire how Mrs. Broughton was. + +"Just about as ill as she can be," the doctor answered grimly. "I had +left special orders that she was not to see anyone. What in thunder +did you mean by forcing yourself upon her in that way?" + +"I didn't. She sent for me." + +"Sent for you? What for?" + +"She wanted to ask me something about the Fullerton case." + +"Are you serious?" + +"Certainly." + +"And was that what you had been talking about when she had that +attack?" + +"Yes, in general. She used to know Lawrence, and what she particularly +wanted to know was whether his situation was serious. She did not seem +hysterical at all, or even specially nervous, until she went off +suddenly at the end into that awful laughter." + +"Well, if she should send for you again, you are not to go without +letting me know first. Frankly, I consider that her reason is +trembling in the balance, and the greatest care will be necessary to +pull her through the crisis safely. I have a trained nurse with her +now, and she is not to be allowed to see anyone till the danger point +is passed." + +"I wish you would let me know when I may safely call upon her." + +"That won't be for some time yet. What do you want to see her about?" + +"She entrusted me with a commission. I want to report upon it." + +"She probably won't remember it when she recovers. I don't consider +that she was really responsible for what she may have said or done +yesterday. She has had some sort of nervous shock that has shaken her +entirely out of the normal. It will take a long time before she is +herself." + +"When did she call you in?" Lyon asked abruptly. + +"Tuesday afternoon. Why?" + +"Oh, I just wondered how you came to know so much. Good-by." + +He went away with a sense of bafflement. That Mrs. Broughton was in +some way connected with the tragedy, and that the nervous shock from +which she suffered dated from that evening, seemed to have been made +so patent that he had all the eagerness of the hunter to run the facts +down. And yet to do so under the present circumstances was almost +brutal. How could he raise a breath of suspicion against a woman who +was trembling on the verge of mental derangement as a consequence of +what he had seen or had possibly had a share in? And yet if the truth +would serve to clear two innocent people from suspicion, could he +justify himself in not speaking? More and more he felt inclined to +entertain the idea that the woman he had seen running across the +street was Mrs. Broughton. If he could but establish this as a fact +and so clear Lawrence's mind of the conviction that it was Miss +Wolcott, he felt that Lawrence would probably be able to clear himself +of the shadow under which he rested without difficulty. Brutal or not, +he must get the facts,--quietly if possible, but he must get them. It +would be more brutal to let the innocent suffer than to fix the crime +upon the guilty, however sympathetic he might feel toward the latter. +He determined to go quietly on and gather what information he could +without at present sharing his suspicions with anyone. With this end +in view he went to the Wellington, Fullerton's home. + +He hunted up the elevator boy in the first place, and soon established +a thoroughly satisfactory understanding with him on the basis of some +theater tickets. + +"Now I want to see how good a memory you have, Johnny. You know that +lady who came to see Mr. Fullerton that evening,--" + +"Yes, sir, I remember all about her." + +"Did you know who she was?" + +"No, sir, she kept her veil down all the time. But she was an elegant +lady. She had on a dress that swished when she walked, and an elegant +muff and coat." + +"What were they like?" + +"Why, just fur." + +"There are lots of kinds of fur. Did you notice particularly?" + +"Why, dark fur, I guess," Johnny answered hopefully. "Yes, elegant +black fur." + +Lyon saw he was improvising and passed on to another point. + +"What time did she come?" + +John brightened into positiveness. "Half past seven. I know that for +sure, because that was when I told her she would be apt to find him, +and so I was watching out for her when she came." + +"Oh, then she had been here before?" + +"Yes, she came twice in the afternoon, but Mr. Fullerton was out. I +told her she would find him for sure if she came at half past seven, +because he wouldn't be going out in the evening before eight, but she +was so anxious that she came again about four o'clock. I knew he +wouldn't be here then, and it was just as I said." + +"When you told her to come at half past seven, didn't she look at her +watch?" + +"Yes, she did!" + +"What kind of a watch was it?" + +"A little watch. I don't remember. But, gee, It was on a dandy chain +all right!" + +"I don't believe you remember the chain any better than you do the +watch." + +"Yes, I do. It was a long chain that went around the neck and she wore +it outside of her coat, dangling, with a purse at the end. The watch +was inside the purse. The chain was gold, with red stones in it here +and there, and they sparkled like anything." + +Lyon recognized the fidelity of the description. Mrs. Broughton had +worn a long chain of enameled gold links, set with rubies magnificent +enough to have excited the admiration of even less appreciative +observers than an elevator boy. It would be crediting too much to +coincidence to suppose that there could be another chain of so unusual +a style worn by someone else that day. + +"Had that lady ever been here before?" he asked. + +Johnny was positive on that score. "No, she was a stranger. The +first time she came, early in the afternoon, she didn't know where +his room was, and I took her around and rang the bell for her myself. +I never seen her before. She had a funny way of talking,--'Misteh +Fullehton,'"--and he mimicked the soft evasion of the "r" that had +characterized Mrs. Broughton's speech. + +"Good for you, Johnny. You are doing well. Now do you know when she +went away?" + +"She and Mr. Fullerton went out together about eight o'clock." + +"Now think carefully about this. Was there any other lady who came to +see Mr. Fullerton that afternoon?" + +"No." + +"Or in the forenoon or in the evening? Any time at all on Monday?" + +Johnny looked a little uncertain of his ground. + +"They don't always say who they want. They just say 'Second floor,' or +'fifth,' you know. And sometimes they walk up." + +"Then if there was anyone else who came to see Mr. Fullerton that day, +you wouldn't know about it?" + +Johnny dived into his memory. + +"There was another lady here that evening, but I don't know who she +wanted to see. She didn't say." + +"When did she come? What do you know about her?" + +"She came just after the lady with the long chain, because I met her +in the hall as I came back from ringing Mr. Fullerton's bell. I +thought she was going to the Stewarts' apartment because there isn't +anyone else at that end of the hall except the Stewarts and Mr. +Fullerton. Then when Mr. Fullerton and the lady came out and went down +together, this other lady was in the hall again. I held the elevator +for her, but she turned her back and I went down." + +"Did you take her down later?" + +"No, she must have walked down." + +"Can you describe her? Did you see her face?" + +"Na, she had a veil on." + +Lyon inwardly anathematized the feminine expedient of wearing veils. + +"Can't you remember anything about her?" + +"I didn't see her close," he said apologetically. + +"Have you told anybody else about Mr. Fullerton's visitor, Johnny?" + +"Mr. Bede was here, asking me all about her the next day." + +"Did you tell him the same things you have told me?" + +"I didn't tell him about the chain. I didn't think about her looking +at her watch until you reminded me." + +"Oh, well, that isn't important," said Lyon, carelessly. "Did you +mention the other lady to Mr. Bede?" + +"No. Was she a-comin' to see Mr. Fullerton, too?" + +"Not that I know of. What made you notice her, by the way?" + +"She was a stranger. Most people that come here I know." + +"You've done very well, Johnny. Now I want to see the janitor. What's +his name?" + +"Mr. Hunt." + +He proceeded to look up Mr. Hunt, and preferred his request that he be +allowed to inspect the rooms of the late Mr. Fullerton, but he found +that functionary disposed to make the most of the temporary importance +which the tragedy had conferred upon him. + +"Them rooms is locked up. The public ain't admitted. The police has +took the key." + +"But you have a duplicate key, you know." + +"And what if I have?" + +"Why, you could let me in for half an hour." + +"What for should I do that? This ain't no public museum, and I ain't +no public Information Bureau to answer all the fool questions that +people as ain't got nothing else to do can think of asking." + +"I dare say that people have been imposing on you," said Lyon, with +that serious and sympathetic air which served him so well on occasion. +"But that's the penalty which you have to pay for being a man of +importance. I like to meet a man of your sort. You're not the kind to +let every curiosity seeker in. But this is different. You know I am +writing this case up for the _News_ and I think I'll have to have your +picture for the paper, with a little write-up. No reason why you +shouldn't get something out of all this. You let me into those rooms +for half an hour, and I'll see that you have a notice that your wife +will cut out and frame." + +He had his way in the end, of course, and Hunt, grumbling but +gratified, took him up by the back stairs, admitted him, and locked +him in, with the warning that he would come personally to let him out +in half an hour. + +Left alone, Lyon looked about him with a great deal of curiosity and +interest. Fullerton was a sufficiently important person in himself to +give interest to his rooms, apart from the accident that a mystery had +settled down upon his death. And these were not the conventional rooms +of the average well-regulated and commonplace man. There was a +mingling of oriental luxury and slovenliness, of extravagance and +threadbare carelessness, that was a curious index to the owner's mind. +The first room was evidently a combined study and lounging room, for +it contained a revolving book-case filled with law books, a large +table with papers and books spread promiscuously upon it, a couch, +several luxurious easy chairs, a curious oriental cabinet high upon +the wall, a dilapidated rug in which Lyon caught his foot, and a table +with all the paraphernalia of a smoker. The feature of the room that +especially attracted his attention, however, was the pictures. These +were not of the character that one would have expected to find in a +lawyer's private study. Instead of the portraits of jurists and +law-givers, the walls were adorned with pictures of ballet girls of +varying degrees of audacity. Some were so extreme that Lyon was +distinctly startled. From the pictures, his eye wandered to the +book-case at the head of the couch. No law books here, where he threw +himself down to smoke at his ease, but novels, French and English, at +least equalling the pictures in audacity. Evidently Fullerton had not +had the tastes or tendencies of a Galahad. He could hardly have +received his clients in this telltale room. Yet the open law books +on the table indicated that he did occasionally do some studying +here. Lyon was struck with the title of the first book he saw, +and still more so when he found that of the half dozen lying open +or with markers in them on the table, all dealt with the same +subject,--divorce. The reason seemed clear when he picked up the file +of legal papers on the table and found them to be a complete +transcript of the Vanderburg divorce case. Evidently, for some reason +or other, that matter had been uppermost in his thoughts of late. As +he put the papers down, a filmy, crumpled-up handkerchief on the table +caught his eye. It called to his mind the handkerchief which Mrs. +Broughton had pressed to her lips the evening before to conceal their +nervous trembling, and he was not surprised, when he unfolded it, to +find the initials "G.B." woven into the delicate embroidery. + +"Well, what do you make of it?" + +The amused voice from the bedroom door made Lyon start, for he had +supposed himself entirely alone. He spun about and faced a quiet +little man, who was regarding him with a rather satiric interest. + +"Hello!" he said. "I didn't know you were there." + +"You were not supposed to," the other man retorted. "You are not +supposed to be here yourself, you know. Are you trying your hand at +amateur detective work?" + +"I'm looking for material for a lively story," said Lyon, with his +most ingenuous air. He had at once recognized Bede, a detective +connected with the police force. Of course he had known that the +police would be working on the case, but the actual presence of this +shrewd-eyed, silent detective gave him a feeling akin to panic. Could +Bede read his thoughts and tear from him the secret he was most +anxious to guard,--Miss Wolcott's connection with the affair? It was +absurd to think so, and yet the idea made him absurdly nervous. He +thrust the thought down to the bottom of his mind and faced Bede with +a blank aspect. "Help me out, can't you? Give me some interesting bits +to work up for the public. What have you discovered so far?" + +Bede laughed softly. "For the public?" He came over to the table and +picked up the handkerchief which Lyon had thrown down. "You were +interested in this, I noticed. Have you any idea who G.B. is?" + +"I am a stranger in Waynscott," said Lyon casually. "Besides, my +circle of acquaintances would hardly coincide with Mr. Fullerton's, I +fancy." + +"Oh, Fullerton had more than one circle of acquaintances. He was +engaged to be married a few years ago to a young lady belonging to one +of the most eminently respectable families of Hemlock Avenue. Ah, you +knew that, I see, though you are a stranger in Waynscott." + +"I think I have heard it mentioned," said Lyon carelessly, though his +heart shook to think he had unconsciously betrayed so much. "One hears +all sorts of rumors about the man." + +"For instance--?" Bede asked politely. + +"Oh, nothing that would be news to you. By the way, what theory have +you to offer in regard to his coat being on wrong side out?" + +"What do you make of it yourself?" + +"Nothing. I'm entirely at sea." + +Bede smiled a little and dropped his guarded air. "Well, he didn't +turn it after he was hit, that's evident. Death was practically +instantaneous. And the girl didn't turn it,--" + +"The girl?" + +"The woman you saw running across the street." + +"Oh!" + +Bede did not smile at the startled monosyllable. He only took quiet +note of it, and went on without a break, + +"--because a woman wouldn't touch a man who had been struck dead at +her feet in the street. She would simply run away at once." + +Lyon nodded attentively. + +"And the man wouldn't have had time to do it after the girl ran away, +because you were so near that you would have seen him if he had +lingered in the neighborhood. He must have disappeared almost +immediately." + +"Not very gallant of him to run off in an opposite direction and let +the girl shift for herself." + +"Oh, I don't know. The girl had to get out of the way, and alone, as +soon as possible. Besides, the man may not have run off in an opposite +direction. He may simply have jumped off into that low, vacant lot +until the gathering of a crowd gave him a chance to get away without +being conspicuous." He was watching Lyon closely, but that young man's +surprise was too genuine to be mistaken. "Therefore, to return to the +question of the coat," he continued, "it is pretty clear that he must +have turned it himself." + +"But why?" + +"As a disguise. To escape being recognized by a young woman who had +seen him in a black coat a very short time before. It is possible that +he trusted too much to the disguise and so came too near, and so +provoked the quarrel which ended so fatally. Even a mild-tempered man +doesn't like to be spied upon when he is, we may assume, making love +on his own account." + +"It seems to me you are assuming that Lawrence killed him, and then +building up a scene to fit that theory," said Lyon hotly. + +"What makes you think I am assuming it was Lawrence?--Because I +suggested he was making love on his own account?" + +Lyon felt that he had been trapped. "Well, aren't you assuming it to +be Lawrence?" he asked bluntly. + +But Bede was never blunt. + +"At any rate, we must assume that it was a man who struck the blow." + +"Why must we?" + +"A woman doesn't kill in the open, even where she hates. She has the +cat nature. She strikes from ambush, unless attacked. And she doesn't +carry a man's cane, even for purposes of defense, much less for +purposes of offense." + +"There's one point about that cane business that I wonder whether you +noticed," said Lyon, thoughtfully. "Lawrence swore that he had it in +the State Law Library a few days ago, because he remembered poking a +book down from a high shelf with it,--which is as characteristic of +Lawrence as it must have been bad for the book. But he couldn't swear +that he took it away with him, because he got into a dispute with +Fullerton and he doesn't remember what he did. Now, isn't it possible, +and even probable, that being excited by that discussion he walked off +without his cane, and that Fullerton, seeing he had forgotten it, +picked it up and carried it off, meaning to return it, and then forgot +about it, and then, either intentionally or absent-mindedly, carried +it with him that fatal Monday night on his walk? That would explain +how Lawrence's cane got to be there, without involving Lawrence." + +Bede had listened with the closest attention. "That is a very +ingenious theory," he said thoughtfully. He walked back and forth +across the room a couple of times, revolving it in his mind. "It is +certainly a plausible explanation. Fullerton's antagonist may have +wrested the cane from his own hand and struck him with it, as you very +cleverly suggest. But I don't see that it alters the essential +elements of the case." + +"Not if it removes Lawrence's connection with the cane?" + +"The cane is not a vital point. As you have ingeniously demonstrated, +it would be possible to explain it away. The essential point is +somebody's antagonism to Fullerton. A casual stranger does not walk up +and hit him a blow of that nature, either with his own cane or with +one snatched from the hand of his victim." + +"A man of Fullerton's character would be sure to have enemies," said +Lyon, argumentatively. + +"But not all of his enemies would be roused to murderous fury to see +him in company with a particular young lady." + +In spite of himself, Lyon started. "Then you think you have identified +the young lady?" he asked. + +Bede was watching him closely, with a hint of a lurking smile. + +"You don't ask with whom we have identified her? Quite right. Of +course I couldn't tell a representative of the press. But I don't mind +saying that we have theories as to her identity." + +Lyon's heart sank. "Based on what facts?" he asked, doggedly. + +"Oh, all that will come out in due time. I'll ruin my professional +reputation if I let you lead me on to gossip any more." His serious +manner contradicted the hint of irony in his eyes, but Lyon guessed +that the eyes came nearer to telling the truth. "By the way, Mr. Lyon, +how did you get into these rooms?" + +"Oh, I'm in the habit of getting in where I want to go." + +"Good for you. But I'll have to instruct Hunt as to his duties. You +won't get in so easily the next time." + +And Lyon fully admitted the truth of that statement the next time that +he did get into those rooms. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +Lyon was distinctly nervous when he got away from Bede and had time to +reflect on their conversation. Two things were evident,--that Bede +knew about Fullerton's former relation with Miss Wolcott and that he +suspected Lyon of knowing more of the situation than the miscellaneous +public. Was it possible that he was trying to connect Miss Wolcott +with the woman who had called upon Fullerton that evening and had gone +out with him? Lyon was satisfied in his own mind that the woman was +Mrs. Broughton, but Bede was certainly justified in entertaining the +other hypothesis, since he knew nothing about Mrs. Broughton. Would he +give his hypothesis to the public? That was exactly what Lawrence had +been so anxious to prevent that he had refused to clear himself of the +charge of murder,--if, as Lyon believed, he was really not implicated. +Was his sacrifice to be for nothing? Lyon saw, at any rate, that he +himself must be wary in his movements, since it was evident that Bede +was thoroughly alive to as much of the situation as he knew. + +He had received a note from Howell, Lawrence's lawyer, asking him to +call at his office, and he turned in that direction now. His way, +however, took him past the jail, and he took the opportunity to carry +out the scriptural injunction to visit those in prison. Poor Lawrence +must need a little cheering up. + +But poor Lawrence greeted him with a gayety that did not suggest the +need of sympathy. Indeed, his eyes were dancing with triumph. + +"Do you see my flowers, old man?" he cried jubilantly. + +A huge bunch of long-stemmed roses, still in the florist's box, was +filling the cell with color and fragrance. + +"Who sent them?" asked Lyon suspiciously. + +"Devil a card or a scrap of writing with them." + +"Oh, then it's merely because you have become a celebrity," said Lyon, +indifferently. "Silly women are always sending flowers to the +principals in any murder case." + +"Bad luck to you, you're jealous," cried Lawrence. "If you are going +to slander my roses after that fashion, you can go,--go and get me a +dictionary of the flower language. I want to find out what American +Beauties mean,--when they come without a card." + +"I'd like to know myself," said Lyon, taking note of the florist's +name on the box. + +Lawrence looked at him with mischievous eyes, that still were dancing +with happiness. "Oh, but you are slow of imagination, Lyon," he said, +softly. + +Lyon concluded that he was not needed at that moment as a cheerer of +those in prison, so he got away, and hunted up Howell's office in a +tall office building down town. He was taken into the lawyer's private +office, where he found Howell with his hands behind his back, staring +moodily through the window into a dingy court, instead of deep in his +books as a lawyer is supposed to be. There was exasperation and +protest in every line of his figure. He turned to nod to Lyon without +relaxing his gloom. + +"I am glad to see you, Mr. Lyon. Sit down. I asked you to call in +connection with this case of Lawrence's." + +"Yes." + +"Have you any influence with him?" + +"I doubt it," said Lyon, with a smile. "I don't think that he allows +many men to exert an influence upon him." + +"At any rate, you are a friend of his?" + +"Most certainly,--so far as I am concerned. I am rather too new a +friend to feel that I have much right to claim the title." + +Howell regarded him frowningly though with what was evidently intended +for good-will. + +"I think you will understand me, Mr. Lyon, when I say that a more +pig-headed, exasperating, obstinate client never fell to my lot. He +doesn't remember. He can't say. What I need in preparing my defense is +not a law library so much as a kit of burglar's tools. I have got to +break into his mind somehow. He is hiding something. Do you know what +it is?" + +Lyon reflected that Bede had not asked that question. Bede had known! +He must still keep faith with Lawrence, who had trusted him; but was +it not possible to help Lawrence against his will through this lawyer? +He picked his way carefully. + +"I don't really know very much, Mr. Howell. I guess at some things, +and I shall be glad to lay my little knowledge before you. But first, +tell me, is Lawrence's situation really dangerous?" + +"Yes," said Howell tersely. "You see, an alibi is out of the question. +He has admitted that he was in the neighborhood. Donohue's testimony +shows that he might easily have been on the very spot. Certainly he +was not far from it. Yet he offers no explanation as to what he was +doing there. That Fullerton could have been struck down--there must +have been some sort of an altercation--and Lawrence neither see nor +hear anything, is certainly curious. That his cane should have been +found on the spot is certainly unfortunate. That he should have +publicly slapped Fullerton's face that morning is the devil's own +luck. Frankly, Mr. Lyon, unless I can in some way discover the actual +facts of that night's proceedings, the prospects for clearing Lawrence +are not cheerful. Of course, the facts may not help him,--but if that +is the case it is even more important that I should know them. I can't +work in the dark. Now, do you know, yourself, what Lawrence was doing +that night?" + +"No." + +"You didn't see him?" + +"Not until the crowd had gathered." + +Howell looked disappointed. "I hoped that possibly you might be able +to give me the facts that he is withholding." + +"Isn't it possible that he is withholding nothing,--that there is +nothing to withhold?" + +"It is possible, but if that is the situation, it is a malicious +conspiracy on the part of fate to trap an innocent man. It will be +difficult to make a jury believe he is as ignorant as he wants us to +think. No, as far as I can see into the situation, our only hope is +that there is a woman in the case and that we can work the jury for +emotional sympathy." He looked keenly at Lyon. + +"You may think it a wild notion," said Lyon, "but I have an idea that +possibly there is a woman in the case, though Lawrence doesn't know +anything about her. I was in Fullerton's rooms at the Wellington this +morning,--" + +"How did you get in?" + +"Blarneyed the janitor. On the table I found a handkerchief that is +the mate of one I have seen in the hand of Mrs. Woods Broughton." + +"Well?" + +"On the table was a transcript of the divorce proceedings in the case +of Grace Vanderburg v. William H. Vanderburg. You know, of course, +that Grace Vanderburg is now Mrs. Woods Broughton." + +Howell nodded. + +"There were a number of books on divorce on the table, as though he +had just been looking up the subject,--or discussing it with a client. +You know Fullerton was Mrs. Vanderburg's attorney." + +"You are leading up to something." + +"This. The elevator boy gave me a more particular description of the +woman who left the Wellington with Fullerton that evening than Donohue +was able to give. I feel sure that woman was Mrs. Broughton." + +"Mrs. Broughton is not in Waynscott." + +"Yes. She is staying with Miss Elliott on Locust Avenue." + +"But the papers have not mentioned it. Are you sure?" + +"She is very quiet,--under the care of Dr. Barry, and suffering from a +nervous shock which dates from Monday night." + +Howell's foot tapped nervously upon the floor. "But this is amazing, +if not incredible. How do you come to know it,--or think you know it?" + +"I have seen and talked with Mrs. Broughton." + +"You!" + +"Yes. She sent for me to ask for information about Lawrence. She said +she had been distressed by the news of the murder, and as Lawrence was +an old friend she was anxious to learn what danger he stood in,--if I +could tell her anything more than the reports in the papers. That's +about all." + +"All!" exclaimed Howell, excitedly. "What more would you want, in the +name of wonder? The woman who was in Fullerton's company--" + +"That's merely my guess, you remember. But the elevator boy described +a chain she wore, and her manner of speaking very accurately." + +"When did you see her?" + +"Last night." + +"You must take me to her immediately. Here you have wasted hours--" + +Lyon shook his head. "Dr. Barry has forbidden her seeing anyone. He +fears serious nervous disturbance,--mental derangement, in fact. She +has evidently had a severe nervous shock." + +"Does Dr. Barry know what you have told me?" + +"No." + +"Does anyone know?" + +"No." + +"Not even Lawrence?" + +"No. I didn't know just what effect it might have upon--his policy of +silence. In fact, I didn't know how to proceed farther, until I had +consulted you." + +Howell smiled grimly. "I am glad you allowed me some share in handling +the matter. From the way you have been going on, I didn't know but +what you were going to take the case out of my hands entirely. Now, +how soon can I see Mrs. Broughton?" + +"I don't know, but not immediately. I saw Dr. Barry this morning. He +thinks her condition serious. I told him I wanted to see her as soon +as possible, but he warned me not to attempt it until he gave me +leave." And he described the scene he had gone through the evening +before, when Mrs. Broughton went into hysterics. + +Howell looked serious. "I see. Of course I can't force myself upon a +woman in that condition. And until I know exactly what her testimony +is going to be, I don't want to have her appear in the case at all. It +is possible, of course, that after I have talked with her my chief +care will be to have her out of the way of the prosecution. I can't +tell _what_ I shall do until I have seen her. If only Bede does not +stumble upon this,--" + +"I came upon Bede in Fullerton's rooms this morning. I don't think he +has thought of identifying the woman with Mrs. Broughton." + +"Although you have?" + +"Well, I had the advantage of knowing that Mrs. Broughton was in town. +I don't think Bede does." + +"How did you find it out?" + +"By a sort of accident. I was at Miss Elliott's School, making some +inquiries about the school, and Miss Elliott let it out." Lyon +breathed a little more freely when that dangerous question was passed. + +Howell tapped his underlip thoughtfully with his long forefinger. + +"You have given me a most important suggestion, Mr. Lyon. Of course it +may lead up to nothing. Even if Mrs. Broughton was the woman whom +Donohue saw with Fullerton, it doesn't follow that she was still with +him when the tragedy occurred. Indeed, it is more than unlikely, +because if she knew anything about the affair, a woman of her standing +and character would have spoken out at once. She would have nothing to +fear." + +Lyon said absolutely nothing, but Howell, watching him, caught some +unspoken thought and turned upon him with swift amaze. + +"You don't mean--" + +"No, no, no," said Lyon. "I am sure not." + +But Howell looked thoughtful. "He was her attorney in that divorce +suit, and you say that the table was covered with books on divorce, +and she had been there to consult him, as is evidenced by her +handkerchief. If there was anything irregular about that divorce and +he knew about it, and threatened to use that knowledge-- It is not +impossible to believe that Fullerton might resort to blackmail on +occasion. He was very hard up and Mrs. Broughton is a very wealthy +woman,--so long as her marriage is not impugned. And if we suppose for +a moment that that was the situation, it is not difficult to go a step +further and imagine that his death would be a great relief to her,--so +great that it might have taken the form of a swift temptation. The +blow may have been a sudden, desperate impulse, and it would not have +been beyond the strength of a woman, even a slight woman. But the +means,--the cane?" + +"It has occurred to me as a bare possibility that Fullerton may have +been carrying the cane himself, and that his assailant may have +wrested it from him. You remember Lawrence's testimony that he had the +cane in the library a few days before, and that, owing to an excited +discussion with Fullerton, he did not remember whether he took it away +with him or whether he left it there. Suppose he left it there, and +Fullerton picked it up, it might have happened that he had it with him +on that evening." + +Howell started to his feet and paced the room in suppressed +excitement. + +"It may be utterly fantastic and incredible," he said finally, pausing +before Lyon and looking at him with abstracted eyes, "but it is the +first possible gleam of an outlet that I have seen in any direction. I +must follow it up. I must see Mrs. Broughton just as soon as possible. +I am walking on a mine until I know what she has to say for herself. +It may all amount to nothing. It may be of the most vital importance. +Now how can I be sure of knowing the earliest moment that I can risk +demanding an interview without danger to her health?" + +"I know Dr. Barry." + +"But you can't tell Dr. Barry why you want to know. It is important +that not the slightest hint of this should reach the other side. Of +course Bede may work it out for himself. He is not a fool. Quite the +contrary. We have to take our chances on that. But we don't want to +help him. And if by chance Mrs. Broughton should have nothing to +confess except that she saw Lawrence assault Fullerton, we don't want +to help Bede to that bit of testimony. It is quite on the cards that +that is what she will have to tell me, too. Have you considered that?" + +"I don't think she will," said Lyon slowly. + +"Do you happen to have any reason for that assurance? Your theories +are interesting, young man. If you have any more of them in reserve, +I'd like to hear them." + +But Lyon shook his head. "My theory is based on the assumption that +Lawrence really knows no more about the affair than he has told you." + +"I hope it may prove so," said Howell, somewhat dubiously. "In the +meantime, bear in mind that I must have a chance to see Mrs. Broughton +quietly at the earliest possible moment. Good Lord, man, the Grand +Jury meets in ten days from now. Now, have you any suggestions as to +how that interview can be arranged without notice to the public and +without any chance of a slip-up?" + +"I have just secured a letter of introduction to one of the pupils in +Miss Elliott's School,--Miss Kittie Tayntor," said Lyon. "I thought +that it might prove useful in keeping in close touch with the +situation." + +Howell's gray eyes twinkled appreciatively. "It strikes me that you +are wasted as a mere newspaper man. You have talents. Go ahead and +improve your acquaintance with Miss Kittie. That is safer than to +depend upon Dr. Barry, because he might be biassed. He might think it +advisable to get Mrs. Broughton away quietly, without letting you know +about her movements. Of course a woman of her prominence can't be +lost, but on the other hand, if she wanted to get out of reach, she +could make it difficult for us to find her. It is much better that we +keep watch on her movements without letting her suspect that fact." + +"I'll do my best," said Lyon. + +"And that is a good deal," said Howell, with a sincerity that made +Lyon flush with pleasure. + +When Lyon left Howell's office, he went around to the florist whose +name he had noted on the box of roses in Lawrence's room. After +selecting a boutonnière and admiring the seasonable display of +flowers, he asked casually, + +"By the way. Maxwell, who sent those roses to Lawrence,--Arthur +Lawrence, you know?" + +"I'd like to know myself," said the florist, waking up to sudden +interest. "I don't have such an order as that every day." + +"Why, what was there unusual about it?" + +"Well, hundred dollar bills are unusual in my business, and it isn't +often that I get a letter with a hundred dollars in it and no name +signed to it, with orders to send flowers till the money is used up +and more will be coming." + +"That does sound uncommon. I'd like to see that letter, if you have it +around." + +"Oh, yes, I kept it as a curiosity." He opened a drawer in his desk +and threw a letter on the counter before Lyon. Lyon's first glance at +it showed him plainly enough that the brief note was written in the +same large, angular handwriting that had marked the note which he had +himself received from Mrs. Woods Broughton. As he picked it up to +examine it more closely, an unfortunate accident occurred. A man who +had entered the shop shortly after Lyon and who had possibly overheard +their conversation, had come up close to Lyon's elbow, and now leaned +forward suddenly as though to look at the note over his shoulder. His +hasty movement upset a vase of flowers on the counter. The vase was +broken, the flowers scattered over the floor, and the water poured +over Lyon's cuff and hand, as well as over the note which he had just +picked up. The man was profuse in his apologies, and supplemented +Lyon's handkerchief by his own to remove the traces of the deluge. +Somehow in the momentary confusion the note itself was lost sight of, +but Lyon had seen enough to satisfy him that this munificent order for +flowers was simply another indication of Mrs. Broughton's interest in +Lawrence and his situation. + +Lawrence had wondered what the roses might mean in the language of +flowers. Lyon could not help wondering whether they spelled "Remorse." + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +The first thing to do was to see Kittie Tayntor. Lyon had received +from his kind-hearted friend in Columbus a glowing endorsement, which +he had mailed to Miss Elliott, with a formal request that he might be +permitted to call upon Miss Tayntor. In reply he had received a polite +note, authorizing him to present himself the following Wednesday. This +was encouraging, but it hardly prepared him for the more than +encouraging reception which awaited him when he had duly sent up his +card. A tall girl, with a fluff of light hair and eyes so dazzling +that he really could not tell what color they were, came down to meet +him with a pretty impetuosity. + +"Oh, Cousin Percy! I'm so glad to see you! It took you the longest +time to find out I was here, didn't it? I made up my mind I would +never send you word to the end of time! I just thought I'd have a good +joke on you when you did come around at last." + +"I--I beg your pardon,--" stammered Lyon. + +"Oh, I don't mind I We'll make up for lost time. I have so many things +to tell you about home. When were you there last? I know you don't +write often,--men never do, Aunt Meg says,--so I don't suppose you +know that Cousin Jennie is engaged? To Dr. Whitman. Did you know him? +No, I think you were in the east when he was there. We all like him +very much." + +"I'm afraid you are mista--" Lyon tried to put in, but she swept on, +with the charming hurry of a breathless little brook. + +"And I want to know all about your work. It must be just awfully +interesting to write for the papers. I don't see how you can think of +things to say! I told Miss Elliott that maybe you would help me with +my compositions." + +"I should be delighted, but I must--" + +"She said that since you were my cousin," Kittie ran on, with a subtle +emphasis, and a momentary widening of her wide eyes, "that she would +be very glad to have me submit my compositions to you and get your +suggestions. It is very fortunate that you are my cousin. You know if +you were not, you wouldn't have been allowed to call on me at all. +That's one of the rules of the school." + +"Oh!" said Lyon, with sudden illumination. "I didn't know that. I'm +afraid I never mentioned our relationship to Miss Elliott. I did not +know that it was necessary." + +"Oh, I made it all straight. I explained it to her," Kittie said, +clapping her small hands inaudibly, and fairly beaming her joyous +thanks upon him. + +"Would the rules of the school permit you to go out for a walk with +me? If I tread on dangerous ground without knowing it, you will have +to put me straight. It is a glorious day, and a brisk walk would do +you a lot of good." + +"I don't know," Kittie murmured. "Some time, maybe,--" + +"No time like to-day," said Lyon, firmly. With his best air he +approached the lady who, in the far end of the reception room, had +been absorbed in a volume of British Poets. "Would there be any +objection to my taking my cousin out for a walk?" + +"I think not," the lady said, somewhat hesitatingly. + +"Then run up and put on your hat, Kittie," said Lyon, coolly. "I'll +guarantee to have her back at any time you set." + +"I don't quite know what Miss Elliott would say," hesitated the timid +lady, "but I think you'd better be back in half an hour." + +Kittie threw her arms around her neck. "You're just an angel. Miss +Rose!" And she flew up to her room, while Lyon devoted himself to Miss +Rose so successfully that she looked upon young men as a class more +hopefully from that hour. + +"Now, Cousin Kittie," said Lyon, as soon as they were outside. + +"You needn't keep that up," she interrupted. + +"Yes, I do," he said, firmly. "I mustn't get out of practice for a +minute, or I might slip up some time. Now talk fast and tell me all +the things that I really have to know." + +She shot a shy glance at him under her lashes. "It was awfully nice of +you to catch on so quickly." + +"It was interesting, but difficult. But you are a courageous girl! +Suppose I hadn't caught on?" + +"I know! Wouldn't it have been awful? Or suppose you hadn't +been--nice, you know! But I had to take some chances. You don't know +how dreadful it is to stay shut up inside of walls like that, and +never to go outside unless we go with one of the teachers, and never +to see any callers unless they are relatives. And I haven't any +relatives at all except Aunt Meg and Uncle Joe and Cousin Jennie at +Columbus, so I never had the excitement of going downstairs to see +some one in the reception room, while the girls hung over the +banisters to see what he looked like when he went away." She stole a +gratified glance at Lyon's straight figure and good clothes. "When +Miss Elliott came to tell me about your letter, I was just wild to +think that I should have to miss this splendid chance, just because +you hadn't said you were a relative, so--so--" + +"I see." + +"Do you think it was very awful?" + +"If it had been anyone else but me, it would have been awful, but +since it was I, and since you are never going to do it again for +anyone else,--" + +"Oh, never, never!" + +"I think I was in great luck," said Lyon simply. And certainly the +words were well within the limit of his feelings on the subject. He +had barely hoped to establish some sort of an entrée to the school. +That the Miss Kittie whose name he had selected at random from the +catalogue should be so pretty, so funnily absurd, so unusually +entertaining, was pure gratuity on the part of Fate. And what a +daringly reckless child it was! Modest as Lyon was, he couldn't help +recognizing that it was luck for Kittie as well as for himself that it +was he and not some one else who had been admitted so confidently to +this fascinating intimacy. A dawning sense of responsibility for this +irresponsible new cousin made him defer the real object of his inquiry +to extend the field of his acquaintance with Kittie herself. + +"How long have you been at school here. Kittie?" + +"I came last September. Why?" + +"Oh, I think I ought to know. Do you like it?" + +"Oh, it's rather good fun," she said, cheerfully. "We have lots of +spreads in our rooms and Miss Elliott has rules about everything, and +that keeps us busy. Rules always make me want to go right to work to +break them, just to see if I can." + +"And can you?" he asked, with interest. + +She looked demure. "Oh, maybe there might be some that I don't know +about yet that I couldn't break." + +"What are some of the rules of the school?" That was a point on which +he particularly wished to post himself. + +"Oh, everything. Miss Elliott won't ever let me go out walking with +you like this again. Miss Rose is a new teacher. She has just come, +and she didn't know." + +"But I may come and see you?" + +"Only on Wednesdays. But that will be quite exciting. There are very +few girls who have some one come to see them every Wednesday. But +maybe some Wednesdays you will be busy?" she added politely. "Of +course, if you are busy, I shouldn't expect you to come. Some of the +girls sometimes have flowers sent to them." + +"I'm glad that's allowed," said Lyon, with an inward smile. He was +trying mentally to figure out how he was going to keep in touch with +Mrs. Broughton's condition if he was only allowed to visit the school +once a week. That would not suit him at all. There was now only a week +or eight days before the meeting of the Grand Jury, and if Mrs. +Broughton's information was going to do any good at all, they must +have it very soon. He must try to draw Kittie into his scheme at once, +while he had this opportunity. + +"Kittie, I want you to help me out about something. There is a lady +visiting Miss Elliott--" + +"Oh, do you know her?" + +"I know who she is. And I have met her once." + +"Isn't she perfectly beautiful? I should rather be like her than +anyone else in the world." + +Lyon smiled inscrutably, but his tongue was discreet if his eyes were +not always. But instead of explaining to Kittie that Mrs. Broughton, +beautiful as she was, could never hope to be as delightful as Miss +Tayntor, he held himself strictly to the matter in hand. + +"Mrs. Broughton is very ill, and Dr. Barry says that I must not +disturb her by talking business. Now, it is very urgent that I should +have a chance to talk business with her as soon as she is able to +stand it,--at the very earliest moment possible. I was wondering if I +could find out through you how she is getting on. I am afraid to trust +Dr. Barry, you see. He will want to keep me off, and it may be too +late to do any good by the time he is willing. At the same time I +don't want to force myself upon her before she really is strong enough +to stand it. You understand?" + +"Oh, yes, indeed. I'll explain it all to her, and then she can say +herself when she wants you to come." + +"Are you allowed to go in to see her?" asked Lyon in surprise. + +"Every evening. She likes to have me rub her head and put her to +sleep." + +"Oh, that's very fortunate. I thought no one was allowed to go in at +all." + +"No one else is. No one even goes into those halls, and we mustn't +laugh or talk so that she can hear it. But the first evening when we +came back after vacation, I naturally wanted to know who it was in +those rooms and why she was shut up with a trained nurse and why we +had to keep so specially quiet for her, so I just waited around till +the nurse went down to get her supper and then I slipped in. The door +wasn't locked, so it was perfectly easy. And there I found the most +perfectly beautiful woman I ever saw outside of a book. You can't +think how fascinated I was. I knew it was good for my education to see +a lot of her, because she had such lovely manners, and I was wild to +think they would come and order me out and make a rule that I must +never go In again, so I just made myself as interesting to her as I +possibly could. I had to hurry a lot because there wasn't much time. +The nurse was liable to come back any moment." + +"How interesting can you make yourself when you really give your mind +to it?" asked Lyon, with lively curiosity. + +"Oh,--interesting _enough_. It worked all right, too, because when the +nurse came back, Mrs. Broughton just insisted that I should stay a +little longer. She said it did her good, and she would be nervous if +they didn't let me stay, and that she liked to have me there, and she +got so excited that they got scared, I guess, because the nurse +finally said, 'W-e-11,--' like that, you know, and so I stayed, and I +_was_ good for her, too, so ever since that they let me go in for an +hour in the evening, while the nurse is having her supper." + +"Good. Nothing could be better. Then you can let me know the first +minute that she is strong enough for me to come and see her, and +particularly whether she is planning to go away. Would you be sure to +know that?" + +"Oh, yes. I'd see. I always see things." + +"And you could send me a note?" + +Kittie looked doubtful. "Miss Elliott reads all our letters, you +know." + +"No, I didn't know." + +"That wouldn't matter, because I could write it so that she wouldn't +understand, although it would be perfectly plain to you, but I am not +sure she would let me write to you at all. You see, you are a rather +new cousin, and if you are going to come to see me every week,--" + +"She would think that was enough. I see. Well then, what can we do?" + +But Kittie had a plan already evolved. "I know. My room is the corner +one at the back of the house,--you can see it from this corner of the +street. There, do you see the two windows with the curtains clear up? +Well, so long as I leave the curtain in the right-hand window up the +way it is now, it means that she is too ill to be disturbed, but if I +pull it down she is getting better, and the more I pull it down, the +better and stronger she is until when I pull it way down she is quite +well. The other window, the one in the corner, will tell about her +going away. If I see signs of her getting ready to go, I'll pull it +part way down, and if it goes as low as the middle sash it means you +must hurry if you want to see her, and when I pull it quite down, she +has gone!" + +"Kittie, you are a genius!" + +"And you don't mind that it is breaking rules,--only they aren't made +into rules, because nobody thought that they would be needed? I +thought just a little that you didn't quite like it a while ago!" + +Lyon laughed. "You are quite right, and I mustn't be superior any +more. But it is very important that I should have a chance to see Mrs. +Broughton,--important to other people than myself." + +She gave him a demure, sidelong glance, and then dropped her eyes. "Is +it about Mr. Lawrence?" she asked, ingenuously. + +"You amazing young lady! What do you know about Mr. Lawrence?" + +"Mrs. Broughton told me about him." + +"Did she?" he asked alertly. "What did she tell you?" + +"Oh, she has talked about him a great deal. He was an old friend of +hers before she was married, and, just think, she had seen him only +the day before all this happened." + +"Did she tell you where she saw him, or what they talked about?" + +"No. But she is very grateful to him for something he did for her. She +says he is like a knight of old. I think if he could know she said +that, he would feel proud, don't you?" + +Lyon frowned thoughtfully. Mrs. Broughton's sudden sense of gratitude +toward Lawrence seemed uncalled for. "What else did she say to you?" + +Kittie reflected. "She said that they would never, never hang Mr. +Lawrence, because nobody saw him kill Mr. Fullerton, and they couldn't +hang him unless somebody swore they saw him. Is that the law?" + +"I don't know much about the law, myself." + +"And she says that it isn't so bad for him to be locked up for a +little while, when they will have to let him go in the end, as it +would be for some one to be hanged. I think that is true, too, don't +you?" + +In spite of the need he felt to explore her mind, the words on her +lips shocked him. + +"Mrs. Broughton shouldn't talk to you about such things," he said +impatiently. + +She lifted astonished eyes to his. + +"But then I should never have known anything about it! Miss Elliott +doesn't allow us to read the papers ever, and I want to know Life." + +"Time enough," laughed Lyon. + +"Oh, I'm not a child. I can understand. It has been a great thing for +me to know Mrs. Broughton." + +"She is a beautiful woman," Lyon conceded, somewhat coldly. Secretly +he thought Kittie might have been as well off without that intimacy. +But before he left the subject there was one point on which he wanted +to get light, if possible, without betraying the point of his +interest,--Mrs. Broughton's possible acquaintance with the loose panel +in the protecting wall of the school yard. + +"Do you know if Mrs. Broughton has been here before?" he asked. + +"Oh, yes. She always stops here when she comes to Waynscott. She was +one of Miss Elliott's first pupils." + +"Then she knows the house and yard, pretty well?" + +"Oh, of course." + +"By the way, I notice that your back yard is fenced in. There is no +way of getting in except by the front door, of course." + +Kittie looked at him with surprise. + +"When you say 'of course' in that careless way, it makes me think you +mean just the opposite," she said, suspiciously. + +He had to laugh at her penetration. "Then is there any other way in?" +he asked. + +She hesitated, and then said with an exaggerated imitation of his own +"careless" manner, + +"Oh, _of course_ not!" + +"Does Mrs. Broughton know about it, do you think?" + +She pursed up her lips and nodded her head violently. + +"She belongs to the Immortal Few Society. It has always been one of +the things the Immortal Few learned at initiation." + +"Has she spoken of it to you?" + +"No." + +"No, she wouldn't be apt to," Lyon reflected. Then somewhat violently +he changed the subject. "Come, we won't talk about her any more. Tell +me about our family, so that I won't make mistakes." + +She spent the rest of the time coaching him about his newly acquired +relatives, and they parted at Miss Elliot's door with mutual +satisfaction. + +There is no game so trying to the nerves as a waiting game. Lyon was +cool by temperament and self-controlled from experience, but he found +it necessary to call on both his native and acquired composure to +enable him to face the situation without wanting to do something, +anything, to force Fate's hand. To wait, just to sit still and wait +for Mrs. Broughton to recover, while all the time Lawrence was drawing +nearer and nearer to the day that would blast his career even if he +escaped with his life,--it was nerve-racking. And all the time Bede +was working, like a mole in the dark, undermining the wall of silence +which Lawrence had thrown up. Heaven knew what he might feel bound to +discover for the credit of his profession! It might prove, of course, +that Mrs. Broughton had nothing bearing upon the subject to tell, but +until he knew that to be the case he would hold the hope that somehow, +in some way, she might clear matters up. Yes, he must wait. + +And then, as he was dropping off to sleep, he woke himself up to +murmur quite irrelevantly, + +"Anyhow, I'm glad she didn't say that she would be a sister to me!" + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +But if Lyon had fancied that Fate was doing nothing merely because he +had run into a blind alley himself, he soon had reason to suspect that +he was mistaken. The manner in which during the next few days he +stumbled against some of her threads, and so became more than ever +entangled in her weaving, was curiously casual,--but as a matter of +fact, most of the happenings of life seem casual at the time. It is +only looking back that their connection comes into view, like a path +on a far mountain, only to be seen from a distance. + +Lyon had allowed himself to jubilate a little over the curtain-code +which he had established with Kittie. He felt that it had the +justification of being important in itself for the purpose which he +and Howell had at heart, but apart from that it was so charmingly +personal. The messages might concern Mrs. Broughton, but Kittie would +have to give them,--and that little fact was so interesting that if he +had not been a young man of much steadiness of purpose, he might have +let it eclipse the significance of the message. As it was, he felt it +highly important that he should be able to see those windows very +frequently. Suppose Kitty should pull down a curtain and he not know +about it for hours! The idea was not to be entertained calmly. Would +it be possible for him to get a room in the neighborhood? He had +learned in his profession that the world belongs to him who asks for +it, so, selecting a house whose back windows must, from their +position, command an unobstructed view of Miss Elliott's School, he +boldly rang the bell. He had no idea who might live there. The house +was on a lot adjoining Miss Wolcott's and, like her house, it +overlooked the back windows and the grounds of the School. It was in a +position that suited his needs. For the rest, he trusted to the star +which had more than once favored his quiet audacity. + +His ring was answered by a servant of a peculiarly uncheerful cast of +countenance. + +"Is your mistress at home?" Lyon asked. + +"There ain't no mistress," the woman protested, in an aggrieved tone. + +"Well, your master, then. Will you take up my card? I want to see him +on business." + +She took it and departed, with that same querulous air of +dissatisfaction with the world in general. + +That there was no mistress in the house was very evident, even to +Lyon's uninstructed masculine sense. The reception room where he +waited was dusty and musty, bearing unmistakable signs of having been +closed for the summer and since left untouched. There was an echoing +hollowness about the halls that seemed to proclaim the house +uninhabited, in spite of the servant. While Lyon was speculating upon +the situation, a thin dark middle-aged man entered the room silently +and yet with an alertness that was noticeable. He looked at Lyon with +sharp inquiry--almost, it struck the intruder, with distrust. + +"Well?" he said curtly. + +"I hope it won't strike you as cheeky," said Lyon, "but I called on +the bare chance of your having a spare bedroom that you could rent me +for a month,--or even less. I think my references would be +satisfactory. They are going to paper my rooms at the Grosvenor, and +I've got to clear out while they are messing around, and I like this +part of town, so I just thought I'd see what luck I had if I went +around and asked. I'm not exacting--" + +"We're not renting rooms." + +"I know, but as a special matter--" + +"Couldn't think of it." + +"Do you happen to know anyone else in the neighborhood who does?" + +"Don't know anyone." + +"I wish you would reconsider. It would be an accommodation to me." + +"Sorry, but it's impossible." The impatience of the man's tone +suggested that the interview Had lasted long enough, and Lyon rose +reluctantly. He hated to feel that his inspiration had failed him. At +that moment, however, the portière which separated the reception room +from what appeared to be an equally musty and dusty library in the +rear was pushed aside, and another man entered,--a man of impressive +bearing and appearance, in spite of the fact that he wore a skullcap +and a long dressing gown and that a pair of large blue goggles hid his +eyes. The lower part of his face was covered with a beard and yet Lyon +felt at once that here was a man of powerful personality. + +"I overheard your request from the next room," he said, in a courteous +but positive tone, and bowing slightly to Lyon,--who could not repress +a wonder whether that position in the back room had not been taken for +the express purpose of overhearing him. "I'm not sure that we cannot +accommodate the young gentleman, Phillips." + +Phillips looked disapproval and injury in every line of his face, but +he said nothing. He had at once fallen into the attitude of a +subordinate. + +"You are more than kind," said Lyon, eagerly. "I know it's a great +deal to ask,--but it would be a great accommodation, and I'd try to +make no bother." + +"You will have to judge for yourself whether there is a room that you +could use. I don't know much about the house. We have only just moved +in ourselves. It was a furnished house, closed for the summer, and the +agent let us take it for the time being. I am in town temporarily, +having my eyes treated, and I wanted a place where I could be more +quiet than in a hotel. My name is Olden. This is my good friend +Phillips, who looks after me generally, and thinks I ought not to +increase my household. I sometimes venture to differ from him, +however. The servant, whom you saw at the door, has undertaken to keep +us from starving, and she would undoubtedly be able to care for your +room. Now you know the family. Would you care to look at the rooms?" + +"Thank you, I should like to very much," cried Lyon gayly. + +It was so much better than he had had any possible grounds for +expecting that his faith in his star soared up again. This was what +came of venturing! And in spite of the curious sensation of talking in +the dark which Mr. Olden's goggles gave him, he liked the man. There +was dignity and directness in his speech, and his voice was singularly +magnetic. + +Olden led the way upstairs, moving with the swift confidence of a man +of affairs and not at all as an invalid. + +"There are four bedrooms on this floor," he said. "Phillips has one of +them, and I have one. This large room at the front is unoccupied." + +The room was large and attractive, but Lyon was not interested in the +view toward Hemlock Avenue! He barely glanced at it. + +"Might I see the other room?" + +Olden opened the door to a back bedroom which, though clean, was small +and in no wise so desirable as the other. But it looked the right way, +and on going to the window Lyon saw that Kittie's curtains were both +high up. + +"This will suit me exactly," he said, eagerly. "May I have this room?" + +"You really haven't looked at it very carefully," said Olden, with +just the barest hint of amusement in his voice. + +"Oh, well,--I--I can see that it will suit me. I shan't be in it very +much, you know. I'm connected with the _News_, as you know from my +card. I'll be here only at night." + +"Yes, it's a pleasant little room. And it has an open view. That large +building is Miss Elliott's School, I am told." + +"Yes, I know," laughed Lyon. "Fact is, I know one of the young ladies +at the school." + +"Indeed?" There was surprise and, if it had been possible to believe +it, disappointment in Mr. Olden's voice. It was as though he had said, +"Oh, is that it?" The blue goggles scrutinized Lyon for a moment +before he said, "Well, shall we consider it settled?" + +"If you please. When can I come in?" + +"Whenever you like. I'll tell Sarah to make the room ready. And I +hope, Mr. Lyon," he added, as they went back downstairs, "that you +will sometimes join me in a cigar before you turn in. Shut in as I am, +unable to use my eyes or to see people, you will be doing me a charity +if you will come in and gossip a bit. Will you do it?" + +"I'll be glad to," said Lyon, heartily. + +"That will more than repay me, if there is any favor to you in our +arrangement," the man said with a certain emphasis. He probably was +lonely, Lyon reflected, with quick sympathy. + +Lyon left the house much elated. When he reached the sidewalk he +remembered that he had not asked for a latch-key, and that he was apt +to return late. He hurried back to the door. The lock had not caught +when he came out and the door stood just so much ajar that he saw +Olden and Phillips in the hall, and heard Olden exclaim, with a ring +of passion in his voice, "You would have thrown such a chance as that +away?" + +They both looked so startled, when he made his presence known, that he +was swiftly aware that he was the subject of what seemed to have been +a heated discussion. Evidently Phillips had protested against his +admission to the household. At his suggestion about a latch-key. Olden +answered, + +"Why, I have only one, but I'll let you in myself whenever you ring. +I'll be up, never fear." + +Lyon had a busy afternoon,--for in spite of his mental absorption in +matters relating to Lawrence, he was still reporting for the _News_ +and had to keep his assignments! He therefore had no opportunity to +see Howell that day, and it was nine o'clock at night when he arrived, +with his suit-case, at his new home. Olden let him in with an alacrity +that suggested he had been waiting for him. This idea was also +suggested by the looks of the dining room, where a tray, with bottles +and glasses and a box of cigars, had been arranged alluringly within +sight. + +"All right, I'll be down in a minute," the new lodger said, gaily. +"We'll make a night of it! Just wait till I put my suit-case in my +room." + +He ran upstairs to his room and looked across to Miss Elliott's +School. Across the white barrenness of the snowy yard that stretched +between the two houses, the light gleamed brightly from Kittie's +windows. The curtain of the right window was perceptibly lower than +the other. It seemed to cut off the upper third of the window. Lyon +read the message with keen interest,--"Mrs. Broughton is better. She +gives no signs of departure." Across the dark he blew a kiss to the +unseen messenger, and hurried downstairs where his mysterious landlord +was walking restlessly up and down the long dining room. + +"Well, what shall we gossip about?" he asked gaily. Olden had shown no +signs of physical feebleness, yet Lyon felt a hurt about him that +prompted him to a show of cheerfulness beyond his habit with a +stranger, and the success of his curtain code had put him into an +elated mood. + +"What do people generally gossip about?" + +"Their friends, don't they? And their enemies; and the delinquencies +of both." + +"That's all right," said Olden, quickly. "Tell me about your friends +and their delinquencies." + +"I haven't many here. I'm a stranger myself, comparatively. The man in +Waynscott I care most for, and admire most, and am sorriest for, is +Arthur Lawrence." + +Olden was leaning forward in an attitude of eager listening. + +"That sounds like a good beginning. Will you have something--? Then +have a cigar, and talk to me about Arthur Lawrence. I'm entirely a +stranger in Waynscott, you know, but of course I have heard of the +murder. I infer that you believe him innocent." + +"Yes, I do." + +"Yet I see that he was unable or unwilling to give a very clear +account of his movements that evening.--Phillips read me the +newspapers, and I thought it looked like a tight box for him, unless +he could explain his movements somewhat." + +"But he may explain them yet. Trial by newspaper is not final. There +has been no chance for the real testimony, you know." + +"Has gossip nothing to say on the subject?" persisted Olden. He had +dropped into an arm chair and was surrounding himself with smoke, but +Lyon was aware that through the smoke and the goggles which he still +wore he was bending an observant eye upon his visitor. + +"Gossip says many nothings. So far, nothing relevant. The murder seems +to be one of these clueless mysteries which are the most difficult for +the police to unravel." + +"But you,--you are behind the scenes, in a fashion. Don't you know +something that the public hasn't got hold of? I--I'm interested, you +see." + +Lyon smoked thoughtfully. The man's interest was so marked that it +struck him as going beyond the bounds of ordinary curiosity. He felt +that he must probe it, and so he answered with a view to keeping the +subject going. + +"We hear of the mysteries that are solved, but there are many more +that drop from the notice of the public because they remain mysteries +forever." + +"Is it not possible that there may be a woman connected with the +mystery?" asked Olden with a sudden hardening of his voice. + +Lyon smoked deliberately a moment. + +"With nothing known and everything to guess, it is difficult to say of +anything that it is not possible," he answered. + +"Has Lawrence's name never been connected with a woman? Is there no +gossip?" + +"Of the sort you suggest, nothing, I believe." Lyon's voice was calm, +If his feelings were not. + +"Your Mr. Lawrence is a wonder," said Olden, drily. "I hope to meet +him some day. Let us drink to his release and to the confusion of the +Grand Jury. A man who can keep himself free from all feminine +entanglements ought to get out of a little thing like an accusation +for murder without any difficulty." + +"You seem to have strong feelings on the subject," said Lyon. It +occurred to him that all the drawing-out need not be on Olden's side. +Olden smoked a minute in silence, and then asked abruptly, + +"Do you believe that women as a class have any sense of truth?" + +"Oh, they must have some!" + +"But do they have the same sense of honor that we have?" + +"I don't know that we have enough to hurt. But you are thinking of +some specific case. Suppose you give me an outline of it." + +"What makes you think that?" + +"Oh, we always are thinking of a woman when we generalize about +women." + +Olden smoked hard and in silence for a few minutes. + +"I don't know whether you are right about that or not," he said +finally, "but you are right in saying that I was thinking of a +specific instance, and I'll be rather glad to give you an outline of +it, because I should like to ask your opinion in regard to it. I think +I understand men pretty well, but I never have had much to do with +women. Perhaps if I had,--this is the story of a friend of mine. He +told me about it just before I came on." + +Lyon nodded. Possibly that might be the truth, but he would keep an +open mind on the subject. + +"My friend is a man past middle life,--a successful business man. He +has made money and has knocked about the world a good deal, but he +never fell in love until he was nearly fifty,--never had time, I +suppose. Then he was hard hit. The woman was a good deal younger than +he was, beautiful, and all that. He married her just as soon as he +could win her consent, and was idiotically happy. For a year he +thought she was happy, too. She seemed to be. Then one day she +received a letter from her old home that upset her. She tried to +conceal her disturbance from him, but he was too watchful of her moods +to be deceived. From that moment his happiness was destroyed. His wife +was concealing something from him. Other letters followed. They always +had the same effect. The husband could not be blind to the fact that +his wife was changed. She avoided him, withheld her confidence, and he +found her more than once in tears. Perhaps it does not sound very +serious, but you must remember that he was madly in love with his +wife. It was serious for him." + +Lyon nodded. "Did he know anything of his wife's past history,--her +friends, or her--" + +"Her lovers? No, he didn't. There was the sting. He simply didn't know +anything. He could only see that something had come out of that +unknown past to ruin his happiness." + +"Why didn't he ask her, straight?" + +"He did, once, and she pretended not to know what he was talking +about. After that he set himself to watch. He pretended to be called +away on a sudden business trip. She left, by the next train, for her +old home, and went at once to the man with whom she had been +corresponding." + +"How did you--how did her husband know who the man was?" + +"He had once found a letter, destroyed before it was finished, which +enabled him to identify the man." + +"Was it a love-letter?" + +Olden dropped his head on his hand. "Not in terms. But it showed that +this man possessed a confidence which she withheld from her husband. +In it she spoke of her unhappiness in her married life as of something +that he would understand,--something that they had acknowledged +between them. Does that seem a little thing to you?" + +"No, I can understand. Well, what did he do?" + +"Nothing, yet. But I am afraid he may do something. If he should kill +the man, would you say he was justified?" + +"What would be the use?" asked Lyon, lightly. + +"That isn't the question, when your brain is on fire. You see only one +thing. The whole world is blotted out, and only that one thing burns +before your eyes. I suppose that is the way one feels when going mad. +Everything else blotted out, you know, except that one thing that you +can't forget night or day,--awake or asleep,--" His voice was +trembling with a passion that went beyond control. If Lyon had had any +question that the strange man was telling his own story, he could no +longer doubt it. Such sympathy is not given to the troubles of a +friend. + +"I understand that he has not killed the man yet?" + +"No,--not yet." + +"Well, then I'd advise him to wait a bit, in any event, and make sure +of his facts. There's no sense in hurrying these things. Tell him to +count ten. Also tell him that circumstantial evidence is the very +devil. The chances are that if a thing looks so and so, that's the +very reason for its turning out to be the other way. Now take this +case of Lawrence's." + +"Yes. What of it?" Olden had recovered himself, and he asked his +question with an interest that seemed genuine, if somewhat cynical. + +"The circumstantial evidence against him is pretty bad, yet you +wouldn't want to have him hanged on the strength of it, would you?" + +"I would not," said Olden, with a sudden laugh that sounded strange +after his passion of a moment before. "I can think of nothing that I +should more regret than to have your friend Lawrence hung. I drink to +his speedy discharge." And he poured himself a stiff drink and drained +it with a fervor that made the act seem sacrificial. Certainly there +was a good deal of the original Adam in this curious stranger. + +The sudden ring of the telephone in the hall cut so sharply across the +silence in the house that it startled them both. Olden went to answer +it, and immediately returned. + +"It's someone to speak to you, Mr. Lyon,--name is Howell." + +"Oh, yes. I suppose he got my new address from the Grosvenor." + +He went to the phone, and this is the conversation that ensued. + +Howell: "Hello, Lyon. Changed your room?" + +Lyon: "Yes. I followed your suggestion." + +Howell: "That's what I wanted to talk to you about. I'm getting +nervous about putting off that interview with Mrs. Broughton any +longer. Barry tells me she is worse. I don't want to risk waiting +until it is too late. If she should die, for instance,--" + +Lyon: "Barry is bluffing, to protect his patient. She is better." + +Howell: "How do you know?" + +Lyon: "Miss Kittie tells me she is better." + +Howell: "When was that?" + +Lyon: "An hour ago." + +Howell: "How did you hear from her?" + +Lyon: "By heliograph. We have established a code." + +Howell: "You seem to have been improving the time! You think I'm safe +to wait, then, a day or two? I simply must see her before she gets +away, you know." + +Lyon: "No sign of departure, the code said." + +Howell. "And will you know if she should suddenly show signs of +departure?" + +Lyon: "Yes. Her curtain will be lowered. Clear down means gone." + +Howell: "That will be too late." + +Lyon: "She isn't likely to bolt without warning, and no one would be +in better position to take note than Miss Kittie." + +Howell: "All right, I'll depend on that, then. But if Bede finds her +first, I'll regret my humanity." + +Lyon: "I think we're safe." + +Howell: "Perhaps. But not sure." And he rang off. + +When Lyon returned to the dining room, he found that the door was +ajar, though he had thought that he closed it after him when going to +the 'phone. If his host had been curious enough to listen to one side +of the conversation, Lyon hoped that he might have found it +interesting. Intelligible it could hardly have been. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +Lyon had carefully refrained from giving Lawrence any hint as to the +new turn his suspicions had taken. He had an instinctive feeling that +the masterful prisoner in the county jail would have scant patience +with any unauthorized efforts on his part to penetrate the mystery. +That, to Lyon's mind, might be a very good reason for not talking +about his activities, but he was the last man to abandon his own line +merely out of deference to another man's prejudices. He was always +more interested in getting results, however, than in getting credit, +so he was content to work instead of talk. + +But on his next visit to Lawrence, he took occasion to put a +hypothetical question which went directly to the heart of his +perplexity and for which he very much wanted an answer--though he +didn't expect to get it. + +"Lawrence," he said, in a casual tone, having first carefully taken a +position where he had the advantage of the light in watching the other +man's face, "have you considered the possibility that Miss Wolcott +may, after all, have had nothing to do with that affair?" + +Lawrence turned upon him with swift amazement and anger. + +"What do you mean?" he demanded in a threatening undertone, with an +apprehensive glance at the door. + +"The guard couldn't hear me to save his ears. I mean simply,--are you +sure of your premises? You see, I am taking for granted that your +policy of silence is to protect--oh, I won't mention her name again. +But what if the facts should be that she doesn't need any protection? +What if it really proves that you are making a sacrifice which is not +merely heroic but is unnecessary? Suppose the woman who ran across the +street was someone else?" + +"Have you dared to tell--to hint--" + +"What I might dare to do is one thing, what I have actually done is +another. As a matter of fact, I have neither told nor hinted,--nor +have I knocked you down for thinking such a thing possible." + +Lawrence dropped into his chair and let his head sink on his hand. + +"I beg your pardon. But it makes me wild to think how helpless I am. I +can't keep Howell, for instance, from mousing around, and I can't keep +Bede from peering and prying,"-- + +"Or me from guessing or breathing. No, you can't. Of course they may +not discover anything, but even the police sometimes get hold of the +right clue. You are trying to keep them from a certain clue, at a +tremendous risk to yourself, and yet you don't know, you only suspect, +that your silence may benefit the person I do not name." + +Lawrence drummed impatiently with his fingers for a minute, and then +he looked up with a direct glance into Lyon's eyes. + +"Lyon, you're an awfully good fellow to have any patience with what +must seem sheer unreason to you, and I wish I could be quite frank +with you and make you see the situation as I do. But you are certain +to be put on the witness stand yourself, so I simply can't give you +any facts which you don't already know. You see that?" + +"Yes,--but are they facts?" + +Lawrence looked at him queerly. "What explanation do you suggest for +my cane being where it was?" he asked. + +"You left it somewhere,--perhaps at the state library--and Fullerton +picked it up, carried it off, and had it in his hand when he was +attacked." + +Lawrence looked surprised and then he laughed in quick amusement. + +"Ingenious, by Jove! I hope you've suggested that theory to Howell. It +will give him something to occupy his mind. It would be difficult for +him to prove it, but then. It would be difficult for the prosecution +to disprove it--_unless they should happen to discover where I +actually did forget my cane_." + +"You mean--?" + +"You can probably work it out," said Lawrence drily. "Supposing that I +did mean that, don't you see that the one and only person who could +throw any light on how my cane came to be where it was found is the +one and only person who must not be questioned?" + +"I see. But do you really think that the one and only person will +maintain silence on such a matter at such a cost to you?" + +"If things come to the worst, I fear the one and only person will not. +My hope is that things will not come to the worst,--that there may be +a disagreement or even an acquittal. Really you see, I don't feel so +sure the prosecution holds a hand that leaves me no chance of coming +out even. We are both bluffing, but I rather think I can bluff hardest +if my flank isn't turned by my too zealous counsel." + +"Still,--" + +"Still, Lyon, and yet, and nevertheless, and in spite of all, I am +happier than I remember ever being before in all my life, and I shall +never think of this room so long as I live without feeling again the +joy of a conqueror." + +"May I ask why, you extraordinary man?" + +"Because the one and only person has accepted my suggestion in regard +to silence so sweetly. I have made several suggestions to that person, +I don't mind telling you, which have not been accepted. They have been +turned down hard. It seemed to have become a habit with her and I was +getting discouraged. Now, the course which I suggested in this +instance would not be agreeable to her. Nothing could be more opposed +to her natural instinct than to keep silence if--well, under the +circumstances. She has done what must have been a thousand times +harder than to make even the most public explanation, she has done it +for me,--because I asked her to. Now do you understand why I am happy? +I'm in Paradise!" + +Lyon grasped his hand in sympathetic silence, and left him. At least +he had found out why Lawrence was so convinced in his own mind that +Miss Wolcott was somehow implicated. Evidently it was the cane that +seemed to him conclusive. He had left his cane at Miss Wolcott's and +he knew it. It could have come into evidence in connection with the +murder of Fullerton only through Miss Wolcott's direct or indirect +agency. That was Lawrence's conviction. To protect her in any event, +he was using his influence to keep her from speaking and drawing +conclusions from her compliance which might be justified if his theory +of her complicity was correct, but which would fall to the ground if, +as a matter of fact, she was really as ignorant of the murder (and the +cane) as Lyon was now inclined to believe she might be. In that case, +alas for poor Lawrence! His paradise might prove but a Fool's +Paradise, after all. The primary question remained, therefore, whether +she really was implicated or not. + +He had promised her, at their first and only interview, to call +occasionally and report as to the progress of affairs, but he had +deferred carrying out his promise, partly because he had nothing +decisive to tell her and partly because he was rather shy of +encouraging a confidence which might possibly place him in possession +of embarrassing information. He did not want to learn anything that +would hamper him when he was called to the witness stand, as he +undoubtedly would be. But two things happened that day to make him +keep his promise without further postponement. + +The first was his discovery that Bede was hovering about Miss +Wolcott's neighborhood. Lyon had caught a fleeting glimpse of Miss +Wolcott going into a shop. A moment later he noticed Bede across the +street from the shop, busily engaged in studying a display of hosiery +in a show-window. He did not connect the two events at the moment, but +half an hour later he met Miss Wolcott face to face, still in the +shopping district. The look of suppressed pain in her eyes as she +gravely bowed disturbed him so much that he walked on rather +unobservantly for a few steps. + +Then he was brought back to consciousness by a keen look that pierced +him like a surgeon's probe as a quiet gray little man passed him. It +was Bede. The significance of that piercing scrutiny flashed upon +Lyon. Bede had seen him bow to Miss Wolcott and was sorting that +little fact into the proper pigeon-hole in his brain. He turned to +look after the detective. Bede was pausing to turn over some +second-hand books on an exposed stall, and he lingered there until Miss +Wolcott came out of a shop farther down the block. As she went on, +Bede, who had never glanced in her direction, finished his inspection +of the books and went on also. Casually, he followed the same +direction she had taken. Lyon, who had lingered to observe his action, +walked on very thoughtfully. That was the first thing. The second was +a special-delivery letter which was brought to him that same afternoon +while he was rushing to an assignment. The urgency of the outside +found no counterpart in the simple little note which it enclosed: + + +"Dear Mr. Lyon: + +"Could you conveniently call this evening? I shall be at home after +seven. Yours sincerely, + +"Edith Wolcott." + + +Lyon looked at the special delivery stamp, remembered Bede, and put +the note in his pocket with some anxiety. What was up now? He +perceived an urgency in the request which did not appear in the words +themselves, and he looked forward to the call with some anxiety. If +her nerve had broken down, and she should hurl a confession at him +before he could stop her, what should he do about it? + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +Miss Wolcott received Lyon with the same curiously cold and impersonal +manner that had struck him before, but unless he deceived himself, +it was a manner deliberately assumed this time to conceal some +unwonted nervousness of which she was herself afraid. Her face was +as Sphinx-like as ever, but there was an unevenness of tension in her +voice which betrayed emotion. + +"I sent for you because something curious has happened," she said +abruptly, "and I don't know anyone else to talk it over with. I +received yesterday, by mail, this letter." And she handed him a single +sheet of note paper, on which was written, in a bold hand, + + +"Remember, I said living or dead. + +"Warren Fullerton." + + +Lyon looked up at her in amaze. "You received this yesterday?" + +"Yes." + +"Are you familiar with Mr. Fullerton's handwriting?" + +"Yes. It is his." + +"Can you be positive about that?" + +He thought she suppressed a shudder, but her voice was coldly calm as +she answered, "I do not think I can be deceived in it. I know it very +well." + +"May I see the envelope?" + +She handed it to him silently. It corresponded with the paper, was +addressed to her in the same bold, assured hand, and the postmark was +particularly plain. It had been mailed the day it had been delivered. +The note and envelope were both made of a thin peculiar grayish-green +paper, oriental in appearance, with a faint perfume about them that +would have been dizzying if more pronounced. Lyon held the paper up to +the light. It vas watermarked, but so faintly that he had to study it +carefully before he made out that the design was that of a coiled +serpent with hooded head. As he moved the paper to bring out the +outline, the coils seemed to change and move and melt into one +another. Certainly it would have been a difficult paper to duplicate. + +"Was Mr. Fullerton in the habit of using this paper?" + +"Yes. It was made for him. He was given to fads like that. And another +thing, though a trifle. You will notice he uses two green one-cent +stamps, instead of the red two. He always stamped the letters written +on that paper with green stamps." + +"Does the message convey any special meaning to you?" + +Miss Wolcott waited a moment before replying, as though to gather her +self-control into available form. "I was at one time engaged to be +married to Mr. Fullerton. I was very young and romantic and--silly. I +had not known him very long. And almost immediately I had to go east +to spend three months with some friends. While I was away I wrote to +Mr. Fullerton,--very silly letters. After I came back something +happened that made me change my mind and my feelings towards him. I +broke the engagement and sent him back his letters and presents. He +refused to be released or to release me. It was a very terrible time. +He said that if ever I should marry anyone else, he would send my +love-letters to him to my husband,--and this whether he was alive or +dead." + +"Ah! That explains, you think, this phrase?" + +"I am sure of it." + +"Did the threat make any special impression on you at the time? I mean +did it influence your actions at all?" + +"It made me determine never to think of marrying." Then, in answer to +Lyon's look of surprise, she added, impetuously, "I would rather die +than have anyone read those letters. I simply could not think of it. +No man's love could stand such a test. To know that his wife had said +such silly, silly things to another man,--it would be intolerable." + +"But no gentleman _would_ read them." + +She shrugged her shoulders lightly. "In a play, no. But in real life, +he would be very curious. Or, if he did not read them, he still could +not forget them. He would have them in his mind, and would perhaps +guess them worse than they were. Besides, you do not know Mr. +Fullerton. He would have managed in some way to bring about what he +wanted. I cannot guess how, but those letters would have been put +where they must be read. He was not one to trip in his plans." + +"Did you make any attempt to recover your letters?" + +She did not answer at once, and glancing at her Lyon saw that the +agitation which she had been holding back seemed to have swept her for +a moment beyond her own control. She was trembling so violently that +she could not speak, and only the forcible pressure of her slender +hands upon the arms of her chair gave her steadiness enough to hold +her emotions in check. He turned to the light and busied himself for a +minute in a critical examination of the letter. Then he came back to +his question--for he was of no mind to let it pass unanswered. + +"Did you ever try to recover the letters?" + +"Once," she said, in a very low voice. + +"And you failed?" + +"Worse than failed." She threw out her hand toward the note he still +held. "Did he not say, living or dead? Mere death could not interfere +when he had set his will upon revenge." + +"Then whoever wrote this note," said Lyon, thoughtfully, "must have +had knowledge of his purposes as well as access to his private desk +and knowledge of his personal peculiarities in regard to stamps. Now, +Miss Wolcott, you must help me. Who would be likely to know of your +letters?" + +"How can I tell? I have hardly seen him for four years until--" She +broke off, leaving the sentence unfinished. + +"Have you spoken of them yourself to anyone? Any girl friend?" + +"No, never." + +"To your family?" + +"No. I have lived alone with my grandfather since I was fifteen. You +know him,--I love him, but he is no confidant for a young girl. I have +always been much alone." + +"Then, so far as you know, no one could have learned from you of those +letters?" + +"No one." + +"Not Arthur Lawrence, for instance?" + +She started, and looked as though he had presented a new idea. + +"I never spoke of them," she said, slowly. + +"Did he know of your engagement to Fullerton?" + +"He never referred to it, but it is probable that he had heard of it. +Some one would have mentioned it, probably. I did not know Mr. +Lawrence at that time." + +"He had no reason then to know--or to guess--the importance which you +placed upon the recovery of the letters?" + +She looked distressed, but her glance was as searching as his own. + +"Why do you ask that? What bearing has it on this letter?" + +"Perhaps none. But I was trying to narrow down the possible actors. If +you on your part have kept the knowledge of these letters to yourself +inviolately, then the information about them must have been given out +by Fullerton if at all. Do you know anyone to whom he would be likely +to confide such a matter,--any confidant or chum?" + +She shook her head helplessly. "I know nothing of his friends. My +impression is that he had very few. He was a strange, solitary, secret +man." + +"And yet it must be clear that either he wrote this himself, or it was +written on his private paper in his handwriting, by someone who had +intimate knowledge of his affairs,--not only of the fact that he had +those letters of yours, but of the threat which he held over you in +regard to them. Now if he wrote it himself, why wasn't it mailed until +yesterday? And who did mail it yesterday, anyhow? If someone was in +his confidence and is trying to play upon your fears, we must find out +who it is. May I take this letter with me?" + +"I don't want to ever see it again." + +"And if you receive any other letters or anything comes up in any way +bearing on this, will you let me know at once? I am going to try to +find out about his office help. And I will leave this letter open to +the sunlight for a day. If it was written yesterday, the ink will show +a change by to-morrow. If written a week ago, it probably will not. As +soon as I learn anything that will interest you, I will let you know." + +But as he was departing she detained him, some unspoken anxiety +visibly struggling with her habit of reserve. + +"You spoke, when you were here before, of the possibility of my being +called as a witness. If that should happen, would I have to tell +about--this?" + +"I do not see how it could come up, unless they could connect Lawrence +with it in some way. Of course if they were trying to establish +motive,--some reason for Lawrence's quarrel with Fullerton,--it might +seem to have a bearing. But you never discussed Fullerton with +Lawrence." + +"No," she said, but her look was still troubled. "If you are +questioned," he said quietly, "you will not have to testify except so +far as you have positive knowledge. You will not have to give your +thoughts or theories or guesses." + +"I see," she murmured, dropping her strange, guarded eyes. + +With that he left her. It was too late to take any active steps in the +way of investigation that night, so he turned back toward his room, +but his habit of keeping on his feet while thinking sent him on a long +tramp before he finally turned in at his door. He fancied that he was +going over the new elements which Miss Wolcott's confidence had thrown +into the problem in his mind, but before he knew it he was making a +comparison of the characters of Miss Wolcott and Kittie Tayntor. Of +course it was natural to think of Kittie,--she was the only girl he +knew in this place, and the only one he had had a chance to talk to +for a long time, and she was so funny, with her transparent, +theatrical make-believes, and so engaging, with her girlish petulances +and revolts! She was like an April day,--a dash of cold rain in your +face, a ray of sunshine dancing freakishly around the edges of things, +and a white bud curled up close under the wet green leaves to call out +the sudden rush of forgiving tenderness which you give only to what is +near and dear and simple and your own. Miss Wolcott was, rather, a +brooding, tropical day, still with the stillness of motionless heat, +silent with the silence of fierce noontide. Low-lying thunder-clouds +belonged to her, and the passionate stroke of the lightning, and the +deluging tumult of the tempest, and the swift-falling darkness, hiding +the hushed passion of Life. How had Lawrence ever dared to love her? +But Lawrence was a master of men, in his own way. There was an +exuberant power about him which would joy in conquest. His nature was +sunny where hers was veiled, but his careless lightheartedness masked +a will as unyielding, a nature as passionately strong, as her own. +Lawrence, now, would never see the dear, funny charms of Kittie! And +with a cheerful sense that, after all, things adjusted themselves very +well in this rudderless world, Lyon swung back in his walk. + +At the door Olden met him. + +"Well, well, well, you're late," he said testily. "What have you been +doing to-day?" + +"Oh, all sorts of things." + +"I don't care about that. What have you been doing about the Lawrence +case?" + +"I don't know that I have been doing anything." Literally, he +didn't know whether he had or not, and he didn't care to share his +half-formed suspicions. "I have to take things as they come, you +know." + +"Haven't you seen Lawrence to-day?" + +"No." + +"Nor his lawyer, Howell?" + +"No." + +Olden tapped with his fingers impatiently on the table, for, as +before, he had led his guest into the dining room, the only really +habitable room in this strange Bachelor's Hall. "Where have you been +this evening?" + +"Calling on a young lady!" + +Olden looked up sharply. "Miss Kittie?" + +"No." Then, with a half mischievous desire to play up to the other's +hungry interest in the case, he added, "A young lady Lawrence knows +and admires. Miss Wolcott." + +The bait drew even better than he expected. Olden leaned forward with +his arms on the table and his chin on his crossed arms, and Lyon felt +the blaze of interest behind the goggles. The air between them tingled +with it as with an electric discharge. + +"Lawrence admires her, does he?" he said, with a curious deliberation. +"Particularly?" + +"I think quite particularly." + +"How do you know?" + +"I merely guessed it, from a look I saw on his face once." + +"Do people generally guess it?" + +"I rather think not. Gossip hasn't mentioned it." + +"And does she believe in him?" + +"Well, that is a point I didn't bring into the conversation. This is +only the second time I have seen her." + +"I didn't mean believe in his innocence. I meant, believe in +_him_,--in his interest in her?" + +Lyon laughed. The man's persistent interest in Lawrence's affairs was +curious. "Really, I didn't ask her that either. But I fancy Lawrence +is a man to make himself understood in that direction when he wants +to." + +"You mean he makes love to every pretty woman he knows?" + +"Oh, no, not so bad as that. Lawrence is a gentleman. Still, he is +partly Irish. There's an old Irish jingle I used to know about the +slow-creeping Saxon and the amorous Celt,--that's the idea. Irish eyes +make love of themselves, whenever their owner is too busy about +something else to keep a tight rein on them." Lyon had talked +jestingly, partly with the idea of erasing the memory of a remark +which he began to think had been somewhat less than discreet. He was +not prepared for the effect of his words. Olden sprang to his feet and +struck the table with his clenched hand. + +"Then damn Irish eyes," he cried. "Damn the man who thinks he has the +right to make love to any woman who is tender-hearted enough to +listen. Damn the man who thinks that as long as a woman will take his +easy lies for truth he has a right to lie." + +"With all my heart. Though, for that matter, he is pretty apt to damn +himself without any help from us. But Lawrence isn't that kind of a +man." + +Olden had dropped back in his chair and his momentary outburst had +given place to a sullen gloom that Lyon guessed had more relation to +his own thoughts and to the story he had told so impersonally the +other evening than it had to their present conversation. There was +something pathetic in the mood he showed,--a strong man bound into +helplessness by the Liliputian cords of emotion. When a young man had +to have it out with his own heart, it was a fair and square fight, +with no odds. But at Olden's age, the thing was not decent to look +upon. It was like seeing some old tennis champion going down before +play that was only healthy exercise for the youngster in the game. He +jumped to his feet. + +"Come, I'm going to bed. Good night, Mr. Olden." + +"Good night," said Olden, absently. Then he looked up, with an obvious +effort to be civil. "Don't think that I have anything against your +friend Lawrence or his Irish eyes," he said lightly. "I hope with all +my heart that he may be set free,--with all my heart." + +"So do I. Good night." + +Up in his own room, Lyon's first act was to walk to the window and +look across the white expanse of snow to Kittie's windows. The +cheerful light answered him, with something of the subtle mischief of +Kittie's own solemn air. As he looked, all the lights went out. Miss +Elliott's School was wrapped in innocent slumber. Lyon blew a kiss +across the night, and then pulled down his own curtain. + +He opened Fullerton's strange epistle and studied it again, but the +cryptic message remained as cryptic as ever. Pulling out a number of +old letters from his own writing case, he compared them with +Fullerton's until he found one which corresponded closely, in the +blackness of its ink, with Fullerton's. This he laid aside as a +standard of comparison. Then he opened the new letter to the air, +leaving it where the sun should strike it when it came into the room +in the morning. The first point to determine was whether the letter +had actually been written by Fullerton before his death, or whether +someone still living was carrying out the dead man's sinister wishes. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +Fullerton, like a number of other lawyers in Waynscott, had had his +office in the Equity Building, and Lyon made it convenient, in the +course of his morning's tramp for news the next day, to visit the +Equity. As he expected, he found Fullerton's office locked, but he +hunted up the manager of the building, and persuaded him to unlock it +for him. Perhaps the fact that he was a personal friend made a +difference in his willingness, though he pretended to protest at what +he called the morbid sensationalism of the press. + +"What do you expect to get out of his empty rooms?" he asked. + +"I'm working up a story," said Lyon carelessly. "I want to see what I +can get in the way of personal idiosyncrasies." + +The suite consisted of three rooms,--a large reception room, one side +of which was covered with book-cases; a private office at the back; +and, adjoining this, a room for the use of a stenographer, as was +evident from the typewriter beside the window. There was so little +furniture in this room that Lyon saw it could be dismissed in the +special inquiry which he had in mind. In the private office a large +flat desk occupied the center of the room. + +"Is this room the way Fullerton left it?" Lyon asked, taking the chair +which was placed before the desk, and glancing about. + +"Yes. No one has been here since he left." + +"No stenographer or clerk?" + +"He has had no clerk for some time, and when he needed a stenographer +he called one in from the agency in the building. As a matter of fact, +I think his business had fallen off rather seriously in the last few +years. He had lost some of his old clients, and he didn't seem to get +new ones. Often his office would be locked up and he would be away for +days at a time." + +"Bad for business, that. Was his office rent paid?" + +The manager shrugged his shoulders and laughed. "No. But I have a lien +on his library, so I guess I'm safe." + +"Indeed! Then he must really have been pretty badly tied up +financially?" + +"He was pretty obviously going to pieces. You see, his personal tastes +were expensive, and they incapacitated him for business. That cut both +ways, in the matter of income." + +"How about his other creditors, if you have a lien on his library? +That seems to be the only valuable property here." + +The manager laughed again. "If there was one man here the day after he +was killed there were nineteen. They were all ready to attach his +books. There was some rather deep swearing. Funny what things come out +about a man after he is dead." + +"It's more than funny," said Lyon, with an air of saying something +worth listening to. He was automatically pulling out one drawer of the +desk after another, sometimes merely glancing in, sometimes lightly +turning over the contents with a careless hand. "We don't know much of +the personal lives of the people about us. Things are not always what +they seem." He probably could have kept up the platitudinizing longer +if necessary, but he had opened all the drawers. None were locked. +There was no scrap of the curious greenish gray paper anywhere, nor, +indeed, anything but files of documents obviously legal, and mostly +dust-covered. "But his personal belongings were rather gorgeous." He +opened curiously a bronze stamp box which matched the other +appointments of the desk, and examined the contents. There was a lot +of red stamps, but no green. That was about all that he had hoped to +discover. It had seemed probable from the first that Fullerton would +have his peculiar personal belongings at his own room rather than at +his office, but Lyon had wished to eliminate the other possibility. + +As he came out of the room, a strange and yet familiar figure passed +down the hall toward the elevator just ahead of him,--the heavy figure +and white head of Mr. Olden. Lyon glanced back. Lawrence's office was +farther down the hall, and Lawrence's law cleric, a young fellow named +Freeman, whom Lyon knew slightly, stood in the open door looking after +his departing visitor with a curious watchfulness. On the impulse, +Lyon turned back. + +"What scrape has my most respectable landlord been getting into, that +he needs legal advice?" he asked. + +"Come in," said Freeman, with evident pleasure. "I'm mighty glad to +have you give the old gentleman a character. I began to wonder if +there wasn't something suspicious about him." + +"Why?" + +"He came in a few days ago and asked for Lawrence. I explained why he +couldn't see him. He fumed around a little, and finally said he wanted +a will drawn up, and couldn't I do it? I thought I could all right, +so I got him to give me the items. It involved a lot of little +bequests,--he seems to be a retired merchant from somewhere down the +state with an interminable family connection,--and I took a lot of +notes and told him I would have the will drawn up in a few days. He +has been in every day since to make changes and alterations, till I am +all balled up. Either I got things badly mixed in my notes or he has +forgotten just how his sisters and his cousins and his aunts are +arranged. I'll swear he has mixed the babies." + +"Well, if he pays you for your trouble," laughed Lyon. + +"Yes, he made it clear that he wanted me to charge up my wasted time, +but--he's queer all the same. I almost thought to-day that the whole +business of the will was a blind, and that he was here for some +purpose of his own." + +"That sounds more serious. What made you think that?" + +"I had gone into the inner room to hunt up my original notes, because +he insisted that I had made a mistake, when I heard the roll top of +Lawrence's desk pushed up. Lawrence never locks it, but the old man +hadn't any business in there, all the same. I came out in a hurry, and +there he was, hunting around in the desk. He wasn't a bit fazed by my +coming back, either. Said he wanted some paper to write a letter and +fretted and fumed over the pen and ink as though the whole outfit +belonged to him. I cleared a place for him, and left him writing, +while I shifted my own chair so that I could keep an eye on him. He +wrote two or three short letters, and tossed something into the waste +basket there. Then, when he was through, he picked up the waste basket +and began hunting through it. I supposed he wanted to recover what he +had thrown in, until I saw him pick out a square envelope and put it +with his own papers." + +"And you think it was not his own?" + +"I know it wasn't, because I knew the paper he was using. As it +happens, that basket hasn't been emptied since Lawrence was here. The +envelope must have been something he had tossed into the basket,--but +I couldn't very well demand the return of an old envelope picked up +from a waste basket. Still, I couldn't help wondering whether the man +was a sneak thief or a private detective or just a little touched in +the upper story." + +"Has he been inquisitive about Lawrence's affairs?" Lyon asked. + +"The first time he was here he asked a good many questions about him, +but I thought that was natural curiosity under all the circumstances. +One of his innumerable cousins had married a Lawrence and he wanted to +find out if there was any connection between the families. And he +really seemed to know something about him, because he insisted that +Arthur Lawrence had married a Mrs. Vanderburg." + +"But he didn't!" + +"No, of course not. But he was a great friend of Mrs. Vanderburg's, +and no one would have been surprised if he had married her. There were +many who expected that to be the outcome. And when she became engaged +to Broughton, whom she afterwards did marry, Lawrence took it hard. +There was a serious quarrel, and Lawrence wouldn't attend the wedding. +I remember hearing my mother say that if Lawrence had had Broughton's +money, Broughton would never have had any show." + +"But she wasn't divorced at that time, was she?" + +"No, but she could have had a divorce whenever she wanted it. +Vanderburg had been missing for ten or twelve years." + +This was surprising information for Lyon, and not a little disturbing. +Was there, after all, a possibility that even if he established the +identity of the fleeing woman as Mrs. Broughton, Lawrence might still +be entangled? Lyon felt as though he were trying to pick his way among +live wires. + +"Did you tell Olden this story?" he asked, remembering the curious +interest which that inquisitive person had always seemed to take in +Lawrence's affairs. + +"Well, he got it out of me, I guess. He knew so much that he could +easily pump the balance." + +"What did he say?" + +"Nothing much. He kept nodding his head, as though he knew it all +beforehand. What do you make of it, anyhow?" + +"The curiosity of an idle mind," said Lyon, lightly. "There are plenty +of people who have an abnormal curiosity about anybody who is accused +of crime. But I wouldn't give him too much rope." + +The episode gave him something new to puzzle about. Olden's curiosity +about Lawrence had been marked from the beginning, and it had not been +wholly a friendly curiosity. That much had been apparent. Lyon was +accustomed to the curious interest which monotonously virtuous people +take in criminals, and he had set down his landlord's desire to talk +about the murder mystery to that score. He had shown no curiosity +about Fullerton or interest in him. And though he was curious about +Lawrence, he seemed very inadequately informed concerning him. + +Lyon turned the thing in his mind without being able to make it fit in +with anything else. At the same time he determined to find out +something more about Mr. Olden at the earliest opportunity. For the +immediate present, however, the thing to do was to get into +Fullerton's rooms at the Wellington again, and see what discoveries he +could make there. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +Lyon suspected that he might have difficulty in securing admission to +Fullerton's room in the Wellington a second time, and when he made +application to Hunt, the janitor who had admitted him before, he found +his fears were justified. Indeed, Hunt's dismay at the suggestion +struck him as extreme. + +"Go in? No, _sir!_ Nobody goes in. The police are responsible for that +room, now. I haven't anything to do with it, and I wouldn't have, not +for a farm." + +"You let me in before, you know, and the police didn't take it to +heart." + +"Eh?" + +"I mean they didn't mind. Bede knew I was there." + +Hunt shook his head. "Mr. Bede says to me that if I let anybody else +in, he would have me arrested for killing Fullerton." + +"That's nonsense, you know. When did he say that,--when I got in +before?" + +"No farther back than yesterday he said that." + +"Has he been around again?" + +"Yes, he has." There was something nervous and dogged about the man's +manner that puzzled Lyon. + +"Well, see here. I'll make it worth your while to let me in for an +hour. You can go along to see I don't steal anything, if you like. I +want to make sure of something I overlooked before." + +"I tell you I can't, Mr. Lyon, even if I wanted to. The police have +put a seal on the door. It can't be opened without their knowing." + +"Then pass me in through the window." + +Hunt lifted his downcast eyes and gave Lyon a long, curious look. + +"You wouldn't want to, if you knew what I know." + +"What's that?" + +Hunt shuffled and stumbled, but perhaps at heart he was not unwilling +to confess his fears in the hope of having them quenched. He looked +somewhat shamefaced, however, as he asked, "Do you believe that +sometimes the dead walk?" + +"I don't know," Lyon answered non-committally. He was more anxious to +get at Hunt's ideas than to confess his own. "What makes you ask? Have +you seen anything?" + +"Well,--not exactly,--" + +"I'd like to hear about it." + +"Well, it's this way. Mr. Fullerton had a way of throwing the letters +he wrote of an evening on the floor right before the door, so that I +could pick them up in the morning and give them to the carrier when he +came around. I always took in his breakfast tray and his paper,--" + +"How did you get in?" + +"He could release the lock on his door by a spring from his bedroom. +There was nothing too much trouble if it was going to save him some +trouble afterwards." + +"Go on." + +"The letters were always in a certain place,--just where he could toss +them easily from the writing table where he sat. They would fall on a +certain mat, so that I knew just what to pick up. If I didn't, he +would swear to turn a nigger white. Mr. Fullerton wasn't no saint. +That's what makes it worse." + +"Makes what worse?" + +"Why, this that I'm going to tell you. Day before yesterday something +possessed me to go in to that room. I don't know what it was,--I just +was pestered to go in. I thought I would just look inside, and there, +on the rug before the door where they always used to be, was a letter +in Mr. Fullerton's hand, on his paper, ready stamped to be mailed." + +"This is interesting," said Lyon, with sparkling eyes. "What did you +do with it?" + +"I didn't rightly know what to do with it at first, I was so took +back. I had been in that room five or six times since--since Mr. +Fullerton was killed, letting the police in, and you, and going in by +myself once to make sure the windows was locked, and there wasn't no +letter on the rug, or I'm blind. Now, what I want to know is, _here +did that letter come from?_" + +"That I can't tell yet. But what did you do with it?" + +"I mailed it. It seemed that it must have been something that Mr. +Fullerton wrote that last night he was home and threw down for me to +mail, and that somehow, in the excitement, it must have been kicked +under the edge of the rug, and then, somehow, kicked out again the +last time someone was in the room. At least, I couldn't see what else +it could be, so I gave it to the carrier, thinking that it ought to go +to the person it was addressed to." + +"I think you were quite right. To whom was it addressed?" + +But Hunt was unexpectedly reticent. "Mr. Fullerton didn't like to have +me talk about his affairs." + +"Oh, that's all right. But I think I know about this letter. It was +for Miss Wolcott, wasn't it?" + +Hunt's surprised look gave confirmation, though his habit of +discretion prevented a verbal assent. "That isn't all," he said, +hastily, returning to his story. "That was queer enough to set me +wondering about it all day, and yesterday, when I went around in the +morning, I opened the door just to make myself believe that it really +had happened. There on the rug was another letter, just like the one +the day before." His eyes sought Lyon's nervously. He seemed to be +almost afraid of his own words. + +"Another letter for Miss Wolcott?" gasped Lyon, in utter amaze. + +"It was just like the first," Hunt persisted doggedly. + +"What did you do with it? Did you mail it?" + +"I wouldn't touch it. Not for money, Mr. Lyon. Where did that letter +come from? That's what I want to know. I wasn't going to have any +truck with it." + +"But you didn't leave it lying on the rug?" + +"Mr. Bede got it." + +"Bede! Oh, the devil!" Gasped Lyon. "How did he come to get it?" + +"He came in in the morning and I told him what I had seen. I couldn't +have stayed in the house without someone knowing. He went in and got +the letter, and then he put a seal on the door, so that no one else +should get in. He came here again this morning himself and looked into +the room, but there wasn't anything on the rug. Do you suppose it was +perhaps because the last one wasn't sent? Does he know? I know some as +thinks he had truck with the devil while he was alive all right. Say, +what do you think about such things, Mr. Lyon?" + +"I think you ought to have mailed that letter to Miss Wolcott. Bede +has no business with her letters." + +"I wasn't going to touch it," said Hunt doggedly. + +"Did Bede ask you anything about her?" + +"He asked if I knew whether she ever came here to Fullerton's room. I +wouldn't know. I never saw her to know her." Hunt was evidently +aggrieved over the turn things had taken generally. "Then he wanted to +know particularly what that lady looked like that came to see +Fullerton that last night,--the one he went out with. I didn't see +her, but the elevator boy told, same as Donohue told at the inquest, +that she wore a veil and a dark dress and a fur coat, short. Anybody +might be dressed like that." + +"Who has the apartment above?" Lyon asked abruptly. + +"It's empty. The people moved out this week." + +"What day?" + +"Yesterday and the day before." + +"Let me look at it. Perhaps I might take it. Is it furnished?" + +"No, the furniture was moved out. Come up with me, sir." + +Lyon knew the arrangement of the suites in the Wellington. They were +all alike, in the corresponding positions. He already knew the +arrangement of Fullerton's room, and his chief interest in the +apartment above was in its relation to the wall outside. He leaned out +of the window to examine it while Hunt was detained in the hall by a +passing tenant, and when the man appeared Lyon's mind was made up. + +"I'd like to take this apartment for a week. They are making some +alterations at the Grosvenor" (those alterations at the Grosvenor were +very opportune!) "and I want a place to stay for a few nights. You can +put some furniture into the bedroom, can't you? I shan't need anything +else. I may not be here more than a night or two." + +Hunt looked shrewd. "You needn't think that being in the building +makes any difference about the room below, Mr. Lyon!" + +"That's all right," laughed Lyon. "Really, what I want is to keep an +eye on Bede. And if Fullerton's ghost comes to carry you off because +you didn't mail that letter, I'll be here to explain things and make +it easy for you." + +The arrangement was made without difficulty, and Lyon went away with +Hunt's assurance that the bedroom would be habitable when he returned +that night. It was his "night off" at the paper, and he had a mind to +make the most of the freedom which that circumstance would give him. + +Several important things happened before the evening came, and these +must be first recounted; but it may as well be mentioned here that +when Lyon did return that evening, the bag which Hunt obligingly +carried upstairs contained, with a few other trifles, a rope +fire-escape and a glazier's diamond. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +THE fact that Bede had put a seal on Fullerton's door indicated that +the detective had not yet made the examination of the room which +unquestionably it was his intention to make. That he should have +deferred so important a matter for twenty-four hours could only be +explained on the theory that he had some still more important project +on hand which was occupying his personal attention. + +Lyon intended to get into Fullerton's rooms if possible before Bede +did, but the plan which he had hastily formed at the Wellington +required the cover of darkness. He could do nothing along that line +before night, and in the meantime he felt that he could do nothing +more interesting (and possibly important) than to discover what Bede +was engaged upon that was so engrossing as to make him postpone the +investigation of Fullerton's rooms to another day. + +Lyon figured it out like this: Bede had received from Hunt (and +undoubtedly had opened and read) a letter from Fullerton addressed to +Miss Wolcott. He already knew (as had appeared at their first +interview) that Fullerton had at one time been engaged to Miss +Wolcott. Therefore the association of her name with his was not a new +idea. Yet he had been "shadowing" her yesterday afternoon. Presumably, +therefore, he had suddenly come to perceive a new importance in her +movements. Was his watchfulness over her the occasion of his present +preoccupation? Lyon would have given much for a clairvoyant vision to +tell him where Bede was at that moment. Being obliged to trust instead +to his reasoning powers, he went to Hemlock Avenue, and walked past +Miss Wolcott's house. The house wore its customary air of seclusion +and there was no lounger in the street. He walked a block farther, and +went into a drug store, where, as he happened to know, there was a +public telephone and a gossiping clerk. + +"Has Bede been here to-day?" he asked, carelessly. + +"Bede who?" + +"Don't you know Bede, the detective?--little gray man with keen eyes +and a voice that he keeps behind his teeth. I expected to find him +here." + +"He was here this morning,--or a man like him," said the clerk. "A +detective, you say. Gee!" + +"What's up?" + +The clerk was looking rather startled. "Well, if I had known he was a +detective! He gave out that he was the credit-man for the new +furniture store around the corner, and asked about several people in +the neighborhood that we have accounts with. Our old man has some +stock in the furniture concern, so I gave him all the information I +could." + +"What accounts did he ask about? Do you remember?" + +The clerk named half a dozen. Lyon was not surprised to hear Miss +Wolcott's among them. He was both surprised and startled to hear Miss +Elliott's. + +"What did you tell him about these two?" he asked thoughtfully. + +"I let him see their accounts in the ledger." + +"I wish you'd let me see those same accounts." + +The clerk demurred and Lyon, who had noticed a college fraternity pin +in the other's scarf, opened his coat. He wore the same pin. + +"Oh, all right," said the easy-going clerk, with a laugh. "If I'm +going to be fired for giving anything away to a detective, I'll have +the satisfaction of helping a Nota Bena anyhow. Here are the account +books. Come around here." + +He opened a page with Miss Edith Wolcott's name at the top. The latest +entry caught Lyon's eye at once. + +"Nov. 25, Sulphonal, 6gr., .45." + +The date was the date of Fullerton's murder. Lyon pointed to the +entry. + +"Could you tell me what time of the day that sale was made?" + +"That's exactly what the other man asked," the clerk exclaimed, in +amaze. + +"And you told him--?" + +"It was half past nine in the evening. I happened to remember because +I leave at half past nine every evening and the night clerk comes on, +and just as I was going out Miss Wolcott came in and asked if I could +give her something to make her sleep. She said she was too nervous to +sleep, and I noticed she seemed all of a tremble. Her hands were +shaking when she took the packet." + +"Did you tell Bede all that?" + +"I guess I did." + +"Did he ask you any other questions?" + +"Not about Miss Wolcott. He looked a long time at Miss Elliott's +account." + +"Let me see it, then." + +The clerk turned the pages. + +"We charge everything that is prescribed for anyone at the school to +Miss Elliott's account, and show on our bill who it was for," said the +clerk. "That's what these names mean." He pointed to the names "Miss +Jones," "Miss Beatly," etc., opposite each item. Lyon was distinctly +startled to catch the name "Miss Tayntor" at frequent intervals. + +"Has she been ill?" he asked with quick concern, and then added +lamely, "She's a--sort of cousin of mine." + +The clerk grinned. + +"Gunther's chocolates." + +"Oh!" + +Lyon studied the entries assiduously for the next few moments. Among +the latest were a number of charges, "for Mrs. W. B." Had that meant +anything to Bede? + +"Did Bede ask about any of them in particular?" he inquired by way of +answering his own query. + +"He wanted to know who Mrs. W. B. was." + +"What did you tell him?" + +"Told him they were Dr. Barry's prescriptions. They were marked that +way. That's all I know." + +"Remember anything else he asked about?" + +"No. That's about all." + +Lyon went into the telephone booth and called up Dr. Barry. + +"Hello, Barry. This is Lyon. I want to know how Mrs. W. B. is getting +along." + +"Now see here, Lyon, don't you think you are crowding things a little? +There really hasn't been time for any radical change since noon." + +"What do you mean?" + +"I told you at noon that she was not to be disturbed for several days +yet." + +"Told _me?_" + +"Well, I told the boy who telephoned for you." + +"I have not authorized anyone to telephone for me. + +"What? Why, someone telephoned in your name, and you have been such a +nuisance about the case that I thought of course it was you again." + +"Did you happen to mention the lady's name, or only her initials?" +asked Lyon. + +Barry hesitated so long in answering that Lyon could only draw the +most serious conclusion. + +"I can't say," Barry answered, with some constraint. + +"It's important I should know, Barry. You know she was very desirous +of keeping her visit here unknown, and if you have been giving it +away, I must at least know the facts, so as to head off trouble if +possible." He threw all his earnestness into his voice and Barry +yielded a reluctant reply, saying, + +"It is possible that I did. I thought it was your message." + +"Did he ask anything else in particular?" + +"No. Excuse me, I'm very busy." And the 'phone shut off. + +Lyon walked out and back up Hemlock Avenue. He was breathing quickly +as though he had been running. + +"If I were Bede I think I should be rather proud of myself, making two +such hauls as that in one morning. At this rate, Bede will soon know +all that I know myself and a little more," he said to himself. "Is it +possible that he will attach any significance to Miss Wolcott's +purchase of a soporific on the fatal 25th? Good Lord, I wish she had +stayed at home that evening! That visit to the druggist at half-past +nine brings her very close to the scene of the murder. Did she go for +a sleeping powder before or after the murder? Is it possible after +all--" He shook his head impatiently at his own suggestion. + +"At any rate, I must let Howell know at once that Bede has discovered +Mrs. Broughton. Something will come from that, and soon. I suspect +we'll have to defy dear Dr. Barry. He deserves the limit of the law." + +He was within half a block of Olden's. He determined to go there to +telephone. It was the nearest place and incidentally it would enable +him to get Kittie's latest report on Mrs. Broughton's condition. + +As he entered the hall. Olden met him,--if indeed this wild-eyed man, +whose goggles lay crushed on the floor and whose white wig sat askew +upon his own black hair, could be the sedate and decorous Olden. He +fairly hurled himself at Lyon, crushing his arm with an iron grasp. + +"The curtain is down,--have you seen? What does it mean? Where is she? +Has she gone away? Can't you speak? What do you know about it? _Where_ +has she gone?" His questions piled one upon another unintelligibly. + +"What in the world do you mean?" gasped Lyon. "The curtain--" He tore +himself away and rushed upstairs to his window. Kittie's curtain was +down to the very bottom in the left hand window. "Gone!" he exclaimed, +in blank bewilderment. + +Olden had followed close. + +"She pulled the curtain down just now,--just before you came in. I was +watching,--I have been watching all the time,--I saw her come and pull +it down." + +"How did you know about the curtains?" asked Lyon, realizing for the +first time that Olden was betraying knowledge that he was not supposed +to have. + +"I heard what you said at the 'phone. I knew what you came here for, +of course,--that's why I let you come,--you were to help me watch +without knowing it,--and now she has gone,--slipped away before our +very eyes,--" + +"Who are you?" + +"Woods Broughton." He pronounced the name with careless impatience, as +though he had never tried to keep it a secret. "What are you going to +do? We must find her." + +"Come downstairs," said Lyon, adjusting himself to the new situation. +"We must telephone to Howell." + +Howell was not an imaginative man, and it took some time to make him +grasp the double idea that Mrs. Broughton had disappeared and that +Lyon's landlord had suddenly turned out to be Broughton himself. The +whole thing was irregular, and he felt himself confused and +embarrassed. But he agreed that he must come at once for a +consultation. + +"I think we shall get along better if we are quite frank," said Lyon, +while they were waiting for Howell. "Will you explain your object in +disguising yourself, so that we may know just where we stand in +relation to each other?" + +"To find out what her secret was," Broughton answered, passionately. +He clenched his hands till the knuckles were white, and his +heavy-featured face, shaped by half a century of business life into +lines of impassive self-control, was wrenched by emotion that was half +pitiful, half ludicrous. "To find out what hold this man Lawrence has +upon her,--to kill him, perhaps,--" + +"Lawrence? Good heavens, what nonsense!" cried Lyon. "What made you +connect her with Lawrence in any way?" + +"I told you that it was a letter that came from Waynscott that first +upset her. She had been happy before that I swear it. She was happy +and content as my wife. Then his letters came--" + +"What made you think they were from him? Did you see any of them?" + +"I found one, partly burnt, in the fireplace in her bedroom. I could +make out the signature plainly,--it was Arthur Lawrence." + +"You could read nothing else?" + +"No, but I, found her unfinished answer in her writing desk." + +"What did she say?" asked Lyon, in a calm voice. + +Broughton struggled to keep his voice steady. "She said that she was +the most unhappy woman in the world,--God, I had been so happy!--that +he had been right in warning her against marrying me, and that she +must see him. I had no chance to read more, for she was coming, and I +could not let her suspect I had seen anything. But I made my plans +from that moment. I told her that I was called away on a sudden +business trip. As I expected, as soon as I was off, she started for +Waynscott. I followed her, in this disguise. She went at once to +Lawrence's office,--" + +"His law office, in the Equity Building?" + +"Yes. Then she went to Miss Elliott's. That was on a Monday. Monday +night, you will remember, Lawrence killed Fullerton, and the next day +he was arrested. That stopped their plans, whatever they were. She has +kept her room at Miss Elliott's, and I took this house, which happened +to be vacant, so that I could keep a close watch on her. She has never +gone out. Dr. Barry has been to see her, as you know. I have had +Phillips get a daily report from Barry, under color of wiring to me. + +"Then you came along, Mr. Lyon. I had seen and heard enough to know +that you were a friend of Lawrence's, so I took you in, because I +wanted to know everything about him that I could. And I knew that for +some reason you were watching Grace. Phillips had tracked you there +several times, and he followed you into the florist's shop and got +possession of Grace's order for unlimited flowers to be sent to +Lawrence. Her flowers for him! I wonder I have kept my senses. But I +could do nothing but wait until Lawrence was released,--as Grace was +waiting over there for his release! You needn't pretend to be +surprised,--you know yourself the connection between them,--that's why +you have been keeping a watch on her,--I saw that from the room you +selected,--" + +"You are quite right as to that, though I think you are quite wrong as +to other things." + +"What other things?" + +"About Lawrence. He isn't that sort of a man. If anyone had a hold +upon Mrs. Broughton, it would seem to have been Fullerton." + +"Fullerton!" + +"You have been very frank, Mr. Broughton, and it is only fair that I +should be equally frank. We have been very anxious to have an +interview with Mrs. Broughton as soon as her health would permit, +Howell and I, because we have reason to believe that she may be able +to throw some light upon the Fullerton murder. She may be wanted as a +witness." + +"You are mad,--utterly mad," gasped Broughton. "What could she +possibly know about that?" + +"She was with Fullerton when he left the Wellington at eight o'clock." + +"I don't believe it!" + +"I don't think there can be much question about that. She had +obviously been to consult him on some legal matters. But, frankly, we +only know enough to make it very important we should know more. And we +have been very anxious to avoid publicity, if possible, for her own +sake, and possibly for Lawrence's." + +Poor Broughton looked dazed. "I don't understand. Fullerton was her +lawyer,--" + +"Yes." + +"And you think she was with him when Lawrence killed him?" + +"We are in hopes that she may be able to explain what did actually +happen. She certainly was with Fullerton earlier in the evening. +Beyond that we don't _know_ anything, and we really haven't even a +coherent theory." + +"But it was Lawrence with whom she was corresponding,--it was Lawrence +who had wanted to marry her and who would not go to her wedding,--it +was Lawrence who came to see her as soon as my back was turned!" + +Lyon shook his head. "You don't know what lies under all that. +Fullerton may have had some hold on her, and Lawrence may have been +acting as her friend merely. Ah, here is Howell. He will tell us what +to do now." + +Howell had had time to adjust his mind to the facts Lyon had +telephoned, and when he came in he seemed more curious regarding the +personality of the famous man before him than anything else. Lyon +explained briefly what he had told Broughton about the situation. + +"Well now, Mr. Broughton, you know as much as we do," said Howell. +"You see that it is highly important we should get at Mrs. Broughton's +testimony. Barry has been keeping me off, so this young man evolved a +somewhat fantastic plan of getting inside information as to her +condition. I hope the code has missed fire, somehow, for it would be +exceedingly unfortunate if the prosecution should get hold of her +before we do. It is quite on the cards, Mr. Broughton, that we may +want you to take your wife away,--quite out of reach as a witness. It +depends on what she has to tell us,--and that we must find out as soon +as possible." + +"How,--if she is gone?" + +"That is the first thing for us to ascertain. Lyon, you must take me +over to Miss Elliott's School at once. We want to find out all we can, +and immediately. If I may make a suggestion, Mr. Broughton, you will +await our return here instead of accompanying us. It may possibly +prove that your disguise should not be disclosed at this juncture." + +Broughton did not demur. He was obviously too much overwhelmed by the +uncertainties of the situation to take the initiative in any +direction. + +"Don't be long," he said, with a wistfulness that sat strangely on his +heavy features. "If she has really gone, I must know it. I must have +the police search the town for her at once." + +Howell and Lyon walked away leaving him standing in the doorway, +looking after them in helpless impotence. + +"That complicates things," said Howell. + +Lyon nodded. + +"If there is any connection between Lawrence and Mrs. Broughton--" + +"There isn't, of the sort he thinks." + +"If there is any connection, it may supply the motive for the assault +on Fullerton. I'm afraid we aren't going to get much help for our side +from this interview, but I'd rather know the worst than be tied up in +ignorance." + +"If Mrs. Broughton will talk!" + +"Well, we shall soon see," said Howell, as he rang Miss Elliott's +bell. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +There was an atmosphere of suppressed excitement about the place that +struck Lyon as soon as they were admitted to Miss Elliott's. There was +a sound of voices, of shutting doors, that was like the buzz of an +excited hive. The maid who took their cards for Mrs. Broughton looked +startled and hesitating, but departed on her errand without remark. + +"She's gone all right," murmured Lyon to his companion. + +In a moment Miss Elliott appeared, severe and formal and angular as +ever, but with a nervous flutter in her voice that told its own story +to Lyon's quick ear. + +"It is impossible for Mrs. Broughton to receive visitors," she said. +"The maid brought your cards to me, but I am authorized to say that +Mrs. Broughton cannot see anyone." + +"It is a matter of some importance,--a legal matter," said Howell. + +Miss Elliott shook her head. "I am sorry,--it is impossible." + +"Do you mean that she has not yet returned?" asked Lyon, gently. + +Miss Elliott turned to him with a start. "Do you mean that you have +seen her? Oh, where was she? When was it? Why did she go?" + +"I have not seen her. I heard that she had been able to go out, and so +hoped that she might be strong enough to grant us an interview. She +had asked me to call in regard to a certain matter in which she was +interested. Do I understand she is out this afternoon?" + +Miss Elliott threw out her hands with a gesture of despair. "I do not +know where she is,--where she went or when. She has simply gone +without a word. And she was hardly able to walk across the room alone. +I am wild about it. Where could she have gone? And why should she go +secretly? I think she must have wandered off in a delirium. And I dare +not start an inquiry, for she may return at any moment, and she was so +anxious to have nothing said about her visit here. But she has been so +ill. With every moment that passes I feel more alarmed and more +helpless." + +"When did she go?" asked Lyon. "You may count on us to help you in any +possible way, Miss Elliott. Give us all the information that you can +about her departure." + +"I went out myself this afternoon at two o'clock. The maid says that a +man called to see Mrs. Broughton about half an hour later. He sent a +note to her, but no card. She asked to have him come to her private +sitting room, and he was there perhaps fifteen minutes. Then he left. +When I came home, at four o'clock, I went at once to her room, and +found it empty. She has not left her room before since she came,--she +has been too ill. She is not in the house. I have myself gone all +through it. She must have dressed and gone out sometime during the +afternoon, when no one happened to be in the hall. But I cannot +understand it. And I don't know what to do." + +"Do nothing at present, madam. And say nothing to anyone about it. I +will have a search instituted quietly, so that if she should not +return of her own accord, we shall soon know, at any rate, where she +is," said Howell. "Can you give us any information about the man who +called?" + +"None." + +"No one saw him?" + +"No one but the maid, and she is not observing. I have questioned her. +She could give no description of him." + +"Well, we must do the best we can without it. I shall take pleasure in +letting you know as soon as we have anything to report," said Howell, +rising to depart. + +Lyon had left his hat and gloves on the hat-rack in the hall. As he +took up his gloves, he felt something crinkle inside one of them, and +he knew instantly that Kittie had sent him a message. + +"That girl is a born intriguante," he laughed to himself, with a +sudden thrill that was curiously tender, for all his amusement. As +soon as they were outside he unfolded the little note. + +"The man who came to see her was small and thin, and wore an old dark +blue coat. He had a bald spot on the top of his head, and a wart on +his nose. He walks on tiptoe. I hate a man who walks on tiptoe. She +went away in a hurry, for she didn't take her comb or brush or +anything. Oh, I'm just wild to know what is happening. Is it anything +mysterious?" + +Lyon read the note to Howell. + +"That man was Bede," he said, seriously. + +"No question about that. Now, why did she go? Because Bede persuaded +her to hide, or because he frightened her into hiding on her own +account? And is Bede going to produce her or isn't he? I never +ran up against so many blind alleys in one case in my life. There +were apparently just three people who knew what happened that +night,--Fullerton, Lawrence, and Mrs. Broughton. Fullerton is dead, +Mrs. Broughton is lost, and Lawrence will not talk. I wonder if this +will unseal his tongue. I think I shall have to see him at once." + +"We'll have to report to Broughton first. That poor man is on my +mind." + +"Very well, we'll go there first. My chief anxiety regarding him is +that he'll give the whole thing away to the police. He is too +accustomed to having his own way about things." + +They walked around the block to Broughton's home, and found him +waiting for them. He fairly went wild when he heard their report. He +was for telephoning the police, printing posters, sending a town crier +around to make proclamation,--anything and everything, and all at +once. His wife was lost, and the resources of the universe must be +requisitioned to get her back. + +"Go slow," said Lyon. "Mrs. Broughton is not a child. She hasn't been +kidnapped and she isn't lost. She is hiding somewhere. She had money +and she is accustomed to traveling. I think you may feel reasonably +sure that she is safe. Speaking for Lawrence, we are anxious to find +her, but speaking for her, it may be just as well that she should not +be found until after the grand jury has adjourned." + +"What do you mean?" demanded Broughton, fiercely. + +"She knows more about the Fullerton murder than it would be agreeable +for her to tell in court." + +"You are mad," gasped Broughton. + +"Why does she disappear, as soon as she knows that Bede has connected +her with the affairs of that night?" + +Broughton walked the floor. Then he stopped abruptly before Howell. + +"I wish that you would call up the county jail and find out if she has +been there to see Lawrence. You can find out hypothetically, without +giving names, you know." + +"That isn't a bad idea," said Howell. He went to the telephone and +inquired whether anyone had been admitted to see Lawrence that +afternoon. The answer, when he repeated it to the others, seemed +significant. + +"A woman tried to see him a little after five, but when she found that +she would have to give her name and submit to search, she went away +without disclosing her identity. She wore a heavy veil, a short +sealskin coat, and a dark dress. General appearance of a lady." + +Broughton dropped his eyes to the floor and a look of sullen anger +displaced the anxiety that had racked his features. + +"I shall have an account to settle with Mr. Lawrence when he is out of +jail," he muttered, savagely. + +"In the meantime, our efforts are all directed to getting him out," +said Howell. "And since I cannot use Mrs. Broughton as a witness, I am +as well content that she is out of Bede's reach, also. I will go down +to see Lawrence at once, and if I can get any information from him +that will interest you in this connection, I shall let you know. I +think that is all that we can do to-night." + +"I'd like to go with you, when you visit Lawrence," said Lyon, +quietly. + +Howell considered a moment, and then nodded. Perhaps he thought that +another influence might be more successful than his own in unlocking +the confidence of his client. + + +Lawrence tossed aside the book which he had been reading, and rose to +greet them with all of his old light-hearted self-possession. + +"Delighted to see you! I've been reading Persian love-poems till my +brains are whirling around like the song of a tipsy bulbul, so I am +particularly in need of some intelligent conversation. Howell, you +look as glum as though you were attorney for a wretched fellow who had +no chance of escaping the gallows. I'm glad you have Lyon associated +with you. I've more faith in his abilities than in yours." And he shot +a dancing glance at Lyon which was not wholly mockery. + +"My abilities are at least equal to the facts that have been given +them to work up," said Howell, drily. "I came to ask you what you can +tell me about Mrs. Broughton's visit to Waynscott." + +Lawrence's eyes widened with surprise. "Mrs. Broughton! What in the +name of wonder are you bringing her name in for?" + +"She visited your office that day." + +"Yes." + +"What for?" + +Lawrence shook his head. "It was a professional visit. I can't discuss +the matter." + +"I rather expected you to say that. But the matter comes up in this +way. Lyon, here, has identified Mrs. Broughton with the woman who was +seen with Fullerton that evening. He may be wrong, of course. But if +he is right, it may be helpful to know what she wanted, first from you +and then from him." + +Lawrence did not look at Lyon this time. His eyes, swept clear of all +expression, were fixed upon Howell in calm attention. + +"Why not ask her?" he said. + +"She has been ill,--too ill to be disturbed. Dr. Barry has insisted. +This afternoon she disappeared. Bede had been to see her a short time +before. Now, what bearing, so far as you know, does this have upon the +case?" + +Lawrence dropped his eyes, which had been fixed intently upon the +speaker, and remained silent for some moments. Lyon, watching him, +felt perfectly satisfied that the facts presented were all new to him, +and that his mind was now trying to fit them into the theory of the +crime which he had before entertained, and that his hesitation in +answering was due to his caution. At last he said, + +"I cannot throw any light on the subject. I did not see Mrs. Broughton +after she left my office in the morning." + +"Was her business of such a nature that she would have been likely to +consult Fullerton about it?" + +Lawrence frowned. "She might have done so. Women never keep to the +rules of the game." + +"You had warned her not to consult him personally?" + +Lawrence smiled satirically into Howell's eyes. "What are you trying +to find out?" + +"Whether her business with Fullerton was of a nature to rouse her to +desperation, if she failed." + +"Nonsense!" Lawrence exclaimed. Then, more slowly and thoughtfully, +"Out of the question. Mrs. Broughton is a shy and timid woman, and +anything like desperation in her case would react upon herself, not on +anyone else. You are clear off the track, Howell." + +"You admit, however, that she might have been made desperate?" + +"I admit nothing whatsoever. If I knew anything I wouldn't admit it. +Or I'll admit that I don't know anything, if that will pacify you." + +"Where would she be likely to go? You know her friends." + +Lawrence shook his head. "If she was bent on hiding herself, she would +not be likely to go to the likely places." + +And with that Howell had to depart. As usual, his client had given him +no information that would be of the slightest value in conducting the +defense. + +Lyon lingered when Howell had departed. + +"There is another matter I want to tell you about," he said. "I had an +interview with Miss Wolcott yesterday." + +The flash of Lawrence's eyes was electric. "Out with it, you +tongue-tied wretch," he cried. "Lord, that such privileges should fall +to a man who doesn't know better than to waste time in wordy +preambles. Tell me every syllable she said, every look that she didn't +put into syllables. To think that you have been sitting here for half +an hour with all that treasure locked up inside of you! Confound you, +why don't you begin? Begin at the beginning, and omit nothing." + +Lyon began, and told all of his tale. Lawrence listened with an +attentiveness that seemed to meet the words half way and drag them out +into expression. He had forgotten himself entirely, and his anger at +her distress, his rage at Fullerton, his amazed and awed wonder when +he heard that shame over her girlish folly in writing her heart out to +a man unworthy of it had made her deaf to all other wooing, were as +plainly revealed as though he had put them into his most voluble +English. At the end he dropped his face upon his folded arms on the +table. + +"The poor child," he murmured to himself. "The poor child! As though +that--or anything--would have made any difference!" Suddenly he +wheeled upon Lyon, with dancing eyes. "Maybe you are thinking that +this is an upper room in the county jail, and that I am a forlorn +wretch with a good prospect of being hung! Never think it, my boy! +There is nothing in all the universe so heaven-wide and free as this +room. I know now how a man feels when his reprieve comes." + +"But your reprieve hasn't come yet," said Lyon quietly. "That is +exactly the point. Do you see any way yet in which I can help it to +come?" + +Lawrence looked at him silently, smilingly, and shook his head. + +"Then it makes no difference in your attitude," pursued Lyon, "that +Mrs. Broughton--and not anyone else--is shown to be the woman who was +with Fullerton that evening?" + +"It makes no difference," said Lawrence, quietly. + +"Not even if she should prove to be the woman who ran across the +street?" + +"Is that your idea?" exclaimed Lawrence, in frank surprise. "Oh, you +are on the wrong track. It was not she." + +"But--if it was?" + +Lawrence walked back and forth thoughtfully. Then he stopped again +before Lyon. + +"It would make no difference," he said. Then with a smile he placed +his hand on the younger man's shoulder. "Believe me, Lyon, I +appreciate your interest and your earnestness, but--beware of letting +it carry you too far. There are times, you know, when the best service +a friend can render is simply to keep hands off. If you start in with +an idea of proving things you may possibly--prove too much! There are +matters that simply must not be brought into question." He shook Lyon +in friendly roughness and let him go. When Lyon came out, the early +night had already fallen and shadows lay heavy in the corners beyond +the reach of the street lamps. Lyon glanced at the sky, and then, +instead of going to Hemlock Avenue, he took his way to the Wellington. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +Lyon's first intention had been to wait until the house was quiet that +night before attempting to carry out his plan of burglarizing +Fullerton's apartment, but after the developments of the afternoon he +felt that it was unwise to risk even an hour's delay. Bede was too +active to be allowed much headway. As he made his preparations, he +could not help reflecting with amusement on the way in which fate was +using him. Here was he, a newspaper man, bending every energy to keep +this affair out of the papers; a law-abiding man, working to frustrate +the efforts of the officers of the law; an averagely moral man, +deliberately planning to commit technical burglary. If he should be +caught in his efforts, he might find himself in jail beside Lawrence. +And to be arrested for attempted burglary was somehow less dignified +than to be arrested for murder! There are delicate shades in crime +that appeal to the sensibilities of the artist. However, he was in for +it, and though the situation might appeal to his philosophical nature +as full of paradox, he had no intention of modifying his plans. + +It was eight o'clock when he got into the room which he had taken in +the Wellington. He had got his keys from Hunt and mentioned casually +that he was going out later in the evening. It was a cloudy, moonless +night, and though the street lamps spread a diffused light through the +air everywhere, the rear of the Wellington was as much in the shadow +as it was possible for any place in the city to be. A jutting angle of +the wall, in which there were no windows, gave him further protection +in his venture. + +He fastened one end of his rope ladder securely on the inside ledge of +his window, and then dropped it down. It reached just to Fullerton's +window on the floor below. Cautiously Lyon went down the frail +support. It was a windy night and the gusts that came around the +corner tossed the free end of the ladder wildly, but his weight +steadied it, and though he swayed dizzily for a few minutes, he soon +swung down to a point where he could get a footing on the broad window +ledge of Fullerton's room. He had come prepared to cut out a piece of +glass opposite the window catch, but as he put his hand upon it he +felt it yield, and to his surprise and very much to his relief he +found that he could push the sash up. This not only would save time, +but it would enable him to cover his trail more effectively. Curiosity +made him pause, even in his hurry, to examine the catch, and he found +that, through a shrinkage of the wood, the snap on the lower sash did +not reach to lock into the upper. It looked locked, but it did not +catch. It would be possible, therefore, for him to leave it still +apparently locked from the inside when leaving. + +He fastened the end of his ladder so that it would not blow out of his +reach, and then pulled down the window and drew the curtains to +exclude the light. Only then did he venture to strike a match and to +turn on the nearest gas-jet. He remembered the general arrangement of +the room very well from his former visit. Here was the large square +writing table in the middle of the room, and there, to the right of it +on the floor, was the rug Hunt had spoken of, where the letters lay. +Lyon sat down before the table and studied the arrangement quietly. A +man sitting here could toss the letters to the rug easily with a +careless flip of his right hand, but a letter would not of itself fall +from the table to the rug. Even if blown from the table by a strong +gust from the open window,--an idea that he had had in his mind as a +possibility,--it would not be apt to fall upon the rug. The direct +line would carry it to one side. For the present he would eliminate +the table. + +Where else could the letters have been placed, so as to fall upon the +rug? Assuming that Fullerton had written them the last evening he was +in the room, and had either forgotten to leave them for mailing, or +had laid them aside for some reason when his caller arrived, where +would he have been apt to leave them? Lyon took his position on the +rug and studied the various pieces of furniture which lay in +unobstructed lines from that point. There was a small table against +the wall, and on it a circular pipe tray with an array of pipes. Above +it, fastened against the wall at a height which a man could reach only +if standing, was a small Chinese cabinet, carved in the semblance of a +dragon, and gleaming with scarlet and gold. Like the serpent-marked +note paper, it bore witness to Fullerton's fantastic taste. It would +be quite in keeping with his habits for him to use this as a +repository for his letters. Lyon walked over to examine it. It opened +readily at his touch. The inside of the cabinet was filled with +tobacco-jars. He tried to lift it from the wall, but it was too +securely fastened to make this easy. But the idea that this was and +must be the place where Fullerton had deposited Miss Wolcott's letters +had now taken possession of him, and stepping up on a chair he +examined the cabinet closely on all sides. From that point he at once +saw what he had not noticed before, that on one side, near the bottom, +was a crack, and the white corner of an envelope was plainly visible. +With the help of his penknife he pulled it out. It was addressed to +Fullerton in a delicate hand. There was at least no more mystery as to +how the letters had reached the rug. Evidently Fullerton had placed +them, at some time, for some purpose, in this cabinet, and they had +been shaken loose at the dramatically opportune moment when Hunt found +them. Probably the jarring of the wall when the furniture in this +upper apartment had been moved out had helped to dislodge them, or +perhaps they occasionally slipped out even when Fullerton was there, +without exciting suspicions of supernatural agency. The letters he +wanted were probably inside. + +He again examined the cabinet within and without, and though he could +find no secret drawer, he saw, by the shallowness of the space within +as compared with the depth on the outside, that there must be a drawer +beneath the compartment where the tobacco jars reposed. Well, if needs +must--He inserted the strongest blade of his knife and pried open the +whole side,--not so difficult a task as one might have supposed, for +the delicate wood of the cabinet had not been expected to resist the +dry heat of a modern apartment house, and it was badly cracked at +several points. As the side came loose in his hands, he saw that under +the ostensible interior was a shallow drawer filled with packages of +letters, longer documents, and note books. He gathered the whole mass +together, and tied it hastily into a bundle in his silk neckerchief. +Then, with a view to Bede's possible explorations, he carefully +pressed the loose side back into place. + +At that moment he heard through the silence the metallic rattle of the +elevator. Someone was stopping at this floor. Hastily concluding that +it was wiser to make his escape unseen, if possible, with the booty +which he had already secured than to risk discovery by lingering on +the chance of finding more, Lyon softly turned out the gas, and made +his escape by the window, carrying his knotted kerchief like an +emigrant's bundle in his hand. He pulled the window down behind him +and climbed up his ladder to his own room. As he leaned out to pull up +his rope ladder, a sudden gleam of light shot out into the night from +the window below. Bede was in Fullerton's room. + +Lyon's heart was jumping, partly from the unusual physical exertion, +partly from the excitement. He stood still for a moment, considering +whether he should examine his find here and now, or try to make his +escape from the building with it before he opened the bundle. He had +suddenly a panicky feeling that Bede might appear at any moment and +demand his papers. Had he really covered his tracks, or had he left +some perfectly obvious clue for the detective to follow? His rope +ladder lay in a heap at his feet. He rolled it up and poked it into +the bottom of his bag, and then, taking courage, he opened up his +bundle. The first thing that fell out was a good-sized package, neatly +wrapped and sealed, and superscribed, + + +"This package is to be delivered to Edith Wolcott's husband on his +wedding day, with the compliments and congratulations of + +"Warren Fullerton." + + +Lyon smiled grimly as he slipped the package into his pocket. There +was little doubt as to the contents of the sealed packet, and with the +recovery of those unhappy love-letters, his immediate object had been +most perfectly accomplished. He glanced at his watch. It was not yet +nine. He might be so fortunate as to be admitted yet, and to save her +even one night of the oppression which he had witnessed would be worth +much. He hastily packed the balance of his trophy into his bag without +examining it, and made his way out of the apartment and out of the +building. Taking the staircase instead of the elevator, he felt +reasonably sure that his departure had been unobserved, and so indeed +it proved. + +When he reached Hemlock Avenue the lights were still burning in Miss +Wolcott's house, and it was Miss Wolcott herself who, after a little +delay, opened the door in answer to his ring. It struck him that she +looked less mistress of herself than usual. She had a startled, not to +say nervous, air. + +"I hoped It might be you," she said. "Come to the library." And she +led the way into the room where a dancing fire blazed upon the hearth. + +"I only stopped for a moment, to bring you this package," said Lyon. +"If you wouldn't mind, I wish that you would open it, so that you can +tell me whether or not it contains the letters you spoke of the other +evening." + +She took the package from him with a startled look but without a +word,--a characteristic of hers which he was coming to understand. He +turned away and picked up a book on the table, to withdraw his +presence from her as much as possible, as she tore open the wrappings. +Then he heard her give a gasping sigh, and he turned quickly toward +her. She had sunk into the chair before the fire, and with her hands +before her face she was sobbing with a childish abandon that was so +poignant It brought a catch into Lyon's throat, even though he saw +that her tears were tears of relief and joy. Scattered on the floor at +her feet, where they had slipped from her trembling fingers, were +dozens of little letters,--the dainty little notes of a young girl's +inscribing. Like the fallen petals of blossoms that had been torn down +by a harsh wind, they lay In pathetic disorder, witnessing to a beauty +that had been and was no more. Lyon reached for his hat and moved +silently to the door, but at his movement she rose, crushing back her +tears with that self-control which had become second nature with her. + +"Oh, wait!" she cried, breathlessly. "Don't go yet! Don't leave me +alone--with them." + +Lyon laughed. "Poor little letters! They look so forlorn. The power to +hurt was never in them,--only in a man's wicked mind." + +She drew a long, sobbing breath. "Still,--I don't want to touch them! +Oh, I have so hated the thought of them all these years,--it seems as +though all the world had been lying under the oppression of the fact +that they were lurking in the dark, waiting a chance to spring out +upon me. Would you mind--would you put them on the fire for me?" + +"Certainly," said Lyon, with perfect gravity. He knelt down by the +fireplace and gathered the white handfuls up and laid them upon the +coals. When the last little envelope had curled up into filmy ash, he +rose. She was standing erect before the fire, with a vitality and +radiance in every line of her figure that made her like a different +being. "Truly, women are beyond all understanding," thought Lyon, as +he waited for her next word. + +"Thank you," she said, and the simple phrase on her lips seemed like a +pæan of thanksgiving. "Now,--one thing more. You know everything,--you +are the only one who does. Will you tell Mr. Lawrence about these +letters? He has always been a good friend, and--I should like to have +him know!" + +"I am sure he will be glad to learn that you will be free from further +annoyance and anxiety," he said, cheerfully. "But as for my telling +him,--suppose instead, I arrange for you to see him yourself +to-morrow. It could be done without any publicity, you know, and it +would be a godsend to him to have a visit from you. You can't imagine +how stupid it is to be in prison. A visit from _anyone_ would be a +welcome diversion!" + +She looked thoughtful and abstracted. + +"To-morrow?" she hesitated. "I don't know. I may not be at home +to-morrow." + +"Well,--the day after, if you must postpone it." + +"I'll send you word," she said, after a moment. He thought a shadow +had crossed her face, but it might only have been a shadow of thought. +When he again reached for his hat, she put out both hands impulsively. + +"However things turn out,--other things," she said, somewhat +incoherently, "I shall never, never forget what you have done for me. +You have given me back myself." + +Lyon smiled to himself as he left her. How long would she keep +possession of that gift, if Lawrence were only free? + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +The radiance of Miss Wolcott's face was still lingering in Lyon's mind +and diffusing a glow over his imagination when he crossed the few +steps that separated her house from Broughton's. Broughton opened the +door for him, as he had formed the habit of doing. The anguished and +despairing inquiry in his eyes pulled Lyon up sharply. He had come +from the morning to night, from the hope of youth to the sorrow of +age, from those whose story was to end happily to those who knew in +their own hearts the tragedy of life. + +"You have nothing to tell me?" Broughton asked, though his tone showed +he expected nothing. + +Lyon shook his head, "No. You have heard nothing?" + +"Nothing. Nothing. Nothing." + +From habit he led Lyon into the dining room, where they had always sat +to smoke before retiring, but the room showed no preparations for an +evening of good cheer. It was as blank and forlorn as Broughton's +face. + +"_Where_ can she be?" he demanded, stopping in his restless walk to +face Lyon imperiously. "Ill as she was, with God knows what trouble on +her mind and conscience, where can she have gone? Did she feel that it +was impossible to live? Did she go to her death,--or to hide and wait +for _him?_" + +"If you mean Lawrence, that's all nonsense," said Lyon, calmly. "I may +tell you now--there were reasons why I couldn't before--that Lawrence +is deeply in love with Miss Wolcott, who lives next door, and she +returns his sentiment. I am satisfied that their formal engagement +will be announced as soon as he is cleared of this accusation." + +"What of that?" said Broughton dully. "He may be playing with a dozen +women for all I know." + +"He isn't that sort." + +"He is the sort that keeps up a secret correspondence with another +man's wife, and lures her from her home and her husband. That I know, +and knowing that I can't believe very much good of him in other ways. +_He_ knows where my wife is now." + +"I don't believe it." + +"Well, he will know before I do," said Broughton, sullenly. "She has +fled because she was connected with that affair in some way. It is +even possible that she discovered I was watching. And if she hasn't +destroyed herself, she has gone where she can wait for him." + +Lyon felt helpless. The unreason of jealousy comes so near to insanity +that argument and common sense are helpless before it. It can only be +mastered by authority or by an appeal to the emotions, and Lyon did +not feel himself in position to offer either to a man of Woods +Broughton's age and personal force. + +"Well, good night," he said lamely. "I'm going to bed." + +"Go," said Broughton. "There is no reason why you should not sleep. I +shall not sleep until I know where she is. Good God, this very minute +she may be a helpless prisoner in some terrible den of infamy. She may +be suffering,--though she cannot suffer as I do." + +Lyon got away from him and went up to the little back bedroom which +had come to seem so homelike in the short week he had been there. +Kittie's curtains were both down--of course. Her faithfulness to their +code even to this disastrous end struck him as pathetic. + +"Dear little girl," he murmured, and blew a kiss across the night to +her. One can venture so much more in the night than in the +unsympathetic blaze of common day. + +How much farther he might have gone on his excursion into sentiment +can only be guessed, for just then his eye was caught and his mind +diverted by something which, in a moment, took on more than a +momentary importance. It was nothing more portentous than a lighted +window in Miss Wolcott's home. The curious thing about it was that he +had never seen a light in that second-story window before. Every +evening when he had looked for Kittie's signal. Miss Wolcott's house +had presented a perfectly blank and unobservant side to his view. Now +some one was occupying a room which corresponded with his own room in +this neighboring house. While his eye lingered on the light in idle +speculation, he saw and distinctly recognized Miss Wolcott as she +passed between the window and the light in the room. The sight was not +in itself startling and yet he started and metaphorically rubbed his +eyes. _Miss Wolcott wore a hat_. Instinctively he looked at his watch. +It lacked a few minutes of eleven. Eleven o'clock in Waynscott was an +hour when respectable householders went to bed, unless they went on a +journey. Was it possible that Miss Wolcott was going out, alone and +unattended, at this hour? He had the greatest confidence in the +innocence of her intentions, whatever they were, but the story which +she had told had not given him the same prejudice in favor of her +discretion. What foolish plan might she have in her mind now? Why had +she said nothing of her intention when he left her an hour ago? +Distinctly worried, he reached for the overcoat and hat which he had +thrown down on a chair in his room, and then went back to the window. +If she was really bent on a midnight errand, he would escort her, +whether she liked it or not. He would quietly watch for the moment of +her departure, and then join her at her own front door. + +But while he waited, another head crossed the lighted field of the +window,--not Miss Wolcott's. She was not going alone, then, for this +woman also wore a hat, and about her neck was the graceful line of an +upturned fur collar. He did not know Miss Wolcott's friends,--he knew, +indeed, very few women in Waynscott,--and yet something teasingly +familiar about the lift of the head, the turn of the neck, puzzled +him. Did he know her? + +And then suddenly, the solution of it all flashed upon him. That +delicately turned head belonged to Mrs. Broughton. Dolt, idiot, that +he was, not to have reasoned it out before! + +Mrs. Broughton, fleeing from Miss Elliott's by way of the secret panel +in the fence, had taken shelter at Miss Wolcott's. What more natural? +What more simple? And now, under cover of the night, she was preparing +to continue her flight. In a flash, without waiting for logical +processes, Lyon saw what he must do. + +He hurled himself downstairs three steps at a time and out of the +front hall. As he had expected, a carriage was waiting before Miss +Wolcott's door. He went up to the driver, ostentatiously looking at +his watch. + +"When does the train leave?" he asked. + +"Eleven forty-five," the man answered. + +"Oh, then there is time enough," he said easily, and ran back to the +house. + +Broughton, who had been startled by Lyon's noisy run through the hall, +was awaiting him at the front door. + +"What's up?" he asked. + +Lyon realized that the moment had come for the autocratic dominance of +the sane mind. He put his hand impressively on Broughton's shoulder +and faced him sternly, imperiously. + +"Mr. Broughton, if I could put you at this moment face to face with +your wife, what would be your attitude toward her?" + +"What do you mean?" gasped Broughton, too bewildered by this new +manner to really grasp Lyon's words. + +"Would you meet her with accusation, doubt, and coldness? Or will you +hide that unworthy side of your thought and let her see the love that +you really feel?" + +Broughton's face darkened. + +"If she can satisfy my doubts--" + +"She must never know them! And this for your sake more than hers. +Think, man. How will you go through the years that lie before you if +you must spend them with the constant knowledge that you once failed +her, that she knows it, and that she can nevermore be proud of you or +sure of you? You will have made it necessary for her to forgive you. +Can you stand the humiliation of that knowledge?" + +"She to forgive me?" stammered Broughton. "For what?" + +"For doubting her. You should have believed in her against every +appearance. If you want to hold your head up before her, never let her +know what traitorous doubts you have harbored." + +"How do you know that they are traitorous?" asked Broughton, +struggling for a grip on his past passions. + +"Because--now listen and understand exactly what this means,--because +your wife, when she fled from Miss Elliott's, took refuge with Miss +Wolcott, who is Lawrence's fiancée. Can you believe for the thousandth +part of an instant that she would have gone to that girl if there was +anything between her and Lawrence? It is unthinkable. Now hold that +one fact firmly,--do not forget it for a moment,--and come with me to +your wife." + +He crushed Broughton's hat upon the bewildered man's head and dragged +him out and across the dividing yards to Miss Wolcott's door. The +whole episode had only taken a few moments, but he breathed more +freely when he had actually got Broughton to the steps of the other +house before the women came out. There was no time to spare, however. +The doorknob turned softly. The door opened noiselessly and the two +women stood there, cloaked and veiled, ready to set forth. Instead, +Lyon drew Broughton inside, as though the door had been opened for the +purpose of admitting them. + +"I must beg that you give me a few moments, Miss Wolcott," Lyon began. + +But the need of making any explanation was taken from him. The lady +who at their first appearance had shrunk back of Miss Wolcott, +suddenly gave a little inarticulate cry and threw herself upon +Broughton's breast. + +"Woods! Oh, Woods! Where did you come from?" she cried and burst into +tears. + +Lyon held his breath in suspense, but it is not in masculine nature to +thrust away a beautiful sobbing woman. Broughton's arms lifted to +enclose her, and his voice murmured, not ungently: "There, there, +Grace! Control yourself!" + +Lyon turned to Miss Wolcott, trying to leave the reunited husband and +wife in as much privacy as the situation admitted. + +"What was your plan? Where were you going?" he asked, urgently. + +She had thrown back her veil, and her face was pale, but resolute. + +"We were trying to escape," she said. + +"From whom?" + +"That terrible detective. He had found Mrs. Broughton. He went to see +her yesterday and told her--" She stopped abruptly, and a shudder +shook her visibly. + +"What did he tell her? In charity, let me know." + +"He told her she would have to appear as a witness at the trial and +give testimony against me. + +"Against you!" The room reeled before Lyon's eyes, but he pulled +himself together. "Let me dismiss your carriage and then you must tell +me what you mean. It was wild of you to try to run away. In the first +place, you would not be able to take any train without being stopped. +The police know of Mrs. Broughton's disappearance and are watching all +outgoing trains, of course. Besides,--but let us dispose of the +carriage, first." + +He went to' the door and dismissed the coachman. As he came back, he +saw that Broughton had disengaged his wife's arms and was facing her +with that jealous sternness in his eyes that Lyon had dreaded. + +"But to leave my home secretly, at the urging of--of--of _anyone_, was +not what I have a right to expect of my wife. I have reason to demand +an explanation." + +The tears were still sparkling on Mrs. Broughton's lashes, but she +looked up at him with a steady glance. + +"I am not your wife," she said quietly. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +THE surprising statement made by Mrs. Broughton was in fact so +surprising that it was difficult for her hearers to grasp at once what +was involved in it. + +"What do you mean?" asked Broughton. But already the sternness of the +righteous judge began to drain away from his face, leaving instead the +uneasiness of the lover who has no ground on which to make a claim of +rights. "You say--what do you mean?" + +That she meant something was very clear, and Lyon, glancing swiftly at +Miss Wolcott, saw that to her, at least, the meaning was quite plain. +She was troubled, anxious, but not surprised. Indeed, it was she who +now took the situation in hand. + +"If you will come into the library, we can talk without arousing my +grandfather," she said, in guarded tones. "If he hears voices he will +come down, and then--" + +It was unnecessary to complete the sentence. They followed her into +the library, and she closed the great doors softly. Broughton was +still looking dazed. Mrs. Broughton, who had not spoken since she made +the startling declaration that she was not his wife, sank into a low +chair. Her eyes were lowered and her hands were pressed hard together, +but there was steadiness and self-control in her attitude. Lyon drew a +little apart where he could observe them both. + +"Are you strong enough to tell them your story, or shall I?" asked +Edith Wolcott, quietly. + +"No, no, I must tell him. That at least is his right--and mine," Mrs. +Broughton answered quickly. She freed herself from her wraps, and +turned toward Woods Broughton. During all that followed she looked +straight at him, talked to him. The others in the room did not seem to +enter her consciousness. It was obvious that her one concern was to be +understood by the man she loved. + +"When you first met me," she said, "you knew that though I was not +living with my husband, there was no legal separation. He had been +away from me so long that I did not think of him very often, and had +long ceased to consider that I had any wifely obligations to him. But +legally I was his wife." + +"You got a divorce before we were married," said Broughton, staring at +her. + +She went on with her story as though he had not spoken. + +"The only ground on which I could obtain a divorce under the laws of +this state was that of desertion. Do you understand? I could make no +other charge against him. Unless I could secure a separation on that +ground, I could not get one at all. I could not marry again." + +"Yes, but he had been away twelve years. That surely was sufficient." + +"He had been away twelve years, but--he did not wish to give me an +opportunity to get my freedom. So--he wrote to me from time to time." + +"He wrote to you! What of that?" + +"It was enough to defeat the claim of desertion. He would always offer +to provide a home for me if I would come and live with him. He did not +expect me to consider it, or, I am sure, wish me to, but he took the +attitude of willingness, so as to forestall any attempt I might make +to set myself free. He made the same offer, ironically as I well knew, +when he first went away. He renewed it whenever he wrote. I did not +understand at the time what his object was. I thought it only a petty +form of annoyance. But when I went to Arthur Lawrence to ask him to +take up the matter of my divorce, I found out what William's purpose +had been. His letters made it technically impossible for me to assert +that he had deserted me." + +"Wait a moment. You say you went to Arthur Lawrence. It was Warren +Fullerton who conducted your suit." + +"After Arthur had refused to take it. He told me that under +the circumstances I could not sustain the charge of desertion +without--without perjury. He tried to persuade me to follow some other +course, and when I persisted he refused to act for me." + +Broughton was leaning forward, following every word with absorbed +attention. His eyes never left her face. + +"How did Lawrence know about these letters?" he asked. + +"William always sent them under cover to Arthur. He wanted to make +sure, not only that I received them, but that Arthur should know I +received them, so that he could call upon him to testify to the fact +if he should ever wish to. All this I have learned since. Then I only +knew that Arthur saw a legal difficulty and refused to prepare the +papers." + +"Was that his only reason for opposing your divorce? There was +no--personal feeling?" + +"Personal feeling? Why, no, how could there be? He would have been +glad to help me. He always disliked William. But he foresaw trouble, +and advised me earnestly to wait until some other plan could be +considered. I would not, and went to Mr. Fullerton." + +She shuddered involuntarily as she mentioned the name, but after only +an instant's pause went on. + +"From what I had learned from Arthur about the law of the case, I +determined to say nothing to him about the letters. I told him that +William had left me twelve years before and never been heard from, and +on that statement the divorce was granted without difficulty. Then you +and I were married." + +She paused, but they all felt that it was only to gather strength to +go on, and no one spoke. + +"The first intimation I had that there was going to be trouble came a +year ago last summer. Mr. Fullerton was in New York and he came to see +me. He wanted money. I could not understand at first, but he soon made +it unmistakably clear. He had found out about the letters, and he said +that the divorce was therefore fraudulent and without effect, and my +marriage void." + +Her voice fluttered as though, in spite of her will, it was slipping +away from her control. Broughton groaned. + +"Why didn't you tell me, Grace? Good heavens, that was a matter for a +man to deal with." + +"I didn't dare. I was afraid to have you know, I was afraid of the +scandal,--of your scorn,--of everything. I was simply terrified out of +my senses. I couldn't think straight. I only wanted to keep it from +ever coming out,--to hush it up and keep it unknown. So--I sold some +jewels and paid him the money he wanted and he went away. But I was +sick for a month,--do you remember?" + +"If you had only told me!" + +"But what could you have done? There would have been nothing possible +but to put me away,--and the thought of that was worst of all. Or I +thought so then." + +Broughton stared. He was just beginning to see the far-reaching +effects involved in the situation. + +"I hoped the matter was settled," Mrs. Broughton resumed, "but a few +months later I received a letter from him, asking for more money. That +was the beginning. They came after that every few months, and I lived +in constant dread. He always wrote very politely, very guardedly, but +I knew what he meant and I did not dare refuse him." + +"One moment. How had he learned about those letters? From Lawrence?" + +"No. William had seen the newspaper reports and had written to him, +giving him the facts. So Mr. Fullerton said, and I don't know how else +he could have found out. Arthur would never have spoken of it. I got +so desperate that finally I wrote to Arthur." + +"Ah!" + +"He was the only one who knew the whole case. He knew about the +letters, had known William, and had warned me that William would make +trouble, and that I was going to build up unhappiness for myself. I +wrote him what had happened. He urged me to tell you frankly the whole +situation and to pay Fullerton nothing more. But I could not bring +myself to the point of telling you. Perhaps I would if--if you had +been as kind as you were at first, but I thought you were growing cold +and distant, and--I could not speak. Then you went away on that sudden +trip. I thought it would be a good chance to see Arthur and have a +talk with him, and perhaps to appeal to Mr. Fullerton's mercy. So I +came out here the moment you had gone. Were you surprised to find me +gone when you returned?" + +"Never mind that now," said Broughton. "Let me get your story straight +first, and then I'll give you mine. When you came to Waynscott you +went to Lawrence's office first, didn't you? That was Monday +forenoon?" + +"Yes," she said, looking a little surprised at the form of his +question. "I went there, and he was very positive that I must not see +Mr. Fullerton. He said he would see him for me and 'settle' him, but I +was afraid to let him meet him,--Arthur has a quick temper and he was +very angry,--you can't think how angry. You know I have known Arthur +Lawrence since a boy. He has really been the best friend a woman ever +could have, and now-- Oh, I can't go on. It is so terrible." + +"But you must, Grace. It is very important. Tell me exactly what +happened and where you went." + +"When I left Arthur I went to Miss Elliott's. I knew she would be glad +to have me stay with her a few days, and that was all I intended, at +that time. I had promised Arthur not to see Mr. Fullerton, but after I +left him, it seemed to me that I simply had to have it out with him. I +couldn't believe that it would be impossible for me to move him in a +personal interview. I found out he lived at the Wellington and went +there. He was not in, but the boy said he would be there in the +evening, so I went again." + +"That was a mad thing to do." + +"I was mad. I could think of nothing but my own troubles. And I had so +firmly persuaded myself that in a personal interview I could somehow +move him to mercy that I took the chances without considering anything +else." + +It was perhaps an accident, but she glanced at Lyon. He had not moved. +Intensely interested as he was in reaching certain points, he knew +that to get the story they must let her tell it in her own way, +without interruption. + +"I did find him. I had a terrible half hour with him. Oh, he was a man +to fear. He was polite and smiling,--and hard as ice. He was not even +sarcastic. He did not show any feeling. It was merely a question of +money. He said it wasn't pleasant to get money from a woman in this +way, but a woman's money was as good as a man's, and since I had +money, and since I had put myself in a box where my whole life and +reputation were at his mercy, it would be sheer foolishness on his +part not to use his opportunity. Those were his very words. Oh, it was +right to kill him,--it was right!" + +"Grace!" gasped Broughton, half rising. "You don't mean--Good +heavens!" + +"_I_ didn't kill him," she said, steadily. "But I want you to +understand that--that whoever killed him was removing from the earth a +cruel, wicked man. I saw I was making no impression on him and I left +the Wellington. He was going out that evening, and he accompanied me +for a block or two. I told him to leave me, and finally he did. I +returned to Miss Elliott's,--" + +"Do you know at what hour?" asked Lyon, quickly. + +"It was half past eight when I got into my room." + +Lyon unconsciously sighed. That statement. If it accorded with the +facts, would completely knock out the theory he had cherished so long, +based on the assumption that the woman who had fled across the street +at ten o'clock was Mrs. Broughton. There was something so convincing +in her manner of telling the details of her story that it was very +hard to believe she was not presenting the facts truthfully. Yet +certainly it was a curious tangle that had mixed her movements on that +evening so confusingly with those of Fullerton and of the other woman +who had also been entangled with his murder. + +"The next morning," she resumed, "I saw the news of his--death in the +papers. You cannot imagine my relief. It was as though a terrible +weight had been lifted. I wanted to fly. I was wild with joy. Then, +just as I was on the point of returning home, came the news of the +arrest of Arthur Lawrence. It was a terrible blow. I felt that he had +done it for me--because of what I had told him in the morning,--and +that I was really guilty not only of Fullerton's death,--I don't think +I should have minded that much,--but of Arthur's. My nerves collapsed +under the shock and I could not be moved. Gradually, as I saw how +little actual proof there was against him, some composure returned. +Perhaps, after all, he might not be convicted. No one but myself knew +how angry he had been with Mr. Fullerton that day. I was trying, oh, +so hard, to get enough of my strength back to get away, to go +somewhere, anywhere, when yesterday a man came to see me,--a Mr. +Bede." + +"What did he come for?" + +"What did he want?" + +Lyon and Broughton asked their questions simultaneously, as she paused +in her speech. + +Mrs. Broughton glanced irresolutely at Edith Wolcott. That +self-controlled young woman had been sitting silent, with her chin in +her palm, listening to Mrs. Broughton's story with sympathetic +attention. It was obvious the story was already well known to her. Now +she answered the men's questions. + +"Mr. Bede had discovered that Mrs. Broughton was at Fullerton's rooms +that evening. It seems he had also discovered or guessed that I was +there. He trapped her into admitting that she had seen me in the hall +when she left the building with Fullerton. He told her that he would +have to have her subp[oe]naed as a witness, to tell about seeing me. +He didn't know that we were old friends, or he would not have said +that, perhaps. As soon as he left she came to me, secretly, and told +me the whole thing. We decided that the best thing would be to get +away from Waynscott, away from the country, until this thing was +settled. Now that you have spoiled our plan, what are you going to do +with us instead? The responsibility is with you, now!" + +"I will take the responsibility of caring for my wife," Broughton +said, in a ringing voice. He rose and shook himself, as if throwing +off some intolerable burden. "Oh, Grace, Grace, if you had only told +me the whole in the beginning! But I will not blame you now. You have +had a terrible time. Now I will try to make it all up to you. We will +do anything you like,--go anywhere you like,--" + +"You forget," she said, quietly, "I cannot go back to you at all. I am +not your wife." + +She put her hands up and pressed her fingers hard against her closed +eyes. + +"All the trouble has come from that,--all the trouble for me first, +and now for you, and for poor Arthur in prison and for Edith here. I +tried to take what I had no right to and I lied to get it. Oh, do you +think I could have laid my whole heart bare to you as I have done +tonight if I were not through with all that false claim? I have told +you everything as though I were on my deathbed, because I can never +see you again. Somewhere in the world, watching his chance to strike, +William Vanderburg is waiting. I will never go back to him,--never, so +help me God,--but while he lives, I will never dare to take any +happiness that may offer. He is biding his time. Oh, I did wrong, but +I have paid for it. I am paying now, and will pay over and over every +year that I live." + +"Dear Mrs. Broughton," said Lyon, gently, "I can at least relieve you +of that uncertainty. William Vanderburg is dead. I was with him when +he died." + +She stared at him for a moment as though she had not understood his +words. Then, with a sighing breath, she sank back in a dead faint. +This astonishing statement, following the long strain of her +confession, was too much for her nerves. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + +Broughton lifted the limp form of the fainting woman to a couch while +Edith Wolcott brought cold water and sprinkled her face. In a few +minutes she showed signs of returning consciousness, and leaving Edith +to chafe her hands, Broughton drew Lyon out into the hall. + +"Is that straight about Vanderburg being dead? Can you prove it?" he +asked anxiously. + +"Of course. He was killed in a railway accident in Ohio three years +ago. I was with him, and I am sure I still have among my old papers +the pocket memorandum book which I took from his pocket. It gave me +his name, and a few minutes before he died he recovered consciousness +enough to confirm it." + +"Was this before or after my marriage, do you happen to remember?" + +"About six weeks after. As a newspaper man, I knew the circumstances +of the case, and therefore was interested in meeting Vanderburg. Of +course I knew nothing further." + +Broughton walked back and forth with nervous steps. + +"We will be married again, at once, and very privately," he said, in +an unsteady voice. "That will satisfy her mind. What an amazing tangle +it has been. And what luck--what amazing luck--that I should have come +across you, the one man who could give that essential information +about Vanderburg's death. Without that, where would we be, even with +Fullerton dead?--We would not dare to take chances." + +He wrung Lyon's hand with a grip that hurt. + +Edith Wolcott came to the door. "Will you go in now?" she said. "She +is conscious and anxious to see you." + +Broughton went in, and Edith Wolcott, with a warning finger on her +lip, drew Lyon across the hall into the little sitting room where they +had talked earlier in the evening. + +"They are happy," she said, with a catch in her voice. "All has come +out well for them. But if she stays in Waynscott, will she not be +called as a witness? And if she tells that story of Arthur's anger +with Fullerton will it not go against him on the trial?" + +"It is already known that there was bitterness between the two men," +said Lyon thoughtfully. "She would add no new element to the evidence +against him by confirming that, though Howell may think it best to +whisk her away. But I want to consult him about that, first. And if +she is to be secreted, it will involve something more than merely +taking a train at the Union Station." + +"Then that other matter," said Miss Wolcott, hesitatingly. "She saw me +in the hall at the Wellington that evening. You know I told you that I +went to him with a wild idea that I might make him give up my letters, +and that I failed. It was that same evening. I gave up my purpose +because I saw him come out with a lady. She was veiled and I did not +recognize Mrs. Broughton, but she recognized me. And Bede trapped her +into admitting it yesterday. How he got any suspicion of my visit, I +can't guess. But he did." + +Lyon nodded. This he already knew, but he felt there was much he did +not know. + +"So if she is called to the witness stand, that will come out." She +looked at him with troubled eyes. "You can't imagine how I dread the +idea of having my name connected with it in any way. I would rather +die! Do you think they will make me tell publicly all that I told +you? Isn't there any way for me to escape? When I think of the +newspapers,--the gossip,--" She clenched her hands in desperation. +"And if it would do Arthur any good, either! But it wouldn't. If +anything, it would hurt him, I suppose." She looked at him wistfully. + +Lyon considered rapidly and resolved to hazard a question which might +prove a very boomerang if the answer was not what he hoped it would +be. + +"Miss Wolcott, you remember that Lawrence called on you that Sunday +before the tragedy?" + +She looked startled. "Yes." + +"Did he forget his cane here when he left?" + +"No." + +"You are sure?" + +"Oh, yes, quite sure. I should have seen it the next day." + +"And you have not seen it at all?" + +"No." + +"Would you have noticed it, without fail? Your grandfather has quite a +collection of canes, I have noticed." + +"Yes; but I would have seen Arthur's if he had left it." + +"You know it, then?" + +"Yes. I remember we spoke of it particularly that evening when he +first came. I made some teasing remark about it being dandified to +carry a cane, and he retorted that he carried it for protection. He +said, I remember, that a gold headed cane was quite as effective as a +sandbag, and more elegant. He advised me to carry one of Dandy's canes +if I ever had occasion to go out alone in the evening." + +"He said that? Just that?" + +"Yes. We were just talking nonsense, you know. It was when he first +came." + +Lyon felt both relieved and disappointed. At least he could assure +Lawrence that Miss Wolcott denied all knowledge of the cane. That +would be something. Yet if Lawrence was as positive as he seemed to be +about having left it here, would her denial have any weight? Lawrence +could not doubt his own knowledge of facts. Might it be possible that +Mr. Wolcott had carried the cane away somewhere? + +As though in answer to his unspoken thought, the old gentleman, in a +flapping dressing gown, with a lighted candle in his hand and a highly +disapproving look on his face appeared at that moment at the door. + +"I _thought_ I heard voices, but I couldn't quite believe my ears," he +said, with a frowning glance. "Do you know what time it is, young +man?" + +"Time that I were going, I know," said Lyon briskly. "It must be well +on toward twelve." + +"Well on toward two in the morning," protested Mr. Wolcott. + +"You don't really mean it! I certainly have lost count of the time. +I'm going this minute. Forgive me for keeping you up in this +unconscionable way. Miss Wolcott. And good night." + +He pressed her hand encouragingly, and went out to the hall where he +had hung his hat and coat. Fortunately the door to the library was +tight closed, as his first glance had assured him. He should have to +leave it to Miss Wolcott to see that Broughton had a chance to slip +out later. + +As he was about to let himself out, his ruling passion reasserted +itself. Blandly he looked the old gentleman in the eye. "I believe +I'll ask you to lend me a cane, since it's so late," he said. + +"Surely, surely. Take this one," cried the flattered old gentleman. +"Or perhaps you would like this better? It is heavier." + +"I don't want to take one that you are accustomed to carrying +yourself, if you have an odd one around you don't use. By the way, +didn't you say that my friend Lawrence left a cane here once? I might +take that, as he is not likely to call for it immediately." + +"Lawrence? No, he never left a cane here. These are all mine. Here, +take this one. You'll find it light and tough." + +"Thank you," said Lyon, taking it perforce. "I thought someone spoke +of a cane belonging to Lawrence,--" + +"He never left it here," said the old gentleman definitely, and Lyon +had to let himself out of the house without further satisfaction. He +crossed the yard to Broughton's house, let himself in, and while he +waited for his romantic landlord to escape, like a concealed Romeo, +from his lady's bower, he mentally reviewed the situation. + +Mrs. Broughton had cleared up her own connection with Fullerton. +Whatever of mystery there had been in her movements, and whatever of +rashness, it touched her personal history only. She had not killed +Fullerton, nor had she witnessed his murder. The fleeing woman whom he +had seen on the fatal night was not she. He had been entirely wrong in +his suspicion, and his pursuit of that clue had done no good except to +assist in bringing Broughton and his wife together. That was a good +thing in itself, but it would not affect Lawrence's case. + +Was it then possible that Lawrence had been right in his first +suspicion that the fleeing woman was Edith Wolcott? She had told her +story so clearly and with so much apparent frankness that Lyon found +it very hard to believe she could really be concealing so vital a +point in her account of that evening. However, whether innocent or +guilty, her whole connection with the affair and her relation to the +two principals was bound to come out, now that Bede had got on her +trail. That was bad. The publicity of such a trial would be as bitter +as death to such a woman. It was the very thing Lawrence had risked +everything to avoid. + +And Lawrence himself? His case looked darker than ever to his brooding +friend. Unless he could explain away the evidence of the broken cane, +the implication was against him. Apparently he could not explain that +away. He had certainly implied to Lyon that the cane had been left at +Miss Wolcott's, and that this was the reason he could say nothing on +the subject. But since Miss Wolcott, who certainly was interested in +his acquittal, and her grandfather, who certainly was innocent of all +complicity, both were positive he had not left it there, what could +one think? Lyon felt utterly and completely at sea. + +His brooding was cut short by the entrance of Broughton. + +"I had to wait until the old gentleman had gone back upstairs and the +house was quiet," he said, as he lit a cigar. His face was glowing, +and he looked twenty years younger than the "Olden" who had spoken +with Lyon in that room two nights before. "Then Grace let me out. Miss +Wolcott had left the door unbolted. Grace is bearing up wonderfully. I +say, isn't she a wonderful woman?" + +"Miss Wolcott?" asked Lyon perversely. + +"I meant Grace. But Miss Wolcott is all right. She has stood by her +like a trump. I won't soon forget that. Well, it has been pretty hard +on all of us, but it is all right now." + +"How about Lawrence?" asked Lyon. + +"Lawrence? Oh, Lawrence! Well, of course I don't know anything about +Lawrence," said Broughton somewhat vaguely. + +Lyon smothered a groan with a laugh. + +"Well, your happiness does not make Lawrence's case any worse, so far +as that goes. And Mrs. Broughton's testimony--" + +"I hope she will not be called on to testify in this case. It would be +very unpleasant--" + +"Undoubtedly. But Bede will have her subp[oe]naed if he thinks she can +help his side. And before you smuggle her away, I must lay the matter +before Howell. You know Howell has been waiting days and days for a +chance to see Mrs. Broughton himself. Bede didn't wait." + +Broughton looked as though the idea were distasteful, but he was too +manly a man to shirk an issue. + +"All right," he said. "You may give Howell the situation to-morrow." + +"To-day," said Lyon, pulling out his watch. "What will this day bring +forth?" + +He was soon to find out. Fate had been dodging behind covers for a +long time. Now she was ready to come out into the open. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + + +Although it was nearly three before Lyon went to sleep, he awoke the +next morning earlier than usual and lay for some time figuring on the +problem that possessed his mind before he thought of such a thing as +dressing. He must see Howell and acquaint him with the strange +developments of the night before as soon as possible, but Howell was +old-fashioned, and he kept no telephone at his residence, for the +express purpose of warding off the intrusion of business matters upon +his hours at home. It was useless, therefore, to try to communicate +with him before he reached his office, which would be at ten +precisely. + +While Lyon lay speculating on the situation, his eye fell upon the +knotted handkerchief containing the booty which he had brought away +from his raid upon Fullerton's room last night. The pressing incidents +that had followed had put it for the time completely out of his mind. +He sprang from the bed to examine it. + +It was a curious record of a curious form of villainy that the little +package revealed. The notes were all from women, who, by fault or +fortune, had given him some hold upon their fears. Evidently the phase +of Fullerton's nature revealed by the decadent literature and pictures +in his room had had dark and complex ramifications in his career. The +rule of terror which he had held over Edith Wolcott and Mrs. Broughton +was, it would seem, only an instance of the methods by which, for the +sake of money or malice or for pure delight in deviltry, he had made +himself master of the secret history of women, and had used his +knowledge to keep them trembling under his lash. + +Lyon soon found to his relief that it was not necessary for him to +read the whole of a letter to classify it, and he conscientiously +averted his eyes from the signatures. What an oppression must have +lifted from the face of nature when this man was dead! The man must +have possessed the fascination and the venom of a cobra. Lyon used up +a box of matches burning the telltale notes over his ash-receiver, and +felt that if he should have failed in everything else, it would have +been worth all to save this package of pitiful secrets from the cold +official eye of Bede. + +Two letters only he saved from the cleansing flame. They were from +William Vanderburg and contained the information which had enabled +Fullerton to terrorize Mrs. Broughton. These he kept to turn over to +Broughton, and with them he placed the old note-book of Vanderburg's +which he had taken from the pocket of the dying man. It was a curious +fact that the two tangled threads of that story should have come into +his hands and that chance should have brought his path and Mrs. +Broughton's again together. + +On his way downstairs, an impulse not wholly devoid of mischief sent +him to the 'phone. If it was too early to talk to Howell, he could at +any rate get Bede on the line,--and he did. + +"Hello, Mr. Bede," he said, respectfully, "This is Lyon, of the +_News_. Any new developments in the Lawrence case?" + +"I think I'd better ask you that question," said Bede, somewhat drily. + +"Oh, I mean authentic information, not newspaper imagination," +protested Lyon. + +"I'd like to know, Mr. Lyon, just how much of your innocence is +authentic and how much is newspaper imagination." + +"Oh, come, you're making fun of me. Really, haven't you any news items +to give me?" + +"Not a scrap. You are very well able to help yourself to what you +want, young man." And Bede suspended the receiver and the +conversation. + +That cheered Lyon a little, but as he came out into the streets his +footsteps lagged. His imagination had achieved little good in the +present case. It had simply led him wandering far afield. He had +imagined that the woman who fled from the scene of Fullerton's murder +might be Mrs. Broughton instead of Miss Wolcott. It was not Mrs. +Broughton,--and now Bede knew all about Mrs. Broughton's share in the +evening's events. Whether it was Miss Wolcott or not seemed as +debatable as at first. Lawrence undoubtedly believed it was. Whether +Bede believed it or not, he certainly had unearthed the facts that she +had visited the Wellington to see Fullerton earlier in the evening, +and that she had been at the drug-store on Hemlock Avenue a few +minutes before the time when Fullerton must have been struck down by +Lawrence's cane. The cards were therefore practically all in his +hands, and the defence could only hope to do what he might graciously +permit. It was maddening. + +That fatal cane! It was the one bit of evidence more than +circumstantial. It must be explained. + +In his dejection Lyon had walked along Hemlock Avenue to Sherman +Street. The empty lot where the cane had been discovered was on his +left, and he crossed the street and stopped to look down into the +trampled hollow. That cursed cane! How was it possible that it had +come here unless by Lawrence's hand? He scowled at the spot, with +gloom on his brow and perplexity in his mind, till someone stopped +beside him, and an eager old voice asked, + +"What is happening? Anything?" + +It was old Mr. Wolcott, eager-eyed and interested as ever. He tried to +discover what it was that was attracting Lyon's attention, with a +lively curiosity that made Lyon laugh, even in his depression. + +"I was looking for an inspiration," he said, "but I can't see one. I'm +afraid it's hopeless." + +"Sometimes you see queer things when you don't expect to," the old +gentleman said, cheerfully. "Once I saw a dog-fight down in that +hollow." + +"Did you?" responded Lyon, looking at his watch. "I must be going on. +I've been killing time till I could see a man down town." + +"It was a lively fight. There is a Boston terrier up in our +neighborhood that is a fighter. I don't like fighting dogs +myself,--and this one is a terror. He is always pitching on to some +poor little fellow that isn't big enough to stand up to him, and +doesn't have a chance to run. I broke my cane over him." + +"Indeed?" murmured Lyon, with polite indifference. Then the echo of +the words rang through the silence of his mind,--louder and louder, +until he pulled up with a start, as though some one had been calling +to him for a long time and he had just become conscious of it. "You +broke your cane over him?" he repeated, and it seemed to him that +everything about him suddenly stood still till he should get the +answer. "Was that here,--in this hollow?" + +"Yes. He's a big brute of a dog, and he had the little fellow by the +throat--" + +"Yes, yes. What did you do with the pieces?" + +"The pieces of the cane?" + +"Yes. What did you do with them?" + +The old man laughed somewhat slyly. "Edith doesn't like to hear about +things like that. She thinks that I am too old to go in and straighten +out a dog-fight. I don't tell her when anything of that sort happens." + +"I see," said Lyon eagerly. "So you hid the pieces?" + +The old man nodded cannily. "She'd never miss the cane. I have a lot +of other walking sticks. But if she saw the broken pieces, she'd get +the whole story out of me." + +"Where did you hide them?" + +"Oh, I put them out of sight, all right." + +"But where, man, where? Show me the place." + +"But I don't want them," protested Mr. Wolcott. "It was an old cane, +anyhow. I didn't mind breaking it." + +"I just wanted to see if you had found a good hiding place. Do you +suppose the pieces are still there?" + +"They aren't any good." + +"No, but let's look and see, anyhow. Was it hereabouts?" + +"Just under the sidewalk here. There's a hole under the sidewalk that +you see when you are down in the hollow." + +"Come down and show me. Here, I'll help you down, and Miss Edith won't +guess where you have been." + +The old man chuckled. This added a thrill to the affair, and with some +difficulty and hard breathing he climbed down into the low-lying lot +and made his way over the snow-covered hummocks of last summer's weeds +to the place which was more familiar to Lyon than it was to him. + +"Right in there," he said, pointing to the famous spot where +Lawrence's cane had been found. "Perhaps they are there now. I poked +them quite far in. But I can't see anything in there." + +"You remember the place? You are sure it was right there?" + +"There isn't any other place where I could poke them in, is there?" + +"No, I don't see that there is. Now, can you remember when it was that +you put them in there? Was there anything that would fix the date in +your mind?" + +"You remember that day you came to the house to see Edith,--the first +time you came?" + +"Yes." + +"Well, it was the last time I had been out for a walk before that. Not +that day. It was on a Monday, because I remember that I didn't go out +Sunday because it stormed. Monday I went, and that was when I saw the +dogs fighting." + +"What sort of a cane was it?" asked Lyon, as he helped the old +gentleman to recover the upper levels of the street. + +"Oh, it wasn't a cane I cared for specially. It was just an old one." + +"But what was it like? Did it have a heavy knob or a little one? Can +you describe it?" + +"It had a pretty heavy knob. But the wood broke off right at my hand +when I beat the dog off. It wasn't a very stout cane. I got it in New +Orleans in 1842." + +"I have noticed that you have a good collection of canes. I'd like to +look at them, if you have time." + +The old gentleman blossomed into a pathetic vivacity under this +unexpected interest in his affairs. + +"Oh, they are nothing to speak of. Not more than eight or nine. When I +was younger, I was something of a dandy, and I liked to have whatever +was going in that sort of thing. There weren't many that could show a +better style in little things than I could. But nobody thinks an old +man like me counts. No one cares for what I have." + +"I should very much like to see your canes," said Lyon. "I have been +interested in canes lately. I can think of nothing that would please +me more than an opportunity to examine your collection. May I go home +with you now and see them?" + +"I shall have great pleasure in showing them to you," Mr. Wolcott +answered, with dignified courtesy, turning homeward at once. "Though I +fear that my modest collection is hardly worthy the attention of a +connoisseur." + +"I can hardly claim to be a connoisseur," protested Lyon in the same +vein. "I merely have a personal interest and curiosity which I may say +amounts to a passion. Now, I suppose you can tell me where you got +each and every cane you own." + +"Certainly I can. Edith says that I am forgetful, but remember the +things that happened a few years back well enough. I can tell you just +where each one came from. Here we are. Come in, sir, come in. I am +glad to have you here as my guest. I don't have so many visitors." + +Miss Wolcott, hearing her grandfather enter, had come into the hall to +look after him, and she was evidently surprised to see his companion. +Her surprise could hardly equal that of Lyon, however, at the change +which a day had made in her appearance. Instead of the somewhat severe +and marvellously self-controlled woman whom he had seen before, he saw +a radiant girl, tremulous and eager. The statue had been touched with +life. She came forward with a questioning look. + +"Has anything new come up? Did you wish to see me?" she asked under +her breath. + +"Not yet," he answered, in the same tone, but she read something in +his eye that made her watch him. + +But the old gentleman did not like this disregard of his prior and +exclusive claims as the host. + +"Mr. Lyon came to see me, Edith. Sit down, Mr. Lyon. My canes are +right here in the hall. I have never made anything like a collection, +and I am afraid you will be disappointed, but this one was my +father's. I've always kept that as a souvenir, but I never carried it +myself. It was cracked when I got it, and I was afraid of breaking it. +This thin little cane was one I carried as a young man. The dandies +carried them for dress canes when they went beauing the young ladies +in those days. I could tell tales--! You wouldn't suspect it, Edith, +but your grandfather was quite a lady-killer in his day." + +"This stout stick is the one that you usually carry, I see," said +Lyon. He had run his eye over the entire lot when they were first laid +before him, and the hope he had cherished that a cane resembling the +one that Lawrence had carried might be found here had swiftly +vanished. There was nothing like it. Still, even without that final +link his discovery was so nearly perfect that he could hardly in +reason ask for more. He rose, eager to get to Howell with his news. +Edith, watchful of his face, guessed that there was something more in +his inquiry than appeared upon the surface. + +"Dandy has another cane upstairs, if you want to know about his entire +collection," she said. + +"No, I haven't, Edith." + +"Oh, yes, you have. Dandy. It's in your room, behind the door. That +cane with the heavy top that you got in New Orleans in 1842." + +The old gentleman chuckled, and essayed an elaborate wink at Lyon. + +"Oh, it's upstairs, is it?" + +"Yes, I put it there yesterday. I came across it in the back hall. I +think Eliza had kept it up there to straighten the pictures with." + +"You are talking nonsense, Edith," her grandfather interrupted, +impatiently. "I know where that cane is. It got broken and I threw it +away. It was an old cane, anyhow,--not worth making a fuss over." + +"I wonder if you could find it," Lyon said to the girl, in a swift +aside. She ran at once upstairs, and in a few moments returned, a +little breathless, but successful. She was carrying a heavy-headed +cane which in general appearance was very like the broken cane which +had figured in the trial. Lyon's eyes sparkled when he saw it. His +idea that Lawrence had forgotten his cane here in the hall, and that +the old gentleman, whose eyesight was confessedly so bad that he could +not read the newspapers, had picked it out of the hall rack by mistake +for one of his own, seemed now conclusively proved. And after all his +work, that the actual discovery of the fact should come so by accident +and casually! + +"Is this your New Orleans cane,--the one you told me about?" he asked. + +The old gentleman was examining it with a puzzled look and growing +perplexity. "I don't understand it," he murmured. "I guess I must be +getting old. I ought to be dead." + +"Nonsense. The explanation is very simple, and I think I can tell you +what It is. But first, _is_ this your New Orleans cane?" + +"It certainly seems to be." + +"Would you swear to it?" + +"But what was that other cane?" + +"Let us settle this first. Would you swear to this one,--that it is +your own, and that this is the cane that you thought you had with you +when you broke your stick across those fighting dogs? You may be asked +in court to testify to that point, Mr. Wolcott. Can you swear that +this stick is actually the one that you thought you had broken?" + +"Why, of course it is. I know my own stick. But I don't understand--" + +"It is very simple. Lawrence left his cane here one evening, and the +next morning, when you went for your walk, you took it in mistake for +your own. It was just about the size and weight of this one, and you +would not be likely to notice the difference since it was not the cane +you commonly carried. You broke the cane, and put the pieces under the +edge of the sidewalk. They were found there immediately after +Fullerton's murder, and as Lawrence's name was engraved around the +knob, they seemed to connect him circumstantially with the murder. It +has been the one point we could not get around." + +"But didn't he remember that he had left it here? I can't understand +why that did not occur to him," Miss Wolcott exclaimed. + +"Can't you imagine why he would not allow himself to remember?" Lyon +asked, bluntly. + +"No. I don't understand you. _Allow_ himself to remember? Why not? If +it was merely a question of where he had left his cane, it would not +have been a serious matter to answer, would it?" + +"But suppose he, too, thought, as all the rest of us did, that the +cane had been the instrument of Fullerton's death?" + +"But it was not!" + +"No, but it seemed so. And with that seeming fact before him, he could +not defend himself by saying he had left it here without throwing the +same suspicion upon someone in this house." + +"But he could not entertain so absurd a suspicion!" + +"It was far from absurd. Do you remember you told me that he had said +that a good stout cane was better than a policeman's whistle, and that +he advised you to carry one of your grandfather's sticks if you had to +go out at night?" + +"Yes, I remember very well. Of course it was all in jest. We were not +talking seriously then." + +"I suspect he thought afterwards that you might have taken his +suggestion seriously." + +"What do you mean?" + +"He has absolutely refused to give any hint of where he had lost his +cane. Of course he had not forgotten. But there was in his mind the +possibility that you had, under some necessity, acted upon his +suggestion, and had taken his cane with you when you went out that +night,--" He had been talking rapidly, following out his own line of +reasoning, and forgetting for the moment that the implication it +contained must be startling to her, till he was pulled up by the look +of horror and amazement that had gathered on her face. + +"What are you saying?" she cried. "Good heavens, what do you mean? You +haven't been thinking that I--_I_ killed Mr. Fullerton with Arthur's +cane?" + +"I haven't," said Lyon, simply. "I haven't from the first. But it was +very natural that, knowing what he knew and not knowing what he +didn't, Lawrence should have felt that to clear himself would be to +implicate you." + +Her horror was too deep for words. She only stared at him, with that +fixed look of dismay. + +"Of course," added Lyon, "now that we can explain the cane away, he +will probably speak out." + +"Was that why he was so anxious I should say nothing?--because he +thought I--oh, it is not to be believed!" + +"But consider, Miss Wolcott! It seemed very clear. He knew he had left +his cane here, he of course remembered the talk you had had about it +as a weapon of defense, he knew that you were out of the house that +evening, because he called to see you at a quarter of nine and you +were not in. He knew, also, that you had reason to hate Fullerton, he +knew that a woman was with Fullerton when he was killed and that when +she fled from the spot she came to this house--" + +She interrupted him with a cry. "No, no! How can he think that? It is +not true! I did go to the Wellington as I told you, meaning to see him +and try to appeal to his better nature, if he had one, for the return +of my letters, but gave up my plan when I found I could not see him +alone. But I saw nothing of him after he left the Wellington with Mrs. +Broughton." + +"That was early in the evening,--before eight. Did you come straight +home?" + +"Yes." + +"But when Lawrence called at a quarter before nine,--" + +"I had shut myself up in my room with a headache, and told Eliza to +deny me to any caller." + +"Then did you go out again, later?" + +She looked surprised. "Yes. I went out to the drugstore afterwards to +get something to make me sleep. I was nervous and overwrought, and I +wanted to get a quiet night's sleep. Then I came home and went in at +the side door and up to my room." + +"Do you know what time it was?" + +"Yes, my grandfather met me in the hall and was very much excited to +find that I had been out alone so late at night. It was a few minutes +before ten. I noticed the time particularly, because he was so annoyed +about it." + +"It all seems very simple, now," said Lyon, cheerfully. "Just what +Bede may have up his sleeve, of course I don't know. But I think that +with the information that you have given me, we can checkmate him very +neatly. Now I must see Howell. With this elimination of the fatal cane +as an element in the case, I cannot see that there is anything to +connect Lawrence directly with the situation. I think we can expect to +have him free at once. If we only could really discover the actual +murderer, it might be better, but I am hopeful, as things are." + +"Was that all you wanted to see my canes for?" protested Mr. Wolcott, +with an air of injury. + +Lyon laughed and shook his hand. "I want to add a cane to your +collection if you will let me. We'll go and pick it out the day that +Lawrence goes free!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + + +When Lyon left the Wolcotts, he hurried for the car to reach Howell's +office as quickly as possible. As he went down Hemlock Avenue he saw a +group of Miss Elliott's girls taking their daily constitutional under +the supervision of Miss Rose. In orderly ranks, two by two, they +crossed the street sedately, and up on the opposite side, and Lyon +scrutinized them eagerly to discover if Kittie was among them. There +she was, near the center of the procession, her tall, slight figure +swinging in the time of the march, but somehow so much more individual +and graceful than any of the others! He was so absorbed in watching +her as the file came nearer that he did not notice at all the sound of +a runaway behind him until a light delivery wagon, with one wheel +gone, dashed frantically by, in the direction of the girls. The horse, +wild with terror at the ungainly thing which bumped at his heels, +swung in toward the sidewalk, and in a moment the girls had broken +ranks and were flying, in swift disorder, in all directions. Lyon had +instinctively broken into a run as soon as he saw the situation, but +if he had any intention of catching the horse and cutting an heroic +figure in the eyes of Kittie, the thought was utterly and absolutely +forgotten the next instant. Instead, he suddenly stood stock still in +the middle of the street, staring at one of the girls who had cut +diagonally across the road with the long, easy running gait that he +had seen once and only once before. It was the girl who had fled from +the scene of Fullerton's murder, and so had swept for an instant +across the field of Lyon's vision,--and it was not the frail and +delicate invalid, Mrs. Broughton, nor yet the slow and stately Miss +Wolcott. This was a young athlete, who ran with a grace, a sureness, +that made the sight a joy and unforgettable. It was not until she had +turned again and was clinging to his arm for protection that he fully +realized what it meant that he should have identified the running girl +whom he had so long been searching for with Kittie Tayntor. + +"Oh, Cousin Percy, wasn't it perfectly beautiful that the horse should +run away right here and give you a chance to rescue me like this? I +have always wanted to be rescued to see what it would feel like. The +girls in the novels almost always faint, but I never faint, so I knew +I would always be able to remember afterwards just how it felt. I was +so glad when I saw that you were the only man in sight on the street!" + +"Kittie, when we were talking about Mr. Fullerton, why didn't you tell +me what you knew about it?" + +"What I knew? About what?" + +"About the--accident." + +"I don't know what you are talking about." + +She looked so plainly bewildered that his heart sank. Could it be, +after all, that she really knew nothing. She _must_ know! He took up +the filmy clue carefully. + +"Kittie, one evening not long ago--it was on the Monday before +Thanksgiving--I was on Hemlock Avenue opposite Miss Wolcott's, and I +saw a girl run across the street, and in at the Wolcotts' side yard. +She ran just as you ran a minute ago when that horse startled you. +Wasn't that girl you?" + +"Oh, _yes!_ I didn't know what you were talking about. Did you really +see me then? How curious! Then _that_ was the first time!" + +"It was a little before ten?" + +She nodded, her eyes dancing with suppressed mischief, though she drew +her lips down like a fair penitent. + +"Where had you been, Kittie?" + +"To the skating rink on Elm Street." + +"Alone?" + +She nodded again, and glanced back at Miss Rose, who was gathering her +scattered flock together at a safe distance beyond hearing. + +"It was this way," she said, hurriedly. "Everybody else had gone home +for the vacation on Saturday, and Miss Elliott had made me stay till +Tuesday to make up some history. I was just wild about it, missing +three whole days. I got thinking what I could do to get even,--it +would be a secret satisfaction even if she never knew it. So Monday +night I climbed down from my room by way of the window, and got out by +the Secret Passage I told you there was, and went to the rink and had +a splendid time. I knew Miss Elliott had a friend visiting her, and so +she would not be likely to think of me or anything like that. And she +didn't. She never knew I wasn't learning the names of the Roman +emperors, horrid old things, all the time." + +"But, Kittie, is that all?" + +"Goodness! Miss Elliott would think it was enough!" + +"But what made you run so? You ran as though you were frightened." + +She gave him a startled look and half turned away. She did not answer. + +"What frightened you? Had you seen anything,--a row, or a fight of any +sort?" + +She shook her head. "I was frightened," she said, "but it isn't worth +talking about. Besides, it isn't pleasant. I don't want to talk about +it." + +"But I have a very special reason for asking, Kittie. It isn't just +curiosity." + +"Well, a horrid man frightened me. I suppose he was drunk. But if Miss +Elliott knew about that--!" + +"How did he frighten you?" + +"He jumped out at me. It's a kind of dark place on Sherman Street, and +I was scurrying along and I didn't see him at all until I was right up +to him, and then as I hurried by he suddenly jumped out and caught my +arm." + +"Did you scream?" + +"I shrieked and struck at him--" + +"What with?" + +"Why, I just struck out. But I had my skates in my hand and I guess I +hit him, because he let go of my arm. Then I ran as hard as I could." + +The physician's testimony at the inquest flashed across Lyon's +mind,--"a heavy instrument with a cutting edge." Kitty's skate and not +Lawrence's cane! The relief was so great that he almost forgot the +necessity of establishing all the links. But Miss Rose was +approaching, and he knew he must lose no time. + +"How was he dressed, Kittie?" + +"Goodness! I didn't stop to see." + +"But in dark clothes or light? Did he wear a hat?" + +"He had a long loose grey coat, and a hat pulled away down over his +eyes. And a silk muffler around his throat was pulled up over his +chin. That came off in my hand when I pushed him away. I didn't know I +had it until I had run half a block. Then I threw it in the street." + +Lyon nodded. "I found it. Now, Kittie, I want you to come and show me +the exact spot on Sherman Street where this happened." + +Her face was already flushed and her breath coming fast with her +recital, but she now looked annoyed at his persistence. + +"I can't. Miss Rose is waiting for me now. And besides,--" she +hesitated to impugn his chivalry by so unworthy a suggestion, but +needs must,--"you aren't going to _tell?_" + +"Kittie, haven't you any idea who that man was?" + +She looked shocked at the question. "Of course not!" Then the +seriousness of his tone struck her and she began to tremble. + +"What do you mean?" + +"It was Mr. Fullerton,--I am sure it must have been. But you must come +and show me the spot. You know that Mr. Lawrence is in jail under +suspicion of having killed him." + +"Yes." Then, suddenly, she understood. She went very white and her +eyes grew large with horror. He feared she would faint, but Kittie was +not of the fainting sort. Instead she began talking volubly, in +intense nervous excitement. + +"I don't care, he hadn't any business to jump out of the shadows in +that way. He just did it to frighten me, and it made my heart beat so +terribly that I didn't know _what_ I was doing. I just struck at him +and I didn't think about the skates, and if Miss Elliott hears about +it she will simply be hysterical. I'll have to tell her how I got out +and that will be breaking my initiation oath and there will simply be +nothing terrible enough for her to say. And--" she stopped suddenly as +a new horror struck her, and gasped. "Will they put me in jail?" + +"I think probably not, but we'll have to see Mr. Howell, the lawyer, +and let him arrange in regard to all that." + +His hesitancy was more terrible than anything she had expected. It +struck her dumb. + +"You never suspected, when you saw the report in the paper the next +day, that the man found dead on Sherman Street was the man you had +met?" + +"I never saw the papers," said Kittie. "Miss Elliott doesn't allow +them to come into the school. And besides I went away early Tuesday +morning, you know, and didn't come back till Saturday. I never heard a +thing about it." + +"I see. And when you came back, and became acquainted with Mrs. +Broughton, and she spoke of Lawrence and Fullerton, you would +naturally never connect that with what had happened to you, especially +as you did not know that the man was dead. I see: Now, first of all, I +want you to come around and show me the place so as to make sure there +is no mistake, and then we'll take the car down town and see Mr. +Howell. I'll explain to Miss Rose. Would you like to have her come +with you?" + +She shook her head. + +"Or any of the girls?" + +"No. They are sillies. I don't want to tell any of _them_. I'd rather +have nobody there but just you. You will take all the responsibility, +won't you?" + +"Yes," said Lyon, with an emphasis that she did not altogether +understand until somewhat later in the story. "I am going to take the +whole responsibility of you from this time on, and you must always +tell me when you do anything like--killing people, you know. Someone +will always have to explain such things, and I am just as good at +explaining as anyone. Promise you will let me--look out for you +always." + +She looked at him doubtfully. "But--if I have to go right to jail?" + +"Perhaps that can be avoided. But you must come down with me to Mr. +Howell's office and tell him the whole story. That is the first thing. +I think he will be able to fix it up so that you won't have to go to +jail even for a minute. Wait here for me while I run back to explain +to Miss Rose." + +Poor Miss Rose was the most bewildered woman in town when Lyon hastily +told her that it would be necessary for him to take Miss Tayntor down +town for an interview with his lawyer, and that there was not time for +her to go back to the school to secure Miss Elliott's permission. + +"But it would be entirely contrary to the rules to allow one of our +pupils to go down town alone with a man," she protested, feebly. + +"That's too bad," said Lyon, sympathetically. "You just tell Miss +Elliott that I was in too much of a hurry to see her and explain, but +I will come around and tell her about it afterwards." He hurried back +to where poor Kittie, looking much more like a frightened school-girl +than like a deep-dyed criminal, awaited him on the corner. + +"Now come on," he said. "We must have this over as soon as possible +and then I'll take you to Sweetzer's and you are to pick out the +biggest box of chocolates he can fill while we have time to wait. +We'll go down Sherman Street first. Oh, Kittie, Kittie, what a dance +you have been leading me for the last two weeks! I have been +suspecting everybody but you. Now show me where the man stood." + +"There," she said, pointing to the exact spot where Fullerton's body +had been found. + +"That, I think, settles everything," said Lyon, cheerfully. "You see, +the law is particular, so I had to know exactly. It will be worth a +month's salary to see old Howell's face when he hears your story." + +He thought he had really placed the estimate too low when he sat +watching that amazed gentleman listening to Kittie a few minutes +later. That witch, whose terrors of the rigors of the law had been +somewhat softened by Percy's manner of receiving her story, rose to +the dramatic occasion and told her tale with a vividness and color +that held Howell absorbed from the beginning. He let her tell the +whole without interruption, and when it was over he turned to Lyon, +drawing him aside so that Kittie should not hear. + +"Perhaps you don't remember, but for several weeks before the murder +there were stories of a man who lurked about that district, +frightening women and eluding the police. There have been no such +reports since Fullerton was killed. That explains the turned overcoat +worn inside-out for a disguise, and the black silk muffler you found +in the street. A quick change and the respectable, black-coated +Fullerton had replaced the skulking vagrant in gray that the police +might be inquiring for. I am not a pious man, but it strikes me as +more than accident that the hand of an innocent girl should be the +instrument, under Providence, to send him to his account. However, +that is speculation. Thank heaven I have some facts to deal with, at +last." + +"And I've found the explanation of the cane business," said Lyon. "You +can add that to your small but choice assortment of facts." + +And he related his encounter with Mr. Wolcott, and the significant +facts that had been evolved from that gentle old peace-maker of canine +quarrels. + +Howell rubbed his glasses, and put them on to look at Lyon, and then +took them off to rub them again. + +"Well!" he remarked. "Well, well!" It seemed inadequate, but it was +the best he could do with Kittie present. + +Then he called in a stenographer, and asked Kittie a number of +questions slowly, and the stenographer wrote them down, and also, to +Kittie's dismay, wrote her answers. This process seemed to her so +uncanny that she could not keep her eyes from the point of the rapid +pencil, and even when Mr. Howell bade her look at him and not at the +stenographer, she could hardly keep herself from turning nervously to +see if that thing was still going. Then she had to wait until it was +all written out on the typewriter, and then Mr. Howell read it all +over to her and asked her to sign it. It was all very exciting and +interesting, and Kittie made good use of it as material for tales +afterwards. But when it was over, and the box of chocolates had been +duly selected and sampled, Kittie suddenly felt that she had been +living up to the character of a reasonable being long enough, and when +Lyon suggested that he would go back with her to the school and tell +Miss Elliott what they had been doing, Kittie calmly announced that +she was never going back there. Never. + +"But, Kittie, you will have to! That is your home while you are at +school." + +"I shall never go back there." + +"But why not?" + +"Do you suppose I could ever tell Miss Elliott that I had killed +somebody? Why, I'd rather go to jail. Honest." + +"Where else can you go?" + +"I don't know. But I won't go there. I won't ever go where Miss +Elliott can say anything to me until I am as old as she is,--or till I +am married, maybe." + +"But you will have to go somewhere for a day or two, you know. You +needn't be afraid. Miss Elliott won't say anything when she +understands,--" + +"No, she won't, because I won't give her the chance. I won't be there +for her to say anything to." + +"Kittie, dear,--" + +"It doesn't make any difference what you say. I won't go." + +"Do you know anyone in Waynscott?" + +"No. But I can go to a hotel." + +"No, you can't. That's nonsense." + +"Now you are not being polite." And her lip trembled in a way that +warned Lyon she was near the verge of tears. He looked distractedly up +and down the street,--for they had been waiting on the corner for the +car when this deadlock developed,--and then he had an inspiration. + +"Will you let me take you to Miss Wolcott's?" + +She looked at him suspiciously. "You needn't think that if you get me +so near the school as that, I will change my mind and go in. Because I +won't." + +"Oh, Kittie, I'm not trying to play any tricks on you! I'd know better +than to try! But you must go somewhere, and if you won't go back to +Miss Elliott's, I don't know of a better place for you to go than to +Miss Wolcott's. She will be glad to see you and to help you, because +she is engaged to Arthur Lawrence, and your--your statement to Mr. +Howell will set him free, you see, so she will feel under obligations +to you on that account. You must have a woman friend to stay with, +Kittie. It wouldn't be nice for you to go off anywhere by yourself." + +"You needn't tell me that," said Kittie, with quick offense. "I guess +I know what is proper. All right, I'll go to Miss Wolcott's if I have +to. But she needn't think she can lecture me." + +"Mrs. Broughton is staying with Miss Wolcott, I forgot to tell you. +You like her, you know." + +"Like her!" exclaimed Kittie with a swift clearing of her darkened +brow. "Why, I'd go to her if she was on the tip-top of the North Pole. +She's the only one in all the world I do like." She stole a glance at +him from the corner of her eye as she made this sweeping statement. + +Lyon made no answer. The subject was too large to discuss. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + + +Lyon would probably have found himself somewhat embarrassed in +explaining Kittie and her methods to Miss Wolcott if Mrs. Broughton +had not been there. But Mrs. Broughton was there (and so was Mr. +Broughton, whose presence at an exceedingly hasty and exceedingly +private wedding that morning had been found necessary), and when +Kittie saw her she ran to her and clung to her with hidden face, while +Lyon told her story to the amazed little group of three. + +"Poor child, poor child," murmured Mrs. Broughton, softly, touching +the defiant little head that was crushed against her sleeve. + +"Will Mr. Lawrence be released, then, without anything further?" asked +Edith Wolcott. It was perhaps natural that to her that would be the +pivotal point of the situation. + +"Immediately. Howell is attending to the red tape of it now. It +certainly won't take long." + +Edith put up her hand to hide her trembling lips. Mrs. Broughton gave +her a glance of sympathetic understanding, and then said to Lyon, + +"And what about this dear little girl? Are there any other +formalities,--" + +"Howell will take care of that. There isn't anything to worry about. +Her deposition will be laid before the county attorney, but as I +understood it, she is not likely to be called on for much of anything +else. The Grand Jury would only act on information laid before them, +and if the county attorney is satisfied, there won't be any bill +brought. In the meantime,--" + +"I won't go back to Miss Elliott's. I won't--ever," Kittie interrupted +suddenly. + +Lyon glanced hesitatingly at Miss Wolcott, but that young woman was +regarding the volcanic schoolgirl with surprise and with no special +warmth of emotion. + +"That's what she says," said Lyon, with a whimsical appeal. "If she +persists, I suppose I must write--or someone must--to her uncle in +Columbus, and explain why she refuses, and assure him that she is safe +with friends until he can arrange for her." + +"I won't go back to Uncle Joe," said Kittie, sitting up suddenly. "Do +you think I could go to them and explain that I had--had _killed_ +anybody? Why, they would think I was crazy. They would look at me so. +I won't go to anybody that knows me." + +Lyon looked distressed. Miss Wolcott looked annoyed and perplexed. +Mrs. Broughton looked at her husband,--a long glance, at least three +sentences long,--and then she said quietly, + +"Would you like to come to New York and stay with me for the rest of +the winter, Kittie?" + +"Would I?" gasped Kittie. + +"Do you think your uncle and aunt would consent to your coming to pay +me a visit?" + +"They'd have to," said Kittie, calmly. + +Mrs. Broughton laughed. + +"We'll see what we can do by way of persuasion first. We'll go by way +of Columbus when we go on, and explain our plans. I can't spare my +little nurse yet. In fact, I think I must have you come with me for a +while to the Metropole, while we have to stay in Waynscott. That may +be--" she glanced inquiringly at Lyon--"a few days? Or a week?" + +"Probably." + +"Then is that all settled?" + +Kittie threw her arms around her. "Oh, I'd do anything in the world +for you." + +"Then come over to Miss Elliott's at once, and I will explain +everything to her while you pack your trunk." + +Kittie looked dismayed. "Oh, I can't,--" + +"Yes, you can,--with me there. Come, we'll go at once. You'd better +come, too. Woods. Miss Elliott has a tremendous respect for your +name!" + +Broughton, who looked curiously like a lion being petted and enjoying +the process, turned to Lyon with benign ferocity. + +"You will have to come to New York, too, Mr. Lyon. I need you in my +business." + +Lyon unconsciously looked at Kittie before answering. + +"I am ready to consider any proposition you may make, sir." + +"All right. We'll talk it over later. But I warn you I shall leave you +no possible room for refusing. Yes, Grace, I'm ready." + +The Broughtons took Kittie off, bent on smoothing the path for her, +and Miss Wolcott turned to Lyon with a sigh of relief. + +"What a wild, unmanageable child! I should think that after all the +trouble that has come from her act she would at least be a little +subdued." + +"Oh, it isn't all trouble," said Lyon, assuming as a matter of course +his life-long privilege of being Kittie's defender. "Mr. Broughton +came out to Waynscott fully determined to shoot Lawrence at sight. +Being in jail probably saved his life,--so you ought to count that to +Kittie's credit. And would you ever have known the measure of +Lawrence's devotion if he had not had this chance of proving how far +he could carry it? Then those letters of yours,--if there hadn't been +a mystery about Fullerton's death, I should never have been spurred on +to run things down, and if I hadn't those letters might have fallen +into who knows whose hands! And Mrs. Broughton's unhappiness,--think +of all the trouble and wretchedness those two people are saved through +the accident of my being drawn into this Hemlock Avenue mystery! Even +Fullerton's death alone would not have cleared the cloud from their +lives. It needed the knowledge no one could give them but I,--and I +should never have known how much the fact in my possession was needed +if I had not met Mrs. Broughton in this curiously intimate way. +Indeed, I should probably never have met Mrs. Broughton! Or you! Or +Kittie! Or had the friendship of Lawrence. And when you think of each +one of us, and how, through this strange tangle, we have all won what +we wanted most, don't you think we can say, with Tiny Tim, that all is +for the best in this best of all possible worlds?" + +He glanced at her, smiling, for confirmation. Her face was so radiant +that he thought he had for once in his life succeeded in being +eloquent. Then his glance followed her eye to the window, and he +realized that she had probably heard nothing of what he had been +saying. Lawrence was swinging up Hemlock Avenue at a pace that +devoured the distance. + +"I--er--really, I must go," murmured Lyon, reaching for his hat. + + + +THE END. + + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Hemlock Avenue Mystery, by Roman Doubleday + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 56780 *** |